by James Ellroy
A man said, “Hello?”
Marcello said, “Who’s this? Are you that guy I talked to at the Hay-Adams?”
“Yes, this is Ward Littell. Is this Mr. Marcello?”
Pete almost SHIT—
Carlos slumped into a chair. “This is him, calling from Guatemala City, Guatemala, where he does not want to be. Now, if you want to get my attention, say something bad about the man who put me here.”
Pete clenched up wicked bad. He covered his mouthpiece so they wouldn’t hear him hyperventilate.
Littell said, “I hate that man. He hurt me once, and there is very little that I wouldn’t do to cause him discomfort.”
Carlos tee-hee-heed—weird for a bass-baritone. “You got my attention. Now, stow that ass-kiss routine you dropped on me before, and say something to convince me you’re good at what you do.”
Littell cleared his throat. “I specialize in deportation writ work. I was an FBI agent for close to twenty years. I’m a good friend of Kemper Boyd, and although I distrust his admiration for the Kennedys, I’m convinced that his devotion to the Cuban Cause supersedes it. He wants to see you safely and legally reunited with your loved ones, and I’m here to see that it happens.”
Pete felt queasy. BOYD, YOU FUCK—
Marcello snapped breadsticks. “Kemper said you were ten grand’s worth of good. Now, if you deliver like you talk, ten grand’s just the start of you and me.”
Littell came on servile. “It’s an honor to work for you. And Kemper apologizes for your inconvenience. He was tipped off on the raid at the last second, and he didn’t think they could pull it off as fast as they did.”
Marcello scratched his neck with a breadstick. “Kemper always gets the job done. I’ve got no complaints against him that can’t wait until the next time I see that too-handsome face of his face-to-face. And the Kennedys keestered 49.8% of the American voters, including some good friends of mine, so I don’t begrudge him that admiration if it don’t fuck with my life and limb.”
Littell said, “He’ll be pleased to hear that. And you should know that I’m writing up a temporary reinstatement brief that will be reviewed by a three-judge Federal panel. I’ll be calling your attorney in New York, and we’ll begin devising a long-range legal strategy.”
Marcello kicked off his shoes. “Do it. Call my wife and tell her I’m okay, and do whatever you need to do to get me the fuck out of here.”
“I will. And I’ll be bringing some paperwork down for you to sign. You can expect to see me within seventy-two hours.”
Marcello said, “I want to go home.”
Pete hung up. Steam hissed out of his ears like he was Donald Fucking Duck.
They killed time. The jumbo pad let them kill it separately.
Chucky watched spic TV. King Carlos buzzed his serfs long-distance. Pete fantasized ninety-nine ways to murder Ward Littell.
John Stanton called in. Pete regaled him with the toilet-snatch story. Stanton said the Agency would cover their bribe tab.
Pete said, Boyd fixed Carlos up with a lawyer. Stanton said, I heard he’s quite good. Pete almost said, Now I can’t kill him.
BOYD, YOU FUCK.
Stanton sard the fix was in. Ten grand would buy Carlos a temporary visa. The Guatemalan foreign minister was set to publicly state:
Mr. Marcello was born in Guatemala. His birth certificate is legitimate. Attorney General Kennedy is wrong. Mr. Marcello’s origins are in no way ambiguous.
Mr. Marcello split to America—legally. Sadly, we have no records to corroborate this. The burden of proof now falls upon Mr. Kennedy.
Stanton said the minister hates Jack the K.
Stanton said Jack fucked his wife and both his daughters.
Pete said, Jack fucked my old girlfriend. Stanton said, Wow—and you still helped elect him!
Stanton said, Have Chuck grease the minister. And by the way, Jack’s still dicking around on a go-date.
Pete hung up and looked out the window. Guatemala City by twilight—strictly the rat’s ass.
They all dozed off early. Pete woke up early—a nightmare had him balled up under his sheets, gasping for breath.
Chuck was out on his bribe run. Carlos was on his second cigar.
Pete opened the living-room curtains. He saw a big hubbub down at ground level.
He saw a string of trucks at the curb. He saw men with cameras. He saw cables stretching into the lobby.
