Presidential Mission

by Sinclair, Upton;

  “The name of the operation is Torch. Eisenhower will command; it’s to be kept an American show, with the idea of riding easier with the French. The coast is long, as you know, a couple of thousand miles. We may take Dakar or Casablanca on the Atlantic, or Oran or Algiers on the Mediterranean. We leave the enemy to guess. Between you and me, it will be all, or most of, those ports.”

  “I see. And the time?”

  “Nobody knows the time yet. We have to change a million details, and it depends on when we can be ready. But it will be this year—that is the agreement. You will be going there immediately?”

  “Vichy is my first goal.”

  “You have transportation arranged?”

  “I have to cable Baker.”

  “That is not necessary. Let me attend to it for you.”

  “I don’t want to put any burden upon you, Harry, I—”

  “I have secretaries. You’ll take a Clipper to Lisbon and fly by way of Madrid?”

  “That will be fine.”

  “O.K., I’ll see that you get a seat on the first plane. You travel under your own name?”

  “Always. I am an art expert, you know. I have commissions to buy paintings in Vichy France, also a very fine fountain for ablutions in Algeria.”

  “Harry the Hop” broke into a grin. He started to get up, but Lanny saw that it was an effort and said: “Stay where you are. Thanks, as ever.”

  “I have to get up. Our train is leaving tonight. You may be interested to know that I am flying back to Washington to be married in the White House.”

  “You don’t say! Congratulations!”

  “I have found a woman who is willing to take care of these tired bones. I understand that you have recently been married also. Good luck to you and yours, old man.”

  They exchanged a handclasp and a smile. So men parted in wartime, knowing well that they might never see each other again. Very often they didn’t, and then they were not supposed to wreck themselves with grief. As Goethe had said more than a century ago: “Everything on the earth can be endured.” Lanny had quoted it to Hess.

  12

  Lull before Storm

  I

  Lisbon was still in its safe berth by the River Tagus, and still pleasanter from the air than from the ground. Portugal was making money out of both sides in the war, and, as always, the rich were adding to their hoards while the poor discovered the meaning of inflation and that wages never kept up with the stealthy increase in the cost of food. The city was so full of spies that they tried to work on one another, and, of course, the arrival of an American art expert via London was not overlooked. Lanny was glad that he had to spend only a few hours telling ladies and gentlemen with assorted foreign accents that he was an esthete, entirely aloof from the hateful intrigues of politics; also, that he never lent money, no matter how sad the story.

  In Madrid he had to stay over until the next day, and he didn’t mind that, for he could spend the evening at the home of his elderly friend General Aguilar, and be internally drenched with copitas de manzanilla—in English, cups of camomile tea. This white-whiskered old aristocrat with the many medals, which he wore even at home, was one of the few Spanish Fascists who were interested in the outside world and made a pretense of culture—meaning, of course, the kind that cost money and was elegant and exclusive. He listened with interest to Lanny’s account of the wonderful art collection which Reichsmarschall Göring was assembling in Germany. “A man out of the old times!” he exclaimed admiringly, and went on to reveal the fact that a year or two ago this conquistador had assembled more than three hundred of the largest guns ever made in the world, with the intention of taking Gibraltar. The fact that the elaborate emplacements had been constructed on the soil of Spain, which was supposed to be a neutral country, and that they were aimed at the property of Britain, which was supposed to be a friendly country, troubled the military commander of Madrid so little that he didn’t mention it and probably didn’t think of it.

  “I suppose those guns have been taken to the eastern front now,” remarked the art expert casually.

  “No, they are still there,” said the General, who was in a mellow mood, having listened to much flattery. “They serve a useful purpose in protecting the neutrality of Morocco.”

  He didn’t say Spanish Morocco, but Lanny knew he meant that; he was refusing to acknowledge the existence of French Morocco. “Do you mean,” asked the American, “the guns are powerful enough to be effective across the Strait?”

