Previously on Manhattan...
You're free to walk away from this Hill anytime you like.
Just because there may be a consequence, doesn't mean you have no choice.
- He touched me. - What do you mean he touched you?
Stop it.
He groped me and said something about how he sees what you're doing,
and he's waiting for you to slip up.
Are you ready to start working?
Keep working on implosion for Frank?
- Are you gonna invite me in? - I'm fresh out of whiskey.
Who was that, a Christmas caroler?
No, just a soldier looking for a good time.
It's all poisoned.
Our clothes?
Everything. It's all radioactive.
Command calls him Magpie.
He has credible intelligence
their atomic program is two months ahead of ours.
Ripped By mstoll
- Nein! - Manfred.
Grete!
I know you don't fully understand this American vogue for camping, tulip,
but everything must be experienced once.
Well, you didn't have to experience the whole bottle.
Oh, didn't I?
You know, we've had, I don't mind telling you,
a bit of a breakthrough in old implosion town,
and it needed celebrating.
Oh, well, so you're not at all curious about our triumph?
Well, we're not supposed to talk about it, right?
Well, of course not, which should make you twice as interested.
Hang compartmentalization.
- Helen, Helen. - Yeah?
We've done it. We cracked shock waves.
Hogarth was wrong. You can govern them.
- Oh, that's great. - Guess how we solved the speed problem.
Uh...
I don't know.
Guess. Just guess. Take your best shot.
What?
Vary the burn rate?
My God, woman, you are superhuman.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's it.
Do you know how many months that took Frank?
I mean, I trust I can, obviously, count on your discretion.
Burn rates sound like a great start,
but it doesn't put implosion in the catbird seat.
Catbird seat?
Some of these Americanisms you're picking up.
- You been tuning in to Red Barber, have we? - Huh!
Excuse me, ma'am.
I'd like to offer you this token
as a reminder of my fondest and most well-intentioned best wishes.
No tokens.
Remember?
Yes, I know, I just...
Just having a laugh.
Make yourself at home.
We're going to need microphones.
- Excuse me? - In these offices
and in the billets of your personal staff.
It's all in this order.
You'll have to clear them all out on Thursday.
Any pretext, go on a march.
You want to record every word in my office?
In my staff's homes? Hell, why not the latrines?
- Don't be vulgar, Colonel. - And who the hell's gonna sort through
40 phonograph records of pillow talk and office gossip week in and week out?
- That's not your concern. - Listen to me.
You may be king shit among the pencil-necks back east,
but you don't bark orders at me.
- I know I'm not your superior officer. - You're goddamn right.
After all, I had dinner with your superior officer last night.
General Groves. Your general's very upset, Colonel.
He had a friend named Magpie, remember him?
A little German fellow about yea big.
Well, no, now, actually about yea big.
- What are you talking about? - The SS, those romantics,
cut off his head at the neck.
Not a little pencil neck like mine, got a big bull neck like yours.
Magpie's dead.
And now we have no eyes on Heisenberg because somebody talked.
- Somebody right here... - No one in my staff leaked any...
Who, then?
You see why we need microphones.
You say no one outside this office knew about Magpie...
Or did someone know?
Colonel?
Methylphenobarbital.
Such a pretty name for an army sedative.
In the Pacific, they call them goofballs.
But here, they paint them robin's-egg blue
and feed them to hysterics.
It's clever.
You're not a hysteric.
It's better than a delusional.
I'm still sorry.
- I really am. - You have nothing to be sorry for.
Other than almost burning down the house, you are absolutely right.
Like it never happened.
So what's on your docket today?
More reading,
less railing against imaginary toxins.
- Pardon the interruption. - Dr. Akley.
I thought you'd be at the airfield by now.
Army pushed it back a few hours for security reasons.
The mathematician in me says the probability
of Hitler shooting me down over Lubbock is fairly low.
- Charlie? - Sir.
I've been watching you and Helen Prins.
I know what you're doing.
I never was sure why you wanted her here in the first place.
Dr. Akley,
um...
I can explain.
- Family's everything, Charlie. - Sir?
You're a married man.
Look, she's a good scientist.
I wouldn't have allowed her in Thin Man if she weren't,
but the men in this group are already starting to talk.
