by Matt Eaton
A few more pieces of the puzzle suddenly fell into place. “You’ve been helping him make money.” He just smiled. It made so much sense. Clarence was a priest. He had no interest in money. Until this moment, she hadn’t stopped to ask herself how he’d managed to trade in gold so successfully.
She almost laughed when she opened the door to discover Adams wearing a trench coat, trilby and dark glasses. Upon catching sight of Tavon, the President’s man was taken aback — he’d obviously assumed Edna would be alone.
“Would you like to come in?” she asked him.
“Perhaps it’s best I come back another time,” he said.
“I’m amazed you’ve come at all,” she said. “But there’s no need to be shy, this is someone you’ll want to meet.”
Adams stepped inside. Lee Tavon introduced himself and Adams shook his hand. Edna watched with no small degree of amusement at the wonder and astonishment washing across Adams’ face.
“You’re the infamous Lee Tavon,” said Adams. “You look remarkably down to Earth for someone from another planet.”
“That’s because I am both these things at once,” said Tavon. “It’s how I hide in plain sight.”
Adams finally remembered why he’d come and turned his attention to Edna, offering her a profound apology for not getting in touch sooner. “I had to wait for the press to lose interest. Though I did see two G-men out front.”
“I hope that doesn’t worry you,” she said.
“J. Edgar is nothing if not predictable,” Adams said. “It’s why I dressed incognito.”
“Probably safe to assume they’ll identify you in photo analysis,” said Tavon. “But there’s no need to worry, we have another way to get you safely out of here.” He gave Edna a wink.
“What would that be? A spaceship on the roof?”
“Not exactly,” said Tavon. Though space travel of a sort was certainly involved. “It’s more of a secret passageway. Now, you two have your talk; I’m going to make a pot of coffee.” He wandered off towards the kitchen, already well aware of the topic of conversation. Edna urged Adams to take a seat on the lounge, knowing now there was more to this than an apology.
“I was impressed with how you handled the lion’s den,” he began. “I want you to know neither the President nor I will forget it.”
“Forgive me for not taking a great deal of comfort from that. You left me to fend for myself.”
He nodded. “We did. It’s one of the harsh realities of politics. You can’t always help your friends. But that’s why I’m here. We want you to come back and work for us. On the down-low.”
“Sherm, my name is mud. How would you ensure that didn’t come back to bite you politically?”
“Quite simple, really. We’d give you an entirely new identity. We need to kill Edna Drake.”
FIFTY FIVE
Sunday September 6, 1953
“All we need to do is fake your death,” said Adams.
Edna screwed her nose up in horror. “I could never do that to my parents.”
Adams nodded. “No, no, I guess not. I take your point. All right then, what if Edna flees to Mexico or Argentina?”
It was odd hearing him talking about her in the third person. “That could work,” she admitted. “But Mexico would be her preference. Edna’s always wanted to visit Acapulco.”
“All right, good. That’s settled. She flies down for a holiday and decides to stay for good. She’ll be out of the FBI’s reach and officially, as far as the US Government is concerned, Edna will remain there forevermore, blending into the expat community and drowning her sorrows in gin cocktails by the waterfront.”
“Meanwhile I become somebody else.”
“All you’d need to do is make the odd appearance down there to maintain the ruse, then return to America in the guise of your newly minted self,” he said.
“I think, with Lee’s help, we can go one better than that. But you’d need to make sure we have the CIA on board. I wouldn’t want James Angleton trying to undermine me.”
“Already taken care of,” Adams assured her.
“But why now?” she asked. “Why couldn’t you do this for me to begin with?”
He smiled grimly. “You needed to die before you could rise again.”
She laughed heartily. “Don’t let Bill Donovan hear you talk like that. Likening a woman to Jesus Christ? That’s blasphemy.”
“I say it merely to make my point,” Adams said. “I’ve read the report you sent me on the FS-1 operation and your experiences in the underground hangar. Remarkable work. The President has noted your concerns about the power in the hands of Verus and Lockheed.”
“It seems wrong to me that these things have been happening without the President’s knowledge,” she said.
“You’re right. Mr Eisenhower and I would happily place the entire Verus Foundation operation under your control, were that within our remit.”
She thought about this. Verus was an autonomous organization; Truman had made sure of that while he was still president. Menzel might be the man in control, but there were still ways to have an influence over his behavior. “There must be someone else in MJ-12 who shares our concerns,” she said. “What about Roscoe Hillenkoetter, or Hoyt Vandenberg?”
Adams shook his head. “Hoyt is dying. He’s about to go into hospital. I’m afraid he won’t be coming out.”
Edna was shocked, but not surprised. “I’m very sorry to hear that.” She’d liked Vandenberg from the moment they met; he was a straight shooter.
Now that she was thinking about it, it occurred to her a front-on assault was not the way with a man like Menzel. There was a better way.
“Roscoe Hillenkoetter is in favor of opening Majestic matters to public scrutiny,” said Adams. “He and Menzel differ on that point, and I’m not sure the art of gentle persuasion is one of Roscoe’s known attributes.”
