Читать книгу Winston’s War - Michael Dobbs - Страница 11

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.

‘You are …’ – the Minister paused for thought, but already it was past thought, too late for anything other than gut emotion – ‘being ridiculous, woman. Hysterical. A disgrace to your sex.’

‘Only a man could be so stupid.’

‘Ask anyone. Neville is the greatest Englishman who ever lived.’

‘He makes me ashamed to be British.’

‘You dare talk of shame!’

‘Meaning?’

‘God’s sake, aren’t you tired of climbing into Winston’s bed?’

‘He might yet save us all.’

‘What? The man who’s killed off more careers than Caligula. Who’s filled the graveyards of Gallipoli.’

‘He’s a prophet –’

‘Nigger in a woodpile with a box of matches.’

‘… pointing to our mortal peril.’

‘All the more damned reason for doing a deal with Hitler, then.’

‘You’d deal with the Devil.’

‘I support my Prime Minister. Loyalty to my own. Something you wouldn’t recognize.’

‘I recognize naked cowardice.’

‘I resent that, madam. I oppose your silly war because it will destroy civilization.’

‘War against Hitler may be the only way to save civilization!’

‘Madness. Pure madness. Are you Jewish, or what?’

And all that from colleagues who sat on the same Conservative benches.

It had started with laughter and gaiety and one of Beaverbrook’s little jokes. (He had a notorious sense of humour – some argued that it had been developed to compensate for his notoriously absent sense of fidelity.) He had given specific instructions about the making of the guy that was to be burnt on the fire and it had arrived with some pomp, seated on an old wooden chair decorated with flowers from the hothouse and pushed in a wheelbarrow by a groundsman. The guy was large and overstuffed, as all good guys should be, bits of straw and paper sticking out from an old woollen three-piece suit that had been plundered from the back of a wardrobe for the occasion. Particular attention had been given to the face, which was round, bald, with a scowling expression and an open slit for a mouth. The arms were spread, as though making a speech. The guests who were crowding about Beaverbrook in the darkness applauded its entrance and drew closer to inspect.

‘So, whaddya think of the villain of the piece, Sam?’ The question was delivered in Beaverbrook’s characteristic style, with a broad Canadian accent and out of the corner of his mouth.

Sam Hoare, the Home Secretary and one of the four most powerful men in Government, studied it carefully, his wife by his side.

‘Guy Fawkes tried to blow up every politician in the land. No wonder they remember him, Max.’

Laughter rippled through the guests. They included diplomats and entertainers as well as politicians and press, all gathered around a charcoal brazier for comfort while they waited for the ceremonial lighting of the large bonfire.

‘Fawkes was a foreigner, of course. Spanish,’ someone added from the darkness.

‘Hey, ain’t nothing wrong with foreigners,’ Beaverbrook insisted in a theatrical hokey twang.

‘Just so long as we can ignore most of them, eh, Max,’ Hoare added.

‘But we can’t ignore them, Sam, that’s the whole point.’

The Home Secretary turned, a shade wearily. Even in the darkness he’d recognized the unmistakable trill of Katharine, the Duchess of Atholl and Member of Parliament for the seat of Kinross and West Perthshire. What was the point? He didn’t want any points, not now, he was trying to enjoy himself. For pity’s sake, they all had points, all passionately held and honed to a razor’s edge, but surely this wasn’t the time or the place. Not here. So the Duchess was a long-standing opponent of the Prime Minister and appeasement, they all knew that, an opponent so venomous she had earned herself the nickname of ‘Red Kitty’. She paraded her conscience everywhere, rehearsed her arguments a thousand times before breakfast and again over lunch until her intransigence had pushed her to the furthest limits of the party and, in truth, almost beyond. But Sam Hoare was a party man, loyalty first, and wasn’t going to allow her to forget it.

‘Kitty,’ he hailed his colleague, ‘didn’t see you there in the darkness. About time you came back into the light and enjoyed yourself with the rest of us, isn’t it?’

