by James Ellroy
Fulo’s car dipsy-doodled across the runway. Chuck stacked Tommy guns and ammo by the dock moorings.
Dougie Frank said, “Can I go?”
Pete said, “Sure.”
Delsol, Obregón and Fulo piled out of the Chevy. They walked sway-bellied—blitzed by too much beer and turkey.
They waddled over to the dock. Tomás Obregón wore shades—at 2:00 a.m. Shades and long sleeves—on a half-assed balmy night.
A dog barked out in the sticks. Chuck Rogers mimicked hound yelps like this late-nite cracker deejay he grooved on. Everybody traded holiday back slaps.
Pete slapped Obregón’s shades off. The fuck had dope-pinned eyes—floodlight glare nailed them clean.
Obregón froze. Rogers threw a choke hold on him.
Nobody talked. Nobody had to—the picture spread rápidamente.
Obregón squirmed. Fulo jerked his sleeves up. Skin-pop tracks ran down his arms, red and ugly.
Everybody looked at Delsol—Obregón’s fucking cousin. The picture spread: Let him do it.
Chuck let Obregón go. Pete handed his gun to Delsol.
Obregón trembled and almost teetered off the dock. Delsol shot him six times in the chest.
He spun into the water. Steam hissed out his exit wounds.
Fulo dove in and scalped him.
Delsol looked away.
38
(Hyannis Port, 12/25/59)
A Christmas tree grazed the ceiling. Spray-on snowflakes dusted a huge pile of gifts.
Kemper sipped eggnog. Jack said, “Holidays make you sad, I can tell.”
“Not exactly.”
“My parents overdid having children, but yours should have had the foresight to give you a sibling or two.”
“I had a younger brother. He died in a hunting accident.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“My father and I were stalking deer near our summer place. We kept getting glimpses, and kept firing through brush. One of the glimpses was Compton Wickwire Boyd, age eight. He was wearing a tan jacket and a hat with white ear flaps. It was October 19, 1934.”
Jack looked away. “Kemper, I’m sorry.”
“I shouldn’t have mentioned it. You said you wanted to talk, and I have to leave for New York in an hour. That story is a guaranteed conversation-stopper.”
The den was overheated. Jack inched his chair away from the fireplace.
“You’re meeting Laura?”
“Yes. My daughter’s having Christmas dinner with some friends in South Bend, then going on a ski trip. She’ll be joining Laura and I in New York.”
Pete’s ring was buffed and polished. He was set to pop the question tonight.
“You and Laura were a hell of a shock.”
“But you’re getting used to it?”
“I think everyone is, to one degree or another.”
“You’re nervous, Jack.”
“I’m announcing in eight days. Obstacles keep popping up in my mind, and I keep wondering how to deal with them.”
“For instance?”
“West Virginia. What do I say to a coal miner who says, ‘Son, I heard your daddy’s one of the richest men in America, and you never had to work a day in your life?’ ”
Kemper smiled. “You say, That’s true.’ And a grizzled old character actor that we plant in the crowd says, ‘And son, you ain’t missed a damn thing.’;”
Jack roared. Kemper snapped to a connection: Giancana and Trafficante ran big blocks of West Virginia.
“I know some people down there who might be able to help you.”
“Then indebt me to them in unconscionable ways, so I can embrace my genetic fate as a corrupt Irish politician.”
Kemper laughed. “You’re still nervous. And you said you wanted to talk to me, which implied a serious discussion.”
Jack rocked his chair back and brushed fake snow off his sweater. “We’ve been thinking of Mr. Hoover. We were thinking he knows the story of Laura’s parentage.”
Devil’s Advocate clicked in, automatically. “He’s known for years. He knows I’m seeing Laura, and he told me the facts of her parentage before she did.”
Bobby’s kids romped through the room. Jack shooed them out and toed the door shut.
“That voyeuristic little faggot cocksucker.”
Kemper ad-libbed. “He also knows about all your paternity buyouts, and most of your sustained affairs. Jack, I’m your best hedge against Hoover. He likes me and trusts me, and all he wants is to keep his job if you’re elected.”
