No Other Choice—别无选择（乔治·布莱克）（第五章）
A week after the armistice, I left for Holland to join the newly set up SIS in The Hague. I was accompanied by three of our secretaries, who had donned a kind of pseudo-military uniform so as not to attract attention to themselves in the vast military camp which liberated Europe then was. We took with us a lot of files and stores and travelled out on a Naval MTB belonging to the Secret Service flotilla. It was a beautiful spring afternoon when we sailed up the New Waterway to Rotterdam. I was back in Holland, once more free of enemy occupation.
【战争结束一周后，我前往荷兰，加入新成立的海牙国际情报研究所。陪同我的是我们的三个秘书，她们穿着一种伪军装，以免在当时解放欧洲的特殊的时局下引起别人的注意。我们带了很多文件和物资，乘坐一辆属于特勤局舰队的鱼雷艇前往目的地。那是一个美丽的春日下午，我们沿着新航道驶向鹿特丹。我回到了荷兰，又一次重获自由。】
We arrived in Rotterdam in the early evening. As soon as we were alongside, I went ashore to find out what had become of my aunt. She lived a fair distance away from the port and there was no transport. A kind workman, to whom I explained the situation, lent me his bicycle. It had wooden wheels and it took me some time to get to the house which I had last seen on the day of my grandmother's funeral. I rang the bell and my aunt opened the door. She had become very thin, but otherwise was well. It was a tearful reunion and we talked till deep into the night when I had to get back to my ship. The next time I came, I drove up in my own requisitioned car and brought with me ample supplies of food. My aunt needed these badly after the winter of famine she had just lived through.
【我们傍晚时分到达鹿特丹。我们一靠岸，我就上岸想看看姑姑怎么样了。她住在离港口相当远的地方，没有交通工具。我向一位好心的工人解释了情况，他把自行车借给了我。自行车是木制的轮子，我花了一些时间才来到我祖母葬礼那天最后一次见到的那所房子。我按了门铃，姑姑开了门。她变得很瘦，但其他方面都很好。这是一次含泪的重逢，我们一直聊到深夜，直到我不得不回到我的船上。第二次来的时候，我开着自己征用的车，带着充足的食物。姑姑刚刚经历了一个充满饥饿的冬天，她急需这些东西。】
The station was housed in two large villas in Wassenaar, a fashionable garden suburb of The Hague. The largest one, which was used as living quarters for the staff, had belonged to a wealthy Dutch Nazi, who only two weeks previously had been taken to a prison camp to await trail for his wartime activities. The other was used as the office. The day after my arrival, I was already engaged on my new job. Assisted by a secretary, I had to go through our files and collect facts to be used in support of citations, which I had to draft, recommending our agents for various British decorations. The station's mission at that time was to wind up our wartime organisations and commitments. The fate of agents who had disappeared had to be investigated; the relatives of those killed had to be cared for; those who had survived prison and concentration camp had to be rehabilitated; most had to be settled in a peacetime career and all had to be recommended for awards, many posthumously. All this was done, of course, in close co-operation with our colleagues in the Dutch Service, who had installed themselves in a large country house not far away. The officers of that service, who had worked in London, were also awarded British decorations while the officers of P8, including myself, received the Order of Orange-Nassau for our work during the war.
