by Ann Bridge
‘Sir Warren Fisher says these are only debater’s points,’ I told him.
‘They are uncommonly good debater’s points!’ he said. ‘They would be quite good enough for me in the House!’
Then I told him what I wanted of Mr Macdonald. About that he was quite clear. It was impossible for R.M. to approach Mr Baldwin as I suggested. They never met, nor held any but the most formal intercourse.
‘But he might give you a letter, or a message. I will speak to him about it tomorrow. I think you had better see him yourself.’
We arranged that I should be in London next day and await his summons at Dean’s Yard, from 12.30 onwards. He pleased me then by speaking in very high terms of Owen and his work We promised to go and see them again as soon as we could, and drove back in pouring rain to Pendell.
Next morning, 2 April, I went up to town. About tea-time I got a note from Mr Ponsonby, enclosing the following letter which, he said, I could use in any way I liked.
House of Commons
2.IV.28
‘Dear Mrs O’Malley
I saw Mr Macdonald this afternoon and talked over with him the whole question of your husband’s enforced resignation from the Foreign Service. Mr Macdonald was very sorry that he would not be able to see you as he will be leaving London shortly. But he asked me to repeat to you the opinion which you told me you had already heard that he had expressed, namely that in the event of the Government seeing fit to mitigate their published decision with regard to your husband, the official Opposition and indeed the party as a whole would not raise any objection. He could not of course make himself responsible for every individual in the party; but as I explained to you even an isolated protest is highly improbable.
Mr Macdonald is as fully aware as I am of the serious loss to the Service which would be involved in the dismissal of so valuable an official as your husband. If therefore his resignation is not insisted on and, after whatever disciplinary action may be deemed necessary, your husband’s services are retained, such a decision on the part of the Government would meet with his hearty approval.
Yours sincerely
Arthur Ponsonby’.
I also got a line from Ralph Furse, saying that he had spoken to Mr J. C. C. Davidson, who wished to see me himself. Would I go to his house at 9.30 next morning? I sent a note to say that I would. That was just what I wanted – that he should see me. Sir Warren spoke to me on the telephone and enquired how I had got on – I told him I had some news for him, and he asked me to go and see him at 6.30.
So I went to the Treasury for the first time, and waited in that ghastly room with the hot-water pipes, the cupboards, the Underground map over the fireplace and the remains of Sir Russell Scott’s tea on the windowsill, till I was shown into the Permanent Secretary’s dignified corner room. There, among the official portraits and mahogany, among his own signed photographs of Prime Ministers and his framed mottoes about robins, sat Sir Warren Fisher, and with him sat Sir Claud Schuster. Both had open copies of the Report of the Board appointed to enquire into certain Statements affecting Civil Servants in their hands. Sir Claud greeted me with great friendliness, and I was delighted to see him. Sir Warren was in a gay mood. He told Sir Claud that I was ‘a very dangerous young lady – she’s found out all about you and me, Claud’. Sir Claud looked a little blank at this – Sir Warren began the story of my lucky guess and made me finish it. That amused Sir Claud. Then Sir Warren began to tease me. I was terribly argumentative and almost impossible to quench in discussion.
I appealed to Sir Claud, ‘Isn’t Sir Warren Fisher the most persistent disputant you ever met – and one of the most illogical?’ Sir Claud seemed disposed to agree.
Sir Warren shifted his ground. ‘She can’t quite make up her mind about me, Claud. She trusts me about – what shall we say? – three-fifths? Is it about three-fifths? But she can’t quite make up her mind to make it four-fifths yet. You might tell her, Claud, that she’d be quite safe to make it four-fifths.’
Sir Claud looked as if he thought this a rather peculiar tone for Sir Warren to take in the circumstances – I said, with some energy, that I thought I did rather well to go as far as I had done in the matter of trusting Sir Warren Fisher.
‘I quite agree with you, Mrs O’Malley,’ said Sir Claud.
Then Sir Warren asked for my news, and I gave him Mr Ponsonby’s letter. He read it aloud.
Sir Claud was impressed. ‘That’s very carefully drafted,’ he said. ‘It’s a very impressive letter indeed.’
