— CHAPTER 10 —

MAY DAY!

Wednesday, May 1, 1963

It was finally May Day, the day Robert and I planned to get married, so I had arranged to take the next two days off from work. At 8:00 A.M. the alarm sounded. I struggled to emerge from a much-needed sleep to prepare for Robert’s arrival. By 10:00, I was waiting anxiously on the front porch, wearing the bone-white linen dress I’d bought in the French Quarter, my hair up in a twist, with pearls around my neck. I wanted Robert to see that his girl was already dressed for the wedding. Robert’s blue Ford pulled up in front of the boarding house about 10:02 A.M.

As he got out, I could see that he was dressed in khaki shorts, a plaid shirt and flip-flops. I couldn’t help but laugh as I thought about what our wedding photo might look like: The Princess and the Pauper. But that smile! That face! I called out his name, and my man came rushing up the steps. He took me into his arms and swung me in a circle. I relished the familiar smell of his aftershave as he kissed me.

“Let’s get married!” he declared and kissed me again. I was thrilled. I had almost forgotten how tall, how well built, how take-charge he was.

“We have a noxious old bat for a landlady,” I told him. “She thinks we’re already married, so...” Robert laughed, and went back to his car to get his bags, his guitar case, and his typewriter, which he lugged up the stairs and into my bedroom. Then we got in his car and headed downtown to the Courthouse to get married. As he drove, I considered the little talk I’d planned — about all my second thoughts — but now my head was spinning with excitement and I didn’t know where to begin. I wondered why he hadn’t dressed better for our wedding. Ah, well. He probably wasn’t planning on keeping his clothes on that long anyway!

As Robert parked his car near the courthouse, I pointed out a sign to him that indicated the parking space was “private.” But Robert was unconcerned about something as trivial as parking restrictions, and dismissed my worries. He was on a mission.

“We’re only going in to buy a marriage license,” he said. “It won’t take five minutes.” We entered the courthouse, filled out some paperwork and handed it to the clerk, saying we wanted to get married today. When the clerk told us there was a two-day waiting period for marriages in Louisiana, Robert exploded in anger.

“What?” he raged. “In a backward state like this? You’re joking!” But nobody was joking. It was hard for me to believe that Robert, the hot-shot scholar with the reputation for thoroughness, had not bothered to look up the laws for marriage in the State of Louisiana. I said as much to him. Not to be out-done in his moment of pique, he snapped back that he couldn’t believe I hadn’t looked up the regulations either, given my stratospheric IQ.

Robert had simply assumed that Louisiana was a primitive, redneck state that allowed cousins or anybody else to marry each other whenever they wanted. But his caricature was wrong. Louisiana operated under the Napoleonic Code, which was far more sophisticated than Robert imagined. It wasn’t a big deal to me. Who cared when the paperwork got done? Waiting two days wasn’t a big problem — we had each other!

“But I only have one day left to marry you,” he said. “After that, I have to start working.” Now I understood. We wouldn’t have a free day to celebrate until the weekend.

Robert calculated his options for a moment, then told the clerk that he wasn’t going to buy the license. Taking my hand, he turned on his heel and walked me outside. What was going on? Had he decided not to get married? When I reminded him that I would not sleep with him unless he used a condom, he dropped my hand and stomped on ahead of me toward the car.

Just then, we saw blinking lights - the dusty blue Ford was being towed away! We ran after the tow truck, screaming for them to stop, but it was useless. Off it went, disappearing into the traffic as Robert stood there helpless and seething. For the next hour, we walked in gloom; finally we reached the “car pound” where Robert paid the $7.50 fine and marked “Paid under protest” on the release form, though “Paid with contempt” would have been a better description of his actions.

“Let’s go to the library, so we can look up marriage laws for nearby states,” he growled. There we found that only Alabama had no waiting period. Robert had located his backward state that didn’t care who married who or when, as long as they were both the same color.

We would head east in the morning to Mobile, about four hours away. Robert calculated that if we started at dawn we could drive there, come back the same day, and avoid paying a motel bill. My so-called wedding day had not worked out well. When we chose May 1st, it was due to my Catholic roots: on May Day, a little girl was crowned “Queen of the May” with flowers in the church. I yearned to think of myself as still sweet and innocent, though I was marrying outside the Church.

