Both places had been subjected to covert searches but the searchers found nothing suspicious apart from large sums of money in cash in a false ceiling in the toilet at the flat. The money was sterling and dollars to the value of just over three thousand pounds. But the search revealed that Mr. Gordon was, in fact, a Mr. Gordon Arnold Lonsdale. Discreet enquiries among some of the customers of the business only confirmed that the business was both successful and efficient. The company had a substantial share of the London gambling machine market, and Mr. Lonsdale’s partners seemed to be no more than normal businessmen.
A request was sent to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Canada for any information on a Gordon Arnold Lonsdale. Suspected of espionage. Two weeks later a report came back that at least established that Lonsdale was travelling on a fake passport. With espionage suspected, the RCMP implemented a routine check on driving licence applications. A Gordon Arnold Lonsdale had applied for one in 1954 giving his address at No. 1527 Burnaby Street, Vancouver. From there he was traced to the address of a boarding house in Toronto. And it was at that point they discovered that he had a Canadian passport.
Corporal Jack Carroll of the RCMP had landed from a British Viscount plane at a snow-covered landing-strip in northern Ontario to check the details of Gordon Arnold Lonsdale in his birthplace—Cobalt, Ontario. It took only three days to reveal that the real Gordon Lonsdale had been taken back to Finland by his mother when he was only three years old. The rest was surmise, but for experienced intelligence officers it wasn’t difficult to imagine what had happened. The boy’s genuine documents would have been taken by the KGB and used to provide cover for the man calling himself Lonsdale. It was a normal KGB practice. But above all they now had legitimate grounds for picking up Lonsdale and charging him, any time they wanted. But they wanted to challenge him with a lot more than using a false passport.
The check on Ethel Gee showed that she had started work at the Underwater Weapons Establishment at Portland in 1950, and she had signed the Official Secrets Act document that all civil servants have to sign if they are engaged on any secret work. She was forty-six and she lived in Hambro Road, Portland, Devon.
Her boy-friend was fifty-five. He was Henry Frederick Houghton and he lived not far from Gee in Meadow View Road, Broadway, a suburb of Weymouth. He was employed at the same establishment as Gee and was responsible for the distribution and filing of all papers and documents, including Admiralty Fleet Orders and Admiralty charts. His salary was £741 a year.
The first meeting of all three of them that the surveillance team had covered was on July 9, 1960.
Lukas had followed Houghton to the Cumberland Hotel. Ethel Gee had walked into the foyer through the Oxford Street entrance a few minutes later. She and Houghton had talked for a few moments and then left the hotel taking the Underground to Waterloo Station. Lukas asked for assistance on his pocket radio and Ivan Beech and Lukas followed the couple out of the station. As they approached the Old Vic they were joined by Lonsdale. They obviously all knew one another well. Lonsdale gave Houghton an envelope. A few moments later Houghton left Lonsdale and Gee talking together. When he returned he was carrying a blue paper bag. He took a parcel out of the bag and gave it to Lonsdale.
About five minutes later they split up. Lukas followed Lonsdale, and Beech followed the couple.
Lonsdale had walked to where he had parked his car, frequently looking over his shoulder to see if he was being followed. Twice he had walked past his car before doubling back and driving to his flat.
Houghton and Gee had gone to the Albert Hall for a performance by the Bolshoi Ballet.
The surveillance was stepped up when the evaluation showed that the first Saturday in the month seemed to be a permanent rendezvous for the three of them.
Farrance had been trailing Lonsdale on August 26 when he followed him to Great Portland Street where Lonsdale parked his car and went into the Midland Bank. A few minutes later he came back to his car and took out a brown attaché case and several small packages which he took back into the bank and left with the clerk for safe custody.
Harris had applied for, and got, a search warrant for the attaché case, and the contents had been listed and photographed before the case was returned to the bank.
In the case was a Ronson table-lighter, a Praktica camera, two film cassettes and a bunch of seven keys.
It wasn’t until October 24 that Lonsdale reclaimed the case from the bank. He walked to an address in Wardour Street and when he left he was carrying a different brown leather briefcase. Lukas had followed him when he went by Underground from Piccadilly and got off at Ruislip Manor station. From the station he walked to 45, Cranley Drive and at last there was further confirmation implicating the bookseller.
On Saturday November 5 Houghton was under surveillance in Puddletown in Dorset. When Houghton entered a hotel Farrance saw a large cardboard box and a leather briefcase on the back seat of Houghton’s Renault car. Beech and Farrance followed him as he drove to London where he parked his car near a pub called the Maypole. Ten minutes later Lonsdale joined him there carrying a briefcase. A few minutes later Houghton and Lonsdale were driving slowly in Houghton’s car. They stopped in the shadows of a group of trees and then drove back to the Maypole. When
