JFK

JIM: Gentlemen, I will not hear this. I value Bill as much as anyone here. We all need to make room for someone else's ideas, Lou, especially me. Maybe Oswald is what everyone says he is and I'm just plain dumb wrong.

AL: I've seen him copying files, leaving here late at night.

JIM: William Walter, the night clerk on duty here in the FBI office, gave me a copy of this. It went all over the country. Nothing was done, and the motorcade went ahead on schedule - and this wasn't even mentioned in the Warren Report! Read it, Al.

AL: "Threat to assassinate President Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, November 22-23. Information received by the Bureau has determined that a militant revolutionary group may attempt to assassinate President Kennedy on his proposed trip to Dallas, Texas, etc, etc..."

AL: The U.S. Attorney in Washington "declines" to serve our subpoena on Allen Dulles, Charles Cabell, CIA Director Richard Helms, or any FBI agent we named.

JIM: Well, what do you expect from a pig but a grunt.

AL: Without them, it's going to be near impossible, chief, to prove Shaw's connection to the CIA. We got the same problem with the governors. All of them. Reagan in California won't give us Brading, Ohio refuses Orville Townsend, Texas on Arcacha, and Nebraska on Sandra Moffet.

JIM: I don't care if he was doing it with giraffes in the zoo, Numa, it's none of our business. Let's keep this side of it quiet, shall we?

AL: When you're in a war, boss, you use every weapon you got.

JIM: Not one word. That's an order.

JIM: Susie, watch the language, would you please.

AL: My instinct is that Ferrie is going to keep on deteriorating, and we'll end up getting more out of him when he finally cracks. If we call him now, he might freeze up and we could lose the best shot we've ever had.

AL: If this is Oswald, it must be our third Oswald.

JIM: The interesting thing is the extent to which the Warren Commission went to make him a Communist. They got almost 150 pages and 130 exhibits of the report on this Mexico trip and the picture doesn't even match. I'm beginning to think the point of the Mexican episode was to lay the blame at Castro's door. If Oswald, or someone purporting to be Oswald, had gotten into Cuba, come back, then killed the President, the American public once again would've screamed for a Cuban invasion...

AL: Boss, Oswald impersonators? Sounds like James Bond now.

JIM: Al, you can't tell a mink from a coonskin unless you see the fur up close. Goddamn, Sam! If we don't start reading between the lines here! Y'all gotta start thinking on a different level - like the CIA does. We're through the looking glass. Here white is black and black is white.

JIM: Recall any names?

ANDREWS: Mario, Jose - they wear names like you and I wear clothes. Today the name is Candy, tomorrow it's Butsie. I wish I could help you, Jim.

JIM: Did you speak to Oswald in Dallas?

ANDREWS: Hell, no! I told this Bertrand cat right off, this isn't my scene, man. I deal with muni court, I'm a hack in nigger town, that kid needs a hot dog.

JIM: Then how the hell did you get in the Warren Commission, Dean? Except through the phone records in the Dallas jail?

ANDREWS: There were no phone records.

JIM: Of course there weren't. 'Cause they disappeared. And yet the Commission found you, Dean.

ANDREWS: I don't know how they got to me. Maybe cause I repped him here. The Feebees run background checks. On my mama's breasts, man, that's all I got. There wasn't no conspiracy, Jim. If there were, why the hell didn't Bobby Kennedy prosecute it as Attorney General, he was his brother for Chrissake. How the fuck three people could keep a secret like that, I don't know. It was Oswald. He was a nut job. Faggot, y'know, hated this country.

JIM: What was his voice like?

ANDREWS: You knew you weren't talking to some low life fag, you know. He had command of the king's English.

JIM: Did he pay?

ANDREWS: Always - like tits on a pig. I wish I had a million of those bimbettes.

JIM: And Oswald?

ANDREWS: Like I told to the Washington boys, Bertrand called that summer and asked me to help the kid upgrade his Marine discharge...

JIM: So you saw Oswald how many times?

ANDREWS: Three, four. He came in with a few Cubano swishes one time I remember...

JIM: Yeah, she was pretty, all right, but not half as cute as you, Deano. You shoulda tried a legitimate line of business.

ANDREWS: You can't ever say crime don't pay in Louisiana, Jim - only not as good as it used to. Good chowder, ain't it?

JIM: When did you first do business with this Bertrand?

ANDREWS: Oh, I first heard these street cats jiving about him back in '56, '57 when I lived down in the Quarter.

JIM: Street cats?

ANDREWS: Swishes. They swish, y'know. Young fags, you know. They'd come into my bureau needing help, no bread, and I'd say, hey man, I ain't Rockefeller, who gonna back you up? These cornmuffins go to the phone and dial...

ANDREWS: Why you keep dancing on my head for, my man? We been thicker'n molasses pie since law school.

JIM: Because you keep conning me, Dean. I read your testimony to the Warren Commission and...

ANDREWS: There you go. Grain of salt. Two sides to every coin.

JIM: You tell them the day after the assassination you were called on the phone by this "Clay Bertrand" and asked to fly to Dallas and be Lee Oswald's layer.

ANDREWS: Right.

JIM: Now that's pretty important, Dean. You also told the FBI when you met him, he was six foot two. Then you tell the Commission he was five foot eight. How the hell did the man shrink like that, Dean?

ANDREWS: They put the heat on, my man, just like you're doing. I gave'em anything that popped into my cabeza. Truth is, I never met the dude.

BANISTER: Who the hell opened my files! You've been looking through my private files, haven't you, you weasel?

MARTIN: You may not like this, chief, but you're beginning to act paranoid. I mean, you really are.

BANISTER: You found out about Dave Ferrie going to Texas today and you went through all my files to see what was going on. You're a goddamn spy.

MARTIN: Goddammit chief, why would I ever need to look in your files? I saw enough here this summer to write a book.

BANISTER: I always lock my files. And you were the only one here today... What do you mean, you son of a bitch?

MARTIN: You know what I mean. I saw a lot of strange things going on in this office this summer. And a lotta strange people.

BANISTER: Who'd ever thought that goofy Oswald kid would pull off a stunt like an assassination? Just goes to show, you can never know about some people. Am I right, Jack? Well, bless my soul. Your eyes are as red as two cherries, Jack. Don't tell me we have another bleeding heart here. Hell, all these years I thought you were on my side.

MARTIN: Chief, sometimes I don't know whether you're kidding or not.

BANISTER: I couldn't be more serious, Jack. Those big red eyes have me wondering about your loyalty.

BANISTER: Well, the kid musta gone nuts, right? I said Oswald must've flipped. Just did this crazy thing before anyone could stop him, right?

MARTIN: I think I'll cut out here, chief. I gotta get home.

BANISTER: Get home my ass. We're going to the office, have another drink. I want some company tonight.

BANISTER: All this blubbering over that sonofabitch! They're grieving like they knew the man. It makes me want to puke.

MARTIN: God's sake, chief. The President was shot.

BANISTER: A bullshit President! I don't see any weeping for all the thousands of Cubans that bastard condemned to death and torture at the Bay of Pigs. Where are all the tears for the Russians and Hungarians and Chinese living like slaves in prison camps run by Kennedy's communist buddies - All these damned peace treaties! I'm telling ya Jack, that's what happens when you let the niggers vote. They get together with the Jews and the Catholics and elect an Irish bleeding heart.

MARTIN: Chief, maybe you had a little too much to drink.

BANISTER: Bullshit! Bartender, another round... Here's to the New Frontier. Camelot in smithereens. I'll drink to that.

SUSIE: Or a cover up! Jesus, Bill, don't you have enough proof of the FBI's complicity now?

BILL: Maybe I have a little more respect for this country's institutions than you do, Susie. You tell me how the hell you can keep a conspiracy going between the Mob, the CIA, FBI, and Army Intelligence and who knows what else, when you know you can't even keep a secret in this room between 12 people! We got leaks everywhere! We're going to trial here! What the hell do we really got? Oswald, Ruby, Banister, Ferrie are dead. Shaw - maybe he's an agent, I don't know, but as a covert operator in my book he's wide open for blackmail 'cause of his homosexuality.

SUSIE: Who?

BILL: Grab your socks and pull... Clay Bertrand is Clay Shaw...

SUSIE: No!... Shaw! Director of The Trade Mart? This is incredible.

SUSIE: I don't know if it's coincidence, but Oswald had a top security clearance and knew about the U2 program from his days at Atsugi Air Base in Japan. Six months after he arrives in Russia, Francis Gary Powers' U2 spy flight goes down in Russia. That plane was untouchable. Powers hinted that Oswald could've given the Russians enough data to hit it. As a direct result, the peace summit between Khrushchev and Eisenhower failed. I can't help thinking of that book Seven Days In May, maybe someone in our military didn't want the Peace Conference to happen, maybe Oswald was part of that. It gets weirder.

BILL: Susie, you're an assistant D.A., remember. Stick to what you can prove in court.

SUSIE: You want facts, Bill? Okay. From 1945 to '59 only two U.S. soldiers defect to Russia. From '59 to '60, seven defect, six return, one of them another Marine a month before Oswald. All of them young men made to seem poor, disenchanted.

BILL: Maybe there's more to this, Susie. The CIA's keeping something from our enemies.

SUSIE: Yes, but we're talking about a dead warehouse employee of no political significance. Three years later and he's still classified? They gave us his grammar school records, a study of his pubic hairs... Put it in context, Bill, of what we know about Oswald. Lonely kid, no father, unstable childhood, high school dropout - wants to grow up and be a spy, joins the Marines at 17. He learns Russian, he acts overtly Marxist with two other marines, but he's stationed at a top secret base in Japan where U2 spy flights over Russia originate. He's discharged from the Marines supposedly because his mother's sick. He stays home 3 days, then with a $1500 ticket from a $203 bank account, he goes to Moscow...

FRANK: Who do you think fed him that information? Garrison's going down. We're talking your career here, Bill, your life. You're a young guy... we know you're working that Castro thing.

BILL: No, I'm not...

FRANK: Yes, you are. Look we know Oswald didn't pull that trigger. Castro did. But if that comes out, there's gonna be a war, boy - millions of people are gonna die. That's a hell of a lot more important than Jim Garrison. Goddammit, look at me when I talk to you! You're too goddamn self- opinionated, now shut up. If you got a brain in that thick skull of yours, listen to me. Listen real hard.

FRANK: Bill.

BILL: Hey, where y'at, Frank? You're wasting your time here. Big Jim gave strict orders. No FBI allowed.

FRANK: It's you I want to talk to, Bill.

BILL: Boss would fry me in hog fat if he knew...

