Roger Hollis in 1956 and remaining in that post until his retirement in 1965. After Kim Philby's flight from Beirut to Moscow in 1963, rumours began to circulate that Hollis had alerted him to his impending arrest. Hollis was criticised for not alerting John Profumo, the War Secretary in Prime Minister Harold Macmillan's Conservative government, that he might have become entangled with a Soviet spy ring through his friendship with Stephen Ward, and his affair with showgirl Christine Keeler, who was introduced by Ward to Profumo. Soviet Naval Attache Eugene Ivanov was also involved with Keeler at this time, in the early
Profumo affair been variously represented as a "gentleman", her truest love, a Soviet spy, and a traitor ranking alongside Philby, Burgess and Maclean. She also claimed that Profumo impregnated her and that she subsequently underwent a painful abortion. Her portrait, by Ward, was acquired by the National Portrait Gallery in 1984. Christine Keeler died on 4 December 2017. Rice-Davies enjoyed a more successful post-scandal career, as nightclub owner, businesswoman, minor actress and novelist. She was married three times, in what she described as her "slow descent into respectability". Of adverse press publicity she observed: "Like royalty, I simply do not complain". Mandy