Said the proprietor of a great fleet of taxicabs, speaking with some hesitation to a hostess from overseas: “I am afraid that the people of your country do not have a clear realization of the position in which they have placed my country.”
“Do feel at liberty to speak freely, Monsieur,” replied Irma, in her most formal French.
“There is a natural barrier which alone can preserve this land from the invasion of barbarians, and that is the River Rhein. It was our intention to hold and fortify it, but your President Veelson”—so they called him, ending with their sharp nasal “n”—“your President Veelson forced us back from that boundary, onto ground which is almost indefensible, no matter how hard we may try with our Maginot line. We made that concession because of your President’s pledge of a protective agreement against Germany; but your Congress ignored that agreement, and so today we stand well-nigh defenseless. Now your President Oovay has declared a moratorium on reparations, so that chapter is at an end—and we have received almost nothing.”
Lanny wanted to say: “You received twenty-five billions of francs under the Dawes plan, and the products have glutted the world markets.” But he had learned in Denis’s home that it was futile to argue with him, and it would be no less so in the palace of the Duc de Belleaumont, one of Denis’s financial associates.
“You do not feel that there is any possibility of trusting the German Republic?” inquired Irma, trying hard to perfect her political education.
“When one says Germany today, Madame, one means Prussia; and to these people good faith is a word of mockery. For such men as Thyssen and Hugenberg, and for the Jewish money-lenders, the name ‘Republic’ is a form of camouflage. I speak frankly, because it is all in the family, as it were.”
“Assuredly,” said the hostess.
“Every concession that we make is met by further demands. We have withdrawn from the Rheinland, and no longer have any hold upon them, so they smile up their sleeves and go on with their rearming. They waited, as you have seen, until after our elections, so as not to alarm us; then, seeing the victory of the left, they overthrow their Catholic Chancellor, and we see a Cabinet of the Barons, as it is so well named. If there is a less trustworthy man in all Europe than Franz von Papen, I would not know where to seek him.”
Irma perceived that you might invite a French Nationalist to the most magnificent of homes and serve him the best of dinners, but you would not thereby make him entirely happy. Practicing her new role of salonnière, she brought the young people into the conversation; but this succeeded no better, for it turned out that Charlot, the young engineer, had joined the Croix de Feu, one of the patriotic organizations which did not propose to surrender la patrie either to the Reds or to the Prussians. The Croix de Feu used the technique of banners and uniforms and marching and singing as did the Fascists of Italy and the Nazis of Germany; but Lanny said: “I’m afraid, Charlot, you won’t get so far, because you don’t make so many promises to the workers.”
“They tell the people falsehoods,” said the young Frenchman, haughtily; “but we are men of honor.”
“Ah, yes,” sighed his old friend; “but how far does that go in politics?”
“In this corrupt republic, no distance at all; but we have set out to make France a home for men who mean what they say.”
Lanny spoke no more. It made him sad to see his two foster sons—they were supposed to be something like that—going the road of Fascism; but there was nothing he could do about it. He knew that their mother had shared these tendencies. They were French patriots, and he couldn’t make them internationalists, or what he called “good Europeans.”
X
Having had such a dose of reaction, he had to have one of hope. He said to Irma: “I really ought to call on Léon Blum, and perhaps take him out to lunch. Would you care to come along?”
“But Lanny,” she exclaimed, “what is this house for?”
“I didn’t suppose you’d want to have him here.”
“But dear, what kind of home will it be if you can’t bring your friends?”
He saw that she was determined to be fair. He guessed that she had talked the matter out with the wise Emily, and was following the latter’s program. If one’s husband must have vices, let him have them at home, where they may be toned down and kept within limits. After all, Leon Blum was the leader of the second largest political party in France; he was a scholar and a poet, and had once had a fortune. In the old days, as a young aesthete, he had been a frequenter of Emily’s salon; now he had exchanged Marcel Proust for Karl Marx, but he remained a gentleman and a brilliant mind. Surely one might invite him to lunch, and even to dinner—if the company was carefully chosen. Emily herself would come; and Lanny knew from this that the matter had been discussed.
