33

Banister supplied files and pedigree notes. Pete narrowed his prospects down to three men.

His hotel room was file-inundated. He was deluged with rap sheets and FBI reports-the far-right South captured on paper.

He got the scoop on Ku Klux Klan klowns and neo-Nazis. He learned about the National States Rights Party. He marveled at the pointy-heads on the FBI payroll-half the Klans in Dixie were Fed-saturated.

Fed snitches were out castrating and lynching. Hoover’s only real concern was KKK mail-fraud minutiae.

A fan ruffled loose file papers. Pete stretched out on the bed and blew smoke rings.

Memo to Kemper Boyd:

The Agency should bankroll a Blessington KKK Klavem. Dirtpoor crackers surrounded the campsite-spic haters all. Klan hijinks would help keep them diverted.

Pete skimmed rap sheets. His instinct held-his prospects were the least rabid of the bunch.

Said prospects:

The Reverend Wilton Tompkins Evans, ex-con radio messiah. Pastor of the “Anti-Communist Crusade of the Air,” a weekly short-wave tirade. Spanish-fluent; ex-paratrooper; three convictions for statutory rape. Banister’s assessment: “Capable and tough, but perhaps too anti-papist to work with Cubans. He’d be a great training officer and I’m sure he’d relocate, because he can broadcast his radio program from anywhere. Close friend of Chuck Rogers.”

Douglas Frank Lockhart, FBI informant/Klansman. Ex-Tank Corps sergeant; ex-Dallas cop; ex-gun runner to rightist dictator Rafael Trujillo. Banister’s assessment: “Probably the premier Klan informant in the South and a true Klan zealot in his own right. Tough and brave, but easily led and somewhat volatile. Seems to bear no grudge against Latins, especially if they are strongly anti-Communist.”

Henry Davis Hudspeth, the South’s #1 purveyor of hate propaganda. Spanish fluent; expert in Hapkido jujitsu. World War II fighter ace, with thirteen Pacific Theater kills. Banister’s assessment: “I like Hank, but he can be stubborn and untowardedly vitriolic. He’s currently working for me as liaison between my exile camp near Lake Pontchartrain and Dougie Frank Lockhart’s nearby Klan Klavern. (I own the property both are situated on.) Hank’s a good man, but maybe not suited for second banana status.”

All three men were close by. All three had party plans tonight-the Klan was torching a cross out by Guy’s camp.

Pete tried to notch a pre-cross-burn nap. He was running on a sleep deficit-his past three weeks were hectic and exhausting.

Boyd glommed some morphine from that CIA-friendly dope ranch. He flew it out to L.A. and gave it to Mr. Hughes.

Mr. Hughes appreciated the gift. Mr. Hughes said, Go back to Miami with my best wishes.

He didn’t tell him, I’m an anti-Red crusader now. With 5% of two casinos forever-if Cuba trades Red for Red, White and Blue.

Boyd sold the deal to Trafficante. Marcello, Giancana and Rosselli agreed to it. Boyd figured they’d make at least fifteen million dollars per year per man.

He told Lenny to swamp Hush-Hush with anti-Castro propaganda. He told him to shitcan the sex jive that Hughes and Hoover drooled for. He told him to make up some skank to keep them happy.

L.A. was prison camp. Florida was summer camp.

He flew back to Miami quicksville. Boyd had signed on the Mexican dope farm as the Cadre’s chief supplier. Chuck flew the initial fourteen pounds down for cutting and brought it back at six times the weight. Trafficante kicked loose bonuses for all Cadre personnel.

He gave them sawed-offs and magnums. He gave them bulletproof vests and cherry-new dopemobiles.

Fulo chose a ‘59 Eldo. Chuck picked out a sweet Ford Vicky. Delsol, Obregуn, Paez and Gutidrrez were all Chevy men. Spics will be spics-they tacoized their sleds from stem to stern.

He met the men and got to know them.

Gutierrez was solid and quiet. Delsol was calculating and smart. His cousin Obregуn seemed borderline dicey-Boyd was starting to think he might run light on balls.

Santo Junior retooled his Miami dope biz. The Cadre took over the nigger trade exclusively.

Boyd decreed free tastes for all local junkies. The Cadre dispensed a shitload of shit totally gratis. Chuck renamed Niggertown Cloud Nine.

They segued from philanthropy to business. They prowled and sold their shit in two-man cars-with shotguns in plain sight A junkie tried to rob Ramуn Gutierrez. Teo Paez cut him down with rat-poison-laced buckshot

Santo Junior was pleased so far. Santo proffered the #1 Cadre Commandment: You may not sample the merchandise. Pete proffered Commandment #2: If you use Big “H,” I will kill you.

Miami was Crime Heaven. Blessington was the Pearly Gates To.

The campsite took up fourteen acres. The installation included two bunkhouses, a weapons shed, an operations hut, a drill field and a landing strip. A dock and speedboat launch site were still in construction.

Cadre recruiters jumped the gun and sent some training prospects down. Local crackers took offense at the spic squatters on their turf. Pete hired some unemployed Klansmen to work on the dock. The move facilitated a temporary peace-Klavernites and exiles were toiling together.

Fourteen squatters were now in residence. More exiles were fleeing Cuba every day. There were more CIA campsites pending-with forty-odd projected by mid-1960.

Castro would survive-just long enough to make Boyd and him rich.

o o o

The cross burned high and wide. Pete caught the glow from half a mile out.

A dirt road veered off the highway. Signs pointed the way: “Nigger stay out!” “KKK-White Man Unite!”

Bugs popped in through his air vents. Pete swatted them off. He saw a barbed-wire fence and Klansmen at parade rest.

They wore white robes and hoods with purple piping. Dig their kanine kompanions: sheet-swaddled Doberman pinschers.

Pete flashed Banister’s gate pass. The pointy-heads checked him out and waved him in.

He parked beside some trucks and went strolling. The cross lit up a segregated pine-forest clearing.

Cubans milled around on one side. Whites boogie-woogied on the other. A row of sign-plastered trailers divided them.

On his left: Klan bake sale, Klan rifle range, vendors hawking Klan regalia. On his right: the Blessington campsite duplicated.

Pete strolled the redneck side. Pointy-hoods bobbed his way- Hey, man, where’s your sheet?

Bugs buzz-bombed the cross. Rifle shots and target pings overlapped. The humidity was close to 100%.

Nazi arrnbands went for $2.99. Jew rabbi voodoo dolls-a steal at 3 for $5.00.

Pete walked by the trailers. He saw a sandwich board propped up against an old Airstream: “WKKK-Rev. Evans AntiCommunist Crusade.”

A hi-fi speaker was bolted to the axle. Sound sputtered out- pure crackpot gibberish.

He looked in the window. He saw twenty-odd cats pissing, shitting and fucking. A tall geek was screaming into a microphone. A cat was clawing some short-wave wires, about to get French-fried to kingdom come.

Pete scratched one prospect and kept walking. All the Caucasoids wore hoods-he couldn’t match Hudspeth or Lockhart to their mug shots.

“Bondurant! Down here!”

It was Guy Banister’s voice, booming up from below ground level.

A hatch snapped out of the dirt. A periscope thingamajig popped up and wiggled.

Guy had rigged himself a fucking bomb shelter.

Pete dropped down into it. Banister pulled the hatch shut behind him.

The space was twelve-by-twelve square. Playboy pinups covered the walls. Guy had socked in a shitload of Van Camp’s pork amp; beans and bourbon.

Banister retracted the telescope. “You looked lonesome all by yourself with no sheet.”