Topaz - Leon Uris [33]
D’Arcy folded, unfolded his hands, tapped his fingers, balked. A large portrait of Pierre La Croix hovered behind him, glowering down on his back. “This whole undertaking is solely in the interest of the United States. I am going to be candid, Devereaux.”
“That should be novel.”
“There are unpleasant rumblings in both SDECE and the President’s office about your overt pro-American attitude. The entire orientation of your office calls for a drastic change of thinking.”
“Just what kind of change do you have in mind, Monsieur l’Ambassadeur?”
“To certain basic facts. France will not have her life and death dictated to by the Americans. France is the mistress of her own destiny.”
“Or, better spoken, the master of her own destruction.” André held up a hand to halt D’Arcy’s rebuttal. “No nation on this earth with a population of fifty million has the slightest chance of defending itself without an alliance with one of the two major powers. Without NATO and America we have nothing to deter a Soviet move on us.”
“You call our force de frappe nothing?”
“France has an atomic popgun,” he answered with disdain, flicking an imaginary fly from his wrist. “It cannot be taken seriously, despite the ill-spent billions.”
“And you call the Western European Alliance nothing!”
“An archaic dream of two old men. A daydream of forming a third power in Europe that calls for us to sleep with the Germans. Are you ready to sleep with Germany after what they have done to France in this century? Ah, Monsieur D’Arcy, but even if we are ready to deceive ourselves into believing that we could control a Franco-German union, the Germans are not so ready to abandon America.”
As André spoke words detested under this roof, his mind suddenly reflected upon Boris Kuznetov. Kuznetov, a Russian who loved his country as he himself loved France. Kuznetov had paid the price for daring to be honest. How long could he, André, continue to hold these unpopular views?
“The return to glory,” André said, “is an illusion. The attempt to break NATO and the medieval mentality of our foreign policy to play one great power against the other with little power pools is establishing exactly the same conditions that led to the destruction of France twice in our lifetime. Oh, yes, President La Croix and company play their cards like masters. I predict they will go as far as to attempt to make France the broker between a union of Russia and Western Europe. And this will keynote tragedy for they don’t understand ... no one plays poker with the Russians. What keeps Soviet ambitions in check is not Pierre La Croix’s international table-hopping but the power of the United States.”
“That’s quite enough, Devereaux,” D’Arcy said, springing to his feet.
“Don’t count on me as a party to the destruction of NATO. As a Frenchman, I say there is no way, no way at all, that Western Europe can survive without the presence of the United States.” André arose and smiled. “You see, in fact, America is our leader.”
D’Arcy’s fist thumped on the desktop and his knuckles hurt. His round face turned apple crimson. “Such treasonous opinions have no place in French life today.”
“You mean, Monsieur l’Ambassadeur, that no opinion other than La Croix’s has a place. I beg to differ. That is not my France.”
12
IT WAS GOOD TO capture a moment of romance. Nicole looked radiant tonight in a lacy dressing gown on the other side of a candlelit table.
As the maid cleared the dishes, André leaned over and kissed his wife’s cheek and thanked her, then luxuriated with a Jamaican cigar and a snifter of cognac.
“Darling, is this trip really necessary?” Nicole asked.
“I’m afraid so.”
“Dr. Kaplan doesn’t think it is.”
“He doesn’t run an intelligence establishment.”
In his business few details were shared with his wife. Nicole usually knew better than to ask.
“You’re going to Cuba, aren’t you?”
André grunted a little laugh and pinched her cheek.