Why do I feel this negativity? I wonder. The Americans have been our saviors in the war, and we remain dependent on them for food and military aid through the lend-lease plan. Is it born from a sense of protectiveness for Winston, who blindly idolizes the man? I fight against my impression of Roosevelt because I know forging a tie with him and Eleanor is partly why I’m here.
* * *
Throughout the conference, I appear at some of the meetings and debrief with Winston afterward if my attendance is inappropriate. The meetings focus on Operation Overlord, the planned mass invasion of France that has been on the horizon for some time, and the resolution to concentrate more forces on the removal of Italy from the Axis by unconditional surrender, although other topics are considered, such as the coordination of efforts to develop an atomic bomb. From what Winston tells me, my impression of Roosevelt is confirmed. I think Roosevelt intends to assume the full mantle of control in this war and marginalize us. Perhaps this is what I’d sensed in Roosevelt from our first encounter, but when I suggest this to Winston, he dismisses it outright.
Given what I suspect about Roosevelt, how can I connect with him? If I confess this to anyone, they’d laugh at the ridiculousness of being chary of the charming Roosevelt and not the sometimes selfish or unruly Winston. Yet with Winston, one always knows precisely where one stands—even if one doesn’t care for his self-indulgent behavior or his principles. With Roosevelt, the ground upon which one stands feels unsteady due to his inconstancy. In the days that follow in Quebec, I cannot summon up the necessary falsity to engage with him, and I fail to match the success I had with the other key Americans, Harry, Gil, and Averell.
After a restful stop in the Laurentian Mountains to help Winston with his lingering cold and fatigue, we stay at the White House as guests of Roosevelt and Eleanor, a place as lacking in charm and tolerable cuisine as had been rumored. While I delight in reuniting with Eleanor, I find it even more difficult to connect with the president in her presence. I think it’s the coldness in his dealings with her. I also find her much more reserved in his presence than when it was just we two, and I wonder if I’m the same with Winston. I decide that even if I cannot call upon her in the ways that we’d discussed, I may be able to take a page from Eleanor’s own book in order to fulfill my purpose here.
* * *
“Mummy, you’re going to be perfect,” Mary exclaims as I pace back and forth across the bedroom with my black silk dress swishing around my legs, practicing my speech. While I’ve given plenty of speeches in the past, this is my first press conference, and much depends upon it. I am placing much on it, I correct myself. No one else is. But that has always been my way.
“Thank you, darling,” I say with a squeeze of her dear hand. “I think I’m ready.”
“I’m certain you are,” she says with an assured grin. We collect our purses and hats, and together, we descend the stairs to the waiting car.
When we reach the foyer, Mary asks, “Shouldn’t I get Papa?”
I squeeze her hand a little bit tighter. “No, darling, let him tend to his work.” I don’t think I could withstand the anxiety of this event with Winston watching my every move and analyzing my every word, much as I’ve been doing to him for the past thirty-five years.
My stomach lurches as we step out of the car to the facility where throngs of reporters await me. I climb the steps to the platform, with my sweaty hands clutching my prepared speech. After introductions are made, I launch into my speech, delivering it passably well due to my zealous preparation. But the pressure mounts when the time arrives for questions, when I know I must put aside all remnants of my natural reserve to achieve the goal for which I crossed the Atlantic. The goal I could not reach directly with Roosevelt in Quebec or Washington.
Squaring my shoulders, I remind myself of the friendly, direct manner Eleanor used with reporters, and I channel it. I charm them, joke with them, spar with them, all while highlighting serious issues. When several of the reporters break into a verse from “Oh My Darling, Clementine,” an old American ballad with lyrics that lament a missing Clementine, I even joke back that, despite their serenading, unlike the song, I am not missing, but I am very much here to stay. I refrain from mentioning that the English pronunciation of my name—it rhymes with Josephine—varies from the American and thus doesn’t even work with the song, because it would dampen the mood.
