“The party,” Flo said.
“The party! Well, the guest list couldn’t have been more impressive. For example, Richard Nixon was there...”
I said, “Nixon was in Dallas during the assassination? Does he have an alibi?”
That last had been kidding on the square.
Flo said to me, “Nixon was in town for Pepsi Cola. They were a client of his legal firm.” She nodded to our hostess. “Please continue.”
“Well, Hunt was there, Sid Richardson, George Brown... George brought Hoover in on his private plane. All the oilmen, who I call the Great White Fathers. Bankers like John McCloy, who’s on the Warren Commission. And all kinds of society people from Dallas. But Lyndon didn’t get there till the party was breaking up, at eleven or even midnight. And he and Hunt and a few others, including Nixon and Hoover, went into the library and locked themselves in for, oh, maybe ten minutes.”
She paused to sip her iced tea.
“When Lyndon came out of there, he saw me and came up and he was red in the face. Like he’d got himself an instant sunburn in there. He had this just... dreadful look. I asked what was wrong, and he whispered, in this terrible grating voice, ‘After tomorrow, those damn Kennedys will never stand in my way again. That’s not a threat, it’s a promise.’ I’ll never forget that. How could I?”
Flo said, “Do you realize what you’re implying?”
“I do. But I don’t know what happened in that room. I don’t know what was discussed. Maybe somebody shared inside news that Lyndon was being dropped from the ticket, and he intended to tell Jack Kennedy off.”
Or perhaps he’d been told of the imminent assassination and had worked himself up some righteous outrage over previous Kennedy humiliations to help rationalize his role in the crime, even if that role was simply foreknowledge.
Flo said, “Forgive me, Madeleine, but my tracking of the whereabouts of the major figures in the case puts Johnson at his hotel at the time. He was seen.”
She waved that off. “Lyndon had a look-alike cousin who filled in for him, if he was slipping out. Somebody who could pass for him, if it wasn’t up close or in conversation.”
I guess his mistress would know.
“Now, not everybody still at the party went into that private conference,” she was saying. “For example, Mac Wallace didn’t.”
I about fell out of the chair. Flo, who knew of Wallace through me, glanced my way, knowing I’d react.
I said, “You know Mac Wallace?”
“Sure do, bless his heart. He’s Lyndon’s number one hatchet man, and that’s not exactly a figure of speech. Mac made seventeen, eighteen people disappear that I know of, or anyway strongly suspect. You know, he was a man with a future, smart as a whip, but then he got mixed up in that love triangle with Lyndon’s no-good sister, and lost his head and shot that poor golfer. Lyndon bought his friend out of that jam, but you know, that was the end of any kind of normal life for Mac.”
“You don’t hold it against him, being a murderer?”
“Oh, I kind of feel sorry for him. He’s certainly a terrible man now, but once he was so promising.” Her eyes tightened as something occurred to her. “You know, we had this wonderful colored girl who all but raised my two boys when I went back to work at the ad agency. She was with us for many years. She traveled with us, and one time on a trip to San Antonio, I believe it was, she accidentally came in on Lyndon and me at a most inopportune moment. She scurried out, and Lyndon said, ‘Say good-bye to her.’ I thought he was joshing, but she disappeared the next day. No one has seen her since. I asked an attorney who’s been my go-between with Lyndon if he knew what became of her. And he said, ‘What do you think? Mac Wallace’... Now, Mr. Heller, you look dry as a bone. I simply have to refresh your tea.”
She took the glass from my hand and went off to do that while Flo and I looked at each other in blank amazement.
Then Madeleine was handing me back my tall glass and I said, “Doesn’t it bother you, these killings?”
She sat. “Killings bother any Christian, Mr. Heller. Why, I would mourn the untimely demise of any person. But these were political decisions. They were deemed necessary. We’re not talking about just any man. We’re talking about a powerhouse of a man who became the President of the United States. A man I love very much. He did what he had to do, to do the very good things that he has done. For Negroes. For the poor.”
I could think of one “poor” Negro he hadn’t done anything good for — the nanny who raised her boys.
Madeleine’s expression was grave now, her brown eyes boring in on me — no pixie in them at all. “Had the assassination not happened the day it did, Lyndon would probably have gone to prison — or at least the Kennedys would have shuffled him out of public life in some way. All because of his involvement with two good friends, two wonderful men, Billie Sol Estes and Bobby Baker. Funny how some of the people who were going to testify against Lyndon found themselves in the middle of homosexual scandals, or like that Marshall fella, who shot himself five times.”
“Mac Wallace,” I said.
“Yes, Nate,” she said pleasantly. “Without a doubt. And Flo? Can you understand why it is that you can’t use my name? Next time Mac Wallace is in town, I don’t want him dropping by.”
Chapter 13
The twenty-two story building at 3525 Turtle Creek Boulevard, of tinted, reinforced concrete and Mexican brick, was the most prestigious apartment house in Dallas.
Built in 1957, 3525 (as it was known) was home to such famous residents as Greer Garson, Jimmy Dean, Senator John Tower, Fabian, and assorted oilmen and wealthy widows. The restaurant off the spacious, modern lobby, the Turtle Room — with its continental cuisine and seventeen-foot, floor-to-ceiling windows on three sides, looking onto magnificent landscaping — was open to the public. The on-site nightspot, Club 3525, however, was for private members only, though of course Flo Kilgore was an honored guest, on the off chance she might mention the place in her nationally syndicated column.
3525 had made the papers before — a while back, a socialite’s body had been found floating in the swimming pool; then department-store widow Minnie Marcus had been relieved of seventy grand in jewelry in a daring robbery; and, not long ago, the club had been raided by the city vice squad for after-hours drinking (the more elderly residents had complained about the noise).
Detective Nathan Heller of Chicago was investigating none of these crimes. Instead I was spending a quiet evening at 3525, first dining on French fare at the Turtle Room in a setting rich with teak and polished crystal, and then in the club, listening to the Bill Black Combo play jazz with a saxy flare that wouldn’t have been wrong for the Colony. Eat your heart out, Bill Peck and his Peckers.
The crowd here was young, at least for 3525 — couples in their thirties and forties, Twisting and Frugging on a small dance floor by the modest stage, pretending they were in their twenties. The room was black booths and mirrored walls with red-and-blue stripper lighting on the stage and dance floor.
Needless to say, I didn’t spot Greer Garson.
Flo had spoken to a number of fans, but signed few autographs, as this was too hip a room for that. She looked very mod in a yellow white-polka-dotted miniskirted dress, with a matching bow in her indestructible bouffant, as seen on TV. She was trying too hard to look young, but the lighting helped.