American tabloid

36

Kemper snapped the lock with his Diners Club card. Lenny didn’t learn that it takes deadbolts to keep rogue cops out.

Littell never learned that INFORMANTS DON’T RETIRE. He observed the retirement gala from the street-and saw Ward soak up abuse like a true flagellant.

Kemper closed the door and stood in the dark. Lenny walked to the A amp;P ten minutes ago, and should return within half an hour.

Laura learned not to press embarrassing topics. She never mentioned that call at the St. Regis.

Kemper heard footsteps and key sounds. He moved toward the light switch and screwed the silencer to his piece.

Lenny walked in. Kemper said, “It’s not over.”

A shopping bag fell. Glass broke.

“You don’t talk to Laura or Littell again. You work Hush-Hush for Pete. You find out everything you can about the Pension Fund books and report exclusively to me.”

Lenny said, “No.”

Kemper hit the switch. The living room lit up-antiqueoverfurnished and trиs, trиs effete.

Lenny blinked. Kemper shot the legs off an armoire. The crash shattered bone china and crystal.

He shot up a bookcase. He shot a Louis Fourteen couch into stuffing wads and wood chips. He shot up a hand-painted Chippendale wardrobe.

Sawdust and muzzle smoke swirled. Kemper got out a fresh clip.

Lenny said, “Yes.”

DOCUMENT INSERT: 10/5/59. Hush-Hush magazine article. Written by Lenny Sands, under the pseudonym Peerless Politicopundit.

CANCEROUS CASTRO COMMUNISTICALLY CALCIFIES CUBA

WHILE HEROIC HERMANOS HUNGER FOR HOMELAND!

He’s been in power a scant ten months, but the Free World already has the number of that slogan-slamming, stogie-stinking strongman Fidel Castro!

Castro ousted the democratically-elected antiCommunist Cuban Premier Fulgenclo Batista last New Year’s day. The bombastic busby-bearded beatnik bard promised land reforms, social justice and pickled plantains on every plate-the standard stipends of welfare-waffled Commie commissars. He took over a small bastion of freedom 90 miles off U.S. shores, pathologically picked the pockets of patriotic patriarchs, nauseously “nationalized” U.S.-owned hotel-casinos, fried the friendly fragrant fields of the United Fruit Company and generally absconded with astronomical amounts of America’s most peonprotecting, Commie-constraining export: money!!!

Yes, kats and kittens, it all comes down to divinely-deigned dollops of dollars-U.S., of course, those gorgeously garlanded greenbacks replete with pulsatingly powerful Presidential portraits, caricatures captivating in their corrosive condemnation of Communism!!!

Item: the beatnik bard bamboozled beleaguered bellhops at the formerly swank Nacional and Capri hotels in Havana, nastily nationalized their tips and rapidly replaced them with a regiment of rowdy Red regulators-bandy-legged bantamweight bandidos who also serve as crucifyingly-corrupt craps croupiers!

Item: fruit fields frantically french-fried! Peons passionately protected by America’s altruistically-altered egalitarian economy are now welfare-wilted., pauper-periled Red Recidivists grubbing for Commie compensation!

Item: Raul “The Tool” Castro has flamboyantly flooded Florida with hellishly horrific, hopheadhazarding amounts of the demonically deadly “Big H”: Heroin!!! He’s bent on needle-notching vast legions of Cuban immigrant slaves: zorched-out zombies to spread the cancerous Castro gospel between bouts of Heroin-biatused, junkiejunketeered euphoria!

Item: there’s a growing number of Cuban exiles and home-grown American patriots who take egregious exception to the beatnik brothers’ broadside of bamboozlement. Right now they’re recruiting in Miami and South Florida. These men are tantalizingly tough tigers who have earned their orange-and-black-not Red-stripes in the jungles of Castro’s jam-packed, jerry-rigged jails. Every day, more and more men like them are arriving on America’s shores, anxious to sing the mellifluous melodies of “My Country ‘Tis of Thee.”

This reporter talked to an American named “Big Pete,” a dedicated anti-Communist currently training anti-Castro guerrillas. “It all comes down to patriotism,” Big Pete said. “Do you want a Communist dictatorship 90 miles off our shores or not? I don’t, so I’ve joined the Cuban Freedom Cause. And I’d like to extend an invitation to all Cuban exiles and native-born men of Cuban descent. Join us. If you’re in Miami, ask around. Local Cubans will tell you we mean business.”

Item: with men like Big Pete on the job, Castro should be considering a new career. Hey! I know a few coffeehouses in L.A. ‘s way-out Venice West who could use a gone beatnik poet like Fidel! Hey, Fidell Can you dig it, Daddy-O?

