by James Ellroy
Heshie brings his entourage: Dick Contino, nurses and hookers. Pete shoots him full of dope twice a day.
Heshie’s entourage is baffled. Why uproot to Dallas when you’re so close to passing away?
11/8/63: Carlos sends him a news clipping. It reads, “Klan Leader Murdered—Baffling Deep South Riddle!”
The cops suspect rival Klansmen. He suspects a Kemper Boyd gesture.
Carlos includes a note. Carlos says his deportation trial is going quite well.
11/8/63: Mr. Hughes sends him a note. Baby Howard wants Las Vegas like most children want new toys.
He wrote back to him. He promised to visit Nevada and compile research notes before Christmas.
11/9/63: Mr. Hoover calls. He says his private taps have picked up scalding outrage—the Joe Valachi Show is terrifying mobsters coast to coast.
Hoover’s inside source says that Bobby is privately interrogating Valachi. Valachi refuses to discuss the Fund books. Bobby is furious.
11/10/63: Kemper calls. He says Guy Banister’s “far-fetched” ploy succeeded: the Miami motorcade was canceled.
11/12/63: Pete calls. He reports more campsite raids and hit-plot rumors.
11/15/63: Jack parades through New York City. Teenagers and middle-aged matrons swarm his car.
11/16/63: Dallas newspapers announce the motorcade route. Barb Jahelka has a front-row seat—she’s performing a noon show at a club on Commerce Street.
An intercom buzzed. Bobby’s voice cut through static: “I’ll see Mr. Littell now.”
The receptionist got the door. Littell carried his tape recorder in.
Bobby stood behind his desk. He jammed his hands in his pockets and made no forward moves—Mob lawyers received cut-rate civility.
The office was nicely appointed. Bobby’s suit was an off-the-rack sack cut.
“Your name seems familiar, Mr. Littell. Have we met before?”
I WAS YOUR PHANTOM. I ACHED TO BE PART OF YOUR VISION.
“No, Mr. Kennedy. We haven’t.”
“I see you brought a tape recorder.”
Littell set it down on the floor. “Yes, I did.”
“Has Jimmy owned up to his evil ways? Did you bring me some kind of confession?”
“In a sense. Would you mind listening?”
Bobby checked his watch. “I’m yours for the next nine minutes.”
Littell plugged the machine into a wall outlet. Bobby jiggled the coins in his pockets.
Littell tapped Play. Joe Valachi spoke. Bobby leaned against the wall behind his desk.
Littell stood in front of the desk. Bobby stared at him. They stayed absolutely motionless and did not blink or twitch.
Joe Valachi laid down his indictment. Bobby heard the evidence. He did not shut his eyes or in any way discernibly react.
Littell broke a sweat. The silly staring contest continued.
The tape slipped off the spindle. Bobby picked up his desk phone.
“Get Special Agent Conroy in Boston. Have him go to the main Security-First National Bank and find out who account number 811512404 belongs to. Have him examine the safe-deposit boxes and call me back immediately. Tell him to expedite this top-priority, and hold my calls until his comes through.”
His voice did not waver. He came on cast-iron/steel-plate/watertight strong.
Bobby put the phone down. The eyeball duel continued. The first one to blink is a coward.
Littell almost giggled. An epigram: Powerful men are children.
Time passed. Littell counted minutes off his heartbeat. His glasses started sliding down his nose.
The phone rang. Bobby picked it up and listened.
Littell stood perfectly still and counted forty-one seconds off his pulse. Bobby threw the phone at the wall.
And blinked.
And twitched.
And brushed back tears.
Littell said, “Goddamn you for the pain you caused me.”
97
(Dallas, 11/20/63)
She’ll know. She’ll hear the news and see your face and know you were part of it.
She’ll trace it back to the shakedown. You couldn’t compromise him, so you killed him.
She’ll know it was a Mob hit. She knows how those guys snip dangerous links. She’ll blame you for bringing her so close to something so big.
Pete watched Barb sleep. Their bed smelled like suntan oil and sweat.
He was going to Las Vegas. He was going back to Howard “Dracula” Hughes. Ward Littell was their new middleman.