FRANK: Your boss got a serious problem, Bill. Real serious. We know what's been going on at your office

BILL: Yeah, I guess you do.

FRANK: You've got nothin', Bill. I'm talking as a friend now. You're riding on the Titanic. Time to jump off before you get destroyed along with Garrison.

BILL: Frank, I don't want to hear it.

FRANK: Senator Long set your boss up, my friend.

BILL: Yeah. They were seen together in Clinton in early September. The Civil Rights Movement was running a voter registration drive.

BILL: ...rumor is Shaw, a local boy, was working on some arms deal to discredit the civil rights movement. No one really knows what they were doing there, but everyone sure saw 'em. They stood out like cottonballs. I got whites and blacks saw 'em, but last time I checked there was nothing illegal with registering to vote. We still got the Negro junkie, Vernon Bundy, saw 'em talkin' at the seawall near Lake Pontchartrain. But it's tough, boss - no one wants to talk about Shaw. He's...

LOU: You know you keep saying that.

BILL: Keep saying what?

LOU: You're not digging.

BILL: The fact is he's gone, chief, and so's our case.

LOU: Not unless we go for Shaw now.

BILL: With whose testimony? Willie O'Keefe? A male prostitute. Jack Martini? A drunk? Vernon Bundy? A dope fiend. Shaw's got respect, the newspaper editors, the American Bar Association - they're not...

BILL: It's addressed to no one and no signature. "To leave this life is, for me, a sweet prospect. I find nothing in it that is desirable and on the other hand, everything that is loathsome."

LOU: Pretty flowery for Dave Ferrie.

BILL: What do you think, Lou?

LOU: I'm just an investigator, Bill. I leave the theories to you lawyers.

BILL: You, Numa?

LOU: Correct me if I'm wrong. I thought we were on the same side. What the hell business is it of theirs to say that?

BILL: Pretty fast, wasn't it. The way they let him go.

MOBSTER: Clay Bertrand? Sure I know him. He comes around the Quarter.

BILL: Who is he, Joe? I've been to every bar, no one wants to talk.

MOBSTER: I told your uncle I never met a lawman who wasn't a punk. You too, Bill, even if you're family. He's a big shot businessman. I seen him on the TV news a lot with all the other big shots. A fag, you know. Goes by another name down here.

BILL: What's the other name?

MOBSTER: Shaw. Clay Shaw.

BILL: Clay Bertrand is Clay Shaw? The guy who used to run the International Trade Mart?

MOBSTER: Yeah, what's the big mystery? Everybody down here knows the guy.

BILL: So why does he call himself Bertrand?

MOBSTER: Who gives a shit what he calls himself?

O'KEEFE: Fuck, yes. Hell, I'm already in jail. I got no reason to lie to you. I ain't no nigger.

BILL: Go on, Willie.

O'KEEFE: ...well the party got crazier and crazier, one of those, y'know "beatnik" type things.

O'KEEFE: ...there were about nine or ten people, Cubans, friends of Dave doing some stuff in the bush with him. Place was a mess. Dave's mind was a mess, Y'know he had all those mice cages around cause he's working on this cure for cancer... Dave's smart - real smart - speaks five languages, knows philosophy, medicine, military history, politics. He wanted to be a priest but they defrocked him 'cause he was queer...

BILL: And that's where you met Oswald for the first time?

O'KEEFE: Yeah, strange guy. Dave introduced him as...

BILL: Did he pay you for this?

O'KEEFE: Twenty dollars each time. Hell, it's no secret. That's what I'm here for.

BILL: Clay Bertrand, Willie?

O'KEEFE: Yeah. Clay. I met him sometime in June of '62 at the Masquerade Bar. Dave Ferrie took me there, for the express reason to meet him.

JIM: With a full-blown conspiracy to cover it up? Y'ever read your Shakespeare, Bill?

BILL: Yeah.

JIM: Julius Caesar: "Brutus and Cassius, they too are honorable men." Who killed Caesar? Twenty, twenty-five Senators. All it takes is one Judas, Bill - a few people, on the inside, Pentagon, CIA...

BILL: This is Louisiana, chief. How the hell do you know who your daddy is? 'Cause your momma told you so... You're way out there taking a crap in the wind, boss, and I for one ain't going along on this one. Jim sighs, saddened. Bill was one of his best men.

JIM: I know this, Bill - Lyndon Johnson got $1 billion for his Texas friends, Brown and Root, to dredge Cam Ranh Bay for the military in Vietnam. That's just for openers.

BILL: Boss, are you calling the President a murderer?

JIM: If I'm so far from the truth, why is the FBI bugging our offices? Why are our witnesses being bought off and murdered? Why are Federal agencies blocking our extraditions and subpoenas when we were never blocked before?

BILL: Maybe 'cause there's some rogue element in the Government!

JIM: Shaw's our toehold, Bill. I don't know exactly what he is, where he fits, and I don't care. I do know he's lying through his teeth and I'm not gonna let go of him!

BILL: So for those reasons, you're going to trial against Clay Shaw, chief? Well, you're gonna lose! We should be investigating all our Mafia leads here in New Orleans - Carlos Marcello, Santos Trafficante - I can buy that a hell of a lot easier than the Government. Ruby's all Mob, knows Oswald, sets him up. Hoffa - Trafficante - Marcello, they hire some guns and they do Kennedy and maybe the Government doesn't want to open up a whole can o'worms there because it used the Mob to get to Castro. Y'know, Castro being assassinated sounds pretty wild to John Q. Citizen. So they close the book on J.F.K. It makes sense to me.

JIM: I don't doubt their involvement, Bill, but at a low level. Could the Mob change the parade route, Bill, or eliminate the protection for the President? Could the Mob send Oswald to Russia and get him back? Could the Mob get the FBI, the CIA, and the Dallas Police to make a mess of the investigation? Could the Mob appoint the Warren Commission to cover it up? Could the Mob wreck the autopsy? Could the Mob influence the national media to go to sleep? And since when has the Mob used anything but .38's for hits, up close? The Mob wouldn't have the guts or the power for something of this magnitude. Assassins need payrolls, orders, times, schedules. This was a military-style ambush from start to finish... a coup d'etat with Lyndon Johnson waiting in the wings.

BILL: Oh, now you're saying Lyndon Johnson was involved? The President of the United States?

BILL: I don't buy it, chief - why would the FBI cover it up? You're talking the whole FBI here. A telex that disappears from every single FBI office in the country?

JIM: There's a word - orders.

JIM: All right, all right. Break it up.

BILL: Where you going, boss?

JIM: I don't know, Bill, I just don't know.

BILL: Found another note, same thing, no name, no signature. "When you receive this, I will be quite dead, so no answer will be possible. I offered you love. All I got in return in the end was a kick in the teeth."

JIM: Jesus, they must've been hard pressed to come up with that one.

JIM: Those bastards! That's proof enough right there of what we're up against. The whole goddamn Federal Government, Bill!

BILL: Well, they offered you the carrot, and you turned it down... you know what's coming next, don't you, boss?

BILL: That's fine, Numa, but what about all the people who aren't writing letters. They're sitting home reading all these lies. I just heard NBC crew's in town to do a "White Paper" - not on the Kennedy killing, but on us. One of their top guys, Harry Stoner, is talking to everybody he can find about you, boss...

JIM: Oh Jesus, Stoner!... Why doesn't he call me?

JIM: Can you get some sworn statements?

BILL: That's gonna be tough. Nobody's talking.

JIM: I think we should have him in for a little talk.

BILL: I still have to question what the legal basis is that supports this, boss. Susie's stuff is colorful, but...

JIM: Let's start making some assumptions about the man. Why would he leave a path as big as Lee Harvey Oswald's? This is not a thin trail, gentlemen, it is a very wide one. Who found the evidence? Who set him up? Lou, Bill, Susie, I want you to go back and check all the sightings of Oswald in Dallas, New Orleans and Mexico in the summer and fall of '63 - see if it's the same guy.

BILL: But why?

JIM: To frame him, obviously. You got to get in your minds how the hell spooks think, Bill! They're not ordinary crooks.

BILL: I'm lost, boss. What are we saying here?

JIM: We're saying that when Oswald went to Russia, he was not a real defector, that he was an intelligence agent on some kind of mission for our government and he remained one till the day he died, that's what we're saying.

BILL: And therefore because Oswald pulled the trigger, the intelligence community murdered their own commander in chief. That's what you're saying!

JIM: I'll go you one better! Maybe Oswald didn't even pull the trigger, Bill. The nitrate test indicates he didn't even fire a rifle on November 22nd. And on top of that, they didn't even bother to check if the rifle had been fired that day.

BILL: He had his palm print on the weapon.

JIM: It went to the goddamn FBI and they didn't find a goddamn thing. It comes back a week later and one guy in the Dallas police department suddenly finds a palm print which for all I know he could've taken off Oswald at the morgue. There's no chain of evidence, Bill. And what about the tow guns actually seen in the Depository? One an Enfield photographed by a newsman and the other a Mauser, described by Deputy Weitzman... Maybe, just maybe, Lee Oswald was exactly what he said he was Bill - "a patsy". Take it at face value. Lou, Susie, I'm going with my gut here. He's got an alias of Hidell to buy the rifle, "O.H. Lee" to rent the room, right? What's in a name, right? In intelligence, they're assumed to be fake. A name is sort of like a postbox number, a code - several different people can use the same name, right? Then why can't somebody be using Oswald's name?

BILL: Well, it's a terrific yard, Chief, but the man's an obvious alcoholic with a reputation lower than crocodile piss.

JIM: Does that bother you, Bill? I always wondered in court why it is because a woman is a prostitute, she has to have bad eyesight.

BILL: He'll never sign a statement, boss, let alone get on a witness stand.

JIM: When something's rotten in the land, Bill, it generally isn't just one fish, we'll get corroboration... find this Clay Bertrand. If I were a betting man, I'd give you 10 to 1 it's an alias. Start checking around the Quarter.

BILL: And the six of us, with almost no budget and in secret, are going to solve the case that the Warren Commission with dozens of support staff and millions of dollars couldn't solve. We can't keep up with the crimes in the Parish as it is, Chief.

JIM: The murder of a President, Bill, is a crime in Orleans Parish too. I didn't pick you because of your legal skill, you know.

BILL: Gee, thanks boss.

BILL: Lord, wake me, please. I must be dreaming.

JIM: No, you're awake, Bill, and I'm dead serious. And we're going to start by tracking down your anonymous source from three years ago. How did you find out Dave Ferrie drove to Texas that day?

BILL: What the hell's a Communist like Lee Oswald doing working out of Banister's?

