Hate.
The Dr. Fred snuff-still unsolved and stonewalled by Jack Leahy. Hate and dope-the jungle was “H”-dry. Marsh Bowen dryly credited black-power consciousness.
Wind toppled Eleanora. Dwight shut the window and put her picture back up. He missed Karen. Eleanora devoured her time. What’s-His-Name was back in L.A. to assist. Karen didn’t know the whole Joan story. She might sense it. He didn’t feel guilty. He felt stretched. It was one more seeping compartment.
He grabbed the wastebasket and pulled out the Wayne photo. He did some DMV research and ID’d the woman last week. Mary Beth Hazzard. Wayne’s West Vegas snafu. The widow of the dead preacher.
He got her DMV file. He compared her driver’s license photo to the kiss shot. It was a drop-dead all-time moment. It brought him back to Joan in a rush.
“What are you thinking about?”
“A friend of mine and the woman he’s with.”
“Tell me about him.”
“He’s in The Life reluctantly. He’s brilliantly skilled and competent and prone to catastrophe.”
“Where is he now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you comfortable with telling me more?”
“No.”
“You’re usually the one asking me all the questions.”
“I know, that’s true.”
A trade show full-booked the Statler. Doors slammed down the corridor. Loud revelry persisted.
It was raining hard. They kept the windows open for the breeze. The room heat kicked in at odd intervals. They pulled the sheets on and off.
“Leander Jackson and Jomo Clarkson had an altercation.”
“I know. I picked Leander up at the hospital.”
“He called you?”
“Yes.”
“You’re strictly BTA now.”
“Not entirely.”
“Tell me about it.”
“I’m not going to.”
“Yet?”
“Yes, yet. I need a moment to work something out. I’ll let you know when it’s settled.”
Dwight yawned. His pill/drink quota hit him early. Joan said, “You should try to sleep.”
He turned off the lights. He kicked his feet out of the sheets for some coolness. Joan tossed her hair and draped a leg over him. Her head fit snug on his shoulder. He reached around and cupped her knife scar.
Four hours, dreamless. A record these days.
Joan was gone. She never left good-bye notes-just lipstick prints. This one: on their spare pillow.
He picked up the nightstand phone. He needed room-service coffee and a line to D.C.
He heard receiver clicks. He pushed the disconnect button and got three more, faint.
Dwight smiled. Bug-and-tap skills. Her curriculum vitae expanded.
He walked to the window and looked down. The porte cochere was busy. He saw a shadow dissolve. He saw smoke rings drift above the awning.
60
(Managua, 1/28/69)
This beaner bin on a lake. Statues of notable fьhrers. Peasants, urban spies and cops with Sten guns. Threadbare overall.
No Hughes flights in. They took La Nica Air to Xolotlan Airport. It was winter muggy. Kids swarmed the cab and hawked baseball cards. Parrots swerved and shit-bombed monuments.
Traffic was slow. Exhaust fumes were thick. The cars ran to pre-’60s belchers. Most street names noted dates: Calle 27 de Mayo to Calle 15 de Septiembre. Froggy said it all pertained to quashed revolution.
Side show, getaway, breather. Nicaragua was a no-sale deal and a sterile stopover. The D.R. was next.
One bright spot loomed. Froggy had a line on an ex-marine colonel. The guy was here now. He lived in the D.R full-time. He’d been in Santo Domingo since the ‘65 war. Froggy’s merc network set up a meeting later.
The guy’s name was Ivar Smith. He agreed to write the pro-D.R. report to Wayne and the wops. Smith called the Frogman yesterday. He said he knew four anti-Castro Cubans. They were eeeeevil. They’d looooove to do wet work out of the D.R.
The cab swerved around a peon with an oxcart. Froggy picked his nose and tossed chump change at beggars. Crutch fingered his lapel pin and re-ran some recent head tapes.
D.C., inauguration night, the Hay-Adams. There’s Sam G. and Gretchen/Celia. Mesplede knows Sam. Mesplede does not know her. Two-second intros, auf wiedersehen.
He told Froggy later: it’s that thieving babe. Froggy shrugged and said the one word: “Cuba.”
A parrot zoomed down and landed on the window ledge. Crutch fed him Fritos out of the bag. He re-punched his replay button and spooled back to Christmas Eve.
Horror House, the hidey-hole, the Commie meeting ledger. The date: 12/6/62. The names: Bergeron, Narduno, Joan.
The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce owned the house then. Three Commies got access. He went by the Chamber and chatted up a clerk. Bum news: the house went unrented in fall/winter ‘62.
The parrot ate all the Fritos and squawked for more. Crutch tried to pet him. The cocksucker bit his hand and flew off.
He foot-tailed Sam and Gretchen/Celia to the Willard Hotel. They had separate suites there. He burgled Gretchen/Celia’s suite the next day. He located her address book. He brought an evidence kit and dusted the cover right there. He got one Joan Rosen Klein latent.
The book pages were coded: weird letters, numbers and symbols. He Minox-photographed every page and put the book back where he found it. He took a biiiiig risk and told Froggy what he’d done. Froggy called a CIA pal in Virginia. A code-breaking manual should arrive in Managua this week. He checked outbound D.C. flights. Sam went back to Vegas. Celia Reyes: Santo Domingo-bound.
“Donald, your hand is bleeding.”
“A parrot bit me.”
“Was it red?”
“Yes.”
“Then you should have killed it.”
The Hotel Lido Palace was lake-close. United Fruit guys hogged the bar and talked golf and oppression. The jukebox played the Chiquita banana song non-stop. UF ran Nicaragua and deployed their Somoza-family puppets. Dissent was a persistent woe akin to parrot shit. UF had a snitch network and a police force. Their mandate: rebuff Red revolt.
Crutch and Froggy settled in and moseyed down to the bar. The waitresses wore hoop skirts and banana-bunch hairdos. Froggy said the country was on Red Alert. Commies were bug-bombing fruit fields. Puppet Man Somoza had pledged reprisals soon.
They glommed an outside booth by a koi pond. Cats perched and drooled for fish dinners. They pawed and snapped and never got close. The koi had sonar and radar.
Ivar Smith was a tall guy in golf togs. He was a gasbag right-winger fueled on pre-noon Singapore Slings. He was the D.R.’s boastmaster general and welcome wagon. He ran a security firm. It assisted Bossman Balaguer’s goon squads. Balaguer craved those U.S. casinos and ached for a fat tourist trade. Yeah, I’ll write that report. The D.R. is ripe fruit. Yanqui, sн, Commie, no. We want your biz.
Pay me. I’m the conduit. I’ll grease Balaguer. The CIA contingent-all boozed-up snatch hounds. Balaguer was a subtle fascisto. He raped pubescent tots in private and evinced public decorum. He was anti-Trujillo that way. The D.R. boded tourist bonanza. Smith’s boys and the La Banda thugs ran pesky jigs back to Haiti routinely. Balaguer had a dual agenda: circumvent due process and eugenically bleach the country three shades lighter. The casinos would attract the swells. Smith’s boys and La Banda would serve as street cleaners and dump trucks.
Yeah, Haiti was close. The Massacre River formed the aptly named dividing line. Smith riffed off Haiti and voodoo. Papa Doc Duvalier raped Haiti like Trujillo raped the D.R. They called Trujillo “the Goat.” He blitzkrieged Haitian settlements within the D.R. It was race shit. Pale-skinned Dominicans have Spanish roots. They hate ink-black Haitians, with their chicken-fucking religion and French affect. The Haitians have leftist allies. There’s a Commie group called the 6/14 Movement. Smith and La Banda suppress it for kicks and grins.