I now suggested that I should go, as I had obviously interrupted them. Sir Claud said that he must go. Finally, Sir Warren asked me to wait while he and Sir Claud had a few moments talk in Mr Knox, the secretary’s, room. So I waited. In front of me, in an open drawer, my eye fell on a file of papers, with Owen’s name on the top sheet. Manifestly the dossier! There, under my hand, lay the answers to all the questions that Owen was asking me every day, that I asked myself from morning till night. I went and sat by the window till Sir Warren came back.
I stayed till 7.30, and then went back to Dean’s Yard and had an early supper with Hope, who forthwith went off to some nocturnal good works. I sat as before in front of the diningroom fire, alone with the portraits, and thought about my coming interview with Mr J. C. C. Davidson next morning. I attached immense importance to this, and wished wildly that I could get some advice before it. Then I had an illumination. Sir Claud Schuster was the very man. I went to the telephone – he was dining out. Did the maid know where? Yes, at his son-in-law’s. She gave me the number and I rang him up and explained what I wanted. There was to be Bridge, and it was difficult – but when he heard that I was seeing Mr Davidson at 9.30 next morning Sir Claud simply said, ‘Then you must come tonight, of course.’ Again I thought of Sir Austen Chamberlain.
I arrived at 9.30. We sat in a nice little study and had coffee and old brandy. My first need was to find out exactly where I stood. Sir Claud was a very old acquaintance and fellow-mountaineer, and I felt much less fear of him than of most of the people I had talked to.
I began by saying quite baldly that there were several questions I wished to ask him, ‘But I should not necessarily wish to ask them of either the F.O. or Sir Warren Fisher, and I want really to know how far you are bound to them?’
His answer came promptly. ‘In this matter I am bound to no one – but you,’ he added.
They were some of the most welcome words I ever heard in my life. At last I had got what I stood in such desperate need of – an adviser.
‘You can ask me anything you choose,’ he continued.
I did. I began by asking him what he thought of our position generally. I took him over the familiar ground of the Report, our points and Sir Warren Fisher’s replies to them. He was extraordinarily definite. The Report was quite unjustifiable. There was no justification for the setting of Don Gregory, Maxse, and O.O’M. in one category, and Mr Villiers and Sir Miles Lampson in another, to begin with; it was arbitrary, artificial, and unjust. The use of the expression ‘initiator of the whole business’ was unwarrantable, as were the implications of the phrases ‘came into a going concern’ and ‘Yielding to persuasion’. I was startled at his conviction on all these points. For this was an adviser worth listening to. Sir Claud Schuster was permanent head of the Lord Chancellor’s office; a lawyer, and also an official; wise, acute, informed, and in touch with the whole Civil Service.
‘But I’ve put all this to Sir Warren Fisher over and over again,’ I said, ‘and I haven’t budged him an inch.’
Sir Claud smiled. ‘Oh yes you have!’ he said. ‘You’ve shaken him to his foundations.’
‘Then why won’t he admit it?’ I asked.
Sir Claud smiled again. Fisher was a curious creature. No one understood him.
But Sir Claud went on to tell me how, after seeing me, Fisher had sent for him, Sir Claud, and had put my points to him and asked his opinion of them. Sir Claud had given it. And then this astonishing pair h
ad laid their heads together to see what they could do if the direct official efforts to get the sentence reversed failed. The plan almost took my breath away, it was so desperate and bold. They were to press for some sort of rehearing of our case before, I gathered, the P.M., the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Austen Chamberlain and the Lord Chancellor. The question arose as to who was to plead our case.
‘Certainly not your husband,’ said Sir Claud. ‘He would – you must excuse my saying so – ruin himself as he did before.’
I agreed; and, in any case, he was not fit for the strain. Sir Claud himself was ready and anxious to act for us, and had been preparing to do so; and with that end in view had been collecting, through Albert, all the information he could. Sir Warren Fisher had put him in possession of our points, and had shown him what the official replies were bound to be, so that he might be prepared to meet them. They had been discussing this when I arrived that very afternoon; they had been about to discuss it on that other occasion when Sir Claud’s arrival turned William Strang out.