Funneling every ounce of charisma I have into the moments on the platform, I manage to accomplish with those anonymous reporters what I could not with Roosevelt, what Eleanor has managed to achieve despite the way her husband has marginalized her in the war. I bypass the president altogether and directly woo the reporters into embracing our country, and through them, woo the American people.
Chapter Forty-Three
December 16, 1943, to January 14, 1944
London, England; Carthage and Tunis, Tunisia; and Marrakech, Morocco
By the time I receive the envelope holding the cable, I have already sensed the message that lies within. Winston has been suffering from bouts of illness—including pneumonia—from the stress and the travel of his international conferences for nearly a year. The letters, calls, and cables about Winston’s declining health have been arriving at the Number 10 Annexe almost from the moment he left for his most recent meeting with Roosevelt on November 11. In one of my recent cables from “Colonel Warden to Mrs. Warden,” our current code names, Winston admitted to his belief that he might be suffering from the beginnings of pneumonia again, and Sarah, who is traveling with Winston as his aide-de-camp, wrote me about one startling evening in which, as he fell into a fevered sleep, he told Sarah not to worry if he dies, because he’d mapped out the winning strategy for the war. But nothing I say will make him return home until he feels ready.
Winston has been acting like a jilted, desperate suitor since we left Quebec and Washington in October. When we first returned home to London and reestablished ourselves at the Number 10 Annexe, he’d been delighted with the newspaper reports about me and my “witty, daring, and direct manner.” But then he spent six sick, unhappy weeks at the Soviet legation in Tehran where he watched Roosevelt pursue Stalin as his primary cohort among the Allies, while he himself was ignored and even taunted by the other two leaders. My success with the American people—through my press conferences and tours—had done nothing to improve his relationship with Roosevelt, it seemed. Winston sat by as they overruled his doubts about a cross-Channel attack on France in spring 1944 as part of Operation Overlord.
I received these desultory reports while I remained in London, putting out fires among upset cabinet members, reviewing reports on Parliamentary debates and giving advice, and dealing with constituency matters. Despite my pleas that he was too ill to continue, he’d insisted on flying from Tehran to Cairo to pursue Roosevelt, and after that, despite his worsening condition, he’d refused to abandon a subsequent flight to Tunis to meet with General Eisenhower. All because he didn’t want to appear weak to the American president.
But when I slice open the envelope with my silver letter opener, I see that the cable comes not from Winston’s doctor, Lord Moran, as I’d guessed, but the cabinet. It contains a secret request that I fly out to Tunis, because Winston has just been diagnosed with pneumonia again and a fibrillating heart. They are worried he might not survive.
I want to crumple on the floor and cry. But everyone is staring at me, taking their cues from my behavior. I will myself to appear concerned but confident.
As a maid packs for me, I frantically pace around my office while aides phone the London airfields for an immediate flight, only to learn that they are all closed due to the thick fog that has settled over the city like a heavy blanket. Finally, one particularly tenacious aide informs me that if we can make it to RAF Lyneham in Wiltshire, the conditions at that site might permit our departure. With Mary, Grace, and Jock in tow, we drive over four hours through the blac
kout and pea-soup fog to reach the airfield in Wiltshire. My heart thumping over Winston’s condition, we board the plane.
After fifteen, then twenty, then twenty-five minutes without any movement, I begin to panic. What is going on? I worry that something has happened to Winston and that the terrible news is delaying our departure. Are they debating who is going to deliver the heartbreaking report to me? No, no, no, I think.
Finally, a beribboned officer steps onto the plane. After introducing himself, he says, “My deepest apologies, Mrs. Churchill, but this plane has a technical problem. We have been trying to find you another suitable aircraft here, but we only have an unheated Liberator bomber. We have checked, and no other airport is able to safely allow planes to depart.”
I stand up and, without glancing at Mary, Grace, or Jock, say, “Then the unheated Liberator bomber it is.”
The battle-hardened officer looks alarmed. “Mrs. Churchill, I’m not sure you understand the nature of the available plane. Its purpose is to fly and drop bombs, not carry passengers. Not only is there no comfortable, permanent seating, but there is no heat. It will be brutally cold.”
