Fall of Giants

Fitz was pleased that the German peace proposal had been spurned, and proud of his part in the process, but when it was over he had doubts.

He thought it over, walking-or, rather, limping-along Piccadilly on the morning of Wednesday, January 17, on his way to his office in the Admiralty. Peace talks would have been a sneaky way for the Germans to consolidate their gains, legitimizing their hold over Belgium, northeastern France, and parts of Russia. For Britain to take part in such talks would have amounted to an admission of defeat. But Britain still had not won.

Lloyd George’s talk of a knockout went down well in the newspapers, but all sensible people knew it was a daydream. The war would go on, perhaps for a year, perhaps longer. And, if the Americans continued to remain neutral, it might end in peace talks after all. What if no one could win this war? Another million men would be killed for no purpose. The thought that haunted Fitz was that Ethel might have been right after all.

And what if Britain lost? There would be a financial crisis, unemployment, and destitution. Working-class men would take up Ethel’s father’s cry and say that they had never been allowed to vote for the war. The people’s rage against their rulers would be boundless. Protests and marches would turn into riots. It was only a little over a century ago that Parisians had executed their king and much of the nobility. Would Londoners do the same? Fitz imagined himself, bound hand and foot, carried on a cart to the place of execution, spat upon and jeered at by the crowd. Worse, he saw the same happening to Maud, and Aunt Herm, and Bea, and Boy. He pushed the nightmare out of his mind.

What a little spitfire Ethel was, he thought with mingled admiration and regret. He had been mortified with embarrassment when his guest was ejected from the gallery during Lloyd George’s speech, but at the same time he found himself even more attracted to her.

Unfortunately, she had turned against him. He had followed her out and caught up with her in the Central Lobby, and she had berated him, blaming him and his kind for prolonging the war. From the way she talked you would think every soldier who died in France had been killed by Fitz personally.

That was the end of his Chelsea scheme. He had sent her a couple of notes but she had not replied. The disappointment hit him hard. When he thought of the delightful afternoons they might have spent in that love nest he felt the loss like an ache in his chest.

However, he had some consolation. Bea had taken his reprimand to heart. She now welcomed him to her bedroom, dressed in pretty nightwear, offering him her scented body as she had when they were first married. In the end she was a well-brought-up aristocratic woman and she knew what a wife was for.

Musing on the compliant princess and the irresistible activist, he entered the Old Admiralty Building to find a partly decoded German telegram on his desk.

It was headed:

Berlin zu Washingon. W.158. 16 January 1917.

Fitz looked automatically at the foot of the decrypt to see who it was from. The name at the end was:

Zimmermann.

His interest was piqued. This was a message from the German foreign minister to his ambassador in the United States. With a pencil Fitz wrote a translation, putting squiggles and question marks where code groups had not been decrypted.

Most secret for Your Excellency’s personal information and to be handed on to the imperial minister in (?Mexico?) with xxxx by a safe route.

The question marks indicated a code group whose meaning was not certain. The decoders were guessing. If they were right, this message was for the German ambassador in Mexico. It was simply being sent via the Washington embassy.

Mexico, Fitz thought. How odd.

The next sentence was completely decoded.

We propose to begin on 1 February unrestricted submarine warfare.

“My God!” Fitz said aloud. It was fearfully expected, but this was firm confirmation-and with a date! The news would be a coup for Room 40.

In doing so however we shall endeavor to keep America neutral xxxx. If we should not we propose to (?Mexico?) an alliance upon the following basis: conduct of war, conclusion of peace.

“An alliance with Mexico?” Fitz said to himself. “This is strong stuff. The Americans are going to be hopping mad!”

Your Excellency should for the present inform the president secretly war with the USA xxxx and at the same time to negotiate between us and Japan xxxx our submarines will compel England to peace within a few months. Acknowledge receipt.

Fit looked up and caught the eye of young Carver, who-he now saw-was bursting with excitement. “You must be reading the Zimmermann intercept,” the sublieutenant said.

“Such as it is,” Fitz said calmly. He was just as euphoric as Carver, but better at concealing it. “Why is the decrypt so scrappy?”

“It’s in a new code that we haven’t completely cracked. All the same, the message is hot stuff, isn’t it?”