He saw people gesturing up.
He saw a big movie camera pointing straight up at them.
Pete said, “We’re blown.”
Carlos dropped his cigar in his hash browns and ran to the window.
Pete said, “The Agency’s got a camp an hour from here. If we can find Chuck and fly out, we’ll make it.”
Carlos looked down. Carlos saw the ruckus. Carlos pushed his breakfast cart through the window and watched it bullseye down eighteen stories.
65
(Rural Guatemala, 4/8/61)
Heat shimmied off the runway. Blast-oven heat—Kemper should have warned him to dress light.
Kemper warned him that Bondurant would be there. He hustled Marcello out of Guatemala City three days ago and arranged for the CIA to play innkeeper.
Kemper added a postscript: Pete knows you’ve got the Fund books.
Littell stepped away from the plane. He felt woozy. His connecting flight from Houston was a World War II transport.
Propeller thwack boosted the heat. The campsite was large and dusty—odd buildings plunked down in a red clay jungle clearing.
A jeep skidded up. The driver saluted.
“Mr. Littell?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll drive you over, sir. Your friends are waiting for you.”
Littell got in. The rearview mirror caught his bold new face.
He had three shots back in Houston. Daytime shots to help him rise to this one-time occasion.
The driver peeled out. Troops marched by in strict formation; cadence counts overlapped.
They pulled into a barrack’s quadrangle. The driver stopped in front of a small Quonset hut. Littell grabbed his suitcase and walked in ramrod-straight.
The room was air-conditioned. Bondurant and Carlos Marcello stood by a pool table.
Pete winked. Littell winked back. His whole face contorted.
Pete cracked his knuckles—his old intimidation trademark. Marcello said, “What are you, faggots, winking at each other?”
Littell put his suitcase down. The snaps creaked. His surprise had the damn thing bulging.
“How are you, Mr. Marcello?”
“I’m losing money. Every day Pete and my Agency friends treat me better, so every day I end up pledging more money to the Cause. I figure the nut on this hotel’s running me twenty-five grand a day.”
Pete chalked up a pool cue. Marcello jammed his hands in his pockets.
Kemper warned him: the man does not shake hands.
“I talked to your attorneys in New York a few hours ago. They want to know if you need anything.”
Marcello smiled. “I need to kiss my wife on the cheek and fuck my girlfriend. I need to eat some duck Rochambeau at Galatoire’s, and I cannot accomplish any of that here.”
Bondurant racked up the table. Littell swung his suitcase up and blocked it off lengthwise.
Marcello chuckled. “I’m starting to detect old grief here.”
Pete lit a cigarette. Littell caught the exhale full-on.
“I’ve got a good deal of paperwork for you to review, Mr. Marcello. We’ll need to spend some time together and devise a story that details your immigration history, so that Mr. Wasserman can use it when he files his injunction to get your deportation order rescinded. Some very influential people want to see you repatriated, and I’ll be working with them as well. I realize that all this unexpected travel must be exhausting, so Kemper Boyd and I are going to arrange for Chuck Rogers to fly you back to Louisiana in a few days and hide you out.”
Marcello di
d a quick little shuffle. The man was deft and fast on his feet.
Pete said, “What happened to your face, Ward?”
Littell opened the suitcase. Pete picked up the 8-ball and cracked it in half barehanded.
Wood chunks snapped and popped. Marcello said, “I’m not sure I like where this is going.”
Littell pulled out the Fund books. A quick prayer tamped down his nerves.
“I’m sure you both know that Jules Schiffrin’s estate in Lake Geneva was burglarized last November. Some paintings were stolen, along with some ledgers rumored to contain Teamster Pension Fund notations. The thief was an informant for a Chicago-based Top Hoodlum Program agent named Court Meade, and he gave the books to Meade when he realized that the paintings were too well-known and recognizable to sell. Meade died of a heart attack in January, and he willed the books to me. He told me he never showed them to anyone else, and in my opinion he was waiting to sell them to somebody in the Giancana organization. There’s a few pages that have been torn out, but aside from that I think they’re intact. I brought them to you because I know how close you are to Mr. Hoffa and the Teamsters.”