Now imagine what it would look like
to the leadership of this project if they found out that you and Dr. Prins were...
- Entangled. - Helen...
Fifteen years I've been with Rose.
Now,
I've been tempted, sure, we all have,
but Rose makes me who I am.
I don't know if it started at Site X, but I know where it's gonna end.
I understand. I do.
Well...
Don't burn down the house while I'm at the Capitol.
So, we have $100.
This is a strange game.
Oh, this is my favorite game.
Évasion. Escape.
Now, our $100, where shall we go?
Albuquerque.
Albuquerque?
Yes. No, all right. How about, um...
How about Paris?
Cherie, I do not think there will be much Paris left.
I don't understand. I thought this was pretend, right?
Paris was real for me, Abby.
Before the war, before Tom, ladies lived there like the two of us.
Who were together, like this.
Only Without the lies.
Well, I guess it's true what they say about the French.
That we do not delude ourselves?
That Paris is gone forever.
But maybe we can find another.
Mmm?
Tangier, where the giant Antaeus lived.
And today, Tangier is a free city
of artisans, lovers,
writers, renegades.
Even under Franco.
And war hasn't touched it.
What do you think?
It sounds better than Albuquerque.
You off to Washington to hold Roosevelt's hand again?
Yeah, a couple days.
How's he looking, the old man?
Not good.
Truman will be sworn in by the time they bring the car around.
What's it like being a scientist without the science part?
What's it like running a department without the department part?
I was sorry to hear about Glen.
What about him?
I heard he threw up the white flag. Left implosion.
Went to go do admin work for Oppenheimer.
Glen Babbit pushing papers, unbelievable.
Brits must have really taken the wind out of his sails, huh?
I work better alone anyway.
Well, my door's always open, Frank.
Save the bedside manner for Roosevelt.
Glen, I need to talk to you.
- Frank, look... - So, what, that's it?
You go over my head? I have to hear about it from Akley?
Oppenheimer needs more hands in his office
and it looks to me like you've got all the help you need.
- Jesus, Glen, I can't do this without you. - You're gonna have to.
All right. All right, fine.
Listen, just keep your ears open in there for me, okay?
If Akley comes in and mentions my name,
if you happen to catch a glimpse of plutonium before it arrives...
No, Frank.
If you want to spend the rest of the decade at Leavenworth, fine,
but I'm tired of the lies, of all of it.
Glen.
I think it's best if we don't speak for a while.
Frank's wish list.
Read and burn.
Jesus, this will take two weeks.
Frank needs it in two days.
Frank doesn't have to fool
50 kind of smart guys into thinking they're doing Akley's work
when they're actually doing Frank's.
What happened to you?
You smell like a brewery on fire.
I went camping.
- On a school night? - Mmm-hmm.
Paul wanted love under the stars, so...
Well, I hope you don't talk in your sleep.
- What's that supposed to mean? - Just don't tell Crosley anything.
Is this about me and Crosley or is this about me and you?
Speaking of which, Akley thinks that we're having an affair.
I told him I'd put a stop to it.
To the affair we're not having?
He thinks I'm in love with you.
I'm gonna open this door and you are gonna break up with me.
You're an asshole.
Right. Perfect. Just like that.
- It's for the best, Helen. - Get off me.
The famous Dr. Winter.
It's nice to finally match a face to the name.
Can I help you?
Yes, I certainly hope so.
Perhaps you'd like to invite me in for a little chat.
You know, I'm not really in the mood for houseguests, so if you'll excuse me.
You got a man killed.
Manfred Schlimmer.
A mutual friend in Werner Heisenberg's office in Berlin.
He's dead.
I'm sorry to hear that.
Hmm.
But here's what so odd, Dr. Winter.
You weren't supposed to know that Magpie existed at all.
Colonel Cox in his infinite wisdom tells you about Magpie,
next thing we know, our asset's head winds up in a box.
So, what, you think I sold him out to Hermann Göring?
Oh, no, no.
I think it's far more complicated than that because you are far more complicated.
You like complexity?
Why don't you try quantum electrodynamics?
The only kind of math I'm any good at is...
What do you call it? Eliminating variables.
- Who else did you tell about Magpie? - I keep secrets for a living.
Oh, yes.
