(9 of 15)
Hunt and I walked easily past the desk to the front door and the street. The place was swarming with police and squad cars.
It was about 3 a.m., when I eased my way into the bedroom, trying not to awaken Fran. After a moment she stirred.
"Is that you?"
"Yes."
"Anything wrong?"
"There was trouble. Some people got caught. I'll probably be going to jail."
The Cover-Up Begins
I went to a secure phone in the Sit Room [White House Situation Room]. When the White House operator got Jeb Magruder in California, I told him that I had an urgent message for John Mitchell that had to be delivered before his noon press conference and over a secure phone. In the Situation Room I had access to a KYX scrambler. The Situation Room personnel told me that the closest KYX to Magruder was at an Air Force missile base nearby, and I told Magruder to go there.
"Why? I can't just go wandering off to some missile base and ask to use the scrambler on your say-so. Be reasonable!"
Good old Magruder. If the plane was crashing he'd object to the inconvenience of putting on a parachute.
"Listen, Jeb, Goddamn it. Get your ass to a secure phone and call me, or I guarantee by noon Mitchell will be building you a new one." I hung up.
Magruder called me back in a short while. "I haven't got long. What's the problem?"
I told him that five of my men had been arrested in the Watergate and that it could compromise the committee.
"You mean it can be traced?" Magruder reacted with horror in his voice. "How can that be, Gordon? You said..."
"Because one of them's Jim McCord, that's why. He's under an alias, but I don't know how long it'll hold up."
"You used McCord?Why, Gordon? Why?'
"Listen, Jeb, this is not time for recriminations. I take responsibility, O.K.? But that's not the problem now. The problem is Mitchell's got a press conference out there at noon. He could get questions on this. He's got to know and have a statement ready or he could be sandbagged."
I was called to the phone [again]. Magruder had a message for me from Mitchell.*I was to find Dick Kleindienst, the Attorney General, and ask him to get McCord out of jail immediately. "Tell him 'John sent you' and it's a 'personal request from John.' He'll understand."
I didn't argue. From experience as a prosecutor I knew that the number of people involved in trying to effect a request like that could only make matters worse. But an order from John Mitchell to pass along a message was not to be disobeyed. I found Kleindienst at the Burning Tree golf course, seated at a table in the middle of the dining room, lunching with others. I caught his eye and gestured to him. He caught my signal and made his way to me. I told him that I had a personal message from John Mitchell and we'd need privacy. Kleindienst nodded toward a locker area. Kleindienst asked: "What's this about John?"
I asked Kleindienst whether he'd heard of the arrests in the Watergate, and he said, "Yeah, Henry Petersen [Assistant Attorney General]