American tabloid

68

Their room adjoined the radio hut. Invasion updates seeped through the walls uninvited.

Marcello tried to sleep. Littell tried to study deportation law.

Kennedy refused to order a second air strike. Rebel soldiers were captured and slaughtered on the beach.

Reserve troops were chanting “PIGS! PIGS! PIGS! PIGS! PIGS!” That silly word roared through the barracks quadrangle.

Right-wing dementia: mildly distracting. Mildly gratifying: a detectable rise in contempt for John F Kennedy.

Littell watched Marcello toss and turn. He was bunking with a Mafia chieftain-mildly amazing.

His charade worked. Carlos scanned ledger columns and recognized his own Fund transactions. His indebtedness increased exponentially.

Carlos was accruing large legal debts. Carlos owed his safety to a reformed FBI crirnebuster.

Guy Banister called this morning. He said he picked up some straight dope: Bobby Kennedy knows that Carlos is really hiding out in Guatemala.

Bobby applied diplomatic pressure. The Guatemalan prime minister kowtowed. Carlos would be deported, “but not swiftly.”

Banister used to call him a weak sister. His phone manner was near-deferential now.

Marcello started snoring. He was drooping off his army cot in monogrammed silk pajamas.

Littell heard shouts and banging noises next door. He formed a picture: men slapping desks and kicking odd inanimate objects.

“It’s a washout”/”That vacillating chickenshit”/”He won’t send in planes or ships to shell the beach,”

Littell walked outside. The troopers, worked up a new chant.

“KEN-NEDY, DON’T SAY NO! KEN-NEDY, LET US GO!”

They bounced around the quad. They swigged straight gin and vodka. They gobbled pills and kicked apothecary jars like soccer balls.

The case officers’ lounge had been looted. The dispensary door had been trampled to pulp.

“KEN-NEDY, LET US GO! KEN-NEDY IS A PU-TO!”

Littell stepped inside and grabbed the wall phone. Twelve coded digits got him Tiger Kab direct.

A man said, “Sн? cabstand.”

“I’m looking for Kemper Boyd. Tell him it’s Ward Littell.”

“Sн. One second.”

Littell unbuttoned his shirt-the humidity was awful. Carlos mumbled through a bad dream.

Kemper picked up. “What is it, Ward?”

“What is it with you? You sound anxious.”

“There’s riots all over the Cuban section, and the invasion isn’t going our way. Ward, what is-?”

“I got word that the Guatemalan government’s looking for Carlos. Bobby Kennedy knows he’s here, and I think I should move him again.”

“Do it. Rent an apartment outside Guatemala City, and call me with the phone number. I’ll have Chuck Rogers meet you there and fly you someplace more removed. Ward, I can’t talk now. Call me when-”

The line went dead. Overtaxed circuits-mildly annoying. Mildly amusing: Kemper C. Boyd mildly flustered.

Littell walked outside. The chants were a good deal more than mildly pissed-off.

“KEN-NEDY IS A PU-TO! KEN-NEDY FEARS Fl-DEL CAS-TRO!”