Nevertheless, Kennedy paused to speak to Boldt, the President seeming to the agent “strangely shy.” He asked the Negro, “Are you one of Mayor Daley’s finest, young man?”
“I’m a Secret Service agent, Mr. President.”
An agent accompanying the group called out, “He’s assigned to the Chicago office, sir! His name is Eben Boldt.”
Kennedy said to the doorman, “Do you know if there has ever been a Negro agent on the Secret Service White House detail, Mr. Boldt?”
“Not to my knowledge, Mr. President.”
“How would you like to be the first?”
“Yes, sir, Mr. President!”
The next day, Eben had his new marching orders.
“That’s how I became the first Negro Secret Service agent to serve at the White House,” he said, the first time I heard the story.
“What you are,” I said, laughing, “is the first bathroom attendant ever promoted to the White House staff.”
Eben had not seen the humor.
Nor had he fit in well on the White House detail. He had gotten along famously with JFK and Bobby, but there was friction with the other agents. They made continual racial digs, and Eben wasn’t the kind of guy who could roll with punches like that. I’m not saying he should have, just that he couldn’t. He reported his fellow agents for racial comments, as well as drinking and carousing when on the road with the President, and was generally not popular.
Eben requested a return to the Chicago office, after a three-month probationary tour, and permission was granted.
Lou and I discussed the A-1’s talented if tight-assed graduate over lunch at Binyon’s.
“He’s a good man,” Lou said. “Think of the shit we’ve got as Jews, over the years, and just try to imagine what his life is like.”
“I’m not a Jew,” I said, over my finnan haddie. “I’m just a Mick with an unfortunate last name. Anyway, his life would be easier if he knew how to laugh.”
“See? You are a Jew.”
Lou also reported to me that he’d assigned various men (and one woman) to the Ellison case, as I’d outlined earlier.
When we got back at one forty-five, Eben Boldt was already there, seated in the waiting room, hands folded in his lap, as immobile as a cigar-store Indian.
Seeing Lou and me, he shot to his feet. He was in a crisply tailored dark-gray suit with a white button-down shirt and a black tie with a restrained red pattern; his black wingtips were mirror-shined. A charcoal green-feathered hat was on the seat cushion next to him.
And he immediately proved me wrong-he smiled at us both. Not a big smile, but he was obviously pleased to see us, and shook both our hands, a firm, perspiration-free grip.
“Mr. Sapperstein,” he said, with nods to both of us. “Mr. Heller.”
“You know us too well for that, Eben,” I said. “It’s Nate and Lou, okay? And just because you work for the government, don’t expect me to call you ‘mister.’”
He gave me a blank look. He could smile-it was just humor that he missed.
I led Eben through the bullpen and he nodded and said hello to a couple of agents who’d worked here when he did. No stopping for conversation, though. We moved right into my office, he took the client chair and I got behind my desk, and we had one of the shortest conversations on (or off) record at the A-1.
“Someone wants to see you,” he said. He stood. “I’ll drive.”
I stayed put. “What, you’re taking me for a ride? To a Chicago guy, that has a kind of nasty ring.”
Nothing.
“Okay,” I said, getting up and coming around the desk. “Why don’t you drive, then?”
He frowned a little, but politely opened my door for me.
Soon the Secret Service man was behind the wheel of a dark-blue Chevy Impala with me in the passenger seat. No other agent had made the trip with Eben-it was just the two of us. On this cool, overcast day, both in raincoat and hat, we headed a few blocks west to the Northwest Highway, and before long were at Foster Avenue, where the road split; keeping left took you to O’Hare, but Eben headed north onto the Edens Expressway.
He hadn’t said anything since telling me somebody wanted to see me.
We got off the expressway at Lake Street, heading west past ranch-style houses and other nice but not pricey middle-class residences.
Finally he broke the ice. “I was in an interesting meeting this morning.”
“Really. What kind of meeting, Eben?”
“Coordination meeting. They held it in the anteroom of Mayor Daley’s office. Fifth floor of City Hall?”
I knew where Mayor Daley’s office was, but didn’t point that out, just saying, “Ah. You were representing the Secret Service at this meeting?”
Whatever the hell it was about.
He steered with two tight hands. Wouldn’t want that Impala to get away from him like a bucking bronco. “I was there with Special Agent in Charge Martineau. I think the SAIC may have resented my presence, but the White House apparently requested it.”
And he smiled again. Just a little. Eben obviously got a kick out of the boss getting trumped by the Negro’s connections in high places.
I, on the other, was not smiling. The White House?
Eben was saying, “There were three deputy chiefs of police on hand, and Captain Linsky, security liaison between the PD and the SS.”
He meant Secret Service, not Hitler’s elite.
“Your friend Chief Cain was there, Nate, serving in the same capacity as Captain Linksy, but for the sheriff’s department. Lasted a good four hours, the meeting.”
“Did it? Is it a breach of security for you to tell me what the meeting was about?”
Since we’d been discussing it for five minutes.
“Oh. Sorry. Thought I’d covered that. We were mapping out the security plans for the President’s visit Saturday. He’s scheduled to attend the Army-Air Force game at Soldier Field.”
“Yeah, I noticed that on the front page on my way to do the Jumble.”
He ignored that, which was okay-it didn’t really merit anything. “Each deputy chief was assigned an area of responsibility. Patrol Deputy Rochford, the airport. Traffic Deputy Madi, the motorcade route. Captain Linsky, the Conrad Hilton-where the President’s motorcade ends up, and where he and his staff will headquarter for the trip. Chief Cain has the stadium, and various street security functions. The mayor’s special events man, Jack Reilly, was there, too. Extended His Honor’s best wishes for a safe visit.”
We were passing through a section of middle-class businesses, currently gliding by Scott Foresman, the textbook publisher, home of the Dick and Jane primers. See Nate. See Nate ride. See Nate wonder what the fuck was up.
“For a few hours yesterday,” Eben said, eyes on the road, “I was ranking agent in the office. So I was the one who took the call.”
I frowned at him. “What call?”
“From the FBI. Phoning from Washington. The agent on the line said they had information from an informant warning of an attempt to assassinate the President by a four-man team using high-powered rifles.”
“What?”
“The attempt would be made on his way to the Army-Air Force game.”
Eben took a curve and I knocked against my door as Lake Street opened up on the north side into a vast open space-an airfield that pre-dated most of the neighborhood we’d just passed through.
The agent was saying, “The suspects are reportedly right-wing military paramilitary fanatics … armed with rifles with telescopic sights. The assassination itself would likely be attempted at one of the Northwest Highway overpasses.”
“The FBI considers this credible intel?”
“Yes. But I don’t know anything about the informant, except that the agent on the phone mentioned his name is ‘Lee.’”