With a license to bemuse and seduce the enemy into revealing their deepest secrets, ‘Klop’ Ustinov, codenamed U35, tricked his way into the confidence of Soviet commissioners and Gestapo Gruppenführer. Passing on his gift in trickery to his actor son Peter Ustinov, Klop’s untold story is one of intrigue, flirtation and beguilement. The extraordinary life of Klop Ustinov can sometimes read like a fantasy, but biographer Peter Day is quick to point out any of Klop’s ‘tall tales’ too. Apparently Klop would regale friends and family with an unfortunate incident with some slippery seafood on a train to Gloucester:
Klop maintained that he had somehow procured enough lobster to concoct a lobster bisque, complete with cognac, cream and cheese, and had decanted it into a jar, which was travelling with him and his defectors on the train from London to Gloucestershire, securely contained in his father’s old top hat box. Unfortunately Klop then placed the hat box upside down in the luggage rack and halfway through the journey observed, with a mixture of amusement and horror, that the bisque was dripping steadily on to the unwitting defector’s Homburg hat.
And you thought your morning commute was bad… For more ‘tall tales’, trespass and train journeys, you’ll need to order your copy of the book.
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