JIM: Y'ever heard of a double agent, Bill? I'm beginning to doubt Oswald was ever a Communist... after the arrest, 544 Camp Street never appeared on the pamphlets again. Now here's another one for you: What would you say if I told you Lee Oswald had been trained in the Russian language when he was a Marine?

JIM: Morning, boys. Ready for a walking tour?

BILL: At 7:30 Sunday morning? It's not exactly fresh blood we're sniffing here, boss.

JIM: Old stains, Bill, but just as telling.

JIM: Hold your horses. What kinda source?

BILL: The anonymous kind, Chief.

JIM: Nick, what would happen if a man suffering from hypertension were to take an entire bottle of Proloid?

CORONER: He'd die pretty quick, either a heart storm or a ruptured blood vessel in the brain.

JIM: Can you ascertain if there's Proloid in his system?

CORONER: Not in a routine autopsy, but if we looked at the spinal fluid, there might be a high level of iodine, but it's difficult to know. Whatcha thinkin', Jim?

JIM: Well, it doesn't make sense, Nick - he was afraid of dying, then he kills himself in a way that leaves no trace, but he leaves two unsigned suicide notes.

CORONER: If it's a suicide, I seen weirder, Jim.

JIM: What's it look like, Nick?

CORONER: I don't see any violence, Jim. Heart attack, maybe an aneurysm. Looks like natural causes.

DYMOND: Mr. Goldberg, you claim you met David Ferrie and Clay Shaw while on a vacation here from your accounting business in New York, you had drinks and, under the influence discussed killing Kennedy, is that not so?

GOLDBERG: I did.

DYMOND: Why?

GOLDBERG: Well, I wanted to make sure she's the same girl I sent.

DYMOND: I see... and why are you experiencing this paranoia?

GOLDBERG: Well, you see, I've been subject to hypnosis and psychological warfare ever since 1948, when I was in Korea...

DYMOND: ...Oswald?

SHAW: No, I did not.

DYMOND: ...ever called Dean Andrews?

SHAW: No, I did not.

DYMOND: ...and have you ever met David Ferrie?

SHAW: No, I would not even know what he looked like except for the pictures I've been shown.

DYMOND: ...did you ever use the alias Clay Bertrand?

SHAW: No, I did not.

DYMOND: Thank you... Mr. Shaw.

LOU: What about the mob, Dave? How do they figure in this?

FERRIE: They're Agency, too. Don't you get it? CIA and Mafia together. Trying to whack out the Beard. Mutual interests. They been doing it for years. There's more to this than you dream. FBI fucking hates the CIA. Navy Intelligence got something to do with it too. Check out "Alan Pope" in Miami. Jack Youngblood. Bill Harvey. Colonel Roselli. The shooter, I hear, was a Dallas cop - the bagman at Ruby's club. I heard he shot his own partner. Got that? Check out the rich fucks in Dallas. H.L. Hunt. He's dirty. That's all I know. But the Agency always runs the show. Check out something called "Mongoose" Operation Mongoose. Government, Pentagon stuff, they're in charge, but who the fuck pulls whose chain who the fuck knows, fun 'n' games man - check out Southeast Asia - that's the next big number - the heroin trail. "Oh, what a deadly web we weave when we practice to deceive."

LOU: Dave, I always play square. No bugs. I'd love you to go on the record, but I"m in no hurry. Whenever you're ready.

FERRIE: I don't have much time. They don't even need bugs anymore. They got these fuckin' satellite waves. They put a bug in a friend of mine when he was born, right up his nostrils, subcutaneous, between his eyes. He was one of those products of a crossbreading experiment. A Nazi rocket scientist father and a Commie spy mother. You'd never believe half the shit the Agency does. I'm so fuckin' tired. Haven't slept since that shit article came out. Why'd you guys have to go and get me involved with this?

LOU: Did we involve you, Dave, or did Clay Shaw?

FERRIE: That cocksuckin' faggot! He's got me by the balls.

LOU: What do you mean?

FERRIE: Photographs - compromising stuff. And he'll use 'em. The Agency plays for keeps... I knew Oswald. He was in my Civil Air Patrol unit. I taught him everything. A "wanna be," y'know, nobody really liked him cause he was a snitch. I treated him good. He'd talk about his kid, y'know, really wanted her to grow up with a chance, but... He got a raw deal. The Agency fucked him. Just like they're gonna fuck me.

FERRIE: I'm caught in the middle. They're after me. It's almost over.

LOU: Listen, Dave, why don't we order some room service, have a bite, relax. I'll stay as long as you want.

FERRIE: I don't know who to trust anymore. Yeah, sure I could use a pot of hot coffee and a few packs of Camels. You got anything new in the investigation?

FERRIE: Somebody planted that fucking story! And somebody tipped off the press I'm one of Garrison's fucking suspects. I can't go home. I'm out on the street. The maggots are everywhere! Do you know what you've done to me? It's all over the national news now. You know what you've done to me?

LOU: Calm down, Dave, what?

FERRIE: I'm a dead man! From here on, believe me, I'm a dead man.

LOU: What are you talking about, Dave? You weren't mentioned in the story. Don't jump to conclusions.

FERRIE: You think your investigation's been all that secret? You know, when you talk to people, they talk to other people.

LOU: What did they...

FERRIE: You still questioning any Cubans?

LOU: Dave, you know that's where this road leads.

FERRIE: It leads farther than that.

LOU: Dave, just calm down. Meet me in the lobby of the Fontainbleau in 20 minutes. I'll have a suite reserved for you under an assumed name.

FERRIE: The Fontainbleau? 20 minutes?

LOU: Yeah. Come on, Dave, come on our side. I guarantee you the boss'll protect you... Dave?

FERRIE: ...give me protection?

LOU: Yeah! He'd kill for you Dave. He likes you. Your mind.

FERRIE: I got no place to sleep. I'll meet you in 20 minutes.

FERRIE: You know damn well who it is.

LOU: Dave?

FERRIE: Yeah, you got it. Since you're the only straight shooter in that fuckin' office, I'd like an answer from you. Did you plant it?

LOU: Dave, do you think we're out of our minds? The whole building's been a zoo since that broke. We can't get a thing done. Reporters crawling everywhere. You think we want that?

FERRIE: They'll get to you, too - they'll destroy you... They're untouchable, man... I'm so fucking exhausted I can't see straight.

JIM: Get some rest, Dave, and you'll feel better in the morning. We'll talk then.

FERRIE: Yeah, yeah. But leave me alone for awhile. I got to make some calls.

FERRIE: Shit! Forgot to glue this fuckin' rug today. You know, at one time I even had a full head of hair like everyone else. And then I lost that. That fuckin' Clay Shaw. I hate the bastard. All I got left is in his rotten, bloody hands. He tipped the newspapers - I know it. That's how the Agency works. They use people, chew them up, spit 'em out. Now it's my turn.

JIM: Dave, it's going to be okay. Just talk to us on the record and we'll protect you. I guarantee it.

JIM: Then who killed the President?

FERRIE: Oh man, why don't you stop. This is too fuckin' big for you! Who did Kennedy? It's a mystery wrapped in a riddle inside an enigma. Even the shooters don't fuckin' know! Don't you get it yet? I can't be talking like this. They're gonna kill me. I'm gonna die! I don't know what happened. All I wanted in the world was to be a Catholic priest - live in a monastery, study ancient Latin manuscripts, pray, serve God. But I had this one terrible, fatal weakness. They defrocked me. And then I started to lose everything.

JIM: Did you take a good look at the TV when they had Oswald?

FERRIE: Black, black - just give it to me. Shit. I'm so exhausted. My neck is killing me. I've got cancer. Had it for years. I been working with mice, y'know, trying to come up with a cure.

JIM: Dave, can I just ask you this directly? Did you ever work for the CIA?

FERRIE: You make it sound like some remote fuckin' experience in ancient history. Man, you never leave the Agency. Once they got you, you're in for life.

JIM: And Shaw?

FERRIE: Shaw's an "untouchable", man - highest clearance. Shaw, Oswald, the Cubans - all Agency.

JIM: What about Ruby?

FERRIE: Jack? Jack was a pimp. A bagman in Dallas for the Mob. He used to run guns to Castro when he was still on our side. Check out Jack Youngblood. Shit - we almost had Castro. Then we tried to whack him. Everybody's flipping sides all the time. It's fun 'n' games, man fun 'n' games.

JIM: Was it the same Oswald, Dave, that was in Dallas, or was it an impersonator.

FERRIE: Same one. I didn't know no impersonator.

JIM: Let me get this straight, now. Clay Shaw is blackmailing you?

FERRIE: Fuckin' A. How do you think the Agency gets people to do their bullshit? Fuck knows what they got on Oswald!

JIM: You mean about the Cubans getting trained north of the lake?

FERRIE: Oh, you got that? Banister's pet project. Getting paid by the government to work against the government. Beautiful. What a mind he had, what a guy, Guy. He had all those files.

JIM: Who was paying you, Dave?

FERRIE: You think I was a getaway pilot for the assassination, don't you?

JIM: I don't know. Were you? Who you scared of, Dave?

FERRIE: Everybody! The Agency. The Mob. The Cubans. Yeah, follow the Cubans. Check them out. Here, in Dallas, Miami. Check out a guy named Eladio del Valle. My paymaster when I flew missions into Cuba - he's somewhere in Miami. You're on the right track.

FERRIE: Leon's in a bad mood, don't get excited, he's all right.

JIM: Would you say this "Leon" was actually Lee Harvey Oswald?

FERRIE: Do you mind if I smoke, Mr. Garrison?

JIM: How could I? Dave, as you know, President Kennedy was assassinated on Friday. A man named Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested as a suspect and then was murdered yesterday by a man named Jack Ruby. We've heard reports that Oswald spent the summer in New Orleans and we've been advised you knew Oswald pretty well.

FERRIE: That's not true. I never met anybody named Oswald. Anybody who told you that has to be crazy.

JIM: But you are aware, he served in your Civil Air Patrol unit when he was a teenager.

FERRIE: No... if he did, I don't remember him. There were lots of kids in and out... y'know.

JIM: I'm sure you've seen this. Perhaps you knew this man under another name?

FERRIE: No, I never saw him before in my life.

JIM: Well that must've been mistaken information we got. Thanks for straightening it out for us. There is one other matter that's come up, Dave. We were told you took a trip to Texas shortly after the assassination of Friday.

FERRIE: Yeah, now that's true. I drove to Houston.

JIM: What was so appealing about Houston?

FERRIE: I hadn't been there ice skating in many years, and I had a couple of young friends with me, and we decided we wanted to go ice skating.

