Establishment (7 page)

“But why?”

“Well, if they admitted to being communists it would be an end to their employment, but they had other reasons, too. From what I've read of the case, the advice of counsel and probably their own decision was to stand on the broad constitutional ground of the First Amendment. If I recall correctly, the First Amendment states that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion; or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. By virtue of that, I presume that they held that an inquiry into their political beliefs or writing or thoughts was an infringement on freedom of speech and of the press. It's a very broad interpretation and one that I would not advise a client of mine to attempt. But the case is still in the courts, and there is no reason to conclude that they are going to jail.”

“My own impulse,” Barbara said, “is to tear up this wretched piece of paper and forget the whole thing.”

“Which I would hardly advise. That would be a contempt. However, your father and I both know a number of people of influence, and it's possible we could get this subpoena withdrawn. Or quashed.”

“How?”

“I'd rather not say how.”

“Harvey, you mean you could pay off members of the committee?”

“Your words, Barbara, not mine.”

“Harvey, stop being so damn cautious and legalistic. If you are talking about bribing one of those bastards, I will not have it. Not by my father and not by anyone else. Furthermore, neither my father nor my mother is to know anything about this until I choose to tell them.”

“I think you're wrong.”

“I think I'm right.”

“You understand, the alternative is that you must go to Washington and testify?”

“Will you come with me?”

“Of course. But again, let me ask you very seriously, is there any question they might ask that you would refuse to answer?”

“No, of course not. They're not going to ask me who I slept with, are they?”

“Oh, no. No, indeed. The questions must be pertinent. And what about Bernie? Suppose they question you about him?”

“Isn't there something in the law that allows a wife to refuse to testify against her husband?”

“I don't know whether it applies to a congressional inquiry. Probably, but I shall make sure.”

“It doesn't matter. There's nothing I know about Bernie that I would be unwilling to talk about anywhere.”

“If they ask you where he is?”

“Ten days from now, that won't matter,” Barbara replied.

***

The ten pilots and three navigators who were to fly the C-54s east were staying at the Marypol Hotel in Hollywood, on Hudson Street between Hollywood and Sunset boulevards. It was an old dilapidated firetrap of a structure and catered to unemployed actors and a few transients. Brodsky chose it because it possessed a single virtue: it was cheap, five dollars a day for a single, seven-fifty for a double. Even at that price and buying their own meals, the volunteers had run up a collective bill of over four hundred dollars. Brodsky's resources were down to a hundred and eighty dollars. Bernie emptied the till at the garage to make up the difference.

Driving down to Los Angeles, Brodsky argued that Bernie should take command of the operation.

“Who's in command now?”

“Nobody. That's just it, Bernie. I suppose this could be called a Haganah operation. But the point is that nobody knew just what kind of an operation it would be because nobody knew when and how the Czechs would deal with us. They had to find someone there who could be paid off and arrange for the sale without putting his neck on the chopping block. Then they had to find the two million. That took over six months. Then they had to figure out a way to get the money to Czechoslovakia and get the Messerschmitts to Palestine. When we heard about these C-54s for sale, they sent me out to make a deal. Herbie Goodman and three of the pilots came with me, and the rest we picked up here. We had our leads, and the five of us spent three weeks driving around and talking people into the job. We actually didn't know how many planes we could find. At first we thought it was only three. You see, the way we figure the cargo area, we can't get more than one Messerschmitt inside a C-54, and that's disassembled. It sounds crazy that a country that's going to be at war and fighting for its existence any day now should be waiting for an air force in this kind of crazy way, but that's the way it is. But me, I never thought about it as a military operation, but with the ten planes, that's what it is, wouldn't you say?”

“No,” Bernie said emphatically. “You're out of your mind. I don't know what kind of laws we'd be breaking in terms of conducting a military operation here in the United States, but there must be at least twenty. And anyway, we're not armed, so let's forget about a military operation.”

“O.K. Then you're boss. How does that grab you?”

