The Nazi Spy

by Alan Hardy

  “I can understand why the Germans chose you, Fiona,” he said finally, smiling at her.

  “But I think I’m trying to help the British here, aren’t I?” she countered. “You did make me a double agent, after all.”

  Matthew seemed troubled. Even anxious. His blue eyes flickered unsteadily, sending Fiona’s body into tiny, sweet convulsions. Rippling waves washing up on her shore.

  “Whose side are you really on, Fiona?”

  She paused in her answer.

  “I’m on your side, darling,” she said. “And you? Whose side are you on?”

  “The same side as you, darling,” he replied.

  She chuckled.

  “Touché, darling,” she said.

  They approached each other and quietly, gently—almost like an old married couple—fell into each other’s arms. They stayed like that for a while, until Fiona stirred, lifted back her head, and spoke.

  “Time for you to tell me what’s going on?”

  He withdrew a step or two, still resting his hands on her arms.

  “My job, as you know, was to check out the pilots of 287 Squadron, and anyone around them. Wentworth, as were the other pilots, was easy to investigate. We know how that ended… When Freddie was looking for help in writing letters to you, it was an opportunity I couldn’t let slip. When the others tired of the silly game of pretending to be Freddie writing to you, I persevered. I—”

  “So, I was just that, was I? An opportunity?”

  “You know that’s not true,” said Matthew. “Those letters were precious to me, they became something central to my life, the most important—”

  “You fell in love with my writing style, did you? Or my handwriting?”

  She looked angry, the colour sucked out of her face again.

  “Fiona, you mustn’t doubt me,” insisted Matthew. “I think I was already in love with you before the squadron moved south, well before the letters started. Don’t you remember when I kissed you at that ball here at The Mansion?”

  “Yes,” she murmured, moving slightly towards him.

  But she didn’t approach him so near as to touch him. His hands were still resting on her arms. He let them drop.

  “When the squadron moved back to Scapa Flow, and I was conveniently posted back here,” he continued, “I carried on with my enquiries, I—"

  “Enquiries?” she cut in contemptuously. “You speak like a policeman.”

  “Well, in a way, that’s what I am.”

  “Yes.”

  “So, of course, I widened the net to include, for example, Belinda, and, yes, Mary Wilkinson, a new face at the base. They’re all suspects for Spy Number Three. As is John Granville. Come to think of it, I reckon it might be a sensible idea to ensure that his next posting is a return here to 287 Squadron.”

  “That’s the plan, is it, Matthew?” she said wearily, rubbing her left wrist. “Get them all posted back here, where you can keep an eye on them, just like poor George Turnbill…and we know how he ended up…”

  “So, of course it could be John Granville, I’m—”

  “Did you sleep with Mary Wilkinson in the line of your enquiries?” cut in Fiona bitterly. “Another woman you had to seduce for love of your country?”

  “Don’t start that again…” he murmured, looking warily at her. “It’s different with you…”

  She was tempted to tell him there and then that she was pregnant. The words formed on her lips, but, at the last moment, she changed her mind. This wasn’t the moment. That moment would come soon.

  “Carry on, Matthew,” she said, with a nod of her head.

  He looked relieved. His blue eyes had tensed up for a second or two, but now they softened, and, in doing so, they softened Fiona’s heart too. She relaxed, stepped forward, and nestled her head on his shoulder, feeling the warmth of his face as she brushed against it.

