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1. Sarajevo - June 28, 1714 - 7
2. An Interview at the Hotel Touraine - 47
3. Supersalesman of Death - 88
4. The Lamps Go Out - 127
5. The Seigesplan in Action - 171
6. Mix-Up at the Marne - 189
7. Too Proud to Fight - 257
8. Damn the Dardanelles! They will be our Grave! - 313
9. Carnage Reassessed - 365
10. Plagne Bacillus - 427
11. All Power to the Soviets! - 485
12. Götterdämmerung - 551
Author's Note - 630
Chapter One
Sarajevo - June 28, 1914
Lord Covington calculated that his chances were roughly even. If Winston chose to adjourn the Friday afternoon conference by four, he's have sufficient time to slip off to Belgravia for his regular pre-weekend tryst with Kathe, his engaging Dutch mistress, before boarding the train at Charing Cross Station for the usual two days of discord in Surrey. Covington had grown increasingly dependent over the past months on Kathe's palliative power, sexual and otherwise, against the deadening effects of a deteriorating marriage, and was at the moment resentful that his urgent gratification hung on Winston's whim.
To be sure, Europe was gripped by another of its recurring crises. First, it was the German Kaiser steaming into Morocco in the prow of one of his gunboats like some preposterous Teutonic figurehead to extend the blessings of Kultur to North Africa. Then the Serbs, Greeks and Bulgars ganging up against the Turks. Now, three teen-aged fanatics had allegedly shot the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne and his wife, and Europe was supposedly again poised at the brink of war.
Covington was philosophical. If it were not for such tempests, the Admiralty Advisory Committee, of which he was a member in good standing, would have no cause to meet, and he would be without a reasonable excuse to spend as much time in London as he did. But he wished the voluble First Lord would get on with today's agenda.
As if divining Covington's thoughts, Churchill moved through the familiar items with dispatch: current status of the fleet; progress of the new navel appropriations bill through the House of Commons; latest intelligence reports on the accelerated German dreadnaught construction program; and rumors that disaffected Army officers were approaching a mutinous posture in their opposition to the Government's plan for Irish Home Rule.
These matters had been discussed at length at previous committee sessions, and required no prolonged consideration at this time. Covington's groin twitched with pleasure at the prospect of being in Belgravia within the hour, with ample leeway for an extended dalliance before departing for the country and another bought of marital strife.
But his libidinous anticipation was abruptly squashed when Churchill dismissed the committee stenographer and announced they would now be presented with "an off-the-record briefing of critical import". While Covington's heart sank along with another of his vital organs, it was left to one of his fellow committeemen to voice the group's unhappiness over this unexpected continuance.
"I say, Winston," complained General Sir Thomas Bosteich, the army's liaison to the naval committee, "this is rather irregular, isn't it? It is the weekend after all, and some of us have other pressing engagements."
"Irregular perhaps, Sir Thomas, but by no means unprecedented," Churchill replied blithely.
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