"Ludlum, Robert - Scarlatti Inheritance" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ludlum Robert)

A buzzer rang on the intercom on the desk of a middle-aged receptionist.
"Brigadier General Ellis?" She barely looked up from tb~, paper
Right here.-
"Ibe secretary will see you now."
Ellis looked at his wristwatch. It was nine thirty-two.
He rose, walked toward the ominous black-enameled door, and opened it.
"Youll forgive me, General Ellis. I felt that the nature of your memorandum
required the presence of a third party. May I introduce Undersecretary
Brayduck?"
The brigadier was startled. He had not anticipated a third party; he had
specifically requested that the audience be between the secretary and
himself alone.
Undersecretary Brayduck stood about ton feet to the right of Hull's desk.
He obviously was one of those White House.-State Department university men
so prevalent in the Roosevelt administration. Even his clothes-the light
gray flannels and the wide herringbone jacket-were casway emphasized m the
silent counterpoint to the creased uniform of the brigadier.
"Certainly, Mr. Secretary. Mr. Brayduck." 71be
brigadier nodded.
Cordell S. Hull sat behind the wide desk. His familiar

4
 features-the very light skin, almost white, the thinning white hair, the
steel-rimmed pince-nez in front of his blue-green eyes-all seemed larger
than life because they were an everyday image. The newspapers and the motion
picture newsreels were rarely without photographs of him. Even the more
inclusive election posters-ponderously asking, Do you want to change horses
in the middle of the stream?-had his reassuring, intelligent face
prominently displayed beneath Roosevelt's; sometimes more prominently than
the unknown Harry Truman's.
Brayduck took a tobacco pouch out of his pocket and began stuffing his
pipe. Hull arranged several papers on his desk and slowly opened a folder,
identical to the one in the brigadier's hand, and looked down at it. Ellis
recognized it. It was the confidential memorandum he had had hand-delivered
to the secretary of state.
Brayduck lit his pipe and the odor of the tobacco caused Ellis to look at
the man once again. That smell belonged to one of those strange mixtures
considered so original by the university people but generally offensive to
anyone else in the room. Brigadier Ellis would be re.lieved when the war
was over. Roosevelt would then be out and so would the so-called
intellectuals and their badsmelling tobaccos.
The Brain Trust. Pinks, every one of them.
But first the war.
Hull looked up at the brigadier. "Needless to say, General, your memorandum
is very disturbing."
"The. information was disturbing to me, Mr. Secretary.*#
"No doubt. No doubt. The question would appear to be, Is there any
foundation for your conclusions? I mean, anything concrete?"
"I believe so, sir.'.'
"How many others in Intelligence know about this, Eliisr' Brayduck