Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery

by Norman Mailer

  I shrugged my shoulders and stood up, signaling the end of our meeting. Oswald’s hands shook as he put the documents back into his jacket. I led Oswald through the reception area and showed him the way out of the compound. He departed, obviously dissatisfied with the results of our talk. He appeared to be extremely agitated. This was how Oswald’s first visit to our embassy in Mexico ended.5

  Later that day, however, Nechiporenko began to think about the American who had come by that morning in such a state of tension about the FBI.

  What guided us most of all—and I do not think I am mistaken in assuming it was the same for all intelligence services—in working with such foreigners was the principle of “fifty-fifty.” This meant that the probability of obtaining a source of good, possibly even valuable, information was equal to the probability that the source was a “plant,” that is, a trap set by the enemy with unpredictable consequences.

  As I thought about that day’s visitor and weighed the criteria of one “fifty” against another, I came to the conclusion that he fit neither category, meaning that he did not have any interest for us . . . It was perfectly clear that our internal counterintelligence back home had already studied him. Now that he was under FBI surveillance, let him be their headache, I thought.6

  In the evening, Nechiporenko, relaxing with Kostikov at a Mexican cantina, was told by him of a call from Silvia Duran. Oswald had gone back to see the Cubans and told them that the Soviets had promised him a visa, so Silvia Duran was interested in checking. Kostikov had corrected her impression. Now, for a little while, over their mugs of beer, they discussed Oswald. Being young themselves and in fine shape physically, they found it agreeable to debate whether the man was schizoid in personality or merely neurotic.

  It is probably fair to say that the physical appearance of Kostikov and Nechiporenko was Mexican. They had been serving in Mexico City long enough to have grown full mustaches, and both men were dark. Perhaps they had cultivated their appearance. It is an advantage for an intelligence officer to look like a native, and to some degree they may even have begun to think like Mexicans—which will have its bearing on an extraordinary episode that takes place the following morning, Saturday, when Oswald returns to the Soviet Embassy.

  Kostikov, Nechiporenko, and their immediate superior, Yatskov, were stars of the Soviet diplomats’ volleyball team. A “serious match” was scheduled for that same Saturday morning against a team composed of military intelligence personnel—GRU.7

  It is one of the ironies surrounding Oswald’s trip to Mexico that on this important day in his life, when he reenters the Soviet Embassy to attempt to convince these Soviet officials that he should, given his qualifications, be granted a quick visa, their minds are elsewhere. His presence in their office only serves to make them late for the game.

  Pavel Yatskov, who was first to arrive at his desk that Saturday morning, was relieved when Kostikov joined him inasmuch as the stranger who had just come in for an interview was speaking in English—which Yatskov barely understood. Kostikov would later describe the scene to Nechiporenko. It is worth following at some length:

  I flung open the door to the first office, and there I saw Pavel sitting at his desk, and at the attached desk to his right, his back to the window, was the American who visited us the previous day. He was disheveled, rumpled, and unshaven. He had the look of someone who was hounded and he was much more anxious than the day before. I greeted him, and he nodded in response. Pavel also seemed tense. He turned to me and said, “Listen, help me out. I don’t fully understand what it is he wants.” . . . At this point, Oswald, on his own initiative . . . reported that he had . . . traveled to the Soviet Union as a tourist, where he had remained for political reasons, and had lived for a while in Belorussia, where he married a Russian and returned to the United States. He even dropped some hints that he had supposedly carried out a secret mission. He announced that he was a Communist and a member of an organization that defended Cuba. Pavel interrupted his monologue and said, since he had been in the Soviet Union, lived and worked there, that he could probably explain himself in Russian and looked at him disapprovingly. Without answering, he switched over to broken Russian, in which the rest of the conversation was conducted . . .

