Presidential Mission Read online

  “Is that the formula, Governor?”

  “That is it. Paste it in your hat and look at it every once in a while. Everybody who is willing to help fight Japs and Germans, and Italians, of course, is our ally, and everybody who wants to fight anybody else will have to be sat on for the time being.”

  “I’m glad to hear it from your own lips, Governor, for I know from previous experience how it is going to be. All sorts of cliques and causes will try to use our armies for their schemes.”

  “The watchword is democracy. That means government of the people, by the people, for the people—and it means all the people, not just General Whoosis and Prince Highupsky.”

  “Don’t forget to mention that to your State Department and to your generals,” was the visitor’s dry suggestion.

  VI

  The busiest man in the world lighted still another cigarette and proceeded to “talk turkey,” as he called it. “Tell me, Lanny, what do you want to do next?”

  The visitor had prepared for this and replied promptly: “I want to do whatever will be of the greatest help to you.”

  “We are building a big, and I hope an efficient, Intelligence service. I can turn you over to ‘Wild Bill’ Donovan, a shrewd and loyal man, and he will make you one of his right bowers.”

  “If that is where you think I can do the best work. But I was rather hoping you might have some personal mission for me. You know how I feel—my contact with you has been half the fun of all this.”

  “It’s not a thankful sort of job, Lanny. It has no future.”

  “You mean that I won’t get titles and a salary? I have never wanted those. My reward is to sit in this gubernatorial chair and tell you my story, and hear from you what is coming next and what I can do to help it along.”

  “You would rather go on as a free lance, then?”

  “I have never learned to be anything else, and I’m not sure I could become a cog in a machine. I have been thinking about it, and here is the difficulty: the contacts I have in Europe are personal and I am bound by pledges; before I could tell Colonel Donovan anything of importance, I should have to go back there and persuade my friends to give their consent.”

  “Surely you don’t expect to go into Germany any more!”

  “I can’t see any way to do it. But I have a contact in Switzerland that has proved valuable in the past, and I hope to find the man still alive and on the job. It is the same with an old friend who is working with the underground in Toulon. There should be code letters waiting at my mother’s home on the Riviera.”

  “The situation has been altered greatly since we have been forced into the war. What will you use as your camouflage now?”

  “I have given much thought to that all the way across Asia and Europe. I believe I can still get along in neutral countries in my role of art expert. My clients have money, and they will buy paintings if I can find them and get them here.”

  “But it surely won’t seem plausible for an art expert to be rambling about Europe carrying on business in wartime!”

  “It will seem more plausible than you might like to believe, Governor. There is plenty of bootlegging and black marketeering going on, and most high-up people still believe that there are special privileges. In London I was offered opportunities to speculate in French industrial shares—I mean, of industries in Occupied France, strictly illegal. I could tell you scores of stories along such lines. All I have to do is to smile knowingly and remind my friends that my father is president of Budd-Erling Aircraft and an influential man in his own country. To those who are sympathetic to our cause I can drop a hint to the effect that I am able to assist my father in getting information. The slightest hint will suffice, for people will realize that such matters would be strictly hush-hush.”

  “Shall you continue to pose as a secret sympathizer with Fascism?”

  “I have worked out a rather complicated technique in the course of the years, and I vary it according to the person I am with. Most of the time I am the art lover, the ivory-tower dweller, the lotos-eater, careless of mankind. Something that will amuse you—I was wearing that role the evening I met the lady who is now my wife, and she gave me a fine dressing down, called me a ‘troglodyte.’ But most of the time that role satisfies people in the haut monde.”

  “I’ve an idea you may find it different now that we’re in the war, Lanny. People have taken sides.”

  “I have learned to shade my statements and put on a little smile which makes me enigmatic and mysterious. With those who are Fascists at heart, or without realizing it, I can take the attitude of my former wife, Lady Wickthorpe, who has become a pacifist and humanitarian; she deplores mass slaughter, and perceives so clearly that it cannot help anybody but the Reds. These lofty sentiments break nobody’s bones.”

  “I am told that conditions are changing fast, in France especially. The Germans are making themselves bitterly hated, and the underground is spreading fast.”

  “I am prepared for that, and I may feel free to make the real truth known to more persons than in the past. I had to use extreme care so long as I was going into Hitlerland; but I’ve an idea that my visit to Stalin has put an end to all that. It is hard to believe the Nazis wouldn’t get a report of it. Indeed, I decided that my goose was cooked last September, when I was brought into Halifax after the plane crash. The hospital people found two passports on me, one of them under an assumed name. The nurses knew about it, and it must have been whispered all over the town. I am bound to assume that the Germans would have agents there, and that the story would get to Berlin. So far as I know, the Führer never had but one American friend, and if that one was revealed to be a spy, it would make a trèmendous scandal among the insiders. I rather think I may get echoes from it when I meet the old-time Social Democrat and labor leader who is my contact in Geneva.”

  “I get your point, Lanny,” said F.D.R. “Let it be understood that I don’t ask you to go into any German-held territory, or Italian. We have many others who can do that, and at less risk.”

