American tabloid

39

Littell got off the train and checked for tails.

The arrivals and departures looked normal-just Notre Dame kids and anxious parents. Some cheerleaders shivered-shortskirted pompom girls out in ten-degree weather.

The crowd dispersed. No platform loiterers stuck close to him. In a phrase: The Phantom sees phantoms.

Tail sightings were a probable booze-by-product. The clicks on his phone line were most likely overactive nerves.

He’d dismantled his two phones. He found no wiretap apparatus. The Mob couldn’t rig outside taps-only police agencies could. That man watching him and Mal Chamales last week-probably just a barfly tweaked by their left-of-center conversation.

Littell hit the station lounge and knocked back three rye-andbeers. Christmas dinner with Susan mandated fortification.

o o o

Amenities dragged. Talk bounced between safe topics.

Susan tensed when he hugged her. Helen steered clear of his hands. Claire had grown into a distaff Kemper-the resemblance had solidified amazingly.

Susan never addressed him by name. Claire called him “Ward baby”-Helen said she was in a Rat Pack phase. Susan smoked like her mother now-straight down to match flicks and exhales.

Her apartment mimicked Margaret’s: too many porcelain knickknacks and too much stiff furniture.

Claire played Sinatra records. Susan served diluted eggnog- Helen must have told her that her father drank to excess.

He said he hadn’t heard from Kemper in months. Claire smiled-she knew all her father’s secrets. Susan laid out dinner: Margaret’s boring glazed ham and sweet potatoes.

They sat down. Littell bowed his head and offered a prayer.

“O heavenly Father, we ask thy blessing on all of us, and on our absent friends. I commend to you the souls of three men recently departed, whose deaths were caused by arrogant if heartfelt attempts to facilitate justice. I ask you to bless all of us on this sacred day and in the year to come.”

Susan rolled her eyes and said “Amen.” Claire carved the ham; Helen poured wine.

The girls got full glasses. He got a splash. It was cheap Cabernet Sauvignon.

Claire said, “My Dad’s proposing to his mistress tonight. Let’s hear it for my Dad and my nifty new mom, who’s only nine and a half years older than me.”

Littell almost gagged. Social climber Kemper as secret Kennedy in-law-

Susan said, “Claire, really. ‘Mistress’ and ‘nifty’ in the same sentence?”

Claire made cat claws. “You forgot to mention the age difference. How could you? We both know that age gaps are your pet peeve.”

Helen groaned. Susan pushed her plate aside and lit a cigarette.

Littell filled his glass. Claire said, “Ward baby, assess the three of us as attorneys.”

Littell smiled. “It’s not hard. Susan prosecutes misdemeanors, Helen defends wayward FBI men, and Claire goes into corporate law to finance her father’s expensive tastes in his old age.”

Helen and Claire laughed. Susan said, “I don’t appreciate being defined by pettiness.”

Littell gulped wine. “You can join the Bureau, Susie. I’ll be retiring in a year and twenty-one days, and you can take my place and torment pathetic leftists for Mr. Hoover.”

“I wouldn’t characterize Communists as pathetic, Father. And I don’t think you could support your bar tab on a twenty-year pension.”

Claire flinched. Helen said, “Susan, please.”

Littell grabbed the bottle. “Maybe I’ll go to work for John F. Kennedy. Maybe he’ll be elected President. His brother hates organized crime more than Communists, so maybe it runs in the family.”

Susan said, “I can’t believe you place common hoodlums in the same league as a political system that has enslaved half the world. I can’t believe that you could be hoodwinked by a fatuous liberal politician whose father intends to buy him the presidency.”

“Kemper Boyd likes him.”

“Excuse me, Father, and excuse me, Claire, but Kemper Boyd worships money, and we all know that John F Kennedy has plenty of that.”

Claire ran out of the room. Littell flat-guzzled wine.

“Communists don’t castrate innocent men. Communists don’t hook up car batteries to people’s genitals and electrocute them. Communists don’t drop TV sets into bathtubs or-”

Helen ran out. Susan said, “Father, goddamn you for your weakness.”

o o o

He called in accumulated sick leave and holed up through New Year’s. The A amp;P delivered food and liquor.

Law school finals kept Helen away. They talked on the phone-mostly petty chitchat and sighs. He heard occasional clicks on the line and wrote them off to nerves.

Kemper didn’t call or write. The man was ignoring him.

He read Bobby Kennedy’s book about the Hoffa wars. The story thrilled him. Kemper Boyd did not appear in the text.

He watched the Rose Bowl and Cotton Bowl on TV. He eulogized Icepick Tony Iannone-dead one year ago exactly.

Exactly four rye-and-beers induced euphoria. He fantasized an exact form of courage: the will to move on Jules Schiffrin and the Fund books.

More liquor killed the notion. To moye meant to sacrifice lives. His courage was weakness pushed into grandiosity.

He watched John Kennedy announce his Presidential candidacy. The Senate Caucus Room was packed with his supporters.

Cameras cut to a picket line outside. Teamsters chanted: “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Kennedy says ‘Labor NO!’”

A reporter spoke voice-over: “A Florida grand jury has Teamster president James R. Hoffa under close scrutiny. He is suspected of feluny land fraud in matters pertaining to the Teamsters’ Sun Valley development.”

An insert shot caught Hoffa laughing off Sun Valley.

Littell juxtaposed words:

Pete, kill some men for me, will ya?

Father, goddamn you for your weakness.