Winston’s War (32 page)

“Bit harsh, old boy, isn't it? What was Neville supposed to do? Hitler and Mussolini are hooligans, for sure, so what do you do with hooligans? You let them pass by the front door. Last thing you do is drag them into the parlor and start up a blazing row.”

“But what if they don't simply pass by? What if they want to kick down our door, too?”

“You mean—invade?”

“Walk in. Just like they're doing everywhere else.”

“Ah, but we have the Channel, Ian.”

“Oh, I see. We sit back and pray for bad weather, do we?”

“It's not like you to be so down, old chap. Don't worry, something'll turn up.”

“Like the bloody Wehrmacht, you mean? No, Dickie, we can't go on, not like this. Something's got to be done.”

“First principles, Ian. The time for change is when change becomes inevitable. Not before.”

“We may be getting close.”

“Good God, you can't mean—not Winston. Not in the Cabinet.”

“A testing possibility, I grant you. But a possibility
nonetheless.”

Dickie grimaced as though a knot had formed in his lower intestine. “Not bloody Winston. We need a steady hand on the tiller right now, not some headstrong alcoholic who's still rushing around trying to rescue his reputation from the trenches of Gallipoli. Which is why I thank God for Neville. Even if the whole of Europe goes up in flames, he'll pull us out of the fire.”

“But will he? That's what I worry about. With this Polish guarantee, it means we don't get a choice. If the Germans invade, we have to go to war, whether we like it or not.”

“Neville would get us out of it. Somehow.” The words were brave, but there was a chaotic glint in Dickie's eye. They fell into silence for several minutes, staring out at the coal barges billowing their way up river, the tidal waters of the Thames rushing past as if they had somewhere more important to go.

“You know, from here on a clear day, Dickie, sometimes you can see as far as Clapham.”

“What'll we do, Ian? What on earth will we do?”

“Maybe time's up for the likes of you and me. Our day's come and now it's gone. Politics doesn't seem to have much meaning any more, no common ground left. Perhaps time to head for the hills. Have a word in the Whip's ear, remind him how loyal we've been. Years and years of loyalty, stretched out like a tiger skin. Not like Winston and all the other fair-weather friends.”

“Thought we were praying for storms.”

“Not the point, Dickie. We've still got years of service left to offer the nation, you and me. From the Lords.”

“What, the coma ward?”

“Why not? I wouldn't mind dying a peer. It would make the passage to the afterlife seem so very much shorter.”

There was a glass-covered lean-to at the back of Carol's house, overlooking the small back garden, where she would sew and knit, darning socks, altering clothes, or letting her hair dry in its curlers, while she watched over Peter and Linda as they played. When it wasn't raining and the glass roof leaking, she would sit with Mac at the little trestle table to read and write.

She was making excellent progress, all the letters and sounds falling into place, the words coming to life, and her fingers forming the written letters most deftly—but that came as no surprise to Mac, who knew all about her deft and dexterous fingers and the magic they could weave. Her illiteracy, it seemed, had more to do with childhood abuse than ignorance or inability, and she appeared to have put so much of her past behind her as reading opened up worlds full of new ideas. She often laughed as she read and recognized new words; it was like a great game and at last she was winning. The kids laughed when he was around, too—Peter seemed to thrive simply through the presence of another man who was much more fun to chase and to run with than his little sister, and even little Linda showed her joy. Only that morning she had
run up to Mac, put her arms around his leg, burbled “uvoo,” and bitten him.

Yet the attention made Mac nervous. He wasn't used to complications, and babies who expressed their love for him seemed hopelessly entangling. His life had been so simple—eat, work, stay warm, survive—yet love meant being responsible for someone other than himself, and he hadn't been responsible for anyone since the day he'd watched poor Moniek's head being blown apart.

“What's wrong with you?” Carol demanded.

“Nothing,” he replied, “just can't concentrate. Do your top button up, woman, it's distracting me. And get on with your magazine.”

