Top Secret (A Clandestine Operations Novel) - Hardcover

W. E. B. Griffin is the author of six bestselling series—and now Clandestine Operations.
 
William E. Butterworth IV has worked closely with his father for more than a decade, and is the coauthor of many books with him, most recently Hazardous Duty and Deadly Assets.

I

[ ONE ]

National Airport

Alexandria, Virginia

0405 25 October 1945

The triple-tail Lockheed Constellation with howell petroleum lettered
on its fuselage came in low over the Potomac River, lowered its
gear, put down its huge flaps, and touched smoothly down at the
very end of the main north-south runway.

Her four engines roared as the pilot quickly moved the propellers
into reverse pitch and shoved her throttles forward. When the Connie
finally stopped, she was very uncomfortably close to the far end
of the runway and her tires were smoking.

The pilot radioed: “National, Howell One on the ground at six
past the hour. Request taxi instructions.”

“Howell One, turn and take Taxiway One on your right. Hold
there.”

“Howell One understands hold on Taxiway One.”

The Constellation was the finest transport aircraft in the world.
It was capable of flying forty passengers in its pressurized cabin
higher—at an altitude of 35,000 feet—and faster—it cruised at better
than 300 knots—and for a longer distance—4,300 miles—than
any other transport aircraft in the world. When National Airport
had opened in June 1941, it had been not much more than a pencil
sketch in the notebook of legendary aviator Howard Hughes, who
owned, among a good deal else, the Lockheed Aircraft Company.
Hughes, who had designed the Lockheed P-38 “Lightning” fighter
plane, had decided that if he took his design of the P-38’s wing, enlarged
it appropriately, put four engines on it, and then married it to
a huge, sleek fuselage with an unusual triple-tail design, he would
have one hell of an airplane.

“Build it,” Hughes ordered. “The Air Corps will buy it once they
see it. And if they don’t, I know at least one airline that will.”

Although the Congress, in its wisdom, had decreed that airlines
could not own aircraft manufacturing companies, and vice versa, it
was widely believed that Hughes secretly owned TWA, then known
as Transcontinental & Western Airlines, and later as Trans-World
Airlines.

No sooner had Howell One stopped on Taxiway One than a
small but impressive fleet of vehicles surrounded it. There were four
Ford station wagons and two large trucks. On all their doors was the
insignia of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. There was also a third
truck with a crane mounted in its bed, and a black 1942 Buick Road-
master. Neither was marked. The Buick had a large chrome object
housing a siren and a red light mounted on its left front fender. Finally,
there was a truck carrying the logotype of National Airport. It
had a stairway mounted in its bed.

A dozen or more men in business suits and hats and carrying
Thompson submachine guns erupted from the station wagons as the
truck with the stairs backed up against the Constellation’s rear door.

Two men in business suits got out of the Buick and quickly
climbed the stairs up to the fuselage.

They stood waiting at the top until the door was finally opened.

A handsome young officer—blond, six-foot-one, 212 pounds—
stood in the doorway. He was wearing an olive drab woolen “Ike”
jacket and trousers. The jacket’s insignia identified him as a second
lieutenant of Cavalry. The jacket was unbuttoned, and his necktie
pulled down.

The two men in suits flashed him looks of surprised disapproval
as they pushed past him and entered the cabin.

The cabin looked more like a living room pictured in Architectural
Digest than the interior of a passenger aircraft. Instead of rows
of seats, there were leather upholstered armchairs and couches scattered
along its length. There was a desk and two tables. A full bar
was at the front of the cabin. The floor was lushly carpeted.

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?”

“Sir, I take your point.”

Souers let the exchange sink in for a very long twenty seconds,
and then ordered, “Ford, answer the colonel’s question.”

“When Cronley seized the cargo, sir,” Ford said, “he did not have
a Geiger counter device.”

“May I ask who Cronley is? And why he didn’t have a radiation
detection device?”

Admiral Souers turned to Cronley. “Son, I’m going to give Colonel
Broadhead the benefit of the doubt, meaning I am presuming
that he has a reason beyond idle curiosity in asking it. Therefore, you
may answer those questions.”

“Yes, sir,” Cronley said, then looked at Broadhead. “Sir, I’m Second
Lieutenant James D. Cronley Junior. The first Geiger counter I
ever saw was the one Commander Ford used on the . . . packages that
I took off . . . wherever they were and gave to him.”

“I predict a great military career for this fine young officer,” Admiral
Souers said. “I’m sure everyone noticed that he didn’t say ‘submarine’
or ‘U-boat’ or ‘uranium oxide’ even once.”

Souers let that sink in for another ten seconds, and then went on:
“Now my curiosity is aroused. Why did you want to know, Broadhead,
if the Geiger counter had been used on . . . wherever these
packages were when Cronley seized them?”

“Sir, I was hoping that someone looked for radiation that might
have leaked from the packages while they were on the sub—” He
stopped.

“Now that the cat’s out of the bag, Colonel,” Souers said, “you
can say ‘submarine.’ You can even say ‘U-boat’ and ‘uranium oxide.’ ”

“Yes, sir.”

Souers looked at Cletus Marcus Howell, who was grinning widely.

“Please don’t think this is funny, Mr. Howell,” he said.

“That was a smile of approval, Admiral. From one mean sonofabitch
to another.”

“Dad, for God’s sake!” Martha Howell said.

“I will take that as a compliment, Mr. Howell,” Souers said.

“It was intended as one,” the old man said.

Souers turned to Broadhead.

“You think the submarine may be hot, Broadhead?”

“I think it’s possible, sir. The uranium oxide was on the submarine
for a couple of months, maybe even longer.”

“Mattingly, get that word to Frade just as soon as we’re finished
here,” Souers ordered. “We don’t want to sterilize half the brighter
officers of the Armada Argentina, do we?”

“Yes, sir,” Colonel Mattingly said, smiling. “And no, sir, we certainly
wouldn’t want to do that.”

Second Lieutenant Cronley chuckled.

“I don’t understand that,” Cletus Marcus Howell said.

“Possibly, Dad,” his daughter-in-law said, “because you’re not supposed
to. It’s none of your business.”

“Actually, with apologies to the ladies, I was being crude in order
not to have to say ‘suffer radiation poisoning,’ ” Souers said. “And,
ma’am, the President ordered me to answer any questions Mr. Howell
might have.”

“I thought I told you, Martha,” the old man said, “that ole Harry
and I have the honor to be Thirty-third Degree Masons. We can
trust one another.”

“May I ask who ‘Frade’ is?” Broadhead said. “And if he’s qualified
to conduct an examination of this kind?”

“No, Colonel, you may not. You don’t have the Need to Know,”
Souers said. “Are you and General Tomlinson about ready to get the
cargo moving?”

“At your orders, Admiral,” Tomlinson said.

“Then may I suggest you get going?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Show them how to get into the cargo bay, Ford.”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

Cronley made a mov...