Anthony Powell - The Military Philosophers

‘Can’t hear all you say, Sunny, in this passage,’ he said. ‘Come into my room just for a moment or two. I’d like a word about Belgian arrangements, so far as they affect us both. I can just fit you in before General Asbjornsen arrives. Don’t keep the Prince waiting, Nicholas.’

‘Why, Nicholas?’ said Farebrother, feigning to recognize me only at that moment. ‘You and I must have a talk, too, about yesterday’s meeting …’

If Farebrother hoped to prolong this interlude with Prince Theodoric by bringing me in, he underrated Finn’s capacity for action. The delaying tactic failed entirely. Finn somehow managed to get behind Farebrother, and, with surprising adroitness, propelled him forward into the room, the door of which was immediately closed.

‘Then I shall hear from you, Colonel Farebrother?’ Theodoric called.

He had shown every sign of being inquisitive about whatever Farebrother had to offer, but now it was clearly too late to go into matters further. He turned and smiled at me a little uncomprehendingly. We set off together in the direction of the front staircase.

‘Your car’s at the main entrance, sir?’

‘Car? Not a bit of it. I walk.’

It seemed wiser not to refer to the party given by Mrs Andriadis more than a dozen years before, where I had in fact first set eyes on Theodoric, but I mentioned my presentation to him when he had been staying with Sir Magnus Donners at Stourwater, and the Walpole-Wilsons had taken me over to luncheon there. According to Pennistone, Mrs Andriadis herself was living in one room in Bloomsbury, drinking and drugging heavily. Later, one heard, she occupied herself with making propaganda for the so-called ‘Second Front’.

‘By Jove, those were the days,’ said Theodoric. ‘We didn’t know how lucky we were. Will you believe me, Captain Jenkins, I had at that time only been shot at twice in my life, on each occasion by certified lunatics? And then, of course, marriage makes one more serious. We have become middle-aged, my dear Captain, we have become middle-aged.’

He sighed.

‘I saw Sir Gavin Walpole-Wilson the other day,’ he went on. ‘Of course he is getting on now, older even than ourselves. We discussed a lot of matters — as you remember, he was formerly your country’s minister plenipotentiary to my own. Now he stands well to the left politically. I have certain leanings that way myself, but not as far as Sir Gavin. One must not remain embedded in the past, but Sir Gavin does not always understand our difficulties and the ruthless methods of a certain Ally. There are plenty of good young men in my country who want to get rid of the Germans. There are also men not equally good there who play another part — not all of them our own countrymen.’

Theodoric spoke with great earnestness. It was clear he considered not only people like Finn and Farebrother, but even those of my own rank worth sweeping in as supporters of whatever policy he represented.

‘In knowing Sir Magnus Donners,’ he said, ‘I am particularly fortunate. He is personally conversant with our industrial problems, also — perhaps I should not say this — has the ear of a Very Important Person. If something is to be done, Sir Magnus is the man to do it. I need not tell you that I have had more than one long and interesting talk with him. He says we must wait.’

Theodoric stopped on the way down the marble stairs, where the flights divided, left and right, under the elaborately gilded wall-clock and bronze bust of Kitchener. His tone suggested my views on the matter were scarcely less important than those of Sir Magnus. In terms of propaganda, that was an effective technique. The persuasiveness of the Prince was something to be reckoned with. This characteristic could have direct bearing on the fate of his country.

‘I shall continue to put our case,’ he said.

By now he had reached the great hall. Vavassor, the porter, an attendant spirit of some importance in the Section’s background, was standing by the door. It was commonly Vavassor’s duty to give warning to Finn of the arrival of callers belonging to the higher echelons, some of whom were capable of turning up without previous appointment, and demanding an interview on the spot. Vavassor could hold them in check; in extreme cases, turn them away. He was also, in this office of guarding the door, a key figure in the lives of Pennistone and myself, on account of frequent association with Allied comings and goings, raising no difficulties about our using the main entrance — superstitiously, though uncategorically, apprehended as prerogative of officers of the rank of brigadier and above — when we arrived for duty in the morning. This not only saved several yards of pavement, but, more important, meant avoidance of the teeming mob at the staff entrance. It was a good opening to the day’s work. Vavassor saluted Theodoric.

