SECRET ARMIES
12
what
to
do and how
turn you will
to
meet the Prague contact
to
whom
in
report."
At the appointed hour Oertel sat on a bench staring at the
fountain, watching men and women strolling and chatting cheer
fully on the way to meet friends for late afternoon coffee. Occa
sionally he looked at the afternoon papers lying on the bench
beside him. He felt that he was being watched but he saw no
one in a gray suit with a blue handkerchief. He wiped his fore
head with his handkerchief, partly because of the heat, partly
because of nervousness. As he held the handkerchief he could
feel the tightly bound capsule.
Precisely at five he noticed a man in a gray suit with a gray
hat and a blue handkerchief in the breast pocket of his coat,
strolling toward him. As the man approached he took out a
package of cigarettes, selected one and searched his pockets for
a light. Stopping before Oertel, he doffed his hat and smilingly
asked for a light. Oertel produced his lighter and the other in
turn offered
him
a cigarette.
He
sat
down on
the bench.
once a week," he said abruptly, puffing at his cigarette
and staring at two children playing in the sunshine which flooded
"Report
Karlsplatz.
He
stretched his feet like a
man
relaxing after a
hard day s work. "Deliver reports to Frau Suchy personally.
One week she will come to Prague, the next you go to her. De
liver a copy of your report to the English missionary, Vicar
Robert Smith, who lives at 31 Karlsplatz."
Smith, to whom the unidentified man in the gray suit told
Oertel to report, was a minister of the Church of Scotland in
Prague, a British subject with influential connections not only
with
English-speaking people but with Czech government
Besides his ministerial work, the Reverend Smith led
officials.*
* The Rev. Smith returned to
England when he learned that the Czechoslovakian secret police were watching him. At the present writing he had not
returned to his church in Prague.