It was strongarm and dope work. It was a boilerplate commuted sentence: death for life imprisonment.
She’d kicked the sheets off. He noticed some new freckles on her legs.
She’d click with Vegas. He’d boot Joey out of her life and fix her up with a permanent lounge gig.
She’d be with him. She’d be close to his work. She’d build a rep as a stand-up woman who knew how to keep secrets.
Barb curled into her pillows. The veins on her breasts stretched out funny.
He woke her up. She snapped awake bright-eyed, like always.
Pete said; “Will you marry me?”
Barb said, “Sure.”
• • •
A fifty-dollar bribe waived the blood test. A C-note covered the no-birth-certificate problem.
Pete rented a 52 X-long tuxedo. Barb ran by the Kascade Klub and grabbed her one white Twist gown.
They found a preacher in the phone book. Pete scrounged up two witnesses: Jack Ruby and Dick Contino.
Dick said Uncle Hesh needed a pop. And what’s he so excited about? For a dying man, he sure seems keyed up.
Pete ran by the Adolphus Hotel. He shot Heshie full of heroin and slipped him some Hershey bars to nosh on. Heshie thought his tuxedo was the funniest fucking thing he’d ever seen. He laughed so hard he almost ripped his tracheal tube out.
Dick bounced for a wedding gift: the Adolphus bridal suite through the weekend. Pete and Barb moved their things in an hour before the ceremony.
Pete’s gun fell out of his suitcase. The bellhop almost shit.
Barb tipped him fifty dollars. The kid genuflected out of the suite. A hotel limo dropped them at the chapel.
The preacher was a juicehead. Ruby brought his yappy dachshunds. Dick banged some wedding numbers on his squeezebox.
They said their vows in a dive off Stemmons Freeway. Barb cried. Pete held her hand so tight that she winced.
The preacher supplied imitation gold rings. Pete’s ring wouldn’t fit on his ring finger. The preacher said he’d order him a jumbo—he got his stuff from a mail-order house in Des Moines.
Pete dropped the too-small ring in his pocket. The Till Death Do Us Part pitch got him weak in the knees.
They settled in at the hotel. Barb kept up a refrain: Barbara Jane Lindscott Jahelka Bondurant.
Heshie sent them champagne and a giant gift basket. The room-service kid was atwitter—the President’s riding by here on Friday!
They made love. The bed was flouncy pink and enormous.
Barb fell asleep. Pete left an 8:00 p.m. call—his bride had a gig at 9:00 sharp.
He couldn’t sleep. He didn’t touch the bubbly—booze was starting to feel like a weakness.
The phone rang. He got up and grabbed the parlor extension.
“Yeah?”
“It’s me, Pete.”
“Ward, Jesus. How’d you get this—?”
Littell said, “Banister just called me. He said Juan Canestel’s missing in Dallas. I’m sending Kemper in to meet you, and I want the two of you to find him and do what you have to do to make Friday happen.”
98
(Dallas, 11/20/63)
The plane taxied up to a loading bay. The pilot rode tailwinds all the way from Meridian and made the run in under two hours.
Littell arranged a private charter. He told the pilot to fly balls-to-the-wall. The little two-seater rattled and shook—Kemper couldn’t believe it.
It
was 11:48 p.m. They were thirty-six hours short of GO.
Car headlights blinked—Pete’s signal.
Kemper unhooked his seat belt. The pilot throttled down and cranked the door open for him.
Kemper jumped out. Propeller backspin almost knocked him flat.
The car pulled up. Kemper got in. Pete punched it across a string of small-craft runways.
A jet whooshed overhead. Love Field looked otherworldly.
Pete said, “What did Ward tell you?”
“That Juan’s loose. And that Guy’s afraid that Carlos and the others will think he fucked up.”
“That’s what he told me. And I told him that I didn’t like the risks involved, unless somebody tells Carlos that we helped him out and saved Banister from blowing the whole fucking hit.”
Kemper cracked the window. His goddamn ears kept popping.
“What did Ward say to that?”
