German woman departs to see swindler (5)
I believe the answer is:
fraud
'swindler' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'german woman departs' is the wordplay.
'german woman' becomes 'frau' (I've seen this before).
'departs' becomes 'd' (common abbreviation e.g. train timetables).
'frau'+'d'='FRAUD'
'to see' is the link.
(Other definitions for fraud that I've seen before include "Charlatan" , "Cheat" , "Duplicity" , "Fiddle" , "Deliberate deception to gain benefit" .)