Mistress of the Ritz

by Melanie Benjamin

  So Claude is mildly surprised—surprise, like all his emotions other than fear and terror, is muted these days—as Frank steps outside of the bar. This is after the plot to kill Hitler had been foiled. That much, Claude can keep track of, a plot that had ensnared many of “their” German officers, including von Stülpnagel. Who disappeared himself, before Claude could glimpse, again, his humanity. But von Stülpnagel had, astonishingly, been one of many German officers who gathered daily in the bar pretending to drink to the Reich, but in reality, planning to assassinate Hitler. Proving that not all Nazis were alike, despite their uniforms.

  Claude, even as he pretended not to notice—sometimes he believes that pretending not to notice is his only job, these days—was not unaware that the plot was hatched in the Ritz bar, under Frank Meier’s nose, and probably with his full participation regarding his role as “mailbox,” as Claude believes those in the espionage profession call it—a person who receives and passes on information without full knowledge of what he is receiving or passing on.

  “Look at her,” Frank says from the doorway of the bar. He is indicating, with a nod, a sleek blond French baroness seated with one of the new German officers—so many have rushed up to Paris in these weeks since the Allied invasion and the plot was foiled that Claude cannot keep track of them. The baroness, attired in a black silk dress with fur cuffs, enormous diamond rings and bracelets ornamenting her black satin gloves, is toying with a glass of champagne, looking up at the German with what some call “bedroom eyes.”

  “What of her?” Claude is disgusted; disgusted by some of these French women. Not all who have kept company with the Germans did so for personal gain, of course; he knows of a woman with three sick children whose husband never came back after the beginning of the war. She’s had no word from him, so has no idea if he’s in a camp or dead. And when the Germans came knocking on her door, threatening to take whatever meager possessions she still had, she seized upon the situation in order to provide food and medicine for her fatherless children.

  Claude cannot—will not—pass judgment on a woman like that and, besides, she has the decency to be ashamed, to try to keep this business secret. But this baroness is different; she is an opportunist who thinks only of herself, who has dined out with these Germans every night here at the Ritz, or at Maxim’s, or the Brasserie Lipp—parading about with them in public.

  “The baroness is desperate, but trying not to show it,” Frank says, amused. “She placed all her bets on the Germans winning the war, and now that the Allies are on the march, she wants this Kraut to take her back to Germany with him when he leaves. Good thinking—the Germans will go far easier on her than will the French, mark my words—but this guy isn’t about to take her home to meet his frau. No matter how many diamonds she offers to give him.”

  “I wish they would hurry up and leave.”

  “They will. But Paris is the biggest prize they’ve won, and they’re not going to give it up so easily. Come with me, Claude.” Frank starts up the stairs and he follows him, to Chanel’s suite. Frank takes out a key and inserts it in the door.

  “Wait—how is it that you have a key?”

  “She gave it to me.” Frank smiles—not something he does frequently and so the effect is rather disturbing; he has a very coy smile for a man that large and blocky. “Coco and I—we have a history.”

  “Mon Dieu!” For Claude doesn’t know what else to say to this startling bit of information, and immediately the image of the two of them in bed—Chanel so sharply slender and imperious, Frank so meaty and gruff—comes to mind. Despite his best efforts to prevent it.

  The two men enter Chanel’s suite, in its monochromatic—mostly browns and creams—Art Deco glory. She has some good paintings, but overall the place has no personality; although Claude acknowledges that the woman herself has enough to compensate for this. Frank shuts the door.

  “Frank, is it you?” Chanel emerges from the bathroom with towels in her arms; she places them in a trunk, one of many open. Her maid is scurrying about, filling them, but stops, curtseys, and leaves after Chanel gives her one of her dismissive nods.

  Claude stands, dumbly; he has no idea why he is here, he feels an intruder.

  “Are you leaving us, Mademoiselle?”

  “Yes, for a while. The atmosphere is getting a little close here in Paris, I think.”