Jack tapped a humidor on his chin. “Dad’s got himself half-convinced that Hoover sent you over to spy on us.”
“Your dad’s no dummy.”
“What?”
“Hoover caught me skimming off a car-theft investigation and retired me early. I applied for the McClellan Committee job on my own, and Hoover started keeping tabs on me. He learned I was seeing Laura and asked me for information on you. I said no, and Hoover said, ‘You owe me one.’ ”
Jack nodded. His look said: Yes, I’ll buy that.
“Dad had a private detective follow you around Manhattan. The man said you keep a suite at the St. Regis.”
Kemper winked. “The way you live rubs off, Jack. I’ve got a pension, a salary and stock dividends, and I’m courting an expensive woman.”
“You’re in Florida a good deal.”
“Hoover has me spying on pro-Castro groups. It’s that ‘one’ I owe him.”
“That’s why you’re so hipped on Cuba as a campaign issue.”
“Right. I think Castro’s a goddamned menace, and I think you should take a hard line against him.”
Jack lit his cigar. His look said: Thank God this is over.
“I’ll tell Dad it’s all okay. He wants a promise, though.”
“Which is?”
“That you won’t marry Laura any time soon. He’s afraid reporters might get nosy.”
Kemper handed him the ring. “Keep this for me. I was planning to ask Laura tonight, but I guess I’ll have to wait until you’re elected.”
Jack slipped it in his pocket. “Thanks. Does this mean you’re out a Christmas gift?”
“I’ll pick something up in New York.”
“There’s an emerald pin under the tree there. Laura looks good in green, and Jackie won’t miss it.”
39
(South Bend, 12/25/59)
Littell got off the train and checked for tails.
The arrivals and departures looked normal—just Notre Dame kids and anxious parents. Some cheerleaders shivered—short-skirted pompom girls out in ten-degree weather.
The crowd dispersed. No platform loiterers stuck close to him. In a phrase: The Phantom sees phantoms.
Tail sightings were a probable booze by-product. The clicks on his phone line were most likely overactive nerves.
He’d dismantled his two phones. He found no wiretap apparatus. The Mob couldn’t rig outside taps—only police agencies could. That man watching him and Mai Chamales last week—probably just a barfly tweaked by their left-of-center conversation.
Littell hit the station lounge and knocked back three rye-and-beers. Christmas dinner with Susan mandated fortification.
Amenities dragged. Talk bounced between safe topics.
Susan tensed when he hugged her. Helen steered clear of his hands. Claire had grown into a distaff Kemper—the resemblance had solidified amazingly.
Susan never addressed him by name. Claire called him “Ward baby”—Helen said she was in a Rat Pack phase. Susan smoked like her mother now—straight down to match flicks and exhales.
Her apartment mimicked Margaret’s: too many porcelain knick-knacks and too much stiff furniture.
Claire played Sinatra records. Susan served diluted eggnog—Helen must have told her that her father drank to excess.
He said he hadn’t heard from Kemper in months. Claire smiled—she knew all her father’s secrets. Susan laid out dinner: Margaret’s boring glazed ham
and sweet potatoes.
They sat down. Littell bowed his head and offered a prayer.
“O heavenly Father, we ask thy blessing on all of us, and on our absent friends. I commend to you the souls of three men recently departed, whose deaths were caused by arrogant if heartfelt attempts to facilitate justice. I ask you to bless all of us on this sacred day and in the year to come.”
Susan rolled her eyes and said “Amen.” Claire carved the ham; Helen poured wine.
The girls got full glasses. He got a splash. It was cheap Cabernet Sauvignon.
Claire said, “My Dad’s proposing to his mistress tonight. Let’s hear it for my Dad and my nifty new mom, who’s only nine and a half years older than me.”
Littell almost gagged. Social climber Kemper as secret Kennedy in-law—
Susan said, “Claire, really. ‘Mistress’ and ‘nifty’ in the same sentence?”
Claire made cat claws. “You forgot to mention the age difference. How could you? We both know that age gaps are your pet peeve.”
Helen groaned. Susan pushed her plate aside and lit a cigarette.
Littell filled his glass. Claire said, “Ward baby, assess the three of us as attorneys.”
