The Winds of War

age with fine skin, a wealth of soft hair, and a smile that was gentle and sweet, despite the protruding teeth stressed in all the caricatures. She firmly shook hands, surveying Pug with the astute cool eyes of a flag officer.

“The Secret Service has an unkind name for my dog,” Roosevelt said, handing his wife a martini. “They call him The Informer. They say he gives away where I am. As though there were only one little black Scottie in the world. Eh, Fala?”

“What do you think of the way the war’s going, Captain?” said Mrs. Roosevelt straight off, sitting in an armchair and holding the drink in her lap.

“It’s very bad, ma’am, obviously.”

Roosevelt said, “Are you surprised?”

Pug took a while to answer. “Well, sir, in Berlin they were mighty sure that the western campaign would be short. Way back in January, all their government war contracts had a terminal date of July first. They thought it would all be over by then and they’d be demobilizing.”

Roosevelt’s eyes widened. “That fact was never brought to my attention. That’s extremely interesting.”

Mrs. Roosevelt said, “Meantime, are they suffering hardships?”

Victor Henry described the “birthday present for the Fuhrer' drive, collecting household tin, copper, and bronze; the newsreel of Goring adding busts of himself and Hitler to a mountain of pots, pans, and irons, and washtubs; the death penalty announced for collectors caught taking anything for their own use: the slogan, One pan per house; ten thousand tons for the Fuhrer. He talked of snowbound Berlin, the lack of fuel, the food rationing, the rule that a spoiled frozen potato had to be bought with each good one. It was against the law, except for foreigners and sick people, to hail a taxi in Berlin. Russian food deliveries were coming in slowly, if at all, so the Nazis were wrapping butter from Czechoslovakia in Russian-printed packages to foster the feeling of Soviet support. The “wartime beer,” a uniform brew reduced in hops and alcohol content, was undrinkable, but the Berliners drank it.

“They’ve got a ‘wartime soap’ too,” Pug said. “Einheitsseife! When you get into a crowded German train it’s not much in evidence.”

Roosevelt burst out laughing. “Germans are getting a bit ripe, eh? I love that. Einheitsseife!”

Pug told jokes circulating in Berlin. In line with the war effort speedup, the Fuhrer had announced that the period of pregnancy henceforth would be three months. Hitler and Goring, passing through conquered Poland, had stopped at a wayside shrine. Pointing to the crucified Christ, Hitler asked Goring whether he thought that would be their final fate. “Mein Fuhrer, we are perfectly safe,” Goring said. When we are through there will be no wood or iron left in Germany.”

Roosevelt guffawed at the jokes and said that there were far worse ones circulating about himself. He asked animated questions about Hitler’s mannerisms in the meeting at Karinhall.

Mrs. Roosevelt interjected in a sharp serious tone, “Captain, do you think that Mr. Hitler is a madman?”

“Ma’am, he gave the clearest rundown on the history of Central Europe I’ve ever heard. He did it off the cuff, just rambling along. You might think his version entirely cockeyed, but it all meshed together and ticked, like a watch.”

“Or like a time bomb.” said the President.

Pug smiled at the quick grim joke, and nodded. “This is an excellent martini, Mr. President. It sort of tastes like it isn’t there. Just a cold cloud.”

Roosevelt’s eyebrows went up in pride and delight. “You’ve described the perfect martini! Thank you.”

“You’ve made his evening,” said Mrs. Roosevelt.

Roosevelt said, “Well, my dear, even the Republicans could agree that as a President, I’m a good bartender.”

It wasn’t much of a jape, but it was a presidential one, so Pug Henry laughed. The drink, the coziness of the room, the presence of the wife and the dog, and the President’s naive pleasure in his trivial skill, made him feel strangely at home. The little black dog was the homiest touch; it sat worshipping the crippled President with a bright stare, now and then running a red tongue over its nose or shifting its look inquiringly to Pug.

Sipping his martini, his pose in the wheelchair as relaxed as before, but the patrician tones subtly hardening for business, Roosevelt said, “Do you think the British will hold out, Pug, if the French collapse?”

“I don’t know much about the British, sir.”

“Would you like to go there for a spell as a naval observer? Possibly after you’ve had a month or so back in Berlin?”

Hoping that Franklin Roosevelt was in as pleasant a mood as he seemed, Victor Henry took a plunge. “Mr. President, any chance of my not going back to Berlin?”

Roosevelt looked at the naval captain for an uncomfortable five or ten seconds, coughing hard. His face sobered into the tired gravity of the portraits that hung in post offices and naval stations.

“You go back there, Pug.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

“I know you’re a seafaring man. You’ll get your sea command.”

“Yes. Mr. President.”

“I’d be interested in your impressions of London.”

“I’ll go to London, sir, if that’s your desire.”

“How about another martini?”

“Thank you, sir, I’m fine.”

“There’s the whole question of helping the British, you see, Pug.” The President rattled the frosty shaker and poured. “No sense sending them destroyers and planes if the Germans are going to end up using them against us.”

Mrs. Roosevelt said with a silvery ring in her voice, “Franklin, you know you’re going to help the British.”

The President grinned and stroked the Scottie’s head. Over his face came the look of complacent, devilish slyness with which he had suggested buying the Allied ocean liners — eyebrows raised — eyes looking sidewise at Pug, mouth corners pulled far up. “Captain Henry here doesn’t know it yet, but he’s going to be in charge of getting rid of those old, useless, surplus Navy dive bombers. We badly need a housecleaning there! No sense having a lot of extra planes cluttering up our training stations. Eh, Captain? Very untidy. Not shipshape.”

“Is that definite at last? How wonderful,” said Mrs. Roosevelt.

“Yes. Naturally the aviators didn’t want a ‘black shoe’ to handle it.” Roosevelt used the slang with self- conscious pleasure. “So naturally I picked one. Aviators all stick together and they don’t like to part with planes. Pug will pry the machines loose. Of course it may be the end of me if word gets out. That’ll solve the third-term question! Eh? What’s your guess on that one. Pug? Is that man in the White House going to break George Washington’s rule and try for a third term? Everybody seems to know the answer but me.”

Victor Henry said, “Sir, what I know is that for the next four years this country is going to need a strong Commander-in-Chief.”

Roosevelt’s mobile pink face turned grave and tired again, and he coughed, glancing at his wife. He pressed a buzzer. “Somebody the people aren’t bored with, Pug. A politician exhausts his welcome after a while. Like an actor who’s been on too long. The good will ebbs away and he loses his audience.” A Navy lieutenant in dress blues with gold shoulder loops appeared in the doorway. Roosevelt offered his hand to Victor Henry. “That Sumner Welles thing didn’t come to anything, Pug, but our conscience is clear. We made the effort. You were very helpful.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

“Welles wasn’t as impressed with Hitler as you evidently were.”

“Sir, he’s more used to being around great men.”

A peculiar flash, not wholly pleasant, came and went in the President’s tired eyes. “Good-bye, Pug.”

* * *

A crashing thunderstorm, with thick rain hissing down from skies black as night, stopped Victor Henry from leaving the White House. He waited for a letup in a crowded open doorway marked PRESS, where a cool damp wind brought in a smell of rainy grass and flowers. All at once a heavy hand thwacked his shoulder.