Graham, who was now the Deputy Director of the OSS for Western Hemisphere Operations, had served as a second lieutenant in the Marine Corps in France in World War I. After the war he had been active in the Marine Corps Reserve, eventually rising to Colonel, USMCR.
An engineer by training, he had become president of the nation’s second- or third-largest railroad (depending on whether the criterion was income or tonnage moved annually). He had made, additionally, a considerable fortune building railroads all over Central and South America.
A political conservative, he had made substantial financial contributions to the presidential campaign of his close friend, Wendell L
. Willkie, who had been defeated in a landslide by Roosevelt in the 1940 election.
When called to active Marine Corps service, he had expected to be given command of a regiment; but Donovan—along with the Deputy Commandant of the Marine Corps, an old friend—had convinced him that his intimate knowledge of South America and its leaders made him more valuable to the OSS than he would be to the Marine Corps, and he had reluctantly given up his dream of commanding a Marine regiment.
“Sit down, Alex,” Donovan said, and went to his office door and ordered coffee.
Graham lowered himself onto a green leather couch, took a long, thin black cigar case from the pocket of his well-tailored suit, extracted a cigar, and, after biting its end off, lit it with a gold Dunhill lighter.
“Nice-looking cigar,” Donovan said. “Argentine?”
Graham started to take the cigar case from his jacket again. Donovan signaled he didn’t want one. Graham shrugged. “Brazilian,” he said.
“That’s right,” Donovan said. “There’s a layover in Rio de Janeiro, isn’t there?”
“And in Caracas,” Graham said. “It took me four days to get here from Buenos Aires.”
“Shall I get right to the point?” Donovan asked.
“That’s often a good idea.”
“I need to know the name of your intelligence source in Argentina,” Donovan said, “the one who helped us with Operation Phoenix. I want to know who Galahad is.”
“We’ve been over this, Bill,” Graham said.
“That was an order, Colonel.”
“Well, we are getting right to the point, aren’t we? Sorry, I’m not in a position to tell you.”
Donovan glared coldly at him.
“Bill,” Graham said. “When I took this job, I had your word that you wouldn’t try to second-guess my decisions.”
“I can take you off this job, Alex.”
“Yes, you can. Is that what you’re doing?”
“What am I supposed to tell the President? ‘Sorry, Mr. President, Graham won’t tell me who Galahad is’?”
“When all else fails, tell the truth.”
“What if the President asked you—ordered you—to tell him?”
“Same answer.”
“What I should have done was order Frade up here.”
“In the Marine Corps, Bill, they teach us to never give an order that you doubt will be obeyed.”
“You don’t mean he’d refuse to come?”
“That’s a very real possibility.”
“He’s a major in the Marine Corps.”