Constantinople was our greatest single prize of the War. Had we kept her all our sacrifices would have been worthwhile. We should have experienced a tremendous revival of idealistic Christianity; a fresh awakening of the Russian spirit would have swept Bolshevism away. Throughout the War the Allies promised us the return of Tsargrad, our Emperor City, our Byzantium, seat of the Orthodox Church. The British were too weak. Rather than reclaim Constantinople for Christ and risk offending Catholic Europe they meekly returned the city to Mohamet. The Turks themselves were astonished. And in the end, of course, the Jew benefited most. The best possible climate for the speculator is a climate of uncertainty. To produce that climate you attack old, honest ideas, accepted habits of morality and scientific examination. Marx, Freud and Einstein did that much better: they invented new languages and prepared the way for their merchant co-religionists just as British missionaries in China prepared the way for opium-traders. By promiscuous questioning of the eternal verities they make our children seek bewilderedly for fresh intellectual and moral security. While we are confused, their legions fall upon our harvest. I know these Jews. I speak their tongue. They put a piece of metal in my stomach. They robbed me of everything. I blame my father. My mother was too kind. I will have nothing to do with old harpies who pick over my stock like carrion flapping on the body of the lamb. They receive short shrift from me. I would rather give my time to the wandering descendants of those Egyptians who refused shelter to the Virgin and Child. At least the gypsies are Christians now. As for the Turks, I say the same thing: Çok ufak or Çok büyüt and make them go away. I do not want their cash. I am not a Jew. It is a matter of derkenen. I am not a fool. I have made my mistakes. I do not deny it. O wieku, tys wiosna, czlowieka! Na lobie ziarno przyszlosci on sieje, Twoim on ogniem reszte wieku zyje! as the Poles say. I am not afraid of the fremder or the frestl. I live with them. I have lived with them for years. To be familiar with something is not to be the same as it. That is why I get so angry if mistaken for a Jew. Is a health inspector the bacteria he examines? The city-builders must be forever vigilant against the greedy nomad. It is not always wise to build convenient roads through the walls.
From the first I was suspicious. The Westway could bring no benefits to us. I had my own ideas for our district: a marvellous North Kensington; a model for the rest of London. Most West Indians and Asians were to be moved to Brixton or back to countries where they would be more comfortable. A greatly reduced population would have assisted the creation of a garden suburb more beautiful than Hampstead. It would have raised the value of property and attracted a better class of person. I sent a detailed plan to the Council. I received a letter back from a Knight of the Realm. My ideas were stimulating and he would bring them to the attention of his colleagues. But the socialists silenced him, for I heard no more. He was not re-elected, which speaks for itself. Mrs Cornelius thought my ideas ‘bloody marvellous’ but she was nervous about an increase in the local taxes. One had to pay for perfection, I said. That was my last attempt to help my adopted country. Throughout the War I made all kinds of offers to the authorities. I described my gigantic bombing aeroplanes, my rocket-propelled bombs, my Violet Ray. In the meantime I saw some of my ideas taken up. But I received no credit. Barnes Wallace, that appalling charlatan, my antagonist from the thirties, claimed my ideas as his own. Anyone who spoke to me in 1940 and later saw The Dambusters will know what I mean. This stealing is taken for granted in scientific circles. No wonder Mr Thompson warned me to patent my ideas. Look at that thief Sikorski’s reputation since he left Russia! My plans are all secure at last. Whoever inherits them will benefit and so my memory will eventually be honoured. The British Government is the loser. The Patent Office cannot be trusted. The last letter I had was from someone called Yudkin. I learned my lesson a little too late. I did not learn it in Russia. I had not learned it by the time I reached Constantinople. God knows how many millions of my rightful pounds have gone into other pockets. Then, however, I was not thinking of my own interest. I was still too impressed by the epic nature of my journey. A Russian who visits Constantinople and the great cathedral of Hagia Sophia as a matter of course makes a pilgrimage. Hagia Sophia is at once the greatest symbol of our slavery and our ultimate redemption. Though not very religious in those days I was still a patriot.
The Russians fully appreciated how bravely Britons had fought the Turk. You lost enormous numbers at Gallipoli. You died in Mesopotamian deserts. You rode against Mecca itself under Lawrence of Arabia. We thought you felt as strongly as we did. We thought Constantinople would be safe in your hands until we were ready to take it over. We knew what bonds of brotherhood existed between Greece and England. But that which was powerful idealism in us was, it emerged, only sentimentality in a nation of shopkeepers. We put too much faith in British determination to resist Italian and French ambitions. These Roman Catholics had no wish to see the true centre of Christianity liberated. British blood had won the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara, the Bosphorus. The British had conquered half Asia, swept back the descendants of the Mongol and the Hun, brought Christianity to the unenlightened, raised up churches in the Himalayas and the jungles of Burma, enforced the Reign of Justice, contained the barbaric spread of the yellow races. Who better to entrust with our birthright? I can understand and forgive them their betrayal. But can God? He only forgives them that confess their sins. With their Empire gone, their economy collapsing, their culture in ruins, they drown in a sea of rotting flotsam, the detritus of Colonial glory. And as their self-satisfied little island sinks do they at last shout ’Mea Culpa’? No! They sing Rule Britannia. It is a horrifying spectacle.
At dawn next morning I went on deck to discover the ship completely fog-bound. I could not see as far as the forecastle. As I drew my scarf to my face I noticed an indistinct figure staring over the side. Hearing my footsteps, she turned to reveal a green, rouged face. It was my card-player. She looked more than ever like a bizarre character from a Guignol puppet theatre. I was about to ask her if she needed help when she said in poorly-accented German: ‘Mir ist schlecht. Bitte, bringen Sie mir ein Becken.’ I was shocked. She was unquestionably a Russian but she had all this time taken me for a German, or even a Jew. I went to fetch the basin she wanted but when I returned she was already being helped below by her husband in his usual riding coat and jodhpurs. My impulse was to run after them and let them know I was as Russian as themselves. Instead I contented myself with a feeble shout, which I do not believe they even heard. It was a sign to me, of course, though I could not understand it then. I have been set apart I am taken for an alien even by my own people. No one will claim me. At least in London I can be nothing but a foreigner. It does not matter how much I worship at the Orthodox Church or how frequently I preach the word of Christ. I will always be an outcast. I am a British citizen. I have lived here for half my life. I gave this country better service than many who were born here. What does it mean? Still fremder, still frestl. Something happened in that awful Ukrainian shtetl when I was a captive of the Jews. What Judas saw my mind was weak and injected me with the metallic fragment of inescapable despair? I shall never be able to find out. My father betrayed me. He took a knife to me, his baby son. What demonic command was he obeying? Surely it was not the word of God. I am freezing and I cannot afford their paraffin.