WC02 - Never Surrender

by Michael Dobbs

  While they were at the brewery there had been a shout for medical tubing, something to keep airways open; he'd found some rubber tubing that was being used as a drip hose from one of the vats. It had done the job, in extremis. Most things seemed to be in extremis.

  And so they moved on, but always back, until they arrived in Le Doulieu, a hamlet that consisted of no more than two farms and some outbuildings. It was getting late, too dark and too dangerous to go on, and they were all exhausted. It would have to do.

  The stench as he opened the doors of the ambulance was indescribable. Twelve injured men strapped inside a vehicle designed for four. Something trickled onto Don's boots. The men were carried to the outhouses.

  Don was astonished- at how primitive French farms could be, yet it would have to do, and within minutes the kitchen had been turned into an operating theatre with water being brought to the boil and the table scrubbed and ready for surgery.

  A patient was brought in, a young French soldier. Two orderlies held him down on the table as the surgeon cut away his uniform and began working on his legs.

  Most of these patients, Don knew, would have to be left behind, spoils of war for the advancing Wehrmacht. And then what would happen to them? For the thousandth time he wondered what it would be like to face an enemy with a loaded rifle; for the thousandth time he heard his father calling him a coward. Inside, part of him wanted it to happen, for the Germans to catch up with them, so that at last he might know who was right.

  He had sworn to the Tribunal that he was not a coward, that he would do his duty, that he would not run. He wasn't certain of it, of course, couldn't be, not until the time came. Yet all around him the British army was running.

  He was shaken from his thoughts by the cry of impotence that came from the surgeon as he threw his scalpel into the kitchen sink. For a moment his head bent wearily over his patient, as if accepting defeat, then he turned upon Don, his eyes filled with anger and awe at the mess God could make of His Creation.

  "Hurry. Go out to the woodshed. There's got to be one. While there's time, fetch me a saw."

  "We always seem to have a drink in our hands," Butler commented, greeting his friend.

  "I, for one, need it," Channon responded. His cheeks were flushed. He was in full evening dress, as was his colleague. "Felt like death most of the day. Temperature of a hundred and three."

  "You should be in bed," Butler replied.

  "My dear Rab, we may all be going to die very soon. Personally I'd rather go down beneath a streptococcal virus with a glass of champagne in my paw than at the end of a German bayonet."

  The bar of the Savoy was beginning to fill with the evening crush. "Cometh the crisis, cometh the crowd," the barman had intoned as he'd polished fresh glasses. Money was being spent while it still had some value. The dining room was already overflowing and Channon had needed to part with a substantial tip in order to reserve a table.

  "Pity you were laid low," Butler muttered, his eyes scanning the evening tide. "You missed the fun."

  "Where?"

  "At Downing Street. My summons came today."

  "Oh, dear. Had to happen, I suppose." Channon's face fell. He was an exceedingly rich and inexhaustible socialite, yet he treasured his role as Butler's parliamentary aide; they were fastened together by ambition and would sink together, too.

  Butler picked up the tale. "It was brief. To the point. He sat there with a wet cigar between his lips, relighting it with the aid of something that resembled a Bunsen burner. Terrible eyes I remember the eyes. Old. Worn out. I had to say I was feeling rather privileged that he'd brought me all the way over there to do it personally Jock tells me most of the others have been sacked by telephone."

  "Damned rude."

  "What else do you expect from this gang? Anyway, he started by telling me how much he appreciated the subtlety and skill with which I handled difficult questions in the House." Butler paused to raise an eyebrow in greeting at a passing acquaintance; it really was growing uncomfortably crowded. "Said much the same thing during the India debates when we first clashed all those years ago. Accused me of being able to take any position on any matter and hold it in all sincerity for so long as I was expressing it. Suggested I should be a lawyer."

  "He accused you of insincerity?" Chips was incredulous. "I hope you put him in his place."

  "Well, I was about to, prepared to hit him straight back over the boundary, when he bowled me something of a googly. Said he wanted me to continue at the Foreign Office."

