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Ueutenant, will you take Major Rosnovski to personnel and then bring him back to me?’
’Yes, ur’ The lieutenant turned to Abel ’Will you co as he reached the door ’Thank you, General,’he said
He spent the weekend in Chicago with Zaphia and Florentyna Zaphia asked him what he wanted her to do with his fifteen suits
’Hold on to the what she et myself killed in this war’
’I’m sure you’re not, Abel,’ she replied ’That wasn’t orrying e for you’
Abel laughed and took the suits to the Polish refugee centre He then returned to New York, went to the Baron, cancelled the advance guest list, and twelve days later banded the building over to the American Fifth Aresture, worthy of a ee of the First World War
It was another threewhich ti of the New York Baron for General Clark and then reported to Fort Benning, to complete an officers’
training programme When he finally did receive his orders to join General Denvers and the Fifth Army, his destination turned out to be soet to Germany
The day before Abel left, he drew up a will, instructing his executors to offer the Baron Group to David Maxton on favourable ter the rest of his estate between Zaphia and Florentyna It was the first time in nearly twenty years that he had conteet hiimental canteen
As his troop ship sailed out of New York harbour, Abel stared back at the Statue of Liberty He could well re the statue for the first time nearly twenty years before Once the ship had passed the Lady, he did not look at her again, but said out loud, ’Next time I look at you, you French bitch, America will have won this war’
Abel crossed the Atlantic, taking with him two of his top chefs and five kitchen staff T’he ship docked at Algiers on 17 February 1943 He spent almost a year in the heat and the dust and the sand of the desert,sure that every member of the division was as well fed as possible
’We eat badly, but we eat a daht better than any~ one else,’was General Clark’s coiers and turned the building into a headquarters for General Clark Although Abel could see he was playing a valuable role in the war, he itched to get into a real fight, butare rarely sent into the front line
He wrote to Zap~iia and George and watched his beloved daughter Florentyna grow up by photograph He even received an occasional letter fro an everilarger profit because every hotel in America was packed because of the continual movement of troops and civilians Abel was sad not to have been at the opening of the new hotel in Montreal, where George had represented him It was the first ti of a Baron, but George wrote at rea&nuing length of the new hotel’s great success Abel began to realise how much he had built up in America and how much he wanted to return to the land he now felt was his home
He soon became bored with Africa and its mess kits, baked beans, blankets and fly swatters T’here had been one or two spirited skirmishes out there in the western desert, or so thefronx the front assured hini, but he never saw any real action, although often when he took the food to the front he would hear the firing, and it rier
One’day to his excitement, General Clark’s Fifth Army was ordered to invade Southern Europe
The Fifth Army landed on the Italian coast in aave them tactical cover They met considerable resistance, first at Anzio and then at Monte Cassino but the action never involved Abel and he dreaded the end of a war in which he had seen no coet him into the front lines
His chances were not unproved when he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and sent to - LGndon to await further orders
With D - Day, the great thr - ust into Europe began The Allies ust 1944 As Abel paraded with the American and Free French soldiers down the Champs Elyses behind General de Gaulle to a hero’s welcoain decided exactly where he was going to build his first Baron hotel in France