Agent in Peril, page 11
England and Switzerland
April 1943
Basil Remington-Barber’s summons to London at the end of March was a good example of how complicated and tedious life had become. Prior to September 1939 this would have been a straightforward and most agreeable business: a journey via Paris and all the pleasures that entailed.
Now it was a far more complicated matter, certainly devoid of any pleasures. A Swissair flight from Geneva to Barcelona, then Iberia to Lisbon and from there the seven-thirty BOAC morning flight to Whitchurch airport just outside Bristol.
He had rather hoped this visit wouldn’t be as rushed as the previous one had been: he’d hoped to stay overnight with his ailing brother in Wiltshire, but he was met by a Service car and taken straight to London and St Ermin’s hotel.
He was permitted half an hour in his room: Barney Allen would be waiting for him in the Caxton Bar.
* * *
Barney Allen had come straight to the point. Presumably Basil had heard the Ruhr offensive had begun?
Basil nodded as he felt an overwhelming tiredness sweep over him.
Barney said it was the first concerted use of the RAF’s area bombing strategy and the idea was to send hundreds of aircraft over at a time and concentrate the bombing on particular targets. It had started with a raid on Essen on 5 March. He asked whether Basil had heard anything, and Basil said not to be ridiculous, the Ruhr was more than three hundred miles north of Berne and Barney said no, not heard the actual bombing, but heard anything about its impact?
Both men laughed and ordered another drink and the atmosphere was quickly more relaxed, so for a while they gossiped about people in the Service and the war generally and then Barney asked what agents Basil might have in the Ruhr and the older man shook his head.
‘None, I’m afraid, Barney. Struggling to keep together the few we’ve got in Germany as it is. Why do you ask?’
Barney explained at some length: area bombing was by its very nature imprecise and the RAF needed better intelligence on the results of their raids. Aerial reconnaissance was all well and good, he said, but what they wanted was what they termed ‘eyes on the ground’.
‘Eyes on the ground?’
‘A phrase they’ve picked it up from the Americans: that’s quite the thing now, trying to sound clever by using these asinine American phrases. The RAF want us to see if we can find people who can visit the sites of these air raids and report back. Even take photographs.’
‘Good Lord: that’s a tall order.’
‘What about Sophia?’
‘Still not heard anything since her last message, when she was still in Berlin. Where are we now, I lose track these days – it’s Wednesday thirty-first today, isn’t it? Last heard from her exactly three weeks ago. Doing our best to find out what’s happened to her.’
‘And Jack Miller?’
‘Jack’s behaving himself in Berne. Very helpful to have around and does a decent job of debriefing escaped aircrew and PoWs. But I’ve no doubt that as far as he’s concerned his real purpose of being in Berne is to be as near as possible to Sophia, so to speak.’
‘Earlier in the war – indeed even before it – Jack had a nice little network in the Ruhr: Dortmund, Essen, Gelsenkirchen. His cover was damned good, as you know, Basil, covering football matches. I’m wondering what the chances are of getting them back in the game. Waking them up, as we call it.’
‘Without Jack, near impossible I’d say.’
There was a long pause during which both men studied their whiskies – Basil’s had ice; Barney’s was neat.
‘I take it you know what I’m about to ask, don’t you, Basil?’
The older man nodded and asked when he thought he should send him in.
‘As soon as possible, Barney.’
‘Let’s hope Jack’s decent about it.’
* * *
‘Germany?’
Jack Miller said ‘Jesus Christ’, which he knew annoyed Basil Remington-Barber intensely. Basil had told him more than once that although he wasn’t religious he regarded that as ‘uncouth’. Such an English word, uncouth.
‘Yes, Jack, Germany. London wants you to know just how important this mission is. Indeed, it’s their top priority at the moment.’
They were in Basil’s office in the British Embassy on Thunstrasse. Noel Moore was there too and the atmosphere was every bit as awkward as Basil had feared it would be.
‘You mean to say, you want me to go back into Germany, clandestinely?’
‘Well, you can hardly go openly, can you, Jack?’
The American paused, taking it all in and looking at Basil in that annoying way he had when Basil had said something he didn’t like, as if he thought the Englishman was mad.
‘We’ll make sure you have a decent cover, Jack, you can be assured of that.’ Noel Moore was adopting his usual calm and reassuring tone.
‘Decent?’
‘Watertight then: the best cover money can buy, so to speak.’
‘You’re buying it?’
‘Not as such, no… turn of phrase.’
‘But I’m a wanted man there.’
‘You won’t be going anywhere near Berlin.’
‘Shame, I could have had a good look for Sophia while I was there.’ Then he paused, reflecting on what he’d just said. It had been a quip but now he was thinking about it and maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea after all. If he was in Berlin, he was bound to be able to find out what had happened to her.
‘You’ll be much further to the west, Jack – that’s the plan. Of course, if you’re saying you don’t feel you’re up to it then…’
‘I didn’t say that Basil.’
‘You didn’t seem awfully keen and I—’
‘“Awfully keen”? Christ, Basil, you spring this on me and act then act as if I’m being ungrateful. I need to know everything about this mission. You know as well as I do that my chances of pulling it off and returning alive are slim, so I have to know just what you have in mind.’