But now, Sir Claud went on, since I had found out, in any case, what they were up to, and since he had talked to me, it had given him a fresh idea. He was not sure whether he had better act for me, after all.
‘I believe you would do it yourself better than anyone could do it for you,’ he said. ‘You are not like most women – I could rely on you to keep your head and get out all your points clearly.’ He considered. ‘Or we might act together. There would have to be certain admissions made which it would be painful for you to make, or even to hear – but you would stand that, or I might make them, and leave you to plead on your own behalf and make your own points.’
Well, this was a mouthful to consider. I told Sir Claud that if it came to it I could and would act, either alone on his instructions, or with him; and would not jib at anything he might have to say or make me say myself, and that I believed I might fairly promise not to lose my nerve.
‘I am sure you would not lose it,’ said Sir Claud.
Then we went on to consider the more immediate matter of the interview with Mr J. C. C. Davidson next morning, and I asked if I might run through what I intended to say, and get his corrections and improvements. Yes – and Sir Claud relit his cigar while I began. It was the familiar plea – Owen had done wrong, but not nearly so wrong as the Report indicated. The five points that were incorrect or unjust. Nothing but the Service was any good to Owen. Surely with some sanctions applied, the sentence might be reversed?
Sir Claud listened attentively, and at the end he burst out laughing.
‘What is it?’ I asked, a little disconcerted.
‘You really are a born barrister!’ he said, still laughing. ‘I had made up my mind what you ought to say to Davidson, and how you ought to say it, and meant to tell you so. And you sit there and reel off all the essential points, and omit the controversial ones, only you have arranged them in a more telling order than I had thought of. You don’t need any help from me!’
Well, that was all right, and now I must go. Sir Claud impressed on me that I was to come to him whenever I wanted, that he was completely at my disposal at all times and up to the hilt. His great kindness and warm concern for us moved me very much. He told me how he literally had not slept for two nights on hearing of the sentence, and again when he heard from Albert that I had come home and was doing battle on Owen’s account.
At the door he asked, ‘Can you sleep?’
‘Like a top,’ I told him, and no drugs after the first few nights.
‘You deserve everything!’ he said.
Chapter XI
I went back to Dean’s Yard much consoled. I had a legal adviser now! And I had a source of information. After the mystery kings of Whitehall and Downing Street, Sir Claud’s complete unreserve was almost the most blessed and comforting part of a most blessed and comforting state of affairs. And we had a second string to our bow now, though that hadn’t to be dealt with just yet. I had my points for Mr Davidson pat, and I tumbled into bed and slept like a top, as I had foretold.
Next morning at 9.30, I saw Mr Davidson. I waited for him in the little morning-room of his house in Barton Street, with all the shelves stacked with Hansards and histories. Presently he came in, very fresh and trim and pink and brisk. After the usual thanks I asked him how long he would give me – because when I knew I could cut my coat according to my cloth. Twenty minutes. Very well – and I weighed in. He listened quietly – now and then he put a question. I told him at the end that I recognized that there must be sanctions, that the incident could not be overlooked – but I wondered if the sanctions need involve leaving the Service. He asked what sanctions I had in mind.
‘A year en disponibilité,’ I said. ‘That anyhow – it would make things easier all round.’
Mr Davidson was very practical. ‘If you had a year without pay, could you live? How much money have you?’ I told him I had nearly £300 a year, and could certainly get a job at £400 – that our relations would help a bit and we should manage. I took occasion to read him the Ramsay Macdonald letter, and he made notes of that. Then it was time to go.
‘Yes,’ he said, pulling on his gloves, ‘I think it can be done. I think it ought to be done. I’ll go and see the Prime Minister now, and perhaps Tyrrell, too.’
Now, I had been adjured on no account to let him see anyone but the P.M., and especially not Tyrrell. I besought him not to trouble Tyrrell, but I could get no assurance out of him. He gave me an excellent box of Cyprian cigarettes, and we walked through the Yard together. Then I went back to Hope’s and told Sir Warren over the telephone about the interview, and that Mr Davidson proposed to see Tyrrell.
