The Spy Who - The Czech Spy Who Stole a Son | What really goes on in the mind of a secret agent? | 4

Episode Date: June 16, 2026

What do you think of when someone mentions the word: spy? Thanks to James Bond, they're often thought of as sleek, sexy and thrill-seeking. But what really goes on in the mind of a secret agent like Václav Jelínek? Charlie Higson is joined author, lecturer, and advisor on handling human sources of secret intelligence, John Taylor. He's pulling the curtain back on the fraught psychology of spies. Including, what kind of agent poses the biggest threat to a mission. And, who he thinks makes for a better spy - men or women?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Audible subscribers can listen to all episodes of The Spy Who ad-free right now. Join Audible today by downloading the Audible app. I'm Charlie Higson, and this is The Spy Who, an audible original. Thank you for joining us on our final episode of The Spy Who Stole a Son. We've wrapped up our season on Vatslav Yelinik, the Czech deep-cover spy who fooled a mother into believing he was the son She put up for adoption as a baby.

It's an extreme and callous example of how far some spies will go to remain undetected. But how do spies manage to live a lie? And how do they cope with the strain of living multiple lives? To find out, I'm joined now by a man all too familiar with the inner world of spies. Author, lecturer and advisor on handling human sources of secret intelligence, John Taylor. John's co-authored the book, The Psychology of Spies and Spying, and will help us get inside the mind of undercover agents to discover what really makes them tick. So John, thank you so much for being here.

How are things with you? Great. You know, I live in a boat in East London and coming here is a very easy commute. So it's been a very gentle morning. Well, I didn't quite miss Russia, but I almost did. So as I mentioned in your introduction, you have co-written the psychology of spies and spying. And just to let our listeners in, could you give just a little overview of your background and how you got interested in the psychology of spies?

So I joined the Foreign Office, as it was then, now, FCDO, way back in 1971, had a full career there, got involved in two things, three things, really, training, which I did in the Foreign Office, which I became head of departments and loved that. I also found into the very bad company of psychologists at University College London, Adrian Fernand, who's now a very good friend. And then the world of espionage, which you brush up against, you know, in the Foreign Office.

And so it was nice. I knew quite a lot of people who worked in that world. And because I was in their world partly, I was able to find out quite a lot. So I spent the last 25, 30 years going around the world and training intelligence and security services around the world. Excellent. Perfect guest.

I mean, just before we start, I think it's quite interesting. You know, we talk generally about spies, secret agents, and here we're talking about the psychology of spying. But really, I suppose, there are two types of spies, aren't they? There are the people that go out and do the field work, and then there are, and presumably there's a lot more of them, there's the people, you know, who are in Vauxhall or whatever, sitting at desks, running those spies or organising it. And are those two sort of very distinct groups?

Not really, so they're essentially walk hand in hand. I mean, you've got, if I can, spy is what I call the generic word. It covers everything to do with spying. And so anybody who's involved in spying is called a spy. Intelligence officers are the professionals, the career people, and then secret agents are the ones who collect the information. The people, they're the ones in Vauxhall Cross, and Thames House and CIA and all the rest of it.

They are officers. And it's a career for them, full-time career. They're properly paid. They're civil servants or in the UK. case crown servants. And they organize, they do, in America, they do analysis, less so in Britain, but they are the professionals. Their job, or part of their, a big part of their job, particularly in MI6, is to go out and

recruit or find people who are willing to betray their country, Russia, China, Iran, or the terrorist organization, threats to the United Kingdom. but we don't get involved in criminality or very rarely get involved in serious organised crime based overseas. And so, I mean, so it's a very basic first question. What kind of person is drawn to becoming a spy, a secret agent, whatever we call them?

Well, if you want a sort of personality profile, if you're looking at intelligence officers, I think I would say, particularly the handlers, I'd identify three qualities. I think they have to be bright enough. I'm not saying you have to be super intelligent. I mean, you're going to the Treasury, you know, foreign office. We're quite good at that.

I think curiosity is a very important thing. They've got to go out there and ask what's going on and be very interested in what's going on. And I think they also have to have very strong interpersonal skills because, after all, they have to be people that... eight secret agents are willing to trust, and that means you've got to have a strong bond. So do you think they're very much two sides of the same coin,

the sort of, whether we're going on, the recruiters or whatever, and the recruitees, if that is a word? No, I think that not necessarily. I think I can easily identify personality traits, and we can go down that path if you like about intelligence officers, but it's impossible to do so with agents, because agents have only one requirement, and that is that they have access to secret information.

