Mr. JENNER. Was that about the appearance of the blanket wrapped
package that you saw on your garage floor?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes; although I recall it as quite flat.
Mr. JENNER. Flatter than it now appears to be?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes. But it is not a clear recollection.
Mr. JENNER. You have a firm recollection that the package you saw was
of the length?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes, definitely.
Mr. JENNER. That is 45 inches, approximately. You had no occasion when
you stepped on the package----
Mrs. PAINE. I stepped over it.
Mr. JENNER. You always stepped over it?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes; until the afternoon of the 22d.
Mr. JENNER. By accident or otherwise, did you happen to come in contact
with it?
Mrs. PAINE. No.
Mr. JENNER. You don't know whether there was anything solid or hard in
it?
Mrs. PAINE. No.
Mr. DULLES. Did it look about the way this package looks?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. McCLOY. Except for the fact it had some cord around it?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Representative FORD. When it had some cord around it, did the way it
was tied pull it in or distort the shape?
Mrs. PAINE. No; it didn't distort the shape.
Representative FORD. About the same shape even with the cord?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. DULLES. The cords weren't pulled tight?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. They were relatively loosely tied?
Mrs. PAINE. I recall this definite shape.
Mr. JENNER. To hold the blanket in that form rather than to hold the
contents of the package firm, is that your impression?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. McCLOY. Are you going to ask about the husband's testimony in
connection with the moving of the package?
Mr. JENNER. I did not intend to.
Mr. McCLOY. I was not present but your husband testified he had moved
the blanket from time to time but had not opened it. Did he ever refer
to it? Did he ever speak to you about having had to move it while he
was----
Mrs. PAINE. Not until after the assassination.
Mr. McCLOY. Not until after the assassination but before the
assassination he had not complained about its being there or any
difficulty in moving it?
Mrs. PAINE. No; he did not mention it, and I was not present when he
moved it.
Representative FORD. Was he the person who used these various
woodworking pieces of equipment?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Representative FORD. Did he work in the garage?
Mrs. PAINE. Well, he had--he made the workbench, and he had worked in
the garage when he lived at the home and it has since been somewhat
filled up.
Representative FORD. But during the time that you and Marina came back
he didn't work in the garage?
Mrs. PAINE. He did still cut occasionally something on the saws.
Indeed, I did, too. I like to make children's blocks. I am trying to
think when I last, if it is pertinent, when I used the saw.
Mr. McCLOY. Did you use the saw while the blanket was on floor?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes; I believe so.
Mr. McCLOY. You had to step over the blanket to do that?
Mrs. PAINE. Or around it.
Mr. McCLOY. Or around it. But in the course of your use of the saw you
never had the necessity or the occasion to readjust the blanket or move
it in any way?
Mrs. PAINE. No.
Mr. DULLES. Did we get the three locations here? I only see two.
Mr. JENNER. There were only two?
Mrs. PAINE. Two that I recall.
Mr. DULLES. Only two.
Representative FORD. She made a mistake in the first drawing of the
second one.
Mrs. PAINE. I touched it by mistake.
Representative FORD. I think that ought to be clarified on the record.
Mr. JENNER. On the right-hand side of Commission Exhibit 429 there is
an X or an arrow above which is written the words "on floor". That is
the first location point at which you saw the package?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. On the left-hand side, the lower half of the photograph
there is a double X.
Mrs. PAINE. Which I could not put in enough to give the proportion.
Mr. JENNER. You mean in the photograph?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Is that where you saw the package for the second time?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes; as I have described it. The position I have described
is more accurate than the XX.
Mr. JENNER. There is a red strip above the table with the tablecloth on
it.
Mrs. PAINE. That is an accident with my hand.
Mr. JENNER. That was an accident on your part?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. So there are only two locations?
Mrs. PAINE. Right.
Mr. JENNER. Now, Mr. Chairman, may I reinsert the rifle in the package,
on the opposite side from what it was before, and have the witness look
at it?
Mr. McCLOY. You may.
We are back on the record.
Mr. JENNER. Yes.
Mr. Chairman, I have now placed the opposite side of the rifle to the
floor, and may the record show that the package is much flatter. The
rifle when inserted firstly was turned on the side of the bolt which
operates the rifle which forced it up higher.
Now does the package look more familiar to you, Mrs. Paine?
Mrs. PAINE. I recall it as being more like this, not as lumpy as the
other had been.
Mr. JENNER. More in the form it is now?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Now directing your attention to the rifle itself, which is
Commission Exhibit 139, when did you first see that rifle, if you have
ever seen it?