“OK. Another five minutes. Then I've got to get Peter's birthday tea.” Peter was ten today. Mac had bought him a cowboy hat.

Carol turned the page of the magazine. He'd begun to bring home old copies of the
Illustrated London News
from Trumper's—the combination of pictures and words along with things she'd heard about on the radio seemed to enliven the lessons and fill in many of the gaps. She examined the page in front of her.

“So what's an eclipse, love?” She pronounced the new
word firmly.

“It's when the sun disappears during the day. Supposed to be bad luck.”

“Says we're going to get one in a couple of days. You'd better stay in bed with me, then, dearie. Try your luck there.” She laughed again and began playing with the offending button on her blouse, only to stop suddenly. “And what's this about Musso and his tomato tops?” She examined a photograph of the chaos in Albania and a dockside swarming with troops. “A column of—kick-lists?”

“Cyclists,” he corrected.

“—whose mobility was of great assistance during the rapid advance…Sometimes I wish I was back in the old days and couldn't read a bloomin' word.” She turned the page in distaste. “Oh, bloody 'ell. It gets worse.” She was looking at a page of photographs of Madrid at the end of the Spanish civil war. Twisted statues that leaned at drunken angles. Bombed bridges. Rubble that had been homes. Fragments of torn fabric that might once have been bedroom curtains, or tablecloths, or children's clothes, now blowing hopelessly in the wind. But no people. “Where have they all gone, Mac, all the people?”

He shook his head, struggling to hide the pain in his eyes. He was back in Poland, standing against a crumbling wall beside a smashed chicken coop, the screams of Ashkenazi still echoing in his ears. Ashkenazi was the youngest in their class. He hadn't screamed at first, simply stood examining the intestines that had fallen into his hands when he'd unbuttoned his tunic. Only after a while had he started screaming, until a Russian had put a bullet in him to stop the racket. There was blood on Mac's uniform, too, someone else's blood, neither his nor Ashkenazi's, perhaps Yitzhak's, and Mac remembered how he had rejoiced when he'd realized that the blood wasn't his own. He also remembered deciding he very much wanted to live, and not to die with Ashkenazi alongside that battered chicken coop. He remembered it all now, and desperately wished he didn't.

“
The ravages of war in a city for thirty months in the front line.”
She turned to him, insistent. “What does it all mean, love?”

“Ravages? It means—”

“I know what the bloody words mean. But all this—the wars, the bombs, the dying. Last month it was Czechoslovakia and now—this.” She pushed the magazine away angrily. “We was promised, Mac, promised. Peace in our time. So what does all that mean?”

He looked away, trying to hide his eyes once more, and saw Peter in his too-large cowboy hat chasing his little sister round the lawn using the garden rake as a rifle. “I'm ten, I'm ten!” he cried. “Bang! Bang! You're dead.” Oh, little Peter, don't rush, don't rush, for it will all come soon enough. It had been Ashkenazi's birthday, too. He'd turned sixteen on the day he died.

A
fine evening, overflowing with drink and verbal excess. Churchill carried its full weight in the back of the taxi as it bore him home. He rarely missed a gathering of the Other Club, a dining group he'd set up nearly thirty years earlier along with his outrageous parliamentary colleague, R.E. Smith. Its purpose was simple—to dine, drink, debate, and dispute with other men of authority and opinion. “Nothing in the Rules or intercourse of the Club,” said its constitution, “shall interfere with the rancor or asperity of party politics.” And it didn't.

