‘Jeff?’ she said quietly, and swallowed. ‘Can you – can you put that thing down? Please?’
But Jeff didn’t respond. He seemed to be in a trance. Was it drugs? she wondered. She had to think quickly or else he would crack the top of her head like a breakfast egg. ‘I know you’re leaving,’ he said in a low monotone. ‘I’m going to make sure you don’t.’
She kept her voice even. ‘I’m not leaving. Why would you think that? I know you’ve been through a lot lately. An awful lot. I’ve tried to help you, to support you, renting the studio and – well – I’ve sometimes had the feeling that you didn’t want me to help you, that maybe I was making things worse. But whatever problem there is we can get through it, Jeff, you and me.’
He was still holding the hammer, tapping it against his thigh. But then she saw that Jeff’s eyelids were drooping. He swayed a little, like someone drunk, or dead tired. She asked him if he was all right, and he blinked a few times before he said, ‘Yeah, I’m all right.’ She took this as her cue to get up from the bed, slowly, slowly, until she was almost facing him. At least at this distance she could put up a fight – pin his arms, or knee him in the groin, maybe. Jeff took a step back, unsteady now, and when he lifted his hand he used the hammer absently to stroke his head, as though it were a brush. He seemed to have forgotten what he’d come in to do. ‘I’m just going to get a glass of water,’ she said, making herself sound casual. As she went around him she thought he might grab at her, but in fact he lowered himself, resigned, onto the edge of the bed.
In the kitchen she tried to calm herself and think. She opened a drawer and took out the carving knife. Then she noticed on the worktop a squat brown bottle of Nembutal, the lid off; a bottle of vodka stood next to it. How many had he taken? Did he mean to numb himself before he set about her? A few swift blows to the head, and then black out. It seemed to put a cowardly skew on his malevolence, as though he could only go through with it under the false fugue of sedation. Well, she wouldn’t go without a fight, she thought, gripping the knife a little tighter. She tiptoed back towards the bedroom, bracing herself. Jeff was where she had left him, on the bed, only now he was on his back, unconscious.
She called his name, prodded him, but he didn’t move. His face was slack, empty – a mask of unknowing. Quickly, she got dressed, then tore out a few clothes from her wardrobe and stuffed them in an overnight bag. At one moment Jeff stirred, muttering indecipherably, and she held her breath: if he woke now she would have to defend herself. But he subsided into sleep, and she completed her getaway preparations, levering out from a drawer a little package of banknotes she had squirrelled away. Outside, on Gray’s Inn Road she hailed a cab that took her to Kentish Town. Her mother, still up, answered the door, and the moment Billie saw her face start to crease with concern she felt her eyes brimming over with tears.
The thought of the hammer had ambushed Billie with a gripping spasm of nausea. The studio person was still talking at her, only now her attention was shot. The reek of the oily river in her nostrils was overpowering, and her breaths were suddenly shallow in her lungs. She had to get to a toilet – oh God, right now. As politely as was possible she excused herself and hurried off; a waiter pointed her to a staircase. She felt her stomach buck like a wild horse about to throw its load. She clattered down the metal stairs into a corridor at the same time as a tall woman in a navy trouser suit approached from the other end and reached the loo door before her. There was a haughty set to the woman’s expression, and Billie faltered. This was not the face of someone you could beg from.
She didn’t have to beg. The woman squinted at her. ‘Are you all right?’ And then, ‘I think you need this more urgently than I do.’
She was standing aside, and Billie gasped out her thanks as she darted through the door and slammed it shut. She just had time to flip the seat up and kneel before she heaved out a great bilious hwaargh into the bowl. Oh God oh God oh God. She groaned, aware of the raucous noise but not caring. She leaned in again and felt another lurch up her throat, but this time there was hardly anything, just a strangled trickle that brought tears to her eyes. She reached up to flush the porridgy pebble-dashing around the bowl, then rested her forehead a moment against the cool porcelain rim. That felt a little better, though her throat ached.
An enquiring knock sounded behind her and the door opened a crack. It was the woman who’d let her go in front.