I wanted very much to talk about everything going on in my life, but Robert wasn’t interested. He was frustrated and tired from his long drive into New Orleans. We sat stiffly in the car as he drove back to the boarding house I called, “The Mansion.”

“What went on in Fort Walton while you were there?” I finally asked.

“Nothing,” he replied. “All I did was type stuff in my parent’s office.”

“Well,” I pursued, “did they catch on to us?”

“No,” he said.

“Did they figure out that the letter from Raleigh Rourke was actually from a girl?” I continued, hoping that I could find some common success that might soften his mood.

“No, but you shouldn’t have used such cute stationery,” he scolded. “They might have thought Rourke was queer!”

Hearing that, I decided it was time to stop beating around the bush and tell Robert that I wanted to stay in New Orleans and go to medical school at Tulane in the fall. Maybe he would change his mind about marrying me, but I knew it was the right thing to do. I decided to approach the subject obliquely.

“Can I tell you something I’ve been thinking about? “ I ventured. “Something that’s on my mind?”

“Did you find a job?” he interrupted.

“Well, yes, but...

“I’ll bet you thought I wasn’t going to come.”

“I needed to hear from you more,” I managed to say. Still, Robert seemed ready to marry me, so I repeated, “I really do need to tell you how I feel about something.”

“You were upset because I came late. Right?”

“Well, yes, but it’s more than that. I’ll just say this: I’ve made some contacts. If you don’t want to marry me, I’ll be okay, even if you go back to Florida.”

“I said I’d show up,” he answered, stroking my face. “Tomorrow, you’ll be legal!”

I was so glad to see his happy shift in mood that I temporarily stopped promoting my plans and started worrying about his hands, one of which was no longer on the steering wheel! Grabbing his right hand firmly I said, “I need to tell you something.”

Robert replied that there was only one thing he really needed at the moment, and that I was about to provide it. There would be plenty of time to talk later. After all, we had our whole lives to talk. He parked in front of The Mansion, and we crept quietly into my boudoir. Robert paused only long enough to close the blinds, which were too high for me to reach. Once they came down, we went to bed, but I did not get much sleep.

Morning - Thursday, May 2, 1963 –

I awoke early in the morning and watched Robert’s face as he slept. How had he avoided any intimate conversation? We’d been apart twelve days. Not very long for him, he claimed. But it had seemed a century to me. For him, it was first things first. It’s time to make whoopee! What could possibly be more important than having sex? Marriage meant access to birth control pills, safe sex, and Robert’s protection and companionship in a rough, tough city. Dear God, I felt I needed him so! Surely I must love him. And I wanted those birth controls pills fast.

After several nudges, Robert awoke, and we headed to Mobile, Alabama. All I remember of Mobile was the Bankhead tunnel under I the river, which we had to traverse because the courthouse was on the other side. Once at the courthouse, we purchased the marriage license in short order. They were satisfied with my U. of Florida ID. I breathed a sigh of relief, because it meant that I would not have to explain that my name wasn’t really “Female Infant Vary.” Anybody old enough to be a college student was old enough to get married in Alabama. Then we went around the corner to the Marrying Man, who inspected the license and saw a blank space.

“What’s your mother’s maiden name?” he asked Robert. My fiancé was a superb mathematician and writer, but his memory about people and events was terrible. He said he couldn’t remember because he hadn’t known her back then. The marriage ceremony was performed anyway with a yawning clerk acting as witness. The words rushed by too quickly for me to even understand. I brought out the wedding band and asked Robert to put it on my finger when the official paused. When he did, we were pronounced “man and wife.” It was the least romantic ceremony imaginable. As I stood there, I wondered if I would have gone through with all of this, if Lee had not told me he had beaten Marina. However, he had, and I was now Mrs. Robert Allison Baker, III.

Afternoon - Thursday, May 2, 1963

We stopped at an Italian restaurant to eat. For our wedding feast, he ordered the restaurant’s best spaghetti-and-meatball dinner, but nothing to drink and no dessert.

“We have to be careful until my first paycheck comes in,” he said. After dinner, we stopped at Providence Hospital for the state-required blood test, necessary before we could pick up birth control pills. Next we stopped at a pharmacy and bought the all-important pills, and started the long drive back to New Orleans. As the hours wore on, Robert’s moodiness returned. What could be wrong now? Hoping to soften him, I snuggled against him, only to feel him draw back. I sat up, worried and alert. Robert was always quiet, but now he was too quiet. A frown crept over his features as he drove, staring at the highway. What was the matter? I started to put my arm around my new husband.

