Ike and Kay
Page 18
This was, she told herself, truly an affair of the heart; she could trace it back to the moment he gave her that box of chocolates after his first trip to London. She had only worked for him for ten days then, but in that time she already felt that she meant much more to him than just a Motor Transport Corps driver.
When he came back that first time he had remembered how she’d said she missed fruit more than anything else in wartime London. There had been fruit on her desk, exotic fruit, bananas, mangoes and pineapples, the next day.
Then there was Telek, the Westie terrier he had named after her, the bridge nights when he would softly squeeze her leg under the table, lunches with Churchill and Roosevelt when he would make sure she was well seated. He had congratulated her after those lunches and said he was proud of her.
She had held her own with two of the most powerful men in the world. They liked her and they had both told her to look after their commander. They had praised her to Ike, and that had pleased him even more – it had placed an official seal of approval on a relationship that everyone talked about but no one understood.
They knew what was happening to them. For a few brief moments every now and then they could leave the world at war – that kiss on the darkened plane flying back from Tunis and their lovemaking in front of a cold fire at Versailles, that was their world now, which they reached for when they could.
The first time they had seen each other naked in front of the fire that night, there had been no shyness but a hunger between them that had surprised her. It was as if he’d been waiting for that moment since they’d met.
And what did it all add up to? Just a minor fling with a man who wished to relieve the pressures of high command with a little wayward behaviour, a quick foray off the marriage reservation?
No, it was so much more than that. Dwight Eisenhower was in love with her, and increasingly, it seemed, he did not care who saw or heard how happy she made him.
And she had seen a confidential cable from Washington that would make him happier still.
In early December, Eisenhower received a promotion that made him the first five-star general in American history. He was now formally general of the army. Since there was no room for the extra star on his epaulettes, a special badge consisting of five stars sown with gold braid had to be made and stitched into the shoulder of his uniform. He had achieved the same rank as Montgomery. He insisted that Kay also had insignia on her uniform that showed she worked for a five-star general, a smaller version of his, stitched like his, into the shoulder of her uniform.
Kay watched as her boss tried hard to shrug off his promotion as just a smart piece of public relations by the Pentagon; but the back-slapping, the letters and wires of congratulation, the festive drinks at headquarters and to cap it all the new insignia on his uniform made him a happy man. Eisenhower knew that the man he admired more than any other in the military, George Marshall, would have arranged the promotion.
Amid celebrations in the days before Christmas and the lengthy meetings to plan the next stage of the war, Kay and Eisenhower moved like actors on a stage, aware of what was unspoken between them and aware too that moments alone would be brief and liable to interruption.
That hardly mattered to her. She had rank in the American army and a badge on her shoulder that showed she worked closely with the supreme Allied commander.
Her mother was impressed. “You look so important, darling,” she said. “I never thought my little girl would wear a uniform like that. But does it mean you’ll go to America when the war is over? I wouldn’t like that.”
Charlotte was less impressed. She ran her fingers over the badges with one hand while drinking a gin and lime with the other.
“Well, well, doll, you really are in the army now,” she said
“Congratulate me, go on, be nice for once and don’t tell me I’m being used.”
“I don’t have to, doll, you know you are. I suppose it’s a fair trade. He gets to keep you and you get little gold stars on your shoulder. Women have been bought for much less.”
“I think you’re jealous.”
“If I thought all those gold stars came with some high-powered fucking I would be very jealous indeed.”
“I hate that word. You know how to make a girl feel good, you really do. What did you do in your last life, I wonder?”
“I was the Duke of Wellington’s Thursday mistress.”
“Thursday?”
“He had one for every day of the week. He saved the weekends for his wife. Randy bastard.”
Christmas was coming, and beyond that lay hopes of an end to the war. Kay was in the staff mess at Reims drinking coffee and daydreaming about the day when Eisenhower would return to Washington, there to be appointed chief of staff. She would become an American citizen and she would join him there. She looked out of the window and saw it was snowing. The last Christmas of the war was just a week away. She picked up her coffee and slipped back into her dreams.
And Mamie Eisenhower, the wife who had waited for so long – what of her? Kay frowned slightly. The boss was finalising plans for a broad-front offensive early in the new year. The Germans had been retreating since the D-Day breakout and they would go on retreating all the way to Berlin.
Ike would finish the war by Easter. Then he would return in triumph to America and ask Mamie for a divorce. If he made up his mind to do something, he followed through. The Brits had been complaining about him behind his back and Montgomery had been sniping away as usual. Ike had stuck to his guns and refused to change strategy.
It was his military training, Kay knew that. He was pig obstinate and liked quoting an old military maxim: never change tactics while engaging the enemy unless your line breaks. She had heard him tell Montgomery that. The field marshal muttered and blustered but had no real answer. He knew it was Napoleon’s favourite advice to his generals.
