“Yes, sir,” said Bob Lee. His father was a bit ahead of them, broad across the shoulders, bristly across the head where his hair had gone iron gray with age and been forced back with a stout brush. He still carried the marine discipline with him.
The father was a man with scars. His son had seen them: streaks, where something long and sinewy had bit him, puckered clusters from bullet holes, more ragged ridges of dead tissue where the Japanese shrapnel had torn through him. His fists, too, were a latticework of dead white. A bitter mark or two also flecked his jawline. He was a man who’d seen a lot of what the world can do to flesh.
“Come on, you two,” he turned now and called. “If we don’t get back by supper, Junie’s going to be plenty teed off.”
They reached his brand-new used pickup, with the gray fender and the cracked rear glass, but still an upstanding vehicle, if cheap after much bargaining.
“Daddy, what we gon’ tell Mr. Nelson?”
“The truth, Bob Lee. That’s all. He can handle it.”
“Best way,” confirmed Sam.
Mr. Nelson, who farmed a spread seven miles the other side of Blue Eye, had a deer problem. The young bucks had grown brazen as they nibbled his corn. He was a man of law, and so didn’t shoot, as so many might have, out of season. But he’d applied for a special dispensation from the state game agency, had gotten it, and asked Earl, the best shot in the county, to handle his problem in exchange for the meat to be harvested. It was a generous offer. Earl, who was not rich, could use the free meat. But that was before Bob Lee had decided not to shoot.
Another father might have ordered the son to shoot, or shot himself. But Earl wanted his son making up his own mind about things, and tried never to order him toward conclusions. He alone in Polk County would not permit his son to call him sir, as all the other boys did to their dads on pain of a mighty licking. Earl in fact could not bring himself to strike the boy, even when he was bad. Why was a mystery that he never communicated to anybody; it’s just the way he was, and when Earl Swagger was set in certain ways, then those were the ways they would remain.
“I’ll call him and explain,” Sam said.
“No, I will,” said Earl. “Actually, I know a fine hunter named Hitchens, a colored fellow, who could come out and take the deer, and that meat’d do him and his’n right fine in the months to come.”
“If I know Ed Nelson, he’ll not want colored shooting on his property.”
“I’ll make him understand.”
The drive was not long, though they stopped and bought the boy an RC Cola. But when they got home to Earl’s place off Route 7 this side of Board Camp, and saw the house that had been his own daddy’s set a mile off the road, on a bit of a hill, painted freshly white and nice looking in the now failing light, they were amazed at what they beheld, as it was so completely unexpected: three state police cruisers and a Cadillac Fleetwood limousine, black and big and gleaming in the sun from somebody’s fresh labor that very morning.
“Oh, Lord,” said Earl. “I do wonder what’s up.”
“Can’t be much,” said Sam. “We drove on through Blue Eye, and there was no sign of a commotion.”
They approached.
“I’ll be damned,” said Earl. “Lookie that.”
What he gestured toward was the white-and-black license plate on the Caddy, not green and tan like Arkansas’s; this one bore a low number with no letters and the identifying inscription UNITED STATES CONGRESS.
They pulled in, climbed from the pickup, and went quickly to the steps. Through the windows, Earl could see Junie inside, slightly nonplussed, and Colonel Jenks, who was his commanding officer, two or three other state police sergeants known to him as the sort that hung close to headquarters in Little Rock and thereby prospered, and two men in black suits.
“Good lord, Earl,” said Sam, “what does this mean?”
“Daddy, what is—”
“You just no never-mind, Bob Lee. It ain’t a thing to worry about.”
He picked up his son, for the boy’s fear upset him, and meant to give him a hug of reassurance, because he himself had never been hugged as a child. But immediately they were discovered on the porch, and en masse, the visiting party rose, abandoning poor Junie, and headed eagerly to him.
Earl knew in a second this was no lynching party.
“Well, Earl, by god, there you are,” said Colonel Jenks in a way far heartier than his normal dour style. “Why, Junie said you and the boy and Lawyer Vincent had gone hunting south of Blue Eye.”
“We came back early.”