And of course, that can mean anybody. And that's the skill of the case officer, the handler, because the handler doesn't know what kind of personality is going to be dealing with, what kind of motivations they may have. All he or she knows is that they have access, or what he cares about, is that they have access to secret intelligence. But there must be an aspect of that of thinking, are they psychologically

robust enough to do this? Can we trust them on that? Yeah, that's true. The handler will spend weeks, months even, actually getting to know the person and assessing that person on not only confirming he has or she has access, but also that they're suitable,

their personality is stable, they can cope with the secrecy they'll be involved in, but they've also got to have a strong motivation. That's what is fascinating. What is the motivation? for someone to betray their country. You know, many of them, although they are depicted as traitors,

particularly by their own nation, are actually deeply patriotic. It gives you many examples of Russians, I know particularly well, and they became an agent because they hated the Soviet system. Although I have no access to what is happening now, I can imagine

there are a lot of Russians who hate the regime that Putin sits over. So would you put, say, for instance, the famous Cambridge spies in that same basket? No, that's very different. It is different. They were captured by the romanticism of socialism and the socialism that was coming out of the Soviet Union. Their motivation principally was ideological. They believed in communism. They hated the right. totalitarian, authoritarian of Hitler and the like. Also in Spain, you saw what was happening there, many of them went off and fought in Spain.

And so they were genuinely ideologically motivated. Were they all so patriotic towards it thinking it would be better for Britain? Yes, I think they probably were. They probably were looking for a better Britain. Now, we had former CIA officer Jim Lawler on the show a few weeks back, And he said most people who become spies aren't happy people. And your book touches on that as well.

Do you think all spies are unhappy deep down? If you talk about the intelligence officers, they are, my experience, enormously happy, well-rounded people. Of course, in any group of few hundred, few thousand people, there's going to be a few that are unhappy. But generally speaking, they're very happy and content, and they love their work. I think for the secret agents,

they do take a big decision when they come to decide to betray that country organization. And there is an argument that would say this is something psychologists love to look at and say deeply troubled childhood. That means they're going to turn into a sociopath or something like that. I don't think that's necessary. I wouldn't go so far as that. I've met a few. And they are not unhappy people.

I don't know. They've defected and they're in a happy, place now, but there are people who are unhappy and maybe more become agents, secret agents, as in the sense they're willing to betray. But in my experience, unhappiness is not a regular future. Right. So there wouldn't be something that a handler might be looking for, that sort of psychological flaw of trauma or unhappiness? No, they would look for it and they would be interested in it. So, you know, the handler will be looking. They will be asking, you know, tell me about your childhood, you know, for dinners, over drinks, while they're skiing, whatever it is.

But equally, they'll be talking about their time at school, at university, who their friends are, who their relatives are. And I think there is one thing that, well, certainly I think is very common, and that is that they look for people who are disenchanted, that's the sort of, in their current work. So, you know, they would go and chat to a Russian diplomat, and the Russian diplomat would say, I've had a great day, my ambassador is so inspiring. And the intelligence officer will just move on and talk to somebody else until they find somebody who's I have to feel really awful.

And when it comes to recruiting spies, people often use the acronym MICE, M-I-C-E, money, ideology, coercion, ego, as being the sort of four motives for spying. from your studies of spy psychology do you think that holds up? It's one very often used. I don't like it.

I don't like it for two reasons. One is that it oversimplifies a very complex thing. It captures four reasons. But there's one in there which is coercion. And coercion is, A, it's ethically wrong. And I'm not saying the West don't use it, I haven't done it, or don't. still today. But all my studies of what happens in MI6, that is not what they want. They need good

sources, willing to work with them, and that are long term. And if you're being blackmailed or, you know, there's some threat against you, you're never going to give everything. You're only going to give what the case officer, the handler, wants. And it's going to be a very unhappy relationship and it's not something that in my experience I've ever seen. Right. I've talked to a lot of people on this series about spies and I think the ego side of it, that seems to me quite a strong thread through this,

particularly that idea of I'm the person who knows things and I'm not going to tell the people about around me and it gives me this sort of power over them. And that is what probably differentiates the secret agent from the intelligence officer. And the intelligence officer clearly wants to achieve, if you go back to classic motivation theories among ordinary people, they want to achieve, but they don't need the recognition.