  “I have the feeling the Germans are panicking,” he said. “They know Wentworth’s been rubbed out. Maybe they thought initially it was an accident of war, but now they’re not so sure. Have they heard that maybe you’ve been rumbled? Remember, MI5 must have asked the British agent who was checking up on me if he or she agreed with my assessment of you. We’re assuming he or she did agree. So, that British agent—who we’re assuming is a double agent—could well have radioed Berlin that you were under suspicion. I don’t think MI5 would have told him or her that I had turned you, and you were now a double agent. So, the Germans are floundering in the dark a bit. Maybe two spies down. Only one left. Maybe one of the spies—namely, you—about to be turned, or maybe already working for British Intelligence. That’s why I’m worried about you. If John Granville is one member of the duo which constitutes the third spy cell, then maybe he’s been told to liquidate you. Either you’ve already been turned, or the odds are you soon will be. Better to remove you from the scene. Better safe than sorry. They’re showing their hand a bit too much. They’re desperate. Granville already knows Mary—if it is her—is a spy. He recruited her, after all. Berlin have now confirmed to him, one assumes, that Wentworth and you were the others. So, one man knows who all the German spies are. That’s dangerous. Especially as at the beginning, they kept the three spies, or cells, isolated from each other. They’re panicking. That’s why I don’t like it. I don’t like the idea of you meeting him.”

  “But if we meet in a public place, what can he do there? If he shoots me while we’re at a Lyons tea-room, he’ll be arrested, either there and then, or later on. His cover will be blown. Spy Number Two liquidated, but Spy Number Three arrested. And then British Intelligence will break him under interrogation. He’ll reveal the identity of the other member of the two-person spy cell. Mary, or whoever it is.”

  “You’re right, Fiona. They won’t try anything in a public place. He’ll try to arrange a more private meeting for afterwards. Or… He won’t use a gun or anything, but he might try to slip something in your tea, a slow-working poison, for example, which would kill you much later, away from him…”

  “Then I won’t touch any food or drink…” she murmured. “Anyway, we don’t know if it is Mary, and Granville, who are the spies… It’s not proven yet…”

  “I think Granville is,” remarked Matthew deliberately and portentously. “Mary, I’m not so sure of.”

  “Why so sure of Granville?”

  “Instinct, a bit. I always felt it… But there’s another reason. The Germans are so desperate that I think they’ve made a terrible mistake, or rather they’ve advised Granville to make what is a terrible mistake.”

  “What? To break cover? Answer my letter? Make us suspicious of him?”

  “Well, that partly… But, if he wasn’t a spy, he shouldn’t really feel the need to ask to see you personally. Remember, you wrote that letter to him—and to me and Turnbill—when you thought Freddie was dead, and were desperate to know what had happened, and who had played that dirty trick of writing letters to you.”

  “Of course,” she joined in, “but Freddie is alive and well now. He’s back. Everyone knows he’s back. Even if he’s still being kept locked away, Granville would have known Freddie had miraculously returned from the dead.”

  “It’s common knowledge the length and breadth of the RAF that Freddie and Wentworth switched planes, and the one presumed dead is in fact alive, and the one presumed missing over France was in fact killed over Beachy Head. It’s a tale repeated over and over in every Mess in every squadron of the RAF.”

  “Yes, Freddie isn’t dead. There’s no need for Granville to explain matters to me, or apologize, is there? I already know everything. Or soon will. Why would Granville want to see me? Just to look silly?”

  “That’s why I fear the only logical reason for him wanting to see you face-to-face is to kill you.”

  “What shall we do, Matthew?” she asked, looking puzzled and anxious.

  “I’ll speak to London about it. Get their advice.”

  “It could be really useful to see what he mi
ght let slip…”

  “I know, Fiona…”

  She remained pensive a moment or two.

  “There’s one thing I don’t understand, Matthew,” she said slowly, looking intently at him.

  “Which is?”

  “Well, Matthew, whether it’s Mary or somebody else, you know the third spy—or at least the second member of the two-person cell—is also a British agent whose job it is to keep an eye on you. Well, why don’t you just explain your suspicions to British Intelligence, and tell them that British agent is the German spy? Or, at least, ask them who is keeping tabs on you?”

  “If I do that, and they confront her, or him, he or she will deny it, of course, and try to turn the tables on me. Then it will be a contest between which of the two of us can better persuade MI5 of their innocence, and the other’s guilt. It’s not worth the risk.”

