214 • GOUZENKO, IGOR
neythrough the letter box of his apartment in Holland Park. Unaware
that Gordievsky was aSecret Intelligence Serviceagent, Gouk ac-
cepted his advice that the offer was a deliberate provocation and de-
clined to respond. When Bettaney was eventually arrested, Gouk was
declared persona non grata and expelled, thereby enhancing the
status of Gordievsky, who was appointed rezident in his place.GOUZENKO, IGOR.A 26-year-oldGRUcipher clerk based at the
Soviet embassy in Ottawa, Igor Gouzenko was scheduled to return to
Moscow in September 1945 at the end of a tour lasting three years.
However, he decided to stay in Canada with his wife, Svetlana, and
his daughter, and over a period of weeks he smuggled documents
from the closely guardedreferenturain which he worked to give
himself something to bargain with. In total, he removed from the
building and hid in his home 109 items, including copies of tele-
grams to Moscow and file entries relating to individualNKVDand
GRU sources, among them a member of Parliament, Fred Rose, and
numerous Communists.
As soon as the Soviets realized Gouzenko had gone missing, they
broke into his apartment and reported to the Canadian authorities that
he was wanted for the theft of money. Belatedly the Canadian gov-
ernment realized Gouzenko’s value and he was granted full protec-
tion. The implications of the material he had purloined were far-
reaching: The atomic scientistAllan Nunn Maywas identified as a
Soviet spy and in February 1946 more than a dozen others were ar-
rested and accused of supplying secrets to the Russians. A Royal
Commission was empaneled to examine Gouzenko’s compelling evi-
dence, and when its report was published, complete with facsimile
reproductions of secret Soviet files, 12 suspects were convicted.
Gouzenko enjoyed his newfound fame and courted publicity. He
sold interviews to magazines, appeared on television with a pillow-
case over his head, and even sold the movie rights to his story,The
Iron Curtain, to Twentieth Century–Fox. However, for hisRoyal Ca-
nadian Mounted Police(RCMP) bodyguards, he proved very diffi-
cult to handle. With the help of his RCMP interpreter, Mervyn Black,
and two journalists, John Dalrymple and Laurie McKechnie, he wrote
a novel,Fall of a Titan, and an autobiography,This Was My Choice,
both of which were best-sellers. His wife also wrote a book,Before
Igor.