The Wilson Deception

by David O. Stewart

  Feisal waited for Lawrence’s translation to catch up with him, then started again,

  Lawrence continued. “The Arabs did the same when they fought the Turk.”

  Feisal spoke again, speaking a short phrase that ended with Lawrence and extending a hand to the Englishman. Lawrence didn’t bother to translate, since the table was already guffawing at the explanation that he had been the Arabs’ little donkey.

  Dulles grinned, thinking the story managed to celebrate and belittle Lawrence.

  Lawrence, whose face showed no reaction, said softly, “A private word?”

  Dulles nodded.

  In Arabic, Lawrence excused them from the company. After Feisal’s response, Lawrence reported that the prince wished Dulles’ business card. Dulles presented it with as much formality as he could muster in a hotel dining room.

  Feisal produced a pen and wrote on the card, then handed it to Lawrence, who read out, “I agree to all of Feisal’s demands.”

  Feisal let out a great belly laugh, then bowed his head as Dulles said farewell.

  Lawrence led them to a quiet alcove in the lobby. The man was only a little older than Dulles—at college, he would have been a senior when Dulles was a freshman—yet he had an ageless quality.

  Becoming a legend in your twenties must do that, Dulles thought, even if you’re short and odd-looking.

  “Mr. Dulles, I understand you’ve become an adviser to the president.” Lawrence appeared for all the world to be speaking not to Dulles, but to the armrest of Dulles’ chair.

  “Mr. Wilson has many advisers.”

  “Let’s not waste time. The president holds the hopes and dreams of the Arabs in his hands. The Arabs are a great people. They invented algebra and installed indoor plumbing at a time when Europeans were still chanting around open fires. Arab religion and literature are deep expressions of the human soul, and their civilization goes back millennia.”

  “This is all most educational, Colonel—”

  Lawrence held a hand up but still did not look at Dulles. “They joined us in striking down the Turk, and they must share in that victory or they will become our adversaries for generations. It’s that simple. I have lived with them. I understand them. If we fail in this, we will trigger an era of mistrust and hatred that may rival the Crusades.” Still no eye contact. “I hope you can explain that to the president.” Lawrence nodded, rose, and walked off.

  Lawrence was a man of passion, Dulles thought as he sat back in his chair. That passion could be both appealing and disturbing. Certainly he wasn’t an altogether trustworthy fellow.

  Dulles found that dinner and dancing with Lady Florence were very small pleasures. No expanse of prime real estate could compensate for her sluggish conversation and deficit of sensual feeling. He ended the evening as quickly as possible.

  Noting the light shining under the door to Uncle Bert’s suite at the Crillon, he rapped on it. When he entered, his uncle sat stripped to his vest in an overstuffed armchair, a stack of papers on the side table next to him with a glass one-third full of golden cognac.

  “I warn you, Allen, that I’m in a foul humor. You might do better to pass on to your room.”

  “Cognac?” Dulles nodded to a bottle on a low coffee table.

  “Serve yourself.”

  “The foulness in your life?”

  “This wretched conference.”

  “Ah.”

  “Ah, indeed. Our sainted president is leaving to go home to deal with Congress. Of course, he never should have come in the first place, which I told him in no uncertain terms, thereby beginning my exile to the outer regions of the universe. Also, Lloyd George is leaving for London to deal with his Parliament, his unions, his Irishmen, and I don’t know what else. Before they depart, the single thing they will have agreed to is the Covenant for the League of Nations. Not a bad thing of itself, but hardly a worthy output for the immense leaders of the world who have stopped everything else in their respective countries for a two-month period. They will not, Allen”—Lansing pointed an accusing finger at him—“decide on another goddamned thing before they leave.”

  Dulles concentrated on pouring his drink. His uncle had discerning taste in liquors.