JIM: Dave, may I ask why the urge to go ice skating in Texas happened to strike you during one of the most violent thunderstorms in recent memory?

FERRIE: Oh, it was just a spur of the moment thing... the storm wasn't that bad.

JIM: I see. And where did you drive?

FERRIE: We went straight to Houston, and then Saturday night we drove to Galveston and stayed over there.

JIM: Why Galveston?

FERRIE: No particular reason. Just to go somewhere.

JIM: And then Sunday?

FERRIE: In the morning we went goose hunting. Then headed home, but I dropped the boys off to see some relatives and I stayed in Hammond.

JIM: Did you bag any geese on this trip?

FERRIE: I believe the boys got a couple.

JIM: But the boys told us they didn't get any.

FERRIE: Oh yes, well, come to think of it, they're right. We got to where the geese were and there were thousands of them. But you couldn't approach them. They were a wise bunch of birds.

JIM: Your young friends also told us you had no weapons in the car. Dave, isn't it a bit difficult to hunt for geese without a shotgun?

FERRIE: Yes, now I remember, Mr. Garrison. I'm sorry, I got confused. We got out there near the geese and it was only then we realized we'd forgotten our shotguns. Stupid, right? So of course we didn't get any geese.

JIM: I see. Dave thank you for your time. I'm sorry it has to end inconveniently for you, but I'm going to have you detained for further questioning by the FBI.

FERRIE: Why? What's wrong?

JIM: Dave, I find your story simply not believable.

JIM: Come in, Dave. Have a seat, make yourself comfortable. Coffee?

FERRIE: Do you remember me, Mr. Garrison? I met you on Carondolet Street right after your election. I congratulated you, remember?

JIM: How could I forget? You make quite a first impression. Sharon, could you please bring us some coffee? I've heard over the years you're quite a first-rate pilot, Dave. Legend has it you can get in and out of any field, no matter how small... I'm a bit of a pilot myself, you know. Flew grasshoppers for the field artillery in the war.

FINCK: I don't remember his name. You must understand it was quite crowded, and when you are called in circumstances like that to look at the wound of the President who is dead, you don't look around too much to ask people for their names and who they are.

JIM: But you were a qualified pathologist. Was this Army general a qualified pathologist?

FINCK: No.

JIM: But you took his orders. He was directing the autopsy.

FINCK: No, because there were others. There were admirals.

JIM: There were admirals.

FINCK: Oh yes, there were admirals - and when you are a lieutenant colonel in the Army you just follow orders, and at the end of the autopsy we were specifically told - as I recall it was Admiral Kenney, the Surgeon General of the Navy - we were specifically told not to discuss the case.

JIM: Colonel Finck, are you saying someone told you not to dissect the neck?

FINCK: I was told that the family wanted examination of the head.

JIM: As a pathologist it was your obligation to explore all possible causes of death, was it not?

FINCK: I had the cause of death.

JIM: Your Honor, I would ask you to direct the witness to answer my question. Why did Colonel Finck not dissect the track of the bullet wound in the neck?

FINCK: Well I heard Dr. Humes stating that - he said...

GARRISON: Jesus, Ed, from time immemorial it's been standard booking procedure to ask an alias. You know that. There's no constitutional requirement that says a lawyer has to be present for routine questions.

JUDGE HAGGERTY: I call'em as I see'em, Jim. I'm ruling it inadmissible.

GARRISON: That's our case!

JUDGE HAGGERTY: If that's your case, you didn't have a case. I wouldn't believe whatever Habighorst said, anyway.

GARRISON: I can't believe you're saying this in the courtroom.

JUDGE HAGGERTY: Well, I am saying it. Bring in the jury.

JUDGE HAGGERTY: I'm going to have to ask the jury to leave the courtroom.

GARRISON: What?

JASPER: I'm scared.

JIM: There's nothing wrong with feeling a little scared, Jasper, Virginia. Telling the truth can be a scary thing. It scared President Kennedy, but he was a brave man. If you let yourself be too scared, then you let the bad guys take over the country, don't you - and then everybody gets scared.

JASPER: Are we going away, Daddy?

JIM: Well, it looks like it, Jasper.

JASPER: Because of Kennedy? Are the same people gonna kill us, Daddy?

JIM: No, Jasper, nobody's gonna kill us.

JASPER: Daddy! Where have you been?

JIM: Hi, Freckle Face.

JASPER: Dad, look what I drew.

JIM: That's something, Jasper. What is it?

JASPER: A rhinoceros. Can I stay up another hour?

JASPER: Daddy said it was all right if I was real quiet.

JIM: Sure it is. Freckle Face, if I ever handled a minor felon like that, it'd be all over the papers. I'd catch hell. And this is the alleged murderer of the President?

JEAN HILL: He asked me why I thought I was in danger and I said:

JEAN HILL: Well if they can kill the President, they can certainly get me.

LAWYER: That doesn't make sense, Mrs. Hill. We have the man that killed the President.

JEAN HILL: No, you don't!

JEAN HILL: He kept trying to get me to change my story about the shots. He was getting hot under the collar, and telling the woman not to write when he wanted.

JEAN HILL: Look, do you want the truth, or just what you want me to say?

LAWYER: I want the truth.

JEAN HILL: The truth is that I heard between four and six shots. I'm not going to lie for you.

LAWYER: ...you heard echoes.

JEAN HILL: No. I had guns all my life. I used to go turtle shooting.

LAWYER: I realize you're under a great deal of stress .. it's clouded your judgement.

JEAN HILL: So off the record, he starts talking about my family, and even mentioned my marriage was in trouble like I didn't know it or something. He got angrier and angrier and then:

LAWYER: Look, we can put you in a mental institution. We can make you look crazier'n Marguerite Oswald, and everybody knows how crazy she is.

JEAN HILL: I knew something was crooked as a dog's hind leg, 'cause no one who is just taking a deposition gets that involved and angry... sure enough, when I finally read my testimony as published by the Warren Commission, it was a fabrication from start to finish.

JEAN HILL: These new people never identified themselves. They musta been watching the whole thing 'cause they knew everything Mary and me had been doing that day. I guess I wasn't too hard to find - wearing that red raincoat.

MAN: How many shots you say you heard?

JEAN HILL: Four to six.

MAN: That's impossible. You heard echoes ...echoes. We have three bullets and three shots which came from the Book Depository and that's all we're willing to say.

JEAN HILL: ...which is strange 'cause this is less than 20 minutes after the assassination.

JEAN HILL: No, I saw a guy shooting from over there. He was behind that fence. What are you going to do about it?

MAN: We have that taken care of. You only heard three shots and you are not to talk to anyone about this. No one, you hear?

JEAN HILL: I was scared. It was all kinda queer, but it sure felt like two and two was coming up three... and then they took Mary's five snapshots from me, sent them to Washington, and when they returned them weeks later, two of them had the backgrounds mutilated... The only one we saved was in Mary's camera. I didn't want to go to Washington when the Warren Commission subpoenaed me... so the lawyer come down here and interviewed me at Parkland Hospital.

SUSIE: I'm sorry.

JIM: I know.

SUSIE: Aren't you being a little hard?

JIM: No, I don't think I am, Susie. Anyone else?

JIM: I think Clinton is a breakthrough. Shaw denies he knows Ferrie or Oswald. Is that right? It proves he's a liar. Keep on it, Bill.

SUSIE: This is interesting - are you ready for this? Oswald went to see the FBI two weeks before the assassination. It seems Special Agent Hosty made three routine visits to his house, supposedly to keep an eye on Marina Oswald.

JIM: I don't believe it!

SUSIE: Bugging the District Attorney's office of New Orleans! It's outrageous!

SUSIE: ...now it gets positively spooky. In January, 1961 - in New Orleans, at the Bolton Ford Dealership - when the Oswald we know is in Russia - there is a man using the name "Oswald" to buy trucks for the Friends of Democratic Cuba. The salesman never saw him again, but guess who's on the articles of incorporation of the Friends of Democratic Cuba? Guy Banister. Banister has someone using the name "Oswald" to buy the trucks. Hoover, at the FBI, writes a memo dated June, 1960, that there could be someone using Oswald's passport and identity.

JIM: Goddamn! They put Oswald together from Day One! Like some dummy corporation in the Bahamas - you just move him around a board. Sent him to Russia, in and out, no passport problems. You got the word "microdots" in his notebook, you got the Minox camera and the electronic devices they find in his possessions, the sealed DIZ201 personnel file. For all we know, there could be a dozen Oswalds in different cities, countries - all of them leaving a trail of incriminating evidence that could easily be traced to a scapegoat after the assassination. Does the real Oswald know he's been put together? Who knows. It doesn't matter, does it? He's a low level spy, he doesn't know who he really works for...

SUSIE: All I can find out about the Williams' is their tax returns are classified and that Bill Williams, a descendant of the Cabots of Massachusetts, has links through his family and United Fruit to the CIA and does classified work for Bell Helicopter which requires a security clearance - so what is Oswald, a defector, doing visiting his wife in his house? Williams has a relationship at Bell with General Walter Dornberger, another one of the Nazis we brought in after the War for our missile program. He used slave labor to build the V-2 Rockets for Hitler before Bell needed him.

JIM: I wonder about the Williams'. Just where did the first description of Oswald come from at 12:44? No one knows. They claimed it was Brennan's, but his description came after 1 P.M. Who called? Somehow the FBI's been tapping the Williams' and picks up a call between Bell Helicopter and Janet's phone, an unidentified voice saying "We both know who's responsible." Who called? Why's the Bureau been tapping them?

SUSIE: The Oswalds are introduced by George de Mohrenschildt to Janet and Bill Williams. It's through Janet Williams in October '63 that Lee gets the warehouse job, right smack on Elm Street at the Book Depository, which is owned by another oilman with ties to defense and military intelligence.

JIM: Presumably so he can now exercise his intellect stacking school texts at $1.25 an hour.

SUSIE: The next thing we know he's living in Dallas/Ft. Worth in October '62 working 6 months at Jaggars-Chiles- Stovall, a photographic firm that contracts to make maps for the U.S. Army... He starts work only days before the government reveals Russian missiles in Cuba and the crisis explodes. Oswald may have had access to missile site footage obtained by the U2 planes and works alongside a young man who'd been in the Army Security Agency.

JIM: Sort of like Benedict Arnold coming back to George Washington's cabinet.

SUSIE: Equally incongruous is Oswald becoming chummy with the White Russian community of Dallas - all rabid anti- Communists.

SUSIE: Spas T. Raikin, a leading member of an anti-Communist group.

JIM: And Marina? Does she have a problem getting out?