  While telling his story, Oswald again, as he had the day before, tried to support it by showing various documents . . . [and] repeated his desire to quickly obtain a visa to the USSR . . . He said he was motivated by the fact that it was very difficult for him to live in the United States, that he was constantly under surveillance, even persecuted, and that his personal life was being invaded and his wife and neighbors interrogated. He lost his job because the FBI had been around his place of employment asking questions. In recounting all this, he continually expressed concern for his life.

  In his words, he dreamed of returning to his former job in the Soviet Union and living quietly there with his family. He spoke with noticeable warmth about his wife and child.

  Throughout his story, Oswald was extremely agitated and clearly nervous, especially whenever he mentioned the FBI, but he suddenly became hysterical, began to sob, and through his tears cried, “I am afraid . . . they’ll kill me. Let me in!” Repeating over and over that he was being persecuted and that he was being followed even here in Mexico, he stuck his right hand into the left pocket of his jacket and pulled out a revolver, saying, “See? This is what I must now carry to protect my life,” and placed the revolver on the desk where we were sitting opposite one another.

  I was dumbfounded, and looked at Pavel, who had turned slightly pale but then quickly said to me, “Here, give me that piece.” I took the revolver from the table and handed it to Pavel. Oswald, sobbing, wiped away the tears. He did not respond to my movements. Pavel, who had grabbed the revolver, opened the chamber, shook the bullets into his hand, and put them in a desk drawer. He then handed the revolver to me, and I put it back on the desk. Oswald continued to sob, then pulled himself together and seemed indifferent to what we had done with his weapon. Pavel poured Oswald a glass of water and handed it to him. Oswald took a sip and placed the glass in front of him.8

  At this point, Oleg Nechiporenko, suited up in shorts for volleyball, knocked on the door to summon the others and then opened it to come in. They were already late for the game.

  But now, of course, there was no question of that. Not with the revolver on the table. Nechiporenko closed the door again. Afterward, Yatskov would tell Nechiporenko:

  . . . his eyes were wet with tears, and his hands shook . . . I began to console him, saying that it might seem terrible to him, [but] the reasons for his being victimized were not immediately evident [to us]. Valery repeated a few of my sentences in English. Regarding his visa to the Soviet Union, we explained our rules once again, but in view of his condition, I offered him the necessary forms to be filled out. [Then in] response to his persistent requests that we recommend that the Cubans give him a visa, as an alternative to obtaining our visa, we told him that Cuba was a sovereign nation and decided visa questions for itself . . .

  Oswald gradually calmed down . . . [and] did not take the forms we offered him. His state of extreme agitation had now been replaced by depression. He looked disappointed and extremely frustrated. Valery and I exchanged glances and let it be known that the subject of this conversation had been exhausted and that it was time to break it up. I rose from the table. Oswald got up from his chair, and simultaneously grabbed the revolver and stuck it somewhere under his jacket, either in a pocket or in his belt. Turning to Valery, he once again said something about being followed. I bent down to get the bullets from the desk drawer. I then handed them to Oswald, who dropped them into a pocket of his jacket. We said good-bye with a nod of our heads. Valery also stood, calmly opened the door leading into the reception area, and after letting him go first, followed right behind him . . . 9

  Here, Oleg, who has apparently opened the door again, now overlaps Yatskov’s account with his own:

  At th
at moment I distinctly heard Oswald say that he was afraid to return to the United States—where he would be killed. “But if they don’t leave me alone, I’m going to defend myself.” Valery confirms these were Oswald’s words.

  It was said without mentioning anyone in particular. At the time this phrase meant nothing to us. What happened to him in his own country was his problem. We recalled these words only on that fateful November twenty-second. When I led Oswald out of the reception area into the courtyard and showed him the way to the gate, he pulled his head down, and raised the collar of his jacket to conceal his face and thus attempt to avoid being clearly photographed . . . 10

  Recently, Nechiporenko was asked by this book’s interviewers how it was possible that a responsible KGB man would give back not only a gun but its bullets to someone as disturbed in appearance as Oswald. Nechiporenko shrugged. It had happened, he said. He could not speak for why. Yatskov had done it, but it did not seem exceptional at the time.