They don't need their names out in them. With agents, it's not that they can't publicize what they're doing, but they certainly want recognition from people around them. And so ego is very strong. I talked about disenchantment. I talked to somebody who was much revered in the community, intelligence community. And what he said was really important was wounded vanity. It's the same thing.

But where somebody is, for one reason or not slighted by their authority. Now, John, I read that you said women make far better agents than men. Do you stick by that still? And if so, why? I do. And it reflects a little bit, you know, what I sensed and saw back in the 1970s when I first entered this sort of world of the civil servant. At that stage, men dominated.

And it was all about charisma. Leaders were, you know, they were the big Napoleonic figures. So back in the 70s, it's men who are the people. big I am, and they think about me rather than the team. Now, if you translate this into the intelligence world, and I'm talking about the intelligence officers, I believe, and that's certainly the evidence I have in training, certainly going around the world now, more in recent years, is that women tend to be better listeners. They tend to be more sensitive to the other person. Because there are more women in this area who have that listening ability.

And of course, that's what, that's, you know, an intelligence officer has to collect intelligence. Therefore, they have to listen. When they're talking, they're not collecting intelligence. So I believe it. It's also a little bit because I want to shake people up a little bit and say, you've got to be more diverse in your recruitment. but I remember I was in Eastern Europe and Ukraine and talking there

and I said how many women do you employ? I said no. So how can you ignore half the population? Particularly when I believe they're instinctively better. Alison Matt here from British Scandal. Matt's some news for you. British Scandal is going to Broadway. What?

Sorry, not literally. I just mean we're taking it to the stage. Is this your show? Festival Crossed Wires, where all the UK's biggest podcast do live shows across iconic venues in Sheffield, between the 2nd and 5th of July. And that was a beautiful read. Matt and I cordially invite you to our British Scandal live show on Sunday, July the 5th. And if we're doing the story, I think we are, it is potentially one of the most ridiculous scandals we've ever told. So grab a ticket at crossedwires.org. That's C-R-O-S-S-E-D wires. Live. When a charming neurosurgeon rode into western towns selling a persona of confidence and care, patients trusted him.

He wore cowboy boots in the operating room and became sought after by patients. He promised to heal them. Instead, he left a trail of broken bodies. This is a story of greed, betrayal, and a fight for justice. Listen to Dr. Death, the cowboy, wherever you get your podcasts, or binge the entire series right now, only. with Audubal. So John, let's talk about what life looks like for someone who is actively working as a spy. Obviously, there's a lot of training an agent undergoes before they're let out into the wild, so to speak.

But I would imagine that officially working for the CIA, or MI6, is a whole different stress entirely. I mean, how much of a shock to the system is it for novice agents who are now newly out there? I don't think it's really a shock. I mean, they are recruited. The recruitment process is extensive, and they will be looking for people who are, in fact, use a silly phrase really, but psychologically stable. They're looking for people who can take stress well, what happens under stress. And of course, keeping secrets, you know, lying.

then people, some people, I go to my daughter. She says, I hate secrets. I can't cope with secrets. But my other daughters love secrets. Well, it can give you a certain power. Exactly. So people, some people enjoy it, some people relish it. The recruitment process means that you're selecting 95% the right kind of person.

Of course, there's always 5% that you get wrong. And I mean, do agents struggle making choices? in the best interests of the job, but that might contradict their own moral code? There's always a red line. We all have red lines. For example, when NATO in the West, NATO-led invaded Afghanistan after 9-11,

I think everybody, as I recall, everybody in the British established and thought that the Taliban were responsible for 9-11 and therefore that was a perfectly reasonable invasion. it was less clear about going into Iraq, and anybody who knows about that will be aware. But I've heard, and I've met one or two, people in MI6 who said, I don't believe in the war.

I don't want anything to do with it. And they were told, that's fine, you will find you another job somewhere else, and their promotion on their pay or anything else was not in any way negatively impacted. And how common is it for spies to freak out on the job? and say that's it and burnt out, I can't do this anymore. It does happen.