SUSIE: None either. It's bizarre. It's next to impossible to get Russian sweethearts out. Nor does Lee have any problem getting a new passport when he wants to go to Cuba and Russia in '63. A man who has defected once already. It's crazy.

JIM: Dammit, it doesn't add up! Ordinary people get blacklisted for leftist affiliations! The State Department did everything short of dispatching a destroyer to Minks to insure Oswald's return. Only intelligence people can come and go like that.

JIM: Don't get sidetracked! How does he get back to the States? That's the point. Does he have any problems?

SUSIE: None! The State Department issues him a new passport in 48 hours and loans him the money to travel. He's never investigated or charged by the Navy for revealing classified information or, as far as we know, debriefed by the CIA.

JIM: This is a man whose secrets cause us to change our radar patterns in the Pacific! He should've been prosecuted as a traitor!

SUSIE: The FBI finally gets around to talking to him in Dallas and runs a file on him as a miscreant Communist type.

JIM: But who meets him when he gets off the boat in New York in June '62?

SUSIE: Finally they shuttle him to a radio factory in Minks where he lives as high on the hog as he ever has - he's given 5,000 rubles, a roomy apartment with a balcony, has affairs with local girls.

JIM: Makes sense - he's a spokesman.

SUSIE: But he never writes, speaks, or does any propaganda for the Russians. He meets Marina, whose uncle is a colonel in Soviet intelligence, at a trade union dance; she thinks he's Russian the way he speaks, six weeks later they marry, have a daughter.

JIM: If we go to him our investigation'll hit the front pages by sunrise. Blow up right in our face. Ruby was just given a new trial. If he has something to say, it'll be there. Susie, what did you find out on Oswald?

SUSIE: Negative on his tax records. Classified. First time I know a D.A. can't get a tax record. I put together a list of all the CIA files on Oswald that were part of the Warren Report and asked for them. There are about 1200 documents... Oswald in the USSR, in Mexico City, Oswald and the U2, a CIA 201 personnel file, a memo from the Director on Oswald, travel and activities - can't get one of them. All classified as secret on the grounds of national security. It's real strange.

SHAW: And if I was, Mr. Garrison... do you think I would be here today... talking to somebody like you?

JIM: No, people like you don't have to, I guess - people like you walk between the raindrops.

SHAW: May I go? Regardless of what you may think of me, Mr. Garrison, I am a patriot first and foremost.

JIM: I've spent half my life in the United States military serving and defending this great country, Mr. Shaw, and you're the first person I ever met who considered it an act of patriotism to kill his own president.

SHAW: Now just a minute, sir! You're way out of line!

JIM: Mr. Shaw, this is an Italian newspaper article saying you were a member of the Board of Centro Mondo Commerciale in Italy, that this company was a creature of the CIA for the transfer of funds in Italy for illegal political-espionage activities. It says that this company was expelled from Italy for those activities.

SHAW: I'm well aware of this asinine article. And I am thinking very seriously of suing this rag of a newspaper.

JIM: It says that this company has heavily Fascist ties to the French secret army organization that tried to assassinate de Gaulle in 1960.

SHAW: Nonsense. What next?

JIM: ...and that this company is linked to the Schlumber tool company here in Houma, Louisiana - which is where their arms may have come from to David Ferrie and his Cubans...

SHAW: Mr. Garrison, you're reaching. I am an international businessman. The Trade Mart which I founded is America's commercial pipeline to Latin America. I trade everywhere. I am accused, as are all businessmen, of all things. I somehow go about my business, make money, help society the best I can and try to promote free trade in this world.

JIM: Mr. Shaw, have you ever been a contract agent with the Central Intelligence Agency?

JIM: Mr. Shaw, can you identify this man?

SHAW: Naturally. Are you claiming, Mr. Garrison, that Mr. Oswald also had dinner with me?

JIM: Mr. Shaw, did you ever meet Lee Harvey Oswald?

SHAW: You really have me consorting with a cast of sordid characters, don't you, Mr. Garrison.

JIM: Please answer the question.

SHAW: Of course not! Such a pity, that assassination. In fact, I admired President Kennedy. A man with true panache, and a wife with impeccable taste.

JIM: Let me show you his picture.

SHAW: No. I'm sure I've never met anyone of such a bizarre appearance.

JIM: Does the name Clay Bertrand mean anything to you?

SHAW: Clay Bertrand? Clay Bertrand? I believe there was a man with a name similar to that who worked at the Chamber of Commerce. Is that the man you had in mind?

JIM: No, it was not. Do you know an attorney by the name of Dean Andrews?

SHAW: One meets so many attorneys in my business. No, I don't believe I know Dean Andrews.

SHAW: Who?

JIM: David Ferrie.

SHAW: No. I have never known anyone by that name. Of course never having met Mr. O'Keefe I could hardly have met Mr. Ferrie...

JIM: ...and that the four of you partied early into the morning hours...

JIM: After dinner you paid him to have sex with you.

SHAW: Pffft! Absolute nonsense. The Quarter is filled with vivid imaginations, my dear Mr. Garrison - grimy young hoodlums who'll say and do anything. As you well know.

JIM: ...in the course of that night, Mr. O'Keefe said a man named David Ferrie stopped by the house... along with another young man...

JIM: Perhaps a few more details about the evening will refresh your memory. Mr. O'Keefe told us dinner was served by a uniformed waiter - a colored man. He particularly remembers that you sat at one end and he at the other - which he found rather unusual because the table was so long. Does that bring back memories of Willie O'Keefe?

SHAW: Not at all. But on the other hand, I do have a lovely Chippendale dining table and I often have a friend over sitting at one end while I sit at the other. That is precisely the point of a long dining table. The splendor of the meal adds to the enjoyment of it.

JIM: I would imagine a uniformed waiter helps.

SHAW: It adds a taste of elegance for which I must confess a weakness for now and then. I call him Smedley. His real name is Frankie Jenkins - but I could hardly imagine anything more uncouth during dinner than my turning toward the kitchen and hollering "Frankie!" .. Where is this leading to, Mr. Garrison?

SHAW: I'm not sure I understand.

JIM: Well... in an investigation we're conducting your name has come up a number of times.

SHAW: I wouldn't imagine where.

JIM: We recently talked to a number of men who claim to know you. Are you acquainted with a David Logan?

SHAW: No. Never heard of him.

JIM: A Perry Russo?

SHAW: No.

JIM: A Willie O'Keefe?

SHAW: No, I don't believe I know anyone by that name.

JIM: Mr. O'Keefe told us he met you at the Masquerade Bar down in the Quarter and several evenings later you had him over for dinner at your apartment on Dauphine Street. Do you recall that?

MERCER: This says "Mercer could not identify any of the photographs as being identical with the person she had observed slouched over the wheel of a green Ford pickup truck." That's not true. I recognized him and I told them so... They also said it was a dark green air conditioning truck, which it was not. And here... ...on the Dallas Sheriff's report. This is really strange. See that notarized signature on the bottom of each page? That's not my signature. And there never was any notary present during any of my questioning. I guess that's all...

JIM: Mrs. Mercer, as a former FBI man, it's difficult to accept this.

MERCER: I know, but Mr. Garrison, the FBI is just not doing their job.

JIM: You mean you identified him on Saturday, the day before Ruby shot Oswald?

MERCER: That's right. When I saw him on TV, I was shocked. I said to my family, "that was the man I saw in the truck."

JIM: But you didn't seem nearly so sure in your statement to the Warren Commission.

MERCER: That's what bothers me, Mr. Garrison. You see, they've been altered. My statements...

JIM: In the sheriff's report, Mrs. Mercer, it says you were at Dealey Plaza two hours before the assassination but that...

MERCER: Yes, it was about 11 in the morning. I was driving west on Elm Street toward the Triple Underpass, in a rented car - a blue Valiant. I'll never forget that day.

JIM: They killed him, honey.

LIZ: Huh?

JIM: He won... and they killed Robert Kennedy. They shot him down.

LIZ: Oh no! No! I can't believe it. I can't believe it. Both of them, both brothers, oh my God!

LIZ: And if you're wrong?

JIM: I never doubted for a second that I was. Will you come to the trial, Elizabeth?

LIZ: I don't think so, Jim...

JIM: Well so do I, goddammit! So do I! I had a life too, y'know - I had a life, too. But you just can't bury your head in the sand like some ostrich, goddammit, Elizabeth! It's not just about you - and your well- being and your two cars and your kitchen and your TV and "I'm jes fine honey." While our kids grow up into a shithole of lies! Well, I'm not "fine" about that, I'm angry. My life is fucked, Liz! And yours is, too! And if you don't want to support me I can understand that but don't you go start making threats of taking the children away.

LIZ: You never talked to me this way before, Jim Garrison. I'm not making any threats. I'm leaving you. I'm taking the kids to my mother's. I am - I am.

JIM: I'll take them up to my mother's if it'll make you feel better. Spend a week. I'll change the locks, the phone lines, I'll even get a bodyguard, all right? Elizabeth, get a hold of yourself.

LIZ: Jim, before this Kennedy thing, nothing mattered to you in this life more than your children. The other night Jasper tried to show you a drawing. You didn't even notice he was there. He came to me bawling his little eyes out. Jim, he's sensitive - he needs more from you.

JIM: I promise I'll make more time for Jasper.

LIZ: Is it such a chore? I don't understand you.

JIM: Damn it, if I say I'll spend more time with him, I'll spend more time with him. I can't fight you and the world too, Liz.

LIZ: I'm not fighting you, Jim, I'm just trying to reach you. You've changed.

JIM: Of course, I've changed! My eyes have opened, and once they're open, believe me, what used to look normal seems insane! And now King. Don't you think this has something to do with that? Can't you see?

LIZ: I don't want to see, goddammit! I'm tired. I've had enough! They say you don't have anything anyway! Everybody in town's talking. You're ruining this man Shaw's life! You're attacking him because he's homosexual! Going ahead with this stupid "trial"! Did you ever once stop and consider what he's going through?

JIM: That's not why I'm attacking him! You don't believe me - all this time you never believed me.

LIZ: Oh, I don't know anymore! I believe there was a conspiracy, but not the government. I just want to raise our children and live a normal life! I want my life back!

JIM: Honey, come on. The government wants you to be scared. They want everybody to be scared to speak out. They count on it. But there's nothing to be scared of.

LIZ: You and your government! What's the matter with you? Don't you have any feelings? Your daughter! What kind of man are you?

JIM: Honey, some crackpot. Martin Luther King was killed in Memphis today!

LIZ: Your daughter's life was just threatened!

JIM: Just a crank making phone calls. Happens a dozen times a day at the office.

LIZ: Our home, Jim! A kidnapper, a murderer, who knows!

