Murder at Ford's Theatre - Margaret Truman [134]
The corpulent controller had barely made it to the corner of Tenth Street before being apprehended in front of Honest Abe’s Souvenirs, with dozens of Lincoln masks in the windows witnessing the event. Crowley offered no resistance, and was seen crying as the police placed him in the rear of a patrol car. He was held that night for his attack on Clarise Emerson; charges in the Zarinski murder would come later, after he’d confessed and other evidence had been processed and presented to the U.S. Attorney.
Clarise was rushed to the nearest hospital. Crowley’s blow had fractured bones in her skull. Emergency room physicians stabilized her, and the prognosis, according to a neurosurgeon called in to operate that night to relieve pressure on her brain, was for a full recovery—with a headache now and then to remind her of her encounter with the controller in whom she’d invested so much trust. Once she was sufficiently recovered to travel, she sold the Georgetown house and flew to California, where she established a small production company to produce documentaries for public television. Annabel’s contact with her quickly trailed off to virtually none. Clarise’s former husband, Senator Bruce Lerner, abandoned his plans for a presidential run and was easily reelected to another Senate term.
Bancroft was held in a maximum-security cell and placed on suicide watch, which necessitated taking everything from him, including his shoe laces and belt. He was allowed to read the morning papers on Friday, and seemed pleased with the photograph of himself on the Post’s front page and the lengthy and detailed history of his career in the theatre that accompanied the picture. He looked every bit the leading man in the photo, and it appeared in newspapers across the country and around the world, as well as on TV screens in millions of homes. While court-appointed attorneys prepared his insanity plea—which they were confident would prevail—Sydney collected his press clippings and dutifully catalogued them in large scrapbooks. His British agent, Harrison Quill, interviewed by the London Times, stated, “Sydney Bancroft was a fine Shakespearean actor in his day. But I’m afraid he’d become a bit dotty in his old age and had lost his grip on reality. Sorry he’s ended up in such a pickle. Dreadful shame, it is. Dreadful shame.”
Once the police had Crowley’s confession in the Nadia Zarinski murder, charges were dropped against Jeremiah Lerner. Because his mother faced a lengthy hospital stay and even longer convalescence, he’d spent a few days at his father’s house before returning to his apartment in Adams-Morgan. He didn’t accompany his mother to California, and seemed to drop out of sight in Washington, which to Mac and Annabel seemed only fitting. Whether he was the son of an ambitious U.S. senator, or a demented, aging British actor—or whether he was ever even made aware of the possibility that the senator wasn’t his natural father—remained unknown to Mac and Annabel, nor did they wish to know. It didn’t seem to matter.
IT DIDN’T TAKE LONG for other events in the nation’s capital, and abroad, to render that Thursday night at Ford’s Theatre a dim memory in a city filled with memories, triumphant and tragic. But the publicity surrounding it was good for business at the theatre. Its shows were standing room only, and the number of tourists visiting the historic site reached all-time highs. Park rangers who conducted tours added something to their fifteen-minute spiel about Sydney Bancroft and the havoc he created the night he took the stage and fired that errant shot. “He thought he was John Wilkes Booth,” the rangers said, usually adding a laugh when they said it. “But let’s get back to Lincoln and the night he was shot. That’s what’s important about this historic theatre.”