Dragon's Teeth

by Sinclair, Upton;

  “Yes, but that won’t stop it. We have to figure out some way to save them.”

  “What can we do?”

  “I don’t know yet. I’ll have to go to Berlin and see what has happened.”

  “Lanny, you can’t go into that dreadful country!”

  “I can’t refuse, dear. Don’t forget, we have been Johannes’s guests; we were going to be his guests another whole year. How could we throw him down?”

  She didn’t know what to say; she could only sit staring at him. She had never thought that life could play such a trick upon her and her chosen playmate. It was outrageous, insane! Lanny saw her lips trembling; he had never seen her that way before, and perhaps she had never been that way before.

  For that matter, he didn’t like it any too well himself. But it was as if fate had got him by the collar, and he knew he couldn’t pull loose. “Get yourself together, darling,” he said. “Remember, Johannes is Hansi’s father, and Hansi is my sister’s husband. I can’t let them see that I’m yellow.”

  “But Lanny, what on earth can you do? Those Nazis control everything in Germany.”

  “We know some influential people there, and I’ll ask their advice. The first thing, of course, is to find out what has happened, and why.”

  “Lanny, you’ll be in frightful danger!”

  “Not too great, I think. The high-ups don’t want any scandals involving foreigners, I feel sure.”

  “What do you expect me to do? Go with you?”

  “Well, it’s not a holiday. You might prefer to go to Bienvenu with Baby. You could have your mother come; or you could take Baby and visit her.”

  “I wouldn’t have a moment’s peace, thinking you might be in trouble. I haven’t the least idea what I could do, but I think I ought to be with you.”

  “I have no doubt there’ll be ways to help. The fact that you have money impresses the Germans—and that includes the Nazis.”

  “Oh, Lanny, it’s a horrid nuisance and a disappointment! I thought we were going to have such fun!”

  “Yes, dear, but don’t let Hansi or Bess hear you say that. Remember what it means to them.”

  “They should have thought of this long ago. But they wouldn’t let anybody tell them. Now they see the results of their behavior—and we are expected to pay for it!”

  “Dear, there’s no reason to suppose that they have been the cause of the trouble.”

  “There must be some reason why Johannes is picked on, and not other rich Jews. The fact that one of his sons is a Communist and the other a Socialist certainly must have made him enemies.”

  Lanny couldn’t deny that this was so; but he said: “Please don’t mention it now, while Hansi and Bess are half beside themselves with grief. Let’s go and get their family out, and then we’ll be in position to talk to them straight.”

  “Yes, but you won’t!” said Irma, grimly. She would go with him into the lion’s den, but she wouldn’t pretend that she liked it! And when it was over, she would do the talking herself.

  X

  The adult members of the family had no sleep that night. The six sat in conference, going over and over what meager data they had, trying to anticipate the future and to plan their moves. A distressing thing, to have their happiness for a year upset, and to be “stranded” here in Calais; but they were well-bred persons and concealed their annoyance. Beauty couldn’t bear letting her darling go into danger, and for a while insisted that she must go along and put her social powers to work. But Lanny argued no—he wasn’t in the least worried for himself, and in a few days the yacht might be freed and their plans resumed. Let the family stay here for a few days, and serve as a clearing house for communicating with their friends in the outside world. If the worst proved true, and a long siege was to be expected, Marceline and Frances could be taken back to Juan, and the Dingles and Hansi Robins could go to Paris—or perhaps Emily would shelter them at Sept Chênes.

  Lanny got Jerry Pendleton on the phone in the middle of the night. Jerry was still in Paris, having bills to pay and other matters to settle. The plan had been for him to drive his car home, and the chauffeur to drive the Mercédès, the car of Irma and Lanny. But now Lanny ordered Jerry to remain in Paris, and the chauffeur to leave at once for Calais; with fast driving he could arrive before noon, and Lanny and Irma would take the car and set out for Berlin. They were going alone, since neither the chauffeur, Bub Smith, nor Feathers was any good for Germany, not knowing the language. “If you were worth your keep you would have learned it,” said Irma to the secretary, taking out her irritation on this unfortunate soul.

