Bookmaker, The (15 page)

Tired and quite drunk, I was gonna call it an evening when Preston asked me to stay for an impromptu work session
. “What you’ve been going through with Corynne has brought back a part of my past I was debating whether to tell you or not. Not that I was hiding it, I just didn’t know if it was pertinent to what we were doing.”

“Oh yeah,” I yawned, “what’s that?”

“If you’re going to accurately tell my story, I got to tell you about my marriage and kid—Corynne’s father—those parts are integral.”

The bats circled in the sky almost in time with the chirping crickets and the bass of the croaking frogs. The darkness of night out here always
carried savagely ominous overtones—daring you to step ten feet away from any light source to be swallowed whole. I lit the citronella candles and flipped on the Chinese lanterns that still hung from the beam; a carry-over from last night’s festivities. The flickering lights of the four muted televisions added an eerie glow. Now sufficiently lit, the onslaught of invading mosquitoes was on display. Preston and I sat in the moonless night, sufficiently stoned, swatting at anything that moved.

* * * * *

“In 1949, my time in the Old World had come to an end. I moved back home—here, to Walker Manor. I came alone, leaving Phillip in London to wallow and brood in his own self-pity and cowardice. When I came home the only people living here were Delotta’s parents, Vernon and Celeste Carter with Delotta on the way. I was relived to be home and surprised by how much I missed the place and vowed never to live anywhere else.

“In the spring
, I moved in with Vernon and Celeste and little Delotta. Celeste helped around the house while Vernon looked after the grounds. My days were spent wandering and loitering downtown or scoping out the campus for willing co-eds. My nights were dominated by an ever-growing need for revenge. I would sit out on this very balcony and stare into that never-changing night; always pleased with the two deaths and Joe’s destroyed career, but far from satisfied, and I sought ways to exact further vengeance for my family, now all but gone.

“In 1951, I turned twenty-five, giving me control of my trust. In a smart move
, I hired a young upstart lawyer to handle my share of the estate as Phillip had taken his and was hoarding it away. Jimmy Ray Upshaw Esq. would handle my finances, and he did it very well. Under his skilled watch, the money flourished. I would never have to work a day in my life.

“Since I didn’t work and was done with school, I spent a lot of my time in off-campus watering holes. Lorraine Honeycutt, a stunning blue-eyed brunette with a penchant for Faulkner and whiskey sours
, was an art history major at Ole Miss. We hit it off one Saturday night down at a bar called Tully’s and ended up sneaking back into her dorm room. When I walked through the campus early the next morning, I was struck by two thoughts: I wouldn’t have thought she’d been a virgin, but our struggling attempts and her pain and blood told a different story, and I never thought I’d see her again.

“I wasn’t too hard to find
; she came into Tully’s very pregnant, claiming the child was mine, and in a chivalrous attempt to do the right thing, there was a shotgun wedding at Walker Manor. The grandstand down there…that’s why it was built. Lorraine was willing to wed outside a church, but she had to have a beautiful altar. I paid a few townies to work double shifts; they had it done in a week or two.

“On her side of the aisle w
ere her parents and two brothers and a sister bridesmaid. They all seemed pleased that Lorraine wouldn’t have the baby out of wedlock and about the fact that I had money. On my side were Vernon, Celeste, and baby Delotta, with Jimmy Ray as my best man. It wasn’t the fact that I was being somewhat forced into marriage that made me so sad, it was who wasn’t at my wedding. My wedding day was one of the darker days of my life; a stark reminder of everything that was taken from me. My hate only grew stronger.

“We named the baby Mason, after my father. Remember he was named after the Mason-Dixon Line? Anyway, the first few years of our marriage we were so busy with the baby that we didn’t really notice that we’d come to despise each other. You can only keep that simmering on the back burner for so long until it explodes. Lorraine became such a caustic shrew that by the mid ‘50s, when we mercifully got a divorce, I considered myself off women for good.

