The Berlin Connection

by Johannes Mario Simmel

"But I feel fine again."

  "You have been drinking, too. You are very ill and in acute danger, please believe me."

  "But I must make this movie!" I cried.

  "Mr. Jordan, did you have any exceptional excitement last night or this morning?"

  I stared at her and nodded.

  "Well, it caused this attack. If you are going to make this movie there will be excitement without letup. You told me you were very frightened of a heart attack. This was no heart attack. Not yet. But the next attack will be a heart attack. Most probably you will recover. Most people survive the first infarction. Not many survive the second."

  "And . .. and if I go to a clinic ... how long will it be before I am healthy again?"

  "You want to hear the truth?"

  "Naturally."

  "Nine months."

  '^ou could be wrong."

  "Unfortunately, no. Any third-year medical student would make the same diagnosis."

  The telephone rang.

  "This is the desk again, Mr. Jordan. Mrs. Gottesdiener asks if you could not see her for even ten minutes. She says everything depends on her talking with you."

  "Tell her to go away! Do you understand me? Tell her to leave me alone. And don't call me again!"

  14

  Any third-year medical student.

  That was the death sentence. Only Natasha Petrovna did not know that. She had examined me today. Tomorrow I was to be examined by the doctor employed by the movie insurance company. If every medical student could see what was wrong with me he would see it too. And would advise his insurance company not to insure me. My life was ruined.

  Staring at Natasha Petrovna my thoughts were running rampant. Today was the twenty-seventh of October. The appointment for the examination was for the twenty-ninth at nine o'clock. The insurance would then have been in effect—according to Kostasch's planning—for me, for the American actress Belinda King, for Henry Wallace and our director Thornton Seaton from midnight, the first of November. The fourth was to be the first day of shooting. We would have been covered by insurance against illness or death of one of the main actors or our director. We would have been.

  I suddenly seemed to hear little Jerome Wilson's voice, "Paragraph fourteen should read, Tn the event the movie Come Back cannot be produced within the specified limits all obligations of the Wilson Brothers will automatically cease. All payments, compensations or indemnities will be to the debit of Jorkos Productions ...' "

  It was one week before we were to start shooting. We had rented a studio, equipment, hired actors and actresses, musicians and studio and technical staff. We had to compensate ...

  I reached for my glass and emptied it. Jorkos Productions belonged to Kostasch and me. Even if we could make advantageous arrangements, the uninsured film would cost us a million German marks. I did not know if Kostasch had five hundred thousand marks cash. I did not. And there was only one person in the world who had and who was probably willing to give it to me, my wife Joan. My wife Joan, whom I wanted to leave in order finally, completely to possess her daughter. "Mr. Jordan ..."

  I jumped. Natasha had spoken. "Excuse me?" "I said, is it not possible to postpone this film?" "We'd lose the people who are financing the movie." "And if—I'm sorry—and if someone else were to play your part?"

  "That's not possible either. The movie is the story of

  my life. A forty-year-old American, once a famous child star, making a movie in Germany, is given the chance of a comeback. Naturally, the contract is in my name ..." I looked at her quiet, composed face. My words came hurriedly. "My position is desperate ... if I cannot make the movie we'll have to compensate all concerned ... as soon as anything becomes known of my illness people will make outrageous demands ..."

  "No one will hear anything from me."

  "That is important . . . that is very important. I shall have to talk to my partner now..."

  "Is he here in Hamburg?"

  "No, unfortunately not. He won't be back until tonight from Diisseldorf—^he is looking for movie locations—that is if he does get back tonight ... he intended to stay until tomorrow . . ." Herbert Kostasch! Desperately I was wishing him back, my imagination credited him with marvelous abilities. Cunning, wisdom, craftiness. He would find a way out with one single great idea. Oh! Herbert Kostasch!

  "I won't have to go to a clinic today or tomorrow, will I?'*

  "No, but—"

  "What I mean is, there is no immediate danger, is there?"

  "Not if you rest. Your heart has to rest. You must sleep. You must not drink any more."

  "All right. Well, no. You can still look after me for a day or two?"

