by K. W. Jeter
“I guess I’m flattered. But… I don’t know. Films are…”
Marte sipped at the champagne as Herr Wise searched through his limited German vocabulary.
“ Szenen,” he said at last. “Pictures. That’s all.”
“Ah, aber am Anfang war das Wort – in the beginning was the word, Herr Wise.” Joseph’s thin-lipped smile grew wider. “Don’t you agree?”
“Maybe. I didn’t expect a National Socialist to quote Scripture, though.”
Joseph tilted his head back in amusement. “You do not know, Herr Wise – in my youth, I attended the seminary. I had wanted to become a priest. That was, of course, before I found a new faith to believe in. And entered politics.”
“Yes -” Wise nodded. “I’ve heard some things about that new faith. You’ve changed it to am Anfang war die Tat. The deed, the action.”
“Just so. And I would not have expected an American screenwriter to quote our Goethe.” The bright gaze grew sharper. “When you write a script, Herr Wise, when you first see that film inside your head – do you not start with an action? Something that happens, something that determines all that is to follow? That is why films are so important to people. They can see things happening. In that, there’s really no difference between the films made here, guided by National Socialist principles, and those you make in Hollywood. What is different here is that we are making a new world with them. Die Tat – not das Wort.”
Herr Wise seemed to be caught at a loss. To Marte, it appeared as if Joseph’s smooth words had overwhelmed the American visitor’s understanding of the language – as though again he had to take a few seconds to sort out the pieces he hadn’t caught immediately.
“Perhaps,” continued Joseph, “you would find it interesting to work here in Berlin.”
“What would I do?”
“Make films, of course. What else does a producer do? Perhaps the Wise Studios might appreciate a European partnership.”
Wise didn’t return the other man’s smile. “I’ve had partners before. Sometimes they work out.”
“Yes? Was there one in particular?”
“When I was a kid, back in Red Hook. I used to set up bare-knuckle matches for myself. Just to get something to eat. Won most of them. Another kid, this polack I was friends with, would hold the bets, and then we’d take our splits afterward.”
“Ah. But something happened, I take it? To break this… partnership?”
“Yeah.” Wise nodded. “I went the distance with a guy who stood a head taller, outweighed me by, I don’t know, maybe twenty pounds or so. The only reason I won the fight was that I was still standing at the end. When I got my eyes open again, I found that my partner had run off with the money, figuring I wasn’t going to make it to the other side. Took me two days to track the sonuvabitch down.”
“And did you get your money, Herr Wise? Your winnings?”
“Pretty much. But not without another fight.”
“Ah.” The Reichsminister regarded him with renewed appreciation. “You are indeed a man of more than das Wort. Tell me, was this early partner of yours also a Jew, such as yourself?”
“No.” A shake of the head. “I told you. He was Polish.”
“Ah, yes.” Joseph smiled again. “They are beasts. We have our own problems with them -”
“Your crowd seem to have problems with a lot of different kinds of people.”
Marte watched Joseph’s smile tighten. “The things that one hears in America, Herr Wise, should perhaps be taken with a grain of salt. But you have my apologies; I have let our conversation stray from the more pleasing matters of art. One of which we are fortunate to have here with us. May I present to you Fraulein Marte Helle?” Joseph tilted his head toward her. “A great future lies before her. She has appeared in but one film – starred, as I believe you Americans would say – but the praise her talents have received has been most gratifying to me.”
“It’s a pleasure, Miss Helle.” The American smiled and nodded at her, then turned his gaze back toward Joseph. “And you’re right, of course. When I saw her in Die Prinzessin – that’s the movie you’re talking about? – I could see that she was a real find. A natural.”
“I’m not sure what you mean, Herr Wise.” Joseph frowned. “How could you have seen Prinzessin? The studio has not even yet released it to the theatres here in Germany. Nobody has watched it other than myself and a few other officials at the Propaganda Ministry.”