  “They might be; but I mean that our ability to take Gibraltar will exercise a restraining influence upon hostile forces that might wish to land on the other side.”

  “I keep hearing talk of such expeditions,” remarked Lanny, “but of course a civilian never knows whether it is something real or just a smoke screen. From what I can gather, the most likely place for a landing appears to be the Vardar valley in Greece.”

  Said the Spaniard: “It is a never-ending source of wonder to me, how you Americans continue to let yourselves be persuaded to pull chestnuts out of the fire for the British.”

  “I don’t think it is going to go on much longer, my General. There are signs of an awakening. Just before I left New York I had a part in the founding of a new organization called the American Christian League. I was amazed by the extent of the public response.” Lanny reached into his pocket and took out one of the leaflets which he had taken off Hartley’s desk. The Red Nightmare—he translated, Le Cauchemar Rouge, for they were speaking French. The document suited the old General’s ideology, and he was glad to hear about the sums of money that had been collected and the mass meetings that had been held. In return he talked freely about the “Blue Division,” which represented the first installment of El Caudillo’s promised million men to help the Führer put down the Red demon. These “Blues” were volunteers, in the same sense that the Germans and Italians who had come to fight in Spain had been—that is, they could volunteer or be shot. They had been meeting with heavy losses in Russia, but now the Axis armies were advancing rapidly toward the oil of the Caucasus, and it looked as if the dawn were breaking at last.

  Too bad this victory could not have been won by Christian armies, instead of by the Nazis, who were not exactly cordial to Holy Mother Church! But Marshal Pétain had the word of the Führer that the Church would be restored in France as a bulwark against the Reds. They talked about the old Marshal for a while; Aguilar had come to know him intimately while Pétain had been French Ambassador to Madrid during the period of the Sitzkrieg, before the German invasion of France. The fact that Lanny had been received by Pétain here at that time, and had been able to visit him in Vichy, was one of the reasons that the commandant of the Madrid district trusted him completely and talked to him freely. Lanny wasn’t a Catholic and couldn’t pose as one, but he could cite the names of wealthy Americans who recognized the Hierarchy as the chief means of holding down the labor unions and keeping the Reds and the Pinks out of power. Lanny had discussed this subject with Mr. Hearst and Mr. Henry Ford, and what these great men had said on the subject was heard gladly by generals and admirals as well as cardinals and archbishops throughout Europe.

  II

  In Vichy a free-spending American was an old friend by now. A landlord would vacate his own room for him, and maîtres-d’hôtel would greet him by name. He could look up important ministers of state and tell them what their friends in Washington and London and North Africa were doing, and promise to take them messages in the course of his travels. To M. Benoist-Méchin and others of his set Lanny could explain that the present depreciation of the franc offered unusual opportunities to do business in old masters. American collectors were attracted by the prices which Lanny reported to them; and while this would represent a loss to French culture, the French might consent to look at it from the international point of view and be willing to assist in uplifting the American hinterland. When the matter was put thus tactfully, any statesman could agree, and would tell friends who
needed ready cash, and Lanny would be invited to inspect art works in elegant country villas; mostly they were third-rate, but it cost him nothing to say: “Very interesting, and I’ll be happy to report it to my clients.”

  Meantime he invited important persons to lunch or dine, and was invited to soirees where the elite of this miserable government displayed their shoddy splendor. “A banana republic without any bananas,” some wit had called it, and yet, the smaller the prizes, the more bitterly men fought for them. Intrigue, jealousy, and hatred appeared to be staple foods at Vichy buffets. Lanny had never been in any place where secrets were so ill kept; you could hear all the crimes of all the world, except of the person who was talking to you, and you might hear about him from any of his associates. Bourgeois France was falling to pieces, and Vichy was the garbage can.