‘Oh dear. Anything I can do?’ She stepped inside the cubicle, quite unembarrassed, and handed Billie over her shoulder a paper napkin. ‘Reminds me of the war, there were always girls being sick. The only useful thing you could do was to hold their hair.’ Her voice was sympathetic, yet it was also feathered by an unmistakable note of amusement. Billie longed to lay her head on the floor and be still for a couple of hours.
She wiped her mouth with the napkin and gingerly raised herself to her feet. The woman, towering over her, pulled a face.
‘Poor thing!’ she said, with a playful frown. ‘I’d recommend you go straight home to bed, but unless you’re a strong swimmer …’ She looked through the little porthole window. ‘We’ve only just passed Tower Bridge.’
Billie dabbed at her leaking eyes. She must look a mess, an impression confirmed when the woman made a wincing gesture. A dribble of sick striped Billie’s black dress from shoulder to chest. Hurriedly she used the napkin to wipe it away.
‘Oh God,’ she muttered. ‘What a fright. And today of all days.’ She was an actress, she explained, and her agent planned to introduce her to people.
‘Let’s get you fixed up, then,’ the woman said, and briskly opened her clutch bag. She handed over a compact. ‘I’m Freya, by the way.’
‘Billie. Thanks for being so –’ But Freya batted away the sentiment, and joked that this was the longest conversation she’d had since boarding. It turned out she was an old friend of Nat Fane’s.
‘I’ve heard Nat talk about you, actually,’ said Billie. ‘You’re the journalist, aren’t you? He said –’ But she stopped herself, belatedly realising that what Nat had said to her was probably in confidence: she was pretty sure he had called Freya ‘the one that got away’. Freya waited while Billie did some light repairs on her face. The girl still looked fragile but the colour was coming back to her cheeks. Unfortunately there was no disguising the ghostly imprint of the vomit dribble on her dress.
‘Here, take this,’ she said, unloosing her patterned silk scarf and draping it around Billie’s neck. It effectively camouflaged the stain. Billie felt that any more kindness from this woman would make her cry.
Her glance fell on the label. ‘This is Pucci.’
‘Yeah, and it was a present. So you’d better look after it.’ She gave Billie the once-over. ‘Are you ready to go up?’
Billie nodded. ‘I think so.’
‘All right. Wait for me while I have a wee.’
They emerged back on deck just as Dox Walbrook and his band were starting up. The slow tempo of ‘My One and Only Love’ sounded to Freya more like an end-of-the-evening number than a set opener, but still, the creamy cushioned tone of Walbrook’s tenor sax was fine by her any time of the day. Billie was keeping close to her side, like a shy girl on the first day of term. Sunlight glittered on the Thames.
They were edging their way through a little cluster of guests when a woman detached herself and stepped in front of them. It took Freya a moment to recognise the lynx eyes and imperious cheekbones of Sonja Zertz. She was wearing a mannish, pinstriped suit with wide lapels and had slicked back her hair like a ballroom dancer of the 1930s.
‘Hello again. Freya, yes?’
‘I couldn’t place you for a moment – your hair.’
Sonja grinned. ‘It is my “Weimar gigolo” look. Ah, Billie! You two know one another?’
‘We’ve just met,’ said Freya. ‘We were on the lookout for drinks.’
Sonja spun round and, as if she were the hostess herself, beckoned a waiter. Freya took a gin cocktail fr
om his tray; Billie only wanted water. Sonja, shading her eyes, cast her gaze around the bright prospect of the river. ‘What glorious luck to be on a boat today! The benefit of having a rich patron.’
‘Where is he, by the way?’ asked Billie.
‘Oh, he’s joining us at Chelsea, or somewhere,’ said Sonja. ‘I suppose he wants to make a dramatic entrance.’
‘Like, walking across water?’ suggested Freya.
Sonja smirked. ‘I don’t think Mr Pulver has much in common with Jesus.’
‘Has he visited the set?’
‘I’ve never seen him once. Reiner said that he’d had a meeting with him a few weeks ago – not gemütlich.’
Freya had been keeping an eye out for Reiner Werther Kloss but so far hadn’t spotted him. Billie, meanwhile, was being dragooned by her agent into a huddle of studio people, leaving Freya and Sonja alone together. Freya decided to respond to the candid interest of the woman’s gaze with some candour of her own.
