Dracula has many guises: bat, wolf and now, Truman Capote. Or so it would seem from the vibes caused by his short story in Esquire last November. Titled La Cote Basque, 1965 and taken from his unpublished novel Answered Prayers, the piece focused on a posh Manhattan restaurant and its haul monde clientele. For his cast, Capote chose some old acquaintances, including Jacqueline Onassis and Sister Lee Rodziwill, former Vogue Editor Diana Vreeland, Heiress-Artist Gloria Vanderbilt, as well as several other real people thinly cloaked in fictitious names. The author likened his gossipy story to a "minor pane" in a cathedral window. But many of his cronies considered it a major pain in the neck and accused Capote of betraying their confidences. "The reaction has been completely unjust," pouted Truman, 51, last week. "If I were not an extra-experienced, objective person, it would have crushed me." The uncrushed author is returning to Esquire this month with still another chapter from his roman `a clef. Ominously titled Unspoiled Monsters, the new installment will describe the narrator of Answered Prayers, a struggling writer named P.B. Jones, and what promises to be the book's central character, a figure named Kate McCloud. Destined to appear as the first chapter in Capote's novel, Monsters follows Jones through scatological reminiscences of his life as a male prostitute in Manhattan and his years as an unsuccessful novelist living in Tangier, Paris and Venice. "I began making notes for this book eleven years ago, and I started writing three years ago," says Capote, disclosing that he has put copies of his still unfinished 800-page manuscript into two separate bank vaults. His Parthian shot: "This is my swan song. If I do anything else, it will be something short."

"I have been talking about doing a portrait of him for a couple of years," disclosed Painter Jamie Wyeth after unveiling his version of Pop Artist Andy Warhol last week. Wyeth, who tracked Warhol down to his Manhattan lair two months ago, found his model an "excellent" subject. "He has an incredible childlike quality," observed Jamie. "He was very concerned that I would use too much red in his skin, or show up a pimple." Warhol, who refuses to hang separately, has already snapped off a batch of Polaroid pictures of Wyeth. The patriarch of pop plans to have his counterpart framed in time for a gallery showing this June.

"We are a general in retirement and an admiral in mothballs," notes Actor Peter Ustinov. The "we" are the speaker and Zero Mostel, stars of an ABC-TV special. The May 18 program of four original plays, all directed by Ustinov, includes a Neil Simon sketch titled A Quiet War. In it, Mostel and friend play a couple of old Russian "Sunshine Boys" who get together every Tuesday for an argument. "We pick a different subject every week. This time it's food," says the actor-director. "We're deciding what the perfect lunch is." Sounds like a toothsome assignment for such noted trenchermen. But Gourmet Ustinov insists that the playwright's fare is indigestible. "It's difficult to talk with obvious sensuality about things you hate--such as liver and kidneys," he beefs. "I had to do a character performance."

For an upcoming feature on the children of U.S. Presidents, editors at the Ladies' Home Journal hired a couple of experts on the subject: Susan Ford, 18, and Lynda Bird Johnson Robb, 32. Last week the pair visited another First Family offspring, Helen Taft Manning, 84, daughter of Republican President William Howard Taft. "Mrs. Robb and I gossiped about people at the White House. I have always admired the Johnsons," said Mrs. Manning. As for Susan, "She was the least bothersome photographer I have ever had, very professional and businesslike." Did the bipartisan progeny engage in any political shoptalk? Answered Manning quickly: "None at all, I assure you."

"Satisfied and vindicated" was the way Political Columnist Joseph Kraft described himself last week. After years of protesting illegal wiretaps on his Georgetown home, Kraft was finally given assurances from Attorney General Edward Levi that his FBI files would be destroyed, and that such taps "would not be authorized" any longer by the Justice Department. Kraft had first learned of the bugs back in 1973; after gaining access to his FBI dossier recently, he learned even more. During a trip to Paris by the journalist back in 1969, FBI agents arranged for a bug in his room at the George V hotel. The result? A befuddled agent's report that Kraft had spoken with a mysterious woman named Jean Monnet. "I didn't know whether to laugh or cry," said Kraft last week. Statesman Jean Mannet, now 87, is a founding father of Europe's Common Market.

That gremlin with the Groucho stash is really Sandy Dennis, disguised as a payoff man in the movie The Abbess. Based on Novelist Muriel Spark's spoof of Watergate, The Abbess of Crewe, the film features Dennis, Melina Mercouri and Geraldine Page as nuns engaging in some unholy intrigue. Says Sandy: "I play a not very bright sister who talks loudly and does what my mother used to call 'all the grunt work' " --including the delivery of hush money to a men's room in Philadelphia. At that point, justice triumphs, and Sandy is nabbed as a gay on the prowl.

In the great tradition of theatrical producers, Zev Bufman is keeping subtlety in the wings. Witness his attempts to lure Phyllis Star Cloris Leachman into his stage production of Same Time, Next Year. "He sent three dozen roses to the Phyllis set and kept pleading," recalls Leachman, 49. "The last communique was: 'Please come or I'll die.' " Cloris relented, along with fellow Phyllis Regular Dick School. The two are now appearing in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., where so far their fans have been mostly older folk. Says Phyllis: "I know, because the intermissions are longer so they can go to the bathroom."

"We're not formally engaged, but we're talking about getting married," coos Financier Bernie Cornfeld, 48, referring to his newest love interest. "She is a bright, beautiful, charming lady." Former Paris Model Lorraine Armbruster, 28, may also have to be brightly, beautifully, charmingly tolerant if she expects to corral her man. At the moment, Cornfeld seems reluctant to abandon his freewheeling bachelorhood and his covey of lovely Beverly Hills roommates. "I just haven't decided if that's all going to end," he reflects. "I'm going to have to think about it more."

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