Between Silk and Cyanide

by Leo Marks

  It backfired. Within hours of receiving the message Badoglio informed Massingham that the Germans had somehow learned of the armistice proceedings and the announcement of the surrender would have to be postponed.

  Eisenhower was notified and the news presented him with a major decision. Should he allow the invasion to proceed?

  He telephoned Dodds-Parker at Massingham and asked if SOE’s codes were secure.

  Sticking his neck out, the Giraffe replied ‘Yes’.

  Eisenhower immediately sent a message to Badoglio confirming that the invasion would proceed as planned and urging him to postpone the announcement of Italy’s surrender.

  On 9 September fifty thousand Americans occupied Salerno, the armistice was announced, and three days later Italy declared war on Germany. But Mallaby still had vital information to pass on to Allied Forces HQ, and on 14 September London’s LOPs and substitution squares finally reached him, and he began using them at once for the rest of his traffic.

  Allied Forces HQ then took over his traffic, and on 21 September the round-the-clock listening watch on Monkey was cancelled.*

  It may have been providential – it was certainly a huge slice of merde alors – that my involvement with Monkey was reduced to a stranglehold by the contretemps with Duke Street which took place in parallel. Although by comparison with Monkey it was no more than a domestic dispute, according to Charlotte Denman (our French encyclopaedia), it was likely to cause a divorce between SOE and Duke Street.

  Trying not to take sides, and almost succeeding, she explained that the capture of Jean Moulin in July, followed by the arrest of most Free French leaders, had forced de Gaulle to rethink his structure of command. The problem was that SOE disagreed with his conclusions.

  The general was determined to divide France into two zones, each controlled by a commander appointed by Duke Street. But SOE was adamant that the Free French should decentralise, and that the new Conseil National de la Résistance should be based as far away from the Gestapo as possible, preferably in London.

  ‘Neither side will give an inch, not that they have one to spare,’ added Charlotte.

  She then hurried off to meet Nick, leaving me to ponder two questions: What had CD meant when he referred to ‘a serious dispute over two messages’? And what was the ‘certain action’ I might have to take? Divided into two zones myself, I returned to Mallaby.

  On 6 September Robin Brook, the controller of western Europe, instructed me to report to him. He was the only person (apart from Gubbins) whom the whole of Baker Street regarded as brilliant, which was one of the few majority verdicts he saw no reason to question.

  Tall, slender, with the kind of eyes I’d sooner have than look into, he allowed me to settle down before saying that he had a question to ask me which I must regard as strictly confidential.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘If I give you the authority to do so, could you break a message in secret French code?’

  Unaccustomed to senior officers making improper suggestions, I gaped at him in appropriate bewilderment. ‘I’m afraid I know nothing about the secret French code, sir.’ It was time to have it printed on my lapel.

  ‘I didn’t expect you to. But that won’t prevent you from trying, will it?’

  ‘I suppose not, sir.’ I was beginning to enjoy this, which made it even more dangerous.

  ‘There are two messages I want broken – both from Duke Street to Serreules in secret French code … you probably know him by his code name Scapin.’

  ‘Indeed I do, sir. I gave him his English code.’

  He’d been dropped in July, and since then I’d broken three indecipherables from him in his secret French code, and re-encoded them accurately. I could have complied with Brook’s request in a matter of minutes but dared not let him know it. ‘I’ll need some help from you before I can start, sir.’

  It was the first time I’d seen the famous Brook frown, and once was enough. ‘What sort of help? – I’ve given you my full authority.’

  ‘That won’t help me break it, sir. I’ll need as much information as you can give me in case the messages need anagramming.’