Littell smiled. “It’s not hard. Susan prosecutes misdemeanors, Helen defends wayward FBI men, and Claire goes into corporate law to finance her father’s expensive tastes in his old age.”
Helen and Claire laughed. Susan said, “I don’t appreciate being defined by pettiness.”
Littell gulped wine. “You can join the Bureau, Susie. I’ll be retiring in a year and twenty-one days, and you can take my place and torment pathetic leftists for Mr. Hoover.”
“I wouldn’t characterize Communists as pathetic, Father. And I don’t think you could support your bar tab on a twenty-year pension.”
Claire flinched. Helen said, “Susan, please.”
Littell grabbed the bottle. “Maybe I’ll go to work for John F. Kennedy. Maybe he’ll be elected President. His brother hates organized crime more than Communists, so maybe it runs in the family.”
Susan said, “I can’t believe you place common hoodlums in the same league as a political system that has enslaved half the world. I can’t believe that you could be hoodwinked by a fatuous liberal politician whose father intends to buy him the presidency.”
“Kemper Boyd likes him.”
“Excuse me, Father, and excuse me, Claire, but Kemper Boyd worships money, and we all know that John F. Kennedy has plenty of that.”
Claire ran out of the room. Littell flat-guzzled wine.
“Communists don’t castrate innocent men. Communists don’t hook up car batteries to people’s genitals and electrocute them. Communists don’t drop TV sets into bathtubs or—”
Helen ran out. Susan said, “Father, goddamn you for your weakness.”
He called in accumulated sick leave and holed up through New Year’s. The A&P delivered food and liquor.
Law school finals kept Helen away. They talked on the phone—mostly petty chitchat and sighs. He heard occasional clicks on the line and wrote them off to nerves.
Kemper didn’t call or write. The man was ignoring him.
He read Bobby Kennedy’s book about the Hoffa wars. The story thrilled him. Kemper Boyd did not appear in the text.
He watched the Rose Bowl and Cotton Bowl on TV. He eulogized Icepick Tony Iannone—dead one year ago exactly.
Exactly four rye-and-beers induced euphoria. He fantasized an exact form of courage: the will to move on Jules Schiffrin and the Fund books.
More liquor killed the notion. To move meant to sacrifice lives. His courage was weakness pushed into grandiosity.
He watched John Kennedy announce his Presidential candidacy. The Senate Caucus Room was packed with his supporters.
Cameras cut to a picket line outside. Teamsters chanted: “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Kennedy says ‘Labor NO! ’ ”
A reporter spoke voice-over: “A Florida grand jury has Teamster president James R. Hoffa under close scrutiny. He is suspected of fel ony land fraud in matters pertaining to the Teamsters’ Sun Valley development.”
An insert shot caught Hoffa laughing off Sun Valley.
Littell juxtaposed words:
Pete, kill some men for me, will ya?
Father, goddamn you for your weakness.
40
(Tampa, 2/1/60)
Jack Ruby said, “I am desperate. That well-known indigent Sal D. owed me a bundle when he died, and the IRS is climbing up my you-know-what for back payments I ain’t got. I’m overextended on my club, Sam already turned me down, and you know I am a great friend to the Cuban Cause. A pal and me brought strippers down to entertain the boys in Blessington, which was strictly voluntary on my part and has nothing to do with the request I just made.”
Santo Junior sat at his desk. Ruby stood in front of it. Three fat German shepherds drooped off the couch.
Pete watched Ruby grovel. The office stunk: Santo gave his dogs free run of the furniture.
Ruby said, “I am desperate. I am here before you like a supplicant before his local pontiff.”
Trafficante said, “No. You brought some girls down when I was locked up in Havana, but that is not ten grand’s worth of collateral. I can let you have a thousand out of my pocket, but that’s it.”
Ruby stuck his hand out. Santo greased him with C-notes off a flash roll. Pete got up and opened the door.
Ruby walked out fondling the money. Santo spritzed cologne on the spot where he stood groveling.
“That man is rumored to have strange sexual tastes. He could give you diseases that would put cancer to shame. Now, tell me some good things, because I don’t like to start my day with beggars.”
