It was August 8, 1974 and history was happening, everyone in town had retreated to their living rooms to watch the important moment.
Duke sat alone in his office.
He had stripped off his suit jacket hours ago, draping it over the back of the leather chair, his white dress shirt unbuttoned at the collar, the sleeves pushed up past his forearms.
He wasn't looking at the financial ledgers, nor the scripts on the desk.
His gaze was locked on the television, a small RCA set resting on a metal rolling cart. It was tuned to the ABC News broadcast.
On the glass screen, the East Room of the White House looked small. Richard Nixon stood behind the presidential podium. His shoulders were slumped.
Duke took a slow sip of whisky, letting the heat bloom on his chest.
He watched as Nixon began to speak.
Nixon Didn't start talking about the tapes or the impending vote by the House Judiciary Committee, or the legal peril that awaited him.
He started talking about his parents.
"My mother was a saint," Nixon said.
Duke leaned forward, resting his forearms on the desk.
He knew the biography well. In a world run by the sons of the elite, Nixon was an anomaly.
He was the kid who wore his older brother's hand-me-down shoes, abrilliant student who won a scholarship to Harvard, only to turn it down because his family needed him to stay home and work to keep them out of bankruptcy.
As the President's voice continued, a couple tears went down his cheeks, Duke felt a surprising flicker of sympathy.
The Republican establishment had been thrilled to ride Nixon's coattails when he was delivering historic electoral landslides and opening up China.
But the moment he transitioned from a political asset to a liability, they had shoved him under the bus. Sacrificed the king to save the board.
Duke reached out and twisted the dial, killing the television feed.
He stood up, walking over to the window. Below him, the studio lot was sort of empty, with people probably watching the TV.
"He thought the office made him untouchable," Duke murmured to his own reflection in the glass. "He believed he was necessary."
Duke knew better.
The RNC hadn't abandoned Nixon because of a moral awakening about Watergate, they abandoned him because keeping him was costing them too much.
'I can not let that happen', Duke thought, 'I need to become so fundamental in the architecture of this country, that cutting me loose would cost them more than they could afford to pay.'
Before he could turn away from the window, the ring of a telephone shattered the quietnesss of the office.
It wasn't the standard multi-line phone that his assistant used to route directors or talent agents.
It was the red secure line sitting on the corner of his desk. Very few people possessed the routing number for that device.
Duke crossed the carpet and lifted the receiver. "Hauser."
"Mr. Hauser. Good evening. Or perhaps, given the circumstances, I should say good luck to us all."
The accent was clear, a clear Mississippi drawl. Duke recognized it immediately. It was Mary Louise Smith.
Just weeks ago, she had been already choosen to be appointed by Gerald Ford to replace George H.W. Bush as the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee.
A historic appointment, the first woman to run the RNC. In an era defined by scandals, Smith was widely respected as a moderate. She was the clean face the party needed.
"Chairwoman Smith," Duke replied smoothly, leaning his hip against the edge of the desk. "A historic night indeed. I suspect there's very little sleep happening in Washington right now."
A soft, tired chuckle came through the line. "You are entirely correct about that, Duke. I am calling you tonight under the radar. I wanted to personally thank you for your assistance which i'm sure we will need more of in the future."
She was referring to the meeting at his New York brownstone. The handshake with Barry Goldwater and George Bush. Duke had kept his end of the bargain.
He had used the reach of his American News Exchange (ANE) syndication network to subtly stabilize the national narrative.
He hadn't printed propaganda, but he had buried the most inflammatory left-wing editorials and smoothed out the edges of the news cycle, giving the GOP some breathing room it needed to organize a transition of power.
"We are currently in the midst of a top-to-bottom structural reorganization," Smith continued, her tone shifting to business.
"Gerald Ford will take the oath of office tomorrow morning. The immediate goal is to project stability. But the long-term goal is 1976, we have to rebuild our foundation."
"The Democrats are going to run an aggressive campaign," Duke noted.
