Michael Dobbs - Winston’s War

‘What is to be gained by seeing him crucified now?’

‘For the pleasure of it!’ Ball cried.

‘To clean up Westminster,’ Wilson suggested.

‘But he can do us no harm,’ Chamberlain persisted. ‘It would be like stepping on an ant.’

The two elves fell into silence. They hadn’t caught on, not yet, but they knew the Prime Minister tied a mean fly.

‘Winston doesn’t matter, not now, at least. He has lost, we have won. That’s the truth of the matter. And if at this moment he were to fall over the edge, no one would even hear the splash. And how should we gain any benefit from that? Those who stand against us would only regroup, find a new leader and we would have to start all over again. No, there’s a better way. Not today, perhaps, not this month but sometime soon, there will be another crisis. How much better it would be, when that time comes, that their leader is a man who is on the brink. Vulnerable. Unstable as always. Whom we control and with one small nudge can send spinning into the abyss – if that were to prove necessary.’ There was colour in his face again, a spirit that had revived. The tips of his fingers were beating time, pacing his thoughts.

‘By God,’ Wilson breathed. ‘But how?’

‘Bail him out. Extend just sufficient credit for him to survive, for now. Play him on the line. Until he’s exhausted and we can net him whenever we choose.’

‘But he must not realize …’

‘Of course not. Do we know his bankers?’

‘Most certainly.’

‘Are they … friends?’

Ball snorted, struggling with the concept that bankers might be blessed with feelings more complex than those of black widow spiders. ‘Much better than friends. They’re the party’s bankers.’

‘Then they will co-operate. Tell them we want to help a colleague – but quietly, anonymously, to save embarrassment. Underwrite his loan. Let Winston survive – for the moment.’

‘Goes against the bloody grain. When they’re hooked, pull ’em in, Neville, that’s what I say. Don’t let them slip the line.’

‘You and I are a little too skilful for that, I hope, Joe.’

‘You let that forty-pounder go last August.’

‘You know very well he tangled the line in the roots of a tree. Winston is considerably less agile and will have much less stamina for the fight. Don’t you agree, Horace?’

Wilson had been quiet. He was no angler. He was a negotiator, looking for advantage. ‘If we’ve won and there’s no real opposition, as you say, then strike now. Not just for Winston but the whole damned lot. You have the King beside you and the country behind you. Call an election!’

‘An election? But it’s not due for another two years.’

‘There may never be a better time.’

‘Joe?’

‘It would call Winston’s bluff. Maybe get him thrown out in Epping, if he continues to be disloyal. Think of that. What a sign that’d be to the rest of the buggers! And the opinion polls are putting you a mile ahead, Neville.’

‘Are they? Are they …?’ But Chamberlain was uneasy.

‘A referendum on the peace,’ Ball encouraged.

‘But profiting from Munich?’ He looked tired once more, his sentences growing clipped.

‘Why not make a little profit?’

‘I signed the agreement at Munich. Doesn’t mean to say I have to like it.’

‘Peace with honour, Neville.’

‘Silly phrase. Borrowed it from Disraeli – what he said when he came back from the Congress of Berlin. I shouldn’t have. Moment of weakness. Did what I had to do, but how can I take pride in it? I gave my word. To the Czechs. Then I broke it. Sacrificed them to save the world. Not much of a manifesto, that.’

His eyes were cast down in confession, and for a moment silence hung heavily in the room until Wilson spoke up. ‘We did what we had to do, Neville. And the world rejoices.’

Slowly the head came up. ‘A fine thought to take me to my bed.’ Chamberlain rose.

‘But does that mean forgive and forget, Neville? Let the bastards off?’ Ball called out, evidently exasperated, as Chamberlain made to leave the room.

‘I think that’s for their constituencies to decide. And the press.’ He was standing at the door, leaning on the jamb. The exhaustion had returned and he could fight it no longer. His face was the colour of old linen yet his deep-set eyes still burned with a remarkable defiance and were staring directly at Ball. ‘I suspect some of them are going to be given a pretty rough ride, don’t you, Joe?’

‘Damn right,’ Ball said.

The eyes flickered and went out. ‘And so to bed.’ It was then Chamberlain noticed that he still had his glass in his hand. He drained it before setting it aside. ‘Incidentally, an excellent hock. Far better than our usual fare.’

‘It’s a Hochheimer Königin Victoriaberg, from a vineyard once owned by Prince von Metternich. I thought it would be appropriate for you. Full of subtlety, nobility, audacity …’

‘And where did you get this liquid jewel?’

‘From Ribbentrop. He sent several cases back with us from Munich as a goodwill gift.’

‘Always the wine salesman … eh?’

Joachim von Ribbentrop, the German Foreign Minister, had until recently been his country’s Ambassador to London. He had been a natural choice for the post since he was a Nazi of long standing who knew the British capital well, having run a wine business there for many years and established a reputation as an excellent host. He had been – and in many eyes still was – the acceptable face of Hitlerism, and much of London society had beaten a path to the dining table of his embassy in Carlton House Terrace.

‘I was his landlord for a time, you know,’ Chamberlain muttered. ‘He rented my family house in Eaton Place. After I moved in here. Like clockwork with the rent. Always told me – raise glasses, not guns. Good man, good man …’ The rest was lost as he stumbled up the dark stairs of Downing Street.

Guy Fawkes Night – 5 November 1938.

It was one of those nights that would change everything – although, of course, no one knew it at the time. And as was so often the case Max Aitken, the first Baron Beaverbrook, was to be its ringmaster.

They had gathered together at the summons of the mighty press baron to celebrate the torture and execution more than three centuries earlier of that quintessentially British traitor, Guy Fawkes, who had attempted to destroy the entire Houses of Parliament, King included, by stuffing a cellar full of gunpowder. He had been apprehended at the critical moment with candle in hand, and executed by having his entrails dragged from his still-living body, burnt in front of his face, then having his beating heart plucked out. Sadistic, mediaeval Europe – before the twentieth century turned torture into a modern science of factories and furnaces.

The weather had relented after weeks of skies filled with rain and Roman auguries. A full moon hung overhead, an ideal evening for the lighting of the traditional bonfire which had been constructed in the grounds of Beaverbrook’s country home at Cherkley. The garden and walkways had been turned into a fairy grotto by countless candles concealed in old tin cans, while Boy Scouts from the local troop were on hand to cook sausages and chicken legs over charcoal barbecues and to dispense mulled wine loaded with cinnamon and pepper. They had also erected tents and canvas awnings to provide shelter if the sky changed its mind and turned against them. Beaverbrook, ever the showman, had even instructed that chocolate eggs and sweets should be hidden around the grounds for the children. No one was to be left out of the fun. So to Checkley they had come, the good and the great, the famous and those still seeking fortune, more than two hundred of them wrapped in their furs and astrakhans and silk scarves and hand-warmers, giving thanks for the column inches they hoped they would receive from the Express and the Standard and putting aside how many of those past inches had been cruel and indecently unkind. Yet press barons have no monopoly on unkindness.