  “If this same episode had taken place in London, would any of you have returned the bullets?”

  “Never,” said Nechiporenko.

  That gave some purchase for believing this story. It could be proposed that these three KGB men had served in Mexico long enough to feel that it was wrong to deprive a man of his gun. That, by the Mexican logic of the cantinas, was equal to emasculation, and to a Mexican no act could be considered more heinous.

  “All right,” he was asked, “one can understand giving back the gun. But the bullets! What if Oswald had reloaded his gun on the way out and shot the first person he encountered on the street? And then said, ‘The Russians gave me the bullets’?”

  Nechiporenko shook his head. It had happened the way it happened, he said, and perhaps you had to be there to believe it. They just had not been afraid that this man Oswald would go out in the street and cause trouble with his gun.

  They would never admit it, but perhaps they did think that he might need a weapon to defend himself against the FBI. After all, how many FBI men in the same situation would not believe that a Russian defector would need his bullets returned in order to defend himself against the KGB?

  Or, if we are to muse upon Yatskov’s motive, perhaps he did not wish to create a situation where Oswald could go to the American Embassy in Mexico City and claim that the Soviets were holding some of his property. The fellow might be a skilled provocateur.

  In any event, the three officers never got to the volleyball game that day against the GRU. Yatskov, Kostikov, and Nechiporenko were busy filing a coded cable to Moscow Center that described the meeting with Oswald. Since their team lost to the GRU, they felt guilty.

  On that wholly frustrating Saturday morning, Oswald next went from the Soviet compound down the street to the Cuban Embassy and ran into another quarrel with the Consul, Eusebio Azcue:

  Posner: Oswald again demanded that he be issued a visa because of his political credentials, but the consul repeated it was impossible without a Russian visa . . . “I hear him make statements that are directed against us,” recalled Azcue, “and he accuses us of being bureaucrats, and in a very discourteous manner. At that point I also become upset and I tell him to leave the consulate, maybe somewhat violently or emotionally.” He told Oswald that “a person like him, instead of aiding the Cuban revolution, was doing it harm.” Azcue moved toward Oswald, prepared to force him physically out of the embassy. “Then he leaves the consulate,” recalled Azcue, “and he seems to be mumbling to himself, and slams the door, also in a very discourteous mood. That was the last time we saw him around.”11

  It is painful to think of Oswald walking down the street, his documents in his ditty bag. All his striving had gone into collecting those documents, yet no one had been stirred by his deeds.

  On Sunday, he went to a bullfight and on Monday he called Nechiporenko one more time. Had there been any affirmative word from Moscow on his application for a visa? None, replied Nechiporenko.

  Oswald went to the bus terminal and bought a ticket home. If, once in 1959 and again in 1962, he had prevailed against the giant bureaucracies of the Soviet Union and the United States, he could no longer maintain the luster of that achievement.

  On Wednesday, he departed from Mexico City at eight-thirty in the morning. In something like thirty hours, he was back in Dallas. He did not call Marina at Ruth Paine’s house in Irving, but instead took a room at the Y and, presumably, he slept alone with his arms around the ash-heap of his plans.

  PART VI

  DENOUEMENT

  1

  The Road to Domesticity

  On the bus returning from Mexico, there is a revealing moment. As they cross the border into Texas, Oswald is eating a banana. Since there are signs displayed not to bring fresh produce into the U.S., he is gobbling his food down as they enter the Customs shed in Laredo. Or so the official remembers it. That’s all right, Oswald is told, take your time, you can finish your banana.1

  It is a small episode, but it speaks of changes in him. After the ravages of Mexico, he is going to be law-abiding for a time. If the conflict in his adult life has been between fame and family, this last trip has turned the balance. He left in the belief that he might never see Marina again, but on his return, he is prepared to be loving.

