The Paris Architect: A Novel Page 5

  “Since the factory will be on one floor, with the exception of some mezzanine space, let’s assume a 50,000-square-meter footprint,” said Herzog as if he were talking to the drawing. He moved the scale around and then pulled a pencil out of the same pocket, making tick marks on the paper.

  “It fits without any problem, plus there’s plenty of room for stockpiling materiel outside.”

  “Excellent, Major,” said Lieber.

  “Maybe even room for expansion in the future,” Lucien said, knowing that this would please the Germans. Expansion would mean the war was going well for their side.

  “Exactly, Monsieur Bernard. Room for a separate plant or just an addition,” said Herzog.

  Herzog started to draw on the map but stopped and looked at Lucien.

  “Monsieur Bernard, maybe you could come up and rough out the location and how you think the road would connect to the site. Just a rough concept, you know, to get us going.” He handed Lucien the pencil.

  Lucien was delighted to take charge. For the next two hours he led a discussion of how the project should be sited, drawing the outline of the building on the map, then erasing it and placing it in another location, and then another, until all four men were in agreement on where the factory should be placed. They talked about entrances and exits, flow of production, and lighting.

  While the Germans were talking to Manet about the cost of construction, Lucien, who had sat back down to listen, felt a shiver go up his back. He was so caught up in the planning of the new factory he’d completely forgotten about his extracurricular work for Manet. At this very moment, they both had their heads in the mouth of the lion. The realization made him nervous and prompted fierce perspiring. He took out his handkerchief and wiped his forehead.

  Herzog looked over at him with a concerned expression. “Monsieur Bernard, you don’t look well. Do you want some water?”

  “No. No. I’m fine. It’s just hot in here, that’s all.”

  The Germans continued haggling with Manet about the cost, and Lucien continued to perspire. He then heard the magic words that all architects dream of hearing.

  “Well, Lucien,” said Manet, “if the gentlemen of the Reich are in agreement, you should start the plans immediately.”

  The Germans nodded their approval, and both stood up from their chairs.

  “Monsieur Bernard, because of our time constraints, we’re looking for the most basic of drawings,” said Herzog.

  “Are you available for lunch, Monsieur Manet?” asked Lieber.

  Lucien was well aware of what the answer would be. Lieber’s invitation was merely a courtesy. Doing business with Germans in private was one thing, but dining with them in public in the middle of the day was crossing a forbidden boundary. The Germans also knew this, and while they didn’t care what the French did to collaborators, they didn’t want to rock the boat by endangering their French contractors.

  “I’m afraid not, Colonel Lieber, but thank you for asking,” replied Manet.

  Herzog came up to Lucien to shake his hand. “I much admired the building you did for Monsieur Gaston. Wrapping the glass around that exterior staircase was a wonderful detail.”

  When Lucien heard the word “detail,” he knew the man wasn’t a layman but one of the architecture fraternity.

  “Are you an architect, Major Herzog?”

  “I started out to be. In fact, I studied under Walter Gropius at the Bauhaus in Dessau in the late twenties. But when my father came to visit, he thought it was all nonsense and put a stop to it. I transferred to study structural engineering at the Polytechnic in Berlin.”

  Lucien could sense a great deal of regret in that last sentence and empathized with the German, but all the same he was damned impressed. “Gropius is a genius,” said Lucien. “Even to study under him for a short time would be a great experience. It is a shame he had to leave Germany.”

  “The Fuehrer has different ideas of what architecture should be. To him, Gropius and his work were subversive.”

  Lucien was about to say that Hitler’s taste in architecture was rotten but held his tongue. Herzog may have once been a modernist architect, but he was still a German officer. Lucien could find himself in an internment camp.

  “Still, it was quite unfortunate that Herr Gropius had to leave for America,” said Lucien sympathetically. “What kind of person was he?”

  “Ah, rather harsh and pedantic, but a man of great vision and even greater talent. Have you ever seen the Fagus Factory?”