Keeping secrets, it's a lonely business, isn't it?
But you're not so lonely, are you, Dr. Winter?
You inspire loyalty.
In my line of work, that doesn't go unnoticed.
Think of Sid Liao, your star mathematician.
Just a kid and so loyal.
Not to his country, of course, to you.
And then there's Mr. Meeks.
A little, flimsy man who would turn on a dime.
Once again, sweet nothings for old Frank.
What do you want from me?
And let's not forget the curious affair of Glen Babbit.
Your mentor. What a colorful character.
And such colorful friends he has, too.
Not just standard-issue communists,
traitors who run atomic programs for our enemies.
You collect people.
Dented people with little cracks in their Bakelite...
Where the funniest impurities seep in.
The only question is which one of these broken men
did you trust with the identity of our friend in Berlin?
I didn't tell anyone.
Or maybe it wasn't a man. Your wife, perhaps.
Your maid?
Bluffed his way to the promised land.
Speak of the devil.
And the devil's wave function shall collapse.
- Fellas. Uh-oh, teacher caught us.
I take it Dr. Akley knows.
He plays. The parson's one vice.
Are you trying to make Charlie feel left out, Bob?
He's here late building the pyramids and we're just playing Egyptian Ratscrew.
Come on, Charlie, what do you say, join the philistines?
No, um... I don't gamble.
See, now I don't think that's true.
What's the game? It doesn't look like Egyptian Ratscrew.
Hold 'Em. Local delicacy.
Betting structure's like a chain reaction.
It's a dangerous game for a guy who doesn't know when to quit.
Teach me.
About five minutes later, Frank comes out of his office with the pig
and Meeks and I are barely keeping it together.
He puts it on Crosley's desk and says, dead serious,
"Does this mean something in your country?"
- Right? - Yeah, it was, um... It was quite a day.
- It was a great time. - You should be on the radio.
- What are you talking about? - Take me home, will you?
I have band practice in the morning.
Will I ever.
- Nighty-nighty. - Good night.
Um...
Excuse us.
Would it have killed you to laugh at Fritz's jokes?
Oh, that's what they were?
You're the one who wanted a date in public.
If it's such a torture, let's just go back to...
Screwing on the sly.
Helen, there's something I have to ask you.
Crosley...
Oh, shit.
Oh, my God.
Helen, I'm no fool, all right?
I know this is not what you had in mind when we first began
and I know you're a free woman and proud of it.
And I respect that.
I respect you.
I think perhaps you're the most impressive person I've ever met.
Paul...
I've spent my life...
I've spent my life abandoning people.
Starting, I suppose, with myself.
Plenty of women have inspired me to be someone else,
if only for a night...
But you're the first one who makes me aspire
to be myself.
I'm not trying to own you.
I'm asking permission
for me to be myself with you.
For us to just be who we are.
For what, I hope, might be
a rather long and happy time together.
Boys, I feel like stretching my legs.
Oh, Jesus, I hate when we're drunk enough for no-limit.
Fold.
There a problem, Dr. Isaacs?
That's half a year's pay.
Well, I understand if you want to back out.
I mean, what would your pretty little wife say?
Jesus, Charlie.
Didn't realize you were playing with your own salary.
Who does that?
Most people.
Go ahead.
Sayonara, sodomites.
All right.
Oh, look out,
Dr. Isaacs wants to win his little lady a new mink tonight.
Damn you, Tommy.
Keep your money. A night with Belinda and we call it square?
It's your funeral.
Well...
How about we go another...
500.
See, the problem, Charlie,
is I know how bad you need to beat me.
What is this?
What is this, the deed to Palestine?
That about cover it?
- Wait, this isn't... - It is. It works and it's unpublished.
Holy... Is this microwave transmission?
Cracked it looking at radar as a grad student.
After the war, housewives will be boiling eggs in less than a minute.
- You can't deliver this. - You know I can.
Got it all on paper ready to ship.
Take the pot, it's yours to patent.
So what do I put in?
Thatcher, you're everyone's favorite miser.
What's something like that worth, five years out?
More than any of our piece-of-shit cards.
I'd say, conservatively, 8,000 would make it even.
8,000.
Oh.
Ace-eight. Half of dead man's hand.