JIM: Only cowards make crank calls, sweetheart, nothing is going to happen.

LIZ: How do you know? How do you even know what goes on in this house anymore! You're too busy making speeches, stirring up every crazed Klansman in Louisiana after us!

JIM: Get a hold of yourself.

LIZ: I'm leaving. I'm taking the kids and I'm leaving! I won't stand it anymore.

LIZ: Did you enter Virginia into a beauty contest?

JIM: What?

LIZ: A man just called. He asked her everything!

JIM: Nothing is going to happen to you. I won't let it.

LIZ: Leave us ALONE for God's sake! ...Oh, it's Lou.

JIM: Did they live?

LIZ: It's not funny, Jim, I'm scared.

JIM: Don't be. Nothing to be scared about, honey, I been through four years of war - this is nothing.

LIZ: Hi.

JIM: Tough day.

LIZ: My sympathies.

JIM: Liz, I'm really sorry. The meeting went much longer than expected.

LIZ: We waited for you... hours, Jim. You could have telephoned, for God's sake. It's Easter! You promised, Jim.

JIM: I don't know what to say except I'm sorry. I just don't have rabbits on my mind.

LIZ: I think you care more about John Kennedy than your family! All day long the kids are asking, "Where's Daddy?" What am I supposed to tell your kids, Jim!

JIM: I don't know what to tell them. How 'bout the truth - I'm doing my job to make sure they can grow up in a country where justice won't be an arcane, vanished idea they read about in history books, like the dinosaurs or the lost continent of Atlantis.

LIZ: That sounds dandy, but it doesn't replace a father and a husband on Easter Day.

JIM: It's going to get worse, honey.

JIM: No. I told you I was going to talk to Shaw.

LIZ: But why in the Lord's name would you do it in the middle of Easter Sunday when you knew we were...

JIM: Because when I scheduled it I didn't realize it was a holiday. You were there, why didn't you say something?

LIZ: Look at the calendar, for Christ's sake. You said a Sunday, not Easter Sunday.

JIM: I'm sorry, but it's important. Clay Shaw is important. I'm sorry.

LIZ: You're missing most of your life, Jim, and you don't even know it. The kids are missing out too. It's not just you making the sacrifice here, honey.

JIM: Look, I'll rush and be there by two, I promise. Go ahead without me.

LIZ: Jim, come on, honey, get down on your hands and knees and hunt for Jasper's Easter egg.

JIM: You know I don't like these tribal rituals, Freckle Face. I'm interviewing Clay Shaw this morning.

LIZ: Do you have any evidence against him, Jim? Clay Shaw's done so much for the city with all that restoration in the Quarter. He's well connected, all his friends, the money, people, be careful, Jim.

JIM: It'll be off the record, honey. I'll bring him in on a Sunday. A quiet little chat between gentlemen.

LIZ: Honey, you all right?

JIM: It's incredible, honey - the whole thing. A Lieutenant Colonel testifies that Lee Oswald was given a Russian language exam as part of his Marine training only a few months before he defects to the Soviet Union. A Russian exam!

LIZ: I cannot believe this. It's four- thirty, Jim Garrison. I have five children are gonna be awake in another hour and ...

JIM: Honey, in all my years in the service I never knew a single man who was given a Russian test. Oswald was a radar operator. He'd have about as much use for Russian as a cat has for pajamas.

LIZ: These books are getting to your mind, Mr. Garrison. I wish you'd stop readin' them.

JIM: And then this Colonel tries to make it sound like nothing. Oswald did badly on the test, he says. "He only had two more Russian words right than wrong." Ha! That's like me saying Touchdown here... ...is not very intelligent because I beat him three games out of five the last time we played chess.

LIZ: Jim, what is going on, for heaven's sake! You going to stay up all night every night? For what? So you'll be the only man in America who read the entire 26 volumes of the Warren Report?

JIM: Liz, do I have to spell it out for you? Lee Oswald was no ordinary soldier. That was no accident he was in Russia. He was probably in military intelligence. That's why he was trained in Russian.

LIZ: Honey, go back to sleep, please!

JIM: Goddammit! I been sleeping for three years!

LIZ: One hour, y'hear? Some Saturday night date you are. Mama warned me this would happen if I married such a serious man.

JIM: Oh, she did, huh? When I come up I'll show you how Saturday night got invented.

JIM: I can't believe a man as intelligent as Earl Warren ever read what's in those volumes.

LIZ: Well maybe you're right, Jim. I'll give you one hour to solve the case... until the kids are in bed. Then you're mine and Mr. Kennedy can wait 'til morning. Come on, everybody say goodnight to Daddy.

LIZ: Jim, dinner's just about ready... I've got a surprise for you... tried something new... Jim? Jim, dinner.

JIM: Mmmmm... sure smells good... but Egghead, do you realize Oswald was interrogated for twelve hours after the assassination, with no lawyer present, and nobody recorded a word of it? I can't believe it. A police captain with 30 years experience and a crowd of Federal agents just had to know that with no record anything that Oswald said would be inadmissible in court.

LIZ: Come on now, we'll talk about it at the table, dinner's getting cold. What are you doing in here?

JIM: Willie, are you willing to repeat your statements under sodium pentothal? Under the supervision of a doctor?

O'KEEFE: Fuck, yeah! I told you so. And you can tell'em all I told you so.

JIM: You realize the things you're saying, Willie, are going to be attacked by a lot of different people.

O'KEEFE: Bring on all the motherfuckers! Bring their college degrees in here! I got nuthin' to hide. They can't buy me. You can't buy me. I don't even need the parole. This is about the truth coming out. You're a goddamn liberal, Mr. Garrison, you don't know shit, cause you never been fucked in the ass. Fascism is here now, Facism is...

JIM: No one's trying to buy you, Willie. It's important to know why you're telling us this.

O'KEEFE: You wanna know why? 'Cause that mother fucker Kennedy stole that fuckin' election, that's why! Nixon was gonna be one of the great Presidents 'til Kennedy wrecked this fuckin' country. Got niggers all over the fuckin' place asking for their rights, where do you think we got all this fuckin' crime now, 'cause Kennedy promised 'em too damned much. Revolution comin'. Fascism's coming back. I tell ya this - the day that Communist sumbitch died was a great day for this country. I jes' hate to think they're blaming it on some silly fuckin' Oswald who didn't know shit anyway. People should know why that sumbitch was killed. 'Cause he was a Communist. Put me on the stand, go ahead, I'll tell the same goddamn story, I'm proud of it, don't matter fuck all to me, things don't change.

JIM: Anything else unusual about him you'd be able to describe in a court of law, Willie?

O'KEEFE: I remember he had some kinda thing wrong with his left leg. He limped. Don't get me wrong, he's not one of those, you know, limp wrists. He's a butch John. You'd meet him on the street, you'd never snap. You could go fishing with him, play poker with him, you'd never snap in a million years. So one night we were over at Ferrie's place. Having a party. Sometime in the late summer of '63.

JIM: For sexual purposes?

O'KEEFE: Well... yeah.

JIM: I want to thank you, Mr. O'Keefe, for this time.

O'KEEFE: Call me Willie. I ain't got nuthin' but time, Mr. Garrison. Minutes, hours, days, years of'em. Time just stands still here like a snake sunnin' itself in the road...

JIM: Are you giving me an ultimatum, Lou?

LOU: Well, if that's what you want to call it. I didn't ever think it would come to this. I guess I am, boss.

JIM: I will not have any damned ultimatums put to me, Lou. I'll accept your resignation.

LOU: You sure got it. You're one stubborn and stupid sonofabitch D.A. and you're making one hell of a mistake!

LOU: I just plain don't trust him anymore.

JIM: Maybe you didn't hear what I said. I will not tolerate this infighting among the staff, I warn you that...

LOU: Boss, then I'm afraid I can't continue working with Bill.

LOU: Chief, I've had my doubts about Bill for a long time. He's fighting everything.

JIM: We need him back.

JIM: Maybe we should just call it a day, Lou. Go home. While we're still a little behind. We got two people killed, maybe more we never thought about.

LOU: You never got anyone killed, boss. Their actions killed them years before. If we stopped now, it'd be even more wrong.

JIM: Who do you think changed the parade route?

LOU: Beats me. City officials. Secret Service. Dallas police. They did a dry run with Chief Curry a few days before. But they didn't bother running through Dealey. They stopped right there, said something like, "and afterwards there's only the freeway," and went home.

JIM: You know who the mayor was?

LOU: No.

JIM: Earle Cabell. And guess who his brother is?

LOU: Who?

JIM: General Charles Cabell. Deputy Director of the CIA. Fired by Kennedy in '61 because of the Bay of Pigs fiasco, he moved back to the Pentagon, called Kennedy a "traitor". When he came to New Orleans to address the Foreign Policy Association, you know who introduced him? Our friend Clay Shaw.

LOU: The Warren Commission call him?

JIM: His boss was the one on the Warren Commission who handled all the leads to the intelligence community.

LOU: Allen Dulles?

JIM: Head of the CIA since '53. Kennedy fired them both. Cabell was his deputy for nine years. Talk about the fox investigating the chicken coop. Now we'll have to subpoena them, Lou.

LOU: They're gonna love you, chief.

LOU: When Kennedy gets to the kill zone, it's a turkey shoot.

JIM: How many men?

LOU: One shooter. One spotter on a radio. Maybe three teams. I'd say these were professional riflemen, chief, serious people. Hunters... patient. It takes skill to kill with a rifle, that's why there's been no execution of an executive with one in 200 years... "3-2-1... green!" Or else "Abort! Abort!"

LOU: Time?

JIM: Between six and seven seconds.

LOU: The key is the second and third shots came right on top of each other, and it takes a minimum 2.3 seconds to recycle this thing. The other problem is there was a tree right there... Blocking the first two shots at the time they occur in the Zapruder film.

JIM: Didn't Hoover say something about that? The leaves had fallen off in November?

LOU: It was a Texas Live Oak, boss. It sheds it's leaves the first week of March. You try to hit a moving target at 88 yards through heavy foliage with this cheap 13-dollar sucker, the world's worst shoulder weapon. No way. The FBI tried two sets of tests and not one of their sharpshooters could match Oswald's performance. Not one. And Oswald was at best a medium shot. The scope was defective on it, too. I mean this is the whole essence of the case to me. The guy couldn't do the shooting. Nobody could. And they sold this lemon to the American public.

JIM: The Zapruder film is the proof they didn't count on, Lou. We gotta get our hands on it.

LOU: That means we gotta subpoena Time- Life on it.

JIM: Why not just shoot Kennedy coming up Houston? There's plenty of time - he's out in the open - a frontal shot?