Kitty Atholl bristled. ‘Enjoyment? Is that what it’s supposed to be about, Sam? Is that why we gave Czechoslovakia away? For fun?’

‘Let’s not trespass on Max’s hospitality …’

‘Don’t mind me, Sam,’ the Beaver interjected. ‘Always encourage a healthy disagreement. Except amongst my employees, of course.’

And so it had begun. A discussion that became a debate that transformed into a character-ripping confrontation in the middle of a moonlit field and in a manner that had been matched across the land for weeks, and yet still showed no signs of exhausting itself. As they faced up to each other a squad of Boy Scouts ran around with jugs of mulled wine to top up the fuel tanks.

‘Hey, how about a toast to the guy?’

‘And death to Ribbentrop. May he die in pain.’

‘You callous witch.’

‘I’m not the one with my head buried in my red box desperately trying to ignore everything that’s happening in Europe.’

‘There you go again, fussing about Hitler. Fellow’s only digging over his own back yard.’

‘Digging graves.’

‘He’s cleaning up Germany, that’s all. He may be a dictator, but he’s also a bit of a Puritan. Like Cromwell.’

‘Cromwell didn’t slaughter Jews!’

‘For God’s sake, listening to you you’d think that pogroms started yesterday. It’s the history of Europe, woman, centuries old.’

‘Where’s your sense of justice, Sam?’

‘Kitty, we all have our consciences. But only you dine out on it.’

‘Put yours away in the closet, have you? All wrapped up in tissue paper?’

‘Any fool can go to war. And right now, only a fool would go to war.’

‘Conquest. Bloodshed. That’s what you’ll get with Hitler.’

‘Bugger it, Kitty, it’s how we won the Empire.’

‘And cowardice is how it’ll be thrown away!’

Gradually it had just become the two of them. Others fell by the wayside until it was just Sam Hoare and Red Kitty, and he had accused her of being weak-minded and a xenophobe and every other calumny that came to hand. It had gone too far. Neither could find the words to stop it and their host refused to intervene – hell, he was enjoying the game, every minute of it, one arm waving a huge cigar, the other arm linked through that of Joe Kennedy, another spectator who had stepped out of the fight several insults earlier. Beside them, out of the darkness, appeared the rotund form of Joseph Ball. Hoare saw him, and even though he was Home Secretary, feared him a little. It gave him his cue.

‘Loyalty. That’s what this is really all about,’ Hoare offered, trying to find a way out of the confrontation with a final jibe. ‘You go sleep with your strange friends but I’m a party man, Kitty. Always been a party man. And I’ll die a party man.’

Her lip twisted in mockery. ‘Dying for your principles, that I can understand, Sam. But to die for your party?’

She reached sharply towards him. He swayed back in apprehension, alarm flooding his eyes, afraid she was intent on slapping his face, but she did nothing more than grab the umbrella that was dangling over his arm. With her trophy she walked over to the stuffed guy, stared at it as though it might spring to life, then thrust the umbrella beneath its armpit and with a final glance of dark-eyed derision swept away into the night. Hoare was left standing on his own, suddenly isolated, feeling like an abandoned bicycle.

A gust of English embarrassment blew around the ankles of the onlookers until Beaverbrook was once again centre-stage, demanding their attention, strutting theatrically over to the guy as though on a tour of inspection. He was ridiculously small with a face that would not have been distinguished even on a gnome, but his money more than made up for it. A Napoleon in newsprint and an astrakhan collar. ‘So – what do we have here?’ he demanded. ‘Munich Man, eh? Not quite what I had in mind.’ He retrieved the umbrella and used it to prod the guy. ‘Whaddya think?’ he addressed the gathering. ‘Who is he? Had him made specially, so don’t disappoint me.’

‘A clue, Maxie darling, give us a clue,’ a giggling voice pleaded.

‘OK. So he’s a little like Guy Fawkes, maybe. Someone who tries to blow up everything in sight. Over-stuffed. Over-blown. Come on, any ideas?’

A brief silence from the crowd and then: ‘Mussolini. It’s got to be Mussolini!’

