Public Enemies_ America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI - Bryan Burrough [272]
“Hell no!” Karpis said. He ran for the hotel, worried that police would soon be on the scene. In the lobby the clerk suggested Karpis stay in his room. Snipers would be on the rooftops soon. “Jesus Christ,” Karpis said, “I thought I was getting away from crime.”
Karpis wasted no time getting out of Havana. Heller arranged for him to rent a six-room beach house down the coast outside the town of Veradero. It was as beautiful a spot as Karpis had ever seen. The sand was white as snow, the water alive with glints of blue and green. The house came with a fourteen-foot motorized skiff that Karpis used almost every day to fish in the Gulf of Mexico. He hired a maid and a houseboy and a Korean cook, none of whom could speak English. It was heaven.
A month passed. They did nothing but fish and walk the beach, collecting seashells. One evening at dusk, Karpis was sitting on his veranda when a pack of children approached to tell him there was a call for him at the town switchboard. It was Nate Heller with a message: Ma was on her way to Varadero for a visit; she had learned from Joe Adams where they were staying. Later that night Karpis was listening to Amos ’n’ Andy on the radio when he realized he was late to pick her up. He drove to the bus stop and found a red-faced Ma involved in a manic tug-of-war with a Cuban boy who was intent on helping her with her baggage. When Karpis walked up, Ma turned her anger on him, yelling that he was late. Karpis laughed and handed the boy a peso.
For three days, Karpis took Ma beachcombing and fishing, a peaceful interlude marred only by an afternoon when Ma failed to catch a fish and accused Karpis of sabotaging her fishing line. Karpis just rolled his eyes; that was Ma. When it came time for her to leave, Karpis drove her to Havana and put her on the flight to Miami.
While in Havana, Karpis dropped by George’s American Bar, where he was known as “Mr. Wagner.” The proprietor’s wife, whose hobby seemed to be drinking rum-and-Cokes from dawn to dusk, showed him a detective magazine. She opened it to a photograph of the Barker Gang.
“Why Mr. Wagner,” she slurred. “If I didn’t know you so well, I would swear this was you.”
“It does look a little like me, doesn’t it?” Karpis said.
She wouldn’t let it go, prattling on about what an uncanny resemblance the photograph was. Karpis forced a chuckle and offered to buy the magazine from her for thirty-five cents. “No, no, no” the woman said. She wanted to show it to her friends. At this point, the owner stepped from behind the bar and angrily snatched up the magazine. “Take the thirty-five cents!” he snapped. He winked at Karpis.
When he returned to Varadero the next day, Karpis could see Delores was growing restless. “Why don’t you go over to Miami for a few days?” he suggested.
“Would you let me?”
“Sure,” Karpis said. “Check into the El Commodoro and maybe if you want, you can go up there where Freddie and his mother are. While you’re over there, look around and maybe you’ll find someplace maybe you’d like to live ’cause we may not stay here much longer.” Karpis, too, was growing restless. Cuba was too violent for his tastes.
Delores spent a week in Miami and returned with a bulldog pup. She and Karpis fell back into an easy rhythm of eating, fishing, and sunbathing, until one night Karpis was listening to Lowell Thomas’s newscast and heard that Pretty Boy Floyd was dead.
“Jesus Christ!” he snapped. “They’re knocking everybody off!” He felt nothing. Better him than me, he thought.
Then, on a trip into Havana a few days later, he changed a one-thousand-dollar bill at a branch of the Royal Bank of Canada. Some of the bills he received in exchange, he noticed, were discolored. He checked the Federal Reserve numbers. They were from Minneapolis. He realized with a start that it was some of the Bremer kidnap