“No, you’re right,” she agreed. “The person we need is Gordon Gray. He and Donald are both intellectuals. Gordon is well capable of helping Dr Menzel gently shift course.”
“What does that mean?” Adams asked.
Lee Tavon delivered them coffees on a wooden tray and then made another tactical retreat. As usual, he’d appeared at precisely the right time. With a single glance, he confirmed to her he knew what she was about to propose, and that he approved.
“We can control the purse strings,” she said. “Clarence Paulson has become something of a necessity for Verus. He trades in gold. In fact, I strongly suspect he has a stockpile of it. All we need to do is ensure the money keeps coming, through Clarence. He who controls the money, controls Verus.”
“You’re talking about a man who’s about to be deported.”
She thought of the black box handed to her by Lee Tavon and remembered the spare destinations on the dial. She grinned. “I don’t think will be much of a problem. But tell me, what exactly is it you want me to do for the President?”
Adams stared at her intensely. “We want you to help us work toward full public disclosure. Let’s get these secrets about unearthly visitors into the open.”
That caught her completely off-guard. “Sherm, do you understand what you’re saying?”
“I do. More importantly, the President understands.”
“There are many powerful men who will do everything to stop you. To say nothing of the visitors themselves. There are some whose motivations remain far from clear.”
Lee Tavon chose this moment to reappear. She knew he’d been listening in, or reading their minds. Or both. “The Outherians would fully support your plan,” Tavon said. Edna wasn’t surprised. It was the Outherians who had orchestrated the Big Flap — the saucers that appeared over Washington D.C. for two successive weekends the year before.
“What about the churches?” Edna asked. “Or the stock market? This would need to be done very carefully.”
Adams nodded. “You’re right. It’s why we need to conduct a test.”
FIFTY
SIX
Wednesday, September 23, 1953
Ernst ‘Teddy’ Stauffer was a handsome musician who looked like he was born for the silver screen, though his star quality dulled the moment he opened his mouth. Not that this was his fault. It was due to his German Swiss accent, which was decidedly out of vogue at the box office.
This Germanic confidence that oozed from every pore combined with his Aryan good looks meant Teddy came across like a Nazi poster boy when Edna first met him. Germany was where he began his career, playing American swing music with his band the Teddies. In the 1930s, he was regarded as Germany’s king of swing. But the war drove him back to Switzerland — the Nazis never trusted jazz. It just wasn’t deemed to be good German music. From Switzerland, Teddy emigrated to America and thence to Mexico where he had built for himself a lush and lucrative life.
Teddy Stauffer was the manager of the Casablanca Hotel in Acapulco, a grand iconic landmark sat high upon a hill, a haven for America’s rich and famous. Its suites and public spaces offered unparalleled views of the Acapulco waterfront. Teddy had become a close friend and associate of Washington bar owner and businessman Lee Tavon, and happily agreed to do him the favor of hiring Edna.
He made a pass at Edna by way of an opening gambit. She took a great deal of pleasure in turning him down. She’d heard the casting couch was his standard hiring tactic. Thus, he’d blithely assumed he would have his way, because men like him almost always did. His look of shock at her forceful rejection was worth the trip to Mexico all on its own. He hired her anyway, as she’d known he would. They had both been happy to put that first awkward meeting behind them, and had since become firm friends.
In the short time he had been running the Casablanca, Teddy had attracted many of the biggest names in Hollywood to his lavish playground south of the border. For them, the promise of a getaway free from America’s relentless scrutiny and bothersome morality offered endless allure. Teddy was almost a celebrity in his own right. In 1947, he’d been Rita Hayworth’s lover while she was between husbands, her heart broken by Orson Welles but still valiantly playing the field. The affair didn’t last long. Later, Teddy married actress Hedy Lamarr, but it over between them inside two years. That’s Hollywood, folks. For Teddy, fame and fortune had their attractions, as they did for anyone, but they were by no means the only way to his heart. He simply loved to love. But Edna couldn’t afford to be just another one of his conquests. She needed his respect and, more importantly, she needed him permanently on the hook to support her cover story. Teddy hired her as deputy manager of Casablanca’s rooftop nightclub Ciro’s. It was supposedly her job to be on call for the nightclub’s performers and to hand out party invitations to VIPs, a job that might take her anywhere in the city or abroad, meaning her prolonged absences raised no eyebrows.
Teddy’s cooperation had been secured by none other than the charming young senator John F. Kennedy, while he was honeymooning in Acapulco with his new wife Jackie. The senator paid Teddy a discreet visit at the behest of Sherman Adams. Sure, he might have been a Democrat, but Kennedy had no problems with delivering a letter from the President. Had he known what it was about, he might have thought twice, but thankfully he was happy to act in the service of his nation, no questions asked. The letter offered the promise of reward from the leader of the free world. It didn’t stipulate the nature of this reward, but the promise was enough to ensure Teddy instantly became Edna’s greatest fan.
She spent a week learning the intricacies of the nightclub business so she could talk about it convincingly when the occasion called for it. For the most part, it was pretty breezy and fun. There was the mundane side of ordering food and beverage and organizing staff, but the hotel itself was like heaven on Earth. Ciro’s was an open-air nightclub. Her nights were thus spent literally surrounded by stars above and below as the hostess to the glamorous, wealthy and famous while they partied long and hard into the wee small hours. She loved Teddy’s taste in jazz, and he hired some of the best in the business to play at Ciro’s.