‘Signor Mussolini to you,’ Beaverbrook growled. ‘Hell, he hears that and he’ll confiscate my villa in Tuscany. No, not Pasta Man. Another guess.’

A woman’s voice: ‘With a stomach like that it’s got to be Hermann Goering.’

‘No, no, no. And if you’re listening up there, Hoyman’ – Beaverbrook swapped his Canadian brogue for a thick Brooklyn accent and raised his eyes to the dark skies – ‘we loves ya!’

Amidst the bubbling of laughter other names were thrown in – Hore-Belisha, Herbert Hoover, Generalissimo Franco, even Wallis Simpson (‘It’s got to be her with the mouth open like that …’) – but Beaverbrook continued stubbornly shaking his head until: ‘Give us another clue, Maxie. Don’t be such a tease.’

The diminutive press baron waved his hands for silence, the gleam of mischief in his eye. ‘One more clue, then,’ he conceded. Taking the large cigar from his own mouth, he inserted it into the slit in the face of the guy, where it remained gently smouldering. ‘I give you …’

‘Cigar Man. It’s Cigar Man! Oh, Maxie darling, you’re so wicked!’

They cheered Beaverbrook from all sides. Only one or two of those present drifted off into the night, declining to be carried along on the tide.

The smell of sausage and singeing onion that wafted on the breezes of that night had proved irresistible, and the canvas awning erected by the Boy Scouts as a hospitality area was crowded. Brendan Bracken had lingered on the edge for some time, fighting the urge to join their number. He was hungry but it was a question of image and image to Bracken was most of what he had. A workman could eat sausages in public, so could an earl or an actress, but an Irish impostor had to be careful of such glancing blows to his reputation. The English insisted that things be in their rightful place, and the place for a would-be statesman who wanted to be taken so terribly seriously was not on his own in a sausage queue. He imagined them all talking about him – but he always imagined people talking about him, dreamt of it, insisted on it, for to be ignored would be the biggest humiliation of all. But not about sausages. So he fought his hunger, feeling weaker with each passing minute, twisted inside by childhood memories of the kitchens of Tipperary until, despite his reservations, he could resist his cravings no longer. He grabbed a sausage and bun with all the fillings and wandered a little way from the other guests to enjoy in solitude the sensation of simply stuffing himself. That, he knew, was where the danger lay. These bangers-in-a-bun were impossible to eat delicately, you had to wolf them down before they turned on you and attacked, dripping grease and ghastliness everywhere. Bracken was notoriously fastidious, a desperate hypochondriac who took meticulous care over his appearance, washing his hands many times a day. This public encounter with a sausage was definitely a one-off, so he prepared himself. He found a spot where he could turn his back on the crowd, place his feet carefully in the sticky grass for security, lean gently forward and –

‘Why, is that Mr Bracken hiding over there?’

The sausage turned into a missile, disappearing into the night, leaving the bun limp in his hands and a trail of grease spreading across the front of his starched white shirt. His bow tie drooped in despair.

‘You told me you’d call, Mr Bracken,’ Anna Fitzgerald said accusingly, ignoring his plight – no, enjoying it! Bracken’s arms were spread in dismay, his hair tumbled over his forehead as though trying to get a look for itself at the devastation. ‘You offered to show me round London, but you never called,’ she continued.

‘I … I … I’ve …’ Words suddenly deserted him as he tried to comprehend the mess of slime that was creeping across his chest. His brain and his tongue, usually so sharp and active, had seemingly dived for cover. All he could do was to gaze at her through pebble-thick glasses with the expression of a chastened child.

‘You don’t like Americans?’

‘No, no, please …’

‘Married or something?’

‘No, of course not …’

‘You’ve got a jealous girlfriend?’

‘Nothing like that.’

Good, she’d got that sorted. She approached much closer; he noticed she had a small dog in tow, a russet-and-white King Charles spaniel trailing from a lead. ‘I know, you’re an important man. Very busy. Lots of distractions …’

She had taken the linen handkerchief from his top pocket and was beginning a clean-up operation on his shirt, gently wiping away the mess, taking control. ‘The truth is, Mr Bracken, you’re just a little clumsy. And rather shy.’