  “Not worth the risk of you being suspected of being a spy?” Fiona asked, looking at him

  rather incredulously.

  “That’s right.”

  “Is there another reason?” she asked, narrowing her eyes suspiciously.

  “No.”

  “I don’t believe you,” she stated coldly. “Matthew, what exactly is your game?”

  “I could ask you the same question, Fiona,” he stated. “What exactly is your game?”

  Neither answered the other’s question. They remained standing still, staring at each other, stony-faced and unflinching.

  28

  Matthew had certainly been right about the destruction being delivered nightly to poor old London. Fiona strode along rubble-strewn streets, with the strange sight of billboards displaying wartime posters situated right next to bombed-out buildings. The streets were peppered with an alternating mix of the propaganda of war, and its stark, raw reality. Posters exhorted the people to work together for victory, buy bonds, be careful what they said, and admire our brave lads in the Forces, while demolished buildings all around spoke their voiceless message just as eloquently.

  But the people seemed undaunted. They carried on with their lives, going to and from pubs, rushing home or to places of work, darting into shops, chatting aimlessly at street corners.

  If Fiona had sent a message back to Germany now, she would have said that London was being badly hit, but that the people seemed to be taking it. Whatever you thought about Londoners, they were courageous.

  She hadn’t contacted Berlin for some time. Except for the relaying of the information concerning the Anglo-American summit at Scapa Flow, which Matthew, for some reason, kept conveying to her, and wanted her to transmit.

  She had, since the beginning of the war, sent messages containing snippets of local military information—which in the main she used to pick up from her oafish husband—as well as more general observations on the morale and spirit of the civilian population. Last time she had visited London, she had relayed her impressions to Berlin, once she was back in Scotland.

  She had even mentioned early in 1940 that HMS Tamworth was docked at Scapa Flow. She hadn’t relayed specific information on the day and time of its departure—another spy must have done that—but she had to admit that she had felt a stab of guilt in her gut on hearing it had been hit by German bombers. Still, war is war, she thought, as she looked around, and surveyed the indiscriminate destruction wrought on London’s streets.

  She was on the way to the Lyons tea-room in Baker Street.

  Matthew was close by, tailing her—as they called it in the Hollywood movies—and a couple of MI5 agents would be already installed in the tea-room, ready to keep a watchful eye on proceedings.

  John Granville was just as Fiona remembered him. Unprepossessing. Unobtrusive. Completely unnoticeable. Perfect material for a spy, she supposed.

  He was short and plain, rather rat-faced, and his teeth stuck out a bit. He did gnaw and munch at his cake in a rodent-like way. His face was so pale he seemed a perfect model for an artist’s depiction of Death.

  Fiona had only ordered tea, as discussed with Matthew. Once poured, she toyed with the cup-handle, and tapped on the rims of the cup and saucer, but never quite got around to picking either up.

  She had laid her beige handbag on her lap. She touched it now and then to make sure it was there. In case it was needed. Or, rather, the fully-loaded Smith and Wesson revolver inside it.

  He’d arrived a minute or two after her. She hadn’t spotted him approaching the table; he was suddenly there, his tiny frame standing in front of her.

  It was the usual preliminaries to start with. Polite chat. Small chat.

  He seemed innocuous to look at, but he scared Fiona. There was something repressed about him, something nasty bottled up inside him. The sort of chap who, it would turn out, had murdered his wife. Or preyed upon old ladies and their savings. Or was a mass murderer.

  Fiona kept eyeing the people seated around them in the tea-room. One time, she imagined the two burly men nearby drinking tea and smoking cigarette after cigarette must be the British agents. Another time, she thought it more likely to be a shy young man who kept his head buried in his newspaper, every now and then daring to raise it above the paper to glance out. Probably his secret service partner was the young woman in the far corner he kept looking at, or the old man eating scones, and puffing on a cigar, in the middle of the room.

