The Autobiography of Devon Miles

Loneliness and Boredom

Germany in the 1960's was a very interesting place. After much of the Allied forces left the western portion of the country, the Federal Republic of Germany continued its amazing growth and economic resurgence. Many, many people fled the Soviet-controlled East Germany, especially the young -that is until the Berlin Wall was erected. West Germany was able to easily absorb these refugees and used the manpower to rebuild. By the time I arrived, there was essentially full employment and Turkish guest workers were being invited in. Everywhere you looked, something was being built. The work begun with the Nuremburg Trials to bring awareness of the crimes against humanity by the Nazi regime and to punish those who were still alive had turned toward an era of education, reparation, and national acknowledgement. A parliamentary government had been reconstituted, led by the old man of post-war German politics, Konrad Adenauer and the capitol sited at Bonn. The German military had been re-formed as the Korean conflict (and later Vietnam) siphoned off western military units.

Like any democracy, West Germany had its share of political voices. As the Sixties proceeded, especially in the second half as the economy slowed down and then faltered, some measures were taken that limited some of the boundaries of that democracy. This led to many new political organizations forming, including many student groups protesting anti-democratic measures, policies, and individuals. Just as much of the rest of the world was in turmoil, West Germany was also. There were huge debates about colonialism, emancipation, women's rights, and environmental management.

I arrived in Bonn as First Secretary and I managed the Second and Third Secretaries and the locally hired staff. At first, with the air of excitement then typical, it was a wonderful position. Everyone was eager and felt a real mission to hold the line against the machinations of the East Germans and the Soviets. I spent my early months organizing the staff and looking for ways to make the office more efficient. Later, my staff and I were greatly involved in the support of UK businessmen who were eager to engage with their German counterparts. By the middle of the decade we were seeing an increase in Turkish and other guest workers from the Near East and South Asia who wished to migrate to Great Britain. We certainly had our work cut out for us because, by-and-large, this group of people spoke little to no English and often had limited facility with the German language.

I often went home to my small flat in a modern Bonn high rise, exhausted by all the demands of the office during that time. It was a nice enough place, I suppose, but I hardly paid much attention to my surroundings. When I did notice, I was a bit dismayed by the bland steel boxes of flats that I saw from my windows. At the time the world was entranced by these character-less buildings, erected efficiently and with much cold, unappealing concrete. In fact, I tried quite hard not to notice the depressing uniformity of it all.

I was not happy anymore. I was forty in 1963, and while I had traveled the world and had more than my share of excitement, I realized that I had no permanence. After Mother and Father passed on, I rarely went "home" to London to see my family. I found myself spending my holidays on a beach or in a museum. Wherever I was living was merely a stopping place for a few years' time. I had my share of female companionship, but after Carolyn, I did not find anyone that could make me feel as happy and comfortable as she did. In fact, once I was settled in Bonn, I wrote her, hoping that we could resume our relationship. Her response made me feel more despondent; she had married a few years previously and had had another child. I was happy for her and wrote a congratulatory letter back to her, but something in me died. For months I could hardly stand to be alone in my flat. After work I would stop in some restaurant, have a quick meal, and then walk for hours before convincing myself that I needed to get off the streets and get into bed for a little bit of rest.

The only thing which brought me any happiness at all at the time was music. I had a bit of an inheritance from my parents' estates. While I put away most of it, I did use some to purchase a wonderful Blaupunkt radio which has not only AM and FM bands, but short-wave as well. It's been with me ever since. I still have a few remaining glass tubes for it, but when they are gone, I don't think I'll be able to replace them and will likely have to hold a burial service for the old thing. Unless Bonnie can work a miracle and come up with a way to convert it to solid-state components without sacrificing its tone. Perhaps I should speak with her now about it?

I also bought an excellent stereo. Being in West Germany, it was easy to obtain Deutsche Grammophon records, and I indulged myself in their excellent classical catalog. In fact, I have so many long-playing records that the thought of moving them now strikes absolute terror in my heart. KITT has tried to convince me of the superiority of the compact disc, and while I do recognize the utility of the format's portability, I cannot concede in the matter of the sound of the recordings.