  VII

  They had come to the crucial part of their talk, about which Lanny had been dreaming for half a year. The Big Boss fell silent, looked at him steadily, and began in a grave voice: “I am going to share some information with you, Lanny—top secret. You will understand without my saying it, you are not to drop any hint of it to any person.”

  “Of course, Governor.”

  “I have to specify, not even to your wife.”

  “My wife has never asked me a question, once I had told her that I was pledged.”

  “Churchill came here just before Christmas, as you probably heard; he brought a large staff, and we threshed out the problems of world strategy. We both agree that Germany is our principal foe and must be beaten first; but we differ as to the best way to get at him. I would like to cross the Channel and seize the Cherbourg peninsula. I would do it this summer, even poorly prepared as we are. The Russians are pleading for a second front; they are in desperate straits, and we fear they may be knocked out of the war. But Churchill won’t hear of it; he is afraid of another Dunkerque. He keeps talking about what he calls ‘the soft underbelly of Europe.’ He is hypnotized by the idea of breaking in by the back door. As you know, he tried it in the last war.”

  “I have heard him explain his failure, to his own satisfaction.”

  “I doubt very much if I’ll be able to change him. In any case, I am determined that we shall fight this year; and if it can’t be Cherbourg, then it’ll be French North Africa. In either case, it will be the largest expedition ever to cross an ocean and will involve a colossal amount of work; something like a thousand ships, with landing craft, artillery, air support. Have you picked up any hint of all this?”

  “I haven’t been any place where there were hints, Governor. I can see the strategy—to make the Mediterranean safe, shorten the route to Suez, and be in a position to take Rommel in the rear.”

  “Just so. And if we can take Tunis we shall b
e able to cross to Sicily, and then to Italy.”

  “Italy would be dreadful country to fight in, Governor. I have motored through it, and it is a bootful of mountains.”

  “We shall have command of the sea, and soon, I hope, of the air. If we can take the airfields in southern Italy we shall be in a position to bomb southern Germany and the munitions plants which Hitler has built in Austria, imagining them safely out of reach.”

  “That all sounds fine to me, Governor.”

  “The main point is that we shall be doing something, and giving our troops actual battle practice, the only way they can learn. Also, we shall be showing the Russians that we mean business; every division that Hitler has to send to stop us will be one more missing from the eastern front.”

  “You want me to go and spy out the land?”

  “Go first to Vichy and meet the leaders, as you did before. Let them talk, and tell you how they feel about us, and what they expect us to do, and what they will do in reply. Then you might meet your friend in Toulon and get acquainted with some of the underground people. Sound them out on the all-important question of their Fleet, and what we have to expect from both officers and men.”

  “They won’t talk to me, Governor, unless I reveal the truth about myself.”

  “Use your own judgment. If you can meet the right people and get anything of value, you may tell them that you have been sent by me. Tell them that our armies are coming, and soon, but don’t say where or when. Give them money, if they are dependable and can use it to our advantage. We must have a new arrangement about money, Lanny, for we are spending it, really spending now. Nothing counts but saving the lives of our men and furthering our objectives.”

  “I see what you mean, Governor. I don’t want any money for myself—”

  “I am paid a salary, Lanny, and so is everybody I am putting to work. You are a married man now, and you have to think about a family.”

  “My wife is very proud of earning all she needs, so put me down as one of your dollar-a-year men. But when it comes to distributing money to the underground, I’m willing of course. I have the good fortune to know one absolutely reliable man, and have no doubt that he will be able to lead me to others.”

  “I will arrange to have a hundred thousand dollars put to your account in your New York bank. I shall not expect any accounting, except in a general way, when we meet. When you can use more to good advantage, let me know.”

  “What the underground needs, Governor, is not so much money as arms and explosives.”

  “When you come back, bring me the names of such persons as are willing to be known to us. I will turn them over to Donovan, and his agents will get in touch with them. We have many ways of getting supplies into France now, and we shall have more. However, I don’t want you to go deeply into that sort of thing, which is bound to be dangerous. What I want from you is information from the top people, with whom you have had so much success. It’s all right for you to go to Switzerland and see what your German man is doing, and give him whatever money he can use; but don’t stay long. I’d rather you would go to North Africa and meet the top people there, and find out what their attitude is now and what it’s likely to be when we come. I don’t need to go into details, you will understand what is needed.”

  VIII

  So there were the orders, not very different from what P.A. 103 had received in the past and what he had expected now. His quick mind started thinking up questions, but before he could speak his Boss began: “Do you know Robert Murphy?”

  “I met him in Vichy, but only casually. You may remember, you advised me to keep away from Admiral Leahy and the rest of our staff because they might suspect that I was the mysterious ‘Zaharoff’ who was sending reports through the Embassy.”