‘All in good time, Jack, all in good time.’
‘You have to at least give me some idea of why you’re sending me in, Basil.’
‘Very well: you’ll get a more thorough briefing in due course but I imagine you’ve heard the phrase “eyes on the ground”?’
‘Why would you imagine?’
Basil Remington-Barber sighed in the manner of an adult dealing with an awkward child. ‘Because I’m told it’s one of your American phrases, which is imposing itself on our language. Having said that, it does rather neatly sum up the purpose of your mission. The RAF has launched a large-scale bombing campaign in the Ruhr. We need to gather more intelligence on likely targets and also – perhaps even more importantly – on how effective the bombing has been. Ex post facto, as we say.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning after the event. We need you to see which of your agents are still around and wake them up, so to speak. Get them working for us again. First things first though. We need to sort out your cover story. I’ve asked Noel to look after that.’
‘We’re working on a German identity for you,’ said Noel. ‘Thank heavens your German is now excellent.’
The following morning Noel Moore shared his thoughts on creating Jack’s identity. ‘I don’t like to talk about problems, Jack, but the problem is that you’re of an age whereby you ought to have been conscripted by now in Germany – anyone between the ages of eighteen and forty should have been called up. We could give you papers that show you’re either medically exempt or have been invalided out of the forces, but the Germans are rather strict in that respect – you have to be very unwell or seriously injured and that’s hard to fake.
‘Having you as a member of the armed forces, home on leave – that’s also risky, as is putting you in one of the occupations that’s exempt from conscription, that’s not nearly as straightforward as it may seem: we can never be entirely sure what occupations are on that list and we’re told it constantly changes.’
‘So, what are you proposing?’
‘You’re what, Jack, thirty-five? Chap we use to make the documents thinks it’s feasible to age you a bit, say to forty-two. We can make your hair grey and give you some spectacles and hope that works. He also had the idea of giving you call-up papers. We have copies of these and we’ll come up with one ordering you to report to the Kriegsmarine’s training base at Kiel on the first of May. You’ll be a sailor!’
‘And my name and occupation and where I’m from – all of that?’
‘I’m working on it, Jack. Give me a couple of days.’
* * *
‘Have you ever been to Mainz?’
‘No.’
‘Pity, because it’s now your hometown. Here we are…’
Noel Moore stood up and pointed to a large map to his office wall. ‘All rather conveniently set around the Rhine. Here on the southern tip is Mainz: it’s just some twenty-five miles south west of Frankfurt, on the other side of the Rhine. If you follow the river north you come to the area we’re interested in, the Ruhr Valley. In particular, these major industrial centres from Cologne here to Düsseldorf, Duisburg, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Dortmund… you know the area?’
‘Some of it.’
‘But at least you know your way around, Jack. Come over to the desk.’
Noel Moore opened a folder and carefully removed some papers from it.
‘This is a kennkarte for Hans Schumacher: it’s not finished yet because we need to sort out the photograph, but all the other papers verify your identity. Hans is a travelling salesman from Mainz. In February last year the RAF raided Mainz on two consecutive nights and dropped around four hundred tons of bombs. The city was extensively damaged, especially the centre and your family lived here… just off Hindenburg Strasse, on Colmar Strasse. According to our information, most of the apartment blocks there were obliterated with dozens of casualties, your family included: Schumacher is a particularly common name in those parts. Should anyone try and check into your background they’ll be unable to verify anything. You now live in a lodging house in the south of the city, here in Langenbeck Strasse, not terribly far from the crematorium, as it happens.’
Noel Moore pointed out the ephemera of everyday life: bus tickets, cinema tickets, a bill for dry cleaning.
‘This is Hans Schumacher’s Mitgliedskarte, his Nazi Party membership card. Basil wasn’t too sure about whether to make you a member, but I think it helps. You joined in March 1942, just a few weeks after your family would have been killed by the RAF, so remember you’re a bitter man. And here’s the Nazi Party lapel badge.
‘You represent a ship’s chandler based on Rheinallee, which is here… see it? Just by the port. By all accounts there are dozens of them round there and some were destroyed in the air raids. Gives you a reason for pottering around the Rhine though, trying to sell your wares. Let’s put all this away and you and I need to go and see Basil.’
* * *
Basil Remington-Barber stood in front of a large calendar, pointing a pencil at various days as if wondering whether they were in the correct order.
‘Tuesday sixth today… when do you think all of Jack’s paperwork will be ready, Noel?’
‘We’ll get the photograph done this afternoon. Tomorrow we’ll have all the clothing, everything from Germany. Wednesday it’s the woman…’
‘Get him over the border on Thursday night, Noel: Friday’s a better day to travel inside Germany though – busier day on trains and buses, more crowded.’
Jack never found out her name. She was Jewish and had fled Mainz in 1939 and now lived in Basel. She’d agreed to come to a safe house on the outskirts of Berne. She wasn’t to ask any questions and she certainly wasn’t to mention it to anyone.
