5. Short air routes to the East Coast cities and Europe.
6. If you don’t like golf, you can try ocean sports.
7. Moving east will get me away from actresses once and for all.
Let the gangsters have Nevada. Of course, there will be a honeymoon when the public flocks to the poker palaces and cheap whores but I have to believe eventually the American people will tire of these things and will learn that games of chance are heavily fixed in favor of those running them, anybody who has been to a carnival and thrown a baseball at a stack of milk bottles knows there is little to no chance of winning. But if they are that stupid, if they keep going to gambling houses full of diseased whores to hand their hard-earned money to greasy idiots who don’t know how to do anything except buy a gross of dice and playing cards and lay some green felt across fifty kitchen tables and call the whole thing a casino, then screw them.
Hughes diary entry, August 6, 1945
If Walt Disney shaved off the left and right sides of his moustache and left only the part under his nose he’d look like Hitler except the German had a better dye job. I can understand losing Nevada to the false hope gambling gives and also the drinking and easy sex, but losing Florida to a damn cartoonist is more than I can take. Disney is in the land-buying stage for building Coney Island type parks in both California and Florida. He calls the parks imitations of cities, only cities where no one has to work. They will have fake main streets and boardwalk rides and robots that look like figures in a wax museum but that can move and talk and sing. Disney says the parks will be dreams given a steel and concrete existence. I asked him if he was putting any churches in his fake cities. No, people don’t want to think about that on vacation he said. How about a fake hospital with a robot that looks like a man who just had a leg amputated? That happens most days in any city you pick I said. Or how about a robot screaming during childbirth? Or a fake poultry processing plant with thousands of fake dead headless chickens hanging upside down with fake blood running out their necks into a gutter and then a pit? People could throw coins into the pit of fake blood and make wishes, then go have a nice chicken dinner in one of your restaurants. By that point he was looking at me with a dull glazed look that was equaled in stupidity by the semi-conscious besotted smile of the governor. I asked the governor if he was left handed. He looked confused for a second, then said, no, right. I said I was surprised, I figured he wrote left handed since I’d never seen him without a highball glass in his right.
Florida goes to Disney. He gets the tax exemptions, the guarantees for the electricity and water he needs. The way things stand now I couldn’t get a permit for a hot dog stand in this state.
They dropped an atom bomb on the Japs today.
Article titled “Howard Hughes Returns” from the society page of the November, 2, 1945, issue of the New York Post
After a long, long time away, Howard Hughes has been spotted all over town recently wearing black tie and tails and, egads, tennis shoes. Mr. Hughes puts the lie to the old adage that the clothes make the man; apparently, the man makes the clothes.
Mr. Hughes came sailing into town in October, from no one knows where, in the world’s fifth largest yacht, which he recently bought and rechristened The Gloria. Could this be in honor of a certain Miss G. Vanderbilt who has had such a successful coming-out season? Recently this reporter spotted Miss Vanderbilt and Mr. Hughes at 21, and May and December seemed to be getting along famously. However, later the same week, outside a Manhattan nightclub, Mr. Hughes was seen entering a cab with another striking deb, a Miss B. Hutton.
What will his yacht be called next week?
Painters, stay at the ready.
Alton Reece’s second interview with Tom Lourdes
At the Tremelo Retirement Home I unload the box from my wagon and wheel it to the entrance. As I’m struggling to get it through the front door, a well-dressed man and woman approach from inside and ask what I’m doing. I back the box out of the doorway and they step outside, where I introduce myself and tell them I have an appointment with Tom Lourdes. The man says they know who I am, they’re the home’s comanagers and they’ve been waiting for me, but appointment or not, I’m not bringing a coffin inside. I explain the box isn’t a coffin and tell them to check my story with Tom Lourdes — he knows about Hughes’s box and I’m certain he’ll want me to bring this in for him to see. The man nods to the woman and she disappears into the building, leaving the man and me facing each other with nothing to say. He’s heavyset, bald, wearing a black suit, and his forehead and upper lip are covered with a sheen of perspiration. Then a van bus pulls up and starts letting out elderly women; I wheel the box off the sidewalk to get out of their way, and as they approach the entrance they all stare at the box, some with alarm. As the manager holds the door open for them he makes apologies about the box and explains it isn’t a coffin. Then the woman manager returns and with obvious disappointment says Mr. Lourdes apparently does want to see the box.