  Lanny sent cables to his father and to Rick, telling them what had happened. He guessed that in times such as these a foreign journalist might prove a powerful person, more so than an industrialist or an heiress. Lanny saw himself in a campaign to arouse the civilized world on behalf of a Jewish Schieber and his family. His head was boiling with letters and telegrams, manifestoes and appeals. Robbie would arouse the businessmen, Uncle Jesse the Communists, Longuet and Blum the Socialists, Hansi and Bess the musical world, Zoltan the art lovers, Parsifal the religious, Beauty and Emily and Sophie and Margy the fashionable, Rick the English press, Corsatti the American—what a clamor there would be when they all got going!

  Taking a leaf from his father’s notebook, Lanny arranged a code so that he could communicate with his mother confidentially. His letters and telegrams would be addressed to Mrs. Dingle, that being an inconspicuous name. Papa Robin would be “money” and Mama “corsets”—she wore them. Freddi would be “clarinet,” and Rahel “mezzo.” Lanny said it was to be assumed that all letters and telegrams addressed to him might be read by the Nazis, and all phone calls listened to; later he might arrange a secret way of communication, but nothing of the sort could come to the Hotel Adlon. If he had anything private to impart, he would type it on his little portable machine and mail it without signature in some out-of-the-way part of Berlin. Beauty would open all mail that came addressed to Lanny, and forward nothing that was compromising. All signed letters, both going and coming, would contain phrases expressing admiration for the achievements of National Socialism.

  “Don’t be surprised if you hear that they have converted me,” said the playboy turned serious.

  “Don’t go too far,” warned his mother. “You could never fool Kurt, and he’s bound to hear about it.”

  “I can let him convert me, little by little.”

  Beauty shook her lovely blond head. She had done no little deceiving in her own time, and had no faith in Lanny’s ability along that line. “Kurt will know exactly what you’re there for,” she declared. “Your best chance is to put it to him frankly. You saved his life in Paris, and you have a right to ask his help now.”

  “Kurt is a Nazi,” said Lanny. “He will help no one but his party.”

  Irma listened to this conversation, and thought: “This can’t be real; this is a melodrama!” She was frightened, but at the same time began to experience strange thrills. She wondered: “Could I pretend to be a Nazi? Could I fool them?” Her mind went on even bolder flights. “Could I be a vamp, like those I’ve seen on the screen? How would I set about it? And what would I find out?”

  XI

  They got the morning newspapers. Hard to imagine a millionaire’s yacht and palace being seized, and no word of it getting to the outside world; but the rules were being changed in Naziland, and you didn’t know what was possible until you saw it. They searched the French papers and found much news from Germany, having to do with the Conference on Arms Limitation at Geneva, and Germany’s threats to withdraw from it. Hitler had unexpectedly summoned the Reichstag to meet, and the correspondents assumed that it was to give him a platform from which to address the world. All France was agog to know what he was going to say, and apparently that left the papers no space for the troubles of a Jewish Schieber.

  The next chance was the mail. A letter mailed in Bremerhaven or Berlin on the day before yesterday might
have arrived yesterday afternoon or it might not, but surely it would arrive this morning. Hansi was waiting downstairs at the hotel office; he couldn’t think about anything else, not even Lanny’s plans. He came rushing into the room, out of breath from running and from anxiety. “A letter in Mama’s handwriting!” He handed it to Lanny, to whom it was addressed; his own sense of propriety had not permitted him to open it.

  The letter had been scrawled in haste on a scrap of paper and mailed in a plain cheap envelope. Lanny tore it open, and his eyes took it in at a glance. He hated to read such words aloud, but there were five persons waiting in suspense. The letter was in German, and he translated it:

  “Oh, Lanny, the Nazis have seized the boat. They have arrested Papa. They would not tell us a word what they will do. They will arrest us if we go near them, but they will not arrest you. We are going to Berlin. We will try to stay there and wait for you. Come to the Adlon, and put it in the papers, we will watch there. We are so frightened. Dear Lanny, do not fail poor Papa. What will they do to him? I am alone. I made the children go. They must not find us all together. God help us all. Mama.”