“Don’t touch me!” he said, pushing my arm away.

“What’s wrong?” I demanded.

“My parents will cut me off financially when they find out that we eloped. You’ll have to get a job,” he said bluntly.

“Dr. Ferrie offered to set me up with a job at PenChem in Gainesville,” I said, hoping to please him. “I could work there and continue to go to school.”

“You’ll need to work full time in order to support us.”

“But what about you? We could get by on two part-time incomes.”

“I’ll be in graduate school and will need to make good grades. I can’t work and do that. You’ll need to support both of us.”

“But what about my grades?”

“Your schooling could wait,” he concluded emphatically.

I turned and stared out the window at the endless row of tall pine trees that lined the dark highway. They looked like the bars of a prison cell. In the silence, my heart ached, and I began to tremble with anxiety: What had I done?

Night - Thursday, May 2, 1963

When we finally returned to The Mansion in New Orleans, it was late, but there were so many cars we had to park a block away. Not long after we entered our room, Mrs. Webber knocked on the door and questioned whether Robert was really my husband. After all, she’d seen me with Lee many times and made her own sinful assumptions about our relationship. But I held up my hand for her to see the wedding band, while Robert waved our marriage certificate at her.

Then the old bag wagged her bony finger at Robert and said: “Your wife is a lousy cheat! She’s been runnin’ around with another man behind your back!” I gulped. But then she topped her claim with an even wilder accusation, saying I had been sunbathing naked on the front porch to attract a little business my way.

Robert laughed at her and closed the door in her face. He knew how modest I was about nudity and automatically regarded her exhibitionist claim as preposterous.

Giving me a quick kiss on the forehead, he said, “That’s for all the wicked things you might have done with other men while I was gone!” I felt a surge of guilt, and decided not to explain about Lee Oswald until a better time.

This was our wedding night. There were no flowers, nor even a photo. We didn’t even have a souvenir postcard of Mobile. It was the most meager honeymoon possible.

As my husband bathed down the hall I started thinking. Robert and I had previously enjoyed campus movies and plays. Maybe we couldn’t have a honeymoon, but surely we could have a night out tomorrow after work. Thanks to my friends at the YWCA I knew some nice places in the French Quarter where we could celebrate cheaply. When Robert returned to our room, I told him I had to leave for work at Royal Castle in less than six hours. “I hope you can drive me over,” I told him. “I’m working extra hours today, so we’ll get a bigger paycheck Saturday. Then we can go to the beach, or have fun in the French Quarter.”

Robert agreed to drive me there, but then he said something shocking.

“Don’t cash that Saturday check,” he said. “Send it to me, instead.”

All of a sudden, alarm bells went off.

“What do you mean by ‘send you my paycheck?’”

“I’ll explain later,” my new husband said. “Right now, first things first!”

“But I have to get up soon — and I’m tired!”

I took a birdie bath, hoping Robert would fall asleep. No such luck. That man was inspired by my very breathing. Finally, he allowed me to get a bit of sleep.

Morning - Friday, May 3, 1963

The alarm went off. The physical and emotional stress of the last few days had taken its toll. I was so exhausted that Robert helped get me dressed, which was a switch, and then he drove me to work. I entered Royal Castle, dazed and blanched. I was in no condition to work. Robert climbed into the back seat of the car and slept as I tried to handle the demanding breakfast crowd. It was a disaster. I was a zombie. Walking like a wounded soldier, I dropped things and spilled coffee. My condition was impossible to conceal and my performance was indefensible. It no longer mattered how much the customers liked me. After six hours, the inevitable happened: the manager fired me.

Too tired to care, I stumbled back to the car and collapsed inside, but Robert had spent the last six hours stretched out sleeping on the back seat. He was ready the minute we got home to prove he was one of the great marathon lovers of all time. I begged for mercy, but then he broke the news.

“I have to get in as much lovin’ as I can,” Robert said, pleadingly, “because our days together are going to be few and far between.”

“W-what are you talking about?” I managed to stammer.

“I’m going to be in the Gulf of Mexico for ten or twenty days at a time,” he said, dressing me in the baby doll see-through nightie I’d purchased for our honeymoon. “I’ll only have two or three days off between hitches. That’s why we have to get in as much lovin’ as we can. Like right now!” He began kissing and caressing my tired body.

