The Wilson Deception (6 page)

 

W
hen Prince Feisal stood to approach the podium before the Peace Council, an electric charge flashed through the ceremonial conference room of the Quai d'Orsay. His black beard contrasted with his silvery turban. His flowing robe of soft gray silk was edged with scarlet. His dignity and calm suggested the quiet of empty spaces. He glided to the front of the room and began to speak in soft Arabic. Though none of the delegates understood the language, he commanded the room, casting a spell with unexpected glottal stops and gentle susurrations.

Allen Dulles thought of the tales of Scheherazade.

But the magic of the moment dissipated when the young prince had to pause for translation. An earnest interpreter rendered Feisal's remarks into French, then a second interpreter restated them in clotted English. When Feisal began again, his Arabic had degraded from spellbinding to incomprehensible. Impatience and boredom built in the hot, high-ceilinged room.

Allen Dulles, feeling trapped, sat in his usual place behind the principal delegates arrayed on one side of a vast table. Near each delegate was at least one interpreter, leaning forward vigilantly, ready to mutter clarifications into a master's ear lest an offhand remark be lost in the soup of unfamiliar tongues. Behind Dulles' row came the secretaries, striving to suppress the signs of their near-terminal boredom.

Heavy curtains blanketed the tall windows, closing off twilight on the Seine. The conference's familiar smells, tangy ink and heavy central heating, lingered in the air with a hint of violet hair wash from the French delegation. The principal delegates favored heavy black suits with brilliant white cuffs. Military advisers in blue and khaki and olive broke the visual monotony, as did the crimson drapes and green baize blotting pads before each delegate. An approaching messenger's progress could be tracked through hushed footfalls on carpet and staccato bursts on parquet flooring. The cane seat of Dulles' chair felt brittle. His mind strayed to the vixen he had met the previous night at El Sphinx, an establishment offering the sort of sensual Xanadu that could be found nowhere in North America. He wondered for a moment about tonight's minx, Lady Florence. Inevitably, she would be more conventional. Unlike last night's companion, though, she offered the enchantments of an estate in Surrey and properties on the Italian Riviera.

Of the few spectators present for the prince's appearance, one group stood out. Colonel Lawrence, green-tasseled headdress in place, burning blue eyes contrasting with a vague and insincere smile, watched his robed protégé from the second row of gilt chairs. Next to Lawrence were the heavy-featured American rabbi, Wise, and that hard-charging British Jew, Weizmann. Conference staff joked about Weizmann's resemblance to Lenin, the Russian Bolshevik, but in truth the two men could have been twins.

Clemenceau decreed a break between the prince's talk and questioning by the delegates. To rally his spirits, Dulles moved directly to the tea table in the adjoining room.

The large Colonel Boucher, never far from Clemenceau, approached with a plate stacked high with brioche and macaroons. “Monsieur Dulles. You must assist me with these.”

“Solely in the interest of amity among allies.” He selected a brioche and bit through its crisp shell into its buttery center. He heard a low moan, realized that it came from him.

“You have the brioche in America?”

Dulles swallowed quickly. “Pale imitations, Colonel. Wicked ones, to be honest, which should be illegal.”

“I am glad we can save you from such sins.” Boucher made short work of a macaroon and held a brioche at the ready while he swallowed.

Dulles, toying with the idea of a second brioche, nodded toward the prince and his knot of colleagues. “Tell me, Colonel, what do you make of that rather motley collection?”

Boucher looked troubled. “Motley?”

“You have a Jewish chemist who invented explosives for the British, an American cleric of the Old Testament, and a glory-mad English soldier and archaeologist, all sponsoring a descendant of the prophet Mohammed.”

“That is what
motley
means?”

“Perhaps I should simply say
unusual
. But what do you make of them?”

Boucher licked his fingers and again offered his plate of treats. Dulles decided on a macaroon. In Paris, he had concluded, the only crime was saying no.

“I think,” the Frenchman said, “we should not think of them as unusual. They are something with which to be . . . coped, is that right? Your president, I am told, has many Jewish friends, as well.”

“Not so many.”

“Perhaps they seem like many to us.” Boucher shrugged and placed the plate on the table. “You know, we enter the war. We talk to our allies, the British, on what will happen in Syria and Jordan when we win. We agree with our allies and write down the agreement. Then, we win. Wonderful, we think. We shall have peace on the terms already agreed. They are, after all, written down. But this group, this
unusual
group”—Boucher loosed a theatrical sigh—“they do not like those terms because they have agreed to other terms with England. Colonel Lawrence prefers those other terms. The newspapers have great love for Colonel Lawrence, and Mr. Lloyd George reads the newspapers very carefully. The newspapers make Colonel Lawrence very strong. Suddenly our agreement—poof!” He lifted a cloth napkin from the serving table and used it to dab his lips and brush crumbs from the front of his tunic. “Perhaps your Mr. Wilson can use the shame to persuade Mr. Lloyd George to honor our treaty?”

Dulles snorted. “Shame the British? You can't be serious.”

“Perhaps not.”

“Really, Colonel. Can the French be shamed?”

Boucher smiled. “Quite impossible.”

 

Allen Dulles, uncharacteristically early for his evening date, noticed the Arab party in the dining room of the Hotel Majestic. Despite the influx of foreigners for the war and the peace conference, head scarves and robes still were conspicuous in a Parisian restaurant. The prince seemed to be something of a cut-up, entertaining his laughing companions. Evidently in the Arab world, as in the West, jests by the powerful are unfailingly funny.

