“I think it’s a wonderful face,” said Hitchcock, “don’t you agree, Fritz? Wouldn’t he make a marvelous red herring in a…” he smiled at Thea, “… political thriller. I’m so glad he’s a friend of Anna Grieban’s. Now I can meet him.”
“And who is this Anna Grieban?” inquired von Harbou as she dissected a herring.
“She’s our script girl,” said Alma.
“That is all she is? A script girl? And she comes to this restaurant?”
Alma felt her face flush with anger, and she clenched her hands together under the table. What political repercussions would there be between England and Germany, she wondered, if she grabbed Thea von Harbou by the shoulders and tried to shake some sense into the arrogant, bigoted bitch.
“Ach!” exclaimed Lang. “They are arguing!”
Anna Grieban and the man were undoubtedly arguing, their pantomime exquisitely eloquent to the table where Hitchcock’s group sat. The man threw his napkin on the table, as Anna Grieban pushed her chair back, grabbed her handbag, and went hurrying out of the restaurant.
“Now you shall not meet him,” said Lang with mocking sadness.
“There’s always tomorrow,” said Hitchcock.
The man put a pile of marks on the table and then hurried out of the restaurant.
“You see what I mean?” von Harbou asked Alma. “Underpeople like this script girl of yours are always making scenes.”
“But this one,” said Hitchcock, “wasn’t terribly well directed.”
Outside the restaurant, the man emerged just as Anna Grieban entered a taxi and it drove away. He cursed and then hailed a taxi for himself.
Back in the restaurant, as the main course was being served, Lang exclaimed, “But that is wunderbar, Hitchcock! I’m delighted you’re going to make another film here.”
“I’m not,” said Hitchcock as he examined his plate of Schweinshaxe and Knodel (pork shank and potato dumplings) and then attacked it with unrestrained relish.
“Ah so?” asked von Harbou. “You do not like our working conditions here?”
“My dear Thea,” explained Hitchcock, beginning to understand why Alma disliked the woman, “working conditions here are perfectly adequate, but these films I’m being assigned, though I am most grateful for the opportunity they present for me to learn my craft, are little more than mediocre potboilers. I wish to get on to better things.”
“You must not be so impatient,” admonished von Harbou. “You should stay here in Germany. Your talent could replace that of the swine who are defecting to Hollywood, whores seduced by Jewish millions. A word in the right ear, and I could help you set up as a director right here in Germany. I’ve heard good things about you!” Alma loathed people who spoke while they chewed food. Chalk up another demerit against Thea von Harbou. “What you call a potboiler my friends at the studio tell me you are directing with great flair and imagination. Is that not so, Fritz?” Fritz nodded as he ate, and Alma wondered if Fritz wasn’t secretly praying for an opportunity to be seduced by Hollywood’s Jewish millions. “What do you say, Alfred?” Thea’s voice was growing anxious and shrill, like a recruiting officer who’d heard the enemy had arrived at the outskirts of the city.
“I want to go home,” said Alfred with the simplicity of a small boy, and Alma wanted to lean over and kiss him.
“Ach!” Thea dropped her knife and fork with disgust.
“What displeases you, dear?” inquired Lang, “Hitchcock or the food?”
“They are both indigestible,” snapped von Harbou. She turned to Alma. “Tell me, Alma, what do you plan this weekend?”
“I plan to rest.” Is there no escape? she thought; is there no escape from this awful woman? She and Hitchcock exchanged glances.
Hitchcock asked swiftly, “What about your next picture, Fritz? Is it set after Metropolis?”
“I have been offered a thriller located somewhere in India. I don’t think I wish to travel to India.”
“Oh, I would!” said Alma. “I’d love to travel the world.”
“Well, not me,” said Lang, “this location is so obscurely placed geographically, the Russians don’t have spies there.”
“And what is this tune you are humming?” Thea asked Alma.
“Oh, dear, forgive me.”
“But why? It is so charming. I’ve never heard it before.” Alma explained its origin. “Ah so? This Rudolf Wagner is a piano player, and he composes such a charming melody? Isn’t it charming, Fritz?”
“Very nice.”
“Perhaps we should meet this Wagner. He might be a discovery, a real find. He might be the person to compose the score for Metropolis.” She explained to Hitchcock and Alma. “We are most anxious to provide the cinemas with our own suggested scoring for Metropolis. It needs the right atmospheric music, doesn’t it, Fritz?”
“It does, but it won’t get it. Ach, Hitchcock. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the motion picture could talk and sing and then we could control everything?”
Anna Grieban climbed the stairs to her apartment in the attic of a building located on the street along which the Isar River flowed. She could smell boiled cabbage and boiled turnips and stale urine from the communal bathrooms on each floor. She was tired and troubled and hungry and cursed herself for the fool she was for not having eaten before arguing with the Man. That Man. That face. It had once been so handsome, so beautiful. She paused on the landing outside her door and listened. Was someone coming up the stairs behind her? She looked over the handrailing into the void below, but there was nobody. She strained her ears, but she heard nothing, only the drip-drip-drip of the leaky shower stall that adjoined the door to her apartment. She found the key to her door in her handbag and let herself into her untidy bed-sitter. She shut the door, tossed her handbag and her hat on the bed, and then realized the lamp next to her bed was glowing. Had she left it on all day? God, the elec-
trie bill! She must have. Because the room was dimly aglow when she entered, she hadn’t reached for the light switch. Oh, the hell with it.
