“Thank you,” Varian said. “I’ll tell Zilberman. He’ll be delighted.”
“I must work now, Monsieur Fry, before the light is gone.”
“Madame Chagall wanted me to tell you she’s waiting for you downstairs.”
“She is, as you can see, here with me,” the painter said, and turned back to his canvas. He lifted a brush and began to apply a white-blue glow, the opposite of shadow, to the undersides of the angel-doves.
* * *
________
That night Grant passed a terrible six hours between midnight and dawn. He had become acclimated to the morphine dose now, but the doctor refused to give him more. Killer, their other source of morphine, had left Air Bel; Varian had no idea where he’d gone. Mary Jayne had vanished along with him, leaving a one-line note: I don’t expect you to understand. Grant sat upright in bed, leaning forward on a stack of pillows, in the only position that gave him any relief; the pain was still so acute that sleep was nearly impossible. Every time he began to nod, his body would shift and he would jolt awake. Varian held Grant’s hand, he read him incomprehensible lines from Finnegans Wake, he gave him doses of brandy, he sat at the head of the bed so Grant could rest against him. But there was no relief, not a moment all night when Grant’s body relaxed entirely. Even in his brief moments of sleep his body was tensed against the next jolt of pain. By dawn he was weeping silently, wishing aloud that he could die.
“I’m afraid I can’t let you,” Varian said. “Not just yet.” Holding Grant from behind, he put a hand against his forehead; it was damp and cool. “Your fever hasn’t gone above a hundred for three days now. The inflammation around your heart will soon go down. That’s what the doctor says.”
“I’ll kill myself if I—have to pass another night like this,” Grant said. “Swear to God.”
Varian smoothed the sweat-damp waves of his hair. “What about your life not belonging to you, et cetera?”
Grant gave a harsh sob. “If you—cared about me at all,” he managed to say, “you would have either found more morphine or—killed me by now.”
“As soon as it’s light, I’ll run to town and knock down that doctor’s door.”
“You’d better.” He shifted and grimaced.
“Grant, can you tell me something?” Varian said. He’d been thinking about this all night; he couldn’t help saying it now. “The political situation’s growing worse by the day. We have fewer and fewer allies here. What would you do if I were forcibly ejected from France? Don’t you think we should have some plan?”
“Tom. I can’t—plan the next minute just now.”
“All right.”
Grant paused, took two pained breaths. “If you’re ejected—forced out—I’ll go—wherever you are.”
“And where will that be? Where will I go? I have no job anymore. And I’m fairly certain that, with my last letter to Eileen, I’ll soon be without a home. It’s not as though I can just go to yours. Do you know, I don’t even know where you live. I’ve never asked this—do you live with Gregor? With him? You’ve said you’re up near Columbia. 112th Street. That’s all.”
“Give me that—sheet of paper on the desk, there,” Grant said. “And—a book or something.”
Varian complied, and Grant wrote an address on the sheet of paper. Folded it. Put it into Varian’s hand. “A ridiculous—exercise,” Grant said. “But. There it is. My address. Mine alone. Not—Gregor’s.” He let his head fall back onto Varian’s shoulder, and Varian held him there.
“I’d like to see you in my—” Grant shifted and groaned. “In my—”
“Bed. You’d like to see me in your bed.”
A laugh that was half-sob. “Not what I was going to say. But yes. Oh, yes.”
“You will. Or we’ll run off somewhere together and never see New York again.”
“South America,” Grant said. “I hear Rio is—ah! God—fine this time of year.”
“Brazil,” Varian said, in a low and velvet tone. “That’s where we’ll go. Brazil.” And he repeated it, a rhythmic one-word mantra, until at last Grant closed his eyes and slept.
