The Monkey Handlers

by G Gordon Liddy

  “So,” he said, “can I be givin’ you two a lift?”

  Sara opened the rear door for herself and said, “Thanks. I’d better tell Michael … Mr. Stone, my lawyer. He’s at One eighty-two Garden.” Saul climbed in on the other side and introduced himself: “Saul Rosen, many thanks.”

  “Not at all,” said Sullivan. “Just doing m’ job. I earn me living talking to people in the news. I don’t suppose you’d care to comment on this latest development, Miss Rosen?”

  “No,” said Saul, “she wouldn’t. Her lawyer’d fire her as a client.”

  “Damn you, Saul, I can speak—”

  “Now, now,” said Sullivan, “let us not resume the internecine warfare. How about you, Mr. Rosen. You’re new on the scene. Where do you fit?” He pulled out from the curb and headed for Garden Street.

  “Just a nice Jewish boy trying to keep his sister from going to jail over some reform-nut-case animal-rights fanatic—”

  “You bigoted bastard!” Sara shouted. “Who gives a shit if Eddie’s reform—?”

  “All right, all right,” said Saul. “We’ll talk about it later. Mr. Sullivan wouldn’t know what we’re talking about, and I’m sure could care less.”

  “On the contrary,” said Sullivan, taking a turn, “the Catholics are as divided as anybody. How d’ya think a real Irish Catholic takes to the bishops over here backin’ Maryknollers runnin’ with the Commies below the border? Next thing y’know, the Little Sisters of the Poor’ll be callin’ themselves the Marxist Sisters of the People!”

  “Hey,” said Saul, “I thought the IRA was Communist.”

  “Glory be to God, no,” said Sullivan. “The original organization did go that way years ago—that’s why there’s so few of them left. The IRA that you’re hearin’ about these days is the Provisionals. They’re socialist, yes, but not Communist. They owe no allegiance to the Soviet Union.” Sullivan pulled into Stone’s driveway. “Well,” he said, “from the look of his digs, it’s a good lawyer you’ve got! Good luck to all.”

  “If you don’t mind,” said Saul as his sister got out of the car, “I’d appreciate a lift downtown. Got some shopping to do.”

  “At your service, Guv’nor,” said Sullivan, backing out. Saul waved to his sister. Still angry, she stalked away without reply.

  * * *

  It was twilight when the telephone rang in Stephanie Hannigan’s office. She took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes before answering it. “Public defender’s office,” she said, giving the after-hours reply that office protocol specified, “Hannigan speaking.”

  “All work and no play,” said the voice of Naomi Fine, “and you’ll never make it with Jack.”

  “Naomi”—Stephanie laughed—“you’re impossible. Right now, I couldn’t make it with anybody. I’m so tired, I can’t see straight.”

  “That’s probably a good thing, considering who you’re thinking of makin’ it with. You find anything at the library?”

  “Haven’t had a chance to try. I’ve got a caseload here—”

  “Spare me, kiddo. Save it for the board of supervisors at raise time. Besides, on account of you, I’m in my office, too. Didn’t want to get caught printing out personal stuff from the computer on taxpayers’ time.”

  “You found something?”

  “Yeah. But don’t sound so eager. I don’t think you’re gonna like what I found. If you do, you’re probably into whips and chains.”

  “What?”