“He said he’ll tell Carlos after the hit. If we find Canestel and save the fucking day.”
A 2-way radio sputtered. Pete turned it down.
“This is J.D. Tippit’s off-duty car. Him and Rogers are out looking, and if they get a spot on Juan, we go in. Tippit can’t leave his patrol sector, and Chuck can’t do anything that could fuck him out of showing up for the hit.”
They dodged baggage carts. Kemper leaned out the window and popped three Dexedrine dry.
“Where’s Banister?”
“He’s flying in from New Orleans later. He thinks Juan’s solid, and if something happens and they lose him, he’ll move Rogers into his slot, and go out with him and the pro shooter.”
They knew Juan was volatile. They didn’t have him tagged as a possible sex killer. The job was fucked up and full of holes and reeked of amateur-night on-the-job training.
“Where are we going?”
“Jack Ruby’s place. Rogers said Juan likes to dig on the whores there. You work inside—Ruby doesn’t know you.”
Kemper laughed. “Ward told Carlos not to trust psychopaths with bright red sports cars.”
Pete said, “You did.”
“I’ve had some revelations since then.”
“Are you saying there’s something I should know about Juan?”
“I’m saying I quit hating Jack. And I don’t really care whether they kill him or not.”
The Carousel Club was midweek listless.
A stripper was peeling on the runway. Two plainclothes cops and a hooker clique sat at ringside tables.
Kemper sat near a rear exit. He unscrewed the bulb on his table lamp—shadows covered him from the waist up.
He could see the front and back doors. He could see the runway and stage tables. The shadows made him close to invisible.
Pete was out back with the car. He didn’t want Jack Ruby to see him.
The stripper stripped to André Kostelanetz. The hi-fi played off-speed. Ruby sat with the cops and spiked their drinks with his flask.
Kemper sipped scotch. It jump-started the Dexedrine. He got cozy with a new revelation: You’ve got a chance to toy with the hit.
A dog ran across the runway. The stripper shooed it off. Juan Canestel walked in the front door.
He was alone. He was wearing an Ike jacket and blue jeans.
He went straight for the whores’ table. A hostess sat him down.
He’d enlarged his prosthetic bulge. Check that shiv in his left hip pocket.
A sash cord was bunched into his waistband.
Juan bought drinks all around. Ruby schmoozed him up. The stripper tossed a few hips his way.
The cops checked him out. They looked mean and full of hate for non-Anglos.
Juan always carries a gun. They might shake him on general principles.
They might book him on a weapons charge. They might rubber-hose him.
He might betray Banister. The Secret Service might cancel the motorcade.
Juan loved to drink. He might show up for the hit hung over. He might jerk the trigger and miss Jack by a country mile.
Juan loved to talk. He might arouse suspicion between now and noon on Friday.
The sash cord leaked out his front waistband.
Juan is a sex killer. Juan kills with his surrogate balls.
Juan chatted up the whores. The cops kept sizing him up.
The stripper bowed and walked backstage. Ruby announced last call. Juan zeroed in on a zaftig brunette.
They’ll walk out the front door. Pete won’t see them. Their combustion might affect Juan’s hit performance.
Kemper popped the clip out of his piece and dropped it on the floor. He left one round in the chamber—let’s toy with the hit a little more.
The brunette stood up. Juan stood up. The cops looked them over.
The cops huddled. One cop shook his head.
The girl walked toward the parking-lot door. Juan followed her.
The lot fed into an alley. The alley was lined with hot-sheet-hotel doorways.
Pete was just outside.
Juan and the girl disappeared. Kemper counted to twenty. A cleanup man started slapping tables with a rag.
Kemper walked outside. A light mist stung his eyes.
Pete was pissing behind a dumpster. Juan and the whore were strolling down the alley. They were moving toward the second doorway on the left-hand side.
Pete saw him. Pete coughed. Pete said, “Kemper, what are you—?”
Pete stopped. Pete said, “Fuck … that’s Juan.…”
Pete ran down the alley. The second door on the left opened and closed.
Kemper ran. They hit the door together at a full sprint.
