American Tabloid - James Ellroy [133]
The average amount lent was $1.6 million. With repayment fees: $2.4 million.
The smallest loan was $425,000. The largest was $8.6 million.
Numbers growing left to right. Multiplications and divisions in the far right-hand columns—odd percentage calculations.
He EXTRAPOLATED:
The odd numbers were loan investment profits, tallied in over and above payback interest.
Eyestrain made him stop. Three quick shots of scotch refueled him.
He got a brainstorm:
Look for Hoffa’s Sun Valley skim money
He scanned columns with a pencil. He linked the dots: mid ’56 to mid ’57 and ten symbols to spell “Jimmy Hoffa.”
He found 1.2 and 1.8—hypothetically Bobby Kennedy’s “spooky” three million. He found five symbols, six, and five in a perfectly intersecting column.
5, 6, 5 = James Riddle Hoffa.
Hoffa laughed off the Sun Valley charges. With valid assurance: his chicanery was very well cloaked.
Littell skimmed the books and picked out odd totals. Tiny zeros extended—the Fund was billionaire rich.
Double vision set in. He corrected it with a magnifying glass.
He quick-scanned the books again. Identical numbers kept recurring—in four-figure brackets.
[1408]—over and over.
Littell went through the brown books page by page. He found twenty-one 1408s—including two next to the Spooky Three Million. Quick addition gave him a total: forty-nine million dollars lent out or borrowed. Mr. 1408 was well-heeled either way.
He checked the black book initial column. It was alphabetically arranged and entered in Jules Schiffrin’s neat block printing.
It was 9:00 a.m. He had five hours of study in.
The “Loan %” subhead tweaked him. He saw “B-E” straight down the graph—the number/letter code decoded to 25%.
He EXTRAPOLATED:
The initials tagged Pension Fund lenders—repaid at a fat but not brutal rate.
He checked the “Transfer #” column. The listings were strictly uniform: initials and six digits, no more.
He EXTRAPOLATED:
The initials were bank account numbers—repaid mobster money laundered clean. Said initials all ended in B—most likely short for the word “branch.”
Littell copied over letters on a scratch pad.
BOABHB = Bank of America, Beverly Hills branch. HSALMBB = Home Savings & Loan, Miami Beach branch.
It worked.
He was able to form known bank names out of every set of letters.
He jumped columns tracing 1408. Right there on the money: JPK, SR/SFNBB/811512404.
SFN meant Security-First National. BB could mean Buffalo branch, Boston branch, or other B-city branches.
The SR probably denoted a “Senior.” Why the added designation?
Just above JPK, SR: JPK [1693] BOADB. The man was a piker compared to 1408: he lent the Fund a paltry $6.4 million.
The added SR was simply to distinguish the lender from someone with the same initials.
JPK, SR [1408] SFNBB/811512404. One filthy-rich money-lending—
Stop.
Stop right there.
JPK, SR.
Joseph P. Kennedy, Senior.
BB for Boston branch.
August ’59—Sid Kabikoff talking to Mad Sal:
“I knew Jules way back when”/“when he was SELLING DOPE and USING THE PROFITS to finance movies with RKO back when JOE KENNEDY owned it.”
Stop. Make the call. Impersonate a Bureau hard-on and confirm it or refute it.
Littell dialed O. He dripped sweat all over the telephone.
An operator came on. “What number, please?”
“I want the Security-First National Bank, in Boston, Massachusetts.”
“One moment, sir. Til look the number up and connect you.”
Littell held the line. Adrenaline hit: he went dizzy and parched.
A man answered. “Security-First National.”
“This is Special Agent Johnson, FBI. Let me speak to the manager, please.”
“Please hold. I’ll transfer you.”
Littell heard connection clicks. A man said, “This is Mr. Carmody. May I help you?”
“Th-this is Special Agent Johnson, FBI. I have an account number at your bank here, and I need to know who it belongs to.”
“Is this an official request? It’s a Sunday, and I’m here overseeing our monthly inventory—”
“This is an official request. I can get a bank writ, but I’d rather not put you to the trouble of an