Spy story

Secrets and lies of a master spy: The agent who fooled the British, Russians, Italians, Japanese and the Nazis during WW2

In 1943, Peter Fleming, brother of Bond creator Ian, recruited a promising-looking Indian intelligence officer and code-named him Silver. His new recruit was a master of deception who worked for all the Axis powers as well as for the Soviets and the British - and fooled them all. Meet the only quintuple agent of the Second World War

On the afternoon of February 22, 1941, a small, clean-shaven man walked down an alleyway in Kabul, knocked on the back door of the Italian embassy and told the guards he was a cook sent to work for the ambassador.

The guards, gathered around the back entrance smoking, had little reason to doubt he was a local – he was certainly dressed like one, in his traditional fur cap, long shirt and flowing trousers. They showed him into a high-ceilinged room where the ambassador was sitting behind a large desk framed by the Italian flag and a picture of Prime Minister Benito Mussolini.