KB: He’d love it.
JEH: Good, but let me be the one to inform him. Goodbye, Mr. Boyd. I commend you for work well done.
KB: Thank you, Sir. Goodbye.
4
(Beverly Hills, 12/4/58)
Howard Hughes cranked his bed up a notch. “I can’t tell you how lackluster the last two issues have been. Hush-Hush is a weekly now, which increases the need for interesting gossip incrementally. We need a new dirt digger. We’ve got you for story verification, Dick Steisel for legal vetting and So! Maltzman to write the pieces, but we’re only as good as our scandals, and our scandals have been chaste and ridiculously dull.”
Pete slouched in a chair and thumbed last week’s issue. On the cover: “Migrant Workers Carry VD Plague!” A co-feature: “Hollywood Ranch Market–Homo Heaven!”
“I’ll keep at it. We’re looking for a guy with unique fucking qualifications, and that takes time.”
Hughes said, “You do it. And tell Sol Maltzman that I want a piece entitled ‘Negroes: Overbreeding Creates TB Epidemic’ on next week’s cover.”
“That sounds pretty far-fetched.”
“Facts can be bent to conform to any thesis.”
“I’ll tell him, Boss.”
“Good. And while you’re out…”
“Will I get you some more dope and disposable hypos? Yes, sir!”
Hughes flinched and turned the TV on. “Sheriff John’s Lunch Brigade” hit the bedroom–squealing tots and cartoon mice the size of Lassie.
Pete strolled out to the parking lot. Lounging upside his car like he owned it: Special Agent Kemper Fucking Boyd.
Six years older and still too handsome to live. That dark gray suit had to run four hundred clams easy.
“What is this?”
Boyd folded his arms over his chest. “This is a friendly errand for Mr. Hoover. He’s concerned about your extracurricular work for Jimmy Hoffa.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’ve got an ‘in’ on the McClellan Committee. They’ve got some pay phones near Hoffa’s house in Virginia rigged to register slug calls. That cheap fuck Hoffa makes his business calls from public booths and uses slugs.”
“Keep going. Your slug call pitch is bullshit, but let’s see where you’re taking it.”
Boyd winked–brass-balled motherfucker.
“One, Hoffa called you twice late last month. Two, you bought a round-trip L.A.-to-Miami ticket under an assumed name and charged it to Hughes Aircraft. Three, you rented a car at a Teamster-owned rent-a-car outlet and were maybe seen waiting for a man named Anton Gretzler. I think Gretzler’s dead, and I think Hoffa hired you to clip him.”
They’d never find a corpse: he tossed Gretzler in a swamp and watched gators eat him.
“So arrest me.”
“No. Mr. Hoover doesn’t like Bobby Kennedy, and I’m sure he wouldn’t want to upset Mr. Hughes. He can live with you and Jimmy on the loose, and so can I.”
“So?”
“So let’s do something nice for Mr. Hoover.”
“Give me a hint. I’m just dying to roll over.”
Boyd smiled. “The head writer at Hush-Hush is a Commie. I know Mr. Hughes appreciates cheap help, but I still think you should fire him immediately.”
Pete said, “I’ll do that. And you tell Mr. Hoover that I’m a patriotic guy who knows how friendship works.”
Boyd waltzed off–no nod, no wink, suspect dismissed. He walked two car rows over and bagged a blue Ford with a Hertz bumper sticker.
The car pulled out. Boyd fucking waved.
Pete ran to the hotel phone bank and called information. An operator shot him the main Hertz number.
He dialed it. A woman answered: “Good morning, Hertz Rent-a-Car.”
“Good morning. This is Officer Peterson, LAPD. I need a current customer listing on one of your cars.”
“Has there been an accident?’
“No, it’s just routine. The car is a blue ‘56 Ford Fairlane, license V as in ‘Victor,’ D as in ‘dog,’ H as in ‘Henry,’ four-ninezero.”
“One minute, Officer.”
Pete held the line. Boyd’s McClellan pitch danced around in his head.
“I have your listing, Officer.”
“Shoot.”
“The car was rented to a Mr. Kemper C. Boyd, whose current Los Angeles address is the Miramar Hotel in Santa Monica. The invoice says the charge is to be billed to the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Investigations. Does that help?–”