Mr. American

by George MacDonald Fraser

  For Mr Franklin there was an additional, vicarious satisfaction in listening to the talk around him. This, too, was of a very different quality from the conversation at Oxton. There, although the topics had meant little to a stranger like himself, they had at least been mundane; here, unless he was much mistaken, great matters beyond the ken of the public were discussed - and discussed with a confidence and freedom which surprised him. He had already heard Admiral Fisher, whom he knew vaguely to be Britain's leading naval authority, and a political stormy petrel, disputing high naval policy with Mr Churchill, a minister of the Crown; which was no doubt very gratifying to a chance visitor, until he reflected that their debate had been conducted with a complete indifference to whoever might be listening, which seemed indiscreet, and even more extraordinary, its tone had been that of two neighbours quarrelling over a garden wall. Was this how the mighty ordered the destiny of nations? Mr Franklin had supposed in his innocence that such matters were weighed in secret by grey-haired senators, all personal differences and prejudices subdued, with decisions slowly emerging only after mature deliberation. Not that Fisher and Churchill had determined to surprise the German High Seas Fleet, exactly, but their attitude and tone had suggested a carefree pragmatism, a casualness almost . . . It was all very unexpected, and startling, in a heady sort of way.

  They were at it again, on a different tack; from the table head he caught a reference to the House of Lords - now that was a crisis of high moment, surely? At least, so the newspapers, which he read with an alien's foggy half-interest, led him to believe; weren't the Lords the crux of the impending dissolution of Parliament, and the General Election which would follow early in the New Year? Mr Franklin increased the intensity of his smile at the lady-in-waiting, and attuned his ear to muffle her chatter about the forthcoming Christmas festivities in Mayfair, and catch what the King, wearing a slightly dyspeptic smile, was saying to Fisher:

  .. so I suppose there is a funny side to it. Balfour wanted to know what titles we could give 'em; J. M. Barrie, for example. He seemed to think Lord Pan of Whimsy would be appropriate.'

  There was a murmur of laughter, and Churchill said: 'Lord Never Never would be more like it.'

  'Or Lord Darling Hook?' suggested another voice.

  'I can see it becoming all the rage among Christmas party games, at this rate,' sighed the King. 'Balfour had another - what was it? Oh, yes, for Anthony Hope - Lord Rupert of Hentzau!'

  There was more laughter, and Mrs Keppel exclaimed: 'No - I have it! Lord Buckle of Swash!'

  'Surely that ought to be reserved for Stanley Weyman,' said Fisher, smiling.

  'Oh, he's not important enough, Jackie. Mere boys' stories!'

  'Poor old Oscar Wilde thought he was important, though. Wanted to give Weyman's romances to all the convicts in Reading Gaol - required reading for safe-crackers, evidently.'

  'Imagine thinking of a title for Wilde! No, better not, perhaps. Who else, though?' Churchill frowned in mock concentration. 'What about Bernard Shaw?'

  'Catch him accepting,' said Soveral. 'Of course, you'd have to give him the chance to refuse, with immense publicity; he'd never forgive you otherwise.'

  'Call him plain Lord Shaw -with a preliminary "P", of course. Lord Pshaw!'

  'Or call him Lord Chancellor - he'd be sure to like that!'

  Mr Franklin could make nothing of this; he glanced round and found Cassel's eye on him.

  'I feel more provincial every day,' confessed Mr Franklin. 'What are they talking about?'

  'Titles - for authors raised to the peerage,' was the reply. 'I can't imagine that his majesty finds it terribly amusing, though.' And indeed the King was leaning back in his chair, with a slight frown between his brows, murmuring something to Mrs Keppel as the suggestions flew back and forth across the table before him.

  'Are they going to make some writers peers?'

  'I very much doubt it - more's the pity, in a way. If anyone must be elevated, it might as well be someone who has the wit to write a novel or a play. What would you think? - suppose it was suggested that Mark Twain, and - let's see, who else? - oh, Jack London and Henry James, and that clever chap whose name I never seem to hear nowadays - Dreiser, Theodore Dreiser. Suppose it was suggested that they and other American writers should be appointed to the Senate - in addition to the Senators you already have?'

