Mission to Paris (3 page)

‘Tell me, umm, where are you going in Europe?’ he said.

‘It’s Iris – I bet you forgot.’

‘I won’t again.’

‘Paree,’ she said. ‘Brussels, Amsterdam, Geneva, Rome, Vienna. There’s more, oh, ah,
Venice
. I’m still forgetting one.’

‘Maybe Budapest.’

‘Nooo, I don’t think so.’

‘Berlin?’

‘That’s it!’

After a moment, Stahl said, ‘You’ll see a lot.’

‘Where are
you
going, Mr. Stahl?’

‘Just to Paris, to make a movie. And please call me Fredric.’

‘Oh, is that all? “Just to Paris”? “To make a movie”?’ A ladylike snort followed. She was already writing the postcard.
You’ll never guess who I
… ‘Are you French, Fredric?’

‘I was born in Vienna, wandered about the world for a time, lived and worked in Paris, then, in the summer of 1930, Hollywood. I’m an American now.’ He paused, then said, ‘Tell me, Iris, when you planned the trip, did you think about the politics, in Europe?’

‘Oh who cares – they’re always squabbling over something. You can’t go to Spain, ’cause there’s a war there, you know. Otherwise I expect the castles are all open, and the restaurants.’

He could hear approaching footsteps on the iron deck, then a ship’s officer flicked a torch beam over them, touched the brim of his cap and said, ‘
Bonsoir, Madame, Monsieur
.’

‘What’s it called, your movie?’

‘
Après la Guerre
. That would be
After the War
, in English. It takes place in 1918, at the end of the war.’

‘Will it play in Bryn Mawr?’

‘Maybe it will. I hope so.’

‘Well, we can always go to Philadelphia to see it, if we have to.’

It was true that he’d ‘wandered about the world’. The phrase suggested romance and adventure – something like that had appeared in a Warner Bros. publicity bio – but it didn’t tell the whole story. In fact, he’d run away to sea at the age of sixteen. He was also not really ‘Fredric Stahl’, had been born Franz Stalka, forty years earlier in Vienna, to a Slovenian father and an Austrian mother of solidly bourgeois families resident in Austria-Hungary for generations. His father was beyond strict; the rigid, fearsome lord of the family, a tyrant with a face like an angry prune. Thus Stahl grew up in a world of rules and punishments – there was hardly a moment in his early life when he wasn’t in trouble for doing something wrong. He had two older brothers, obedient little gentlemen and utterly servile – ‘Yes, papa,’ ‘As you wish, papa’ – who studied for hours and did well in private academies. He had also a younger sister, Klara, and if he was the bad boy of the family, she was the angel and Stahl adored her. A beautiful little angel, with her mother’s good looks. Inherited, as well, by the boy who would become an actor and take a new name.

It was said of him by those who made a living in the business of faces and bodies that he was ‘a very masculine actor’. Stahl wasn’t sure precisely what they meant, but he knew they were rich and not for nothing. It referred, he suspected, to a certain inner confidence, expressed by, among other things, a low-pitched voice –
assurance
, not just a bass register – from an actor who always sounded ‘quiet’ no matter how loudly he spoke. He could play the sympathetic lawyer, the kind aristocrat, the saintly husband, the comforting doctor, or the good lover – the knight not the gigolo.

His hair was dark, combed back from a high, noble forehead which rose from deep-set eyes. Cold grey eyes – the grey was cold, the eyes were warm: receptive and expressive. Just enough grey in those eyes for black-and-white film, and even better – it turned out to his great relief – in technicolour. His posture was relaxed –
hands in pockets
for Stahl was not a weak gesture – and his physique appropriate for the parts he played. He’d been scrawny as a boy but two years as an Ordinary Seaman, scraping rust, painting decks, had put just enough muscle on him so he could be filmed wearing a bathing suit. He couldn’t punch another man, he wasn’t Clark Gable, and he couldn’t fight a duel, he was not Errol Flynn. But neither was he Charles Boyer – he wasn’t so
sophisticated
. Mostly he played a warm man in a cold world. And, if all his movies were taken together, Fredric Stahl was not somebody you knew, but somebody you would very much like to know.

In fact he was good at his profession – had two Oscar nominations, one for Supporting Actor, the other for the lead in
Summer Storm
– and very much in control of gesture and tone but, beyond skill, he had the single, inexplicable quality of the star actor or actress. When he was on screen, you couldn’t take your eyes off him.

