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SECURITY SCANDALS AND SPY REVELATIONS 235
one end, and a magnetic box container. These were used for
passing documents and money. The beer cans were marked
'NAAFI Stores from HM Forces', and were to be left in a telephone
box near the Municipal Stadium in Famagusta. The piping
was to be discarded casually near a ticket booth at the stadium,
while the magnetic box was to be placed beneath a bench on
the road from the docks to the Army married quarters at
Famagusta. In each case the containers were to be left for thirty
minutes. Britten was then to look for a piece of crushed chalk
on the road. This was the sign that the device had been collected
by the KGB. 19
During his last year in Cyprus, Britten's relationship with the
KGB fluctuated wildly. At times his controllers told him that
'everybody was pleased', and brought him 'greetings from
Moscow'. On one occasion they seemed to be offering him sex
with a Russian woman he had not met before. At other times
they made unpleasant threats. He recalled a meeting on a park
bench at which he was warned that if his work did not improve
they would 'arrange for me to disappear and something would
happen to my family'. On another occasion he was 'pushed
against a wall and punched several times in the head and body'.
He was told to improve his performance, since he had been
given 'an awful lot of money'. The KGB wanted him to opt for
a sigint site in Germany as his next posting, but he told them
that the choice was not his. Throughout this time his objective
was 'to get as much money as I could to buy a house when I
got back home'. His posting in Cyprus would finish in October
1966, and from the spring of that year the KGB began to prepare
for his return to Britain. There were elaborate procedures for
making contact with his new KGB controller. On a particular
Saturday in January 1967 he was to go to Brookdale Road in
Amos Grove at 2 o'clock in the afternoon, carrying a copy of
Autocar magazine. The KGB officer would enquire how to get
to Edmonton cemetery, and Britten was to reply, 'You can catch
a 219 bus.' The Russian would then reply with the familiar
phrase 'Greetings from Alex'.