  “She’s running away to the Alps with Spatzy,” Frank interrupts, and is rewarded with a sharp, piercing look from Chanel. “Running away from the Allies, from the citizens, who might not look too kindly on her actions, like those two who kidnapped her. Right, Coco?”

  “That’s one way of putting it” is all the woman will allow, before she goes to one of her closets, opens it, and produces a key, which she inserts into a safe. She removes some jewelry cases from the safe and puts them in one of the trunks.

  “But before she goes—”

  The staccato of gunfire just outside interrupts him; all three rush to the window—foolishly, Claude thinks later, for they have no idea where the gunshots are coming from. There, in the rue Cambon, are three Nazi soldiers lined up facing a wall, about a block away; a crumpled body lies before them. A crowd has gathered but slowly they begin to walk away. The body remains, but Claude cannot see, from his vantage point, if it is young or old, male or female. All he knows is that it is one less French citizen.

  The three turn away at the same time, and they don’t even discuss it. It’s not the first time any of them has seen this, although it is the first time Claude’s seen it while looking out a window of the Ritz. This place—it cannot protect them anymore, not from the horrors of war or the horrors of retribution once the Germans leave. And who among them will be spared? Not even Chanel can count on that.

  Claude has helped his country to the best of his abilities, he sincerely believes. He would have fought to the death for it, had he not been instructed, that black day in 1940, to lay down his arms and give up. So he found other ways to fight, while protecting one of the shining examples of French culture and taste—and protecting those citizens who work for him, too.

  But will it be enough to satisfy the bloodlust—one can already sense it rising—of the citizens, once they are free to think and act once more?

  “I’m leaving too, Claude,” Frank says, lighting a Gauloise. He inhales. “I have to. Things are heating up—well, you know better than anyone.”

  “Yes.” Everyone in the hotel knows about Blanche, but they don’t speak of it; they avert their eyes when they see Claude. And every time he does his job, every time he replies to one of the Nazis—“Yes, of course, Herr Enreich, I will see to it that your private dinner with the actress will be served precisely at nine o’clock.” “Herr Steinmetz, your new uniform has just arrived from the tailor. Shall I have it brought up to your room?” “How can I help you, Herr this, Herr that?”—Claude knows that they are keeping his Blanche, that they ordered her arrest, and he cannot do a thing about it. Except keep serving them, keep them satisfied, pray that this will not go unnoticed.

  Get down on his knees and beseech the Blessed Virgin that all this will result in Blanche’s return.

  “So I’m going to leave,” Frank continues. “For good.”

  “Why are you telling me? Why don’t you simply go?”

  “Well, Claude, you’ve been decent to me and I think you deserve an explanation.”

  “About the money?”

  “What?” Frank, for the first time in their acquaintance, is caught off guard; he actually drops the cigarette but picks it up before it can leave a burn mark in the cream carpet. Chanel, still rummaging through drawers and closets, makes a hissing sound, but does not pause in her packing.

  “The money you have been skimming. Money that rightly belongs to Madame Ritz.”

  “Who told you? Blanche?”

  “No—what? Blanche?” But
of course, Claude realizes. Blanche has always known more about the inner workings, the secrets, the whispers—the truth—of the Ritz than he has.

  “Yes.”

  “She did not tell me, but she didn’t need to. I count every sou that comes in and goes out of this hotel. What I don’t know is how you’ve been using the money.”

  “And I won’t tell you, for your own good.”

  “So you can’t repay it?”

  Frank shakes his head, sighs, leans back against the cushions.

  “Very well then. Of course, in a different time, I would have to fire you for this.”

  “Which is one reason why I’m leaving—to spare you, to spare us both that.”

  “Fine. Go. And don’t tell me where.”

  “I won’t. But I thought you might want to hear about Blanche.”

  Claude gasps, burned by the suddenly leaping flame of hope that these words ignite. He’d asked Frank about her before—of course he had. He’d knocked on every door of both sides of the hotel, cornered maids, collared bellhops. But nobody knew anything. Or so they said.