He took the good the gods had provided him. The Socialist leader sat in the same chair which Denis de Bruyne had filled, and maybe he felt some evil vibrations, for he spoke very sadly. In the midst of infinite corruption he was trying to believe in honesty; in the midst of wholesale cruelty he was trying to believe in kindness. The profit system, the blind competitive struggle for raw materials and markets, was wrecking civilization. No one nation could change this by itself; all must help, but someone must begin, and the voice of truth must be heard everywhere. Léon Blum spoke tirelessly in the Chamber, he wrote daily editorials for Le Populaire, he traveled here and there, pleading and explaining. He would do it at the luncheon table of a friend, and then stop and apologize, smiling and saying that politics ruined one’s manners as well as one’s character.
He was a tall slender man with the long slim hands of an artist; a thin, sensitive face, an abundant mustache which made him a joy to the caricaturists of the French press. He had been through campaigns of incredible bitterness; for to the partisans of the French right it was adding insult to injury when their foes put up a Jew as their spokesman. It made the whole movement of the workers a part of the international Jewish conspiracy, and lent venom to all Fascist attacks upon France. “Perhaps, after all, it is a mistake that I try to serve the cause,” said the statesman.
He was ill content with the showing which his party had made at the polls. A gain of seventeen was not enough to save the day. He said that immediate and bold action was required if Europe was to be spared the horrors of another war. He said that the German Republic could not survive without generous help from France. He said that the “Cabinet of the Barons” was a natural answer to the cabinet of the bigot, Poincaré, and to that of the cheat, Laval. Blum was standing for real disarmament of all the nations, including France, and he had been willing to split his party rather than to yield on that issue. Said Irma, after the luncheon: “We won’t ever invite him and the de Bruynes at the same time!”
XI
From the time her decision was taken to rent the palace, Irma’s mind was occupied with the problem of a party which tout Paris would attend; a sort of housewarming—Lanny said that a building of that size, made of white marble, would require a lot of cordiality to affect its temperature. His wife wanted to think of something original. Parties were so much alike. People ate your food and drank your wine, often too much of it; they danced, or listened to a singer they had heard many times at the opera and been bored by. Lanny quoted an old saying: “Gabble, gobble, git.”
Irma insisted that tout Paris would expect something streamlined and shiny from America. Couldn’t they think of something? The husband tried various suggestions: a performing elephant from the circus, a troop of Arabian acrobats he had seen in a cabaret—their black hair was two feet long and when they did several somersaults in one leap they brought down the house. “Don’t be silly, dear,” said the wife.
He thought of an idea to end all ideas. “Offer a prize of a hundred thousand francs for the most original suggestion for a party. That will start them talking as nothing ever did.” He meant it for burlesque, but to his amusement Irma was interested; she talked about it, speculating as to what sort of
suggestions she would get, and so on; she wasn’t satisfied until she had asked Emily, and been assured that it might be a good idea for Chicago, but not for Paris. Even after Irma dropped it, she had a hankering, and said: “I believe my father would have done it. He didn’t let people frighten him away from things.”
It would have to be a conventional soirée. The young Robins would come and play—a distinguished thing to furnish the talent from your own family, and have it the best. Fortunately the Paris newspapers did not report Communist doings—unless it was a riot or something—therefore few persons knew that Hansi had assisted in electing Zhess Block-léss to the Chamber of Deputies. (Already that body had met, and the new member, refusing to be intimidated by the splendid surroundings, had put on his old phonograph record, this time with a loud-speaker attachment, so that his threats against the mur d’argent had been heard as far as Tunisia and Tahiti, French Indo-China and Guiana.)
