Citizen Hughes - Michael Drosnin [193]
“Howard, if I cannot get answers from you in matters as important as TWA, Air West, LAA, I really don’t know why I should continue worrying about these things alone.
“After all, in the last analysis, the only person who stands to get hurt is yourself and ultimately, however devastating the results may be, they will have very little to do with me personally or my future life. If I do not get answers from you I am stymied.
“I have no reason to believe that I will hear from you for the next two or three months,” concluded the cast-aside pen pal. “It appears, therefore, that this might be the propitious time for me to take a much needed vacation, and perhaps this will enable me to stop having these sleepless nights.
“In sincere friendship, Bob.”
Maheu’s threat to go AWOL finally broke Hughes’s silence. In his first memo to Maheu in weeks, the recluse—trapped in his penthouse, unable to make good his own escape, about to lose his own wife (who had finally filed for divorce), beset by financial crises, and in failing health—lashed out bitterly at his deserting lieutenant.
“I don’t think the rebuke and hostility expressed in your last message is one damn bit justified,” replied Hughes through his aides.
“I have been very ill lately. I have had a personal problem of the enth magnitude involving my wife. And I simply have not been able to keep abreast of the inflow of all these communications. This is not the fault of my staff, it might be my fault, but really it is nobody’s fault but just a fault of the system. I am trying to carry the load of 25 normal men.
“The matters to which you refer are still in the pipeline to me,” continued the wretched recluse. “If you think this entitles you to go into a fit of rage and sail off to Europe then it certainly is, in my opinion, a peculiar way of demonstrating this loyal, everlasting friendship we have been talking about.
“You may have a lot of political friends and a lot of people who profess to be your friends, but I don’t think you have so damn many left who are really, truly reliable friends of yours that you can afford to throw away the one who may be the most reliable and most important of all, namely me.
“If you think you can dispense with me as a friend, go ahead and sail on off to Europe and enjoy yourself,” added Hughes, hurling a bitter bon voyage at the man he planned to dump overboard. “Please regard it as the end of what I have considered to be a true and loyal and personal friendship.”
It was not so much losing Maheu as the thought of losing control over him that drove Hughes crazy. For years he had been unable to let Maheu free for a day, for a night, for even a few hours, could hardly bear to let him sleep, and now, even as he withdrew behind his Mormons and plotted to escape his alter ego, Hughes could not contemplate letting Maheu escape his control.
But Maheu was not really ready to ship out.
“I am sure that you know that in the last analysis I could not find it within myself to leave for Europe or to be unavailable to you at a time like this for one damn moment,” he assured Hughes. “Let us say, therefore, that if the message to which you refer has done nothing more but to reopen communications it perhaps was not in vain.
“I can assure you that if I were not concerned and if I did not care about your well being, I sure as hell would not have spent as many sleepless nights as I have during the last several weeks. Your staff can testify as to the number of telephone calls they have received from me at 3 and 5 AM when I was wide awake because of my deep concern.
“Howard, I do not particularly appreciate your statement relative to my friends and contacts,” Maheu continued, heatedly defending his fidelity to his jealous partner. “You better believe that I have them, but it has been many years now since I have thought of them only as they relate to you. I am deeply hurt that you have