(starting at time index 38:00)
background to danger scene - Video Search Results (yahoo.com)
George Raft’s character walks into a tobacconist’s shop and, due to being a secret agent, talks in code to shop owner about Polo cigarettes.
Being unfamiliar of said brand, George writes out the word POLO on a sheet of paper, which the shop owner looks at upside down.
Does the upside down POLO have some secret meaning in Russian/cyrillic?
“I will not buy this tobacconist, it is scratched.”
If there were a mirror involved, the upside-down “L” and capital “P” would look like Cyrillic letters, but I don’t know Russian anyhow.