  Lucien was eager to tell Herzog that he had indeed made the pilgrimage to Germany in the mid-1930s to see all the famous German modern buildings. Many snapshots of them were often scattered next to his drafting table for inspiration when he was designing. “I spent two months traveling throughout Germany seeing my favorite buildings, but Gropius’s Fagus Factory is a masterpiece. Better than the Bauhaus School, which I also visited.”

  Lucien saw a smile come over Herzog’s face. The major picked up his cap and gloves off a side table and put them on, moving slowly toward the door.

  “I’ll be looking forward to seeing your design for Monsieur Manet. Maybe it’ll be another Fagus Factory,” said Herzog with his hand on the door handle.

  Lucien grinned and shook his head. “Nothing of mine can ever come close to it, I assure you. But I will produce a building of advanced ideas.”

  “The Reich will be most pleased,” replied Herzog.

  7

  Lucien had soon discovered one of the prices he’d be paying for all that money, the commission, and the thrill of designing the hiding place: living in a constant state of fear. He stopped in the doorways of three shops to check if he was being followed. Manet had insisted on a meeting. Lucien didn’t think one was necessary; he had done the drawings and that was the end of it. But Manet wanted him to see the finished work. On rue Euler, just a block away from the apartment building, Lucien looked out from another doorway and came face to face with three smiling German enlisted men.

  “Pardon, monsieur, could you please tell us the way to Notre Dame? We’re totally lost,” said a handsome soldier with golden blond hair.

  His companions laughed and shrugged their shoulders, admitting their helplessness. Lucien knew his face registered a look of abject terror, but the men didn’t seem to notice. The Occupation had brought busloads of German tourist-soldiers like these. Carrying cameras and guidebooks, they hit every main attraction in Paris, including climbing the Eiffel Tower and seeing the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, where they all insisted on getting their photo taken. Ever since Hitler had taken a two-hour tour of the city right after the armistice, every German soldier had had to see Paris, and the army encouraged them to do so. On one hand, it was kind of flattering to have Germans come to admire the city—they had nothing like it in Germany. Berlin was a second-rate city compared to the City of Light. Giving directions to Germans was a delicate matter, though, as misdirecting them could cause problems if the soldiers ran into you again. Teenagers and the elderly routinely gave them wrong directions—it became a running joke—but many adult Parisians put their hatred aside for a moment and directed the Germans as they would any stranger. Lucien fought the overwhelming urge to bolt. He swallowed hard and smiled.

  “Certainly, gentlemen. Go down this street to the avenue Marceau, turn left, and stay on it until you hit the Seine, turn left, and walk along the river for about fifteen minutes, and you’ll see Notre Dame. It’s on its own little island in the Seine.”

  A soldier with reddish-brown hair scribbled the directions in a little notebook. The blond one repeated Lucien’s directions aloud to make sure he had it right.

  “Thank you so much, monsieur. You have a very beautiful city.”

  “Enjoy yourselves. And remember, we have the best collection of dirty postcards in Europe.”

  The soldiers roared with laughter, waved, and went on their way. Lucien stayed where he was until they were out of sight. He leaned against a wall of a building and
reached inside his jacket pocket for his cigarettes. Could they be Gestapo men disguised as Wehrmacht soldiers who were following him? His hands were shaking, but he managed to light a cigarette and take a few drags before flicking it into the gutter. He waited another five minutes then finally made it to the building, nodded at the concierge, who ignored him, and started up the stairs.

  He knew the Gestapo could be waiting for him in the apartment. He’d be tortured and killed, and he hadn’t even had the chance to enjoy all that money, having only spent 700 of the 12,000 franc fee on black market eggs and some real wine. At each landing, he felt like turning and running down the stairs, but he continued on. Lucien kept thinking of how fast the construction work had been done—in just a few days. It seemed impossible. Was it a trap?

