The Heart of the Ritz

by Luke Devenish

  ‘I live at the Hôtel Ritz,’ she offered them. ‘Perhaps you know of it?’

  The soldier handed her paper back. ‘You are a British foreigner, Fräulein, and therefore you must make yourself known to the Occupation authorities. Please report to your nearest police station to be placed upon the official register. You must return to that police station daily so that your movements can be monitored for your own safety.’

  Polly felt a sting of anger but wouldn’t let herself give in to it.

  It took great effort, but Polly gave the solider her sweetest smile. ‘I did not know this was the rule, Monsieur. I will do as you say at once. Thank you so much for your kindness.’

  Both soldiers seemed to swim in her smile, beaming back.

  ‘Please return to your hotel first, Fräulein. Refresh yourself from your journey. The police station will still be there for you tomorrow. The formalities can wait until then.’

  As the four of them left the bridge, turning to pass the Metro entrance on the Quai de Louvre, they encountered a row of lurid, identical posters pasted onto the walls. Joan of Arc was depicted, tied at the stake, while at her feet, with his flaming torch ready, was the British Prime Minister Churchill. Few of the posters were still legible. Some had been torn to pieces and many more were smeared with river mud. Further along the quay, closer to the Louvre, a band of Frenchmen were pasting fresh posters over the top of the spoiled ones, identical in message. These men, supervised by a group of frowning German soldiers, showed vivid signs of having been beaten for the crime of defacing the older posters.

  Zita stopped dead in the street.

  ‘Darling, what’s wrong?’ said Alexandrine, startled.

  ‘I can’t do it, puss. I can’t go back to the Ritz, just now. I – I need to do something else.’

  ‘What else?’ Alexandrine was clearly thrown. ‘Don’t be silly, darling. The Ritz is our home. Where else would we go?’

  ‘No. You go on. I’ll come back later . . .’ Zita stepped into the oncoming traffic.

  ‘Zita!’ Polly cried, horrified at the danger.

  The film star looked even tinier amidst the flow of German military vehicles and motorbikes that honked and swerved around her.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she called to them. ‘I just can’t.’ She barely made it to the other side of the street in safety.

  ‘Zita, please!’ Alexandrine called after her.

  But she was already running in the other direction.

  * * *

  When they had recovered enough to continue along the last few blocks to the Place Vendôme, Polly finally insisted on knowing the truth. ‘This is about the person who sent her the telegrams, isn’t it?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Alexandrine.

  Polly looked hard at her.

  ‘I don’t,’ said Alexandrine. ‘It could be as she said – that she received them by mistake.’

  ‘I saw you when we talked about it near Dreux,’ said Polly. ‘You didn’t even make a pretence of going along with that twaddle Zita came up with for my benefit. What you implied that day was the truth: the telegrams came from someone Zita once loved.’

  Alexandrine tried to seem vague. ‘Perhaps there was a man she was involved with when she was making films in Berlin . . .’

  ‘What did he do to make her so frightened of him?’

  ‘You put words in my mouth,’ said Alexandrine. ‘Zita is never frightened.’

  Polly gave her a sceptical stare. ‘She ran into the traffic. She could have been knocked down. She seemed frightened to me.’

  ‘You misinterpret her,’ Alexandrine shook her head. ‘And I’m sorry, but that’s all I know of it.’

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ said Suzette, dark.

  ‘Don’t,’ said Alexandrine to her, warningly.

  Suzette wasn’t having it. ‘We’re in this together, you said, Madame. All equal. Tell the kid what else there is and stop using all your pathetic excuses to keep her in the dark. If I worked it out, so will she in good time. Why not let her feel trusted by you? Or isn’t being Marjorie’s niece enough for you cows?’

  Alexandrine looked to the pavement, exposed, while Polly waited in astonishment. It was as if Suzette had known exactly what she had spoken of only in her heart.

  ‘If it is the same man, then there may have been a child born to them,’ Alexandrine answered, finally. ‘Although, I swear to you, Polly, Zita will deny it if you ask.’

  ‘No, she won’t,’ said Suzette. ‘She might even be relieved.’

  ‘Shut up, Suzette, you don’t know a thing about it.’