  "Only until tomorrow night. I'm just filling in for a colleague. Saturday I am leaving for the Congo."

  "You are going to Africa?"

  "Yes. I've signed a contract for five years with the city hospital in LeopoldvUle," she said and behind the thick lenses of her glasses her eyes were shining with contentment and happiness. I thought, it is true then, there are people, not only like me, with dirty secrets and desperate

  passions. No, there are others with true purity of soul. People, who set out to help their brothers, black, sick, poor, despised ...

  "You must sleep."

  "But I have to reach my partner ... I have to telephone ..."

  "Not now. If your partner is expected back tonisht you have until five o'clock." She took a box of ampoules from her Uttle bag. "I'm giving you just enough medication so you will be awake then. You cannot have any sedative containing barbiturates. It would put too much strain on your liver. I'll leave word you are not to be disturbed." She filled the ampoule. "I'll come by at eight tonisht to give you an injection for the nieht. I'm doins this providing you are going to stay in bed. Will you promise me that?"

  "Yes."

  "You give me your word?"

  I did.

  Suddenly I felt tears running down mv face. T wiped them away. I did not want to cry but the tears kept coming. Natasha was sitting next to me while she filled a syringe with the contents of the ampoule.

  "I know how desperate you must feel now. You know there is a proverb in the Congo: The sun sets and rises, but our misery remains."

  "Nice proverb. Thanks a lot."

  "A false proverb, Mr. Jordan. Those people are not miserable any more. They have freed themselves. Soon they will be independent." Natasha reached for a tissue and dried my eyes. Indeed the tears stopped after the gentle, no, strangely tender touch. "Your miserv will disappear when 3'ou free yourself of your need to drink."

  I looked at her.

  "You think you cannot manage your life. That is why you drink. But if you change your way of livine you will be able to live normally. Then you will make movies

  again, have confidence and be happy. And remember what I said. Please, turn over on your side ..."

  She gave me the injection, shook my hand, smiled reassuringly and left. I felt myself growing tired. The storm continued to howl, the rain to beat down. And shp-ping into this chemically induced sleep I had only one thought.

  And if I have to commit a crime to get that insurance coverage, and if they have to take me to the studio every morning on a stretcher, and if I die before the cameras—^I am going to make this movie. I, no one else. Now and not later. Addicted to alcohol, yes, and ill, yes—^now, not when I may be cured—yes, I'm going to make this movie. My movie. Now.

  You, Professor Pontevivo, can probably easily imagine what a man, his existence threatened by destruction, is capable of. Your beautiful young assistant could probably understand the worst deed a woman would do if another one took her love. But neither of you, dear Professor Pontevivo, can imagine (not in the least and not in your wildest dreams!) what an actor, whose last chance of acting, after waiting half a lifetime for it, is likely to do.

  Actors are not ordinary people. Their profession alone (surely that of writers too) is a continual provocation to any psychiatrist. Does an ordinary person take on a thousand
different faces, does a normal person feel a thousand curious pains and desires, impulses and thoughts, speak convincingly the words another wrote, is a thousand different people in one but never himself?

  The actor's profession demands that he be schizoid. And what of him who is prevented from acting?

  I have seen, in Hollywood and elsewhere, what happens when those players, those actors are kept away from the studio, from the stage. I am my best example. I began to drink. Others became criminal, addicted to drugs, insane. Some killed themselves. A beautiful woman— celebrated star of the Roaring Twenties, finished with the

  advent of sound movies—undressed at large parties and gave herself to anyone who reached out for her, and everybody had to watch, evervbndv. She was not given any part to play. She then created her own role. Appear in public! To have an audience! Being seen! The most shameless whore does not possess one thousandth the urge of exhibition which even the most insignificant actor has.

  I was an actor. And mv existence was nullified if I did not make this movie. And mv love was destroyed. Did I make myself quite clear. Professor Pontevivo? Can you measure the decree of detprmination to make this movie, even if it would mean mv death, or if I had to commit a crime to secure insurance roverpge for our DT^oduction? I was determined. All I did not know was: Determined to do whpt'' "^welve hours b^*"^ T v^ew—t^hanks to a white-haired old lady by the name of Gottesdiener.

