Harlot's Ghost

by Norman Mailer

  But I did lose a bit of respect for Hugh. He should not have handed me the file. In truth, I wouldn’t forgive him if it were not for Ty Cobb’s death on July 17.

  Hugh once remarked that your father broods over the obituary columns instead of enjoying them, but Ty Cobb is a signal figure in the Montague arcana. After all, Ty Cobb’s mother killed his father in much the same way that the Montague family tragedy enacted itself. So, when Cobb died (of prostate cancer, by the way—poor man—once so fleet on the base paths!), Hugh took a tumble, and finally handed over the BLUEBEARD file.

  As you may expect, I was riveted to it. Of course, I kept wondering whether anyone but you could be Harry Field. (Hugh wouldn’t relinquish that morsel.) And yesterday, receiving verification, I confess that I went through a turn.

  Well, I not only have digested your reports, but some later BLUEBEARD transcripts you have not seen, and I’m worried, as is Hugh. He’s been doing his subtle best to get our young President to recognize what an incubus is J. Edgar Buddha on any administration, especially this one, but in the interim, I don’t believe Jack comprehends how many pressure points are being handed over to Hoover. That man could end with a total choke on the Kennedy windpipe. Modene is so fabulously indiscreet. I am not going, as you did, to memorialize her meanderings with her friend, Willie, which I find misleading since under the guise of telling nothing, she tells her friend (and J. Edgar) all, even if it takes too long to find out! I am going to summarize what I have learned and save you the time you did not save me.

  In brief, Modene suffered the lacerations of the abandoned during Jack and Jacqueline’s visit to Paris at the end of May. Do you recollect? Our First Lady was a sensational success in Paris. Jack even said, “My real mission in Paris is to escort Jacqueline Kennedy.” God, how all that must have been etched into your poor girl’s brain. And, of course, our ogrish Sam G. couldn’t resist twitting her on the raw nerve. “Are you jealous, Modene?” he kept asking. “Not at all,” she kept replying. In recounting it to her stalwart Willie (whom, I must say, I picture as post-deb, blond, and seriously overweight—did you ever obtain a description?) Modene does, however, burst into tears. It comes out that earlier in May, before the trip to Paris, Jack had Modene in bed at the White House. Can you imagine? After a surprisingly dreadful lunch of cold soup and ketchup on the hamburgers—Irish!—Jack took Modene from the family dining room on the second floor to a bedroom, same floor, with a commodious bed. There, they consummated their reunion. She is madly in love again. Or so she will tell Willie that night.

  This transcript does happen to be worth offering for flavor.

  WILLIE: Wait a minute. The guards just allowed you to walk into the White House?

  MODENE: Of course not. I had to go through the gate, and then there was a short, well-built little man named Dave Powers who came down to meet me. He had a twinkle in his eye, permanently, I think. Looked like a troll. The President, he said, was having a swim and would be by soon. Dave Powers kept saying, “the President” with a high hush in his voice as if asking you to kneel in church. Of course, he left as soon as Jack came in to lunch. By then Dave Powers had gotten it across to me that he’s the fellow who wakes Jack up every morning and tucks him in at night. He certainly makes you feel you are in the White House.

  WILLIE: It’s not a very sexy place, is it?

  MODENE: I would say it is like the inside of a Quaker church, only heavier. Sacred trust sort of feeling. I never wanted a bourbon so much. It was early Saturday afternoon, the place was deserted, and I kept having the feeling I would never get to see Jack. After Powers took me upstairs to the family quarters, though, it was less uncomfortable—I was familiar with all that N Street furniture they had moved over to the second floor.

  After lunch, they journey to the bedroom. Following the preliminaries, Jack receives her on his back. Which French king was it who used to greet his mistresses in that manner? Louis XIV, perhaps, given that pampered look. In any event, as Modene explains it, Jack’s “lumbar condition” has grown worse. “Cares of office.” She is happy to serve the master, but a nugget of discontent remains. “I don’t mind which position is chosen. Different positions bring out different sides of me. Only I prefer to get to them on my own.”

  Mind you, all this while, through a window near the double bed, she can see the Washington Monument.

