American Dreams (69 page)

When that occurs, we shall most certainly be operating there, to prevent shipments of arms manufactured in your country from reaching English ports.'

'Will you sink the ships?'

'I would hope they would strike their colors before that became necessary.'

'We're

talking of cargo vessels here?'

'Exactly so.'

'In London I heard rumors that arms are being sent over secretly on passenger ships.'

'Yes, we receive similar reports. It is said that some British liners carrying
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such contraband fly the flag of the United States to protect themselves.

A cowardly deception, in my opinion.'

, 'But even in a war zone, you wouldn't torpedo a ship flying a neutral flag, would you?'

'Oh, I am sure we shall never have to confront that unhappy question,'

the Kapitanleutnant said, evading. He stepped close to Paul so as not to be overheard by his men. 'However, Mr. Crown, I would urge you to exercise caution if you plan any trip to your homeland in the near future.'

'As a matter of fact I'll be going over for lecture engagements sometime next year. These pictures will be part of my program.'

'Then I advise you to cross on an American vessel, not a liner operated by Cunard or White Star. While those may be passenger ships, they are not neutrals.'

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'I see. Thanks for the warning.' Which he found appalling.

Gulls cried overhead, swooping above the whitecaps. The German ensign flapped and cracked on the conning tower flagstaff. Wilhelmshaven with its tidy streets and beach promenades had a quaint, peaceful look in the winter sunshine.

Paul reversed his cap and leaned into the camera. 'Ready, here we go.' Kapitdnleutnant Waldmann snapped to attention and saluted the lens smartly. Sammy turned his back and spat over the side. Several of the crewmen saw him and muttered. Sammy gave them glares.

That evening on shore, Paul and Sammy dined comfortably at an inn decorated for Christmas with wreaths and candles and a creche. A procession of children passed in the street singing 'Stille Nacht, Heilige Nachf in high, sweet voices.

Sammy asked for details of Paul's conversation with the Kapitdnleutnant that morning. Paul obliged.

'When I pressed him about what would happen if he came on a passenger ship suspected of carrying munitions, he tried to leave the impression that neither he nor any other U-boat commander would open fire. He left room for doubt, though.'

' 'Course he did, deceitful fucker.' Sammy mopped up veal gravy with a chunk of black bread. 'He'd torpedo a boatload of babies if some admiral ordered it - him an' all the rest of 'em in their fancy uniforms.'

Paul believed there was reason for Sammy's pessimism. In this season
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of goodwill toward men, savage fighting that raged on the Western front threatened to spread seaward with the U-boat fleet. London repeatedly accused Berlin of scorning established rules of warfare, substituting a policy of Schrecklichkeit - terribleness.

Paul finished his glass of strong Christmas beer. 'You may be right about that. I feel a duty to get back to the States and at least report what I see and hear. Millions of people are asleep over there.'

'Fancy the Atlantic protects 'em, do they?' Sammy said.

'That's true. It's time America wakes up to what's really happening.

Understands the threat. People have to be told the truth.'

it's noble of you to try, gov, but you can't do the whole job.'

i can make a start,' Paul said.

Winter of Discontent 433

78 Winter of Discontent

December settled early darkness on the mountains and the shore of California. Fritzi hated to see the sun set because it meant the hour of sleep was that much nearer, and sleep no longer brought her release, but instead frequent nightmares of loss, failure, pursuit, even death. In one dream that recurred she was Richard III, humpbacked and ugly, raging against fate. In another Loy rode away from her on a stallion with a flowing mane, always out of reach, and laughing.

She. hated Christmas 1914 - found no joy in it, only burdens: shopping, wrapping, posting, giving, all empty and sad. Carols sounded discordant.

Good wishes of the season voiced by friends and acquaintances sounded hypocritical, meaningless.

Of an evening she began to cook in Mrs. Hong's kitchen, for herself and sometimes Lily. She cooked simple fare that was hard to botch. Starchy, heavy dishes like spaghetti; if she was alone she would devour several plates of it, accompanied by beer. She brought home sacks of seeded rolls from a small bakery in Venice and ate two, three, four at a time. The eating was prompted in part by the comfort food provided, in part by a return of her lifelong conviction that she was scrawny, therefore undesirable.