Anna Fitzgerald was petite, slim, almost boyish, dressed in a dark leather airman’s jacket that was a couple of sizes too large for her, and boots up to her knees. She was dressed so much more sensibly than he. The cold, damp grass beneath his feet was turning to mud and already laying siege to his hand-tooled leather town shoes, yet it no longer seemed to matter. She possessed the purest black hair he had ever seen. Her eyes danced and shimmered in the light of a thousand candles. She was different – so very different from other women he had ever met. It had taken her only a few moments to break down the defences of a lifetime and now no one else at this gathering seemed to matter. He wanted the grease stain to last for ever.

‘Busy – yes. I have been busy.’ At last he had regained some measure of composure, his brain in contact once more with his tongue. Other parts of his anatomy seemed to be gaining a life all their own, too. ‘Winston’s been making speeches, keeping me running around …’

‘So no time to show a dumb American around town.’

‘Well, it wasn’t just that – I mean, not that at all …’ Bracken began to stammer; bugger, he was making a mess of this. He was almost relieved when she was distracted by the spaniel – whose name turned out to be Chumpers. He had found something in the grass – Bracken’s sausage – and was giving it his undivided attention. ‘I was worried that your uncle the Ambassador, and Winston, they – how should I put this?’

‘Send smoke signals from opposite sides of the blanket?’

‘Exactly. Both very passionate people. I thought it might be difficult.’

‘You find passion difficult, Mr Bracken?’

‘I meant that it might be awkward – for you – if I were, you know, to invite you out. Mixing with the enemy.’

‘I’m not so sure about English girls but in Massachusetts they raise us with minds all of our own.’

‘Ah.’

‘So is it Mr Churchill who would object if you called me? He owns your social loyalties as well as your political loyalties?’

‘Of course not!’ he protested, before suddenly it dawned on him that this was probably a lie. ‘There was also the thought – well, I am considerably older than you. About fifteen years.’

‘Why, glory be, Mr Bracken, you are a very ol’-fashioned gen’leman,’ she whispered in a voice that reeked of Dixie and seduction on the verandah. She was mocking him, but gently. Her hand was back on his chest, adding improvements to the clean-up operation.

‘Not at all. It’s just that –’ He stopped. Came to a complete halt. No point in continuing. A flush had appeared upon his face that came close to matching the colour of his ridiculous hair and he had an expression that suggested he might be passing kidney stones. ‘I’m making a complete mess of this.’

‘For the first time this evening, Brendan, I’m inclined to agree with you. So let me simplify things for you. Would you like to see me again? Take me to dinner? Show me the sights of London? Play canasta, or whatever it is genteel English folk do?’

‘Of course I would.’

‘And you know how to use a phone?’

He began to laugh.

‘Hey, Brendan, looks like you’re in business.’

She held up his grubby handkerchief and dropped it into the palm of his outstretched hand. ‘Bombs away,’ she whispered. Then she walked off, dragging the reluctant Chumpers behind her.

It was a night not simply of entertainment but also of encounter and intrigue – just as Beaverbrook had required. He couldn’t plan such things, of course, but he understood human nature and knew that the inevitable outcome of mixing alcohol and ego was information. And in his world, information was power.

As he turned to mingle with other guests, he found himself pursued. A woman, tugging in agitation at his sleeve. Lady Maud Hoare, wife of Sir Sam.

‘Maxwell, dear Maxwell …’

Whoa, no one called him Maxwell. The girl was nervous.

‘I’m so sorry. I hope it didn’t cause a scene,’ Maud spluttered.

Of course it caused a scene. A splendid one. As Joe Kennedy had just remarked to him, good parties were like battles. They required casualties.

‘It’s just that Sam is so passionate,’ she continued. ‘You know that, being such good friends …’

Friends? Well, scarcely. Friendship wasn’t the sort of game played between politician and press man.