  'I guess there'd be plenty of support for Mark Twain, anyway,' smiled Mr Franklin. 'It's an interesting idea.'

  'Well, something of the sort might happen here.' Cassel sipped his wine. 'You know about the Budget, and all that?'

  'I know the Conservatives don't like it, and that the House of Lords threw it out the other day. And that the House of Commons are saying the Lords have betrayed the Constitution. And since you don't have a Constitution am I right? - it's kind of confusing for an American cousin.

  'Ye-es, it's rather odd, I agree. But the issue's quite simple, really. The Liberal Government wants that Budget passed, and it's being suggested that the King should create enough peers - about goo, they say - which indeed he has the power to do, to ensure a majority for the government in the House of Lords. It's unprecedented, and leaves him a nasty choice. If he does make all these new lords, he'll infuriate the Tories, who are his traditional support, and be setting a shocking precedent - for theoretically any monarch henceforth could make as many peers as he liked and play fast and loose with Parliament. If he doesn't create the peers that Asquith wants, on the other hand, he'll be seen to be frustrating the will of his democratically-elected government, and that's a risky thing to do. Plenty of people might call the whole existence of the monarchy into question. That's why it's being talked of as a crisis. It's the government's own fault, in my opinion - making the monarch a catspaw. A dangerous game. At worst, I suppose it could lead to revolution.'

  He said it so blandly that for a moment Mr Franklin thought he had misheard. 'You don't mean that seriously?'

  'Why not? Everyone thinks it could never happen here. They forget that it's happened before. No doubt it came as a terrible shock in 1641, and again in 1776, in your country.' Cassel. 'I know you think of that as your revolution; it can just as well be described as Britain's second civil war. And the conditions were no more dangerous then than they are now.'

  Mr Franklin considered his pudding, and saw no political enlightenment therein. 'Well, of course, you know, and I don't - but it's pretty hard to believe.'

  'It always is. You know that you countrymen blame George III for your revolution - and in a way, they're right. He didn't start it. That was the work of idiot ministers in London and, if you'll forgive me for saying it, some fairly seedy political opportunists in Boston. But he could have stopped it. Whatever the King's lawful power, or lack of it, he has the tremendous influence of his position, if he knows how to use it. George III, poor old soul, didn't know how; he didn't know the right moves to make. Edward VII is in a similar position now. Thank God he's wiser than George was - and cleverer. And in his own way, more honest, for he knows what matters. And that isn't government or opposition or Liberals or Tories or peers - but the people of the land. You see, our ridiculous system, our so-called parliamentary democracy - which is a flagrant contradiction in terms, if only people would think about it - our ridiculous system, without any written constitution and so forth, is open to all sorts of abuses. It works - and works probably better than any other form of government yet devised by man - only as long as the people who operate it play fair. And that's something that can't be guaranteed by any law or constitution. And if ever they don't play fair - and many people think they're not playing fair now - then there's only one hope. And he's sitting up there now, being bored stiff by Jackie Fisher on the German Navy. In the end, it's up to him. "Upon the King", as Shakespeare said.'

  'I didn't realise he had any power in politics,' said Mr Franklin. `I thought he was just a figurehead. What do you think he'll do?'

  'Wait. And play the political chess game between Liberals an
d Tories to the best of his not inconsiderable ability. But in the long run he'll try to do what he thinks the ordinary people want - that's what he'll be guided by. Oddly enough, I doubt if the politicos realise that; they think in political terms, and can't see any other. The King can, because in the last resort, it's what he's there for Figurehead? Oh, yes - but the day any monarch forgets his reason for existence - to be the people's champion, in the face even of Parliament if necessary, then God help us.'

