Grand Days (15 page)

Major Buxton presented a short dissertation on the amount of reading that committee members had to do. He said, ‘We in the Secretariat should be the world experts at presenting material so that people can take it in quickly.'

Everyone liked Major Buxton. He was the social centre of their lives and also ran a pack of hounds, much to the annoyance of the Geneva police.

‘To show what happens, I have attached a copy of each of the documents so far circulated for one meeting of a single subcommittee. The meeting's not till March 19 and there are already about 350 pages of Roneo and 170 pages of print. Documents are still coming in. How can a member of committee cope?

‘My proposals are for a new form of agenda which I've designed with short notes on each item. The Secretariat or the rapporteur should also issue summaries of information saying that the original longer documents can be called up if needed.' The meeting accepted Major Buxton's suggestions.

The next item on the agenda was Emergency Procedures. This was Ambrose's big moment at the meeting. Edith and Ambrose had discussed it endlessly over the last month.

Ambrose spoke about the need for the Secretariat to take precautions at least equal to those taken by a Foreign Office, or War Office, to ensure that important communications reached the proper League officials with the least delay at whatever hour
they arrived. He reminded the meeting of an incident where a telegram had sat in the Palais over the week-end, unopened.

‘If we can be expeditious about the matters of war, surely we can be equally expeditious about matters of peace.' Ambrose had practised that line on her a couple of times and he delivered it well.

There were hear, hears.

Ambrose said that
Agence Télégraphique Suisse
now telephoned through to the League any important news received by them by wireless.

‘We have also arranged that if a member of the League sends an emergency communication it is to be marked
Priorité Nations
and governments and foreign offices have been informed that they should mark their cables thus.'

Ambrose went on to propose a duty roster for week-end and nights and the creation of a bedroom at the Palais Wilson for the duty officer.

He paused, went to the door and rapped. The door opened, and to the surprise of the meeting, Jules limpingly wheeled in a model of the bell alarm system. It was mounted on a mobile trolley which Ambrose had borrowed from one of the local street vendors. Jules must have been primed and waiting outside. ‘Thank you, Jules.'

Jules audibly muttered, ‘For peace, anything.' Everyone was used to Jules' irreverence.

Ambrose stood and went over to his demonstration. ‘When the telephonists leave at 8 p.m. they will connect an electric bell running from the telegram tube to the concierge's desk. If a telegram does arrive, the cartridge carrying a telegram will automatically start the bell ringing.'

Ambrose directed their attention to a length of telegram tube he had set up. He took a telegram cartridge loaded with a
telegram and dropped it down the neck of the tube. It came out the other end and hit a trigger which rang a bell set up on a tray connected by wires and held by Jules at the other side of the room. The bell continued to ring until Ambrose cut it off.

‘To make sure that the cartridges do not become stuck in the tube on their way to the Secretariat, my clever mechanics have arranged that one of the lamps of the tube will remain lighted in the concierge's office until the telegram has arrived safely to the duty officer.'

Ambrose again demonstrated the flashing light. ‘And that, gentlemen, is my apparatus.' There was some light clapping.

‘Boys will be boys,' Dame Rachel whispered to her. Edith smiled broadly relishing the rapport with Dame Rachel but her smile also carried a private amusement sparked off by Dame Rachel's remark, and a voice in her head said, ‘And boys will also be girls.'

There was much approval of Ambrose's memorandum and after discussion of costs and so forth, it was adopted unanimously. A triumph.

‘I think the League needs a secret code as well,' Ambrose said in conclusion.

‘Oh dear me,' said Dame Rachel under her breath, again sharing it with Edith, smiling at her in collusion, although Edith felt torn between the collusion and her attachment to Ambrose.

Sir Eric ruled that the question of codes should be looked into by the Under Secretary Bartou and a report made to the next meeting.

Following on Ambrose's submission, Sir Eric reminded them of the immense effectiveness of the League when its political workings were combined with the speed of the telegraph.

