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There was a long moment of silence, which Allen Dulles finally broke: “Obviously, Captain, neither Colonel Graham nor I have the authority to accept or reject a proposal like this—”

“Or even to have been having this conversation,” Graham interrupted. “There are those who would consider it trafficking with the enemy . . .”

“Even giving aid and comfort to the enemy,” Dulles chimed in.

“But you have been honest and forthcoming with us,” Graham said. “And we’ll try to be the same with you. What I think Mr. Dulles and I are going to have to do is decide, first, if we should—if we dare—bring Admiral Canaris’s offer to the attention of our respective superiors . . .”

“Which might well carry the risk of seeing one or both of us relieved of our posts,” Dulles chimed in again.

“So, if you will be so good, Captain, to give Mr. Dulles and myself a little time—say, thirty minutes—to decide between us whether we can take the next step, bringing this to the attention of our respective superiors or not. And if not, what other—”

“I understand,” von und zu Waching said. “I will await your call, your decision.”

Von und zu Waching walked to the door, unlocked it, opened it, turned to look at Graham and Dulles, bobbed his head, and then went through the door.

Dulles waited a full thirty seconds—which seemed longer—before breaking the silence: “The basic question, of course, is whether or not he’s telling us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but.”

“I think that we have to presume he is not, Allen. And further, that he has an agenda we can’t even guess at.”

“And insofar as telling Colonel Donovan about this, can you imagine his reaction if he knew about this meeting?”

“Or that I flew over here to participate?”

“Or what the President would do if he heard about this?”

“Well, he would certainly tell the Vice President, and Uncle Joe Stalin would know within twenty-fours that we know he has spies all over the Manhattan Project. Do you know General Graves, Allen? Know him well?”

Dulles nodded.

“He told me that he thinks at least six of Dr. Oppenheimer’s geniuses are—how did he put it? ‘Far to the left of Vice President Wallace.’ ”

“Graves told me that when he went to J. Edgar Hoover, Hoover told him that when he tried to bring up the subject of Soviet spies in the Manhattan Project to the President, Roosevelt flashed his famous smile at him and said since the Russians knew nothing of the Manhattan Project, how could they have spies trying to penetrate it?”

They lapsed into silence for another long moment.

Finally, Dulles again broke it.

&nb

sp; “I would say then that we are agreed we don’t mention this to Donovan?”

Graham nodded.

“What about Hoover?” Graham asked.

“Hoover already knows about the Russian spies. I suspect J. Edgar has some of his best people keeping their eyes on them.”

“Nevertheless, when von und zu gives us the names of his spies, I think we should pass them on to J. Edgar; his spies may not be the same as Canaris’s spies.” Dulles nodded, and Graham went on: “Slip them under J. Edgar’s door in the dead of night; I don’t think he should know they came from us.”

“That leaves only two minor problems to be resolved,” Dulles said. “Where do we get the one hundred thousand dollars immediately, and the million we will need later? Probably more than a million dollars. Estimates for this sort of thing are invariably far short of what is actually required.”

“I don’t see that as a problem. What’s the other thing?”

“How do we get this officer of Gehlen’s from here to South America? And the families von und zu is talking about? And subquestion a: What do we do with him—with, ultimately, all of Gehlen’s women and children—once they are there? And why isn’t a million dollars a problem?”

“I’ve been giving that some thought. If you and I suddenly spent even the hundred thousand from our nonvouchered funds, Donovan would be all over us wanting to know what we spent it on.”

“Leaving us where?”