"They are. Which is why we are gathering our most allies. I am personally extending a confidential invitation for you to attend a closed-door RNC strategy session in Washington on September 16. You'll be meeting with key committee members, senior senators, and the architects of the upcoming campaign."
"We need people like you right now, Duke. People who understand the mechanics of mass communication, who know how the game is actually played, and who don't have the ego to need their name on a ballot."
Duke calculated the angles. This was the natural evolution of the Goldwater handshake.
"I would be honored to attend, Mary," Duke said, keeping his voice even. "But you understand my position. Paramount is a global entity. The entertainment industry leans heavily to the left."
"If my physical presence at an RNC strategy meeting leaks to the Washington Post, it compromises my ability to manage my studio effectively."
"You have my guarantee of discretion," Smith replied without hesitation. "Your name will not appear on any registry, visitor log, or donor list. There will be no press on the premises. As far as the public is concerned, you are just a Hollywood tycoon focused on selling movie tickets."
"Then I'll see you on the 16."
Duke placed the receiver gently back. He grabbed his suit jacket, turned off the desk lamp, and walked out into the corridor.
Nixon had clawed his way up, only to be discarded. Duke needed to make sure the next person in that position wasn't him
The next morning, the California sun was bright, burning off the smog across the Paramount lot.
Inside his office, the television was on again, the volume muted.
Gerald Ford stood in the East Room, his hand resting on a Bible held by his wife, Betty.
He was taking the oath of office, 38th President of the United States.
The multi-line phone on Duke's desk rang. Duke picked it up, pressing the button for line one.
"Are you watching this?"
It was Barry Diller.
"I'm watching," Duke said, pouring himself a cup of coffee from the decanter on his desk.
"Ford is decent," Diller said, "He has zero television charisma, but there's people saying Ford might issue a pardon for Nixon to force the country to move on."
Duke took a sip of his coffee.
"If he issues a pardon, it's going to demolish his approval ratings," Duke said calmly. "The country wants blood, Barry. They want to see Nixon in handcuffs. If Ford takes that away, the Democrats will use it as their political tool for the next two years."
"Exactly," Diller agreed. "The RNC is in a state of panic. They are still purging Nixon loyalists. Nobody even knows who is actually steering the ship for 1976."
"Let them," Duke said. "If the RNC seems to hopeless, I wouldn't mind flipping to the democrats."
"Also, remind our friends at the agencies that Paramount has been an island of stability during this... whole thing. We expect a frictionless environment moving forward."
"I'll make the calls," Diller promised. "Oh, before I forget. Look at the morning trades."
Duke pulled the stack of Hollywood trade papers toward him.
Chinatown was a critical and commercial juggernaut. The Robert Evans produced noir was already crossing the 10 million-dollar mark in its initial run.
Right beside it was Death Wish. The studio had taken a gamble on the violent Charles Bronson thriller.
Cultural elites and elite critics in New York had condemned the film as fascist trash. But the working-class audiences were lining up around the block cheering at the screen.
"The slate is performing great," Duke noted, a smile touching his lips. "Don't touch a thing. Let the creative side run."
He was too busy to actually arrange things right now.
He hung up the phone.
Four hours later, just after lunch, the secure line rang again. Duke answered it to find Diller back on the phone.
"Duke. I just got off a phone call with my contact at the Department of Justice."
Duke leaned forward, his body going still. "And?"
The federal investigation into the Paramount Records division had hung over the studio, luckily the Watergate incident had taken a lot of press from them so it wasnt a massive PR problem.
"It's gone," Diller breathed, the relief palpable. "The investigation is officially closed. No criminal indictments. No civil fines. The file has been stamped shut."
"Did your contact say why?" Duke asked, though he already knew the answer.
"He said word came down from the Attorney General's office to reallocate resources. He mentioned that some people had made it clear that prosecuting an American media institution wasn't in the national interest right now."
It was the Goldwater handshake. The machinery of Washington had stepped in, altering the trajectory of the federal government to protect Duke's assets.
