Dickerson looked furious at the implication. ‘I want to talk to Osaka,’ he barked.
Nessheim didn’t say anything Dickerson didn’t need to know about the envelope in his pocket. If Nessheim couldn’t find the kid, maybe the LAPD could – before Mo’s mob got there first.
Part Four
Washington, D.C. and New York Early October 1941
7
THE MEETING WITH Hoover and Tolson this week was scheduled for noon, which was cutting it fine in Harry Guttman’s view. Nothing got in the way of Hoover’s lunch, and this Friday Hoover and Tolson would not dally long over their midday meal in the Mayflower Hotel, since they had a train to catch for New York. Increasingly Hoover liked to spend his weekends there, enjoying a nightlife at ‘21’ and the Stork Club that had no counterpart in D.C. He and Tolson usually caught the Embassy at three o’clock at Union Station, and they weren’t going to risk missing it (or lunch) because of their weekly meeting with Harry Guttman.
Marie, his secretary, came through the doorway. She was trustworthy yet completely undeferential; Guttman sometimes wished it was the other way round. A redhead and a big-boned gal with wide high shoulders, she was always nicely turned out, which was all the more impressive, Guttman thought, since he happened to know she made most of her own clothes. Her face was distinctive rather than pretty, with elongated lips and a flattened nose, but she carried herself well and the visiting field agents always seemed to find reason to hang around her desk, to Guttman’s annoyance.
‘You want to speak with Kevin Reilly?’ she asked.
He had thought of Reilly only the week before. ‘Sure. Put him through.’
He waited for the buzzer, then picked up his phone. ‘Hi there.’
‘Harry, you’re like a bad penny. You only turn up when I’m having nightmares at work.’
‘What is it this time, Kevin?’
‘You better come see for yourself. I’m in Rock Creek Park; we could have a picnic. Though when you’ve had a look, you might lose your appetite.’
Reilly met him at the parking lot and they walked in together, past the bench where he and Palmer had sat the week before, and another 200 yards into the park. From there Guttman could see the creek – and a pair of uniformed cops smoking and talking quietly. When he and Reilly came into view, they stubbed out their smokes and pulled back their shoulders.
The grass around them had been trampled by many pairs of feet, and a man’s body lay in the middle of the exposed area. It had been hauled out of the water; the clothes were still wet. The corpse lay face up on his back on the bank. Guttman took a quick look and wished they would turn him over.
‘I did warn you, Harry,’ Reilly said.
Guttman forced himself to look again. The dead man had been shot in the face – at very close range since he no longer had a nose, just a blood-soaked hole which resembled a second mouth. The force of the bullet had pushed one eye socket upwards, into a grotesque showman’s wink. On one cheek a piece of bone balanced pristinely – unless it was a splintered tooth, since the upper lip of the man’s mouth was caved in. Blood had run down the man’s neck, soaking the lapel of his khaki-coloured jacket. It had also reached his silk tie, where it added a rough smear to the stripes, and had dried to the colour of prunes.
‘Poor bastard,’ said Guttman.
‘You know who it is?’
‘Don’t you?’
Reilly shook his head. It had rained that morning and he wore a light raincoat over his cheap suit. ‘If he had a wallet on him, it got taken. Though I can’t believe this was your average stick-up.’
‘It seems a little excessive for that.’ Guttman remembered his futile bellowing into the dark. ‘I don’t suppose there were any witnesses.’
Reilly laughed derisively. ‘What do you think?’
‘How’d he get found?’
‘Pure chance. He could have been there a long time,’ he said, pointing to the bushy undergrowth around the creek. ‘Some lady walks her dog here early in the morning. She came off the path to let the bow-wow take his crap and spotted a shoe heel sticking out of the water. She took a closer gander and started screaming; one of the park rangers heard her. When we got here she was still shaking – I thought any minute we might have another stiff on our hands.’
‘Why’d you call me?’
‘We found this in the grass over there.’ Reilly reached in his coat pocket and handed a small card to Guttman, who didn’t bother to look at it.