One day she might be happy doing all this for real. Meantime, she was free to come and go between Mexico and America as often as needed.
“You need to leave,” Teddy insisted that morning. “Don’t come back for at least a week.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Rita’s coming,” he said.
“Rita Hayworth?”
“It’s the perfect time for you to make your exit. Once Margarita is here, nobody will notice your absence. She’s all anyone will be talking about.”
“Isn’t she getting married again?”
“Fourth time lucky. So she thinks,” said Teddy. “The wedding’s tomorrow, in Las Vegas. They’re coming here for the honeymoon.”
“She’s spending her honeymoon in her ex-lover’s hotel.”
“Dick Haymes is a terrible man,” said Teddy. “I hear he’s flat broke. In Hollywood, they call him Mr Evil. You can bet he’s marrying her for money. Poor girl. Still making bad choices.”
Edna held herself back from pointing out the obvious. “Why would she come here? Are you still... friends?”
A term with its own special hierarchy of meanings in Hollywood circles.
“No,” said Teddy. “Maybe. I don’t know. These things are never clear with Margarita. No doubt she’ll have Jack Kennedy back in here. I’ve heard he likes movie stars. You don’t want to be around for any of this, things could get complicated. Rita treats her men like father figures. It brings out the worst in them.”
Edna reluctantly agreed it was a good time to leave. “But you call me if you need me. This is my world too now.”
“You should pray I don’t take you up on it.”
Acting against the express wishes of Mr Adams, she’d taken Teddy into her close confidence. She’d demonstrated to him the means by which she moved to and from America. Her hotel room was another destination point on the dial of her little black box. Adams believed Teddy Stauffer couldn’t be trusted to keep this information to himself. But Edna’s recent experiences told her the opposite was true. Who could he possibly tell, and what could he say to make such a tale sound convincing? That he’d hired a spy with magical powers? She’d told him his life would be over if he breathed a word of it to anyone. He believed her.
Edna’s best protection was the sheer strangeness of it. Teddy made all the predictable noises about fortunes in the offing and how they could put the airlines out of business. But when she pointed out this was the reason they couldn’t go public, he understood. To her mind, this was her first tentative step along the road ahead. Teddy was her everyman; her sounding board. In return, she would never be more than an hour or two away if she was needed at Ciro’s, or if strange men in the service of J. Edgar Hoover started questioning her whereabouts. All Teddy had to do was pick up the telephone and she would return.
For her American alias, she’d gone with her middle name, Jean. Her father had often called her ‘Edna Jean’ or ‘Jeanie’ when she was a kid and she instinctively answered to the name. Her new surname, Gellhorn, was a nod to novelist and journalist Martha Gellhorn, who’d been a profound influence on her life during their time together in Berlin in those terrible days at the end of the war. Gellhorn was why she became a journalist.
There was no real need for Jean Gellhorn to have a passport, but Adams made sure she had one anyway, in case she ever needed to travel more extensively. She also had her own social security number and a convincing cover story, which was anchored in reality. Jean Gellhorn was a badged Treasury special agent reporting directly to the head of presidential security, Elmer Deckard. It was enough to ensure compliance from whoever crossed her path, no questions asked.
Of course, in the event questions were asked, Deckard would back her to the hilt. She took a great deal comfort and satisfaction from the irony that as she set out to end UFO secrecy, her own tracks were being zealously covered up by the Secret Service.
FIFTY SEVEN
Saturday Septembe
r 26, 1953
Coffee and cigarette in hand at the red formica kitchen table of Deborah’s house at Arlington Forest, she set her order of attack to paper.
There were two important considerations. First, they must decide upon the number and the make-up of their group of test subjects. Each of these people must be approached delicately to gauge their interest in serving their country, but they could not be told ahead of time the nature of the task they were being called upon to perform. This could only be revealed on the day of the test.
The idea was to expose them to all the collected knowledge and evidence of interplanetary activity on Earth. It would be made clear their safety was assured, though this might ultimately offer little or no comfort in the face of such a shocking reality. But there would be no point excluding people who they thought might react badly — this was the very reason the test was necessary.
Who and how many to pick for the test group required a great deal of consideration. A glance at the latest US census information offered an almost endless array of options upon which to base their choice. Edna felt strongly that black and Latino people should have a place in the group. But there was also religion to consider, along with political opinion. This brought into question levels of education and socio-economic status. Then there was a question of age — there had to be a range of ages, if they were to go anywhere close to reflecting the breadth of public opinion.
Normally, taking this many variables into account would necessitate a group of several hundred people, but they simply couldn’t involve that many people. Each member of the group would need to be vetted (definitely no communist sympathizers) and sign vows of secrecy. Edna decided they should go with a group of 12 people. This was the number chosen to serve on a court jury and, in the end, a verdict was what they needed here. Six men and six women chosen across a spread of ages, backgrounds and beliefs. Not perfect, but good enough.
