The Spy Who Loved: The Secrets and Lives of Christine Granville

by Clare Mulley

  The rest of their evenings were mostly whiled away over a drink in the Hotel Continental’s roof garden, occasionally entertained by belly-dancers but more often with repeated choruses of Lili Marlene, and the loose security talk of the officers around them. Sometimes they joined the civilian expats on the well-watered lawns of the Anglo-Egyptian club on Gezira Island, but often they would just stroll out to the pyramids together, watch the feluccas dipping in the wind on the Nile, and listen to the long, wailing notes of the muezzins calling the faithful to prayer as the kites rose to wheel above the city’s mosques.

  Cairo was a deeply cosmopolitan city. Here Muslims, Jews, Copts, Syro-Lebanese Christians and a mixture of European expatriates did business together ‘over endless little cups of sugary coffee and glasses of syrupy tea’.22 ‘After the provincial quiet of Istanbul,’ Christine’s old SOE friend Basil Davidson wrote, between ferrying explosives around the region in diplomatic bags, ‘Cairo had all the bustle of a strange and various metropolis.’23 For their colleague Julian Amery, too, the city was ‘astonishingly vital’, and among the varied population the military were ‘everywhere, dressed in the simple, tropical uniform of the desert, with every now and then the red tabs of a brass hat or the distinctive cap of a French or Polish officer. All was noise, bustle and hurry.’24 The city’s souks, cafés, hawkers, beggars, dogs and donkeys created a vibrant, and pungent, picture of Arab street life, but the Egyptian middle classes had long adopted a policy of British administration with a veneer of French polish. Most fellahin wore turbans and djellabas, but the well-to-do effendi landowners wore smart suits with their tarbooshes and drove limousines between the caravans of camels on the streets.

  In 1875 Britain had become the largest shareholder in the strategically vital Suez Canal when it acquired the interest of Egypt’s Ottoman ruler, the khedive. In the early 1880s Her Majesty’s forces had intervened to help crush a nationalist revolt against European and Ottoman domination. Although Egypt officially gained independence in 1922, the troops had stayed, and Britain continued to dominate the country’s political life. By the start of the war, however, as Cairo again filled up with British uniforms, Egyptians were divided in their sympathies towards their former colonizers. As Poles, Christine and Andrzej were viewed similarly – with polite suspicion. It was something they both hated but were fast getting used to. The main redeeming feature of these idle early weeks in Cairo was that they were together. ‘We are in a perfect friendship’, Christine wrote, and ‘without him I think I would have already gone into a lunatic asylum’.25 It was then that Christine’s husband, Jerzy Giżycki, arrived.

  Jerzy had been in Istanbul when the British learnt that all links with the Musketeers were to be broken off. Impressed by his work in Hungary, Russia and Turkey, ‘the firm’, as SOE was known to insiders, was keen to keep him on its books. ‘He speaks a number of languages fluently, is very debrouillard, and seems to hate the Germans as much as is humanly possible’, one report extolled.26 But the British also knew that Jerzy had a temper. Considering it unwise to inform a volatile man about their sudden change of loyalties while he was in neutral territory, de Chastelain quickly dispatched Jerzy to Cairo. However, nothing could have prepared the British for the extent of his fury when, en route in Jerusalem, he heard the rumours and accusations surrounding Christine, Andrzej, and – by extension – himself.

  ‘I have been informed by my wife that Maj. Wilkinson has notified her that she, [Andrzej] Kennedy and I are as suspect as the organisation in Poland we were in touch with,’ Jerzy stormed, ‘and which counts between its members well known Polish patriots and friends of Gen. Sikorski!’ Hardly lifting his pen from the paper he continued, ‘This is the reward from the British government for all our efforts, our sincere desire to do some useful work, and the grave risks my wife and Kennedy were running!’27 Jerzy was livid and, not satisfied with submitting this tirade in his official report, he soon began talking to all his contacts. For the British this was not good news; Jerzy knew senior diplomats in several countries, including the USA, and was a personal friend of Sikorski. Some of the wind was taken out of his sails by a hasty message from London confirming that it was well known that all three of them, now referred to as X, Y and Z, ‘acted out of patriotic motives and are free from suspicion’.28 Jerzy continued to protest ‘most emphatically against this unfair, ungentlemanly attitude towards us’ over seven closely typed pages, but he knew it was pointless.29 Any future collaboration with the Poles now seemed impossible. ‘As a former cell of the Witkowski organisation,’ Wilkinson reported, ‘they are barred, for good, from having anything to do with Poland or Polish affairs.’

