Presidential Agent

by Upton Sinclair

  “I doubt very much if he’ll resist if it comes to a showdown,” said Lanny; and Adi burst out: “What has he to resist with?”

  “Not much, I agree; but he could make it awkward—you don’t want to kill people of German blood, and you don’t want to make too much of an uproar in the foreign press.”

  “Die verdammte Judenpresse!” exclaimed Adi, and began moving restlessly about the room, with those nervous jerks that he gave when something had upset him. He started scolding at foreign journalists, comparing them to a pack of jackals standing around a lion and his kill. Adi, of course, was the lion, and Schuschnigg, presumably, the kill, though Adi didn’t say so. What he objected to was the noise the jackals made—for in the neighborhood there was a rival lion, the British, and also a rooster, or whatever symbol you assigned to the French and their army. Hitler dropped his simile, and exclaimed: “My generals are not to be convinced that Britain and France will stay quiet.”

  “I have heard, Herr Reichskanzler, that your generals took the same position when you wished to move your armies into the Rhineland, and again when you started rebuilding the Reichswehr.”

  “Sehr richtig! The same men, and they made the same speeches—in the Old Chancellery then, and now in this very room.”

  “Generals are good advisers when it comes to military matters, but for political affairs it takes a different sort of mind, I should imagine.”

  “That is what I tell them, and I’m going to give them a shaking up that will make their teeth rattle! For five years we have been getting ready, and what is it all for? Am I expected to sit on my tail and let the German Reich go bankrupt because its army leaders haven’t the courage to use the forces I have created for them?”

  That was almost word for word what Lanny Budd had said to Roosevelt concerning Hitler’s problem and his attitude. The “P.A.” ventured to repeat: “If a man builds a bicycle, presumably his intention is to ride, and not to go sailing.”

  “Ein ausgezeichnete Vergleich, Herr Budd! You have a happy faculty of finding the word. I am forced to waste my energies arguing with men who have been brought up to obey rules, and who have never had an original impulse in their lives. I tell them: Empires are not made in that way.”

  II

  Lanny wondered: Was the Führer of the Nazis unaware that he was being indiscreet, or was it a calculated indiscretion? Was he thinking of sending this plausible American back to Vienna, to report the iron determination of the Führer and thus frighten a conscientious Catholic scholar? Lanny had another purpose in mind, and he said: “May I make a suggestion, Herr Reichskanzler?”

  “I am always ready to hear them from you.”

  “Why don’t you invite Doktor Schuschnigg to visit you at Berchtesgaden? It is a short trip, and if you and he could talk matters over he might discover that your intentions toward the Austrians are not so alarming as he has been led to fear.”

  “That is what I instructed Papen to arrange, but he has not succeeded. Schuschnigg is afraid, he reports. Does he imagine I would do harm to a guest?”

  “I do not know, Herr Hitler. The subject was not brought up in our conversation.”

  “Do you suppose you could persuade him to come?”

  “I am afraid that if I made such an attempt I should destroy any usefulness I might have to you. My advantage lies in the fact that I am an art lover and a citizen of the world. I met the Doktor socially, and we talked as friends; he asked my advice and I gave it. If now I should turn up in Vienna with a message from you, I should forfeit that status and be definitely set down as your agent. When I went to London or Paris, that reputation would follow me, and I should no longer be in a position to hear what my friends in the British Foreign Office are saying, and what they are planning to do with regard to Vienna.”

  “I suppose so,” admitted the Führer, reluctantly—for he hated to give up anything he wanted. Following Lanny’s red herring, he demanded: “What will the British do?”

  “I should say that fundamentally it depends upon one factor, whether or not you succeed in convincing Whitehall that your ultimate goal is Moscow.”

  “What more can I do to convince them? Have I not promoted and signed an Anti-Comintern Pact with Italy and Japan?”

  “That is not quite the same thing as saying that you intend to use your armies against Russia.”

  “Do they expect me to say that? Where? And how? In a public speech? Do I have to set the date when the advance begins?”

