Rick spoke with eloquence, more than he usually permitted himself. The reason was that it was a scene from his play. He was writing about people confronted with just such a cruel decision. He didn’t say: "Let’s all put our money and our labors into getting an anti-Nazi play produced, and use the proceeds to start a paper to oppose the Nazis." But that was what he had in mind, and Rahel knew that if her husband could speak to her, he would say: "Rick is right."
But poor Mama! She was no Socialist, and couldn’t make real to herself the task of saving all the Jews in Germany. She kept silence, for she saw that Rick had convinced Rahel and Lanny; but what gave her hope was a letter from Johannes, about to sail for Rio de Janeiro to try to work up business for Budd Gunmakers. "I’m going to get some money again, and then I’ll find a way to get Freddi out." That was the sort of talk for a sensible Jewish mother!
V
The Riviera was full of refugees from Germany; all France was the same. Many of these unfortunates tried to get hold of Lanny Budd, but he was afraid even to answer their letters. He was still clinging to the idea that Göring might release Freddi; if not, Lanny was going back to make some sort of effort. Therefore he had to be circumspect. Trying to play the spy makes one spy-conscious. How could he be sure that any refugee who appealed to him for aid might not have come from Göring, to find out how he was behaving, and whether he was a person to be dealt with?
All this suited Irma completely. She didn’t care what was the reason, so long as her husband kept away from Reds and troublemakers. She and Beauty and Emily and Sophie consulted and conspired to keep him busy and contented; to provide him with music and dancing and sports, with interesting people to talk to, with Jerry Pendleton and the faithful Bub Smith to go fishing. Best of all for the purpose was little Frances; Irma got a book on child psychology and actually read every word of it, so as to be able to make intelligent remarks, and keep Lanny interested in what his home had to offer. She made love to him assiduously; and of course he knew what she was doing, and was touched by it. But he took Dachau with him everywhere; at one of Emily’s soirées musicales a strain of sad music brought tears to his eyes, and then a pro-Nazi remark by one of the ladies of the haut monde made the blood rush to his head and ruined his appetite for the delicate viands.
Early in February Robbie Budd arrived in Paris on a business trip. Irma thought that change of scene would help, and she knew that the father would back her point of view; so they put their bags into the car and arrived at the Crillon the evening before Robbie was due. Always a pleasant thing to see that man of affairs, sound and solid, if a little too rotund and rosy. He was taking his loss of the presidency of the company as just one of those things; what can’t be cured must be endured, and Robbie was getting along with the new head. A self-made man, well informed on financial conditions, he had won everyone’s respect; he didn’t try to tell Robbie how to sell goods in Europe, and had taken Robbie’s word as to the capabilities of Johannes Robin. Things were going on much as in the old days.
Robbie wanted to hear every detail of what had happened in Germany. It was important for him to understand the Nazis, for they were trying to get credit from Budd’s and from the banking group which now had Budd’s under its wing. Morals had nothing to do with it—except as they bore on the question whether the Third Reich would meet its notes on time.
Robbie and the two young people discussed the problem of Freddi from every point of view, and Robbie gave his approval of what had been done. He said no more in his son’s presence, but when he was alone with Irma he confirmed her idea that the Reds and Pinks of Germany had brought their troubles upon themselves. Nor was he worried about Hitler; he said that all Britain and France had to do was to stand together firmly, and let the Nazis devote their energies to putting down the Red menace throughout eastern and central Europe.
Of course it was unfortunate that one of the victims of this conflict had to be a young Jewish idealist. They must try to help the poor fellow, if only for the family’s peace of mind. Robbie, who usually thought of money first, made the guess that if Freddi really was in Dachau it was because of Irma’s stocks and bonds. Rumor invariably multiplied a rich person’s holdings by three or four, and sometimes by ten or twenty; the fat General doubtless was expecting to get many millions in ransom. Robbie said that he himself would offer to go in and see what could be done; but he didn’t propose to see Irma plundered, so the best thing was to wait and let Göring show his hand if he would. Irma appreciated this attitude, and wondered why Lanny couldn’t be as sensible.
One thing Robbie said he was unable to understand: the fact that they had never received a single line of writing from Freddi in more than eight months. Surely any prisoner would be permitted to communicate with his relatives at some time! Lanny told what he had learned from the Kommandant of Dachau, that the inmates were permitted to write a few lines once a week to their nearest relatives; but this privilege was withheld in certain cases. Robbie said: "Even so, there are ways of smuggling out letters; and certainly there must be prisoners released now and then. You’d think some one of them would have your address, and drop a note to report the situation. It suggests to me that Freddi may be dead; but I don’t say it to the Robins."
VI
Hard times were producing in France the same effects they had produced in Germany; and now the political pot boiled over, making a nasty mess. It was the "Stavisky case," centering about a swindler of Russian-Jewish descent. "Too bad he had to be a Jew!" said Irma, and Lanny wasn’t sure whether she was being sympathetic or sarcastic. "Handsome Alex," as he was called, had been engaged in one piece of financial jugglery after another, culminating in a tour de force which sounded like comic opera—he had promoted an extensive issue of bonds for the pawnshops of the town of Bayonne! Altogether he had robbed the French public of something like a billion francs; and it was discovered that he had been indicted for a swindle eight or nine years previously, and had succeeded in having his trial postponed no less than nineteen times. Obviously this meant collusion with police and politicians; either he was paying them money or was in position to blackmail them. When Robbie read the details he said it sounded exactly like Chicago or Philadelphia.
Stavisky had gone into hiding with his mistress, and when the police came for him he shot himself; at least, so the police said, but evidence began to indicate that the police had hushed him up. The Paris newspapers, the most corrupt in the world, printed everything they could find out and twenty times as much. Two groups were interested in exploiting the scandals: the parties of the extreme right, the Royalists and Fascists, who wanted to overthrow the Republic and set up their kind of dictatorship; and the Communists, who wanted a different kind. The two extremes met, and while vowing the deadliest hatred, they made war on the same parliamentary system.
Lanny couldn’t afford to visit his Red uncle, but he invited Denis de Bruyne to dinner, and the three Budds listened to the story from the point of view of a French Nationalist. The situation in the de Bruyne family bore an odd resemblance to that between Robbie and his son. Denis belonged to a respectable law-and-order party, and was distressed because his younger son had joined the Croix de Feu, most active of the French Fascist groups. Now Charlot was off somewhere with his fellows, conspiring to overpower the police and seize control of the country’s affairs. At any moment he and his organization might come out on the streets, and there would be shooting; the unhappy father couldn’t enjoy his dinner, and wanted Lanny to find the crazy boy and try to bring him to his senses. Such were the duties you got in for when you chose a lovely French lady for your amie!