*
One thing Oona and I wanted was to get away from California. In the year we had been married we had both been put through a meat-grinder and we needed a rest. So we took our little black kitten and embarked on the train for New York; from there we went to Nyack, where we rented a house. It was away from everything, surrounded by stony, unproductive terrain; nevertheless, it had its own particular charm. It was an attractive, small house, built in 1780, and with the rent of it went a most sympathetic house-keeper who was also a wonderful cook.
With the house we inherited a sweet old black retriever who attached himself to us like a lady’s companion. He appeared regularly on the porch at breakfast-time and after a gentlemanly wag of his tail would lie down quietly and efface himself while we had breakfast. When our little black kitten first saw him she hissed and spat at him. But he simply lay down with his chin on the ground to show his willingness to coexist.
Those days in Nyack were idyllic, although lonely. We saw no one, and no one called. It was just as well, for I was not yet over the embarrassment of the trial.
Although the ordeal had crippled my creativeness, nevertheless I had almost completed Monsieur Verdoux. Now my desire to finish it was returning.
We had intended to stay at least six months in the East, and Oona was going to have her baby there. But I could not work in Nyack, so after five weeks we returned to California.
Soon after we married Oona had confessed she had no desire to become an actress either on the screen or the stage. This news pleased me, for at last I had a wife and not a career girl. It was then that I abandoned Shadow and Substance and went back to work on Monsieur Verdoux – until I was so rudely interrupted by the Government. I have often thought that the films lost an excellent comedienne, for Oona has a great sense of humour.
I remember, just before the trial, Oona and I went into a jeweller’s shop in Beverly Hills to get her vanity case mended. While waiting we began looking over some bracelets. An exceptionally fine one set in diamonds and rubies we liked, but Oona thought the price was too high, so I told the jeweller we would think about it and we left the shop. As we got back into the car I said nervously: ‘Hurry up. Drive on quickly!’ Then I put my hand in my pocket and cautiously pulled out the bracelet which she had admired. ‘I took it while he was showing you the other bracelets,’ I said.
Oona turned white. ‘Oh, you shouldn’t have done it!’ She drove on, then turned up a side-street, pulled over to the kerb and stopped the car. ‘Let’s think it over!’ she said and repeated: ‘You shouldn’t have done it!’
‘Well, I can’t put it back now,’ I said. But I could not keep the pretence up any longer, I burst out laughing and told her the joke: that while she was looking at the other things I had taken the jeweller aside and bought the bracelet.
‘And you – thinking I’d stolen it – willing to be an accessory to the crime!’ I said laughingly.
‘Well, I didn’t want to see you get into any more trouble,’ she said.
twenty-eight
DURING the trial we had been surrounded by many dear friends – all of them loyal and sympathetic. Salka Viertel, the Clifford Odets, the Hanns Eislers, the Feuchtwangers and many others.
Salka Viertel, the Polish actress, gave interesting supper parties at her house in Santa Monica. Salka attracted those of the arts and letters: Thomas Mann, Bertolt Brecht, Schoenberg, Hanns Eisler, Lion Feuchtwanger, Stephen Spender, Cyril Connolly and a host of others. Salka established ‘une maison Coppet’ wherever she resided.
At the Hanns Eislers’ we used to meet Bertolt Brecht, who looked decidedly vigorous with his cropped head, and, as I remember, was always smoking a cigar. Months later I showed him the script of Monsieur Verdoux, which he thumbed through. His only comment: ‘Oh, you write a script Chinese fashion.’
I asked Lion Feuchtwanger what he thought of the political situation in the States. Said he whimsically: ‘There might be something significant in the fact that when I completed building my new house in Berlin, Hitler came to power and I moved out. When I had completed furnishing my flat in Paris, the Nazis marched in and again I moved out. And now in America I have just bought a house in Santa Monica.’ He shrugged and smiled significantly.
Occasionally we saw the Aldous Huxleys. At that time he was very much lulled in the cradle of mysticism. Frankly I liked him better as the cynical young man of the twenties.
One day, our friend Frank Taylor telephoned to say that Dylan Thomas, the Welsh poet, would like to meet us. We said we would be delighted. ‘Well,’ said Frank hesitantly, ‘I’ll bring him round if he’s sober.’ Later that evening when the bell rang I opened the door and Dylan Thomas fell in. If this was being sober, what would he be like when he was drunk? A day or so later he came to dinner and made better sense. He read to us one of his poems, rendered in a deep resonant voice. I do not remember the imagery, but the word ‘cellophane’ flashed like reflected sunshine from his magical verse.
Among our friends was Theodore Dreiser, whom I greatly admired. He and his charming wife Helen would occasionally dine at our house. Although there was a burning indignation within him, Dreiser was a gentle, kindly soul. When he died, John Lawson, the
