PART ONE
Chapter 1
1
Mr Wormold, a british vacuum cleaner salesman, and Dr Hasselbacher are drinking
some scotch in the Wonder Bar in Havana. They are chabbering about a nigger,
about the professions and many other things.
2
Wormold is in his store, waiting for his daughter. A customer wants to know
much about all the different vacuum cleaner and asks many questions, but
finally he doesn′t buy nothing.
Chapter 2
Wormold is thinking about his daughter, Milly, who is very pretty. Milly is
very believing Catholic while Wormold is atheist. Wormold had to promise to the
mother of Milly to (erziehen) her Catholic. It seems to him, that Milly has a
duenna who always takes care of her. But sometimes she loses this duenna. Once
she set fire on Earl, a small boy of her school.
Milly comes home from the school. Captain Segura, a police officer, had gave
her a lift. Wormold doesn′t like that. They speak about the birthday of
Milly. Milly has really no wishes - only one: She wants to have a horse, that
stands now in the country club out of Havana. She bought yet all the equipment
for this horse with the credit card of her father. But Wormold doesn′t
have so much money After a long discussion, he agrees to buy this horse for
300 Pesos.
Chapter 3
1
Wormold goes to the bank to get 350 $ for the horse. Because it is an american
bank, it takes a long time to get the money. There was a lot of small talk, and
two long telephon calls. Wormold has an overdraft of 50 $.
2
Wormold doesn′t want to see Hasselbacher this day and goes to another bar
to take his daily daiquiri. A man wants absolutely to talk to him and leads him
to the toilet. There, he says that he works for the British Secret Service and
he wants Wormold to be ,,their man in Havana'. As they discuss, suddenly a
man is coming. Wormold slips into the toilet and the Secret Service man called
Hawthorne washes his hands, while the stranger is pissing. Afterwards,
Hawthorne says that it was a police man. He leaves his room key in the basin
and tells Wormold to meet him this night at nine o′clock in his hotel
room.
3
Half past eight: Wormold is saying good night to Milly. He′s thinking
about his bad experiences in school, because they always were laughing at him.
He thinks about clowns, who make the same mistake every evening at eight
o′clock and never learn from experience. He damns lerning from
experience, because all the bad things like Hiroshima were caused by
experience. Then they talk about praying and the mother of Milly.
Chapter 4
1
Wormold is meeting Hawthorne. But on the way to the hotel, he mets
Hasselbacher. He wants to buy some lottery tickets, and Wormold has to come
with him. They are seeking the ticket through the whole city, and at eleven
they arrive at the hotel bar. Wormold wants to get rid of Hasselbacher and goes
to the elevator. But Hasselbacher joins him and comes to the sixth floor.
Suddenly, Wormold disappears down the stairs, and Hasselbacher has no chance to
follow him because he′s too drunk. Wormold enters Hawthorne′s room.
Hawthorne is yet sleeping, but he woke up. Then he explains Wormold the work of
a spy. But Wormold didn′t yet confirm that he wants to become spy.
Finally, he does and gets some equipment.
2
Milly says that se had heard voices the night before. Because of this, she
doesn′t eat so much as usual, to save money. She wants her father and
herself to become a member in the Country Club.
Interlude in London
Hawthorne is talking to his chief of new agents in the Caribic, especially of
Wormold who has a very important position in Cuba. The chief is very critic
first, but after Hawthorne tells him some things he is persuaded that Wormold
was a good choice. He has full confidence in Wormold and wants to send him a
secretary for his affairs. Hawthorne talks to Miss Jenkinson of this, and she
decides to send Beatrice to Cuba. Beatrice doesn′t speak Spanish, but at
least French.
PART TWO
Chapter 1
1
Wormold gets a message from the British Secret Service. They ask, what
he′s doing all the time, why he didn′t send messages and what about
sub-agents. Wormold has now a bad conscience and tries to recrute Lopez, but
Lopez misunderstands him. Wormold has no idea how to begin as a spy.
2
During the daily daiquiri, Hasselbacher recommends Wormold to invent the secret
stories, because they are so secret that only he can know them. He should also
invent the agents.
3
Wormold invents three sub-agents and writes a coded message to London. Then he
buys every day the local newspapers and writes economic reports. He learns much
about the life in Cuba of this newspapers. One day, he gets an envelope with
money from the BSS. He brings it to the bank. But Wormold gets no message from
the BSS.
Chapter 2
1
Ten days pass and no word reaches Wormold. He couldn′t send his economic
reports because the sub-agents were not traced and approved. He decides to make
his annual visit to Matanzas, Cienfuegos, Santa Clara and Santiago. He writes
to Hawthorne that he does this for the BSS and wants expenses.