32
Gone
After that long night awake with Grant, he experienced the next morning as if from a numbing distance. At the office he strategized with Danny and Theo, discussed money with Jean, reviewed cases with Lucie Heymann, the new secretary, but his own voice seemed to emanate from somewhere outside of him; he felt incapable of making any decision or judgment. At lunchtime he resolved to go for a walk to the Vieux Port and let the mistral shock him awake. He had just gotten up to put on his jacket when Lucie came to his open door and knocked twice on the frame. She looked stricken, her pale skin stark beneath the black wing of her hair.
“What is it?” Varian said.
“Madame Chagall’s on the phone. Crying, I believe.”
Varian ran to pick up the extension in his office. The line was full of hiss and crackle, as though a bonfire were burning at the other end.
“Bella?” Varian said. “What’s happened?”
“They’ve arrested Marc! And dozens of others. Can you hear me?”
“What?”
“Arrested him! Taken him off to the Evêché.”
“God. When?”
“Just now! I can see them from the window, they’re marching everyone down the street in columns.”
“Who did they arrest? Refugees?”
“Jews,” she said. “All Jews. Nearly the entire clientele of the Moderne. I was in the bath, thank God they didn’t check. Can you help, Monsieur Fry? What must I do?”
“I’ll telephone the Préfecture,” Varian said. “Don’t go anywhere. I’ll call you the moment I have news.”
“Shouldn’t I come to the office?”
“No. I don’t want you on the street. If anyone comes to the door, don’t answer.”
“All right,” Bella said, and hung up.
A moment later he rang the Evêché. “Connect me to Captain Villand’s office at once,” he said to the operator. “Tell the secretary it’s Varian Fry, director of the Centre Américain de Secours. Say it’s an emergency.”
“Hold the line,” the operator said. There was a click on the other end, and a long pause. Then the secretary answered, and Varian demanded to speak to Villand.
“I’m afraid Captain Villand is occupied at the moment,” the secretary said. “Would you like me to transmit a message?”
“Listen to me, and listen hard,” Varian said. “This is Varian Fry, director of the Centre Américain de Secours. I want you to tell Captain Villand that his men have just arrested Marc Chagall—yes, that Chagall—and are conducting him in handcuffs to the Evêché. Tell the captain I must speak with him at once.”
“Hold the line, monsieur,” the secretary said.
Another silence. After what seemed an unbearable interval, there was a rattle and a click, and then a familiar voice came on the line. The captain demanded to know who had disturbed him at his work.
“It’s Varian Fry,” Varian said. “Director of the Centre Américain de Secours. Maybe you remember me. You were kind enough to receive me last fall.”
There was silence at first, then a distinctive snap-click: the sound of Villand’s brass pineapple lighter. Villand took a round, shallow breath: the first draw of a cigar.
“Yes, I remember you, Fry. What is it you want? Something regarding Chagall?”
“I’ve just had a call from Chagall’s wife. Apparently her husband is in police custody, having been rounded up with most of the guest roster of the Hôtel Moderne. Do you hear what I’m saying, sir? Marc Chagall himself will shortly be arriving at the Evêché, handcuffed like any criminal.”
“I didn’t give an order for the arrest of Marc Chagall,” Villand said. “I haven’t heard of it.”
�
��Now you have,” Varian said.
“I’m not responsible for this,” Villand said. “If you’d like to make an official complaint—”
“Consider this my official complaint. You’re the secretary-general of the Préfecture of the Bouches du Rhône. If you’re not responsible, who is? What will happen once the news hits the papers tomorrow? Will you tell the people of France, will you tell the world, you simply had no idea that Marc Chagall was a prisoner under your own roof? That one of the living treasures of this continent, one of the greatest painters who has ever lived, was simply swept into a vast dustbin along with everyone else?”
There was a silence on the other end. Another cigar puff. “Monsieur Fry, matters of arrest and detention are often complicated. You may not know the full history.”
“Here’s all the history that matters: Chagall is in chains. His wife is frantic for his safety. And frankly, having seen the conditions of your detainment facilities, I share her sentiment. I must insist you locate Monsieur Chagall and release him at once. If not for his own value, if not for what he means to France, then to avert your own disgrace in the eyes of the world!”