“No luck? I don’t see no animal on the fender.”
“The best luck. It worked out fine.”
He put his son down.
“You run off, Bob Lee. Seems these boys come to talk to Daddy. Junie, can you get the boy some lemonade?”
“You come, Bob Lee,” sang Junie, taking the boy in her sheltering presence.
Earl turned to face whatever this would be. They stood, all of them, on the porch, in the pale twilight. “Now what is going on here, sir? You don’t come to call with a Cadillac every day.”
“Earl, may I introduce Phil Mackey of Governor Becker’s office and Lane Brodgins, on the staff of Congressman Harry Etheridge himself.”
The two men stepped forward behind large smiles and pushed hands at him; Earl shook each numbly. He looked behind them to see that Junie had been pressed to prepare for whatever this would be: A suitcase, the nice one he’d bought for her when she went on a trip to Cape Girardeau for her mother’s funeral last year, lay on a table. In it he saw neatly folded clothes: shirts, socks, slacks—his own. He also saw his new Super .38 Colt, wrapped in a cotton cloth, nested in his undercover shoulder holster. It was the right gun to pack, whatever was coming up. Junie knew.
“Earl—may I call you Earl, Earl?” said the governor’s man.
“Earl, you know how highly Fred Becker thinks of you. We all know you may have put him in the governor’s mansion.”
“That was some years ago,” said Earl.
“Yes, sir, it was. Now—well, you tell him, Lane.”
This Brodgins, the Washington version of the slickster of which Mackey was only a rural prototype, stepped forward now, and put a well-manicured hand on Earl’s shoulder.
“Earl, you know how Congressman Etheridge—hell, Harry—how highly Harry thinks of you, too. You’re one of three Arkansas Medal of Honor winners. Harry thinks of you as his boys.”
Earl just nodded. He knew enough of Boss Harry to go on edge, for he didn’t trust the man: a speechifying, deal-making politician who rose to power through old Ray Bama’s organization in Fort Smith. But Boss Harry—who came originally from Polk, moved up to Fort Smith, and made his way from gofer to secretary of the Democratic party to city legislator to mayor to congressman—had far exceeded his mentor. He was a man who, getting to Washington in record time, and quite young, had mastered its lessons, solved its system, and learned how to get himself into key positions. He’d been there so long he was a power, now especially, as chairman of some big moneybags committee.
“The governor always says, ‘That Earl, he’s the most capable man in Arkansas,’” said Phil.
“Earl,” said Sam, “I’d keep my hand on my wallet. These boys are reaching for something.”
“Now, Mr. Sam,” said Phil, “you may be Polk County’s prosecuting attorney, but you are still Earl’s best friend, so you advise him to listen to us, because we come with some damned good news.”
“Let’s hear it,” said Earl.
“Earl,” said Phil, “you’ve seen gangsters. You’ve seen how they take over, how they make things their own, how they kill what gets in their way. You know that truth well,” said Phil.
“The point is,” Lane said, “as Senator Kefauver has exposed, crime ain’t just home-grown no more. It’s national. You saw the hearings, Earl. They’re everywhere.”
“It was on the television, Earl.”
Earl didn’t watch
television much.
“I see where this one is going,” said Sam. “Harry’s seen how much ink old Estes is getting and wants a big bite of gangster pie, too. They’re saying Estes might run against General Ike in ’56, that’s how famous he is. Well, not if Harry has his way.”
“Mr. Vincent, Harry’s commitment is to the people of his district, and his state. He’s not anxious to give up representing Arkansas. But—”
“Here it comes, Earl. You watch yourself.”
“But,” continued Lane, “Harry ain’t content to sit back and let the gangsters do what they want. Now it happens they’re at their boldest on a little island just off of Florida called Cuba.”
“Woooieee,” said Sam. “Earl, Cuba’s so hot it makes Hot Springs seem like a Baptist church picnic.”
“We can’t hold hearings in Cuba,” said Lane. “It’s not our country, though we cooperate closely with its government. But there is a large naval base called Guantanamo. Marines are there, too. Now there are allegations that the gangsters from New York might be muscling in on the contracts for all the service to Guantanamo: you know, garbage, laundry, that sort of thing. We can’t have gangsters living off our servicemen, can we, Earl? So the congressman proposes an investigation.”
