‘He flew to London the next day and reported at once to that huge, ungainly monstrosity of a building on the corner of Whitehall and Great Scotland Yard which housed the British War Office.
“Bruce, Bruce, Bruce! Come in, come in, man! Good to see you. I followed your testimony at the Nuremberg trials. Nasty bit of business.”
“I am glad it is over,” Sutherland said.
“Sorry to hear about you and Neddie. If there is anything at all I can do…”
Sutherland shook his head.
At last Tevor-Browne led up to the reason for asking him to come to London. “Bruce,” he said, “I called you here because a rather delicate assignment has come up. I must give
a recommendation and I want to put your name up. I wanted to talk it over with you first.”
“Go on, Sir Clarence.”
“Bruce, these Jews escaping from Europe have posed quite a problem. They are simply flooding Palestine. Frankly, the Arabs are getting quite upset about the numbers getting into the mandate. We here have decided to set up detention camps on Cyprus to contain these people-at least as a temporary measure until Whitehall decides what we are going to do with the Palestine mandate.”
“I see,” Sutherland said softly.
Tevor-Browne continued. “This entire thing is touchy and must be handled with great tact. Now, no one wants to ride herd on a bunch of downtrodden refugees, and the fact is … well, they have a great deal of sympathy on their side in high quarters-especially in France and America. Things must be kept very quiet on Cyprus. We want nothing to happen to create unfavorable opinion.”
Sutherland walked to the window and looked out to the Thames River and watched the big double-deck buses drive over the Waterloo Bridge. “I think the whole idea is wretched,” he said.
“It is not for you and me to decide, Bruce. Whitehall gives the orders. We merely carry them out.”
Sutherland continued looking out of the window. “I saw those people at Bergen-Belsen. Must be the same ones who are trying to get into Palestine now.” He returned to his chair. “We have broken one promise after another to those people in Palestine for thirty years.”
“See here, Bruce,” Tevor-Browne said, “you and I see eye to eye on this, but we are in a minority. We both served together in the Middle East. Let me tell you something, man. I sat here at this desk during the war as one report after another of Arab sellouts came in. The Egyptian Chief of Staff selling secrets to the Germans; Cairo all decked out to welcome Rommel as their liberator; the Iraqis going to the Germans; the Syrians going to the Germans; the Mufti of Jerusalem a Nazi agent. I could go on for hours. You must look at Whitehall’s side of this, Bruce. We can’t risk losing our prestige and our hold on the entire Middle East over a few thousand Jews.”
Sutherland sighed. “And this is our most tragic mistake of all, Sir Clarence. We are going to lose the Middle East despite it.”
“You are all wound up, Bruce.”
“There is a right and a wrong, you know.”
General Sir Clarence Tevor-Browne smiled slightly and shook his head sadly. “I have learned very little in my years,
Bruce, but one thing I have learned. Foreign policies of this, or any other, country are not based on right and wrong. Right and wrong? It is not for you and me to argue the right or the wrong of this question. The only kingdom that runs on righteousness is the kingdom of heaven. The kingdoms of the earth run on oil. The Arabs have oil.”
Bruce Sutherland was silent. Then he nodded. “Only the kingdom of heaven runs on righteousness,” he repeated. “The kingdoms of the earth run on oil. You have learned something, Sir Clarence. It seems that all of life itself is Wrapped up in those lines. All of us … people … nations … live by need and not by truth.”
Tevor-Browne leaned forward. “Somewhere in God’s scheme of things he gave us the burden of an empire to rule____”
“Ours not to reason why,” Sutherland whispered. “But I can’t seem to forget the Arab slave markets in Saudi Arabia and the first time I was invited to watch a man have his hands amputated as punishment for stealing, and somehow I can’t forget those Jews at Bergen-Belsen.”
“It is not too good to be a soldier and have a conscience. I won’t force you to take this post on Cyprus.”
“I’ll go. Of course I’ll go. But tell me. Why did you choose me?”
“Most of our chaps are pro-Arab for no other reason than our tradition has been pro-Arab and soldiers are not in a position to do much other than follow policy. I don’t want to send someone to Cyprus who will antagonize these refugees. It is a problem that calls for understanding and compassion.”
Sutherland arose. “I sometimes think,” he said, “that it is almost as much a curse being born an Englishman as it is being born a Jew.”
Sutherland accepted the assignment on Cyprus, but his heart was filled with fear. He wondered if Tevor-Browne had known he was half Jewish.
That decision, that horrible decision he had made so long ago was coming back to haunt him now.
He remembered that afterward he began to find solace in the Bible. There were those empty years with Neddie, the painful loss of the Eurasian girl he loved, and it all seemed to plunge him deeper and deeper into a longing to find peace of mind. How wonderful for a soldier like him to read of the great campaigns of Joshua and Gideon and Joab. And those magnificent women-Ruth and Esther and Sarah … and … and Deborah. Deborah, the Joan of Arc, the liberator of her people.
He remembered the chill as he read the words: Awake, awake, Deborah; awake, awake.
Deborah! That was his mother’s name.
Deborah Davis was a rare and beautiful woman. It was small wonder that Harold Sutherland was smitten with her. The Sutherland family was tolerant when Harold sat through fifteen performances of The Taming of the Shrew to watch the beautiful actress, Deborah Davis, and they smiled benevolently as he went over his allowance on flowers and gifts. It was a boyish fling, they thought, and he’d get over it.
Harold could not get over Deborah Davis, and the family stopped being tolerant. She defied an edict they issued for her to appear at Sutherland Heights. It was then that Harold’s father, Sir Edgar, traveled to London to see this amazing young woman who refused to travel to Sutherland Heights. Deborah was as clever and witty as she was beautiful. She dazzled Sir Edgar and completely won him.
Sir Edgar decided then and there that his son had been damned lucky. After all, the Sutherlands were known to have a tradition of inclining toward actresses and some of them had become the grandest dames in the family’s long history.
There was, of course, the touchy business of Deborah Davis being a Jewess, but the matter was closed when she agreed to take instructions in the Church of England.
Harold and Deborah had three children. There was Mary, their only girl, and there was moody, irresponsible Adam. And there was Bruce. Bruce was the oldest and Deborah’s favorite. The boy adored his mother. But as close as they were she never spoke of her own childhood, or of her parents. He knew only that she had been very poor and run away to the stage.
The years passed. Bruce took up his army career and married Neddie Ashton. The children, Albert and Martha, came. Harold Sutherland died, and Deborah moved along in age.
Bruce remembered so well the day that it happened. He was coming to Sutherland Heights for a long visit and bringing Neddie and the children. Deborah would always be in the rose garden or the conservatory or floating about gaily on her duties-smiling, happy, gracious. But this day as he drove up to Sutherland Heights she was not there to greet him nor was she anywhere about to be found. At last he discovered her sitting in darkness in her drawing room. This was so unlike Mother that it startled him. She was sitting like a statue, looking at the wall, oblivious to her surroundings.