“She got a chunk of money—not enough to hurt thanks to Jimmy Ray—and we split custody of Mason. But as was the case back then, society and the courts assumed a child should be with his mother. Mason would spend most of his time with her, although, I would get him for the summers. But even with a son, my mind was still consumed with revenge. I spent most of my time plotting to kill Kennedys, and this wasn’t exactly the best situation for a child to be around. This was my hatred, my burden to carry. I wouldn’t make it his as well.”

* * * * *

Preston paused; it looked like he was getting ready to nod off. I was glad to see this as I was having trouble staying awake myself. I shut off all the TVs and lights, blew out the candles, and helped him to his room, where he demanded that he could take it from there, and I went back to my place, hoping to get a couple days’ rest.

By Wednesday
, I was itching to get out and do something, so I joined Matador and Jay in the fields. Early fall was harvest time in Mississippi, and that included marijuana too. The buds were hairy and colorful; the stink was just right. The healthy crops had budded and were ripe for the picking. The non-budding males had been determined and removed by Matador, a tricky and arduous process Matador would be happy to turn over to Jay. The males had to be removed before they flowered otherwise the buds the females produced would contain too many seeds and not enough high-quality product. Matador had been shrewd enough to keep about ten male plants to assure that there would be seeds for the next planting season.

The heat and humidity were sweltering
, and the work was hard. Each of us got our own set of rows. We would clip the stem with the buds and place them into a large basket. Once the basket was full, Jay would carry them to a drying shed Matador had built just for this process—a crude twenty-by-thirty-foot metal shed hidden in the trees about a hundred yards from the crops. Lines were strewn across the ceiling and the plants were hung from clothes pins to dry for six days. Too little drying time and molds or fungus might develop. Too long and the weed might lose some potency and taste funny.

Two days of this and I was wiped, we all were, but with only half a crop to harvest
, we’d finished most of the clipping by Saturday and the drying shed was almost full. You want to talk about smell—walking into the drying shed was like a punch in the face. Once the drying was complete, Matador and Jay would separate the buds from the leaves, stems, and any remaining seeds, then wrap up the finished product in cellophane and stack them neatly into one-pound bricks. That was it and this year’s harvest was complete and ready for sale.

The selling was easy—the buyers were already lined up, all existing customers with deep pockets. However, it would now be Jay’s job to take the risk and drive the SUV filled with pounds of high
-potency marijuana to pre-determined locations throughout the south. Stops would be made in Jackson, Mobile, and Birmingham, then on to Atlanta and finishing down in Florida with drops in Jacksonville, Tampa, and Miami. Jay sold the pounds for $2,000 a pop; the dealers would then break it up and sell it for much more. Jay took a hundred pounds on his first trip, netting $200,000. He didn’t receive any payment from the customer—that was all done with deposits into an untraceable bank account in the Bimini Islands.

On
Saturday, Ole Miss had a bye. When I went up to the balcony to watch the other games with Preston, I realized I hadn’t seen him or Corynne for almost a week. I’d been in the fields helping Jay and Matador all day and then I’d crawl right into bed, sometimes too tired to even take my clothes off. Preston was in a fine mood as he usually was when he could watch his football while enjoying a cocktail or two. But his condition was getting worse. He became more reliant on his cane; moving slower, more deliberately, and he looked frail. I didn’t mention his perceived deterioration. I was sure he was well aware.

I gave him my three best plays of the day and he made his usual bets. So far, the season was treating us well. Otto and I were up almost five figures
, and Preston, with my help, was cleaning up as well. Halfway through the Auburn-Alabama game, he confided to me that we’d soon get into his “big hits,” they were next. He let me know that so far I’d just been given a taste of his work. The more he drank, the more proud of himself he was, and he became more and more eager to share his secrets with me and get his great accomplishments on record. I suggested we do it here and now. Preston thought it over and agreed, no time like the present.

The dying light caught the gleam in his eyes. “Let’s start with this…have you ever got into the many conspiracy theories regarding the Kennedy assassination?”

“Nah, never gave it much thought. I did see Oliver Stone’s
JFK,
but that just left me more confused coming out than going in.”