“Huh. That’s strange.” Herr Wise shook his head. “When I received the print of the film back in Hollywood, I figured that it was one of your staff who had sent it to me. I watched it in the screening room at my office, figuring maybe you were shopping it around for a distribution deal. Partners, like you were talking about before.”
“As you say – strange.” The angles of Joseph’s face had turned hard and sharp. “This is something… I shall have to look into.”
One of the squadron of functionaries stepped from behind. “ Herr Reichsminister -” He leaned close, whispering into Joseph’s ear.
“We must talk again, Herr Wise.” Joseph gave a quick tilt of his head. “I’m sure there’s much we could learn from each other.” He turned away, his retinue closing around him. Marte watched him leave the reception, walking with a careful, measured pace; she knew well by now his particular vanity, that of a man who took care to conceal his club foot, the disfigurement that marked him.
“Quite a priest he would make, eh?”
“Pardon me?” Herr Wise turned toward the bearded figure who had come up beside him.
“Shame on you,” scolded Marte. “You have been eavesdropping.”
“As does everyone in Berlin these days. If only for self-preservation.”
“ Herr Wise -” Marte turned back toward the American. “May I present to you Ernst von Behrens? He directed me in Die Prinzessin. ”
“And discovered you, my dear. Right here in Berlin, in that shabby coffee house.”
“You have an eye for talent, Mr. von Behrens.”
“It has served me well. The Reichminister ’s estimation of my worth has risen considerably of late.” Von Behrens used the empty glass to point across the crowded banquet hall. By the great gilded doors, one of the functionaries was helping Joseph into his fur-collared overcoat. “The priesthood lost quite a candidate in him, I’m afraid.”
“Yeah, I bet,” said Wise. “Probably would’ve been a real Savonarola type. I hear he likes to burn things.”
“Ah, yes, the unfortunate books. I did not see the bonfire that night, but I did pick up a scorched Heine collection in the gutter the next morning; it was still quite readable.” Von Behren nodded, watching the distant figure bid farewell to a fawning circle. “I believe the good doctor now regrets that incident. I’ve heard him talk about it – not in public, of course – and about how he hadn’t known at that time just how powerful such images are, how they’re seen by outsiders. With that lean, fanatical face of his, and the fiery – yes? – the fiery speeches he gives, incidents such as the burning of books give people the wrong impression of him. Or so he believes.”
“Must be hell, all right, being so misunderstood.”
The director shrugged. “Perhaps. Though in this case, it is useful to him to be thought of as something of an ascetic. As you say, a Savonarola. A great discipline is being demanded of the German people, great sacrifices to achieve great ends. And they might feel less than kindly toward Reichsminister Goebbels – they might feel they were being abused, or tricked – if they were to have their noses rubbed into his taste for luxuries.”
Wise snorted. “As if they didn’t know.”
“Oh, of course they know. They make jokes about such things, especially here in Berlin, where the people are so cynical to begin with, and they see so much more of his comings and goings. They know; they just want a modicum of discretion on his part. That’s all. Bad enough when Goebbels allowed pictures of his children’s horses to appear in a magazine. So now
, no matter how proud he is, say, of having in his house at Schwanenwerder a bar that rises up from the floor when he pushes a button, he makes sure no mention is made of it in the press.”
“It comes up from the floor?” Wise had to laugh. “Jesus – the only other person I know of with something like that is Jack Warner, back home.” He wasn’t sure if this person knew to whom he was referring. “That’s the head of one of the big studios back in Hollywood, Warner Brothers Pictures -”
“Yes, of course.” A smile appeared in the middle of the dark beard. “I know who Herr Warner is. And so does Goebbels. That’s where he got the notion for his wondrous bar; he read about it and decided he must have one just like it. The UFA set builders came out and put it in for him. All free of charge, a donation, a token of their respect. By all reports, he is quite happy with it. Because it shows that now he is a genuine… what is the word?… mogul. Yes? Just as in Hollywood.”