‘Oh bother David! That will never do,’ said Sir Warren. ‘I’ll get hold of the old thing and tell him to shut up.’
He told me later that he had done so, so what, if anything, came of this visit I never knew. Long afterwards Mr Davidson himself told me that after hearing the facts as related by me from him, Mr Baldwin expressed the opinion that the whole thing should be washed out and Owen reinstated without any further sanctions, since the publicity and misery had been in themselves a much more than adequate punishment for the original transgression – but that Sir Austen Chamberlain would not agree to this.
I went and saw Ralph Furse that morning and told him what had happened and thanked him for his good offices. Then I returned to Pendell, where I remained over Easter. We expected that our fate would be decided during Easter week, but we heard nothing. The suspense became so distressing in its effect on Owen that May and I at last decided that we must do something drastic to relieve it. Owen had expressed a wish, oddly enough, to see Sir Warren Fisher, and on Friday, 13 April, I telephoned to him to ask if he would come down to Pendell for the day on Saturday. He was on leave till the following Monday, staying at The Grove, Stanmore, with Mrs Ernest Cunard – he was not at all anxious to come, but in the end, with his usual good-nature, he promised to do as I wished, and I promised to fetch and return him by car.
So, on Saturday morning, the faithful Lawrence, the Pendell chauffeur, was mobilized once more, and I went off in the Rolls to collect Sir Warren. He had asked that I should come and meet him so that we might have a talk before he met Owen. On the way down I told him how dreadfully disturbed in mind Owen was. I was, as usual, derided for thanking him for his very real kindness in coming, and the rest of the drive was spent in arguing on the nature of reality, the Nature of God, and the existence of Evil. I then discovered for the first time how full Sir Warren’s head was of what seemed to me wildly irrational theories, and I made him laugh by pulling him up short at one point and asking him to define some of his terms, reality in particular.
The visit was rather a nightmare. Owen had wished to see Sir Warren alone first, so I told Howell, the butler, to show him up to the Panelled Room, where Owen was waiting. We all met at lunch. Sir Warren contrived to carry the meal off with admirable gaiety. After lunch, we three had coffee in the Panelled Roo
m once more, and then Owen hunted me off to rest. I went in some anxiety as to how they would get on in my absence, but, nevertheless, I slept. Owen called me again at three, and I sat with them till tea. They argued – but I cannot remember anything that they said, only my own vague emotions of discomfort. I stood in an awkward position between the two of them. Sir Warren regarded me as a friend and ally in controlling Owen for his own good. Owen was still feeling Fisher rather acutely as a potential foe, and naturally assuming my complete unanimity with his point of view. They seemed to me very tiresome. Both appealed to me: ‘He says this’ – ‘He says I’m that.’ I was glad when tea came, and with it the Rolls. After tea, in accordance with a previous arrangement with May, who wished to put in a word for us, we all escaped on various pretexts and left her with Sir Warren. She spoke warmly on our behalf, he afterwards told me. He for his part told her that he considered Owen ‘the most honest-minded man he had ever met’. All the same she derived an impression that he regarded me with much commiseration as a femme incomprise, victim of the follies of a husband who didn’t treat me any too well. She advised me to correct this plausible but mistaken view at the first opportunity.
Owen drove us back to Stanmore in the Buick. It was dark and cold. Sir Warren and I sat in the back. I was tired and frightened – frightened of the speed at which Owen drove, frightened at the remarks which he launched over his shoulder at Sir Warren. The suspense was beginning to tell on me, too, and, as we crossed London and bounced down the Finchley Road, I wondered secretly how much more of this sort of thing I was good for?
Chapter XII
The suspense, if I had only known it, was nearly over. On the Monday following Sir Warren’s visit to Pendell I went up to London to stay with Lady Crowe, and to meet John, who was returning from Chateau d’Oex one day that week under Lady Montague Pollock’s escort. I lunched at Elm Park Road, Lady Crowe’s house, and in the afternoon went to see Sir Claud Schuster at the House of Lords. He told me not to move at all any more, but to wait.