Stardust (32 page)

“I’m trying to save this country,” Minot said. He put his hand on Ben’s shoulder, about to move to his car. “Nice to have you with us.”

F
AY ASSUMED
it was a condolence call and insisted they have coffee on the back patio. The day was mild but overcast, fall on Summit Drive, and she put a light cardigan over her shoulders as they went out. After Lorna brought the tray, Fay poured from the silver pot, fluttering like Billie Burke, then sat back and lit a cigarette, crossing her still-good Goldwyn Girl legs.

“It was nice of you to come. There’s no one to talk to—who knew her, I mean.”

“It was only the once. But I liked her.”

“The language was a problem. People don’t make the effort.”

“The friend who called—he was German?”

“Well, Lorna didn’t think so at first. She thought it was Bunny, somebody from the studio, you know. But then Genia spoke German to him, so it must have been.”

“A man, then?”

“Mm hmm. Why?”

“I just wondered. He never called again?”

“No, isn’t it the strangest thing? Maybe he doesn’t
know
. Thinks he was stood up or something. The notice in the papers—if you blinked, you missed it. I can’t imagine who it was. She never talked to anybody.”

“Maybe someone she knew before. Over there.”

“But she never went out. Where would she—?”

“At the party, maybe. She met people then.”

“You, mostly. Of course, Bunny can talk to a stone, so she knew him. Maybe somebody through the Red Cross. I don’t know. None of it makes sense to me. I mean, you call to meet somebody, it’s usually a hotel, a bar, someplace like that.”

“Maybe she was going to his house.”

“And never got there. Or maybe she did. I never thought of that. Maybe it was after.” She frowned, turning this over. “Well, he has the number.”

“Let me know if he calls, will you?”

She looked at him, surprised, her cigarette in midair.

“Just curious. It’s like a mystery.”

“Everything about her was a mystery.” She inhaled some smoke. “Look, we don’t have to pretend. She didn’t slide off the road, did she?”

Ben said nothing.

“I thought it would help, all this,” she said, stretching her hand toward the sloping lawn. “Well, you do what you can. She liked the garden. So that’s one thing.”

“You’ve put a lot of work into it,” he said, taking in the lush rose beds, the perennial borders.

“Me? I wouldn’t know a weed from—well, whatever the opposite is. Miguel does everything. Filipino, but with a Mex name, don’t ask me why.”

“It was a Spanish colony. So lots of Spanish names.”

“Is that right? Ha. Wait till I tell Sol.” She looked over at him. “That’s something everybody knows, right? About it being a colony?”

“No. It was a while ago.”

“But people know.” She laughed. “Who am I kidding? Sitting here with a teapot, la-di-da, like I ever made it past ninth grade. Bunny likes me with all this high-tone stuff, and fine, I like it, too, because Sol likes it, but I know. I like the roses, though, to look at. Sometimes I look at this place and I think, who would have imagined? All those years on the road, washing out things in the sink, and now you’ve got your own roses, not just what some guy brings backstage. A gardener with a fancy name.” She stopped and looked away. “But I guess she didn’t see it that way.”

“You ever miss it?” he said, steering them away. “The business?”

“That life? Not for two seconds. What’s to miss? One town after another with nothing to do—someplace in the sticks, you couldn’t wait to get back to New York. It’s the same here, you ask me, but don’t, because Sol loves it. At least it’s not the road, schlepping around, worrying are you losing your looks. What kind of life is that? Oh, at first, you’re young, you think there isn’t anything else. I never saw myself like this. Married. Mrs. Lasner. And all right, he’s a handful, but you know what? He’s crazy about me. The rest,” she said, waving her hand, “it’s nothing.” She put out the cigarette, looking straight at him. “Would you tell me something? He almost died on the train, didn’t he? Don’t worry, I didn’t get it from you.”

“He had an attack. I don’t know how serious. I’m not a doctor.”

“He almost died,” she said flatly. “He thinks I don’t know. How can you live with somebody and not know these things?”

“What did the doctor say?”

“Rosen? What does he ever say? Retire. And do what? Watch birds? Anyway, he wasn’t there, only later when Sol’s better. You were. You know how I know? How he is with you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Close. You almost die, there’s a closeness.”

“I think you’re imagin—”

But she was shaking her head. “He watches you at the studio, how you’re doing.”