‘Like you, he’s so loyal to the cause.’

Ah, the cause. The great cause to which he had devoted so many of his front pages in recent weeks. The cause of winning! Winning was everything and Chamberlain had won, for the moment, at least. There was to be peace. It had to be so, the advertisers in the Express insisted on it. They wanted a world in which everyone had a little fun and spent a little money, not a world in which every last penny was buried in war bonds or pots at the end of the garden. So far Chamberlain had proved a good bet.

‘And Sam’s under such a lot of pressure …’

‘Pressure? What sort of pressure?’ Beaverbrook’s news instincts were suddenly alert. He laid a comforting hand on her sleeve.

‘He’d never complain, of course, not the type. But, oh, Maxwell, the poor man’s so torn.’

‘Torn?’

‘He’s a good man, a great man …’

Perhaps one day the main man, too. The man to take over the reins. Beaverbrook had a sharp eye for the runners and riders, and Slippery Sam was a man with prospects. In Beaverbrook’s judgement Hoare was a man to watch, a man to be – well, all right, to be friends with.

‘You know what it’s like, Maxwell, so many demands on your time, your energies, your … money.’

Ah, so there it is. The girl had shown her slip.

‘He’s not a man of inherited wealth like Neville or Edward Halifax. He can’t simply run off on grand lecture tours and sell himself like Winston does.’ She made it sound worse than pimping. ‘Sam has to struggle by on nothing more than his Cabinet salary. And it is a struggle, Maxwell.’

What – five thousand a year? A struggle for him, maybe, but a fortune for most.

‘You know Neville couldn’t have done what he’s done without Sam’s unfailing support – you know that, don’t you, Maxwell?’

‘Most certainly,’ he lied.

‘But it’s slowly wearing him down, and I’ve been crying myself to sleep worrying about him.’

‘We can’t have that, Maudy.’

‘Oh, at times I get quite desperate, watching him sacrifice himself. For others. Always for others.’ Her voice had fallen to a whisper, but it was soon to recover. ‘I scarcely know what to do. These are such terribly difficult times.’

How well she had rehearsed it. How easily the lip quivered, the manicured fingers clutched, how readily the nervous sentiments emerged and presented themselves in regimented line.

‘So I was wondering …’

Here it comes.

‘Maxwell, is there any way you can think of that might just – take the pressure off him? Allow him to get on with that great job of his?’

If you were a few years younger, maybe, Maudy, old dear, and not so hideously ugly …

‘I’m a woman, I barely understand these things, while you, Maxwell, are not only a friend but such a wise man.’

Oh, Maudy, you think flattery is the way past my defences? When I am surrounded every day by lapdogs whom I pay to fawn and fumble at every moment in my presence? But present me with a business proposition, that’s another matter entirely. Show me a man who is Home Secretary – one of the most powerful men in the land, the keeper of secrets, the charmer of snakes, the guardian of reputations high and low, a man who has a reasonable chance one day of being placed in charge of the entire crap game – show this man to me and place him in my debt. How much would that be worth? As a business proposition – and fuck the friendship?

‘Two thousand.’

‘I beg your pardon, Maxwell.’

‘Two thousand a year, Maud. Do you think that might help? We can’t have him being distracted, having to work through his worries.’

‘No, of course not, you’re so right.’

‘If I can help him, Maud, be a damned privilege. Ease those worries. Make sure my newspapers are behind him, too – hell, make sure Sam and I are working on the same team, for each other.’

‘And the cause.’ She was breathless now, red in cheek, like a young girl who had just been ravished and loved every second of it.

‘An entirely private matter, you understand. No one must know apart from you and me, Maud. And Sam, of course. Wouldn’t want the muck media to get hold of it.’

‘Of course, of course … I scarcely know what to say, Maxwell. “Thank you” sounds so inadequate.’

‘No, I thank you, Maud. Sam’s a great man. I’m glad to be of some service. Send him to me. We’ll sort out the details, man to man.’ Yes, send him on bended knee, Maudy, and get him used to the position.

