an intolerable insult, for which the Jews must be punished. How? Minister of Propaganda Josef Goebbels met with Chancellor Hitler, and they determined that the German people would avenge the insult with attacks on the Jewish population — in Berlin, and throughout Germany. Thus, on the night of 9 November, at 11.55 p.m., an order was issued by the Gestapo: B ERLIN N O. 234404 9 N OVEMBER, 1938 To all Gestapo Stations and Gestapo District Stations To Officer or Deputy This teleprinter message is to be submitted without delay: 1. At very short notice, Aktionen against Jews, especially against their synagogues, will take place throughout the whole of Germany. They are not to be hindered. In conjunction with the police, however, it is to be ensured that looting and other particular excesses can be prevented. 2. If important archival material is in synagogues, this is to be taken into safekeeping by an immediate measure. 3. Preparations are to be made for the arrest of about 20,000- 30,000 Jews in the Reich. Wealthy Jews in particular are to be selected. 4. Should, in the forthcoming Aktionen, Jews be found to be in possession of weapons, the most severe measures are to be taken. SS reserves as well as the General SS can be mobilized in the total Aktionen. The direction of the Aktionen by the Gestapo is in any case to be assured by appropriate measures. Gestapo II Muller This teleprinter message is secret.
9 November. The Lufthansa flight to Berlin would leave Le Bourget Airport at 10.20 a.m. A photographer from the Paris office of the DNB — Deutsches Nachrichtenburo, the German press agency — was at the airport, waiting to photograph Stahl as he climbed the stairway that was wheeled up to the door of the aeroplane. Starting early, Stahl thought. Very thorough, very Teutonic. But it would be a good photo — the handsome movie star in fedora and trench coat, the caption to read, American movie star Fredric Stahl leaves for Berlin. ‘Over here, Herr Stahl,’ the photographer called out. ‘Could you give us a wave?’ Then, ‘Thank you. Another?’ Well, Stahl told himself, you’d better be as good an actor as they say. Otherwise, the photo would reveal a very anxious man, going off to meet a bad fate.
In the plane, Herr Emhof was waiting for him, black-framed glasses tilted over his bulging eyes as he read his morning newspaper. ‘Ah, here you are, right on time,’ Emhof said as Stahl settled himself in a seat across the aisle.
‘Good morning, Herr Emhof,’ Stahl said. ‘A good day for flying.’ True enough. Despite a low sky heavy with Parisian cloud, it was, everywhere but in Stahl’s mind, calm weather. Stahl wasn’t surprised to find Emhof waiting for him, making sure his package would be delivered to Berlin, bringing his treasure home. Once Stahl had made the change-of-mind telephone call to Moppi — who’d been so excited Stahl could hear him breathing — he knew the machine would be put in motion.
For Stahl, some serious thought had gone into that call, a matter of tone. What he’d finally come up with was not precisely apologetic, something closer to I don’t really know why I made such a fuss about this. ‘I spoke with the publicity people in Paris,’ Stahl told Moppi. ‘And they thought it was a good idea. So, off to Berlin!’ Frivolous. Devil-may-care. It doesn’t matter. In fact, the newly cooperative Stahl had elected to stay a second night in his suite at the Hotel Adlon, so he could be honoured at the banquet opening the festival, then would announce the winners at a second banquet the following night.
What he’d told Moppi was, like any good lie, partly true. He had spoken to Mme Boulanger about the journey — he didn’t want her surprised, if she found out, didn’t want her to think he had secrets. And though he couldn’t tell her what he was really doing, he could lie persuasively, and confided to Mme Boulanger that ‘someone at Warner Bros.’ had suggested he go ahead and attend the festival. But he’d prefer, if possible, that nothing appear in the Paris press. She’d thought for a moment, then said, ‘I don’t see that they’d care, when you think about it, it has nothing to do with France.’ As long as no press release was issued in Paris, she suspected the event would slide past without public notice.
He’d told Jean Avila the same thing. Avila had grimaced, his loathing of Nazi Germany was no secret, but he understood Stahl’s position and simply said, ‘As long as you’re back on time, to hell with it.’ And then, he just couldn’t resist, ‘If they put you in a camp, be sure and send me a postcard. “Dachau at Sunset” maybe, if they have that one.’
Very funny. No, not so funny.
Emhof broke into his reverie. ‘Are you feeling well, this morning?’
‘I am,’ Stahl said. ‘And looking forward to the festival.’
