Winston’s War (26 page)

Saturday morning. They had wandered through the marketplace at Epping, purchasing a bag of boiled sweets to pacify Peter, lingering over swatches of dress material, pinching and prodding the offerings of fruit and fresh vegetables that were laid out on the stalls. They shopped with care, loading their purchases into the baby's push-chair while Linda was carried along, uncomplaining, on Mac's shoulders. She drooled on his hair while he pretended
to be a circus ride, swirling her around until she squealed for him to stop. Carol struggled to hide the smile—there they were, the hooker and the now non-paying punter, shopping for cabbages and King Edwards, to all intents like any other Epping family busy with the weekend chores. There was a long way to go up the mountain, but so far Mac's footing seemed remarkably secure.

The market was filled with tantalizing smells and traders' cries. Women staggered like drunken sailors beneath a week's worth of provisions while menfolk muttered at their side, rolling cigarettes from tobacco they kept in little leather pouches and wondering if there'd be enough left to put a little on the two-thirty at Kempton. It was growing busier, the crowd ever more pressing. Carol's little caravan pushed ahead, pushchair to the fore like a battering ram, squeezing, nudging, until Peter dropped his bag of sweets in the crush and it became clear that they were getting nowhere. They had become mixed up in a throng that stretched around an elderly man who was standing on a platform and shouting at everybody. Several of those around were shouting back.

“And so I have decided to bring my campaign to the people—”

“But the people don't want you, Mr. Churchill!”

The man on the platform stared at the accuser. “Some people don't want me, that is true. Some people within my own party don't want me. Want to push me out, like cuckoos in the nest. But it is not the cuckoo class who must decide, it is the ordinary people of Epping, like you, ladies and gentlemen—yes, and even you, young man”—he pointed to the persecutor who was trying to interrupt him—“even you, sir. Because the rules of democracy insist you should be allowed to vote if you are over the age of twenty-one. Which is only fair and right and decent, in spite of your evident shortcomings, since those same rules of democracy insist that if you are over the age of seventeen and one-half you should be allowed to enlist for your country and be shot.”

There was an outpouring of abuse. Mac turned away, wanting to leave, but Carol tugged his sleeve and held him back. “It's old Winnie. Hang on a minute,” she whispered.

Another young man, slightly older than the first, had taken up the cudgels. “You don't know what you're saying. You used to be a bleedin' Liberal.” Others in the crowd joined in with jeers.

“Yes, indeed I was. But we must always be prepared to change. Why, I have changed, I cannot deny it. When the Boers were hunting me throughout the veldts and kops of South Africa, they put up a notice—indeed, many notices. Wanted. Dead or alive! Winston Churchill.” There was a stirring of pride amongst some of the older members of the crowd. “Twenty-five years old, they said I was. But sadly, and all too evidently, I have changed. Red-brownish hair, they said. That has changed, too—all but disappeared. Small toothbrush moustache, they said. That also has gone—although I notice that such appendages have become rather fashionable in other parts of Europe.” The crowd was chuckling, joining in with him. “And the Boers accused me in their posters of having an indifferent build. Well, just look at me now”—he patted his substantial stomach, which was clearly detectable beneath his overcoat, and there was laughter, punctuated by yet another interruption. Someone was accusing him of living off the fat of the land. “And the Boers also said—and I quote”—Churchill was shouting now to drown the interruption, waving pages of prepared notes that had become irrelevant—“that he talks through his nose and cannot pronounce the letter 'S' properly. Well, I commend that defect to you, sir, for talking through one's nose is far to be favored over talking through the back of your head!”

He was getting the better of them now. Others in the crowd were turning on the agitators, trying to shout them down, but Churchill called them to order, waving his hand. “No, we must respect their freedom. Freedom to disagree, and freedom even to abuse. Freedom that is denied them today in half of Europe, and will be denied in
the whole of Europe if dictatorship wins the day. We cannot take our freedom in this country for granted. So let them have their say. Allow them the liberty of making fools of themselves. But I must warn you, young man”—he was pointing at one of the more persistent of his antagonists—“that if you insist on keeping your mouth open and your ears closed, you'll catch nothing but flies!”

A mistake. Normally a speaker can have the last word, beat the hecklers at their own game but, at the rear of the crowd and out of sight of Churchill, Mac could see a well-suited middleaged man circulating, whispering in the ears of the hecklers, urging them on, pressing money into the hand of one. The day was not yet done. As soon as the cheers for Churchill had died down, the agitation started once again.

“You talk about liberty. But what about loyalty?”

“Loyalty, yes. To my party, to my leader, to my country. But not necessarily in that order.”

“Loyalty to Mr. Chamberlain?”

“I am loyal to Mr. Chamberlain. But I am loyal to freedom above all else. And freedom is not divisible. We cannot in this country be free if half of the rest of Europe is cast into slavery. We cannot turn a blind eye, for it will be our turn next. We must look at what is happening to the Jews, and take care, for if we do not I fear that we shall all soon be Jews.”

A rhetorical gesture too far for some in the crowd. “Send 'em back to Germany. To Austria. Send 'em back to where they came from!” the cries began.

“It would be like throwing Christians to the lions.”

“It's called appeasement.”

“The Christians had another name for it.”

“These ain't Christians, they're Jews.”

