American Tabloid - James Ellroy [224]
Littell tapped Play. Joe Valachi spoke. Bobby leaned against the wall behind his desk.
Littell stood in front of the desk. Bobby stared at him. They stayed absolutely motionless and did not blink or twitch.
Joe Valachi laid down his indictment. Bobby heard the evidence. He did not shut his eyes or in any way discernibly react.
Littell broke a sweat. The silly staring contest continued.
The tape slipped off the spindle. Bobby picked up his desk phone.
“Get Special Agent Conroy in Boston. Have him go to the main Security-First National Bank and find out who account number 811512404 belongs to. Have him examine the safe-deposit boxes and call me back immediately. Tell him to expedite this top-priority, and hold my calls until his comes through.”
His voice did not waver. He came on cast-iron/steel-plate/watertight strong.
Bobby put the phone down. The eyeball duel continued. The first one to blink is a coward.
Littell almost giggled. An epigram: Powerful men are children.
Time passed. Littell counted minutes off his heartbeat. His glasses started sliding down his nose.
The phone rang. Bobby picked it up and listened.
Littell stood perfectly still and counted forty-one seconds off his pulse. Bobby threw the phone at the wall.
And blinked.
And twitched.
And brushed back tears.
Littell said, “Goddamn you for the pain you caused me.”
97
(Dallas, 11/20/63)
She’ll know. She’ll hear the news and see your face and know you were part of it.
She’ll trace it back to the shakedown. You couldn’t compromise him, so you killed him.
She’ll know it was a Mob hit. She knows how those guys snip dangerous links. She’ll blame you for bringing her so close to something so big.
Pete watched Barb sleep. Their bed smelled like suntan oil and sweat.
He was going to Las Vegas. He was going back to Howard “Dracula” Hughes. Ward Littell was their new middleman.
It was strongarm and dope work. It was a boilerplate commuted sentence: death for life imprisonment.
She’d kicked the sheets off. He noticed some new freckles on her legs.
She’d click with Vegas. He’d boot Joey out of her life and fix her up with a permanent lounge gig.
She’d be with him. She’d be close to his work. She’d build a rep as a stand-up woman who knew how to keep secrets.
Barb curled into her pillows. The veins on her breasts stretched out funny.
He woke her up. She snapped awake bright-eyed, like always.
Pete said; “Will you marry me?”
Barb said, “Sure.”
• • •
A fifty-dollar bribe waived the blood test. A C-note covered the no-birth-certificate problem.
Pete rented a 52 X-long tuxedo. Barb ran by the Kascade Klub and grabbed her one white Twist gown.
They found a preacher in the phone book. Pete scrounged up two witnesses: Jack Ruby and Dick Contino.
Dick said Uncle Hesh needed a pop. And what’s he so excited about? For a dying man, he sure seems keyed up.
Pete ran by the Adolphus Hotel. He shot Heshie full of heroin and slipped him some Hershey bars to nosh on. Heshie thought his tuxedo was the funniest fucking thing he’d ever seen. He laughed so hard he almost ripped his tracheal tube out.
Dick bounced for a wedding gift: the Adolphus bridal suite through the weekend. Pete and Barb moved their things in an hour before the ceremony.
Pete’s gun fell out of his suitcase. The bellhop almost shit.
Barb tipped him fifty dollars. The kid genuflected out of the suite. A hotel limo dropped them at the chapel.
The preacher was a juicehead. Ruby brought his yappy dachshunds. Dick banged some wedding numbers on his squeezebox.
They said their vows in a dive off Stemmons Freeway. Barb cried. Pete held her hand so tight that she winced.
The preacher supplied imitation gold rings. Pete’s ring wouldn’t fit on his ring finger. The preacher said he’d order him a jumbo—he got his stuff from a mail-order house in Des Moines.
Pete dropped the too-small ring in his pocket. The Till Death Do Us Part pitch got him weak in the knees.
They settled in at the hotel. Barb kept up a refrain: Barbara