“Good for him.” The American glanced at Marte before speaking again. “Does the Reichsminister have any other indulgences?”
“You must mean the women.” Von Behren raised a hand, his gesture sweeping across the hall. “Surely you saw that for yourself.”
Marte could see that the American knew what the director had spoken of. Now that Joseph had left, the reception hall was different, diminished somehow, as though its animating spirit had departed as well. But before that, it must have been obvious, in silent, unspoken ways, the bright chatter that filled the room failing to mask the other forms of communication. The glances, the touch of a woman’s hand to her own bared throat, the tinge of blood growing suddenly warmer beneath the fair skin, the laughter too bright and hard and nervous; the smells of desire and excitement, a mingled odor of perfume and sweat that slid between bodies like a dancing, invisible ghost. All those currents swirled around the slight, seemingly unheroic form of the Reichsminister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, his bright, hungry face above the hobbled body, like iron filings drawn into patterned rings by a magnet. Even the women who were with other men, young actresses holding onto a uniformed arm or laughing prettily at a UFA producer’s joke – without even turning to look, they knew where Joseph was in the hall. And the men – they knew as well. They could see the shadow passing between themselves and the women they escorted, the momentary shift in attention, falter of voice, quick look from the corner of the eye. If the men’s guts screwed tighter in anger or jealousy, they said nothing – not here, not in public – they said nothing because they were afraid, or they were ambitious, or in some other way, they simply acknowledged the power the little clubfooted man held. Not just inside himself, but through him, a door to all the corridors and whispered rooms of the Reich itself.
“You saw, did you not? As soon as you stepped into the hall.” Von Behren nodded slowly as he spoke. “I know that stories get told abroad; that any actress who wishes to appear in German films must first acquire permission from the head of the Propaganda Ministry, a magic piece of paper with the signature of Reichsminister Goebbels on it. And this, of course, gives him what you would perhaps call the privilege of the casting couch – that’s what they would say in Hollywood, is it not? The parade goes through the door of his office and leaves by the back way, each pretty Madchen adjusting her clothes back in place.” Von Behren leaned forward, turning his head to look into Wise’s eyes. “But you see, don’t you, that it’s not really as simple as that. Even if he were not the Reichsminister; even if he did not have such power, and the rich man’s things that go with it – still the women would look at him that way. They did before, when he was nothing, a skinny little man in a dirty trench coat, with spittle flying from his mouth as he stood on boxes on streetcorners, shouting over the heads of a troop of paunchy, beer-soaked stormtroopers.” The director’s voice warmed to the subject, the words spilling out, as though pushed by a grudging admiration of Goebbels’ self-willed transformation. “Even then…” He smiled, a conspirator in the knowledge of the world. “What is that American expression I found so colorful? Ah, yes – even then, our good minister enjoyed a great many – what is the word? – conquests. That’s the saying, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, sure – that’s how you say it.”
Marte watched as Wise nodded in turn. The way the men spoke, so cruelly about such things – that disgusted her. Not the speaking, but the forgetting – as if she were no longer standing there with them, hearing every word. Not for the first time, she wanted to throw her empty glass to the floor, turn and stride away – but she knew she couldn’t. Not yet. Not while the things of which the men spoke, Joseph and all the rest, so mattered to her.
“Are you well?” Von Behren peered with concern at the American. “You’ve gone very pale.”
Wise took a deep breath and opened his eyes. “I’m all right.”
“Some things are not good to think upon, Herr Wise.”
Marte saw a spark of anger flash in the American’s eyes.
“How do you know what I’m thinking about?”
Von Behren smiled. “Oh, I know a great deal about you, Herr Wise. About how you came to be here. And what you came looking for. Or perhaps more properly, who.”
“Really?” It was obvious the American didn’t like people knowing such things. “And why’s that?”
“ Aber naturlich – you have come to speak with a certain young woman.” The director gestured toward Marte beside him. “And so you have.”