  Lansing continued. “The world wants peace, Allie. But Mr. Wilson wants his League of Nations, so the world will have to wait for its peace. We’ll keep just enough troops here to enrage the people back home, disappointing the soldiers who are so homesick and disgusted that they go AWOL on a daily basis. And that will also be just enough soldiers to fail utterly to intimidate the Germans. It’s a masterpiece of a muddle.”

  “Mr. Wilson will come back to finish the treaty, of course.”

  “Oh, yes, but this will add at least a month’s delay, so time will be very, very short upon his return. Revolutions are breaking out around the world while we prance through broad statements of principle for world peace.”

  “World peace isn’t such a bad thing. Perhaps Wilson and Lloyd George will return to Paris more highly motivated after talking with the people back home.”

  They sat quietly for a while. Dulles took a swallow of the cognac. It burned sweetly, then warmed him. One more reason to admire the French.

  Lansing tapped a finger on the side of his glass. “Allie.” Lansing leaned forward slightly. “I must know what is going on with Wilson. I must have additional sources of information. Day to day, I’m completely in the dark. I had no idea about this trip back home. Even Colonel House doesn’t know what’s going on over at that palatial residence Mrs. Wilson flutters about in.”

  “Uncle Bert, are you suggesting that we should spy on our own president?”

  “That’s a crude phrase, Allen. Gratuitously so. We should think of it more as an effort to enhance consultation at the highest levels of government.”

  “How exactly do you propose to enhance consultation?”

  “That’s the sort of thing you’re so good at, Allen, you and your clever brother. I’ll leave it to you.”

  Chapter 8

  Monday, February 17, 1919

  “Major?”

  Fraser looked up wearily at the speaker.

  “There’s a patient you should see in the gas ward.” It was the dark-haired nurse with the overbite.

  There must have been a time when he could remember their names, but he couldn’t even remember when that was. She wouldn’t come for him now, at the end of the day, unless it was important. Still, he didn’t stand.

  She interpreted his lack of response as disbelief. “We agreed that you should see him.”

  Ah, it had been a corporate decision of the nursing staff. No medical director could afford to ignore that.

  In the gas ward, the nurses had placed screens around the patient’s bed. Infectious. Fraser instantly hoped it was pneumonia, not influenza. There were reports of new flu cases in the city. In the autumn, the epidemic started with the soldiers and spread to civilians. He didn’t want it back.

  The patient was Gunnarson, a pale boy from the Midwest who was missing one leg below the thigh. His lungs were already compromised.

  “He complained of a headache,” the nurse said. “The fever came on this afternoon.”

  Fraser went through the steps. He listened to the boy’s heart and lungs. He looked down his throat and inside his nose. The examination told him nothing he didn’t already know. After the first five hundred cases of influenza, he could diagnose it from across a crowded room. There was a miserable look, a flush combined with a gray cast of the eyes.

  “Private Gunnarson?”

  The boy looked at him dully.

  “You’re coming down with a fever. We’re going to put you in a ward for special care. I hope you’ll respond well there.”

  The boy nodded.

  “Nurse Callahan.” The name just came to him. The key was not thinking about it. She was from Philadelphia. Or something like that. He kept his voice low. “Take him to the green ward. Keep him comfortable. And please put masks on,
for everyone.”

  “The masks scare the patients, Doctor.”

  “Better scared than sick. I’m not going to lose any more nurses . . . or doctors, either. Also, shift the beds so the patients are head-to-heel, like we did last fall.”

  “In all the wards?”

  Fraser sighed. “Yes, I guess so.” Moving the beds was hard work. There weren’t enough orderlies so the nurses had to pitch in. And then it would be inconvenient for getting to the patients. He ordered it because it might help suppress the spread of the disease. So little did.

  On his way back to his office, he stuck his head in the doctors’ coffee room. “A definite case of flu in the gas ward.”

  “Jesus, not again.” O’Connor, the only one in the room, stood at the window. He looked unhappy, offended.

  Fraser liked that about him.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yup.”

  “How bad?”

  Fraser shook his head. “I’m going to call the colonel. Spread the word, okay?”

  “Shit. Is it the same stuff?”