  The Second Tape

  The moment I stepped through the open plate-glass doors of the hotel, floodlights were switched on; a camera attached to the roof of a car swung toward me and about a hundred people, many of them women and teenagers, began to scream, wave and applaud. They were held back by police forming a barrier on the other side of the street. Surprised, I stood motionless.

  It was six o'clock in the evening. The rain had stopped but it was still stormy. The sky, a few stars already visible, was sea-green and cloudless in the twilight. I was blinded by the floodlights. The crowd broke through the police barrier and stormed across the street. Tires screamed on the rain-soaked asphalt; the traffic came to a halt. I saw many people waving autograph books and photographs. Two men came running toward me. One held a microphone, the other the cable. The people in the crowd were yelling joyfully. The picture was a familiar one. As did Dr. Pavlov's dog, my reflexes reacted too, the way I had been taught a long time ago. I opened my arms wide, nodded and waved, smiled, to show I loved them all.

  I heard boos, derisive laughter. Then the reporter had reached me.

  71

  "Stop it, man," one of them yelled. The other pushed me and cried, "Get out of the way! You are blocking the cameraman's picture!"

  Stumbling, I reached the other side of the street. Now I was in the midst of the crowd of screaming women. They were all staring at the hotel entrance. There I now saw Sophia Loren and Vittorio de Sica.

  His white hair shone in the bright lights. Sophia Loren wore a mink coat over a skin-tight, gold lame dress. She was throwing kisses, De Sica opened his arms wide, just as I had done a moment ago. The crowd was in a frenzy, the police powerless. I was pushed towards the entrance of the hotel bar, and I heard De Sica exclaim, "Amici, si-amo fehci d'essere in Germania!"

  And Sophia Loren, "Questa bella citta d'Amburgo!"

  The crowd roared.

  I heard whistles, patrol cars arrived. Policemen were trying to control the crowd and move the stopped traffic. I watched the beautiful Sophia Loren and De Sica, whom I admired as an actor and director, smilingly sign autographs. I recalled the time, the crowds, the conmiotion, now long ago and forgotten, when I, a httle boy in a pageboy haii:cut, had appeared. The chaos at the Waldorf-Astoria, the hysteria at the Colonial House in Tokyo, where fans had torn my clothes to get hold of souvenirs, hotels in Vienna, Quebec and Rome.

  Suddenly I felt sick and fearful again. I had felt well when I awakened an hour ago. I had showered, eaten and written two letters which I was now taking to the nearby post office. Those letters had to go cpiickly and I did not trust the bellboys. Since my attack I distrusted everybody. The waiter serving dinner seemed to be smiling ironically. Walking through the foyer I had the feeling that the desk-clerks were exchanging meaningful looks . . .

  I had noticed a new symptom: agoraphobia. It had been extremely difficult for me to walk through the foyer. This was not a new symptom, once before, as I left my

  apartment, I found myself unable to enter the elevator. I was certain I could never descend in this narrow, hot cell with its mirrored sides without—

  Without what?

  Without doing something which would attract attention, something alarming, something I could not control. The realization gave me a fright; I ran back to my apartment where I felt safer as soon as I had shut the door. I was supposed to stay in bed. I had given Natasha my promise.

  But the letters had to be mailed. Shirley and I were at stake.

  I had to have a drink. There was enough left in the bottle. Then I tried again. This time I could not leave the elevator on the main floor but quickly pressed the sixth-floor button and went back upstairs. My heart was beating furiously. Another Scotch. I dropped into a chair. It was growing dark. I stared at the fog shrouding the Al-ster River.

  Now I knew self-pity. I was alone in Hamburg, very ill. The symptoms terrified me. A long way from home. Which was my home? The Spanish-style ghostly house? A double bed alongside an unloved wife? The bungalow with Shirley, who was expecting my child?

  I could not stand these thoughts and drank again. Then, with great concentration I tried the descent into the foyer once more. This time with success. I was somewhat confused but not drunk. I was standing away from the crowd, looking at the radiant Sophia Loren, the distinguished De Sica.