2
As ususally, on his tour Wormold wrote a letter to his younger sister Mary who
lives in Northampton. He writes that he probably will come back to England. He
observes a ,,chief' on a boat and asks his name, only for his Secret work.
3
The car of Wormold is broken. He leaves it for repairing in Santa Clara and
goes by bus to the occupied city Santiago. All the restaurants and bars are
closed there, and the people are extremely suspicious. After dark,
there′s no more people in the streets exept police patrols. Wormold goes
walking and gets catched by a patrol. He has to answer questions, they ask
about the card he sends to Dr Hasselbacher. He begins to invent a story, that
Dr Hasselbacher is a woman and so one. But problems are still getting bigger.
Finally, he invents actions of Captain Segura in his story. The policemen seem
to be in fear of Captain Segura, they let go him in the end.
Chapter 3
Wormold comes home from his tour. There are some telegrams waiting for him,
telling that he shold stop meeting Hasselbacher and that Parkman, a supposed sub-agent,
probably was already employed by American service. Suddenly, Hasselbacher
phones and asks Wormold to come as soon as possible, something very bad had
happened. When Wormold arrives in the appartment of Hasselbacher, it is in a
terrible mess. The labor of Hasselbacher is destroyed, and because of this
Hasselbacher is very sad. He is worried about some old papers he had in the
appartment and now disappeared. He thinks, that it was the police. Back home,
Wormold invents some Secret reports about huge militar things in the southeast
of Cuba. He sends his reports.
Interlude in London
The reports of Wormold arrive London. The chief is very astonished about it,
all are surprised by the good work of Wormold. They decide to send him a help -
Beatrice.
PART THREE
Chapter 1
Hasselbacher, Milly and Wormold are celebrating Milly′s birthday in a
club in Havana. They are talking about this, that and the other. Then, Captain
Segura comes and joins them. He wants to make his party of the evening, wants
to pay all and so one. He′s flirting first with her and another, unknown
girl. Wormold and Hasselbacher meet some KLM staff and begin to talk to them.
Also the girl that beforehend had flirted with Captain Segura joins them. She
introduces herself as Beatrice, and finally results as the purposed secretary.
Beatrice and Wormold leave the table and go talking in secret. She tells him
that also a radio operator is coming to help him in work. They want to live in
the offices of Wormold - but Wormold doesn′t have so big offices.
Chapter 2
1
The next morning, Wormold is looking through his agents cards. He′s got a
light hangover. He′s wondering who could be suspicious to be no agent.
He′s talking to Milly about Beatrice. Milly wants to know if he loves
Beatrice. Then Beatrice arrives and Milly asks her about her former husband.
Later, Milly disappears and Beatrice begins to talk to Wormold about secret
belongings.
2
Beatrice makes come a new, big safe for Wormold′s office. When it′s
being transported to the house, a crowd is looking. Afterwards comes also Rudy,
Wormold′s futur ,,assistant accounter'. He′s got some stuff
for microphotographs. They are talking about some agents. They again talk about
secret belongings, but also about the former husband of Beatrice.
Chapter 3
1
Wormold contiunes sending fake reports to the BSS. Beatrice is worried that she
doesn′t know much about the sub-agents and is always asking Wormold
concerning them. Occassionally, they see Cifuentes, a invented sub-agent, in
the Country Club. Later, Beatrice is more intrested in a Cubana air line pilot
called Raul Dominguez. They want to send a message to London, but the code-book
is in the safe and Wormold forgot the code. Finally, they find the book on
Milly′s bed and send the message: That Raul lost his job with Cubana air
line and that he need money, 1700 $ Raul should take some photos in the Orient
province and then give them to Kingston. Wormold thinks, quite enough for a
year in a Swiss private school, for Milly to get a school degree.
2
The evening, when Raul should start, Wormold and Beatrice are eating dinner
out. They are talking about Raul. Wormold says that he′s very worried
about Raul, there′s so much danger. Beatrice becames more and more
suspicious. She is joking, that Wormold was talking of Raul like of an invented
story in a book. On the street, they meet Hasselbacher who invites them to his
home. There they are drinking a whisky. Suddenly, there′s a phone call,
and when Hasselbacher returns he′s in a very bad state. He tells about a
man on the way to the airport who died in a car crash. Beatrice asks if he was
called Raul, and Hasselbacher confirms.
PART FOUR
Chapter 1
1
Wormold and Beatrice come home, very anxious. Raul had an accident - an
invention of Wormold had become real! But this was not enough. Milly has the
news that Cifuentes has been killed, probably because he looks like a ministre.