Marcello went slack-jawed. Pete snapped a pool cue in half.
He tore out fourteen pages back in Houston. He had all the Kennedy entries safely stashed.
Marcello offered his hand. Littell kissed a big diamond ring papal-style.
66
(Anniston, 4/11/61)
Voting rolls and poll tax reports. Literacy test results and witness statements.
Four corkboard-mounted walls dripping with paper—systematic suppression in typescript black-on-white.
His room was small and drab. The Wigwam Motel was not quite the St. Regis.
Kemper worked up a voting rights obstruction brief. One literacy test and one witness deposition formed his evidentiary basis.
Delmar Herbert Bowen was a male Negro, born 6/14/19 in Anniston, Alabama. He was literate, and a self-described “big reader.”
On 6/15/40, Mr. Bowen tried to register to vote. The registrar said, Boy, can you read and write?
Mr. Bowen proved that he could. The registrar asked exclusionary questions, pertaining to advanced calculus.
Mr. Bowen failed to answer them. Mr. Bowen was denied the right to vote.
He subpoenaed Mr. Bowen’s literacy test. He determined that the Anniston registrar fabricated the results.
The man said that Mr. Bowen could not spell “dog” and “cat.” Mr. Bowen did not know that coitus precipitates childbirth.
Kemper clipped pages. The work bored him. The Kennedy civil rights mandate was not bold enough for his taste.
His mandate was gunboat diplomacy.
He grabbed a sandwich at a lunch counter yesterday. In the colored section—for the pure hell of it.
A cracker called him a “nigger lover.” He judo-chopped him into a bowl of grits.
Shots zinged his door last night. A colored man told him the Klan torched a cross down the block.
Kemper finished the Bowen brief. He did it catch-up fast—he had to meet John Stanton in Miami in three hours.
Phone calls blitzed his morning and put him off-schedule. Bobby called for a deposition update; Littell called to drop his latest A-bomb.
Ward delivered the Fund books to Carlos Marcello. Pete Bondurant observed the transaction. Marcello seemed to buy Ward’s convoluted cover story.
Ward said, “I made copies, Kemper. And the depositions on your incursion and Joe Kennedy’s malfeasance remain fail-safed. And I’d appreciate it if you advised Le Grand Pierre not to kill me.”
He called Pete immediately. He said, “Don’t kill Littell or tell Carlos his story is bullshit.” Pete said, “Credit me with some brains. I’ve been playing this game as long as you.”
Littell finessed them. It was no severe loss—the books were always a moneymaking longshot.
Kemper oiled his .45. Bobby knew he carried it—and laughed it off as pretentious.
He wore it to the Inaugural. He found Bobby on the parade route and told him he cut Laura off clean.
He found Jack at a White House reception. He called him “Mr. President” for the first time. Jack’s first presidential decree: “Find me some girls for later tonight.”
Kemper rustled up two Georgetown coeds. President Jack told him to stash the girls away for late quickies.
Kemper stashed them in White House guest rooms. Jack caught him yawning and splashing water on his face.
It was 3:00 a.m., with Inaugural galas set to run past dawn.
Jack suggested a pick-me-up. They walked into the Oval Office and saw a doctor preparing vials and hypodermics.
The President rolled up one sleeve. The doctor injected him. John F. Kennedy looked positively orgasmic.
Kemper rolled up one sleeve. The doctor injected him. A rocket pay-load hit his system.
The ride lasted twenty-four hours. The time and place cohered around it.
Jack’s ascent became his. That simple truth felt spellbindingly articulate. The time and place were beholden to one Kemper Cathcart Boyd. In that sense, he and Jack were indistinguishable.
He picked up one of Jack’s old flames and made love to her at the Willard. He described the Moment to senators and cab drivers. Judy Garland showed him how to dance the Twist.
The ride sputtered out and left him wanting more. He knew that more would only vulgarize the Moment.
The phone rang. Kemper cinched his overnight bag and picked up.
“This is Boyd.”
