Ungentlemanly Warfare

by Howard Linskey

As he was flung forward, Cooper was dimly aware of his audience being exhorted to use their opponent’s anger and forward momentum against them to knock an attacker off-balance. Then he crashed heavily to the floor, letting out a considerable groan as the wind was knocked from his body. Cooper rolled over on the mat but Fairbairn was on him in an instant, drawing back a boot to deliver the coup de grace, as he enthusiastically instructed the room full of candidates, ‘Then kick him hard in the testicles!’ And he did just that, halting his heavy boot only at the very last moment before impact. Cooper was entirely uninjured by the kick but for a brief alarming second had fully believed it would connect.

  ‘Thank you, Captain Cooper, you’ve been most helpful,’ concluded Fairbairn politely, ‘you can take a seat again now.’ He held out a hand to haul the American to his feet.

  Cooper had just gone several throws with William Fairbairn, the SOE’s unarmed-combat instructor, an expert in silent killing, and the former Shanghai policeman had dumped him repeatedly onto the rubber mat. Fairbairn was teaching two dozen khaki-clad candidates of both sexes how to master the ancient eastern art of jujitsu. If it was so ancient and eastern, wondered Cooper ruefully, why did almost all of Fairbairn’s moves end with the very British phrase ‘then kick him hard in the testicles’?

  At the end of the session the candidates all filed from the gymnasium. Valvert caught up with Cooper on the way out to enquire after his well-being. Cooper’s torso ached but he shrugged, ‘I’ve had worse.’ Certainly that was true but not recently and never in the name of training. Cooper told himself it was in no way a humiliation to be called out in front of an audience, including a fair number of women, to be almost casually disarmed of the razor-sharp commando knife he had been given, then thrown all over the matting like a small child trying to fight a fully grown adult. ‘I hope you learned something watching me get slung about in there.’

  ‘Oh, I did,’ replied the Frenchman, ‘I learned violence is definitely not for me. I will leave all of that to you and Captain Walsh. William Fairbairn is remarkably skilled but I would be surprised if a man such as I could learn too much of that in a week. I fear I may have forgotten most of his instructions already.’

  ‘I haven’t,’ Cooper assured him. It was the silver lining he would take from the comprehensive beating. ‘I remember every last damned thing and God help the first person who gives me an excuse to use it.’

  Lunch was typical British wartime fare, a plate consisting largely of potatoes and watery cabbage, accompanied by a small chunk of protein of indeterminate source. Cooper thought it best not to enquire after its origins but he wondered how something so flavourless could give off such a pungent aroma. Even the effort required to stick a fork into it made his aching muscles throb.

  Apart from the quality of the food and bruises from the jujitsu, Cooper had to agree Walsh was right. Beaulieu had been a good idea.

  ‘Beaulieu is a sort of SOE finishing school, Sam,’ Walsh had explained, ‘it will be tough down there but they’ll teach you a few things you’ll be glad you learned.’

  That was true. The American had used the time well, attending talks on everything from escape and evasion to rudimentary safecracking. He concluded that almost all of the lectures were worth staying awake for. Admittedly some of Beaulieu’s experts could not, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as charismatic. Some were eccentrics, others had the ability to declaim the most interesting of topics as if teaching advanced algebra to bored boys at a prep school but all had something useful to impart from their experience of clandestine warfare in occupied lands.

  One or two of the instructors were even quite compelling. He had heard promising things about the first lecture of the afternoon. ‘This fellow’s very good you know, considering he’s quite new,’ confirmed a fellow diner.

  Sure enough the speaker was a confident young man with a clipped patrician accent, who seemed entirely sure of both himself and his abilities. He started the lecture punctually and without ceremony, ‘I will be devoting the next hour to a talk on the art of propaganda and its practical uses against the enemy.’ He spoke authoritatively in a voice that somehow defied you not to listen to him. By the lecture’s end, Cooper had to admit he had learned a great deal from a relatively short time in the company of Kim Philby.

  Goering’s office was large enough to house a small aircraft. Professor Gaerte was seated opposite him in an opulent, handcrafted chair made from soft leather and varnished beechwood, yet he was far from comfortable.

