by Joe Joyce
‘It’s not a secret, in one sense.’ Duggan lit his own cigarette, outlining his own conclusions. He had given a lot of thought to the question but had no definite answer. ‘Everybody seems to know they have this secret bombsight called the Norden. The secret seems to lie in keeping it in the box, not showing it to anyone.’
‘That’s one way of putting it,’ McClure said, giving him a lopsided grin. ‘So why was it on this plane?’
‘They were going to give it to the British.’
‘Probably,’ McClure nodded.
‘Do we give it back to them? Now that everybody knows they’re looking for it?’
McClure waved his cigarette hand back and forth, creating a non-committal trail of smoke. ‘Let’s think about that. There’s no hurry now that we know it hasn’t fallen into the wrong hands.’
‘And what do we tell the Germans?’
‘That the Americans are offering a reward. And that you’re doing your utmost to find it.’
‘Could get interesting if they make a better offer,’ Duggan suggested, half seriously.
McClure gave a decisive shake of his head. ‘Not a good idea for small countries to play games with the military affairs of big ones.’
Duggan accepted the instruction with a nod. ‘Have they responded to our first radio message?’
‘Just a confirmation.’
‘So I’ll send them a message about the reward.’
‘No hurry. Meanwhile, draw up the monthly report for External Affairs on German activities. We’ve got to go there this afternoon.’
‘Anything new?’
McClure shook his head. ‘German activity has eased off. No sign that they’ve been using their legation radio recently. Seems they’ve taken the government’s protests about it on board.’
‘Should we tell them about this?’ Duggan pointed at the box.
‘External Affairs? No. That’s an operational detail. We could tell them about the Americans seeking it, and the fact that they hadn’t told us it was missing. But don’t put that in the report. We’ll do that verbally if the opportunity arises.’
Duggan propped the Irish Times against his typewriter and read the headlines. Germany said it had captured Minsk and Lwow, and the Russians claimed to have beaten back a German-Finnish landing at Viborg, which had been part of an attempt to seize back the Karelian Isthmus in the Gulf of Finland. He flicked over the unfamiliar names, places which were just words in communiqués, of which he had no real knowledge. He didn’t even know where they were. The US Secretary of the Navy was urging his country to clear U-boats from the Atlantic and secure the safety of supply convoys to Britain now that Germany’s attention was elsewhere. The new ration of one egg per person per week had come into force in the North and in Britain.
‘Hard at work,’ Bill Sullivan said as he came in.
‘Waiting for you,’ Duggan tossed the paper to one side. ‘Anything new from Herr Dr Goertz?’
‘Bloody man’s becoming a bore,’ Sullivan said, sinking into his chair with a defeated air. ‘Just repeating himself at this stage. Same stuff over and over again. You should go visit him. You might get something new.’
‘No thanks,’ Duggan said, rolling a sandwich of typing and carbon papers into his typewriter.
‘When’s he due his next visit from Henning Thomsen?’ Duggan asked. Thomsen was the diplomat in the German legation who usually liaised with German nationals interned in Ireland.
‘Any day now.’
‘And we’re ready for it?’
‘Ready as we’ll ever be.’ Sullivan smirked. ‘Our lad who can hear a pin drop at fifty yards is all set up.’
‘And you’re sure his German is good enough to understand their conversation?’
‘He’ll get the gist of it anyway.’
Would that be enough? Duggan wondered. They needed to know if Thomsen said anything which indicated that the Abwehr was trying to communicate with Goertz through the legation. The chances were that it wouldn’t try, partly because of the difficulty of communicating with the legation, and partly because the German Minister had made clear his insistence on sticking to diplomatic formalities and his objection to being dragged into espionage. Still, it was a risk, and it could scupper their operation. ‘Give me the file of daily reports,’ he said.
Sullivan slid a buff folder of documents down the table. Duggan flicked through them, noting the number of incursions into Irish airspace by German aircraft, the occasional references to the country in Lord Haw-Haw’s nightly broadcasts, and the reports of wreckage and bodies being washed up on the west coast, particularly in Donegal. He summarised the information in three succinct paragraphs and looked to Sullivan, who was now hidden behind the Irish Press.
