Part One WINTER ONE. PLATFORM 61 A BITTER COLD WEDNESDAY in February, nearly midnight. Jack strolled out of Grand Central Terminal and up Park Avenue to the Waldorf-Astoria, carrying his ancient suitcase. Seventeen hours on the 20th Century Limited, the most exclusive and luxurious train in America, and he felt as battered as if he''d traveled by camel. He hadn''t eaten much more than a Parker House roll. He hadn''t slept, either. His skin was drawn tight across his cheekbones and his eyes had the feeling of August on the Cape--too much sun and salt ripping across the Wianno''s bow. The hotel doorman was looking at him as though he were a Bowery bum in search of a heating grate.
His clothes were a rumpled mess--they always were; his mother was constantly nagging him about it--but the Waldorf was Kennedy territory. His father had lived here for a year when Jack was a kid, and he still stayed at the hotel whenever he came to New York. His mother preferred the Plaza--and booked it whether Dad was at the Waldorf or not. It was a metaphor for their marriage. Never mind separate beds; Joe and Rose got separate hotels. "Checking in, sir?" the doorman inquired frigidly. Jack handed him the suitcase. The man''s arm sagged from the weight of his books.
"I think my father already has a suite. Ambassador Kennedy?" "Of course." The doorman snapped his ?ngers for a bellboy, his relief obvious. "Welcome to the Waldorf-Astoria." "Thanks." He thought about tipping the guy, but before he could ?nd a quarter in his pants pocket, a hand came down on his shoulder. A surprisingly heavy hand. Like a cop''s.
"Mr. Kennedy?" He turned around. "Yes?" There were three of them--Foscarello, Casey, and Schwartz, as he would learn later. They wore trench coats and snap-brim fedoras, and although they bore no relation to one another, their faces had a blunt-featured sameness. Schwartz was in charge of this cutting-out expedition and it was he who''d clapped his hand on Jack''s shoulder. He was four inches shorter than Jack but his hips and chest had the centered mass of a wrestler. Jack could feel the doorman watching him; he saw the bellboy halt in his tracks. And so he ?ashed his smile at the men who were not cops, and said, "Gentlemen.
What can I do for you?" THE MAN IN THE WHEELCHAIR couldn''t sleep, but that was nothing new. Because his days were ?lled with too much talk and competing bids for attention, he''d made a habit of insomnia; he thought more clearly in the emptiness of midnight. Four hours of peace were his as the train rolled north from Washington, and he''d spent some of it reading the manila ? le that Ed Hoover had sent over from the Bureau that morning. When his eyes grew tired, he stared blankly at the protective steel louvers that striped his private Pullman''s windows, thinking. He was pulled up in the lee of a desk bolted to the train car''s ?oor. It was covered with cables from Europe. He had owned this job for nearly eight years now, and the insomnia was building with the threat of war, a continuous adrenaline feed into his bloodstream. It was sapping his strength and his life, but he could no more give it up--this excitement like a second pulse throbbing beneath his skin--than he could choose to walk again.
He knew, better than any man in America, just how critical the work was and how little time he might have to control it. The work was more vital than legs or sleep or even living a few years longer. It was de'ning the shape of the coming world-- he was de'ning the shape, he and a few other people on the opposite side of the ocean, and the crooks they tried to contain, and the sheer variability of facts and impulses that collided each day as randomly as a boy''s marbles. He could not sleep because he could not stop watching the world as it gathered itself to explode. A year ago--1938--Adolf Hitler had seized Austria, although the term he used was "annexed," without ?ring a shot. A few months later, he''d screamed for the German slice of Czechoslovakia, the Sudetenland, when what he really wanted was the country''s munitions factories and uranium mines and a clear passage to the Russian border. Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister, had ?own to Germany twice to tell Hitler he was welcome to the Czechs, if only he''d leave England alone. Hitler had shaken on the deal and promised to be a good boy.
The British public cheered with relief and called Chamberlain a savior. The man in the wheelchair thought Chamberlain was an egotistical ass. He squinted through his spectacles at the most recent cable--it was from Poland, the next prize in Hitler''s sights--then set it down in favor of the manila ?le he''d practically memorized. Believed to be dying at age seventeen . misdiagnosed with leukemia . possible blood or liver disease . damaged vertebrae while playing football at Harvard . spends several weeks each year at the Mayo Clinic, with additional tests at Brigham Hospital .
medical consensus: unlikely to thrive . A slight sound from the doorway drew his head around; Missy was leaning there, the perfect personal aide, a cup of tea in her hands. "Like some?" she asked. "Please." He took the cup from her, scenting the rum-spiked tea. As he drank, he tapped the manila ?le. "Ever meet this boy?" She shook her head. "Supposed to be a charmer.