“It doesn't. You started this thing. Why don't you finish it?”

“Because I'm half your size, and I don't look like a boss of anything. We got a bunch of lunatics waiting for us down there at the Marypol Hotel. All right, they're good guys, but do you know how crazy you got to be to try to fly those crates to Czechoslovakia?”

“You said the planes are airworthy.”

“Sure. Herbie and a guy named Calvin Council—he's a navigator and a pretty good mechanic; he's from El Paso and he's not Jewish—well, he and Herbie went out and spent three days going over the planes. They seem to be all right. What else can I tell you? Bernie, please, take it on. You're the boss.”

By the time they reached Los Angeles, Bernie had agreed. It was about half-past seven in the evening when they parked and walked into the Hotel Marypol, Bernie carrying the briefcase of money in a tight grip. Herb Goodman was waiting for them. He told them that six of the men were up in his room, playing poker. The rest were out somewhere or other, except for Seltzer, who was keeping an eye on Mick White, who was in his room getting drunk.

“We'll take Mick White,” Bernie said, “him first.” He handed the briefcase to Goodman. “There's a hundred and ten grand in there, so don't let go of it. Just stay with us.”

Mick White, about thirty, pale, short, and going to fat, looked at Bernie out of glazed, bloodshot eyes. He was pouring vodka out of a quart bottle that was half empty. The tiny room was drab, its paint peeling from the walls, and lit by a single unshaded bulb that hung from the ceiling. “You certainly found the bottom,” Bernie said to Brodsky. “I wouldn't put a dog in a place like this.”

“Who the hell is he?” Seltzer demanded. He was a tough, hard, streetwise kid with a Brooklyn accent, and he regarded Bernie with open hostility. He sat back to front on a wooden chair, with a glass of vodka in his hand.

There was a small, dirty sink on the wall at one side of the room. Bernie took the bottle out of Mick White's hand and poured the vodka into the sink. When Seltzer leaped to his feet to stop him, Bernie flung him back against the opposite wall with a sweep of his arm.

“You sonofabitch,” Seltzer began, going at Bernie, who turned to face him, holding the vodka bottle by its neck. Seltzer stopped short. Bernie was six inches taller, fifty pounds heavier, and Seltzer was conditioned to authority. He had spent five years in the air force.

“My name is Bernie Cohen,” he said mildly. “I'm running this operation. Take one more step, and I break this bottle over your head. That might cost us a pilot, but we'll find another. You are a pilot, aren't you?”

“You're damn right.”

“You're Jewish?”

“Yeah.”

Bernie nodded at where Mick White sat slumped in the one other chair the room contained. “He isn't, so maybe that excuses something. But you, mister, you take a drink again before this is over and I'll break you in two with my bare hands.” He finished pouring the vodka into the sink.

“You're real tough,” Seltzer said.

Bernie nodded. “Yes. More than you might imagine, mister. So what do you say we just play it cool and easy, and no more trouble, right?” He held out his hand. Seltzer hesitated. Then he took Bernie's hand. Then Bernie went to White and asked him how he felt.

“Not good enough to beat the shit out of you. That's tomorrow.”

“Sure.” Bernie put his arm around White and lifted him out of the chair, and with White struggling and swearing, he dragged him to the sink and forced his head under the faucet. “Turn it on,” he told Brodsky. For at least two minutes, he held the struggling, cursing White under the faucet. “Get him a towel.”

“Motherfuckingjew bastard,” White said as he wiped his face.

“You a pilot?” Bernie asked.

“I'll fly your ass off, you lousy, oversized pile of turd.”

“Good enough,” Bernie agreed.

That night at ten o'clock, the pilots, navigators, and five radio operators whom Goodman had recruited in Los Angeles gathered in what the Hotel Marypol was pleased to call its banquet room. Not having been rented for a banquet these past ten years, the room was half filled with old beds, mattresses, broken chairs, and one-time banquet tables. Three dollars purchased it for two hours. The volunteers sat facing Bernie and Brodsky.