  First, however, having arrived in Dallas at mid-day, he spends the afternoon at the Texas Employment Commission, where he files his claim for the last of his series of unemployment compensation checks, and registers for work. Then he puts up at the Y that night and in the morning applies for a job as a typesetter. It is equal to Buster Keaton becoming a banker. Dyslexic Oswald will set type! Or does he see it as a major opportunity to print his own materials?

  He certainly does well on the interview: “Oswald was well-dressed and neat. He made a favorable impression on the foreman of the department . . . Since Oswald had worked in a trade plant, I was interested in him as a possible employee . . .”2

  Unfortunately, Lee had listed Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall as a place of previous employment, and so, on the back of his application, Theodore F. Gangl, the plant superintendent who interviewed him, later adds: “Bob Stovall does not recommend this man. He was released because of his record as a troublemaker—Has communistic tendencies.”3

  Feeling confident that he would get the job, Oswald called Marina and hitchhiked up to Irving, where she was staying with Ruth.

  McMillan: He followed her like a puppydog around the house, kissed her again and again, and kept saying, “I’ve missed you so.”

  Lee spent the weekend at the Paines’. Ruth left them alone as much as she could, and even tried to keep June out of their way. Carefree as children, they sat on swings in the back yard . . . All weekend he showed the greatest solicitude toward her, trying to get her to eat more, especially bananas and apples, to drink juices and milk, things that would strengthen her before the baby came. But Marina saw that he was distracted—worried about finding a job. As Ruth drove him to the bus station at noon on Monday, Lee asked if Marina could stay until he found work. Ruth answered that Marina was welcome to stay as long as she liked.4

  Back in Dallas, he rented a room from a lady named Mary Bledsoe, and it takes no more than a bit of her testimony to recognize that she is so classic a landlady, one can even visualize the pucker of her not-so-generous lips.

  MR. BALL. Did you talk to him about the use of the refrigerator?

  MRS. BLEDSOE. Well, he said he was going to put something in there, and I said—I didn’t have anything to say, and I hemmed-and-hawed, I said, “Well, no; I don’t have a very big refrigerator.”

  Well, he said, “I won’t use it after this time.” He was very, very congenial.

  MR. BALL. Did he go down to the grocery store?

  MRS. BLEDSOE. He bought some peanut butter and some sardines, and some bananas and put it all in his room, except the milk, and he ate there, ate in his room. I didn’t like that either . . . Then he talked to somebody on the phone and he talked in a foreign language . . . I was
in my room, and the telephone is over there [indicating], and I didn’t like that, so I told my girlfriend, I said, “I don’t like anybody talking in a foreign language.”5

  Oswald is a prodigious snob, but given some of the people he meets, who would not be?

  He was paying seven dollars a week, and on Friday, ready to go back to Irving again, he spoke to Mrs. Bledsoe about a few housekeeping details:

  MRS. BLEDSOE. . . . he said, “And I want my room cleaned and clean sheets put on the bed.”

  And I said, “Well, I will after you move because you are going to move.”

  He said, “Why?”

  I says, “Because I am not going to rent to you any more.” . . . He said, “Give me back my money.” Now, $2.

  I said, “Well, I don’t have it.”

  So, he left Saturday morning . . . 6

  Without the two dollars. It was just after his first week back. Having lost a room for no evident reason, and a job he thought he had, Oswald could have come to the conclusion that the FBI was alerting people to his presence. So, for the next room he rented after his return to Dallas from the second weekend in Irving, Oswald gave his name as O. H. Lee to Earlene Roberts, who was taking care of the rooming house for the landlady, Mrs. Johnson. It was this alias, O. H. Lee, that may have brought him to the end of the drama that was his life.

  His relations with Earlene Roberts were marginally better than his encounters with Mrs. Bledsoe.

  MR. BALL. Did you ever talk to him about anything?

  MRS. ROBERTS. No; because he wouldn’t talk.

  MR. BALL. Did he say hello?

  MRS. ROBERTS. No.