I SPY LUCY

Long before she ever told Monica Lewinsky's confidant Linda Tripp to "buy a tape recorder," New York socialite Lucianne Goldberg had shown an impressive flair for subversion.

Born Lucianne Steinberger in 1935, the brassy blonde, who started life as a gossip columnist on her local paper, openly admits she was a spy for disgraced ex-President Richard Nixon in the early 1970s.

Disguising herself as a reporter for the Woman's News Service, Lucianne talked her way onto the campaign plane of Democrat George McGovern and began filing sexy reports about the McGovern staff and its Secret Service entourage to Nixon 'dirty-tricks' meister Murray Chotiner. "I was just winging it," she later admitted to The New Yorker. "Telling them who was sleeping with the stewardesses."

But though the reputed $1000 a week Lucy earned for her espionage was a lot of money in those days, she quickly realised there were easier ways to make a living. Like writing bonkbuster novels and ghost-writing autobiographies for hair-brained Hollywood stars.

As the money rolled in Lucy realised her talents might lie in other directions.