The only thing they had in common was that they were all veterans of World War II. Their ages ranged from the middle twenties to the middle thirties. Of the pilots, seven were Jewish, two were Catholic, and one was a Baptist. Two of the navigators and one of the radio operators were not Jewish. What forces impelled them, Bernie did not know. Possibly they bore some of the guilt for the Holocaust; possibly they wanted a break in the dullness of postwar life, a chance to travel, an opportunity to put their hands on the controls of a four-motor plane again. Or possibly the motives of the non-Jews were as deeply buried and entangled as those of the Jews. None of them were in it for the money, because no one was being paid; they were guaranteed food and lodging, such as it was, and passage home from Palestine, though neither Brodsky nor anyone else appeared to know just how that would be managed. Three of them were unemployed; one was a film director who had just had a notable success, two were actors, one was a carpenter, one had quit the Los Angeles Police Force, four were students, two were selling insurance, and two others had taken a leave from jobs as pilots for large corporations. Two of the radio operators worked as television repair men. Oddly enough, nine of the group were married, and with this information, Bernie wondered how many of them, like himself, had used this as an escape hatch, a way to flee, a way to “bug out,” as he put it to himself, of real life. Or was this real life? Or was anything real life? What had Barbara said to him once, that no male of the species ever reaches maturity? Wars were games, politics were games—deadly, senseless murderous games of children in adult bodies. Glory, idealism, and courage were the three mindless labels.
Still and all
, he told himself,
someone has to do it
.

Aloud, he said to them, “My name is Bernie Cohen. As much as anyone is in charge of this operation, I am, and I intend to see it through. So if any of you have any second thoughts, doubts, or misgivings, now's the time to speak up and get out.” He waited, but no one spoke. “All right. We're going to leave here at five a.m. and drive to Barstow. I say five a.m. because we'll take off if all goes well at five the following morning, and I want the lot of you dog-tired so you'll sleep. I don't care if you don't sleep tonight as long as you get a good night's sleep tomorrow. That will give us a whole day to work on the planes.

“We're flying into a field at Melville, New Jersey, and the weather conditions look good. We've got maps, and we'll lay out our flight plans tonight. Now, how many of you were trained as mechanics?” Eight hands went up. “Good. There is no rank here. Tomorrow, everyone pitches in and works with the mechanics. Tonight, I want you to throw out every question you can think of. Let's have no loose ends.”

***

Tom Lavette, two years older than Barbara, was Dan Lavette's first child. It was common gossip in certain San Francisco circles that the two Lavettes, father and son, had not spoken to each other in almost twenty years. Since San Francisco is not a very large city, and since the group of men who control the wealth and power of the city is even smaller, Dan Lavette and his son were bound to come face to face periodically. On such occasions, they both respected the widening gulf that separated them, and each made no effort to resume contact with the other. Observing this, Jean would press the subject with Dan.

“He is young and insufferable, if you will, but he is still your son.”

Dan would simply reply, “That's quite true,” and let it rest there.

In time, Jean no longer raised the possibility of a reconciliation. She herself saw her son regularly if not frequently. About once a month, he would call and ask her to lunch with him.

When Jean remarried after her divorce from Dan, she chose John Whittier for her husband. He had inherited the largest shipping line on the West Coast, and during the war years it had expanded enormously. After his marriage to Jean in 1931, he had developed a growing fondness for Tom, possibly less as a person than as the potential heir to the Seldon Bank. When Tom came into his share of the controlling stock of the bank, Barbara sold him a portion of her share, quite willing to let him have it; then his interests merged with Whittier's to form an entity they called Great Cal, one of the largest holding companies on the Coast.

Through the years, Whittier's position as the dominant force in the corporation weakened. He saw Tom originally as a rather bland, reasonably bright, well-mannered young man, but one without too much ambition and drive. In this, he misjudged him.