The Jefferson Allegiance

by Bob Mayer

  “Fuck the FBI,” Ducharme said.

  “That’s the spirit,” Pollack said. “Except when the Blackhawk catches up they’ll box me in.”

  The radio came alive once more. “Colonel Ducharme. This is Agent Turnbull. This is way beyond your pay grade. Land immediately, give us what you’ve got and you’re free to go.”

  Ducharme saw the Blackhawk appear above and behind them. The Apache was directly behind, inching so close he could see the two pilots clearly.

  Pollack spoke up on the intercom. “The Sergeant Major said this was important. He’s a lot of fun, but he’s definitely a no bullshit kind of guy when it comes to business.”

  “That he is.”

  “Screw it,” Pollack said. “Country’s going down the crapper anyway.”

  The Blackhawk went by, about a hundred feet higher in altitude. It picked up speed, easily outpacing the older, Vietnam era chopper.

  “What’s he going to do?” Ducharme asked.

  “Try to stop me,” Pollack said. “Thruway’s ahead.”

  Ducharme saw the wide lines of the NY State Thruway about a mile ahead. The Blackhawk suddenly turned and faced them, diving down toward the ground. It flared, directly in their path, hovering. A thousand feet ahead. Nine hundred.

  “Ducharme?” Turnbull’s voice was flat, calm. Eight hundred. “Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be.”

  Ducharme keyed the radio. “It needs to be hard.” Seven hundred. Ducharme leaned out of the Huey, trusting the harness to hold him. Six hundred. He put the MP-5 to his shoulder, aiming forward.

  “Don’t do anything stupid,” Turnbull warned. Five hundred.

  It would be ineffectual at this range, but Ducharme fired a sustained burst anyway, emptying half the magazine. Every third round was a tracer, arcing out in a red blaze toward the Blackhawk. Four hundred feet.

  On the other side of the cargo bay, Kincannon joined in, firing his submachinegun.

  “I will fucking shoot you down,” Turnbull yelled, finally some emotion into his voice.

  “No, you won’t.” Ducharme aimed. Three hundred feet. “Wood disks burn pretty easily.” Two hundred. He fired, emptying the magazine, seeing sparks as rounds hit the armored front of the Blackhawk. One hundred feet.

  Hanging further outward on the harness, Ducharme dropped the magazine out of the well and slammed another one home. Then he dropped it to the end of its sling. He reached into a pocket on the combat vest. The Blackhawk was right in front of them. Ducharme’s stomach lurched once more as Pollock dropped them hard. He didn’t think there was enough room between the bottom of the Blackhawk and the top of the trees.

  And there wasn’t as a branch slapped Ducharme in the side. The Huey stuttered as its nose smashed through treetops. Its blades were scant inches from the Blackhawk’s wheels. Then they were through. Ducharme twisted, and with all his might threw a handful of mini-grenades up and to the rear, barely missing the Huey’s own blades.

  They went off, puffs of explosions right below the Blackhawk. Then he lost sight of it as the Huey banked hard, right on top of a railroad track.

  “I got an idea,” Pollack yelled into the intercom. “I know this area.”

  Ducharme regained his balance and looked back. There was no sign of the Blackhawk, but no sign of a crash either. The Apache was coming, having backed off during the game of chicken.

  “I’m ordering the Apache to shoot you down.” Turnbull did not sound pleased.

  “I don’t think so,” Ducharme said.

  A string of big-ass 30mm tracers sliced across the front of the Huey as the Apache swung wide to get a firing angle.

  “You’ve been warned,” Turnbull said.

  The Huey rolled right. Ducharme braced for a crash as they went below the rail tracks. Then he realized the tracks were on a long trestle, arcing across a valley. The Huey slowed as Pollock flared it. The Apache flashed by overhead, turning hard away from the tracks.

  Pollock turned them toward the long trestle. Massive iron girders reached up from the valley floor to support it. Pollack flew right between two of the supports, blades barely clearing on either side, then swung around to face back the way they’d come. She put one of the sets of girders between them and the approaching Apache. Not the best cover in the world, Ducharme thought, but better than nothing at this point.