‘Some of you newcomers to the League were not with us during the Bulgarian crisis …' He glanced at Edith. ‘At one in
the afternoon I received an appeal from Bulgaria. Greek troops had crossed the frontier and were battling their way into Bulgaria. Four days earlier there'd been a quarrel over a card game at the border post at Demir-Kapou. A Greek soldier had been killed and a Greek officer coming up to settle the matter under a white flag of truce had been gunned down. I telephoned Monsieur Briand, then President of Council, and urged him to telegraph both sides, asking them to cease hostilities and withdraw their forces, which he did. Both sides immediately complied with our telegraph. Invasion orders were countermanded. This demonstrates the amazing power of the telegraph. After the telegrams arrived the troops on both sides remained frozen in position. We then issued our first League ultimatum — again by telegraph — that both sides must withdraw to their borders within sixty hours. British, French, and Italian military attachés in the Balkans were dispatched by the League to supervise the withdrawal. The war was over in three days.'

There were courteous murmurs of pleasure, and a few said, ‘Well done, Sir Eric.' One or two tapped the table in affirmation. ‘Well done, Sir Eric,' she said along with the others, in a voice that could hardly be heard.

‘Not “Well done, Sir Eric”,' Sir Eric said, sternly, ‘well done, Sir Telegraph.'

They laughed like school children at the end of class. He closed the meeting.

The complaint from New Zealand and the Stockholm Commission on the Lighting of Coasts had not been reached and were put over to the next meeting. She knew about the New Zealand complaints that the mail always got to them too late and that Sir Eric was paid five times more than their Prime Minister.

As the meeting was breaking up Dame Rachel said, ‘Sir
Eric — may I quickly raise a small matter — or what I take to be a small matter?'

Sir Eric looked at the pocket watch which he had on the table in front of him. ‘If we can be brief, Dame Rachel.'

‘It's about this strange cavalcade which went through Geneva last week.'

People were gathering their papers together and rather eager to go but there were chuckles at the mention of the cavalcade.

Edith coloured and shuffled her papers. Ye gods, please, no.

Dame Rachel said, ‘This Captain Strongbow had a military motor-car and a girl dressed I think as a cowboy. Other “girls” were involved. I have no recollection, Sir Eric, that this Captain Strongbow had ever obtained any recognition from us. But his publicity material claims so.'

Under Secretary Bartou gave a comradely glance over at Edith. She wondered whether he was implying that she should say something about the matter. At least he wasn't mad at her for not having sat with him. She tried to avoid Ambrose's eyes, realising that the mention of the cowgirl would have caused a penny to drop. She eventually glanced across. He had a strange expression on his face but it was affectionate and he'd obviously made a connection. He wagged his finger in a gesture which said, ‘Just you wait, young lady.' His comradeship didn't help much and she filled with apprehension and fiddled with her notes, eyes down.

‘Oh, we mustn't worry ourselves with every exhibitionist who comes to town,' Sir Eric said, himself putting together his papers to leave.

Good. No, we must not.

‘I felt that it should be made clear in the
Journal de Genève?
' Dame Rachel continued.

‘If you think so, Dame Rachel,' said Sir Eric, agreeing, Edith could tell, only for the sake of avoiding further discussion. He looked over at Comert. ‘Could you arrange for a statement to be issued?'

Edith waited to hear if anything else was to be said, whether Dame Rachel was now going to point at her and say, ‘Finally, Sir Eric, here in this very room, seated beside me, is the traitor, the person who masqueraded as a silly cowgirl and who besmirched the good name of the League of Nations.' She saw the members of the
haute direction
in unison shouting, ‘Off with her head.'

Nothing more was said. The meeting was over.

Dame Rachel said to Edith, ‘Did you see this cavalcade?'

Edith was able to answer with technical honesty that no, she had not ‘seen' the cavalcade.

‘The League could end up attracting every crackpot idea and person in the world to Geneva,' Dame Rachel said crossly.

‘I suppose it's our job to assess them.'

‘I sincerely hope not.'

Relieved of the apprehension of being implicated in the Strongbow matter, Edith now imagined creating a sensation by defending the ideas of Captain Strongbow. However, she knew that it would be beyond her, and anyhow, the meeting was over.

