The Vengeance of Rome - [Between The Wars 04]

by Michael Moorcock

  Doctor Goebbels had no idea, of course, that I was familiar with his leader’s foibles. Like a loyal, half-despairing wife, he retailed much gossip with a kind of mocking admiration of Hitler. This made a fellow conspirator of you, drawing you in until you were involved in supporting Hitler in spite of knowing the reality.

  ‘The Little Doctor’ had been talking to Schirach about me. He knew I had invented the famous Violet Ray of Kiev. Some thought that story a myth, he said slyly. I laughed. A few more watts and we should have wiped out the Reds in minutes. The power station was the first thing they hit. We were overwhelmed. While admiring my acting, Goebbels was especially interested in my engineering projects. He and Göring were great champions of air travel. Again I glimpsed a golden future for myself. I was the twentieth-century Leonardo, as familiar with the arts as I was skilled in the sciences. Goebbels clapped me on the shoulder. Men like me were flocking to Berlin because they sensed their bold ideas might at last become reality. ‘I’m so glad you’re one of us.’

  He must have had my background checked out, discovering not only my political stance but my ancestry. I had been circumcised for clinical reasons but had to explain, for simplification’s sake, how I had been forced to convert to Islam by the Tuareg in the Sahara. My enforced captivity by the Mussulman and his imposition on me of his religion and its practices was, for some reason, a more acceptable explanation than the simple truth. At least I did not have to mention my dastardly father forcing his scientific notions on me. No wonder I have been suspicious of abstraction and perverse idealism all my life! I prefer actions, not words, to speak for me!

  In spite of Goebbels’s invitation to his parties, I did not engage with Berlin’s infamous demi-monde. I had been kept far too busy by Munich’s. My Spartan visits to the capital helped demonstrate my conservative values to Doctor Hugenberg, who became less and less suspicious of me and much happier about leaving Mrs Cornelius in my company. I sensed my ambitions coming to fruition, even by such a strange route. The cinema had always been good to me. Ultimately it would lead me back to my true destiny. I remained baffled about who had been responsible for blocking those same ambitions in Italy! Happily, I had never turned over to Il Duce the full details of my inventions.

  As a press tycoon, Doctor Hugenberg’s friendship also promised to stand me in good stead. As I built up my career again, I intended to renew my acquaintance with Goebbels and Göring. Perhaps after a decent passage of time, I might even show my ideas to Hitler. Hitler, however, was not yet in full control of Germany. Few these days understand how he worked his way through the democratic system, taking full advantage of the German constitution, to gain what he wanted. If the German people had not been encouraged to fear interference from outside, they would never have given him so much power.

  The atmosphere of intrigue in Berlin was palpable. I myself again felt I was being followed. At least once in Leipziger Platz I saw Brodmann in a small cafe drinking a Berliner Weisse mit Schuss. Munich had by now become my natural home. I was relieved to learn I would not have to spend too much time in the capital.

  Doctor Hugenberg announced that he had decided to produce the ‘Shatterhand’ series himself, since he had promised May’s heirs faithful renditions. I was delighted he decided it was more economical to base production at the Munich studio. I would not have to run the risk of encountering old, unwelcome faces. Of course Frau Oberhauser was no longer a threat, but I could not help wondering about that child of hers. How old was he now? How much might she have told him? Did he, for instance, believe that I was his father? Before I left Berlin I did try to find Kitty again, but she and Prince Freddy were not easy to contact. Many had heard of them. Few had met them. I did not look too hard, fearing the news would get back to Hugenberg. But I longed to know if the boy had gone to other relatives or was now with his half-sister.

  Hugenberg explained again how Munich was closer to where he planned to film our outdoor scenes and location shots. The Croatian Alps would stand in for the rocks and rivers of Winnetou’s ‘Sacred Land’.

