*
It was all on two sheets of paper. Julie listened while Luis acted it out. To add a bit of drama he sat in a roller chair and scooted himself about the room while he spoke. Sometimes, for variety, he made the chair spin.
“Well, it’s good and simple,” she said. “That’s a start. There’s one big weakness.”
“No authentication. No documents. Nothing to wave.” The chair slowly revolved to a halt. “Bullshit won’t do the job.”
“Not in a Senate hearing.”
They looked at each other, soberly, hoping they’d overlooked something. Nothing offered itself. “Today I boosted McCarthy,” he said. “I almost married and impregnated the eternal virgin. I damn near got shot to pieces by the Mafia. I invented the lightbulb. All before lunch. Let’s go eat.”
They went to a Mexican place whose name contained one vowel and seventeen consonants, mainly x, p and q. They ate chili with grated cheese and tiny crackers and Dos Equos beer. They went back to the office. A man they had never seen before was waiting. “You got a customer,” Stevie said.
“We haven’t got a business,” Luis said.
“Metal Exchange is just a name,” Julie told the visitor. “I won it playing poker.”
“But you need something, Miss Conroy,” Mikhail said. “You need authentication and documents. Something to wave.” Nobody in the room moved, nobody breathed. Even the traffic noise seemed to stop. “You need help to get Mr. Fantoni out of his hole, and bullshit won’t do it, Mr. Cabrillo.”
The traffic moved again. “How did you…” Luis began.
“Oh,” Mikhail said, “you know.”
*
They moved into the conference room, where the chairs were more comfortable. He said his name was Mikhail; no surname. “The only authentication I cannot provide is my own,” he said.
“Let’s get this straight,” Luis said. “We’ve prepared a new scenario for Fantoni’s hearing that says—”
“I know what it says.”
“Oh. Yes. Of course. Sorry. Well, it needs a dossier to support it, by tomorrow morning …”
“I’ve done this before, Mr. Cabrillo.”
“Okay,” Julie said. “Suppose you tell us.”
Mikhail told them. They made suggestions, added this, discarded that. After forty minutes he looked at his watch. “If I go now, you can have it by ten tonight,” he said.
They walked with him to the elevator. “You know, this is very strange,” Luis said. “The senator believes my stuff comes from a secret informant. But that’s all balls.”
“Yes. I know.”
“And now you turn up.”
“Just in time.”
“But you haven’t asked for money,” Julie said.
“Not that we have any money,” Luis said.
“You have twenty-nine thousand two hundred and eighty dollars, as of this morning,” Mikhail said. “Relax. My services are free.” The doors opened. They all shook hands. “Dosvedanya,” he said. “Whatever that means.”
*
Jerome Fantoni had a suite in the Hotel Washington. Julie met him in the rooftop bar. The hospital had put his shoulder back and given him a stylish black sling, but there was little they could do for his swollen lip. He was drinking milk: the doctors had advised no booze for a couple of days. She asked for a champagne cocktail.
“I read your script,” he said. “I see no problems.”
“Good. We kept everything simple.”
“Too simple. I’ve added color, emphasized the chiaroscuro. Or, to use a metaphor from the concert hall, I’ve written my own cadenzas.”
“Bully for you. You realize the hearing’s liable to get kind of intense.”
“Miss Conroy, I played Macbeth for the Princeton Dramatic Society. My performance was described by the Herald-Tribune’s critic as ‘majestic, manly, momentous.’ You have the dossier?”
“You have ten thousand dollars?”
She gave him a fat file. He gave her a briefcase. For a moment their eyes met. He said. “It would be crass of each of us to ask the other how this was done so speedily.”
“You bet.”
After that, there was nothing left to do but enjoy the view. Jerome sipped his milk. He pointed to the floodlit White House. “The Tomb of the Weil-Known Warrior,” he said. “I feel sorry for Eisenhower.”
“Why?”
“People tried to kill FDR, and Truman, so chances are that someone is planning to kill Ike. We are a violent nation.”
“Yeah. That reminds me: d’you want your gun back?”