“I’m not going to worry about you,” he added, “because you’ve got yourself a nice hidey-hole here, and a job to cover your expenses. You’ll do fine without me, just as you said. And every time I’m back I’ll be just as horny as I am now!”

Afternoon - Friday, May 3, 1963

“I have to drive to Houma at 3:00 P.M. to sign on with the crew,” he muttered. “By Monday night I’ll be on a quarter boat doing seismic exploration.” Then he confided that he was replacing a man who had both hands blown off by a charge of dynamite. But the pay was good, and there was free room and board as well.

As Robert continued to indulge in his impressive manly pursuits on my benumbed body, my brain managed to function enough to formulate one thought clearly: “What possessed me to get married?” Then I fell asleep briefly, waking to see him finish packing. I was too tired to move, but my tangled thoughts were still active. It took awhile, but Robert finally noticed that I wasn’t speaking to him.

“You’re mad now, but you’ll miss me when I’m gone,” he said. “You’ll feel different later.” I was still silent.

“Finances have to come first,” he added. “We have to have enough money to pay for my last semester at school. That’s the goal. Now - please — give me just a little more lovin’,” Robert begged, “before I have to go!” I wearily wondered how much it would cost to get a civil marriage annulled. My feet were sore, so I mentioned that I needed new walking shoes, telling Robert I would not be able to work another day in high heels (my flattie shoes were worn out). Instead, Robert handed me three dollars for bus fare and meals, adding “You have to make this last. Remember — don’t cash your next paycheck. Send it to me. I might need it for car repairs.”

I was still in a state of disbelief. Robert was not going to be in New Orleans. I was tired and sore, I had no job, and a hellion for a landlady. Just then, we caught her looking through the keyhole again, so I opened Robert’s umbrella and hung it open over the lock, making my new husband laugh. Then he was kissing me passionately again, as I considered the pantry of excuses that women offer men to avoid just saying “No.”

Robert finally got up and started taking things to the car. He would be gone at least ten days on a quarterboat owned by Evangeline Exploration. But he refused to reveal the name, location or phone number of the ship’s owners. “I don’t want you spending any money coming over to see me,” he said. “Don’t worry,” he added. “I’ll write.”

At the last minute, Robert put his guitar on the bed and told me to keep it for him because the salt air offshore could ruin it. He kissed me goodbye and left me sad, exhausted and lying there in my black baby doll see-through nightie, and my almost-there panties with a big red rose sewn on the front! Too tired to take off my honeymoon attire, I closed the guitar case with my bare foot, and fell into a deep dreamy sleep. It was long overdue.

Night - Friday, May 3, 1963

In my dreams, I floated gently above the beautiful bed in a Victorian mansion in which I was sleeping. Then suddenly, I woke to the sound of men yelling and women screaming. Police sirens pierced the night at point-blank range. Car doors slammed. It was midnight, and my room was pitch black. Shouting, crying and cursing resonated through the walls. The house was being raided by police! So much for Mrs. Webber’s posturing about morality. I had rented a room in a brothel!

“Judy,” I told myself “You’re on your own. You’ve got to do something fast!” As I climbed out of bed I realized I was still wearing the black nightie, and nothing else. It was hardly the way I wanted to greet the vice-squad. I yanked off the negligée, stuffed it into a suitcase and trying to look collegiate threw on a shirt, pants and shoes as fast as I could.

I wanted to get out of there as soon as possible before I got swept up in the mass arrest. The sounds of heavy footsteps shook the building as the police stormed through the foyer and up the stairs. I frantically packed my two suitcases in the dark and hoped that the police would keep heading to the upstairs bedrooms and bypass my darkened ground-floor parlor. I quietly loaded my books and Robert’s typewriter into a cardboard box.

Peering out the curtains to plan my escape, I saw four patrol cars crowding the curb in front of the house with their lights flashing. A girl clad in a feather boa and handcuffs was being man-handled down the front stairs. Above me, I could hear the sounds of the police as they systematically invaded room after room searching for sinners. Several more handcuffed girls were brought out of the building with bed sheets thrown over them. Some cursed as they passed my door. Others wept. Finally, I saw several men escorted out with uniformed policemen at their elbows.