  The jargon seemed to reassure him. ‘Very well. I’ll fill you in on the background and then show you the messages.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  He then explained that in spite of knowing SOE’s attitude, Duke Street had encoded a message to Scapin appointing Mangin and Morinaud as chefs de zone, each to control one half of France. They’d sent the code groups to RF section with a copy of the clear-text ‘as per standard procedure’. But Brook had refused to allow the code groups to be sent to Signals for transmission until all references to the chefs de zone had been deleted. Duke Street had agreed to do this and had sent a new set of code groups to RF section with an assurance that the deletions had been made. Someone in RF section spotted that the second message contained the same number of code groups as the first and raised the question whether Duke Street was telling the truth.*

  He then handed me both sets of code groups and a copy of the original texts. ‘I need to know if the deletions have been made – I can’t impress on you enough how important this is.’ He proceeded to do so. ‘SOE and Duke Street have lost all confidence in each other, and Anglo-French missions like Marie-Claire are likely to be cancelled. As it is, it’s been postponed.’

  I hadn’t realised that Tommy was involved. ‘I’ll start right away, sir.’

  He looked at me searchingly. ‘I’m sorry if this is an impossible question, but how long will it take you?’

  I indulged in a Jack Benny pause. ‘It depends on what the damn code is, sir. It could take hours or days, and there’s no guarantee I can do it at all – but your briefing will help …’

  ‘Give it absolute priority, and contact me on the scrambler one way or another.’

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  I took Scapin’s code to the gents and decoded both messages while someone in the adjacent cubicle uttered a grateful ‘That’s better’. The texts were identical. It was only the code groups which had changed. All that remained was my cover story.

  I returned to my desk, and with Charlotte as my witness pretended to launch a full-scale blanket attack on Scapin’s messages. By teatime I’d accumulated enough evidence to convince everyone, myself included, that I’d broken the messages with the help of the charts and announced to Charlotte that I’d found the right key. I then contacted Robin Brook on the scrambler and told him that his fears were well founded.

  He asked me to bring the proof to him at once.

  It was a relief to return to Monkey.

  On 7 September I learned from Heffer that officers of RF section and Duke Street were no longer allowed to speak to each other and had to meet in ‘safe houses’ as if they were in France.

  ‘How about Tommy?’ I asked. ‘Where’s it leave him?’

  ‘In limbo. He’s the one I feel sorriest for after all that he’s done.’

  I waited anxiously for the sound of my favourite footsteps. They reverberated down the corridor around 6 p.m., which was far earlier than usual.

  I had never seen Tommy looking so tense. He invited me to tell him about Cairo in one sentence.

  ‘Why waste words?’ I asked and blew a raspberry instead.

  ‘I’m getting plenty of those from other quarters. I’d prefer a cigar.’

  I waited until he was puffing away and then invited him to tell me in one sentence what the row was all about.

  He took a deep breath. ‘I can tell you what it’s not about. It’s not about killing Germans or helping agents to survive or shortening the war, though that’s what they all pretend it is.’ His eyes were glowing like the tip of his cigar. ‘Robin Brook accuses Duke Street of lying about the messages and says he can prove it because he instructed you to break them. They say he’s the liar and that the only thing he’s broken is SOE’s agreement with de Gaulle.’

  ‘What agreement’s that?’

  ‘You k
now bloody well what agreement.’ He sat bolt upright. ‘The agreement which says that copies of the secret French code must be lodged in D/R’s safe’ (Robin Brook was D/R) ‘and that D/R mustn’t look at them without Duke Street’s consent.’

  The secret French code was the only subject (except Holland) that I’d never discussed freely with him, though I’d often longed to tell him the truth.

  And the truth was that the agreement was a sham because there was no secret French code to deposit. The agents used their British code for both sets of traffic. All Duke Street gave them was a secret indicator to show which words of the British poem they’d used, and the most they’d deposit in D/R’s safe would be a description of how the system worked.

  I’d been silent for far too long, because Tommy pounced. ‘Have I got something wrong?’

  ‘No more than usual.’

  I was relieved when he didn’t pursue it, but should have known better.