Mrs. PAINE. I saw a rifle I judge to have been the same one at the
police station on the afternoon of November 22, I don't recall the
strap.
Mr. JENNER. You don't recall at the time you saw it on the 22d of
November in the police station that it had a strap?
Mrs. PAINE. It may well have had one but I don't specifically recall
it. I was interested in the sight.
Mr. JENNER. Had you ever seen this rifle prior to the afternoon of
November 22?
Mrs. PAINE. No.
(At this point, Senator Cooper entered the hearing room.)
Mr. JENNER. Now, we do have some particular interest, Mrs. Paine, in
the rifle strap. Had you ever had around your house a luggage strap or
a guitar strap similar to the strap that appears on Commission Exhibit
139?
Mrs. PAINE. No; in fact, I don't recall ever seeing a strap of that
nature.
Mr. JENNER. Whether in your home or anywhere else?
Mrs. PAINE. Precisely.
Mr. JENNER. And you are unable to identify or suggest its source?
Mrs. PAINE. That is right.
Mr. JENNER. What do you have in your home, Mrs. Paine, by way of heavy
wrapping paper?
Mrs. PAINE. I have the sort of paper you buy at the dime store to wrap
packages, about 36 inches long, coming in a roll.
Mr. JENNER. Exhibiting to you Commission Exhibit No. 364, is the
wrapping paper that you have in your home as heavy as that?
Mrs. PAINE. I don't believe it is quite that heavy and it certainly
isn't quite that long. Well, it could have been cut the otherway,
couldn't it, possibly?
Mr. JENNER. What about its shade, color?
Mrs. PAINE. It would be similar to that.
Mr. JENNER. Similar in shade.
Do you have the broad banded sticky tape or sticky tape of this nature?
Mrs. PAINE. There is no tape this wide in my home nor to my
recollection has there ever been.
Mr. JENNER. You have whole rolls of this tape, of the paper in your
home?
Mrs. PAINE. A whole roll.
Mr. JENNER. A whole roll?
Mrs. PAINE. Which I use for wrapping packages, mailing.
Mr. JENNER. Do you have string in your home that you use in attaching
to this wrapping?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Did you by any chance know the weight of the string that
wrapped the blanket package as against the strength or weight of the
string that you normally used in your home for packages?
Mrs. PAINE. It was similar in weight, rather thin.
Representative FORD. Color was the same?
Mrs. PAINE. I think it was a whitish color on the blanket and one of
the rolls I have is that.
Representative FORD. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Would you say it was a relatively light package string?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Not a rope type?
Mrs. PAINE. Oh, no.
Mr. JENNER. And the string you saw on the blanket package was of the
lighter weight type and not----
Mrs. PAINE. And of the lighter color too, I think.
Mr. JENNER. And the lighter color.
Now, you and Marina arrived home on the 24th of September, with the
packages and contents of the station wagon, and, save the duffel bags,
they were moved into your home, and everybody settled down?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. When next was there--did you hear from Lee Harvey Oswald at
any time thereafter?
Mrs. PAINE. Not until the afternoon of the 4th, which I have already
referred to.
Mr. JENNER. No word whatsoever from him from the 24th of September?
Mrs. PAINE. 23d we left him in New Orleans.
Mr. JENNER. 23d of September, until the 4th of October?
Mrs. PAINE. That is correct; no word.
Mr. JENNER. By letter, telephone?
Mrs. PAINE. Or pigeon.
Mr. JENNER. Or otherwise, anything whatsoever?
Mrs. PAINE. No word.
Mr. JENNER. Did you and Marina have discussions in that 10-day period
about where Lee was or might be?
Mrs. PAINE. No.
Mr. JENNER. None whatsoever? Did you have any discussion about the fact
that you hadn't heard from Lee Harvey Oswald in 14 days or 10 days?
Mrs. PAINE. No; we didn't.
Mr. JENNER. No discussion on that at all. What did you and Marina
discuss during that 10-day period?
Mrs. PAINE. I can't recall which was during that period or which was
after; general conversation.
Mr. JENNER. Was it generally small talk, ladies talk about the house?
Mrs. PAINE. It was generally what my vocabulary permitted and then she
would reminisce, her vocabulary being much larger, about her life in
Russia, about the movies she had seen. We talked about the children and
their health. We talked about washing, about cooking.
Mr. JENNER. Did you have ladies visit. Did ladies in the neighborhood
come and visit?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Did you go to neighbors homes?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. With Marina?
Mrs. PAINE. Again, I can't recall which was before October 4th and
which was after, but there was the normal flow nonetheless----
Mr. JENNER. And interested people?
