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“I don’t hold them responsible for anything,” Jimmy told the agents. “And, besides, you didn’t get anything.” The agents hung around another two or three weeks and then they left. They knew that we were on our guard and that they weren’t going to get anything from us.

All in all, the agents had spent at least six months observing us and trying to get down our movements and our schedules. But we had seen them from the very beginning of their operation. They had thought they were watching us, but we had been watching them. Inept at covert observation, the DEA agents had stuck out like sore thumbs. Jimmy and I couldn’t help noticing all the cars driving by the variety store or following us wherever we went. When they were in a car that circled around the rotary three or four times, their faces stood out. When they were in the park with binoculars and we were looking back at them with our binoculars, they stood out. Plus, it was obvious to us from the beginning that these people weren’t from the town. Agent Reilly had been the smartest one of all of them, somehow managing not to appear as obvious as the rest. Plus, he had spent time developing an effective plan on how to put the bugs in the car. The problem with his plan was that, unable to use a power source, he’d had to use batteries, which had to be constantly replaced.

But it wouldn’t have mattered what the agents had used. The cold fact was that we never talked in buildings or cars or on phones, so nothing could have come of their efforts. Unlike the way the media reported it, the true story of Operation Beans was not that we had been tipped off about it, but rather that the agents had been obvious and we had been aware. Yes, they had succeeded in bugging the apartment and the car, but we never said a word about business in either of those two places, so the bugs did them no good. Jimmy and I always talked outside, never in any enclosed place. No matter how important something was that we had to tell each other, it could wait until we were able to take a walk or go to a place we considered secure. The agents had taken everything into account, except for the discipline, the one issue about which Jimmy never, ever let up. Not then. And, assuming he’s still out there somewhere, not now.

Still, the law eventually got to a lot of those involved in the drug traffic. As a result, some guys just packed it in, while others went to prison. In August 1990, the Southie drug bust, a joint effort by the DEA and the Boston police that netted fifty-one drug dealers in South Boston, basically stopped Jimmy’s drug business. They got these guys on charges through wiretaps or photographs, along with the confiscation of drugs and records. But this raid and the previous ones did not yield the large-scale information the DEA had hoped for. Everyone had been aware of the ongoing DEA operations for months. We’d watch or hear about the DEA raiding houses, businesses, and garages, trying to build their case, searching for records, products, and anything else they could find. In some instances, they did get records, although never the quantities they expected. One day they even raided the variety store. I was there as they hauled off my computer, where they were certain I kept records of all the drug transactions. But all that was on the computer were records for the videos we rented or sold. Nothing having to do with the drug trafficking business was on that computer or written down anywhere else. That was all in my head.

They tried many more times to bug Jimmy’s car, but, as always, they failed to get what they wanted. Knowing they were always trying to do that, I used to make a tiny cut with a razor on the dashboard and on the sun visor. It would drive Jimmy crazy when I did that, but once I saw the dashboard didn’t have my slash or if I couldn’t see the little white insulation through the blue covering on the visor, I’d know that it had been replaced and had a bug. But I didn’t bother to get rid of it. Like I said, we never talked in the car anyhow.

In January