Per the stateside conduit:
I'd like to ship via Agency-courier flights to Nellis. I've got a well-placed lawyer friend who may be able to pull strings Sc get us clearance there. Then we'll distribute out of Tiger Kab, to (expendable) Negro pushers who'll push exclusively in West Vegas. Rogers, Guery Elorde will funnel the final profits to exile groups on the gulf.
The team is solid. I'm confident that they'll work well together. Let's stay focused on the Cuban end of things.
Viva la Causa!
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 10/29/64. Pouch communiquй. To: Pete Bondurant. From: John Stanton. Marked: "Hand Pouch Deliver Only"! "Destroy Upon Reading."
I like your personnel and plan, per one proviso.
You'll need cargo-manifest cover to land at Nellis, and it must be convincing. What do you advise?
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 10/31/64. Pouch communiquй. To: John Stanton. From: Pete Bondurant. Marked: "Hand Pouch Deliver Only"! "Destroy Upon Reading."
Per your last pouch:
Howard Hughes (my old boss my lawyer friend's current boss) wants to curry favor with politicians Sc military personnel in Nevada already has Hughes Aircraft-Tool Co charter clearance at Nellis. My lawyer friend will try to convince H.H. to purchase ARVN-surplus ordnance to donate to the Nevada National Guard, as a PR ploy. This will expand his ground clearance allow us to hide our merchandise in with the ordnance fly it straight to Nellis Vegas.
What do you think?
P.B.
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 11 / 1/64. Pouch communiquй. To: Pete Bondurant. From: John Stanton. Marked: "Hand Pouch Deliver Only"! "Destroy Upon Reading."
Contact your lawyer friend and try to implement ASAR I approve your selected personnel, and I'll have Lt. Chaffee approach and detach Set. Relyea from his regular duties. See you in Saigon: 11/3/64.
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 11/2/64. Verbatim FBI telephone call transcript. Marked: "Recorded at the Director's Request"!"Classtfied Confidential 1-A: Director's Eyes Only." Speaking: Director Hoover, Ward J. Littell.
JEH: Good morning, Mr. Littell.
WJL: Good morning, Sir.
JEH: The election bodes. Prince Bobby's probable victory must hearten you.
WJL: It does, Sir.
JEH: The Dark Prince has plundered New York State with great verve. I liken it to the Visigoths storming Rome.
WJL: It's a vivid comparison, Sir.
JEH: Lyndon Johnson was Bobby's reluctant henchman. He told me, quote, Edgar, I hate that little rabbit-faced cocksucker, and it galls me to hustle him votes.
WJL: President Johnson has verve of his own.
JEH: Yes, and much of it is directed toward the passage of dubious legislation. I view the words "Great Society" as fresh lyrics to "The Internationale."
WJL: It's a deft analogy, Sir.
JEH: Lyndon Johnson will deplete his prestige on the homefront and recoup it in Vietnam. History will judge him as a tall man with big ears who needed wretched people to love him.
WJL: Said with verve, Sir.
JEH: Lyndon Johnson appreciates the verve of one Martin Lucifer King. I've been sending him motel-room tapes. Lucifer performs with equal verve in bed and at barricades.
WJL: Dr. King wears many hats, Sir.
JEH: Yes, and he also wears garishly patterned Fruit-of-theLoom briefs.
WJL: You're maintaining a close surveillance, Sir.
JEH: Yes, and I have Lyle Holly to direct me to Lucifer's favored tryst-spots. I talk to Lyle on a near-daily basis, and he tells me that Bayard Rustin is very much taken with you and your allegedly pilfered organized-crime donations.
WJL: Mr. Rustin finds me sincere, Sir.
JEH: Because you are.
WJL: I work at verve, Sir.
JEH: You succeed.
WJL: Thank you, Sir.
JEH: I detect a shift in tone. Do you wish to ask a question?
WJL: Yes, Sir.
JEH: Ask, Mr. Littell. You know I find preambles taxing.
WJL: Do you know when you'll leak word of my donations?
JEH: When I sense that my missives on Lucifer's Communist ties and sex life have reached their cumulative peak.
WJL: That's a sound strategy, Sir.
JEH: It's an inspired strategy. It's inimical to your recent gambit with Wayne Senior.
WJL: Is he peeved at me, Sir?
JEH: Yes, but he won't tell me why.
WJL: I set up a deal for him. He facilitated some charter flights out of Nellis and wanted a higher percentage. His Mormons have cut him out of his existing one.
JEH: Percentage of what?
WJL: The casino skim his Mormons were moving.
JEH: I am as delighted by that bit of data as Wayne Senior is vexed.
WJL: I'm always pleased to amuse you, Sir.
JEH: Wayne Senior has been in a thoroughly vexed state lately. He's rebuffed all my inquiries about his son.
WJL: I'm going to raise his percentage, Sir. That should improve his mood.
JEH: Why? What do you need from him?
WJL: I need to expand my Nellis clearance.
JEH: To include?
WJL: Flights from Vietnam.
JEH: Data coheres in odd fashions. You're my second postcard from Vietnam this morning.
WJL: Sir?
JEH: Dwight Holly called. He told me that Wayne Tedrow Junior and Pete Bondurant were recently granted Vietnamese travel visas.
WJL: That is odd, Sir.
JEH: Yes, and you are being oddly and blithely disingenuous, so I'll change the subject. How are Count Dracula's colonization plans proceeding?
WJL: Very well, Sir. Pete Bondurant has purchased a taxi stand and is using it to accrue intelligence for Mr. Hughes. The drivers have picked up dirt on several Nevada state legislators.
JEH: It's ingenious. Cab drivers are night-riding denizens of the first order. They view wretched foibles from a gutter perspective.
WJL: I thought you'd appreciate it, Sir. And while we're on the topic of-
JEH: Don't lead me. Ask your favor while I'm still pixilated and bemused.
WJL: I'd like to initiate a standing-bug operation in Vegas. I want to bug the hotel rooms the legislators stay in most frequently. I'll bring in Fred Turentine to help me with the installation, and I'd like local agents to do the retrievals and forward copies to me.
JEH: Do it. I'll assign two agents from the Las Vegas Office.
WJL: Thank you, Sir.
JEH: Thank yourself. You charmed me out of a bad mood.
WJL: I'm glad, Sir.
JEH: What would Tedrow Junior and Le Grand Pierre be doing in Vietnam?
WJL: I couldn't begin to guess.
JEH: Good day, Mr. Littell.
WJL: Good day, Sir.
60
(Saigon, 11/3/64)
Dig it:
Rickshaw bikes and sandbags. Gun nests and frangipani trees. Grenade nets and gooks.
Saigon at high noon-Brave New Fucking World.
It's big. It's tricultural. It's hot. It's noisy. It stinks.
The limo crawled. The limo bucked rickshaws. They bumped. They slid. They locked a la _Ben-Hur_.
White buildings. Pagodas. Propaganda signs: VIGILANCE IS FREEDOM! TREASON HAILS NORTH!
The limo crawled. The shocks creaked. The wheels slid. The cooler fan died.
Mesplиde smoked. Chuck smoked. Flash smoked. The driver sold them black-market Kools. Guйry smoked a Cohiba. Chaffee smoked a Mecundo. They smoked pro-Fidel.
Wayne moaned. Wayne got green-gilled. Pete got queasy. Pete read native tongue: