American Tabloid Read online

  Acclaim for James Ellroy’s

  American Tabloid

  “Thoroughly engrossing.… A graphically violent, profane expression of personal and political corruption.… The book’s prose is spare and minimalist, so hard-boiled you could bounce it off the sidewalk.”

  —Houston Chronicle

  “American Tabloid should be read for the feel of the period, for its author’s peculiarly brutal genius, and for the way his unique prose illuminates a brutal time.”

  —San Francisco Sunday Examiner & Chronicle

  “One hellishly exciting ride.”

  —Detroit Free Press

  “Ellroy sprays declarative sentences like machine-gun bullets, blasting to kingdom come all notions of justice, heroism, and simple decency.”

  —Entertainment Weekly

  “A style so hard-boiled it scorches the pot.”

  —New York magazine

  “Powerful.… The plot runs on high-octane violence.… One emerges breathless, shaken, and ready to change one’s view of recent American history.”

  —The Sunday Telegraph (London)

  “[A] frenetic, explosive thriller.”

  —The Sunday Times (London)

  James Ellroy

  American Tabloid

  James Ellroy was born in Los Angeles in 1948. His L.A. Quartet novels—The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, and White Jazz—were international bestsellers. His novel American Tabloid was Time magazine’s Novel of the Year for 1995; his memoir My Dark Places was a Time Best Book of the Year and a New York Times Notable Book for 1996. He lives in Kansas City.

  Also by James Ellroy

  Hollywood Nocturnes

  L.A. Confidential

  The Big Nowhere

  The Black Dahlia

  Killer on the Road

  Suicide Hill

  Because the Night

  Blood on the Moon

  Clandestine

  Brown’s Requiem

  White Jazz

  My Dark Places

  Crime Wave

  The Cold Six Thousand

  FIRST VINTAGE BOOKS EDITION, APRIL 2001

  Copyright © 1995 by James Ellroy

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 1995. Subsequently published in paperback by Fawcett Columbine, an imprint of Ballantine Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 1996 and 1997.

  Vintage and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the Knopf edition as follows:

  Ellroy, James, [date]

  American tabloid: a novel / by James Ellroy.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  eISBN: 978-0-307-79843-5

  I. Title.

  PS3555.L6274A8 1995

  813′.54—dc20 94-42898

  CIP

  www.vintagebooks.com

  v3.1_r2

  To

  NAT SOBEL

  America was never innocent. We popped our cherry on the boat over and looked back with no regrets. You can’t ascribe our fall from grace to any single event or set of circumstances. You can’t lose what you lacked at conception.

  Mass-market nostalgia gets you hopped up for a past that never existed. Hagiography sanctifies shuck-and-jive politicians and reinvents their expedient gestures as moments of great moral weight. Our continuing narrative line is blurred past truth and hindsight. Only a reckless verisimilitude can set that line straight.

  The real Trinity of Camelot was Look Good, Kick Ass, Get Laid. Jack Kennedy was the mythological front man for a particularly juicy slice of our history. He talked a slick line and wore a world-class haircut. He was Bill Clinton minus pervasive media scrutiny and a few rolls of flab.

  Jack got whacked at the optimum moment to assure his sainthood. Lies continue to swirl around his eternal flame. It’s time to dislodge his urn and cast light on a few men who attended his ascent and facilitated his fall.

  They were rogue cops and shakedown artists. They were wiretappers and soldiers of fortune and faggot lounge entertainers. Had one second of their lives deviated off course, American History would not exist as we know it.

  It’s time to demythologize an era and build a new myth from the gutter to the stars. It’s time to embrace bad men and the price they paid to secretly define their time.

  Here’s to them.