‘Am I right in thinking you invited me to this thing?’
‘Of course,’ replied Sonja, with a little pout. ‘Is there something unusual in that?’
‘Well, only in so far as I’m a complete stranger.’
‘But I like complete strangers. The stranger the better.’
She said this with an insolent gleam that amused Freya, and slightly irritated her. Who did this one think she was – Dietrich? She asked her where in Germany she was from.
‘Stuttgart. But I left years ago. I live in Munich.’
‘Ah. Then perhaps you could recommend a hotel,’ said Freya. ‘I’m going there next week.’
It was the first time Sonja had looked surprised. ‘Why?’
‘A festival honouring the work of your director, as a matter of fact. Useful for the piece I’m researching.’
Sonja drew in her chin sharply. ‘But you know he’s here?’ Freya returned a look of innocent interest, secretly hoping that Sonja might be the one to provide an entrée. At that moment a thickset, curly-haired fellow with sweat on his top lip interposed himself.
‘Sonja, everything good?’
‘Everything peachy, darling,’ she said, allowing herself to be kissed. ‘This is Freya. Our producer, Berk Cosenza.’ The man offered her his hand, also sweaty, and a distracted nod. Sonja tipped her head at him. ‘Something the matter?’
Berk made a grimace. ‘Have you ever tried a “jellied eel”? Harry told me to pick up a bunch of ’em at Greenwich. Now, I can eat most anything – look at me – but I just tried a mouthful downstairs, and Jesus, it’s like chewing a dead tramp’s eyeball. Truly, I gagged.’
‘Did you have it with liquor?’ asked Freya.
‘I wish I had!’ he exclaimed. ‘A big Scotch might have taken away that God-awful taste.’
‘No, not that kind of liquor. It’s a green sauce that traditionally goes with jellied eels, made from parsley and, um, stewed eel water, I think.’
Berk looked at her in horror. ‘You gotta be kidding. What kind of a country is this? The stuff you put in your mouths! Harry told me it’s a “great London delicacy” – wanted to serve it to his guests.’
‘It’s an acquired taste,’ admitted Freya. ‘Though I’ve never actually known anyone to acquire it.’
‘That I can believe.’ Berk called over a waiter and asked him for a large Scotch on the rocks, and smiled at Freya slyly. ‘You put the idea in my head. So, you’re a friend of the legendary Miss Zertz here?’
Freya looked at Sonja. ‘You could say. I’m also a writer on the Chronicle.’
‘She’s doing a piece about Reiner,’ Sonja supplied.
‘Then we should get you to meet him,’ said Berk, looking round.
‘I’ve already met him, at a press conference. I asked him for an interview and he very politely turned me down.’
‘Playing hard to get! He just needs some warming up.’
This promising connection was broken when one of the boat’s crewmen sidled up for a private word with Berk, who excused himself. Throughout their encounter Freya had felt Sonja’s gaze upon her; there was an inviting sultriness in it. The Thomas Bertram was now deep into tourist territory. Leaning on the rail, Freya shifted her body in slight invitation to watch the riverfront skimming by. Seen from this unaccustomed perspective the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben looked like stage-set creations, familiar and yet strangely, almost deliriously surreal. Red buses the size of Dinky Toys shimmered over Westminster Bridge. She half expected Sonja to comment on the famous sights, but instead she let the silence between them lengthen. They could hear Dox Walbrook introducing a guest singer, a woman, who laughed easily at his drawling blandishments. Nice to be here, thank you, Dox …
The saxophone crooned out an intro and the woman’s attractively husky voice took up the lyric:
This bitter earth
Well, what fruit it bears
Sonja had joined Freya against the rail and silently offered her a cigarette, which she took. The churn of the water, the warm slanting sunlight and the music wafting down the deck held her in a magical trance of stupefaction; it was like being high, only without the springboard of drugs.
For a few seconds everyone’s face went dark as the boat passed under the bridge, and the singer’s voice echoed in the tunnelled gloom. Bands of light rippled on the black water below. The brief eclipse held a delicious intimacy, like the moment the lights went down before a show started. If she wants to kiss me, now would be the moment, Freya thought.