  “Hard to say. I’ve only seen the one case, but it looks the same. It’s not been that long, so it probably never went away.”

  “Maybe it won’t be so bad this time.”

  An hour later, after Fraser described the new case to the appropriate officials of the Army Medical Corps, a knock sounded on his office door. It was after six, long since dark in early February. He called for the person to enter, then looked up at Lawrence in a heavy overcoat and military cap. Without his Arab headdress, his hair showed as a sandy color. Though somewhat dazzled by his famous visitor, Fraser chose not to rise. It was late. He was tired. It was his office.

  “Major Fraser?”

  “Yes. What can I do for you?”

  “I’m Colonel T.E. Lawrence—”

  “Yes, I know. We met.”

  “Did we?”

  “At the American Embassy. The party to welcome the president.”

  Lawrence gave no sign of remembering. “I’m terribly sorry to impose on you, but I’ve come about a friend, Mark Sykes, who seems to have come down with the influenza. He’s at the Hotel Majestic—”

  “What the devil is he doing at a hotel? That’s a splendid way to spread the disease.”

  Lawrence looked uncertain for a moment. “He’s just fallen ill, grievously ill, and it’s moved very fast. We didn’t think to move him right now.”

  Fraser gritted his teeth and shook his head slowly.

  “See here,” Lawrence picked up, “you’ve been pointed out as the man who knows the influenza best, and I’ve come in the hope you might see Mr. Sykes. There’s a car waiting for us at the door.”

  Fraser tried to dismiss the subject with a backhand wave. “There are plenty of doctors in Paris who know this flu. It’s one of the advantages of an epidemic. Everyone treats it.”

  “Doctor, I could try to impress you by explaining that Mr. Sykes was critical to resolving the future of Arabia, which he is. But that matters not a fig to me, nor should I expect it to matter to you. I say only that he’s my friend. I would count it a great kindness if you would see my friend. Perhaps I should have gone to another doctor, but here I am and I’m afraid for him.”

  Unhappy about it, Fraser followed Lawrence out the door.

  During the silent drive to the hotel, Fraser wondered how conscious Lawrence’s effort had been. Had he instinctively phrased his appeal in a way that would actually move Fraser? Or had he calculated it out beforehand? Or had he just assumed that the glow of his celebrity would carry Fraser along no matter what Lawrence said?

  When the door to Sykes’ room was wrenched open, Fraser was shocked to find a solemn-faced Allen Dulles on the other side.

  “Major Fraser,” he said. “I hoped you would come, old boy. Sykes declines by the minute.” Dulles stepped aside, revealing a classic sickbed tableau. A person leaned over Sykes, probably the hotel doctor or someone from the British medical service. Two others sat on the far side of the bed.

  The light was muted, but the first look sank Fraser’s spirits, then left him cold inside. The purpling of cyanosis was setting in. Sykes bled from his nose, fought for breath. Fraser had never seen a patient return from that stage. He wheeled on Lawrence, not bothering to conceal his anger. “You should have told me your friend was like this. I can’t help him.”

  “Doctor, after coming all this way, which I appreciate so terribly much, won’t you just take a look?”

  “I can’t work the miracle you want. The war has taught me not to waste time on those I can’t help. You must know that, too.”

  “What am I to do?”

  “Let your friend know he’s not alone. You can do that. I can’t. I can’t sit at his bedside through the final minutes. It’s a duty that would never end.”

  Lawrence looked crumpled.

  In a gentler tone, Fraser added, “It shouldn’t be long. For your friend’s sake, I hope not. He may have some moments at the end. He’ll be glad to see a friend.”

  Emerging from the birdcage elevator at the lobby level, Fraser paused to wrap his muffler around his neck and rebutton his coat. He had never taken it off.

  “Jamie?”

  The voice, tentative but familiar, came from beside him.

  He turned. The face had aged. He hadn’t seen it for close to twenty years. The remaining hair—not a whole lot of it—was gray. The waistline was thicker. But there was no mistaking him.