  ‘I promised the Fűhrer the Komet would soon undergo combat testing because you assured me it was nearly ready.’ A subaltern tried to bring them coffee on a silver tray but Goering waved him away. ‘I brought you back to the Komet expecting great things, Gaerte, yet all you give me is more dead pilots. I hear they have started to call the planes “Buzz-bombs”. They tell me the last man was literally dissolved by chemicals. Nothing left to bury. Is this progress?’

  Gaerte had time to reflect that Goering had a source close enough to the project to leak embarrassing details to him but that was hardly a surprise. ‘That was the new fuel mixture, Reichsmarschall.’ The professor was nervous but knew he had to stand firm. ‘It is highly corrosive and increases the risk for our brave volunteers.’ Gaerte calculated that the welfare of pilots was not high on Goering’s list of priorities. He was unlikely to blanch at an increase in casualties if it brought results. ‘However, as you know, the previous mixture did not allow enough time in the sky for target selection.’

  ‘As soon as the damned plane is in the sky, the pilot brings it home again. I know that much.’

  ‘Which is precisely why I ordered a change from the T-Stoff mixture to the new Z-Stoff formula.’ Goering leant back in his chair and folded his arms. Gaerte knew he could easily lose the Reichsmarschall’s interest; he cared little for detail. ‘The correct mixture is essential; previously, at eighty-five per cent hydrogen superoxide, with carbon dioxide, hydrogen and catalysts, we had less than one minute to reach altitude, assuming that is, a forty-five degree climb at 10,000 feet per minute…’

  ‘Enough!’ cried Goering, ‘I did not order you here to lecture me. I just want to know if the plane is ready to go to France and engage the enemy without running out of fuel or exploding on landing. Can you answer that simple question, Gaerte?’

  ‘Which was the part I was just coming to; yes, Reichsmarschall, trialling the new fuel mixture, combined with the additional work on weight elimination…’ Goering sighed and Gaerte went faster, desperate to finish his explanation, ‘… I predict the Komet will gain an additional sixty seconds of airborne target selection time yet still land safely.’ Gaerte raced to the end of the sentence.

  Goering nodded, ‘Well, I hope you are right. The Fűhrer has a lot of faith in this project, Gaerte. Of all the weapons he is counting on to deliver the Reich from its enemies, this is the closest to completion. If you succeed, there will be a summons to the Berghof and you will be a hero of the Fatherland.’ Gaerte risked a small smile. He could not resist the briefest glance towards the framed picture of Hitler on the wall behind Goering. ‘If you fail… well, just don’t bother to come back.’

  On his way out of the building, Gaerte contemplated the words Goering had used. Did he really mean them in a literal sense? By inference, would it be better for Gaerte to take his own life? The conclusion seemed inescapable. The Reichsmarschall really did mean that.

  The sign above the door read ‘Dickens, Templeman & Marlowe – Antiquarian books and lithographs’, and beneath it, in smaller olde worlde style lettering, the words ‘Specialists in rare first editions’ were added, almost as an afterthought.

  Of course, there was no Dickens nor was there a Marlowe. Clavelle, the latest proprietor of this specialist bookstore on the Charing Cross Road, had chosen the names purely for their English literary connections. Templeman did in fact exist but he had nothing whatsoever to do w
ith the book trade. He was in fact the first Englishman Clavelle had met upon his arrival; a young army officer who gave the Frenchman a sympathetic debrief in the post-Dunkirk chaos. Poor Templeman had no idea of the true character of the man to whom he had just granted sanctuary.

  As the bell above the door rang shrilly, Clavelle looked up from the counter. He showed no sign of recognition as Walsh entered his crumbling shop. Instead he continued with the task in hand, gently coaxing an elderly male customer into parting with twenty English pounds for a rare and ancient edition of Don Quixote.

  ‘I can assure you this purchase will never be a cause for regret,’ the English words were mangled by a soup-thick French accent but Clavelle practised them often enough to be understood. ‘Cervantes is such a solid investment in these uncertain times.’ As no doubt was every other author on these shelves, thought Walsh, in case the customer’s eyes should carelessly wander to another tome.

