A Gathering of Spies Read Online Free PDF

us out to the Nazis—there are a few of those, too.”
    He waited to see what impact this revelation would have on Winterbotham. Winterbotham waited to see how long Taylor would wait. Finally, Taylor cleared his throat, disappointed, and continued.
    â€œNow, here’s the good part,” he said. “Of those hundred-odd agents, Harry, we’ve captured … How many would you guess?”
    â€œI wouldn’t have any idea.”
    â€œAll of them,” Taylor said, and grinned.
    This time Winterbotham couldn’t help himself. He blinked with surprise. “ All of them?”
    â€œEvery last one.”
    â€œHow can you be sure?”
    â€œWe weren’t, at first. But as time went on … Suffice it to say that if we had missed even one, Harry, we would know about it by now—for reasons that will become clear in a moment. We got most of them right at the start of the war. In September of thirty-nine, we rounded up all the enemy aliens in the country. We went over each case individually. If there was any doubt, we interned them. They’re not made of terribly stern stuff, these Abwehr agents, and few of them have any training worth mentioning. They cracked quickly. And then … What do you think we did then?”
    â€œYou hanged them, no doubt.”
    â€œSome of them, yes. But some of them, we realized, could be of more value to us alive … and so we started Double Cross.”
    â€œDouble Cross?”
    â€œThat’s what this place is,” Taylor said. He made an expansive gesture with the hand holding the cigarette. “The headquarters of Operation Double Cross. The greatest misinformation campaign ever conducted in war or in peace. We have dozens of Abwehr agents here, Harry, and they’re all working for us. They use these”—he tapped the suitcase on the table—“these radios to send intelligence back to Hamburg. But in reality, everything they say is coming from us. Do you see?”
    Winterbotham nodded slowly. “You’re feeding them worthless information.”
    â€œNot …” Taylor trailed off.
    Winterbotham read his face in an instant. Taylor may have had his talents in this world, but concealing his thoughts was not among them.
    â€œAndrew,” Winterbotham said mildly, “if we’re going to be working together, it goes without saying that I’ll require your full confidence.”
    Taylor frowned. “Of course,” he said, but he didn’t look pleased. He cleared his throat. “Not exactly worthless,” he said. “And that’s where it gets tricky. We can’t simply feed them worthless information, or they’d realize that their spies have been compromised. No, Harry, the intelligence has to be true, at least for the most part. If Canaris loses faith in his spies, the jig is up, as they say—and we’ll need the operation to be in good working order as the war goes on. Whenever we send troops back to the mainland, next year or the year after, we’ll use Double Cross as our ace in the hole. We’ll make sure Hitler expects the landing to be exactly where it won’t be.”
    â€œSo you’re sending true information?”
    Again, he could see Taylor hesitate.
    â€œIt’s extremely delicate,” Taylor said then. “Yes, the bulk of the information is true. But of course, we don’t want to help our friend Canaris too much, or he might just win the war. We walk a very fine line here, Harry. Sometimes we provide intelligence of some value—it’s a sacrifice that has to be made. Sometimes we put a bit of a spin on the truth. If there’s an accident at an airfield, we’ll let one of their spies take credit for it, claiming sabotage. Sometimes we’ll manufacture something out of whole cloth that will seem, to reconnaissance planes, to be real. We have all sorts of people working for Double Cross. All sorts. Chess champions.