Read Online (1976) The R Document by Irving Wallace - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Irving Wallace
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OC file, Mom?’ ‘Always ready,’ she said with a broad smile. He left the table, went into the living room, and brought the top-security Official and Confidential file back with him. This file, for the next ten minutes, was his regular Saturday gift to his mother. This file contained the FBI’s weekly input, largely sexual and potentially scandalous, on celebrities of the stage, screen, and sports worlds, with additional juicy tidbits on a variety of well-known politicians, industrialists, and jet-setters. Rose Tynan, who read all the fan magazines and national weekly newspapers, reveled in the gossip.
Again, Tynan felt that had J. Edgar Hoover been here, he would have approved. After all, it had been Hoover who had gathered material on the sex lives and drinking habits of prominent Americans and who had regularly passed this secret material on to President Lyndon B. Johnson for the Chief Executive’s more pleasurable bedtime reading.
Tynan opened his folder and took up the OC memorandums one by one.
‘For starters, a real treat, Mom. Your favorite movie star.’ He read off the name of the handsome liberal motion-picture actor his mother adored, and she clucked with anticipation. ‘He went to a massage parlor in Las Vegas last week, undressed, had two nude girls tie him down to a cot, and then had them whip him.’
‘That’s all?’ said the jaded Rose Tynan, a connoisseur of the outrageous, with disappointment.
‘Well, some people think that’s pretty hot stuff,’ said Tynan. ‘But I can do better. You know the Congresswoman who makes all those anti-Pentagon speeches?’ He gave his mother the name. ‘Nobody knows this, but we’ve found out she’s a lesbian. Her press secretary, a Radcliffe girl of twenty-two …’
He went on, then on and on, for the remainder of the ten minutes, as Rose Tynan sat enchanted.
When he was done and had closed the folder, his mother said, ‘Thank you, Vern. You’re a good boy. You’re always thoughtful about your mother.’ ‘Thank you, Mom.’
At the door, she studied his face.
‘You have lots of troubles,’ she said. I can see.’
“These are bad times in the country, Mom. There’s a lot to do. If we don’t get the 35th Amendment through, I don’t know what will happen.’
‘You know what’s best for everybody,’ she said. ‘I was telling Mrs Grossman the other day - she’s in the apartment above me - I was telling her you’d know what to do if you were President I believe it. You should be President’
He winked at her as he opened the door. ‘Maybe I’ll be better than that one day,’ he said. ‘We’ll see.’
*
It had been a long day for Chris Collins. Trying to make up for the time he had lost attending Colonel Baxter’s funeral in the morning, he had worked straight through without taking off his usual hour for lunch. Now, seated with his wife and two of their closest friends near the white Parian marble hearth in the upstairs dining room of the 1789 Restaurant on 36th Street in Georgetown, he was just beginning to satisfy his hunger.
Two scotches, a bowl of French onion soup, and the Caesar salad he had shared with Karen had brought him to his first moment of relaxation today. Cutting and eating his roast duck in orange sauce, Collins glanced up to see whether Ruth and Paul Hilliard were enjoying the entre6s they had ordered. Obviously, they were.
Collins considered Hilliard - it was hard to think of him as the junior Senator from California - with affection. He had known Hilliard from their beginnings, when Hilliard had been a San Francisco city councilman and he himself had been an ACLU attorney. In those early days, they had played handball together three times a week at the Y, and Collins had been best man at Hilliard’s wedding. And here they were, years later, both in Washington, he Attorney General Collins and his friend Senator Hilliard. They both had made it big.
Hilliard was a pleasant man, bespectacled, scholarly,
Again, Tynan felt that had J. Edgar Hoover been here, he would have approved. After all, it had been Hoover who had gathered material on the sex lives and drinking habits of prominent Americans and who had regularly passed this secret material on to President Lyndon B. Johnson for the Chief Executive’s more pleasurable bedtime reading.
Tynan opened his folder and took up the OC memorandums one by one.
‘For starters, a real treat, Mom. Your favorite movie star.’ He read off the name of the handsome liberal motion-picture actor his mother adored, and she clucked with anticipation. ‘He went to a massage parlor in Las Vegas last week, undressed, had two nude girls tie him down to a cot, and then had them whip him.’
‘That’s all?’ said the jaded Rose Tynan, a connoisseur of the outrageous, with disappointment.
‘Well, some people think that’s pretty hot stuff,’ said Tynan. ‘But I can do better. You know the Congresswoman who makes all those anti-Pentagon speeches?’ He gave his mother the name. ‘Nobody knows this, but we’ve found out she’s a lesbian. Her press secretary, a Radcliffe girl of twenty-two …’
He went on, then on and on, for the remainder of the ten minutes, as Rose Tynan sat enchanted.
When he was done and had closed the folder, his mother said, ‘Thank you, Vern. You’re a good boy. You’re always thoughtful about your mother.’ ‘Thank you, Mom.’
At the door, she studied his face.
‘You have lots of troubles,’ she said. I can see.’
“These are bad times in the country, Mom. There’s a lot to do. If we don’t get the 35th Amendment through, I don’t know what will happen.’
‘You know what’s best for everybody,’ she said. ‘I was telling Mrs Grossman the other day - she’s in the apartment above me - I was telling her you’d know what to do if you were President I believe it. You should be President’
He winked at her as he opened the door. ‘Maybe I’ll be better than that one day,’ he said. ‘We’ll see.’
*
It had been a long day for Chris Collins. Trying to make up for the time he had lost attending Colonel Baxter’s funeral in the morning, he had worked straight through without taking off his usual hour for lunch. Now, seated with his wife and two of their closest friends near the white Parian marble hearth in the upstairs dining room of the 1789 Restaurant on 36th Street in Georgetown, he was just beginning to satisfy his hunger.
Two scotches, a bowl of French onion soup, and the Caesar salad he had shared with Karen had brought him to his first moment of relaxation today. Cutting and eating his roast duck in orange sauce, Collins glanced up to see whether Ruth and Paul Hilliard were enjoying the entre6s they had ordered. Obviously, they were.
Collins considered Hilliard - it was hard to think of him as the junior Senator from California - with affection. He had known Hilliard from their beginnings, when Hilliard had been a San Francisco city councilman and he himself had been an ACLU attorney. In those early days, they had played handball together three times a week at the Y, and Collins had been best man at Hilliard’s wedding. And here they were, years later, both in Washington, he Attorney General Collins and his friend Senator Hilliard. They both had made it big.
Hilliard was a pleasant man, bespectacled, scholarly,
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