交友之道15

When Crowley was captured, Police Commissioner E.P. Mulrooney declared that the two-gun desperado was one of the most dangerous criminals ever encountered in the history of New York. “He will kill,” said the Commissioner, “at the drop of a feather.”But how did “Two Gun”Crowley regard himself? We know, because while the police were firing into his apartment, he wrote a letter addressed “To whom it may concern.”And, as he wrote, the blood flowing from his wounds left a crimson trail on the paper. In his letter Crowley said, “Under my coat is a weary heart, but a kind one—one that would do nobody any harm.”
　　A short time before this, Crowley had been having a necking party with his girl friend on a country road out on Long Island. Suddenly a policeman walked up to the car and said, “Let me see your license.”
　　Without saying a word, Crowley drew his gun and cut the policeman down with a shower of lead. As the dying officer fell, Crowley leaped out of the car, grabbed the officer's revolver, and fired another bullet into the prostrate body. And that was the killer who said, “Under my coat is a weary heart, but a Under my coat is a weary heart, but a kind one—one that would do nobody any harm.”
　　Crowley was sentenced to the electric chair. When he arrived at the death house in Sing Sing, did he say, “This is what I get for killing people”? No, he said: “This is what I get for defending myself.”
　　The point of the story is this, “Two Gun”Crowley didn't blame himself for anything.
　　Is that an unusual attitude among criminals? If you think so, listen to this：
　　“I have spent the best years of my life giving people the lighter pleasures, helping them have a good time, and all I get is abuse, the existence of a hunted man.”
　　That's Al Capone speaking. Yes, America's most notorious Public Enemy—the most sinister gang leader who ever shot up Chicago. Capone didn't condemn himself. He actually regarded himself as a public benefactor—an unappreciated and misunderstood public benefactor.
　　And so did Dutch Schultz before he crumpled up under gangster bullets in Newark. Dutch Schultz, one of New York's most notorious rats, said in a newspaper interview that he was a public benefactor. And he believed it.