  So there it was! Those poor souls traveling separately, and doomed to spend their days and nights in terror for themselves and grief for what might be happening to the father of the family! Hansi broke down and cried like a child, and Beauty did the same. Bess sat twisting her hands together. The others found it difficult to speak.

  Somebody had to take command of that situation, and Lanny thought it was up to him. “At least we know the worst,” he said, “and we have something to act on. As soon as the car comes, Irma and I will drive to Berlin, not stopping for anything.”

  “Don’t you think you ought to fly?” broke in Bess.

  “It will make only a few hours’ difference, and we shall need the car; it’s the right sort, and will impress the Nazis. This job is not going to be one of a few hours, I’m afraid.”

  “But think what they may be doing to him, Lanny!”

  “I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I doubt if they’ll do him serious harm. It must be money they’re after, and the job will be one of bargaining.”

  “He’s a Jew, Lanny.”

  “I know; but he has a great many friends at home and abroad, and the Nazis know it, and I don’t believe they want any needless scandals. It’s up to Irma and me to serve as mediators, as friends to both sides; to meet the right people and find out what it’s going to cost.”

  “You’ll be exhausted when you arrive,” objected Beauty, struggling with tears. She wanted him to take the chauffeur.

  “No,” said Lanny. “We’ll take turns sleeping on the back seat, and all we’ll need when we get there is a bath, a shave for me and some make-up for Irma. If we drive ourselves we can talk freely, without fear of spies, and I wouldn’t want to trust any servant, whether German or French. That goes for all the time we’re in Naziland.”

  XII

  There was a phone call for Lanny: Jerry Pendleton calling from Paris, to report that a letter from Germany had arrived. It bore no sender’s name, but Jerry had guessed that it might have some bearing on the situation. Lanny told him to open and read it. It proved to be an unsigned letter from Freddi, who had reached Berlin. He wrote in English, telling the same news, but adding that he and his wife were in hiding; they were not free to give the address, and were not sure how long they could stay. If Lanny would come to the Adlon, they would hear of it and arrange to meet him.

  To Jerry, Lanny said: “My family is coming to Paris at once. Do what you can to help them. I am telling them to trust you completely. You are to trust nobody but them.”

  “I get you.”

  “You are still Contrôleur-Général, and your salary goes on. Whatever expenses you incur will be refunded. Has the chauffeur left?”

  “He left at four this morning. He thinks he can make it by ten.”

  “All right, thanks.”

  Lanny reported all this to the family, and his mother said: “You ought to get some sleep before you start driving.”

  “I have too many things on my mind,” he replied. “You go and sleep, Irma, and you can do the first spell of driving.”

  Irma liked this new husband who seemed to know exactly what to do and spoke with so much decisiveness. She had once had a father like that. Incidentally, she was extremely tired, and glad to get away from demonstrative Jewish grief. Lanny said “Sleep,” and she was a healthy young animal, to whom it came easily. She had been half-hypnotized watching Parsifal Dingle, who would sit for a long time in a chair with his eyes closed; if you didn’t know him well you would think he was asleep, but he was meditating. Was he asking God to save Johannes Robin? Was he asking God to soften the hearts of the Nazis? God could do such things, no doubt; but it was hard to think out the problem, because, why had God made the Nazis in the beginning? If you said that the devil had made them, why had God made the devil?

  There was no longer any reason for anyone’s remaining in Calais, so Feathers went to buy tickets for Paris and arrange to have the mountain of luggage transported. Meanwhile Hansi and Bess and Lanny discussed the best way of getting Papa’s misfortune made known to the outside world. That would be an important means of help—perhaps the most important of all. Lanny’s first impulse was to call up the office of Le Populaire; but he checked himself, realizing that if he was going to turn into a Nazi sympathizer, he oughtn’t to be furnishing explosive news items to a Socialist paper. Besides, this was not a Socialist or Communist story; it had to do with a leading financier and belonged in the bourgeois press; it ought to come from the victim’s son, a distinguished person in his own right. Hansi and his wife should go to the Hotel Crillon, and there summon the newspaper men, both French and foreign, and tell them the news, and appeal for world sympathy. Lanny had met several of the American correspondents in Paris, and now he gave Hansi their names.