Ike wouldn’t change his mind about her either. He would ask for a divorce. She was sure of that. They had never discussed it, but just last night, in a rare moment alone, he had had taken her in his arms and given her a long bruising kiss. That kiss was a promise: I will never let you go.
There was an urgent tap on her shoulders. It was Mickey McKeogh.
“The boss wants you to take the car and get his clothes. He’ll be sleeping rough here tonight. There’s a big flap on.”
“Why? What’s happened?”
“The Germans have broken through, some place called the Ardennes.”
16
January 1945
“A case of oysters, Mr President?” Steve Early, White House press secretary and the longest serving of all Roosevelt’s aides, tried to keep the surprise out of his voice.
“A big case of oysters,” corrected the president, looking with satisfaction at the bewilderment on his press secretary’s face. Men in power enjoy being able to surprise those who serve them, especially people such as Steve Early who, although a remarkably able and loyal aide, lacked imagination.
“Right, Mr President, but where shall I send it?”
“To his headquarters in Versailles, of course. I want it there by tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow, Mr President?”
“Don’t repeat me, Steve. You’re being a little slow today, if I might say so. Call George Marshall and tell him to ship a case of oysters to Ike. He’s got planes going over there every day. It’s my New Year’s greeting, congratulations on the way he dealt with the Ardennes business and a little gesture to salute his fifth star.”
“Right, Mr President,” said Early, wondering where he was going to get a case of oysters in Washington. He did not like the molluscs himself, but he knew Eisenhower did. They were his favourite seafood but no longer obtainable in France; the invasion had wrecked the fishing fleets and most of the oyster beds in Brittany and Normandy.
Later that day George Marshall e
ntered the Oval Office for what had become a daily meeting between the chief of staff and his commander-in-chief.
Marshall put down a file of papers and sat in the vacant chair opposite the presidential desk. “The oysters are on their way,” he said.
The president smiled. “Good. He deserves them. It’s been a tough time.”
“I agree,” said Marshall, looking grave. “But ...”
There was a pause. Roosevelt watched Marshall’s fingers twisting into each other as he sought the right words. The president admired and trusted this man like no other in Washington. He had vetoed Marshall’s appointment as supreme commander of the European campaign two years earlier for that very reason. He had needed him here, by his side, close to the White House.
Roosevelt had just won an unprecedented fourth term and now intended to make more history. There was a major Allied conference coming up where Stalin, Churchill and he would draw up the post-war map of Europe. It was a long way to travel, halfway across the world to an unknown town called Yalta on the Crimean peninsula, but he had to be there.
At first he had wanted Marshall to stay behind in Washington, keeping that military mind of his focussed on the final weeks of the war in Europe. But his golden rule, one which had served him well at every stage of his political life, was to take a fresh look at any major decision the morning after it was made. Thus he had changed his mind. He would take Marshall to Crimea to allow Stalin and Churchill to understand and admire the man who was the real architect of the war in Europe.
Roosevelt’s respect for his army chief of staff did not extend to personal warmth in their relationship. Marshall believed that men in high office, whether military or civilian, should adhere to, and were enhanced by, formal behaviour.
He did not approve of the casual camaraderie of Roosevelt’s White House. The president used first names to address most of those around him, including servants, cabinet members and the press corps. He had once addressed Marshall in a similar manner back in 1938. The deep frown that followed ended such informality.
Marshall placed his hands on his knees and leant forward. The man he faced, the president of the United States, who had broken with constitutional tradition and won a fourth term, the man who held the future of Europe in his hands, looked old and haggard. His face was furrowed with deep lines and the eyes had sunk back into their sockets. He had lost weight and was said to be eating little. There was death in that face, thought Marshall. He wondered which would end first, the president or the war.
“Yes, general?” Roosevelt prompted.
“... but it shouldn’t have happened,” said Marshall.
Roosevelt sighed. “You know I don’t like post-mortems. Let’s look forward, the war will be over in a couple of months.”
“I must tell you that big mistakes were made. We missed a lot of intelligence about the build-up in the Ardennes. The Germans switched six divisions from the Russian Front while no one was looking. A lot of good men died because of that.”
“Are you blaming Ike?”
“Not me, Mr President. He blames himself. Intel that didn’t fit the conventional wisdom was ignored.”
“Conventional wisdom?”
“That the Germans would go on retreating and we would go on advancing.”
“Go on.”
“We had reports of a German build-up as far back as November. The Brits gave us Ultra reports saying that Hitler was stripping divisions from the Russian Front and switching them to the west. Eisenhower’s people didn’t want to believe them because the information didn’t fit.”
“Why are you telling me all this, general?”
“Because I think Ike is tired. His mind is not on the job. He’s getting distracted.”
The president lit a cigarette and waited.
“Go on.”
“I’ll be frank, Mr President. The Brits are beginning to lose faith in him.”