A center hallway ran back to front. Every door on both sides was closed. There was no elevator—the hotel was one story only.
Kemper counted ten doors. Kemper heard a stifled screech.
Pete started kicking doors in. He threw his weight left, then right-clean pivots and clean flat-heel shots sheared the doors off their hinges.
The floor shook. Lights snapped on. Sad old sleepy winos cringed and cowered.
Six doors went down. Kemper crashed through number seven with a shoulder snap. A bright ceiling light caught the face-off.
Juan had a knife. The whore had a knife. Juan had a dildo strapped to the crotch of his blue jeans.
Kemper aimed at his head. His one round in the chamber went way wide.
Pete pushed him out of the way. Pete aimed low and fired. Two magnum shots blew out Juan’s kneecaps.
He spun over the bed rail. His left leg dropped off at the knee.
The whore giggled. The whore looked at Pete. Something passed between them.
Pete held Kemper back.
Pete let the whore slit Juan’s throat.
They drove to a doughnut stand and drank coffee. Kemper felt Dallas ooze into slow motion.
They left Juan there. They walked to the car. They drove off law-abidingly slow.
They didn’t talk. Pete didn’t mention his toy-with-fate number.
This weird adrenaline had everything running in slow motion.
Pete walked over to a pay phone. Kemper watched him feed coins into the slots.
He’s calling Carlos in New Orleans. He’s pleading for your life.
Pete turned his back and hunched over the phone.
He’s saying Banister fucked up. He’s saying Boyd killed the henchman he never should have trusted.
He’s pleading specifics. He’s saying, Give Boyd a piece of the hit— you know he’s a competent guy.
He’s pleading for mercy.
Kemper sipped coffee. Pete hung up and walked back to their table.
“Who’d you call?”
“My wife. I just wanted to tell her I’d be late.” Kemper smiled. “It doesn’t cost that much money to call your hotel.” Pete said, “Dallas is pricey. And things are getting more expensive these days.”
Kemper laid on some drawl. “They surely are.” Pete crumpled his cup. “Can I drop you somewhere?”
“I’
ll get a cab to the airport. Littell told that charter man to wait for me.”
“Back to Mississippi?”
“Home’s home, son.”
Pete winked. “Take care, Kemper. And thanks for the ride.”
His patio looked out on rolling hillsides. The view was damn nice for a discount motel.
He requested a southern exposure. The clerk rented him a cabin apart from the main building.
The flight back was beautiful. The dawn sky was goddamn lustrous.
He fell asleep and woke up at noon. The radio said Jack arrived in Texas.
He called the White House and the Justice Department. Second-string aides rebuffed him.
His name was on some kind of list. They cut him off midway through his salutations.
He called the Dallas SAC. The man refused to talk to him.
He called the Secret Service. The duty officer hung up.
He quit toying with it. He sat on his patio and replayed the ride start to finish.
Shadows turned the hills dark green. His replay kept expanding in slow motion.
He heard footsteps. Ward Littell walked up. He was carrying a brand-new Burberry raincoat.
Kemper said, “I thought you’d be in Dallas.”
Littell shook his head. “I don’t need to see it. And there’s something in L.A. I do need to see.”
“I like your suit, son. It’s good to see you dressing so nicely.”
Littell dropped the raincoat. Kemper saw the gun and cracked a big shit-eating grin.
Littell shot him. The impact knocked him off his chair.
The second shot felt like HUSH NOW. Kemper died thinking of Jack.
99
(Beverly Hills, 11/22/63)
The bellhop handed over his passkey and pointed out the bungalow. Littell handed him a thousand dollars.
The man was astonished. The man kept saying, “You just want to see him?”
I WANT TO SEE THE PRICE.
They stood by the housekeeping shed. The bellhop kept checking their blind side. He said, “Make it quick. You’ve got to be out before those Mormon guys get back from breakfast.”
Littell walked away from him. His head raced two hours ahead and locked in to Texas time.
The bungalow was salmon-pink and green. The key unlocked three deadbolts.
Littell walked in. The front room was filled with medical freezers and intravenous drip caddies. The air reeked of witch hazel and bug spray.
