That was why Roosevelt did it, of course; because he was stuck in that chair while men like Joe strode and kicked and screwed their way through life. It was the envy of a cripple, refined into sadism.
So he’d had to drop his pants to get the job. Well, he’d done worse. Bow-legged Irishman he might be, he’d got the job (in long pants) and faced the Brits on his own terms. He would endure anything to get where he was headed.
As for Roosevelt, a reckoning was coming. Kennedy believed fervently that the poisonous old gimp would be defeated in 1940. His day was done, as was that of the Jew financiers who supported and funded him. Roosevelt would be relegated to the wilderness, the Jews would all be shipped off to Africa, and the way would be paved for a red-headed, bow-legged Irishman to reign in the Oval Office.
And by then – he also firmly believed – the Luftwaffe would have reduced London to smoking ruins, and England to subservience. Churchill would be hanged; Hitler would be master of all Europe.
He’d told them so tonight, over the port and cigars. He never scrupled to tell the truth. ‘You can’t stop the Germans,’ he’d told them, ‘so you’d better learn to live with them.’
How he enjoyed the disgust that curdled their faces. He knew they called him ‘Jittery Joe’ and hummed Run Rabbit Run behind his back. God rot them all. Their day was done, too. They thought he didn’t know that they were spying on him, their much-vaunted MI5, opening his diplomatic bag, intercepting his cables. Well, he knew right enough, and he didn’t care.
At least he would be home for Christmas.
The official line was that none of the Kennedys would leave England until every American had been repatriated, but that of course wasn’t true. Joe Junior had sailed already on the RMS Mauretania. Jack would be on the New York flight in a few days. His wife, Teddy and the girls were waiting for the arrival of the SS Manhattan from Le Havre.
He would get them all home as soon as he could. The German ambassador had privately told him what was coming: a rain of fire such as the world had never seen, devastation on an awesome scale. ‘Get your family out,’ von Ribbentrop had whispered. ‘When this is done, we will need men like you, men who understand our Jewish policy so perfectly, men with whom we can build the future.’
And by God, he looked forward to that day.
The telephone on his desk buzzed. He picked it up. ‘Yes?’
‘She’s here, sir.’
He checked his watch. It was two a.m. ‘What condition is she in?’
‘Quiet.’
‘Have them bring her up.’ He drained the second glass of whisky and poured himself a third. He’d drunk nothing more than water during the interminable banquet tonight, damned if he would give them the satisfaction of adding ‘sodden Paddy’ to the book of insults they compiled on him. But he was the son of a man who’d started life as a saloon-keeper, and he knew hard drink was medicine for anger. It didn’t kill it; it kept it alive and burning, so you didn’t forget it.
There was a knock at the door. He pulled his suspenders up and squared his shoulders, fixing a bright grin on his face. ‘Come in,’ he called.
His eldest daughter had grown into a tall, curvaceous beauty in the last couple of years. But the woman who was led in to his study now was dishevelled and dazed, her head bowed. She bore little resemblance to the vivacious Rosemary he’d last seen a few days earlier.
His smile faded. He got up and hurried over to her. ‘Hello, Rosie.’
She didn’t seem to know where she was, and looked around dazedly, her face blotched, her lids swollen. Then her dull gaze landed on his face. ‘Oh, Daddy!’ she whispered.
She collapsed into his arms. He enfolded her, pressing her face into his broad chest. ‘Rosie, my Rosie. You’re safe, now.’
The nurse who had brought her into the room stood back, her hands clasped dutifully around the handle of her Gladstone bag. ‘She’s had a strong sedative, sir. She might be a little confused.’
‘When’s her next dose due?’
‘As soon as she seems to be getting agitated again.’
‘Have you got the stuff?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Put it on my desk. I’ll give it to her.’
The nurse took the packets out of her bag and laid them on the desk in a row. ‘A single dose stirred in a glass of water,’ she murmured. ‘Whenever necessary. She goes out like a light.’
He nodded, still holding Rosemary, who had buckled against him, her body getting heavier in his arms. ‘I’ll call you if I need you. You can go.’
When they were alone, Kennedy lifted his daughter’s head and looked into her face. Her features were blurred, coarsened, as though someone had beaten her with fists, though there were no injuries to be seen. Her beauty had gone. She looked, he thought, hideous.
‘God damn it,’ he said angrily, ‘how could you let yourself get into this state?’
His displeasure, always terrible to her, made her break out in fresh tears. ‘I’m so – sorry – Daddy.’ The medicine they had given her made it hard for her to talk properly. Her tongue lolled in her mouth, her words slurred into each other.
He gave her a handkerchief. ‘Clean yourself up.’
She swayed as she tried clumsily to wipe her eyes and nose. She had been barely conscious during the drive from Southampton, lying on the back seat of the car, her misery suppressed by the medicine, all her functions slowed to a standstill so she could hardly even breathe, her heart a slow thud. Now she felt as though she had been broken all in pieces, and put together wrong. Her head ached dreadfully. She could barely see. Her father’s softly lit study swam around her. All she knew was that Cubby was far away, and that her mother had promised she would never see him again. The grief of that was like a vast chasm, at the edge of which she teetered, only prevented from falling in by the thinnest of threads.
‘Tell me about this boy.’ Daddy always knew what she was thinking. Daddy knew her better than anyone. ‘Have you slept with him?’
‘Yes, Daddy,’ she whispered.
He didn’t scream at her, the way Mother did, but his expression made her want to curl up and die. ‘Did you go all the way?’
‘Yes, Daddy.’
‘How many times?’
‘I – I don’t know.’
‘Ten times? Twenty?’
‘I – I don’t know, Daddy.’
‘Are you pregnant?’
‘I don’t – don’t think so. But I want a baby!’ He had put on his glasses and was looking at her intently, one fist on his hip. ‘Please don’t be angry with me,’ she begged. ‘I love him!’
His face grew more hawk-like for a moment, his eyebrows coming down. He turned and filled the whisky glass on his desk. ‘Drink,’ he said, pushing it into her hand.
Rosemary tried to obey, but the stuff burned her throat, which was swollen and raw from all the crying she’d done. She choked. ‘Can I have ginger ale with it?’
‘I don’t have any here. Throw it down, Rosie. You’ll feel better.’
She closed her eyes and drank the whisky obediently. She got it down in two gulps, but her head instantly began to spin even more wildly. She staggered.
‘Stand up straight.’
‘Daddy, I have to go back. The ship – the ship is leaving.’
‘Yes. But you’ll be staying here.’
‘No,’ she moaned, shaking her head from side to side desperately, ‘no, no, no.’
He took the empty glass from her. ‘You have to forget him, Rosie.’
‘No, Daddy!’
He spoke slowly, reasonably. ‘Even if I would accept a son-in-law like that – a musician, and a Protestant into the bargain – you’re not ready for marriage.’
Rosemary struggled to articulate her anguish through the fog of the whisky and the sedative. ‘I am, I am. I love him!’