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Author

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Part I: Shakedowns

  1: Pete Bondurant: (Beverly Hills, 11/22/58)

  2: Kemper Boyd: (Philadelphia, 11/27/58)

  3: Ward J. Littell: (Chicago, 11/30/58)

  4: (Beverly Hills, 12/4/58)

  5: (Washington, D.C., 12/7/58)

  6: (Washington, D.C., 12/8/58)

  7: (Los Angeles, 12/9/58)

  8: (Miami, 12/11/58)

  9: (Chicago, 12/11/58)

  10: (Los Angeles, 12/14/58)

  11: (Washington, D.C., 12/18/58)

  Part II: Collusion

  12: (Chicago, 1/1/59)

  13: (Miami, 1/3/59)

  14: (New York City, 1/5/59)

  15: (Chicago, 1/6/59)

  16: (Los Angeles, 1/11/59)

  17: (Miami, 1/13/59)

  18: (Chicago, 1/14/59)

  19: (Los Angeles, 1/18/59)

  20: (Washington, D.C., 1/20/59)

  21: (Chicago, 1/22/59)

  22: (Miami, 2/4/59)

  23: (Chicago, 5/18/59)

  24: (Havana, 5/28/59)

  25: (Key West, 5/29/59)

  26: (Chicago, 8/23/59)

  27: (Gardena, 8/25/59)

  28: (New York City, 8/26/59)

  29: (Dallas, 8/27/59)

  30: (Miami, 8/29/59)

  31: (Miami, 8/30/59)

  32: (Chicago, 9/4/59)

  33: (New Orleans, 9/20/59)

  34: (New York City, 9/29/59)

  35: (Chicago, 10/1/59)

  36: (Chicago, 10/2/59)

  37: (Blessington, 12/24/59)

  38: (Hyannis Port, 12/25/59)

  39: (South Bend, 12/25/59)

  40: (Tampa, 2/1/60)

  41: (New York City/Hyannis Port/ New Hampshire/Wisconsin/Illinois/West Virginia, 2/4/60–5/4/60)

  42: (Blessington/Miami, 2/4/60–5/4/60)

  43: (Greenbrier, 5/8/60)

  44: (Chicago, 5/10/60)

  45: (Blessington, 5/12/60)

  46: (Lake Geneva, 5/14/60)

  47: (Los Angeles, 7/13/60)

  48: (Beverly Hills, 7/14/60)

  49: (Chicago, 7/15/60)

  50: (Miami/Blessington, 7/16/60–10/12/60)

  51: (Chicago, 10/16/60)

  52: (Miami, 10/20/60)

  53: (Lake Geneva, 11/5/60)

  54: (Hyannis Port, 11/8/60)

  55: (Miami, 11/9/60)

  56: (Washington, D.C., 11/13/60)

  57: (Chicago, 12/8/60)

  58: (New York City, 1/20/61)

  Part III: Pigs

  59: (Blessington, 2/10/61)

  60: (Washington, D.C., 3/6/61)

  61: (Washington, D.C., 3/14/61)

  62: (Rural Mexico, 3/22/61)

  63: (Washington, D.C., 3/26/61)

  64: (New Orleans, 4/4/61)

  65: (Rural Guatemala, 4/8/61)

  66: (Anniston, 4/11/61)

  67: (Rural Nicaragua, 4/17/61)

  68
: (Rural Guatemala, 4/18/61)

  69: (Miami, 4/18/61)

  70: (Miami/Blessington, 6/61–11/61)

  71: (Washington, D.C., 6/61–11/61)

  Part IV: Heroin

  72: (Miami, 12/20/61)

  73: (Meridian, 1/11/62)

  74: (Washington, D.C., 1/24/62)

  75: (Los Angeles, 2/4/62)

  76: (Meridian, 2/18/62)

  77: (Miami, 4/15/62)

  78: (Washington, D.C., 5/2/62)

  79: (Orange Beach, 5/4/62)

  80: (Washington, D.C., 5/7/62)

  81: (Los Angeles, 5/10/62)

  82: (Meridian, 5/12/62)

  83: (New Orleans, 5/12/62)

  84: (Meridian, 5/13/62)

  Part V: Contract

  85: (Miami, 9/15/63)

  86: (New Orleans, 9/15/63)

  87: (Sun Valley, 9/18/63)

  88: (Miami, 9/23/63)

  89: (Miami, 9/27/63)

  90: (Miami, 9/27/63)

  91: (Puckett, 9/28/63)

  92: (Miami, 9/29/63–10/20/63)

  93: (Blessington, 10/21/63)

  94: (Blessington, 10/21/63)

  95: (Meridian, 11/4/63)

  96: (Washington, D.C., 11/19/63)

  97: (Dallas, 11/20/63)

  98: (Dallas, 11/20/63)

  99: (Beverly Hills, 11/22/63)

  100: (Dallas, 11/22/63)

  Also by James Ellroy

  Part I

  SHAKEDOWNS

  November-December 1958

  1

  Pete Bondurant

  (Beverly Hills, 11/22/58)

  He always shot up by TV light. Some spics waved guns. The head spic plucked bugs from his beard and fomented. Black & white footage; CBS geeks in jungle fatigues. A newsman said, Cuba, bad juju—Fidel Castro’s rebels vs. Fulgencio Batista’s standing army.