JIM: I took it once for a low thyroid condition... It raises the metabolism, Lou. Did David Ferrie strike you as the kind of person who had a low metabolism?

LOU: I'd say the opposite - hypertension.

LOU: You don't get it, guys - he can't go down any further. We got to protect him full time.

JIM: I have a plane to catch... going to Washington. An interesting lead, says he's closely connected to these events, but he won't come down here... I know what you're going through with Ferrie, Lou. We'll talk tomorrow.

LOU: I'm onto Ferrie's Cuban paymaster, Eladio del Valle, in Miami. I gotta get him in, boss. I need more men - I can't even pull the teams to watch Ferrie... This is our case!

JIM: Goddamn Sam!

LOU: And it ain't pretty ..."the AD has spent more than $8,000 on unexplained travel and investigative expenses since November, 1966.

LOU: Mobbed up all the way. Tight with the Dallas cops. I'm digging, chief. I just need 10 more men and some more dollars.

JIM: I know you do, Lou. I'm doing three more lectures this month. You're all doing an incredible job, Sue, Al, Numa. But this is one where if you don't nail the other guy, you're dead. How did Jack Ruby dies so quick? Of what? Cancer, right? A history of Nazi Germany, Lou. They were studying viral cancers as a weapon in the 30's. We learned a lot more than you think from the Nazis. Read this. Our biological warfare lab is in Fort Detrick, Maryland. Close to where the National Cancer Institute is located. Think about it. Think the unthinkable - question everything.

LOU: I never could figure out why this guy orders a traceable weapon to that post office box when you can go into any store in Texas, give a phony name and walk out with a cheap rifle which can never be traced.

JIM: Unless he or someone else wants him to get caught. Maybe he never ordered the weapon, Lou. Somebody else did. It was picked up at the post office early morning when Oswald's time sheet shows him clocked in at his job. Lou, come alive. These things are not adding up.

JIM: Can we find her?

LOU: Graveyard dead near Big Sandy, Texas in '65. Two in the morning on some highway. A hit and run.

LOU: Graveyard dead. August this year. A single car accident on an empty road in Midlothian, Texas. The doctor said he was in some kind of strange shock when he died.

JIM: We need to find more witnesses, Lou.

LOU: There was Rose Cheramie. A whore. Two Cubans threw her out of a car on the way to Dallas.

LOU: ...take a good look, chief, do any of 'em look like the hoboes you remember?

JIM: Hoboes I knew of old used to sleep in their clothes - these two look pretty young.

LOU: ...not a single frayed collar or cuff, new haircuts, fresh shaves, clean hands - new shoe leather. Look at the ear of the cop... That's a wire. What's a cop wearing a headset for? I think they're actors, chief; they're not cops.

LOU: They took 'em to the Sheriff's office, not the police station, and they let 'em go. No record of them ever being questioned.

JIM: I can't say that comes as a surprise anymore.

LOU: A photographer from The Dallas Times Herald got some great shots of them never published...

JIM: Bill, Lou, we're standing in the heart of the United States Government's intelligence community in New Orleans. That's the FBI there, the CIA, Secret Service, ONI. Doesn't this seem to you a rather strange place for a Communist to spend his spare time?

LOU: What are you driving at, boss?

JIM: We're going back into the case, Lou - the murder of the President. I want you to take some money from the Fees and Fines Account and go to Dallas - talk to some people. Bill, I want you to get Oser on the medical, the autopsy, Susan on Oswald and Ruby histories, tax records...

LOU: Post Office.

JIM: Upstairs. In 1963 that was the Office of Naval Intelligence - And just by coincidence, Banister, before he was FBI, was ONI. What do they say?

LOU: "Once ONI, always ONI"?

LOU: I'd say he was probably getting intelligence training.

JIM: Lou, you were in the Marines. Who would be running that training?

LOU: The Office of Naval Intelligence.

JIM: Take a look across the street.

JIM: Remember whose office this was back in '63? 531 Lafayette Street.

LOU: Yeah, Guy Banister. Ex-FBI man. He died couple years ago.

JIM: I know David - a strange character.

LOU: He's been in trouble before. Used to be a hot shot pilot for Eastern Airlines, but he got canned after an alleged homosexual incident with a 14-year old boy.

LOU: One little guy with a cheap rifle - look what he can do.

JIM: Let's get outta here, Lou. I saw too much stuff like this in the war.

JIM: Oh no!... How bad?

LOU: No word yet. But they think it's in the head.

JIM: What's wrong, Lou?

LOU: Boss, the President's been shot. In Dallas. Five minutes ago.

LONG: Hell, you're the District Attorney. You read the Warren Report - and then you tell me you're satisfied Lee Oswald shot the President all by his lonesome.

JIM: Russell, honestly you sound like one of those kooky critics spreading paranoia like prairie fire. I just can't believe the Chief Justice of the United States would put his name on something that wasn't true.

LONG: Honey, another one of these. This one's as weak as cricket pee-pee. Yessir, you mark my words, Jim, Vietnam's gonna cost Johnson '68 and it's gonna put that other varmint Nixon in - then watch your hide, 'cause there ain't no offramps on a freeway to Hell!

JIM: I thought the FBI test-fired the rifle to make sure it could be done?

LONG: Sure, three experts and not one of them could do it! They're telling us Oswald got off three shots with world-class precision from a manual bolt action rifle in less than six seconds - and accordin' to his Marine buddies he got Maggie's drawers - he wasn't any good. Average man would be lucky to get two shots off, and I tell ya the first shot would always be the best. Here, the third shot's perfect. Don't make sense. And then they got that crazy bullet zigzagging all over the place so it hits Kennedy and Connally seven times. One "pristine" bullet? That dog don't hunt.

JIM: You know, something always bothered me about that from day one, and I can't put my finger on it.

LONG: If I were investigatin', I'd round up the 100 best riflemen in the world and find out which ones were in Dallas that day. You been duck hunting? I think Oswald was a good old-fashioned decoy. What'd he say? "I'm just a patsy." Out of the mouth of babes y'ask me.

JIM: You think there were other men involved, Russell?

LONG: Sad thing is the way it's screwing up this country, all these hippies running around on drugs, the way young people look you can't tell a boy from a girl anymore. I saw a girl the other day, she was pregnant - you could see her whole belly, and you know what she painted on it? "Love Child." It's fuckin' outa control. Values've gone to hell, Jim... Course it figures when you got somebody like that polecat Johnson in the White House.

JIM: I sometimes feel things've gone downhill since John Kennedy was killed, Senator.

LONG: Don't get me started on that. Those Warren Commission fellows were pickin' gnat shit out of pepper. No one's gonna tell me that kid did the shooting job he did from that damned bookstore.

JOHNSON: Pictures like this don't show up on television!

JIM: Sure they do. The camera can pick this up.

JOHNSON: No, it can't!

JOHNSON: There have been a number of reports in reputable news media - Time, Newsweek, our own NBC - that you have gone way beyond the legal means available to a prosecutor, that you've intimidated and drugged witnesses, bribed them, urged them to commit perjury. What is your response?

JIM: Your faith in the veracity of the major media is touching, Jerry. It indicates that the Age of Innocence is not yet over. But seriously, Jerry, people aren't interested in Jim Garrison - they want the hard evidence! They want to know why he was killed and what forces were opposed to...

JOHNSON: Some people would say you're paranoid.

JIM: Well, if I am, why is the Government concealing evidence?

JOHNSON: Are they? Why would they?

JIM: That's exactly my question, Jerry. Maybe I'd better show you some pictures so you can begin to understand what I am talking about.

JOHNSON: Welcome, District Attorney Garrison. May I call you Jim?

JIM: I've been called everything under the sun, Jerry. Call me whatever you like.

X: I knew the man 20 years. That's him. The way he walked... arms at his side, military, the stoop, the haircut, the twisted left hand, the large class ring. What was he doing there? If anyone had asked him, he'd probably say "protection" but I'll tell you I think he was giving some kind of "okay" signal to those hoboes - they're about to get booked and he's telling 'em it's gonna be okay, they're covered. And in fact they were - you never heard of them again.

JIM: ...some story... the whole thing. It's like it never happened.

X: It never did.

JIM: Just think... just think. What happened to our country .. to the world... because of that murder... Vietnam, racial conflict, breakdown of law, drugs, thought control, guilt, assassinations, secret government fear of the frontier...

X: I keep thinking of that day, Tuesday the 26th, the day after they buried Kennedy, L.B.J. was signing the memorandum on Vietnam with Ambassador Lodge.

X: He's done it before. Other countries. Lumumba in the Congo, Trujillo, the Dominican Republic, he's working on Castro. No big deal. In September, Kennedy announces the Texas trip. At that moment, second Oswalds start popping up all over Dallas where they have the mayor and the cops in their pocket. Y flies in the assassins, maybe from the special camp we keep outside Athens, Greece - pros, maybe some locals, Cubans, Maria hire, separate teams. Does it really matter who shot from what rooftop? Part of the scenery. The assassins by now are dead or well paid and long gone...

JIM: Any chance of one of them confessing someday?

X: ...don't think so. When they start to drool, they get rid of 'em. These guys are proud of what they did. They did Dealey Plaza! They took out the President of the United States! That's entertainment! And they served their country doing it.

JIM: ...and your General?

X: ...got promoted to two stars, but he was never military, you know, always CIA. Went to Vietnam, lost his credibility when we got beat over there, retired, lives in Virginia. I say hello to him when I see him at the supermarket...

JIM: Ever ask him?

X: You never ask a spook a question. No point. He'll never give you a straight answer. General Y still thinks of himself of the handsome young warrior who loved this country but loved the concept of war more.

JIM: His name?

X: Does it matter? Another technician. But an interesting thing - he was there that day in Dealey Plaza. You know how I know? That picture of yours. The hoboes... you never looked deep enough...

JIM: Well, thanks for coming.

X: You didn't get that break you needed, but you went as far as any man could, bubba. What can I do for you?

JIM: Just speculating, I guess. How do you think it started?

X: I think it started in the wind. Money - arms, big oil, Pentagon people, contractors, bankers, politicians like L.B.J. were committed to a war in Southeast Asia. As early as '61 they knew Kennedy was going to change things... He was not going to war in Southeast Asia. Who knows? Probably some boardroom or lunchroom somewhere - Houston, New York - hell, maybe Bonn, Germany... who knows, it's international now.

JIM: I don't... I can't believe it. They killed him because he wanted to change things. In our time - in our country?

X: Kings are killed, Mr. Garrison. Politics is power, nothing more. But don't believe me. Don't trust me. Do your own work, your own thinking.

