George picked up the phone and called Joe Hugo at FBI headquarters, which was on another floor in the same Justice Department building. “What is this shit?” he said.

Joe knew immediately what he was talking about and did not bother to pretend otherwise. “It’s not my fault your friends are Commies,” he said. “Don’t shoot the messenger.”

“This is not a report. It’s a smear of unsupported allegations.”

“We have evidence.”

“Evidence that can’t be produced is not evidence, Joe, it’s hearsay—weren’t you listening in law school?”

“Sources of intelligence have to be protected.”

“Who have you sent this crap to?”

“Let me check. Ah . . . the White House, the secretary of state, the defense secretary, the CIA, the army, the navy, and the air force.”

“So it’s all over Washington, you asshole.”

“Obviously we don’t try to conceal information about our nation’s enemies.”

“This is a deliberate attempt to sabotage the president’s civil rights bill.”

“We would never do a thing like that, George. We’re just a law enforcement agency.” Joe hung up.

George took a few minutes to recover his temper. Then he went through the report underlining the most outrageous allegations. He typed a note listing the government departments to which the report had been sent, according to Joe. Then he took the document in to Bobby.

As always, Bobby sat at his desk with his jacket off, his tie loosened, and his glasses on. He was smoking a cigar. “You’re not going to like this,” George said. He handed over the report, then summarized it.

“That cocksucker Hoover,” said Bobby.

It was the second time George had heard Bobby call Hoover a cocksucker. “You don’t mean that literally,” George said.

“Don’t I?”

George was startled. “Is Hoover a homo?” It was hard to imagine. Hoover was a short, overweight man with thinning hair, a squashed nose, lopsided features, and a thick neck. He was the opposite of a fairy.

Bobby said: “I hear the Mob has photos of him in a woman’s dress.”

“Is that why he goes around saying there is no such thing as the Mafia?”

“It’s one theory.”

“Jesus.”

“Make an appointment for me to see him tomorrow.”

“Okay. In the meantime, let me go through the Levison wiretaps. If Levison is influencing King toward Communism, there must be evidence in those phone calls. Levison would have to talk about the bourgeoisie, the masses, class struggle, revolution, the dictatorship of the proletariat, Lenin, Marx, the Soviet Union, like that. I’ll make a note of every such reference and see what they add up to.”

“That’s not a bad idea. Let me have a memo before I meet with Hoover.”

George returned to his office and sent for the transcripts of the wiretap on Stanley Levison’s phone—faithfully copied to the Justice Department by Hoover’s FBI. Half an hour later a file clerk wheeled a cart into the room.

George started work. Next time he looked up was when a cleaner opened his door and asked if she could sweep his office. He stayed at his desk while she worked around him. He remembered “pulling all-nighters” at Harvard Law, especially during the absurdly demanding first year.