Reilly said, ‘Maybe it’s a coincidence – your calling card found thirty feet from a dead man who’s had his face blown to smithereens. But I thought I should let you know.’
Reilly and Guttman had worked together before, but there was nothing pally in his voice now – he was a homicide dick who liked everything in its rightful place. Guttman said, ‘His name’s Thornton Palmer and he worked at the State Department. I saw him last week – about halfway between here and the car park.’
Reilly scratched his head. ‘Are you in the habit of meeting diplomats in Rock Creek Park?’
‘His choice of venue.’ He stopped suddenly, realising he had moved a foot closer to Palmer’s body. He didn’t want to look at it again. ‘We through here?’
‘Sure. I’ll walk back with you.’
They rejoined the path and trudged along in silence for a moment.
Then Reilly said, ‘What did he want to see you about?’
Guttman sighed. ‘I can’t say just yet.’
‘Can’t say or won’t say?’
‘Take your pick,’ said Guttman. He looked at Reilly. Once his Irish features – green eyes, a residue of freckles and the tangerine-coloured hair now starting to fade – had made him seem younger than his years, but now he looked as tired as Guttman felt.
Reilly said, ‘Why can’t you talk to me, Harry?’
‘I’m sorry, Kevin, I just can’t.’
‘For Christ’s sakes, Harry,’ Reilly said impatiently as Guttman turned his eyes back to the path, ‘I’m not going to ask the Chief to call Hoover, and you know it. But see it my way: I got a dead man with no face left and nothing to go on except that he met with an FBI assist-ant director only a long piss from where he got slammed. Do you blame me for wanting an explanation?’
‘I have a new job at the Bureau, keeping the Nazis from setting up shop in Latin America. Palmer worked at the embassy in Argentina, so we had business to discuss.’ He looked at Reilly with as much sincerity as the lie let him muster. ‘That’s as far as I can go.’
Reilly dropped his head and scratched his hair. ‘Okay, but why did he want to meet you here? What’s wrong with a coffee shop?’
‘State and the Bureau have been having a bit of a ding dong lately. You know how these things go. Palmer didn’t want to be seen with an FBI man.’
Reilly waved a hand dismissively. ‘All right, all right. Beats me how you guys manage.’
‘I don’t know that we do,’ said Guttman. He was thinking of what Hoover was going to say, and not looking forward to it. He looked at his watch – if he took his time getting back to Connecticut Avenue, the Director would be on the train for New York.
8
ON MONDAY, THREE days later, Guttman was waiting for his postponed meeting with Hoover when Clyde Tolson appeared in the doorway of his office. Tolson wore a soft grey suit with a white handkerchief deftly folded in the breast pocket. He had been to the barber’s: his hair was close cropped above his ears and the faint aroma of talcum powder drifted into Guttman’s little room.
‘I was just coming, Clyde,’ said Guttman, starting to stand up. He’d been due on the fourth floor in five minutes.
‘Relax,’ said Tolson. ‘The Director’s had to go to the White House. It’s just you and us chickens today.’
Tolson’s presence always made Guttman feel uneasy; Hoover’s Number Two had a disconcerting curiosity that could be unpredictable – he would lean over and pick up a confidential file, then ask why it had been pulled and when, or s
uddenly ask what a Field Agent from Topeka he’d seen on the floor was doing visiting the Washington HQ. Usually he contented himself with an acerbic remark about the state of Guttman’s desk; fortunately Marie had come in twenty minutes before and done her daily sort out.
Today Tolson was in a rare playful mood, tossing a scrunched-up ball of paper from hand to hand as he ambled in and plopped himself down in the chair across Guttman’s desk. He kept tossing the wad of paper, like an ex-ballplayer, which he often said he was – he’d boasted to Marie that he’d been all-Conference halfback. In a rare moment of disloyalty, Louis B. Nichols, Head of Records and Press Relations, had confided to Guttman that there was no record of Tolson playing any football after high school.
‘What’s going on at 1600?’ Guttman asked lightly. He noticed that one of Tolson’s sideburns had been trimmed higher than the other. ‘War been declared?’
‘Well, the boss is certainly waging one of his own. It’s Donovan again.’
