either no one knew or no one was willing to say

~~~ Gonna tell you a story
that you won't believe
But I fell in love last Friday eve-
nin'--with a girl I saw on a
bar-room T.V. screen

Well I was just gettin' ready
to get my hat
When she caught my eye
and I put it back
And I ordered myself --
a couple o' more shots and beers

-----------[book excerpt]---------The first person on whose door Bernstein knocked pleaded with him to

leave "before they see you." 

The employee was literally trembling.  "Please leave me alone.  I know you're only trying to do your job, but you don't realize the pressure we're under."  Bernstein tried to get a conversation going, but was told, "I hope you understand I'm not being rude; please go," as the door closed.  Another said, "I want to help," and burst into tears.  "God, it's all so awful," she said, as the reporter was shown to the door.

The nighttime visits were fishing expeditions.  There was, however, one constant lead that was pursued on all the visits: 

It concerned Sally Harmony, Gordon Liddy's secretary at CRP.  Mrs. Harmony

had apparently not told everything she knew to the FBI and the grand jury.  Bernstein had first heard this in late August from a reporter on another newspaper.  He had jotted down the tip on the back of a telephone message slip and filed it away in the mountain of papers, trash, books and cups of stale coffee that covered his desk.  ". . . lied to protect Jeb Magruder . . . dep. campaign mgr.," he had written.

A Justice Department attorney had confirmed that the Watergate prosecutors were

suspicious of Mrs. Harmony's testimony, but said they lacked evidence to charge her with perjury.  Her lack of candor seemed common knowledge

at campaign headquarters.  But either no one knew or no one was willing to say what she had lied about, beyond vague references to "protecting others." 

Gradually, a pattern started to emerge about the bugging affair from the fragments of information they picked up on their nighttime visits. 

Several committee employees spoke of wholesale destruction of records that took place in the days immediately after the Watergate break-in, although they said they had heard it secondhand and knew no specifics.

===============
{book excerpt:  All The President's Men, written by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.  Copyright, 1974.  Simon & Schuster, New York}
{song excerpt: "Roller Derby Queen" -- on Jim Croce's Life and Times album, 1973, and also included on 1974's Photographs & Memories - His Greatest Hits.}

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