“You are sure Kennedy is not involved in the other two killings?” Kaz asked.
“Yes,” I said. “There’s nothing to connect him with Daniel Tamana. He did see Sam Chang that night in the hospital, but Chang was alive when he left.” I told Kaz about the report I’d given Ritchie and his promise to allow us to stay on to investigate.
“Now that Kennedy is in the clear,” Kaz said, “isn’t it time you told me what grudge you have against him? Not his family, but him personally?”
“Kao,” I yelled. “Bring out the bottle.”
Kao fetched the half-empty bottle of whiskey. Then he carried out plates of fish, rice, and taro and placed them on the low table between us. I filled our glasses and figured there was enough to get me through the story, as long as Kaz didn’t hog the bottle.
“It was the spring of 1937,” I said. “I was still a rookie and pulled duty with the vice squad one night. They were going to raid a brothel on North Street. Queen Lil’s, it was called. Fancy place with a doorman and a reputation for clean girls.” I stopped to take a few bites of fish and wash it down with the whiskey. “Lil hadn’t kept up her protection payments, so it was time to teach her a lesson. We weren’t supposed to arrest any of the girls, only the customers.”
“Why?”
“Because she needed them working, to keep the cash flowing to the powers that be,” I said. “The idea was to show we could embarrass her clientele whenever we wanted. If we kept that up, Queen Lil’s would just be another cheap whorehouse in the Black Sea.”
“The Black Sea?”
“That’s what they call the area around North Street and North Square. It’s near the docks, with a lot of brothels and bars catering to sailors. A good deal of gambling, too. Queen Lil’s was at the top of the heap in the Black Sea, and her payments were probably a considerable source of income for the higher-ups. So it was a delicate operation. No damage to the premises, and leave the girls alone. Collar a bunch of customers and haul them away.”
“Wouldn’t that hurt her business even more?” Kaz asked. “I’d think the public exposure would keep the elite clientele away.”
“I thought the same thing at first,” I said. “It was only later I learned that the men were never booked. They were tossed in the paddy wagon in front of Lil’s and taken within a block of police headquarters. They paid a fine on the spot and were cut loose.”
“A bribe,” Kaz said. “But Queen Lil did not know that either.”
“Exactly,” I said. “Anyway, we go in like gangbusters, making a lot of noise and grabbing guys with one leg in their trousers. A vice detective has me check the back door and then the top floor. When I get up to the third floor, there’s a sitting area at the top of the stairs. Plush red velvet chairs. In one of them, sitting with his legs crossed and smoking a cigar like he didn’t have a care in the world, is a young skinny kid. Nice suit.”
“He hadn’t been taken away?” Kaz said.
“Nope. He looked calm, like he had every right to be there, and to be left alone at that. Two detectives walked right by him, and he gave them a little nod, enough to send a message: you can’t touch me.”
“Which you did not take well to, if I know you.”
“Right. So I asked him who he was and what he was doing there. He smiled and said he was Jack Kennedy, and he was waiting for a friend. I asked where his friend was, and he showed me a room down the hall. A uniformed cop, a sergeant, was standing guard at the door. I was confused and didn’t know what to do. But vice had given us our marching orders, and I didn’t want to get in trouble with them. Or with my father, since he’d hear about how I did from his pals. So I grabbed Kennedy by the arm and hustled him downstairs.”
“Did you know it was Ambassador Kennedy’s son?” Kaz asked.
“No. Back then I mostly read the sports section and the funny pages. All I knew was that he was some Harvard rich kid, out catting around. He kept telling me I was making a mistake, which is what a lot of these clowns say.”
“But I get a sense you may have been,” Kaz said.
I nodded, and dug into the food and drink to fortify myself.
“How was I to know at the time?” I said. “When we got outside, this Kennedy kid asked if we could wait for his friend. The paddy wagon was crammed full, so I said fine. We had plenty of squad cars, and I said we’d give them both a ride to the station. While we’re waiting, another kid comes up and starts asking Jack what’s up. Turns out it was his older brother, Joe Junior.”
“Was he visiting Queen Lil’s establishment as well?” Kaz asked.
“Apparently. He began to get testy with me for taking Jack into custody, and with Jack for allowing himself to be caught. Joe worked himself up to the point where I was ready to smack him with my billy club, but Jack laid a hand on my arm and shook his head. It was strange, my own prisoner touching me like that. I should have had him in cuffs, but somehow I never thought to do it. He was so confident, I couldn’t picture him doing something as low as running off. I took his advice, and told Joe to hold his horses. It was a bit tense, until Commissioner Timilty showed up.”
“That’s the police commissioner you mentioned before,” Kaz said. “The man who demoted your father because he investigated Joe Senior. Why would the commissioner of police be present at a raid on a brothel? Isn’t that unusual?”
“He wasn’t there for the raid. Turns out, he was a regular at Queen Lil’s. That was the friend Jack had been waiting for. The guy behind the door guarded by the police sergeant.”
“Oh no,” Kaz said.
“That was almost the end of my career, then and there. Timilty tore into me like I was responsible for the entire raid, and then demanded to know why I was harassing upstanding young men like the Kennedy brothers, and did I know who their father was. It went on like that for quite a while.”
“Upstanding young men visiting a house of prostitution,” Kaz said.
“Hey, it’s Boston, no reason why the two things can’t go together. We’d just had a mayor who was also head of the Irish mob in the city. James Curley himself, as crooked as they come. The only way to get him out of town was to elect him to Congress.”
“What happened next?”
“Needless to say, I didn’t take either of the Kennedy brothers to the station. They drove off in Timilty’s automobile, his sergeant at the wheel. Timilty’s last words to me were that he’d have my badge by morning.”
“I take it he calmed down?”
“No. The vice detective who organized the raid was demoted to the traffic division. It turned out that Jack put in a good word for me and got Timilty to back off from firing me. I was sent to walk the beat in East Boston, around the shipyards. Not the choicest assignment, but it could have been worse.”
“If not for Jack’s intervention,” Kaz said.
“Right. He came to see me at work the next day and apologized. I think he’d gotten the lowdown from someone, maybe his brother, about how Timilty had punished my dad. Maybe he felt bad about giving a second generation of Boyles a kick in the gut. It’s the odd kind of thing Jack would do; get you in trouble and then fix things as best he could.”
“You became friends, it seems,” Kaz said.
“Yeah, we struck up a friendship. Both of us were Irish kids, our families not too long off the boat. He’s a big Red Sox fan-I prefer the Boston Braves myself-and he invited me to a game. Best seats I’ve ever been in, right by the first-base line. I’d been to plenty of games but always in the bleachers.”
“I thought you were telling me the story of how you came to dislike Jack Kennedy so much,” Kaz said, finishing the food on his plate.
“I’m getting there,” I said. “You got anywhere else to go?”
“Yes, actually,” Kaz said. He refilled my glass. “But I am tired from the long flight. Continue.”
“Oh, right,” I said, thinking of Jai-li. I guess I was honored. “Okay, so we’re pals. Not the closest of friends, but we get along. Jack invited me down to Hyannisport a couple of times that summer. There were usually a bunch of guests, all of his brothers and sisters inviting friends for sailing and football. I had a crush on his sister, Kathleen. They called her Kick, and it turned out that every guy Joe or Jack brought along fell for her. I liked Rosie a lot, too. She’s the oldest sister, a really sweet kid with a great smile. Even better looking than Kick, but the family made it clear that the girls were out of bounds for male visitors. They were pretty strict, old-fashioned Irish Catholics. Attendance at Mass was obligatory.”