They gathered in the Pinafore Room at the Savoy. It was decorated with splendid
trompe l'oeil
reminders of Victorian comic opera, but the discussion that evening had taken a particularly rancorous turn. The sense of order never sat more than lightly on such evenings, and it had begun to fall apart as soon as one of those present reminded the group that it was nearing the third anniversary of Chamberlain's appointment as Prime Minister. On cue and in the manner of a conductor pursuing the Valkyries, Bracken had started throwing his arms about wildly and denouncing “a Government based on a jumble of old umbrellas and unction.” That had required a response from the only Government Minister present, who
had found himself following a route which led him inexorably to the conclusion that Chamberlain's foreign policy, in spite of all its adversities, was above all unambiguously ethical. It was an argument which even the Minister himself suspected went more than a step too far, but alcohol induces politicians to overreach the limits of their own logic and he found himself stuck with it. Having reached the end of his road, he turned to face his accusers and raised his glass in a defiant toast—“To Neville. Happy anniversary!”—challenging the others to join him. Bracken had begun to shout something particularly rude when, to the astonishment of everyone and not least the Minister himself, Churchill had raised his glass. It was a substantial balloon of cognac, which the old man examined in the light of the candles as though weighing the reputation of his leader. He demolished it in a single gulp. “Anesthetic,” he had announced, and belched. The Minister rose and left.

The evening had grown ever more boisterous, and Churchill seemed disinclined for it to finish. “Celebrating Mr. Chamberlain's success exhausts me so. I need your help,” he had informed both Bracken and Bob Boothby as at last the gathering had broken up. His two young friends now accompanied him, squashed in the back of the London taxi as it bore them through darkened streets towards Churchill's apartment in Morpeth Mansions overlooking the Catholic cathedral. It was beyond midnight when they arrived and, with some unsteadiness, tumbled onto the pavement. Churchill made some attempt at searching his pockets for the change to pay the driver, but his fingers had suddenly become those of an elderly man. Bracken had more money than either Churchill or Boothby combined but was notoriously reluctant to part with any of it, so it was left to Boothby to provide a ten-shilling note.

It was while they were fumbling on the pavement that a figure emerged from the darkness, calling out Churchill's name. Startled by the intrusion, Bracken sprang forward, moving
protectively in front of his master and placing a hand on the advancing man's chest with such force that the stranger was propelled backwards. The raincoat he wore was old, his hair unkempt, and in the gloom he could easily have passed as a tramp—or worse. IRA bombers had been active since the turn of the year and had left a trail of destruction and fire across the major towns of Britain; it was only a matter of time before someone died. The Churchill family's reputation in Ireland made him an obvious target. So Bracken's caution was understandable, indeed commendable, yet appeared unwelcome on all sides.

“Touch me again and you'll end up on your arse in the gutter,” the stranger growled, showing his teeth like an alley dog.

“No, no, no, Brendan,” Churchill protested, pushing Bracken brusquely aside, “that's Mr. Burgess, I believe.”

Bracken stepped back in embarrassment.

“I'm sorry but—I saw you as I was passing,” Burgess lied. “On my way home—round the corner. Chester Square.”

Beneath the meager yellow light of the street lamp Churchill looked into Burgess's eyes and recognized the companionship and hard glaze of a fellow drinker. “So, are we neighbors as well as fellow travelers, Mr. Burgess? Splendid. Meet Mr. Bracken, Mr. Boothby. You will join us for a nightcap,” he instructed, taking Burgess's arm and leading him energetically up the steps. Boothby followed, stumbling from the excesses of the night, while Bracken appeared reluctant to follow. He was disconcerted by the arrival of this outsider, not only by its manner but also by the enthusiasm with which Churchill had taken his arm and left the others in his wake. Bracken was intensely proprietorial about his relationship with the old man. Churchill had a passion for life and a grasp on all matters political that Bracken knew he would never match, no matter how much he paid his tailor, so he was content to stand close—closer than anyone else—and bathe in the reflected
light. It made him reluctant to share such favors with others, even with a colleague like Boothby, and after an evening's indulgence he had no relish for being pushed aside to make way for a complete stranger. The sense of Celtic disgruntlement only increased when, once inside Churchill's apartment, the old man threw his coat across the back of a dining chair and artlessly instructed Bracken to pour drinks for the rest of them. Churchill could inflict many careless insults; tonight, somehow, it mattered.