  Lanny smiled. “You men of great affairs have your own ways of making things known to one another, Exzellenz. Sometimes a nod suffices.”

  “Zum Teufel! I have nodded my neck out of joint. I have said to every statesman I met that my abhorrence of Jewish Bolshevism is fundamental, and the duty to destroy it is the first of all duties I recognize.”

  “Do you authorize me to say that for you, Herr Reichskanzler?”

  “Indeed I do, and I will be grateful to you for the service, as for so many others.”

  III

  That seemed a good place to leave the subject, and Lanny said abruptly: “By the way, Herr Reichskanzler, shall I report on the matter of the Defregger?”

  “By all means,” was the reply, and Lanny opened up a portfolio he had brought. He had gone to some trouble to get photographs of half a dozen paintings of which he approved, and now he spent an enjoyable half hour, delivering his suave lecture and hearing his client’s responses. Adi really loved art, and never tired of telling his guests that he would have preferred to be an artist, and that if the world would let him he would now retire to paint landscapes and design buildings for the rest of his days.

  He liked all these paintings, and said that he would be glad to own them if he could afford it. Lanny, who wasn’t thinking about commissions right now, remarked: “The prices of two or three seem to me excessive, and I would advise you, if you are thinking of going into Vienna, to wait until you are established there, and I might be able to do much better for you.” He grinned, and the future world conqueror began to laugh and slap his two knees; he looked at Lanny and went on chuckling, rubbing his thighs.

  So clever and so disinterested an agent deserved his reward, and the Führer demanded: “What about that Detaze?”

  “I have been thinking it over, Exzellenz, and what I want to do is to pick out half a dozen of our best landscapes and either send them or bring them to you and let you make a choice. I will return to the Riviera and attend to that errand now, if you like; and if you are still in the mood to try experiments with my Polish medium, I might bring her back with me. She is an old woman and is not used to traveling alone, especially in a foreign country.”

  “I am interested in what you have told me about this woman, Herr Budd; but I have to remember that I am the head of a state, and that what I do is an example which millions follow. I must on no account have any publicity to the effect that I am dabbling with spirits.”

  “There will certainly be no publicity as far as I am concerned, Exzellenz, and I assume that you can control your own entourage.”

  “You grant me a power which is unattainable by any public man. Whatever goes on in my home is whispered all over Germany in a very few days.”

  “Permit me to make a suggestion. I recently had a séance with Pröfenik, who tells me that he knows you.”

  “I haven’t seen him for years, but I used to see a good deal of him in the old days. He was a friend of Hanussen, and they sometimes gave stage performances together.”

  “He mentioned that Herr Hess sees him frequently.”

  “Yes, Rudi is never satisfied unless some astrologer has approved what he is doing. He can always manage to find one to approve, if he lets them know what he wants.”

  “It occurs to me that Herr Hess might be the one to invite Madame Zyszynski. Presumably he would do that if you asked it.”

  “Rudi is my other self; my Deputy.”

  “Well then, Madame could come to Berchtesgaden as his guest, and you could
give it out that you have no interest in her. If she was in the house and you wished to see her, that could surely be arranged without attracting attention.”

  “Jawohl,” said the Führer; “bring her along. You see how it is—I am represented as a self-willed man, doing whatever he pleases, but in reality I am a slave to my German people, and am not master even in my own house.”

  “You belong to history, Herr Reichskanzler,” said the American admirer.

  IV

  Lanny took the train to Paris, where he had his car and his friends. Zoltan had just come back from New York, full of news about the art shows there; they talked shop quite shamelessly, and had no secrets from each other—except that Lanny was not free to name the important person in Berlin who had just purchased a couple of Defreggers on his advice. Zoltan would assume that it was Göring, and that could do no harm. Inside his shrewd head must have been the guess that this grandson of Budd Gunmakers had not changed his Pink opinions, but was disguising them for some purpose important to himself. The only sign Zoltan ever gave was a slight smile curving the sensitive lips, under a mustache which had once been light brown but was now turning gray.

