THE PEGASUS DIRECTIVE, page 9
A huge smile creased Zakharov’s face. “None, Pegasus. I’m feeling better already.”
“So let’s get to work.” St. James fiddled with the recorder, then sat back and slipped into his persona of professional inquisitor. “General Zakharov,” he began, “this morning I want you to tell me everything you know about the assassination of President Kennedy. I want to hear how Romulus and Remus were able to get to Dallas, and how they managed to slip away. But I especially want to hear what happened to the film of Vice President Johnson and Ambassador Dobrynin after it left your embassy.”
Zakharov lit a cigarette. He coughed once, visibly winced as he struggled to find a comfortable position and ended by placing a protective hand over his abdomen. “I do appreciate how hard it must be for you to sit and listen to the man who masterminded the assassination of your President Kennedy. I will not sugarcoat events. I spent many, many days debriefing Romulus and Remus when they finally arrived home. But especially so with Romulus.”
Zakharov stubbed out his cigarette and lit another. “First, I will recount what happened that day in Dallas, and then I will tell you what I did with the embassy film.”
CHAPTER 9
Dallas, Texas
November 22, 1963
“MESDAMES ET MESSIEURS, votre attention s’il vous plait . . .’’ ‘‘Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please. Air France announces the immediate loading and departure of Flight 56 to Montreal, Canada. Passengers holding tickets are asked to proceed to Boarding Gate 12 in the South Terminal.”
In the Air France waiting lounge at Orly Field, south of Paris, dozens rose slowly and began making their way to the gate. The time was two-fifteen am on the morning of November 18, 1963, and Flight 56 had been delayed since six p.m. the previous evening. Most of the seventy-seven passengers were Canadians and Americans returning home from vacations or business trips in Europe.
Included in the group were two Roman Catholic priests, men claiming to have spent the entire month in Rome, Canadian clerics observing the Vatican II Conference. Although their passports showed they had left from Montreal, the two, in fact, had started their odyssey in Moscow. The older was code named Romulus; the younger, Remus.
Neither were strangers to the North American continent. However, they had not met each other until the previous June when they had been introduced by Colonel Zakharov.
Romulus had been stationed in the Soviet Embassy in Ankara, Turkey, awaiting new orders when he was unexpectedly summoned home. Remus was already at KGB headquarters. Neither had been given any particulars regarding their new assignment, they were only told it would rank high among the KGB’s most ambitious undertakings.
Because both were already proficient in English, the entire month of June was devoted to a total immersion of all things American. To hone their skills, they were treated to hours of the latest Hollywood movies. They devoured American newspapers and magazines; they became fluent in the use of current slang, and within thirty days, their demanding instructors pronounced them ready for any assignment requiring assimilation into mainstream America. They suspected they would be going to either the U.N. Mission in New York or the consulate in San Francisco, both plum postings.
They soon learned differently. Zakharov said the assignment called for them to spend only a few days in America, and not the full, multi-year tour both had anticipated.
The first twelve days of July were spent at the Red Banner Institute’s KGB Personal Firearms and Weapons Center ten miles north of Moscow. They received recurrent training in the use of a number of different handguns, ranging from small .22-caliber automatics to .44-magnums, and then to a variety of high-powered rifles with scopes. On the first day, they learned they would not be using any of these weapons during their upcoming mission. The practice was to sharpen their eye and reflexes. Both were thoroughly puzzled but said nothing.
The last half of July, and most of August, were devoted to learning their covers, and their entire lives were mapped out for them to memorize: Where they were born; the schools they had attended; the towns they had lived in; their parents’ names and family histories; their brothers’ and sisters’ life histories; time spent in military service; where they were stationed and when; the jobs and training they had received after the military; all was committed to memory. Both were soon unerring in their answers. A cursory background check by local law enforcement agencies would pass muster; a detailed check by the FBI would not. Zakharov weighed the laws of probability and deemed the risk to be acceptable.