  Mr Franklin was impressed. It had not occurred to him, from what he had seen, that kingship amounted to much more than a leisurely progress from country house to race meeting to theatre, seeking pleasure, stuffing and swilling, and being fawned upon. What Cassel said caused him to view the monarch in a rather more sympathetic light; he had his troubles, too, and awesome they were indeed - on the other hand, as Mr Franklin glanced up the table he could not help thinking that they sat uncommonly lightly on the royal shoulders. The King was sitting back, listening to a whisper from Mrs Keppel, a bored, well-fed, contented smile on his pouchy, bearded face. Mr Franklin's puritan soul was vaguely stirred - if he had had the creation of 500 peers on his mind, he'd have been striding up and down somewhere, worrying and demanding advice from grey-bearded counsellors. The King, on the other hand, was quite prepared to join in jokes about the subject, or listen to Mrs Keppel's tittle-tattle while fondly contemplating her bosom, and surround himself with admirals and statesmen who discussed great affairs with a carefree abandon. And what they said mattered; what the King thought mattered; what took place round that elegant, well-bred, gossiping dining-table mattered - why, the veriest trivia exchanged among these light minds could have world-wide effects. There was Churchill, leaning across towards Mrs Keppel, coaxing her to choose from a dish of petit-fours ... 'the stuffed dates are delicious. .. or there are the little German biscuits. ..' She was considering, a finger on her cheek - suppose she chose the date, and got her glove sticky, and later in the evening he, Franklin, had to come to her aid with a handkerchief, and the King noticed, and thought irritably that Alice was paying too much damned attention to that Yankee fellow, and Fisher happened to be talking to the King at that moment about naval strategy or something, and the King gave him a snappy answer, and Fisher went back to the Admiralty and said the King wasn't in favour of such-and-such - why, in two years time the Royal Navy might be building only two submarines instead of twenty, and all because Mrs Keppel had chosen a stuffed date instead of a German biscuit ...

  'No, really, I think I'd rather not. I eat far too much as it is.' She was smiling and declining the petit fours, and Churchill was offering the plate to his other neighbour. Mr Franklin felt a sudden relief; the naval crisis was past, for the moment anyway.

  Of course, that was ridiculously fanciful, and he chuckled automatically. 'What's the joke?' asked Cassel, so Mr Franklin told him. The Jewish knight nodded, smiling. `Well, it's not so ridiculous. That's how human destiny works. Napoleon's father felt amorous one evening, and nine months later Napoleon was born and the shape of the world changed; now, if Napoleon's father had stubbed his toe getting into bed, and quarrelled with Madam Bonaparte in consequence - no Napoleon, no Waterloo, and a different world today. It's the old horse-shoe nail proposition, and there's no guarding against it, or sense in worrying about it. Anyway, I doubt very much if H.M. is going to be greatly influenced by anything said or thought - ' his gesture took in the table' - in this company. No one here counts for very much. Oh, Jackie Fisher's the most brilliant sailor we've had since Nelson, and if this country is prepared for any trial by combat that may arise, it will be due to his brilliance and determination; but he's a wild man, and the King regards him as a good friend and no more. Churchill? He's not one of the royal circle - indeed, I'm surprised that he's here - and certainly the King would never turn to him for advice, thank God; a political gadfly, and too clever by a quarter, many people think. No, you won't find many top-weight people round the King; he doesn't care for 'em. Some regret it, but I don't; he's capable of making up his own mind.'

  'You've got a high opinion of the King, haven't you?'

  'High?' Cassel frowned thoughtfully. 'He's the best friend I've ever had. Does that imply a high opinion? I know the worst that can be said of him - that he can be selfish, spoiled, petulant, and horribly self-indulgent where his own pleasure and comfort are concerned. Which of us isn't? But our faults aren't under such a merciless light as his; no one notices if you or I pull a face over a cup of coffee. And I know the best of him, too: he's kind, and honest with himself, and he's got common sense. I'd be happy enough if they could put those things on my tombstone.'

  'So you don't really expect a revolution, then?'

  Cassel leaned back and laughed with pure amusement. `No, I can't honestly say that I do. But I don't make the mistake of ruling the possibility out entirely, just because we're in civilised old England in the civilised twentieth century. Revolution doesn't just belong to the ancient past - heavens, there are thousands of people still alive who fought in your last rebellion - old Flashman there, for one.' He nodded down the table, where the ancient general, his fine whiskers a-bristle, champagne glass at the ready, could be distinctly heard:

  '... so I said to Bismarck-ugly devil he was, tried to put me out of a carriage once, used to shoot rats with a saloon pistol, revolting brute -I said, "Your trouble, Bismarck, is that you didn't go to a decent public school. So you've got no manners, see?" Frightful bounder, rode foul against me in a steeplechase in Rutland, I remember. ..'