  He had completed the column drawings in a couple of hours then had set to work on the factory. It felt good to be designing again, and Lucien enjoyed every minute he worked on the building, drawing detail after detail, trying out different ideas for the facades. The building had wonderful skylights, which brought light into the center of the factory floor, and three two-story entries, where the workers would pass through each day. The last thing to do was a perspective drawing of the entire building, as if one were looking at it from an airplane. By Monday, the drawings would be complete, ready for Tuesday morning’s meeting. He couldn’t wait to present the drawings. Herzog would be impressed.

  The Germans had only given him a week to complete the design drawings. If it had been any other client, he would have told them to go to hell. But since this was a client who could have him executed, he didn’t protest. He also didn’t protest the tiny fee—just 3,000 francs—he was getting for the design. What mattered most was the opportunity to design a good building; he couldn’t blow this.

  Lucien lightly knocked on the door. He didn’t want to draw the attention of any neighbors. The door swung open, and Manet stood before him, looking very contented.

  “Come in and see your handiwork, Lucien,” he said in a loud voice that made Lucien cringe.

  He cast a nervous glance behind him and went into the apartment, following Manet into the salon. At first, Lucien was puzzled that everything looked the same as when he’d first visited the apartment almost a week ago. Then he realized that was a good thing. It seemed as though nothing had been touched. He walked toward the column, but stopped about three meters away to see whether he’d notice anything odd about the shaft. As he circled the column, he kept staring, but everything seemed perfectly normal to him. Moving a meter away, he still saw nothing. Then with his face five centimeters away, Lucien examined the shaft up and down to see if even the tiniest flaw would give the whole ruse away. He could barely see the joints hidden in the square edge of the fluting. He had designed quite a bit of custom cabinetry before the war and had seen work of great precision, but this was amazing. The joints were even less than razor-thin; they almost disappeared. It was the kind of precision one would see in the engineering of high-quality steel machine parts. As an added precaution, the door had been placed on the side of the column closest to the wall to avoid detection.

  Lucien took the index and middle fingers of his right hand and sharply tapped the right side of the door about three meters from the floor. The very tall door popped open to reveal the hollow space of the column. He stepped inside and pulled the door shut with a brass handle. He stood in total darkness, looking about him. Lucien couldn’t see any light showing through the joints of the door. He stooped down and slowly stretched out his hand, finding a latch at the bottom of the door and fastening it. Running his hand along the door’s edge, he found another one a half a meter above it. He continued to do this until he’d fastened five latches.

  “Monsieur Manet, I want you to pound on this door with all your might,” Lucien shouted.

  Manet got a running start and threw his entire body against the door, repeating the motion two more times. With his hand on the door, Lucien felt that the door didn’t budge a millimeter. The column itself didn’t move at the base either. The workmen had done a good job of securely fastening it to the floor.

  “A few more times,” said Lucien. Manet walked four meters from the column and charged at it like a bull. After the second time, he began to get winded and tired, but he did it two more times.

  “All right, Monsieur, I’m coming out.”

  Outside the column, Lucien circled it, running his hand along the fluting of the beautiful wood shaft, his face beaming with pride. The feeling of incredible exhilaration was back, and he was off on another high.

  “You’re certainly a man of your word, Monsieur Manet. The workmanship is extraordinary.”

  “I’m glad you approve. My men are excellent, but they needed your imagination. They just followed your instructions.”

  “It’s incredible that they could do such fine work in so short a time.”

  “Because I may have more than one guest staying here at a time, I decided to have the other column done as well,” said Manet.

  At once, Lucien walked over to the second column to examine its exterior. The work was equal to the first.

  “Doubly extraordinary,” said Lucien with a smile.

  “A clever solution, Monsieur,” said Manet, patting him on the shoulder.

  “That’s if your guest doesn’t panic and start crying in there,” replied Lucien who knew that the success of the most ingenious design depended on the nerve of the occupant. “I can’t soundproof this thing.”

  “I’m afraid that is something you and I have no control over.”

  “I’m ready for Tuesday’s presentation,” said Lucien, shifting the conversation to a more pleasurable topic.