“He watches everybody,” Ben said.

“But he tells me about you. How you are with Hal. Other things. He thinks you have a feel for the business. A family thing.”

“Only my father. My mother hated it.”

“Why? Oh, the girls? He got distracted?”

Ben smiled at the word. “Over and over.”

“People say I should worry about Sol, and you know I never do. I figure, if it happens, who’d want to know?”

“She did.”

Fay smiled. “So maybe I’m not telling the truth, either. I’d kill him. Bare hands. But I’ll tell you something, he doesn’t even look. I know. I was on the lot, for years. I know what to look for. The thing about Sol, nobody gets this, he’s a gentleman. They see the rough spots, not here.” She tapped her heart. “Here he’s not so tough.” She looked down, flustered. “I don’t mean the real one. A figure of speech.”

“I know.”

“But that’s right, too, isn’t it? The real one’s not so tough, either. Then what? You know what he thinks about, all the time? What happens to the studio. Me, I guess he figures I can take care of myself. But what happens to the studio. Who could do it? You know we never had children. He said it didn’t matter to him, but now I think it does. You build something, you want to pass it on, not just hand it over to the banks. I said to him once, maybe it’s better, look at the Laemmles, Junior almost took it down with him, and I could tell he’s not even listening. So that’s part of it, I think. Why he watches people.”

“What about Bunny?”

“Bunny’s not a son.”

“I’m not, either.”

“But he likes you. So maybe it was the train, I don’t know. All the sudden you feel you’re running out of time. Maybe this is it. Did you ever wonder how much time you have left? I’ve been thinking about
that, because of Sol. But I guess that’s one thing nobody can know.” She paused. “Unless it’s like with her. You decide,” she said, her face softer. “You were nice to come. It’s good somebody came.” She lifted her head, a visual pulling up. “It’s funny, she’s the one contacted the Red Cross. She wanted to come over. You wonder. But you know what I think? It came to me this morning. Does this make sense to you? I think she was already gone. She just didn’t want to die over there—give those bastards the satisfaction.”

T
HERE WAS
still a police marker by the broken fence, so Ben stopped short, pulling the car over to the lookout shoulder where couples parked. The drive up Feuchtwanger’s corniche had been no easier in daylight, an ordeal even for anybody familiar with the road. Ben imagined it dark, headlights shining on the wet surface. He got out, not even sure what he was looking for. Something left carelessly behind? But the place seemed undisturbed, even the smashed car removed now, any tire marks or shoe prints washed away. He walked to the fence, looking over into the canyon. A steep drop. All you’d have to do was put the car in gear and let it go. Gravity and a soft skull would do the rest.

Ben went down the slope. There were ruts gouged out of the ground, probably made by the tow truck or whatever kind of winch they’d used to haul the wreck up. The tree that had stopped it had some bark scraped away, but was still standing. Given the angle of descent, the impact must have been violent, a thudding crash, enough to throw a body into the windshield. So why hadn’t there been more blood? He tried to remember the body, his brief look when the sheet was pulled back. Lacerations, the matted wound on the head, but not drenched in blood. But it wouldn’t have been if she’d died instantly. A dead body doesn’t pump blood. Still, the blow on the head had caused a bloody welling. Ben looked up to the broken fence. Unless she’d been hit before the crash, maybe already dead when the car began plunging.

He hiked back to the road and walked along the shoulder to the turnoff. Big enough for two cars, even more, somewhere to meet,
marked by the curve. Ben turned back again to the fence, searching the ground. He’d wanted to come back to the site, show himself how it was possible, but he’d known outside Chasen’s that she hadn’t been alone. A phone call, a hasty meeting, dead or almost dead before she went over. The ground falling into Topanga told him nothing. He thought of her at the Lasner party, unafraid to tell him things he shouldn’t know. No more whispers and shadows, not after everything. A German voice on the phone. Who else was at the party, what other ghost? Who recognized her.

He drove back to Feuchtwanger’s house, parking near the other cars along the steep patch of road, one of them, he noticed, Ostermann’s.

“Come in, come in,” Feuchtwanger said, bubbling, his rimless glasses catching the afternoon light.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“No. Brecht is starting to make speeches. Please interrupt. What, were you just passing by? Nobody passes by up here.”