It was the music that eventually returned my heart and mind to some semblance of stasis after about a year. After spending many months wandering in the night and sleeping very little, seeing nothing but grayness about me, I began to feel a bit better about myself. Not totally back to normal, mind you, but I no longer felt like there was nothing for me left in the world.

Of course, the second half of the 1960s was more and more complicated and contentious. I was in Germany for quite a long time for a diplomatic posting, but it was a dynamic and evolving society and there were times I was temporarily posted to offices in other cities. While much of the country had been reduced to rubble during the war, the smaller hamlets and towns retained their quaintness and the forests, and the fields were as beautiful as always. I went camping one time but found myself recalling the summer I had spent with Father and more than once I found myself sobbing as I swam in a cold stream or as I lay on my pillow, thinking of how much I wished I could speak with him and Mother one more time.

The few times I was in London during this period, I found myself both delighted and saddened by my nieces and nephews. They were all bright and friendly children and I enjoyed speaking with them, especially the older ones. Still, I found myself saddened by them, because I truly like young children and I knew that I would never have any of my own. One niece in particular caused me much heartache. Emilia was an exact copy of Mother and therefore shared my hair and eyes. Often, when I took her to the shops or to play, people would congratulate me on my beautiful daughter, which always made my heart wrench. I remember a time when she was eight, and she caught my look of pain after such an encounter. The poor child was frightened that somehow she had displeased me and that I was angry at her. I didn't know what to say at first and then told her that it was "only her silly old uncle wishing he had a little girl exactly like her". Naturally, this got back to my family, which worried them and for a long time I had to endure their good intentioned attempts to get me married off. Emilia is now a successful barrister and she visits me from time to time here in California.

In addition to my family, my trips to London often included meetings with my superiors. During this period, the diplomatic services were undergoing many changes and eventually became the Foreign and Commonwealth Offices or FCO. At the time, it was hard to know from month to month who was who and what was what. It seemed like somedays we were part of Her Majesty's foreign services and sometimes civil servants. But, like everything else, it eventually got sorted out.

I was in London in 1968 for an extended period for updating , training and the like prior to my next assignment. There were rumors that I might be posted to the Soviet Union, where I desperately did not want to go, not the least because I understood only a small bit of Russian. There was also the possibility of a return to Africa, where the situation in many states was still quite tumultuous. I wouldn't have minded that very much. I hadn't spent much time in Sub-Saharan Africa, but what I had seen there was very beautiful, and the land and the people had very great potential. I just wasn't sure how beneficial my posting there would be. Despite my poor showing many years before in the family bank as a low-level manager, I found that I had become a manager par excellence while First Secretary in Bonn.

While I was still training in London, I received a letter from Wilton. Unfortunately, it had made the rounds from California to Germany and then west again to Great Britain to find me, so it was a few weeks old by the time it landed in my hands. He and Elizabeth had decided to divorce. As with their romance over a decade before, this was a surprise to me. I never detected any problems or concerns in his letters to me, although he did complain that the children were being spoiled by Elizabeth and they didn't seem to understand the concept of hard work. Garthe and Jennifer were both bright children and didn't have to study much to succeed in school. Now that the boy was fifteen, he was becoming harder and harder to control. The fact that his Grandfather Blackstone (who had gained a few extra years of life through grueling treatments) had always indulged his every whim didn't help and the boy could always find refuge from Wilton's reach at the Blackstone estate. Jennifer was on the cusp of becoming a teenager herself and apparently Elizabeth encouraged the child to look down on her father for his unpretentious ways and lack of interest in anything social or fashionable. She developed the attitude that she and her mother knew what was best for the family and didn't understand that Knight Industries was far more than just the financing arm and support of the family. Elizabeth demanded that she and Jennifer have the latest fashions, and that meant trips to Carnaby Street and Mary Quant's boutique every six months. There were also the trips to France for André Courregès boots for them both, as well as Givenchy suits and Balenciaga dresses for Elizabeth. Jennifer conceived a desire to be a model, in the Twiggy mode and it seemed like she and her mother were shortening their skirt hems on a monthly basis.

