Hitler's peace

The Headquarters of SOE-British military intelligence in Cairo-was a supposedly secret location on Rostom Street that every taxi driver and street waif in the city seemed to know as “the secret building,” much to the irritation of those who worked there. Since the battle of El Alamein, it was the most important military building in Cairo. It was located in a large and ornate block of apartments right next door to the American legation and only a stone’s throw from “Grey Pillars,” the British GHQ.

The area outside Rostom Buildings was surrounded with checkpoints, barbed wire, and dozens of soldiers. Inside, the atmosphere was of a busy department store. It was here that the whole military effort in the Balkans was centered, most of it related to finding safe places in Yugoslavia where the new missions could be deployed.

“Of course, they’re much more formal than we are,” explained General Donovan as he and I climbed the stairs behind a young lieutenant escorting us up to the office of the SOE’s operational commander. “But I think you’ll see some similarities. They’re mostly academics, like us. Not much regular army. Soldiers are probably not bright enough for this outfit. The fellow who’s nominally in charge, General Stawell, is a good example. He has absolutely no experience of running a secret organization. Which is why we’re seeing his number two, Lieutenant Colonel Powell. Quite an interesting fellow, this Powell. I think you’ll like him. Like you, he was a professor before the war. Of Greek, at the University of Sydney.”

“Is he Australian?”

“Good grief, no, he’s as English as they come. Stiff as a board to look at. But as bright as new paint.”

Carrying Donovan’s Louis Vuitton suitcase, I trudged up the steps like a man ascending the scaffold.

Colonel Enoch Powell was a curious man. Donovan and I looked like a pair of wilted wedding cakes in our white tropical suits, but unlike his two junior officers and in spite of the heat, Powell was wearing full service dress: a collar and tie, long trousers (not the more usual shorts), tunic, and Sam Browne belts.

Donovan made the introduction. Noting my quizzical look, Powell felt moved to explain his appearance in a reedy, almost musical voice that spoke sentences as precise as any Mozart concerto.

“It’s a curious fact but I find that wearing full uniform keeps up my morale,” Powell explained. “By temperament I am something of a Spartan, you see.” Powell lit a pipe and sat down. “I wonder. Are you the Willard Mayer who wrote On Being Empirical?”

I said I was.

“In many ways it was an admirable philosophical work,” said Powell. “But quite wrong. I hope you will forgive me when I opine that your chapter on ethics was the most puerile piece of logic I have ever read. Sheer casuistry.”

“Well, Colonel,” I said, “I am an Athenian by temperament. I doubt that an Athenian and a Spartan are ever destined to agree about very much.”

“We shall see,” smiled Powell.

“Besides, I was describing not a first-order ethical theory but a theory of the logic of moral language.”

“Indeed so. I merely question your implied assertion that our moral and aesthetic convictions are separable from our empirical beliefs.”

Donovan cleared his throat, loudly, to stifle this philosophical debate before it could really get started. “Gentlemen,” he said. “If I could ask you to postpone this debate until another time.”

“By all means,” agreed Powell. “I should like a chance to debate you, Professor Mayer. Perhaps over dinner this evening? At the Gezira Sporting Club?”

“I’m sorry but I have a prior engagement. Another time, perhaps.”

“Then let us talk of your Russian transcripts,” said Powell. “I’m sorry to tell you this, but cipherenes are in rather short supply right now.”

“Cipherenes?” frowned Donovan.

“Cipherists, if you prefer,” allowed the colonel. “Or even decipherers. Either way, there is a huge backlog of important signals traffic that has yet to be decoded. German signals to which, per-force, a greater degree of urgency is due. They are our own bread and butter, General Donovan. Since we are not yet at war with the Soviet Union, but with Germany, I am afraid that I cannot grant your material a greater priority, with or without the facility of a Russian codebook. You do understand, gentlemen?”

I breathed a sigh of relief. “Yes, I understand, perfectly,” I told him.

“However,” added Colonel Powell, “our Major Deakin believes he may have a somewhat unorthodox solution to your problem.” Powell turned to one of the two majors who were sitting on either side of him. “Major Deakin taught history at Wadham College, Oxford,” added Powell, as if this were some kind of recommendation for the British major’s solution to our problem.