by Seb Spence
“But why go to all this trouble? Surely you’ve got your own people who could help you?”
Minton smiled grimly and poured another measure of Scotch into each of the mugs.
“Let me tell you a story,” he said, sitting back in his armchair. “I’d like to get your opinion on it at the end. Your friend Kemp tried to get a message to you about the German agent who goes by the codename ‘Cobalt’. Eight days ago, we intercepted an incoming message from an Abwehr station indicating that this agent Cobalt would be making a pick up from a dead-letter box in Lambeth. We put the street under surveillance, and sure enough a woman appeared and uplifted a package from behind a loose brick in a wall there. We arrested her and discovered the package contained microfilm of a highly classified nature. We believed her to be Cobalt, or if not Cobalt then certainly a member of her cell ... ”
Minton recounted in detail the story of Lucy’s capture and subsequent interrogation, itemizing the evidence they had accumulated against her. He described fully the operation to trap Ortega and Cobalt in Grindley Street, which culminated in Lucy’s apparent suicide attempt using a cyanide capsule. He also related Lucy’s version of what had happened – her assertion that she had been set up by John Elliott to believe she was acting in a film scene. “So what is your opinion?” he asked Barton finally.
“It looks to me as if you’ve definitely found Cobalt”, Barton said, enthusiastically. “Her description and her claim to be an actress fits in with what GK said in his phone call. The story about being set up to do a film scene sounds far-fetched. It looks like an open and shut case to me: she’s as guilty as they come. I’d say she needs to be put on trial straightaway.”
“That’s what my fellow interrogators believe.” Minton paused, and glanced down at his whisky as he swirled it around in the mug. Looking up again at Barton, he continued. “I have, however, developed certain misgivings about the case. First of all, this woman, Lucy Walker, does not seem to be cut out to be an agent: she seems timid, weak, neurotic and emotional.”
“But if she’s an actress she could be putting it on.”
“Perhaps, but secondly, she has stuck rigidly to her story. We haven’t broken her; we haven’t managed to find a single inconsistency in what she has told us. No contradictions.”
“That just goes to show what a proficient agent she is – highly trained.”
“And then there is the question of the coincidence: the only two people who could corroborate her story are unavailable: one was killed in the “Black Saturday” bombing raid, the other one went missing and is now presumed to be another victim of the raid. I don’t like coincidences in a case.”
“Well, perhaps it is just that – a coincidence and nothing more.”
“I told you she claimed that she had taken a fake suicide capsule when she was apprehended – a cod liver oil capsule in fact. She said she had discarded the original one given to her by the man Elliott, who supplied her with the props for her scene – she said she had spat it out in an alleyway round the corner from where she was arrested. This was just a minor detail from her story. A few days ago, I decided to check it. I went back to Grindley Street and retraced the route she said she had taken. I found this in the alley she said she came down.” Minton took a small object from a side pocket of his tunic and placed it on the table: it was an amber capsule. “I’ve had the contents analysed – a lethal dose of potassium cyanide.”
Barton shrugged. “Doesn’t mean anything. Perhaps she just got cold feet on the way to the pick-up and spat it out. Then, when you arrested her, she went through her little suicide act, knowing you would probably find the capsule – it would lend credence to her tale that she had been set up. I expect she had her cover story carefully prepared in advance.”
“You’re a hard man to convince, Barton. But I have to agree that what I’ve said so far doesn’t clear her definitely. However, what has tipped the balance for me is this. We have been monitoring Cobalt’s radio transmissions for several months. Around the time Kemp went missing, she – assuming Cobalt is a ‘she’ – changed her code. The GC&CS people guessed she had changed it to a book code, in which the key to decoding each message is a sentence or passage from a particular book. Such codes are difficult to crack – unless you know which book is being used. In the course of her interrogation, Miss Walker mentioned that this man Elliott had purchased a particular edition of ‘Bleak House’. A few days ago, she happened to add that he had bought two copies of the book. It occurred to me straightaway that this might be significant, so I got in touch with a contact of mine at GC&CS and suggested he try using this edition to decrypt Cobalt’s latest transmissions. It worked – in a matter of hours, he was able to decode all of Cobalt’s recent undeciphered messages. There’s some highly classified material in them. Now why would a dedicated German agent, who is desperately trying to convince us she is not working for the Abwehr, allow her codes to be discovered, thereby not only confirming her guilt, but betraying sensitive information?”
“Perhaps she is trying to put you off the scent – trying to get you to follow up this imaginary character Elliott.”
“But why? If she were a fanatical Nazi sympathizer she would not reveal her codes to protect herself. If, on the other hand, she just wanted to save her skin, she could simply have told us about her codes – we have offered her immunity from prosecution if she co-operates with us.”
Minton took a file from his briefcase and removed from it a single sheet of paper with typed text on it. “Here, read this,” he said handing it to Barton. “It’s a decrypt of a radio message Cobalt transmitted the day before we arrested Lucy Walker. My contact was able to decode it using the ‘Bleak House’ book.” Barton began reading the message, which started off:
Currently unloading at Surrey Commercial Docks ...
and continued with a long list of ships and their cargoes. Further down were details of anti-aircraft defences in the area, including, he noticed,
... anti-aircraft battery Southwark Park four 3.7 inch guns ...