  “Come on, come on,” Pollack was whispering into the intercom.

  Ducharme leaned out and fired the entire magazine at the approaching attack helicopter. Several of his rounds richocheted off the iron girders.

  The Apache reached the gap they had just flown and the pilot must have realized his mistake at the last second, trying to stop. The tips of the blades clipped the iron girders. Sparks flew for several long seconds, then the Apache backed off, losing altitude quickly. Ducharme watched it land hard in the field below.

  22 March 1962

  President John F. Kennedy, as was the custom for his lunches with J. Edgar Hoover, had the Oval Office emptied of everyone, even his brother Robert. To Kennedy, today was looking to be a particularly odious session as Hoover was carrying a particularly thick file.

  Kennedy had been advised by Eisenhower to continue a tradition begun by FDR: inviting the head of the FBI to lunch at the White House every month. It was under the principal of keep your friends close, but your enemies closer. Since taking office, Kennedy had stretched the interval out to every two months and he was hoping he could eventually go without seeing the grotesque man at all. Bobbie wasn’t happy about the luncheons either, because technically Hoover worked for the Attorney General, although the man never acted like he answered to Bobbie. Or even the President, Kennedy reflected as he sat on the couch across from Hoover, a low, ornate, coffee table between them, Jackie’s choice.

  Hoover dropped the thick file onto the coffee table with great relish. Kennedy didn’t rise to the bait. Instead he waited as his secretary refilled his coffee cup, offered some to Hoover, and then departed. Kennedy took a sip of coffee and waited some more, refusing to descend into Hoover’s gutter.

  “Interesting wiretaps,” Hoover finally said. “Should I set the stage for them?”

  Kennedy shrugged, knowing the old man would say what he wanted regardless. His back was aching him and he shifted, trying to adjust the brace strapped around his body. He glanced at his watch, thinking ahead to his schedule for the afternoon.

  His thoughts came to an abrupt halt at Hoover’s next two words: “Judith Campbell.”

  Kennedy tried to stay relaxed. “Who?”

  Hoover gave that sickening smile of his. “Las Vegas. 1960. The filming of Oceans Eleven. Your ‘buddy’ Frank Sinatra. He introduced you to her. Don’t you remember?”

  “I can’t recall. I don’t even remember being in Vegas.”

  The smile grew wider. “I can assure you that you were,” Hoover said. He opened the folder and on top was the picture of a woman. He slid it across to Kennedy, who didn’t pick it up.

  “She’s quite beautiful,” Hoover said. “Interesting timing. You were seeking the democratic nomination at the time. Apparently you were seeking more than that, as you became involved with Miss Campbell.”

  “I’m afraid your information is—“

  “Incorrect?” Hoover completed for him. “Do you know how many times I’ve heard that? I never share information unless I am certain it is correct.” He grabbed the next picture in the folder and tossed it on top of Campbell’s. Kennedy’s stomach tightened.

  “Perhaps unknown to you at the time, but certainly known afterwards, was that Sinatra also introduced Miss Campbell to this man.” He leaned forward and tapped the picture. “Sam Giancana. A criminal. Head of what is called the Outfit in Chicago. Since there is no organized crime in this country, the Outfit is a bunch of thieves and murderers.” The sarcasm was dripping from Hoover’s words.

  “It wouldn’t surprise you, of course, to know that Miss Campbell is also Mister Giancana’s mistress?”

>   Kennedy couldn’t tell if it was a question or not, so he remained silent.

  “Of course not.” Hoover answered his own question. “Since Miss Campbell calls you here at the White House using the phone in Mister Giancana’s apartment in Chicago.” Hoover picked up a third picture and threw it down. “Your father. Joseph Kennedy. He had dealings with men like Giancana, especially during Prohibition. I believe the Sinatra introduction was at his behest.”

  Kennedy had not thought of that, but he knew as soon as Hoover said it, that it was true. Chicago. Of course. His father pulling strings.