  “How do you know? Have you seen her?”

  Frank glances at Chanel, who frowns, her hands full of filmy lingerie, which Claude tries very hard not to notice. Then, after abruptly flinging the lingerie into a trunk, she sits down, very noticeably perturbed. Claude almost apologizes for inconveniencing her.

  She crosses her arms, her sharp elbows jutting out. There is nothing soft about her at all, Claude recognizes. Her nose, her chin, her pointy heels, her talon-like fingers. The slits of her eyes, allowing a sliver of a dark gleam.

  “Blanche was taken to Fresnes,” she finally says, her words, too, sharply biting. “Spatzy told me.”

  Swallowing—difficult to do with a throat so very dry—Claude nods. He’d assumed she was in Fresnes. He did not think she was being held in any of the smaller jails in the city; he would have found her by now.

  But then it fully sinks in.

  Fresnes.

  Fresnes—on the outskirts of town, about fifteen kilometers to the south—is the last stop before the work camps; once you are there, your fate is sealed. During the entire Occupation, Claude has never once heard of anyone going to Fresnes and returning. Alive.

  “Is she still there?”

  “Yes.” Chanel inhales her cigarette, blows the smoke out, staring at him as if he is a specimen at a zoo, an animal whose behavior puzzles her. He thinks she doesn’t know what love looks like, this woman. That she has never known it, cannot understand it.

  “Thank God for that, anyway,” he whispers, voice shaking. “Is she—how is she—?”

  “I have no idea; it is not my concern.” She stabs her cigarette out in an ashtray and rises.

  Frank, who has been watching Chanel—almost daring her not to disappoint him—grunts. “Once people are inside that place, there’s no way to know anything more. She and Lily both were taken there. I suppose you know by now what they were up to? So Blanche, she has a file with the Gestapo. Von Stülpnagel didn’t tell you that.”

  “No.” Nor had any of the new officers who have replaced him, for naturally, Claude asks each and every one. He’s gotten only a shrug, a disavowal of any knowledge. Claude wonders if anyone knows anything in the Third Reich; it is crumbling before his eyes, officers running around, eyeing one another distrustfully, telegrams flying back and forth between Berlin and Paris. But what does that matter, when Blanche is still gone?

  “I have to admit, I am surprised,” Coco calls over her shoulder as she’s bending down to lock a suitcase. “I didn’t think Blanche had it in her.”

  “Courage? Decency? Honor?” Claude rushes over to her, and almost shakes her. “More of a Frenchwoman, a patriot, than you?”

  “Calm down, Claude.” Chanel narrows her already-narrow eyes at him, bemused. “I admire her, if you must know. It can’t have been easy for her these years, being a Jew. I suppose, in a way, I understand why she’s done the things she’s done. Even if I think they’re pitifully rash and stupid.”

  “You knew about Blanche?” Claude stares at Frank, disbelieving. “You told her, Frank?”

  “No, Frank did not,” Chanel declares. “I’m simply very astute. Unlike our German friends.”

  “Have you—was it you who turned her in? I swear upon the flag, if you did, I will—I will—”

  “Nonsense.” Chanel’s entire bony body stiffly registers outrage. “No one turned her in, Claude. She was recognized by almost everyone at Maxim’s, that day. Everyone saw what she did. And they knew where she lived.”

  “You’ve used the Vichy laws to your advantage, though, haven’t you? In trying to get control of your perfume company back from your Jewish partners? You have no love for the Jews, mademoiselle. It’s well known.”

  Chanel shrugs. “I’m a businesswoman, what can I say? But I have no business with your wife, Claude. I quite enjoy her, as a matter of fact—our little sparring. It’s amusing.”

  “Claude,” Frank breaks in, glancing at a clock. “You must know—the Nazis, they came for Greep yesterday.”

