On that first day of September, Annabel could see the irony of the new film festival—a gathering for peace, freedom, and goodwill—being canceled for an imminent world war.
But it could no longer be avoided. Every bit of strength had to be mustered for a tragedy that had already begun, at the ungodly hour of 4:45 a.m., when a Nazi warship opened fire on a depot in Poland’s Free City of Danzig.
“Typical of the tight-assed fascists, to wake everybody up before dawn, just to start a war,” Raphael the concierge grumbled that day. “You’d think they’d at least let those people have their breakfast before being bombed into rubble.”
The last departing German guests were also not the least bit enthusiastic about the prospect of another war and returning home to a country where, as Marta told Annabel, the Berlin housewives were already being forced to line up to get ration cards.
“They’ll have to deal with a black market, all over again, just to feed their families,” Marta said resignedly, thinking of all the friends she’d left behind.
Suddenly on the Côte d’Azur, there were French soldiers everywhere—camped out in tents in the woods, driving in jeeps down the boulevards, marching past merchants on the streets. The Mound at the top of the Cap had been turned into a complete military fortification now, with trucks filled with serious-looking uniformed soldiers coming and going.
The Grand Hotel was eerily quiet, as if those who remained were collectively holding their breath and praying for the impossible—a last-minute reprieve, the world returning to its senses. Yet already, every male of draft age had been called up to register and prepare for war. So the staff was being severely depleted of its young men—bellboys, porters, waiters, lifeguards, valets, bartenders, kitchen help. Only the elder male workers could remain.
But it didn’t seem to matter, because there were hardly any guests left to serve; and those who were still here were floating about in a daze, too stunned to make many demands. The lobby seemed to ring with its own hollow emptiness. The only chatter was in the restaurants and bars, and even here, people spoke in hushed tones as if in a funeral parlor.
The Jasmine Cottage and the Villa Sanctuaire were clean and neatly ready for new guests—but the doors were locked, the windows shuttered.
Down by the sea, the big swimming pool lay still as glass, except for an occasional soft splash of a lone swimmer slicing through the water.
“There are machine gunners posted along the cliffs, and they even put antiaircraft units at the little road leading to the lighthouse,” Yves, the pool director, told Annabel, raising his gaze to scan the hills above them. Because of a knee injury he had not been summoned to fight. He gestured at the sea. “The waters along the coast are being planted with mines.”
Annabel, gazing at the sparkling sea, imagined that the baffled fish were wondering what had possessed humanity to destroy its own paradise.
She had taken Delphine for an early swim in the pool before its opening hour. It was against the rules, but Annabel didn’t care; she simply could not bring herself to go down to the swimming cove, and she averted her eyes from the coastal path because she knew she could still “see” Jack lying there on the stretcher. He had been buried in a cemetery at a nearby town that overlooked the sea. Annabel, Oncle JP, and the priest were the only ones in attendance.
“Everyone’s so quiet!” Delphine said in a scared, hushed voice as Annabel wheeled her back to the hotel. The fisherman, who’d just made a small delivery today, took the little girl back home, where she would play with her friend who lived nearby and whose mother would look after them. Delphine’s school had postponed its opening day.
Annabel helped out at the reservations desk that morning, assisting the few remaining guests to secure their train tickets, which were as rare as rubies now. At noon, she went to work at the bar on the terrace, where luncheon was being served. There were more diners than she’d expected; local people who’d remained at their villas now seemed to want one another’s company in the safety of a hotel restaurant where information could be exchanged.
She saw Dr. Gaspard calmly taking his déjeuner today just as he usually did twice a week. But this time he had the company of two men who were both fastidiously dressed with silk ascots and handkerchiefs: a tall, rather dapper-looking gentleman who looked to be in his mid-sixties and had a wrinkled, watchful face just like the stone frog on the fountain; and his companion, a younger man with a neatly trimmed mustache and a cigarette poised between his long fingers. All three men sat there smoking, drinking, and talking in low voices.
