Free Mrs Zigzag: The Extraordinary Life of a Secret Agent's Wife by Betty Chapman Page A

very well with him, they kept in touch and he later skippered Eddie’s yacht, Flamingo (see Chapter 6). He was rather a drunk captain! On one trip, which turned out to be very rough seas, he came aboard with plenty of bottles of booze, but no food. Eddie made him catch fish and eat it raw when they were out to sea, as punishment, because he spent all his money allowances on alcohol.
    It wasn’t long after his stint as a seaman that Behan became famous as a playwright:
Eddie and I went to the first night of his play. He had an old dirty shirt, and a pint of Guinness. Many people had come to see him. People were buying him drinks, and he got drunk. Halfway through the play he suddenly shouted ‘Stop! That’s not the bloody way I wrote it.’
    Eddie and Betty’s business venture was not approved of by the authorities. They had opened up the harbour at Newry and were offering a cheaper and more convenient service than was previously offered to the farmers and traders who had to transport their goods via Belfast, which was further away. The vested interests exerted pressure on Stormont to bring in restrictions to hamper the business. 5 Eventually using subsidies, the rival company undercut and put Eddie and Betty out of business.
    Betty says of the venture:
It was a hard slog. They did a lot of tough work to get the shipping thing going. Other shippers used to rip-off the merchants and, because of this, Eddie was able to cut their prices and carry the merchandise for much less, so that was a good start! Whilst in Ireland, I got ill and suffered a breakdown; I went to a nursing home called Saint John of God. Despite the severe rationing, the nuns used to smuggle beef across the border for me to eat to build up my strength. I then got transferred to Queen Mary’s Hospital in London for five months. I really suffered from stress. It was a hard life with Eddie.
    While Betty was recuperating, Eddie stayed in Ireland to run the shipping business. After its collapse he continued with the cargo business, but this time using an aeroplane. He had retained contacts with many former Battle of Britain pilots. Their expertise and undaunting courage, which had earned them accolades during the war, did not qualify them for anything during peacetime, however. So Eddie and some of ‘the Few’ ran cargo in and out of Tangier, which at that time was an international port.
    Gradually Eddie’s story was becoming known, and both Betty and Eddie became well-known personalities. Betty says:
Sometimes I look at celebrities and think how I know that scene only too well. At some point when Eddie wasn’t around so much, I went to Paris for the weekend with a friend. Eddie told us to go to The Elysee and look up Johnny Zumbach who was the man that owned this club. We went in and sat down, made ourselves known, ready for some refreshments. I said to Johnny, ‘That’s not Aristotle Onassis 6 and Maria Callas 7 is it?’ He took me over and introduced me and we had a good cosy drink and a chat. It was something that very few people have probably had the opportunity to do; they were among the most famous people of the time. To be certain they were more interested in each other than me, but even so I found them both to be very nice people. It was obvious that there was a very deep and loving relationship there. Maria sang with my friend, the famous opera singer Joan Carlyle, and Joan was later asked to unveil a bust of her in London.
We used to go quite a lot to Les Ambassadeurs in Park Lane when we were together in London again. I remember one time when we were there, Richard Burton 8 was having lunch with Eddie, and I with his then wife Sybil. We often lunched there to discuss the possibilities of making a film of Eddie’s exploits. Sometimes we met with people such as Paul Douglas 9 and Audrey Hepburn, 10 and various producers. Audrey was so excited, as she was about to go off and do a film – she was all over the place! She was only about 20 at