  Old Shatterhand, exploring the unmapped West, would come upon this Sacred Land, defended by the Red Gentleman, and at first they would clash. Then Shatterhand would begin to understand Winnetou’s values and ride side by side with him to evict the alien invaders, sending them back to the East where they came from. The films would have a solid budget, but on no account were they to overrun it. If a film went beyond budget, the extra money needed would be taken from the next film’s budget, thus encouraging discipline in actors and directors.

  Increasingly, von Schirach visited me there in Corneliusstrasse. Sometimes I stayed overnight with the Fraus but generally I slept in my little apartment. Seryozha was forever offering to put me up in his hotel suite, but I knew what that would lead to. To be honest, I was not really looking forward to travelling with him. He had become part of the film team along with Mr Mix. Mrs Cornelius had insisted on it. She was not one to leave old friends behind.

  Our location work would be something of a timely vacation. Mrs Cornelius was less enthusiastic. Croatia was a backward country. She was afraid she would have to ‘rough it’.

  The day of departure arrived. Doctor Hugenberg’s people determined our locations, booked our lodgings in Zagreb and Split and then wished us ‘bon voyage’. Taking the train from Nice, our director would join us in a few days.

  On that beautiful May morning shortly before I was due to leave Corneliusstrasse, suitcase in hand, I received a note in the mail from Kitty in Berlin. She was coming back to Munich and looked forward to seeing me. I was even gladder to be leaving. Some sense of gathering darkness was now associated with that young lady. I remained uneasy about the circumstances of her mother’s death and still wondered how much she had told the boy. At the station I joined the rest of the party. Mrs Cornelius had also had a letter to say Doctor Hugenberg would come as soon as possible. He was dealing with yet another government crisis. Hugenberg’s Reichstag duties, the unstable nature of the government together with the Berlin elections, required more of his attention than he had estimated.

  Mrs Cornelius was in two minds whether we should board the train, but Reid persuaded her. Hugenberg had had the first three scripts drafted. We had gone through them in a rough rehearsal. With the May company’s agreement, one or two modernisations and romantic love elements had been added to give them the wider appeal to the American market. Hugenberg would be with us in a few days. I was inclined to agree with Mrs Cornelius’s reservations, especially since the love interest between her and Reid was not in the original books. Hugenberg had reminded me that the films could be pointers to the books whose sales were bound to rise. Nothing a film did would alter the book!

  In May 1932 the weather was glorious. Hawthorn blossomed everywhere. Daffodils and wild flowers bloomed as the snow melted on the mountains’ lower slopes. Suddenly everything was brilliant green. The train journey from Vienna to the warm, glowing stone of timeless Zagreb was delightful, with sparkling rivers and stately mountains on all sides, the countryside growing steadily more magnificent and wild as we entered a world where the battle between Islam and Christendom was still undecided, though peace of a kind reigned in the new federal kingdom of Yugo-Slavia.

  A poor country, Croatia was generally unspoiled. Gypsies in brilliant traditional costumes washed their clothes in the rivers, waving as our train passed. Peasants wore elaborately embroidered blouses, trousers, skirts and boots. Many had a slightly Turkish cast which distressed me until I realised how long this region had been polluted with Ottoman decadence. They would make excellent ‘extras’ when hordes of Indians were required!

  All other considerations aside, the Dinaric Alps, and especially the area known as ‘the Devil’s Garden’, was going to be a perfect location for our films. The snow still lay on the picturesque Croatian peaks. I looked forward to seeing the local beauty spots, the famous lakes and cascades. These were what had first attracted Doctor Hugenberg when he came here
as a young man during his ‘wandering days’, as he called them. In 1932 the area was still mainly known only to hikers and climbers.

  While we waited for our director, we were based in Zagreb, a medieval German town in everything but name, with much of the charm of Nuremberg but on a more human scale. The citizens were delighted to entertain international celebrity. They spoke perfect German which made everything easier for us. The old-fashioned town bore only a few signs of twentieth-century improvements. In atmosphere it reminded me of the prosperous country centres of my native Ukraine. I was now in fact closer to Odessa than Berlin!