“Who is that distinguished-looking older man with Dr. Gaspard?” Annabel whispered to an elderly waiter.
“He’s the playwright William Somerset Maugham. He has a splendid villa overlooking Villefranche.” The waiter gave Annabel a sly look. “He’s with British intelligence, they say.”
Annabel had heard about Maugham from Elsa Lanchester, who’d said that the man had had a “rather Dickensian childhood” after his beloved mother died and he was sent from the Parisian home he’d loved to his dour uncle’s vicarage in England. That’s when the poor fellow started stuttering, Elsa had told her. Childhood trauma, you know.
The diners ate quietly, their silence punctuated by occasional comments that carried across the terrace. The younger man seated at Maugham’s side was telling Dr. Gaspard, “The lobby of the Carlton Hotel is mobbed. People convene there, waiting to get out. And Willie and I saw invalids being brought down to the piers on stretchers, desperate for the last ships out. Some will stop at Gibraltar to refuel. We’re going to sail Willie’s yacht as far as it will take us.”
Mr. Maugham said to the doctor, “I once v-v-very nearly drowned in a tidal wave off Burma, so I have had a fear of d-d-drowning ever since. If our s-s-ship is attacked by the Germans and starts sinking, what’s the b-b-best way to drown, do you suppose?”
Dr. Gaspard put his fork down. “Don’t struggle,” he advised. “You see, if you just open your mouth and let the sea in, you will go unconscious within a minute.”
Then Marta, the reservations manager, came to the hotel doorway leading out to the terrace. “Dr. Gaspard, please come at once!” she said, her usual composure altered just enough so that Annabel instinctively hurried over.
“What is it?” she asked in dread.
Marta said, “It’s your uncle, Annabel. He’s had some sort of attack.”
* * *
It was Rick who volunteered to drive Annabel to the hospital, in his sporty red car. This was a godsend, since most forms of transportation—trains, autos, even horses—were being commandeered by the military. Rick followed the ambulance through the clogged traffic that had complicated the usual route.
On the way, he astounded Annabel by actually confessing to her—all the while with both hands on the steering wheel and eyes forward—that he loved her.
“You can’t be serious,” Annabel said. “Stop it.”
“No, I mean it,” Rick insisted. “I was hooked the first day I saw you—heard you, actually, singing French lullabies to little Delphine. I’ve been smitten ever since. You’re beautiful, Annabel, and you’re exactly what I want for a wife. I was just waiting for things to blow over with you and—”
“Please!” Annabel said abruptly, unable to hear him speak of Jack.
“Right. Well, I told myself that if you were free by the end of the summer, I’d marry you and take care of you. I thought I’d wine and dine you, but now there’s a war, well, there isn’t any time to waste, is there? So come away with me to America, where you’ll be safe and comfortable, for the rest of your life. Marry me!”
“For God’s sake,” she exclaimed as Rick careened into the parking lot of the hospital, “I can’t think about anything else right now except my uncle.”
“We can take him with us!” Rick exclaimed jubilantly. “And Delphine, too. You are the family I’ve always wanted.”
“You’ll change your mind after you take some time to seriously think this over.”
“No!” he assured her. “I’ve waited long enough. I only held out this long because your uncle said to wait until September, when you turn twenty-one—and then, he says, you can do what you want. You see, I’ve already asked his permission. He says it will be up to you.”
Annabel distractedly sensed that there was a bargain being offered here. Something to do with the Grand Hotel and her uncle’s position there. She realized that she must tread carefully at a time like this, when the whole world was on the brink of self-destruction and no one could afford to refuse a helping hand.
“Can we please discuss this later?” she said more gently.
“Of course. Meanwhile, I’ll wait for you in the hospital lounge off the lobby. Holler if you need me to shout at the doctors or to get you any other help with your uncle.”
Annabel remained in the waiting room for hours, because the hospital had to run tests. She was not permitted to see her uncle until the doctors got some answers. Rick returned twice, to bring coffee and to get an “update.” Then he went out for dinner, promising to bring her back a sandwich.
