The Hornet's Sting_ The Amazing Untold Story of World War II Spy Thomas Sneum - Mark Ryan [98]
Another estranged wife, a former friend of Else, had suffered no less from the impact of the war. Having spent her first Christmas for ten years apart from her husband, Tulle Oxlund had time to reflect upon where it had all gone wrong. Kaj’s personality had changed almost as soon as the Nazis had invaded. Then, in the summer of 1941, he seemed to have squandered a handsome inheritance on several failed business ventures. To her intense embarrassment, creditors had started knocking on their door. It was no coincidence that in this awful atmosphere their worst arguments had erupted. Before long, the fights had become violent. That was when she had known it was time to leave, for both their sakes. A formal separation was the next step, but she found it hard to erase the sweeter memories she had from many happy years of marriage.
Her first, pre-Christmas, telephone call to the marital home had thrown up more questions than answers, not least over the mystery man who had picked up the phone. Confused, Tulle called Kaj again in January 1942 to ask what was happening. He was necessarily evasive. Whatever sticky predicament he was in, he didn’t want her to know the details; nor, quite clearly, did he want her help. Sadly, she realized she was destined to remain firmly on the outside, looking in.
Tommy had only just settled into Hagedorn’s cellar when he received a visit from his new landlord and Chiewitz. The latter had some very important news. The previous night he had persuaded Niels Bohr to come to dinner. Eventually, he and Hagedorn had steered the conversation towards the possibility of a new super-bomb. As far as they could understand from Bohr, it would be based on the release of nuclear energy. And if he was right, both sides in this war had realized the hugely destructive potential of such a weapon, and would already be assessing how quickly it could become a reality.
Chiewitz continued: ‘Bohr says that in Germany two professors in particular, Werner Heisenberg and Otto Hahn, have been working in this field. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they have been building a bomb.’
‘But it’s possible?’ Sneum feared the answer.
‘Niels says that such a bomb could be built.’ There was a stunned silence before Chiewitz added: ‘To build it would be one thing. To control it would be quite another. That’s what Bohr told me. But he thinks there is one man who might be able to control the huge forces involved: an Italian professor called Enrico Fermi.’
As long as the Allies kept Fermi out of the clutches of the Nazis, Tommy felt there was reason to believe that this devastating new weapon might remain out of Germany’s reach, however much pressure Hitler placed on his own scientists. He recalled later: ‘Bohr believed that the Germans thought they could develop this bomb. But he didn’t think they would be able to do it in practice.’
The fact that they might try, however, was in itself a hugely important piece of intelligence. And what if Bohr was underestimating the ingenuity of the German scientists? Such a mistake had been made before. Tommy knew he had to move quickly to send the British news of what he had just learned. Fortunately, his scheduled transmission to London was imminent.
Now, more than ever, Duus Hansen’s expertise would be crucial. Within an hour, Tommy had contacted Copenhagen’s most innovative engineer and they had arranged to meet that evening in the coastal village of Skodsborg. Sneum had rented a third-floor apartment at the upper end of the quaint little holiday village in the hope of achieving clearer contact with his spymasters. Sigfred Christophersen, who now considered it too dangerous to be present during transmissions, wouldn’t be there to hinder them. Duus Hansen had given up trying to act as peacemaker between the two agents, and Tommy considered Sigfred’s absence at key moments a positive advantage. The new partnership had the right crystals