  “I have sent Bob as our counselor to North Africa. He has been provided with a staff of vice-consuls, about a dozen. They are carefully chosen men, mostly young; they know French, and of course their consular duties are nominal; they are there to prepare the way for a possible invasion. You will inevitably meet them and form an impression of what they are doing. I am not sending you to watch them, but if you see anything that I ought to know, you will tell me about it; that goes for good things as well as bad, their successes as well as their inadequacies.”

  “I understand, Governor.”

  “You will find Bob Murphy a delightful fellow, warmhearted and genial—perhaps too much so for the sort of people he will be dealing with. He is one of what you have called my ‘striped-pants boys.’”

  “Your cookie-pushers, Governor.” Lanny grinned.

  “Also, he is one of those liberal Catholics whom you find it hard to believe in. But you will recognize that he is the sort I have to send to Vichy France and to their colonies. You will like him personally, and will discover that he has a nasty job. I need not tell you that the enemy agents are swarming in that region and are pretty well in command of its affairs.”

  “I realize that. Do you wish me to approach them secretly and pretend that I am still their friend?”

  “I leave that to your judgment. I doubt if you could get much from them, because they will naturally assume that you must be their enemy now. I am more interested in what you can get from the French, of all groups. They are bound to know that we are coming sooner or later, and they will be trimming their sails to the new wind. You will encounter many varieties of intrigue.”

  “Algiers will be a nest of rattlesnakes, Governor; I’ll do my best not to get bitten. Am I to give Murphy any hint of what I am doing?”

  “Not at the outset, I think. He’ll no doubt have his suspicions. Tell me this, can you manage to work your camouflage in that part of the world? Is there any art there?”

  “Wherever there are wealthy French residents, there are always paintings, and maybe good ones. I have come upon old masters in unexpected places, and to be looking for them in those colonies would be as natural as looking for spinning wheels and grandfather’s clocks in Vermont or New Hampshire. There must also be Moorish art preserved there. I don’t know much about it, but I could bone up in the library and be an ‘authority’ in a week or two. I’ll try to interest one or two of my clients in the idea, and then I’ll be able to write letters and send cablegrams from the field. That impresses the censors, and of course they inform the authorities, and presently they begin to think that I may really be what I pretend to be.”

  “Fine!” said the President. “I am beginning to believe it myself.”

  “But of course I won’t be able to interest the State Department gentry in Moorish art. It’s up to you to see that I get a passport to all these places you have suggested.”

  “I’ll have Baker attend to that at once. How soon do you think you can go?”

  “I ought to have a week or so to attend to personal matters. I want to get my wife settled in New York, and take her to Newcastle and introduce her to my father and his family. My father may have some request to make of me—and that’s important, because it provides an extra camouflage and enables me to meet influential people. I suppose you will want me to talk with Professor Alston about this project?”

  “By all means. He will have many suggestions to make. Take your time, but no more than is necessary.”

  “Am I to send you reports in the usual way?”

  “Through our chargé when you are in Vichy, through Harrison in Switzerland, and through Bob Murphy in North Africa. I will instruct Bob that letters for me marked ‘Zaharoff’ are to be forwarded by diplomatic pouch, unopened.”

  “By the way, Governor, that reminds me—an odd thing. As you know, I amuse myself by delving into psychic phenomena. Most of my friends take it as a sign that I am slightly cracked, but they can’t explain the things that happen.”

  “I have known of such experiences, Lanny, and am not surprised that you are interested in the subject.”

  “At my mother’s home on the Riviera there is an old Polish woman who is a medium. She has been a family pensio
ner for the past fifteen years. Whenever I go there, I never fail to try a few sittings, and one of the ‘spirits,’ or whatever they are who never fail to announce themselves, is old Zaharoff. He fusses and frets because I won’t pay a debt he owes a man at Monte Carlo, but he never tells me any way to get the money. The last time I was there, about a year ago, he gave me quite a shock by announcing that he was greatly displeased by the way I was making use of his name. You understand, I have never mentioned that fact to a living soul, and I thought you and I were the only two persons who knew that I was ‘Zaharoff.’ Of course, it may be that the medium got that out of my subconscious mind; anyhow, it makes me uneasy about having other people experimenting with Madame. My stepfather does it continually, and he might talk about it, simply because he wouldn’t have any idea how important the secret is.”

  “I get you,” said F.D.R.

  “It set me to thinking about the name. The old munitions king didn’t have many intimates before his death, and if one of my reports were to fall into the hands of the Gestapo, they might set out making inquiries among the old man’s heirs and business associates and thus come upon my name. So I think we had better have a new deal and bury old Sir Basil.”

  “All right,” said the President, “choose a new name.” Then, before Lanny could speak, he added: “A North African landing is known as ‘Operation Gymnast.’ That is top secret, but if ever you get into a spot and want to convince one of our people that you are an insider—somebody like Bob Murphy—you can use it.”

  “O.K.,” replied Lanny. “It might be a good idea for me to have a name along the same line. Suppose we say ‘Traveler.’ I seem to be earning that fairly.”

  “So let it be, and I’ll give the necessary instructions. Also, I’ll list the name with my private telephone service, and any time you call the White House and give the name, you’ll reach me if I am available.”