Minton interjected: “Note that most of the information in the message relates to the Surrey Docks and their vicinity – the Bermondsey/Rotherhithe area, the area where Lucy Walker said these people had their film ‘studio’”.
The message ended with:
Security service closing in. Must cease transmissions permanently. All future contact will be via Argon. Do not believe reports of my demise.
Barton frowned. “What’s your explanation of all this then – why was this girl set up?”
“Let us suppose that members of Cobalt’s cell were aware that your friend Kemp was on to them, and that they followed him to the phone box where he made his last call. They heard him start to give details of Cobalt and moved in immediately to shut him up. If that’s the case, they might deduce that he had managed to pass on some information about Cobalt – at least her description, possibly clues about her occupation. They feared it might not take long for us to track her down and decided to act to protect her.
“I believe they set up Lucy Walker so that we would think she was Cobalt. In view of the information that they supposed Kemp had passed on to the intelligence service they guessed we would have her description. They got their Abwehr controllers to send a fake message to their agent Ortega at the Spanish Embassy, knowing somehow that we would intercept it. The message indicated Cobalt would be making the pick up in Grindley Street. They intended that Lucy would die during the arrest, taking the cyanide capsule they had provided her with, and they expected us to assume the dead girl was Cobalt. If the plan worked, we would obviously stop looking for the real Cobalt, who could then continue her spying activities. I also believe that members of the cell murdered George Kemp and Miss Walker’s aunt.”
“But they were both killed in bombing raids. In George’s case the police found the remains of the incendiary bomb that killed him.”
“And in the case of Lucy’s aunt as well – I asked the local police specif
ically to check whether it might have been arson, but they confirmed that the casing of a standard Luftwaffe B-1E incendiary bomb was found in the ruins of the aunt’s house. But it means nothing. The Luftwaffe are dropping thousands of such bombs every night. Many of them go off harmlessly in streets and parks. Old casings are easy to get hold of; kids even collect them as war souvenirs. I suspect the victims were first killed and then fires started to destroy the body and conceal the method of killing. A casing from a spent incendiary bomb was left in the building to make the police think the fires were the result of the raids. I believe Miss Walker’s aunt – and probably her employer, Mr Pickering, as well – were murdered. They were killed in order to prevent them from corroborating Lucy’s story.”
“Yes, you could be right – it all seems to fall into place.” Barton was beginning to feel the anger rise in him. If what Minton said was true, this gang needed to be apprehended and made to pay for what they had done. “We need to hunt these people down and bring them before a court.”
“Which is why I need your help,” Minton declared emphatically. “Let’s consider the implications if my theory is correct. First of all, we now know what Cobalt looks like: we have her description from Kemp, and the fact that they chose Lucy to act as Cobalt confirms this – she fits the description. We also know what her cover is, thanks again to your friend Kemp, who gave us a clue about her occupation – she was someone ‘on the stage’, he thought. The fake passport with ‘actress’ as the occupation also confirms what Kemp found. We can now be fairly certain that Cobalt really is an actress with brown hair in her twenties.
“Secondly, in the course of her interrogations Lucy has told us a great deal about the people who set her up. We have good descriptions of eight members of the cell – the staff of the fake film company who duped Lucy.”
Minton paused and downed the whisky remaining in his mug. “There is, however, a rather worrying implication: if my theory is correct, Lucy’s aunt and her employer were murdered after Lucy was arrested; the question is, how did the gang know Lucy didn’t die in Grindley Street? To all intents and purposes (to anyone watching) she followed the script she had been given and took the capsule – no one could tell she was only feigning death. We ourselves even thought she was dying, and we were right there with her.
“In addition, some of the incriminating evidence the gang planted on her matched material we had already taken from German agents arrested previously. I suspect this was deliberate – they believed that if she were found to be carrying items that had been issued to other agents, we would take this as further proof she was one too. So how did Cobalt’s cell know these agents had been captured? We’ve kept it a closely-guarded secret.
“Finally, their plan relied on us decoding the Abwehr’s message to Ortega at the Spanish Embassy. How did they know we were monitoring him and had cracked his code? The fact is, Barton, that they have someone on the inside – someone in my organisation is working for the Germans and is in contact with this spy ring. This is why I’m asking for your help, I need someone outside the organisation who I can trust.”
After a pause he continued: “We’re going to have to play along with their game for a while, which is why I intend to transfer Miss Walker to Holloway prison to await trial for treason.”
“You can’t be serious,” Barton exclaimed in disbelief. “If you really believe this woman’s innocent, you can’t send her to stand trial for something she could be executed for.”
“I have to, Barton. If I let her go, their contact on the inside will know I believe her story and will realise I’m on to him and Cobalt. They’ll go to ground. They might also try to kill Lucy to make sure she can’t provide any further information or ID members of the cell if we capture them. But don’t worry, I won’t let it come to a trial. I can’t tell Lucy what we’re doing because she might give the game away, but rest assured I won’t let anything happen to her. We’ll make her comfortable in prison, and she’ll be safer there.”