  Croats were often inclined to deny they were Slavs. The middle class all spoke German and disparaged their Slavic peasants. They and the Germans enjoyed a common culture. The Mayor and all his officials turned out to greet us, giving us free meals in admittedly unexceptional restaurants and asking us to sign menus and pose for photographs. Mr Mix was of considerable interest to them, as most had never seen a Negro. They were delighted when, good-heartedly, he entertained them on his banjo. They called him ‘Uncle Tom’ perfectly innocently, after the character made famous by Louella May Alcott.

  With the habits of professionals, we eased ourselves into our work. To look at the glories of the scenery where we would be filming our outdoor shots, we were taken by local trains, carts, bumpy charabancs and even, over unmade roads, by sedan chairs, escorted by a variety of Croatian ‘characters’, every one of whom had a different favourite place they insisted on us viewing. Poor land supported a few goats, but other parts were dramatically beautiful, with waterfalls and deep turquoise pools formed by local geological phenomena. Sometimes our explorations required us to travel by horseback or on donkeys. Mrs Cornelius made two such journeys before announcing she would be quite happy to agree with whatever scenery we selected. Filming was going to be hard enough when it started. Only then would she be prepared to sit on a horse all day. She said she hadn’t been bounced about so much since she was with that Persian bloke. ‘Builds yer calf muscles, Ive, but it’s more like physical jerks than a bit o’ the ol’ wotsit.’ All we were waiting for now was our mysterious director Peter Saxon, supposedly on his way from the South of France. He had decided to take the Orient Express as far as Budapest and change there. He sounded like another of that languid English breed to me. I prayed he would do nothing to harm our project.

  He did not arrive, in fact, for two weeks, by which time we were all word-perfect and ready for the microphone and the camera. Perhaps Mr Saxon planned his delay?

  Mr Mix and I went to meet our director at the train in Zagreb. Any deception ‘Mr Saxon’ might have hoped to maintain was immediately lost. As the few passengers disembarked, one descending the steps was immediately recognised by Mr Mix. With a huge welcoming grin he sprang forward. ‘Howdy, Mister Rex!’

  Rex Ingram stood there, elegant in his evidently American camel-hair coat. His wide-brimmed soft hat in one hand, a cigarette in the other, he smiled broadly and shook his head as if telling himself he had been a fool to try anything on! He remembered me when I reminded him where we had met in Beverly Hills. He spoke of Mucker Hever and his recent death in Italy. I had not heard. An aeroplane accident, apparently, with a young woman. His parachute had failed to open, and he had disappeared into the Mediterranean. I was Christian enough not to mention that the man had received his just deserts.

  Before we rejoined our party at the hotel, Ingram asked us a favour. ‘If it’s no skin off your nose, boys, would you mind keeping it buttoned about this? It doesn’t suit me for anyone to know who I am. Doctor H is in on it, of course, but I made it a condition he doesn’t tell his press people.’ Ingram assured me that he had long since forsworn the decadent liberalism of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and even wondered if he had not gone too far in the tango scene. Had he, inadvertently, precipitated Valentino’s tragically early death? He remarked on my resemblance to ‘that poor little wop’.

  We were only too pleased to share the great director’s secret and spent the ride back to the hotel talking about old times and agreeing what stiff, serious devils the Krauts were. He was rather relieved to hear Hugenberg had been delayed as he would have a chance to work without looking over his shoulder all the time.

  Ingram was sick of himself, he said, after his last picture. Nothing had worked out. Mr Mix knew what a lousy movie it had been. The director couldn’t believe his own crassness in trying it. As a result he was seriously short of dough and needed some fast, easy work which would give him experience with sound. Otherwise he might have to go back to Los Angeles and earn his living painting movie posters. We assured him he would have our very best performances and we would make sure our fellow actors offered the same! Both of us knew the film was in safe hands with ‘Peter Saxon’. (As ‘Peter Saxon’, of course, Ingram would build another reputation as a novelist. He led a productive life and returned to Los Angeles where he died.)