In the dayroom where we did our first interview, Tom Lourdes sits in his wheelchair wearing a new-looking, dark green, shiny silk bathrobe.His yellowish-white hair is slicked down and neatly parted to one side. Susan, the attendant I met on my first visit, sits next to him — she gives me a quick smile. However, as soon as I enter the room Tom Lourdes fixes me with a withering stare. He has a cushioned writing desk in his lap and on top of it are copies of the stories I built from his notes, the pages filled with scratchings and margin notes in red ink. Three chairs are arranged in a semicircle in front of Mr. Lourdes and Susan, so I place the box between that semicircle and them, and then the two managers and I sit down, with me in the middle chair.
TL: Where’s your recorder?
AR: (I produce my micro-recorder from my shirt pocket.) This has been running since I entered the room. It’s digital, state of the art. Picks up anything within—
TL: Your gizmo doesn’t interest me.
AR: (I sigh.) Of course not.
MALE MANAGER: (Sternly.) Mr. Reece, there’s some things I want you to understand.
AR: (Forcing a smile.) Yes?
MALE MANAGER: Sheila and I are sitting in on this interview at Tom’s request, but even if he hadn’t asked us I’m sure we’d be here anyway. You see, two weeks ago we were contacted by a private investigator about a matter concerning you.
FEMALE MANAGER: (About fifty, plump, leaning forward to look around me at her partner.) We agreed not bring that up, didn’t we? (She smiles stiffly.) We’re not getting involved in that matter. We’re here for Tom today, and that’s all.
MALE MANAGER: (Impatiently.) I’m not going to be an accessory to a crime.
FEMALE MANAGER: Carl, please.
MALE MANAGER: I told the investigator you were going to be here today, Mr. Reece.
FEMALE MANAGER: (Exasperated, dropping her prim demeanor.) oh good Lord.
AR: NO, that’s fine. I hope he does show up so we can settle this, whatever it is. I’d appreciate knowing, though, just what—
TL: (Interrupting.) All these shenanigans … (He shakes his head.) And this silly box. God, you don’t care about Hughes. You don’t have any real feeling for the man. It takes more than dragging this thing around to understand him.
AR: Mr. Lourdes, I’m sorry you feel that way. (A pause, and then with building emotion.) But if that’s really how you see what I’m doing, then you don’t know what love is.
TL: What? Did you say love? (He picks up a paper-clipped story from his lap and waves it.) I’ve spent weeks trying to clean up this mess you sent me. (He lowers the story and clumsily thumbs through it.) These are all lies. Time and again you take one or two insignificant details from my notes and concoct whole fictions from them. This one here … (He shakes the story at me.) The stories you put in Brucks Randall’s mouth are almost complete falsehoods. But the worst of it is that you portray Hughes as some kind of … I don’t know what. (He pauses, and as he looks at me his eyes narrow.) No, that’s not right. I do know what
you’re doing. I know exactly what you’re doing. You’re making Hughes into the man you wish you yourself were. It’s an adolescent fantasy of a great man, nothing but unspeakable exploits with women and daredevil adventures. A pornographic cartoon. A sexual epic filled with meaningless stunts. (He stops. His face is red and his breathing is rapid and shallow. A string of spittle hangs at one corner of his mouth; Susan hands him a tissue and he wipes it away.)
FEMALE MANAGER: Susan, bring the machine over and check Tom’s blood pressure.
MALE MANAGER: (Glaring at me.) I hope you’re happy.
SUSAN: (In one quick motion she stands up and snaps her head toward the male manager.) This isn’t Alton’s fault.
(A short silence)
FEMALE MANAGER: (Nodding toward me.) Susan, do you know him?
(Susan won’t look at her. She crosses the room to the vital-signs machine, six feet tall with a variety of cords and digital gauges.)
AR: I’ll answer that. When I found out Mr. Lourdes was on some kind of crusade against me, calling people all over the country, I phoned Susan to see if she could tell me what was going on. We developed an acquaintance.