Romulus and Remus next underwent a comprehensive course in photography. They learned about optics, photographic chemistry, and the art of splicing and editing raw film footage. They became proficient with motion picture cameras. By early September, it would have taken a true expert to uncover they were not what they appeared to be—freelance photo-technicians often employed by either the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC), or United Press International (UPI).
On September 7 they returned to the KGB range and were introduced to a completely modified Swiss Bolex 16mm motion picture camera. Outwardly, it appeared to be a stock production model capable of shooting at a speed of twenty-four frames a second. Because of its ease of handling and simplicity of design, this particular model was a worldwide favorite of newspaper and theatrical people alike. Loaded, it weighed under fourteen pounds and could be shoulder mounted for greater mobility.
They immediately realized this was to be their weapon. The instructor spent the next half-hour demonstrating and dry firing the camera’s gun-mode, all the while explaining the mechanics and physics which made everything work in synch with its ability to record through special optics fitted inside the case. They practiced breakdown and re-assembly until they could do the task blindfolded.
Zakharov decided that Romulus would be the actual shooter, Remus his back-up. They took turns firing at silhouettes, stationary and moving; sometimes in the open and unobstructed, at other times, partially hidden from view. The actual gun had little recoil, minimal noise, no muzzle flash, and the bullets could destroy a target at five hundred meters. By September 10 both men were proficient in handling this unique weapon.
When Colonel Zakharov told them on September 21 who was to be their intended target, neither showed any emotion.
They spent hours with Zakharov weighing the pros and cons of killing the President either during a speech, or while riding in an open car. Finally, it was agreed a motorcade setting would be the preferred option because the noise of a crowd could be used to advantage.
By early November 1963, Dallas had been pinpointed as the city of choice. The decision was based on the simple fact that Governor Connally of Texas had publicly confirmed what was already widely known: the President’s visit would be November 21 to 22, and a detailed map of the presidential motorcade route from the airport to downtown had appeared in all the major Dallas newspapers. A copy of The Dallas Morning News was flown to Moscow for the twins to study. Colonel Zakharov zeroed in on an area along the route which looked most promising: a spot called Dealey Plaza.
Their real break came when they learned President Kennedy had informed the Secret Service he wanted the top removed from the limousine for this trip—unless there was a torrential downpour, and not just a slight drizzle.
Romulus and Remus were told of a man Zakharov called Gemstone who would provide them with whatever assistance they might need. But Gemstone would be unaware of their actual mission. He thought they were simply a TV camera crew on assignment. Zakharov explained that Gemstone was a volatile, and oftentimes unstable character, who owned a seedy nightclub in Dallas, yet despite such baggage, the man had his uses. Gemstone had solid contacts within the police department, but was totally ignorant of the fact that he was employed and being paid by the KGB. He actually thought he was a paid informant for the Chicago Mob, and was proud of his reputation as one who could keep his mouth shut.
The last piece of the intricate assassination puzzle was added when Zakharov told Romulus and Remus a decoy had been hired to fire a rifle at the same time they would fire theirs. Zakharov then cautioned the duo: if Gemstone was known to be unstable, the decoy was ten times worse, and they should avoid him at all costs. He explained.
Out of nowhere, a character had shown up unannounced at the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City in late September, seeking help in getting permission to travel to Cuba. The resident KGB station chief—an agent Zakharov had partnered with in the past as assassins—didn’t quite know how to handle the weird request, so he cabled Moscow for instructions.
The subject was a lifelong loser named Lee Harvey Oswald. Zakharov had never met the man, but after reading his file, accurately pegged him as a bankrupt, communist sympathizer who not only spoke Russian, but had actually married a woman from Molotovsk.
Zakharov saw the timing as nothing short of serendipitous. Only a few days earlier, on September 25, the White House had announced that a presidential trip to Texas was planned for late November and would include a motorcade in Dallas for the morning of November 22. The exact route had been published by the White House Press Office while Oswald was in Mexico City, and that’s when Zakharov made his decision. President Kennedy’s assassination would take place in Lyndon Johnson’s very own backyard!