  Suddenly Granville put his hand in his jacket side-pocket. Fiona tensed up. She remained frozen a moment. Without being conscious of it, her hand was inside her handbag and gripping the revolver. She watched him like a hawk.

  He took out his packet of cigarettes. He offered one to Fiona.

  “No thank you.”

  He lit up a cigarette, and inhaled deeply. His throat crackled. He exhaled the smoke out of his mouth and nostrils.

  He made a few comments about the letter-writing incident. A sort of half-hearted apology. Chaps being a bit silly together. The pressure of combat, and all that. It made chaps thoughtless. They hadn’t thought it through properly.

  Fiona nodded.

  “How much leave have you got?” asked Fiona.

  “A couple of weeks.”

  “Do you know where your next posting is?”

  “Not yet, Mrs MacIntosh.”

  He looked closely at her. He returned the packet of cigarettes to his pocket.

  They had a minute or two of more small talk.

  “Have you maintained contact with your fellow-pilots of 287 Squadron?” asked Fiona.

  “Not really,” he replied drily and emotionlessly. “When you’re overseas…”

  “And with any other of the 287 Squadron crowd?” Fiona pressed him. “You know, ground crew, or WAAF personnel?”

  Granville smiled.

  His small face and his tiny frame, as he leant forward with his smile, seemed more and more menacing.

  “Are you thinking of anyone in particular?” he asked pointedly, staring blankly into her eyes.

  “No, no…” mumbled Fiona.

  He glanced at his watch.

  “I shouldn’t stay too long,” he said in a low voice.

  She nodded again.

  He leant forward towards her even more. Goosepimples ran up her back. She slipped her hand into her handbag again. She hoped the two British agents were paying attention, and not too side-tracked by muffins and pretty ladies.

  “Mrs MacIntosh,” he said, hardly above a whisper.

  “Yes?” said Fiona, despite herself, edging forward in response to his movement towards her.

  “If you ever find yourself in an emergency, or faced with major problems, and you think you need help, contact Mary Wilkinson,” he said, his face taut and pale. “Do you understand?”

  “Of course,” she answered, completely taken aback.

  “If British Intelligence ever ask you to name the third spy, or they ever find out about me, and our meeting here, or whatever circumstances might arise where they ask you that question, and you feel you must answer, you must say that you have been told by me, your
German handlers, or whoever it was, that the third German spy is Belinda Jackson. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” she replied.

  “I must go,” he murmured, looking around. “It doesn’t pay to linger. I’m hoping I’m not under surveillance, or suspected… Have you heard anything?”

  “No.”

  He stood up, his body still slightly bent, and nodded at her.

  “Sieg Heil,” he whispered, his lips seeming to do barely more than breathe.

  Fiona nodded.

  29

  As she scurried along Baker Street, aiming for Regent’s Park, she kept turning around in case Granville was following her. Once or twice, in a state of near-panic, she almost screamed out as she swivelled round, as if she were in a nightmare she couldn’t wake herself from, and the monster was right on her shoulder, about to strike.

  Once she got clear of Baker Street and its crowds, and she was snaking along the pavement beside the black iron gates separating her from the park, with the entrance enticingly getting nearer and nearer, she could breathe a bit more. She checked behind her now and then, but the open spaces soothed her. Anyway, she assumed the two agents would be keeping an eye on her, and others were probably tailing Granville. She even felt relaxed enough as she turned around to gawp wistfully at the barrage balloons she could see dotting London’s sky-line.

  What was she going to tell Matthew?

  That was why she was rushing to Regent’s Park. She would be reporting to him what had happened, but it was also a romantic nod to their past. More a tryst than a meeting. Regent’s Park was where she had spotted him meeting George Turnbill, when she had been tailing the latter. She and Matthew had had something of an argument, and he’d kissed her, and she’d slapped him… They’d more or less carried on like that ever since… It had excited them when they had decided on Regent’s Park as their meeting-point.

  But Fiona was deeply troubled.

  What on earth was she going to say to him?