Preston smiled and took another slow, drawn-out hit from the joint
. “Actually, I’m glad you brought that movie up. Oliver Stone wasn’t too far off, he was close, but he over-complicated a rather simple plot.”

I was blown away
. “Really! Stone was on the right track?”

He let out a short laugh
. “Surprisingly, yes. He had a few of the principle characters right and some correct plot points. Then again, he was way off. But in his defense, I’m sure the process of movie making brings exaggeration, conjecture, and of course, the biggest selling point…conspiracy.”

Still shocked
, I shook my head, lit up a smoke, and said again, “Shit, so Stone was on the right track?”

Preston sipped his scotch
. “One part he did get right was when he mentioned that witnesses at Dealey Plaza claimed they saw two white men in suits loitering behind the fence on the grassy knoll. Well, one of those lurking shadowy figures was yours truly,” he said, looking past me to check out the score of the game.

“Really?” I said
. “Well, who was the other guy?”

Preston, with eyes back on me, leaned forward with a knowing smile
. “He’s the gentleman you so commonly refer to as Matador.”

“No shit? It was you two who did Kennedy?”

Preston leaned back. “Well, amongst others, Matador and I did the deed, but we needed help setting everything up and finding someone to take the fall. We weren’t about to go to prison.”

“Oswald?”

“That’s right, we needed a fall guy and he fit the bill perfectly. He was young, ambitious, idealistic, easily manipulated, and hungry, in both the literal and figurative sense; with the insatiable need of a nobody who so desperately wanted to be somebody.”

“How’d you find him?”

“That is what we’re going to get into right now.”

He looked off into the darkened trees with visions of his past filling his eyes.

“I spent the years after my divorce taking care of Mason and doing renovations to the house. But my true calling was never far from my thoughts. John Kennedy’s ascension from war hero, to Senator, and then elected President in 1960 only fueled the fire. The media coverage and all the Camelot bullshit had me seeing his face in my sleep. However, now I was faced with a dilemma—he
was
the President, getting close would be a problem. I spent years going over scenarios and situations, planning and strategizing how I could take him out without implicating myself.”

He turned back to me, taking my age into consideration. “When Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested that day in November of 1963, and the microphones were shoved in his face, do you remember what he said?”

I racked my brain—saw the stark, clear black and white footage, the blackened eye toughening up a scared baby face. “I think he went on about how he was innocent, how he wanted a lawyer, how it wasn’t him, right?”

Preston’s eyes grew wider
. “Yes, he said all the crap anyone in that situation would say, but what he also said was that he was a patsy—that was the key word. And you know what? He was, he was
our
patsy.”

Preston tried to collect himself and an uncomfortable stare dominated his face. “But to preface this chapter of our story, I need to get into something I had been debating whether to put into our book. I discussed it with Matador and we both agreed it was essential for the story. Now, you’re neither blind nor stupid, so you’ve probably figured it out for yourself that Matador and I are lovers
, and have been for longer than I can remember.”

I had a hunch
, and the rumors were there, but since they didn’t advertise and make it overt, I hadn’t brought it up.

Preston, a little reticent, went on
. “Now, I’m too old and too sick to care, but is this gonna be a problem for you?”

“Of course not. I assumed you two were…well, you know, it doesn’t faze me one bit. I’m from California.
”

“Good, good to hear. I figured as much. Believe it or not, Matador and I did weigh that into the equation when choosing you for the job.”

“Shit, Preston, in this day and age you shouldn’t think twice about who you are,” I said, trying to show my acceptance and an open mind.

He gave a rough laugh
. “Yeah, maybe you’re right, times have changed. But when I first came out in the early ‘60s—when I was finally truthful with myself about what I was—the times weren’t so accepting. Especially here in the south. You keep that shit under wraps unless you wanted to be lynched.”

The smile quickly disappeared and was replaced by an overcast stare. “My lifestyle needed to remain a secret. I’ve made four people aware of this part of my life—and it cost me both my son and my grandson. Delotta and Corynne are the only ones who’ve accepted me for what I am.”