  Walsh played the part of the browsing customer, lifting books from the old wooden shelves and perusing them, while he waited for the fool and his money to be expertly parted. The room was dark and musty, filled with the aroma of the ancient leather that bound many of the books. It’s the smell of decay thought Walsh.

  When the man finally left, Walsh turned to Clavelle and asked, ‘That a real copy you just sold him or a fake?’

  Clavelle smiled, ‘What does it matter if it’s real to him? Let him tilt at his windmills.’

  Clavelle had the wiry frame of the perennial prisoner. Years of successfully avoiding a return to jail had done little to alter his undernourished body and gaunt face. His cheeks were sunken, the lips thin and bloodless; his hair was lank and unwashed and he constantly swept it from his eyes. ‘So what is it?’ Clavelle’s voice was stilted, as if he struggled to conquer the alien language he dealt in. ‘Not a first edition. What do you want from me?’

  ‘Everything,’ answered Walsh.

  Clavelle nodded slowly, then he walked out from behind the counter and locked the front door. He gestured to a curtain, which hung over a door-sized gap at the rear of the shop.

  ‘Then you had better go through, ’Arry.’

  14

  ‘Go search for people who are hurt by fate or nature.’

  Advice on the recruitment of agents from a Soviet spymaster

  Walsh followed Clavelle into the rear private section of the shop. Here was a storeroom containing, among other things, an overflow of books yet to be sorted for the shelves. There was a small wooden table with two simple chairs and Clavelle removed a pile of books from one of them then gestured for Walsh to sit. There was a tiny stove in the corner of the room with a kettle on it but Clavelle was not the sort to offer his acquaintances refreshment and the people he did business with rarely stayed long. Aside from books, the room was quite bare. Walsh suspected it contained nothing the Frenchman could not leave behind in an instant if he needed to. He wondered if Clavelle spent his solitary evenings in this tiny, cheerless room.

  ‘Whoever said crime doesn’t pay.’

  ‘Very funny, ’Arry. I have overheads, you know.’

  Clavelle may not exactly be enjoying the good life in London town, pondered Walsh, but at least he possessed the good sense to realise he was unlikely to flourish under the Third Reich. He had fled France under a false name with an equally fictitious letter of introduction, purported to be from the British embassy in Paris, bringing with him enough funds to continue his nefarious activities. These included the faking of rare and ancient books, for which there was still a surprisingly buoyant market even in wartime.

  Clavelle had used his skills to forge the necessary papers to spirit himself out of occupied France. His successful escape put him in mind to start a lucrative sideline; forging travel documents for those with a similar incompatibility to the Nazi regime. Passports, travel passes, permits for work and exemptions from it could all be purchased from Clavelle. The majority of these documents were designed to transport people out of occupied France into neighbouring neutral countries. Others would prove just as effective for getting people inside. With a pocketful of Clavelle’s documents an entirely new covert identity could be confidently assumed and that is how Harry Walsh came to know the fraudster.

  ‘I need three of the ration books in the new style and driving licences – the permis de conduire les automobiles on the pink paper.’

  ‘D’accord, what else?’

  ‘Travel passes for the buses and the trains. The Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer Français and the abonnement réseau urbain. I’ll need ID cards, the carte d’identité with the fingerprints and République française stamps on them…’

  Clavelle nodded gravely, ‘They’re always tricky.’ And he began to stroke his chin as if in deep thought. Walsh took this reticence as feigned; a preparation for the convoluted haggling over price that would surely follow. Clavelle was never the easiest man to deal with but he was the only credible alternative to the regular channels used by SOE. The Special Operations Executive employed a number of talented individuals to forge documents, some naturally of a criminal persuasion, but Walsh had begun to distrust internal security. The finished documents appeared wholly authentic but were of minimal use if their cover names had been betrayed in advance by some rogue section of SIS.

  Above all else, Clavelle was discreet, a quality that was based entirely on self-interest, but he was also a lover of money and Walsh always paid on time, so Clavelle was never too disappointed to see him enter the little shop.