Wise turned and studied the smaller man. “Okay,” he said after a moment. “What’s the deal?”
Von Behren smoothed the point of his beard with his hand. “Let us speak frankly, Herr Wise, as professionals in the business of making films. You hire screenwriters to put down the words for the actors to speak, and I try to get those words, and the images that accompany them, into the camera, to make a little world inside there. But we needn’t flatter ourselves. We know, don’t we, that the face, the one up on the screen, so much bigger than all the little ones watching in the darkness – that’s the only thing that’s real, is it not? And a beautiful woman’s face…” He shrugged. “What is more real than that? What has more power?”
“You did it.” The realization broke upon Wise. “You’re the one who sent the print of your film to me.”
“No, not directly. Some things need to be done more subtly than that. One cannot catch certain hares so easily. Let us just say… I arranged to have it sent.”
“Why?” Wise regarded the other man. “What do you think you’re going to get out of all this?”
“I never thought; I only hoped. That when you saw my Marte…” Von Behren glanced toward her, then brought his gaze back. “You are someone who makes things possible, are you not? Many things… for all sorts of people…”
That was when she knew. Why the director – the one who had discovered her, made her his protegee – had sent a print of her film so far away. To America, and to Herr David Wise. He had confided in her that such was his intent, but that she was to remain quiet about it, and not let Joseph know. He had bound her to silence, and now she knew why.
She had known as soon as the American had turned his gaze again toward her. This time, their eyes had met, and she had not looked away. For what she saw there was the same as that burning spark she saw in Joseph’s eyes. Desire, that would not rest until it had grasped all that for which it longed.
“ Herr Wise…” Marte spoke softly. She tilted her head, so that she looked at him through her lashes. There was no need for a script, for her to know the lines to speak now. “You have traveled so much. You must be tired…”
TEN
She listened to him, to the words of his voice, one after another. Coming from a great distance, as though she were listening to him on the radio, as though she weren’t with him in the great high-ceilinged room at all. A dream… that was what it felt like, as she closed her eyes and let his voice flow past, wrapping itself around her, a familiar embrace.
But different, as well. That was
how she knew it wasn’t the radio, it wasn’t the sharp whip of the Reich’s Propaganda Minister lacerating the enemies of the German Volk, or describing the present and coming glories that the Fuhrer would bestow upon the faithful, upon all the uplifted, eager faces. Joseph’s other voice, the private one, almost a whisper. Meant for only one other person; meant for her. The voice she had heard when she had lain in his arms, his bare chest against her breasts, crushing her to him, as though one body could devour another. His mouth close to her ear, so his voice could tell of his worship, his love for the golden thing he’d won, the angel that had descended to the heavy earth and the gaze of men, his gaze.
Marte… The last word he would speak, before he would close his eyes, the lashes brushing her face, letting his other senses drink in the scent and presence of her. Her name, an incantation, a simple faith…
“There have been things said. Things about us.” Now Joseph didn’t look at her as he spoke; he stood with his hands clasped behind his back, the long delicate fingers squeezed bloodless in his anguish. He gazed across the Wilhelmplatz at the dark shape of the Reich Chancellery, and the night sky beyond it. “The lies… the whispering… all of it, again and again.”
How silly of him – she could almost smile to herself as she listened. They weren’t lies, they were the truth. The things that people said, the whispers that circled about her like the dark shadows of birds. Women on the street pointing her out to each other as she passed by, the actors and crews on the film sets watching her and then turning away with shrugs and single raised eyebrows, sharing their cynical knowledge of how things worked in this world. Everybody knew the truth about them, about her and Joseph. Had he spoken so many lies himself, that he could no longer tell the difference?
“They have the ear of the Fuhrer. They’ve poisoned his mind… against you.” He lowered his head, his narrow shoulders slumping forward. “Marte…” Her name, that invocation again, but spoken this time in a voice that could barely emerge from his throat, as though it were his last breath. “We must not see each other again. Ever…”