He shook his head. She finished her drink. Said goodnight. Got a taxi. Hugged the briefcase. Ten percent of this should buy a black silk bikini and leave some change.
*
“How much?” Luis asked. They were in bed.
“Ten grand.”
“Good God.” He watched the shifting pattern of moonlight reflected on the ceiling as the curtains blew with the breeze. “Did you have to haggle?”
“No. Ten grand is the right price, Luis. Us agents know this sort of thing.”
He turned onto his side, so that his body matched hers, his knees behind her knees, his chest against her back, and he slipped an arm around her waist. “You’re brilliant,” he murmured into her hair, “and you smell wonderfully of lemons.” She made pleasantly agreeable sounds. “You could have tried for fifteen,” he said.
“You’re a turd, Luis,” she said softly. “A turd with talent, but still a turd. Now go to sleep. Big day tomorrow.”
2
This was theater. The hearing had precious little to do with law. The chairman and his fellow-senators sat in a row and looked down on the witness. Around him and behind, the room was packed with reporters, cameramen, public, lawyers, cops. The gallery was full. Cohn and Kennedy lurked near McCarthy. As chairman, he had the gavel and everyone expected him to hammer damn hard. The crowd wanted high drama. They hadn’t come for a civics lecture, they’d come for blood.
Jerome Fantoni took the oath. He looked good: hair thick, silvering at the temples and well disciplined; a dark gray suit of conservative cut, buttoned over the sling but the left sleeve hung empty, obvious to everyone; a discreet tie of dark red and navy blue stripes; white shirt with the cuffs just showing.
The chairman gaveled until he got silence, and began, “Now, Mr. Fantoni, you live and work in the New York area, am I right?”
“That is where I live and vote. Work sometimes takes me elsewhere.” His swollen lip gave him a slight lisp.
“Uh-huh. This work elsewhere, does it bring you in contact with Communists?” McCarthy made the word ring out.
“Let’s cut out the preliminary fencing and sparring, senator. I know you enjoy it but it’s a waste of everybody’s time.” Fantoni’s voice was calm and confident and quiet. The shuffling and whispering in the room ceased. “You want to hear how many Communists I’ve ever known, don’t you?”
“Well, this makes a change,” McCarthy said, smiling, and the crowd chuckled. “Put it like that, Mr. Fantoni, then yes I do. Exactly how—”
“Three hundred and seventeen. That’s by personal contact. I know of others whom I have not met. Perhaps five hundred.”
That popped the silence. All over the room, people were saying: Five hundred! You hear that? McCarthy got his gavel going. Cohn leaned forward and said something. McCarthy nodded. His eyes had the gleam of a cardsharp who knows he’s won and wants the other player to keep bidding.
“Three hundred and seventeen Communists you personally know. Is that in the United States, Mr. Fantoni?”
“I never said that. I never said Communists I know, I said communists I’ve ever known. Some are dead. You should pay more attention, senator. Do you want the whole story?” Still calm and quiet.
“Just remember your place, Mr. Fantoni. We ask the questions here.” As McCarthy shuffled some papers, Fantoni said, loud enough for the microphone to catch, “Then why doesn’t he get on and ask them?” A few in
the crowd applauded.
More gavel. “I want the facts, Mr. Fantoni. Communists you’ve known, dead or alive, in this country, total three one seven. That right?”
“It may not be right, senator, but it’s correct.”
Ripple of laughter.
Kennedy said in McCarthy’s ear: “He can’t plead the Fifth now. He’s hung himself, senator.”
McCarthy’s hand had covered his mike. “Craziest damn suicide I ever saw.”
“Nail him down, boss,” Cohn said.
When in doubt, McCarthy gaveled. He beat until dust rose. “Mr. Fantoni, give us the facts. Tell us how many of the three-one-seven communists you’ve known are involved in organized crime?”
“Some were politicians. Is that organized crime?” Big laugh. Fantoni’s face never changed. “Best Marxists I ever met were in City Hall. Best rackets, too.” The crowd agreed.
“Mr. Chairman, if I may,” another senator said. McCarthy nodded. “Why did you join the Communist Party, Mr. Fantoni?”
“Because the FBI asked me to.”