“I will investigate, monsieur,” Villand said gruffly, and disconnected.
Varian slammed the phone into its cradle. His staff, gathered at the open door, broke into applause.
“Bravo!” Danny said. “That was brilliant.”
“This is no laughing matter. Chagall’s in jail.”
“Not for long, I’d bet.”
And he was right. An hour later, as Varian paced the office in a frenzy of anxiety, there was a knock at the outer door; Lucie opened it to find Chagall himself, carrying a pasteboard tube under his arm. Everyone fell silent. Chagall nodded to Danny and Jean, to Theo and Gussie and Lucie. Then he crossed the room to Varian and presented the tube to him.
“Here are the drawings we spoke about,” he said, his eyes sharp and bright. “I thought I’d bring them myself.”
“Marc, you don’t know how glad I am to see you!”
“It was an unpleasant matter. But Capitaine Villand was most apologetic. And now Monsieur Zilberman will have the work he requested.”
Varian took the tube of drawings. “Thank you, truly.”
“And I thank you, Monsieur Fry. I didn’t want to believe you, all those months ago. But you were right. In the end, my position meant nothing to them.”
“It did mean something,” Varian said. “Here you stand, free and unharmed.”
“Because you called,” Chagall said. “Because you insisted, according to Villand. Who knows what might have happened otherwise? And look what was waiting for me when I returned to my hotel.” He pulled from his pocket a thick ivory-colored envelope, which he urged Varian to open. On its front was the seal of the Consulate of the United States, and inside was a letter indicating that the Chagalls had been granted their entry visas. The usual thirty-day window had been waived, opening a broad and limitless path between Chagall and the States.
“Now, Monsieur Fry, we must leave France at the soonest possible moment. And may Monsieur Zilberman precede us! I shall be in touch with my contacts in New York to arrange everything. No practical matter must impede him once he arrives in the States. He must be allowed to make his work, and we must bring it to the attention of the world.”
Varian assured him that he would arrange passage for the Chagalls on the next steamship with a pair of open berths, and that he wouldn’t rest until Zilberman was safely en route. He would go home that minute to deliver the drawings.
“Let me go with you,” Chagall said. “Let me give him the drawings myself. I’d like to see him once more before we go, or before he does.”
“Of course,” Varian said. “And you’ll dine with us? Our garden has just started to yield.”
Chagall agreed, and phoned Bella to inform her of his plan; Bella said she would meet them at the tram stop. Then they left the office with Theo and Danny and Jean, and soon they were all aboard the blue-and-white tram to La Pomme. On the way, they discussed possible sailings for the Chagalls: a boat called the Winnipeg was to leave for Martinique in nine days’ time, and might still have places available; or the Chagalls might travel by train to Portugal, since they now had all the necessary visas and could sail directly from Lisbon to New York.
The pines and cypresses passed in a green blur, the green-yellow sweep of the countryside falling away to the south. How rich it had felt, Varian thought, to shout at that bastard Villand, to shame him into action on Chagall’s behalf. He remembered again what Miriam Davenport had said, months ago, about calculated risk; perhaps he had learned the lesson at last. He would have to write her, tell her what she’d given him. His exhaustion had vanished. All he felt now was gratification, and the thrill of riding the rails toward Grant, to deliver the day’s story to him.
At La Pomme they crossed under the railway and walked the lane of plane trees, Chagall in the lead, swinging the cardboard tube at the roadside grasses as if mowing them with a scythe. Jean Gemähling escorted Bella, and Theo and Danny walked arm in arm; they might have been a family of grown children with their august parents, heading into the countryside for a picnic. They followed Chagall around to the back of the house, toward the greenhouse, where Zilberman could always be found at this hour of the afternoon. But the greenhouse door hung askew from one hinge, the glass broken.
They ran to the greenhouse, pushed inside. Glass lay everywhere, glass and paints and pastels and brushes and blood, strands of it, drops of it, on the floor, on the greenhouse windows. The blue door, the one the children had discovered in the garden, lay flat on the ground, broken glass glittering around it like salt. The drawings that had been pinned to it were gone.