  Cassel shook his head. 'It's hard to believe, perhaps, that he knew a man who fought in the last revolution in these islands. His own grandfather served against the Jacobites at Culloden. I say served - in fact, according to Flashman, his grandfather ran screaming from the field at the first shot, and didn't stop running till he reached Inverness. Ah, I see the ladies are leaving us.'

  The port did not circulate very long after the ladies had left, however. General Flashman, rendered even more reminiscent by the champagne he had consumed, joined the group round the King at the table head and launched into a vivid recollection of how his majesty, as a youthful Prince of Wales fifty years before, had been compromised by an actress in Ireland, to the dismay of the other guests and the suppressed fury of the King. To make matters worse, the old man took to calling the King 'young Bertie', and an unpleasant scene was prevented only by Soveral's tactful suggestion that they should join the ladies, who would be eager for bridge. The King, glaring thunderously, took the hint and led the way from the dining-room; General Flashman cocked a malevolent eye and observed: 'Bridge, eh? Played it in Russia before you lot were born. Game for half-wits,' and then fell asleep over the decanter.

  A couple of winning rubbers soon restored his majesty to good humour, to the general relief; Mr Franklin partnered him in one of them, and thanks to his study of the game since Oxton, acquitted himself reasonably well. But he was glad when the game broke up early; he had found his attention straying towards Lady Helen, playing backgammon with one of the gentlemen at the other end of the drawing-room, and wished he could have joined her, rather than sit through the tedious business of watching the King make three diamonds or two no trumps. Strange, that what had been an ordeal a few weeks ago should now be a bore; he must be getting unusually blase. Strange, too, that he hankered to continue his conversation with Lady Helen, who didn't seem to like him much, and was not an outstandingly attractive girl - handsome, yes, and with a fine figure, but not to be compared with Peggy. What was it about her? She was something different, with her revolutionary views, and her challenging, aggressive front - why did he feel that in spite of her assured, even arrogant manner, she was vulnerable in a way that women like Peggy were not? However, no opportunity presented itself of a tete-a-tete between the end of the bridge game and bedtime, since the gentlemen resorted to the billiard room for a communal game of slosh, and on returning for supper at one o'clock, discovered that the Queen had taken advantage of their absen
ce to retire, the other ladies following suit.

  In the morning there was a pheasant shoot, which occupied most of the daylight hours, and Mr Franklin found himself, like many an expert before him, in the curious position of excelling at something which interested him hardly at all. He was a good shot, by his own standards, and by those of the Court, a brilliant one, but it was tame work, and a far cry from the hunting he had done at home. Shooting birds with a shotgun was mechanical, repetitive, and wasteful, and to pose in a group at the end of the day, to be photographed behind a mound of feathered carcases, was positively childish.

  But it was obviously part of the ritual, and had to be borne - in the moment of posing before the picture was taken, Mr Franklin glanced along at the rest of the group, and was aware of a sudden impatience: there was the King, hat at a rakish angle, cigar poised between his fingers; there were his gentlemen, immaculately tweeded and assured; there was the whole tedious paraphernalia of the day's sport, the guns, the shooting-sticks, the bags, the dogs, and the dead pheasants - had anyone really enjoyed it, he wondered, any more than they enjoyed the bridge games, the endless, trivial gossip, the stilted, mannered routine of afternoon tea, and dressing for dinner, and eating dinner, and watching the King, and listening to the King, and going through the semi-religious forms of behaviour, like participants in some eternal, meaningless minuet, without purpose and without completion? At Oxton it had been a novelty; now, after twenty-four hours of Sandringham, he was regarding it all with something close to revulsion; with insight, he speculated that probably the King himself felt something akin to his own disenchantment, but the King would hardly be able to identify it, since for seventy years he had known nothing else, and was more the prisoner of this unreal merry-go-round than any of his courtiers could ever be.