Lanny was fascinated to observe his young wife functioning in the role which she had chosen for herself. She was not yet twenty-four, but she was a queen, and had found out how queens conduct themselves. No worry, no strain, no sense of uncertainty. Being an American, she could without sacrifice of dignity ask the chef or the butler how things were done in France; then she would say whether or not they were going to be done that way in her home. She spoke with quiet decision, and the servants learned quickly to respect her; even the new Contrôleur-Général was impressed, and said to Lanny: “By heck, she’s a whiz!”
When the great day arrived, she didn’t get excited, like many hostesses, and wear herself out so that she couldn’t enjoy her own triumph; no chain smoking of cigarettes, no coffee or nips of brandy to keep her going. Nor did she put responsibilities off on her mother or mother-in-law; that would be a bad precedent. She said: “This is my home, and I want to learn to run it.” She had thought everything out, and had lists prepared; she summoned the servitors before her and checked off what had been done and gave them their final instructions. She had learned to judge them in two or three weeks. Jerry was a “brick,” and anything he undertook was just as good as done. Ambroise, the butler, was conscientious, but had to be flattered; Simone, the housekeeper, was fidgety and lacking in authority; Feathers had always been a fool and would get rattled in any emergency. Having checked everything, Irma took a long nap in the afternoon.
At about nine in the evening the shiny limousines began rolling up before the palace, and a stream of immaculate guests ascended the white marble stairs, covered with a wide strip of red velvet carpet. It was the cream of that international society which made its headquarters in the world’s center of fashion. Many of them had met Irma in New York or on the Riviera, in Berlin, London, Vienna, or Rome. Others were strangers, invited because of their position; they came because of curiosity as to a much-talked-about heiress. They would see what sort of show she put on, and were prepared to lift an eyebrow and whisper behind a fan over the slightest wrong detail.
But there wasn’t much to quarrel with. The young Juno was good to look at, and the best artists had been put to work on her. The prevailing fashions favored her; they had gone back to natural lines, with high waists. The décolletage for backs was lower; in fact, where the back of the dress might have been there was nothing but Irma; but it was enough. Her dark brown hair was in masses of curls, and that looked young and wholesome. Her gown of pale blue silk chiffon appeared simple, but had cost a lot, and the same was true of her long rope of pearls.
The daughter of the utilities king was naturally kind; she liked people, and made them feel it. She did the honors with no visible coaching. She had taken the trouble to learn who people were, and if she had met them before, she remembered where, and had something friendly to say. If they were strangers, she assumed that they were welcoming her to Paris and thanked them for their courtesy. At her side stood a good-looking young fellow, bon garçon, son of his father—Budd Gunmakers, you know, quite a concern in America. In the background was a phalanx of older women: the two mothers, large and splendid, and Mrs. Chattersworth, whom everyone knew. In short, tout comme il faut, viewed by tout le monde.
XII
A modest-appearing young Jewish violinist came forward, and with his wife accompanying-him played César Franck’s violin sonata; French music, written in Paris by a humble organist and teacher who had lived obscurely among them until an omnibus had killed him; now they honored him, and applauded his interpreter. As an encore Hansi played Hubay’s Hejre Katy, fiery and passionate; when they applauded again, he smiled and bowed, but did not play any more. His sister-in-law, Rahel Robin, whom nobody had ever heard of, came to the piano, and with Lanny Budd accompanying and her husband playing a clarinet obbligato, sang a couple of Provençal peasant songs which she herself had arranged. She had a pleasing voice, and it was a sort of homelike family affair; you wondered if they were showing themselves off, or if they were saving money.
Certainly they hadn’t saved on the food and drink, and that is important at any party. In the ball-room a smart colored band played jazz, and in the other rooms the young wife and the young husband moved here and there, chatting with this one and that. Madame Hellstein, of the international banking-house, with her daughter Olivie, now Madame de Broussailles; Lanny had told his wife: “I might have married her, if Rosemary hadn’t written me a note at the critical moment!” So, naturally, Irma was interested to look her over. A lovely daughter of Jerusalem—but she was growing stout! “These Jewish women all do,” thought Irma.