Guttman nodded. Hedley Donovan was Hoover’s latest bête noire – ever since the President had appointed him Coordinator of Information during the summer. Hoover had a monopoly on the domestic side of intelligence – FDR had announced that two years before – but he didn’t want anyone peeking over his shoulder. So far Roosevelt wouldn’t budge, and Donovan remained firmly in place.
‘Anyhow,’ said Tolson, ‘tell me what’s new in Rio de Janeiro.’ He said this without urgency.
‘Not a lot. But there is something else I wanted to raise.’
‘Go ahead. I’ll be seeing the Director at lunch.’
Guttman took a breath. ‘Ten days ago I met with an official from the State Department,’ he began. ‘His name was Thornton Palmer.’
‘You mean the guy in the papers?’ Tolson asked, sitting up in his chair. Palmer’s death had been splashed all over the pages of the morning’s Washington Star, though Kevin Reilly had taken his time letting the news out, since Palmer had been found on Friday.
‘That’s the guy.’
‘Holy smokes. What did he want?’
‘I assumed it would be about Argentina. I first met him when I was touring State to learn about South America. He was back on leave from Argentina, so I picked his brain about BA. But that wasn’t what he wanted to talk about.’ Guttman paused. ‘He told me he’d been approached by the Russians.’
‘What for?’ asked Tolson without much apparent interest.
‘They wanted him to spy for them.’
Tolson stared at Guttman, then laughed out loud. ‘I’ve heard some good ones in my time, but that takes the prize. Look, right now I wouldn’t think espionage is much of a priority for Comrade Stalin. He’s not even sending money to the CP here any more.’
‘I was sceptical myself. I asked him what the Russians wanted him to do. He said they wanted information from the State Department. Classified stuff.’
Tolson laughed again and Guttman was tempted to join him. Then suddenly Tolson said, ‘You say this was ten days ago. Why didn’t you report it right away?’
That was the thing about Tolson: you were starting to think you were talking to the equivalent of an affable insurance salesman, when suddenly he caught you out.
Fortunately Guttman was used to this. He said calmly, ‘I did do a note for the file.’ It had been written after Palmer had been found dead, but he wasn’t going to tell Tolson that. ‘Palmer wasn’t very credible – to me at least. When I pressed him for specifics, he was evasive.’
‘Did you tell Tamm?’ asked Tolson. Tamm had replaced Guttman as the man in charge of Domestic Intelligence.
‘No, I was going to tell you and the Director first. As I say, Palmer didn’t seem credible and he didn’t give me any proof.’
Tolson snorted. ‘When did he say they approached him?’
‘1935.’
Tolson was shaking his head. ‘You know, for all the problems we’ve had with the Nazis, the Russians have never tried to penetrate us. We’d know if they had.’
Guttman wasn’t about to argue. Hoover – and so by default Tolson – was convinced he had a complete overview of espionage activity in the United States. Until he’d met Thornton Palmer, Guttman would have agreed. ‘I told him I’d need evidence if I was going to help him.’
‘Help him? How?’
‘He said the Russians left him alone after he first said no, and then he went to Argentina for a few years. But once he was back he said they approached him again. I guess he wanted protection – it wasn’t clear.’
Tolson said, ‘The papers suggest Palmer killed himself.’
‘They didn’t find a gun.’
Tolson shook his head. ‘He was in the water. The gun would have been washed away.’
It seemed an odd way to kill yourself, standing in the middle of a creek, but Guttman let this pass. ‘Maybe. But then again, maybe there was something in what he told me. I mean, why make up a story like that?’
‘Who knows?’ Tolson shrugged indifferently. ‘He sounds unstable – a fantasist.’
Guttman said, ‘Don’t you think we should follow this up?’
‘What’s there to follow up? He didn’t give you anything specific. You said so yourself.
‘He claimed he wasn’t the only one the Russians approached.’
‘Did he give you names?’
‘No. He said one of them also went to Yale – but after Palmer.’
‘That’s a big help,’ Tolson said sarcastically. Guttman sensed he was ready for his lunch. Tolson went on, ‘You have to admit, Guttman, they don’t sound like your average Reds. It’s not as if Palmer was a …’ He hesitated.