FEMALE MANAGER: (Lilting.) I see.
(Susan fits the cuff on Tom Lourdes’s bicep, pushes a button, the machine hums and the cuff inflates.)
TL: (His voice low and tired.) The box Hughes carried. Not this one, of course … (He pauses for breath, and before he can continue the machine beeps, signaling it has finished its reading. The red digital numbers say 161/103. Everyone except Tom Lourdes is looking at them.)
TL: This box, you make too much of it. (Pause for breath.) I’m certain Hughes saw it as an elaborate joke on the press and the FBI. It meant nothing to him. (Another pause.) It was a red herring.
AR: How do you know?
TL: I knew him. I understand him. (My cell phone starts ringing.)
AR: (Exasperated.) Good Lord. (I open the phone and answer.) Carol, hi, I’m in the middle of something … Well, they better pay it. Expenses are covered, that’s in the contract, and I expect— (She interrupts, and while I’m listening, a very tall man enters the room. He’s at least six nine, with arms and legs that are long, thin, and loose-looking like a puppet’s. His khakis are two inches too short for him and his brown socks are bunched around his ankles. The male manager stands and greets him and they move to a corner and begin whispering.) All right, look, I’ve got to go. We’ll talk about this later. (I hang up.)
MALE MANAGER: (Approaching my chair.) This is Mr. Yeary, the private investigator I told you about.
YEARY: (For a moment he stands over the box and looks down at it. There’s complete silence in the room, except for Tom Lourdes’s labored breathing. Then Yeary looks up at me and smiles, revealing very gray teeth.) Mr. Reece, my client is concerned about a ring that’s in your possession.
AR: Yes, well, I’ve got—
YEARY: (Interrupting, holding up a hand.) Look, I know you have a release for it, and that’s not what’s at question. What isn’t entirely clear is whether Lisa Trundle had the right to give that release.
AR: Well, I made the agreement in good faith and, well, the terms of it haven’t been broken on my part.
YEARY: Yes, we understand this is a murky situation legally and my client wants to settle this without a lot of fuss, so—(He smiles broadly.) — if I could just have evidence that you’re still in possession of the ring, that you haven’t sold it, then my client would be satisfied.
AR: (Sighing.) Well, I’ll have to go out to the car and get it.
YEARY: That’s fine.
(I get up and leave the room, walk outside and get in the station wagon, then start the engine and drive away.)
The Double
In the summer of 1947, Hughes was subpoenaed to testify at Senate hearings on war racketeering. The allegations against him were that he had received $40 million in government contracts for various projects, including the “Spruce Goose,” and hadn’t delivered anything, and that he had paid bribes to military officials, including a colonel who was the late FDR’s son. There was little truth to these charges. Hughes’s projects were on schedule, and although he had wined and dined and provided call girls for FDR’s son and many others, so had every other defense contractor of any size. The real motivation for Hughes’s subpoena was that Pan American Airways wanted the overseas air routes that Hughes’s newly acquired airline, TWA, had just won. The chairman of the committee conducting the hearings, Senator Owen Brewster, was in the pocket of Pan American and before the subpoena was issued Brewster phoned Hughes and told him he would be left alone if he sold the routes to Pan American. Hughes let Brewster finish, then asked him which side of his ass he would like to kiss, the left or the right.
The subpoena for Hughes was never served. U.S. marshals scoured the country but never found him. Hughes avoided the marshals through use of a double. A Hughes aide accidentally discovered an almost exact double for Hughes in, of all places, Schwab’s Drugstore in Hollywood, a place legendary for the “discovery” of unknown actors and actresses. The man, Brucks Randall, was an actor having difficulty getting work exactly because he looked so much like Howard Hughes. Randall was given lessons in talking and acting like Hughes, was dressed in a typical Hughes wardrobe, and then was sent to various locations in the west to stage fake Hughes sightings. The marshals were always a step too late to catch him and during the whole two-month period the double was used, Hughes was hiding out in a suburban Los Angeles home purchased under a false name.