Mrs. PAINE. Of my visiting at other people's homes and particularly
Mrs. Roberts or Mrs. Craig.
Mr. JENNER. Mrs. Roberts was your next door neighbor and Mrs. Craig was
how many doors down or across the street?
Mrs. PAINE. She is, you have to drive. You have to drive to her home.
She is the young German woman to whom I referred.
Mr. JENNER. Yes. Was there any discussion during this 10-day period of
Marina's relations with her husband, Lee?
Mrs. PAINE. Not that I recall.
Mr. JENNER. She expressed no concern during this 10-day period, that no
word had been heard from Lee?
Mrs. PAINE. No.
Mr. JENNER. Did she evidence any--did she do or say anything during
that period to indicate she did not expect to hear from him during that
10 days period?
Mrs. PAINE. No; she did not.
Mr. JENNER. There was nothing?
Mrs. PAINE. There was nothing.
Mr. JENNER. Did it come to your mind that it was curious you hadn't
heard from Lee Harvey Oswald for 10 whole days?
Mrs. PAINE. No; it didn't seem curious. I know he had spent at least 2
weeks looking for work on previous occasions in different cities and I
thought he wanted to find something before he communicated.
Mr. JENNER. But in view of the affection that had been evidenced on the
day of departure on the 23d, you were not bothered by the fact that not
even a telephone call had been received in 10 days?
Mrs. PAINE. If he was not in town I wouldn't have at all expected a
telephone call because that would have cost him dearly.
Mr. JENNER. He might have made it collect.
Mrs. PAINE. I didn't expect that either.
Mr. JENNER. But there was no telephone call, there was no postcard,
there was no letter?
Mrs. PAINE. No.
Mr. JENNER. There was nothing?
Mrs. PAINE. There could well have been a letter but there was none.
Mr. DULLES. Where did you think he was at this time?
Mrs. PAINE. Houston.
Mr. DULLES. Houston, looking for a job? Houston?
Mrs. PAINE. Houston, possibly.
Mr. JENNER. Because of the conversation on the morning of the 23d,
because of the possibility of his going to Houston or Philadelphia,
your frame of mind was that he was either in Houston or Philadelphia?
Mrs. PAINE. I thought he probably was in Houston. The Philadelphia
reference was very slight.
Mr. JENNER. Was there any reference or discussion between you and
Marina during that period of the possibility that he was off in Houston
looking for work?
Mrs. PAINE. No, there was not.
Mr. JENNER. You are sure there was just no discussion of the subject at
all during that whole 10 days period with Marina?
Mrs. PAINE. I don't recall any discussion of it.
Mr. JENNER. She expressed no concern and you none?
Mrs. PAINE. That is right.
Mr. JENNER. That nobody had heard from Lee.
All right.
You heard from him on the 4th of October?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Would you give the Commission the circumstances, the time
of day and how it came about?
Mrs. PAINE. He telephoned in early afternoon, something after lunchtime.
Mr. JENNER. The phone rang. Did you answer it?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. And did you recognize the voice?
Mrs. PAINE. He asked to speak to Marina.
Mr. JENNER. Whose voice was it?
Mrs. PAINE. Well, after he asked to speak to Marina, I was certain it
was Lee's.
Mr. JENNER. What did you say?
Mrs. PAINE. I said "here" and gave her the phone.
Mr. JENNER. You didn't say "where are you", or "I am glad to hear from
you, where have you been?"
Mrs. PAINE. No. I thought that was her's to ask. He wished to speak
to her and I gave her the phone and, of course, that is what was then
asked. I heard her say to him----
Mr. JENNER. You heard her side of the conversation, did you?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. All right.
What did you hear her say?
Mrs. PAINE. I heard her say, "No, Mrs. Paine, she can't come and pick
you up."
Mr. JENNER. Was she speaking in Russian?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Throughout?
Mrs. PAINE. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. When Lee asked for Marina, did he speak in English or
Russian?
Mrs. PAINE. I don't recall. And Marina went on to say that Mrs. Paine,
"Ruth has just been to Parkland Hospital this morning to donate blood,
she shouldn't be going driving now to pick you up."
Mr. JENNER. Did she refer to you as Mrs. Paine or Ruth?
Mrs. PAINE. No; I am trying to make it clear who is being talked about.
Mr. JENNER. I see. You might give your testimony the wrong cast.
Mrs. PAINE. No; of course. She referred to me as "Ruth" or "she".
To Junie, she called me Aunt Ruth. To Junie, speaking of me to her
little girl, she referred to me as Aunt Ruth.
Mr. JENNER. You are giving the conversation now, the end of it that you
heard?