Fall of Giants

Her eyes filled with tears. “Oh!” she said. “Oh, Mr. Dewar, thank you for bringing this!”

He took a tentative step closer to her. “There, there,” he said. He patted her arm.

She tried to read the rest of the letter but she could not see the words on the paper. “I’m so happy,” she wept.

She dropped her head to Gus’s shoulder, and he put his arms around her. “It’s all right,” he said.

Maud gave in to her feelings and began to sob.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE – December 1916

Fitz was working at the Admiralty in Whitehall. It was not the job he wanted. He longed to return to the Welsh Rifles in France. Much as he hated the dirt and discomfort of the trenches, he could not feel good about being safe in London while others were risking their lives. He had a horror of being thought a coward. However, the doctors insisted that his leg was not yet strong enough, and the army would not let him return.

Because Fitz spoke German, Smith-Cumming of the Secret Service Bureau-the man who called himself “C”-had recommended him to naval intelligence, and he had been temporarily posted to a department known as Room 40. The last thing he wanted was a desk job, but to his surprise, he found that the work was highly important to the war effort.

On the first day of the war a post office ship called the CS Alert had gone out into the North Sea, dredged up the Germans’ heavy-duty seabed telecommunications cables, and severed them all. With that sly stroke the British had forced the enemy to use wireless for most messages. Wireless signals could be intercepted. The Germans were not stupid, and they sent all their messages in code. Room 40 was where the British tried to break the codes.

Fitz worked with an assortment of people-some of them quite odd, most not very military-who struggled to decipher the gibberish picked up by listening stations on the coast. Fitz was no good at the crossword-puzzle challenge of decoding-he could never even work out the murderer in a Sherlock Holmes mystery-but he was able to translate the decrypts into English and, more importantly, his battlefield experience enabled him to judge which were significant.

Not that it made much difference. At the end of 1916 the western front had hardly moved from its position at the beginning of the year, despite huge efforts by both sides-the relentless German assault at Verdun and the even more costly British attack at the Somme. The Allies desperately needed a boost. If the United States joined in they could tip the balance-but so far there was no sign of that.

Commanders in all armies issued their orders late at night or first thing in the morning, so Fitz started early and worked intensely until midday. On the Wednesday after the shooting party he left the admiralty at half past twelve and took a taxi home. The uphill walk from Whitehall to Mayfair, though short, was too much for him.

The three women he lived with-Bea, Maud, and Aunt Herm-were just sitting down to lunch. He handed his walking stick and uniform cap to Grout and joined the ladies. After the utilitarian environment of his office, he took a warm pleasure in his home: the rich furnishings, the soft-footed servants, the French china on the snowy tablecloth.

He asked Maud what the political news was. A battle was raging between Asquith and Lloyd George. Yesterday Asquith had dramatically resigned as prime minister. Fitz was worried: he was no admirer of the Liberal Asquith, but what if the new man was seduced by facile talk of peace?

“The king has seen Bonar Law,” Maud said. Andrew Bonar Law was the leader of the Conservatives. The last remnant of royal power in British politics was the monarch’s right to appoint a prime minister- although his chosen candidate still had to win the support of Parliament.

Fitz said: “What happened?”

“Bonar Law declined to be prime minister.”

Fitz bridled. “How could he refuse the king?” A man should obey his monarch, Fitz believed, especially a Conservative.

“He thinks it has to be Lloyd George. But the king doesn’t want Lloyd George.”

Bea put in: “I should hope not. The man is not much better than a socialist.”

“Indeed,” said Fitz. “But he’s got more aggression than the rest of them put together. At least he would inject some energy into the war effort.”

Maud said: “I fear he won’t make the most of any chance of peace.”

“Peace?” said Fitz. “I don’t think you need to worry too much about that.” He tried not to sound heated, but defeatist talk of peace made him think of all the lives that had been lost: poor young Lieutenant Carlton-Smith, so many Aberowen Pals, even the wretched Owen Bevin, shot by a firing squad. Was their sacrifice to have been for nothing? The thought seemed blasphemous to him. Forcing himself to speak in a conversational tone, he said: “There won’t be peace until one side or the other has won.”