  "What?"

  "Yes. Took me aback for a moment, too. But the fact is, dear Chips, you and I are still in business."

  Chips struggled to compose himself as delight squeezed alongside his confusion.

  "So I asked him. Why? Point blank. In all honesty I was too startled to be subtle. And d'you know what he said? Because, although we have had our differences'

  "I should say so!"

  '- I had once asked him to my private residence."

  "I never have."

  "And that is why, dear Chips, I am His Majesty's Minister for Foreign Affairs and you .. . are not." The lips wobbled; it looked like the slightest of smirks.

  "Is that the price of a position in this new Government: a lamb cutlet and a bottle of claret?"

  "Apparently. Must admit, I feel as though I've been accosted by a passing bank robber and had a ten-pound note thrust into my hand."

  "I don't know whether to laugh or burst with misery."

  "Neither do I. But I suppose we shall potter along for a while longer." At this point his attentions were drawn to the other side of the bar. "Ah, there's Jock. Inexcusably late. And not dressed for dinner."

  Colville was forcing his way through to where they were standing, launching hurried apologies both for his unpunc-tuality and for the fact that he would be unable to join them for the evening.

  "Won't Winston let you come out to play?"

  "It's .. . it's just awful," Colville spluttered through the champagne that Channon thrust towards him. He appeared greatly distracted. "It all started happening just after you'd left."

  "What started happening?" Butler enquired gently, trying to hide his irritation that he wasn't fully in the picture. It wasn't the first time; Churchill never entirely trusted the Foreign Office.

  Colville took a conspiratorial breath, trying to ensure they couldn't be overheard. "Panic. Or something close to it. It seems that Brussels has gone. Antwerp is about to fall. And the panzers are only a hundred miles from Paris."

  "Oh, my poor Paris," Chips cried, his face once again growing fevered. He'd spent much of his peripatetic youth in the French capital, an education that had left him with a taste for most French vices, except those relating to women.

  "Winston's flown there this afternoon," Colville added.

  "Searching for excuses."

  "I don't think we can blame Winston," Colville countered.

  "But fault has to find its home, Jock. He will be blamed -blamed for what is beginning to look like the greatest military disaster of all time." Suddenly Butler stiffened. "Which is why he reappointed me and the others. So that we can all share in the responsibility. Had nothing to do with lamb cutlets, after all."

  "Lamb cutlets?" Colville muttered, but Butler swept his question aside.

  "Tell me, Jock, has Winston heard back from Mr. Roosevelt?"

  Colville's eyes fell. "Usual story. All support short of actual help, I'm afraid."

  "Of course. Joe Kennedy had said it would be what was his phrase? - "all smiles but no sausage"."

  "So what are we to do?" Channon demanded, an anxious hand on Butler's sleeve.

  "Have you ever read Mein Kampf?" the Minister enquired.

  "You're kidding."

  "Terrible tome, but .. . Hates the Jews, of course, and the Russians. French, too, because of the humiliations they inflicted after the last war. Yet he seems almost to have a soft spot for the English. He talks about a division of the spoils. To us the Em
pire, and for him the rest of Europe. Something along those lines."

  "Why would he do that?"

  "A sense of Aryan togetherness, perhaps. A desire for a new world order, with us controlling the seas and keeping the natives quiet while he does' the most fractional of pauses 'whatever it is he wishes to do on the continent. It's all set out in his book."

  "Judging by the last few days he seems rather to have changed his mind," Colville interjected.

  "Really? I'm not sure, Jock. It's just that we haven't tried. And never will, so long as Winston's in charge."

  "But what do we do?" Chips demanded yet again.

  "Do, my dear Chips?" Butler muttered, his lips quivering in surprise. "Isn't it obvious? We do a deal."

  FIVE

  Don hadn't thought it possible to fall asleep standing up. But he had, in broad sunlight, against the wall of the barn with a cigarette between his lips. He hadn't woken until his legs had collapsed beneath him.

