Arthur Seymour, as MI6’s chief spy in the region, had a front-row seat for all of it. Officially, he was attached to Beirut station, but in practice it was only the place where he hung his hat. His brief was the region, and his masters were in London. He was in near constant motion, breakfast in Beirut, dinner in Damascus, Baghdad the next morning. Egypt’s Nasser entertained him frequently, as did the House of Saud. He was even welcome in Tel Aviv, though the Office regarded him, with some justification, as unsympathetic to the Israeli predicament. Seymour’s grudge against the Jewish state was personal. He had been inside the King David Hotel on July 22, 1946, when a bomb planted by the extremist Irgun killed ninety-one people, including twenty-eight British subjects.
Given the demands of Seymour’s assignment, Kim Philby was something of a hobby. His reports to London were irregular at best. He sent them directly to Dick White, Philby’s main nemesis from MI5 who was appointed chief of MI6 on the eve of Philby’s arrival in Beirut. In his telegrams, Seymour referred to Philby by the code name Romeo, which lent their correspondence a faintly comic air.
“I bumped into Romeo on the Corniche on Wednesday last,” he wrote in September 1956. “He was in fine form and good humor. We talked, about what, I cannot recall, as Romeo somehow managed to say nothing at all.” It would be three weeks before the next update. “I attended a picnic with Romeo in the mountains outside Beirut. He became unspeakably drunk.” Then, the next month: “Romeo became insultingly drunk during a party at the home of the American Miles Copeland. I don’t know how he manages to function in his work as a correspondent. I fear for his health if present trends continue.”
Gabriel and Graham Seymour had divided the eight boxes of files equally between them. Gabriel worked at a folding table in the sitting room, Seymour in the kitchen. They could see one another through the open communicating door, but their eyes rarely met; they were both reading as quickly as possible. Seymour might have doubted the woman’s existence, but he was determined to find her first.
It was Gabriel, however, who discovered the first reference to Philby’s complicated love life. “Romeo has been spotted at a café called the Shaky Floor with the wife of an important American newspaper correspondent. An affair might prove harmful to British interests.” The important American correspondent was Sam Pope Brewer of theNew York Times. More reports followed. “I have it on reliable authority the relationship between Romeo and the American woman is intimate. Her husband is unaware of the situation, as he is away on a long reporting trip. Perhaps someone should intervene before it is too late.” But it was already too late, as Seymour soon discovered. “I have it on good authority Romeo has informed the American correspondent of his intention to marry his wife. Apparently, the American took the news quite well, telling Philby, ‘That sounds like the best possible solution. What do you make of the situation in Iraq?’”
The internal politics of MI6’s outpost in Beirut changed dramatically in early 1960 when Nicholas Elliott, Philby’s closest friend, was appointed Head of Station. Philby’s fortunes rose overnight, while Arthur Seymour, a known Philby doubter, was suddenly out of favor. It was no matter; he had his own back channel to Dick White in London, which he used to undermine Philby at every turn. “I’ve had occasion to review some of the intelligence Romeo is producing for H/Beirut. It is as dubious as Romeo’s newspaper reporting. I fear H/Beirut is blinded to this fact by his friendship with Romeo. They are inseparable.”
But Elliott left Beirut in October 1962 and returned to London to become controller for North Africa. Philby’s drinking, already extreme, grew worse. “Romeo had to be carried out of a party last night,” wrote Arthur Seymour on October 14. “Truly appalling.” Three days later: “Romeo is so saturated with alcohol he becomes drunk after a single whisky.” Then, on October 27: “Romeo hurled an object of some sort at his wife. It was most embarrassing for all of us who were forced to watch. I fear the marriage is unraveling before our eyes. I am told reliably that Romeo’s wife is convinced he is having an affair.”
Gabriel felt a tingling in his fingertips.I am told reliably that Romeo’s wife is convinced he is having an affair... Rising, he carried the telegram into the kitchen and placed it solicitously before Graham Seymour. “She exists,” he whispered and then withdrew once more to the sitting room. The great undertaking had entered the homestretch.
Gabriel had a single box of files remaining, Seymour a box and a half. Unfortunately, the files were in no particular order. Gabriel lurched from year to year, place to place, crisis to crisis, with no rhyme or reason. What’s more, Arthur Seymour’s habit of adding brief postscripts to his telegrams meant that each one had to be reviewed in its entirety. At times, it made for compelling reading. In one telegram, Gabriel found a reference to Operation Damocles, a clandestine campaign by the Office to assassinate former Nazi scientists who were helping Nasser develop rockets at a secret site known as Factory 333. There was even an oblique reference to Ari Shamron. “One of the Israeli operatives,” wrote Seymour, “is a thoroughly unpleasant figure who fought for the Palmach during the war of independence. He is rumored to have taken part in the Eichmann operation in Argentina. One can almost hear chains clanking when he walks.”
But it was Graham Seymour who found the next reference to Kim Philby’s mistress in the long-forgotten files of his father. It was contained in a telegram dated November 3, 1962. Seymour dropped it triumphantly beneath Gabriel’s nose, like an undergraduate who had just proven the unprovable. The relevant material was contained in a postscript. Gabriel read it slowly, twice. Then he read it again.
I have been told by a source I consider reliable that the affair has been going on for some time, perhaps as long as a year...
Gabriel placed the telegram atop the first one that referenced an affair and burrowed on, but once again it was Graham Seymour who unearthed the next clue.
“It’s a message from Dick White to my father,” he called through the doorway. “White sent it on November fourth, the very next day.”
“What does it say?”
“He’s concerned the other woman might actually be Philby’s KGB controller. He instructed my father to find out who she is.”
“Your father took his damn sweet time about it,” replied Gabriel a moment later.
“What are you talking about?”
“He didn’t send a response until November twenty-second.”
“What was it?”
“He was reliably informed that the woman is quite young and a journalist.”
“A freelance journalist,” added Seymour a moment later.
“What have you got?”
“A telegram dated the sixth of December.”
“Was hereliablyinformed?”
“By Richard Beeston,” answered Seymour. “The British reporter.”
“Is there a name?”
From the kitchen there was silence. They were getting closer, but they were both running low on files. And Arthur Seymour, though he didn’t know it, was running out of time. By the end of the first week of December 1962, he had not yet learned the identity of Philby’s lover. In a little more than a month, Philby would be gone.
“I’ve got another one,” said Seymour. “She’s French, our girl.”
“Says who?”
“Says a source whose been reliable in the past. The source also says they see each other in the woman’s apartment rather than Philby’s.”