【驻地坐落在海牙郊区时尚花园的两座大别墅里。其中最大的一间被用作工作人员的生活区，原属于一位富有的荷兰纳粹分子，他在两周前刚刚被押往战俘营，等待对他罪恶的审判。另一间用作办公室。在我到达的第二天，我就开始了我的新工作。在秘书的协助下，我不得不翻阅文件，收集证据，用来支持我起草的引文，推荐各种英国勋章的适合者。该站当时的任务是解散我们的战时组织和实现一些承诺。必须调查失踪特工的命运;遇难者的亲属必须得到照顾;那些从监狱和集中营中幸存下来的人必须重新回归社会;大多数人不得不在和平时期的职业生涯中安顿下来，所有人都必须被推荐获得荣誉，其中许多人是死后提名的。当然，所有这些工作都是与我们在荷兰服务的同事密切合作完成的，他们住在不远处的一所乡村别墅里。在伦敦工作过的军官也被授予英国勋章，而P8的军官，包括我在内，因我们在战争期间的工作而获得了橙色拿骚勋章。】
I must admit, however, that I do not remember this first summer of peace primarily for the work we did. Rather it has remained fixed in my memory for the almost unbroken round of parties, drinking sessions and high living into which I was flung. It was as if the sudden release from danger, from suffering and privation, from strain and excessive work, from gloom and misery had gone to people's heads so that they lost for a while all sense of measure, and with dizzy abandon threw themselves into a whirlpool of pleasure. Those in the first place affected by this passing madness were the military, who at that time held all power and controlled all supplies and facilities. Requisitioned cars, luxurious villas, stocks of champagne and brandy (hoarded by the defeated Wehrmacht) clubs located in the most expensive restaurants or the most picturesquely situated country houses, luxury hotels in famous spas and holiday resorts, attractive girls avid for a good time after the gloom of the occupation years, all these privileges normally enjoyed only by the very rich were now available to every officer.
【然而，我必须承认，我记得这第一个和平的夏天，主要不是因为我们所做的工作。相反，它一直留在我的记忆中，是因为我被扔进了几乎不间断的聚会、酗酒和奢靡的生活。人们突然摆脱了战争，摆脱了苦难和贫困，摆脱了劳累和繁重的工作，摆脱了忧郁和痛苦，仿佛一下子冲昏了头脑，一时失去了分分合合的意识，而盲目地纵情投入了快乐的漩涡。首先受到这种短暂的疯狂影响的是军队，他们当时掌握着所有的权力，控制着所有的物资和设施。征用的汽车、豪华别墅、被打败的国防军囤积的香槟和白兰地(在最昂贵的餐馆或风景如画的乡村别墅里)俱乐部、著名的水疗中心和度假胜地的豪华酒店、渴望在占领年代的黑暗之后度过美好时光的迷人女孩，所有这些通常只有非常富有的人才能享受的特权，现在每个军官都能享受到。】
I too found myself irresistibly drawn into this maelstrom of pleasure. In the words of the well-known hymn 'the world, the flesh and Satan dwelt around the path I trod'. To my shame, I must admit that my strong religious convictions, although I had not lost them, proved no safeguard against the temptations which surrounded me.
【我也发现自己不可抗拒地卷入了这欢乐的漩涡。用一首著名的赞美诗的话说，“世界，肉体和撒旦居住在我走过的道路周围”。让我感到惭愧的是，我必须承认，尽管我并没有失去强烈的宗教信仰，但事实证明，我无法抵御围绕在我周围的诱惑。】
By September most of the winding-up work had been done in spite of all these distractions. I was recalled to London to look after P8 once more.
【到9月，虽然有这些的干扰，但是大部分清盘工作已经完成。我又被召回伦敦去管理P8。】
It was a period of reorganisation and of adjustment to new conditions, to a new style and tempo for the Service, as a whole, and every individual in it. The past was coming to an end, the future had not yet begun. Many people were leaving, returning to their old professions and occupations, some to the City, some to the Bar, others to schools and universities. Several former officers of the Service stood for Parliament in the 1945 General Election which put a Labour Government in power. Colonel Cordeaux was elected Conservative MP for Grimsby and became a regular speaker on intelligence affairs in succeeding Parliaments. Lt-Col Seymour left to return to his old job as the representative in Holland of a large tobacco company.