  But it was clear to Polly that she did. The old woman scoffed.

  ‘How do you know about this child?’ Polly asked Alexandrine, quietly.

  ‘You forget I was a mother once – however briefly.’ Polly watched her struggle to word her answer, struggle to break her code of loyalty to her friends. ‘It is just something I sense in Zita,’ said Alexandrine, ‘a feeling that she understands my pain more than Lana Mae could, because she has known the experience of being a mother herself . . .’

  Suzette clicked her tongue in disgust at what she saw as obfuscation. ‘I’ve had enough of this,’ she told Polly. ‘Zita’s kid is called Lotti.’ She glared at Alexandrine. ‘And there’s no getting round it, Madame, she was born a little kraut.’

  * * *

  Anonymous in the evening shadow, Zita felt the alcohol course through her veins as she told herself it made up for the pride she had lost somewhere on the trek from Dreux, along with her suitcase of clothes. She was drunk. Not so far gone as to be incoherent, for she knew she would have need of her words, but drunk enough to face him, if indeed he was there to be faced.

  As she rounded the rue de la Paix, the near-empty cognac bottle slipped from her hands and smashed on the pavement. Shocked by the noise it made in the weirdly quiet surrounds, Zita briefly sobered again to consider what she was about to do.

  She was returning to the Ritz, the one home she had. Her friends would already be inside, despising her now for abandoning them. Yet Zita knew that if they were ever to truly hate her then it would have come months ago, back when she told them of what she had done. Each, in turn, had been angry then, certainly, and horribly shocked, but in the end the long years of friendship – the long years of secrets shared and kept – had meant too much. Zita’s beloved friends – Alexandrine, Lana Mae, and Marjorie – had forgiven her actions because they understood why she had done them, true friends to the end. Then Marjorie had died and left as her legacy, Polly, a parentless girl. It was the thought of Polly discovering Zita’s truth that she so struggled with.

  German military vehicles were drawn up outside the hotel where once the private cars of the wealthy had parked. Wehrmacht sentries stood guard at the Ritz glass doors.

  Zita looked longingly at the cognac dripping into the gutter. She could have done with one last slug for her nerves.

  It was time for her to perform.

  Pulling herself up to full height, which was more than it might have been, thanks to her heels, Zita stepped towards the two sentries, willing herself not to stagger or slip, and risk giving her drunkenness away. She lit a cigarette.

  ‘Halt!’

  ‘Hello, boys.’ She greeted them in German. ‘Nice night for it.’

  Their manner was polite, but they were looking her up and down like so much horseflesh.

  ‘It is nearly curfew,’ one of them said, ‘please return to your home, meine Dame.’

  ‘This is my home.’ She moved forward.

  ‘Halt!’ They drew their machine guns at her.

  ‘What?’ said Zita, innocently. ‘A woman can’t kick off her shoes and run a nice bath for herself now? Look at me, boys, I look like shit on a plate. But you’ll love the little show I’ll put on for you tomorrow when I come out these doors again.’ She fished in her handbag. ‘See. Here’s my suite key. Now let me in.’

  ‘Civilian guests use the Cambon entrance,’ said the first soldier.r />
  ‘Oh, do they now?’ It hadn’t occurred to Zita to try the other way first. ‘All right then.’ She made to go.

  ‘Halt!’ commanded the second of the Wehrmacht men. He said something to the first sentry that Zita couldn’t quite hear. They regarded her again. ‘What is your name, Fräulein?’

  Zita considered giving him her real name, until instinct told her she’d do better offering them the name that went with her suite. ‘Zita,’ she told him. ‘Just Zita.’ She was thankful the light outside the entrance was rather more flattering than the brighter light within. She gave a long exhale of cigarette smoke from the shadows. ‘Perhaps, you’ve heard of me?’

  ‘We have, meine Dame.’

  ‘How nice,’ said Zita, pleased.

  ‘Won’t you come this way?’

  Zita preened. ‘Preferential treatment? Now I know I’ve come home.’ She stepped through the doors held open for her. ‘Thank you, boys. I didn’t catch your names?’

  But the first of the sentries was saying something to a pair of Wehrmacht soldiers positioned inside the entrance. Zita’s German was rusty, and she missed what it was while trying to block the glare of the lobby’s chandeliers from her eyes. All four soldiers now regarded her.

