Emerald Decision

him, further than ever before. Beneath the smiling, almost boyish adventurer's exterior there was something cold and dangerous that this situation had force-fed. He was a film star whose screen image masked a filthy or perverted private character. Gilliatt could find no more appropriate an analogy. He couldn't understand McBride and wanted a view of him that explained him in stark monochrome and not in shades of grey. He was more than a little mad, perhaps, and certainly a killer.

McBride moved away, as if sensing the bent of Gilliatt's reflections, and Gilliatt went on caricaturing him for the sake of his own mental comfort.

* * *

Churchill entered one of the small operations rooms in the command bunker beneath the Admiralty building set aside for the select team he had assembled to deal with what he now officially termed Emerald. He had taken personal command of the operation, and its classification for security was the highest possible. On the wall immediately in front of him was a map of the British Isles, to which a It commander from the Tracking Room was attaching pins to show the position of the channel that the Germans had swept. Churchill allowed himself a gruff, barking laugh at the handwriting which described the minefield by its nickname. He saw Walsingham in consultation with two officers, a major and a colonel, from the War Office's Co- ordination of Intelligence Branch, and signalled him to join him. Two armchairs and a cocktail cabinet had incongruously been added to the linoleum-floored, concrete-walled room. Churchill slumped into one of these, noticing the patch of striped shirt that had pushed itself from beneath his waistcoat, tucked it back into his waistband, and placed his hat on the small table beside his chair.

Walsingham waited, and the Prime Minister indicated the drinks cabinet. Walsingham poured the old man a large brandy which Churchill swiftly demolished. Then he indicated that Walsingham should sit. Around them, the work of the room continued like the soft and constant hum of machinery. The two minelayers were indicated on the map, already well into the British-swept channel and approaching the German sweep. For its part, the army intelligence unit the War Office had assigned to Emerald was working at a papier-mache relief-model on a table, the Brittany coast divided by a strip of board from the Irish coast from Cork to Mizzen Head. The relief-models had been hastily painted green, brown and blue, and around the sea inlets and the beaches were marker flags and along the coast were model soldiers in field-grey.

Churchill studied Walsingham. The younger man felt uncomfortable under his gaze, while at the same moment he was aware of some intense inward debate, as if the old man looked inward with one eye, towards him with the other. Churchill's proximity unnerved him. The man emanated will, ruthlessness, energy. He was unsparing and unforgiving, perhaps most evidently with himself. The blue eyes were intent, dissatisfied with the corpulent, flagging body which the mind inhabited. The eyes and their gaze seemed totally an instrument of the man's intellect and nothing to do with the ageing sack of the flesh. Churchill puffed at his cigar.

'What do we know, Commander? How many troops have the Nazis dropped into County Cork?'

'The weather has been too bad for any aerial reconnaissance of the area, Prime Minister.' Churchill's face creased in irritation. 'But we have reports which suggest the number of planes they used was very small. We don't think they could have landed anything like a division in one drop.'

'How many?'

Two or three rifle regiments, signals unit, perhaps — not much more than that.'

'A holding operation.'

'Would you like to see our guesswork as to their dispositions?'

'In a moment. What are the reports from France?'

'Sir, we can explain it better if you'd look at the models,' Walsingham persisted. Churchill looked across the room as if reluctant. Then he heaved himself out of the deep armchair, teetered for a moment but shrugged away Walsingham's supporting hand, and then crossed the room with a conscious determination in his step. The colonel from the Army Intelligence Unit snapped to attention. Walsingham noticed the way in which Churchill seemed to enjoy the subordination of the people around him, their punctilious awareness of his importance. A commander-in- chief rather than a Prime Minister. Had he painted at Chartwell all those years just for moments like this?

'Now, Colonel. Explain.' Churchill dabbed at the Brittany model. Cigar ash dropped into the blue-painted sea off Brest, and the colonel delicately blew it away, dispersing it over the flat painted paper of the Atlantic. The colonel then dabbed towards the model with a pointer. A grey toy soldier with a rifle.

