central bank, responsible for issuing banknotes and partly private at the time—authorizing him to print banknotes in return for an alleged loan from a consortium to develop Angola. His plan was to use the contract to convince a legitimate banknote printing contractor to make the notes, thereby obtaining notes that would be indistinguishable from those legitimately authorized by the bank. In 1924, Reis reached out to business contacts of his to assist him in his "confidential mission" for the Governors of the Bank of Portugal. Reis wrote up the fraudulent contract and had it officially notarized by an assistant notary who was too casual and trusting to read it. Taking advantage of a similarly lazy approach among diplomatic staffs, he acquired three certifications for the notarization in the embassies of Britain, Germany (Weimar Republic) and France (French Third Republic). Then he rewrote the contract with a French translation, forged the signatures of Bank of Portugal officials (he traced them from the currency in his pocket) and affixed the notarizations, and two new bills as samples, to the contract. The key to Reis's plan was that only he knew that the contract was forged; trading on the period's widespread cynicism about the monetary policies of governments and on Portugal's reputation for corruption and self-dealing, he convinced the others who assisted in his operation that what they were doing had the clandestine support of the Bank. Reis' key associates, Dutch trader Karel Marang van IJsselveere, German trader Adolph Hennies, and José Bandeira (brother of António Bandeira, the Portuguese Ambassador to the Netherlands) later claimed to have believed the project was legitimate throughout. Reis had been lucky or fortunate in his selection of associates; although currently legitimate, each man had checkered pasts and had no objections to engaging in an enterprise that was technically legal even if shady, especially if it involved such major insiders. Reis alone knew unquestionably that there were no insiders and his various documents were worthless, though prosecutors and journalists later suggested that the continuing credulity of his associates as the scheme progressed strained belief. On the pretext that the supposed loan and issuance would be politically unpopular, and with the implication that it was a bit of sharp practice by bank insiders, the entire operation was conducted in an atmosphere of deep secrecy. It was vital, Reis emphasized to his contractors from Lisbon, that the matter be kept