【这是一个重组和调整的时期，以适应新的情况，作为一个整体，每个人都参与其中。过去已近尾声，未来尚未开始。许多人离开了，回到他们原来的专业和职业，一些人去了金融城，一些人去了律师事务所，另一些人去了中学和大学。在1945年的大选中，几名前特务官员参加了议会选举，工党政府上台执政。科尔多上校被选为格里姆斯比的保守党议员，并在随后的议会中成为情报事务的定期发言人。西摩中校离开后，回到他原来的工作岗位，担任一家大型烟草公司驻荷兰的代表。】
Meanwhile, in the higher echelons of the Service a good look was being taken at the new distribution of power in the world, brought about by the war, and the framework of a new service, designed to meet the new challenges, hammered out. It was clear already then that the main target of the future would be the Soviet Union, the new socialist countries of Eastern Europe and the world Communist movement.
【与此同时，在军队高层中，人们正在仔细观察战争带来的世界上新的权力分配，并制定了旨在迎接新挑战的新军种的框架。当时已经很清楚，未来的主要目标将是苏联、东欧的新兴社会主义国家和世界共产主义运动。】
The pre-war Secret Service had been very much a kind of club of enthusiastic amateurs, autocratically ruled by the Chief, who could take them on, sack them and pay them as he deemed fit, not bound by any Civil Service rules and regulations. The new SIS, which emerged after the big post-war reorganisation was a properly established Government Department with a personnel department, gradings,regular promotions, pension schemes and annual increments. There were many old hands who shook their heads at all this new-fangled bureaucratic paraphernalia, predicting that the new organisation would be too cumbersome, too hidebound, not flexible enough for such a subtle and delicate business as spying.
【战前的特勤局在很大程度上是一种业余爱好者的俱乐部，由局长独裁统治，他可以雇用他们，解雇他们，给他们他认为合适的薪水，不受任何公务员制度的约束。战后大规模重组后出现的新特勤局是一个适当建立的政府部门，包括人事部门、职务、定期晋升、养老金计划和年度增量。许多老手对所有这些新奇的官僚制度都摇头，他们预测这个新组织将过于繁琐，过于保守，对于间谍这样微妙的业务来说不够灵活。】
At the beginning of 1946, Commander Child paid a visit to Head Office to put forward a proposal which involved me. A certain Naval Intelligence unit was in process of being wound up. During the war it had specialised in commando-type operations against enemy shore establishments with the purpose of capturing personnel and documents of intelligence interest. The last remnants of it were still stationed in Hamburg, and Commander Child suggested that I should be appointed its nominal CO as a convenient cover for secret service operations in Germany. There was already a large SIS station in Hamburg, but, as CO of the Royal Naval Forward Intelligence Unit, as it was called, I might be better placed to carry out certain operations, especially those with a naval angle.
【1946年初，查尔德司令访问总部，提出了一项我也参与其中的建议。某个海军情报单位正准备解散。在战争期间，它专门从事针对敌方海岸设施的突击行动，目的是捕获具有情报价值的人员和文件。它最后的残余部分仍然驻扎在汉堡，查尔德司令建议我担任它名义上的指挥官，以便为在德国的秘密行动提供方便的掩护。汉堡已经有了一个很大的特勤局站点，但是，作为皇家海军前沿情报部队的指挥官，我可能更适合执行某些行动，尤其是那些从海军角度出发的行动。】
The proposal was accepted and in March of that year I went to Hamburg to succeed from the unit's last real CO, Captain Charles Wheeler, Royal Marines, who later became well known as a BBC correspondent in Washington.
【建议被采纳了，同年3月，我前往汉堡，接替该部队最后一位真正的指挥官，皇家海军陆战队的查尔斯·维尔勒上尉，他后来成为了著名的BBC驻华盛顿记者。】
The unit was located in an attractive villa with a garden sloping down to the river Elbe. This house I now took over, together with a naval writer, who spoke excellent German, a station wagon with a Royal Marine driver and an ample store of food, cigarettes and drink to be used for operational purposes.
【该单位位于一栋漂亮的别墅内，花园靠近易北河。现在我和一位能说一口流利德语的海军作家一起接管了这所房子，还有一辆由皇家海军陆战队司机驾驶的旅行车，以及充足的食物、香烟和饮料，以供使用。】