  Dear man, I have to wonder what your reactions must have been while reading the earlier transcripts. I hope I understand you well enough to assume that such perusal spurred you on to greater heights with Modene—or was it faster flats? We do want to shine in the eyes of the Immortal Race Steward.

  Oh, Harry, is all this due to the teasing I was never able to give to that younger brother I never had?

  I return to the essential. Despite Jackie’s triumphs in Paris, Jack does get in touch with Modene again early in June, and all through the summer, on fearfully hot, deserted, dog-day Saturday afternoons in Washington, he keeps bringing her to the same double bed. They used to say of Joe Kennedy that the longer you were in a business deal with the man, the more he took from it, and the less you brought home. Something of that lament creeps into her conversations with Willie. All the same, she finds justifications for Jack. “He is so tired. He does have many concerns to deal with.”

  It is a most peculiar period for our BLUEBEARD. She is based now in Los Angeles. She is actually sharing an apartment in Brentwood with four other stewardesses. Hardly the Modene you knew! From this base, however, she keeps waiting for the next summons to Washington. Meanwhile the Brentwood apartment is a focus for parties. Actors, marriageable young corporate types, a couple of professional athletes, one or two fringe film executives, and a prodigious amount of drinking. I’m not familiar with evenings of this variety, but gather there’s a great deal of dancing and a fair amount of marijuana. Then she’s always ready to fly to Chicago or Miami to spend a weekend with RAPUNZEL. Yet—her steadfast claim—there is “no sexual link.” I won’t bore you with Willie’s doubts about this.

  What speaks loudly is dissipation. Modene keeps gaining weight, and is drinking so much that she actually goes “as a tourist” to an AA meeting, but is “appalled by the gloom.” She is also taking stimulants and depressants. Her hangovers are described as “calamities.” A tennis game outside her window sounds “like an antiaircraft barrage.” She keeps referring to “a crazy drunken summer.” When working, she suffers “as never before.” She calls Jack frequently. Apparently, he has given her a special number to reach one of his secretaries. According to Modene’s account, Jack does call back when not immediately available. And she has offered hints that last summer she did carry a manila envelope from IOTA to RAPUNZEL. All the same, Jack keeps teasing her. “Don’t,” says Jack, “let it get too personal with Sammy. He’s not a fellow to trust with the collection plate.”

  Hugh, in one surprising moment of candor, said to me, “I suspect this has to do with Castro. Under it all, your Jack has an IRA mentality. Trust that Mick instinct. He wants to get even. Get even and you can enjoy your old age.”

  I find the most curious feelings in me. I’ve always thought of myself as ruefully patriotic, that is, I love America, but it’s like having a mate whose gaffes keep you exclaiming, “Oh, my God. He’s done it again.” I am outraged, however, that this man Castro, who is probably more qualified to be captain of a pirate ship than a head of state is now gloating over us. It does bother me. And I know it rests like a thorn in the Kennedy heart. With his love of intrigue, it might not be unlike Jack to pick such an outré back channel as Sammy G.

  Toward the end of August, our girl is invited once again to lunch on Saturday in the small second-story dining room. This time, however, Dave Powers is invited to eat with them.

  MODENE: At the end of the meal, Jack said to me, “Modene, I am picking up a few tales out of school.” “Tales?” I asked. For the first time since I knew him, I didn’t like his tone. Not at all. He said, “Did you ever say to anyone that I tr
ied to get you to accept another girl to go right in there with us?”

  WILLIE: He spoke in such manner right in front of Dave Powers?

  MODENE: I think he wanted a henchman there for the record.

  WILLIE: Maybe you were being recorded?

  MODENE: Don’t say that. It’s offensive enough already. I certainly had the feeling that he was doing it for Dave Powers’ benefit. As if to announce: “Well, here is this unlikely tale, but were you, Modene, malicious enough to go around spreading it?”

  WILLIE: You must have been furious.

  MODENE: I don’t make a habit of swearing, but instinct told me to get downright coarse. So I said: “If you ever tried something so low as hoping to put another girl into the sack with you and me, I sure as hell would be the last one to run around with that story. It’s an insult to me.”