“Where is the Flight Portfolio?” Chagall said. “Where does he keep it?”
“There,” Varian said, pointing; but there was nothing on the table but broken glass, nothing on the floor but splintered wood and tubes of paint and dirty oil pastels and blood and more glass. They searched every corner of the greenhouse, even the root cellar below, but it was gone, all of it but the two drawings Chagall held in his cardboard tube.
They stumbled out onto the patio in a daze. Varian couldn’t comprehend what he had seen; his head thrummed with a noise like the far-off roaring of a crowd. Then the door of the house opened and there was Grant, dressed in pajama pants and a half-buttoned shirt, gasping in pain as he crossed the paving stones.
Varian ran to him and took his arm. “What happened? Did you see?”
Grant bent and put his hands on his knees, breathing hard. “They came for him—while he was—” The effort of speaking broke across his face, and he closed his eyes. “I heard them coming up the drive. A police car, and a van. I tried to—shout down to him. Tried to get downstairs. But they—got to him first. Took the work, all of it. Everything he was going to—bring to the States. I demanded to know—where were they taking him? But they pushed me off. Put him in the van with some others. Madame Nouguet went to call you. She’s on her way into—town now.” He leaned against Varian, his skin burning hot.
“God, Skiff. Danny, Jean, help me! Help me get him up to bed. How did you even make it down here? God, how am I going to get the doctor?”
“I’ll go to the depot,” Jean said. “I’ll telephone from there.”
“And I’ll return to town and go to the Evêché myself,” Chagall said. “That must be where they’ve taken him.”
“No!” Varian said. “I’ll go to the Evêché. You’ll go back to town, but straight to your hotel. Don’t give them a chance to regret letting you go.”
“But Zilberman’s in danger.”
“I’ll go myself. As soon as the doctor arrives, I’ll go.”
“Go now,” Danny said. “Theo and I can look after Grant.”
Theo nodded, her serious eyes fixed on his own. “You must, Varian.”
“Please,” Grant said. “Don’t stay here a minute longer for my sake.”
“Let me see you upstairs first.”
He and Danny helped Grant up to bed. The doctor would come, Danny assured him; he would do what he could. There was nothing Varian could do but get back to town, to the Evêché, and demand to see Zilberman at once.
* * *
________
There again at the old Bishop’s Palace, walking beneath the stone archway with its bas-relief of cockleshells and fronds of greenery, Varian was not without hope; after all, he’d made them release Chagall. But as the functionary who’d met him at the front desk led him farther into the building, Varian realized with a contraction of the gut where they were taking him: directly to Captain Villand’s office.
“Ah,” said Villand, as Varian entered. “Monsieur Fry. I can’t imagine what could bring you here now, unless you’ve come to thank me for releasing your protégé, Chagall. Have you perhaps changed your mind? Shall we arrest him again?” Villand’s milky blue eyes caught the light, seeming to reflect a glitter of pleasure.
“I’ve come to see Monsieur Zilberman,” Varian said. “I demand an audience with him at once. And I want the portfolio of works on paper, the one your men took.”
Villand tsked, reaching for his brass pineapple again. He didn’t light it right away; he sat for a while with his finger on the roller, making it pronounce its faint rasp. “The company you keep, Monsieur Fry!” he said. “You seem to have forgotten that you are a guest of France, and that to consort with suspected criminals casts suspicion upon your own character. As for whatever else my men might have removed in the process of the arrest, that is to be retained as evidence.”
“Zilberman is not a criminal. And if the Flight Portfolio is evidence of anything, it’s of the brilliance, the genius, of the very people you’re trying to track down and kill.”
“Ah, I see. Then why on earth wouldn’t I just hand it over? Silly me, following the protocols of criminal justice all this time, when I might have simply consulted you!”
The Flight Portfolio Page 50
