“There can be no question of not handing this letter to our superiors.” Hagen sounded shocked at the very idea of not delivering the Mufti’s letter—more shocked at my implied suggestion than anything the Grand Mufti had said. “That wouldn’t do at all. This is diplomatic correspondence.”

“It didn’t sound all that diplomatic to me,” I said.

“Perhaps not. Nevertheless the letter still has to go back to Berlin. This is part of what we came for, Gunther. We have to have something to show for our mission here. Especially now that we know we’re being watched by the Gestapo. Fiddling expenses is one thing. Coming down here on a wild-goose chase is something else. That would make us look ridiculous in the eyes of General Heydrich. Our careers in the SD can’t afford that.”

“No, I hadn’t thought of that,” said Eichmann, whose sense of career was as developed as Hagen’s.

“Heydrich may be a bastard,” I said. “But he’s a clever bastard. Too clever to read that letter and not know the Mufti is a complete spinner.”

“Maybe,” said Eichmann. “Maybe, yes. Fortunately the letter isn’t addressed to Heydrich, is it? Fortunately the letter’s addressed to the Führer. He’ll know best how to respond to what—”

“From one madman to another,” I said. “Is that what you’re suggesting, Eichmann?”

Eichmann almost choked with horror. “Not for one moment,” he spluttered. “I wouldn’t dream—” Blushing to the roots of his hair, he glanced uncomfortably at Hagen and Reichert. “Gentlemen, please believe me. That’s not what I meant at all. I have the greatest admiration for the Führer.”

“Of course you do, Eichmann,” I said.

Finally, Eichmann looked at me. “You won’t tell Flesch about this, will you, Gunther? Please say you won’t tell the Gestapo.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it. Look, forget about that. What are you going to do about Fievel Polkes? And Haganah?”

Eliahu Golomb joined Polkes in Cairo for the meeting with Eichmann and Hagen. He only just made it before the British closed the border after a number of bomb attacks in Palestine by Arabs and Jews. Before the meeting, I met with Golomb and Polkes at their hotel and told them everything that had been said at the meeting with Haj Amin. For a while Golomb called down plagues from heaven on the Mufti’s head. Then he asked for my advice on how to handle Eichmann and Hagen.

“I think you should make them believe that in any civil war with the Arabs, it’s Haganah that will win,” I said. “Germans admire strength. And they like winners. It’s only the British who like the underdog.”

“We will win,” insisted Golomb.