“And maybe he was lying. For whatever reason. Who knows why? Maybe none of it happened. Can we prove it did?”
“He wasn’t lying,” Oppenheimer said.
“No. He wasn’t. But we’re the only ones who know that. Look around,” Connolly said, sweeping his hand toward the sunny mesa. “Anything seem wrong to you? Any reason to think-any proof- that something’s wrong? What do you believe, General? Do you believe me? Do you think I was taken in by a crazy man telling stories? Maybe I’m telling stories-that’s what I get paid to do. All you’ve got is my word. Do you trust me that much?”
“You’re wasting time,” Groves said. “I don’t have to trust you. If Dr. Oppenheimer says it’s true, then it is. We have to do something.”
“Then let me finish what I started. You know as well as I do that once they get hold of this, we’ll have a Chinese fire drill around here. Everybody’ll want to do something. I can hear them already. ‘Why didn’t you tighten security? How could it happen?’ You’ve got a new President. Do you know him? Is he going to back you up when everybody starts jumping up and down? He’d have to do something. Maybe he’d start at the top.”
Groves frowned, not saying anything.
“The point is, we don’t know. But the odds are they won’t be able to fix anything and they’ll make one hell of a mess trying.”
Oppenheimer looked over at Groves, waiting.
Groves stared at the ground, moving his foot in thought. “You’re a good talker,” he said to Connolly, “but you don’t know what you’re asking. I can’t do it. I have to tell him.”
“Maybe. But not quite yet. All I’ve raised is a suspicion. You’d have to investigate to find out if there’s anything to it. You’re not putting the project itself in danger. This isn’t about sabotage. And you don’t want to send out any false alarms. If there’s the possibility of a security leak, you’d have to try and plug it. It’s your project-you’d have to decide the best way to go about that.”
“And that’s you.”
“It’s not them. It’s a chance, I know. But we’ll never get it if this goes beyond the three of us. I could delay telling you,” he said, looking directly at Groves. “I’m independent. Maybe I didn’t want to come to you until I had more to go on. I should have, but—”
“It would be your head,” Groves said.
“Yes.”
“I wouldn’t have any choice.”
“No, you wouldn’t.”
“You’d do that?”
“I’m not in the army. It’s easier for me. I just-wanted to close the case.”
Groves looked around, glancing over toward the Jemez Mountains. “But you weren’t the only one there. That leaves you, Robert.”
Oppenheimer took a drag on his cigarette, then looked at Groves. “We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for Connolly. We wouldn’t know any of it. Under the circumstances—” He paused. “I think he might be given a little more rope.”
Groves was silent. “You hang yourself with it,” he said finally. “Dr. Oppenheimer’s out of it. That understood?”
Connolly nodded. “You’ll have everything you need for the record. If you need it. I just delayed telling you. Both of you.”
“I don’t like this,” Oppenheimer said.
“No, he’s right,” Connolly said. “You can’t have anything to do with this. You know, it could have happened this way,” he said, turning to Groves. “You wouldn’t know anything about it if I hadn’t told you.”
“Why did you?” Groves said.
“I need your help.”
He had been looking at Groves, but it was Oppenheimer who said, “What do you have in mind?”
“First, some classified papers, something to hook him. Something Eisler’s already handed over, so they know it’s real, but that somebody else might have access to. Bait. Could you do that?”
Oppenheimer nodded.
“Wait a minute,” Groves said. “You want to pass classified documents?”
“Something they already have,” Connolly said. “Or Eisler said they have. If we believe him. But we do believe him, don’t we?”
“I can’t allow this. Do you know what it means if—”
“Yes, but I won’t get caught. I’m not planning to go to jail.”
“How about first telling me what in God’s name is going on?” Groves said irritably, wiping his forehead. “And do we have to stand out here in the sun?”
Connolly nodded and began leading them toward the shade of the water tower. “There’s only one way to do this. We have to give him another Eisler. We don’t know how they put people here. Maybe there isn’t anybody else. But either way, they’re going to need a new source. It’s late. They’re hungry.”
“Just who did you have in mind?” Oppenheimer said.
“I’ve been thinking about that. Ideally, a scientist, of course, but it’s too tricky and there isn’t enough time. We have to assume they’ve got a list of the scientists working on the project-that would be the first thing they’d ask for.”
Groves groaned out loud.
“So it’s too easy to check,” Connolly continued. “They’d spot a marker right away, just from the list. Who’s the new guy? Never heard of him. And of course if they do have somebody else up here, he’d spot it as a ghost. Then there’s the background. We say our man’s from Berkeley, they check Berkeley. It’s a fairly small community, isn’t it? It’s unlikely you’d have a spare physicist up here nobody’s ever heard of.”
“Quite,” Oppenheimer said. “Are you proposing to use a real person?”
“No. You’ve got four thousand people up here. Technical support comes and goes. We make up a dummy file in one of these areas. Maybe the Special Engineering Detachment. There are always new SEDs coming in. But someone who could put his hands on the papers. An idealist,” he said to Groves, who was watching him with growing discomfort. “You could set up some army records, couldn’t you? I’ll make up a project folder-bio, clearance, the usual. Just put it in the files. If we’ve got a leak up here, he’ll know where to go and we’ll have it all ready for him.” He looked up at the giant tower, crisscrossed wooden slats rising to support the broad tank, Los Alamos’s Empire State Building. “Maybe we’ll call him Waterman.”
“There’s a Waterman in metallurgy,” Oppenheimer said.
“Okay, Waters, then. Steve, I think. That sounds about right. Corporal Steve Waters, SED. The rat.”
“You think this is funny?” Groves said impatiently. “I fail to see anything funny about it. I don’t know what we’re playing at here. This isn’t some petty crime anymore.”
Connolly reddened at the schoolboy reprimand. “What makes a crime petty-the amount you steal?”
“Don’t start with me.”
“It’s the same,” Connolly said. “Same people who knock over a liquor store. Calling them agents doesn’t make them smarter. Who do you think does this, anyway? Masterminds? I’m not trying to break up the rackets, I’m just looking for a guy who got jumpy with a tire iron.”
Groves snorted and looked away, his eyes following a coal delivery truck rumbling toward Boiler No. 1.
“There’s only one thing I don’t understand,” Oppenheimer said, as if nothing had happened. “Your phantom Corporal Waters has some valuable papers to offer. How do you let them know? Put an ad in the papers?”
“I assume there’s a network. Our rent collector may be only one link, but no one works alone on that end. You know, like the numbers,” he said, looking at Groves. “I need to get access to the network, someone to pass on the invitation. If they’re as efficient as we think they are, they’ll come calling.”
“You know someone like that?” Groves said. “Why don’t we just haul him in?”
“Anyone can pass a message. I thought of your brother,” he said to Oppenheimer, then turned to Groves. “But I suspect you’re already having him watched. That would complicate things.”
No one said a word. Groves, already red and sweating, flushed and looked away.
“Frank left the party,” Oppenheimer said quietly. “Some time ago.”
“And they’d probably think it was all a little too good to be true,” Connolly continued. “They’d want to be very