" Roosevelt peered at her over his spectacles. "The Black Sheep of the family. Hang around and say hello, if you want." Missy had a soft spot for black sheep. She came over to his chair and planted a kiss on his head. "My book''s too good." He eyed her critically. His wife would be reading an improving work ?lled with labor statistics.
But Missy . "Is it something by Jane Austen?" "Dashiell Hammett. Tell me about Jack in the morning." THEY LED HIM THROUGH a part of the Waldorf few guests ever saw and exited a service door into the hotel garage, pulling up eventually before a freight elevator. By this time Schwartz had ?ipped open his badge. "Secret Service," Jack mused. The Treasury department''s special force. Which might mean he''d been dragged out of the lobby because Dad had overplayed the markets again.
Why not talk to his father, then? Why buttonhole Jack? It was important, he ?gured, to look unconcerned. To stay calm, even if his heart was racing. His eyes met Schwartz''s and held them. "Is my father in some kind of trouble?" He didn''t need to remind the Secret Service that Joe Kennedy had made a fortune manipulating stock in ways the Treasury department had never been able to prosecute. Franklin Roosevelt had made Jack''s father his ?rst chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission as a reward for his cunning. Set a thief to catch a thief , Roosevelt had said--or so Dad once told Jack, smiling his thin smile at the head of the dinner table. Dad found the President''s cynicism funny. How could Treasury have caught up with Joe Kennedy now ? "Last I heard," the man named Foscarello said, "your old man was just swell.
Out dancing with a hatcheck girl." Jack ?ushed and almost went for Foscarello, but at that moment the doors of the freight elevator opened and Schwartz''s hand was on his shoulder again, guiding him into the steel cage. "Mr. Kennedy," Schwartz said soothingly, "we''re President Roosevelt''s bodyguards. He wants to see you. He''s waiting below in his Pullman." Foscarello stared at Jack without blinking and there was a de'nite challenge in the man''s stolid face. The elevator lurched like a tin can on a string and Jack''s stomach dropped sickly.
"Below?" he repeated. "The President''s Pullman is in the hotel''s basement?" Schwartz sighed. "There''s a track beneath us, Mr. Kennedy. The Waldorf was built over some old train yards connected to Grand Central. Platform 61 belongs to the hotel. Public trains don''t stop here--you can''t actually ?nd the platform unless you know where to look. The President uses it on his way to Hyde Park.
" Jack ran a hand tentatively over his hair. "You''re sure Mr. Roosevelt didn''t ask for Joe Kennedy?" "He asked for Jack." "How''d he know I''d be here tonight?" Schwartz almost smiled. "I have no idea, Mr. Kennedy." The elevator doors opened. "Hey," Jack said urgently.
"Anybody got a comb?" ROOSEVELT WAS PRETENDING to read the ?le when the boy slid through the doorway, ducking his head in deference to the occasion, one ?nger working at his tie. His clothes were a mess; so was his hair. It was remarkable hair: springy and barely tamed with pomade that''d been applied a day and a half ago. Roosevelt dismissed Schwartz with a nod. "Ah. Jack. Good of you to come. Sit down, won''t you?" "Mr.
President." It was all visitors ever said, as though the title implied whole layers of meaning-- I''m honored, I''m bewildered, I''m waiting to ?nd out what I did wrong --and for a moment Roosevelt was disappointed. He''d expected more from the Black Sheep. "I didn''t exactly have a choice," Jack went on, with a sudden grin. "Those boys of yours are very persuasive. But I like my nose unbroken. So I came along quietly." There it was: The jauntiness.
The inveterate curiosity. Roosevelt had guessed right about this one. Jack sank into one of the Pullman''s seats with unconscious grace. His face was gaunt, his frame as thin as a teenager''s. But Roosevelt caught a whi? of cordite on the air--the scent of a ?red gun, a burnt match. It came from the kid in front him. Jack crackled with energy. J.
Edgar Hoover thought the boy was an embarrassment, the expendable Kennedy. He''s the kind who never ?nishes anything, the FBI chie.