13
fruitlessly infatuated, and who would cause her much emotional pain
over the years), appears to have officially evaluated her cartographic
intelligence, which he then despatched to the War Office for further
processing.^34 Until the establishment of the Middle East Intelligence
Centre (MEIC) in Cairo on 18 August 1939, which then became
responsible for collecting and collating all regional intelligence,^35 it was
normal procedure for individual military attachés such as Holt to per-
form this evaluation and liaison function, with expert cartographic sup-
port provided in Iraq by RAF intelligence officers on the staff of the Air
Officer Commanding (AOC) in Baghdad (and later at Habbaniya). It
therefore seems certain that Stark’s end-client as an intelligence gatherer
during this period was the War Office; consequently, we may reliably say
that she was working overseas for military intelligence, which could only
mean MI6, presumably in cooperation with MI4.^36
Cover is neither absolute nor permanent: it is always relative to its oper-
ational space, and it is potentially transitory. Also, the effectiveness of
cover often stands in inverse ratio to the transparency of its historical con-
text. As that context becomes more and more thoroughly researched and
increasingly familiar, especially 70 or 80 years on, cover identities and
Fig. 1.2 Freya Stark in Jebel Druze (Syria), 1928. Source: Royal Geographical
Society/Alamy Stock Photo
PROLOGUE: OF SPIES, SCOUTS, AND COVER