  “The Nazis lie freely,” said the budding intriguer, “and they compel you to do the same. Don’t mention the rest of your family, and if the reporters ask, say that you have not heard from them and have no idea where they are. Say that you got your information by telephoning to the yacht and to the palace. Put the burden of responsibility off on Reichsbetriebszellenabteilung Gruppenführerstellvertreter Pressmann, and let his Hauptgruppenführer take him down into the cellar and shoot him for it. Don’t ever drop a hint that you are getting information from your family, or from Irma or me. Make that clear to Jerry also. We must learn to watch our step from this moment on, because the Nazis want one thing and we want another, and if they win, we lose!”

  17

  Will You Walk into My Parlor?

  I

  Mr. and Mrs. Lanning Prescott Budd of Juan-les-Pins, France, registered themselves at the Hotel Adlon, on Unter den Linden. That is where the rich Americans stop, and this richest of young couples were installed in a suite appropriate to their state. Every luxury was put at their command. Attendants took their car and serviced it promptly and faithfully; a maid and a valet came to unpack their things and to carry off their clothes and press them; a bellboy brought iced drinks and copies of various morning newspapers. Lanny sat down at once and made certain that these contained no mention of a confiscated palace and yacht. There might be ever so much clamor in the outside world, but the German people would know only what their new masters considered proper for them. It was the seventeenth of May, and the headlines were devoted to the speech which the Führer was to deliver to the Reichstag at three o’clock that afternoon, dealing with the Geneva Conference on Arms Limitation and the attitude of the German government to its proposals.

  The telephone rang: a reporter requesting the honor of an interview with Mr. and Mrs. Budd. Lanny had wondered how it was going to be in this new world. Would money still make one a personage? Apparently it would. Tourist traffic, so vital to the German economy, had fallen off to a mere trickle as a result of the Jew-baiting, and the insulting of foreigners who had failed to give the Naz
i salute on the proper occasions. The papers must make the most of what few visitors came to them.

  Every large newspaper has a “morgue,” in Germany called the Archiv, from which one can ascertain without delay what has been published concerning any person. The reporter who receives an assignment of consequence consults this file before he sets out. So here was a smart young representative of the recently “co-ordinated” Zeitung am Mittag, fully informed as to the new arrivals, and asking the customary questions, beginning with: “What do you think of our country?”

  Lanny said that they had motored to Berlin in twenty-four hours, so their impressions were fleeting. They had been struck by the order and neatness they had seen along the way. They were non-political persons, and had no opinions concerning National Socialism, but they were open-minded, and glad to be shown. Lanny winced as he spoke, thinking of his Socialist friends who would read this. When the reporter asked if the outside world believed the stories of atrocities and persecutions in Germany, Lanny said he supposed that some did and some did not, according to their predilections—ihre Gesinnung, he said. He and his wife had come to renew old friendships, and also to make purchases of old masters for American collectors.

  All this would put him right with the Nazi world, and enable him to stay without exciting suspicion. Nothing was said about a Jewish brother-in-law or the brother-in-law’s Schieber father, either by this reporter or by others who followed. They were made welcome and treated to cigars and drinks by two friendly and informal darlings of fortune. Delightful people, the Americans, and the Germans admired them greatly, went to see their movies, adopted their slang, their sports, their drinks, their gadgets and fashions.

  II

  It was Lanny’s immediate duty to report himself to the Polizeiwache. He submitted the passports of himself and wife, and stated his business as art expert and his race as Aryan. Then he went back to the hotel, where he found a telegram from his mother in Paris: “Robbie reports grandfather died last night impossible Robbie come now he is cabling embassy concerning you advises you report there immediately.”