  It's just as well no one knows me, I thoueht. In my condition I would hardly be able to smile, shake hands, sign autographs.

  "Now I've found you," said a trembling voice and very strong, ice-cold fingers encircled my wrist.

  Startled I turned around.

  The woman holding my wrist was surely seventy years

  old-—a most dismal character, clad in a tattered Persian lamb coat. Distressingly thin, white hair straying from her old-fashioned fur hat, worn out high-button boots. Waxen face, hollow-cheeked. Dull sunken eyes, bloodless lips. In her agitation she could hardly speak. "It's almost six o'clock. I've been waiting since nine-thirty."

  "Who are you?" Was this reality? Was this old lady flesh and bl^od? Or was she as real as the seagull?

  "I'm Hermine Gottesdiener," she said with extreme dignity.

  "You have been waiting that long for me?"

  "At first I was waiting in the foyer. At three, when the clerks changed shifts, I was told to leave. No one has dared to speak to me in that manner, never! To think that my husband, may he rest in peace, and I celebrated our weddine right here in this hotel!"

  "When was that?"

  "Nineteen thirteen. And today I'm told to leave . . ."

  She was carrying an old handbag slung over one arm and a flat, heavy package under the other.

  "I said to myself you have to come down sometime. I would have waited another eight hours. I would have waited until I dropped."

  "But why?"

  Her fingers were still holding my wrist. "Because you are my last hope, Mr. Jordan. If you don't help me now I'm going to end it all."

  She wept genuine tears and let them fafl without a dab of a handkerchief. Her hands were otherwise busy holding her package, her handbag and my wrist.

  I have never forgotten the poverty we endured when I was a child. I have never forgotten cold, hunger or shame.

  "You must be hungry, Mrs. Gottesdiener."

  "Yes. No. Yes."

  "We'll go to a restaurant and you'll tell me everything. But 1 must go to the post office first."

  Her nails dug into my arm. "You want to get rid of me. You'll go back to the hotel where I'll be thrown out.'*

  "I won't go back to the hotel."

&nbs
p; "I've waited too long. I'U come to the post office with you."

  Now two shiny black cars pulled up in front of the hotel. Sophia Loren, Vittorio De Sica and their entourage got in. The people crowded around the cars. They yelled and laughed. Mrs, Gottesdiener was walking with short unsteady little steps. She was still holding on to my wrist.

  The first letter was addressed to Mr. Gregory Bates, 1132 Horthbury Avenue, Los Angeles, California, USA.

  The second letter was addressed to Miss Shirley Brom-field, care of Post Office, Pacific PaHsades, California, USA. To my stepdaughter I wrote:

  Dearest Heart,

  I know exactly how you must feel when you read this letter. Let me say right now, before anything else: I love you. I have never loved anyone as much as I love you; I shall never ever want anyone as much as I want you.

  Years ago a woman told me I could not love, did not know love. I don't know if that is true. All I know is: All I feel, tenderness, longing, courage, patience, selflessness, trust, loving care and admiration, is directed toward you. As great, or whatever love may be in me, is all yours and will be yours until I die.

  Shirley, my All, you must now be brave and reasonable. Reasonable — what a horrible word. And yet, now we must use good judgment. It is impossible for you to have this child. The scandal would surely ruin our future. 1 detest myself for forcing you to do this dreadful deed

  but I swear I shall make it up to you, soon. I will take care of you, protect you, love you. We shall have a child, Shirley — but not this one.

  I am also writing to Gregory Bates. You know him, he is my best friend, and you can trust him. Gregory knows many doctors. He will know who will be able to help you quickly and safely.

  I am telling him that you came to me for help because you were afraid of your mother, and that the father of your child is a younQ man from the studio. Gregory will not question you. Since he is still producing movies I shall suggest that he ostensibly engage you as a cutter and send you to a different movie location for a few days. This way Joan will not become suspicious.

  These letters will be on the jet leaving Hamburg tonight on a direct flight to Los Anpples. They should be in vour post office by tomorrow morning. Please arrange to see Gregory at night. I shall telephone him at his apartr ment at eleven o'clock.