  “Speed,” he cried out. “This is unbelievable.”

  Cook held out his hand and Fraser grabbed it. Grinning, each used his free hand to grip the other’s elbow.

  “Unbelievable.”

  “Hold on, there.” Speed nodded at Fraser’s military cap. “Maybe I should be saluting?”

  Fraser smiled. “That sort of thing was never your strong suit.”

  They each took a half step back.

  “You look good, Speed. Real good.”

  “Fat and old, but still causing trouble.”

  “And your family?”

  Cook’s smile vanished. “Jamie. You got a minute? Maybe a few minutes. We could go in the bar?”

  Chapter 9

  Monday, February 17, 1919

  At a corner table in the hotel bar, they took a moment to regard each other.

  “So,” Cook said, “have you been back to Cadiz or to Harrison County, Ohio?”

  “Not once.”

  “Me neither.”

  “What’s it been . . . eighteen years?”

  “At least.” Cook waved down a waiter.

  Back home, Fraser thought, Cook might set off a stir by sitting in the bar of the Waldorf Astoria and summoning the staff. Yet his old friend didn’t seem out of place with the cosmopolitan clientele of the Majestic. Maybe things had changed back home since Fraser left.

  When they ordered beer, the waiter offered a trace of a sneer but left without comment. Cook smiled. “Tell me about Miss Eliza and your daughter.”

  Fraser kept it vanilla, positive, talking mostly about their home in New York, how the big city had made him into a real doctor, or closer to one. He mentioned doing research at Rockefeller Institute. He had never stopped being proud of that. He passed off joining the army as part of his work on infectious diseases.

  “Back in Cadiz,” Cook said, “folks always thought you were a real doctor.”

  “Lucky thing, too. But I’ve learned so much since then. We’re learning so much in medicine now.”

  Cook shrugged. “I’m not sure I’ve ever become a real anything. Just kept bouncing around, since I buried the newspaper, anyway. I came here for this Pan-African Congress that’s starting soon over at the Grand Hotel.”

  “That sounds like a big deal. What’s it about?”

  The waiter arrived with their beers.

  Fraser lifted his. “To old times.” After they drank, he understood the waiter’s expression when they placed their orders. The beer was a mistake.

  Cook l
eaned forward. “Listen, Jamie. I can’t really chitchat now. Don’t have the heart for it or the time.” He drank some more beer, evidently indifferent to the taste. “I know we didn’t end on such great terms.”

  “Not that bad.”

  “Yeah, well, maybe I didn’t end on such great terms with you.”

  Fraser stared at the table, remembering how angry Cook had been. He looked up and said, “Okay.”

  “I knew I was right and I haven’t changed my mind.” Speed shrugged. “I know why you did what you did. For love.”

  Fraser said in a low voice, “Yes, for love. But I stood by that newspaper of yours for three years.”

  “You did. And I lost your money. Every dime. I know that.”

  Fraser gave a small smile. “It’s only money.”

  “Look.” Cook looked straight into Fraser’s blue-gray eyes. “I’m hoping you can put that aside. Maybe you can help me. I didn’t come here looking for you. I had no idea you were in France. But then I saw you get off that elevator, and you being an officer, I’ve got to ask.”

  “Please. Ask.”

  The words poured out as Cook launched into the tale of Joshua’s nightmare. The decorated hero was facing a twenty-year sentence for desertion. No appeals left. Every American officer who had commanded him, every soldier who’d served with him was dead or on a ship back to the States. Joshua would follow them soon, in chains. Cook kneaded his knobby old catcher’s hands so hard that Fraser almost flinched at the sight. Cook had a half-dozen statements plus transcripts from two trials, but the army paid no attention to any of it. He’d gone up the chain of command like you’re supposed to, almost to General Pershing himself. He tried civilians, too, even ambushed Colonel House in the lobby of his hotel. No one cared. He got Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois himself to send a letter to Pershing. No luck.