‘No fire?’ said the Prince.

‘Don’t let us have any coal when the weather’s short of freezing,’ said Vavassor. ‘That grate takes the best part of a hundredweight a day, it’s the truth. Wasn’t made for rationing.’

He pointed to the huge fireplace. One supposed that at a certain level of rank — say, lieutenant-general — he called officers ‘sir’, though I had never heard him do so. In any case it was a formality he always considered inappropriate for foreigners, royal or otherwise.

‘When I wait to be summoned by Colonel Finn and warm myself beside the fire,’ said Theodoric, ‘I always feel like St Peter.’

‘I hope you won’t cut off any ears, sir, when delay has been intolerably long.’

‘How reassuring, Captain Jenkins, that your General Staff are brought up on the Scriptures. They are the foundation of knowledge. Now I must say goodbye. Tell Colonel Finn I will check the figures I gave him — persuade him, something I think he is rather nervous about, that I will not involve him in any matter of which he might disapprove.’

Theodoric laughed. He had evidently summed up Finn correctly. I remembered Sillery (who had recently written a long letter to The Times in praise of Stalin’s declared war aims) speaking of the shrewdness Theodoric inherited from ‘that touch of Coburg blood’, adding with characteristic malice, ‘though I suppose one should not hint at that.’ I saw the Prince down the steps. He waved his hand, and set off at a sharp pace in the direction of Trafalgar Square. I returned under the high portal.

‘Prince, is he?’ asked Vavassor. ‘That’s what he calls himself when he arrives.’

‘That’s what he is.’

‘Allied or Neutral?’

‘So far as he himself is concerned, Allied.’

‘See ’em all down here if you wait long enough.’

‘I bet you do.’

‘I suppose some of ’em help to win the war.*

‘Let’s hope so.’

‘Not too good in the Far East at the moment of speaking.’

‘Ever serve there?’

‘Eight years to a day.’

‘Things may pick up.’

‘I worry too much,’ said Vavassor. ‘Shakespeare’s dying words.’

His attention, my own too, was at that moment unequivocally demanded by the hurricane-like imminence of a thickset general, obviously of high rank, wearing enormous horn-rimmed spectacles. He had just burst from a flagged staff-car almost before it had drawn up by the kerb.

Now he tore up the steps of the building at the charge, exploding through the inner door into the hall. An extraordinary current of physical energy, almost of electricity, suddenly pervaded the place. I could feel it stabbing through me. This was the CIGS. His quite remarkable and palpable extension of personality, in its effect on others, I had noticed not long before, out in the open. Coming down Sackville Street, I had all at once been made aware of something that required attention on the far pavement and saw him pounding along. I saluted at admittedly longish range. The salute was returned. Turning my head to watch his progress, I then had proof of being not alone in acting as a kind of receiving-station for such rays — which had, morally speaking, been observable, on his appointment to the top post, down as low as platoon commander. On this Sackville Street occasion, an officer a hundred yards or more ahead, had his nose glued to the window of a bookshop. As the CIGS passed (whom he might well have missed in his concentration on the contents of the window), this officer suddenly swivelled a complete about-turn, saluting too. No doubt he had seen the reflection in the plate glass. All the same, in its own particular genre, the incident gave the outward appearance of exceptional magnetic impact. That some such impact existed, was confirmed by this closer conjunction in the great hall. Vavassor, momentarily overawed — there could be no doubt of it — came to attention and saluted with much more empressement than usual. Having no cap, I merely came to attention. The CIGS glanced for a split second, as if summarizing all the facts of one’s life.