With one finger, Stahl touched the inside pocket of his jacket, making sure, yet once again, that what he carried in there was still with him. He didn’t need to touch the pockets of his trousers, those were so full he could feel them against his body. ‘It’s quite safe, that way,’ Wilkinson had told him in the stacks of the American Library. ‘They wouldn’t dare to search you. Not you.’ Wilkinson had spread his hands and smiled — that’s why you’re valuable. Still, there was some considerable bulk to the money, two hundred thousand Swiss francs in thousand- franc notes — a little less than fifty thousand dollars. And then there was the crucial ten-reichsmark note, in his shirt pocket. Stahl had wanted to go back over the whole thing, making sure he had it all right, but heavy footsteps were ascending the stairs and Wilkinson had laid his index finger across his lips and with his other hand had gripped Stahl’s shoulder. Goodbye. Good luck. Strong, J. J. Wilkinson, perhaps he’d played football, somewhere in the Ivy League. Then the diplomat walked away down the narrow aisle, leaving the Dewey Decimal 330.94s, European Economies, for Languages in the 400s.
Grey mist whipped past the aeroplane window, stubbled fields and dark evergreens below when it cleared. Emhof, saying, ‘Perhaps you’d like something to read,’ handed Stahl the day’s newspapers, German newspapers. Well good, Stahl thought, a diversion. But of course it wasn’t. On top of the stack, Volkischer Beobachter — the nationalist observer — the Nazi party newspaper owned by Adolf Hitler. Or perhaps Das Reich, owned by Propaganda Minister Goebbels? Stahl settled on the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, supposedly the choice of German intellectuals.
Stahl had read his share of Los Angeles tabloids; dreadful crimes and humorous gossip — humorous as long as it wasn’t about you — and he’d grown up with an Austrian press that could be venomous and often was, but what he had before him was something new. Hitler here and Hitler there, Hitler and his cronies everywhere. What a newspaper! It grovelled and fawned, down on its knees in the hope that its lord and master would present a certain part of himself for a kiss. After ten minutes — news of sports: how mighty the German shot-putters, how swift her sprinters, how noble her soccer players — Stahl set the newspapers on his lap and looked out of the window, then closed his eyes and pretended to doze, avoiding a potential conversation with Emhof. But solitude, alas, led Stahl to brood about what lay ahead of him. So it was a long plane ride. A long, long plane ride.
On landing at Berlin’s Tempelhof Airport, the traveller was met by a force not unlike a storm; a powerful and dangerous storm — on its tide you could be swept away into a dark sea and never be seen again. The most sacred phrase of the Nazi creed was Blood and Soil. Well, here was the soil, the German earth, and before you could set foot upon such precious stuff you had to face its guardians, its border post. Where the uniforms of the SS were a shade of black that seemed to glow in the light of the overcast afternoon. Their polished boots glistened, their faces like white stone. The Alsatian shepherds on chain leads — no effete leather for us! — were as watchful as their masters, and the black and red swastika flags were hung as stiffened banners, which the wind was forbidden to disturb. Stahl approached the customs officers but he never reached them — Emhof cut in front of him, produced an identity card, then took Stahl’s passport and had it stamped. Wilkinson was right: Stahl was too important to search, and ignored the stares of the officers as he walked past, his pockets stuffed with money.
The car waiting outside the terminal was a black Grosser Mercedes, its chauffeur standing at attention by the rear door. When Stahl and Emhof were settled in the back seat, Emhof barked out their destination and the chauffeur responded as though he’d been given a military order. And if Tempelhof Airport had been a kind of overture, the city of Berlin, when they reached its centre, was the Wagnerian climax. Uniforms everywhere, brown- shirted storm troopers with puttees bloused out above their boots, Wehrmacht officers in field grey, the navy in blue, the Luftwaffe in blue-grey, women in fur coats, men in homburgs and overcoats, and all of them, to a greater or lesser degree, marched. This country was already at war, though enemy forces had yet to appear, and Stahl could sense an almost palpable violence that hung above the city like a mist. And although he was not actually frightened, the street show had brought him to a state of high alert.
Emhof glanced over at him and said, ‘Not much like Paris, is it?’
‘No, not at all.’
‘As you can see, we are a very determined people.’
Berlin was, Stahl thought, a movie set, meticulously designed for effect. People who saw this place — visitors, or an audience watching a newsreel — might wonder what sort of fool would dare to attack such a country. A quote about Goering that Stahl had read somewhere suddenly came to him: ‘He loves war as a child loves