  Jerzy hung around Cairo for nearly five miserable months, but there was nothing there for him. As soon as they met, Christine finally told him that she no longer loved him, and intended to leave him. After an explosion of grief and rage, he never spoke to her again. ‘His reaction was not what I expected’, Christine wrote to Kate O’Malley, and was ‘almost impossible to put into writing’.30 She had forborne to tell him any sooner not because she doubted her feelings, but because she knew that Jerzy was unlikely to take over her Budapest network unless he believed that their relationship had a future. She might not love him, but she greatly respected her husband’s energy and abilities, and must have felt sincere pity for the distress that she now evidently caused him. Christine was not intentionally cruel, but while excellent at bluffing she found sincerity more difficult and usually dealt with emotional conversations bluntly. Whatever she had anticipated, it was not surprising that her last meeting with Jerzy ended acrimoniously. It was a bitter double blow for a man who had stayed at least emotionally loyal to his wife, and absolutely loyal to his country, only to find himself betrayed by both in the same few weeks. In a series of written accusations, Jerzy now blamed the British for everything from his situation in Cairo to failing to pass on his earlier letters to his wife. ‘He is terribly sore about the treatment he says he has received,’ Guy Tamplin warned Gubbins, ‘also I gather his personal life has gone wrong as XY is now own firm, and for this we are to blame!!’31 Wilkinson also put in his own tuppence worth, writing: ‘I gather that their marriage had never looked very permanent.’32 It is fortunate, perhaps, that Jerzy was not party to British cipher telegrams. As it was, citing his impossible position, he turned down all British offers of work, including a role in Iran, then under British jurisdiction, and demanded repatriation to Britain, before, as a colleague noted, he told Tamplin to ‘fuck himself’ and left.33 He finally returned to London in October 1941 and refused to have anything further to do with the SOE. The following spring he moved to Canada. His marriage, and his war, were both over.

  On 22 June 1941, a week after Wilkinson dismissed Christine and Andrzej, Hitler had launched Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of Russia. Although the Musketeers’ microfilm carried by Christine, and a range of corroborating evidence, had long since reached Churchill and the commanders-in-chief, the massive buildup of German forces from the Black Sea to the Baltic had generally been interpreted as a mere show of force, designed to push through a more favourable German–Soviet agreement. It was not until June 1941 that Churchill sent a personal message to Stalin, warning of the imminent invasion. Stalin dismissed the letter as a crude attempt to cause dissent between Russia and Germany. Ten days later the greatest invasion force in history tore though Stalin’s ill-prepared border defences and ploughed relentlessly on towards Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad. Christine and Andrzej knew that they were to some degree vindicated – no Nazi agent would have provided warning of the invasion – but the rise of their personal stock was in direct correlation to the waning of Poland’s status in the war. Until Hitler invaded Russia, Poland had been Britain’s only effective ally. On 22 June 1941 Russia officially came to the Allied table, relegating Poland to a rather problematic acolyte.

  Twelve hours after hearing the news of the invasion, Churchill broadcast his aim to help Russia in whatever way he co
uld. Asked by his private secretary, as they strolled in the gardens at Chequers, whether this alliance presented difficulties for such an arch anti-Communist, Churchill replied, ‘Not at all. I have only one purpose, the destruction of Hitler, and my life is much simplified thereby. If Hitler invaded Hell I would make at least favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons.’34 General Sikorski must have envied Churchill his clear-cut position. On 30 July, strongly encouraged by the British Foreign Office, Sikorski signed an agreement to re-establish diplomatic relations between Poland and Russia, but for many Poles accepting an alliance with the Soviets would prove impossible. Poland had been carved up by Russia and Germany less than two years previously, and Russia still had clear territorial ambitions in Poland. Under pressure, in August the Soviets granted an amnesty to the surviving Poles they had interned since 1940, including 40,000 prisoners-of-war. Although notably few officers were among them, these 40,000, along with around 75,000 Polish civilians, mainly their families, now left Russia for Iran, under the leadership of General Władysław Anders, a former cavalry officer and an old friend of Andrzej’s. The whereabouts of the many thousand missing Polish officers would weigh heavily on Polish–Soviet relations.

