Hughes could not hold still. He was upset by Laxalt’s wavering support, and he was angry.
“Do you think maybe it is just barely possible that the Gov. is cooling just a little bit toward me?” he wondered, feeling unappreciated. “Maybe now that I have contributed the 100 million to the sagging Vegas economy and stopped the run on the bank (so to speak) is it just possible he has decided I am more of a liability than an assett?”
The more Hughes brooded on Laxalt’s ingratitude, the angrier he got. Hold still? Hell, he would take his money where it was appreciated.
“I can only call the shots as I see them, Bob,” he fumed. “I think this multiple ownership howl is a lot of shit.
“I will lay you ten to one that if I tell the Gov. that I will be willing—unhappy but willing—to divert our investments elsewhere if that is really what he wants, but I wish to be very sure he realizes the situation. I have at least another hundred and fifty million to invest. Since moving here, I have turned down three very attractive investments simply because they were not in Nevada.
“Now, if the Gov. looks at this fairly I dont think he will want to see me put 40,000,000 in a hotel-casino in Venezuela where I have an unbelieveable offer. I think he may prefer not to have multiple licensing up to a point. But when it reaches the spot where he has to stand by and see us plant 40,000,000 down in Venezuela, I dont think he will go for it. Not when he need only pick up the phone to keep the 40 right here.”
But why wait for Laxalt to pick up the phone? Hughes had a bold idea: he would call Laxalt! That should buck him up. Yes, he would do it. It had been a long time, but Howard Hughes was now ready to reach out and touch someone.
To soothe the nervous governor, the phantom placed a phone call to the statehouse. It was the first time he had talked to anyone outside his inner circle since coming to Nevada, and the conversation was banner headline news throughout the state: “GOVERNOR TALKS TO HUGHES.” Something like the Second Coming.
“It was one of the most interesting conversations of my life,” Laxalt proclaimed, seemingly dazzled by the billionaire’s grasp of state affairs and his big plans for Nevada. The governor, however, failed to mention what Hughes himself considered most important.
It was not the Stardust, it was not the Slipper, it was not the threat of a legislative probe or the growing resistance to his casino-buying spree. It was not even his plans to make Laxalt president. It was something far more important than all that. It was the water. Hughes was in an absolute frenzy about the water.
“When I spoke to Gov. Laxalt,” he complained a few days later, “I told him I was truly and urgently alarmed at the way the authorities were rushing ahead into the so-called ‘Southern Nevada Water Project.’ I told him I felt the entire plan simply was not palatable. That the water might be treated with sufficient chlorine so that it would meet the minimum test requirements and be technically drinkable—just as they boast that you can drink the effluent of the Los Angeles sewage disposal plant.
“But that is not the point. This is a resort, and we have to make the air and the water etc. not just non-poisonous but attractive, tasty, palatable. We are in competition with other resorts and if it becomes known that our new water system is nothing but a closed-circuit loop, leading in and out of a cesspool, our competitive resorts will find this out and they will start a word-of-mouth and publicity campaign that will murder us.
“Anyway, it is not the actual purity of the water that counts. In this case, where we are considering a resort, the question is how many tourists will be dissuaded from coming to Las Vegas by the word-of-mouth campaigns of Hawaii, Florida, and all the other U.S. resorts sneering at the spectacle of people swimming, bathing, and drinking water which is nothing more or less than diluted piss and shit.”
Hughes had gone on at some length and with considerable passion about the purity of fluids, and Laxalt had been quick to agree with him.
“The Gov. said he was aware of this situation and was ‘sick about it,’” the billionaire continued, recalling their conversation. “Those were his words. I said I felt no matter how far the present program had progressed, it had to be changed. I urged him to see what could be done to hold it up temporarily while he and I try to find some solution.
“I have not heard a word in reply, and it appears everything is going right ahead,” complained Hughes, for the moment more puzzled than angered by Laxalt’s inexplicable failure to scuttle the multimillion-dollar water project. “Why haven’t I heard from him?”
Not only was the governor strangely silent about the water but he also remained reluctant to ram through two more casino licenses for Hughes. Obviously it was going to take more than a phone call to get Laxalt fully motivated. In order to expand his domain and make his new kingdom a fit place to dwell—to protect himself by becoming absolute sovereign and banishing all contamination—Hughes would have to make at least one additional purchase. He would have to buy Laxalt.
“Now, to make the Laxalt deal work, we have to find a means of motivation,” he wrote.
“When I have a real tough assignment like this, I search about for two ingredients: 1. A man who can do the job if he truly wants to. And, 2. A means of furnishing a consideration to this man which will be of such a nature and such an amount as to be well nigh overpowering in its effect upon the man.
“Now, Bob, I think Laxalt can be brought to a point where he will just about entrust his entire political future to his relationship with us. I think that is the way it should be and the way it can be.
“I think we must convince him beyond a shadow of a doubt that I intend to back him with unlimited support right into the White-House in 1972. I think I must even set up some legal entity charged with doing this job, and said intity must be self perpetuating, so that, in [the] event of my death, or change of political objectives, the financial support for Laxalt will continue uninterrupted.
“Anyway, to return to my original thought, if we can truly convince the Governor that his future destiny lies with me, then I am positive that, with a little coaching from me at the time, he will have no difficulty in accomplishing our objective.”
An eternal “Laxalt-for-President” slush fund. That should motivate the governor, indeed have an overpowering effect upon him. Hughes, however, was not content to let it go at that. As in all his acquisitions he needed one-hundred-percent control, and he was worried that others might get their hooks into the man he was grooming to be Leader of the Free World.
“I am fearful that somebody or some company may be getting to Gov. Laxalt on a sub-rosa basis,” wrote Hughes.
“[W]e must show enough interest to keep the Gov. solely and exclusively devoted to our interests. The first time he ties up with somebody like K[erkorian] or Crosby of Mary Carter Paint or any other source of financing, I think we will be forced to pull out of here lock stock and barrell. I am ready to ride with this man to the end of the line, which I am targeting as the White House in 1972,” he reiterated, “but there is no room in our program for a second angel.”
No, Hughes could not share his governor. And it would be four years before he could promote Laxalt from the statehouse to the White House. In the interim he had to find some means of keeping Laxalt devoted. Perhaps promise him a second term as governor, maybe just offer to put him on the payroll. Or why not both? Hughes was ready to let Laxalt write his own ticket.
“Any time you will tell me to go ahead,” he informed Maheu, “I am prepared to make a personal phone call to Laxalt and tell him it is my desire that he remain governor and that I promise unlimited support for this campaign, and, further, that should he fail to be elected governor for another term, I want him to accept a position in private industry which I know will meet his requirements, no matter how extreme they may be.