Free A Mighty Endeavor by Stuart Slade Page B

any consolation, fish and chips is not rationed either although I am told it is very expensive. We will be given ration books when we disembark. If we stay at a hotel, we have to surrender them to the hotel management while we stay there and retrieve them when we leave. Oh, restaurant meals are not rationed but they are really expensive.”
    “That shouldn’t worry us, ducks. We’ve got a big budget for this trip. Lillith’s done us proud on the money front. I’m not sure why.” Eleanor paused while the engines went to full power and the flying boat took off. Underneath, Ireland was richly green, the rolling hills running down to the deep blue of the Shannon River. She suddenly felt severely homesick and questioned her decision to leave her homeland. Then she settled down and common sense reasserted itself. England had held very little for her and the prospect of a new country had been overwhelming. Then again, there was a lot she had needed to hide.
    Achillea was looking down at the same sights. In her case, she was seriously grateful for the fact that they were flying direct to Southampton. The last time she had visited the area they were now flying over, her behavior hadn’t been calculated to win friends and influence people. She was quite convinced there were people with memories long enough to put a bullet in her back if she ever returned to the small village of Beal na mBIath. “I guess Phillip wants to know what things are really like on the ground over here. We’re a reconnaissance party to him.”
    “Keep that thought to yourself, ducks.” Eleanor looked around but they were alone in their section of the Boeing 314. “What’s a reconnaissance to him there could well be considered spying by the people here.”
     
    Conference Room, Government House, Calcutta, India
    “We have been given our instructions. It is for us to obey them.” Sir Richard Graham Cardew stuck his chin out pugnaciously. “There may have been some point in discussing whether we should follow London’s lead when we had no specific instructions to do so, although I could not see any merit in such a discussion and still do not for that matter. But now we have clear instructions and we have no option other than to obey them. That is the way it has always been and that is the way it shall remain.”
    Lord Linlithgow frowned mightily, not quite so much at the content of the words but at the tone in which they had been uttered. The truth of the words might be argued; the tone of disrespect within them could not. He was already aware that Cardew was attempting to assemble a supporting clique from the traditionalists within the old guard of the Indian civil service. “Is there any word from the other Dominions?”
    “There is indeed, Your Excellency,” Gerald Tarrant was actually having a hard job stopping himself laughing. The Australians might be an uncouth lot but they had a talent for a pithy phrase. They have sent a message to London which reads ‘if the Colonial and Dominion Offices had sent us a dispatch of the tone and content exemplified by this message, we would tell them to get stuffed.’ Prime Minister Robert Menzies has resigned, saying his identification with the London regime has rendered him unfit to lead Australia at this time.”
    “Don’t tell me that cad John Curtin is the new Prime Minister there.” Harold Hartley was appalled at the prospect.
    “I think you underestimate Mister Curtin.” Tarrant spoke somberly. “I believe he has every prospect of being an excellent Prime Minister whose leadership promises to serve Australia well. In his inaugural address to the Australian Parliament, he tore up the message from London and threw the pieces on the floor, saying ‘good riddance to bad rubbish.’ That won him much applause from the House.”
    “That is a disgrace.” Cardew wattled furiously. “Who do those people think they are?”
    “People who face a dilemma that is exactly equivalent to ours in form