Littell stood up, blushing. “She’s meeting me later, at my hotel. I told her men liked women who traveled for them. And she’s been the pursuer so far.”
“Helen Agee is a college girl in the guise of a Mack truck. Remember that if things get complicated.”
Littell laughed, and walked off primping. His posture was good, but those dented glasses had to go.
Idealists disdained appearances. Ward had no flair for nice things.
Kemper ordered a second martini and watched the back booths. Echoes drifted his way-congressmen were talking up Cuba.
John Stanton called Cuba a potential Agency hotspot. He said, I might have work for you.
Jack Kennedy walked in. Lyndon Johnson’s redhead passed him a napkin note.
Jack saw Kemper and winked.
Part II
January 1959-January 1961
12
Unidentified Male #1: “Beard, schmeard. All I know is Mo’s real fuckin’ nervous.”
Unidentified Male #2: “The Outfit’s always covered its bets Cuba-wise. Santo T. is Batista’s best fuckin’ friend. I talked to Mo maybe an hour ago. He goes out for the paper and comes back to watch the fuckin’ Rose Bowl on TV. The paper says Happy fuckin’ New Year, Castro has just taken over Cuba and who knows if he’s pro-U.S., pro-Russian or pro-Man-from-Mars.”
Littell tilted his seat back and adjusted his headphones. It was 4:00 p.m. and snowing-but the Celano’s Tailor Shop talkfest talked on.
He was alone at the THP bug post. He was violating Bureau rugs and Mr. Hoover’s direct orders.
Man #1: “Santo and Sam got to be sweating the casinos down there. The gross profit’s supposed to run half a million a day.”
Man #2: “Mo told me Santo called him right before the kickoff. The crazy fuckin’ Cubans down in Miami are pitching a fit. Mo’s got a piece of that cabstand, you know the one?”
Man #1: “Yeah, the Tiger Kabs. I went down there for the Teamster convention last year and rode in one of those cabs, and I was picking orange and black fuzz out of my ass for the next six fuckin’ months.”
Man #2: “Half those Cuban humps are pro-Beard, and half of them are pro-Batista. Santo told Sam it’s nuts at the stand, like niggers when their welfare checks don’t arrive.”
Laughter hit the feed box-static-laced and overamplified. Littell unhooked his headset and stretched.
He had two hours left on his shift. He’d gleaned no salient intelligence so far: Cuban politics didn’t interest him. He’d logged in ten days of covert listening-and accrued no hard evidence.
He cut a deal with SA Court Meade-a surreptitious work trade. Meade’s mistress lived in Rogers Park; some Commie cell leaders lived nearby. They worked out an agreement: I take your job, you take mine.
They spent cosmetic time working their real assignments and flip-flopped all report writing. Meade chased Reds and an insurance-rich widow. He listened to hoodlums colloquialize.
Court was lazy and pension-secure. Court had twenty-seven years with the Bureau.
He was careful. He hoarded insider knowledge of Kemper Boyd’s Kennedy incursion. He filed detailed Red Squad reports and forged Meade’s signature on all THP memoranda.
He always watched the street for approaching agents. He always entered and exited the bug post surreptitiously.
The plan would work-for a while. The lackluster bug talk was vexing-he needed to recruit an informant.
He’d tailed Lenny Sands for ten consecutive nights. Sands did not habituate homosexual meeting spots. His sexual bent might not prove exploitable-Sands might belittle the threat of exposure.
Snow swirled up Michigan Avenue. Littell studied his one wallet photo.
It was a laminated snapshot of Helen. Her hairdo made her burn scars stand out.
The first time he kissed her scars she wept. Kemper called her “the Mack Truck Girl.” He gave her a Mack truck bulldog hood hanger for Christmas.
Claire Boyd told Susan they were lovers. Susan said, “When the shock wears off, I’ll tell Dad what I think.”
She still hadn’t called him.
Littell put on his headset. He heard the tailor shop door slam.
Unknown Man #1: “Sal, Sal D. Sal, do you believe this weather? Don’t you wish you were down in Havana shooting dice with the Beard?”
“Sal D.”: most likely Mario Salvatore D’Onofrio, AKA “Mad Sal.” Key THP stats:
Independent bookmaker/loan shark. One manslaughter conviction in 1951. Labeled “a psychopathically-derived criminal sadist with uncontrollable psycho-sexual urges to inflict pain.”
Unknown Man #2: “Che se dice, Salvatore? Tell us what’s new and unusual.”
Sal D.: “The news is I lost a bundle on the Colts over the Giants, and I had to tap Sam for a fucking loan.”
Unknown Man #1: “You still got the church thing, Sal? Where you take the paisan groups out to Tahoe and Vegas?”
Static hit the line. Littell slapped the feed box and cleared the air flow.
Sal D.: “…and Gardena and L.A. We catch Sinatra and Dino, and the casinos set us up in these private slot rooms and kick back a percentage. It’s what you call a junket-you know, entertainment and gambling and shit. Hey, Lou, you know Lenny the Jew?”
Lou/Man #1: “Yeah, Sands. Lenny Sands.”
Man #2: “Jewboy Lenny. Sam G.’s fuckin’ court jester.”
Squelch noise drowned out the incoming voices. Littell slapped the console and untangled some feeder conis.
Sal D.: “…So I said, ‘Lenny, I need a guy to travel with me. I need a guy to keep my junketeers lubed up and laughing, so they’ll lose more money and juke up my kickbacks.’ He said, ‘Sal, I don’t audition, but catch me at the North Side Elks on January 1st. I’m doing a Teamster smoker, and if you don’t dig-’”
The heat needle started twitching. Littell hit the kill switch and felt the feed box go cool to the touch.
The D’Onofrio/Sands connection was interesting.
He checked Sal D.’s on-post file. The agent’s summary read horrific.
D’Onofrio lives in a South Side Italian enclave surrounded by Negro-inhabited housing projects. The majority of his bettors and loan customers live within that enclave and D’ Onofrio makes his collection rounds on foot, rarely missing a day. D’Onoflio considers himself to be a guiding light within his community, and the Cook County Sheriff’s Gangster Squad believes that he plays the role of “protector”-i.e., protecting Italian-Americans against Negro criminal elements, and that this role and his strongarrn collection and intimidation tactics have helped to insure his long bookmaker/loan shark reign. It should also be noted that D’Onofrio was a suspect in the unsolved 12/19/57 torture-murder of Maurice Theodore Wilkins, a Negro youth suspected of burglarizing a church rectory in his neighborhood.
A mug shot was clipped to the folder. Mad Sal was cyst-scarred and gargoyle ugly.
o o o
Littell drove to the South Side and circled D’Onofrio’s loan turf. He spotted him on 59th and Prairie.
The man was walking. Littell ditched his car and foot-tailed him from thirty yards back.
Mad Sal entered apartment buildings and exited counting money. Mad Sal tabulated transactions in a prayer book. Mad Sal picked his nose compulsively and wore low-top tennis shoes in a blizzard.
Littell stuck close behind him. Wind claps covered his footsteps.
Mad Sal peeped in windows. Mad Sal took a beat cop’s money: $5 on the Moore/Durelle rematch.
The streets were near-deserted. The tail felt like a sustained hallucination.