In most doppelgänger stories— Dr. fekyll and Mr. Hyde is a well-known example— the double, or alternate personality of the protagonist, represents our inappropriate desires. Sin is what doppelgänger stories are about. However, instead of having a “bad” double, Hughes tried to create a good one. In a series of memos sent to Brucks Randall over the two months of his employment, Hughes instructed him “to do some of the things I can’t seem to bring myself to do, for whatever damn reason.” Randall was paid four hundred dollars a week— a fine salary at the time— plus expenses.
Hughes memo to Brucks Randall, dated June 2, 1947
1. Dress in disguise so I don’t look like me. Use a fake beard, a bowler, a cane, a built-up left shoe. Walk with a limp. When I speak, use a British accent. My name is Henry Vontobel.
2. Go to the morning service at the 3rd Street Methodist Church.
3. If anyone asks what happened to my leg, say I was an RAF fighter pilot during the war and was injured when I had to bail out over the Channel. If anyone asks what I’m doing in America, tell them I married an American girl who was a Red Cross volunteer in London. Her name is Janice. She is visiting her sister in Cleveland. We have just moved to Tucson and I am seeking work as a salesman.
4. When the offering is taken, put the supplied envelope in the plate. Do not keep the envelope and say to yourself, as I might: To hell with these self-righteous jackasses, they’re not getting a dime of my money to spend on a new Buick so the minister can drive his mouthy wife to bridge parties. Remember, I am Henry Vontobel, British war hero, grateful to be alive and looking forward to starting a family and a new life in America. My wife is a knockout and a sweet girl too. All the death and suffering I saw during the war and all the ignorance and pettiness and blackhearted intentions I see around me daily have some ultimate meaning even if I don’t know what it is.
5. When the congregation prays, bow my head and close my eyes. Do not look around to see how everyone looks while they are praying.
6. After the service, shake hands with confidence. I have no fear of infection.
7. There is a good chance, given my status as a war hero and a newcomer, that I will be invited to dinner after the service. Accept. Eat with gusto whatever they serve no matter how filthy or imperfectly prepared, participate in the conversation no matter how trite, play with the children afterward and tell them stories about my wartime flying exploits, though say nothing that would unman their father. Chances are he does not have th
e tales of derring-do to tell that I do. If anyone asks my age, say thirty-one.
8. Never let me be caught alone with the wife or any daughter older than 16. Do not try to charm the women; they will be enamored of me enough as it is. I must guard against the inclination to arrange a meeting with one of them for later in the week. If one does make a flirtatious move, act like it didn’t happen. But be careful. They are tricky. There is always a smokescreen. I might find myself alone with the wife or older daughter in the kitchen, maybe I have limped in to refill my coffee cup and she is doing the dishes, and she might ask a little too brightly and eagerly when my wife will be back in town, she’d love to meet her— generally this is done so she can know how long the coast is clear. Don’t give a definite date. She might ask what hotel I am staying in: tell her I am changing hotels tomorrow, and I’m not sure where I’m going.
9. If something does happen with the wife or an older good-looking daughter, a hurried embrace in the kitchen or maybe a longer encounter in the cellar or sewing room or some such place where I have gone to see some woman’s project of hers she wants to show off— her canned goods, the newest model wringer washer, a half-finished quilt— do not obsess about her for days and weeks. Think about her for the rest of the night, then let her go! No meetings later in the week.
10. If I do have a minor slip with one of the women, a goof up that Sunday or later in the week while her husband or father is at work, I must immediately upon parting from her get on my knees and ask for forgiveness instead of trying to figure out a way to meet some of her friends. Think about my lovely wife whom I’ve betrayed. Suffer, and let my suffering instruct me.
Brucks Randall, reconstructed from Tom Lourdes’s story notes
Hughes said go to church in Tucson in disguise as a Brit. It was one of those churches where everybody’s smile looked like it was held up with safety pins, so after the service I got plenty of lunch invitations. I accepted the choir director’s because he had a daughter who looked good enough to make a deacon punch out a stained glass window. She was a college girl and during the afternoon I set up a lunch date with her— I said I wanted her to give me the lowdown on Tucson since I was new to town. On Tuesday we met, one thing led to another, and she came back to my hotel. Hughes had said don’t touch the women, but I did and the sky didn’t fall, so I had her over again on Friday.
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