Page 128 of The Gathering Storm

CHAPTER TWENTY

The Boeuf sur le Toit had moved to new premises in the rue de Penthièvre, but it was still the best place in Paris to listen to jazz. It had always been an avant-garde gathering place, frequented by famous names like Picasso, Diaghilev, Milhaud, Cocteau, André Gide, Camus, Ernest Hemingway, Charlie Chaplin. On a jolly evening, Artur Rubinstein might play the piano, with Milhaud on drums, or Maurice Chevalier might sing Gershwin; later on, Josephine Baker, tired from a performance, might come in, and sing something slow and sad. Above all, it was about the music. Virtually founded by the group called Les Six, it attracted leading composers, like Stravinsky, Poulenc and Satie, but James and Emil went there for the jazz. It was such a magnet for talent, jazz musicians from other Paris clubs would turn up after hours and play long into the night for the joy of it. In Paris, to have a jam session was called faire un boeuf.

It was also a well-known meeting place for homosexuals, but James and Emil had no beef with that. ‘It’s just a pity they don’t come here for the jazz,’ James said one evening, when he and Emil, accompanied by Florence – the affair was still going well – and a fellow Folies dancer called Huguette, were at a favourite table. The girls were tired and hungry after the show, but scrambled eggs and champagne perked them up.

‘Look at them, for instance,’ James went on.

At the next table, a very handsome young man, with large eyes, a tender mouth and a dimple in his chin, was entertaining an extremely swarthy youth, who seemed to be in a bad temper. Neither of them was paying any attention to the music – in fact, it looked as though a quarrel was brewing.

Emil shrugged. ‘As long as they pay for the drinks,’ he said. ‘You can’t legislate for taste.’

‘No, but he’s in here a lot, using up a seat that a music-lover might like,’ said James.

‘You know who he is?’ said Emil.

‘He works at the German embassy in some lowly capacity,’ James said. ‘German nobility by birth, apparently – it’s odd how they can become Nazis.’

‘Oh, I know who you mean,’ said Emil. ‘Vom Rath. He’s a rising star in the Sturmabteilung, and a bit of a pet of Ambassador Welczeck. I didn’t know he was that way inclined. He’d better not let his superiors find out. I believe the beloved Führer is rather down on that sort of thing.’

‘I’m surprised he’s got this far without being found out,’ James said, looking across at vom Rath’s current surly interest. ‘He seems to like the rough trade.’

Huguette interrupted, bored with the conversation: ‘Can’t we dance? I’m tired of talk about Germans. They’re so dull.’

‘I was only sitting still out of respect for your feet,’ James said. ‘I’ll dance with pleasure, if you’re rested enough.’

It was a good session, and the four of them didn’t leave until two, and then James had to see Huguette back to her lodgings, and walk back to his own. So he was fast asleep the next morning when Emil woke him up with intemperate banging on the door.

‘What’s the matter with you?’ James asked, strangling his waist with his dressing-gown cord as he opened the door. ‘Can’t you sleep?

‘Sleeping at night is a waste of time. And Florence was very lively,’ Emil said, walking past James and into the small kitchen.

‘I don’t wish to know that,’ said James, following.

‘Are you alone? Still not sleeping with Huguette?’

‘I have no wish to follow any more closely in your footsteps. Especially when it means being this energetic first thing in the morning.’

‘It’s nearly noon, old man. Coffee is the order of the day, I think. And then I’ll tell you the news, since you evidently haven’t heard it.’ He filled the kettle and put it on to boil.

James slumped at the table. ‘Tell me, and then leave me to die.’

Emil turned, leaned back against the kitchen cabinet, folded his arms, and said, with barely suppressed excitement, ‘Who do you think has been assassinated?’

‘Someone we know?’

‘We were sitting next to him last night. Pretty little Ernst vom Rath.’ James stared. ‘Yes, apparently a swarthy youth walked into the German embassy in the rue de Lille this morning, asking to speak to the ambassador, saying he had a most important document to hand over. Welczeck had just left, so the duty clerk asked vom Rath to see him. He was shown into vom Rath’s office, and the youth pulled out a pistol and shot him five times.’

‘Oh, my God. You don’t think it was the same person we saw him with last night?’

‘Couldn’t say. Might be. But his taste seems to run that way so it might be an entirely different swarthy youth. In any case, it seems he didn’t ask to see vom Rath by name, so it might not be personal at all. He didn’t make any attempt to escape. From what I’ve heard he’s an illegal, a Polish Jew with no papers – on the run from the police, who want to deport him. He said his motive was to avenge persecuted Jews.’

‘If it was a lover’s tiff, he might still have said he was avenging the Jews, since he is one.’

‘Point.’

‘Is he dead – vom Rath?’

‘In hospital, but not expected to live. Shots to the abdomen – not a nice way to go. One almost feels sorry for him.’