Passport For A Renegade by Ken Bennett

Tense espionage fills this 1955 Cold War thriller of weapon secrets and double agents that does not let up.

A British firm has created an almost perfect naval torpedo. Twice the size, it waits dormant like a mine until its self-activating acoustics and directional radar lock onto its target. Tested off Plymouth by Royal Navy scientific and American naval officers, the fine-tuning is almost complete. Research Director John Ewart works with metallurgists and chemists on the top-secret armament. John is in love with Miranda, daughter of the company owner, who is still married to Andrew Blake, Production Manager. When she tells Andrew she is leaving him, it would mean the end of his job as well, and he is not going to let that happen. The weapons company, from the floor to top-tier management, is rife with spies eager to achieve the plans for the Communists. Andrew is the weakness they are looking for, and a double agent convinces him to deliver the plans to the Reds. As his wife, Miranda is forced to go with him, and they travel to Austria via Paris with the relevant documents. An MI6 agent has been working the experimental division from the inside, and a Red agent has the files stored on film to sell to the highest bidder, if they survive. In Paris, Andrew and Miranda deal with the French Sûreté, American agents, and German Communists, who are too deeply involved in blackmail, suicides, hostages, and murder, to let them to retreat back to London.

This is Len Deighton territory - deadly cold spy action. The relationship angle is quickly replaced by a complex web of trusted agents suddenly revealing themselves as traitorous. An intricate web even some of the players find too much to take. The chase to secure the red-hot files by any means necessary, including sudden brutal violence, leads to a finale in Chartres. Thick with suspense and tension until the very last page.

1955 / Hardcover / 192 pages