But Sonja, her face lit by the tip of her cigarette, only said, ‘The Marienbad.’
‘Sorry?’
‘You asked about a hotel, in München. You must stay at the Marienbad. I know the manager there, he will take care of you.’
‘Thanks. Remind me to write down his name.’ The boat emerged again into the daylight, and the spell was broken.
‘No need,’ Sonja said, with one of her slow blinks. ‘I’ll get them to call you. Too bad I’ll be away: I would have liked to show you round the place.’
‘That would have been nice,’ Freya replied breezily.
There was a pause before Sonja spoke again. ‘May I ask you a question? You said before that you and Billie had just met. So how then did she come to be wearing your scarf? I saw it on you – no? – when you stepped on board.’
‘Ah. She’d had an accident, just at the moment we met. There was a mark on her dress – the scarf helped cover it up.’
‘You give away your clothes to strangers?’
‘They’re only clothes. And I like strangers, too. The stranger the better.’
They smiled at one another.
Dox Walbrook and his band had just taken a break as the boat came into Chelsea Harbour. The skipper and his white-jacketed crew made themselves busy lowering the gangplank and securing the boat to the landing pontoons. The waiting staff had done a once-around of the upper and lower decks, collecting glasses, plumping cushions, sprucing up the bar. For a moment Nat wondered if they were going to line up and pipe the owner aboard, but in fact Harry and his entourage – the wife, whose helmet of ash-grey hair looked as brittle as a meringue; an elderly lady who was possibly his mother; a couple of goons – stepped up the plank with relatively little ceremony. Berk performed the role of welcoming committee, though given it was Harry’s boat an air of superfluous oddity was unavoidable.
Nat had introduced Freya to a pale older man named Arno, who had edited all of Kloss’s films, and an actress, Gina. The latter was a vivacious young woman with a beseeching smile, though her expression would go strangely blank at times, as if she were deaf. Nat and Arno treated the girl with noticeable gallantry, though in Nat’s case it might have been influenced by the brevity of her minidress. Just when Freya had begun to think that Kloss was avoiding her, without warning her quarry joined their little group. He wore a bead necklace of vaguely Eastern aspect over a plain T-shirt with jeans and monkey boots.
‘Reiner, this is a dear friend of mine, Freya Wyley,’ sa
id Nat suavely. ‘She’s been dying to meet you.’
Reiner smiled amiably and offered her his hand. Freya said, ‘Actually we’ve already met, after the press conference you did at the Palais-Royal in March.’
Behind his spectacles Reiner’s eyes narrowed. ‘Have we? I meet quite a few people … my apologies.’ Freya couldn’t tell if he was bluffing or not.
‘I’m writing a piece about your work. I’ll be going to Munich next Friday for the grand Kloss-fest. They must have invited you.’
‘Kloss-fest,’ repeated Reiner. ‘I like that! Yes, Veronika Braun’s an old friend of mine. She wants me to go, but ach, the timing is impossible, with the film.’
She decided to try a more provocative line. ‘I wondered if you could tell me what’s happened to The Laudanum Waltz.’
He didn’t flinch. He explained that he and Arno had just settled on a final cut when the film became embroiled in a legal dispute. The studio wanted to recut certain scenes; they had resisted; the film remained in limbo. ‘It’s frustrating,’ he said mildly. ‘The film was a mess to start with, but Arno did some fantastic repair work in the editing room. He turned the whole thing around.’
They all looked at Arno, who was shyly dismissive of this tribute. ‘I only helped to smooth it out. The genius is the Regisseur here.’
But Reiner wasn’t having this. ‘As Arno well knows, every film is made three times: once when it is written, once when it is shot, and once when it is edited. In my experience, the last of these is the most important. The editing governs not only the shape and rhythm of the film, it more or less determines its meaning also.’
Nat, slightly nettled, said, ‘Well, I’d like to see how a film acquires its “meaning” without a writer.’
Freya, aware that they had strayed from the point, interposed. ‘Do you know where the negative of The Laudanum Waltz might be? There’s a rumour that someone burnt it.’
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