  A personable Irishman, Ingram immediately won our goodwill. He had taken the trouble to read the ‘Shatterhand’ series in their French translations. Indeed, his pronunciation of the names gave them their own charming sound. I found a little bit of his Franco-Irish lilt creeping into my own major soliloquies.

  In Winnetou: Der Rote Gentleman, I extolled the virtues of the natural life and the open air while Desmond Reid learned the lore of the West at my side and fell in love with my adopted sister Nosha Tishi, who was actually the only white survivor of a Kiowa raid which killed her parents. She had been rescued by Winnetou’s father and raised as his own daughter until she ran away to find herself and become, in the course of time, White Queen of the Kakatanawa Apache. This last was an Ingram touch. He said that an American audience could not accept a love interest between a white man and an Indian, unless she was aristocracy and really white.

  Ingram’s next act was to change the names of Sam Hawkens, Dick Stone and Will Parker to Davy Crockett, Kit Carson and Calamity Jane, names which would mean more to Americans. We should note that Old Shatterhand’s rifle was named Henry, after the famous buffalo gun. Creighton had no problem with his new name, though he was not the Crockett later reinvented by Disney’s Fess Porker, a smooth-faced Valley boy who would have looked better advertising hair oil. Carson, too, was more hirsute than he is nowadays depicted, and Calamity Jane was a buxom local character actress who specialised in playing comic parts. Her oddly accented English made her even funnier. Since she had an unpronounceable native name, Ingram rechristened her Bessie Bunter. Plump and content as a pumpkin, Bessie appeared on the screen under that name. She played the comic love interest against the serious romantic story of Mrs Cornelius’s unspoken love for Old Shatterhand. Kit and Davy became in Ingram’s expert hands a kind of Laurel and Hardy in identical coonskin hats, forever getting into hilarious scrapes, both rivals for the favours of Calamity Jane. He convinced us this was a necessary element in any successful adventure film. For a while he toyed with putting Bessy in blackface to play against Mr Mix, but her make-up somehow clashed with her accent. Mr Mix had to be content with a smaller part as the funny cook.

  So that summer, while the NSDAP made wonderful gains across the country and Hitler became a name on everyone’s lips, we all moved down to the Dalmatian coast and the fairy-tale town of Split, with its views over the Mediterranean. Dr Hugenberg had still not joined us, but telegrams arrived regularly. The political situation demanded his full attention.

  In Split we put up by the station at the Bellevue, a popular five-star hotel only a short walk from Diocletian’s Palace. Now a bizarre quarter of its own, its rooms and corridors had been added to over the centuries until the entire complex was a teaming warren of resident families and bawling merchants. Founding the settlement when he had divided the empire into three, Diocletian retired here not far from where he was born. As he sat dreaming in his vast palace, the empire broke into warring factions. In Rome his own daughter was despoiled and destroyed and the true Church exiled to Byzantium. In a fit of conscience, kn
owing that he had set the scene for centuries of conflict, that his own failure of responsibility would mean Chaos descending like a black fire upon Europe, Diocletian took poison not a quarter of a mile from our hotel. Rex Ingram was intrigued by the story. He started to make notes for a script and planned to talk Hugenberg into financing another film once the Winnetou pictures were in the can.

  Split would be the base from which we would shoot our location scenes for Winnetou: The Red Gentleman and two planned sequels. Hugenberg saw no point in spending money on a similar trip for every movie. The rest of the films would be made either in the studio or in closer Bavarian locations where the German Alps could substitute for the Dinaric Alps, in turn substituting for the Texas Mountains. Split, while scarcely more convenient than Zagreb, had the advantage of good hotels, decent restaurants and fresh sea breezes. When we were not filming, we found it extremely easy to relax there. Ingram, Reid and myself spent several happy evenings in the company of the youngest of the city’s rather attractive whores. But gradually fun turned into obsession as Ingram began to display iron control of his camera, which needed little sound work in these scenes. All the dubbing would be done in the Berlin studios, which had the most advanced sound effects equipment.