Сусана Фортес – Waiting for Robert Capa (страница 4)
Ruth shook her head, as if she truly felt bad dashing her friend’s hopes like that.
“He’s one of us,” she said. “A Jew from Budapest. He doesn’t have a franc.”
“Too bad!” Gerta said, deliberately smacking her lips in a theatrical manner. “Is he at least handsome then?” she mused.
She had gone back to being the happy and frivolous girl from the tennis club in Waldau. But it was only a distant reflex. Or maybe not. Perhaps there were two women trapped inside her. The Jewish adolescent who wanted to be Greta Garbo, who adored etiquette, expensive dresses, and the classic poems she knew by heart. And the activist, tough, who dreamed of changing the world. Greta or Gerta. That very night, the latter was going to gain territory.
Chez Capoulade was located in a windowless basement on 63 Boulevard Saint-Michel. For months, leftist militants from all over Europe had started gathering there. Many of them were German and a few were from the Leipzig group, like Willi Chardack. The place was dimly lit, no brighter than a cave, and at the last minute everyone would show up: the impatient ones, the hard-core ones, the severe ones, those in favor of direct action, the ones that could be trusted. Impassioned looks, irritated gestures, lowering their voices to say that André Breton had joined the Communist Party, or to quote an editorial in
Deep in thought, she walked behind them without a single misstep. