Target Churchill

by Warren Adler

  “Not the slightest hint?” Todd asked. “Why so close to the vest?”

  “You know he dictates his own speeches and doesn’t like to preempt his own drama.”

  “Did you get an impression, something instinctive?” Baker asked.

  He remembered Sarah’s words almost verbatim and had written them down after getting back to his hotel. He had called her upon arriving in Washington, but she had already gone back to Los Angeles. He hoped he would not lose a good friend—and a source, he added cynically to his thoughts.

  “My impression, Todd,” he said, after a lengthy pause, “in the light of his deliberate evasion, is that he is planning a significant speech.”

  “What exactly does that mean?”

  “Maybe something critical about the way the peace is going, the division of Berlin by the Potsdam Agreement. Maybe something very unpleasant about the Russians.”

  He waited for a reaction from his editor.

  “He’s always been critical of the Russians.”

  “Still it’s only speculation. I don’t think you could build a hot news story on a mere reporter’s impression without quoting sources. And I’ve never felt comfortable not using real live sources. I hate quoting anonymous sources.”

  He knew he was being ingenuous, since the paper often quoted anonymous sources, albeit sparingly. But he knew that if Sarah got wind of a story about her father wanting to create a stem-winder that would rock the world and practically indict Stalin for stealing half of Europe, their friendship would be over. He didn’t want that to happen. It would always be a journalist’s dilemma.

  “Tell you what, Todd,” he said. “Suppose I sleep on it. The speech is more than a month away. I know what you’re looking for. Also, Todd, I’ve got some good stuff for a Churchill feature. Maybe I can get Sarah to arrange some photo stuff to go with it.”

  “How is your friend?”

  “Great,” Benson said, as he walked away to see Maclean.

  They met in Maclean’s opulent, paneled first secretary’s office in the British embassy on Massachusetts Avenue. The redbrick dwelling with stone dressing featured a pillared, classical Greek front. The combined residence and diplomatic office, which he had once described in a feature story, suggested an English manor house in the time of Queen Anne.

  A large desk dominated the thick-carpeted room. To one side was a spit-shined, long, oval conference table, and the other side contained a sitting area with dark leather chairs and couches and a large, square cocktail table.

  Benson noted a number of pictures with Maclean, his wife, and children, as well as photos of him with various members of the royals, including the king and queen, and Churchill and Anthony Eden. It was an impressive stage setting for the tall, handsome Maclean.

  Maclean ran the embassy for the ambassador, Lord Halifax, a tall, austere man whom Benson had met and who spent much of his time riding to the hounds or other familiar pursuits of the British aristocracy. He had been Chamberlain’s foreign secretary and had hoped to be Churchill’s. But after Dunkirk, when he had advocated making peace with the Nazis, Churchill had sent him off to Washington.

  Donald Maclean, in his capacity as first secretary, was always the first to arrive at the embassy and the last to leave. No diplomatic activity between the Americans and the British took place without his knowledge.

  Benson’s appointment had been timed for teatime; and almost as soon as Benson arrived, a tall, attractive, dark-haired, young woman brought in a tray filled with tea things and small cakes and sandwiches in the age-old tradition.

  “This is Victoria Stewart,” Maclean said, making a sweeping motion toward the woman. “Spencer Benson, a good and trusted friend.”

  He patted the reporter on the upper arm.

  “So pleased to meet you, sir,” she said, offering a broad smile.

  “So how was your little tête-à-tête with the great Winston Churchill and the magnificent Sarah?” Maclean asked.

  The young woman carefully poured the tea and politely asked for the usual preferences of milk and lumps of sugar.

  “Impressive,” Benson replied.

  “And what will the old man talk about when he greets the great unwashed in Nowheresville, Missouri?”

  Benson was impressed with Maclean’s command of American slang.

  “My sense of it is that it will be a real Soviet basher.”

  “Really?” Maclean said, with a heavy touch of sarcasm.

  With well-manicured fingers, he lifted a tiny cucumber sandwich, pausing for a moment to ask a question.

  “Did he tell you that?”

  “Not in so many words,” Benson said.

  “Will that be all, sir?” Victoria interrupted politely.

  Maclean nodded and observed her as she left the room. Benson noticed that he was observing her with what seemed like more than routine interest. Maclean daintily slipped a sandwich into his mouth and washed it down with a sip of tea.

  “Just your conclusion then?” Maclean pressed, returning the cup and saucer soundlessly to the table.

  Benson again mulled over Sarah’s words. He weighed the harm of revealing them in this venue. It wasn’t as if he were quoting it in his story.

  “I had a drink with Sarah while I was down there. She alluded to it.”

  “Alluded?”

  “She seemed convinced her father was going to be rather harsh.”

  “On the Russians?”

  Benson nodded.

  Maclean turned away and looked into his teacup as if some response was hidden there.

  “Nothing more specific?”

  “Just an allusion.”

  Maclean grew oddly pensive.

  “At our lunch at Cosmos, you predicted it,” Benson said.

  As in all relationships with sources, it was business under the guise of socializing. Each wanted something from the other. Benson was looking for a quotable source.

  “That wasn’t for attribution, Spencer,” Maclean rebuked, his expression suddenly wary.

  “Of course not, Donald,” Benson said. “As always, we are on background here. And confidential.”

  He was, of course, disappointed. A quote from Maclean would take him off the hook with Sarah.

  “It is inevitable, Spencer. Darling Winnie has been pissed about Uncle Joe for endless reasons. Stalin blamed him for delaying a second front. Indeed, he actually called him a coward to his face, which infuriated the old man. Later, Churchill wanted the Allies to take Berlin before the Soviets. Patton was hot to go, and Churchill—it is rumored—agreed. He apparently pressed Roosevelt to take such action, but Roosevelt, who thought good old Uncle Joe a kindred soul, turned down the idea. Of course, the PM yielded, with—I may add—a Latin quotation: Amantium irae amoris integratio est.

  “Meaning?”

  “‘Lovers’ quarrels always go with true love,’” Maclean snorted, as if it were a private joke. “Nothing like an English education.”

  “Makes me feel somewhat diminished,” Benson shrugged.

  “And diminished you should be.”

  His hand reached again for the cup and saucer. Benson followed suit, although his tea was already getting cold.

  “Churchill, it is common knowledge, hates Stalin. Thinks him a cruel, heartless bastard.” Maclean continued, “When Stalin suggested that one hundred thousand German officials and military officers be lined up and shot at the end of the war, the PM was so appalled he left a banquet in disgust and went into one of his black dog depressions.”

  “How do you know this, Maclean?”

  “Foreign office gossip. Even when Stalin told the old man he was only joshing, Churchill was unappeased. Secretly, he was rumored to be soft on Germany, which, by the way, gave Stalin the heebie-jeebies, fearing that Churchill would push for a separate peace with Hitler.”
r />   “You are a fount of Churchill lore, Maclean.”

  The men picked up their cups and saucers simultaneously and eyed each other over the rims. Maclean was the first to break the brief silence.

  “Then there were the Jews,” Maclean said, lowering his voice and swiveling his neck for a furtive look around, although there was no one in the room.

  “The Jews?”

  “Churchill lobbied Roosevelt to do something about the Jews. They all knew that Hitler was exterminating the whole race, burning them in the ovens. Roosevelt didn’t want the distraction of doing something about it to deflect attention from the main point: winning the war. Stalin agreed.

  “Churchill wanted the world to know what was happening, thinking that it would give a boost to our will to win. Churchill, once again, reluctantly surrendered. It was also suspected that our PM was not fully in accord with unconditional surrender, on the grounds that it would prolong the war. He was getting flack from the British people in the streets who were growing weary of the conflict. But then, it did conflict with his ‘never give in’ cheerleading, and he acquiesced. Not that it mattered. They turned him out anyway. So you see, there were differences between them.”

  Benson had the impression that Maclean was egging him on, pouring out information, offering areas of response in the hope that Benson would reveal more than he was willing to impart. He knew the Washington Ping-Pong game; only the little white ball was potentially inside information, a tit-for-tat pas de deux.

  “If I read you correctly, Maclean, you think that Churchill, no longer constrained by the diplomatic niceties of being prime minister, will use the occasion to blast away.”

  “Hardly at the Americans. I’d guess that he would hold his fire there, but the Russians would be fair game. He’s always hated Communists and, you must remember, he fought with the Whites attempting in his words ‘to strangle them in the cradle.’”

  Maclean chortled, as if he were ridiculing the idea, adding with what might pass as glee, “Without success.”

  “How far do you think he will go with Truman standing by?” Benson asked. “Considering the present climate is distinctly pro-Russian.”

  “As you say, he is no longer constrained. Even the great ones have a soft spot for vengeance. My sense is that he might be so blinded by old prejudices, he may well not recognize that the Soviets could have earned their new spheres of influence.”

  Benson found this latest wrinkle of Maclean’s somewhat off-key and perhaps a reflection of the Brits’ current political agenda vis-à-vis the Soviet Union—or his own.

  “But he is out of power. In our last conversation, you dismissed his having any real impact for that very reason. Have you changed your mind?”

  Maclean smiled and took another quick sip of his tea and put the cup and saucer on the table.

  Benson detected a sudden change in the man’s expression. His face seemed ruddier than usual as if some internal mechanism was heating his blood.

  “Does it sound so? I’m not sure. With old Winnie, there’s no telling. There seems to be a groundswell of interest in the old man’s prognostications. Perhaps it comes from some pity over his political defeat. But with Truman introducing him, he will be in the spotlight of the world stage. When he addressed the American Congress in ’41, he brought the house down. His weapons are quite formidable.”

  “Weapons?”

  “Words, my dear Benson. Although being turned out of office may have diminished his power, Winston is a master of words. And words—as we have heard ad infinitum—are mightier than the sword. ‘We will fight them on the beaches,’ et cetera, et cetera. Who knows what would have happened to our tight little island if we Brits had not heard those words?”

  Maclean reached for another cucumber sandwich and popped it into his mouth.

  “His words could be a fatal stab into the heart of our plans for the postwar world. We need harmony, Spencer, not divisiveness.”