Remember, dear reader, you heard it first here: off the record, on the Q.T. and very Hush-Hush.

DOCUMENT INSERT: 10/19/59. Personal Note: J. Edgar Hoover to Howard Hughes.

Dear Howard,

I greatly enjoyed Peerless Politicopundit’s piece in the October 5th Issue of Hush-Hush. It was, of course, far-fetched, but subtract the purple prose and what remains is politically substantive.

Lenny Sands has certainly adapted to the Hush-Hush style. And as a fledgling propagandist he shows promise. I found the subliminally-planted plugs for the Tiger Kab Kompany to be a nice little aside to the cognoscenti, and especially enjoyed the lofty sentiments expressed by our pragmatist friend Pierre Bondurant.

All in all, a most salutary issue.

Warmest regards,

Edgar

DOCUMENT INSERT: 10/30/59. Summary Report: John Stanton to Kemper Boyd. Marked: CONFIDENTIAL/HAND POUCH DELIVER.

Dear Kemper,

A short note to keep you advised of some recent policy decisions, You remain hard to reach, so I’m sending this to you via courier.

First off, our superiors are now more than ever convinced that the Castro problem will extend. Although the President’s latest allocation came in low, we have every hope that Castro’s powers of persistence will loosen up the White House pursestrings. To paraphrase our friend Peerless Poiticopundit: “Nobody wants a Communist dictatorship ninety miles from our shores.” (I wish I could write reports like he writes yellow journalism.)

Mr. Dulles, Deputy Director Bissell and selected Cuban-expert case officers are beginning to plan for an exile invasion in late 1960 or early 1961. It is assumed that by that date the Agency will have a pool of at least ten thousand well-trained U.S.-based exile troops to draw from, and that public opinion will be strongly on our Side. The general idea is to launch an amphibious assault force, backed by air cover, from Gulf Coast campsite-launch sites. I’ll keep you abreast as plans develop further. And you keep at our friend Jack. If this plan stays on hold until after January 20, 1961, there’s a chance he’ll be the man to approve it or scrap it.

Since we last spoke, eleven more “Banana Barges” have landed in Florida and Louisiana. Regional case officers have been assigned immigrant caseloads and are dispersing the men to various campsites. Many who decline regular Agency assistance will be heading to Miami. I’ll be curious to see if our Cadre latches on to any of them. As I’m sure you know, the Blessington site is now ready to house troops formally. I have approved the hiring of Douglas Frank Lockhart to run the camp, and I think it is time to rotate our Cadre on a Miami-business, Blessingtontraining axis. Put Pete Bondurant and Chuck Rogers on this immediately, and have Bondurant pouch deliver a report to me inside six weeks.

Per our Cadre’s Miami “business,” and in keeping with our elliptical way of discussing it, I’ll state that I’m glad profits seem to be growing and that the agreement you reached with our Agency-friendly source in Mexico seems to be flourishing.- I envision a time when our superiors will vet this “business” as good common sense, but until anti-Castro rancor or whatever reaches that point I must stress absolute compartmentalization and secrecy. Mr. Trafficante’s participation must remain secret, and I would not want it generally known that Mr. S. Giancana and Mr. C. Marcello have also contributed to the Cause.

Keep me posted, and burn this communique.

All best,

John

DOCUMENT INSERT: 11/1/59. Summary Report: Kemper Boyd to Robert F. Kennedy.

Dear Bob,

I had a talk with James Dowd, the head of the Organized Crime Section at the Department of Justice. (I knew him when he was with the U.S. Attorney’s Office.) As a courtesy, I had sent Mr. Dowd carbons of the paperwork I forwarded to various grand juries seeking Hoffa evidence, and now that courtesy seems to be bringing results.

As you know, the Landrum-Griffin Labor Reform Bill passed Congress, so now the Republican-dominated Justice Department has a clear “Get Hoffa” mandate. Dowd has deployed investigators and assistant-counsels to grand jury investigatory bodies in Ohio, Louisiana and Florida. The McClellan Committee spawned LandrumGriffin; everyone knows it. Dowd has seen the political light and has decided to concentrate his energy on our Sun Valley evidence. (He thinks the two missing witnesses-Gretzler and Kirpaski- give it a moral weight.) As of 10/25/59, he had assigned six men to serve with three south Florida grand juries. They are actively seeking disgruntled Teamsters who had purchased Sun Valley property. Dowd thinks the “Get Hoffa” process will be grindingly attenuated, which suits our political purposes to a degree.