And I've heard of cases where perhaps the pressure got a bit much, they started drinking too much, but it's handled pretty well these days. Yes, I think any senior job, I've heard it's in the civil service. It's not unique to MI6 or any job. Just to focus for a moment on Yelinek, is the spy of our current season. He knew that MI5 had him under surveillance,

and he became kind of increasingly paranoid. Exactly how that surveillance was, isn't public. But he got to the point where he thought his neighbour's children were working for MI5. And how hard is it for agents to stop paranoia from consuming them? I think it's not just agents, but paranoia is... is something that people develop or build up. I mean, you know, when an intelligence officer is cultivating someone and sees paranoia in them, there's a little bit of, oh, good,

that means they're going to be careful, but it also becomes damaging to their operational activity because they become constrained. They wouldn't do things. They said, oh, no, I couldn't do that because somebody was watching me or listening to me on the phone or whatever. So talking about agents, I guess, rather than handlers, do you think they can ever actually find satisfaction in their work? Or is it something they've just got to keep doing?

Those that I've met or talked about or studied, those coming out of Russia, China, coming to the West, are basically happy with their decisions in life. So you talked about how important the sort of psychological appraisal of potential spies is, do the handlers then have to sort of act as therapists? Because they must be the only, almost the only people that these spies can actually speak to. Yeah. I can remember them all, but I remember Adrian who wrote the book with Adrian Fernum. He said, you know, I think that they have to combine being, you know, a salesman, person because they've got to sell, they've got to be a journalist, because they've got to get

information out, and they've got to be able to write about it, and they have to be a therapist as well, because exactly as you point out, they are the only person that the agent can talk to. And so, yes, there will be. And it's not about necessarily just their lives as an agent. You know, my mother's really ill, or my daughter's sort of going off the rails or whatever, they have to cope with all of those things as well. And they can't say, well, that's nothing to do with my business, or nothing to do with us. They've got to manage that as well.

And psychiatrists have to have their own psychiatrists. Is it the same for the spy handlers as well as the spies? Or are they happy just to talk to each other? I think they're, yeah, I think you've got it in. They're very happy just talking to each other. And a good boss in MI6 and any agency will be sensitive to people who are going through personal problems. And they will be sympathetic because they are, most of them are good, people who have good interpersonal skills. So what happens to spies who become disillusioned on the job?

Do they pose a threat? Yes, very much so. Audrey Keynes, who was a CIA officer in 1985, he offered his services to the KGB in America. Now, Alder Cames' notorious case, and his main motivation was money. He got himself on his second wife, who was quite demanding, wanted a big flat in New York, in Manhattan, wanted two cars, and Aldra Keymes found himself in quite big debt, I think, to the tune of $47,000. And he thought, well, what do I do? I either rob a bank or I'll get it from the KGB and he chose the latter course.

So that was his main motivation. But in looking at the papers and all the interviews around him, he was also pretty disenchanted with the CIA because, and there's an irony in this, Ames had worked on the Russian desk at the time. and he'd written a paper saying the Soviet system cannot survive since 1985 Soviet system must collapse and everybody poo-pooed it around her and said that's ridiculous and you know, nobody's so silly. So he felt a little bit wounded by that.

He didn't get the promotions or I think the postings that he felt weren't it served. So it was this combination. So disenchanted spy and whose short of money is quite dangerous. So Yelinax assignment was a deep cover illegal. Not only did he have to pretend to be someone he wasn't for years on end, but his contact with his handlers was also very limited, usually just receiving radio messages, a few dead drops and other signals. Does that take a specific kind of person psychologically?

I think that if you go back to the one about, you know, the distance that you have from your handlers or from the... the centre headquarters. And we're talking about illegals here in this particular case. The KGB have this system of what they call the illegals. And what that means is that they were trained from a very early stage. I'm talking 19, 20, 21, 22. I don't think you can train people, you can train people in certain skills. And they were trained in languages primarily. But a trainer, and I spent a lot of my time as a trainer, I can't change people's personality.

I can change their behaviors. I can change their habits, but I can't change their personality. And therefore, if you've got the wrong kind of personality, but somebody who is not resilient, someone who does crave for friends, those kinds of things, then there's nothing I can do.