“Where do I fit in?” Earl asked.
“Well, sir, the congressman needs a bodyguard. It’s a dangerous town, Havana. He needs someone who can talk to the military, whom the military respects. He needs someone who’s been out and about in the world, someone who’s been the world over, say, in the Marine Corps. He needs someone who’s been up against gangsters, beaten them down, knows how they operate. Any of these seem like anybody you know, Earl?”
“What does Colonel Jenks say?” asked Earl.
“Well, Earl,” said Colonel Jenks, “the governor wants us to cooperate with the congressman, and so it seems we could easily enough detach you on special assignment to the congressional party that’s headed to Cuba. You’d go down there with the congressman, help him in any way you can, report to Mr. Brodgins here, and of course the state of Arkansas will continue your pay, and you’d be back in a few weeks. It’s a great opportunity, Earl. You could do well for yourself.”
“You’ve noticed, Earl, how them who help the congressman get helped themselves? It can happen to you, Earl.”
“Sounds to me,” said Sam, winking at Junie, “like this deal’s been signed, sealed and delivered for a month. These here fellows are just bringing the word.”
Chapter 5
“That’s him?” Roger asked.
“Yep,” Walter Short replied.
“Hmmmm. Somehow, from your descriptions, I was expecting Superman.”
“Don’t get him mad. Then you’ll see Superman.”
The two of them were huddled like junior G-men behind a sofa on the balcony above the foyer in the ambassador’s residence in the American embassy complex in the posh precinct just west of Centro Havana called Vedado. It was an old sugar millionaire’s place converted from opulence to mere luxury, and down below candles glinted, potted palms waved and a warm sea breeze cascaded in through the open marble atrium. A three-piece combo beat out one of Desi Arnaz’s softer rhythms.
The reception for the Honorable Congressman Harrison J. Etheridge and staff was well lubricated by ample rum from the folks at Bacardi, which bought so much of the sugar Domino milled from the Cuban cane. But all that labor against the good earth was far from view. Men in dinner jackets swirled about; women, brown and quivery, laughed gaily. Congressman Etheridge could even be glimpsed—that is, when he slowed down: a heavyset man with great, carefully tended mounds of white hair. But his dinner jacket was bespoke, from a fine Savile Row firm, and he cut a surprisingly dapper figure for a man whose Arkansas accent, amplified theatrically, seemed to come from a radio humor hour hosted by Lum and Abner. That mighty, booming voice cut through the air above the laughter and the music.
But neither Roger nor Walter watched the congressman. The congressman wasn’t nearly as interesting as he thought he was. They watched instead the congressman’s bodyguard, the large, dour, flattopped man in the khaki summer suit standing near a pillar, almost at parade rest, his piercing eyes glancing around the large room.
“He doesn’t look capable of making the Big Noise we need. He’s so banal,” said Roger.
“He won the Medal of Honor.”
“Not banal, admittedly. But he could be any cop. He looks so cop. The brush haircut, the size, the wariness, the solitude.”
“He was a marine sergeant.”
“Well, yes, a sergeant. I do see that. Not the college polish of your typical officer. Walter, really, this isn’t a mistake, is it? A state cop with a good war record? We’ve bet a lot on this fellow, and engineered our butts off to get him down here.”
“Take it from me, he’s not just a cop. Put a gun in his hand and he’s something you would not believe. Ask the Japs at Iwo, they found out the hard way. Ask the thugs of Hot Springs, if you can find any above the ground. He made plenty of Big Noise in those places.”
“Well, I hope you’re right. Let’s go start the dance.”
But Roger immediately sensed something from his younger assistant: reluctance, possibly fear. At least awkwardness. It was odd coming from a perfect no. 2 like Walter Short.
“Well? You’re the one who knows him. It’s your job to smooth this thing out, facilitate, make it happen.”
“Yes, but…”
“But what?”
“Well, we parted under ambiguous circumstances.”
“Now is a fine time to tell me.”