Men! What about the men in my life? Lee Oswald had booked me into this whorehouse and Robert Baker had abandoned me here! And I had really only wound up here in the first place because my father beat the women in his family. Thanks a lot guys. I could have strangled all three of them.

The problem was they weren’t there, the vice squad was, and my options were quickly narrowing. Think! What can I do to show them I am not one of the good-time girls? Wait, I just got married. Where is my license? I had just started frantically digging through my suitcase, when I heard a thunderous banging on the door. There it was! I grabbed my certificate in one hand and flipped on the overhead lights with the other, flooding the room with bright light, just as a uniformed policeman burst in.

He was a huge man, overweight and red-faced with excitement, towering over me like a bridge. “You!” he yelled at me, as he put his hand on his gun. “What’s your name?” I froze and stared at him.

“M-Mrs. Robert Allison Baker, the Third,” I stammered in a crackly voice on the edge of hysteria. The policeman laughed cruelly and said that was the most ridiculous excuse for a name he’d heard all night.

“I just got married. Here’s my certificate,” I said, waving the paper at him.

“So where’s your husband?” he queried with cop logic and in a cop voice.

“He works offshore. He just left a couple of hours ago,” I countered.

Then Mrs. Webber entered the room with her hands on her hips, demanding attention. “She’s cheating on her husband, I tell ya’. You ought to haul her away with the others. Besides, she’s been lying around naked on my front porch trying to drum up business.”

“Shut up!” The police officer told Mrs. Webber with impatient contempt.

“All right,” he said turning to me. “I get it. You’re clean. But you’re going to have to leave. We’re closing this place down, so get your things together and get the hell out of here now.”

“Please don’t swear at me,” I mumbled. “I’m not used to it.” The officer seemed to understand that I was a good girl after all. Seeing that I was caught in this trap by accident, he helped me carry my two suitcases, my box of books and Robert’s guitar case down the stairs and out to the sidewalk. At least I wasn’t being arrested and thrown in a paddy wagon with a bunch of whores, but what to do now?

As I stood on the sidewalk with the neighbors who’d gathered for the spectacle, I pondered my situation. I clutched my purse close to my body to make sure I hung onto the three-and-a-half dollars I had left. I decided I’d better get out of there before someone changed their mind about arresting me. Within the last 24 hours I had lost my job, my room, my food, and my new husband had come and gone. I began walking away with no clear destination, lugging my possessions as I went.

Early A.M. before dawn - Saturday, May 4, 1963

Slowly I dragged myself and my belongings down the narrow sidewalks of St. Charles Ave. The uneven concrete paths were hopelessly broken by the massive roots of ancient oak trees erupting from the earth. Their branches towered overhead and entwined with each other.

As the commotion of the raid disappeared into the distance, silence set in. The streets were empty. The leaves were still. Everywhere I looked were black shadows full of unknown dangers. What was next for me? Did I need to be beaten and raped to complete my initiation into this strange city? I began to tremble with fear. Will the next bush or snarled tree be the one that the assailant springs from? Suddenly a cat leapt from the darkness and ran across my path with a growl. I shrieked and stumbled, falling to the sidewalk and scraping my knee. I rolled over and sat up on the sidewalk, digging the pieces of stone and dirt out of my knee. I started to cry. Forget about “Adventures in New Orleans”! I was alone, afraid, angry and miserable. I had never felt so vulnerable in my entire life. I needed a plan, and realized that panicking would not help my situation. It’s time to focus, Judy!

I had heard about a 24-hour restaurant when I was at Dave Ferrie’s party. That skinny little man named David Lewis said it was on St. Charles Avenue and that his wife worked the night shift on weekends. He had invited Lee to bring me there for some free pie. It was called Thompson’s. And it was somewhere down these streetcar tracks. If I could just reach Thompson’s, I could stay there until morning and then call Lee, since he was the only person I knew how to contact at that point. And I figured he owed me “big time,” for getting me into this mess.

I thought about calling Lee immediately, demanding action. Maybe he could borrow his uncle’s car and come get me. Maybe I could get curb-side service. But I hadn’t seen a single pay phone in the residential neighborhood I trudged through. And what would the Murrets think of a strange young woman calling Lee in the middle of the night?