  ‘Are you sure?’ one of the new soldiers queried.

  A man from the first pair confirmed it. ‘It’s her. Look at her. Don’t you go to the Kino, man?’

  The new soldier scratched his head. ‘She always plays sluts.’

  Zita thought on her feet. ‘I’ve made a career of it, puss.’ She gave a little twirl. ‘Can’t you tell I’m in costume? I’ve come off the set. Christ, do you think I’d let myself look this rotten if I wasn’t getting paid for it?’

  This seemed to amuse them.

  ‘This way, please.’ The men directed her to the grand staircase, where two more Wehrmacht men stood guard.

  Zita glanced around the Vendôme lobby for any evidence of Mimi or Claude, or any other face she knew. But there were only Germans. ‘Thank you, boys. Tell your mamas they gave you nice manners.’ She took the first stair.

  ‘Escort Fräulein Zita,’ said the original sentry to the third pair of men.

  ‘This way, meine Dame.’

  ‘There’s no need, I’ve lived here for years.’

  ‘For your safety, meine Dame.’

  ‘Oh. Well, if you insist on it.’

  The two stair sentries fell into position on either side of Zita as she began to ascend. ‘Isn’t this sweet?’ she purred. ‘Personal service.’ Her head was swimming and she caught her heel on a step, making her stumble. They steadied her under each arm.

  ‘Careful, meine Dame.’

  ‘It’s been a very long day on the set, boys,’ said Zita, embarrassed. ‘Guess I’m more tired than I knew.’

  They didn’t let her go. Their hands felt like steel.

  When they reached the first floor, rather than continuing up another flight of stairs to where Zita’s suite was, they turned into the first-floor corridor.

  ‘Not this way, I’m in the cheap seats.’

  ‘This is the way, meine Dame.’

  ‘The way to where?’

  ‘Where you are wanted.’

  She tried to plant her feet on the floor. ‘Enough now, boys, we’ve all had some fun. I’m on the second floor.’

  They lifted her from the ground and continued walking. She struggled in their grip.

  ‘Please do not, meine Dame. There is only shame in being forced to strike a woman.’

  Zita went limp.

  They were nearing Lana Mae’s rooms. ‘Stop here, boys. There’s an old pal of mine in this one. If we play our cards right, she’ll give us all a drink.’

  To her surprise, they did stop, returning her feet to the floor in front of the closed doors.

  ‘That’s better.’ Zita smoothed her hair and dress. ‘Christ, let’s hope I don’t make her bring up her dinner at the sight of me.’ She went to press the bell, but one of the double doors opened before she could reach it. Another Wehrmacht soldier stood guard on the inside.

  ‘Fräulein Zita is here,’ said one of her escorts.

  The new soldier opened the double doors fully, regarding her with interest. ‘Please come in, Fräulein.’

  Every bone in her body told her not to. ‘A good friend of Mrs Huckstepp are you, puss?’

  The new soldier waited. Zita stepped inside. The Imperial Suite doors closed softly behind her.

  She looked fearfully at the new man, before calling into the rooms beyond. ‘It’s only me, Lana Mae – your little Zita, back from the grave and looking like the warmed-up dead.’

  The doors to the grand boudoir opened slowly and Zita caught a glimpse of the armoire, incongruously blocking the built-in. Then she saw him: a huge, middle-aged German man, still dripping from a bath and wrapping himself in a Ritz peach robe. There was a cigar at his lips.

  ‘Ah, little Zita, you have come home at last. And you look like the dead, you say? Yet to me you have never looked lovelier.’

  She gasped. ‘Hans?’

  The past reclaimed Zita. Her strength gave out and she sank to her knees.

  Metzingen took his time approaching her, savouring the cigar. He opened a drawer at the bedside table first and withdrew something from it. The Wehrmacht sentry who had let her into the suite now vanished inside another room.

  Zita tried to make words. ‘Hullo – how’ve you been, puss?’

  ‘But my pretty Liebchen, why do you look so afraid of me?’ said Metzingen, surprised.

  ‘I’m not afraid – I’m very happy to see you. Can’t you tell?’