Here was a disgruntled American, a stooge he could plant at the scene. He wired encrypted instructions to the embassy station chief to make an arm’s length offer to Oswald through a cutout masquerading as a Cuban national, for a ten thousand dollar very important assignment in Dallas sometime in late November. Two thousand to be paid immediately, the balance upon completion of the task, a fortune to the near-penniless Oswald. He was instructed by the “Cuban” to return to the U. S. and await further instructions.
Zakharov immediately put KGB operatives in Dallas to work, greasing palms and pulling strings, and in late October, an agent arranged for Oswald to be hired as a temporary worker in a book depository building alongside the presidential motorcade route. Oswald’s instructions were explicit. As the parade of cars passed below, he was to fire three rounds in rapid succession into the air from a rifle he already owned, then drop it and run fast and far. Zakharov had openly scoffed at the idea of any marksman choosing a cheap, Italian Carcano rifle as an assassin’s weapon, but it was perfect for this gullible individual and his assigned role. Romulus alone would kill President Kennedy. Zakharov’s fervent hope was that Oswald would be killed while fleeing from scores of enraged Dallas police officers.
Zakharov wanted Romulus and Remus positioned in Texas two days early to familiarize themselves with the motorcade route and surrounding terrain in the plaza. They would depart the scene immediately after the shooting, return to Canada by way of Detroit and fly from there into separate European cities. Gemstone would arrange their transportation out of Dallas.
Romulus set aside his book. The plane’s interior was dark, the majority of his fellow passengers either asleep, or wishing they were. He snapped off his reading lamp, tilted his seat back, and stared out at the nothingness beyond the oval Perspex window.
He realized he must have fallen asleep because the next thing he remembered was a stewardess nudging his shoulder and telling him they were starting their descent into Montreal. He shook Remus awake. Twenty minutes later they relinquished their passports to a yawning officer and declared they were bringing nothing back into the country. Entering the main terminal, he heard a loudspeaker announcement that a message for arriving passenger Father Thiebold was waiting for him at the Air France Information Counter.
“I’m Father Thiebold,” Romulus said, proffering his passport for identification to a bored woman who gave it a careless glance, and wordlessly handed over an envelope. It bore the seal of the Chancellery of the Archbishop of Montreal.
Once registered in a nondescript hotel not far from the airport, Romulus tore open the letter signed by a Monsignor Henri Gauthier. The typed message in French thanked them for their interesting and informative dispatches from the Vatican Council and offered shelter should they be staying in the Montreal area for a few days before heading home to their motherhouse in Toronto.
Romulus reached for his well-worn breviary. “Let’s see what we’ve really got,” he said, as he began leafing rapidly through its pages. His search was not for the Word of God, but rather instructions from Colonel Zakharov. His prayer book was a codebook, the letter a message from the senior resident KGB agent in the Soviet Consulate General’s Office in Montreal.
It took him twenty minutes to turn the innocuous letter into detailed instructions. When finished, he tossed the book down and intently studied the converted text which spelled out the where and the how they would get scrubbed passports, money, and American clothing packed in American suitcases.
“Our first stop will be at the last stall in the Greyhound bus station men’s toilet room,” he said, “but we can’t make our appearance until eight-fifteen in the morning. I don’t know about you, but I’m off to bed for a couple of hours sleep.”
The bus station was swarming with early morning travelers. Following instructions, Romulus found the bathroom and locked himself in the last stall. He lifted the cover off the tank and felt around under the float. Yes! He pried loose a key wrapped in waterproof electrical tape, pocketed it, replaced the tank top, washed his hands, and rejoined Remus with a “mission completed” grin and a wink.
He ambled over to a wall lined with lockers stacked three-high and began pointing down the row until he found one with numbers 64T matching those on the small brass key. He pulled out a parking ticket for a car in the lot across the street.