  Howard Hughes found a vein and mainlined codeine. Pete watched on the sly—Hughes left his bedroom door ajar.

  The dope hit home. Big Howard went slack-faced.

  Room service carts clattered outside. Hughes wiped off his spike and flipped channels. The “Howdy Doody” show replaced the news—standard Beverly Hills Hotel business.

  Pete walked out to the patio—pool view, a good bird-dog spot. Crappy weather today: no starlet types in bikinis.

  He checked his watch, antsy.

  He had a divorce gig at noon—the husband drank lunch alone and dug young cooze. Get quality flashbulbs: blurry photos looked like spiders fucking. On Hughes’ timecard: find out who’s hawking subpoenas for the TWA antitrust divestment case and bribe them into reporting that Big Howard blasted off for Mars.

  Crafty Howard put it this way: “I’m not going to fight this divestment, Pete. I’m simply going to stay incommunicado indefinitely and force the price up until I have to sell. I’m tired of TWA anyway, and I’m not going to sell until I can realize at least five hundred million dollars.”

  He’d said it pouty: Lord Fauntleroy, aging junkie.

  Ava Gardner cruised by the pool. Pete waved; Ava flipped him the bird. They went back: he got her an abortion in exchange for a weekend with Hughes. Renaissance Man Pete: pimp, dope procurer, licensed PI goon.

  Hughes and him went waaay back.

  June ’52. L.A. County Deputy Sheriff Pete Bondurant—night watch commander at the San Dimas Substation. That one shitty night: a nigger rape-o at large, the drunk tank packed with howling juiceheads.

  This wino gave him grief. “I know you, tough guy. You kill innocent women and your own—”

  He beat the man to death barefisted.

  The Sheriff’s hushed it up. An eyeball witness squealed to the Feds. The L.A. agent-in-charge tagged Joe Wino “Joe Civil Rights Victim.”

  Two agents leaned on him: Kemper Boyd and Ward J. Littell. Howard Hughes saw his picture in the paper and sensed strongarm potential. Hughes got the beef quashed and offered him a job: fixer, pimp, dope conduit.

  Howard married Jean Peters and installed her in a mansion by herself. Add “watchdog” to his duties; add the world’s greatest rent-free doghouse: the mansion next door.

  Howard Hughes on marriage: “I find it a delightful institution, Pete, but I also find cohabitation stressful. Explain that to Jean periodically, won’t you? And if she gets lonely, tell her that she’s in my thoughts, even though I’m very busy.”

  Pete lit a cigarette. Clouds passed over—pool loungers shivered. The intercom crackled—Hughes was beckoning.

  He walked into the bedroom. “Captain Kangaroo” was on TV, the volume down low.

  Dim black & white lighting—and Big Howard in deep-focus shadows.

  “Sir?”

  “It’s ‘Howard’ when we’re alone. You know that.”

  “I’m feeling subservient today.”

  “You mean you’re feeling your oats with your paramour, Miss Gail Hendee. Tell me, is she enjoying the surveillance house?”

  “She likes it. She’s as hinky of shack jobs as you are, and she says twenty-four rooms for two people smooths things out.”

  “I like independent women.”

  “No you don’t.”

  Hughes plumped up his pillows. “You’re correct. But I do like the idea of independent women, which I have always tried to exploit in my movies. And I’m sure Miss Hendee is both a wonderful extortion partner and mistress. Now, Pete, about the TWA divestment …”

  Pete pulled a chair up. “The process servers won’t get to you. I’ve got every employee at this hotel bribed, and I’ve got an actor set up in a bungalow two rows over. He looks like you and dresses like you, and I’ve got call girls going in at all hours, to perpetuate the myth that you still fuck women. I check every man and woman who applies for work here, to make sure the Justice Department doesn’t slip a ringer in. All the shift bosses here play the stock market, and for every month you go unfucking-subpoenaed I give them twenty shares of Hughes Tool Company stock apiece. As long as you stay in this bungalow, you won’t be served and you won’t have to appear in court.”

