Archie waited impatiently, his tetchiness made worse by the final throes of a cold. A bell boy appeared in due course, understandably eager to show someone to the star’s rooms. The lift purred quietly to the fourth floor and he followed his guide down plushly carpeted hallways, noticing that – for all its fashionable elegance – there was something sedate and restrained about this particular hotel which encouraged a reverence more appropriate to a church. The bell boy turned a corner and gestured to the door at the far end of the corridor, which led to an outer lobby. Two men stood guard there, one on either side, and Archie stopped in his tracks, understanding now what the receptionist had meant. Their dark uniforms struck a jarring note in the hotel, the silver eagles and swastikas giving the lie to an otherwise convincing illusion that the world was a place of peaceful civility; in spite of a life that had seen more than its fair share of war, Archie was shaken by their presence. ‘You can leave me here,’ he said, dismissing his chaperone. ‘Thank you.’
The bell boy took his tip and hurried back to the lift. Archie headed for the suite, and as he approached the inner door opened, giving him his first glimpse of Dietrich. She was dressed entirely in white, and the contrast with her visitors – whether coincidental or carefully staged – could not have been more dramatic. The Nazi she was showing out was taller than his colleagues and his face looked vaguely familiar from the newspapers; he snapped his heels together and kissed the hand that she held out to him, a movement that was simultaneously chivalrous and threatening. Then, after a clipped ‘Heil Hitler’ which met with no response, he strode from the room. His henchmen fell into step, as if joined by an invisible thread, and Archie stood aside to let them pass.
Marlene looked at him and smiled. ‘Christmas greetings from the Führer,’ she said. ‘They have been waiting downstairs for hours. I only saw them because my daughter said no one should be left in the lobby at Christmas time, not even a Nazi.’ Her smile faded, and she looked intently at Archie. ‘She has no idea how much I hate them.’
‘What did they want?’
‘The same thing they always want. My triumphant return to the homeland. Sadly, you arrived before I could give them my answer. Sadly for them, but not for me.’ The smile came again, but this time it was more genuine. ‘Come in, Mr Penrose. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.’
A butler appeared from a side room to take his coat, and Archie followed his host through to the main suite. The sitting room smelt of cigarette smoke and perfume, something heavy and floral, and was spacious enough to contain everything that a guest could need with several extravagances that most would never use: a grand piano stood over by the windows, and a self-contained recess was dominated by a carved oak desk, whose size most boardroom executives would struggle to justify. French doors led out to a balcony, and the Mayfair rooftops were softly silhouetted in the dusk. In the corner of the room there was a Christmas tree, simply decorated like those of his own childhood; the snowman perched on top brought back a memory that he couldn’t quite place. Perhaps it was the company, but the apartment had the feel of a stage set, reminding Archie that luxury on such a scale was always a theatre of sorts, and he wondered why one of the richest women in the world would want to trade this in for a draughty Cornish castle.
‘My visitors are just one of the reasons I’ll be glad to get away,’ Marlene said, answering his unspoken question. ‘Please, Mr Penrose – take a seat.’ She gestured to a sofa and Archie sat down, surprised to find it more comfortable than it looked. The actress pressed a service bell in the wall and the butler returned immediately. ‘Pour us some champagne, darling, would you?’ She turned to Archie. ‘Unless you’d prefer something else? Whisky? A martini?’
Her voice was so familiar from the screen that he had to remind himself he was no longer a passive observer in the conversation. ‘Whisky would be lovely,’ he said, trying in vain to suppress a sneeze. ‘Thank you.’
‘You are not well?’
‘I’m fine. It’s just the end of a cold.’
‘William, bring Mr Penrose some of the chicken soup that Maria liked so much when she was here.’
‘No, really,’ Archie protested. ‘There’s no need.’
‘Nonsense, I insist. You will feel better before you know it. Go now, William. Leave the drinks to me.’
The butler was ushered from the room, and Marlene busied herself at the bar. She ignored the Dom Pérignon that sat on ice and poured two large whiskies instead, talking all the time about her daughter and what a fuss the hotel had made of her. Archie was struck by how English her accent was. Without asking, she added lemon to his drink and disappeared into another room, returning seconds later with a jar of honey. ‘Do you have children, Mr Penrose?’
‘Yes, a daughter. She’s twenty-one now.’
‘Ah, they grow up so fast. I bet you can scarcely fathom where your little girl went.’
Before he could explain that he hadn’t been part of Phyllis’s childhood, the butler returned with a bowl of steaming soup and some bread. Archie stood to take the tray while the actress fussed round him, plumping the cushions on the sofa; her attentions were so unexpected that he began to think he must be running a fever which threatened his grip on reality. When she was satisfied that he was comfortable and had sat down next to him, he noticed that the lighting in the room had been carefully arranged to emphasise her beauty as it was seen on the screen – the hollow cheeks, the full lips and thinly pencilled eyebrows. ‘It was so good of you to offer to be my escort for Christmas.’
Archie couldn’t help but smile. ‘It really doesn’t feel like a favour,’ he said, ‘but I can’t imagine your visitors would be very pleased by your plans for the holiday? Donating so generously to a charity for Jewish refugees is a courageous thing to do when the Gestapo are standing outside your door.’
‘By courageous you mean foolhardy.’
‘In my experience, they’re often hard to tell apart.’
‘They will not criticise me while they still think they have a chance of persuading me to return. Anyway, they are always keen to assure me that there is no anti-Semitism in Germany.’
‘What happened last month makes that a very hard position to maintain.’
‘You would think so, wouldn’t you, and yet Hitler made a speech the following day without mentioning it once.’
Her voice was understandably bitter. The events were still recent, but Archie knew that he would never forget the shocking newspaper accounts of the way in which synagogues and Jewish businesses throughout Nazi Germany had been ransacked and destroyed in the course of a single night, dubbed ‘Kristallnacht’ after the shards of broken glass that littered the streets. Nearly a hundred Jews had been murdered and thousands more taken away, sparking outrage around the world. ‘It must sadden you to know what’s happening in your country,’ he said.
The actress shrugged, deflecting the observation, and Archie realised what an understatement it had been. ‘Helping people is the decent thing to do, and it is the time of year for goodwill. I love Christmas, don’t you? We always start it early because Maria’s birthday is in December. She’s just fourteen. What do you think of our tree? We decorated it together when she was here with me last week. We went shopping. There’s nowhere quite like London for shopping. Maria had such a happy time. Is the soup good?’