  Hoover pursed his lips as if in thought. “Now this part is not validated, but comes from credible sources. It seems someone from your campaign gave a bag of cash to Giancana back when you were seeking the Democratic nomination. You did win Illinois, mainly because of a huge push in Chicago. Some would say a statistically impossible push. A lot of votes from the grave.”

  “What do you want?” Kennedy had had enough.

  Hoover picked up the next item in the folder. A thick sheaf of papers. “Come now, Mister President, are you really trying to hire this Giancana fellow and his ‘Outfit’ to assassinate Castro?”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  Hoover blinked. “You really don’t know about that? Curious. Your precious CIA is keeping secrets from you too. But, like me, they know your secrets.”

  “What do you want?”

  Hoover reached over and grabbed the sheaf of papers and the photos, making a large show of putting them back in the folder and shutting it. Kennedy didn’t miss that there was a lot in that folder that Hoover had not brought out.

  “It isn’t what I want. It’s what we want.” Hoover lifted the lapel on the right side of his suit jacket, revealing a medallion. “The Society of the Cincinnati, Mister President.” With his other hand he tapped the thick folder. “We have you—and your brother—by the balls, to use a crude but appropriate metaphor. If I ask for something, we want it. Do you understand?”

  Kennedy just stared back at the old man.

  Hoover stood, tucking the folder under one arm. “Right now, all we want it is for your brother to change his mind and sign off on the paperwork on his desk to wiretap Martin Luther King.”

  “I don’t—“ Kennedy began, then stopped as Hoover waved the folder, as if fanning himself. “All right.”

  5 August 1963

  “I love you too,” President Kennedy said, and then hung up the phone, severing the line to his wife in Hyannis Port.

  “How is Jackie?” the only other occupant of his private dining room on the second floor of the White House asked.

  Kennedy grimaced, both from the pain in his back and the recent conversation. “Not good. The heat is bad, she feels ill and she’s scared.”

  “Of course she’s scared. She already lost one child. I know how she feels.”

  Kennedy watched as Mary Meyer took a sip of her drink. He enjoyed her company—one of the few people he felt comfortable being alone with and simply talking, but to be honest, he still missed their affair.

  “Graham shot himself,” he said, referring to the Washington Post publisher who had killed himself with a shotgun just two days previously. And who, back in January, had pushed his way to the podium at a conference of newspaper editors in Phoenix—even though he wasn’t supposed to speak—and drunkenly delivered a tirade that included references to the President’s ‘new favorite’ Mary Meyer. He had been wrong about the ‘new’ part, Kennedy mused. He’d known Mary since college and she’d long been a staple of White House life.

  “I heard,” Mary said. “I feel for his wife. He’d just gotten out of the hospital. They thought he was better.”

  “He was out of control,” Kennedy said. He had been intimate many times with Mary and even though that part of their relationship had ended with the dual pressures of Graham’s publicity and Jackie’s pregnancy, he still felt a tight bond. He’d once smoked marijuana with her, even tried LSD—not his thing—and she’d been there with him through the Cuban Missile Crisis, Bay of Pigs, and many other significant events of his Presidency. Always someone he could confide in and count on for solid advice. “What’s wrong, Mary? Is it Jackie? She’s fine with your being here.”

  Mary Meyer shook her head. “I was approached by some men. They wanted me to give you a message and they showed me something.”

  “What men?”

  She shook her head. “I can’t tell you, except that they’re for real. Three high-ranking generals and someone—let’s say he’s on a level with Graham.”

  Kennedy frowned. “What did they show you?”

  “A document.” Mary got up from her end of the table and sat caddy-corner to the President and took his hand.

  Kennedy was surprised at the move and the look on her face. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  “Have you ever heard of the Jefferson Allegiance?”

  Kennedy gripped her hand tighter. “A rumor of it. No one has ever confirmed its existence though.”

  “It exists. They showed it to me.”

  Kennedy could feel his back tighten, the old injury from PT-109 coming back to haunt him as it always did when he was under stress. “Why did they show it to you?”

  “They wanted me to give you a message. And they knew you trusted me.”

  “Go on,” Kennedy prompted.