  “Major Herzog is looking forward to seeing your work. He called yesterday to see how things were going.”

  “You…and the major will be very pleased,” Lucien said. “It’s a very functional design that—”

  “Tuesday at 9:00 a.m., then?” said Manet as he walked to the door, gesturing for Lucien to precede him, for they couldn’t leave together.

  Lucien wasn’t insulted that Manet had cut him off. The old man had probably worked with architects before, so he probably knew what bullshitters they were when it came to explaining their work.

  Walking down the stairs, Lucien’s pride in his columns slowly faded away. When he got to the front door, he stayed there for about two minutes, terrified to go in the street. A black Citroën, the automobile favored by the Gestapo, could be parked at the curb waiting for him. He took a deep breath and opened the door slowly. Looking to the left and right, he stepped out onto the sidewalk and began walking briskly down the rue Galilée. He wanted to break into a run, but he remembered the dead Jew in his blue suit and slowed down to a walk.

  8

  “You were right, it’s ingenious.”

  Mendel Janusky popped open the door to the column and stepped inside. He shut the panel, then came out. “The total darkness in there is serenely peaceful.”

  Janusky walked over to Auguste Manet. “Can your architect be trusted?”

  “Without question, my friend. You’ll be safe in his hands,” said Manet.

  “I hope so. I’m so tired of running, Auguste. There are some days I feel like walking into Gestapo headquarters and giving myself up. I’d tell them where all the money is and let them kill me.”

  Manet laughed. He had known Mendel Janusky for almost twenty years, and he wasn’t a man who gave up easily. Janusky would never surrender to the Nazis, let alone let them have his vast fortune. Every sou of it went to buy freedom for his people, not just in France but throughout Europe. Beginning in the late ’30s, Janusky had set up a network of agents on the Continent to arrange transit papers and visas to help Jews escape, mainly to Portugal, Turkey, and South America, the easiest places to bribe officials. Money could buy freedom, and he was willing to spend as much as it took. Even as late as 1941, families were being saved by him. Manet knew he’d recently arranged to smuggle sixty Jews in
to Turkey, where they’d boarded a freighter bound for Venezuela. Warned by his friends that he must get out of France, he’d ignored their advice and now was trapped. The Gestapo was tightening the noose around him. Nonetheless, he told Manet he was determined to escape to continue his work. There were many more to help.

  “That’s a joke. I’ll turn myself in before you ever do, Mendel.”

  Janusky smiled. “You’re a good man, Manet. When most gentile businessmen turned their backs on the Jews, without hesitating you offered to help us, putting yourself and your entire family at great risk.”

  “Any good Christian would do the same.”

  “Now that’s a goddamn joke. You know, I never trusted gentiles. They would smile in your face and call you a dirty kike the minute your back was turned. They would do business with us, but forget about socializing. Did any gentile ever invite me for a weekend in the country except you? Not on your life. France might have been the first country in Europe to grant Jews civil rights, but it’s still a country of Jew haters. I was stupid enough to be fooled into thinking they’d finally accepted us.”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “That’s because you’re a true Christian gentleman. But you’re a fool to think most men think like you.”

  Manet was saddened to see the physical change in his friend. Once a tall, distinguished-looking man with piercing blue eyes and a vibrant personality, Janusky’s eyes now seemed dull and lifeless, and his face was haggard. His salt-and-pepper hair was completely white. Walking with a pronounced stoop back to the column, Janusky ran his fingers up and down its fluting, clearly enjoying the tactile pleasure of its smoothness.

  “You know, I had a dream about my father last night,” Janusky said, almost absentmindedly. “That hasn’t happened in many years.”

  “I remember your father. No man worked harder for his family. He rose from nothing.”

  “Less than nothing. He escaped the pogroms in Russia in 1881. Gathered people’s old scrap metal eighteen hours a day and sold it for a tiny profit. A sou here, a sou there. Until he had the biggest scrap metal business in Paris. Then came the steel mill.”