  WILLIE: You did tell him off.

  MODENE: He had transgressed the line of privacy.

  WILLIE: I appreciate what you are saying.

  MODENE: Yes.

  WILLIE: Except you did tell it to me.

  MODENE: I did? . . . Yes, I did, didn’t I? But you don’t count.

  WILLIE: Did you tell anyone beside me?

  MODENE: I may have told Tom. I can’t remember. Do you know, I really can’t remember. Do you suppose pot and alcohol if taken with sleeping pills might injure a person’s memory?

  WILLIE: Yes.

  MODENE: Well, I do remember telling Sam.

  WILLIE: Oh, no.

  MODENE: I couldn’t stew in it alone.

  WILLIE: What happened after you told him off?

  MODENE: I kept on the high road. I asked him how he dared to discuss something that personal in front of a third party? Jack must have made some signal then, because Powers left the room. Then Jack tried to make amends. Kept kissing me on the cheek and saying, “I’m awfully sorry. But a story did get back to me.” I told him if he didn’t like tales out of school, maybe he ought to comport himself in another manner. And then very suddenly I said, “Let’s break it off.” I couldn’t believe I had said it. He tried to get me to stay. I think, after all this, he still wanted to get me in bed. Men are single-minded, aren’t they? I finally had to say, “You are insensitive. I want to leave.”

  WILLIE: You just took off?

  MODENE: Oh, no. He wouldn’t permit that. Dave Powers had to take me on a tour of the White House.

  WILLIE: I’m sure they wanted to check on whether you were under control. All they needed was some mad beauty running out of the White House and ripping off her clothes on Pennsylvania Avenue.

  MODENE: You are particularly humorous today.

  WILLIE: Sorry.

  MODENE: The tour was painful. Dave Powers had done it so many times before that I wanted to scream. I felt as if I were working an all-seats-occupied flight. Dave must have taken forty-five minutes guiding me through the Green Room and the Red Room and the Oval Room and the East Room.

  WILLIE: Do you remember any of it?

  MODENE: Don’t I just? “Elegance is the fruit of rationality.”

  WILLIE: What?

  MODENE: “Elegance is the fruit of rationality.” That was in the East Room. Dave Powers kept talking about the noble proportions of the East Room. When we got to the Oval Room, he had to say, “It’s traditionally employed for White House weddings.” Then he began to describe all the shades of blue that the Oval Room has seen. Originally, under President Monroe, it was crimson and gold, but Van Buren changed it to royal blue, then President Grant made it violet-blue, and Chester Arthur’s wife altered it to robin’s-egg blue. Mrs. Harrison picked out a cerulean blue.

  WILLIE: There is nothing wrong with your memory.

  MODENE: Thank you. Mrs. Harrison’s cerulean blue was a figured wallpaper.

  WILLIE: Thank you.

  MODENE: And then Teddy Roosevelt made it steel blue. Harry Truman altered it back to royal blue.

  WILLIE: Amazing.

  MODENE: I was sick. I wanted to get out of there.

  I can feel for Modene. Men don’t understand how much importance women attribute to composure when they are feeling nothing but emotional debris. The moment Modene does get back to her hotel, she packs her bags and catches a flight to Chicago.

  It is here, I must tell you, that she begins her affair with Sam. However, I don’t feel ready to write to you about that today. I would feel more secure if you would answer this letter first.

  Yours provisionally,

  Eiskaltblütig

  P.S. Can you believe it? That is one of Hugh’s nicknames for me. I, who am as unformed and overheated within as Lava Inchoate.

  5

  Oct. 22, 1961

  Dear Ice-cold Lava,

  If we are to correspond, I would like to leave Modene out of it. Can we discuss other matters? I am, for instance—believe it if you will—ready for your theory on narcissism. Why don’t you give me some idea of that? I expect your formulations can apply to a few people one knows. Yes, and what you may have to say on psychopathy.