“My husband, your prime minister, needs me. Please ready the aircraft for departure.”
The staff switches our luggage and zips Jock, Grace, and me into flight suits—I’ve told Mary she needn’t make this dangerous flight—and I almost laugh at the serious, bespectacled Grace in her flight suit, who insists on coming. But then I remember why we are taking this dangerous trip, and all humor leaves me. I step inside to find that the bomb racks had been removed and some kind soul has spread RAF rugs on the metal floor. Grace, Jock, and I settle into the makeshift seating as young soldiers pile blankets on us to protect us against the frigid temperatures. Temperatures that they themselves endure on a routine basis.
I am horribly nervous about Winston and, to a much lesser extent, this flight, and my legs are shaking. But I cannot afford to let this show. So after a few deep breaths, I reach into my luggage and pull out a backgammon board. “Care for a game?” I ask Jock.
Thirty games of backgammon, two thermoses of hot black coffee, and one stop in Gibraltar for refueling later, we touch down, and I step out of the bitterly cold airplane into the comparatively warm Tunisian afternoon. After a jarringly fast automobile ride, I reach General Eisenhower’s white villa near ancient Carthage in Tunis, where Sarah, who had accompanied Winston on the latter leg of this trip, runs out to greet me.
Tears of relief are in her eyes. “We were so worried you wouldn’t make it in time.”
A sob catches in my throat. “Is he that bad?”
“He’s been deteriorating and resisting every effort to make him well. You know how Papa is. I’ve been reading aloud to him from Pride and Prejudice, and the only thing he’s said in four hours is a comparison of you to Elizabeth Bennet.”
Tears streaming down my face, I follow Sarah and race to his side. But when I walk into his bedroom, I automatically step back. How could this diminished man, so sunken and gray, be my Winston? It has only been five weeks since I’ve seen him, but he is completely altered.
I am very nearly afraid to approach his bedside, and yet I do. When the heels of my shoes clatter on the hard bedroom floor, his eyes fly open, and I see the spark of my husband there in the blue depths. He croaks, “You came. You finally came.”
I sink into the chair next to his bed, warm from the long hours Sarah has spent on it. I feel a strange mix of relief and fear course through me as I hold his hand and speak to him softly. He doesn’t answer, but his breathing seems calmer, and once he’s deeply asleep, the doctor whispers, “His color and his pulse are better than they’ve been for several days.”
“This is an improvement?” I ask, incredulous. I have to choke back my tears at the state of my husband.
“Yes, one I attribute to your presence.”
Lord Moran instructs me to take advantage of Winston’s state to rest for a couple of hours, but within ninety minutes, Winston is awake, asking for me. Having determined to stay at his bedside constantly, I witness firsthand the overcooked dinner and breakfast he’s served and immediately make alterations that I know will foster his health and energy. I insist on a new cook and discuss with him the sorts of clear soups and meats that will sustain Winston. Feeding this food to him myself, I ensure that he gets adequate nourishment and avoids stimulants, like his cigars and highly volatile work. Instead, I arrange for a steady stream of engaging but not taxing guests to visit with him for short periods, including his old crony Beaverbrook and Randolph. We hadn’t seen Randolph for the better part of two years because of the strain about Pamela, and the tearful reunion between father and son conjures almost magical healing.
We celebrate a most unusual Christmas, with all of us, even Winston, attending services in a corrugated tin shed with stacks of ammunition. Just as the service draws to a close, I hear a fluttering of wings. A small white dove circles around and around near the ceiling, finally perching on a shelf just above the altar. A guardsman sitting behind me whispers rather loudly, “A dove means peace,” and as soon as the service concludes, General Alexander rushes out to see if indeed Hitler has surrendered. When no such thing is reported, Winston announces, “Most likely, the minister released the dove himself to grant people a hopeful Christmas.” From this wry remark, I know my husband is well on his way to recovery.