  ‘And finally, census certificates, exempting the bearer from compulsory work service.’

  The Frenchman whistled at the burden required of him.

  ‘And how long do I have to prepare these crown jewels for you?’

  ‘Two weeks.’

  Clavelle spread his palms, ‘It cannot be done.’

  ‘Yes it can, as long as I agree to your ridiculously inflated price and I go to the front of your queue. That way I am unlikely to inform my friends at Special Branch that not everything in your shop is a genuine first edition.’ As if his contacts in Special Branch would give a damn, thought Walsh, but Clavelle was not to know that.

  Clavelle frowned, ‘’Arry, please, I thought we were friends. Very well, I shall think about my price, which will be fair as it always is, bearing in mind the risks I must take to get hold of the genuine documents for copying plus the latest stamps.’

  ‘It’s not your risk, Clavelle. You never leave Charing Cross Road. Your associates in France take all the risks.’

  ‘And since I must pay them, it amounts to the same thing.’

  As Walsh left the Charing Cross Road he found himself almost instinctively heading north. When he reached the British Museum he suddenly stopped, checked and turned back towards Russell Street then along the Theobalds Road into Holborn.

  The morning’s business with Clavelle had gone smoothly enough, so perhaps now was as good a time as any to get it over with. Though the prospect was distasteful to him, Walsh knew he could no longer put it off. He would do it then and do it now and have done with. He would go and visit Jago.

  Halfway along Theobalds Road, Walsh stopped abruptly. He moved sharply to cross the street, glancing back the way he had come as if checking for traffic. Walsh could often detect a pursuer with a sudden about turn, even if they were very good. A flicker of hesitation was all he needed. Did anyone move too quickly into a shop doorway, look away abruptly or merely lower their head instinctively to shield the face under the brim of a hat? It could be enough to give them away.

  Not this morning. No one seemed to be following him now and there had been no tail on his way to meet Clavelle. He was almost sure of it. Unless the person – or more likely persons – doing the surveillance was really very good indeed, and there were still some out there even at this stage in the war. Six had followed him before but not in a while. Walsh had to concede he pr
obably wasn’t worth their time these days. After all they had no inkling of his role in Gubbins’ scheme.

  Of course there was another possibility. All that time in the field had dulled his edge. Perhaps he was no longer able to tell the difference between a watcher from MI6 and a midshipman home on leave or a housewife clutching her ration book. Walsh put the doubts from his mind. In any case Jago was worth the risk.

  These days, Jago lived in a run-down, one-bedroom apartment above a shabby pub on the Gray’s Inn Road. ‘I do like to be near the street,’ he’d explained in that peculiarly resonant voice of his, turned deeper over the years from the excessive intake of whisky and tobacco. ‘The street’ was nearby Fleet Street but Walsh knew it was the low-level rent that really attracted Jago to the spot. ‘I’m back where I belong in the autumn of my years, on the streets of “Sod’em” and Gomorrah, amid the human detritus of dear old London town – and you know what, Harry? I wouldn’t have it any other way!’ He spoke the words defiantly but with little apparent conviction.

  Jago was sitting in the saloon bar of the pub beneath his tiny apartment, as Walsh knew he would be. As the younger man crossed the floor the warped wooden boards creaked in protest, as if they were never designed for treading on. Jago did not seem to notice. He was too busy making notes with an ancient Mont Blanc fountain pen, its nib leaking ink on to the writing paper. Jago wore his crumpled, worsted Savile Row suit and the chain of a gold pocket watch strained against the ample girth of his waistcoat. Walsh doubted it was actually attached to anything. More likely he had already pawned the watch for rent money, an impression that was immediately heightened when Jago squinted at an ancient Cartier wristwatch to check the hour. Like Jago, it had seen better days. Next to his papers was a glass, containing a generous measure of scotch, and Jago reached for it absent-mindedly with yellowing, nicotine-stained fingers that shook visibly. It was a little after eleven thirty.

  ‘Writing your will, Jago?’