Wormold is now very worried. Several invented people had become alive with
dying - what the fuck was happening? Beatrice also was worried, she wanted the
other agents to know that they are in danger. But until now, there′s no
relation between them and Beatrice. Beatrice absolutely wants to see Teresa,
who works as a nude dancer in Shanghai.
2
Wormold and Beatrice try to get Teresa out of the Shanghai. But Wormold
doesn′t know Teresa, and Teresa doesn′t know Wormold. Finally, they
meet another in the cabin. The police is arriving. Wormold knows that they are
looking for Theresa. He pays 50 Pesos to get out of Shanghai with her and
Beatrice. Then, they turn towards Vedado.
3
In the richest part of Havana, Wormold is going to warn Professor Sanchez.
Sanchez is in his house with a young woman - obviously not his wife. When
Wormold is beginning to talk about the danger, the young woman becomes
extremely jealous and considers the action as a revenge of the former wife of
Sanchez. In the end, there′s a big argue, and all is very confused. So
Wormold leaves without success.
4
Coming back from Sanchez` house, some policeman leave Wormold, Teresa and
Beatrice to a police quarter. There, Captain Segura is very surprised to see
them. He asks if Wormold knows Raul. Wormold negates. Then he plays a tape,
recorded at the phone of Hasselbacher. Someone phoned him and told him to say
that Raul was dead. But Wormold gives Captain Segura his word of honour, that
he never had known something about Raul until this night. So Captain Segura
lets them go.
Chapter 2
Coming home from the police station, Wormold ,,visits' Hasselbacher. He
goes secret on his useless balcony. There, he sees Hasselbacher, quite strange
dressed: He has an old Uhlan fight equipment on! He goes into the appartment
ans asks him what he′s doing. Hasselbacher explains that he likes this
Uhlan things very much, because it is of a time before WWI, a time of peace that
never was again. Hasselbacher says that he′s doing condolence for Raul.
He and Wormold caused his death. But Wormold says to only have invented Raul.
Hasselbacher doesn′t believe him. It results that he has been engaged for
another secret service, after that his appartment has been destroyed. So he
knows all what Wormold faxed to the BSS. He is glad that Wormold changed his
book code, because now they perhaps will leave him in calm. The other secret
service had broken his book code.
Interlude in London
The Chief has guests in his house. They talk about the situation in Cuba, about
their man in Havana who lost all his agents. The chief considers Hasselbacher
to have broken the book code. He sends a double agent to Havana. He thinks
about inform the u.s. secret service.
PART FIVE
Chapter 1
Wormold and Captain Segura are playing draughts in Havana Club, where drinks
are for free. Segura knows much about the operations of Wormold, but he doubts
that Wormold is a real secret agent. He speaks about torturable and
untorturable people. Wormold has given up the friendship to Hasselbacher. After
the play, Wormold meets Beatrice and tells her some invented stories, about a
blind man who makes observations for him because in reality, he′s not
blind. He tells her also that Cifuentes is useless now because he′s
blown, and that Captain Segura is on their side and can help much.
Chapter 2
1
Wormold has been invited to make a speech at the annual lunch of the European
Traders` Association. Wormold doesn′t want to do it absolutely, but Milly
wants him very much to do it.
2
Wormold has to go to Jamaica to meet Hawthorne. Hawthorne says that the painted
objects reminded him of parts of a vacuum cleaner. But he says that he′s
sure that these objects are genuine, because the other secret service wants to
kill Wormold - this proves the genuinity. He says him that ,,they' want to
poison him at the annual lunch oft the European Traders` Association. He
considers not to go, but Hawthorne says that this makes him suspicious. They
talk about how he should act there, and finally Hawthorne has the idea that a
sub-agent of Wormold is waiter in the Nacional, where the lunch takes place.
Unfortunately, Wormold did invent him only
3
In the plane back to Cuba, Wormold meets an Englishman called Carter who works
with Nucleaners, the concurrent of Phastkleaners. Also Carter is going to the
annual lunch.
Chapter 3
1
Milly is worried because Wormold is not eating so much. Then Milly goes to
school and Beatrice enters. Beatrice wants Wormold not to go to the lunch, but
he says he will. They are also talking about some stupid stories on the cereal
packet.
2
At the entrance to the lunch, Wormold meets Hasselbacher. Hasselbacher tries to
keep away Wormold from the lunch because they will kill him. But he has no
success. At the end, he says: ,,Good-bye, Jim' - the first time that he
uses the first name of Wormold! Wormold meets Carter again.