‘What’ll I tell External Affairs about Goertz?’
‘Tell them . . . ’ Sullivan lowered his paper with a deflated look. ‘Tell them he’s continuing to cooperate but won’t name names of his IRA contacts.’
‘They don’t care about that.’
‘Or the names of others who provided him with information or safe houses.’
Duggan began typing but stopped as Sullivan added: ‘Or the full details of his relations with the German legation.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘He’s cagey about that. Complains that the German Minister wouldn’t treat him as a representative of the Wehrmacht high command. Kept him at arm’s length.’
Good, Duggan thought. So relations between them are not the best. ‘Should we say he’s not cooperating fully?’
‘I wouldn’t go that far,’ Sullivan said, pondering the question. ‘More a case of him not wanting to be too critical of them, I think.’
‘Keeping his distance,’ Duggan said to himself as he scrolled up the paper to reread what he had written. He shrugged and scrolled back down to the line he was on and modified the end of the sentence he had begun.
‘Are you free this evening?’ Sullivan folded his newspaper.
Duggan nodded as he finished typing and took the carbons from between the three sheets of typing paper.
‘Carmel’s cousin is down from Belfast and she’d like you to come to the Metropole with us.’
‘No chance,’ Duggan laughed. ‘I’m not going on another of your blind dates.’
‘It’s not my idea. It’s Carmel’s.’
‘That’s what I mean. I’m not going on another of Carmel’s blind dates.’
‘Ah, come on. Doesn’t mean anything. We’ll have a few jars.’
‘Did she ask you to ask me?’
Sullivan gave a vigorous nod. ‘Yeah. She likes you.’
‘And I like her too. But I’m not so keen on the way she keeps trying to fix me up with her friends.’
‘It’s not like that. It’s only her cousin.’
‘Why don’t you ask Anderson? They could talk about Belfast or wherever he’s from up there.’
‘That prick,’ Sullivan muttered. He had a visceral dislike of Captain Liam Anderson, which, unlike Duggan’s antipathy towards him, was not based on anything more specific than his northern arrogance. As far as Duggan knew. ‘I wouldn’t let him near her.’
‘You’ve met her?’
‘You’ll like her,’ Sullivan nodded. ‘She’s good fun. Good looker too.’
‘All right,’ Duggan said, signing his name to the bottom of the top copy of his report. ‘But tell Carmel not to get any ideas.’
‘Sure,’ Sullivan said with a relieved smile. ‘She knows it’s not like that. She knows about your American penfriend.’
The afternoon had brightened up, a warm breeze from the west breaking up the clouds and sending them scudding across the sky, their shadows drifting fast over the river and its quaysides. Duggan drove with McClure in the passenger seat. They crossed the Liffey after the Four Courts and went up under the bridge at Christchurch and around by St Patrick’s Cathedral and into Kevin Street.
‘Have you sent the message to the Germans?’ McClure asked as they cros
sed the bottom of Harcourt Street into St Stephen’s Green.
‘Haven’t had a chance to code it yet. I’ll get it done when we go back, and get it out to the signals man in Greystones in time for tonight’s transmission.’
‘Good.’ McClure pointed as they passed Newman House. ‘Pull over there and park.’
Duggan did as instructed and stopped short of the new headquarters of the Department of External Affairs at Iveagh House. ‘You heard about the representative of the Polish government in exile in England?’ McClure asked as they got out, continuing without waiting for an answer. ‘Got a cab from the mailboat and asked the driver to take him to Iveagh House. The cabbie took him to the Iveagh Hostel. Which was probably appropriate enough for a representative of a homeless government.’
Duggan laughed as they went up the steps under the portico and entered the marbled entrance hall, thinking it was a far cry from the hostel they had passed on nearby Bride Street. A porter took their names and spoke on a phone. ‘You know where it is?’ he asked McClure, who had been there the previous month when Duggan was in Lisbon.