Because as soon as they get tired or worried or perhaps have too much to drink or under some sort of stress, they'll revert back to their personality. So you can't change people that much that enables you to be sure that over 15 years they're going to do it. The requirement is that they have to be handled very carefully because they have no protection. If they're arrested, they're put in prison. If an intelligence officer as a diplomat is arrested, you may have two or three hours

in an uncomfortable prison. until his identity is established, but there's certainly going to be no more problems than that. An illegal is put into prison for decades. Is being a spy a very lonely job? Loneliness suggests that they are living in a Garrett flat and without many contact. But of course, that's not the way they build up families.

They marry people. Well, in Yelinek's case, he posed as Irwin to his mother. And it's a particularly awful thing to do to someone, yet he never seemed to show any remorse. I mean, is it just that spies are good at compartmentalizing things or justifying their actions? Or is there something almost sociopathic

or extremely narcissistic about some of them? Yeah, but I think the use of the word, it's more sociopathic than narcissistic. Right. It is sociopathic. And therefore, you know, and we all have. have degrees of antisocial sociopathy in our makeup, not all of us, but most of us have some.

And that means, at the extreme end, then you have no guilt. You could do whatever you like. And that is why they become very effective in business or civil service, or the military, because they don't care about other people. They have no end. empathy. And these sort of people are good at this kind of thing. But in the selection of it, you don't want somebody who is an extreme sociopath, I would suggest. Yes, they need to be able to do some of these things. But if they're an extreme sociopath, then the organization, the agency that's running them, has a problem because that person is going to be so selfish at the end of the day, if they feel that their objectives,

the things they want out of life, varying from the organisation, they're going to go off and do things for themselves and therefore ignore. So there's a fine balance, but yes, it's a degree, it's not black or white, but a little bit of sociopathy helps in this area. And given how often agents are asked to manipulate, deceive, to lie, whatever, do those behaviours show up in their real relationships? I think they probably do. But, you know, most agencies encourage their officers to be open with their family,

to tell their family that they are a member of the service and to be able to talk about it. It's an important safety valve in many cases so that they can talk to their families and therefore let off steam a bit. But of course they learn how to deceive and how to plan operations. So if they want an affair or something like that, then it's easier for them to do that. But as I recall, you know, the divorce rate in MI6 is no greater than the divorce rate in the foreign office. So I don't think that has a big issue.

There are people you're told to trust. lawyers, teachers, especially doctors. But what happens when you put your life in someone's hands and they betray you? The hit podcast, Dr. Death, is back. And this season is unlike any other. Dr. Death, the cowboy, is the story of a charming neurosurgeon who rode into western town selling a persona of confidence and care. He wore cowboy boots in the operating room and became sought after by patients.

He promised to heal them. Instead, he left a trail of broken bodies. This season is about a doctor who was never truly held accountable for the patients whose lives he ruined. A story of greed, betrayal, and a fight for justice that will leave you questioning who to trust. Listen to Dr. Death, the cowboy, wherever you get your podcasts, or binge the entire series right now, only with Audible. So, John, there's lots that gets written about spies during active service. but we never or very rarely hear about what life looks like for a spy after they leave the secret service and given how stressful the life of a spy can be do they ever experience any form of

PTSD? No I think mostly CIA and as high as people I've met are pretty comfortable people comfortable in their own skin they're quite lively, they're fun, I see no sign that's of PTSD. So afterwards, after that, they go off and do a whole variety of things. And I don't think there's anything to do it. Some of them go into the, you know, quite a few going to what we call the private intelligence sector. Some of them just go off and do their gardens. They go off and do other things, use their skills, interpersonal skills, in order to, and apply it in other areas.

So I guess that comes back to that whole idea of the people that are recruited, in the first place are resilient. They're dandelions rather than orchids. Yes. But I guess it might be slightly different, though, if you've been an agent in the field and perhaps something that you've done or intelligence that you've given has led to bad things happening

and whatever. Yes, I think, and we touched on earlier and I mentioned defectors, so people who've had to leave the country and can never go back. I think for them, the big issues. That's a big, big issue.

I think for agents who come to the end of their usefulness will feel a hole in their world because they don't have this very close relationship with their case officer, whom they may well have met every four or five weeks, had a good time with, had a good meal with, chatted openly because that's what happens. And they have no trade union.