Others were approaching. The moment was over, the business done. He had bought a Home Secretary for less than the price of his new car.

‘Be in touch, Maud.’

‘Oh, we shall, we shall,’ she breathed as she wafted into the night.

‘And who was that?’ his new companion enquired, staring after the retreating woman. His voice was deep, carefully modulated, like that of a bishop.

‘A Hoare,’ Beaverbrook muttered.

‘Oh.’

‘But a whore on my White List. For now.’

‘Ah.’ Tom Driberg sucked his teeth. A tall, dark-complexioned figure in his mid-thirties with receding hair that wrinkled in the manner of a studious maharajah, Driberg was one of the many paid by Beaverbrook to ‘fawn and fumble’. To the outside world he was known as William Hickey, the highest-paid gossip columnist in the country, and Driberg was very good at gossip – good at both recording and creating it – although the rules by which he was required to document the misadventures and general muck-ups of the society set were far tighter than those by which he himself chose to live. One of the strictest rules governing the way in which he worked was that he should never, never, antagonize his publisher, and the White List contained the names of Beaverbrook’s intimates who were deemed to be beyond bounds and who would never find their way into the William Hickey column without the copy first being scrutinized by the press lord himself. Gossip was a powerful political currency, and both Beaverbrook and Driberg were keepers of the keys.

‘Busy evening?’ Beaverbrook enquired, almost casually, reminding the other man that he was here to work.

‘A Minister who appears to be canvassing for the support of a young lady who – how can one put such things delicately? – won’t be old enough to vote for several years yet.’

‘Looking to the future, eh? Damn fine slogan.’

‘And an actress who has just spent the last twenty minutes rehearsing the role of Cleopatra in the back of her car. A magnificent performance, all moans and misted windows. I damned nearly froze waiting for her to take her bow. Then she steps out with her husband. It beggars belief.’

‘What is the world coming to?’

‘But the night is young.’

‘Yeah. Which reminds me. Keep your hands off the Boy Scouts. None of your nancy nonsense here. My house is off limits. Understand?’

‘I shall protect your honour down to my last item of underwear, Your Lordship.’

‘Fuck off.’

‘With the greatest pleasure.’

‘Oh, and look out for Duffie Cooper. He’s here tonight, I don’t suppose with his wife. He no longer makes the White List.’

‘Good. He was once very rude to me when I asked him about a certain Austrian lady with whom he was seen breakfasting on four consecutive days in Biarritz. It only goes to remind one, sir. Always be nice to them when you’re coming, because you’re bound to meet them again in the morning, that’s what I always say.’

‘You’re full of crap.’

And much, much more. Or would be later. He’d just met this amazing young producer from the BBC.

The climax of the night was drawing near. The guy had been sent in procession around the guests, still with the cigar in its mouth – someone had even sacrificed a homburg to complete the effect – and had now been wheeled to the base of the bonfire, where the groundsman and two young assistants used a ladder to place it at the very top of the pyre. Soon it would be ablaze.

‘Fine, fine party, Max.’ Joseph Ball congratulated his host and took his arm in a manner that gave clear signals to those around them that the two men intended to talk business – alone.

‘You’re not drinking that pond water, are you, Joey?’ Beaverbrook growled, examining Ball’s glass of mulled wine as though expecting to find tadpoles. ‘Here.’ He produced a large hip flask filled with an exceedingly fine single malt. In return, Ball offered him an Havana.

‘Max, old friend, the pleasure of your hospitality never dims. And quite a show you’ve put on for us this evening already.’

‘You mean Sam and Kitty? Sam’s a fine chap, damned fine chap, but Kitty …’

‘Yes, dear Kitty. Not a chap at all. Perhaps that’s the root of her problem. Frayed nerves. Mental feebleness. You know, women of a certain age. You saw her tonight: she’s lost control, a gnat’s wing away from hysterical. Apparently it runs in her family. They say there may be money troubles, too.’

