Murder For Love

"So what do you think?" he asked me on the phone.

"I think I'll have to kill him," I said.

"Who?"

"Legs Diamond."

There was a long silence.

"Vi

"I heard you," he said. "I don't think that's such a good idea, Richie."

The wires between us crackled; we were a long way away from each other.

"Vi

"No, I don't think so. He has a lot of people who can do the hounding for him. It's no trouble at all for him, really."

"Richie, listen to me."

"Yes, Vi

"What do you want from life, Richie?"

"I want to marry Dominique," I said. "And I want to have children with her."

"Ah," he said.

"And I want to live in a house with a white picket fence around it."

"Yes," he said. "And that's why you mustn't kill this man."

"No," I said, "that's why I must kill this man. Because otherwise…"

"Richie, it's not easy to kill someone."

"I've seen a lot of people killing a lot of people, Vi

"In a war, yes. But unless you're in a war, it's not so easy to kill someone. Have you ever killed anyone, Richie?"

"No."

"In a war, it's easy," he said. "Everyone is shooting at everyone else, so if your bullet doesn't happen to kill anyone, it doesn't matter. Someone else's bullet will. But killing somebody in a war isn't murder, Richie. That's the first thing a soldier learns: killing someone in a war isn't murder. Because when everyone is killing someone, then no one is killing anyone."

"Well…"

"Don't 'well' me, just listen to me. Killing Legs Diamond will be murder. Are you ready to do murder, Richie?"

"Yes," I said.

"Why?"

"Because I love Dominique. And if I don't kill him, he'll hurt her."

"Look… let me ask around, okay?" Vi

"Ask around?"

"Here and there. Meanwhile, don't do anything foolish." "Vi

I heard a sigh on the other end of the line. "He's in Troy, New York. They're putting him on trial for kidnapping some kid up there." "Richie…"

"I think I'd better go up to Troy, Vi

"I never thought it would get down to killing him. Ru

Five hours and thirty-one minutes after the jury began deliberating the case, Legs Diamond was found i

When he and his entourage came out of the courthouse that night, Dominique and I were waiting in a car parked across the street. We were both dressed identically. Long black men's overcoats, black gloves, pearl-gray fedoras. It was bitterly cold.

Diamond and his family got into a taxi he had hired to chauffeur him to and from the courthouse during the trial. The rest of his party got into cars behind him. In our own car, a maroon sedan, Dominique and I followed them into Albany and then to a speakeasy at 518 Broadway. We did not go into the club. We sat in the car and waited. We did not talk at all. It was even colder now. The windows became rimed with frost. I kept rubbing at the windshield with my gloved hand.

At a little after one in the morning, Diamond and his wife Alice came out of the club. Diamond was wearing a brown chinchilla coat and a brown fedora. Alice was wearing a dress, high-heeled shoes, no coat. The driver came out of the club a moment later. From where we were parked, we could not hear the conversation between Alice and Diamond, but as he walked with his driver toward where the taxi was parked, he yelled over his shoulder, "Stick around till I get back!" The driver got in behind the wheel. Diamond climbed into the backseat. Alice stood on the sidewalk a moment longer, plumes of vapor trailing from her mouth, and then went back into the club. We gave the taxi a reasonable lead and then pulled out after them.

The taxi took Diamond to a rooming house on the corner of Clinton Avenue and Tenbroeck Street. Diamond got out, said something to the driver, closed the door, and went into the building. We drove past, turned the corner, went completely around the block, and then parked halfway up the street. The cab was still parked right in front of the building. We could not have got by the driver without being seen.

Diamond came out at 4:30 A.M.

I nudged Dominique awake.

We began following the taxi again.

Ten days ago, a man and a woman named "Mr. and Mrs. Kelly" had rented three rooms in a rooming house on Dove Street -for themselves and their relatives, a sister-in-law and her ten-year-old son. I learned this from the owner of the rooming house, a woman named Laura Wood, who gave me the information after she identified some newspaper photographs I showed her. She seemed surprised that Mr. Kelly was in fact the big gangster Legs Diamond who was being tried "over in Troy." She told me he was a respectable gentleman, quiet and well behaved, and she had no real cause for complaint. I gave her fifty dollars and asked her not to mention that a reporter had been there.

The taxi took Diamond there now. Sixty-seven Dove Street.

Diamond got out of the taxi. It was a quarter to five in the morning. The taxi drove off. The street was silent. Not a light showed in the rooming house. He unlocked the front door with a key, and went inside. The door closed behind him. The street was silent again. We waited. On the second floor of the rooming house, a light came on.

"Do you think the wife is already here?" Dominique asked.

"He told her to stay at the club."

"What will you do if she's there with him?"

"I don't know," I said.

"You will have to kill her, too, no?"

"First let me get in the building, okay?"

"No, I want to know."

"What is it you want to know?"

"What you will do if she is there with him."

"I'll see."

"Well, I think you will have to kill her, no?" "Dominique, there is killing and there is killing." "Yes, I know that. But if you go in there, you must be prepared to do what must be done. Otherwise, his people will come after us again and again. You know that." "Yes. I know that." "We will have to keep ru

"So if the woman is there with him, you will have to kill her too. That is only logical, Richard. You ca

"If she is there, you must kill them both, it is as simple as that. If you love me."

"I do love you."

"And I love you," she said.

The light on the second floor went out.

"Bo