“Jesus was a Jew!” Churchill retorted hotly.

“So was Barabbas!”

And Churchill had lost. From all corners of the crowd shouts of derision erupted. Not from the majority, for the British
majority has that peculiar habit of preferring to remain silent, embarrassed by confrontation. Placards on sticks had appeared and were being waved around the platform, blocking Churchill off from those he wanted to reach. His tongue was sharper than his opponents' but their number was greater and blunted his edge. They didn't have to win; stopping him from winning was sufficient for their purposes.

It was too much. With a wave of his hand and muted applause from his supporters, Churchill stepped down and disappeared from view. Another day, another battle. He hadn't won this one, but there would be many more to fight. The crowd began to disperse. Carol tugged at Mac's sleeve, time to go—but now it was his turn to be reluctant to leave, looking back over his shoulder to the place where Churchill had been standing. Mac's face was raw. Linda was pulling at his hair and wanting to use him as a hobby horse but he seemed not to notice. The joy they had shared only minutes before had vanished. He was elsewhere, in another marketplace. He remembered youths—just like those here—in Wadowice, except they had hurled not only abuse but rocks, too. He remembered asking his father why. Why us,
tatele
? Why don't we just stop it? “One day,
kindele
, you will understand,” his father had said, and dragged him away, just as Carol was doing now. But Mac could never be dragged far enough. Throughout his life, wherever he had gone and no matter how hard he had run, he had never been able to escape, not even here, no matter how hard he pretended to be almost English. They would always find him.

Yet he had just seen one man who understood—or understood as much as any
goy tzedek
Gentile could. A man who had stared into the fire that was to come and was crying a warning. Yet his words seemed futile, like birdsong in a thunderstorm.

“Mac, love, what on earth's the matter?” Carol's voice was filled with concern. This was supposed to be such a special day, yet something had gone wrong. She'd lost him, somewhere deep within himself, a place where she couldn't follow.

“It's Yosef Ya'akov. That's the matter.”

“Who the hell's he? And why's he upsetting you?”

“Can't be helped.”

“He'll need bleedin' help after I've finished with him.”

“No he won't.” He had stopped and was looking at her, holding her wrists tight—too tight, he was almost hurting her. His skin was hot, burning inside. He had an air about him that seemed turbulent, a battleground, a territory that had been fought over many times and yet would be fought over again. “You see—it's me. Yosef Ya'akov. Yosef Ya'akov Farbenblum. My name. I think I just remembered who I am.”

Churchill was in deep trouble. The Chigwell branch of his Epping constituency party voted to sweep all his supporters from their official positions and replace them with Chamberlainites. Then the branch in Theydon Bois declared its unambiguous support for the Prime Minister, and other branches did the same. Such moves were made possible by the sudden influx of fresh members. New names were conjured up as though by magic on the membership lists and their votes were counted in the tally against Churchill, although very few of these new members ever attended a single meeting. And every party gathering within the constituency was reminded that Epping was on the bombing route to London. Yes, Epping was nervous and blamed Winston Churchill, and there were those who wanted to ensure that the entire country knew it …

(The Times, Monday, March 6, 1939)

MR. WINSTON CHURCHILL'S “INSURRECTION”
A CONSTITUENT'S PROTEST

Mr. C. N. Thornton-Kemsley, chairman of Chigwell Unionist Association, speaking at a dinner of the Nazeing (Essex) Unionist Association on Saturday night, said:

“
Mr. Churchill's post-Munich insurrection was shocking. His castigation of the National Government, which we returned him to support, would in any other party but the Conservative Party have earned him immediate expulsion.

“
Loyal Conservatives in the Epping Division have been placed in an intolerable position. I feel that unless Mr. Churchill is prepared to work for the National Government and the Prime Minister he ought no longer to shelter under the goodwill and name of such a great party. Most of us in the Epping Division agree that Mr. Churchill has overstepped the line.”

I
n the gardens of Buckingham Palace it was undeniably spring. Snowdrops were handing over tenancy of the lawns to daffodils and crocuses while cherry blossom and early willow buds had begun their annual dance across a stage of bare bark. Life—and hope—seemed to be reclaiming the land after a winter that had seemed endless, bringing with it a mood of infectious youth that had revived even the Prime Minister.

“The dawn of a golden age, sir,” he reported. “I used precisely that description with the press lobby this morning. A golden age.”

“You did?” his Monarch replied. It wasn't really meant as a question, it was simply that all his life the tongue-tangled “Bertie” had found it easier to participate in conversations by peppering them with questions, no matter how pointless, thus relieving himself of the need to offer comments of either length or substance.

“Yes, sir,” Chamberlain responded, recognizing the game. “Sir Joseph had summoned them to St. Stephen's Club for a briefing.”

“St. Stephen's? Don't know it myself.”

“And neither should you,” Chamberlain continued, laughing gaily. “A gentlemen's club frequented by many politicians. A place of ne'er-do-wells within the shadow of Big Ben. And ideal for its purpose, I must say. A fine leather chair for myself, a fire-place on which Sir Joseph can lean and survey the scene, and far too few seats for the gentlemen of the press. Most of them have to stand. Keeps them alert, of course—and in their place.”

“I never c-cease to admire your success in that respect.”