JIM: The size of this is... beyond me. Testify?

X: No chance in hell, Mr. Garrison. I'd be arrested and gagged, declared insane and hospitalized... maybe worse. You, too. I can only give you background, you got to find the foreground, the little things... Keep digging. Y'know you're the only person to ever bring a trial in the murder of John Kennedy. That's important - it's historic.

JIM: I haven't yet. I don't have much of a case.

X: But you don't have a choice anymore. You've become a significant threat to the national security structure. They would've killed you already, but you got a lot of light on you. Instead, they're gonna destroy your credibility; they already have in many circles in this town. You're some kinda ego-crazed southern caricature to many folks. Be honest - the best chance you got is come up with a case, something, anything, make arrests, stir the shitstorm. You gotta hope to reach a point of critical mass where other people will come forward and the government will crack. Remember, fundamentally people are suckers for the truth, and the truth is on your side, 'bubba. I hope you get a break...

X: I could give you a false name, but I won't. Just call me X.

JIM: I've already been warned by the Agency, Mr. Whoever. If this is another type of threat, I don't...

X: I'm not with the Agency, Mr. Garrison, and I assume if you've come this far, what I have to say interests you. But I'm not going to name names, or tell you who or what I represent. Except to say - you're close, you're closer than you think...

X: Jim Garrison?

JIM: Yes.

X: I'm glad you came. I'm sorry about the precautions.

JIM: Well, I just hope it was worth my while, Mr...

MARTIN: Clay something, that was his name - Clay.

JIM: Bertrand. Clay Bertrand?

MARTIN: Yeah! That's it. I don't know. Maybe it wasn't. I gotta go.

JIM: Clay Bertrand. He's in the Warren Report. He tried to get Oswald a lawyer. Was Kennedy ever discussed, Jack?

MARTIN: Sure. 'Course they hated the sonofabitch, but...

JIM: The assassination, Jack?

MARTIN: Never. Not with me sir, never... Listen, I think I'd better go. I said enough. I said all I'm going to say.

JIM: Hold on, Jack. What's the problem?

MARTIN: What's the problem? What's the problem? Do I need to spell it out for you, Mr. Garrison? I better go.

JIM: Nobody knows what we're talking about, Jack.

MARTIN: You're so naive, mister.

JIM: Anyone else involved at Banister's level?

MARTIN: There was one guy, I don't know, big guy, business guy, white hair - I saw him come into the office once. He looked out of place, y'know - like a society guy. Can't remember his name. Oswald was with him.

MARTIN: Yeah, he was there, too... sometimes he'd be meeting with Banister with the door shut. Other times he'd be shooting the bull with Ferrie. But he was there all right.

JIM: Anything more specific, Jack? It's important.

MARTIN: Like I said, a fuckin' nuthouse.

JIM: And Oswald?

JIM: Where is Banister in all this?

MARTIN: Banister was running his camp north of Lake Pontchartrain. Ferrie handled a lot of the training. There was a shooting range and a lot of tropical terrain like in Cuba. A few Americans got trained, too. Nazi types. Mercenaries. But Ferrie was the craziest.

MARTIN: Dave Ferrie - you know about him?

JIM: Was he there often?

MARTIN: Often? He practically lived there. It was real cloak and dagger stuff. They called it Operation Mongoose. The idea was to train all these Cuban exiles for another invasion of Cuba. Banister's office was part of a supply line that ran from Dallas, through New Orleans to Miami, stockpiling arms and explosives.

JIM: How much more?

MARTIN: I don't know if I should talk about this.

JIM: Well, I'd ask Guy - we were friendly, you know - heart attack, wasn't it?

MARTIN: If you buy what you read in the paper.

JIM: You have other information?

MARTIN: I didn't say that. All I know is he died suddenly just before the Warren Report came out.

JIM: Why did Guy beat you, Jack?

MARTIN: Well, I guess now that Guy's dead, it don't really matter... it was about the people hanging around the office that summer. I wasn't really part of the operation, you know. I was handling the private-eye work for Guy when that came in - not much did - but that's why I was there... it was a nuthouse. There were all these Cubans coming and going. They all looked alike to me.

JIM: Here's my problem, Jack. You told me you and Guy were good friends for a long time?

MARTIN: More than ten years.

JIM: And he never hit you before?

MARTIN: Never touched me.

JIM: Yet on November 22, 1963 - the day of the President's murder - our police report says he pistol-whipped you with a .357 Magnum. But the police report says you had an argument over the phone bill. Here, take a look at it. Now, does a simple argument over phone bills sound like a believable explanation to you?

JIM: I don't think so, Al. You remember the Hemingway story, "The Old Man and the Sea"? The old fisherman manages to catch this great fish - a fish so huge he has to tie it to the side of the boat to get it back in. But by the time he reached shore, the fish had long since been picked apart by sharks and nothing was left but the skeleton.

NUMA: Then what are we going through all this trouble for?

JIM: It's a means to an end. This war has two fronts - in the court of law, we hope, against the odds, to nail Clay Shaw on a conspiracy charge. In the court of public opinion, it could take another 25 or 30 years for the truth to come out, but at least we're going to strike the first blow.

NUMA: Sure sounds like he's winning.

JIM: He'll never make it. If he wins, they'll kill him. He wants to avenge his brother. He'll stop that war. No, they'll kill him before they let him become President.

NUMA: Hate mail here. Fan mail here. The bad news is the IRS has just requested an audit on your income from this office.

JIM: I expected that two months ago, and they're wasting their time... The bad news is the National Guard has just asked me to resign after 18 years. Well, maybe that's good news - it was never as good as combat, but this is. Bill, any more on Oswald and Shaw?

JIM: No, she could get hurt. If you believe what's happening to these other people.

NUMA: She's the best damn witness we have!

JIM: I just don't want to do it. What else?

NUMA: Well, believe what you want, boss, but we got to be more careful. All these new volunteers, any one of them could be...

JIM: Okay, you handle it, Numa. I don't have time for this nonsense. We've obviously got the bastards worried now. I'm going to Washington.

NUMA: HOLD IT, CHIEF...

JIM: You just need some sleep, Lou. It won't look so bad when...

NUMA: Even my own wife, chief, Who's wondering where I am?

JIM: Even your own wife, Numa. Any of you want to quit, do me a favor... put us out of our misery.

NUMA: Didn't someone say he didn't speak good Russian?

JIM: It's a contradiction, Numa, get used to them. The only explanation for the royal treatment is he did give them radar secrets. Or fake secrets.

MILLER: I propose you accept an appointment to the bench in Federal District Court and move into a job worthy of your talent. Do you have any idea, do you have any conception of how easily such an appointment can be arranged?

JIM: And what would I have to do?

MILLER: Stop your investigation... it was a magnificent effort but it's over and done with. The press is already on your behind and that's only the beginning, my boy, only the beginning.

JIM: How long do you think it would take me to be appointed?

MILLER: I'm going to be very frank with you. You've done a great job, an astounding job considering the limited resources available to you. But the best you can ever hope for is to stir up a lot of confusion. You're not going to do this country any good, and you're not going to do yourself any good. You don't belong here. On this Mickey Mouse street with that cheap strip of bail bond shops.

JIM: The job manages to keep me pretty busy.

MILLER: Nonsense. You should be in a job where you can make decisions that have impact, affect the world. Here you're trying to climb up the steep side of Mount Everest.

MILLER: I know about that shot. A terrible tragedy. How much do you have for carrying on your investigation?

JIM: If you must know, virtually nothing.

MILLER: How many men are working with you on this?

JIM: Less than you would guess. Most days two to three assistant D.A.'s. A handful of police investigators.

MILLER: That's all you've had all this time?

JIM: That's it.

MILLER: Where were you? Europe, Pacific?

JIM: Germany.

MILLER: You were lucky. I spent three years in the Pacific. I've never seen an avenue with such a profusion of bail-bonding companies. Why is that?

JIM: I imagine because this is the Criminal District Court Building This is an enlargement of a potential shooter standing behind the picket fence. We...

JIM: They've been enlarged and show a lot of detail...

MILLER: Splendid, love to see them.

MILLER: I'm glad you could find time to see me. I flew down from Denver this morning on my private jet.

JIM: Yes, your letter indicated you were in he oil business up there.

MILLER: I've done quite well in Denver, Mr. Garrison, but I have to admire someone like you - and I have the means to back up what I say.

JIM: We can use all the support we can get. I think these might interest you.

JIM: Welcome, Mr. Miller. Jim Garrison. Would you care for some coffee?

MILLER: Yes, thank you, Mr. Garrison. Your coffee's almost Turkish down here but I could get used to it.

MALE VOICE: And you get of from school at 3 every day?

VIRGINIA: Yes.

MALE VOICE: Do you walk home?

VIRGINIA: Uh huh.

MALE VOICE: Hello. Is this Jim Garrison's daughter?

VIRGINIA: Yes?

MALE VOICE: Virginia or Elizabeth?

VIRGINIA: Virginia.

MALE VOICE: Virginia, you're a lucky little girl. Your daddy has entered you in a beauty contest. Would you like to be in a beauty contest?

VIRGINIA: That sounds fun.

MALE VOICE: I need some information from you then. How old are you?

VIRGINIA: Six.

MALE VOICE: And how tall are you?

RUBY: When are you going back to Washington, sir?

OFFICIAL: I am going back very shortly after we finish this hearing - I am going to have some lunch.

RUBY: Can I make a statement? If you request me to go back to Washington with you right now, that is if you want to hear further testimony from me, can you do that? Can you take me with you?

OFFICIAL: No, that could not be done, Mr. Ruby. There are a good many things involved in that.

RUBY: What are they?

OFFICIAL: Well, the public attention it would attract. And we have no place for you there to be safe, we're not law enforcement officials, and many things are at stake in this affair, Mr. Ruby.

RUBY: But if I am eliminated there won't be any way of knowing. Consequently a whole new form of government is going to take over this country, and I know I won't live to see you another time. My life is in danger here. Do I sound screwy?

OFFICIAL: Well I don't know what can be done, Mr. Ruby, because I don't know what you anticipate we will encounter.

RUBY: Then you don't stand a chance, Mr. Chief Justice, you have a lost cause. All I want is a lie detector test, and you refuse to give it to me. Because as it stands now - and the truth serum - how do you pronounce it - Pentothal - whatever it is. They will not give it to me, because I want to tell the truth... And then I want to leave this world.

RUBY: Then do you understand that I cannot tell the truth here? In Dallas. That there are people here who do not want me to tell the truth... who do not want me to have a retrial?

OFFICIAL: Mr. Ruby, I really can't see why you can't tell us now.