They don't have any alumni. they don't have anywhere that they can share this with. And I think from what I can gather, they are suffering. And because spies are often asked to assume someone else's identity, is it common for them to experience some level of disassociation with their own life? I mean, if you're talking about intelligence officers, and I only speak authoritative about the British ones, but they're involved in choosing that new personality.

They very often will pretend that they're single rather than married with children, which most of them clearly are. And so they have to take off their wedding ring and they have to appear as a single person traveling around with no friends and very little family. They'll have one or two things they can use as backup. But I don't think that's a difference. It's a short period of time.

It may last a month, but it's not a long period of time, and that is easily sustained. But what if you're a sleeper agent coming over and completely taking on another? That's a different thing. That's a very different thing. And where you do have to abandon your mother. I read somewhere that Yeleneck was reunited with his mother after 10, 15 years. That's tough. And I wouldn't want to do that.

But that is required of illegals. They have to abandon. They will have family back in Moscow or wherever they brought up. They will have family back there. And there's no communication with them. Yes, we've looked at a few spies from the Soviet bloc, who've had to completely cut off all contact with their own families. So just to wrap up,

even after a spy is retired, do you think they can ever turn off that part of their brain? I doubt it. I think, no. I think it's with them. You know, if you've had a career, you know, maybe 20, 30 years in an institution, and then you can't just cut it off and say that's no longer relevant. Some people do, you know, in all sorts of lives and careers. So on the whole, you seem to be saying that the British Secret Service, at least, people who work for it seem to be fairly happy and well-adjusted.

Absolutely. I think they are. And they're always, whenever I've come across them, they've nearly always been very good fun. They're charming people. And I'd like to say there's quite a few of them who are still friends. Well, I think maybe after listening to this, MI6 will get a whole load of new people asking to be recruited.

That's not been my purpose. Thank you so much for speaking to us, John. That was really interesting and so much more we could have talked about as well. Thank you. I found it fascinating talking to John. And there's a couple of points that really struck me. One, and I'm saying this as an author of James Bond books, that the word spy covers two very different types of people, really. It covers the handlers, the people working in the offices at MI6,

who then go out and look to recruit people, and the actual people they recruit. And John was quite careful about saying there isn't particularly a psychological type when it comes to the agents, but the handlers have to be a certain type of person. And I think that key point that what they're looking for in an agent

is not a psychological type, they are looking for someone who knows something that would be useful. I also find it really interesting in a world where we hear so much about, oh, you can't trust, MI6 or MI5 or the CIA and when every other spy film

it turns out that the real villains are the people running the Secret Service agency or even your own handler. I did find it refreshing really that John was coming from a point of view of saying that on the whole

the British Secret Services try to do the right thing and behave in an ethical manner and they are there because they believe in the job that they're doing who knows where the full truth lies. But it was certainly interesting to hear from someone who obviously has a great admiration

for the British Secret Services at least and what they do. And I think this is something that comes up quite a lot is that the, shall we say, the Russian approach to espionage is very different to the British approach where the Russians kind of throw things against the wall and see what sticks. They train sleeper agents who will go out. into the world and embed themselves in society for years and years and years and

years and may never find out anything. And the British approach, which is to go out there and look for people who already do know something and would be useful to recruit. Next time we open the file on Benedict Arnold, the spy who betrayed the American Revolution. As America fights for freedom from the British Empire, Arnold becomes one of the Rebellion's greatest generals. But when his loyalty is pushed to the limit, he turns spy and devises a plot that threatens to shatter the rebellion and make General George Washington a prisoner. Follow The Spy Who Now, wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also listen to the full season of The Spy Who betrayed the American Revolution early and ad-free on Audible. Follow the Spy Who on the Audible app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to all episodes of The Spy Who, add free by joining Audible.

You have been listening to The Spy Who, an Audible original. Have you got a spy story you'd like us to tell? Email your ideas to The Spy Who at Audible.com. The Spy Who is hosted by me, Charlie Higson. It's a yellow ant production. This episode was written and produced by Liam Gero, and researched by Louise Byrne. The senior producer was Jay Priest.

The sound designer was Joshua Morales. Music supervision by Scott Velascus for Frisson's Sink. For Yellow Ant, the executive producer was Tristan Donovan. For Audible, the executive producers were Estelle Doyle and Theodora LaLouis.