Dahlerus put the call through to London from a phone booth
next to the kitchen. Whitehall said they would think it over.
Göring could hear the Swede shouting hoarsely that he had
done his “damnedest,” and allowed himself a wan smile as
Dahlerus parroted his own remarks to the Foreign Office official,
shouting that a victorious army had never in history been re-
quired to withdraw before negotiations.
It was ten-fifteen. In his imagination Göring was already in
London, fêted as the savior of world peace.
He ordered Görnnert to have two Storch light planes
standing by, and to get two Junkers airliners warmed up at
Staaken Airfield. He told Robert to press a dinner jacket. He in-
structed his detectives to put on their best suits. At :, how-
ever, Dahlerus was still cajoling the Foreign Office. “I think I can
talk the field marshal into flying,” he was saying.
At the other end of the line there was a brief, unheard
consultation with Lord Halifax, then a stiff and formal rebuff:
His Majesty’s government was still waiting for a “definite reply”
to the ultimatum.
Ten, twenty, thirty minutes passed. For a while Hermann
Göring brooded in the sunshine, slouching at a trestle table set
up beneath the beech trees. At : .. Staatssekretär Körner
sidled over with a note Mr. Chamberlain had just broadcast
on the radio, declaring war on Germany. General Albert Kessel-
ring, whose Luftflotte was spearheading the attack on Poland,
saw Göring telephone Ribbentrop, purple with rage. “Now
you’ve got your %!#@% war!” he screamed at his foe. “You are
alone to blame!”
Shortly, the phone rang again. Görnnert answered. It was
Hitler himself. Bodenschatz had just told him of Field Marshal
Göring’s planned jaunt to London.
“Give me the field marshal!”