‘That so? I’ll be damned.’ Beaverbrook reclaimed his flask and refreshed himself, all the while never taking his eyes from his guest. Ball was up to his old tricks, putting ferrets down holes and flushing out a few reputations. He’d turned ruination into an art form. ‘So what are you going to do, Joey? You’ve already taken the party whip from her, not much more to threaten her with, is there?’

‘Max, we’d never dream of threatening her. You know me better than that. But as for what others might do …’ – he paused to take a long pull at the cigar and fill the air around them with smoke and mystery – ‘I hear on the grapevine that her constituency party is positively rattling with resentment at her disloyalty. Applies to all the rebels, really. In the next couple of weeks most of them are going to come under a deal of pressure to start toeing the line, or else.’

‘Else what?’

‘There’s the whiff of an election in the air – next year, maybe. Time for the party to wipe its boots clean.’

‘Throw ’em out?’

‘Their constituencies might well decide they’d had enough.’

‘Bent over the old ballot box and buggered? I like it.’

‘Only one small problem …’

‘Tell your Uncle Max.’

‘The constituencies don’t know about this yet.’

‘You sly bastard.’ It was offered, and accepted, as a commendation.

‘Look, you remember that little group of letter-writers you set up at the time of the Abdication nonsense?’

‘The journalists I got to write poison-pen letters to the King’s bitch?’

‘Exactly. It never leaked.’

‘Was never going to leak. I told ’em if one whisper of that got out, none of ’em was ever going to work in Fleet Street again. It’s one of the benefits of being an authentic Canadian bastard like me – I get loyalty, Joey. I always get loyalty.’

‘So what I had in mind was this. Another loyal little group who’ll write letters to the main people in Kitty’s local association. You know, complaints about her unreliability, saying they’ll never vote Conservative again while she’s the candidate, time for the party to move on. Talk about her age, her feebleness, imply she’s been shagging Stalin. That sort of stuff. See if we can’t push her out before the voters do. Have a new candidate in place before the next election.’

‘Same thing for some of the others?’

‘All of the others, Max. Everyone who was against Neville over Munich. It’s not a time for half measures.’

Beaverbrook nodded in the direction of the guy. ‘Winston too?’

‘Everyone. Most will survive, of course, but it’ll shake them. Keep their heads down until after the election. Make them realize there’s no such thing as a free shot at Neville. But Kitty’s a special case, she’s too near the edge. One shove and she’ll be over. A few screams, the flapping of petticoats, a bit of blood. Something that will motivate the others.’

A broad smile almost cut Beaverbrook’s face in two. ‘You want things stirring up a little? My pleasure.’

‘I shall be in your debt.’

‘Hey, don’t you just love democracy?’

As they conferred, other guests kept their distance, the hunched shoulders and conspiratorial tones of the two serving as a warning unmistakable to any but the most insensitive – or young.

‘Let’s go, Maxie, we’re all waiting,’ a young woman called out, stamping her feet impatiently against the cold. ‘Time to set the night on fire.’

The base of the bonfire had been well soaked in paraffin and tar, and the groundsman was standing by with a burning torch.

‘Come on, darling Maxie,’ she complained again, tugging at the fox-fur stole around her neck. It looked new.

‘Time for some action,’ Beaverbrook muttered. He grabbed the torch, raised it high above his head to the applause of his guests, then thrust it deep into the innards of the bonfire. Soon the flames began to conquer the night and Cigar Man from his lofty throne began to cringe in the heat and turn black, squirming as the flames took hold until finally he slumped forward and disappeared in a storm of sparks. The young woman squealed with delight.

‘Bit young even by your standards, isn’t she, Max?’ Ball chided.

‘Hell, Joey, I’m simply growing nostalgic. I once knew her mother.’

Later that week, much of Europe burned, too.

It was called Kristallnacht – Crystal Night – named after the millions of shards of glass that were left shattered in the street after Jewish shops throughout Germany and Austria were ransacked. Businesses and homes were plundered, the synagogues put to the flame. Ninety-three Jews were killed that night. In the ensuing weeks thousands more were to take their own lives. It was to be but a small down-payment on what was to come.