She had no appetite but was feeling strangely passive, in the way that waiting people can succumb to the combination of anxiety and boredom. Finally she was told that she could go in.
“How is he, Doctor?” she asked, pausing in the hallway.
“Well, you know, he’s had that hereditary heart condition. We always knew it could be trouble,” Dr. Gaspard began.
Annabel’s heart sank. She’d heard something just like this before, when her father died.
“He’s going to be all right, for now. What he really needs is the care of a certain sanatorium in Switzerland which I’ve told him about. But for the time being, he must stay home until I feel it’s safe for him to make such a journey.”
What hung in the air, unspoken, was that, quite soon, it might be impossible for anyone to travel anywhere at all, if France officially declared war on Germany.
“I’ll keep him here in the hospital for a day or two, but we may become overwhelmed soon, and I don’t want your uncle to be here when that happens. He’s already like a horse champing at the bit to go back to work,” Dr. Gaspard said with some admiration. “Perhaps it’s best to get him back to the Grand Hotel as soon as possible and let him recuperate there. Otherwise, he’ll just lie here chewing his heart out. But he mustn’t overdo it, Annabel. You must be vigilant. Don’t let him work his usual hours; don’t let him climb stairs or get distressed.”
The doctor left, and Annabel was finally allowed into her uncle’s room.
Oncle JP, his hair slightly mussed, was sitting up in his bed looking furious, having been forced to wear a hospital gown. His severe attitude seemed incongruous here as he sat there frowning, with feathers ruffled, like a displaced, disgruntled owl. Annabel sat in a chair alongside his bed, taking his hand. He let her hold it.
“How do you feel?” she asked softly.
“Like a fool,” Oncle JP replied. “A useless fool. At a critical time like this! For all I know, the German tanks are already rolling into France, and I can’t do a thing about it.”
“But we have the Maginot Line,” Annabel said hopefully. “People are saying that we can hold off the Germans for at least six months.”
Oncle JP looked her in the eye. “That is a fairy tale that certain men in our government recite to the populace like a bedtime story. Meanwhile, there are other forces in France that want Hitler to take over and ‘straighten us out.’ You can’t fight a war if some of your leaders secretly wish to ally with such a man. No, I give us a month at best to hold the Maginot Line.”
“You’re scaring me,” Annabel said.
“Good. You should be frightened,” Oncle JP said with some passion. “If more people in this country feared fascism, we’d all be better off. Our soldiers and sailors will fight bravely, when the time comes, but some of their leaders have already failed them.”
Annabel found it all so nightmarishly inconceivable. Would France be taken over, like Czechoslovakia, Austria, Poland? How could that possibly be? Marta at the front desk had warned her: It can happen anywhere.
Oncle JP looked so agitated and disgusted that she said soothingly, “You mustn’t upset yourself. We will survive this, all of us, together.”
He gazed at her compassionately now. “You should go back to America with that screenwriter you work for; or with Rick, or anybody who can get you a ticket out,” he urged. “And don’t wait to do it. Go now. You may not get another chance.”
Annabel considered this. Suddenly the life of a secretary in New York no longer seemed drab. It sounded incredibly more hopeful than staying here, waiting for war. But she said in a light, teasing tone, “Oncle, then who would take care of you? That nice widow in Èze?”
He looked embarrassed, then recovered and said calmly, “Non. She left France two weeks ago. She’s gone to Quebec in Canada, to live with her daughter and son-in-law.”
For some reason, it was this bit of news, more than everything else, that suddenly made Annabel understand what was at stake. She thought of the terrible things she’d heard that the Nazis did to anyone and everyone that they didn’t like; the thuggish way that “might made right” in Germany. She recalled how those arrogant men in the garden had scorned the crippled Delphine at the fountain; she shuddered at the thought of what might happen to that sweet, gentle little girl and to Oncle JP if they were left to fend for themselves in France. The fascists had killed Jack. They would kill anybody.