I had met the children a few times when I was in the States or their parents took them on trips to the continent. As toddlers, I found them to be bright and sociable, although Garthe did have moments of temper. I didn't think anything of it at the time. After all, three-year-olds have never been known for the ability to regulate their emotions; one is grateful that they can handle the demands of toileting in an unfamiliar environment! A few years later when they were school children, I began to detect some anti-social behaviors in the boy, although Jennifer remained a charming little girl. In fact, I can truthfully say that she always has and remains charming in her own way. But Garthe…

The first time the Knight's brought the children to Bonn, I brought them all up to my flat after a few hours of sight-seeing. Garthe was going on nine and Jennifer was six and amusements that would not bore them were not easy for me to find. As a reward for relatively acceptable behavior, I arranged to make an ice cream social-type of party for them with some children of the Embassy's staff. I knew enough from my own nieces and nephews to put away my more delicate items and was not unduly surprised to hear the sounds of the children running around the place, whooping, and hollering as Wilton and I set up the dining room table with everything needed to make sundaes of every imaginable combination. Elizabeth was ostensibly watching the children, but she really was watching the other mothers watch the children. I had made certain to invite those that could speak at least a modicum of English, so that my guests would be at ease, but she didn't seem interested in conversing with them in the least. Fortunately, the children seemed to all be getting on splendidly. That is, at least until it was time to make their ice cream desserts. The chocolate fudge was in great demand and Garthe did not like not being the first to get some. He pulled the boy ahead of him away from the table and began what I can only describe as a "beat-down" until I came 'round the table and pulled him off the other child. Wilton was right behind me and he pulled his son off to the side to reprimand him while mothers began to collect their children and leave. Garthe was a strong child and never one to observe the niceties. He kicked Wilton in his bad leg, hard enough to obviously hurt, and then scrambled out of his grip. Even at that tender age, he had an impressive vocabulary of foul language which he unleashed at his father. I attempted to grab him, but he easily avoided me, having much more experience evading adults than I had in catching children. He ran past the last of the guests and past his mother, who had been watching his performance without much reaction. Garthe went to the lounge and first attempted to send a potted plant through the large plate-glass window, (which cracked it), and then began to pull down my record albums from the shelf, bending and breaking all that he could get his hands on. Jennifer was used to her brother's tantrums and I watched her evaluate the situation. Should she play the frightened but innocent sister, or should she join in the fun of the wholesale destruction of my flat? Being of an age where being "Daddy's little girl" was still very important, she decided to hide behind him pretending to cry. Wilton and I had to both hang onto Garthe and pin him to the floor before he finally stopped his rampaging. He still shouted about the injustice done to him and appealed to his mother, but Wilton gave his wife a look that clearly told her that her intervention was no longer wanted.

They visited again two years later during the children's winter school holiday. They were on their way to Gstaad for the skiing. Thirteen-year-old Garthe was taller than his mother and quite nearly as tall as Wilton. I was not surprised to find that the adult Garthe, like his "brother" Michael was an inch taller than I. His sister was even more of a daddy's girl than before, but I noticed that she was imitating many of Elizabeth's mannerisms and was developing a certain uncomfortable flirtatiousness.

Garthe made it quite clear that he did not want to visit with me and stayed back at the hotel while his parents, sister and I toured the city to see the changes that had occurred in the last few years. We dropped Jennifer off at the hotel at the beginning of the evening. She and Garthe would order room service while I took Wilton and Elizabeth to a wonderful place where the most authentic German cuisine was to be found. We did have an excellent time together, enjoying several bottles of good Rhine wine. For once Elizabeth was charming to me and I thought that Wilton was happy that I was at last seeing the woman he had fallen in love with. Both of the Knights were enthusiastically talking about the latest projects their company was engaged in. There had been much diversification in the past few years, and now they were looking at global expansion. They already had small contracts with some foreign governments, which of course they were unable to discuss, but obviously they were doing quite well. Wilton expressed some concern about one or both of the children being able to lead the company in the future, but Elizabeth stressed that it wasn't necessary to think of such things at this time. I dropped them back at the hotel rather much later than I should have, but we'd had a wonderful evening and I wondered if I had truly misjudged Elizabeth and was glad that Wilton was happy in his domestic and business lives.

