“And if I say yes, what happens then? Will you have to get another special waiver for me, and tell the president and all that?”

“No. This is different—it isn’t an intelligence mission, it’s law enforcement. It’s really an FBI operation, since it’s inside the country. You’ll still be a confidential source for us. But basically, you’ll just be doing your job as a reporter, arranging an interview with someone. We’ll do the rest.”

“I want my life back after this. I just want to be a journalist again.”

“That’s your problem,” Rubino answered, “not mine.”

On Monday morning, I went to Bob Marcus and told him I had a blockbuster. A French lawyer named Michel Bézy—who was the personal adviser to Alain Peyron, the CEO of Unetat—had received a $120 million kickback on the China plane deal. He had already transferred $40 million to his own Swiss bank account. I had the numbers of both accounts, I said. Marcus loved it. It was “the next shoe dropping,” he said, documenting the allegations I’d hinted at in my front-page piece a few days before.

Marcus immediately called the Mirror’s general counsel in New York. The lawyer advised that we needed to talk to Bézy. Unless we were able to interview him, we couldn’t run the story. So there it was: the planets were all in alignment. The requirements of The New York Mirror and the Central Intelligence Agency were identical.

I had a number for Bézy’s law office in Paris, which Rubino had given me in that first pack of material back in March. It was 10:30 A.M. in Washington—early enough that Bézy might still be in his office. A Frenchwoman answered the phone in the singsong “Bon-jour, mon-sieur” voice favored by Gallic shopkeepers and secretaries. I gave her my name and told her I was calling from The New York Mirror, and that I wanted to interview Michel Bézy for a story. “Ne quit-tez pas, mon-sieur,” she said. She put me on hold for so long I thought we’d lost the connection, but eventually a man came on the line. His voice was clipped, perfectly controlled.

“This is Jacques Alessi, Mr. Bézy’s confidential assistant. How may I help you?”

“I’m a reporter for The New York Mirror. I would like to speak with your boss for a story I’m working on.”

“We know who you are, Mr. Truell, you can be assured of that. What is the nature of your story?”

“It’s kind of sensitive. I’m not sure whether Mr. Bézy would want me to talk about it with you on the phone.”