Sir Eric knocked his pipe on the desk and called for attention. ‘Sorry, people, but there is one further matter. Huston has asked that, during the Assembly, dogs should not be brought into the building. Staff should keep their dogs at home for the two weeks of the Assembly, and that includes section mascots. Some of our less stalwart delegates, I am told, have a phobia about dogs.'

More laughter.

Edith felt sweat on her back from her nervousness about the Strongbow matter and she still avoided Under Secretary Bartou's eyes.

The meeting broke up at 7.30 p.m, although some of the Directors stayed chatting. Dame Rachel again complimented her on her contribution to the meeting. Although she wasn't looking, she sensed Under Secretary Bartou coming over to her. She forced herself to look up at him, deciding that she wouldn't try to explain why she'd sat with Dame Rachel when she'd said she was going to sit with Ambrose. He congratulated her on her contribution about tendering. ‘It is probably uniquely historic.'

‘Historic?'

‘You got to give an answer on a problem which probably happens once in a lifetime.' He smiled. ‘Well done. Good night.'

She walked back to her office with Ambrose. ‘Cowgirl scandalises League of Nations,' he said. ‘Very, very naughty. I won't ask questions. It was very naughty. You take my breath away, Edith Campbell Berry — or it is E. Campbell Berry now? — you take my breath away.'

‘You can be the cowgirl next time,' she said, trying to be self-confident.

‘Thank you. So I take it that you were the cowgirl of the cavalcade mentioned?'

‘Afraid so.'

‘Amazing. I think, in future, we'll keep costumes for the bedroom. Agreed?'

‘Agreed.'

The rest of the staff had gone, and she felt a tingle of importance at still being around. She liked it when there were only a few of them working late and she especially loved it when they had to work through the night and came out into quai Woodrow Wilson to see dawn breaking over the lake and all went for a breakfast together in a café. She envied the people in Documents who often worked all night to get the minutes and
reports circulated by 9 a.m. and had such wonderful
esprit de corps
.

Ambrose and she decided to go off for a champagne celebration of the acceptance of his memorandum on emergency procedures, and Ambrose graciously in turn added, ‘And to celebrate your display of acumen. But not,
not
to celebrate your display of audacity.'

She said she wanted to be known for her diplomacy, not for her commercial acumen.

‘You will be. Give it time.'

They collected Florence who was also working late.

On the way out, Edith teased Ambrose about making a distinction between a conference and congress. ‘Satow no longer thinks it matters. I nearly corrected you in the meeting.'

Florence, obviously impressed, said, ‘Edith! You've been swotting.'

Florence's praise caused her to smirk inwardly.

Ambrose came back, ‘Ah, but Sibert does. On these matters of diplomatic distinction, I'm a Sibert man. I think it's good to know what a thing is when you see its name. Really, if one was to be a stickler, which I am, congress should be used only when plenipotentiaries meet to make peace.'

Edith laughed with another, different sensation of gratification. She was glad that Ambrose had made a comeback at her and she was glad to defer to him. She told how as she'd gone into the meeting, Under Secretary Bartou said — Edith mimicked his voice — ‘“Remember, Berry, a meeting is a diplomatic endeavour: you pursue interests: you exercise comity.” The problem was that I didn't know what comity was. So I couldn't exercise it. I hope he didn't notice.'

They laughed with her.

‘Comity is courtesy, Edith dear, those courtesies granted among nations. Expressed through protocol.'

‘And protocol is formalised goodwill,' Edith said.

‘Correct. Ten out of ten. Did he also say that diplomacy is part of a country's arsenal?'

‘No, he didn't.' She realised how much she loved to relax in deference to Ambrose. Oh, she did. Though as they walked to the Beau-Rivage, she realised that her deference to Ambrose was, this day, not quite firm. In the beginning of their relationship, it had been there strongly. She realised she was frightened now that Ambrose might fail; she no longer had the same unquestioning confidence in him that she had at the beginning. Perhaps it was Dame Rachel saying ‘Boys will be boys' while she'd been quietly cheering him on. Dame Rachel's remark had caused her to see Ambrose slightly differently. She couldn't say exactly how. Maybe today he had gone too much into details over emergency procedures in an almost embarrassing way. The bell business. Jules wheeling in the scale model. No. She worried too much. Today had been a triumph for him.