American tabloid

16

Hush-Hush was cramming toward deadline. The office staff was buzzing on Benzedrine-spiked coffee.

“Artists” were pasting up a cover: “Paul Robeson-Royal Red Recidivist.” A “correspondent” was typing copy: “Wife Beater Spade Cooley-Will the Country Stomper Stomp Too Far?” A “researcher” was browsing pamphlets, trying to link nigger hygiene to cancer.

Pete watched.

Pete was bored.

MIAMI bopped through his head. Hush-Hush felt like a giant cactus shoved up his ass.

Sol Maltzman was dead. Gail Hendee was long gone. The new Hush-Hush staff was 100% geek. Howard Hughes was frantic to find a dirt digger.

His prospects all said NO. Everybody knew the L.A. fuzz seized the Kennedy smear issue. Hush-Hush was the leper colony of scandal-sheet journalism.

Hughes CRAVED dirt. Hughes CRAVED slander skank to share with Mr. Hoover. What Hughes CRAVED, Hughes BOUGHT.

Pete bought an issue’s worth of dirt. His cop contacts supplied him with a one-week load of lackluster skank.

“Spade Cooley, Boozefried Misogynist!” “Marijuana Shack Raid Nets Sal Mineo!” “Beatnik Arrests Shock Hermosa Beach!”

It was pure bullshit. It was very un-Miami.

Miami was goood. Miami was this drug he got withdrawals from. He left Miami with a mild concussion-not bad for the pounding he took.

Jimmy Hoffa called him in to restore order. He got out of jail and did it.

The cabstand demanded order-political rifts had business fucked six ways from Sunday. The riots sputtered out, but Tiger Kab still simmered with factional jive. He had pro-Batista and pro-Castro guys to deal with-left- and right-wing ideologue thugs who needed to be toilet-trained and broken in to the White Man’s Rule of Order.

He laid down laws.

No drinking and placard waving on the job. No guns or knives-check your weapons with the dispatcher. No political fraternizing-rival factions must remain segregated.

One Batistaite challenged the rules. Pete beat him half-dead.

He laid down more laws.

No pimping on duty-leave your whores at home. No B amp;Es or stickups on duty.

He made Chuck Rogers the new day dispatcher. He considered it a political appointment.

Rogers was a CIA contract goon. Co-dispatcher Fulo Machado was CIA-linked.

John Stanton was a mid-level CIA agent-and a new cabstand habituй. He got Fulo’s murder-one beef squelched with a snap of his fingers.

Stanton’s pal Guy Banister hated Ward Littell. Banister and Stanton were hipped on Kemper Boyd.

Jimmy Hoffa owned Tiger Kab. Jimmy Hoffa had points in two Havana casinos.

Littell and Boyd made him for two killings. Stanton and Banister probably didn’t know that. Stanton fed him that little teaser: “I may ask a favor of you one day.”

Things were dovetailing tight and cozy. His feelers started perkperk-perking.

Pete buzzed the receptionist. “Donna, get me long distance person-to-person. I want to talk to a man named Kemper Boyd at the McClellan Committee office in Washington, D.C. Tell the operator to try the Senate Office Building, and if you get through, say I’m the caller.”

“Yes, sir.”

Pete hung up and waited. The call was a longshot-Boyd was probably out somewhere, conniving.

His intercom light flashed. Pete picked up the phone.

“Boyd?”

“Speaking. And surprised.”

“Well, I owe you one, so I thought I’d deliver.”

“Keep going.”

“I was in Miami last week. I ran into two men named John Stanton and Guy Banister, and they seemed real interested in you.”

“Mr. Stanton and I have already spoken. But thanks. It’s nice to know they’re still interested.”

“I gave you a good reference.”

“You’re a sport. Is there anything I can do for you?”

“You can find me a new dirt digger for Hush-Hush.”

Boyd hung up, laughing.