Ike and Kay

by James MacManus

  Even the pervasive presence of Winston Churchill stomping the streets after a raid with cigar and homburg hat, talking on the radio of the coming dawn after the long hours of darkness, failed to lift the spirits.

  Kay had spent Christmas with her mother in a small village in Surrey. There was a nanny-goat in the back garden and a carefully tended vegetable patch in what had been a small rose garden in front of the house. Christmas lunch was a mushroom omelette followed by goat’s cheese.

  As they moved into the sitting room after washing up, they joked about the lack of a traditional festive meal, but then her mother’s humour dried-up.

  “People are fed up with this war. They don’t see an end to it. There are Americans everywhere, but they don’t seem to be doing anything. Invasion? What invasion? No one believes it’s going to happen.”

  “Of course there’s going to be an invasion, Mother – you can’t move anywhere without bumping into troops. They say the Channel ports are all full of barges,” said Kay.

  Kay was wearily familiar with her mother’s complaints. Mrs MacCarthy-Morrogh made much of the fact that she had lived through one war already but omitted to say that she had done so in the comfort of an estate on the coast of Ireland while her husband was away in the army.

  Kay decided it was time for a drink. There had been no wine for lunch, only water. Now it was time for something stronger. She took a brown paper package from her handbag.

  “Mummy, let’s have a Christmas toast.”

  “Oh yes! What did you bring?”

  “It’s a surprise, but get some glasses and some mint from the garden.”

  Kay unwrapped a half-bottle of whisky. It was bourbon, not Scotch. There would be a complaint. There always was. Her mother returned with the mint and two heavy crystal tumblers. Kay poured what she reckoned was a treble measure into both and added water and the mint. She handed a glass to her mother who took an immediate gulp and said, with the conspiratorial air of someone about to divulge an important secret, “You know that some people in the village are saying that it might not have been a bad thing if the Germans had crossed the Channel in 1940. At least we would have had something to eat and water enough for a bath.”

  “Mother! How could you say such a thing? I’m shocked!” she replied, aghast.

  Her mother took another gulp of her whisky, held up the glass and said, “It’s all very well for you. You’re in with the Americans. You can get this stuff and those nice nylons you’re wearing. Most people haven’t had sight of a pat of butter, a banana or a decent bit of meat since the war started, and that was five years ago. That’s a long time to wait for a decent meal. A bloody long time.”

  Her mother never used bad language; she regarded herself as a refined middle-class lady. She had drunk far too much.

  Kay yearned to tell her the news from America, announced on Christmas Eve, which for a day or two over the festive season had gone unnoticed in Britain, but she couldn’t face the endless questions she knew would follow.

  She had kissed her mother goodbye and walked to the car thinking of the announcement from the White House. There was so much news those days that a battle won, a ship lost or rationing rules changed all blurred into background noise broadcast by the BBC eighteen hours a day.

  People shrugged, grumbled and got on with their lives, listening only to the news that really mattered, black market cigarettes below the counter of the local pub or real lamb’s liver on sale at the butcher’s.

  So the announcement from Washington that Christmas was largely ignored across the Atlantic. President Roosevelt had surprised his government and the wider American public with the appointment of General Dwight Eisenhower as supreme commander, Allied Expeditionary Forces.

  Eisenhower’s mission had been laid out in a presidential statement of such forceful simplicity that it reminded those who knew their history of Lincoln’s Gettysburg address. In two minutes President Lincoln had defined, in 1863, the national purpose in fighting for the principles of human equality in the American Civil War. He had told his countrymen from the far north to the deep south in stark simple language where their duty lay. Roosevelt’s words were similarly resolute and of poetic brevity.

  You will enter the continent of Europe and undertake operations aimed at the heart of Germany and the destruction of her armed forces.

  It took almost an hour to get to the four-storey town house off Berkeley Square that had been requisitioned for the new Allied Commander. In that time Eisenhower never stopped talking. It was as if, once on British soil, he felt able to give vent to the ideas, questions and plans that had been piling up inside him since his appointment.

  In a long monologue that invited no interruption, Eisenhower talked calmly about the two greatest challenges he faced: the Channel weather and the genius of Erwin Rommel, the German general who had been ordered to defend occupied Europe against Allied invasion.

  She watched in her rear-view mirror as Tex handed his boss a file and then prepared to take notes.

  She wanted to catch his eye, tell him she had missed him. Every miserable moment she had spent with her mother she had thought of how he would be spending time with his family, Mamie and the boys in Washington.

  But he didn’t look at her. The usual conspiracy of quick half-smiles that were beamed into the rear-view mirror had been set aside. Eisenhower was talking about the need for an expert meteorologist, someone he could trust to forecast the fast-changing weather in the English Channel.

  He wanted to know everything about the winds, waves, currents and tides that made the sea between Britain and France such a “disagreeable” stretch of water – the word Churchill had used, apparently, when describing the role the Channel had played in English history.

  “Disagreeable for our enemies, but bloody helpful for us,” the prime minister had said. Eisenhower wanted to know just how disagreeable or helpful the narrow seas would be as spring turned to summer.

