Winter Kills

  “In short, you are defying me. You are saying to me, ‘Go ahead, Cerutti, blow us all up.’”

  “I am counting on you fucking up, Cerutti.”

  “What do you mean?” the professor snapped.

  “I mean you are very fond of what you like, and you like Cerutti being alive, therefore no crazy idea of my father’s orders to blow this place up would have any effect on you if you had to be blown up with it.”

  “What is the deal you are offering me?”

  “Tell me everything you know about my brother’s assassination, Professor, and everything that followed it—everything. Then I can let you disappear in any way you choose.”

  “I’ll accept that. Very kind of you, I’m sure.”

  “Not at all. Please don’t thank me. They’ll catch you anyway.”

  “I don’t think so,” Cerutti said. “I have been thinking about this for some years.”

  “Professor, what was real and what was a scenario?”

  Cerutti dialed at the console. The table opened and a tray with a pot of tea and one cup and saucer ascended. Cerutti poured the tea and said, “Captain Heller, Joe Diamond, Turk Fletcher and Willie Arnold were as real as real can be. That guard who beat you up on the fiftieth floor of your father’s building was very real. He was telling you specifically and incontrovertibly that you were to stop.”

  “The rest was fantasy?” Nick asked.

  “Almost.”

  “Except the twenty-four murders.”

  “I had nothing to do with those. Furthermore, most of those deaths were only coincidental—people wanted to believe they were connected with the assassination.”

  “What did Z. K. Dawson have to do with any of it?”

  “Nothing. Dawson was just a mistake of your father’s. He was off Dawson because of an aluminum deal Dawson won about twenty-six years ago, so he thought he’d give Dawson a hard time—create a public scapegoat and pay off an old score. But your father’s mistakes got worse. He decided he wanted to protect Fletcher. He wouldn’t let us find Fletcher. Are you going to tell me that a man who doesn’t even bother to change his own name, who has limited means of earning a living, who has to be in touch with his centenarian mother and who had an Amarillo accent like a knife sharpener in Indonesia could have gotten away from our people?”

  “But, why would Pa—”

  “Oh, your father knew where he was. He told General Nolan to give Fletcher a letter of reference, and your father followed Fletcher straight through to Bangladesh and Brunei, but I think he wanted Fletcher alive to keep himself sharp. There was no way for him to get old and flaccid while Fletcher was still alive, and then there was the biggest reason of all, which your father didn’t know himself. He could not stand the guilt of what he had done. He wanted to get caught and he wanted to be punished. Deep, deep down in his mind and in his soul he had put the whole combination together. He knew Fletcher was working for you. Maybe he even told Nolan to tell Fletcher that there would be a safe job for him with you. Then he waited for something to happen that would make Fletcher talk, make Fletcher draw you in, because your father knew absolutely that if you could get pulled into this you would surely turn to him, and with him steering the whole investigation through you, he could force its course and could bring about his own apprehension.”

  “Pa was using me to make sure he was punished for what he did to Tim?”

  “Yes. But he didn’t know that. And considering all that he had done over fourteen years’ time to cover his tracks, he didn’t have to lay down an order on the first day that you were to be protected—no matter what—that no harm was to come to you. He didn’t have to demand that I bring Lola Camonte into the scenarios. That was getting close to the bone, that was right down at the real issue.”

  “Camonte and Frank Mayo were real, then. Just the way the witnesses said they were?”

  “Camonte and Mayo are real people, God knows,” Cerutti said. “But except for one section, they were just characters in the scenarios and therefore unreal. The real part was the tape your father had made about the meeting between Camonte and the President, when the President heard for the first time that your father had stolen the two-million-dollar campaign contribution that had been made through Camonte by the crime industry. All of the rest about Camonte I fabricated, because our science functions in the balance between the real and the fanciful, and that is what makes our scenarios the marvelously effective things they are—the task-force strength of all modern American political action.”

  Nick inhaled very deeply again. “Professor”—he sighed helplessly—“did Pa have Tim killed?”

  “Yes.”

  There was a silence. Nick covered his face with his hands. Then he released them and sat back, staring at Cerutti.

