Harlem (New York, N.Y.); New York (N.Y.) -- Description and travel; New York (N.Y.) -- Social life and customs
As she came out, two men slipped from the front seat, and as one opened
the door the other, with his hand inside his coat at his armpit where
he carried his gat, looked up and down the block. Schultz and Frances
got in and the door closed with that authority which only a high-priced
limousine can express with a bang and a click.
Within a month, Frances was Mrs. Arthur Flegenheimer. It was
infatuation on the whisper of a name, but it had grown into a
tremendous and all-conquering love. Few romances with figures that defy
the law were ever more mutually fervent and sincere.
Schultz was always in trouble. Despite the enormous sums he took in,
he had to pay out, at times, more. He cheated on his Federal and
State income taxes, kept enormous staffs of bodyguards and fixers and
collectors, and when he wasn't hunted by the Internal Revenue men
he was tracked by gunmen of rivals who wanted to take over. He was
frequently arrested and numerous times shot at, and his only chance
for a few hours or days of happiness with his bride was to drive to
remote villages in New England or 100 miles out on Long Island, where,
under an assumed name, he might hole in for a day or two before someone
recognized him.
Thus they lived for four years, in which time two children were born,
first a girl and then a boy. She proudly named their son Arthur
Flegenheimer, Jr.
He bathed Frances in furs which she didn't want to wear, and weighed
her down with jewels which she rarely wore; and he got her up in the
middle of nights and took her to strange places, whence they frequently
had to escape on a moment's notice, more than once to the music of
whining bullets.
On October 9, 1935, they were under cover in a hotel in Newark, N.J.
They dined in their rooms and then he told her he had to meet some
of his henchmen in a little restaurant. She went to a movie. Schultz
walked into a little café and joined two other men on a bench in a
booth.
The two favorite methods of murder among the outlaws were "put him on
the spot" and "take him for a ride." The first was designed to plant a
victim, drawn by treachery, to be slaughtered by executioners who would
know just where and when, and thus elude the uncertainties of pursuit
or having to do a job in a public street. The theory of "taking for
a ride" also was usually carried out through misplaced faith, though
sometimes at the point of a gun, and its strategy lay in taking the
body-to-be out to a quiet, lonely spot where there would probably be no
police or witnesses.
Dutch Schultz was put on the spot.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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