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Having set up the meeting, Gyberg was taken back into custody until the evening. ‘I knew you’d come back,’ said Olsen.

‘I wasn’t so sure,’ replied Gyberg.

That night the meeting went ahead as planned, and Olsen had the chance to sit down and talk with Duus Hansen for the first time. They would form an understanding which lasted for the rest of the war, and helped to keep Duus Hansen one step ahead of the Abwehr. By risking his life to attend the meeting, Tommy had therefore laid the foundations for the future police protection of Duus Hansen against the constant threat of discovery by the Germans. That, in turn, gave Duus Hansen the platform to assume a leading position in the Danish resistance. And his increasing importance led ultimately to his pivotal role in the delivery of precious V-rocket intelligence to the British later in the war.

Sneum’s position in late March 1942 contrasted sharply with Duus Hansen’s. It was obvious that Tommy’s time had run out in Copenhagen, and he would have to leave at the first opportunity. Men he didn’t trust had told him as much already. Now men he did trust were telling him exactly the same, and he knew his mission for the British was over. Later he recalled: ‘We had the typed reports of Christophersen’s latest revelations to the Swedes, and my friends told me that the Germans were increasing their efforts, and one day they would be sure to find me in a small country like Denmark. If I left, it would be better for Gyberg too. Those were some of the reasons why I agreed to go.’

Before planning his escape, Tommy suggested that Duus Hansen should renew attempts to contact the British-run spy who had survived the parachute drop that had killed Carl Bruhn just after Christmas. They all assumed that Bruhn’s partner must still be free somewhere in Denmark, and Sneum was convinced that the man would welcome such an approach if it were made discreetly. He was working for the British after all, just as they were.

Although he didn’t know it at the time, by arguing strongly for this new link Tommy opened the way for Duus Hansen to work for SOE as well as SIS in the years to come. It was a piece of simple common sense unheard of at the time. The fierce interdepartmental rivalry between Britain’s two covert services, and the wasteful duplication it ensured, had almost killed Sneum and could still prove to be his downfall. Yet here he was, an SIS agent unwittingly doing SOE a favor, because he knew that the only important war was the one being waged against Hitler.

Duus Hansen’s account of his extraordinary meeting with Gyberg, Olsen and Sneum emphasizes Tommy’s importance right up to the end of his mission:

Police investigations led to the fact that Sneum had to leave the country, as his continuing work was impossible, due to the Danish police’s and the Germans’ knowledge of it. But the whole investigation led to the establishment of some very useful connections inside the police [Roland Olsen]. Already, before Sneum had left the country, two other parachutists were dropped near Haslev. One [Bruhn] was killed while the other, [Mogens] Hammer, started organizational work within the country. We had tried to get in contact with Hammer without success, and it was a deal between Sneum and me that I should do everything to get in contact and achieve a successful working relationship with this man, which I managed to do.

Chapter 35

LIVING ON THE EDGE

THE MORNING AFTER that historic meeting, something happened which might yet have trapped Sneum. Politikommissaer Odmar ordered Detective Sergeant Olsen to surround 2 Harald Jensensgade, the building where Else Sneum’s father, Carl Jensen, had a third-floor apartment. There was no time for Olsen to forewarn Tommy or the occupants of the targeted apartment, because he was sent to the location with two other detectives, Kaj Andersen and Oestergaard Nielsen. Olsen must have been praying that Sneum hadn’t decided to say goodbye to his wife and baby before trying to escape to Sweden.

The policemen set up surveillance of the building, and Olsen