  The first thing he noticed was that the casualties were still coming in. Hundreds of them. Soldiers, civilians, French and British, even a few German troops. They'd all found their way to this farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. It was as if the rest of the world had ceased to exist, and the survivors had struggled to this last and most remote place on earth.

  The BBC had announced that the French forces had the situation under control, but not here they didn't. The outhouses of the farms were overflowing with casualties; newcomers were being left outside in the sun; and it seemed to Don that their injuries were growing ever more terrifying. His physical and emotional strength was almost overwhelmed, and he didn't think he could take much more. As he relit the cigarette that had remained stuck to his lips, he noticed that his hand was trembling uncontrollably. And all for two shillings a day.

  Yet there could be no escape. The screams of those injured mixed with the cries of instruction from the doctors, and Don found himself running to help with another of the wounded, brought in on the shoulder of a fellow soldier, his head wrapped in a red tablecloth.

  They laid him on the- kitchen floor the table was occupied and a doctor slowly unwrapped the sodden cloth. Two terrified eyes stared out, but of the rest of the face there was almost nothing. No lower jaw, no tongue, no cheek, only those two staring eyes which understood it all. Fingers clutched at Don's sleeve with the force of a man under siege from pain he was incapable of resisting.

  Don's stomach heaved in revulsion, and perhaps it was only his exhaustion that prevented him from throwing up. He'd never encountered such horror. But the eyes understood it all, staring at him, pleading. Gently the doctor replaced the cloth over those parts where the lower face should have been. He paused in prayer.

  "God help him," he whispered, 'for we can't." He heaved himself back to his feet it seemed to consume most of his remaining energy and returned to his patient on the table. "Give him morphine," he instructed.

  As he lay there the wounded soldier began to foul himself. He was no longer in control, carried away down a path of unbearable distress and darkness. He knew what was happening, for nothing had dulled either his mind or his pain. The eyes had taken on a new sharpness, and were screaming silently at Don.

  With great tenderness, Don prised himself free from the clenched fingers and did as he was instructed. He gave the soldier morphine. Unscrewed the cap, squeezed the capsule. Marked an "M' on his forehead. Then he gave him another dose. Two syringes. Too much. But still it seemed to have no effect, so ten minutes later Don gave him yet another.

  And slowly the eyes began to change, to lose that edge of fear, to go gently into his night. And to smile, Don thought. Don stayed with him, holding his hand, feeling him slip away.

  Don did not stir until it was done.

  "You did your best," the surgeon offered, trying to console.

  "I might have given him too much," Don blurted back in shock. "I didn't know how much to give him."

  "Do you think I do?" the man at the table spat, bent over yet another patient. There was bitterness in his voice.

  "But you're a doctor .. ."

  "Me? Not now, and not ever, not after this. I'm nothing but a dental surgeon," the man replied, turning back to his work.

  "I wasn't sure if you would come," the old man muttered as he clambered into the back of the Humber.

  "Neither was I," she replied bluntly.

  They said no more. Inspector Thompson sat up front alongside the driver as their journey unwound across the river and through the jumbled suburbs of south London until they had left behind the respectable brick fronts of Norwood and were into the open hills of Surrey. Churchill was hunched, bound inside an overcoat in spite of the sunshine, his hands resting on his silver-topped walking stick. His cheeks were grey. Ruth Mueller wore the same frayed suit, although he wouldn't have noticed.

  "I have been Prime Minister for a week, and every day of that week I have woken with dread in my heart." He sounded bitter, as if it were her fault. "We are facing disaster."

  She considered this outburst for a moment. "I'm puzzled, Mr. Churchill. I am, by the definition of your own Government,

  an enemy alien. A security threat. Why are you telling me this?"

  "Because That Bloody Man Hitler already knows," he growled. He took a large handkerchief from his pocket and blew his nose fiercely. "I-was in Paris. Went to see for myself. Everyone had gathered together at the Quai d'Orsay -Reynaud, Daladier, General Gamelin their top men, dripping dejection across every thread of carpet. They were standing; no one sat. It was as if at any moment they expected to start running." He wiped his eyes, but she could sense that his sorrow was beginning to give way to anger. He sat up, more alert.