  “‘Devils with green faces.’ That’s what Vietnamese on both sides called the SEALs. They were organized in 1962 on orders from President Kennedy, using Navy frogmen volunteers. SEAL stands for Sea, Air, and Land. They pick from the strongest there are, give them special training to get them ready for the six-month course, and even then about seventy percent don’t make it through. In one week during primary training, called ‘Hell Week,’ they never get to sleep at all. It’s constant training, day and night. They put them naked into the cold Pacific surf at dusk. There’s a doctor on shore with a stopwatch and an ambulance. He knows the temperature of the water—say in the fifties. When the doctor says they’re in danger of death from hypothermia, they let them out of the water and sit them in a circle on the beach around a fire—close enough to see the flames but too far away to feel any heat. When the doc says they’re no longer in danger of death, back in they go. Sometimes they’re cycled in and out like that over twenty times before dawn, trying to break them psychologically. They take them over five miles out to sea and throw them overboard. They don’t just have to make it back—they have to do it in fast time! Listen to this. They take their primary parachute training after they complete the basic SEAL training, called BUD/S. They take it at Fort Benning with the rest of the airborne, and they always get in trouble. Once, when they were on one of those two-mile runs, the SEALs pulled out as a unit and literally ran circles around the other trainees for the entire two miles! There’re not many of them, and no wonder. They’re the most elite military unit in the world, quote, ‘often referred to by other military personnel as super commandos,’ unquote. Those few who make it through the training and long probationary period after that are reviewed by a confirmation board and ‘only those who are perceived’—I’m still quoting—‘to perform at optimum level are awarded the coveted SEAL Trident … the right to pin the infamous “Budweiser” badge above the left breast pocket. A SEAL is an individual by nature who has learned to submit his ego, desires, and needs to that of the team. At the completion of his training, a SEAL exceeds the medically accepted limitations of human physical and psychological strength by a factor of ten.’ Jesus, Neffie, you want to go to bed with that? What’re you, Lois Lane?”

  “Naomi, I—”

  “I mean, I’m not reading you half this stuff. This guy’s a stone killer—”

  “Damn it, Naomi, that’s enough! That’s all in the past. He’s a lawyer now. People change.”

  “Sure,” countered Naomi, “you remember Freckles, the dalmation used to live down at Hook and Ladder Number One over on Crawford Street? To the day he died, he’d leave a bitch in heat to jump on that goddamn truck when the siren went off. Listen, honey. You asked for my help, I gave it. I’m not saying another word. Bye!”

  The telephone clicked, and the dial tone came on. Stephanie just held it for a minute, then quietly put the receiver back in its cradle.

  * * *

  “You know anything about that van outside in the driveway with the big ice chest inside?” Michael Stone was looking down at the kitchen table where Saul Rosen was stripping the insulation off wires and making connections between a mysterious-looking black, crackle-finished, vented metal box, a small black and white television receiver, and a videocassette recorder. To the side lay a citizens-band radio antenna, the kind with a black rubber-suction-cup base for mounting on the roof of an automobile.

  “Well,” said Saul, “most of it is just what it looks like. The black box here is what’s called a synchronizer. I built it from parts. If I remembered right and cobbled this stuff together correctly, starting this afternoon we might just get some intel out of Riegar. You know, from their computer screens, the way I told you.”

  “I’ve already got some, never mind how. Either Riegar’s using undocumented alien labor, or someone down there’s running a wetback distribution system on the side, which I very much doubt. The people doing it are Spanish-speaking Germans.” Stone deliberately left out any mention of the lethality of the Germans or their method of disposing of a body. He was puzzled by the fact that there had been no report in the press of the death of the control operator, nor, in view of the hullabaloo over Sara Rosen’s cat-rescue attempt, any mention of his intrusion. On the one hand, the report might have been suppressed as part of the investigation by police; on the other, the Riegar people might not have reported it for reasons of secrecy.

  “Who gave you that information?” Saul asked. “Ira Levin?”

  “What do you know about Ira Levin?�
�

  “Hey, I’ve been here a few days now. Everybody knows about Ira Levin. He’s a local legend. You ought to get out of the house and into the gin mills more. Be surprised at the intel you can pick up. Here, help me get this stuff out to the truck.”

  Stone grunted in reply and picked up the television, then put the VCR on top of it, being careful not to stress the wiring. Saul did the same with the synchronizer and the antenna, and together they walked slowly out to the van. Saul had the lighter load, so he stuck the antenna under one arm and opened the van doors. “Put ’er down here,” he said, indicating the floor of the rear of the van.

  Stone watched as Saul opened the ice chest and motioned him to take a look. Inside was a gasoline-powered portable electric generator. A rubber hose had been affixed to the muffler with an insulator against the heat and it ducted the exhaust out the side of the box and through a hole in the van floor.