She

decided that too many bad memories lived under the bed in the room she rented. After talking it over with Lily and settling what she owed the Hongs, she leased a small house on a hilly side street off North
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Whitley, in Hollywood. California Mediterranean, it pleased the eye with

' its golden stucco and half-round red roof tiles. Or it would have pleased if there'd been room in her heart and mind for architectural niceties.

She moved in two days after New Year's. To commemorate the occasion and relieve the long, lonely silences of the night hours, she replaced her old talking machine with a new, fancier one, a Victor, with a painted flower shaped horn that poured sad romantic music through the house.

On her first Sunday in her new home, her friends and coworkers surprised her with a housewarming, organized by Hobart and Polo. Those closest to her knew of Loy Hardin's abrupt departure, and the party was meant to cheer her up.

Eddie brought Rita, Jock Ferguson brought his lrma, B.B. brought 434

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Sophie. Al Kelly pleaded another obligation and sent a cheap vase of carnival glass. Charlie sent a telegram of good wishes.

Little Mary brought Fairbanks; their affair was an open secret in the picture community. The handsome actor's memory had undergone a marvelous rejuvenation. He fussed and hugged Fritzi as though they'd been chums since childhood.

Mr. Hong furnished the champagne, obtained at a cut price through a wholesaler he knew. While Mrs. Hong beamed approvingly, Mr. Hong offered a toast to a happy house favored by the gods. No such luck there, Fritzi thought as she raised her glass. She had the solitude she craved, but no peace.

On Monday night, February 8, David Wark Griffith premiered The Clansman downtown at Clune's Auditorium. The picture had already been shown at surprise previews in remote locales such as Riverside, but Fritzi had heard little about it, except that a subtitle, The Birth of a Nation, had been added, and Negro groups had vainly attempted to block showings by going to court.

rickets for the Los Angeles premiere cost two dollars. Despite the high price all twenty-five hundred seats sold out, and scalpers got as much as twenty dollars on the weekend before the showing. The gala event at 'the Theater Beautiful' was somewhat disrupted by the presence of a dozen black people picketing under the Fifth Street marquee. Since the picture hadn't been shown locally, Fritzi assumed they were protesting on the assumption that it followed the racist story line of the Dixon novel.

Placards identified the pickets as members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, an organization less than ten
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years old.

Fritzi's escort for the evening was Hobart, who still managed to be a presence even though he was no taller than her shoulder. Edging toward seventy, Hobart refused to discuss age or birthdays. His heart trouble hadn't recurred, though Fritzi from time to time cautioned him against overexertion.

Polo had friends in the tailoring trade, so Hobart's formal suit fit him well, minimizing to the extent possible his bow legs and his stomach, which of late resembled the front end of a Zeppelin. The old actor had long ago trimmed his shoulder-length Oscar Wilde hair, but time had removed it on the top of his head, and he insisted on covering his baldness i

I

Winter of Discontent 435

with a ridiculous shiny chestnut wig that always seemed to sit a bit crookedly, one day listing to port, the next to starboard; in a brisk breeze it had a tendency to slip astern.

On the way into the theater, Fritzi nearly collided with Loretta Gash.

The reporter's red satin cloak and turban shimmered under the electric lights. The look she gave Fritzi was hostile, the abruptness with which she turned away a calculated affront -- if Fritzi had bothered to be offended.

A full symphony orchestra in the pit played the score for Griffith's film.

From the first notes of the overture, a thrill of excitement swept the crowd.

The tale of a Southern family before and after the Civil War enthralled the audience. Fritzi admired Mr. Griffith's ambition, and the genius displayed in composition and editing. The battle scenes, including the one whose filming she'd watched, were spectacular. Her heartbeat quickened when the Little Colonel, dapper Henry Walthall, charged the Union guns with a Confederate banner he spiked into the mouth of a cannon. After the intermission, the Wan galloping to the rescue of the beleaguered family had undeniable power and exciterhent, intensified by the 'Ride of the Valkyrie' thundering out of the pit. One of those hooded riders was Loy, she recalled sadly.

