Passenger to Frankfurt - Agatha Christie [51]
‘And you are with them?’
‘I say so.’
‘What do you mean by that, Renata?’
She said, ‘I say so.’
He said: ‘That young man last night–’
‘Franz Joseph?’
‘Is that his name?’
‘It is the name he is known by.’
‘But he has another name, hasn’t he?’
‘Do you think so?’
‘He is, isn’t he, the young Siegfried?’
‘You saw him like that? You realized that’s what he was, what he stands for?’
‘I think so. Youth. Heroic youth. Aryan youth, it has to be Aryan youth in this part of the world. There is still that point of view. A super race, the supermen. They must be of Aryan descent.’
‘Oh yes, it’s lasted on from the time of Hitler. It doesn’t always come out into the open much and, in other places all over the world, it isn’t stressed so much. South America, as I say, is one of the strongholds. And Peru and South Africa also.’
‘What does the young Siegfried do? What does he do besides look handsome and kiss the hand of his protectress?’
‘Oh, he’s quite an orator. He speaks and his following would follow him to death.’
‘Is that true?’
‘He believes it.’
‘And you?’
‘I think I might believe it.’ She added: ‘Oratory is very frightening, you know. What a voice can do, what words can do, and not particularly convincing words at that. The way they are said. His voice rings like a bell, and women cry and scream and faint away when he addresses them–you’ll see that for yourself.
‘You saw Charlotte’s Bodyguard last night all dressed up–people do love dressing up nowadays. You’ll see them all over the world in their own chosen get-up, different in different places, some with their long hair and their beards, and girls in their streaming white nightgowns, talking of peace and beauty, and the wonderful world that is the world of the young which is to be theirs when they’ve destroyed enough of the old world. The original Country of the Young was west of the Irish Sea, wasn’t it? A very simple place, a different Country of the Young from what we’re planning now–It was silver sands, and sunshine and singing in the waves…
‘But now we want Anarchy, and breaking down and destroying. Only Anarchy can benefit those who march behind it. It’s frightening, it’s also wonderful–because of its violence, because it’s bought with pain and suffering–’
‘So that is how you see the world today?’
‘Sometimes.’
‘And what am I to do next?’
‘Come with your guide. I’m your guide. Like Virgil with Dante, I’ll take you down into hell, I’ll show you the sadistic films partly copied from the old SS, show you cruelty and pain and violence worshipped. And I’ll show you the great dreams of paradise in peace and beauty. You won’t know which is which and what is what. But you’ll have to make up your mind.’
‘Do I trust you, Renata?’
‘That will be your choice. You can run away from me if you like, or you can stay with me and see the new world. The new world that’s in the making.’
‘Pasteboard,’ said Sir Stafford Nye violently.
She looked at him inquiringly.
‘Like Alice in Wonderland. The cards, the pasteboard cards all rising up in the air. Flying about. Kings and Queens and Knaves. All sorts of things.’
‘You mean–what do you mean exactly?’
‘I mean it isn’t real. It’s make-believe. The whole damn thing is make-believe.’
‘In one sense, yes.’
‘All dressed up playing parts, putting on a show. I’m getting nearer, aren’t I, to the meaning of things?’
‘In a way, yes, and in a way, no–’
‘There’s one thing I’d like to ask you because it puzzles me. Big Charlotte ordered you to bring me to see her–why? What did she know about me? What use did she think she could make of me?’
‘I don’t quite know–possibly a kind of Eminence Grise–working behind a façade. That would suit you rather well.’
‘But she knows nothing whatever about me!’
‘Oh, that!’ Suddenly Renata went into peals of laughter. ‘It’s so ridiculous, really–the same old nonsense all over again.’
‘I don’t understand you, Renata.’
‘No–because it’s so simple. Mr Robinson would understand.’
‘Would you kindly explain what you are talking about?’
‘It’s the same old business–“It’s not what you are. It’s who you