  ‘So the question, my friend, is this. Did Brook instruct you to break Scapin’s code, or did he take it from his safe without Duke Street’s consent – they’re convinced that he did? And if they’re right, how many times has he done it before? I’ve got to know the truth …’

  I’d glimpsed his distress at the death of Moulin. This was as great. ‘I broke it on D/R’s instructions …’ I tried to say it matter-of-factly.

  ‘You’re feeling guilty about something. But no one’s going to blame you for this, you have to obey orders sometimes. And Brook can’t be blamed either because Duke Street shouldn’t have lied to him. But then why did they feel they had to? – Christ, what a mess! …’ He stood up slowly. ‘My friend, we’re all in the shit – SOE, Duke Street and Signals – all because we haven’t the guts to talk to each other openly.’

  He turned to the door.

  ‘I’ve something else to tell you.’

  ‘Next time.’

  I knew there wouldn’t be one. ‘I’d already broken Scapin’s secret code. I’ve broken the secret code of every Free French agent since July ’42. Nobody knows this but you.’

  The White Rabbit turned round. Very white. ‘You what?’

  ‘How else could I stop the indecipherables? – Duke Street never tried to … and there’s something else you should know …’ I bombarded him with the reasons the Free French code was insecure, but he cut me short.

  ‘And you’ve only just told me after all this time?’

  I did my best to meet his gaze but had no dark glasses.

  ‘Do you think you’re the only one who cares about agents and that I wouldn’t have helped you if I could? Or were you afraid I’d turn you in?’ He clenched his fists, but I didn’t care because I was toothless anyway.

  Instead he threw his cigar on the floor and stamped on it until both of us were extinguished. He followed this with the ultimate rejection. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he whispered. ‘Isn’t there anyone in SOE who knows the meaning of trust?’

  He closed the door so quietly I was almost deafened.

  I’d lost a lifeline nothing could replace.

  He was waiting outside my office when I returned the next morning. I asked him to come in, but he shook his head. His contempt had matured overnight and was now as entrenched as my parents’ admiration.

  He told me he’d been in touch with Brook, Nicholls and the Free French and that a decision had been reached. ‘You’re to report to Duke Street and show the Free French how you broke their code.’

  ‘I’m what?’

  ‘You’re expected at two o’clock this afternoon – kindly be there!’ He turned away abruptly.

  ‘Kindly wait a sec,’ I called out.

  He halted in mid-stride but didn’t turn round.

  He hadn’t told me what to say or who the Frenchmen were or what the objective was.

  But I had a far more important question, and it popped out in a very small voice. ‘Will you be there?’

  He strode down the corridor in silence.

  Notes

  * Mallaby was subsequently awarded the MC, which in his case meant Master Coder.

  * That someone turned out to be Captain O’Bryan-Tear, one of my classmate at St Paul’s. Old Paulines (General Montgomery was one of them) could usually be relied upon to spot other people’s discrepancies.

  FIFTY-TWO

  Man with a Mission

  ‘You’re going to Duke Street for one purpose. To convince the Free French that they can trust SOE. They’ll try to trip you up so be careful what you say! … For God’s sake don’t make matters worse.’

  Nick to the ambassador of goodwill, September 1943

  On 8 September I insisted on being driven to Duke Street to deliver my address. I didn’t want to trip up before I arrived. Knowing the quality of my French, Charlotte had offered to accompany me to act as my interpreter, but I daren’t let her in case she gave Nick a verbatim report of everything I said.

  Without an interpreter I could always claim to have been misunderstood.

  A young lieutenant who spoke excellent English escorted me into a briefing room full of Free French officers, and I felt it being redecorated in high-quality hatred. I spotted Valois in the front row and remembered I still owed him a dozen prefixes for his sacrosanct code. The only face I wanted to see wasn’t there.

  I sensed them preparing to make moules of me as I followed the lieutenant to my journey’s end: a blackboard which had been delivered to Duke Street to await my arrival. Its contents were concealed by a cloth.