  With the launch of Operation Barbarossa the British felt both more certain of Christine and Andrzej’s loyalties and less obliged to keep them on ice for the sake of good relations with the Poles. Aware of their obligation to Christine, they offered her passage to Britain, but she decided to stay in Cairo, where she felt she had a greater chance of an operational posting. She ‘lacks nothing except employment’, the SOE Cairo office reported. ‘We are trying to remedy this.’35

  In August, Christine and Andrzej escaped Cairo’s claustrophobic heat for Jerusalem under arrangements made by SOE, but ‘on their own private business’, Tamplin informed Gubbins.36 Their stated plan was to get medical attention for Andrzej’s leg, which, Christine wrote to Kate O’Malley, was ‘in a bad way’.37 Christine took the opportunity to meet both with friends at the British Legation, and with Zofia Raczkowska. As a result she would have been perfectly placed to provide the British with an off-the-record dialogue with the Jewish–Israeli independence movement. In June and July this organization had played a significant role in the successful Allied campaign to prevent the Germans from using Vichy French Syria as an air-refuelling base and a springboard from which to attack Allied-held Egypt, and five years later SOE would credit Christine with having ‘proved particularly useful during the Syrian campaign against the Vichy French’.38 However, there is nothing further on this in the files.* Whatever the reason for this Jerusalem visit, it was short and seemingly not newsworthy and, perhaps partly because of this lack of fanfare, there was good news waiting for Christine and Andrzej on their return to Cairo.

  The British had agreed with the Polish Second Bureau that they would not employ Christine and Andrzej in any position that would bring them into direct contact with Poles or Polish affairs, but there was nothing to stop them being used elsewhere. Now that the Allies had secured Syria and Lebanon they also had strategic control over the main routes to the oilfields of Iraq, which had been held by pro-German rebels since April. As the summer progressed, and the Panzers pushed across Russia, it looked as though Germany might again burst into the Middle East, giving the oil routes renewed strategic importance.

  At the end of August, Tamplin proposed that Christine and Andrzej should be sent into northern Syria. From there they were to monitor political developments in the region, in particular the volatile situation in neutral Turkey, and the security of the bridges over the Euphrates, with an eye to their suitability for sabotage should the Germans break through. Before instructing Christine, however, Tamplin cleared the mission with the Poles. As Polish investigations had unearthed nothing to further incriminate Christine on the basis of the allegations made in May, references to her earlier ‘indiscretions’ had now been dropped, and the green light came through in September. The rest of the month was spent in preparation. Christine was briefed on the political and military intelligence required, information which, Tamplin commented drily, ‘I would imagine she would find it quite easy to get’. Andrzej was sent on a course in explosives, ‘so that he could be in a position to deal with railways if and when necessary’.39 Both of them were reminded in no uncertain terms that they were on unofficial probation.

  In late October, Tamplin reported, ‘X and Y have at last gone off – very pleased to have an occupation again’, adding that ‘they swore that they would not let their enthusiasm run away with them and lead them into indiscretion’.40 They drove the Opel to Aleppo, the largest Syrian city near the Turkish border, well placed to monitor the likelihood of Turkey joining the Axis. Ultimately, as Turkey remained neutral and the Russian front held, Christine did not have much to report, but despite the lack of drama these were, for her, some of the happiest months of the war. She was back in the field, however modest the role, and living and working with Andrzej. She was also winning admirers among the more distinguished residents of Aleppo, among them the son of the Emperor of Afghanistan, with whom Andrzej went fishing (with dynamite), and whom Christine teased about his solid gold signet ring being inferior to her Skarbek ring with its slice of iron.