A blizzard of flashbulbs. The witness kept his head still. One eyebrow was raised, wrinkling his brow. Otherwise, no change.
“That’s the most unheard-of thing I ever heard of,” McCarthy said.
“Tell us more,” the other senator said.
“Your chairman told me to remember my place, sir.”
“Very well, Mr. Fantoni. Why did the FBI ask you?”
“It was J. Edgar Hoover’s idea, so perhaps you should put the question to him. However, I’ll do my best. Hoover invited me to form a Communist club at Princeton so that he could keep track of Leftist sympathizers. You must remember that, in some intellectual circles, Communism was, in the Twenties, fashionable if not respectable. Rather like gin during Prohibition. Excuse me.” He took a sip of water.
“Brilliant,” Julie said quietly. She and Luis were in the gallery. “Now he’s running the show.”
“The FBI financed the Princeton Communist Club,” the witness said. “All done covertly, of course. No incriminating records kept by us. Without Hoover’s money, Communism would never have survived at Princeton. Our treasurer was hopeless. He is now the professor of mathematics at the University of Texas, I believe … But Hoover got more than he expected. The Soviet consulate in New York recruited me when I graduated. They trained me to be a longterm underground secret Communist agent—a sleeper who could infiltrate American society and be ready when the KGB had work for me. It wasn’t the KGB then, of course. It was the NKVD. I told Hoover, and Hoover told me to do exactly what they wanted.”
McCarthy said, “So you were a secret agent for the Kremlin.”
“And for the FBI. I was a double-agent.”
“But you signed for the Kremlin first. How many Americans have you betrayed?”
“Mairzy doats and dozey doats,” the witness said, “and little lamsey tivey.”
“That’s an insolent answer.”
“It was a dumb question. If I didn’t act like a dedicated Red when I met the Communists, I was no use to the FBI. But my ultimate loyalty was to the USA.”
“And when we ask J. Edgar Hoover—”
“He’ll deny it. Standard operating procedure. Last thing Hoover said to me was that if I ever lost my cover, the Bureau would deny any knowledge of me. That’s how all intelligence agencies work. I’m surprised at your naivete, senator. Did you really expect me to come here with a double-agent’s badge?”
“No proof, then.”
“Not from the FBI. Plenty from the Soviet side.” Fantoni opened a document case. “These reports are all from the archives of various Soviet embassies. They cover my knowledge of various illegal or Un-American activities.” He held up a fistful of papers. “Why has the FBI never arrested me? Because they knew about everything in advance. I told them. Copies of all these documents are in the FBI files.”
Another senator claimed the microphone. “Mr. Fantoni, would you have us believe you stole all those Soviet documents?”
“Yes, sir. I did.”
“But why?”
“Because I knew the day would come when I would face the difficult task of proving my patriotism.”
McCarthy gaveled. “This hearing will go into closed session!” he announced. “Marshals, clear the room!”
3
The Carolina shrimp was undoubtedly tasty, but after all that Jambalaya they felt shrimped out. The red snapper was sure to be good; or there were crab cakes. Or grilled salmon. Hard-shell steamed crabs. Lobster. Old Henry’s Tavern was the best seafood restaurant in Foggy Bottom. Said so on the menu.
They ordered. Mikhail did the wine: Bordeaux Blanc.
“What d’you think’s happening now?” Julie asked.
“They’ll have to get a translator for the dossier,” Mikhail said. “And stenographers. We have plenty of time.”
“I bet they get in experts to test the paper and the ink and stuff,” Luis said. Julie patted his hand. “Of course it’s all genuine,” he said. “I keep forgetting.” For a moment he was flustered. “Did you ever meet Stalin?” he asked.
“Give the poor guy a break,” Julie told him.
“Forgive me,” Luis said. “Shocking bad taste. I’m quite mortified.”
Mikhail tasted the wine, and nodded. When the waiter had gone away, he said, “I know the collapse of Western capitalism is inevitable, but personally I hope it doesn’t happen until after lunch. In fact I’m prepared to wait indefinitely.”