  “Your brother knew that your father and his friends had been taking him down the wrong road in the Presidency. For eleven months he had gone along because he could see no way to break with the men who had elected him. Then your father gave him his chance over the issue of the stolen campaign contribution, and the President barred your father and the rest of the oligarchs he could identify from access to the White House and key government offices. He became, so to speak, his own President. When he did that he sealed his death warrant.”

  “His death warrant?” Nick cried out. “Who signed it? Who ordered it? Who are these—the rest of the oligarchs Tim barred?”

  “The executive committee of the men and women who own this country met and voted. Your brother had to be punished, and a man they could trust had to be moved into the White House in his place. They controlled the CIA, the Secret Service and the FBI, and it was understood that one of these would organize the strike, but your father said it was his right to get that part of the work done. It was he who had lost your brother in the first instance. It was his job to make it all good and to re-establish himself among his peers. That motion was carried.”

  THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 1959—ROCKRIMMON

  The two spokesmen for the executive committee arrived at Rockrimmon in a sweet little Jovair that was affected by its pilot. It was a red, white and blue four-seater, tandem-rotor helicopter, with egg-shaped tail fins mounted on outriggers below the rear rotor head. It was supercharged with a 235 horsepower 6A-350 Franklin engine, and it had a range of 200 miles at 105 miles per hour. Its owner-pilot was Francis Manning Winikus, “the grand old man of the CIA,” cultivated, healthy and pink behind his neat white moustache and his twinkling eyeglasses. “The Incomparable Spymaster,” Georges Marton, the espionage chronicler, had called him. His passenger was Dr. Hugh “Horse” Pickering, leader of the Federal Synod of American Churches Pro-Christ, who was heavy-boned, hearty and cunning. The two men were dressed for the country, except that Dr. Pickering wore a black-and-white-checked sports jacket and black slacks and loafers, as befitted his calling, and Winikus wore a blood-red-flecked and -lined tweed jacket with blood-red slacks and kerchief, as befitted his.

  Pa and General Nolan were waiting for them at the pad. For the day only, the General wore his full kit: brass glowing, fruit salad bulging, overseas cap at a merry tilt. It had not been the uniform he had worn in World War II. He had gained sixty-one pounds since the old, flat days, but Pa liked him to be dressed out for ceremonial occasions, and the uniform had been measured, cut and tailored by Welshman in London only five weeks before. Pa wore knickers and a pullover under a heavy overcoat.

  They rode to the house in two golf carts under sable throws, Pa riding in the lead cart with Francis Winikus, the General handling the rear guard in the cart with Dr. Pickering. Si had a bowl of hot punch waiting for them. Winikus asked for a Dr. Pepper drink. Dr. Pickering wanted Ovaltine laced with Southern Comfort. General Nolan waded into the hot punch. Pa drank beer.

  There was a roaring fire going in the high-manteled, wide fireplace. Standing around it, sipping their drinks, they settled what had gone wrong with the Army-Navy game the previous Saturday. In a little while luncheon was called.

/>   At Dr. Pickering’s curate’s request, Pa had laid on a sound, high-protein meal (because Dr. Pickering did not feel it right for his presbytery to buy and serve proteins openly): jambon persillé, slabs of cold roast beef, cold haricot beans in oil and garlic, and a magnum of 1949 Bonnes Mares. Francis kept them entertained with stories of how he had gotten ITT into France the day before World War II was over, what an advantage it had turned out to be, and how it had all become quite a large pot. Dr. Pickering ate 2.3 pounds of beef, 1.2 pounds of ham, but bypassed the beans. After lunch they went into Pa’s study, with its four five-foot-wide balconies cantilevered high up on the forty-two-foot-high walls to get at the upper books. They sat around the open fire this time, the two visitors on sofas on either side of Pa, Pa in a low, comfortable, calfskin chair. General Nolan was at a desk, making notes to keep up the pretense that the conversations were not being recorded.

  Si brought in a glass cona of black South African coffee on a battery-operated heating stand. The General passed among them with a bottle of Pelisson cognac that had been in the cask for thirty years. When Si left, Francis said in his wonderful voice that could speak so many languages, “We are interested to hear your final reactions, Tom.”

