Winter of the World

That was an exit line, but he hesitated. ‘I can’t tell you how glad I am that I found you again,’ he said.

She looked him in the eye for the first time. ‘Oh, Woody, so am I,’ she said. ‘So glad!’ Then she put her arms around his waist and hugged him.

It was what he had been longing for. He embraced her and put his face into her wonderful hair. They stayed like that for a long minute.

At last she pulled away. ‘I’ll see you at seven,’ she said.

‘You bet.’

He left the house in a cloud of happiness.

He went from there straight to a meeting of the steering committee in the Veterans Building next to the opera house. There were forty-six members around the long table, with aides such as Gus Dewar sitting behind them. Woody was an aide to an aide, and sat up against the wall.

The Soviet foreign minister, Molotov, made the first speech. He was not impressive to look at, Woody reflected. With his receding hair, neat moustache, and glasses, he looked like a store clerk, which was what his father had been. But he had survived a long time in Bolshevik politics. A friend of Stalin’s since before the revolution, he was the architect of the Nazi–Soviet pact of 1939. He was a hard worker, and was nicknamed Stone-Arse because of the long hours he spent at his desk.

He proposed that Belorussia and Ukraine be admitted as original members of the United Nations. These two Soviet republics had borne the brunt of the Nazi invasion, he pointed out, and each had contributed more than a million men to the Red Army. It had been argued that they were not fully independent of Moscow, but the same argument could be applied to Canada and Australia, dominions of the British Empire that had each been given separate membership.

The vote was unanimous. It had all been fixed up in advance, Woody knew. The Latin American countries had threatened to dissent unless Hitler-supporting Argentina was admitted, and that concession had been granted to secure their votes.

Then came a bombshell. The Czech foreign minister, Jan Masaryk, stood up. He was a famous liberal and anti-Nazi who had been on the cover of Time magazine in 1944. He proposed that Poland should also be admitted to the UN.

The Americans were refusing to admit Poland until Stalin permitted elections there, and Masaryk as a democrat should have supported that stand, especially as he, too, was trying to create a democracy with Stalin looking over his shoulder. Molotov must have put terrific pressure on Masaryk to get him to betray his ideals in this way. And, indeed, when Masaryk sat down he wore the expression of one who has eaten something disgusting.

Gus Dewar also looked grim. The prearranged compromises over Belorussia, Ukraine and Argentina should have ensured that this session went smoothly. But now Molotov had thrown them a low ball.

Senator Vandenberg, sitting with the American contingent, was outraged. He took out a pen and notepad and began writing furiously. After a minute he tore the sheet off, beckoned Woody, gave him the note, and said: ‘Take that to the Secretary of State.’

Woody went to the table, leaned over Stettinius’s shoulder, put the note in front of him, and said: ‘From Senator Vandenberg, sir.’

‘Thank you.’

Woody returned to his chair up against the wall. My part in history, he thought. He had glanced at the note as he handed it over. Vandenberg had drafted a short, passionate speech rejecting the Czech proposal. Would Stettinius follow the senator’s lead?

If Molotov got his way over Poland, then Vandenberg might sabotage the United Nations in the Senate. But if Stettinius took Vandenberg’s line now, Molotov might walk out and go home, which would kill off the UN just as effectively.

Woody held his breath.

Stettinius stood up with Vandenberg’s note in his hand. ‘We’ve just honoured our Yalta engagements on behalf of Russia,’ he said. He meant the commitment made by the USA to support Belorussia and Ukraine. ‘There are other Yalta obligations which equally require allegiance.’ He was using the words Vandenberg had written. ‘One calls for a new and representative Polish Provisional Government.’

There was a murmur of shock around the room. Stettinius was going up against Molotov. Woody glanced at Vandenberg. He was purring.

‘Until that happens,’ Stettinius went on, ‘the Conference cannot, in good conscience, recognize the Lublin government.’ He looked directly at Molotov and quoted Vandenberg’s exact words. ‘It would be a sordid exhibition of bad faith.’

Molotov looked incandescent.

The British foreign secretary, Anthony Eden, unfolded his lanky figure and stood up to support Stettinius. His tone was faultlessly courteous, but his words were scathing. ‘My government has no way of knowing whether the Polish people support their provisional government,’ he said, ‘because our Soviet allies refuse to let British observers into Poland.’