Presidential Mission

by Upton Sinclair

  So the P.A. knew that nobody was going to get much sleep that night in the soft beds of this millionaire’s playground. The system of working appeared to be that Harry and Harriman made drafts, and then, after they were criticized, went off to their own rooms and rewrote them. Each time Harry the Hop would stop at Lanny’s room and leave a copy of the latest draft, and on his way back to the big chiefs he would stop to see if Lanny had any suggestion. Since the P.A. had been through China, he had suggestions for the letter to the Gissimo, and he was shown the drafts of the Conference summary. He didn’t get very much of Hippolyte Taine’s opinion of the English poets that night.

  XII

  It was three in the morning before this labor was completed; and Lanny had been told that the President was scheduled to fly from the airport at eight. He didn’t expect to have any interview, and perhaps not even to see his Boss. But that showed that he still didn’t know Roosevelt. Pendar came and took him to the President’s room, which opened upon the court—the Secret Service had refused to let him have a room with outside windows. Lanny discovered that F.D.R. hadn’t even been put to bed; he was lying on a very elegant divan with all the appurtenances of silken pillows and drapes. Extending his hand to the P.A. he said in languid tones: “You may kiss my hand. I am the Pasha.” Never while he lived would the impulse to fun die in him.

  When they were alone he said: “I meant to give you more time, Lanny. I am sorry it didn’t work out.”

  “Never mind, Governor. There’ll be other times, I hope.”

  “I’ll come to the point. I want you to go to Moscow for me and have a talk with Stalin. Are you in a position to do it?”

  “Why, of course, Governor, but—”

  “I suppose you know that we invited him to this Conference, and that he turned us down. He was too busy with his winter campaign, he said, and all we had to do was to decide to open the second front—‘as you have promised,’ were his words. That means that he is angry, and I feel that at all hazards we must persuade him to have a meeting with us, and both put our cards on the table.”

  “You think I am the man for that?”

  “I would send Harry, but the trip in midwinter would be a severe strain upon his health.”

  “That part doesn’t worry me. But what can I say to Stalin?”

  “Talk to him as a friend and make him understand our position. Tell him about me and my intense desire for real friendship between our two countries. Make him understand that I am doing everything in my power to get help to him. Some of our military men thought we could get across the Channel last fall and hold on; we had all our plans made for a try, as you know. But the British disagreed with us flatly. Winston put his foot down; he wouldn’t take any part in the venture, and we couldn’t possibly have done it alone. Winston wanted to force us over to the eastern Mediterranean, and of course you know that Stalin doesn’t want that. The decision is for Sicily and Italy this spring, and that’s a sort of compromise we hope Stalin will accept. We simply must keep Russia from giving up!”

  “You think there’s any chance of that, Governor?”

  “We can’t any of us be sure. You know that Hitler is making desperate efforts to get out of his predicament. He makes offers to us, and he’s bound to be making them to Russia. My heart is set on talking to Stalin personally, and making him realize that he can trust me—as he surely cannot trust Hitler.”

  XIII

  Lanny was fairly staggered by this proposal, but he said: “Of course I’ll go, and I’ll do my best. But don’t you think it might be wise if I came back to Washington and got your instructions in detail?”

  “I don’t believe that is necessary. I want just one thing: for Stalin to set a time and place for a conference with Churchill and myself. You realize the importance of it without any further elaboration. You know me and my ideas, you know Stalin; you told me the details of your talk with him, and what you said was exactly what I would have said if I had been there. You told Harry about it, and he agrees. You understand the Communists, and the Socialists, too; you have lived among them for long periods, and you don’t need me to tell you how to deal with them.”

  “You compliment me, Governor; but I beg you, don’t expect too much. They are difficult groups to deal with, the Commies especially. They change their Party line overnight, as fast as one of our PT boats dodging a submarine.”

  “Do you think I am ill advised, trusting Stalin in this crisis?”

  “I can’t see that you have any choice in the matter. The Axis attacked us, and on the battlefield we take such Allies as we find there. What will happen after the battle is any man’s guess.”

  “I have to try to guess, Lanny. The future depends upon it. Will the Reds be exhausted and want peace and reconstruction, or will they want to take the whole of Central Europe?”

  To the P.A. it seemed infinitely pathetic that this overdriven statesman should be bringing up such a topic at half-past three in the morning. There was a look of tragedy upon his face, the expression of a man who was carrying the burden of the world upon his shoulders. Was some inner voice telling him that his strength was no longer equal to the strain?

  Lanny answered in the same mood. “God knows I would like to say what you want to hear, Governor; but only God can tell what will happen under a dictatorship.”

  “Surely the Russian people will be demanding peace—world peace—after their frightful losses!”

  “No question about that. But how much will the Russian people have to say? In a country where public opinion rules, you can form some idea of the way it will swing; but when you have a Party dictatorship embodied in a Politburo of thirteen men, who can guess what the next turn will be? There will be a struggle for power, and maybe a purge—there is always a purge, whichever faction wins out.”