  In the mail awaiting Lanny was a letter from his father, saying that he had made an advantageous deal with Baron Schneider and it would help him over a really desperate time. So Lanny would be doing a filial duty in having lunch with the Baron.

  He called at the Paris mansion. When he mentioned that he had had talks with both Hitler and Schuschnigg, the munitions king wanted to hear every word that they had spoken, and there was no reason why he shouldn’t hear most. He was especially pleased with what Hitler had said concerning Russia; the pleasure lasted half-way through the meal, but by that time he had begun to wonder, could he believe it, and what did Lanny think on that point? Lanny said: “I would say you may believe it so long as you can make it to Hitler’s interest to act upon it.” This, of course, was according to the code of a man of great affairs.

  In return for Lanny’s frankness the Baron brought him up to date on French affairs, which were in a turmoil. The Chautemps cabinet had been forced out, and Blum had been trying to form a “National Ministry.” Schneider said he had put his foot down; he wanted unity in France, but not under Socialist auspices, conferring prestige upon that dangerous party. So now there was another Chautemps cabinet, this time with the Socialists excluded; the Baron called that unity—disregarding the fact that the French workers were completely alienated, and ready to do whatever they could to sabotage another government of the deux cent families. The franc had taken another tumble—thirty to the dollar now, and Schneider said it was the doings of the Britisher Montagu Norman. Premier Chautemps was asking for special financial powers and the Socialists were opposing him. Such was la patrie, torn in half by a civil war in the very presence of the foreign enemy.

  Nothing had been done to punish the Cagoulard conspirators, except that they were still under confinement; the extreme rightist press was hailing them as martyrs, mass meetings were being held in their defense, and Lanny carried off as souvenir a leaflet headed: “Libérez les de Bruynes!” He wondered who had paid for the printing—Schneider, or Denis himself, or possibly Graf Herzenberg or Kurt Meissner? Lanny still didn’t feel that it was the part of wisdom for him to visit the prisoners, but he drove out to the château to call on Annette.

  This lovely young gentlewoman, living in the home which for Lanny had been consecrated by the presence of Marie, didn’t know very much about politics, and had only one thought, to free her loved ones. To her the arrest was an outrage committed by the terrible Reds who controlled her beloved France; she went to see each of the martyrs twice a week—they were confined separately—and spent the rest of her time telephoning, writing, and calling upon ministers and persons of influence. She would always be polite to Lanny, but he was sure that in her heart she would never forgive him because he went about his own affairs, instead of dropping everything and trying to help these friends to whom he had stood in such close relationship. All he could say was: “I have assurances that they will never be brought to trial.” Also: “I am a foreigner, Annette, and when a foreigner tries to do anything in French politics, it always works backwards.”

  V

  One last duty: at command of the Trudi-ghost, Lanny got a hundred one-thousand-franc notes from his bank. Since they were all new, and the serial numbers consecutive, he spent the better part of two days getting them changed into smaller denominations—mostly by the method of purchasing inexpensive gifts for his family and friends in England and America. He wrote a typewritten and unsigned note to the ex-clarinetist, making an appointment for a dark street, and instructing the man to wear a red carnation and be prepared to give the name of two mutual friends. With the wad of bills wrapped up in a piece of newspaper, as if it were a pound or two of newly bought cheese, Lanny went strolling at the appointed hour, wondering as usual whether this would be the underground or the Gestapo.

  The street was dimly lighted and had few persons out on a raw and windy night. There came an elderly gray-bearded German, wearing the proper sign, and Lanny turned and joined him, saying: “Guten Abend.” Promptly the man said: “Monck.” Lanny said: “Noch einmal,” and the man answered: “Weill”—pronouncing it French fashion “Vay,” as Trudi had done in Paris. That was enough, and Lanny slipped the package into his hands, turned sharply, and went off into the darkness, looking behind him frequently to make sure he was not being trailed.