Somehow, she had to help get her family to a safe place. There was, as Oncle JP had warned, no time to lose.
“Go to America,” he repeated softly now.
Annabel said firmly, “I will never leave you and little Delphine behind.”
* * *
Two days later, the British government sent Hitler an ultimatum. As the world awaited his reply, Oncle JP was released from the hospital and brought back to the Grand Hotel. Rick drove him there and helped to get Oncle JP situated in his office.
“I’ll be up in the penthouse,” Rick said to Annabel. “Let’s talk later, okay?”
“Yes,” she replied, reminding herself that this was a time when one needed all the friends one could get.
As soon as Rick left, Oncle JP said quickly to her, “They won’t let me climb stairs. But someone must go up to my radio room and see if there is anything they want us to do. I am going to tell you how to operate that radio, Annabel. Just do as I say, nothing more.”
She listened intently to his instructions, then went up the spiral staircase to the tiny locked room. At first, just putting on the headphones and switching on that radio was a terrifying task, to communicate with people who were already preparing for war. It seemed as if she could feel the rest of the world reaching out to her across the airwaves, asking for help.
Carefully, she gave the coded greeting, waited for a response, and then diligently took their message. Then she removed the headphones, switched off the radio, locked the door behind her, and hurried down the stairs to her uncle’s office.
He was sitting at his desk, but already he looked tired.
Annabel told him breathlessly, “Paris and London agree. They want us to get ‘the Polish package’ out of France. I assume that means the Enigma replica, right?”
“Yes,” Oncle JP said, looking troubled. “Our replica is destined to go to London. But we can’t use ordinary channels, especially now, because there are German spies everywhere, and they will be looking for anyone who appears to be a courier or an agent.”
At that moment, there was a knock at the door, and a woman poked her head in.
Elsa Lanchester’s wild reddish hair was topped with a small round hat at the crown of her head, making her look all the more like a Girl Scout leader.
“Sorry to disturb!” she trilled in that high, theatrical voice. “But we simply couldn’t leave without saying goodbye to our dear girl from the Grand Hotel.”
She smiled at Annabel, then turned to Oncle JP. “And how is the patient? Are you feeling better?”
“Yes, thank you,” he said, looking nonplussed at such a lively, forthright creature. “Do you have everything you need?”
Charles Laughton peered over Elsa’s shoulder and said, “Yes. We have somehow managed to secure seats on a private flight to London. We are told that one must bring cotton wads for one’s ears on the aeroplane,” he added, a trifle apprehensively, his plump face puckered with thought. “To drown out the roar of the engine, you see.”
“Yes, and I hear that the pilot has to use a small megaphone just to communicate with his passengers!” Elsa said, wide eyed. “I daresay that if Charles gets hold of that megaphone, he’ll be reciting Hamlet’s soliloquy over the English Channel.”
“Do you suppose you could take one more passenger?” Oncle JP said suddenly. “My niece needs to get to London. She has a friend there awaiting a birthday gift from us.”
Annabel just stared at him, astounded. “I can’t leave you, Oncle, just for a package,” she insisted. She meant it. She was not going to save the world only to lose him and Delphine.
“Besides,” she said meaningfully, “if I leave, someone might notice and follow me.” She did not have to say aloud what else she was thinking: The Nazi spies might still think that I was the tennis player’s contact here in France.
“My, that sounds ever so cryptic,” Elsa observed, exchanging a meaningful look with Charles, which they held for a brief time, as if they comprehended somehow that Annabel’s mysterious errand had to do with the fate of France, of their country, of the free world. Slowly, Charles and Elsa nodded to each other.
“Now what about this birthday person of yours, waiting for a gift from you? Perhaps we might carry this little parcel for you?” Charles suggested. “Would that help resolve your dilemma?”
Oncle JP looked at Annabel inquiringly. She knew what he was asking her. Can these people be trusted?
“Yes,” Annabel said firmly.