Stahl shifted slightly in the deck chair, the damp was beginning to reach him and he had to suppress a shiver. And, he sensed, the weather was turning – sometimes the ship’s bow hit the oncoming wave with a loud smack. ‘We might just have a storm,’ he said. It was, he thought, time to get Iris back where she belonged, the cuddling had devloped a certain familiar edge.

‘A storm?’ she said. ‘Oh, I hope not. I’m afraid I’ll get seasick.’

‘You’ll be fine. Just remember: don’t stay in your cabin, go someplace where you can keep your eyes on the horizon.’

‘Is it that easy?’

‘Yes. I spent two years at sea, that’s how I know.’

‘
You?
A sailor?’

He nodded. ‘I ran away to sea when I was sixteen.’

‘Your poor mom!’

‘I wrote them a letter,’ he said. ‘I went to Hamburg, and for a month all I did was sweep out the union hall, but then a Dutch ship needed a deckhand and I signed on and saw the world – Shanghai, Batavia, Calcutta …’ This had been the purest possible luck; Stahl had gone to sea in the spring of 1914, before the war, on what by chance was the ship of a country that remained neutral, thus he was spared service for the enemies of Austria-Hungary.

‘Say, you’ve had some adventures, haven’t you,’ she said.

‘I did. In 1916 we were shelled and set on fire, just off the coast of Spain. An Italian destroyer did that.’

‘But, you said “neutral” …’

‘We never knew why they did it. Exuberance, maybe, we didn’t ask. But we managed to reach the port of Barcelona, where I got help from the Austrian legation. They could have sent me off to fight in the trenches, but instead they gave me a job, and that was my military service.’

‘What did you do?’

‘I opened the mail. Made sure it got to the right people.’

She started to ask a question, but then a gust of wind hit her and she said ‘Brrr’ and burrowed against Stahl, close enough now that her voice was soft. ‘So,’ she said, lingering on the word, ‘when did you decide to become an actor?’

‘A little later, when I was back in Vienna.’ The
Ile de France
lifted and fell, hitting another wave. ‘I think, Iris, it might be time for you to go back to your cabin, your husband’s probably beginning to wonder where you are.’

‘Oh, Jack sleeps like a log when he’s drunk.’

Nonetheless, she wasn’t coming to Stahl’s cabin. She didn’t really want to, Stahl felt, maybe she wanted to be asked. But, in any event, what he didn’t need was a public row with some lush over a wife’s shipboard infidelity. With certain actors, Warner Bros. wouldn’t have cared, but not Fredric Stahl. He put a hand on her cheek and turned her face towards him. ‘One kiss, Iris, and then back to our cabins.’

The kiss was dry, and tender, and went on for a time because they both enjoyed it.

The storm came full force after midnight, the liner pitching and rolling in heavy seas. Stahl woke up, grumbled at the weather, and went back to sleep. When he left his cabin in the morning, the exquisite art deco carpets had been covered with rolls of brown paper and, up on deck, the sky was heavy with dark cloud and every wave sent spray flying over the bow. Returning to his cabin after a long walk, he found the ship’s daily news bulletin slipped beneath the door.

The French Line wishes you good morning. Temperature at 0600 hours 53°. The Paris weather 66° and partly cloudy.

The 1938 Salon d’Automne will open 5 October at the Grand Palais in Paris. The International Surrealist Exhibition remains open at the Galerie des Beaux-Arts, 60 artists, including Marcel Duchamp, and 300 works, including Salvador Dali’s ‘Rainy Taxi’.

Yesterday at the European Championships in Paris, the Finnish runner Taisto Mäki set a new record in the 10,000 metre race, 29 minutes, 52 seconds.

The British Prime Minister Chamberlain goes to Berchtesgaden today for consultations on the Sudeten issue with Reichs Chancellor Hitler.

In Hollywood, filming has begun on ‘The Wizard of Oz’ with Buddy Ebsen, allergic to his costume, replaced by Jack Haley.

Great Britain has ordered its fleet at Invergordon to alert status.

Pittsburgh halfback Whizzer White, injured in a loss to the Eagles, has said he will play against the NY Giants on Friday.

The first-class shuffleboard tournament has been postponed until 1400 hours tomorrow.

It was dusk when the
Ile de France
docked at Le Havre, and a brass band greeted the passengers at the foot of the first-class gangway. A band made up, according to the fancy writing on a giant bass drum, of municipal sanitation workers. Wearing blue uniforms and caps, working away at a spirited march, they could surely not
all
have been short and stocky with black moustaches, but that was Stahl’s impression. As he stepped onto the pier, a shout rose above the cornets and trombones. ‘
Mr. Stahl! Fredric Stahl!
’ Who was this? Or, rather,
where
was he? He was, Stahl now saw, attached to a hand waving frantically above the heads of people waiting to meet the passengers.