3
At the lunch, Wormold is sitting next to a Scottish called MacDougall and to
Carter. First, he avoids all food and drinks, but finally they serve the blue
plate (an american way of serving whole meals). Wormold gives that one he
receives to Mac Dougall, this one gives it again, and finally it′s the
plate of Braun, the president of the association. The waiter comes and takes it
away, because it′s poisoned. Wormold takes another plate and eats it. To
drink, he takes of MacDougall and Carter. Before his speech, Carter gives him a
little bottle of whisky. A howling dog enters the room exactly at this moment.
Wormold doesn′t drink the whisky, has a short speech, about him and
Carter, and that a man gave Carter the whisky to poison him. The dog howls
again, and it results that it had eaten the poisoned blue plate. The dog dies,
it was the waiter′s dog who is very sad.
4
Wormold tells Beatrice that he has come back victorious.
Chapter 4
1
Captain Segura asks Wormold for the hand of Milly. Wormold doesn′t like
that so much, but Captain Segura has much influence. He could consider the
residence-permit of Wormold, for example. He also knows the list of the
,,poltergeists', who always cause strange stories around Wormold. But for
this, Wormold has to ,,give' Milly. They go together to the Wonder Bar. There,
Hasselbacher has been killed, by the ,,poltergeists'.
2
Wormold wants to kill Carter because he killed Hasselbacher, but he
doesn′t know how. Beatrice is showing to Milly how to do make-up. Milly
says that she doesn′t want anymore get a lift of Captain Segura, but
Wormold wants her to do it once again, to tell him that he wants play draughts
and that he should bring him the list. He plans to leave Cuba afterwards, with
the real list of all the secret agents working in Cuba. He tells Beatrice that
this would be the only one real operation he did, that the other things all
were invented. After he told her that, she confesses her love to him, because
he made a fool of the organisation and is loyal to his daughter.
Chapter 5
1
Wormold and Captain Segura are playina a special kind of draughts. The pieces
are little bottles of whisky, and every taken piece has to be drunken. Wormold
gets Segura surrender and steals his gun.
2
Wormold goes to the hotel of Carter, to kill him. He says that he wants to show
him some places, he knows (Carter was looking for some houses in the ,,red
light quarter'). Carter comes with him, and they go to a striptease bar.
But Carter doesn′t like it so much, so they go away again. Carter
confesses much things to Wormold, that in reality he fears women and so one.
Wormold gets always more scruples to kill Carter, but he has to. Back in the
car, Wormold drives to such a house and forces (with Seguras gun) Carter to
ring the bell. Carter confesses even to have shot Hasselbacher, but he had to
do it. Wormold shoots, but hits only the pipe of Carter. Then the door opens,
and Carters says Wormold to be a clown. Then, Carter fires.
Chapter 6
1
Wormold tells Beatrice that he′s still alive only because he was
switching on the engine when Carter was firing. Then he shoot back and killed
Carter. Afterwards, he gave the gun back to the sleeping Captain Segura. He
takes also microphotographs of the list of the agents in Cuba and posts them on
the back of a stamp. There′s the problem that he putted this stamp
together with 500 other stamps, and he doesn′t remember the stamp
2
Wormold has to meet the ambassador. This one tells him that Captain Segura had
come and told him about Wormolds troubles and affaires with invented
information. He has given this information to London and finds it very
distasteful. He wants Wormold to fly to England with the next plane.
3
Wormold takes all his things in Havanna, burns all the secret stuff and says
good-bye to Beatrice. Perhaps they′ll meet again in London. Milly means
that′s god is the same in England and has no problem to go. Wormold is
considering about his future.
4
On the airport, Captain Segura was doing the ,,seeing off'. He tells that
also Dr Braun is leaving Cuba, and that Cuba a little bit more peaceful without
them. He has little presents for Wormold and Milly.
Epilogue in London
1
Wormold has to wait a long time in the underground of the BSS head quarter.
They are making him a trial because he sent fake messages. The chief decides,
that he won′t be decorated, but should remain in the staff - training.
2
Wormold meets Beatrice in London. Beatrice tells him, that the chief staff were
pretty angry with them both. It was a desaster for the BSS and they don′t
know what to do know. They declared all the messages from Cuba for totally
unreliable. Beatrice had told the staff that she wouldn′t have stopped
Wormold even ich she′d known what happened. Then she had a little speech
about it. Wormold and Beatrice say, how much they love each other, and think
about marriage. Then they kiss, and surprisingly Milly enters the same moment.
But Milly means, it′s good that her father gets married again. Then the
three are thinking about their future - together - now.
