38

I HAD NOT FELT TOO MUCH PAIN IMMEDIATELY AFTER LOSING MODENE, but then some wounds are anesthetized by the shock of the laceration. Returning from Guatemala was more difficult. I soon called the Fontainebleau. I was determined not to speak to her, but at least I could learn whether she was still in Miami. The desk clerk told me that her base had been moved to Washington. Would I like a forwarding address? I would not. It cost me something to say that, as if we were separating all over again.

New difficulties with the Frente awaited Howard and myself. The proposed linking-up of the Frente with Manuel Ray’s forces was dividing ranks. Half of the exiles in Miami appeared to believe that Ray was an agent for Castro.

On the other hand, Manuel Ray was laying claim to the largest underground network in Havana, and, in addition, Presidents Betancourt of Venezuela and Muñoz-Marín of Puerto Rico were well-disposed toward him. It was reported that they had serious influence with Kennedy’s administration.

I felt for Hunt. He worked so hard. He had done his best to advance the political agenda of Cubans whose political programs he could hardly endure. Now there was every intimation he would soon be forced to accept a Cuban he considered cousin to a Bolshevik. “Just look at Ray’s policies,” he would complain. “Keep Castro’s nationalization of banks and public utilities; keep socialized medicine; don’t restore any confiscated properties. Maintain close relations with the Communist bloc. Why, Manuel Ray is Castroism without Castro.”

Next day, Howard was called up to Washington. He came back to Miami with the news that Dr. José Miro Cardona—by choice of Quarters Eye—was going to head up the Frente. Cardona had been President of Cuba for the first few weeks of Castro’s triumphal arrival in Havana, but soon resigned and went to Argentina. Recently, the CIA brought him to Miami. He was, Hunt told me, a prestigious figure. He would be able to unify the Frente far better than Toto Barbaro.

“Just one thing wrong,” said Hunt. “Until now, whenever Quarters Eye has asked Ray to join the Frente, Ray was arrogant enough to tell them that it would make more sense for the Frente to join him. Now that Dr. Miro Cardona is coming on board, however, I think Ray will sign up.”

“Where does that leave you?”

“I haven’t decided.”

By the second week in March, Hunt was summoned once more to Washington, where Bissell informed him that Manuel Ray was indeed joining their ranks.

Hunt replied: “This is tantamount to liquidating the Frente.”

My father, who had been asked to attend this meeting, now said to Hunt, “Couldn’t you force your guys to accept Ray?”

“Yes,” said Hunt. “I could force them, but I’d rather not be asked to try.”

“Why not?”

Hunt provided a full answer to the question. Later, Cal said that he could not remember the reply. “Hunt was just being a royal pain in the ass,” Cal said. “I have no use for Manuel Ray, but it was obvious that Howard had to get on the train or get off. Instead, he was arguing.”

Telling it to me, Hunt repeated his speech. I knew why my father had not listened. The remarks were too well rehearsed for Cal’s taste. “We,” Hunt said, “have trampled heavily on the pride of men who, in their own country, were distinguished, highly respected citizens. Over a period of time, these men of the Frente have come to realize that in Miami they are not much more than puppets. Despite that, they go on doing what I ask because they know there’s no other way their country can be rescued. They have become just about entirely dependent on us. I can’t face them, however, with a proposal to make Manuel Ray their equal. Rather than compromise on the issue, I prefer to withdraw.”

“What was the reaction in Bissell’s office?” I asked Hunt.

“A prolonged silence. I took in the message. I said, therefore, that I’d like to come back to Washington. I could work with Phillips on our radio broadcasts for the invasion. I can assure you, they were relieved to have me come up with such a proposal.”

“It must have been a long plane ride back to Miami,” I said.

“Time enough,” he said, “to change one’s thinking about more than a few things.”

I invited Howard to dinner, but he was going out with Bernard Barker to tour a few Cuban hangouts and say some farewells. Tomorrow, he would be on his way to Quarters Eye. On the drive home to my empty apartment that night, I decided that Howard Hunt had lost more than his job. I did not pretend to understand the Agency, but I thought he had probably come to the upper limit of his career. No job was supposed to be too onerous to take on.

All the same, next morning over breakfast, I accepted Hunt’s invitation to work with him at Quarters Eye. If I remained at Zenith, I, too, might have no future. Whoever succeeded Howard would hardly be partial to his former assistant. Whereas, at Quarters Eye, as propaganda officers, we would, Hunt calculated, still be flown to the beachhead with the Frente. A spill of adrenaline as pure as the fear of jumping from a quarry wall into ice-cold water confirmed my decision. I would fight against the steel-tipped hearts of the Communists after all.

So, the move was put into the paper mill, and a week later, my orders were cut. I sublet my apartment in Miami, and got ready, upon his sudden if unexpected offer, to bunk with Cal in Washington.

Just before I went up to Quarters Eye, the Frente was reorganized into the Cuban Revolutionary Council. Dr. José Miro Cardona became President, and Manuel Ray’s group was proposed for membership. In a meeting at the Miami Skyway Motel, a couple of Agency officers I had never seen before, large men calling themselves Will and Jim, dressed in three-piece gray flannel suits, declared to a near-riotous group of exiles that if the proposed change did not take place, no further aid was forthcoming. The executive wisdom of the Agency had just been demonstrated. When it came to promulgating stern measures, send out a couple of strangers.