  ‘Yet you are trembling?’

  She was. Zita stared at his powerful arms, his enormous hands, remembering everything about him, everything he could do. ‘Hans, don’t – please don’t – whatever you’re thinking of doing to me . . .’

  ‘But I have not come all this way to hurt you. Why would I do that, Liebchen?’

  She wanted to believe him.

  ‘Wasn’t that clear in my telegrams?’

  She raked his eyes, desperate for a sign of sincerity. ‘Yes, the telegrams . . .’ Now her teeth were chattering.

  He shook his head pityingly. ‘Zita, you are the love of my life. You know that you are.’

  ‘Listen, Hans –’

  ‘You know you are. You have been so very good to me,’ said Metzingen, ‘so very loyal.’

  She tried again. ‘I haven’t, Hans – not really.’ She took a deep breath, squaring up to it. ‘I ran away from Berlin. I left you there.’

  Yet he seemed only forgiving of it. ‘That’s old news now. We were both so young and naïve back then. All is forgotten because you have been kind to the Reich.’

  She cleared her throat. ‘It wasn’t kindness, Hans – you made me do what I did.’

  ‘Hush now, that’s not true.’

  ‘But it is.’

  ‘Liebchen . . .’ He cradled Zita’s face in his massive hands. ‘The floor plans, the files, all that we needed to know of the Ritz – what you did, you did for your love of the Führer.’

  She closed her eyes at her crime fed back to her. ‘You know I didn’t, Hans, I don’t share your ideology – I can’t share it. It’s why I ran away.’

  ‘That was the reason?’

  She opened her eyes again. ‘It was one . . .’

  He chuckled. ‘Hush. You did what you did for your love of me, Zita.’

  ‘Oh God. Hans, please listen –’

  ‘And of course, you did it for the love of our child . . .’

  Zita stopped, frozen, her face in his fingers. With a twist of his wrists, he could kill her, she thought, like she’d seen him kill others.

  Instead, he showed her what he had taken from the drawer. ‘I promised you a gift from her . . .’

  It was a photograph of a smiling girl, aged no more than twelve. Her hair was cut in blunt bangs. Her dress was simple and shapeless. She was using both hands to eat a hunk of bread in
some institutional room. She was innocent and happy; a simpleton.

  ‘And look, see, she has written to her mutti,’ said Metzingen. He turned the photograph over. On the reverse, in the crayon scrawl of a child far younger, the girl had written her name.

  Lotti

  ‘I have kept my side of our agreement,’ Metzingen said. His look was tender. ‘Our Lotti is well cared for.’

  The longed-for sight of her daughter pushed Zita into something like clarity. ‘She looks so pretty, Hans . . .’

  Metzingen smiled. ‘She’s a lucky girl, healthy and strong.’

  ‘When did you see her last?’

  ‘Two months ago. Before we commenced the French campaign.’

  Was this a lie? Zita wondered. And yet she wanted to believe he had visited her. ‘My Lotti . . .’ She kissed the photograph before slipping it into her purse.

  There was a long moment while Zita and Metzingen regarded each other; he so incongruously effeminate in the peach Ritz robe, she so incongruously ugly in her still filthy clothes from the long walk home. Her fear at seeing him again after so very long fell away. It could have been 1927 once more. Zita saw herself from that time: the rising silent film star in a divinely decadent Berlin. She saw Hans as he was then: the lowly director’s assistant and the most beautiful man she had known; a Teutonic god. She remembered the very first words he had said to her: a quaint little story of how once he had held open the door for her at the Ritz, five years earlier, when he had given her a lip rouge which she had dropped on the step. Zita had lied and told him that she remembered it well. He had been transparently pleased. They had fallen into bed. They had fallen into an affair. And then she had learned of his growing interest in something he called National Socialism – something that had come to mean everything to him. Or, almost everything. He had room in his heart for Hitler – and for her.

  Metzingen drew on his cigar. ‘Well, then,’ he said, exhaling a billow of smoke to the ceiling.

  ‘Yes, Hans. Well, then.’ She looked at him now knowing all he could do to those who posed a threat to his obscene belief. She looked at him knowing he was still just a man despite everything; a man who had once desired her as no other man had desired her before – or since.