  Claude stares at him, not comprehending—until he does.

  “Oh.” Claude has run out of words today, it would appear. Or—perhaps there are simply no words to describe the horrors. The words they’ve used—occupation, occupiers, taken, rounded up, disappeared—do not, cannot, begin to describe the reality.

  “They came for Greep,” he repeats, understanding what Frank is saying. So they must know, by now, like Chanel, that Blanche is a Jew—Greep very likely could have confessed his role in all that. Claude truly didn’t realize how much he’d been hoping that somehow she’d be able to continue to hide her secret, until this moment when some small spark, infinitesimal but essential, seems to escape his body; he sees it fly away, dimming with each heartbeat.

  “But the man killed himself. That damn little Turk—he jumped off a building before they could get him.” Frank chuckles, admiringly, and Claude reaches for that last little firefly of hope that was fluttering away, snatches it, cups it in his hand again. It is weak, it is sputtering. But it’s all he has.

  “So I have to leave, before the Nazis come for me, because I don’t have the balls that little Turk had.” Frank rises, removes his white jacket—not a spot on it, there never is; how he spends all his time behind the bar with liquors—chartreuse, ruby red grenadine, even yellow absinthe—without spilling a drop upon his person, Claude will never understand. And while Frank and he have never been close, Claude doesn’t want him to leave. He doesn’t even want Chanel to leave—he is not her friend, no, and she is dangerous and despicable.

  It’s simply that too many people have left Claude lately.

  Even Martin; he, too, is gone, since the invasion. Their dealings have dried up, there is too much chaos and many of their contacts are no longer at their posts, but still. Claude would have liked to say goodbye before he—left? Was taken? He will probably never find out, and perhaps that’s for the best.

  So Claude says it now, to Frank; the two men embrace, even though Frank generally, as an Austrian, is not fond of the French greeting and farewell. But war—occupation—terror—tragedy; again, the words cannot express, describe. Whatever it is, it will do this—cause men to behave in ways they once would have believed utterly impossible.

  Frank then turns to Chanel, who is standing, her arms by her side, so brittle, so wary and dangerous, watching him. “Farewell, Coco. It sure was fun once in a while, wasn’t it?”

  “Take care of yourself, Frank,” she says in a voice that, to Claude’s surprise, is capable of sounding soft, wistful. “Wherever you may go.”

  “You, too. If you want my advice, get rid of that Nazi as fast as you can.”

  “Good advice, I’m sure. But the heart doesn’t always want good advice.”

  F
rank chuckles, kisses Chanel’s cheek, then leaves. Claude turns to her, bowing stiffly, remembering his duties as the director of the Ritz.

  “We will keep your suite intact for your return, mademoiselle.”

  “Thank you. I’ll be back, of course—my business, I can never leave that. But for now, I think it’s best that I take a little holiday. Don’t worry. I’ll still pay my bills.”

  “I never thought for a moment that you wouldn’t. And—thank you. For telling me about my wife. Can you do something for her—can von Dincklage? I would, of course, forever be in your debt.”

  Chanel shakes her head. “Spatzy doesn’t have that kind of influence, Claude. I already asked.”

  Claude can’t trust himself to say another word, so he can only bow once more as she resumes her packing. Before he leaves, however, he takes one more look out the window. The body in the street is gone, removed by someone—a grieving loved one? A Nazi? Who can know? He cannot even see the bloodstain on the wall or pavement, although it must be there.

  War is nothing but attrition, it seems to him in this moment. There is nothing gained, only lost. Except—

  Perhaps this war has given Claude Auzello a few things. Compassion, for one. He doesn’t think he’s ever been a cold man, but he can accept that he was, at one time, more attuned to his head than his heart. Except for when he met Blanche; that is the only time Claude can recall when he allowed passion to rule his actions, until now—now that war has amplified the connection between his emotions and his reaction to the world about him. Which is why, he presumes, he is so touched by Chanel’s words, he wants to frame them.