‘A what?’ asked Guttman.
‘Come on, you know as well as I do that most of these Communists are foreigners or Jews.’
‘I’m a Jew and I’m not a Communist,’ Guttman said, his voice rising a notch.
‘I’m not saying all Jews are Commies.’
Guttman wasn’t going to argue – it was undeniable that so many members of the Party were Jews. What was the distinction he’d been taught at CCNY – between necessary and sufficient conditions? Which one was being a Jew? It never seemed sufficient to him; he was American first, he liked to think. But certainly it seemed necessary when he was talking to the likes of Tolson, if only because it wasn’t something Guttman could get out of. It was too late to change his name, even if he’d wanted to – and besides, with his schnozz and dark eyes, plus a bulky build that seemed to be made out of corned beef and pickles and chopped liver, he could have been a poster-boy Yid for Goebbels.
He said, ‘Palmer claimed the Russians had sent money to the West Coast recently – he heard about it from his Yalie friend. It went to a Japanese bank.’
Tolson waved a dismissive hand. ‘Hitler will give money to synagogues before the Russians help the Japs. They hate each other.’ He sighed and looked at his watch. ‘This gets more and more far-fetched. Just turn it over to Tamm.’ Guttman’s face must have shown his dismay, for Tolson said sharply, ‘What’s the matter Guttman? Don’t you like your new responsibilities? The spics getting you down?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘You’re not in charge of this stuff any more. That was the deal, remember?’
‘I remember,’ he said coldly.
‘It’s Tamm’s business now. Though I can’t believe he’ll waste his time on this.’
That was true. Edward Tamm was constitutionally incapable of following a hunch (and probably incapable of having one). Intelligent, thorough, efficient, he followed orders like nobody’s business and was terrier-like pursuing a lead, especially one coming from a superior. But he was totally unimaginative – yes, he had proposed naming the Bureau the Federal Bureau of Investigation back in 1935, but that didn’t exactly require the soul of a poet.
Guttman hesitated. ‘The thing is …’
‘What?’ Tolson asked bluntly.
The thing is I believed the guy, thought Guttman. Maybe not at the time, but afterwards, whe
n I went through our conversation in my head. Palmer had been scared, but he hadn’t acted crazy. Not in the slightest.
He couldn’t say this to Tolson, because he had no proof – in that sense, Tolson was as rigid as Tamm. Guttman tried one more time nonetheless: ‘I’ve got Nessheim out on the Coast. I thought maybe he could have a sniff around – about this money transfer, I mean. Just in case Palmer was telling the truth.’
Tolson was already shaking his head. ‘Absolutely not. Nessheim’s not there to play hero any more. He’s doing just what the Director wants at that studio and he’s going to be plenty busy in the months ahead. We’re going out there in a little over a month and after that he’ll have his hands full.’
‘With what?’ asked Guttman. Nessheim might be an anomaly, since Guttman was supposed to operate only south of the Rio Grande now, but he was still his agent.
‘With the movies, of course. The Director has plans. So drop this business: that’s an order I know the Director will confirm. I gotta go now. Next time we meet, let’s stick to Rio de Janeiro.’
9
IT HAD BEEN an early start for Guttman, after a restless night for Isabel, which meant a restless night for him as well. He had risen in the dark and driven over the bridge and across most of Washington to catch the 5.15 Crescent for Philadelphia. There, at 30th Street Station, he’d grabbed a roll and a paper cup of coffee before boarding the Pilgrim, heading north for its terminus at Boston.
He was allowed to travel first class on business, but this trip wasn’t going to appear anywhere on the monthly expenses sheet he submitted to the Director, so he had bought a seat in the ordinary day coach. He would have liked the comfort of one of the Parlor cars they’d added to the sleepers in Washington; you could recline like a potentate in the soft swivel chairs that sat on either side of the aisle. He had tried not to think of the hot breakfast he was missing – bacon and eggs and toast, steaming hot coffee – as he chomped on the dry roll.
The Little Tokyo Informant Page 9