With difficulty, the man wormed his way through the crowd and stood in front of Stahl. He was not much over five feet tall, with a hook nose and a beaming smile, nattily dressed in a tan double-breasted suit. What remained of his hair was arranged in strands across his head and plastered down with oil. Reaching up, he grasped Stahl’s hand, gave it an enthusiastic pump, and said, ‘Welcome to France, I am Zolly!’ When Stahl didn’t react he added, ‘
Zolly Louis
, the Warner man in Paris!’ His accent was from somewhere well east of the dock in Le Havre.

‘Hello, Zolly, thanks for meeting me,’ Stahl said.

Then the flashbulbs went off. The floating lights of the afterimages made it difficult for Stahl to see much of anything, but he didn’t need to see. Instinctively, he turned his head slightly to the left, to show his right, his better, side, and his face broke into an amiable smile, accompanied by a raised hand seemingly caught in mid-wave. A voice called out, ‘Over to here, Mis-ter Stahl.’ Stahl turned towards the voice and, blind as a bat, smiled away.

‘He speaks French, boys,’ Zolly called out. Then, an aside to Stahl, ‘I made sure the press got here.’

A man with a small notebook appeared from the after-image. ‘Jardine, of
Le Matin
,’ he said in French. ‘How was your voyage?’

‘I enjoyed every minute of it,’ Stahl said. ‘The
Ile de France
is a fine ship, one of the best. Luxurious, and
fast
.’

‘Any storms?’

Stahl shook his head, dismissing the idea. ‘A smooth voyage in every way. Maybe I ate a little more than I should have, but I couldn’t resist.’

Now a different voice: ‘Would you say something about your new movie?’

‘It’s called
Après la Guerre
, being made for Paramount France and produced by Monsieur Jules Deschelles.’

‘You know Monsieur Deschelles?’

Zolly cleared his throat.

‘By reputation,’ Stahl said. ‘He is well regarded in Hollywood.’

‘This movie,’ Jardine of
Le Matin
said, ‘is it about the, ah, futility of war?’

‘You might say that,’ Stahl said, then, as he considered going on, Zolly said, ‘That’s enough, boys. He’ll be available for interviews, but right now Mr. Stahl would like to get to Paris as soon as possible.’

As the photographers took a few more shots, working around to get the
Ile de France
as background, a beautiful girl appeared at Stahl’s side, firmly taking his arm and smiling for the cameras. Stahl’s expression didn’t change but, out of the corner of his mouth, he said, ‘Who the hell is this?’

‘No idea,’ Zolly said. As he led Stahl away from the crowd, the Warner man in Paris glanced back over his shoulder. Winked? At the young woman he’d promised …? This was all in Stahl’s imagination, but it was a highly experienced and accurate imagination.

Zolly Louis had a car and driver waiting on the pier. Since Stahl had already cleared customs and border control – the passports of first-class travellers were stamped in their staterooms – and his baggage would be delivered to his hotel, he was free to head south to Paris. The car was stunning, a grand four-door sedan that glowed pearlescent silver, with the graceful curve and sweep of an aerodynamic masterpiece. Curiously, the steering wheel was set in the centre of the dashboard, so a passenger could sit on either side of the driver.

Who, Stahl thought, certainly looked like a relative of Zolly Louis – similar height, and a similar face, except for a thin moustache. ‘Meet your new driver,’ Zolly said. ‘My nephew, Jimmy.’ Handing Stahl a business card, Zolly said, ‘Call him anytime.’ Jimmy, sitting on a pile of seat cushions, nodded to Stahl – bowed might have been a better description – and said in English, ‘So pleased to meet you, sir,’ one word at a time.

Zolly opened the rear door for Stahl, climbed in behind him, and said, ‘Now we go. To the Claridge, Jimmy, and make it snappy.’

The Hotel Claridge, on the rue François 1er, was not at all where Stahl wanted to stay but somebody in Paris had made the reservation and Stahl hadn’t complained. The Claridge was where rich Englishmen took suites, close to the Champs-Elysées, a
quartier
of fancy cinemas, overpriced restaurants, and hordes of tourists. Stahl meant to find somewhere else as soon as he could.

As they left the pier, Zolly said, ‘How about this car?’

‘Very impressive,’ Stahl said.

‘The 1938 Panhard Dynamic,’ Zolly said. ‘It’s all the rage in Paris.’