  “I know there is a strong element that favors understanding with the West, and is willing to take a chance on winning by persuasion. Litvinov, for example.”

  “Quite so,” agreed Lanny. “Unless I am mistaken, Litvinov is now Molotov’s deputy in Narkomindel, the Foreign Office. If I were to hear that he had been set aside, then I would put my money on the guess that the strict Leninists have won, and that the Party is going to have its way by force wherever it dares.”

  “We must do everything in our power to prevent that, Lanny. I have lost much sleep thinking about it.”

  “Well, you need sleep now, Governor. I’ll say just one thing more about the way to prevent it. We must handle our own affairs, and those of Europe, in such a way as to convince the people that we are not asking them to return to the old system of exploitation. We must offer them democracy in industry as well as in politics. That is the only method by which we can get them behind us and make headway against dictatorships, whether Left or Right.”

  “In other words, get rid of the Vichy crowd here in North Africa!” The tired man made an effort to smile, but it was a feeble one. Then he added: “You will go for me. There is no immediate haste—I mean, you can take a week or two to make your plans. Go to Algiers and send me a report from there.”

  “And how am I to travel to Russia?”

  “I have spoken to Murphy about it, and he will arrange for the Army to fly you, first to Cairo and from there to Teheran. The Russians are flying our planes in from there. I understood from you that Stalin asked you to call again.”

  “That is correct.”

  “You can wire him from Teheran; or if there is any hitch you can wire me, and I will endeavor to arrange it.”

  “All right, Governor. You know the story of Isaiah, how he heard the voice of the Lord, saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And Isaiah said: ‘Here am I; send me!’”

  Lanny received a strong handclasp, and a smile, and went out of the room, wondering if that overburdened great man was going to lie down and sleep his two or three hours without the labor of undressing.

  20

  The Great Divide

  I

 
Lanny sent a cablegram to his father, telling him that he was taking a considerable journey and might not be heard from for some time. “No dangerous place,” he added, and “love to all”—hoping that would not sound too mysterious to the censor. Laurel would understand that he could not say more; she would have the whole world, except the Axis part, to speculate about. He called off his negotiations over Moorish fountains, greatly to the distress of Hajek, who was on the verge of successes. “Orders have been changed,” Lanny said, and that was true enough.

  He flew to Algiers, put up at his old lodgings, and went about meeting his friends and listening to their talk about what was going on under the administration of Marcel Peyrouton: not much headway being made in the canceling of Nazi-inspired policies, but some headway in getting rid of persons who expressed disapproval of these policies. Denis de Bruyne was well content, Lanny found, because the De Gaulle agents had won the right to work freely with both propaganda and money; they were setting up recruiting offices close to the barracks of Giraud’s Army, to lure both officers and men away to join the De Gaulle forces in French West Africa. Lanny had been told that De Gaulle himself had promised to moderate his criticisms of the American campaign, but this apparently did not extend to his representatives.

  These details Lanny duly incorporated in a report which he delivered to Robert Murphy. It was sealed, because the President had ordered that no one else should see it. No doubt this would make the new Minister uneasy, but he said nothing, and was extremely polite, though possibly a bit more formal. Could it be that in spite of a P.A.’s most careful efforts the other had come to realize that there existed some difference between their points of view? Could it be that Murphy suspected Lanny of having influenced, not merely the Boss, but also some of the newspaper correspondents who were “panning” the Minister’s policies by touches subtle enough to elude the strict censorship? Several of these men had gone home and had fed the fires of dissatisfaction in liberal circles. Lanny had had nothing to do with this, but it was hardly possible that Murphy should not suspect him of it.

  The Minister said: “A letter came for you several days ago. I was sure you’d be coming here, and I wasn’t sure what day, so I held it.”

  “Thanks,” Lanny said, and glanced at the envelope. A fraction of a second sufficed him to recognize the writing of Raoul Palma, alias Bruges. He put the letter into his pocket without a word, and finished the conversation, which consisted for the most part of hearing the Minister’s complaints concerning the lack of information on the North African situation in the United States. Lanny said very mildly that he had done what he could to make certain that the President understood it. Then he discussed the arrangements for his flight to Teheran; Murphy had spoken to General Clark about it and said that the Army was flying planes to Cairo daily, veering to the south to avoid what was left of enemy territory. Lanny might be flown any time at a day’s notice or less. He promised to set the date.

  II

  Outside the office Lanny opened the letter and read:

  Dear Monsieur Budd: This is to let you know that I am in a concentration camp at Bou Arfa. Nobody has told me the charge, but as I have not committed any crime it can be only that I am suspected of improper political activities. I have a chance to smuggle this letter out, but do not know if it will ever reach you. If it does, please note that I have located some paintings which I am sure would interest your American clients.

