Mrs. BATES. I couldn't keep a copy of anything.
Mr. JENNER. Did you agree that you would do the job under those
circumstances?
Mrs. BATES. That's what he wanted--and my customers are always right.
Mr. JENNER. Uh-huh.
Mrs. BATES. Then, I asked him how come he had gone to Russia. I said,
"It can't be very easy. How did you arrange it? Why did you want to go?"
And he said he had just gotten--he had gotten out of the Marine Corps
and had taken elementary Russian--a course in elementary Russian.
Mr. JENNER. Where?
Mrs. BATES. While he was in the Marine Corps, as I understood him. He
wasn't very talkative. And whenever I did get him to talk, I had to
drag it out of him. He didn't talk voluntarily.
Mr. JENNER. Uh-huh.
Mrs. BATES. And that he had wanted to travel and so he applied to the
State Department for a visa. And I asked him if he was an exchange
student--if he went over as an exchange student. Sometimes--I didn't
know. I was kinda ignorant about things like that.
He said, "No"--that the State Department finally agreed to let him go
over, but they would not be responsible for him; he was granted a visa
to go over there but the State Department refused to stand behind him
in case he got in trouble or anything.
So, he went. And that's all I got out of him, then, about that.
And then we got busy and he opened this large package and he brought
out the notes. And, as I said, they were on scraps of paper not even
this big, some of them [indicating with finger], and some of them large
pieces of paper, some of them were typed, some of them handwritten
in ink and pencil. And he said that he had had to just do it when
he could. And it was about the living conditions and the working
conditions in Russia. And they were very bitter against Russia.
Mr. JENNER. His writings were bitter against working conditions?
Mrs. BATES. And living conditions. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Did he say when he had prepared these notes?
Mrs. BATES. Just whenever he could.
Mr. JENNER. When in Russia?
Mrs. BATES. Yeah. Oh, they were all done in Russia. And he smuggled
them out of Russia. And he said that the whole time until they got over
the border, they were scared to death they would be found, and, of
course, they would not be allowed to leave Russia.
Mr. JENNER. Did he imply that Marina was aware that he had these notes?
Mrs. BATES. He didn't say. He just mentioned his wife once or twice in
the 3 days he was up there. And, at the time----
Mr. JENNER. Were these 3 successive days?
Mrs. BATES. Uh-huh; 18th, 19th, and 20th.
Mr. JENNER. Did he spend substantially all day with you?
Mrs. BATES. No; it was 8 hours altogether in the 3 days.
Mr. JENNER. That was 8 hours that you worked, or 8 hours that he was
there?
Mrs. BATES. I worked. And--uh--I spent 8 hours typing 10 pages,
single-spaced.
Mr. JENNER. Which would indicate to me, as a lawyer, that you were
having some trouble interpreting these notes?
Mrs. BATES. Oh, he'd--he had to spell things out for me and--uh--it was
partly in Russian. And he had to transpose it--I mean, translate it
for me. And--uh--it was--uh--very difficult to read. A lot of it was
scribbled. He would scribble notes and, then, to refresh his memory on
it--he said he had to do it surreptitiously [witness pronounced word
phonetically _surreptiously_], he just had to do it when Marina would
cover for him while he was doing this.
Mr. JENNER. Marina would cover for him?
Mrs. BATES. Uh-huh--muffle the tone of the typewriter and everything so
people wouldn't know that he was--what he was doing.
Mr. JENNER. And Marina was aware, then, according to what he said to
you, that he was making these notes?
Mrs. BATES. Well, evidently--because he said she would cover or watch
for him so that nobody would know that he was making them.
Mr. JENNER. Uh-huh.
Mrs. BATES. Kind of--try to steer anybody away while he was doing
this--because he could have got in trouble.
Mr. JENNER. Uh-huh.
Mrs. BATES. He didn't talk very much. He--well, there wasn't much time
to talk when you're typing and trying to translate things like that.
And he was very cool and----
Mr. JENNER. Cool? You mean reserved?
Mrs. BATES. Cold.
Mr. JENNER. Cold?
Mrs. BATES. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. Very matter of fact?
Mrs. BATES. Yes; and if he didn't want to answer a question--if you
asked him a question, no matter how simple it was, if he didn't want to
answer it, he'd just shut up.
Mr. JENNER. He'd just ignore you?
Mrs. BATES. Uh-huh.
He said he was living with his brother out in Arlington Heights. Well,
I lived in Arlington Heights, and I recognized the area he lived in by
the telephone number. I said, "Well, where do you live, Lee? I have
lived out in that part of town."