McClure nodded and led Duggan up the grand staircase and around to the left when it divided in two. He caught Duggan’s silent whistle at the luxury of the building and smiled his agreement. Their contact, Pól Ó Murchú, was in a small high-ceilinged room with doors leading in both directions, suggesting that it had previously been a passageway or anteroom when it was a Guinness home. His new surroundings hadn’t changed his demeanour: he looked as troubled as usual, old beyond his forty-odd years.
‘Gentlemen,’ he nodded to them. ‘Pull over a chair.’
They each took an upright chair from the wall opposite and brought them in front of his desk. It was beginning to pile as high with files as his old desk in Government Buildings. ‘What do you have for me?’
‘Not a lot, sir,’ McClure said, laying Duggan’s report on the desk facing him. ‘The Germans have not been very busy in the past month.’
‘Other things on their minds,’ Ó Murchú said automatically as he scanned the page. ‘Good.’ He looked up. ‘We’ve more than enough on our plate with our other friends.’ He managed to make ‘friends’ sound more like the opposite of its usual meaning.
‘The Americans?’ McClure suggested, seeing his opening. ‘It has come to our attention that they were less than forthcoming about their plane that crashed in Mayo some weeks ago.’
Ó Murchú said nothing but gave him a quizzical look. McClure told him about the Norden bombsight and that the Americans were now offering a reward for its recovery. ‘We weren’t made aware of any of this,’ McClure concluded.
‘Nor was I,’ Ó Murchú replied to his unasked question. ‘What do you make of it?’
‘We’re not sure what to make of it. This bombsight is said to be of great military significance. “The bomber will always get through”, ’ he said, quoting the common phrase of the pre-war years, ‘but can it hit its target? That’s the question. And that’s what the Norden bombsight allows it to do.’
‘So it’s important.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Do we assume it was on its way to England? That they were giving it to the English?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Could that plane have been on its way to the North?’
‘That’s possible. But they said it was en route to England. And most of its cargo seemed destined for their legation in London. Caviar and the like.’
Ó Murchú pursed his lips and gave the matter some thought. ‘You know we’ve reason to believe that they’ve got some of their people in the North? Without as much as a by-your-leave from us.’
McClure nodded. Most of the reports of American activity around the docks in Derry had originated with G2, beginning with some information Duggan had come across six months earlier.
‘It’s extremely unhelpful in the current climate,’ Ó Murchú sighed, as if it was a matter of personal discomfort. ‘After Mr Aiken’s visit to America. You know they’ve refused our request for arms? Offered to sell us a couple of ships but are now dragging their heels on that. It’s impossible to categorise their attitude as friendly at the moment. It’s anything but, in reality.’
Duggan wondered if the results of his enquiries into Aiken’s comments in Lisbon had made their way to Ó Murchú’s desk. It wouldn’t surprise me, he thought. But there was no way he could ask anyone if it was true, not even McClure, in spite of their close working relationship. Things had to be kept in their own compartments.
‘If I may speak frankly and, of course, confidentially, Mr Aiken’s visit was not the success we’d hoped for. And Mr Dillon is only too happy to point that out. Of course he’s playing Gray’s game as usual,’ Ó Murchú was saying of the opposition td James Dillon.
Dillon had questioned the success of Aiken’s mission, which the government was presenting as having deepened America’s understanding of Ireland’s neutrality. Dillon was known to be friendly with David Gray, the American Minister in Ireland, who made no secret of his opposition to Irish, and American, neutrality in the war against Hitler.
‘That’s by the by,’ Ó Murchú said. ‘We can prevent the newspapers going to town on it. But everything to do with the Americans must be handled with great care at the moment.’
‘Yes, sir,’ McClure said.
‘We cannot afford any further misunderstandings with them,’ Ó Murchú added. Yes, Duggan decided, he has been told what I found out in Lisbon. ‘We are trying to make it clear to them in a friendly fashion that we have the right to make our own decisions on the war, but they don’t want to listen. Mr Gray wants everyone involved and he’s poisoning the well on us in Washington. So everything to do with them is to be handled with the utmost care.’