  Mary’s tongue snaked over her lips, a sign of how nervous she was. “They said that they respected what you did during the Missile Crisis. That it was important that one man be in charge and handle things. That it was one of those unique moments with high stakes where the responsibility and decision-making had to rest on the President’s shoulders.”

  “But?” Kennedy prompted.

  “The Bay of Pigs. The Wall being built in Berlin. Your recent speech there worried people. They felt you were continuing to challenge Khrushchev. That it had become personal. And the involvement in Vietnam greatly concerns the military men.”

  Kennedy scoffed. “There are only eleven thousand men in Vietnam—all advisers. And the Pentagon has promised they can be withdrawn by the end of the year after they crush the Vietcong rebels. Vietnam is not an issue.”

  “That is not the way the Philosophers see it.”

  “The ‘Philosophers’? So it’s true that they guard the Allegiance.” He stared at her. “Is it as powerful as rumored?”

  Mary nodded. “If they invoke it, they would remove you from office. And that’s just the beginning.”

  The silence in the dining room lasted a long time before Kennedy spoke again. “What do they want?”

  “For you to use the National Security Council for advice more often. To back off Vietnam. Back off of pressing Khrushchev.”

  “Do they want an answer?”

  “They told me they would get their answer from your actions.”

  “I don’t like being threatened,” Kennedy snapped. “I get it from both sides. The damn Cincinnatians and Hoover. Now the Philosophers. I’m sick of it.”

  “There’s something else,” Mary said.

  “What?” Kennedy knew he was being short, but the pain in his back and this information along with Jackie being miserable in Hyannis Port was ruining what he had hoped would be a pleasant evening.

  “Did you know the CIA is trying to use the mob to kill Castro?”

  Kennedy leaned back in his chair, trying to ease the pain in his back, pulling his hand out of hers. “Hoover said something to me about that. I thought he was bluffing.”

  “I asked Cord,” Mary said, referring to her ex-husband, who was high in the ranks of the Agency. “He said ‘of course not’, which means of course they are.”

  “Goddamnit,” Kennedy slammed a fist onto the tabletop, causing the crystal to bounce.

  “The Philosophers want you to get on top of that. After the Bay of Pigs, there can’t be another Cuban fiasco. They say it’s very complicated and dangerous and that the Cincinnatians are involved.”


  “Who the hell runs this country?” Kennedy demanded.

  Mary got up and walked behind his chair. She leaned over and wrapped her arms around his chest. “I’m worried, Jack. Very worried for you. Cord didn’t just lie to me. There’s something going on. Something very dangerous. Promise me you’ll be careful?”

  Kennedy was hardly comforted by her touch or her words, but he nodded anyway. “I promise.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Burns watched as the pilots inspected the damage to the underside of the Blackhawk. The landing had been hard, but without injury to anyone on board. The Apache had called in shortly afterward that it too was down.

  “They took out two advanced helicopters with a Vietnam era chopper,” Burns noted.

  “I’ve told you I don’t like it when you tell me something I already know,” Turnbull snapped. He’d already been on his satphone, calling in the second Blackhawk, which had stopped to pick up the quick reaction force from Target Hill Field. And alerting all airfields within range to report if a Huey landed. The calls from various agencies and the military were piling up and keeping this under wraps much longer was going to be impossible.

  “Wood disks?” Burns calmly asked, putting on his fedora.

  “Nothing to concern yourself with.”

  “I assume he was referring to the disks that Tolliver and Ducharme had.” Burns checked his Fedora in the plexiglass window of the chopper. “The Head and Heart.”

  Turnbull paused. “What?”

  “The Head-Heart letter that Tolliver referenced in the interview. Curious the killer would signal that in the first murders.”

  “Not curious,” Turnbull said.

  “How so?”

  “Jefferson argued with himself in that letter. It meant he was uncertain.”

  “I just read it,” Burns said. “He seemed pretty certain at the end.”

  Turnbull gave a cold smile. “But look at the bigger picture. The Heart seems to win the argument in the letter, but in reality, Jefferson never saw Mrs. Cosway again. So while he felt what he thought was the right thing, he did the wrong thing.”