  VI

  Two cords drew his heart to London: Rick, and his little daughter. One morning he climbed into a transport plane at Le Bourget field, and an hour later was set down comfortably at Croydon. What marvels man had achieved—and what use was he going to make of them? Nina and Rick met him in their small car, Nina driving, as always; the three of them squeezed into the space meant for two, and they had an hour in which nobody could intrude on their conversation. An old and tried friendship, this; a quarter of a century, or two-thirds of Lanny’s life, since he and Rick had become friends. Lanny could tell them everything, save only the name of Roosevelt, and if they guessed that, no harm would be done.

  For the first time he unburdened himself completely about Trudi; and if the tears came into his eyes he didn’t have to feel embarrassed. “It’s rugged, old chap!” said Rick, and that was enough from an Englishman. They listened to every detail of Lanny’s adventure in the Château de Belcour, and at the end Rick’s verdict was: “It’s no go; you have to count her dead.”

  Lanny replied: “I suppose so; but I have to make sure. I can’t go on wondering about her the rest of my life.” He told of his plan to make Hitler tell him, and of the progress he had made to that goal.

  “It’s all right if you can get away with it,” was his friend’s judgment—“and especially if you can pick up news as you go along. That was a ripping story you sent me from Vienna; I had it in type two days later.” Rick put the newspaper clipping into his friend’s hand. He had got twenty pounds for the story, and wanted to go halves. Lanny refused it, for he knew that Rick needed the money, and might have got twenty pounds every day of his life if he had been willing to write for the press lords.

  “You give me as much news as I give you,” the American insisted. During the time he spent at The Reaches he got a pretty complete picture of the state of opinion in Britain among those classes which counted. The “appeasers” had won all along the line. As regards Spain, the “Non-Intervention” farce was continuing, and while France had been forced to close her border again, Mussolini and Hitler were sending the Franco crowd all the men and supplies they needed. Hitler would be allowed to expand his borders, provided only that he didn’t take anything British. Reaction ruled the world, and the masses of the people weren’t even allowed to know what was being done to them.

  VII

  Nina drove Lanny over to Wickthorpe Castle, and he spent several days verifying what the pessimistic Rick had said. The renovating of the castle had been completed,
and Irma was safely launched upon that social career for which her life had been a training. Very interesting to watch her, so gracious and self-possessed, and to remember her first halting steps, and the guidance she had received from Emily and Margy and the other grandes dames, not to mention Beauty Budd and her son. Now she was intending to become the greatest of all the great ladies. Only one rival to dispute her future, another American, Nancy Astor; and Irma had the advantage, because her home was both comfortable and venerable, whereas Cliveden was merely comfortable.

  It was in truth a public service to maintain a great establishment with all the comforts of a hotel, where persons of importance could come for stays long or short and discuss the problems of the Empire. Irma had the final say about who should be invited, but she was broad-minded about it, consulting not merely Ceddy and his intimates, but anyone of the right sort. If a guest should say: “You ought to know So-and-so,” Irma would reply with easy informality: “Bring him along next week-end.” She had forty bedrooms, each now provided with its bath. So-and-so might be a high official just returned from Sarawak, or an explorer from the Orinoco; he might be the exponent of a new scientific theory or the author of a best-selling novel; he might even be some notorious leftwinger like Rick, but an English gentleman even so. He might say what he pleased, and be ever so much in earnest, provided he kept his temper and gave the others a chance to answer.

  Certainly it was a privilege for Lanny Budd to have the freedom of this establishment. Lanny the man might not be entirely happy here, but Lanny the presidential agent was in his element. He listened to Montagu Norman, governor of the Bank of England, one of the most secretive men in the world, discussing with Gerald Albany the financial techniques by which recalcitrant foreign statesmen were compelled to serve the purposes of the Empire. Baron Schneider accused the British of having caused the collapse of the franc, and “the Governor” wasn’t saying anything about it except to the right people. He took it for granted that the son of Budd-Erling, just back from a visit with Hitler, was among these.