Free Hitler's Spy by James Hayward Page B

Colonel Johnny was operating under control.
    What happened next did little to assuage Tar’s myriad doubts about Snow. ‘Unfortunately, in looking over his set Owens pushed a switch which caused a fuse to blow. This ended our
activities for the day, as we were unable to repair the set before the following morning.’
    No signal, just noise.
    Apprehension over Snow’s bona fides only increased with the simultaneous arrival of a registered letter from Amsterdam containing four £5 notes, addressed to ‘Mr Wilson’
at 112 Stratford Road. Having sided with her forsaken sister-in-law Irene, Esther Ferrett took the incriminating package to West Ham police station. On returning to Wandsworth on Saturday morning,
Tar initiated a robust exchange with Owens, during which he made it ‘abundantly clear’ that it was in his best interests to establish contact with Stelle X. ‘Since our
conversation it is now my impression that Snow is doing all he can to get in touch with Germany.’
    Owens’ change of heart owed less to a sense of patriotic duty than a desire for simple self-preservation. There was also Lily, his Achilles heel, now back with her parents in West Ham,
exposed to the fury of the Ferretts, and perhaps even that of the public at large. His choice was no choice at all. By six o’clock on Saturday evening Meakin had managed to repair the faulty
klamotten. With Owens on the key, his Morse signature slow and apprehensive, B1A’s first double-cross signal flashed across the ether to Wohldorf:
‘All ready. Have repaired radio.
Send instructions. Now awaiting reply.’
    No convoys or Blenheims, no fuel dumps, no weather.
    Not even
ein glas bier
.
    And no reply.
    A repeat transmission at 19.45 gave the same disappointing result. According to boffins at GCHQ the strength of bothsignals was poor, with no definite reply detected.
Owens suggested buzzing the message for a third time at 04.00 on Sunday morning, when the funkers at Wohldorf would be listening in for Johnny. Again, however, the test proved negative.
‘Unfortunately our transmission was reported as completely jammed by a powerful unidentified station,’ Tar wrote ruefully. ‘It is of course possible that the message might have
been received in Germany, but no reply was picked up by GCHQ.’
    Desperate to escape Wandsworth, Owens offered to contact Hamburg by letter, though Robertson demurred. Besides, there were now indications that the future security of London might not rest
entirely on the feeble shoulders of Agent Snow. ‘Klop Ustinov has reported,’ wrote Liddell, ‘that the reason for the German abstention from bombing England or France is that
Hitler intends to destroy Poland, then offer to make peace on the grounds that he has taken no offensive action against the Allies.’
    During this brief interregnum Arthur Owens and Tar Robertson struck an unprecedented deal. This bargain – more a Faustian pact – involved the provision of a new home for Snow in
Kingston-upon-Thames, an upmarket suburb not far from Surbiton, together with false identity papers in the name of Thomas Wilson. In return for relative personal freedom, and a small monthly
retainer, Owens would transmit controlled messages to the enemy, continue to treff with Rantzau on neutral territory, and maintain the fiction of a zealous Welsh sabotage ring. Best of all, Lily
would also reside at the new London stelle.
    The complexities were considerable, not least the small matter of housing Snow and his klamotten. ‘Enemy agents in this country using radio transmitters would be operating under
difficulties,’ observed a specialist from the Radio Security Service. ‘It was not easy for a man to take lodgings, put up an aerial and lock himself in his room for a period each day
while he sent messages and received replies on equipment which, if it wereseen by the landlady, would certainly cause her to call the police.’
    MI5 might have preferred to keep Snow’s priceless