Again, if only he could stop this Forstchen's parents from meeting…
The director read Clayton's summary of the book.
It claimed that he was a blackmailer. That he befriended criminals and that he had suppressed evidence about the assassination of a President John F. Kennedy-the son of that bootlegging villain in London, no less! It said he was corrupt, and a liar, and had nothing at all to do with the killing of Dillinger or the capture of the Lindbergh baby's kidnapper, two of the greatest triumphs of his career so far.
There was even one claim that his mother had twisted his mind, and that he was a… a homosexual, and a pervert who dressed in women's clothing.
His head reeled. It was practically unbearable.
"Eddie, people have always gossiped," said Tolson, who looked worried even when he wasn't. "You can't let it get to you. It's just words."
Hoover's eyes were nearly brimming with tears as he regarded his constant companion. For once he spoke slowly. "Junior, words… they are… grossly insufficient to express the thoughts in my mind and the feelings in my heart for you. But mark me well, words can be weapons, too, every bit as deadly as a knife or a gun.
"Look at this, just look at it, would you. They're saying I knew about Pearl Harbor before it happened. That little weasel Popov is behind that, or that bastard Stephenson, or both of them, believe you me. And that Jewish rat Kolhammer is pulling their strings, and…"
He was beginning to heat up again, accusations and insults spilling out of him in a cascade of high-pitched, verbal machine-gun fire.
Tolson rubbed his eyes and shook his head from side to side. It was unusual for him to play an assertive role in their relationship. He was loyal, but very much the subordinate partner, two steps behind and one to the side. "Eddie, Eddie, please, you'll kill yourself. Come on, now, we've faced worse than this before. And besides, these people are vulnerable. They're a rabble. There's not a genuine hero amongst them, not like you and me. You know what it's like in California now. Those sort of degenerate shenanigans might play well with the Hollywood set, but decent Americans won't stand for it. You need to rally the people against this menace. You know Roosevelt won't do it. Why, he's half a red himself, what with that awful wife of his. The New Deal was naked socialism, no less. And then there's this desegregation garbage."
Tolson had actually climbed to his feet, and was stalking around the office now. He slammed the door closed and turned on the startled director. When he spoke, it was with unusual intensity.
"The real people aren't happy at all with that gang of perverts out there. They want things put right again. And we can do it, Eddie. They'd expect us to do it, to protect them the same way we protected them from the mobsters and kidnappers. They expect you to do it."
J. Edgar Hoover blinked away a tear. It fell to his desk, smudging a line of Special Agent Clayton's report, a horrid passage alleging that the director had worn-or would wear-a red dress and a black feather boa to some sort of homosexual orgy in a hotel in the 1950s. It was all lies and filth, carefully crafted to break his will.
But Clyde, that wonderful, dear, dear man, had led him through the darkness that threatened to envelop them both.
"You are my sword and my shield, Junior," he croaked as he stood and hurried around his desk to embrace the only human being, besides his sainted mother, whom he had ever really known and loved.
Clyde was right. Kolhammer and his kind would have to be fought. And J. Edgar Hoover, American patriot, would lead that fight.
As he pressed up against the familiar, reassuring bulk of Clyde Tolson's body, he was already plotting his counterattack. "I think I need to see Congressman Dies again," he said.
SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE ZONE, CALIFORNIA
A long time ago, in a universe far, far way, a much younger Phillip Kolhammer had read a book, A Man Called Intrepid. William Stephenson, the Canadian adventurer who was Winston Churchill's personal representative in the United States, was every bit as impressive in real life as he had been in the pages of that book. An infantryman and later a fighter ace flying Sopwith Camels in the First World War, he became a very successful businessman after the armistice-so successful, in fact, that he performed his current duties, as the head of Britain's intelligence operations in the western hemisphere, without being paid.
According to his biography, he was a believer, and for that reason, Churchill had placed him in his position above the objections of the old guard within British Intelligence. Stephenson had used his extensive business contacts to funnel information about the Nazis to Churchill during the latter's wilderness years, and when the old warhorse had finally made it to Downing Street, the Canadian had offered to personally assassinate Hitler. That plan was quashed by Lord Halifax, who was then foreign secretary.
For once, Kolhammer allowed himself a wry smile concerning the tangled threads of fortune within which he'd become trapped. He'd bet big money that Halifax regretted his decision now.
"Is something funny, Admiral?" asked Stephenson.
"Not really," Kolhammer said. "Idle thoughts, that's all. It's late."
And it was. They met in his office, which was swept every few hours for bugs. It was a bare space, particleboard walls and government-issue furniture. Kolhammer had softened the raw fit-out with some personal photographs, a rug he'd bought many years ago in Cairo, and a couple of armchairs, where he and Stephenson now sat, nursing mugs of coffee with rum shots. The office might have looked unimpressive, but it was a central node of the distributed infotech system he was building in the Valley. There was more network capacity in this one small room than in all of Washington. Not all of the equipment was authorized, however.
"You wouldn't believe the number of these things we keep finding all over the Zone," Kolhammer commented, holding up a bulky, primitive listening device. It was most likely an FBI plant. His counterintelligence people had swept it out of a bar down on Ventura that was popular with his officers.
"Actually, I would," Stephenson replied. "Hoover's more trouble than the Abwehr and the NKVD put together, at least as far as my work goes. You know, we gave that guy one of our best double agents-"
"Popov," said Kolhammer, who'd downloaded Intrepid for a skim-through before he'd first met Stephenson.
The Canadian rolled his eyes. "Yeah, Popov. You know, I can never get used to the idea that the world is full of people who know all my secrets now. Anyway, Popov was sent to New York by his Abwehr controller, this guy Auenrode. This is before Pearl Harbor, right? The Japs wanted to know all sorts of things about the defenses in Hawaii. The exact location of ammo and fuel dumps, which hangars are where, what ships and subs anchor at what piers.
"Hoover did nothing. He let this guy cool his heels for two weeks while he took off on a holiday with his boyfriend, with the mob probably picking up the tab. When he finally does get back, Hoover explodes, screeching at Popov to get out of his office."
Kolhammer knew the story. He even vaguely recalled that Popov had described Hoover as looking like "a sledgehammer in search of an anvil," although he hadn't seen that phrase when he quickly reread the book about Stephenson. He thought it was apt.
"Well, this is a pain, but I can live with it," Kolhammer said, twirling the antique listening device around his finger.
"I don't think you can, actually," Stephenson countered.
Kolhammer took a sip on his cold cup of coffee. It needed more rum. He was tired, and looking forward to a few hours' sleep on the cot he kept in the room next door. But he'd come to respect Churchill's spymaster as much as anyone he'd ever met, and if Stephenson was concerned enough to fly all the way out to California, it probably meant he had some real concerns.