_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 7/23/67. Boston _Globe_ headline and subhead:
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 7/29/67. Detroit _Free Press_ headline and subhead:
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 7/30/67. Boston _Globe_ headline and subhead:
KING TO PRESS:
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 8/2/67. Washington _Post_ subhead:
RIOT DAMAGE MOUNTS; POLICE CALL DISTRICT "COMBAT ZONE"
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 8/5/67. Los Angeles _Times_ headline and subhead:
KING ON RIOTS:
_DOCUMENT INSERT_: 8/6/67. Telephone call transcript. Taped by: BLUE RABBIT. Marked: "FBI-Scrambled" / "Stage- 1 Covert" / "Destroy Without Reading in the Event of My Death." Speaking: BLUE RABBIT, FATHER RABBIT.
BR: Senior, hi.
FR: How are you, Dwight? It's been a while.
BR: Don't mind the clicks. My scrambler's on the fritz.
FR: I don't mind. I'd rather talk than mess with pouches.
BR: Have you been watching the news? The natives are restless.
FR: King predicted it.
BR: No, he promised it, and now he's gloating.
FR: He's making enemies. There's times I think we might not get there first.
BR: There's times I agree. The Outfit hates him, and every cracker in captivity has got his tits in a twist. You should hear my listening-post tapes.
FR: Shitfire, I'd like to.
BR: There's a joint in St. Louis. A dump called the Grapevine. Outfit guys and sub-lease hoods frequent it. They've been talking up a fifty-grand bounty. It's starting to feel like a giant wet dream out there in the spiritus mundi.
FR: You slay me. "Wet Dream" and "Spiritus Mundi" in the same sentence.
BR: I'm a chameleon. I'm like Ward Littell that way. I alter my vocabulary to suit the company I'm with.
FR: At least you know it. I can't say Littell's that much in control of his effects.
BR: He is and he isn't.
FR: For instance?
BR: For instance, he watches for tails everywhere he goes. Mr. Hoover's been running spots on him off and on for years, and he knows it. He catches 90% and misses 10. He's probably got just enough hubris to think he's batting a hundred.
FR: Hubris. I like it.
BR: You should. I picked it up at Yale Law.
FR: Boola, boola.
BR: Tell me about the intercepts. By my lights, your son should be twelve weeks in.
FR: More like eight. You know how he travels for Bondurant. It took him months to set up his system.
BR: Tell me about it.
FR: He rented a place in D.C. He's pulling mail off King, Barry Goldwater, and Bobby Kennedy. The Bureau's running normal intercepts, and all their mail comes addressed to the SCLC headquarters and the Senate Office Building. There's a four-agent team running a mail drop at 16th and "D." The night shift goes home at 11:00, so Wayne lets himself in at 1:00, pulls the mail, copies it and returns it at 5:00. He shuttles down from New York when he rotates in from Saigon.
BR: How does he get in?
FR: He made a mold of the door lock and had duplicate keys made.
BR: And he picks up at irregular intervals?
FR: Right. All synced to his rotations. He print-dusts the mail he picks up, since those hate-mail guys never put their return addresses on the envel-
BR: It's redundant. The mail teams dust the incomings. Everything's been wiped by the time he sees it.
FR: Shitfire. My boy's a chemist. He sprays the pages with some goop called ninbydrin and brings up partial prints all the time. He said he's working out his technique, and one of these days he'll be able to bring up completes.
BR: Okay. He's good. You've convinced me.
FR: And he's careful.
BR: He'd better be. We do not want it known that outside eyes saw that mail.
FR: I told you. He's care-
BR: What about prospects?
FR: None so far. All he's got are a bunch of lunatics who sound like they're one step ahead of the net.
BR: Bob's got a prospect. We might not need Wayne's help on that end.
FR: Bob should have told me. Shitfire, I'm his runner.
BR: You're his Daddy Rabbit. There's things he won't tell you for just that reason.
FR: All right. You tell me.
BR: The guy escaped from the Missouri State Pen in April. Bob knew him when he worked as a guard there. They were jungled up in Bob's right-wing foolishness.
FR: That's all you've got?
BR: Bob's pouching me a memo. I'll forward it to you.
FR: Shit, Dwight. You know I've got a veto on this.
BR: Yeah, you do, and we won't use the guy unless we both agree that he's perfect.
FR: Come on. You owe me more-
BR: He's on the lam. He was afraid to stay at Bob's compound, so he split to Canada. Bob's got a line on him. If we agree that he's the guy, I'll send Fred Otash up to work him.
FR: Hands-on? I thought we'd bring in some cutouts.
BR: I made Freddy lose 60 pounds. He was tall and heavy, now he's tall and thin.
FR: He looks different.
BR: Completely. He's Lebanese, he speaks Spanish, we can pass him off as some kind of beaner. Bob said the prospect is malleable. Freddy eats up that kind of guy.
FR: You like the guy.
BR: He's a strong prospect. Read the memo and let me know what you think.
FR: Shit. This is taking time.
BR: All good things do.
FR: Someone might beat us to it.
BR: If they do, they do.
FR: What's Mr. Hoover been-
BR: He's afraid that Marty and Bobby will team up. It's all he talks about. BLACK RABBIT's been up in the air since the shakedown flopped. Hoover knows I'm "exploring more radical means," but he hasn't asked me a single question about it since I made the proposal.
FR: That means he knows what you're planning.
BR: Maybe, maybe not. Second-guessing the old poof gets us nowhere.
FR: Dwight, Jesus.
BR: Come on. Remember what I told you? He can't read minds and he can't patch scrambled calls.
FR: Still.
BR: What about Durfee? Have your LAPD guys turned up anything?
FR: Nothing. They've got covert bulletins out, but they haven't got a single goddamn bite.
BR: First we've got to find him. Then we've got to rig it so Wayne doesn't know that we're handing him up.
FR: That's easy. We stiff a call through Sonny Liston, who's allegedly got people out looking for Durfee, not that that impresses-
BR: I want that wedge. I'm not bringing Wayne any closer without one.
FR: I owe him Durfee. I have a debt to repay to him, and Durfee will settle it.
BR: I'll put my sources on him. Between yours and mine, we might hit.
FR: Let's try. I owe Wayne that.
BR: I'm glad I never had any kids. They end up killing unarmed Negroes and pushing heroin.
FR: The Gospel According to Dwight Chalfont Holly.
BR: Enough. Let's discuss ops money.
FR: I'm in for two hundred cold. You know that.
BR: Otash wants fifty cold.
FR: I'm sure he's worth it.
BR: Bob's putting in a hundred.
FR: Shitfire. He hasn't got that kind of money.
BR: Are you sitting down?
FR: Yes. Why-