  "The panzers push on, they told me, scattering the French armies in front of them. They had a large map set up on a student's easel. It had a battle front marked on it in a thick black line, but as they talked their fingers were always pointing to places behind that line. As if the line meant nothing any more. So I asked them: where is their strategic reserve? No one answered. I thought they had misunderstood, so I tried it in French. "Ou est la masse de manoeuvre?" I demanded."

  He rapped his stick sharply on the floor.

  "D'you know what Gamelin told me? Know what he said? Simply shrugged his shoulders and said, "Aucune." None. They haven't got a bloocjly strategic reserve! Five hundred miles of front and they haven't got a single man, goat or mattress to plug the gaps!"

  The grey cheeks had grown crimson with fresh life.

  "And while we were talking, outside in the garden I could see bonfires. They were trundling out papers in wheelbarrows, and all for burning. The Third Republic disappearing in cinders and ash. They say Paris may fall in days. You can see it written on the faces of the people. Last time I was there they applauded as my car passed, but now there are no cheers, no salutes, no waving arms, nothing but the ripe stench of fear. They know their country is dying."

  And suddenly his whole body sagged, the anger giving way to exhaustion, as though all the sinews and strands that held his body together had been cut. It seemed that only the buttons on his overcoat kept him from collapsing completely.

  "We have been fooled, duped, Frau Mueller. Hitler has shown us not only daring but also great wisdom. This has all been to his plan. He wanted us to advance into Belgium, encouraged us to move out from behind our de fences That's why he didn't bomb us during our headlong rush to adversity. We were blind, jumped to do his bidding. And now he has swept behind us and we are in danger of being cut in two. It seems barely credible, but we have been overwhelmed by a handful of tanks. Holland has gone, Brussels has been surrendered without a shot being fired, and his troops will soon be on the outskirts of Paris. Our great alliance with the French lies in ruins."

  He was weeping quietly now, the handkerchief to his eyes, the dark smudges beneath them like dead ash scattered over a hearth. "It is said that the French troops are surrendering in entire companies with their officers at their head. They are throwing t
heir weapons into the road to be crushed by the passing panzers. But the panzers don't even stop to take the surrender, they roll onwards, thirty and forty miles a day. Nothing like it has ever been seen before in the history of warfare."

  Suddenly he was staring at her, eyes still flooded but waving his hand in passion. "He is beating me, Frau Mueller. Not only out there upon the field of battle, but up here' he began jabbing a finger to his massive forehead 'in the battle of the mind. Out-thinking me, outsmarting me at every turn."

  He fell to brooding once more until they had rolled into Kent. A little more than twenty miles from their starting point, they drew into the driveway of an old brick-fronted house. The windows on the ground floor were shuttered and weeds were beginning- to peer through the gravel of the driveway. In front of the house a bank of rhododendron bushes was in full and violent flower, but to her mind it only served to make the old house look more forlorn.

  "Welcome back to Chartwell," he announced as the car drew to a halt. In normal times his arrival would have lifted his heart. She remembered how he would leap out, scattering dogs and papers before him as he revelled in the joy of returning home. But these were not normal times. The house had been shut since the start of the war and an air of melancholy had settled around it. He made no attempt to go inside but led her around by a path that brought them to the rear of the house, and there his spirits seemed to lift, for Chartwell was set upon the side of a great Kentish hill that looked out upon endless miles of misty countryside. Nature had chosen this spot as a great stage with half of England as its audience. While Thompson and the driver disappeared inside the house, Churchill led her down towards the lakes in the valley below, and with every step his energies slowly returned. The back straightened, the gaze lifted, the walking stick became a weapon rather than a prop, slashing angrily at nettles that had begun to grow in corners, digging at young bramble shoots that would soon burst into a jungle of thorns. Yet the beauty of spring could not be turned by a few weeds; this was much as the Tudors would have seen England from this spot, and much as it might appear in another thousand years, if England still lived.