“Eh bien, if you would be so kind,” Oncle JP said, turning to Charles now, man to man. “As long as you don’t mind taking a certain amount of risk. I do not think you will be in any real danger, but one must be careful. Your government, and ours, would be most grateful.”
“Ahhh!” Elsa interjected, then said softly and wisely, “Well, I assure you, I am very good at cloak-and-dagger. Apart from being an actress, you know. As a child, I, and my mother, managed to give many a landlord the slip when our rent was a tad overdue.”
Charles rolled his eyes. “I always knew it would come to something like this. Elsa is descended from a long line of renegades and radicals. Her father was a labor organizer, and her mother was a suffragist who made the headlines—people still speak of that court case, to this very day. As for me, well, I come from a family of hoteliers. Modest ones, but we did face our share of—occasional dilemmas, shall we say; and so, as a young man, I was the family bouncer. Therefore, I assure you, I can toss out the worst of troublemakers and give as good as I get. In short, you can count on our unwavering support.”
“Bravo!” Oncle JP said with a smile. “May I ask, where is your luggage at the moment?”
“Upstairs in our room, all set,” Elsa said briskly. “We haven’t yet called for the porter.”
“I will take care of that,” Oncle JP said. “But first, if you would be so kind as to wait in your room for Annabel, who will bring the package to you. It must be secured amidst other rather innocent items, so that it will not be noticed.”
“Good show!” Charles said. “See you upstairs.”
When they were gone, Oncle JP sighed. “I suppose you are right, Annabel. No one would suspect that couple of carrying one of the most important items of military intelligence. I just hope they don’t overdo their performance.”
“Not them,” she assured him. “Those two are pros.”
* * *
Soon afterward, Annabel entered the service elevator carrying the Enigma replica, all closed up in its wooden case. When she reached the Laughtons’ room, she saw that the tray of coffee she’d ordered for them had already been delivered. She’d also had the chef pack some sandwiches and cookies into a box for later, with a small bottle of wine.
Charles thanked her profusely for her thoughtfulness. She smiled, feeling a burst of affection for these two, with all their boundless enthusiasm, stoicism, and good cheer.
Elsa stared at the valise in fascination.
“Mercy, that is a sizable package,” she observed.
Annabel said nervously, “My uncle says it’s best to pack it into a larger suitcase with other items piled on top of it, so that it won’t be noticed.”
“We shall have to chuck some of our own things overboard, and you can send them on after us,” Elsa said determinedly. “Let’s bury the ‘birthday gift’ under a pile of our pyjamas and my unmentionables. I’ve yet to see a customs man who wanted to touch ladies’ corsets.”
She gazed at the wooden case. “What—exactly—is it?” she asked delicately.
“I can’t tell you that,” Annabel said regretfully.
“Hmm. I’d say it looks rather like a typewriter case,” Charles suggested.
“Yes,” Annabel answered, “and as far as you know, that’s all it is. Oncle says that if anyone asks, you should say it belongs to your French secretary—me—who left it behind when she went on to London ahead of you.”
“Righto, got it,” Elsa said briskly.
Annabel continued, “When you reach London, a man from British intelligence will meet you at the gate. He will pretend to be your press agent. He will greet you with the code words, Hello, Hunch! It’s short for Hunchback of Notre Dame.” She herself had suggested this code to her uncle and his contacts.
“Ahh! That’s fine,” Charles agreed, as if relishing the whole subterfuge.
“Thanks again for the picnic food,” Elsa said, kissing Annabel. “And darling, ‘I’ll See You Again,’ as the Noël Coward song says—” She hummed the mournfully sweet lines. Then she added softly, “We won’t be in London very long, dear Annabel. Hollywood beckons with its siren song. So, ducks, be sure to look us up, if you ever go back to the land of the free.”
The porter arrived to pick up their things. The Laughtons sailed through the lobby, out the front door, and into a taxi. Elsa waved and blew kisses, calling out, “À bientôt!”
Annabel stood staring long after their car had passed the hotel gate.
That very morning, Hitler did not meet the British demands, so the United Kingdom declared war on Germany.