Philip Kerr - The Lady from Zagreb

I nodded. I remembered seeing the newsreel of his assassination. Everyone did. It was probably the first time anything like that had ever been seen in German cinemas. The king had been shot in his limousine, just like Archduke Ferdinand. Which just goes to show: when you’re a king or an archduke, it pays to rent a car with a hardtop.

“Following the assassination of King Alexander, my mother decided the writing was on the wall for Yugoslavia, and soon after that we left the country for good to live with her brother in Zurich, where I enrolled at the Girls’ High School. I passed my Matura exam with top marks and won a place at the polytechnic to study mathematics, which I think is where my real talents lie. I’ve always been more interested in science and maths than anything. In another life I think I should have liked to have been an inventor. Maybe I still will be when people get tired of seeing my face up on the screen. However, because of my mother I was always being pushed toward the theater, and I started acting as a hobby, only to discover that people thought I was actually good at it. I played Cordelia in King Lear at Zurich’s famous Theater am Neumarkt; and, in 1936, I was Lena in Büchner’s Leonce and Lena , which is when I was discovered, as they say in cinema, by Carl Froelich, who’s a big noise at UFA studios and second only in importance to Josef himself. Carl arranged for me to have a screen test in Berlin, as a result of which I was offered a seven-year contract. At his suggestion I changed my name to Dalia Dresner — because it sounded more German — and had all sorts of acting and deportment lessons and was generally groomed for stardom, although frankly I was more interested in going to the polytechnic and completing my education. I don’t know whether you are aware of it, but Albert Einstein was a student at Zurich Polytechnic; and he was always a bit of a hero of mine. Anyway, there’s nothing complicated or clever about acting. It’s a job. A dog could do it. In fact dogs often do. One of the biggest stars in Hollywood used to be a German shepherd called Rin Tin Tin.

“Of course, my mother wanted the contract with UFA more than I did, and so we both moved to Berlin, in 1937. My mother generally got what she wanted. She was always a rather overbearing figure in my life, and when you met her it was easy to see why she’d driven my father back into the arms of the priesthood. Which is probably why I married my own husband, Stefan. He’s a Swiss-Serbian lawyer who lives and works in Zurich. He’s much older than me, but he loves me very dearly and helped me to break the hold my mother had over me. When I’m not working, I live there, with him. But mostly I’m here in Babelsberg, making three or four indifferent pictures a year.”

She shook her head. “If I’m as frank about this as you were earlier, Herr Gunther, indifferent is putting it mildly. Let’s face it, anything directed by Veit Harlan is not going to be without controversy, to say the least. I only narrowly avoided being cast as Dorothea in Jud Süss . Fortunately Harlan gave that part to his wife. But The Saint That Never Was had its anti-Semitic side. It wasn’t the Jews who stoned Hypatia but Christians. At least that’s what the history books say, although it’s perfectly possible that many of those Christians were Jews first.”

She paused.

“Anyway, my mother died recently.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. She was a difficult woman. But even so, I did miss her. And suddenly feeling very alone, in spite of my husband, I realized that I simply had to try to get in contact with my father again. When you’ve lost one parent, the one that survives, no matter how distant he or she has become, starts to look more important. Of course, since I left Yugoslavia the political situation has deteriorated badly, and to cut a long story short, my country was invaded by German, Italian, and Hungarian forces in April of 1941. The Independent State of Croatia was established as a Nazi state, ruled by a fascist militia known as the Ustaše. On the other side are two factions: the communist-led Yugoslav partisans and the royalist Chetniks. The partisans are probably the largest resistance army in occupied Western Europe. And it’s probably no exaggeration to say that outside of Croatia, and away from the influence of the Axis powers, Yugoslavia is now in total chaos. All of which probably explains why I’ve been unable to make contact with my father. I’ve sent several letters, without reply. I’ve met with the foreign minister, von Ribbentrop, to see if he can help. I’ve even been to see Cardinal Frings in Cologne, in secret, to see if he could help.”

“Why in secret?”

“Because Josef would not approve. In fact he’d be furious. He’s very much against the Roman Catholic clergy in Germany. Or anywhere else, for that matter. But the cardinal couldn’t help, either. Frankly, I’d go back to Yugoslavia and look for my father myself but Josef simply won’t hear of it. He says it’s much too dangerous.”

“He’s probably right about that,” I said. “Beautiful movie stars are in short supply these days.”

“All he really wants is for me to start this stupid picture as soon as possible.”

“I’m just guessing, but somehow I don’t think it’s all that he wants.”

“No, perhaps it isn’t. But trust me, I can handle him easily enough. If the leader ever heard about what Josef’s wife, Magda, gets up to — her ‘retaliatory affairs’ — there would be hell to pay.”

“Do you mean you’d tell him?”

“If I had to, I would. Indirectly, anyway. I’ve no wish to become another of Josef’s many conquests.”

“It almost makes me glad I’m not married myself.”

“If I could just know for sure that my father was alive. If he could only read a letter I’ve written to him. I’m sure I’d feel I’d done everything possible. But until then, my mind is elsewhere. I simply can’t concentrate on something as frivolous as a movie like Siebenkäs. I mean, have you read the novel?”

“No,” I said. “And somehow I don’t think I’m going to.”

She shook her head, as if the book were beneath contempt. “I know it’s a lot to ask of anyone — to go to Yugoslavia on my account — but if I could just know that everything that could be done to find him has been done, then I’d feel a whole lot better. Do you understand? Then I might actually be able to do this stupid picture.”

I nodded. “Let me get this straight, Fräulein Dresner. You want me to be your postman. To travel to Yugoslavia and deliver a letter, in person, to your father, if I can find him.”

“That’s right, Herr Gunther. To remind him he has a daughter who would like to see him again. I was thinking that Josef might be able to organize a visa for him to travel to Germany, and I could meet with him here in Berlin. It would mean so much to me.”

“And the minister’s prepared to do that? To facilitate my going there and your father coming here?”

“Yes.”

“This monastery in Banja Luka. Is that your father’s last known address?”

She nodded.

“Tell me about it.”

“Banja Luka is in Bosnia-Herzegovina, about two hundred kilometers south of Zagreb. It’s a largish town in the hands of the Ustaše. So quite safe for Germans, I think. You could probably drive there in a day, depending on the condition of the roads. The Petricevac Monastery of the Most Holy Trinity is run by Franciscans. I’ve only been there once, when I was a small child. It’s probably the biggest building in Banja Luka so I don’t think you could miss it.”

“What’s his name?”

“Antun Djurkovic. When he joined the order he took Ladislaus as his religious name. After the saint. He calls himself Father Ladislaus now. I have some pictures of him in the house, if you’d care to look at them.”