Never Surrender. Michael Dobbs
eyes been able to see any of the misery that lay so close ahead? Had he felt any symptoms – had he guessed in any way that he had already set out upon a path that would lead to a slow and wretched death?
No, he could not have known. No man ever knew what lay ahead.
Tiredness gnawed away at the old man and his head sank towards the glass, still clutched tightly in his two hands. Yet as the head fell forward he was once more jerked awake. He opened his eyes to find himself staring at his father. Lord Randolph was sitting in the chair opposite – not an oil painting, not an hallucination, but body and blood, so far as Winston could tell. It wasn’t possible, of course, but …
‘Papa?’
‘What are you doing, Winston? Where are we?’
‘In my office. At the Admiralty.’
‘So, you’ve become a clerk in the navy, have you?’
‘I followed you, Papa. Into politics.’
‘Brutal game. Surprised you had the stomach for it. You were such a weakly child, always sickening for something.’
‘Politics have been my life. I entered Parliament at the same age as you, Papa. Twenty-five.’
‘Ah, all those years, but to what end?’ The father managed to sound both envious and dismissive. He began filling his amber cigarette-holder with a little pad of cotton wool to soak up the nicotine. The process seemed to absorb him, to the annoyance of his son. Instinctively the son decided not to reveal all of his hand, to keep something in reserve.
‘I have been Home Secretary and, as you were, Chancellor of the Exchequer. For five years.’
The father, who had been Chancellor for a mere five months, seemed not to hear, his attention focused on the search for a match from deep within his pockets.
‘I used your old robes, Papa, the ones you wore.’
Randolph scowled impatiently as his search continued fruitlessly.
‘And until this morning I was First Lord of the Admiralty,’ the son added.
‘Under whose authority? Who as Prime Minister?’
‘Neville Chamberlain – Joe’s younger son.’
‘What? A Chamberlain as Prime Minister?’ The eyes of the father bulged in displeasure. ‘Praise be that I never lived to see the day. Nothing but iron-mongers. Why, in my day you could buy a dozen Chamberlains for a single Churchill and still get change.’ He stared at Winston as though he were directly responsible for the devaluation of the currency. ‘So how did this young Chamberlain do?’
‘Not well.’ The son chose the words with care, speaking them slowly. ‘We are engaged in a horrible war with Germany, Papa, for the second time in my life. With flying machines and other terrible weapons that slaughter millions of men.’
‘Millions, you say?’
‘Tens of millions.’
‘My God, is it possible? Then I’m glad not to have lived to see such terrible days. But we will prevail, of course.’
Again the words were chosen with care. ‘Not necessarily. We may not prevail. And if we don’t, we shall lose not only our armies but also our empire, even our independence.’
‘Takes my breath away to hear it. Not the place it once was, eh, our England? But something always turns up. Like fresh cavalry riding out of the afternoon sun.’
‘The British cavalry hasn’t charged in anger in more than forty years.’
The father shook his head in consternation. ‘So, who is to lead us from the jaws of such adversity?’
‘I hope it will be me, Papa.’
‘You, Winston? My God, but you only just sneaked into Sandhurst by the skin of your breeches. And at the third attempt. With your school record I couldn’t even consider you for a career in the law. You, of all people?’ He tugged at his moustache in puzzlement. ‘You are an admiral? Or a general?’
‘No, Papa. But I was once a major in the Yeomanry.’
The father wrinkled his nose. ‘You were always getting yourself into scrapes. Getting beyond yourself. Like that time you fell off the bridge in Dorset.’
‘I didn’t fall. I jumped, Papa. To evade capture by my friends. I jumped onto the higher branches of a tree, but they gave way.’
‘Seem to remember you were in bed for months. And for what? It was a childish game, nothing more. No judgement, that’s the thing.’
‘There are those who would agree with you, I fear.’
‘Always sickening in bed. Caused your mother no end of inconvenience.’ The voice trailed away, diverted down a new, more gentle path. ‘So … what of Mama?’
‘She lived a long life.’
‘There were … other men?’
(Did he truly want to hear? But he knew there would have been other men. There were always other men.) ‘She married twice more.’ The son pondered telling him that they had been young enough to be her sons, the last even younger than he. But somehow it didn’t seem to matter any longer. ‘Neither of them matched up to you, Papa.’
‘Two, you say. Always a little careless with her men, your mama.’ The voice now seemed strained; Winston put it down to his father’s need for a smoke. He had still not lit his cigarette.
‘But, in the end, loyal enough,’ the father continued. ‘Can’t fault her loyalty, not through the last years, at least.’
The painful years of his father’s decline came flooding back to the son, when his brain disease had got hold of him and he had died by fractions in public. Winston himself had died a little as he watched his father being led stumbling and incoherent from the Chamber. Decay of the brain, and of the character. The Churchill legacy.
‘You have sons?’
‘One. And three daughters.’
‘Is he up to carrying the Churchill name?’
‘A father should never give up hope for his son,’ Winston responded. It was both reproach to his father and injunction to himself. His son had been named after the grandfather, Randolph, and had inherited so many of his characteristics. Rudeness, inconstancy, infidelity, lack of judgement – that’s what they said about the younger Randolph, and they had said no less in the grandfather’s time.
‘And Jack? What of him?’
‘My brother is happy. Married. A stockbroker.’
‘A stock—’ Randolph bit off the thought, but there was no hiding the disappointment. ‘Went too soon, I did. Before my time. Always wanted more sons, but your mama … There was so much more still to do, to make the Churchill name stand out above the crowd. So, you have a role to play in this war.’
‘I was with the King this evening.’
‘Which King is that?’
‘George. The Sixth.’
‘What? Two more Georges?’
‘And two Edwards.’
‘Hah! I knew the first, of course, royal rogue that he was. Once challenged me to a duel, he did. Couldn’t accept, of course, not a contest with the Prince of Wales. A pickle over some damned woman. Can’t remember her name.’
The name had been Edith, Countess of Aylesford, a woman to whom passion spoke more loudly than discretion. It had caused her to become entangled not only with the Prince of Wales but also with the Churchill family in an affair that grew into one of the most sensational causes de scandale of the time. It had pushed Randolph’s legendary lack of judgement to new and intolerable extremes, and he threatened the heir to the throne