Pete said, “Profits went up 2% in December and January. I think Wilfredo Delsol’s okay on his cousin, and I don’t think he’d ever rat off the Cadre. Nobody’s stealing from us, and I think the Obregón thing put a good little scare out.”
“Somebody’s fucking up, or you wouldn’t’ve asked to see me.”
“Fulo’s been running whores. He’s got them turning tricks for five-dollar pops and candy bars. He’s turning over all the money, but I still think it’s bad business.”
Trafficante said, “Make him stop.”
Pete sat on the edge of the couch. King Tut put out a cursory growl.
“Lockhart and his Klan buddies built a social club down the road from the campsite, and now they’re talking about lynching spooks. On top of that, Lockhart’s pals with that Dallas cop guy J.D. that drove down here with Ruby. Chuck Rogers wants to take J.D. up in his plane and drop some hate leaflets. He’s talking about saturation-bombing South Florida.”
Trafficante slapped his desk blotter. “Make this foolishness stop.”
“I will.”
“You didn’t have to run this by me.”
“Kemper thinks all discipline should initiate with you. He wants the men to think we’re labor as opposed to management.”
“Kemper’s a subtle guy.”
Pete stroked King Farouk and King Arthur. Fucking King Tut evil-eyed him.
“He’s every bit of subtle.”
“Castro turned my casinos into pigsties. He lets goats shit on the carpets my wife picked out personally.”
Pete said, “He’ll pay.”
He drove back to Miami. The cabstand was packed with loafers: Lockhart, Fulo, and the whole fucking Cadre.
Minus Chuck Rogers—up in his airplane dropping hate bombs.
Pete shut down the stand and laid down The Law. He called it the Declaration of Cadre Non-Independence and the New KKK Bill of Non-Rights.
No pimping. No robbery. No flim-flam. No B&E. No extortion. No hijacking.
No lynching. No nigger assaults. No church bombings. No racial shit directed at Cubans.
The Blessington Klan’s specific mandate:
Love all Cubans. Leave them alone. Fuck up anybody who fucks with your new Cuban brethren.
Lockhart called the
mandate quasi-genocidal. Pete cracked his knuckles. Lockhart shut his mouth.
The huddle broke up. Jack Ruby came by and begged a ride—his carburetor blew, and he needed to run his girls down to Blessington.
Pete said okay. The girls wore capris and halter tops—things could be worse.
Ruby rode up front. J.D. Tippit and the strippers rode in the back of the truck. Rain clouds were brewing—if a storm hit, they were screwed.
Pete took two-lane roadways south. He played the radio to keep Ruby quiet. Chuck Rogers flew down from deep nowhere and spun tree-level backflips.
The girls cheered. Chuck dropped a six-pack; J.D. caught it. Hate leaflets blew down—Pete plucked one out of the air.
“Six Reasons Why Jesus Was Pro-Klan.” #1 set the tone: because Commies fluoridated the Red Sea.
Ruby eyeballed the scenery. Tippit and the girls guzzled beer. Chuck blew off his flight pattern and brick-bombed a nigger church.
The radio signal faded. Ruby started whining.
“Santo don’t possess the world’s longest memory. Santo stiffs me with one-tenth of what I asked him for ’cause his memory’s nine-tenths on the blink. Santo don’t understand the tsuris I went through bringing those ladies down to Havana. Sure the Beard was giving him grief. But he didn’t have no crazy Fed from Chicago leeching onto him.”
Pete snapped to. “What Fed from Chicago?”
“I don’t know his name. I only met him in the flesh once, praise Allah.”
“Describe him.”
“Maybe six foot one, maybe forty-six or -seven years of age. Glasses, thin gray hair, and a boozer in my considered opinion, since the one time I met him face-to-face he had whisky on his breath.”
The road dipped. Pete hit the brakes and almost stalled the truck out.
“Tell me how he leeched onto you.”
“Why? Give me one good reason why I should share this abuse with you.”
“I’ll give you a thousand dollars to tell me the story. If I like the story, I’ll give you four more.”
Ruby counted on his fingers—one to five a half dozen times.
Pete tapped a little tune on the wheel. The beat ran 1-2-3-4-5.
