## FILTHY RICH

One cover of Vanity Fair can turn a minor celebrity into a superstar. And a single thoroughly researched story can bring down a corporate overlord.

Carter's easy to recognize the pompadour of white hair, like a lion's mane. The Santa Claus body stuffed into an impeccably tailored bespoke suit. He wears his fame lightly. But he could not be more serious about his responsibilities, which are weighing heavily on him this month. Months earlier, he'd assigned a piece to Vicky Ward, an Englishwoman who wrote frequently for Van- ity Fair. He'd meant for it to be an easy assignment: Ward was pregnant with twins. She wasn't allowed to fly. But here was a story right on her doorstep. A nice, easy profile of Jeffrey Epstein. Who was he, really? Carter knew he threw fabulous parties attended by academics, billionaires, and beautiful women. Recently he'd flown Bill Clinton to Africa. But no one seemed to know how he had made his fortune. Epstein's story reminded the edi- tor of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby.

## CHAPTER 36

2002

lary editor of Vanity Fair, likes to vell before the rest of his staff

serate at a leisurely pace-three assigning articles, and shooting en followed by one frantic week s done. But this isn't the case at itting investigative pieces along- s. There are also parties to plan us parties, including the annual e fun and far more exclusive than ny itself. Vanity Fair is an old, public face, just as Anna Wintour ic fashion magazine, Vogue.

Carter himself could have stepped out of a novel-though in his case, the author would be Horatio Alger. A Canadian college dropout who'd worked as a railroad lineman, he arrived in New York in his late twenties and commenced an astonishingly quick rise up the social and media ladders. But where Carter was open and outgoing, Epstein really was Gatsby-like-very little about him was known. Maybe, Carter thought, Ward could find out. What did Epstein do, exactly, for money? Why was he so secretive? Why were so many brilliant and powerful men drawn to him? And where did those beautiful women come from?

Almost immediately, Epstein began a campaign to discredit Ward. He prevailed upon Conrad Black, the press baron and

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{"people":["jeffrey epstein","vicky ward","bill clinton","f. scott fitzgerald","anna wintour","conrad black"]}