o o o
Gail needed convincing. Pete sat her down on the watchdog-house veranda and laid out a line of sweet talk.
“Kennedy’s a geek. He had you meet him on his goddamned honeymoon. He dropped you two weeks later, and kissed you off with a goddamn mink coat.”
Gail smiled. “He was nice, though. He never said, ‘Honey, let’s get a divorce racket going.’”
“When your old man’s worth a hundred million dollars, you don’t have to do things like that.”
Gail sighed. “You win, like always. And you know why I haven’t been wearing that mink lately?”
“No.”
“I gave it to Mrs. Walter P. Kinnard. You took a big cut of her alimony, and I figured she could use some cheering up.”
o o o
Twenty-four hours zipped by.
Hughes kicked loose thirty grand. Pete pocketed fifteen. If the Hush-Hush smear exposed the bug, he’d be covered financially.
Freddy bought a long-range transceiver and started looking for a house.
That Fed kept eyeballing his van. Jack K. didn’t call or drop by. Freddy figured Darleen was only worth one poke.
Pete stuck by the watchdog-house phone. Geeks kept interrupting his daydreams.
Two Hush-Hush stringer prospects called: ex-vice cops hipped on Hollywood lowdown. They flunked his impromptu pop quiz: Who’s Ava Gardner fucking?
He made some calls out-and planted a new Hughes double at the Beverly Hilton. Karen Hiltscher recommended the man: her scabby wino father-in-law. Pops said he’d work for three hots and a cot. Pete booked the Presidential Suite and placed a standing room-service order: T-bird and cheeseburgers for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Jimmy Hoffa called. He said, The Hush-Hush thing sounds good, but I want MORE! Pete neglected to share his basic opinion: Jack and Darleen were just a two-minute mattress ride.
He kept thinking about Miami. The cabstand, colorful spics, tropical sunshine.
Miami felt like adventure. Miami felt like money.
o o o
He woke up early publication morning. Gail was gone-she’d taken to avoiding him with aimless drives to the beach.
Pete walked outside. His first-press-run copy was stuffed in the mailbox, per instructions.
Dig the cover lines: “Tomcat Senator Likes Catnip! Ask Nipped-At L.A. Kittens!” Dig the illustration: John Kennedy’s face on a cartoon cat’s body, the tail wrapped around a blonde in a bikini.
He flipped to the piece. Gail used the pen name Peerless Politicopundit.
U.S. Senate cloakroom wags say he’s far from being the most dedicatedly demonic Democrat dallier. No, Senator L.B. (Lover Boy?) Johnson probably tops political polls in that department, with Florida’s George F ‘Pass the Smackeroos’ Smathers coming in second. No, Senator John F. Kennedy is rather a tenuously tumescent tomcat, with a tantalizingly trenchant taste for those finely-furred and felicitous felines who find him fantastically fetching themselves!
Pete skimmed the rest. Gail played it half-assed-the smear wasn’t vicious enough. Jack Kennedy ogled women and “bewitched, bothered and bewildered” them with “baubles, bangles, beads” and “brilliant Boston beatitudes.” No heavy-duty skank; no implied fucking; no snide jabs at Two-Minute-Man Jack.
Perk, perk, perk-his all-star feelers started twitching-
Pete drove downtown and cruised by the Hush-Hush warehouse. Things looked absolutely first-glance SOP.
Men were wheeling bound stacks out on dollies. Men were loading pallets. A line of newsstand trucks were backed up to the dock.
SOP, but:
Two unmarked prowl cars were parked down the street. That ice cream wagon idling by looked dicey-the driver was talking into a hand mike.
Pete circled the block. The fuzz multiplied: four unmarkeds at the curb and two black amp; whites around the corner.
He circled again. The shit hit the fan and sprayed out in all directions.
Four units were jammed up to the loading dock-running full lights and siren.
Plainclothesmen piled out. A bluesuit cordon hit the warehouse with cargo hooks.
An LAPD van blocked the distribution trucks off. Swampers dropped their loads and threw their hands up.
It was fucking scandal-rag chaos. It was fucking skank-sheet Armageddon-
o o o
Pete drove to the Beverly Hills Hotel. A Big Ugly Picture formed: somebody ratted off the Kennedy issue.
He parked and ran by the pooi. He saw a big crowd outside the Hughes bungalow.
They were peeping in Big Howard’s bedroom window. They looked like fucking ghouls at an accident scene.
He ran up and pushed to the front. Billy Eckstine nudged him. “Hey, check this out.”
The window was open. Two men were jacking up Mr. Hughes-double-teaming him with Big Verbal Grief.
Robert Kennedy and Joseph P. Kennedy Sr.
Hughes was swaddled in bed quilts. Bobby was waving a hypo. Old Joe was raging.
“…You’re a pathetic lecher and a narcotics addict. I am two seconds away from exposing you to the whole wide world, and if you think I’m bluffing please note that I opened the window to let your hotel neighbors have a sneak preview of what the whole world will know if you ever allow your filthy scandal rag to write another word about my family.”
Hughes cringed. His head banged the wall and sent a picture frame toppling.
Some all-star voyeurs dug the show: Billy, Mickey Cohen, some faggot Mouseketeer sporting a jumbo mouse-ear beanie.
Howard Hughes whimpered. Howard Hughes said, “Please don’t hurt me.”
o o o
Pete drove to the Shoftel pad. The Big Ugly Picture expanded: either Gail snitched or the Feds exposed the piggyback.
He pulled up behind Freddy’s van. Freddy was down on his knees in the street-cuffed to the front-bumper housing.
Pete ran over. Freddy yanked at his shackle chain and tried to stand up.
He’d scraped his wrist bloody. He’d ripped his knees raw crawling on the pavement.
Pete knelt down in front of him. “What happened? Quit grabbing at that and look at me.”
Freddy did some wrist contortions. Pete slapped him. Freddy snapped to and focused in half-alert.
He said, ‘The listening-post guy sent his transcripts to some Fed in Chicago and told him he was hinked on my van. Pete, this thing plays wrong to me. There’s just one FBI guy working single-o, like he went off half-cocked or some-”
Pete ran across the lawn and bolted the porch. Darleen Shoftel ducked out of his way, snapped a high heel and fell on her ass.
The Big and Ugly Final Picture:
Spackle-coated mikes on the floor. Two tap-gutted phones belly-up on an end table.
And SA Ward J. Littell, standing there in an off-the-rack blue suit.
It was a stalemate. You don’t whack FBI men impromptu.
Pete walked up to him. He said, “This is a bullshit roust, or you wouldn’t be here alone.”
Littell just stood there. His glasses slipped down his nose.
“You keep flying out here to bother me. Next time’s the last time.”
Littell said, “I’ve put it together.” The words came out all quivery.
“I’m listening.”
“Kemper Boyd told me he had an errand at the Beverly Hills Hotel. He talked to you there, and you got suspicious and tailed him. You saw us black-bag this place and got your friend to put in auxiliary wires. Senator Kennedy told Miss Shoftel about Roland Kirpaski testifying, and you heard it and talked Jimmy Hoffa into giving you the contract.”
Booze guts. This skinny stringbean cop with 8:00 a.m. liquor breath.
“You’ve got no proof, and Mr. Hoover doesn’t care.”