  As for myself, I am in a strange place. My career is in irons. No tradewinds blow. Hints, however, of a new wind. A bird streaking across my inner sky turns abruptly to fly back in the direction from which it came. Or, at least, that is what I glimpsed while my eyes were closed. Then, an hour ago, a phone call from your husband. I am to have dinner with him at Harvey’s Restaurant on Saturday, October 28, at 7:00 P.M. General Edward Lansdale, he states, will accompany us. A job for me is to be part of the evening’s agenda, promises your good man Hugh. Then he hangs up.

  Do you know what lies behind all this?

  Your Harry

  October 26, 1961

  Dear Harry,

  Let me answer your questions later. First off, I think I will take on your curiosity about narcissism and psychopathy. It leads, you see, to a point I want to make about you and, even more, about me. So, herewith, in extreme summary, my thesis on narcissism—a pot of notions!

  To begin, cleanse your mind of the common impression that a narcissist is a person in love with himself. That diverts us entirely from the real point. The crux of the matter is that you can detest yourself intimately and still be a narcissist. The key to narcissism: One is one’s own mate. Where relatively normal people are able to express a good share of their love and hate toward others, the narcissist is worn out by these emotions, for Alpha and Omega engage in endless trench warfare within. The self is seeking for an armistice with itself that almost never comes.

  This fundamental inability to have relations with others is revealed most clearly in a love affair. No matter how close and loving two narcissists may appear to be, it is merely a reflection of their decision to be in love. Underneath lies spiritual depletion.

  Yet, the paradox, Harry, is that no love can prove so intense on occasion, and so full of anguish and torture, as the love of two narcissists. So much depends on it. For if they can succeed in coming close to the other person, they can begin to live in a world outside themselves. It is like taking the leap from onanism to honest copulation.

  About psychopathy, I speak less confidently. It is kin to narcissism, yet critically different. While other people are never as real to the psychopath as the inner strife between his Alpha and Omega, the trench warfare of narcissism is now replaced by slashing combat within. Both Alpha and Omega keep raiding each other, looking to gain immediate power. Tension, not detachment, is the prevailing condition. Indeed, this tension is so great that the psychopath can make love and/or attack others physically while feeling no responsibility for the act. After all, a psychopath lives in the dread of not being able to find any action that will decrease his or her tension; whatever offers relief, therefore, carries its own justification. The fastest relief for a psychopath is the sensation of lift-off provided by a sudden shift of psychic authority from Alpha to Omega. That is why psychopaths can be charming one instant, barbaric the next.

  Needless to say, the reality is never so simple as my schematics. In life, t
he psychopath and the narcissist are, in fact, each trying to become more like the other. The narcissist wants to be able to get out of detachment, to act out; the psychopath looks for detachment. It is better to perceive the two as poles in a spectrum of displaced personality that extends across the gamut from the most hermetic narcissism to the most uncontrollable, brutal psychopathy. As a small example, your Modene began, I suspect, as an absolute narcissist—her parents must have doted on her so totally that she was left contemplating nothing but herself. Now, via the ministrations of Sammy G., she is on the road to becoming a bit of a psychopath.

  I don’t want you to think of me as being naught but judgmental. What I say of Modene can apply in some degree to myself as well. I, too, am an only child, and no one could have begun as more of a narcissist than myself. (How, after all, could I have conceived of Alpha and Omega if I had not lived with them from early childhood?) So I do not judge Modene—I am well aware that narcissists are drawn toward the psychopathic.

  Curiously, yet logically, there is one vice, therefore, that tempts both narcissist and psychopath. It is treachery. The psychopath cannot help himself; in raw state, his treachery is not under his control. (Which is what we mean when we speak of psychopathic liars.) Since the psychopath oscillates between Alpha and Omega more rapidly than most humans, Omega or Alpha feel entitled to violate whatever promise the other made in the previous hour. The narcissist, more congested, tends to explore the nuances of betrayal rather than to exercise it. Always present, however, is that balked desire to break out. Treachery is the means to such acceleration.

  So, I come closer to my intimate passion. It is to betray Hugh. Not carnally. My sexual vow is the armature of my sanity. How I know this, I cannot say, but I keep my sexual vows. Yet the urge to betray him is profound. I sublimate such instincts by writing to you. I form a bond with you. An enclave of two. It frees me for other purposes.