  “It’s got to be a Brit,” he kept saying. “Someone who understands the way the goddamn weather works in these foggy islands.”

  Then he opened the file on Rommel. Kay dropped her speed and drove carefully as they entered the North London suburbs. The car had become a war room and the man in the back needed to concentrate.

  Eisenhower quickly flipped the pages of the file, clearly not satisfied with what he was reading.

  “The Brits think too much of Rommel,” he said, talking aloud to himself again. “They think he’s some kind of military god and a decent gentleman with it. Even Winston has fallen for him. Anyway, there’s nothing new here.”

  He closed the file and handed it back to Tex. It was well after dark by the time Eisenhower settled into his new quarters. A servant had taken his two large leather suitcases to the main bedroom and laid them on the bed unopened: Eisenhower had expressly forbidden anyone to open his luggage, let alone unpack it. Kay could see he was exhausted.

  The housekeeper had lit fires and laid out plates of luxuries long unseen in London – ham, smoked salmon and fruit with real coffee and tea. The American ambassador and senior staff from the embassy had welcomed him in the richly furnished drawing room, but he had shooed them all away after a polite drink, allowed his staff to take what they wanted of the food, and sent them to their rooms.

  He told Kay to stay. This had become a routine on their return to London after the North African campaign.

  “Fix us drinks, would you,” he said, unbuttoning his jacket and slinging it over the back of an armchair.

  She wondered if he still remembered the kiss, but pushed the thought away. The boss needed a drink.

  Kay went to the sideboard on which lay bottles of whisky, gin, vodka, vermouth and two soda siphons. She poured a large whisky into a tall glass, added ice and soda the way he liked it, and made a long gin and tonic for herself.

  She handed him the drink, place
d her own on a side-table by the sofa, kicked off her shoes and sat down

  She raised her glass. “Welcome back,” she said.

  He smiled, leant forward, raised his glass and said “Mud in your eye” before drinking first a sip, then more deeply.

  Kay sipped at hers and waited for him to speak. She sensed that the long monologue in the car had given way to more immediate concerns. He leant back in an armchair and said wearily, “Know what? I would rather be at the cottage than here.”

  So he wanted to go back. Eisenhower, the supreme commander in charge of one of the greatest and most secret operations in military history, referred to in whispers as Overlord, wanted to leave the lavishly appointed Queen Anne mansion only a heartbeat from his command headquarters in London’s Grosvenor Square and return to a woodland cottage where he could close the door on the world and sit down with his “family” to relax for an hour or two with a hand of bridge or a game of golf.

  It turned out that was not all. He wanted to take Grosvenor Square with him. The Luftwaffe knew full well that the elegant London square was a little bit of America in the heart of the capital. Apart from the embassy, every building around the square had been taken over for offices and apartments to house US diplomatic, military and intelligence personnel. Retaliation raids for the heavy bombing of German cities were still proving frighteningly effective. A stick of bombs on Grosvenor Square could seriously damage the invasion planning.

  There was another advantage to Telegraph Cottage. It was far enough away from the resurgent night life of London to deny his immediate staff the temptations of the capital. Bushey Park, an anonymous collection of draughty, prefabricated buildings on the western outskirts of London, was chosen to be the new headquarters. There the entire Allied command would be only a few minutes’ drive from Telegraph Cottage and everyone could be kept on the straight and narrow, safe from the distractions – and the bombs – of London.

  “I want everyone to know that from now on we are getting in early, lunching at the desk, working late. No more club nights in London, no more weekends. Is that clear?”

  “It’s clear to me,” said Kay, “and I’m pretty sure it is going to be clear to everyone else tomorrow.”

  “So get Mickey and Butch to fix it,” he said.

  He had finished his whisky, and she wondered whether to pour him another one. He smiled wearily, lifting his glass slightly. She realised it was a silly question. Of course her boss wanted another whisky. He had been back in the country for eight hours and he wanted to change every plan his staff and the British had made for him.

  Just like that, she thought: he wants to move his personal staff and the entire command headquarters involving several hundred people out of central London. That was very Eisenhower. He thought it a very reasonable request of the people he employed. That’s why he employed them: to make things he wanted done happen fast.

  Kay poured him another well-watered whisky and said, “You can tell Number Ten of the move when you have lunch there tomorrow.”

  “Winston won’t mind – he’s got a lot on his plate right now.”

  Eisenhower knew very well what was worrying the British prime minister. Almost two million men were being assembled and trained in Britain for the greatest seaborne invasion in history. Everyone in London, Berlin, Moscow and Washington knew the invasion was coming, but they did not know where or when. It was the most closely guarded secret of the war.

  It was midnight and Eisenhower still didn’t want to go to bed. The time difference must be keeping him awake, she thought. She leant back and let her eyes close.

  Suddenly he was gently shaking her shoulder. “Hey! Go to bed.” He gave her a hand from the chair.

  “I’m sorry, I nodded off.”

  She walked to the door.

  “Just a minute,” he said, frowning.

