Dan Fesperman - The Arms Maker of Berlin

Surely if Berta’s source at the archives had heard about the arrest, then Staley must have, too. But the man’s face betrayed no hint of recognition, only the doleful mien of someone who has endured yet another death of a valued contemporary. The ranks were thinning fast for the wartime crowd.

“I’m here because of Gordon,” Nat said. “I’m looking for materials from his OSS days.” Realizing that sounded awkward with the man not even buried, he added, “I’m speaking at his memorial service. Thought I might fill in a few blanks.”

“I don’t know much about his work in Bern. Mostly clerical, I think. Only person to ever show any interest was some college kid about a year ago. Foreign exchange student. Not sure if she came up with anything. Wouldn’t have anything to do with me once I pointed her in the right direction.”

Probably Berta. No wonder she was laying low. It would also explain her lack of enthusiasm for this track of research. But why hadn’t she shared her results-or lack of them-rather than letting him waste time covering the same ground?

Staley first checked the finding aids, thick volumes cross-referenced by name, place, and subject. None listed a single mention of “Wolfe, Gordon.”

“Could he have had a code name?” Nat asked.

“Doubt it. But we can check the OSS master list.”

That search also came up empty. Nat was on the verge of moving to the next topic when Staley raised a finger.

“We got a new batch of declassified material a few weeks ago. Those always yield a few new identities. It’s still indexed under CIA numbers, but I’d be happy to check.”

“Lead the way.”

That was where they struck gold, taking even Staley by surprise. On a list of seven previously undisclosed code names, “Icarus” turned up next to Gordon’s name.

“I’ll be damned,” Nat said. “Wonder why they took so long to declassify that?”

“Bottom of the pile?”

“You really think it’s that simple?”

“No.” Staley smiled. “But it’s what they’d want me to say.”

With the new point of reference, fresh leads were suddenly abundant, including the Icarus personnel file. It, too, was part of the new batch of material, meaning that probably few, if any, historians had seen it.

Nat and Berta filled out requests for the materials they wanted, and a young librarian hauled out a pair of squeaking pushcarts piled with narrow gray boxes, just like the four that had turned up in Gordon’s summer home. Berta and he set up their cameras and tripods on adjoining desks and hunkered down.

The Icarus file held Gordon’s employment form, the one with the reference to the Metropolitan Club. A stack of attached memos offered the flavor of Gordon’s earliest assignments.

Routine stuff, mostly. Dulles sent him to meet with a shadowy young émigré from France who was offering information in exchange for passage to the United States. Gordon’s report concluded the fellow was a con man.

“Agreed,” Dulles scribbled in the margin, initialing it with his trademark “AWD.”

Some assignments came to Icarus via Zurich operative Frederick Loofbourow, an interesting fellow in his own right. A U.S. commercial attaché on leave from an executive job with Standard Oil, Loofbourow was right out of the Dulles mold of gentleman spy, with posh digs on the Zurich waterfront.

Nat then came across a memo dated October 29, 1943, which stopped him cold. By that time, Nat knew, Dulles had been preoccupied with his new star source-German diplomat Fritz Kolbe, alias George Wood, the fellow who had taped all those stolen documents around his thigh. Thanks to Kolbe, for example, Dulles knew well in advance about the ill-fated July 20 plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler. To clear the board for meetings with Kolbe, Dulles pawned off some of his lesser sources to other operatives, including Icarus. And one of those sources was Reinhold von Bauer, Kurt Bauer’s father.

“Henceforth, 543 to handle Magneto,” Nat read. He recognized Bauer’s code name from the stolen files he had reviewed for the FBI.

Gordon, as operative 543, didn’t seem impressed by what Magneto had to offer.

“Magneto continues to insist on relocation to Switzerland,” Gordon wrote. “I repeated your insistence that he is far more valuable to us in Berlin. Claims family is under pressure from personal circumstances, but would not elaborate. Said his son can also help us. Told him I would await your advisement.”

“Cannot meet him at present,” Dulles replied. “Stick to your guns. AWD.”

A promising lead. But when Nat turned the page the trail went cold. Staring up at him was a canary-colored sheet of cardboard with the words “Withdrawal Notice, Access Restricted.” Below, in smaller print, was the usual boilerplate: “Now Filed in CIA Job No. 79-003317B. Four items have been withdrawn because they contain security classified information or otherwise restricted information.”

The withdrawal was dated three weeks ago, the very day the rest of these materials had become public. Someone had gotten cold feet at the last second. Holland? Although the FBI and the CIA still weren’t exactly pals, maybe the Agency had asked for some last-minute sanitizing. And that made Nat think of Steve Wallace, a CIA archivist he had met years ago at a history seminar. Wallace, a decent source if used sparingly never revealed classified information. But he sometimes nudged you in the direction of other materials, already public, that gave you what you needed. Nat opened his laptop to shoot Wallace an e-mail. Then he showed Berta the withdrawal notice.

“I’m finding those, too,” she said with a frown. “But look at this.”

She handed him a tattered clothbound notebook with the letters “H-P” inked on the spine. It was a Dulles logbook, stuffed with detailed alphabetical listings for his sources and contributors. “Magneto” had his own page of dated, typewritten notations.

Nat had been through that very logbook years earlier. But at the time he hadn’t known Magneto’s identity. No one else would have either, unless they’d had access to the information in the stolen boxes that had turned up at Gordon’s.

Nat read the first paragraph, which included a boldfaced addition:

Source Magneto is a German businessman with excellent connections in France, Germany, and Switzerland. Resourceful, intelligent, hitherto reliable. Source’s son connected with the German underground.

“And look on the very next page,” Berta said.

It was headed “Magneto II.” It began with a physical description from an interesting source:

Would put his height at 511,” full head of hair clipped short and brown. Typical Prussian features, well built although reduced by recent privations. Eyes wide apart, blue-gray, frank in expression. Unworldly but has acquired ease in conversation through his recent travels. Shape of head oval, ears medium but stand out slightly from head. (Icarus, 05/24/44)

“You think Magneto II is Kurt?” Nat said.

“Has to be.”

The logbook contained only two other citations for Magneto II. The first, a bit ominous in its abruptness, was dated only three months before Germany surrendered:

Relationship terminated. (02/10/45)

The last entry was dated five months after the surrender. Dulles wrote it the week he departed occupied Germany to return for good to the United States:

Magneto II file to storage. To be transferred to 109. (10/8/45)

Nat didn’t need to look up code number 109. It belonged to William “Wild Bill” Donovan, chief of the OSS. Whatever information the agency had collected on Kurt Bauer, someone had decided it needed special handling by the nation’s reigning spymaster once the war was over. Unless, of course, the file never made it to Donovan.