This was Barton’s first insight into the devious and murky world of espionage. He wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to be part of it, but for GK’s sake he decided to accept Minton’s invitation.
“So what do you want me to do?”
“Your first task is to go up to Hednesford and find out what your friend Kemp was up to when they got him – see if you can pick up their trail. I warn you, though, this is going to be dangerous. By my count, the gang have probably killed at least five people already – your friend Kemp; Lucy’s aunt and probably her employer Pickering, who hasn’t been found yet; there’s a caretaker from Brown’s warehouse who is also missing, and a policeman who was shot with the pistol we found in Lucy’s bag. This gang won’t baulk at killing again.”
Perhaps it was the effects of the whisky, but at that moment Barton did not care much about his safety – he wanted retribution for GK. He knocked back the contents of his mug and put it on the table. “Alright, count me in,” he declared.
7.
Saturday, 14th September, 1940: The Regent Theatre, Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex
Hugo DaSilva was in a good mood this evening. Their one-week engagement at the Regent Theatre had gone well: they had been playing to full houses, and the reviews had been kind. He was feeling expansive, so after the final performance he invited two other members of the company to a small celebration in his dressing room. Once the invitees had arrived, he poured out three flutes of champagne: one he handed to John Elliott, who was lounging on a couch, and one to the attractive, brown-haired young woman seated on a chair beside the dressing table.
“Well, John, it looks as if you’ve pulled it off,” the woman remarked without much enthusiasm. “I have to confess I didn’t think it would work.”
“I had my doubts, too,” DaSilva added, though in a more genial tone. “I knew that useless cow Lucy would make a mess of things, and so she did, switching the capsule at the last minute. If we hadn’t had our man on the inside to tip us off about her, we’d have been done for. But it all seems to have come right in the end, though it took a bit of fixing: Len and Lukasz had to pull your chestnuts out of the fire, eh John? A tricky assignment that, getting rid of Pickering and the old woman in the middle of an air raid.”
“Why was that necessary?” the woman asked, staring fixedly at Elliott.
“There was no choice,” he responded defensively. “When we heard Lucy was still alive, we had to move fast and get Pickering and the aunt out of the way so that there was no-one to support Lucy’s story, and hence no reason for the security service to suspect she was not Cobalt.” A note of self-satisfaction entered his voice. “Len and Lukasz did a good job,” he affirmed. “They used the same method that they used to get rid of that meddlesome RAF man. With so many people dying in the raids, the police aren’t going to notice a few extra burned corpses, especially if they’re in a gutted building that appears to have been hit with an incendiary bomb. Len knows a scrap-metal dealer who sells old bomb casings for a few bob apiece.” Elliott decided not to mention the fact that, on his orders, Len and Lukasz had also set fire to four other houses in Irene Walker’s street to make the incident look more like the result of an aerial attack.
“The plan could have ended in disaster,” the woman said sharply, aiming to deflate his crowing. “If they’d believed her, they’d have had descriptions of all of us.”
DaSilva began to feel a little tense. He had intended this to be a celebration, not a post mortem. “All’s well that ends well, that’s what I say.”
Elliott held his glass up to the light and watched the bubbles rise in the champagne.
“I admit the plan to set up Lucy Walker was risky–”
“Foolhardy,” the woman interjected.
“–but then you must risk all to gain all. What else could we do? They were closing in on us and we had to put them off the scent. When that RAF snooper tracked us down to Hednesford and phoned in a description of you, I was sure the game was up unless we did somethin
g drastic. Our only chance was to make them think that Cobalt was out of action, and what better way than having her die before their very eyes. Of course, it would have been neater if Lucy had swallowed the cyanide and died, but the British justice system may yet do the job for us – there’s a good chance she’ll end up on the gallows. Even if she doesn’t, she’ll face a long stretch in Holloway Prison, which will keep her quiet for long enough to enable us to do our work here. MI5 think they have caught Cobalt, so now we can continue our operations as before. Here’s to ‘business as usual’,” he said, raising his glass.
DaSilva grinned. “Business as usual,” he echoed, raising his own, but the woman set her glass down untouched on DaSilva’s dressing table.
“Of course,” Elliott went on, directing his remarks to the woman, “you will no longer be able to use the transmitter yourself – the Radio Security Service would recognise your ‘fist’ and realise Cobalt’s still on the loose. The information you gather will have to be transmitted through me, until we can train up someone new.”
“What about Ortega at the Spanish Embassy?” she asked. “We can send via his transmitter.”
Elliott held his glass up to the light again and regarded it. “I’ve had to dispose of Señor Ortega. MI5 know all about him and have been monitoring his transmissions – as you are aware, that was how we managed to inform them about the Grindley Street pick-up. Once this had been accomplished, Ortega was no longer of any use to us. In fact, he was a liability; MI5 would almost certainly have brought him in for questioning and he might have disclosed something.”
