The Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office does think that someone has paid Flood to promote “Baby, It’s Cold Inside.” Prosecutor J. Miller Leavy told the Mirror, “We think we’re dealing with payola, pure and simple, and several police agencies are looking into it for us.” Sergeant Robert Duhamel of the Beverly Hills Police Department confirmed Deputy DA Leavy’s statement.
“Where there’s smoke, there’s fire,” Duhamel told the Mirror. “And our investigation is turning up some prominent people.”
Duhamel refused to comment on which “prominent people.” The Mirror went to Danny Getchell, editor in chief and head writer for the notorious scandal magazine Hush-Hush. Getchell claimed that his piece in the December issue, “Payola Pantheon! Sex-Sational Sinatra and Luscious Linda Lansing Linked!” sparked Deputy DA Leavy’s probe. Getchell told the Mirror: “I got a tip that Frank Sinatra was paying Flash Flood to promote Linda Lansing’s song, and I confirmed that tip to my satisfaction and wrote it up in the December issue. That’s all I’ll say. I’ll never feed your newspaper any hot leads that I could publish in my magazine. You can’t blame me for that, can you?”
Deputy DA Leavy and Sergeant Duhamel would not comment on Mr. Getchell’s assertions. Frank Sinatra and Linda Lansing could not be reached for comment. Flash Flood told the Mirror: “I don’t dig Danny Getchell. He’s a parasite passing himself off as a journalist. I dig Sinatra and I dig Linda Lansing. And dig this: I think Skip Towne (a rival disc jockey and the former Sol Irving Moskowitz) tipped off Getchell to louse up my career. Payola, schmayola. What we’ve got here is freedom of speech run amok. You can dig that, can’t you?”
Skip Towne could not be reached for comment. Danny Getchell told the Mirror: “I stand by my piece in Hush-Hush, and I condemn Flash Flood’s accusations as libelous and communistic. Freedom of speech should always serve as a search for the truth, and the truth is my moral mandate.”
I.
Sin-sational Sinatra:
A macho-maimed mama’s boy and pussy-whipped putz. A punk with a pack of pit dogs to rough up recidivistic reporters.
Skip Towne skimmed me the skinny: Frank flipped Flash Flood five grand to flip that song and hitch it up the Hit Parade. Impishly implied: Linda Lansing lanced Frank’s libido and pulled him around by the pud. Payola payoffs and poontang–perennia] poop for Hush-Hush.
Sinatra sent me a nice note:
“Danny, how could you? The Pacific Dining Car parking lot, Io:oo A.M. Thursday. You know it will go worse if I have to send the boys out to find you.”
The Boys:
Freelance freaks out of Frisco. Greaseballs who grovel and suck up to Sinatra. Discipline dispensers hot to hurl some hurt and rack up ringside seats for Frank’s next stand at the Statler.
Frank hates Hush-Hush. Hush-Hush hates him. I published a piece on his private doc and his prick-enlargement procedure. His pit dogs pounced on my Packard and blew it up on publication day.
“10:00 A.M., Thursday.”
I deconstructed my dilemma. I contemplated compliance and concocted countermeasures. I strategized. I stripped the strait I was in down to strict essentials. I decided to frame Frank in the name of free speech.
8:30A.M., Thursday, 12/21/55.
I bopped by Ben Hong’s herb hut in Chinatown. I bought a bushel of Belladona Bulbs and a mound of man-eating Ma Huang. Hush-Hush pushes panaceas and hopped-up health highballs to hipsters and high-school kids. We pitch potency pills and cancer cures on our back pages and ship the shit out of a shack behind the Shangri-Lodge Motel. It’s legal and lethal in the long run. A loyal league of losers laps it up. Belmont High hopheads buy our Bitter Burdock Buds in bulk and bounce off to Cloud 9 in class.
I needed to nail a big bag of boo. Ben Hong heard me out. He said Bob Mitchum was moving Maryjane to move out of debt with the Mob. I buzzed Bob and blitzed him with a bit of blackmail bait: that bleached blonde who blew you in the Hialeah bleachers was really a high-class drag queen. Bob stuttered, sputtered, and spat out, “What do you want?” I said, “Drop some stuff on me.”