“It’s titled ‘Project Celebrity,’” he said. “A list of celebrities they want to recruit. Winchell, Murrow, Dietrich.”

“A bunch of gossip columnists on there too,” Margaret added. “Parsons and Kilgallen. Hedda Hopper. Walter Lippmann.”

Kennedy turned around and cocked his head toward White. “I suppose nowadays gossip passes for news,” he said, holding out his hand for the document. Kennedy glanced at it for a few seconds, then folded it and put it in his inside jacket pocket. “What happened to the car you drove to the church?”

“We went back and got it the next night,” Charlie said, impressed with the attorney general’s attention to detail. “Took a cab to a spot five blocks away. No one saw us.”

“The same car you drove tonight?” Kennedy asked.

“Yes,” said Charlie. “It’s our rental car.”

Margaret didn’t think anyone from the church had seen them arrive, but who knew; they were a suspicious lot and the odds of surveillance weren’t negligible.

“You two can go back to the hotel and clean up,” Kennedy said. “Then around lunch I need you to sit down with Addington and give a full accounting of everything you’ve seen.”

“We’ve told you everything,” Margaret said.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” White said. “We want every last detail. Projects Sinatra is working on, the behavior of various Rats in the Pack.”

“Projects he’s working on?” Charlie said wearily. “There’s a screenplay about the U.S. accidentally dropping an A-bomb on North Carolina and covering it up.”

Kennedy and White looked at each other.

“Yes, all of that,” White said. “We’ll go over every detail.”

“And then we can go home?” Charlie said. “Back to New York.”

“You can go back east when production moves back east in a few weeks,” Kennedy said. “But until then, you need to figure out this Lola business.”

Charlie realized what Kennedy was saying. “Wait, you want us to figure out who’s framing us?”

“You’re in the best position to do it,” Kennedy said. “If it’s the Mob that did it—and that would be my theory—stick around to see what they do next.”

“Continue as a consultant to Manchurian Candidate,” White said. “There’s about five or six weeks of shooting left, Krim tells me. Soon some of it will be in New York, as you know. But you need to stay on this case until you figure out who killed the girl.”

Charlie sighed wearily. Defeated, deflated. Then he sat up in his seat. “We have an ask of you too, then.”

“Really?” Kennedy said, stunned. He wasn’t used to folks behind the eight ball trying to rack the table.

White jumped in. “Congressman, you’re really in no position—”

“No, no, Addy,” Kennedy interrupted. “That’s fine, I want to hear what he has to say.”