So much for the milk of human kindness.
“What kind of favor?”
“Your presence in Washington is fortuitous, Nathan.”
“It is?”
“Yes. I’d like you to do a job for me. Today. This afternoon.”
“… What kind of job?”
He folded his hands prayerfully on the desktop. “I want you to talk to somebody for me. I don’t want to be seen talking to this individual myself, and I don’t even want my staff knowing about this particular … subject matter.”
That didn’t surprise me. Pearson had a conspiratorial managing style, never letting an investigator or legman know what each other was up to.
I asked, “What subject matter is that?”
He spoke very softly: “In researching your client, Secretary Forrestal, I stumbled onto some information that is either the biggest story of the century … or an attempt to make such a fool out of me that I would be discredited, once and for all.”
“All right. You’ve got my attention. But, favor or no favor, my fee is a hundred a day.”
Immediately, he reached in a desk drawer, withdrew a checkbook and began filling out a check, asking, “You want that made out to the A-1 or to yourself?”
“A-1 will be fine … but make it four hundred, to bring your account up to date.”
Pearson shrugged. “All right.”
My jaw dropped. “Now you really have my attention….”
He handed the check across to me, its black ink glistening wetly. “No further expenses, though … for right now, this is a one-day affair, and you can buy your own damn meals.”
“Fair enough. Who do I talk to, and on what subject?”
He rocked back, folded his arms. “Let’s start with the subject. Nathan … what do you know about flying saucers?”
I winced. Weren’t Commies, Zionists and Nazis enough? Must I add spacemen to the list?
“Nathan, please … answer the question.”
Money was money. “Well … last year or two, there have been a lot of sightings of flying saucers, flying discs, flying cigars, whatever, some of ’em by fairly reputable types. I figure it’s some kind of postwar hysteria-like the gremlins pilots in the war talk about seeing. I saw ’em myself.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, in Bugs Bunny cartoons.”
Pearson shuffled through some manila file folders on his desk, came up with a thick one, folded it open and began thumbing through; I hoped it wasn’t my FBI file again.
“The first published report of a saucer sighting was in June of ’47,” he said, “by an air rescue pilot-Kenneth Arnold, of Boise, Idaho-who said he saw nine flying saucers flying at twelve hundred miles per hour over the Cascade Mountains in Washington State, in formations, shifting positions like … what’s it say, here, where is it … ‘like the tail of a kite.’ This seemed to trigger sightings, with saucers spotted in Texas, New Mexico, Oregon, Idaho, Missouri, Colorado, California, Arizona, Nebraska …”
I nodded. “Yeah, for a few months there, if you wanted to see your name in the paper, all you had to do was just call in and say you saw an unidentified flying what’s-it.”
“Your attitude mirrors my own, essentially; but some of these sightings are from credible sources-a United Airlines pilot, a National Guard captain-and I’ve learned that the U.S. Air Force is studying and cataloguing these sightings.”
“Or pretending to-after all, these ‘saucers’ could be some new experimental top-secret aircraft or weapon of ours. The kind of thing a civilian might easily misconstrue.”
Pearson nodded. “And the inquiry into ‘saucer’ sightings could be a military screen of ‘black propaganda’-lies. In any case, that effort-whether sincere, or simply cosmetic-started in December ’47, as Project Sign, but it’s evolved into something called Project Grudge.”
“That sounds like the code name for your Forrestal crusade.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Well, Secretary Forrestal
“You’re kidding.”
“Not at all. As I said, I came across this information in my investigation of Forrestal…. Take a look at this, Nathan.”
Pearson handed me a photostat from his folder; it was of a single sheet of stationery, rubber-stamped at the top: top secret/majic eyes only.
White House stationery.
The date was September 24, 1947, and the contents were as follows:
MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
Dear Secretary Forrestal:
As per our recent conversation on this matter, you are hereby authorized to proceed with all due speed and caution upon your undertaking. Hereafter this matter shall be referred to only as Operation Majestic Twelve.
It continues to be my feeling that any future considerations relative to the ultimate disposition of this matter should rest solely with the Office of the President following appropriate discussions with yourself, Dr. Bush and the Director of Central Intelligence.
And it was signed, with a flourish: “Harry Truman.”
“This doesn’t say anything about flying saucers,” I said.
“Indeed it doesn’t. But a Pentagon source has informed me that Operation Majestic Twelve is a government research and development project formed with exploring the ‘flying saucer’ problem as its mandate.”
I reread the letter, then asked, “Who’s this Dr. Bush?”
“Dr. Bush is, with Forrestal, one of the twelve-the ‘Majestic Twelve’-that is, key government, scientific and military figures. Bush is former dean of MIT; he led the development of the atomic bomb, radar, the proximity fuse, the analog computer, and much more. The top government science mind.”
I tossed the photostat back on his desk. “Do you believe your source?”
“You know what they say-in Washington, if your mother says she loves you, get a second source to corroborate it.”
“Glad to see you checking your facts, for a change.”
He sighed rather heavily. “Nathan, as I said, I suspect this may be an effort to make a colossal boob out of me. But if what I’ve been told does prove correct, our government may have in its possession technology from another planet, which they are intending to capitalize upon for military purposes.”
“I’m gonna vote for the colossal boob theory on this one.”
Pearson was shaking his head. “I know, I know-it sounds incredible, even bizarre … but it all seems to stem from one incident-the crash of an unidentified flying object in Roswell, New Mexico, in July of ’47.”
I shifted in my chair. “Not a sighting-a crash….”
“Yes-a crash by an alien spacecraft.”
“And Forrestal is nuts? Drew, you thought about trying a smoking jacket that buttons up the back?”
“The Air Force base at Roswell-the 509th Bomb Group, who incidentally are the only squadron in the world armed and ready to drop atomic bombs-issued a public statement to the effect that a flying saucer had crashed, and its wreckage been recovered … a statement that was, within hours, withdrawn by the powers-that-be.”
“You’re making this up.”
“No. I’ll give you my clipping file to take with you, on your way.”
“My way where?”
“To talk to the Air Force major who says he found the saucer. Sure you won’t have a cookie?”
7