  Pa stayed impassive. Everything had been handled courteously and skillfully, as though to convey the impression that he really had a choice in the matter—which he did not. The owners of America in plenary session had voted death for Tim unanimously. Pa’s loyalty to himself and to them—call it bushido, call it omertà, call it love of country—now required that Pa re-establish himself for having made the move that had disaffected Tim, rendering the President useless to them. Pa felt no mawkishness about what he would have to do. Tim knew better than most people about what would happen to him once he dared to pull this man-of-the-people stunt. Now it was either Tim or Pa. As far as Pa was concerned, Tim had already stretched him out on the ice as though he were an old Eskimo whose time was up—over a couple of suitcases filled with some lousy campaign money that they used to buy whores and burglars with. He had barred Pa from Washington. He had locked the door on Pa’s mutual owners of the country, and that was ritual murder. Pa could tell himself with total confidence that if Tim had ever had to have him killed, the way Pa now had to have Tim killed, Tim would have done it with a big, toothy grin. All right. If he didn’t get rid of Tim himself, personally, to hold the esteem of the men like Francis Manning Winikus and Hugh Pickering, he would go down. He would be brought down swiftly, efficiently, painlessly and impersonally. If he didn’t insist, as he had, on doing this job himself, it would be the end. So Pa answered Francis imperturbably. “I thought we’d make the move on the twenty-second of February,” he said. “That’s Washington’s Birthday, and the President will be making the traditional visit to the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia. We’ll be able to lay out a pretty good plan.”

  “Is there anything we can do to ease the way for you, Tom?” Francis asked courteously. “Do you need weapons, disguises, master keys, infrared cameras, surveillance equipment—anything?”

  “Do you have plants inside the White House detail of the Secret Service?” Pa asked.

  “Yes. Eleven men.”

  “When the time comes, we’d like to eliminate building checks on the site.”

  “Of course.”

  “We’ll need some safe weapons. Just what we’ll need we’ll have figured down to a T by the eighth or ninth.”

  “Have you set your contacts with the police?”

  “We’re doing that now.”

  “Have you chosen the marksmen you’ll want?”

  “We’re organizing that right now too, Francis.”

  “I have a sound list of men, if you think that can help you.”

  “No,” Pa said flatly, “I think we’ll be all right there. We’ll have the marksmen and the police and a fall guy for the press and TV. We’ll look to you for weapons and some help from the Secret Service boys, and I think we’ll be all right.”

  “We know you’ll understand, Tom, that the Committee decided it would be necessary,” Dr. Pickering rumbled, “to back you up with an independent team.”

  “Perfectly all right, Horse,” Pa said. “I certainly understand and approve. I just would like it understood, however, that when my team breaks through and does the whole job in the perfect manner in which it is going to be done, it is agreed that this back-up team, this team that is in effect a witnessing element, will be eliminated by Francis’ people.”

  “Oh, absolutely,” Dr. Pickering said.

  “That is understood,” Francis Winikus assured Pa. He turned a red carnation from his buttonhole in his two hands and stared into the fire speaking almost wistfully. “These are sad days for all of us,” he said, “but the saddest for you. I am very, very fond of Tim, as well you know. But, sentimentality to the contrary, I know of no other American whom I would rather have in charge of what must be done.”

  “So say we all of us,” Dr. Pickering intoned.

  ***

  When Francis Winikus and Dr. Pickering took off in the Jovair, Pa and General Nolan drove back to the house silently in a golf cart, then settled down to play pinochle. After a while the General asked, “How do we find this corrupt, well-placed cop, Tom?”

  “Frank Mayo will find him.”

  The General brightened. “Oh—sure. And how will we find the marksmen?”

  “We’ll import one and use a local for the other.”

  “A local?”

  “The cop will find him.”

  “Where do we import the other one from?”

  “What was your mother’s maiden name?”

  “Casper.”

  “Okay. You are now William Casper. You go back to Dallas, where you like it, where you came from, and you call Eddie Tropek at the National Rifle Association, the state office, and ask him to dig you out just the names of the three best marksmen in the state. Then you talk to them one by one until you get a feel of the one who’ll move anything for money. Then we import him to Philadelphia.”