  “Cost no more to rent than a full-sized car,” said Saul. He moved the electronics up to just behind the seats, placed the television on the floor in front of the passenger seat, then mounted the antenna on the roof. Through a cutout in the side of the ice chest, he plugged his jury-rigged electronics into a standard 110-volt outlet in the generator, then started it up and replaced the lid of the chest. “See?” he said. “Can’t even hear it much in here, let alone outside.”

  “It’s not gonna work,” said Stone as the generator engine died.

  “Why not?”

  “You ducted the exhaust all right, but you forgot the intake air. Gotta run another hose from the outside to the air cleaner. Hope you know more about electronics than you do about internal-combustion engines.”

  “Yeah,” said Saul, “so do I.”

  12

  As Michael stone stepped out into the hospital parking lot after visiting Aunt May, his mood was darkening as rapidly as the remainder of the day. Aunt May was taking longer to heal than anticipated, and in her frustration, she was increasingly insistent upon going home. As he drove home, the sun dropped completely behind the hills on the other side of the Hudson and Stone switched on his headlights. He was driving too fast, overdriving his headlights’ reach, and the Mustang’s tires screeched in protest at the way he was taking corners he saw too late to slow down for sufficiently. Stone was frustrated.

  The source of Stone’s frustration was his feeling of impotence in dealing with the whole Riegar matter. His attempts to practice criminal law had exposed only how little he knew of its practical aspects. Without the help of Stephanie Hannigan, Sara might still be languishing in jail. He had attempted to cross back into his special warfare culture with similarly little effect. He had killed a man without much to show for it by way of information. The situation was deteriorating, and he didn’t know what to do. Lone wolfing it the way he had the other night went against all his training. SEALs operated as members of a team, and Stone had no team. He was no longer a SEAL. He wasn’t a very good lawyer. On top of all of that, the solitary and feelingless life he had nurtured carefully, in a Faustian bargain with himself to avoid emotional pain, was now in ruins, along with what had been a promising relationship with the only woman he’d cared about in a long time.

  As the Mustang turned into the driveway at 182 Garden, Stone wondered where Saul was, and how much, if anything, he should tell him. He parked the car, entered the house, and went straight to the kitchen. There, he took out a frozen steak and put it into the microwave oven for a quick thaw, then made himself a large salad.

  While the steak thawed, Stone went through his mail. It was mostly routine: bills, bar-association notices, solicitations, and a notice that his college reunion was coming up. That reminded him of something, but he couldn’t place it. He tossed the mail aside.

  As Stone prepared his solitary meal, his mind conjured up memories of the meal Stephanie Hannigan had prepared for him. It would be nice to come home to that. He thought of the way Metz laughed at the agony of the homesick Mexican, dissolved alive under a flood of scalding sulfuric acid. He thought of the motorcycle hoods, of the attempts to bribe him and the veiled threats to his livelihood. And he thought of what happened to Aunt May. There was just no way he was going to get to the bottom of all this as a lawyer—hell, he couldn’t even protect his aged aunt. To Stone, his course of action was obvious—recruit a team and go operational against Metz. Stephanie Hannigan would probably never forgive him. But, then, Stephanie wouldn’t understand. How could she? The motto of the Special Operations Association to which he belonged said it all:

  You have never lived until you have almost died. Life has a special meaning that the protected will never know.

  The memory that had eluded him when he was going through his mail suddenly returned. He went into his office and searched through the letter holder on his desk. There it was, right where Aunt May had put it the day he’d made a fool of himself with what he’d thought was a letter bomb; his navy-reunion final reminder. No wonder he’d forgotten it. His unconscious mind must have been protecting him. Even now, Stone felt a sense of loss as he unfolded it.

  Inside, on the upper-left-hand corner, was a cartoon of a frog wearing a navy enlisted man’s white hat. Beneath it were the initials UDT/SEAL. Stone pursed his lips and blew through them softly. The reunion was being held at Little Creek, Virginia, this coming weekend; Friday through Sunday. Figure a day to make the drive … if he was going to get there in time, he’d have to leave in the morning.