‘Understood.’
‘Is this bomb thing going to cause a problem?’
‘No, sir. It’s under control.’
‘You have it?’
‘Yes,’ McClure admitted, unable to dodge the direct question.
‘You’re going to give it back to them?’
‘Not immediately. We thought we’d try and work out why they’re offering a reward for it first.’
‘Because they want it back,’ Ó Murchú said, giving him a bland look, stating what seemed obvious.
‘Why they’ve gone public about a piece of secret military equipment,’ McClure clarified. ‘Why they’re risking the German legation hearing about it. And putting two and two together. That they’re giving it to the British.’
Ó Murchú took a deep breath, as if he was about to challenge what McClure had said. ‘All right,’ he exhaled. ‘But be extra careful. Don’t create any further misunderstandings. Don’t cause an incident.’
‘We’ll be careful.’
‘Thank you, gentlemen.’ Ó Murchú dismissed them, adding as they replaced their chairs against the wall, ‘At least we won’t have to pretend to be best friends with the Americans on Friday. There’s no Fourth of July garden party in the Phoenix Park this year.’
‘Why not?’ McClure asked in surprise.
‘A diplomatic illness, perhaps,’ Ó Murchú said with a wintry grimace. ‘Mr Gray is going off to Adare to spend the day with some of his Ascendancy friends.’
‘I’ve heard a lot about you,’ Carmel’s cousin Maura said as she shook Duggan’s hand.
‘All lies, if the information came from him,’ Duggan smiled as he nodded towards Sullivan. They were standing in the lobby of the Metropole, where Duggan and Sullivan had been waiting for the two girls to arrive. The queue outside for the night’s film, This Man Is Dangerous with James Mason, was being allowed into the box office by a uniformed commissionaire in groups of twenty or so.
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Maura said with a tilt to her head, as if appraising him. She had light brown hair raised up by a slide at each side, lively grey eyes, and slightly prominent teeth in a narrow face. ‘It’s all very complimentary.’
‘Let’s go on in,’ Carmel suggested
, as if there was a reason to hurry.
They followed her into the ballroom, where she stopped inside the door. The Phil Murtagh band was playing a lively tune but the dance floor was empty. Tables around the edges of the room were mostly occupied. ‘There they are,’ Carmel said, and set off across the dance floor towards the far corner.
Duggan caught sight of Max Linqvist’s blonde hair. Linqvist was half-hidden behind a pillar, his arm around the shoulders of his girlfriend, Breda.
‘You fucker,’ Duggan muttered to Sullivan as they followed the girls.
‘I didn’t know they’d be here,’ Sullivan muttered back, assuming Duggan’s upset was caused by Breda’s presence.
‘Bollocks,’ Duggan retorted. This is a set-up, he thought. Linqvist has organised it, whether Sullivan realised it or not. Which meant that he wanted something. And something he didn’t want to go through the normal channels to get.
Linqvist and Breda were on their feet, being introduced to Maura, as Duggan and Sullivan arrived. ‘And you know Paul,’ Carmel said to Linqvist.
‘We’ve met before.’ Linqvist shook hands with Duggan. ‘Good to see you again.’
‘Paul,’ Breda said as she gave Duggan a dazzling smile, took his hand in both of hers and gave him a peck on the cheek. ‘I’m so glad you could come.’
They all sat down and ordered drinks from a waitress. Duggan concentrated on Maura, asking her how Belfast was.
‘Nervous,’ she said. ‘Everybody’s on edge waiting for the next raid.’
‘Were you there during the last ones?’
‘Aye. Two girls I was at school with were killed.’
‘Friends of yours?’
‘Not really. I just knew them from school.’
‘It must have been terrible.’
‘It was,’ she said in a matter-of-fact voice. ‘Seemed to go on for hours, bomb after bomb. And now we’ve got the Twelfth coming up.’
‘Is that why you’re here?’
‘Took my holidays to get away for the two weeks.’
The band’s singer, Peggy Dell, appeared on stage and began crooning ‘Blue Moon’ in a husky voice.