Dragging my possessions down St. Charles Avenue was slow going, frustrating and painful. Then I saw a streetcar coming down the track. I hadn’t imagined that they ran all night. When I saw it, I galloped clumsily towards the next stop, burdened with two suitcases, a box of books and a guitar, but I couldn’t reach it in time. The driver rolled past without even seeing me. I figured it would be at least an hour until another came along.

I continued on, pushing the box of books with my foot. Finally, the bottom broke. My frustration blossomed into anger. Robert! You clod! Why did you leave me here alone? And that devil of a landlady! I even thought about saying a prayer, but if there was a God, I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction. Instead, I struggled on through the dark silence for what seemed forever, denouncing the people whose ignorance, selfishness and incompetence had conspired to confound me, while I denied my own part in creating this mess. Suddenly, a flash of hope! I saw the sign for St. George’s Episcopal Church just ahead, on my side of the street. Next to the church was the rectory, where the pastor and his family lived. A light was on in one of the windows, and I saw a silhouette moving across it. Somebody was still awake!

With tears in my eyes, I knocked on the door. It slowly opened to reveal a small minister, with his wife behind him. She inspected me silently, then reached out and took the typewriter that weighed me down. I got about three steps inside before I collapsed on their floor and began to sob, heaping my fears and frustrations on this quiet couple. They listened patiently and consoled me, then fixed up a couch with sheets and a blanket, so I could get some rest. In the morning, everything would surely look better.

Saturday, May 4, 1963

Some time the next morning they woke me with a modest breakfast, just to get me started. I learned that the pastor had been up late writing a funeral sermon, and he believed God wanted me to listen to some of it. The sermon was about Providence, and why we should trust in God. But right then I had no reason to trust anybody, so the sermon didn’t reach me, though I promised to re-examine the reasons for my disbelief. By now, this kind couple had learned how I’d been evicted from my room during a police raid and that my husband was out of town, having “accidentally” neglected to leave his phone number. I anxiously showed them my marriage certificate, which finally convinced them of what I’d been through. At this moment, the pastor told me to call him “Father Bill,” like everyone else.

Father Bill then mulled over what to do with me. Given my limited options, I suggested we call Lee. I gave Father Bill the Murrets’ phone number and asked him to make the call on my behalf, since it would be awkward for a strange woman to call a married man asking for help. He did, and once he explained the situation Lee said he would be right there. My rescuer arrived by streetcar shortly before noon.

He was mortified to hear what had happened to me. “I was told the place was a haven for girls from out of town who needed a safe place to stay, not a den for prostitutes!” Lee said apologetically.

Certainly Mrs. Webber’s posturing about morality had given both of us the impression that she would not tolerate any impropriety in her establishment. As nosy as the old bird was, she must have known what was going on within her domain. But what to make of her crazy comments about my “trying to attract business?” Was it an attempt to take my money, and get rid of me? Anyway, I had other problems to deal with.

Lee made such a good impression on Father Bill and his wife that they invited us to stay for lunch. We accepted their offer and as we ate, Lee talked sensibly about religion and politics, skillfully navigating those touchy issues so as not to offend anyone. They assumed he was just a college student.

Then Father Bill excused himself, saying he had to prepare for a funeral later in the day. He retired to his study and left Lee to make phone calls in order to find me a place to live. After several attempts, someone called back. It was an elderly woman who had known Lee since he was a child. Now she was a widow. She had converted the front half of her modest wood-frame house into an apartment and was willing to rent it to a nice couple. The address was 1032 Marengo Street.

Mrs. Richardson, Father Bill’s wife, said that Marengo Street was close by. It crossed St. Charles about five blocks from their church, and the neighborhood in that direction was “acceptable.” I was encouraged. Mrs. Richardson then drove us down St. Charles Avenue, turned toward the river at Marengo Street, and stopped on the curb after several blocks.

As we rode, Lee explained several benefits of this location. First, it was not far from Dr. Sherman’s apartment, perhaps even within walking distance. Second, it was less than two blocks from Magazine Street with convenient access to its bus, which went to the Central Business District and the French Quarter. I was just glad I would have a safe place to sleep.

The moment we arrived at 1032 Marengo, a little old lady came out to greet us. She immediately gave Lee a big hug, like she was welcoming home a long-lost son. She then scolded him lovingly for having been gone too long. He told her he intended to visit her soon and often, since he would be living nearby on Magazine Street.