But stirred as Fritzi was by the technique of the film, she was at the same time repelled by the story. She remained a child of General Joe Crown, who had fought to make black people free and equal citizens, not buffoons of the kind Griffith depicted - ignoramuses in loud suits who gnawed chicken legs and tossed the bones on the floor of South Carolina's Reconstruction legislature. Griffith's Kentucky boyhood, his father's service
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as a Rebel officer, explained his sympathies, but she didn't see that it justified glamorizing night riders while turning blacks into satyrs and clowns.

She was among the few who didn't stand during the final ovation. In the lobby she avoided the line of well-wishers waiting to congratulate the director.

Lily sauntered into the tent with a folded tabloid-size paper under her arm. The tent was white canvas, with a solid floor, set up behind the sun bleached building that contained Liberty's regular, cramped dressing rooms. A small wooden sign hanging outside the tent said MISS CROWN

'Say, Fritz, where the hell did this come from?'

Fritzi swung around on the stool in front of the makeup table. 'The tent? It was here when I arrived this morning.' Her studied shrug tried to minimize the significance, but Lily whistled anyway.

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'A dressing tent of your own. You're coming up in the world.'

She handed Fritzi the copy of Screen Play. 'Go on, take a look. Page four.'

One side of Lily's shirtwaist hung out, stained by something bright yellow, perhaps mustard. Index and middle fingers of her right hand were a darker yellow-brown. She lit a cigarette and leaned against the center pole while Fritzi turned pages. Lily had already missed two days of work this week. She was gaunt, with a gray pallor.

. .. Also seen at the premiere of Griffith's epic: Liberty's comedy star Fritzi Crown, on the arm of tragedian Hobart Manchester (NOT her usual escort, Screen Play can reveal for the first time). Miss C may be one of the new royalty of this town, but in private she's strictly declasse, playing

'bunk-house' with a cowboy bit player with dirt under his nails and whoknowswhat in his past. A lot of these Cactus Charlies who hang out at the Waterhole looking for day wages are reputed to be one step ahead of the law back home on the range. Careful, Fritzi!

'Oh, good God.' She threw the paper down.

Lily exhaled cigarette smoke. 'What'd you do to her?'

'Nothing. I saw her at a party in December. I wouldn't answer her cheap questions about Loy.'

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'He's gone.'

'Obviously she doesn't know that.'

Lily clucked and shook her head. 'Lots of people read that bitch. Lots of them believe every word she writes.'

'Oh, come on, trash like that can't hurt me.'

Lily ground the wooden match under the toe of her red leather pump.

'I sure hope not. Kelly's secretary said he saw it and didn't like it. Said it reflects badly on the studio. What a fucking hypocrite.'

She got to meet Kelly face to face later that afternoon, in B.B.'s office.

'I called this meeting to discuss how we can speed up production of pictures starring this little gel,' B.B. said. In front of him lay large sheets of pale green columnar paper inked with figures. Fritzi and Eddie sat in front of B.B's desk. Al Kelly hunched in a chair in the corner, regarding Fritzi with a bilious eye.

Eddie spoke first: 'Do we want to do that? We might glut the market.'

Kelly snorted. 'We could finish a two-reel Nellie every third day and not glut the market. The exchanges are screaming for them.'

Winter of Discontent 437

'Even in England, where they got the war to think about,' B.B. agreed.

'Scandinavians and Dutchmen are standing in line. Froggies too. I'm heading over there in a few weeks to check the situation personally.

Negotiate some better percentages. If they want Liberty product, they got to pay for it.'

Fritzi said, is a trip like that a good idea with all those German submarines prowling? I read that they sank an American cargo ship, the William Frye, and it was just carrying wheat, not munitions.'

'You're a sweet gel to worry, but we got an investment to protect, and I smell a rat in the woodpile. Some of those frogs and eyeties may be cooking the books and stealing us blind. Besides, there's a hundred ships crossing the Atlantic all the time, and only a few of those Hun subs. I got no worries. We're taking that fabulous Cunard boat, Lusitania?

The following Saturday, she worked a half day. In the afternoon Hobart and Polo arrived at the house with a noisy, lively present. A female dachshund puppy from a pet shop.