He led Ben into a large living room with a spectacular view of the Pacific through the picture window. Couches were arranged to face it, but the group sat instead at the end of the room, away from the light, clustered around a coffee table littered with half-finished cups and hazy with smoke, as intimate as a Ku’damm café. Everyone was speaking German.

“So, you can decide,” Feuchtwanger said. “I’m thinking about a play and of course Brecht doesn’t want me to write a play, so he doesn’t like anything about it.”

“Write the play,” Brecht said, deadpan, drawing on his cigar.

“Do you like
The Devil in Boston
? For a title?”

“The title tells you what’s wrong,” Brecht said. “All right, so witch trials. Yes, everyone sees, a metaphor for what is happening here, what is going to happen, but it’s not exact. It was then about belief, the
devil
in Boston, a religious phenomenon, not political persecution.”

“It felt the same to the witches,” Feuchtwanger said.

Brecht waved this aside. “It confuses the issue.”

“But the
process
is exactly the same, the psychology.”

“Oh, psychology,” Brecht said, dismissive.

“Why do you think it’s going to happen,” Ben said, back at Chasen’s, Minot’s hand on his shoulder.

“Because I’ve seen it happen before.”

“Precisely,” Feuchtwanger said. “The process is the same, always. Make the fear, then the fear feeds on itself. That’s the devil. Hitler made the Jew the devil, but it was the fear.”

“The motivations are different,” Brecht said. “Hitler wanted to go to war, that’s what he always wanted. From the first. Not religious hysteria.”

“And the rallies?” Feuchtwanger said. “What do you call that?”

Brecht drew on his cigar with a little smile. “Show business,” he said in English.

“Ach,” Feuchtwanger said, a mock exasperation, but enjoying the joke. “And here?”

“Politics,” Brecht said. “Not even serious politics. Foolishness. It’s a country of children.” He turned to Ben. “You know what his inspiration is? For a play about witches? They refused his application. To be a citizen. Of this place. Why he wants such a thing—”

“Why not gratitude?” Ostermann said. “They took us in. They took you in, too.”

“Yes, and they’ll spit me out. Watch.” He took a drink from a small glass. “We have no place now. Only here,” he said, touching his temple.

“Hah. I’m not such a poet,” Feuchtwanger said. “I live here.” He pointed his finger to the floor.

“But not as an American.”

“Why? What did they say?” Ben asked Feuchtwanger.

“I can appeal. The time isn’t right maybe. With what’s going on.”

“The reason? ‘Premature antifascism,’ ” Brecht said, rolling out the phrase slowly, savoring it. “What can it mean? There must have been a time when it was good to be a fascist. Then not. It’s a trick, finding the right moment. You can be against the fascists, but not too soon. Then you’re—well, what exactly?”

Feuchtwanger shrugged, nodding with him. “A socialist. A pacifist.
Before, when you wrote against the Nazis, where could you do it? The places they suspect now. Too left, too this, too that. So it’s not the best time here.”

“Thomas Mann had no problem,” Brecht said, puckish.

“Oh, Saint Thomas.”

They laughed softly, a café murmur. Ben looked at them, slumped against cushions, holding cigars, easy with each other. Was this the sort of meeting Danny had described, Riordan scribbling notes? The author of
Josephus
is preparing a play about the Salem witch trials, drawing analogies to contemporary events. The author of
Galileo
made remarks critical of the U.S. Hans Ostermann, my father-in-law, said— All typed up for the files, smoky, idle talk, a harmless report. But no betrayal was harmless.

“What brings you here?” Ostermann said suddenly.

What did?

“Just a quick hello. Lasner wanted me to check on the car, whether they’d towed it.”

“Yes, the accident,” Feuchtwanger said. “I told you about it,” he said to Ostermann. “Terrible.”

“But on this road not a surprise,” Ostermann said. “Someone you knew?”

“A relative of Lasner’s.” Ben turned to Feuchtwanger. “Are there any Germans living here, up on the hill? Besides you?”

“Oh no. We’re famous, Marta and me—the foreigners. Of course Mann is also in the Palisades. Vicki Baum. But not here, nearer the village.”

“Why do you ask?” Ostermann said.

Ben looked up, at a loss. “Maybe this, hearing German. It would be so nice for you if there were someone else nearby.”

“Only Lion has the courage,” Brecht said. “These roads. In Santa Monica it’s safe, all flat. Even Salka, in the canyon, it’s not so bad.”