“I know you,” Julie said. “There was something familiar but I’ve just placed it. We met a couple of times in New York, years ago, at Bonnie Scott’s place. You’re Gib Rail. The author. He’s Gibbon Connor Rail,” she told Luis. “Wait a minute. Weren’t you kind of bald?”
“A triumph of Soviet technology.” Mikhail smoothed his hair.
“A novelist,” Luis said. “I wish I had time to write a novel.”
“You got expelled,” Julie said. “Didn’t you?”
“All a misunderstanding.”
“I met Graham Greene once,” Luis said. “He was in MI6.”
“I don’t remember that,” Julie said.
Luis snapped a breadstick. “He said he admired my style enormously. I appear in some of his recent novels. Lightly disguised.”
“And I’m Queen Marie of Rumania,” she said.
4
The Sub-Committee came back from lunch to find that the translations had been sorted into groups. Five groups. Five senators. A happy coincidence. Each man settled down to read his pages. Apart from the occasional muttered curse or grunt of surprise, the room was quiet.
“Hot as pigshit,” McCarthy sighed, “as we say in Wisconsin when a virgin comes to town, which is rarely. Who wants to start? What did you draw, Henry?”
“I got labor unions,” Henry said. “Seems our witness was a go-between for the Communist Party and various unsavory gangsters during the Twenties and Thirties. See here: they wanted Machine-Gun Kelly. Couldn’t get him. Too expensive.”
A senator called Sherry said, “The Reds were fighting for the unions, right?”
“Usually. The CP helped the West Coast Longshoremen’s union but when the Party tried to take over the garment industry it had a shoot-out with the needleworkers’ union in New York. Then again, Communists were involved in the Memorial Day Massacre in South Chicago, 1937. Remember that? Steel union marched on Republic Steel, police shot ten workers. Party was disappointed. Not enough blood.”
“Let’s move on,” McCarthy said. “Sherry?”
“I got Race Riots, Joe, and by God the Reds found themselves one hell of a happy hunting ground.” This amused the others. “Here’s one of the best. Detroit, ’43. The blacks are pissed off because the army’s segregated and United Auto Workers is all white. Our witness claims he dreamed up the Double-V slogan for the blacks.”
“Victory at home and abroad,” Henry said. “I was in Detroit that year. Double-V was everywhere.”
�
�Sure,” Sherry said. “And UAW let the blacks into the union and every white man in Detroit saw his job, his neighborhood and his cute blond daughter in danger. One hell of a riot. 34 dead.”
“You’re up, Chester,” McCarthy said.
“Okay. Sabotage. I found three plums in my pie. First up, there’s the liner Normandie, burns until it capsizes at a pier on the Hudson, maybe an accident, maybe a local Red did it, our witness thinks the guy’s bragging. Second, the invasion of Mexico in 1936. Seems—”
“I never heard of that,” McCarthy said.
“It never happened. Father Coughlin, the radio priest, remember him? Tried to get General Butler, ex-commandant US Marine Corps, to overthrow the Mexican government, for reasons too crass to contemplate. Our witness claims he put the priest up to it.”
“Coughlin was a rabid fascist,” Henry said.
“So what? The Reds will get into bed with anyone who suits their purpose. Lastly, the bungled assassination of FDR in 1933, when a jerk called Zangara shot the Mayor of Chicago instead.”
“Don’t see how that helped the Party,” Chester said.
“Rumor was, Zangara was paid to shoot the Mayor of Detroit. Detroit was very anti-Communist in those days.” Chester held up a page. “It’s all here.”
“Amazing,” McCarthy said. “Who’s next?”
“Economic Riots,” Byron said. “You probably know this stuff already. Chicago Eviction Riot of 1931. Depression, no jobs, no money, families evicted by the thousand. CP organized a fight back, so they say. Likewise in Arkansas, 1935. Tenant farmers got kicked off their land. Quite a war down there.”
“Take your word for it,” McCarthy said. “All I’ve got is some crap about Commy propaganda. Let’s move on.”
They sent for the witness.
“Three hundred and seventeen known Communists, I believe you said,” the chairman told him. “What are their names?”
Red Rag Blues Page 29