Seated in armchairs were three people: a tall, sharp-featured, elegantly tailored septuagenarian; a stocky, short-haired blond woman in her late forties; and an attractive, tanned, and athletic-looking young woman of about twenty.
They were, respectively, Cletus Marcus Howell, president and chairman of the board of the Howell Petroleum Corporation; his daughter-in-law, Martha Williamson Howell; and her daughter — the old man’s granddaughter — Marjorie.
“I’m Assistant Deputy Director Kelly of the FBI,” the older of the two men who had come into the cabin announced. He was in his fifties, wore spectacles, and had a short haircut. “Welcome to Washington.”
No one responded.
“Where is the officer-in-charge?” Kelly asked.
The old man pointed to the young officer standing at the door.
“You just walked past him,” he said.
“I asked for the officer-in-charge, sir,” Kelly snapped.
“Sonny,” the old man said, “I hate to rain on your parade, but if that FBI army you have with you was intended to dazzle me, it has failed to do so.”
“Dad!” the older woman said warningly.
Her daughter smiled.
There came the sound of a siren, and then the squealing of brakes, and finally the faint sound of car doors slamming closed.
A moment later, three men came into the cabin.
One wore the uniform of a rear admiral. Another, an Army brigadier general, was in “pinks and greens”—a green tunic with pink trousers. The third, a colonel, wore an Army olive drab uniform.
The colonel stopped just inside the door to both shake the hand of the young officer, then affectionately pat his shoulder.
“You done real good, Jimmy,” Colonel Robert Mattingly said.
“Thank you, sir,” Second Lieutenant James D. Cronley Jr. replied.
“Admiral,” Kelly said.
“What are you doing here, Kelly?” Rear Admiral Sidney W. Souers, U.S. Navy, demanded coldly.
“Self-evidently,” Kelly announced, “the FBI is here to guarantee the security of the cargo aboard this aircraft until it can be placed in the hands of the Manhattan Project.”
The door to the cockpit opened and a man wearing an airline-type uniform stepped into the cabin. His tunic carried the four golden stripes of a captain.
Admiral Souers turned to him.
“Any problems, Ford?”
The “captain,” who was in fact U.S. Navy Commander Richard W. Ford, came to attention.
“None, Admiral,” he said.
Souers turned to Kelly.
“Thank you for your interest, Mr. Kelly. You and your people may go.”
“Admiral, the FBI will stay here until the cargo is in the hands of the Manhattan Project.”
Souers gestured toward the man in pink and greens.
“This is General Tomlinson of the Manhattan Project, Mr. Kelly. You may report to Mr. Hoover, if you are here at his orders, that you witnessed my turning over of the cargo to the Manhattan Project.”
Kelly, white-faced, didn’t reply.
“Are you going to leave, taking your people with you, Mr. Kelly? Or am I going to have to go down to my car, get on the radio, wake the President up, explain the situation to him and ask him to call Director Hoover and tell him to tell you your presence here is not required?”
Kelly turned on his heels, made an impatient gesture for the man with him to follow, and left the cabin.
Souers shook his head as he looked away from the door.
“How did those sonsofbitches manage to beat us here?” he asked rhetorically. He then quickly added, “Pardon the language, ladies.”
“My daughter-in-law and granddaughter have heard the word before,” Cletus Marcus Howell said.
“Mattingly, do you think Hoover has someone in my office?” Souers asked.
Mattingly shrugged. “Sir, I would not like to think so. But…”
“Admiral,” Commander Ford said, “the FBI must have had people at the airport in Miami…”
“Where you refueled,” Souers instantly picked up his thought. “With orders to keep an eye out for a civilian Constellation coming from South America.”
“And they called Washington,” Mattingly added. “When they learned you had filed a nonstop flight plan to National.”
“And instead of calling me,” Souers concluded, “the FBI — probably J. Edgar himself — decided to meet the plane here.”
“Why?” General Tomlinson asked.
“J. Edgar is very good at turning any situation so that it shines a flattering light on the FBI,” Souers said.
He turned and walked back to Second Lieutenant Cronley.
“I have a message for you, son, from President Truman,” he said.
“Yes, sir?”
“Quote Well done unquote.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“The President also said he wants to see you. That won’t happen today, but when it does, I wouldn’t be surprised if he said you can replace your golden bar with a silver one. But…”
Souers stopped as a colonel in an olive drab uniform with Corps of Engineers insignia appeared in the doorway.
“Good morning, Broadhead,” General Tomlinson said. “Come in.”
“Good morning, sir.”
“Admiral Souers,” Tomlinson said, “this is Colonel Broadhead, who will take charge of the cargo.”
Souers nodded, and then asked of Cronley, “Where is it, son?”
“In the cargo hold, sir.”
“How hot is it?” Colonel Broadhead asked.
Commander Ford answered for him.
“There are six packages, Colonel. Each weighing a little over two hundred pounds. They’re roped so as to be manhandle-able. Each came with two lead blankets, each weighing about a hundred pounds. With the blankets off, my Geiger counter indicated significant, but not life-threatening, radiation within a two-hour period. With the lead blankets in place, the counter shows only insignificant radiation.”
“You are?” Broadhead asked.
Ford looked to Souers for permission to answer the question. Souers nodded, just perceptibly.
“Commander Richard Ford, sir.”
Broadhead then said, “Where did you first put the Geiger counter to it, Commander? On the submarine?”
“Colonel,” Souers snapped, “who told you anything about a submarine?”
“Admiral,” General Tomlinson put in, “Colonel Broadhead has worked for me in the Manhattan Project for three years. He has all the necessary security clearances.”
“That’s very nice, General,” Souers said unpleasantly. “But my question to the colonel with all the necessary security clearances was ‘Who said something—anything—to him about a submarine?’”
“Sir,” Broadhead said, “one of my duties at the Manhattan Project was to keep an eye on the German efforts in that area. I knew they had some uranium oxide — from the Belgian Congo — and I heard about the missing German U-boats. When I heard that the OSS was about to turn over to us a half ton of it that they’d acquired in Argentina, it seemed to me the most logical place for the OSS to have gotten it was from one of the missing U-boats.”
Souers went on: “And did you share this assumption of yours, Colonel, with a bunch of other colonels — all with the necessary security clearances — while you were sitting around having a beer?”
Broadhead, sensing where the line of questioning was headed, replied, “Yes, sir. I’m afraid I did.”
“Not that it excuses you in any way, Colonel,” Souers said icily, “but you’re just one of a great many stupid senior sonsof… officers with all the necessary security clearances who think it’s perfectly all right to share anything they know with anyone else who has such clearances. Now do you take my point? Or do I have to order you not to share with anyone anything you’ve seen or heard here today or any assumptions you may make from what you have seen or heard?”