  Liberated from the disapproval and constant surveillance they had endured in Cairo, and back on an active-service wage, Christine made the most of her freedom, exploring the city’s ancient souks, riding out into the dry and stony Syrian steppe, being guest of honour at a Bedouin feast and attending the birth of a camel. Andrzej was also enormously cheered by the apparent change in their fortunes. As soon as he had the opportunity he bought Christine a beautiful bracelet whose heavy gold links, inset with ivory, folded back on themselves to form a neat cube when not being worn. He also proposed to her. He knew she was not free, being still technically married to Jerzy, and perhaps this is what emboldened him. Christine did not accept Andrzej’s proposal, although she did not reject him out of hand. But she kept the bracelet for the rest of her life – much as she did Andrzej.

  At the end of 1941, the course of the war changed again as the attack on the US naval base in Pearl Harbour drew America into the conflict. ‘The Japanese declaration of war on America eclipses all other news this week’, Wilkinson filed in December, adding, in perhaps the greatest understatement of the war, ‘it seems that Pearl Harbour was not a very pleasant surprise for them’.41 The Allied position had never been stronger, but Poland’s once strategic significance to the course of the war was over, and once again Christine’s fortunes were to change in inverse correlation to those of her country.

  8: THE BEAUTIFUL SPY

  The scene is a military ballroom.

  The gallant and fair are the dancers;

  But who’s the brunette,

  Who with eyes black as jet,

  Fascinates all the guards and the lancers?

  Shame on you, shame on you!

  Oh, fie, fie!

  Olga Pulloffski, you beautiful spy!1

  In June 1942 Guy Tamplin prudently informed Peter Wilkinson that Christine ‘seems to be regarded as our tame Olga Polofsky [sic] who spies on the Poles and reports all the things she learns’.2 Olga Pulloffski, ‘the beautiful spy’, was the anti-heroine of a 1930s popular song which was once again enjoying considerable Allied air time, and whose name had just been appropriated for the glamorous honeytraps surrounded by fawning officers in the British government’s ‘Keep Mum’ poster campaign. But behaviour that seemed rather romantically daring to the British was viewed as treasonous by the Poles.

  Britain had officially entered the Second World War to defend Poland’s borders, but during the course of the conflict the two allies’ interests had diverged. Unlike Britain, Poland faced twin threats, from Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. The British had now embraced Russia as an ally, but within the Polish camp there was huge discord about whether their aggressive neighbour should be resisted or appeased. Christine was deeply patriotic but she was not
overtly political. She had no doubts about Soviet intentions, but she had lost her country, and many of her family, under the Nazis. She had also seen how divided the Polish authorities, home army and exiled forces had become. Convinced that Britain offered the greatest hope for the deliverance of her country, Christine had repeatedly risked her life to bring intelligence out for the British secret services from the independent Polish ‘Musketeers’.

  Now, back in Cairo, she was playing a dangerous game, using her charm, social contacts and skill at securing and assessing information to report select bits of Polish political and military news and gossip to the British. SOE did their best to protect their source, giving both Andrzej and Christine new code-names. In all British ciphers and telegrams they now appeared as ‘Forcible’ and ‘Willing’, ‘the latter name, by the way, an obvious libel’, Wilkinson’s team admitted.3 In fact ‘Willing’ seems rather too passive for Christine, who had, throughout the war, sought out the most dashing lovers and dangerous missions. If she was frustrated at being reduced to the role of ‘beautiful spy’ in Cairo while waiting for another posting to the field, then she at least saw that pleasure and duty could to some extent go hand in hand, and as always she threw herself into the job.

  Christine and Andrzej had returned to Cairo from Syria in early 1942. They moved into a boarding house in Zamalek, the leafy, residential part of Gezira Island in the Nile, run by a Jewish couple and ‘infested by WAAFs’ (members of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force).4 Being largely undomesticated, Christine preferred living in a boarding house or hotel to having a flat, and she loved the café life that allowed her to come and go as she pleased. Most mornings she would stroll down Zamalek’s wide shady avenues, lined by flame trees, nineteenth-century villas, restaurants, bars and cafés, on her way to the renowned Gezira Sporting Club, a well-maintained complex of parks, lawns, café, swimming pool and tennis courts leased to the British military command. Officially re-employed by SOE, she could now enjoy the benefits of club membership. If she arrived early enough she could watch the polo ponies being ridden on the lawns before the working day began. She had never learned to swim, but would settle down beside the pool to sunbathe, read, drink tea and enjoy being entertained by a wide range of admirers drawn from the city’s large officer corps.