“I did tell you, Roger. Possibly you weren’t listening.”
“Oh Christ, of course it’s my fault. So you were sacked?”
“Sort of. A long story. Not worth retelling. Then, a few days later, that outfit had a catastrophe and some men were killed. I had nothing to do with it, of course, but you don’t know how some people may see things.”
“So suddenly you’re frightened? Excellent timing. My compliments.”
“I just feel a little off tonight. If I’m there, you won’t get a sense of who he is and how to handle him. My presence will throw the dynamic off. I’ll make myself known sometime later.”
“God. You sound like a schoolboy with a crush afraid to ask the girl out.”
“It’s complicated. Don’t stare at him.”
“We’re way up here—”
But down below, it was as if Earl Swagger sensed that he was being examined, and from what angle. He immediately flicked his eyes up to them, and they were barely fast enough to recede into shadow before he locked on them.
“See? He has incredible reflexes. He feels things. It’s the predator’s sense of danger. It’s his natural aggression. You stare at him, he feels it. It’s what kept him alive in the Pacific.”
“You are so ridiculous,” Roger said. “All right, Walter, hide up here from your love object. You be Cyrano, I’ll be Christian.”
“Go, Big Winnetka,” said Walter.
“Good lord, Sergeant Swagger, you don’t have to stand at attention,” said Roger heartily, turning on his best and most blazing Indian Hill Country Club charm. It had served him well there and at Harvard, in the army even, and most certainly in the Agency. He had no doubt that it would help him here, too.
“Sir?” said Swagger, turning his direct gaze upon the younger, thinner, far more glamorous man.
Roger saw less a face than some kind of Spartan shield with eyes: bronze, bone and leather, baked in the sun until brown, dented, battered, hooding gray eyes almost serene. Roger hurried onward. “I mean, the place is guarded by U.S. Marines. And it’s Cuba, for God’s sake, the forty-ninth state. It’s practically Miami.”
“Sir, I’m just trying to pay attention,” said the state policeman.
“Let me introduce myself. I’m Roge Evans, I do a little something in the codes department upstairs.”
“Yes, sir. I guess you’d be the spy.”
&
nbsp; Roger laughed.
“Say, I wish it was that exciting. No, I just make sure the private messages to Washington stay private. I button things up for later unbuttoning. That’s all. It’s easy work, and it leaves me a lot of time to work on my tennis. You don’t play?”
“No, sir.”
“Please. A man with your combat record should not be calling a man with mine sir. It should be the other way around.”
“Sure, but don’t you know a lot about me.”
“Sergeant, you can’t keep a secret in an embassy, let me warn you of that right now. So everyone knows about the medal on Iwo Jima, the five battle stars. Why, I only have one—”
“All that was a long time ago. I hardly ever think of it.”
Great! Roger had played what he assumed would be his best shot, the brotherhood-of-arms angle, and this Arkansas guy hadn’t even noticed. But Roger wouldn’t let it go without a struggle.
“Well, I think of it all the damned time,” he responded. “Nothing that big ever happened to me before or since. I’m no hero, Sergeant, not like you, but I tried to do the right thing. I even got shot at a little, over in Europe. I was a sergeant, too. Look, if you feel you must stand here, let me get you a drink or something. You look so damned rigid.”
“I don’t drink no more. I’m fine. I’m not a man for parties, that’s all. I just stand around like a dumb ox and maybe sneak a peek at a gal now and then. The congressman seems to be enjoying himself.”
Damn! Roger was disappointed that the man hadn’t picked up on his war-service gambit.
“Yes, well, if certain people are to be believed, he has a history of enjoying himself. Anyhow, you’ll be happy to know that this is just the warm-up. The ambassador likes these intimate gatherings to show the staff and his millionaire pals how important he is. But next Monday, he’s got the whole island coming in for a more formal thing. Oh, it’ll be something. Movie stars, some athletes, Hemingway, newspaper joes, probably some actors, lots of corporation big boys, and the best kind of beautiful women: those of dubious morality. Some mobsters, some gamblers. They call themselves ‘sportsmen.’ If you don’t like this, you’ll hate that.”