Hugo said: “Hoover will undoubtedly mention this next time he meets with Bobby. So don’t try to keep it to yourself.”

That thought had crossed George’s mind, but now he said: “Of course not.” It had been a bad idea anyway.

“So what will you do?”

“I’ll tell Bobby,” George said. “He’ll decide.” He left the room.

He went up in the elevator to the fifth floor. Several Justice Department officials were just coming out of Bobby’s office. George looked in. As usual, Bobby had his jacket off, his shirtsleeves rolled, and his glasses on. He had evidently just finished a meeting. George checked his watch: he had a few minutes before his next meeting. He walked in.

Bobby greeted him warmly. “Hi, George, how are things with you?”

It had been like this ever since the day George had imagined Bobby was about to hit him. Bobby treated him like a bosom pal. George wondered if that was a pattern. Maybe Bobby had to quarrel with someone before becoming close.

“Bad news,” George said.

“Sit down and tell me.”

George closed the door. “Hoover says he’s found a Communist in Martin Luther King’s circle.”

“Hoover is a troublemaking cocksucker,” said Bobby.

George was startled. Did Bobby mean that Hoover was queer? It seemed impossible. Maybe Bobby was just being insulting. “Name of Stanley Levison,” George said.

“Who is he?”

“A lawyer Dr. King has consulted about tax and other matters.”

“In Atlanta?”

“No, Levison is based in New York.”

“It doesn’t sound like he’s really close to King.”

“I don’t believe he is.”

“But that hardly matters,” Bobby said wearily. “Hoover can always make it sound worse than it is.”

“The FBI says Levison is a Communist, but they won’t tell me what evidence they have, though they might tell you.”

“I don’t want to know anything about their sources of information.” Bobby held up his hands, palms outward, in a defensive gesture. “I’d be blamed for every goddamn leak forever after.”

“They don’t even have Levison’s party card number.”

“They don’t fucking know,” Bobby said. “They’re just guessing. But it makes no difference. People will believe it.”

“What are we going to do?”

“King has to break with Levison,” Bobby said decisively. “Otherwise Hoover will leak this, King will be damaged, and the whole civil rights mess will just get worse.”

George did not think of the civil rights campaign as a “mess,” but the Kennedy brothers did. However, that was not the point. Hoover’s accusation was a threat that had to be dealt with, and Bobby was right: the simplest solution was for King to break with Levison. “But how are we going to get Dr. King to do that?” George asked.

Bobby said: “You’re going to fly down to Atlanta and tell him to.”

George was daunted. Martin Luther King was famous for defying authority, and George knew from Verena that in private as well as in public King could not easily be talked into anything. But George hid his apprehension behind a calm veneer. “I’ll call now and make an appointment.” He went to the door.