Free Bomb by Steve Sheinkin

thing to do,” he said. “That would be treason.”
    Chevalier said nothing more.
    Oppenheimer went back to his martinis. “That was the end of it,” he later said. “It was a very brief conversation.”
    Chevalier reported the results to Eltenton. A disappointed Eltenton told Peter Ivanov, the KGB agent, that there was “no chance whatsoever of obtaining any data—Dr. Oppenheimer does not approve.” Ivanov relayed the news to Moscow.
    Oppenheimer chose not tell General Groves that he’d been approached by the Soviets. It was a decision that would haunt him for the rest of his life.

DISAPPEARING SCIENTISTS
    ON THE AFTERNOON OF NOVEMBER 16, 1942, Robert Oppenheimer and Leslie Groves stood together in a deep canyon in northern New Mexico. Steep red-rock cliffs rose on both sides of the canyon. A clear mountain stream trickled down the center. It was a gorgeous spot.
    â€œThis will never do,” Groves grunted.
    The two men walked back toward their car.
    â€œIf you go on up the canyon,” Oppenheimer suggested, pointing east, “you come out on top of the mesa, and there’s a boys’ school there which might be a usable site.”
    The men climbed into the car and continued their search for the perfect place to build an atomic bomb lab. The site had to be remote, so work could be kept secret. But it also had to be fairly close to railroad lines, so people and equipment could quickly move in and out. And, ideally, it would have some buildings already in place, so scientists could move right in and get to work.
    A light snow began falling as the car wound its way up a narrow dirt road carved into the side of a mesa. The car reached the top and pulled up to a gate with a sign reading Los Alamos Ranch School.
    From their car seats, Groves and Oppenheimer peered through the gate. “We didn’t want to get out,” Groves remembered, “as we should have had to give some reason why we were inspecting the place.”
    Inside the gate, boys ran around playing sports in the snow—in shorts. “It was bitterly cold,” recalled Groves. “I thought they must be freezing.”
    Beyond the playing fields were a few school buildings, a dining lodge, log dormitories, and several small houses for teachers. Oppenheimer loved the mountain and desert views. Groves loved the isolation.
    â€œThis is the place,” Groves said.
    A few weeks later, the school director opened an official-looking letter and saw that it was signed by Secretary of War Henry Stimson. “You are advised,” declared Stimson, “that it has been determined necessary to the interests of the United States in the prosecution of the war that the property of Los Alamos Ranch School be acquired for military purposes.”
    The school was closed, the students sent home.
    While construction crews began expanding roads and nailing together new buildings at Los Alamos, Oppenheimer turned to his next task: “a policy of absolutely unscrupulous recruiting of anyone we can lay hands on.”
    *   *   *
    A SHORT WHILE LATER, a Harvard University chemistry student named Donald Hornig was doing research in an explosives lab when the lab director walked in. Hornig’s boss took him to the attic and locked the door.
    â€œHow would you like another job?” asked the lab director.
    â€œWhat have I done wrong?” Hornig asked.
    â€œNothing,” said his boss.
    â€œWhat kind of job?” Hornig wanted to know.
    â€œCan’t say.”
    â€œWell, where is it?”
    â€œCan’t say.”
    â€œEast or west?”
    â€œSorry, my lips are sealed,” said the director. “Think it over and let me know in the morning.”
    Hornig decided to turn the offer down. It just sounded too strange. Then he started getting phone calls from former professors, and the president of Harvard. They all wanted to know what his problem