Fall of Giants

Mortimer was not intimidated. “I don’t like yours,” he said. “You’ve made it clear, without even a semblance of courtesy, that you consider me inadequate to treat your family. I will gladly take my leave.” He picked up his bag.

Fitz sighed. This was a foolish quarrel. He was angry with the Bolsheviks, not with this touchy middle-class Welshman. “Don’t be a fool, man.”

“I try not to be.” Mortimer went to the door.

“Aren’t you supposed to put the interests of your patients first?”

Mortimer stopped at the door. “My God, you’ve got a bloody nerve, Fitzherbert.”

Few people had ever talked to Fitz that way. But he suppressed the scathing retort that came to mind. It might take hours to find another doctor. Bea would never forgive him if he let Mortimer leave in a huff. “I’ll forget you said that,” Fitz said. “In fact I’ll forget this whole conversation, if you will.”

“I suppose that’s the nearest thing to an apology that I’m likely to get.”

It was, but Fitz said nothing.

“I’ll go back upstairs,” said the doctor.

{III}

Princess Bea did not give birth quietly. Her screams could be heard throughout the principal wing of the house, where her room was. Maud played piano rags very loudly, to entertain the guests and drown out the noise, but one piano rag was much like the next, and she gave up after twenty minutes. Some of the guests went to bed, but as midnight struck, most of the men congregated in the billiard room. Peel offered cognac.

Fitz gave Winston an El Rey del Mundo cigar from Cuba. While Winston was getting it alight, Fitz said: “The government must do something about the Bolsheviks.”

Winston glanced quickly around the room, as if to make sure that everyone present was completely trustworthy. Then he sat back in his chair and said: “Here is the situation. The British Northern Squadron is already in Russian waters off Murmansk. In theory their task is to make sure Russian ships there don’t fall into German hands. We also have a small mission in Archangel. I’m pressing for troops to be landed at Murmansk. Longer-term, this could be the core of a counterrevolutionary force in northern Russia.”

“It’s not enough,” Fitz said immediately.

“I agree. I’d like us to send troops to Baku, on the Caspian Sea, to make sure those vast oil fields are not taken over by the Germans, or indeed the Turks, and to the Black Sea, where there is already the nucleus of an anti-Bolshevik resistance in the Ukraine. Finally, in Siberia, we have thousands of tons of supplies at Vladivostok, worth perhaps a billion pounds, intended to support the Russians when they were our allies. We are entitled to send troops there to protect our property.”

Fitz spoke half in doubt and half in hope. “Will Lloyd George do any of this?”

“Not publicly,” said Winston. “The problem is those red flags flying from miners’ houses. There is in our country a great well of support for the Russian people and their revolution. And I understand why, much as I loathe Lenin and his crew. With all due respect to the family of Princess Bea”-he glanced up at the ceiling as another scream began-“it cannot be denied that the Russian ruling class were slow to deal with their people’s discontents.”

Winston was an odd mix, Fitz thought: aristocrat and man of the people, a brilliant administrator who could never resist meddling in other people’s departments, a charmer who was disliked by most of his political colleagues.

Fitz said: “The Russian revolutionaries are thieves and murderers.”

“Indeed. But we have to live with the fact that not everyone sees them that way. So our prime minister cannot openly oppose the revolution.”

“There’s not much point in his opposing it in his mind,” Fitz said impatiently.

“A certain amount may be done without his knowing about it, officially.”

“I see.” Fitz did not know whether that meant much.

Maud came into the room. The men stood up, a bit startled. In a country house women did not usually enter the billiard room. Maud ignored rules that did not suit her convenience. She came up to Fitz and kissed his cheek. “Congratulations, dear Fitz,” she said. “You have another son.”

The men cheered and clapped and gathered around Fitz, slapping him on the back and shaking his hand. “Is my wife all right?” he asked Maud.

“Exhausted but proud.”

“Thank God.”

“Dr. Mortimer has left, but the midwife says you may go and see the baby now.”

Fitz went to the door.

Winston said: “I’ll walk up with you.”

As they left the room, Fitz heard Maud say: “Pour me some brandy, please, Peel.”

In a lowered voice, Winston said: “You’ve been to Russia, of course, and you speak the language.” Fitz wondered where this was leading. “A bit,” he said. “Nothing to boast about, but I can make myself understood.”

“Have you come across a chap called Mansfield Smith-Cumming?”

“As it happens, I have. He runs… ” Fitz hesitated to mention the Secret Intelligence Service out loud. “He runs a special department. I’ve written a couple of reports for him.”