  Turning his back on the assembly, an example I was quick to follow, my escort asked me in a garlic-flavoured whisper if I’d like him to be my interpreter, as not everyone present spoke good English (Valois knew two words: ‘no’ and ‘prefixes’), and as the atmosphere needed no interpreting I replied, ‘Merci mille fois,’ Father’s favourite phrase when clients paid him in cash.

  ‘It is now time for me to introduce you,’ he whispered. ‘Do I call you chef de codage, or how shall I say?’

  ‘Say nothing,’ I replied. ‘They know why I’m here.’ And pulled the cloth from the blackboard.

  It disclosed two encoded messages of equal length which I’d written one on top of the other. Each pair of letters had a number, a format I’d used at Cairo and at countless FANY lectures. At the foot of the blackboard there was a simple announcement in large block capitals: LE SECRET FRENCH CODE.

  The room was filled with angry whispers. I glanced at my interpreter. His complexion was the colour of his garlic. I turned to face the Bastille.

  Tommy was standing at the back of the room. His eyes were focused on a point far beyond the blackboard. He was the only person whose judgement I’d trust to evaluate the effect of a surprise I’d prepared for them which could have disastrous consequences if I’d misconceived it, but it was too late now. I was committed to building up to it.

  ‘Alors, messieurs … the messages sur the blackboard are from one of your agents. Je suggest that we attackez votre code together.’

  This did nothing to diminish the whispering.

  ‘Messieurs,’ I said, ‘c’est the moment to have a go.’

  With the help of the interpreter I explained that the messages would be easy to anagram as they’d been encoded on the same transposition keys and that if enemy cryptographers correctly guessed the words of one message the words in the other would also make sense.

  Since my hosts clearly regarded me as an enemy cryptographer I couldn’t be sure how much they were taking in and it was time to put them to the test. ‘Je vous en prie to start calling out suggestions.’

  One of them did, and the laughter which greeted it would have done credit to a Jack Benny one-liner. The interpreter refused to translate the suggestion on the grounds that he hadn’t heard of it.

  ‘Je vous en prie to call out another.’

  Someone obliged, causing even more hilarity than his predecessor. Tommy was looking worried.

  ‘Agents die because of this,’ I said.

  The lieutenant tran
slated immediately, and there was complete silence. It was a beautiful sound.

  Taking it as a licence to proceed, I asked whether the word ‘stop’ appeared in most agents’ messages, and if so, why didn’t they start with it?

  They agreed that ‘stop’ did appear, and soon discovered that nuit appeared beneath it, and one word led to another, as they invariably did in this deadliest of parlour games, and twenty minutes later they reluctantly contemplated two broken messages.

  Whispering again broke out.

  Wondering how best to time my surprise, I began explaining how the words of the poem could now be reconstructed, but an imperious voice interrupted.

  ‘Un moment, s’il vous plaît.’

  ‘One moment, if you please,’ said the interpreter nervously.

  A bemedalled officer had risen to his feet and was addressing me in rapid French.

  My vocabulary simply wasn’t up to it (though it was slightly larger than I wanted my hosts to realise), and I didn’t understand a word of what he said. But there was no mistaking his confrères’ reactions. Heads were nodded, hands were clapped, and they gave him a sitting ovation. His comments must have been devastating because Tommy seemed to be willing me both his decorations.

  I turned to the interpreter. ‘Translatez-vous, s’il vous plaît.’

  He was clearly embarrassed.

  ‘I want to know exactly what he said … It’s time Duke Street provided accurate transcripts.’

  This didn’t go down too well with those who spoke English.

  He looked at me apologetically. ‘The colonel accuses you of trying to deceive us. He says you cannot have broken Scapin’s code in the way you have said.’

  God bless the bastard. He’s given me my cue.

  ‘Pourquoi not?’ I demanded indignantly.

  ‘He says our messages to Scapin were enchiffré on different keys and that the method you showed us does not apply. He says you didn’t break his code at all and that Colonel Brook took it from his safe.’