My strongest sense is that we do not want “Get Hoffa” rancor to go too bi-partisan, and we do want Jack to stand out as the anti-labor corruption candidate. Dowd told me that he expects Hoffa to barnstorm primary election states and deluge voters with anti-Kennedy sentiment, and I think this may play into our hands. As hard as he sometimes tries to hide it, under duress Hoffa always comes off as a psychopathic thug. We want the Teamsters to endorse the Republican candidate. We want Richard Nixon to take Hoffa’s money and sidestep labor corruption as an issue in the general election. That said, I think it is imperative that Jack redouble his efforts to woo legitimate labor leaders and convince them that he differentiates them from Hoffaites.

I’m shifting my emphasis now to the primaries. The Kennedy crime fighter image has impressed many of my normally-Republican law enforcement acquaintances, and I’m working my way through Wisconsin, New Hampshire and West Virginia county by county. Your local organizations seem sound, and I’ve told each and every volunteer I’ve met to keep their ears down for Hoffa barn-storming scuttlebutt.

More later. Write your book; I think it could be a valuable campaign tool.

Yours,

Kemper

DOCUMENT INSERT: 11/9/59. Memorandum: Robert F. Kennedy to Kemper Boyd.

Kemper,

Thanks for the note. You’re starting to think politically, and I think your Hoffa-Republican observations were quite astute. I’m glad the Justice Department has focused on Sun Valley, which I have always considered our strongest Hoffa case.

I’ve always believed that illegally-procured Pension Fund money (the “Spooky” 3 mIllion) financed Hoffa’s Sun Valley investment, and that Hoffa skimmed a large amount off the top. Some Pension Fund leads and/or Intelligence on the possibility of “Real” Pension Fund books would do us a lot of good now. What’s the Chicago Phantom been doing? You’ve always portrayed this anonymous Jesuit crusader as quite a worker, but you haven’t forwarded a Phantom report to me in months.

Bob

DOCUMENT INSERT: 11/17/89. Note: Kemper Boyd to Robert F. Kennedy.

Dear Bob,

I agree. We certainly could use some Pension Fund leads now. The Phantom is working hard, but he’s run up against one brick wall after another. And keep in mind, he’s an FBI agent with a full load of regular duties. He’s persisting, but as I’ve said before, it’s very slow going.

Kemper

DOCUMENT INSERT: l2/4/59. FBI Field Surveillance Report: Chicago Special Agent-in-Charge Charles Leahy to J. Edgar Hoover. Marked: EXTREMELY CONFIDENTIAL/DIRECTOR’S EYES ONLY.

Sir,

Per your request, agents co-opted from the Sioux City Office have kept SA Ward J. Littell under spot surveillance since 9/15/59. He has not been observed in the vicinity of Celano’s Tailor Shop, and he has apparently refrained from covert antiOrganized Crime activity. He has not been seen with SA Kemper Boyd, and the (11/20/89 Initiated) tap on his home telephone indicates that he speaks only to Helen Agee, with occasional calls to his ex-wife Margaret. He does not call or receive calls from his daughter Susan, and since the 11/20/59 tap initiation date SA Boyd has not called him.

Littell’s work performance has steadily deteriorated. This decline was in effect before the spot tails were initiated. Assigned to surveil CPUSA members in Hyde Park and Rogers Park, Littell frequently abandons his surveillance positions to drink in taverns or visit various Catholic churches.

Littell’s Red Squad reports have been slip-shod. He regularly misrepresents the hours he spends on his assignments and his comments on CPUSA members can only be considered overly charitable.

On 11/26/59, SA W.R. Hinckle observed CPUSA cell leader Malcolm Chamales accost Littell outside his apartment building. Chamales accused Littell of “FBI black bag chicanery” and challenged him to respond. Littell invited Chamales to a tavern. SA Hinckie observed them engaged in a political discussion. They met again on 11/29 and 12/1. SA Hinckle observed both meetings and believes the two men are becoming friends or at least drinking companions.

Bureau-friendly University of Chicago sources have reported that SA Littell and Helen Agee have been seen on campus arguing heatedly. Their affair appears to be strained and Miss Agee was overheard urging Littell to seek help for his drinking problem. On 11/3/59, BA J.S. Burtler observed Littell and Miss Agee engage in a political discussion. Miss Agee expressed admiration for Vice-President Richard Nixon. – Littell referred to Mr. Nixon as “Tricky Dick” and called him a “Red-baiting, slush-fund financed cryptofascist.”

In conclusion: a pro-Communist profile of Littell is now being compiled. I believe that his subversive statements, treasonous Red Squad omissions and friendship with Malcolm Chamales will continue and comprise a damaging security risk portrait.

Respectfully,

Charles Leahy

SAC, Chicago Office

DOCUMENT INSERT: 12/21/59. Field Report: Pete Bondurant to Kemper Boyd, “For Forwarding to John Stanton.” Marked: KB-BE CAREFUL HOW YOU TRANSMIT THIS.