“Your son and grandson?” I asked.

“When they found out, neither one of them wanted anything to do with me. To my son
, I was an abomination, the ultimate sinner; his mother got too much church in him. Once Mason found out about Matador and me when he was fifteen, he wanted nothing to do with me. And we haven’t spoken since and we never will as he was killed in a car accident ten years ago. And Marcus, he’s just too embarrassed to have a fag for a grandfather, but the little shit becomes much more accepting of my lifestyle when he needs money.”

“I’m sorry, that must have been hard,” I said.

“My family is everything to me and losing them hurt as much as losing my father and sister.” I placed my recorder on the wicker table so we could begin.

* * * * *

“As far back as I can remember, I’ve always felt I was different. But growing up, I deluded myself, pushing my feelings deep inside and talking myself into conformity. School dances and awkward first dates were just going through the motions, unconscious acts to fit in and not make waves. Looking back now, I can see that I convinced myself that those unnatural, ungodly thoughts weren’t my true feelings and I was into girls like all my friends. This carried over all the way into my thirties, when I finally came to the realization that I’d never be truly happy unless I surrendered to these feelings and became true to myself.

”
By 1962, I was ready to act on my desires—secretly, of course. An exhaustive search led me to a burgeoning gay community down in New Orleans. After backing out of a few trips out of fear, I told myself, it’s now or never and finally headed three hundred and sixty miles south to the Big Easy.

“Sonny’s was an openly gay bar in the French Quarter, one of the first in the country. I got a room down the street with a view of the bar and set up surveillance—I wanted to scout the place out before I ventured in. I needed to get a feel
for the neighborhood and the people coming and going. I watched all day. I was both frightened and exhilarated. Sonny’s seemed like a normal bar—well maintained with clean-cut patrons, but I was still intimidated by all the men, far more courageous than I, who strolled into the bar without looking over their shoulders. It was at dusk on the third day when I saw a young, well-built man in jeans and a T-shirt exit the bar. I eyed him as he lit up a smoke and walked to the pay-phone to make a quick but animated call and then went back inside. I felt compelled to get a closer look at him. I got dressed, psyched myself up, walked across the busy street, and stepped through the door into a new life—a life out of the shadows of guilt, fear, and shame, and I’d never look back.

“He was a regular at Sonny’s and a well-known player in the gay scene. He spotted me nervously sipping a beer at the bar. The only one in the bar drinking beer, the bartender thought I was kidding when I ordered a draft.

“He walked over and stood behind me. ‘You’re new. How about I buy you a drink?’

“I couldn’t muster the nerve to look right at him so I caught his reflection above the bottles in the mirror behind the bar. It was the man I’d been watching from my window. He wasn’t a dandy or a queen like many gays of that era
, who had no choice but to come out. He was just like me, a regular guy who happened to be gay. He was good-looking and he knew it. He had an easy swagger and a cool confidence that gave an empowering voice to the whole movement. I knew he was the one right away, and he made it no secret that he liked what he saw.

“‘Two scotches
, Mitch,’ he said to the bartender without getting a response from me. ‘Name’s Mattheus, everyone calls me Matador.’

“I shook his hand and whispered my name without making eye contact.

“‘You’re new at this, aren’t ya? That’s okay; it gets a lot easier as you go along. Mind if I sit down?’

“We talked until closing. He was a revelation. Here was
a guy just like me: a southerner who liked football and knew his way around a tool-belt, but he was gay. I wasn’t alone; there were more like me. He asked me to meet him back there the next day, of course I showed up. Two weeks later, I was spending most of my time at either Sonny’s or his apartment on Cook Street. This was a very happy time for me. I was finally in a place where I could be who I was without fear of attack or ridicule. Matador showed me how to act, what to expect, where to go, and who to know. And for a brief moment, my quest for revenge moved to the back burner as I was consumed by something else, or rather, someone else. It was a welcome change.