'Yesterday, according to aerial reconnaissance, these units of parachute troops were moved from here down to the airfields here—' He picked out the marked airfields one by one. 'There were a number of transport planes at each which had arrived the previous night. These units—' He picked out two other toy soldiers, standing above Plabennec, ' — were moved down to the harbour area. As definitely as we can tell from photographs and from what the man McBride brought back with him, they are two infantry divisions. Also, we have vague reports from the local network that engineer units — Panzers — have also been on the move towards Brest. That's more or less it.'

Churchill was silent for a while then: 'What are the latest weather reports?'

'They'll sail tonight.'

'Who will come first?'

'One of the divisions will send in infantry, there'll be signals — at least a couple of abteilungen — recce units, engineers. They'll want a bridgehead—' Already, it was evident that Churchill's eyes had strayed towards the Irish coast model, via the wall map which revealed that the two minelayers had moved into the gap of the German-swept channel. He pointed with the cigar.

'What do we know about the dispositions here?' He waggled the cigar along the coast of County Cork.

'Difficult, sir,' the colonel offered apologetically. 'We've very few reports from Drummond's rather poor intelligence network, and we've no aerial reconnaissance.'

'But—?'

'We estimate there were four landings at least, possibly five or six. To secure the beaches, since they landed so close to the coast in each case.' He pointed towards the field-grey toy soldiers. 'We know they landed here—' Near Kilbrittain and the Old Head of Kinsale. 'And here.' Rosscarbery Bay. 'On that basis, we've selected the likeliest beaches for landings, and the easiest to hold — here, here and here.' Toe Head Bay, Clonakilty Bay, Glandore Harbour. Churchill nodded. A toy soldier loomed over each shallow inlet of the sea, carrying a rifle across his body. Churchill turned to Walsingham.

'What do you hear of the Republic's army?'

'Our intelligence sources in Dublin are indicating that the Irish are sitting tight, sir.' Churchill nodded. 'They're still gathering their own intelligence. There's an alert, all leave canceled, a lot of meetings and consultations between the army and the government—'

'And it doesn't amount to more than piss and wind,' Churchill snapped. 'They won't want to go up against crack parachute troops. God, they saw what happened to us at Dunkirk! Who could blame them?' He rubbed his nose. 'They need our help, but they're not asking for it. Strict neutrality. I know they've been in touch with Berlin—' He smiled at the sharing of one of his secrets. 'Apparently, the Fuhrer is denying all knowledge of such troop landings and is assuring the Irish government he continues to recognize their neutrality. Gentlemen, it's up to us, I'm afraid. We must look out for ourselves. Now, what can we do?'

The intelligence colonel cleared his throat. 'We could land a couple of regiments today. The Dorsets and the Herefords are on full alert. They've not been told why.'

'Colonel, you know it would take today to get them to the coast and aboard suitable vessels, even if we had them. By tomorrow night, they might have begun to disembark in Cork harbour, if we were very lucky.' He paused while the colonel flushed slightly. 'Very well, get them to the coast, Bristol or Cardiff, as quickly as possible. Just bodies — forget heavy equipment. I will talk to the Prime Minister of the Irish Republic and inform him that dockside facilities will be required in Cobh or Cork tomorrow. You have a list of vessels in Bristol and Cardiff—' Walsingham looked into Churchill's eyes, and shook his head. 'Get one!'

Walsingham crossed to the telephones ranged alongside each other on a fold-away table. Churchill watched his retreating back for a moment, then said, 'Get them onto anything, let them sail as soon as possible.' Again, he pointed with his cigar. 'They'll require Cork airport. I presume they'll try to take it tomorrow, and land equipment and the Panzergrenadiers then. Then Cork harbour, and it would be all over.' The colonel looked as if Churchill had touched a hidden nightmare or shame. 'Very well. Then our relaid minefield had better work effectively, to give us time to round up the parachutists, on behalf of the sovereign republic of Eire.' He emitted his gruff, barking laugh. The colonel realized, looking into his face, that there was a confidence that bordered on fanaticism in Churchill. The