And then one of Zaharoff’s married daughters, who also had looked upon the son of Budd as a parti. And old M. Faure, rich importer of wines and olive-oil who had bought paintings of nude ladies from Zoltan. A traveling maharajah who bought ladies—but from another dealer! A Russian grand duke in exile; a crown prince from one of the Scandinavian lands; a couple of literary lions, so that you wouldn’t appear to be snobbish. Lanny had been a dear and hadn’t asked for any Reds or Pinks; they wouldn’t appreciate the honor, he said.
Irma wasn’t clever; but that is a quality for the “outs,” whereas she was among the “ins.” She was serene and gracious, and as she moved among this elegant company little shivers of happiness ran over her and she thought: “I am getting away with it; it is truly distingué”—this being one of the first French words she had learned. Lanny, thirty-two and world weary, thought: “How hard they all try to keep up a front and to be what they pretend!” He thought: “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players”—these being among the first words of Shakespeare he had learned.
He knew much more about these players than his wife did. He had been hearing stories from his father and his business friends, from his mother and her smart friends, from his Red uncle, from Blum and Longuet and other Pinks. This lawyer for the Comité des Forges who had all the secrets of la haute finance hidden in his skull; this financier, paymaster for the big banks, who had half the members of the Radical party on his list; this publisher who had taken the Tsar’s gold before the war and now was a director of Skoda and Schneider-Creusot! Who would envy these men their stage roles? The whole show was tolerable to the players only because of the things they didn’t know, or which they thrust into the back of their minds. Lanny Budd, treading the boards, playing acceptably his part as prince consort, enjoyed it with one-half his mind, while the other half wondered: how many of his guests could bear to dance if they knew what would be happening to them ten years from now?
12
Pleasure at the Helm
I
The Dress-Suit Bribe was in rehearsal in London, and if Lanny could have had his own way, he would have been there to watch every moment. But Irma had her new white elephant on her hands, and had to get some use of it; several weeks would have to pass before she would feel justified in going away and leaving its staff of servants idle. Meanwhile, she must invite people to come, at any hour from noon to midnight. Supposedly she was doing it because she wanted to see them, but the
real reason was that she wanted them to see her. And having offered them hospitality, she was under obligation to accept theirs; she would be forever on the go, attending social affairs or getting ready for future affairs.
Always she wanted company; and Lanny went along, because it had been his life’s custom to do what he didn’t want to do rather than to see a loved one disappointed and vexed. His wife was attaining her uttermost desire, she was standing on the apex of the social pyramid; and what could it mean to her to climb down and go off to London to watch a dozen actors and actresses rehearsing all day on an empty stage, the women in blouses and the men with their coats off on a hot day? The fact that one of these women was Phyllis Gracyn didn’t increase her interest, and Lanny mustn’t let it increase his too much!
He persuaded the young Robins to stay for a while; he much preferred their company to that of the fashionable folk. They would play music every morning, and at odd times when social duties permitted. Nothing was allowed to interfere with Hansi’s violin practice; it was his task to master one great concert piece after another—which meant that he had to fix in his head hundreds of thousands of notes, together with his own precise way of rendering each one. Nobody who lived near him could keep from being touched by his extraordinary conscientiousness. Lanny wished he might have had some such purpose in his own life, instead of growing up an idler and waster. Too late now, of course; he was hopelessly spoiled!
II
Sitting in the fine library of the Duc de Belleaumont, filled with the stored culture of France, Lanny had a heart-to-heart talk with his half-sister, from whom he had been drifting apart in recent years. She was one who had expected great things of him, and had been disappointed. It wasn’t necessary that he should agree with her, she insisted; it was only necessary that he should make up his mind about anything, and stick to it. Lanny thought that he had made up his mind as to one thing: that the Communist program, applied to the nations which had parliamentary institutions, was a tactical blunder. But it would be a waste of time to open up this subject to Bess.
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