  * * *

  Without even a reserve commission, Michael Stone couldn’t use the Bachelor Officers’ Quarters at the Norfolk, Virginia, naval base to put up overnight, so he chose a motel in the resort community of Virginia Beach, right next to Little Creek, site of the Naval Amphibious Warfare Center. He got up early, but exercised lightly, just enough to work out any kinks after the long drive down from Rhinekill. Among the features of UDT/SEAL reunions were serious athletic contests and part of Stone’s recruitment plan was to enter and do outstandingly well. No worthwhile recruits were going to join a would-be leader who couldn’t demonstrate that he still had the tremendous physical and psychological prowess of an active-duty SEAL.

  After breakfast, Stone went over to the athletic field cum park where the festivities were to be held. The June day was fair, cooled by an onshore breeze—perfect for athletics. Wall-less tents were already set up against the midday sun, for while mad dogs, Englishmen, and SEALs might go out in it, the same could not be expected of their women and children. The atmosphere was half twenty-year high school reunion and half carnival.

  There are fewer than three hundred active-duty SEAL officers and, in the course of a career, they serve in several teams. Thus, nearly all the men in attendance knew Stone, and those few who did not, knew of him. The vast majority of those at the reunion had retired as enlisted men, many as master chief petty officers. Stone, whose career had been cut short, was thus about the same age as the recent retirees; enlisted men entered the service at seventeen and were eligible to retire in twenty years.

  Stone headed for the table set up to receive entries in the athletic contests, seeking to be early. It was not to be. “Mr. Stone!” he heard behind him as he was shouted at by someone who wasn’t aware he’d made lieutenant commander just before his resignation and so therefore used the form of address naval courtesy accorded junior officers. Stone turned his head around to his right to see who it was. He needn’t have. A giant hand slammed down from behind on his right trapezius muscle and squeezed. “Monster” Malone, who had no idea at all of his strength, had struck again with his patented, paralyzing greeting.

  “God damn ‘Monster!’” Stone protested, ducking around and out of Master Chief Malone’s grip. “I was going to enter some of the events. Now I think I’ll head for the nearest corpsman! Uh-oh. Who’s this?”

  Stone suddenly discovered a very pretty tiny woman of about four feet ten in the lee of Malone’s six-foot-six, 240-pound body. Grinning sheepishly, the huge master chief said, “This here’s the li
ttle lady. We been married six weeks!”

  “Well,” Stone said, “congratulations. I can see she is a little lady.”

  Malone popped the top on a can of beer and handed it to Stone, who didn’t want it before exercising but took a swig just to be sociable and not offend the newlyweds. At that moment, the bride chose to say, “I can tell what you’re thinking. Everyone does. But don’t worry, those big gorillas in the zoo have dicks only two inches long.”

  Stone sprayed beer all over the infield as Malone and his ‘little lady’ roared. He was spared further embarrassment as two older men, one a veteran of World War II and the other of the Korean War, hailed him. “Hey, Mike!” said a seamed-faced man who’d scouted the beach at Iwo Jima. “You gonna enter anything?”

  “Yeah, if I can ever get over to the damn table.”

  “Good,” said the Korean vet, “we’ll bet on ya.”

  Stone finally made it through to the entry table and looked over the contests available. It was difficult because people kept interrupting to greet him, calling him everything from “ol’buddy” to “old fuck” with equal affection. In between, he ran his finger down the table of events to keep track of what he had read. He skipped the parachute accuracy jump and several runs and swims. He was looking for a contest that would demonstrate the highest degree of practical fitness. He found it in the obstacle course. As in BUD/S, it was to be run in boots and soft sand and was followed immediately by a three-mile run, in still more sand.

  Stone entered, then wandered the field, greeting friends, some in the same superb condition as himself, others grown overweight and still hung over from drinking the night before. He visited tables that displayed and sold reunion memorabilia and turned down countless proffered beers from the free-flowing kegs. Steers and huge hogs were already roasting on great spits being hand-turned slowly over fires in large, hot coal-packed pits. Farther out in the field, some naval security types were giving a proficiency demonstration of attack-trained dogs: shepherds, Dobermans, and Rottweilers. One dog was demonstrating his drug-sniffing prowess. Off to the side, for those who couldn’t wait for the noontime feast, hot dogs and hamburgers were being cooked over a grill fed by a large bottle of propane gas. Everywhere was the aroma of cooking food and the sound of beer-enhanced laughter.