All hail the Prince of flipping Israel! Bluffing his way to the promised land.
Home. Everybody back here 8:00 a.m. tomorrow morning.
You should buy Abby something nice with my money.
Since, um...
I don't think we'll be playing together again,
I'm gonna let you in on something...
You've got a tell.
You wink.
Left eye.
Do I?
Whenever you don't get what you want.
Here, let me show you.
How does that feel, you sack of shit?
You touch my wife?
You brag to your Ivy League circle-jerk club about it?
I can't believe it took you this long.
You even look at her again, I will break your neck.
At first I thought maybe you were afraid of me, but, no,
you're pulling one over on Akley.
A man with nothing to hide would have clocked me the second I touched his wife,
but you, Mr. Divide and Conquer,
silent as a cigar-store Indian because you're playing a longer game.
You gotta be the longest-winded rapist on record.
I've been watching you for weeks.
Harvesting our numbers, keeping us in the dark.
And all that added security, that is... That is rich.
It took me a while to figure it all out...
Go home, asshole.
I know about your side project.
You and Frank.
It's not a side project, is it?
It's the project.
Whole reason you're here.
So...
When Akley gets back,
you're going away.
Who knows, maybe Saipan?
New Guinea?
No Jew quotas there to hold you back.
You'll move up fast, ambitious kid like you.
Right to the front.
See, I can afford to lose a hand here and there.
Am I winking now?
Can we bring him in?
Lancefield? Not a chance.
You don't think we can trust him?
Who, the man who attacked my wife?
- Then fire him. - No good, they'll just reassign him.
No, fire him off the Hill.
Get his security clearance revoked.
- I'd need cause. - Then get some.
You think Lancefield won't spill his guts to G-2?
Who do you think they're gonna believe?
Disgruntled former employee or Akley's golden boy?
Anyway, we just have to buy ourselves some time, so put an asterisk by his name
for violating the rules of compartmentalization.
- An asterisk? - He'll go back to Chicago,
he'll tell his sad tales to the faculty club.
That's not what happens to people who violate compartmentalization.
Lancefield's a son of a bitch, but...
The man inside Heisenberg's project...
Mmm.
They executed him.
Magpie?
They found out he was spying for us?
You didn't tell anyone else about him, did you?
Of course not.
This isn't the Ivy League. We're in the middle of a war.
If Akley finds out what we're doing here, we'll be next.
Jesus Christ.
We're playing a zero-sum game.
Every move costs a piece and this piece tried to rape your wife.
Hey, hey.
Hey, hello?
Hey.
- I gotta pull up this Elm tree. - Cottonwood.
- What? - Rio Grande Cottonwood.
Populus wislizeni.
It's actually a miracle they survive here at all.
Yeah, I gotta pull 'em all up.
And why's that?
There will be 1,000 more eggheads here by summer.
They all want a Formica kitchen.
You know, the only reason this desert hasn't been blown away entirely
is because of these tree roots.
And besides...
It's where I do my reading.
Try a library.
This is the civilian side of the Hill,
so I'm not moving anywhere until you show me an order
from the civilian town council.
Town council approved this?
They approve everything.
Why would they allow the army to cut down all our trees?
Why do you think?
Because the Colonel handpicked every single one of those puppets
and he tells them how to vote.
You'll never beat the army, lady. Maybe pick on someone your own size.
- Crosley. - Hi.
This is really not a good time.
Huh.
I thought it was nothing but good times in the old whack shack.
I know you asked for time,
but I'm dying on the vine here.
Have you...
Have you thought at all about what I said?
Yeah, of course I have.
What you said was beautiful.
- Well, then... - Well...
But it's not who I am.
Helen. Helen, I know you.
If you did, you wouldn't have asked.
Here, let me in. Let's just think about this.
I have.
Maybe we shouldn't do this anymore.
Is it... Are you...
Right.
Yeah, no, of course.
- This is just work. - Of course it is.
Paul, I'm sorry.
You deserve...
What I deserve.
- Not a goddamn word from you. - I didn't say anything.
He's a good man.
Why are you here anyway?
If you want me to talk you out of getting rid of Lancefield, I'm not gonna do it.
- Frank's right. - So what the hell am I supposed to do?
I can't stick papers in his bag, he doesn't carry one.
