“Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri. Two hundred twenty students.”
“Hardly an international forum, Sarah,” Churchill replied gruffly.
“But, Father, it is Truman’s state, and with him to introduce you, it will become automatically a center of international interest.”
“Really, Sarah, hardly Harvard,” he persisted. “You’ll recall they gave me a degree a couple of years ago.”
She produced the invitation, which was typed on White House stationery with a handwritten postscript from President Truman. She read the president’s scrawled words, as she had done a number of times since the invitation had been received.
“‘This is a very fine old college in my state. I will be there to introduce you.’” She looked pointedly at her father. “Now how can you turn that down, Father?”
They had discussed the invitation at length, and Churchill had asked her to find an atlas. He had always been an inveterate reader of maps, ever since his days as a subaltern in India. He had always carried a map book with him.
Sarah had found one in the library, and both father and daughter studied it carefully. “Father, Fulton is west, actually southwest, of St. Louis, almost a hundred miles or so.”
She had pointed a finger towards Fulton and directed her father’s eyes to the spot.
“What do the Americans say: A hick town? A hick college in a hick town.”
“But with the President introducing you and after your speech, it will never be hick again. Besides, they still love you in America, Father.” She paused. “It is called the Green Lecture, and there is a $4,000 honorarium.”
“Unthinkable!” he said. “To be introduced by the President and accept money? Absolutely not.”
Although he dismissed the suggestion, he had promised to give it some thought, but Sarah had continued to lobby him and now in front of witnesses where he would be more vulnerable.
Churchill chuckled, amused at his daughter’s spirit. She had always been the rebellious child. The two guests were silent as they watched this domestic byplay between father and daughter. He turned to his guests.
“You see? Do you think I can withstand this daughterly bombardment?”
The men shrugged, obviously not wanting to get involved in the dispute.
“Then you’ll accept?” Sarah persisted.
“Have I a choice, daughter?”
“Only one, Father.”
“Well, then….” He paused for effect. “Why not? The old Hussar goes west.” He laughed. “Guns blazing.”
By then the lunch was coming to an end. The men offered their compliments to the cook, and then Churchill asked Sarah to bring him the box of Romeo y Julieta cigars that Herman Upmann had sent him recently. He offered them to his guests who declined. He clipped one, lit the end carefully, and sucked in a deep drag, his face beaming with contentment.
“A cigar, you know, is one of the few vices yet remaining for the advanced in age.”
He looked at the men, smiled, and fell into another long, brooding silence. He found himself recalling Potsdam and Yalta, assessing his own behavior. Had Stalin bested them? Should he have been more forceful, less willing to go along with Franklin at Yalta and Truman at Potsdam. He was fast coming to the opinion that Stalin had won the day at both conferences. He took some deep puffs on his cigar.
“I remember once when I was invited to have a drink with Stalin in Potsdam, I felt it was rude not to match him drink for drink of Russian vodka. After we had drained most of the bottle, and Stalin was questioning me in general terms about our intentions in Greece and our position on Poland as he touted the new ‘liberation’ committee that was running that country, I saw this aide furiously writing down anything and everything that the Russian interpreter reporting my reactions said to Stalin.
“I said to him, ‘Premier Stalin, why the need of taking notes?’ Next afternoon, Uncle Joe walks over to me with his English translator, pushes his pipe into my chest, and amid chuckles, announces, ‘I’ve destroyed the notes and the notes taker.’”
“He sacked the aide, Mr. Churchill?” asked Luddington.
“Oh, yes, literally, General.” Churchill paused for effect. “He had been executed that morning.”
“Not executed?” said the astonished Luddington.
“Oh, yes, a bullet to his head I’m told. I had the sense that he thought I would laugh.” Churchill shook his head and sighed. “This man is a killer. The reports of the Russian offensive last year are appalling: indiscriminate killing, rape, looting. He thought Russians in the lands occupied by the Germans had been brainwashed into the Nazi philosophy. His NKVD troops went on a killing spree targeting Russians and Germans alike. The man is a killer who enjoys killing.”
“Chilling,” Luddington said.
“Way of life, gentlemen. There is an apocryphal story I have heard about some woman from Zagreb who, when informed about my demise as prime minister, proclaimed, ‘Oh, poor Mr. Churchill. I suppose he will now be shot.’”
Churchill chortled and the two men laughed appreciatively.
“This is the way Stalin handles dissent — off with their heads!” Churchill shrugged.
“What did Stalin think of Roosevelt?” Luddington asked.
“He charmed poor Franklin; they really bonded. It was appalling, and yet, he had told others that he thought Roosevelt was merely a rich playboy, soft as butter and easily manipulated.”
“And you, sir?” Luddington let the question hang in the air. “I mean, how did you feel about Roosevelt?”
“You may recall it took me quite a while to get him to act on our behalf.” Churchill shook his head. “Nevertheless,” he continued, “we became good friends in the process. He was a great man, a master politician.”
He grew distant and silent for a long moment.
“God, I miss Franklin; I loved him. England is forever in his debt.”
There was another long pause, and Churchill noted that his two guests eyed him expectantly. He was, he knew, holding court and he reveled in the opportunity, not wishing it to end. He signaled by a nod that he was no longer being reflective and would welcome fresh questions.
“And what of Byrnes, the new Secretary of State? Where does he stand in all this?”
He noted that Luddington was being deliberately vague, but he took “all this” to mean the attitude towards the Soviet Union.
Ah, Churchill thought, British intelligence, for some reason, is probing.
He wanted to ask Luddington if this visit’s pithy fruits would make their way not only to Alex but also to MI6 and perhaps, the Russians. Churchill secretly suspected that Communist moles had invaded MI6.
“Byrnes, yes, Byrnes,” Churchill remembered. “Met him at Potsdam… a southerner with a drawl like honey. Truman calls him ‘Jimmy.’ I’m told he was put out a bit when Roosevelt picked Truman over him for Vice President, an office he had coveted. But then, politics being what it is, Roosevelt chose Truman. Perhaps Roosevelt thought that Truman might be more compliant. Indeed, he kept him at arm’s length.”
He checked himself. Sarah admonished him with a glance. He was rambling a bit.
Back to Byrnes! he rebuked himself.
“Byrnes is no political innocent. He was once the majority leader in the Senate until Roosevelt put him on the Supreme Court. Then Roosevelt made him the ‘Czar’ of war mobilization somewhat like what I had Beaverbrook do for me. Like Max, Byrnes speaks to Truman like a peer with a capital P—without a pretense of subservience. I liked that in Beaverbrook — but in our cabinet the Prime Minister is ‘first among equals.’ Not so in America — the cabinet members are puppets of the President.”
“I hear he’s not pro-Soviet,” said Luddington. “At least, we’ve been reading that in the articles on Byrnes’ trip to Paris where he talked to de Gaulle.”