  First of all Lanny sought out his friend Charlot de Bruyne. Here was one man who still believed in his creed and was willing to make sacrifices for it. Lanny felt pity for him and would have liked to say: “Wake up, jeune homme! You are in the middle of the twentieth century, not the eighteenth.” But of course he couldn’t speak such words; he had to go on with his role of superspy, which he had not chosen, but which had chosen him.

  What he did, the first thing, was to tell Charlot about his older brother. Denis was well, he was doing his duty as an officer, and he had received Charlot’s messages of love with the same affection that had prompted them. “But so far as concerns his political opinions, I’m afraid there’s nothing to be done, Charlot. I argued with him, but it was useless; he is not to be moved from what he believes.”

  “What does he believe, Lanny?”

  “He believes that General de Gaulle is a great man, a prophet and all that sort of thing. And of course it’s a very dangerous opinion for an officer to hold; it won’t further his career. All we, can do is to recognize the fact that he is sincere, and respect him for it.”

  But the younger brother couldn’t leave it there. The times were too critical, the feelings too intense. Men were killing each other, and not even brothers could be spared. Lanny had to take refuge in his ivory tower, the stairs of which were getting badly worn with his footprints running up and down. “You know, Charlot, you mustn’t expect an American to take part in French politics.”

  “But your President is doing just that, Lanny! He made a radio speech in the French language, denouncing our present government!”

  “It was in very crude schoolboy French, Charlot, and can hardly have made any impression on your intelligent public. Don’t blame this old friend for anything that any politician does. Let me stay au-dessus de la mêlée, and continue to work at my profession.”

  Lanny asked about Charlot himself and what he was doing. He was working hard at organizing and training his Légion Tricolore, for the purpose of repressing the traitor enemies here in France; they were expecting an Allied landing somewhere and planning to aid it, and Charlot was planning to put them down—yes, even if it proved to be his own brother! There was no keeping away from subject of Denis, and Lanny saw that there couldn’t be any peace or reconciliation between them, only a war to the cruel death.

  III

  The P.A. followed his practice of not seeking out the higher-ups but letting them seek him. This increased his importance and at the same time laid him less open to suspicion. What Lanny did was to tell Monsieur le Ministre Jacques Benoist-Méchin that he had recently come from New York, where he had been instrumental in organizing the American Christian League, and what great encouragement this group would offer to Christian France. Later on, he asked after the health of Admiral Darlan, and expressed his great admiration for that sailor-statesman, knowing that Benoist-Méchin was the Admiral’s man, or had been until lately. The next time Lanny met the ex-journalist he was told that the Admiral had expressed the hope of seeing M. Budd before he departed. Lanny telephoned promptly and an appointment was made.

  What did this pipe-smoking Commander of the French Fleet want of an American dilettante and playboy grown up? First, to offer him some of his favorite Pernod Fils brandy; then to chat politely, asking about the visitor’s mother and father, and where he had been and what he had seen; then to state how deeply he had been hurt by the American attitude toward Unoccupied France since the formation of the Laval government. He wanted Lanny to tell his father and his influential friends how Frenchmen had been compelled to choose between Red anarchy and White law and order. Also, he had felt his personal honor impugned by the suspicion, so generally expressed in America, that he, Commander of the French Fleet, might somehow be persuaded or intimidated into letting that Fleet come into the possession of the Germans. “Jamais, jamais, jamais!” exclaimed Jean Louis Xavier Françis Darlan, and he said it several times more in his discourse. It just wasn’t going to happen. But of course if the Americans should be so misguided as to put troops ashore upon the soil of France, the French would have no choice but to defend their patrie and their honneur.

  Did Lanny think the Americans were preparing to do this? The Frenchman had heard rumors and was greatly worried. Lanny said: “Believe me, mon Amiral, if I knew I would tell you. I hear this and hear that, and I wonder, does anybody really know? This I can tell you: My father expects it will be Salonika and the Vardar River. He talks learnedly about reaching the Germans in their unarmored back, and I get the impression that he has got it from some of the military men who come to Newcastle to supervise the fabricating of fighter planes. I can tell you only of my sincere hope that none of those planes will ever be flying over French soil.”