  Respectfully,

  Raoul Palma

  Lanny understood at once that the signature to this note was no oversight on the part of his Spanish friend. By signing his own name instead of the alias he had been using, Raoul was telling the P.A. that the French had discovered his identity. Doubtless that was the reason for his incarceration. Raoul must have escaped from Toulon and come to Algeria; and now he was in one of the desert concentration camps where the Vichyites were holding those thousands of men whose political activities they feared.

  Lanny went back to the Minister’s office and asked to see him again. He put the letter in Murphy’s hands and explained: “This is a man whom I have known for something like twenty years. He is an American secret agent, who has been working under the direction of the O.S.S.”

  “Do you know that positively, Budd?” inquired the other.

  “He has worked under my personal direction for several years. I gave him money and sent him to Toulon, and told the President about him. I sent the information he gave me to the President through Admiral Leahy. Later he gave me permission to give his name to Colonel Donovan. The last time I saw him, which was in Toulon last summer, he had been contacted by an O.S.S. man and received orders from him. His assignment was to make friends with the sailors and spread propaganda to see that the Germans did not get hold of the Fleet. A dangerous assignment, at which he has been working for the past couple of years on money which I gave him, first my own money, and then some which the President gave me out of his secret funds.”

  “Why in the world do you suppose he didn’t make himself known to the French?”

  “I suppose because he didn’t trust them; he would think that they would probably take him out into the desert and shoot him.”

  “But surely they wouldn’t, Budd! An agent of ours!”

  “They might choose not to believe him. It happens that he has what they would consider a very bad record—he was with the Spanish Republican government, in their press department. I don’t know whether the French have discovered that, and so I ask you not to mention it. It may be that all they have against Raoul is that he is using forged papers. He was going under the name of Bruges in Toulon. I suppose he may have been helping to resist the Germans there, and somehow got himself smuggled over here.”

  “Do you suppose our O.S.S. people here would know about him?” inquired Murphy.

  “I doubt that very much. They work in teams, and the teams have their contact with the home office, but seldom with one another. You can inquire about him from Colonel Donovan if you think it necessary.”

  “Not at all, Budd, your word is sufficient. I’ll get busy at once.”

  “I should like very much to see the man and send a report to the President before I take off on my journey. You understand, what he writes about paintings is camouflage; he means that he has something to tell me. You might, if you don’t mind, be a little indignant when you talk with Peyrouton or whomever you speak to, and ask that the man be flown here. It will be a long journey otherwise.”

  “Certainly, Budd,” replied the Minister, who surely didn’t want to be reported as being indifferent to the fate of an O.S.S. man.

  Said Lanny, with studied mildness: “It might be that this would be a favorable opportunity to call the government’s attention to the distressing consequences of throwing people into concentration camps without charges or hearing. It was, as you can see, only by accident that this valuable man was able to get word to me.”

  III

  So it came about that Lanny sat in an obscure waterside café and listened to the tale of his old friend’s misadventures. Raoul was half starved, and his olive complexion was blanched; however, he didn’t want to talk about his own troubles, but about the thousands of captives in that desert hellhole called Bou Arfa. Raoul was one of the most selfless men that Lanny had ever known, and no amount of injustice had ever been enough to make him cynical; he said that the worst shock of his life had been the discovery that the Americans didn’t care enough about their friends here in North Africa to protect them against the scoundrels and traitors who had been shooting at American soldiers less than three months ago. Persons who had risked their lives to help in the landings had been picked up on the streets of Algiers by the pro-Vichy police agents and shipped off to be half baked by day and half frozen by night in the Sahara desert. And not a voice raised in protest, not a chance of any help for such victims!

  Lanny could only repeat the excuses which had been made to him: the weakness of our Army, the dangers of taking over the governm
ent of a vast province, the ignorance of many of our officials, the desperate need of getting into Tunis, the impossibility of thinking of everything at once, to say nothing of doing it. Here was Lanny, under orders to take a long journey on behalf of the President, and how could he stop to carry out a crusade against the French system of concentration camps? And if he did it, what would be left of his camouflage as a collector of Arabic mosaics and Moorish fountains for ablutions? “We just have to do first things first, Raoul, and the first of all is to knock out the Nazis.”

  The Spanish Socialist told the story of his efforts to awaken the sailors of the Fleet to the danger of losing it to the enemy. “Cells” had been established and literature had been distributed under the noses of the Vichy authorities. Three days after the Americans had landed in Africa, the Germans had moved into Unoccupied France; they had pledged themselves not to enter Toulon, but Raoul and his friends had realized that this was nothing but an effort to gain time, so as to get airplane bases established on both sides of the harbor, to be in position to bomb the Fleet if it tried to escape. A strange situation, with the city and its semicircle of forts completely surrounded by the silent and unmoving German Army for nearly two weeks.

  “We did our best to persuade the sailors of the Fleet to make a try at escape,” said Raoul, “but the officers were divided among themselves and unable to do anything but argue and scold one another; and it’s hard for seamen to take action against officers whom they have been trained to respect. What we anti-Nazis did was to concentrate on watching the enemy and spreading the alarm the moment he showed signs of moving in.”