The woman sat opposite Noel Moore in the middle of a large lounge, formally dressed as if at a job interview. The two were lit by a single overhead light, but the rest of the room was cast in darkness. Noel explained to her that she was to relax and simply answer his questions. He told her a colleague would enter the room and sit behind her and take notes. He hoped she understood if he asked her not to turn round, and she said of course, she quite understood.
It took the best part of six hours altogether, with a brief break for lunch. Prompted by Noel’s questions, the woman described Mainz in detail: the school she went to, the parks she walked in, the shops, the different areas, the cinemas, the famous Rhine promenade, the cathedral, of course, though she understood it had since been destroyed by the bombs, the Guttenberg Museum…
Noel asked her to describe different areas, dropping in Colmar Strasse among dozens of other streets he named. She’d had a friend there… before the Nazis of course… a nice area, lots of families, maybe a bit crowded… the number seven tram went there, if she remembered correctly…
She was less familiar with the port area – her father had been an optician on Schiller Platz, you understand… but yes, she knew of Rheinallee, not the most pleasant part of Mainz…
Noel thanked the woman very much and nodded at Jack, who slipped out of the room. He now felt he had a reasonable sense of Mainz.
The final briefing took place on the Thursday morning, before his departure that night. Basil assured him he was as well prepared as any agent he’d ever sent into Germany.
‘Your identity is solid; your German is excellent. Remember what I said: stay for no more than a week. As I’ve told you, the purpose of your trip is to find out which of your old contacts are still around and which of those you can get working for us again. Be very circumspect though, Jack: it’s possible people have changed their minds. They may be terrified and feel the safest thing to do is turn you in. If you can’t find anyone then so be it, but I’d hope that from the sources you had in that area before, one or two… maybe… and there’s something else…’
He paused to light a cigarette. ‘A pal of mine in the Swiss police let me read the debriefing notes of a policeman who escaped from Germany. Usual self-serving stuff really, but what stood out was something he said about how they were trained to spot suspects – Allied agents, fugitives, escaping prisoners and the like. He said that in the first year or so of the war they concentrated too much on paperwork and not enough on how people behaved. And he said something very interesting: that the reason people got caught was invariably because they were too friendly and eager to please, their stories were often too fluent and they didn’t seem wary enough of the authorities. This chap said not to forget how oppressive the Gestapo and that lot are – I’m sure you don’t need reminding – and people are frightened of them. He said they tended to be alerted when someone appeared to be trying too hard not to be nervous when they’re being questioned.’
* * *
As Jack received his final briefing on Thursday 8, A. I. Stepanov finally returned to the house near Münsingen.
Sophia had been expecting him for most of that week. She’d last seen him the previous Tuesday when he’d come to inform her of her husband’s death. It was also when he’d told her it would be in her interests to work for the Soviet Union.
That week was up on the Tuesday, but there was no sign of him then, nor the following day, and Thursday came and the morning was silent and lunch consumed on her own in the dining room watched over by the woman who spoke little German and the man who’d first interviewed her. The man – she learned his name was Nikolai – was less hostile than the woman, once in a while even smiling at her. When she was allowed into the walled garden there was always a guard watching her and she was also aware of at least one more guard at the front of the house.
That afternoon she paced around the bedroom: five steps from the edge of the bed to the small dressing table, three steps from there to the door, turning around and four steps to the window followed by a while staring out of it. In the three weeks since she’d been confined in the house some of the lower slopes on the High Alps in the distance had begun to lose some of their covering of snow. There were few trees other than those in the garden: seven of which she could see from the window, three to the right, four to the left, their branches bowed as if in conversation.
She had little doubt that if she refused outright to assist the Russians then they’d dispose of her with as little compunction as they had her husband. But volunteering to help them could be almost as dangerous. If there was any way to escape, she’d be prepared to take the risk, but the house had been well chosen: remote and well guarded.
She knew she needed to be clever and she wasn’t sure how. At the moment, it felt as if A. I. Stepanov was the one being clever. The waiting was driving her mad.
The light in the Bernese Oberland was beginning to drop when she heard activity at the front of the house, beyond the locked door of her bedroom. There was the sound of car doors slamming, the front door opening and conversation in Russian followed by laughter. Sophia rinsed her face in cold water and brushed her hair before putting on her lipstick. She had just put on the smarter of her two pairs of shoes – which made her an inch taller – when there was a knock at the door, moments before it was unlocked. The woman nodded at her.
A. I. Stepanov was sitting in the lounge and greeted her politely. Please do sit down… Would you like tea? I hope you are well…
He was smoking a strong Russian cigarette, its aroma pungent, the smoke from it quite dark and she soon felt it at the back of her throat. She was grateful when the tea arrived.
‘You’ve now had plenty of opportunity to consider my suggestion that it would be in your interest to work for us.’
It was a statement rather than a question but A. I. Stepanov peered at her through his cigarette smoke and raised his eyebrows in expectation of an answer.
‘After all, we met last Tuesday, was it not? You asked for a week to consider my proposal. You’ve now had over a week. The Soviet Union is not usually quite so patient.’
‘I understand that, sir, and I appreciate you giving me the time to think things over. May I just say that my husband did dreadful things and deserved his fate, but nonetheless the news of his death came as a shock. I needed time to clear my mind.’