  Hughes plucked at his robe—little palsied fidgets. “You’re a very cruel man.”

  “No, I’m your very cruel man, which is why you let me talk back to you.”

  “You’re ‘my man,’ but you still retain your somewhat tawdry private investigator sideline.”

  “That’s because you crowd me. That’s because I’m not so good at cohabitation either.”

  “Despite what I pay you?”

  “No, because of it.”

  “For instance?”

  “For instance, I’ve got a mansion in Holmby Hills, but you’ve got the deed. I’ve got a ’58 Pontiac coupe, but you’ve got the pink slip. I’ve got a—”

  “This is getting us nowhere.”

  “Howard, you want something. Tell me what it is and I’ll do it.”

  Hughes tapped his remote-control gizmo. “Captain Kangaroo” blipped off. “I’ve purchased Hush-Hush magazine. My reasons for acquiring a scurrilous scandal rag are twofold. One, I’ve been corresponding with J. Edgar Hoover, and I want to solidify my friendship with him. We both love the type of Hollywood gossip that Hush-Hush purveys, so owning the magazine would be both pleasurable and a smart political move. Second, there’s politics itself. To be blunt, I want to be able to smear politicians that I dislike, especially profligate playboys like Senator John Kennedy, who might be running for President against my good friend Dick Nixon in 1960. As you undoubtedly know, Kennedy’s father and I were business rivals back in the ’20s, and frankly, I hate the entire family.”

  Pete said, “And?”

  “And I know that you’ve worked for Hush-Hush as a ‘story verifier,’ so I know you understand that aspect of the business. It’s a quasi-extortion aspect, so I know it’s something you’ll be good at.”

  Pete popped his knuckles. “ ‘Story verification’ means ‘Don’t sue the magazine or I’ll hurt you.’ If you want me to help out that way, fine.”

  “Good. That’s a start.”

&nbs
p; “Wrap it up, Howard. I know the people there, so tell me who’s going and who’s staying.”

  Hughes flinched—just a tad. “The receptionist was a Negro woman with dandruff, so I fired her. The stringer and so-called ‘dirt digger’ quit, and I want you to find me a new one. I’m keeping Sol Maltzman on. He’s been writing all the articles, under a pseudonym, for years, so I’m prone to retaining him, even though he’s a blacklisted Commie known to belong to no less than twenty-nine left-wing organizations, and—”

  “And that’s all the staff you need. Sol does a good job, and if worse comes to worse, Gail can fill in for him—she’s written for Hush-Hush on and off for a couple of years. You’ve got your lawyer Dick Steisel for the legal stuff, and I can get you Fred Turentine for bug work. I’ll find you a good dirt digger. I’ll keep my nose down and ask around, but it might take a while.”

  “I trust you. You’ll do your usual superb job.”

  Pete worked his knuckles. The joints ached—a sure sign that rain was coming. Hughes said, “Is that necessary?”

  “These hands of mine brought us together, Boss. I’m just letting you know they’re still here.”

  The watchdog house living room was 84′ by 80′.

  The foyer walls were gold-flecked marble.

  Nine bedrooms. Walk-in freezers thirty feet deep. Hughes had the carpets cleaned monthly—a jigaboo walked across them once.

  Surveillance cameras were mounted on the roof and the upstairs landings—aimed at Mrs. Hughes’ bedroom next door.

  Pete found Gail in the kitchen. She had these great curves and long brown hair—her looks still got to him.

  She said, “You usually hear people walk into houses, but our front door’s a half-mile away.”

  “We’ve been here a year, and you’re still cracking jokes.”

  “I live in the Taj Mahal. That takes some getting used to.”

  Pete straddled a chair. “You’re nervous.”

  Gail slid her chair away from him. “Well … as extortionists go, I’m the nervous type. What’s the man’s name today?”

  “Walter P. Kinnard. He’s forty-seven years old, and he’s been cheating on his wife since their honeymoon. He’s got kids he dotes on, and the wife says he’ll fold if I squeeze him with pictures and threaten to show them to the kids. He’s a juicer, and he always gets a load on at lunchtime.”