The little old lady was Susie Hanover. Susie’s late husband Billy Hanover had once been a stevedore on the docks of New Orleans.1 Apparently her husband knew Lee’s uncle Dutz Murret and his friend Carlos Marcello from the early days when the three worked together on the docks. By now, I was resigned to the fact that everybody I met in New Orleans had some kind of connection with Carlos Marcello.

My new home was small and bright, with a big bedroom, a living room and hall, and a big bathroom with no bathtub. The bathtub was smack in the middle of Susie’s kitchen. This was an old house and, long ago, water was heated on the stove and poured into the tub. Now, an overhead pipe diverted water from the ceiling into a showerhead aimed straight down. A shower curtain provided privacy. I told Lee I wasn’t concerned about the location of the tub. It would be fine.

Lee apologized again for the events at Mrs. Webber’s boarding house, promising “I’ll get your money back.” Meanwhile, Lee gave Susie twenty dollars as partial payment on the rent. I also had no food, nor any money to buy it. Lee assured me he would take care of that, too, and that I should not worry. “I’m not going to let you go through any more hell,” he told me. “Now it’s my turn to watch out for you.” I wondered if he really meant it.

1032 Marengo was a sunny, cheerful little cottage, and it felt a whole lot more like home than that big stuffy mansion with the crazy landlady. Susie was as sweet as can be and lived in the back half of the building. My portion had the front porch and the front door. There was also an entry on the side which led either back to Susie’s or forward to my place, depending on which way you turned. Susie and I shared access to the kitchen, the bathtub, and the phone. Susie also had a dog named “Collie” who immediately accepted Lee and me as family, but alertly protected her from strangers.

It was time for me to settle into my new home. As I unpacked, Lee got some groceries. But when he returned he left promptly, saying he had to do some things for Dave and Banister, and would call me later.

Evening, Saturday, May 4, 1963

Lee called and said Dave had asked him to handle some lab orders. He was unfamiliar with the terminology and wanted to tap my medical expertise to make sure he was marking off the right items. While his call was all business, he did take the opportunity to mention how helpful it would be if I would finally decide to run Dave’s lab. I told Lee that Robert was going to be gone for weeks at a time, and everything was different now.

“What?” he guffawed, then commented that I was going to have some lonely nights ahead of me, adding that his own wife and child would be arriving soon.

“Get some sleep,” he concluded. “I’ll check on you later.”

The apartment was small and had a very pretty bed, with handsewn quilts and carved wooden bedposts. There were two tall windows in the bedroom, which made the room sunny and bright.

Between the late night sessions at Dave Ferrie’s and Robert’s persistent demands, my sleep had been erratic for days and I felt sick. So I slept, as Lee suggested. Meanwhile, Susie made a big pot of homemade soup. Finally, I took a nice, long bath. Robert Baker seemed to be a million miles away. Well, fine! Life was starting to look appealing again, even though he wasn’t in it.

Lee returned later that evening. He had picked up a discarded newspaper on the bus and offered to read to me about the raids that had been going on all over town. We sat together on the edge of the bed and went through the newspaper, looking for information on the raid at the Mansion. However, there had been several raids and only one story mentioned St. Charles, listing a different address. For some reason, the raid at my house had not been reported. At least, not in the articles.

“The reporters were probably spread too thin last night,” Lee commented, noting that he had picked up some gossip about the raids from the Murrets, since they knew some of the people involved.

As I ironed some clothes on Susie’s breakfast table, Lee gave me his take. The raids were just a sham. The police regularly put on a big show for the benefit of the public, but nothing much ever came of it. The same brothels and strip joints would re-open soon afterwards, and the money flow never stopped.

Only the girls suffered, by getting into debt to their lawyers or “boyfriends” who sprung them from jail. Things would return to normal, if what went on in New Orleans could ever be called “normal.” As I ironed, Lee noticed that my strength was fading. Ever since my miscarriage I lacked stamina. Hearing my tired sigh, Lee got up. “You’ve been standing long enough,” he said. He took the iron from me, and finished my clothes with precision. It’s ‘women’s work’ to most men, but Marines are trained to take care of their own uniforms.

When he was finished, he sat beside me on the edge of the bed and read to me as I rested. First, he read an article in which District Attorney Jim Garrison called Cuba’s leader Fidel Castro a ‘Soviet pawn.’ Then he found an article entitled “Prober’s Work Nets Arrests: Collegiate-Looking Undercover Man Scores.” We read the article twice.