  “The British have flown over it, as you know. They recently bombed the Renault plant, near Paris, and I think the bitterest experience of my life has been the discovery that there are Frenchmen depraved enough to have rejoiced in that bombing, and to welcome the murder of their fellow citizens.”

  “I have never met any such, mon Amiral, but I have heard that it is so. I am told there are clandestine papers being published and circulated, but I have not come upon one.”

  That was true at the time, but it didn’t remain true. That very evening, strolling to his room after a soiree, Lanny was passed on a dark street by a man wearing the blouse and cap of a workingman. This man put out a hand to him, saying: “Pour la France!” Lanny saw that he had a leaflet and took it automatically. He hadn’t far to go, so he ventured to keep it till he got to his room, and to read it by the dim light that was permitted. A leaflet, entitled Le Témoignage Chrétien—The Christian Witness—it gave the text of a manifesto issued by a group of Catholic priests and Protestant pastors who had come together to protest against Fascism and Nazism in the name of freedom and the dignity of the individual human soul. This discovery warmed Lanny’s heart, for he knew that there was another side to Christianity than the defense of capitalist property rights, and he was glad to know that there were humble priests who did not share the political attitudes of the Hierarchy. He mentioned this leaflet in the report to his Chief, which he wrote and sent through the Embassy.

  IV

  Darlan was important because he commanded the Fleet, and the Fleet might command the Mediterranean. Of second importance was Pierre Laval, who would hardly have dared to interfere with the Admiral. He, the fripon mongol, commanded the Army; but if the Allies could keep their hold on the Mediterranean they could deal with whatever army the Germans had allowed to the French in North Africa. With the Premier, Lanny pursued the same waiting tactics; an American art expert went about his business, while the word spread among members of the government that he had been to London and met the “Wickthorpe set,” and to New York, where he had founded a powerful new organization in support of the Axis.

  Just as he was making his plans to leave, there came to his humble lodgings one of the Premier’s undersecretaries, bidding him welcome to Vichy and saying that the Premier would be pleased if he would call at quinze heures that day. Such an invitation was a command, and Lanny said it was also a pleasure. He took an ancient horse-drawn cab�
�taxis being nonexistent—and drove to the Hotel du Parc, where the Mongolian rascal had the royal suite. It was, Lanny thought, the hottest day he had ever known in France, and he found the head of the state in his undershirt amid the best French gilt and rococo. The visitor was invited to take off his coat, and did so, hanging it carefully on the back of his chair and never forgetting it. There were two treasures hidden in it, one of which would have lifted him to glory, and the other of which might have caused him to be hanged.

  The son of Budd-Erling wasn’t going to be taken out to Châteldon this trip; relations with his country were too bad, and it wouldn’t do for the head of the State to exhibit too much intimacy with an American. But in the privacy of his office was another matter, and the butcher’s son spoke as if the son of Budd-Erling were an ambassador, able to swing the destiny of nations. Pierre Laval said that he was desolated by the situation between the two countries, and by the blind, unreasoning prejudice which President Roosevelt and Secretary Hull showed to his harmless self. He said that he was firmly resolved never to break relations with America; if that calamity occurred, it would be Washington’s act, not his.

  Having said this, Pierre proceeded to “fish.” What was Lanny’s own attitude in the present calamitous situation? Surely he could not have weakened in his abhorrence of the Red Terrorists! When Lanny said that he was the same friend of order and property rights that he had always been, Pierre appealed to him as a personal friend to tell him what he knew about the méchanceté which the Allies were preparing to inflict upon Europe. Lanny in reply explained that he was not well informed, for the reason that the ruling people in America knew his sentiments, and the only place where he heard frank talk was in his father’s home. There the opinion seemed to be that the Allies were planning an invasion through the Vardar valley. “A safe distance from France,” he commented.