What should I do? Sleep with him?
Stick the papers in his bedside table?
That's never gonna happen.
All right.
Why don't you ask your wife to do it?
Abby.
I need to ask you something.
Um...
That French woman, Lancefield's wife, what's her name?
Elodie.
I need you to do something.
What?
I need you to help me. Um...
I know you two are close. You've been spending a lot of time with her.
We haven't been spending that much time together.
The floor plans to these houses, they're all the same, right?
There's a panel in the kitchen that leads to a crawl space?
Charlie, what are you talking about?
Listen to me. Um...
I need you to put something into their house.
- Put something? - Some papers.
I need you to...
To make it look like Lancefield hid them.
What papers?
I can't tell you any more.
My God, Charlie, I am so sick of this.
- Abby. Abby. - Of only hearing half the story.
Your husband's half.
The half that matters.
So you're...
Framing them for something?
Lancefield's trying to ruin me.
To ruin us.
Charlie, people go to jail for having...
He won't go to jail. His father practically runs U.S. Steel.
He'll land on his feet.
Jesus, what do you care, after what he did to you?
Is that what this is?
You're avenging my honor?
You're a little late, Charlie.
Do you really think I would do something like that to my friend?
- To anyone? - Wars have casualties, Abby.
I don't even know who I'm talking to.
Stick a fork in me.
It is movie night and they are showing Phantom Empire.
You and Helen want to join?
Uh, no. No, not tonight.
Come on, it's Phantom Empire.
A race to control the world's radium supply.
The secret city full of scientists.
No, I think I've had enough reality for one night.
- You all right, pretty boy? - Yeah.
Yeah, I just want to get a jump on the morning's burn rate calculations.
Okay. Well, Jeannie charges by the quarter hour, so I should go.
- Abby, are you okay? - Are you alone?
Yes.
Was it a joke, about leaving?
You're scaring me, chérie.
I wanna play this game out.
It may not be Paris, but on the bright side, it's cheap.
And if we saved our paycheck for a month or two,
we'd have enough to make a start.
I have money.
I have an account that Charlie doesn't know about.
What happened between you?
Everything.
He asked me to trust him.
He moved us 2,000 miles to the middle of nowhere.
He's been lying to me since the day we got here.
He stole another scientist's work and...
He made me feel like I betrayed him because I wanted to understand why.
He asked me to do things no one ever should.
I don't know who Charlie is anymore.
And I'm not sure he ever knew who I am.
Who are you?
Fastball is wide. Walker lays off of it for ball one.
Pardon, my lord.
Crosley.
Who's winning?
Oh, no idea.
Well, at the risk of wasting your time, I just want to say
I'm proud of the work we're doing here.
I'm shocked, quite frankly, how fast we're doing it, the four of us.
The work is, more or less, my only solace these days.
Well, good.
That's why you're here.
You're absolutely right.
I'm here to work.
King and country. Save the free world, et cetera.
- With the speed problem now solved... - Nothing is solved.
Baritol's a start, but it doesn't put implosion in the catbird seat.
Sorry, what did you say?
I just said let's not get cocky.
No, it's a good start, isn't it?
Hope I don't sound arrogant,
but I feel for the first time like I'm in the catbird seat.
Picking up the lingo, eh?
Yeah, I'm learning.
He's off playing cards again. He won't be back till the crack of doom.
Do you want a glass of water?
Wine.
You feel like a sack of doorknobs.
I thought this trip would be soothing for you.
You love the Columbia River.
It wasn't exactly a fishing trip.
You're giving FDR the most powerful weapon in the history of the world.
The least he could do is give you a day off when the salmon are running.
Everyone thought I was going to D.C. It's not like I could pack a fly rod.
Dr. Akley.
It's a little early for a house call.
I apologize, but, sir, it's about a problem we've been working on in implosion.
Implosion is Frank Winter country and the border's closed.
That's what I'm here to discuss.
I believe your border's wide open.
Abby?
Hi.
Where have you been?
Walking.
All night?
I should never have involved you in this.
It got complicated and, uh...
I should have listened to my conscience instead of...
Abby?
Get your hands off me! Get your hands off me!
Abby?
Can you let me in?
Abby, open the door.
Ripped By mstoll