Part Seven: Winds of Change — Chapter 7 - The Barman of the Ritz

AUGUST 24, 1944

In mid-August, the smell of a fire burning in the hearth comes as a surprise. It is dark, the door to Elmiger’s office is open, and Frank stares from the threshold. The director is kneeling in front of the fireplace, surrounded by scattered files.

“Come in, Frank!” Elmiger says without turning around.

“Good evening, monsieur.”

“Hurry up and help me!”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Hand me the registers.”

“But… but… What do you think you’re doing?” Frank is too stunned to move, looking out over the chaos of the room. Elmiger finally turns to him, glaring in frustration.

“I’m destroying all the records of the past four years. Come on, quickly!”

Frank shakes himself, snapping into action. He goes around the desk and to the bookshelf where thick leather volumes are lined up.

“Allied troops will march into Paris tonight or tomorrow,” Elmiger says, crumpling some papers. “We have to protect the Ritz.”

Frank carries over three thick files, dropping one in the process.

“Do what I’m doing, rip the pages out one by one, that way they burn faster.”

Elmiger astounds him: even in the midst of a raging storm, he is still trying to strategize. Frank stands and looks down at him. The manager is not simply exhausted, he is at the end of his tether. Even with all the windows open, the office is full of smoke that stings their throats and nostrils. The fireplace is stuffed with paper, blazing crimson and crackling like the Grand Palais did yesterday when it was destroyed by German bombs. The smell of burning permeates the Ritz. There is no need to leave the hotel to know that the atmosphere in Paris is apocalyptic. The whole city is ablaze, a fire that heralds the end. Terror has leached into every soul, but Frank is beyond fear. He no longer feels anything. He simply wants this to be over, come what may.

“Come on, Meier! Move it!”

The heat is stifling. Elmiger, in his shirtsleeves, with his tie loose and forehead bathed in sweat, is ripping up the registers and tossing them onto the fire to cleanse the hotel of its sins. The names of an entire compromised clientele disappear forever in the flames.

“No, not that one!” Elmiger stops Frank as he is about to open a new crate.

“What’s in there?”

“A number of envelopes left by Monsieur Süss.”

Frank recognizes Süss’s handwriting and, out of curiosity, flicks through the envelopes. They all bear Jewish names.

“Jewelery and money left for safekeeping by Jewish families,” says Elmiger.

“Safekeeping?”

Elmiger nervously nods.

“Just before the Nazis arrived, Süss suggested to some of our Jewish guests that they could leave their belongings with us to avoid them being confiscated. Some of them agreed and then fled and never came back to Paris.”

Frank does not know what to say.

“Come on, Meier, focus. Tear up those registers!”

Frank sets to work and watches, fascinated, as the names of living customers vanish in the flames, while the names of missing Jewish families remain safe in their envelopes. The former are burned out of a sense of guilt; the latter kept in the hope of making amends.

How many of those Jews are still alive?

Who will inherit their belongings?

Questions no one can answer.

“Did you know that Guitry was arrested yesterday?” says Elmiger, hunched over the fire, jabbing the coals with the poker.

“I had no idea.”

“His secretary called me this morning. Two armed men came and arrested him in his home.”

“Where have they taken him?”

“No one knows. His secretary called and asked me to intervene. There was nothing I could do.”

“The French Forces of the Interior?”

“Yes. I heard that Guitry was led out of the building with a gun to his head.”

“Dear God…”

Elmiger sits up and puts a fist on his hip. He is bathed in sweat. It is hot as hell in the office and Frank is sweating too. He wipes his forehead on his shirtsleeve.

Where is he now? In prison, probably—at least I hope so. Is Sacha dead?

“They didn’t even give him time to get dressed. Guitry was dragged out into the street in yellow pajamas and a pair of crocodile-skin slippers.”

“Did they try to lynch him?” Frank says worriedly.

“Probably not. But these mobs seem indifferent to celebrity.”

Nothing worse for Guitry, Frank thinks. He must have cursed them.

Sacha Guitry predicted this: he and all the regulars at the Ritz are now having to face their judgment for having spent the war socializing with the Nazis. Not one of them can feel safe in their beds tonight, including Frank. Barman, guest, or customer, they now face the consequences of the past few years. There’s not a single German officer left in the hotel: they have all moved to the Hôtel Meurice. Insurgents could burst through the doors at any moment, and everyone in the Ritz would be at the mercy of a vengeful mob. Elmiger knows this.

