Уильям Николсон - Motherland

‘Is it still there?’

‘Oh, yes, it’s still there. There’s no one living there, but people visit.’

‘I’d like to go there.’

‘I think it’s quite a drive.’

Geraldine looks out of the open car windows at the bleak grandeur of the new city.

‘I expect this took fifteen years to build,’ she says.

‘More or less,’ says Larry. ‘And here we are, getting ready to abandon it.’

‘At least it won’t be deserted when we leave.’

‘Not at all. It’ll come to life.’

They drive in silence for a few moments. Then Geraldine says, ‘Why did you come out here, Larry?’

‘Oh, you know how it is,’ says Larry. ‘Life has these turning points, doesn’t it? I suppose it was just chance, bumping into Rupert when I did.’

‘You think it was chance?’

‘Why, don’t you believe in chance?’

‘I don’t know that I do,’ she says. ‘After all— ’ She breaks off, not out of nervousness, but with a kind of old-fashioned courtesy, to say, ‘Do you mind if I talk about God?’

‘Not at all,’ he says. ‘It is Sunday.’

‘Well,’ she says, ‘if you believe God has a plan for you, then nothing happens by chance. Even the bad things have their purpose, however hard it is to see what that might be at the time.’

‘Yes,’ says Larry, wondering how far he agrees with this. ‘But that doesn’t mean we never have to make any decisions for ourselves, does it?’

‘I think our duty is to do the right thing, as far as we know it. And beyond that, to submit to the will of God. If that means we are to suffer, then so be it.’

She speaks in a low voice that makes it all too plain she speaks from recent personal experience.

‘I’m sorry if you’ve suffered,’ says Larry.

She looks round, meeting his eyes with a searching gaze. Her look says to him, Don’t play with me.

‘I’ve been unhappy,’ she says. ‘I can’t claim any more than that.’

The car pulls up by the north entrance to Viceroy’s House, and they go inside. Larry hears Geraldine pausing to thank their driver. Breakfast is still being served in the staff mess.

‘Here they are!’ cries Rupert Blundell, halfway through eating a soft-boiled egg. ‘Are you suitably shriven?’

‘You will go to hell,’ says Geraldine calmly. ‘Pour me some coffee.’

Freddie Burnaby-Atkins, one of the ADCs, points a butter knife at Geraldine.

‘Why only Rupert?’ he complains. ‘I’ve not been to church either.’

‘You’re one of the innocents, Freddie,’ says Geraldine. ‘You’ll go to limbo. But Rupert knows better, so he goes to hell.’

There are several single young men on the staff, and Geraldine’s arrival among them has created something of a flutter. As Rupert predicted, she is soon put to work assisting the hard-pressed team. She has no training in shorthand or typing, but she has a natural talent for organisation. Within a few days she has taken charge of the circulation of notes. Mountbatten has instituted a system where each hour of meetings is followed by fifteen minutes of dictation, in which he makes a résumé of the discussion. The resulting notes are then typed, stencilled, and distributed. Geraldine draws up a chart with the names of all key members of staff, and the date and issue number of each note, and ticks them off as they are sent out.

The workload grows heavier as the temperature of the capital rises. The thermometer in the entrance hall is now reading 110° in the shade. Mountbatten has been closeted in Simla with Nehru, and in London with Attlee and Churchill. Jinnah has made his demand for a ‘corridor’ between the two parts of what will become Pakistan. Baldev Singh has issued ominous warnings about the Sikhs, who will be the biggest losers in partition. The Indian states representatives have met and failed to agree. Lord and Lady Mountbatten are rumoured to be barely on speaking terms. No one has the least idea what Gandhi thinks.

In this atmosphere of confusion and mistrust, the viceroy calls a meeting of the five leaders: Nehru and Patel for the Congress party, Jinnah and Liaquat Ali Khan for the Muslim League, and Baldev Singh for the Sikhs. Nehru asks that Acharya Kripalani be included, as Congress President. Jinnah counters with a demand that Rab Nishtar be included for the League. So the five becomes seven.

Larry is on duty controlling the press photographers. When it emerges that no photographs are to be permitted, he finds himself with a rebellion on his hands. Max Desfor leads a walkout by the foreign press men, saying as he goes, ‘You’ll get a signed protest on this one, Larry. You tell your people, this is no way to get yourselves a good press.’

Larry does his best.

‘The viceroy wants as little distraction as possible. We’ll get you in there later, I promise you.’

The purpose of the meeting is to win all the leaders’ consent to a carefully drafted plan for the transfer of power. Because different aspects of the plan are unacceptable to each one of the leaders, this is no easy task. Mountbatten’s object is to make them realise that poor though the plan is, every alternative is worse. If the British are to quit India, somebody must take over the running of the country. If Jinnah will not work with Congress, there must be partition. If there is to be partition, there must be boundaries, and many people will find themselves on the wrong side of whatever lines are drawn.

Mountbatten explains carefully that he understands he cannot expect to win agreement . Instead he asks for acceptance , which means that the leaders believe the plan to be a fair and sincere attempt to solve the problems, for the good of all. He asks for their goodwill in the attempt to make the plan work. Nehru, for Congress, says he is willing on balance to accept the plan. Jinnah says he must consult further with his working committee.

The meeting then breaks up, to be resumed next day. Mountbatten calls a staff meeting to report progress.

‘Bloody Jinnah,’ he says wearily. ‘I shall have to see him alone.’

The other hold-out is Gandhi, who is due at Viceroy’s House shortly.

‘He’s never going to buy partition,’ says V.P. Menon.

‘He doesn’t have to buy it,’ says Mountbatten. ‘Just so long as he doesn’t speak against it.’

Gandhi comes, and says nothing at all. It turns out that he is observing one of his periodic days of silence. Instead of speaking he scribbles notes on scraps of paper.

I know you don’t want me to break my silence.

Have I said one word against you during my speeches?

No one knows what this means. Mountbatten, incurably optimistic, deeply relieved not to have run into the stone wall that is Gandhi’s conscience, says, ‘He’s letting out rope. He’s giving me some space to try to pull it off.’

Jinnah then returns for his private session. He continues to insist that he can make no decision on his own.

‘Delay now,’ Mountbatten tells him, ‘and Congress will withhold their acceptance of the plan too. Chaos will follow, and you’ll lose your Pakistan.’

‘What must be, must be,’ says Jinnah.

Mountbatten gazes into Jinnah’s implacable eyes.

‘Mr Jinnah,’ he says, ‘this is what I’m going to do. Tomorrow, when we all meet again, I will ask the others formally if they accept the plan. They will say yes. I will then turn to you. I will say that I am satisfied with the assurances you have given me. I require you to say nothing. By that means, if your council so requires, you can deny later that you gave your acceptance. However, I have one condition. When I say, “Mr Jinnah has given me assurances which I have accepted and which satisfy me,” you will not contradict me, and when I look towards you, you will nod your head.’