  “You think his words can be that influential?”

  “Without the shadow of a doubt, my journalist friend. Without the shadow of a doubt.”

  Chapter 8

  By the time Benson had left, the February light had faded into early high-winter darkness. Maclean had confirmed his own gloomy premonition, which he had shared at lunch that day with Alger Hiss. He opened the calendar on his desk and noted the date that Churchill was to arrive in Washington, some three weeks hence. Then he picked up the phone and dialed a number, hanging up after two rings. The phones he knew were allegedly secure, but he had long ago learned the value of overdoing caution. Two rings were quite useful and safe as a signal, and he used the method often.

  Then he called his home. He and his wife, Melinda, had moved into a rented house on Thirty-Fifth Street a month before. Up until then, she had lived with her mother at her farm in Western Massachusetts.

  But Donald had needed an excuse to leave Washington for New York, where Soviet control was maintained, usually staying at Melinda’s stepfather’s apartment on Park Avenue. His cover had been his need to visit his wife during her pregnancy. Although he rarely saw her on his frequent visits, he was never questioned by anyone about his visits.

  With the impending switch of Soviet control to its embassy in Washington, his trips to New York would end. This had meant moving Melinda and their children to Washington and slowly varying his routine, establishing his relationship with new handlers at the Russian embassy in Washington. At that point in time, the transfer had not been completed, and he was still reporting to his handler in New York.

  “Darling, I’ll be going up to New York tomorrow early,” he told Melinda. “Could you pack an overnighter like a dear?”

  “Now that I’m here, Donald, why the need to go up to New York?” she had asked. “Besides, we’re expected at the Stimsons tomorrow.”

  It was an important dinner, he reflected. Stimson was secretary of war, and the chitchat would be valuable. He weighed the alternatives. New York, he decided, was more pressing.

  “Dear Stimmie. Surely, you can find a suitable replacement in twenty-four hours?”

  “Can’t be helped, darling. Important state business.”

  He looked into the mouthpiece and smiled. He had to meet Volkov, his handler. Maclean’s information was, in his judgment, important enough to send along. There were too many crucial matters at stake.

  In his role as first secretary, he was privy to all decoded messages. Arriving early each morning, he was able to read all the overnights, which gave him the clearest possible picture of what was transpiring on this side of the Atlantic from both a British and an American perspective. On his frequent trips to New York, his efficient Soviet handlers were able to get the news back to Moscow quickly.

  He was quite proud of his achievements. Earlier in the year, he had managed to get his hands on sensitive Churchill communiqués to Truman that were useful to the Soviets in their strategy vis-à-vis Poland. The Americans truly believed that Poland would regain her freedom as an independent state. When the Americans would one day learn the truth, it would be too late. Poland would be well within the Soviet sphere.

  He loved the excitement of it, the sheer exhilaration of deceit. Others were involved as well, some of them quite high up and in the know, like Alger Hiss, now involved with the creation of the United Nations and a man with whom he met frequently. Both men were convinced that the Soviet strategy and its socialist underpinnings would carry the day in the postwar world and that their mutual countries were doomed to eventual collapse. Risks had to be taken to further the Soviet advance, and he was not averse to risk, including those of a sexual nature.

  He had been committed to these ideas since a student at Cambridge and had been both lucky and clever enough to make his special contribution. So far, he had totally escaped detection. He supposed that someday the string might run out, but he kept that possibility at bay. Be
sides, there was a heroic component to these peregrinations, and he reveled in his role as a queen bee in the honeycomb of the Allied hive.

  Victoria came into his office. He watched her parade across the room, deliberately exaggerating the movement of her hips, very aware of his observation. She had locked the door after her and drew the blinds. Most of his colleagues had gone. The ambassador always left early. Indeed, he spent more time riding horses than in the embassy and was often the honored guest at embassy dinners and private homes. She opened the liquor cabinet and poured them each a couple of fingers of scotch.

  “Cheers, darling,” she whispered, kissing him on the lips.

  He opened his mouth, and they tipped tongues. The seduction of his gorgeous secretary had been both useful and pleasurable. Her affable socializing with the staff, particularly the secretaries of Lord Halifax and those who served the intelligence officers, had been remarkably helpful.

  Of course, she knew nothing of his real intent or his role as a Soviet spy. He had explained that she was, in effect, the first secretary’s eyes and ears, not that she knew the implications of what she transmitted. Aside from secretarial school, her liberal education was minimal, and her interest in world politics indifferent. Her working-class accent was jarring but added to her sex appeal.

  His intrigues, he assured her, were for his own advancement and, of course, for His Majesty’s benefit. To do his job expeditiously as first secretary, he needed to know as much as he could learn about the motives and agendas of his colleagues.

  In these sensitive times, he told her, he needed the extra dimension of human intelligence to enhance his job, and she had eagerly provided it. Most of it, he understood, was merely raw gossip. Some of it was useful. Some not. She hadn’t a clue which was which. Indeed, she loved doing anything if it pleased him and inured to his benefit.

  “Anything, darling. I’ll do anything,” she had assured him.

  And that included especially sex. Besides, her discretion was impeccable and her sexual appetite extraordinary.