Soon afterward, we give General Eisenhower back his villa and depart to a villa at La Mamounia hotel in Marrakech for a period of convalescence. I serve as a barricade against all agitation, and in that capacity, I spend considerable time in the company of Winston’s toughest military leaders, such as General Bernard Montgomery and Field Marshal Alan Brooke, the chief of the Imperial General Staff. Never allowing them to cow me, I instead develop a rather warm relationship with these otherwise intimidating men, who have no family to speak of in close proximity. I find them surprisingly desirous of companionship and increasingly candid about stressful matters, and I assist them as best I can with staffing matters and minor problems, always drawing a circle around Winston that I will not allow them to cross. When Winston’s strength begins to show glimpses of itself, I arrange picnics in the Atlas foothills against a backdrop of ancient red buildings and pink and white oleander. I plan small, peaceful gatherings to stimulate his senses, but not overly so.
But I can forestall the war for only so long, and I begin to open the gate to more routine work, staffing the villa not only with the necessary domestic personnel but also, in addition to Jock and our own retinue, an army of secretaries and a naval officer. During Winston’s long recuperation, the discontent with Winston I’d sensed simmering from Roosevelt and Stalin has come to a boil. I hear reports that Roosevelt plans to reach a favorable alignment with the perceived powerhouse of Russia, and it seems that Stalin no longer even pretends to tolerate Britain and its leader. They are moving ahead with decisions about critical missions; in fact, Winston just had a visit by Generals Eisenhower and Montgomery not only about his health as I’d hoped but about the massive assault plans made by Roosevelt and Stalin for the cross-Channel Operation Overlord. What choice does Britain have but to withstand this marginalization, dependent as we are on these countries for our survival in this war and beyond? But it saddens me beyond measure to think that our country, for so long the only one courageous enough to fight against the monstrous Hitler, must now take a secondary role.
Winston is in the process of becoming fully immersed in the developments about the alignment of America and Russia when General de Gaulle insists on visiting. De Gaulle, who had kept himself in check for a spell after our fateful dinner, has since treated Winston very badly, despite the fact that my husband has advocated for his leadership of the Free French. Roosevelt has resisted Winston’s efforts to keep de Gaulle informed and has backed General Giraud instead of de Gaulle. With de Gaulle threatening to fly to Marrakech from Algiers, Winston must
dive into the developments of war and the accompanying politics once again.
With a guest list of the British ambassador and the British consul general, I arrange a luncheon to “welcome” the general, whose behavior has been so impossibly poor that, at one point, Winston had to place him under house arrest. But I have a plan to neutralize this potentially disastrous occasion so that it does not lead to a devolution of Winston’s health and a distraction from more critical issues. In order for this scheme to be successful, Winston must first maintain a cordial attitude toward de Gaulle during the luncheon, and I advise him so, extracting a promise from him.
We receive word that de Gaulle will arrive at approximately eleven o’clock. I arrange that Sarah and I will greet the general and his wife and that Sarah will lead Mrs. de Gaulle into the parlor while I take the general into the garden of our villa.
As de Gaulle and I stroll through the garden, I speak in French. I want there to be no confusion. “General de Gaulle, as you know, my husband has recently recovered from a serious bout of pneumonia.”
“Of course, Madame Churchill. It was reported in the newspaper of every country in the free world,” he answers perfunctorily.
“And you understand, of course, how critical his health and vitality are to the ongoing health and vitality of the free world you just mentioned.”
“But of course.” He begins to look slightly bored, which will suit my purposes well. I want to lull him into agreement.
“It seems we understand each other, as we always have.” I pause.
“From our very first dinner,” he answers with an absent smile and a brief nod.
“Then you will hopefully also understand that, in the past, you have acted in ways that have troubled my husband, even though he has staunchly defended you against not only the Nazis but the Americans as well.”
He no longer looks bored. I can see that he is debating how to answer; he is torn between blaming my husband and his actions for his own misbehavior and acknowledging that, indeed, Winston has been his sole defender with the Americans, often at a cost to himself.
Lady Clementine Page 28