Who will get here first, the Resistance or the Allies?

The fate of the Ritz depends on the answer to this question. Elmiger burns as much as he can. Having thrown another bundle of papers onto the fire he pauses and stares into the flames as though searching for answers. Wistfully, he puffs on his cigarette.

Frank dares to ask an apposite question.

“Are you afraid, Hans?”

“There are different kinds of fear, Frank.”

This is no time for surnames.

“Are you afraid of dying?”

“Not really. I’m mostly afraid of what people will say about me when I’m dead.”

“That you sided with the Germans?”

“Well… Yes, they’re bound to say that, aren’t they? The heroes will be those who joined the Resistance. They will get the glory, and they deserve it. The rest of us will have to be content with keeping our heads down and being hypocrites. We allowed ourselves to drift with evil currents. Even if, deep down, I hope I’ve done my best.”

Frank now lights a cigarette. It feels like the last cigarette of a condemned man, but the firing squad has not yet arrived.

“What have you learned from all of this?”

“That we have to be more concerned with people than with flags. That, in the end, the only thing that matters is how we act.”

The manager heaves a weary sigh. Behind him, the incriminating evidence against the Ritz is ablaze. Frank remembers how much he underestimated Elmiger when he first arrived, how much he despised the man at the start of the war. It is a very different man who now stands here in this office. Or perhaps it is the same man, whose true nature was revealed by circumstances? Perhaps tomorrow he will be judged by the country’s new masters. Frank, on the other hand, will never forget that he was a mensch.

“What about you, Frank, what have you learned?”

“That, happy or unhappy, you have to love life as it is.”

“Now that is a true piece of wisdom.”

“It came to me too late. No life is completely made up of good times or of hardships. I try to remind myself of that so that I don’t go under.”

“That’s the danger all of us face.”

For a moment, the two men smoke and stare into the hearth.

“And how are you feeling tonight?” Elmiger asks.

“Not particularly resistant…”

The manager laughs.

“You’ve got a way with words!”

“Oh, it’s not my phrase. I stole it from Arletty. I heard her say it to Guitry one night.”

“Poor Arletty,” says Elmiger with a sigh. “She too has a lot to worry about.”

Frank is about to say something, but an animal instinct has alerted him to the strange silence outside. Suddenly, the air is filled with a deep, booming sound. Elmiger cups his ear.

“Is that… the great bell at Notre-Dame?”

“It sounds like it.”

“Oh my God, that means the Allies have entered Paris.”

Frank is in shock. He has waited so long to hear those words.

“Get me the last of the registers, quick!” Elmiger shouts. “We have to finish what we started!”

Frank cannot so much as lift a finger.

“Come on, Meier! Help me!”

In the darkness, a tenor bell tolls, and soon the tintinnabulation spreads from steeple to steeple. Every church bell in the city rings out. Frank feels the hair on his arms prickle. The bells of Paris are warning the Germans that their reign over the city is at an end. From Montmartre to the Gobelins, from Montparnasse to the Buttes-Chaumont, everyone in Paris knows what this means: the bells herald an imminent explosion of joy. Frank feels his whole body tingling, and is surprised to realize that at heart he is French, now and forever. Elmiger pays no heed to the tolling of the bells; his mind is completely focused on the Ritz. He tears out as many pages as he can, crumples them up into a ball, and tosses them into the fire, oblivious to the present, obsessed with the future.

Frank looks on without helping. One of the other things this war has taught him is that he is alone, as is Elmiger. Holed up in the Ritz, they retreat into themselves in the hope of finding some way to slip between the lines. But tonight Frank envies all those who will be celebrating the liberation of Paris tomorrow. He envies them, but he will not be one of them. Even if the Resistance allowed him to take part in the celebrations, he’s already decided that he has no place there. Back in 1918, he so despised the soldiers with cushy posts who celebrated the armistice that tomorrow he will stay away from the hugging and the backslapping.

It is a matter of honor.

Tonight, Paris is preparing to celebrate its liberation, but Frank must content himself with celebrating the fact that he is still alive.