Chapter 9 of 18 · 3'34"
Woodward and Bernstein knock on a committee secretary's door and ask about documents shredded at the committee. At first she talks, naming John Mitchell and his raincoat trick, then she pulls back: "I'd just as soon not... Okay? Maybe I could call you." The real question is no longer what she knows, but whether someone has already gotten to her.
The Key to the Whole Cover-Up
Woodward Won't Publish on a Hunch
Woodward and Bernstein track down Betty Milland, a frightened clerk at the Committee to Reelect. At her door they ask whether she was there when documents were shredded at the committee. She was, and she adds that Attorney General John Mitchell once came in at night with a raincoat over his head. Then she stops answering and asks them to leave before "they" see them.
This is where the reporting stops being paperwork. A clerk who has nothing personal against the reporters gives them a real lead — shredding, and the attorney general walking in with a raincoat over his head — and then locks up. The raincoat detail is the kind of evidence that sounds like a joke until you think about why a man hides his face: "You have some idea what's in the papers when the attorney general comes in... it's at the committee, and he's got a raincoat over his head." Woodward and Bernstein already sense they have been beaten to her. "Someone got to that woman," one of them says, "It's the key to the whole cover-up." But they still can't write it, and the argument in the car is the movie's real subject: they have a frightened source, a strange image, and not enough verified fact.
A1–C2 is the CEFR scale. Cards above the level you pick fade, and playback will not auto-pause on them.
“I need more fact for a story, and I think you should need the same.”
It turns a personal demand into a shared standard, catching the other man in his own rule.
Neutral
“A guy can come up to me on the street, and he can ask me an address.”
A plain street example quietly makes the point that a fact alone is not a story.
Informal
“I don't have enough gut feeling. I wish I did.”
He admits the limit, then wishes aloud he could trust his instincts.
Neutral
“It's the key to the whole cover-up.”
It names one detail as the hinge of the entire cover-up.
Neutral
Up next · 10bury the reportThe scene: Nixon Renominated, Report BuriedShe is scared. She gives them real details, then asks to quit, says she would just as soon not continue, and asks them to leave before "they" see them — suggesting she has been warned or watched by people at the committee.
She is Betty Milland, a secretary at the Committee to Reelect. She confirms she was there during the shredding and says Attorney General John Mitchell once came in at night with a raincoat over his head.
A man covering his face to enter the committee suggests he didn't want to be seen, which hints the meeting was about something secret — even if the reporters can't yet prove what.
They have one frightened source, a claim about shredding, and an odd detail about a raincoat, but no proof of what was destroyed or who ordered it. Woodward insists the paper needs more verified fact first.