  “When do I talk to this corrupt policeman?”

  “I’ll talk to Mayo right now,” Pa said.

  ***

  General Nolan had been born a Texan, and that had meant just about everything to him. He felt he was a Texan to the marrow of his bones, from the soles of his feet to the top of his head. It meant a very great deal to him to get this assignment from Tom to go back to the land of the sons of the pioneers and to become William Casper/Casper Junior. He could talk again as he had talked as a boy without any fear that he would not be understood. He loved the sound of Texas speech. It was like a concert of massed banjos. At last, after a lifetime of uniforms and eastern clothes, he would be able to dress as his father had dressed. He bought real thick, old b’ar-grease hair tonic. He trained his hair down over his forehead the way his daddy had worn his. He liked the style of it so much that he vowed never to change it back. He got himself a big, old-fashioned gold watch and chain in a New Haven pawn shop. It had a huge elk’s tooth suspended from it. He carried a package of quill toothpicks and one pure gold toothpick for after Sunday dinner. He listed and did all the things his father had done, such as polishing anything he picked up or farting unexpectedly and unself-consciously. It had been near to forty years since he’d even stepped inside the Texas line. He had forgotten how much he liked people like ole Turk Fletcher, who was as plain as a sweaty old hatband.

  Everything went well. There was no need to use the back-up team. They were eliminated on the afternoon of the assassination in an airplane explosion over Champaign, Illinois.

  There was a certain amount of mopping up to do for the intensive four-month period after the assassination until the Pickering Commission could complete its report and disband. Francis Manning Winikus’ specialists handled the elimination of those people who had either observed something inconsistent in Hunt Plaza or who had followed their own hunches in various directions, such as journalists, blackmailers or amateur detecti
ves.

  Then everything settled down. The public bought the Pickering Commission’s recommendations without question, and, happily, the men and women who owned the country could return to their work for a better world, for a better America.

  Fourteen years went by, each one of them a busy and profitable year for Pa. General Nolan gained twenty-six additional pounds. He had to give up coitus and accept fellatio as a way of life, because there was just no other way for him to do otherwise. “I don’t see how can you find it even to pee,” Pa said.

  SUNDAY, JANUARY 27, 1974—PALM SPRINGS

  The call from Carswell had come at 1:05 P.M. It was eleven o’clock at night in London and ten in the morning, on Monday, in Brunei, so Pa figured he could pick up about a full day’s start on Nick, considering the time differences and the traveling Nick still had to do. All Carswell knew was that Nick was going to Philadelphia and wanted a meeting with Miles Gander. It could be oil business, but Pa didn’t think so. Nick had two of the best geologists in the world aboard the Teekay if he had any geological questions. There was no reason to fly halfway around the world to see Gander because he was a geologist.

  When Pa called Keifetz to get the question answered he got a shock equal to a circus sledgehammer crashing into the side of his head. Fletcher had talked to Nick and had spilled everything he knew. Fletcher had hidden the rifle, and Nick knew where to find it. For no reason—and this was what frightened Pa most—when he should have felt metallic and wary and dangerous, he felt suddenly euphoric. He felt extraordinarily released from he did not know what. He sat motionless after he hung up on Keifetz, thinking not about the complex of protective moves he would need to construct but that a strong, warming light seemed to have been switched on within him, illuminating every inner part of him in all the places he could not see and, even now, seventy-four years later, could not understand. Nick is smart. Nick doesn’t like you. You could get into bad trouble over this. But he knew the bad trouble he could find was that he loved Nick too. He had loved Tim, but he had cheated himself by loving Tim for what he could bring in, as a cat’s paw. He loved Nick for being a fine man, his own man, a brave and a responsible man—and he didn’t want to have to face any chance of harm for him. But it had been so long since Pa had known what trouble was that the habituated part of his mind spoke to him soothingly and promised pleasure. This is a game. You must enjoy it. Nick has never lived by his wits. Play with him as long as it amuses you, then send him back to Asia, baffled and empty-handed.