Ten minutes later they were driving back to their hotel in a 1959 Chevrolet Biscayne, and forty minutes after that, lugging two suitcases from the trunk up to their room. Inside they found clothes, money, airline tickets, and more instructions in a letter from Romulus’s non-existent cousin in Toronto. Revisiting the prayer book, they were instructed to drive to Ottawa, leave the car with valet parking at the airport, and catch Air Canada’s seven-fifteen p.m. flight to Toronto. There they would pick up pre-paid tickets at the Eastern Airlines counter in the names of Joseph A. Thomas for Romulus, and Michael Stowe for Remus. They would then catch the one-thirty a.m. red-eye to Dallas, Texas.
At six-twenty a.m. on November 20, 1963, two tired, unshaven, freelance TV camera operators contracted by United Press International (UPI), cleared customs at Love Field in Dallas, and took a taxi to the Downtowner Motel. By two-thirty p.m. that afternoon, having slept and eaten, they made their way to the nightclub owned by Gemstone. After exchanging recognition signals with the stocky, fifty-year-old, balding owner, Romulus and Remus were ushered into a small, untidy, second floor office in the rear of the rundown building that housed his Adults Only Club.
“Y’all have a good trip?” Gemstone asked, plopping down behind a decrepit wooden desk, his favorite dachshund settling in by his feet. “No problems?”
“No problems,” Romulus replied, taking an instant dislike to the beady-eyed Texan. He didn’t want to engage the man in small talk. “Has our equipment arrived?” The camera had been sent from Moscow to Washington in a diplomatic pouch, then forwarded to Dallas by special courier.
“Arrived yesterday,” Gemstone said, pointing with the toe of a cowboy boot toward two wooden crates stacked beside his chair. “I haven’t touched a thing. The bill of lading says they came from the UPI Washington office. You want to check ’em?”
“We do,” said Romulus. He laid the crates side by side on the floor. Opening the first, he found the camera, wrapped in green felt and packed snuggly in Styrofoam. The other revealed three lenses, loaded film magazines, batteries, as well as sundry smaller parts, and a satchel of tools. For the next fifteen minutes the duo painstakingly examined each component for damage, then cross-checked the other’s work until they had the camera assembled.
“Everything OK?” a curious Gemstone asked.
“Seems to be.”
Gemstone pulled out a map from his desk. “Let’s go over some facts about the Dallas area.” He drew an X at the airport, then traced the main artery into the city. “This is the motorcade route. Now, things can change without warning, but I don’t really expect them to. This here’s a political trip for the President, and the whole idea is for him to be seen by the greatest number of people. That’s why the open car. So any changes now will have to be kept to a minimum so as not to piss-off the good folks of Dallas. However, if there should be a change of plans, I have a radio tuned to the local police frequency, and we’d know of it at once. Tomorrow morning, I propose a dry run so you can get a feel for the layout. I’ve already noted the location where your decoy will be placed: it’s a schoolbook depository building in Dealey Plaza. He’s been working there since October.”
“What can you tell us about this fellow?” Remus asked, with a feigned nonchalance, wanting to feel out just how much Gemstone really knew about Oswald.
“I’ve only met him a couple of times myself, but he’s OK,” Gemstone said, after an uncomfortable pause. His tone suggested otherwise. “You won’t be meeting him; hell, he has no idea you guys are even here to film the parade for UPI. Like I said, he works at a book depository building on the motorcade route, right there,” he said, pointing a stubby finger at a spot on Houston Street. “It’s a seven-story brick affair that sits back some. It’s also away from where the crowds will be gathered. He’s been told to shoot off three shots into the air as the lead car in the motorcade passes beneath him, but not to fire at anyone or anything. Just pop off three shots and vamoose. But I’m sure he knows who will be in that car. He’s definitely not the brightest, but I think he can follow instructions. If you have someone else in mind, I suppose we could dump him right now.”
“What reason did you give this guy to fire three shots into the air?” Romulus asked, staring right through the Texan.