Rabbi Wise waved Dulles to their table and had another chair brought over. Dulles, with Lawrence translating, told the prince how fine his presentation had been that afternoon and what a strong impact it had on the delegates. Feisal waved off the compliment, which had been entirely insincere.

Lawrence related that the prince was explaining that his family had no interest in being called kings. Because Feisal was a descendant of the prophet Mohammed and because his ancestors had been Sharifs of Mecca for 900 years, kings were far beneath his family. The prince smiled happily as Lawrence spoke, his composure before the Peace Council having slid into genial affability. He promptly directed a new story at Dulles.

Again, Lawrence translated. “In the desert,” Lawrence said for Feisal. He seemed to know where the story was going. “Out in the desert, it is the custom to tie camels head to tail in a long row. That way they stay together in case of high wind, when the sand blows and it is possible to become lost. The camels are very strong but not so smart. No camel is fit to lead the other camels. He might simply lead them all in the wrong direction. So, it is the custom to put a little donkey at the head of the row, and the little donkey will lead. He is not strong, but he will go straight.”

Feisal waited for Lawrence's translation to catch up with him, then started again,

Lawrence continued. “The Arabs did the same when they fought the Turk.”

Feisal spoke again, speaking a short phrase that ended with
Lawrence
and extending a hand to the Englishman. Lawrence didn't bother to translate, since the table was already guffawing at the explanation that he had been the Arabs' little donkey.

Dulles grinned, thinking the story managed to celebrate and belittle Lawrence.

Lawrence, whose face showed no reaction, said softly, “A private word?”

Dulles nodded.

In Arabic, Lawrence excused them from the company. After Feisal's response, Lawrence reported that the prince wished Dulles' business card. Dulles presented it with as much formality as he could muster in a hotel dining room.

Feisal produced a pen and wrote on the card, then handed it to Lawrence, who read out, “I agree to all of Feisal's demands.”

Feisal let out a great belly laugh, then bowed his head as Dulles said farewell.

Lawrence led them to a quiet alcove in the lobby. The man was only a little older than Dulles—at college, he would have been a senior when Dulles was a freshman—yet he had an ageless quality.

Becoming a legend in your twenties must do that, Dulles thought, even if you're short and odd-looking.

“Mr. Dulles, I understand you've become an adviser to the president.” Lawrence appeared for all the world to be speaking not to Dulles, but to the armrest of Dulles' chair.

“Mr. Wilson has many advisers.”

“Let's not waste time. The president holds the hopes and dreams of the Arabs in his hands. The Arabs are a great people. They invented algebra and installed indoor plumbing at a time when Europeans were still chanting around open fires. Arab religion and literature are deep expressions of the human soul, and their civilization goes back millennia.”

“This is all most educational, Colonel—”

Lawrence held a hand up but still did not look at Dulles. “They joined us in striking down the Turk, and they must share in that victory or they will become our adversaries for generations. It's that simple. I have lived with them. I understand them. If we fail in this, we will trigger an era of mistrust and hatred that may rival the Crusades.” Still no eye contact. “I hope you can explain that to the president.” Lawrence nodded, rose, and walked off.

Lawrence was a man of passion, Dulles thought as he sat back in his chair. That passion could be both appealing and disturbing. Certainly he wasn't an altogether trustworthy fellow.

Dulles found that dinner and dancing with Lady Florence were very small pleasures. No expanse of prime real estate could compensate for her sluggish conversation and deficit of sensual feeling. He ended the evening as quickly as possible.

Noting the light shining under the door to Uncle Bert's suite at the Crillon, he rapped on it. When he entered, his uncle sat stripped to his vest in an overstuffed armchair, a stack of papers on the side table next to him with a glass one-third full of golden cognac.

“I warn you, Allen, that I'm in a foul humor. You might do better to pass on to your room.”

“Cognac?” Dulles nodded to a bottle on a low coffee table.

“Serve yourself.”

“The foulness in your life?”

“This wretched conference.”

“Ah.”

“Ah, indeed. Our sainted president is leaving to go home to deal with Congress. Of course, he never should have come in the first place, which I told him in no uncertain terms, thereby beginning my exile to the outer regions of the universe. Also, Lloyd George is leaving for London to deal with his Parliament, his unions, his Irishmen, and I don't know what else. Before they depart, the single thing they will have agreed to is the Covenant for the League of Nations. Not a bad thing of itself, but hardly a worthy output for the immense leaders of the world who have stopped everything else in their respective countries for a two-month period. They will not, Allen”—Lansing pointed an accusing finger at him—“decide on another goddamned thing before they leave.”

Dulles concentrated on pouring his drink. His uncle had discerning taste in liquors.

Lansing continued. “The world wants peace, Allie. But Mr. Wilson wants his League of Nations, so the world will have to wait for its peace. We'll keep just enough troops here to enrage the people back home, disappointing the soldiers who are so homesick and disgusted that they go AWOL on a daily basis. And that will also be just enough soldiers to fail utterly to intimidate the Germans. It's a masterpiece of a muddle.”

“Mr. Wilson will come back to finish the treaty, of course.”

“Oh, yes, but this will add at least a month's delay, so time will be very, very short upon his return. Revolutions are breaking out around the world while we prance through broad statements of principle for world peace.”

“World peace isn't such a bad thing. Perhaps Wilson and Lloyd George will return to Paris more highly motivated after talking with the people back home.”

They sat quietly for a while. Dulles took a swallow of the cognac. It burned sweetly, then warmed him. One more reason to admire the French.