“It’s Bob, Kemper. I’ve got the President here with me.”
“Does he want me to repeat that update I gave you?”
“No. We need you to help us sort out a communications glitch.”
“Pertaining to?”
“Cuba. I realize that you’re only informally acquainted with some recent developments, but I still think you’re the best man for this.”
“For what? What are we talking about?”
Bobby came off exasperated. “The projected exile invasion, which you may or may not have heard about. Richard Bissell just dropped by my office and said the CIA’s chomping at the bit, and their Cubans are just a bit beyond restless. They’ve got the key landing site picked out. It’s some place called Playa Girón, or the Bay of Pigs.”
It was NEW news. Stanton never told him that Langley picked a site.
Kemper faked bewilderment. “I don’t see how I can help you. You know I don’t know anybody in the CIA.”
Jack came on the line. “Bobby didn’t know the thing was this far advanced, Kemper. Allen Dulles briefed us on it before I took office, but we haven’t discussed it since then. My advisors are split down the middle on the damn thing.”
Kemper slipped on his holster. Bobby said, “What we need is an independent assessment of the exiles’ readiness.”
Kemper laughed. “Because if the invasion fails and it becomes known that you backed the so-called ‘rebels,’ you’ll be fucked in the court of world opinion.”
Bobby said, “Vividly put.”
Jack said, “And to the point. And I should have taken Bobby into my confidence on this a few weeks ago, but he’s been so goddamned busy chasing gangsters. Kemper …”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“I’ve been waffling on a date, and Bissell’s been pressing me. I know you’ve been doing that anti-Castro work for Mr. Hoover, so I know you’re at least somewhat …”
“I am somewhat conversant on Cuba, at least from a pro-Castro-group standpoint.”
Bobby cracked the whip. “Cuba’s always been a bit of a fixation for you, so go to Florida and make something positive out of it. Visit the CIA training camps, and take a swing through Miami. Call back and tell us if you think the operation has a chance to succeed, and do it damn fast.”
Kemper said, “I’ll leave now. I’ll report back inside forty-eight hours.”
John almost died laughing. Kemper almost called a cardiologist.
The
y sat on Stanton’s private terrace. Langley let him upgrade to the Fontainebleau—hotel-suite living was contagious.
A breeze blew up Collins Avenue. Kemper’s throat hurt—he repeated the phone talk replete with Jack’s Boston bray.
“John …”
Stanton caught his breath. “I’m sorry, but I never thought presidential indecisiveness could be so goddamn funny.”
“What do you think I should tell him?”
“How about, ‘The invasion will guarantee your re-election.’ ”
Kemper laughed. “I’ve got some time to kill in Miami. Any suggestions?”
“Yes, two.”
“Tell me, then. And tell me why you wanted to see me when you knew I was swamped in Alabama.”
Stanton poured a short scotch-and-water. “That civil rights work must be vexing.”
“Not really.”
“I think the Negro vote is a mixed blessing. Aren’t they easily led?”
“I’d call them slightly less malleable than our Cubans. And considerably less criminally inclined.”
Stanton smiled. “Stop it. Don’t make me start laughing again.”
Kemper put his feet up on the railing. “I think you could use a few laughs. Langley’s running you ragged, and you’re drinking at 1:00 p.m.”
Stanton nodded. “This is true. Everybody from Mr. Dulles on down would like the invasion to go off some time in the next five minutes, and I’m no exception. And to answer your initial question, I want you to spend the next forty-eight hours devising realistic-sounding intelligence on troop readiness to submit to the President, and I want you to prepatrol our Cadre territory with Fulo and Nestor Chasco. Miami’s our best source of street-level intelligence, and I want you to assess just how far and how accurately rumors pertaining to the invasion have spread within the Cuban community.”
Kemper mixed a gin and tonic. “I’ll get on it right away. Was there anything else?”
“Yes. The Agency wants to set up a Cuban ‘government in exile,’ to be housed at Blessington during the actual invasion. It’s mostly cosmetic, but we’ve got to have at least a facsimile of a consensus-chosen leadership ready to install if we get Castro out within, say, three or four days of our go date.”