“Here’s the answer!” Lee declared. “This is how I can get the attention I need.”

Lee explained that he needed to be able to enter Cuba; therefore later in the summer he needed to appear to be pro-Castro. Banister was running him as an anti-Castro/anti-Communist conservative. How would he change his image 180 degrees? He would need publicity to make the switch and convince people that he was really pro-Castro. Lee read the article out loud:

“The collegiate-looking son of a wealthy Scarsdale, New York, advertising executive is the undercover officer who made 145 illegal purchases for the police narcotics division. He is John H. Phillips...a 23-year old, clean-cut young man...”

Lee broke off, and smiled. “I’m also twenty-three,” he said. “And I’m clean-cut, too.” He then resumed reading the rest of the article aloud:

“... For 21 months, he investigated illegal traffic in narcotics, barbiturates, and amphetamines in New Orleans and nearby parishes. He got into a fight at 6 A.M. one day on Bourbon St. to try to prove he was on the wrong side of the law...”

Lee chimed in his approval, insisting that this was the way to proceed. He and Banister were making plans to lure pro-Castroites to places where their names could be recorded and photos made: they planned to hand out pro-Castro pamphlets in highly public places, making sure photos would be taken by the TV media, which would be pre-warned.

“If I can create a pro-Castro ‘incident’ with TV cameras there,” Lee said, smiling, “I’ll make a good impression.” It seemed like a good idea to me, too, until Lee read on: “Beaten by Three... [Phillips] won that [fight], but was badly beaten in February by three men...”

I broke in. “Oh, no, Lee! Don’t even consider it!”

“Oh, I’d make sure they would secretly be my friends, don’t worry!” Lee said. “I don’t want to get ‘badly beaten.’ Maybe just a punch in the nose. That would do.”2

Suddenly I realized how much I cared about this man sitting next to me. I did not want to see any harm come to him. I was married to Robert, who cared mostly about money and a good time in bed. I was just a necessary component for half of that equation. And he wanted to make me go back to Gainesville to support him through graduate school so he could sit around and study, instead of continuing my own education in New Orleans. My bitterness and frustrations were easy for Lee to see.

“Did you tell him about your plans to go to Tulane Medical School?” Lee asked quietly with a puzzled look.

“No, I didn’t get a chance to tell him. He cut off the conversation as soon as I mentioned the possibility of getting a job at PenChem in Gainesville.”

Lee smiled. “You mean, you didn’t tell him anything about Ochsner?”

“No,” I said. “He thinks I’m still working at Royal Castle. All that concerns him is that I have a job. And now he’s gone, for ten days at least.” I let my exasperation show in my voice and in my crossed arms. “He made me so mad I stopped speaking to him.”

“So, he’s without a clue about everything that’s happened?” Lee asked carefully. I sensed that Lee was referring to issues involving David Ferrie, Guy Banister and the get-Castro project.

“Yes, and unless he asks directly,” I said firmly, “I’ve decided never to volunteer a word about it. He’s going to get a taste of the same medicine he gave me. He deserves it.”

“That’s good news,” Lee said, realizing that the choice of slaving for Robert or pursuing my medical career was no contest. Moreover, Lee saw that I was finally angry enough to make my own decisions instead of listening to Robert.

“So you might consider taking a cover job with me, at Reily’s?” Lee ventured. That’s how Lee was going to provide income for his family which he could account for, so he could do his clandestine work with no questions asked.

“I might,” I replied calmly and with a smile. With that, I finally threw in the towel: “It looks like Dave Ferrie might get his wish after all.” And with that sentence, I agreed to participate in the Ferrie-Sherman-Ochsner plan to develop a biological weapon to kill Fidel Castro. I had bought in. The die was cast.

Lee told me that tomorrow, after Mass, he had to have lunch with the Murrets, but he would come over as soon as he could. Then he encouraged me to get more rest and left.

______________________

1.    Susie’s grand-daughter told me that her grandfather went on to become a merchant marine and a ship captain. That he knew Lee’s uncle and Marcello was clear to me, but his relationship with them may have been personal and not business. I have no reason to assume that Billy Hanover was part of the Mafia.

2.   I would always remember this remark, made to me on May 4, because three months later, on August 9th, three anti-Castro Cubans, among them Carlos Bringuier, would accost Lee in a staged fight - inspired by this very news article.