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which is chock-full of dramatically imagined scenes inside the Barker Gang. Hoover’s demonization of Ma Barker, much like that of Kathryn Kelly, went beyond the need to defend the facts of her death. It neatly fit into themes he had been airing in interviews since the 1920s. The root causes of crime, he argued, were not poverty and economic disparity. Crime was the result of a widespread deterioration in family values, of parents who did not teach their children right from wrong. In time, Ma Barker became Hoover’s favorite symbol of all that was wrong in American families. It was far more than she had ever been in life.

Ralph Brown’s four-man detail arrived at the El Commodoro Hotel in Miami around five that afternoon. After checking in, one of the agents, who had stayed at the hotel two months before, motioned to a clerk he knew, L. E. Grey, to join him in his room. There they showed Grey a collection of Barker photos. Nervous, Grey identified photos of the Barkers as frequent guests. More important, he pointed to a picture of Harry Campbell as a man who had just checked in that Sunday, leaving the next morning. The agents emphasized that anything Grey could do to locate Campbell would be an enormous help to the government.

As the FBI descended on the El Commodoro that afternoon, Karpis and Campbell were wrapping up a long day of mackerel fishing off Ever-glades City. They tossed their rods into Karpis’s Ford around five o’clock and reached the bungalow on 85th Street after dark. Delores Delaney and Wynona Burdette were waiting in their car a block away from the house. The moment Karpis pulled to the curb, Delaney ran to him. She was frantic.

“You should have come home sooner!” she said.

“Take it easy,” Karpis said. “What’s the matter?”

Delaney took several deep breaths. “The FBI shot up Freddie and Ma’s place. Freddie’s dead. Ma’s dead.”

Karpis was stunned. He made Delaney repeat everything she knew. He had to think fast. There was no time to grieve. He knew what this meant. They had to get out of Miami. Delaney’s advanced pregnancy, however, meant they couldn’t hide just anywhere. They would need a safe, clean place, and a doctor. He thought of going to Joe Adams at the El Commodoro but wisely judged it too risky.

That night at 11:30 Adam’s errand boy, Duke Randall, was working his usual shift at a window at the Biscayne Kennel Club, a dog-racing track. A dark-haired girl he would later identify as Wynona Burdette appeared and asked him to join her in the parking lot. There Randall found Karpis waiting in a car. Karpis said he was heading north fast and needed a safe place to stay. Randall suggested a hotel he knew in Atlantic City, the Dan-mor. Karpis wrote it on a card. He told the girls to go with Randall. They could head north on a train the next morning. Karpis and Campbell would go that night. It was too risky for Delaney to ride with them. The FBI was everywhere.

As Karpis spoke, agents flooded into Miami. By midnight they had staked out the Pan American and Eastern Airlines terminals, and were checking every hospital and maternity ward in search of Delaney. But as they fanned out across the city, Karpis was already speeding up Dixie Highway, the lights of Miami growing dimmer behind him.

Atlantic City, New Jersey Saturday, January 19

Just after midnight Karpis and Campbell drove up to the Dan-mor Hotel on Kentucky Avenue, three blocks from the boardwalk. They had driven all day, bypassing the major cities, and were dead tired. The night clerk, Daniel Young, noticed they smelled of liquor. Young assigned them to Room 403, just across from where Delores and Burdette waited in Room 400; the women had taken a train and arrived the previous day. Upstairs Karpis tipped the bellhop a quarter and told him to run out and buy them a pint of whiskey.

The next morning at 8:45 Karpis walked out into the streets. He wandered near the boardwalk for fifteen minutes, glancing around warily. Back in the lobby, he slipped the bellhop a twenty-dollar bill and asked him to fetch some shaving cream and Listerine.