The Spy in Black

During the First World War, German naval officer Conrad von Belke is put ashore by submarine on the wild Orkney coast, charged with a covert strike against the British fleet anchored at Scapa Flow. Working through a network of agents and disguises, he finds his careful plan tangled by shifting loyalties and a woman whose real part in the scheme he cannot quite read. Clouston keeps the tension high and the reversals coming, telling much of the story from the enemy’s point of view, which gives it an unusual moral edge for wartime fiction. Published in 1917, it later became the basis for the acclaimed 1939 Powell and Pressburger film. Free PDF and EPUB editions are available to download.