“Delightful,” I said, climbing down the ladder steps, pearls swaying. Could he not at least suppress the smile?
“I’m on my way to the theater, but I need your signature for Rena’s visa application. If this is a bad time—”
“Of course not.”
Mother approached us, and the orchestra picked up their tempo.
“Mother, may I introduce Paul Rodierre?”
“Lovely to meet you,” Mother said. “You’re in The Streets of Paris, I hear.”
Paul gave Mother one of his best smiles. “Just one of a hundred.”
Mother seemed immune to him. To the untrained eye, she appeared perfectly cordial, but after years of watching her in society, I could detect the chill.
“If you’ll excuse me, I need to see about refreshing the khachapuri. Someone seems to be eating it all.”
Paul turned to face Mother. “Khachapuri? My favorite.”
“It’s for the paying guests, I’m afraid,” Mother said. “Not that there will be many of those tonight.”
Paul bowed a little bow in Mother’s direction, so formal with her. “If you ladies will excuse me, I must be going.” He smiled at me and exited the way he came. So soon?
“Good job, Mother, alienating our one guest.”
“The French can be so sensitive.”
“You can’t expect people to stay here. New Yorkers would rather die than eat tvorog, and it does help to offer alcohol, you know.”
“Next time we’ll sell weenies and beans. If it were up to you, we’d all be out at a bump supper, a jug of corn whiskey on the table.”
I turned my attention to hanging Mother’s pine garlands above the doorways, assisted by a sulky Pia. As we worked I mentally addressed the long list of things I was behind on. Reports for Roger. My comfort packages. Why was Mother so stubborn? She had to adapt to the twentieth century. I felt someone’s gaze on me and turned to see one of the more elderly members of the orchestra, balalaika in hand, wink at me.
An hour later even Mother conceded defeat. Our only potential customers had been Plaza guests, a couple from Chicago who’d wandered in by mistake and left quickly, as if they’d happened upon a nudist colony.
“Well, this was a bust,” Mother said.
I pulled a garland down from the wall.
“I told you—”
I didn’t finish the sentence, for such a clatter grew in the hallway outside the ballroom we could scarcely hear each other. The doors were flung wide, and a crowd streamed in—every sort of person you can imagine, from up and down the social ladder, all heavily rouged and dressed in 1920s French attire. Women in low-belted sweater sets, their hair finger-waved. Some wore dropped waist dresses and Louise Brooks bobs. Gorgeous creatures in satin tea gowns embroidered with beads and rhinestones, their hair Eton cropped and slick à la Josephine Baker. The men wore vintage suits and bowler hats. A slew of black-tuxedoed musicians brought up the rear, violins and saxophones in hand. Mother looked ready to shoot through the roof with happiness as she waved the musicians over to join the orchestra.
“We have khachapuri, everyone,” she announced. “Leave your coats with dear Pia.”
In the wake of it all, Paul strode in.
“My goodness, what’s all this?” Paul said, squeezing past two women carrying a drum set, cloche hats pulled down over their eyes. I recognized them, of course.
“I think you know, Paul. How did you get the whole show here?”
“You know theater people. They were already dressed for a party. Carmen has a migraine, so no matinee today. We’re free until curtain call at six.”
The Streets of Paris pit band mixed well with Mother’s Russian orchestra friends and found “Love Is Here to Stay” their musical bridge across the nations. Once the dancers recognized the song, they took to the dance floor, women foxtrotting and swing dancing with women, men with men.
Mother rushed to us, straightening her headdress as she walked.
“It’s a nice-looking group, isn’t it? I knew we’d eventually draw a crowd.”
“Mother, Paul did all this. They’re from his show. The whole cast.”
Mother blinked, momentarily nonplussed, and then turned to Paul. “Well, the American Central Committee for Russian Relief thanks you, Mr. Rodierre.”
“Is there any way those thanks might include a dance? I’ve never danced to Gershwin played on balalaika.”
“Well, we mustn’t deprive you of the opportunity,” Mother said.
Once word leaked that the famous Paul Rodierre was at the thé dansant, the whole hotel came by, and Serge had to replenish the tvorog three times. Soon I managed to lose my headdress, and everyone was having a grand time, including Mother’s orchestra friends, who’d brought some Russian vodka to liven up the iced tea.
By the time Paul left, his pockets were pregnant with Russian cigarettes pressed upon him by Mother, and the donation bowl for the American Central Committee for Russian Relief was overflowing.
Mother stopped near me to catch her breath between dances. “Feel free to collect as many French friends as you like, darling. I do miss theater people, don’t you, dear? Such a refreshing change of pace.”
Paul waved goodbye to me as he left, a job well done, off to deliver the cast back to the theater for curtain call. His kindness could not have found a more grateful object than Mother. She hadn’t danced like that since Father died. How could I not be immensely thankful to him?
Betty was right. He really was my best friend.
1939
Matka screamed as the SS man brought the shovel down on Psina. After one dreadful squawk she lay quiet, the only sound the scratching of her still-running feet against the hard ground. A few butterscotch feathers hammocked in the air.
“That’s how we did it back home,” said the SS man. He threw down the shovel, picked poor Psina up by her limp neck, and tossed her to the skinny guard. I tried not to look at her legs, still scratching at the air.
“I’ll let this go,” the SS man said to Matka. He wiped his hands on a handkerchief. “But remember, withholding food from the Reich is a serious offense. You’re lucky to get a warning.”
“Of course,” Matka said, one hand on her throat.
“Psina,” I blurted out. Hot tears burned my eyes.
“Listen,” said the skinny guard, holding Psina upside down, avoiding her talons. “?‘Psina’ means ‘doggie’ in Polish. They call a chicken a dog. Stupid Poles.”
The men took Psina and stomped out, tracking soil on our floors.
My whole body trembled. “You let them kill her, Matka.”
“Would you rather die for a chicken?” Matka said, but she had tears in her eyes, too.
We hurried to the kitchen and watched through the front window as the men left in their truck. Thank God my sister had not seen all that.
Zuzanna returned the next day, having spent the night at the hospital. Her mentor and hospital director Dr. Skala, famous for his cleft palate repair work, had been arrested, and she’d been ordered to leave the ward and told Poles were unfit to hold important positions. I’d never seen her so shaken, wild and angry at having been forced to leave her patients, who were mostly children. Later we learned that as far back as 1936 Nazis had been putting lists together of Poles they suspected of being anti-German and even marking targets like hospitals with giant X’s that their pilots could see from the air. No wonder it was so easy for them to take those they wanted.
Papa returned as well after three days of interrogation by the Gestapo. He’d not been beaten, but he was ordered to work early each morning and spent long hours at the postal center. We were relieved he was alive, but he told us how hard it was to watch the Nazis open packages and letters from the post boxes of Polish citizens and just take what they wanted. They scattered sawdust on the floor after hours to make sure he and his staff did not visit the postal center at night when it was unattended.