  She turned, half expecting to be asked to fetch a pad and take notes, as was his way. He could never close the door on the day, at least not here in London. There was always another memorandum to be dictated, an appointment to be noted, a query to be pursued the following morning.

  “Is Telek there? I mean at the cottage?”

  “Yes,” she said and couldn’t help laughing, not at him, but at the absurdity of the newly arrived Commander of Allied forces worrying about a puppy.

  She went to her room thinking of Telegraph Cottage and the black West Highland terrier that he seemed to miss more than anything. She wondered if he had told Mamie about the dog. If so what had she made of the name? Had he explained it to her?

  He had answered Churchill’s query on the subject by saying, “Tele for Telegraph Cottage and K for my driver, makes a great name, doesn’t it?” The prime minister had raised an eyebrow at this. He wasn’t the only one. She walked to her room feeling lightheaded after the gin. He was back and she was happy. She did a little skip dance on the thick corridor carpet and went into her room. She undressed and looked at herself in the full-length cheval mirror.

  She looked good. Her skin was pale and unmarked, the stomach taut, and the breasts firm. There was no saggy skin under her arms or around her neck. The bushy triangle of hair needed a trim. She would do that in the bathroom tomorrow. She was not beautiful, she knew that. The nose was too bobbed, the forehead too high, her figure perhaps a little slender. But she had high cheekbones, a delicate mouth with full lips and deep brown eyes that men liked. Not beautiful, but attractive certainly.

  She turned, looking back over her shoulder. All those hours sitting in the driver’s seat had not done her any harm. Long slim legs, small firm bottom, or butt as the Americans would put it, and the gentle cleft of the lower back; she had the figure of a calendar girl.

  Her reflection misted over for a moment and an older woman looked back at her, not smiling, but not frowning either, a tired face imprinted with the sorrows of age and experience. The stranger could see her, look through her as if she, like the mirror, was made of glass. There she was heart and body stripped bare, secrets unhidden, all mystery revealed. She was a woman falling, or fallen, in love.

  She closed her eyes and shook her head. She must have drunk more gin than she thought. She turned from the mirror, opened her eyes slowly and turned to looked back. The stranger had gone. She was standing there, her own naked self in the mirror.

  She put on a dressing-gown and walked down the corridor to a bathroom. She imagined the boss staring into his whisky, swirling it around while he weighed the tasks ahead. She took off her make-up, splashed water on her face and brushed her teeth. She knew he wouldn’t go the bed until much later.

  She thought briefly of going back, gently taking the glass of whisky from him and holding out her hand to him. He would take it, climb to his feet grumbling and head for the door.

  But she couldn’t do that, she in her dressing-gown and he in his uniform. It would be an affectionate act of domesticity, revealing too much about what they wished to remain hidden from themselves.

  She got into bed. The linen had not been aired. The sheets felt cold and clammy. It would be the same for Ike in his room somewhere down the corridor. He would hate that and growl at her in the morning. She got out of bed and walked back to the living room.

  He looked up in surprise, noting the paisley patterned dressing-gown and the face bare of make-up.

  “What are you doing up?” he asked.

  “You’ve got a long day tomorrow,” she said. “You really should go to bed.”

  “I’ve been on a plane all day. I need to relax. Come and sit here,” he said, patting a place on the sofa beside him. She pulled the cord of her dressing-gown tighter and sat down. His hand reached out to hers. She took it and held it, squeezing gently. His eyes remained closed and she began to knead the back of his hand with her thumb.

  “You know what?” she said. “You need a long, hot bath and a good back rub.”

  “
No time for that,” he said.

  “You’re like a coiled spring. You need to unwind that body of yours.”

  “What I need is another drink. I’ll fix it, you go to bed, that’s an order.”

  “OK, boss,” she said. “But I am going to run you a hot bath. Don’t be too long.”

  He got to his feet, patted her affectionately on the back and kissed her lightly on the cheek.

  “I’ve missed you,” he said.

  She lay in bed, restless, cursing the house staff for the cold sheets and seeking sleep using the memory trick she had been taught by a doctor. Try to remember an important and happy event in your life and recall the time, the people and the places involved, he had advised.

  Memory of past happiness will calm you. Truth of what you recall does not matter because memory is a distorting mirror which bends the truth and reshapes images, events and the very facts of a past life. Just remember what you want and let it sink into your mind. Then you will find sleep. That’s what the doctor had said.

  Kay turned her mind back to the first tours of duty with the general in the summer of 1942.

  It wasn’t the chocolates or the fruit he had given her, the curiosity he showed about her Irish upbringing or the way he insisted on her joining his staff for meals. Such was the generous but conventional behaviour of a decent man in high office.

  It was the touch of her hand on his as she leant over to put his drink on the table, the soapy scent of her body as she placed the urgent overnight messages on his desk in the morning, and the way he looked at her on horseback as she rose and fell in the saddle.

  They would ride together once or twice a week, just the two of them, when they were staying at Telegraph Cottage. When she turned to check he was following she could see that look on his face.