"Barry," Duke said, "Mobilize our internal legal team today, I want every internal memo, unfiled document, ledger, and stray piece of paper connected to that investigation physically destroyed. Burn it. Shred it. I don't care how you do it, but leave nothing behind for an ambitious prosecutor to magically find a decade from now."
"Consider it done," Diller said.
Duke hung up the phone. He stood up and walked back to the window. The lot felt more alive now. Carpenters hauling lumber, Duke wondered how his Carpenter friend, Harrison Ford was doing.
He pressed the intercom button on his desk. "Cancel my afternoon meetings. I'm driving to Owlwood."
When Duke pulled his car up the driveway, the front door of the estate were already open. Standing in the living room was Margaux Hemingway.
She had just returned from Paris, wearing a loose-fitting silk dress. She was pacing the marble floor, her arms wrapped around her own waist.
When she saw Duke, she stopped, her wide eyes welling up with tears.
"Margaux?" Duke asked, dropping his briefcase on a side table amd steeping closer to her. "What's wrong? What happened?"
"I went to a private clinic in Beverly Hills this morning," she whispered, "I've been feeling sick since I was in France and still can't eat chicken. Tired all the time. I thought it was just the jet lag or the stress from the shoots."
"But I went to the doctor, and they did this new test. It's called a tube immunoassay. They take your blood, and it measures the actual hormone levels so there are no false positives."
"Duke. I'm pregnant, I'm two months pregnant."
Margaux didn't wait for him to respond. She stepped backward, "Im so scared, Duke. I just signed a new contract. The fashion industry doesn't wait for mothers. They'll drop me. My career is going to be destroyed just as it's starting."
She let out a sob. "And I'm terrified of what you're going to say. Don't be angry with me. I know how much you hate complicati-"
He stepped forward, bridging the gap between them, and wrapped his arms around her. He pulled her against his chest, holding her.
"Stop," Duke murmured, "Stop talking..."
Margaux buried her face in his shirt, her shoulders shaking as she cried.
Duke's mind flashed back to a history of Hollywood.
Jean Spangler, a beautiful young actress from the 1940s who had vanished off the face of the earth and never found.
Most theories aimed that she had gotten pregnant by a powerful man and sought a back-alley solution to protect his reputation.
He pulled back just slightly, keeping his hands on her shoulders, and made her look him in the eye.
"Margaux, listen to me," he said with sincerity. "I could never be angry about this. I don't give a damn about the studio's public image, and I certainly don't care if some magazine has to find a new girl for the winter issue."
She sniffled, looking at him. "You aren't mad?"
"I'm overjoyed," Duke said.
In this life, in this secondary existence where he was navigating the 1970s with knowledge of the future he had accumulated wealth, and power. But he had been entirely alone.
This child was basically his first family member in this world.
"I am powerful enough to bend this industry to my will," Duke told her, "If the fashion houses drop you, I will buy some fashion houses and put you on the board of directors. The second you are ready to return to the runway, your career will be waiting for you. I will make sure of it."
Margaux stared at him, the panic in her eyes slowly dissolving, replaced by relief.
"We are going to do this together," Duke said gently, wiping a tear from her cheek with his thumb. "You have nothing to be afraid of."
It was way more common in this era, for a unmarried tycoon like Duke to want to get rid of a possible pr scandal by having the girl get an abortion.
Margaux leaned against his chest, wrapping her arms around his waist. "I was terrified," she whispered.
"I know," Duke said, "Things are safe now."
They stood there for a long time.
Eventually, Duke pulled back with a small smile. "Now we need to start making some actual plans."
Margaux wiped her eyes, a smile breaking through. "Plans?"
"Yes," Duke said smoothly. "I need you to start researching what breed of ornamental cows you wanted."
"You're an idiot," she laughed, lightly hitting him in the chest.
"I'm serious," Duke said, "Highland cattle. The ones with the bangs."
In his past life, he always wanted to get one and make crazy hairstyles on them.
Margaux laughed, the last of her anxiety vanishing.
___
name for a first son? Must sound good with Hauser as a last name