The next morning, (although it was technically later that morning), Wilton called me while I was dressing for work. He and Elizabeth had come back to their suite to find that it had been trashed -utterly and completely- by Garthe. He had wanted something from Room Service that the hotel did not have on hand and apparently after demanding, arguing, and threatening, the Hotel Manager told him in a most stern manner that young Master Knight could not be accommodated and that it was fortunate that he and his family would be leaving in the morning, since his hotel was not able to meet their needs. Wilton was beyond exasperated and if he had gotten his way, they would have cancelled the rest of their trip and returned to California. Only the arguing and begging of Elizabeth and Jennifer prevented him from putting the whole family on a plane back to the US. All the good feelings of the night before vanished.

Reading and re-reading his letter, I could see through the lines that the situation with the children was a major component of the breakdown of Wilton's marriage. Elizabeth had never allowed him to have a significant role their rearing and more and more had undercut him in their eyes. Now, when his son especially, needed the firm hand of his father, it was no longer possible for him to intervene in a meaningful way. The arguments had started over the children, as so many couple's do. This then led to incriminations, finger-pointing and at last the mutual discovery that they no longer agreed on many things. Elizabeth wanted to live a life of luxury. She also did not mind seeing "their" company delve into markets that might be quite lucrative, but shady, if not down-right illegal. Wilton felt that her father had encouraged a divorce as well, hoping to be able to merge Knight Industries into what was now Blackstone Holdings if Elizabeth was able to obtain the company in the settlement. Fortunately for my friend, Blackstone had recently died, and it was found that Blackstone Holdings had very, very serious tax problems.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

After I completed my trainings in London, I received a promotion to Embassy Consul in charge of embassy management in Vienna, Austria. I was both happy and sad with the posting. Austria, like Germany, had a great deal of rebuilding to do. While Vienna retained much of what I remembered from 1937, it had lost a lot also. The air of gemutlichkeit was still there, but everything was more rushed, more lacking in individuality. There were still the wonderful little shops where you could sit and enjoy your cafe mit schlag and a decadent little pastry, but the people on the strasse hurried by just as they did in New York, London, or Tokyo.

My dear benefactress, Trudie, had passed away many years before, but I did take the time to return to her village. Her small cottage was gone and the little town on the other side of the lake seemed much larger and more industrialized than I remembered. I began to feel the return of depression. While my work life was proceeding well, I felt that I was going nowhere and that there was an empty void in me that was only growing larger.

The first summer I was in Austria, Wilton came to visit, and we spent two weeks exploring, camping, and fishing. I think we both felt better than we had in some time. Wilton spoke of his continuing interest in robotics and in what would soon be caused "Artificial Intelligence". I didn't understand half of what he was telling me, but I did recognize that he was working on something very great. I was intrigued but just filed the discussion away as interesting trivia. All too soon he left for California, and I returned to Vienna to insure that Her Majesty's Embassy ran smoothly.

Wilton called me on New Year's Day of 1970. Of course, I was glad to hear from my friend and assumed that it was merely a holiday telephone call. It ended up being much more than that. We spoke for a while about all the usual things; family, mutual acquaintances, health problems; all the things that two aging comrades would speak of. I was making ready to retire for the night and I expected the conversation to end shortly when Wilton told me that he had a special project that was about to come off the drawing board and needed a manager that he could trust. It was something that required total secrecy and had both a physical component and an administrative one, and an organization would be developed to support the use of the "product" to come out of the project. The manager needed to be someone who could handle many different areas of responsibility and someone who was a quick study. He didn't expect that person to have expertise in the scientific end of the project, although it was inevitable that a good deal of that knowledge would be picked up along the way. What he did need was someone who not only was capable of the myriad organizational needs that the project would have, but someone who had a background in international laws, the working of governments and in information gathering. Once the physical aspect of the project was completed, the organization that would be developed alongside of it would be self-sustaining and would require what would in essence be a Chief Operations Officer who was willing to devote many years to guiding its functioning. Would I be interested in the position?

I answered in the same way I had when asked if I would be interested in joining the SOE nearly twenty-five years before.