“Really?”
“I’m sure you’ve heard reports from our people in London, but this is from me.”
“And?”
“They think he needs a firmer grip on the ground forces. They use the Ardennes to make that point. The British want him to appoint a second-in-command to take charge of all front line forces. A Brit, naturally.”
“Who are ‘they’ exactly?”
“It’s Churchill. He’s been pressing Ike to appoint a deputy supreme commander. And Ike seems to have agreed. That’s the issue.”
“Who have they in mind?
“Not Montgomery. The Brits are not that stupid. Bradley and Patton would go mad.”
“So who?”
Marshall had seen the president do this many times. He was a tactical master in such conversations, posing gentle questions to draw out the problem and find a solution. Everyone who faced the president in the Oval Office knew that for every problem they laid on his desk they had to follow with a suggested solution.
“It doesn’t matter who, Mr President. We should resist any such suggestion. I hardly have to tell you that three-quarters of the troops fighting in Europe are American. We are producing half the world’s armaments. I don’t think Congress would stand for a Brit in command of their boys.”
“Where is Montgomery in all this?”
“Bitching, as usual, but Ike shut him up. We need him. He’ll take the fight to the Huns in the north.”
Roosevelt placed one of his Camels, his favourite brand, in the holder and lit it. There was a picture of a camel in the desert on the pack above the slogan A camel is worth a long walk. He hadn’t walked a step unsupported since stricken with poliomyelitis in the hot summer of 1921, when he was a forty-year-old successful lawyer and businessman possessed of a famous political name and the ambition that went with it – he was about to enter politics when the polio struck.
George Marshall had presented him with the problem and the solution.
“Go and see Ike,” said Roosevelt. “Tell him he remains the sole commander of Allied forces in Europe. Tell him to stop those generals squabbling among themselves. We’ve got the Germans to beat. I’ll talk to Churchill.”
“Thank you, Mr President.”
Roosevelt looked down at his desk diary. The meeting had overrun his next appointment. But Marshall had not risen from his chair.
“There’s something else,” said Marshall.
Roosevelt raised an eyebrow.
“I think Ike needs a break, a few days off somewhere, maybe where he can get a little sun.”
“Sun in Europe in January?”
“Well, you know what I mean. He’s tired. There are too many distractions in his life.”
“What sort of distractions?” said Roosevelt, knowing perfectly well what his chief of staff was trying to say but interested to hear how he was going to frame it.
“He’s got that English driver of his ...”
“I know. I’ve met her. She’s a charming young woman.”
“He thinks so too. There’s a lot of talk, but that isn’t the point. Every night he ends up with her in his room, or in his tent if they’re on ops, and they stay up late and drink, I guess ...”
“That’s gossip, general.”
“I think it’s a huge distraction.”
“You mean you think he might have learnt a little more about German intentions in the Ardennes if he hadn’t had the occasional nightcap with his driver? Come on, that’s not like you. Where’s the logic in that?”
Marshall didn’t take the hint. He wasn’t going to change the subject.
“He’s made her a WAC and he’s trying to get her American citizenship.”
“I know. I authorised it.”
“Aren’t you worried he might be ...”
“Might be what, general?”
“Well, bringing her to Washington. I mean, there’s Mrs Eisenhower.”
“So you are going to give her citizenship.”
“It’s not my call.”
“You could stop it.”
“I have no intention of stopping it. Nor should you.”
“It means he’s going to bring her back to DC after the war.”
The president put his cigarette holder down on an enamel ashtray, dropping a roll of ash onto his desk.
“Let’s get to ‘after the war’ first before we worry about this, shall we? Frankly, I’m a little more worried about getting to Berlin before the Russians than whether Ike is sleeping with his driver.”
Marshall wanted to remind the president that Kay Summersby was no longer the supreme commander’s driver. Her recent promotion to first lieutenant in the Women’s Army Corps meant she now occupied an even greater position of influence within Ike’s tight circle of aides and advisors.
That raised some interesting questions. She had been checked out thoroughly by the FBI and nothing suspicious had been found in her background. If she had any political views she kept them to herself. Summersby’s mother lived near London, while her father, who had served in a cavalry regiment in the Great War, lived out his life quietly in Ireland. The British intelligence agencies had said repeatedly that she was nothing to do with them.
Marshall believed them. Trouble was that everyone seemed to like Kay Summersby – except Mrs Eisenhower and her friends in Washington. Patton and Clark approved of her because they said it kept Ike sane. In any case, since Patton had that Red Cross nurse of his around all the time, he was hardly going to object.
But Marshall’s view was that Eisenhower was on the edge of a breakdown. He was exhausted as much by the political infighting within the Allied command as anything the Germans had thrown at him. He needed a break, a few days away from the front line – and more importantly from Kay Summersby, because there were other more dangerous implications behind the Allied Commander’s rumoured romance.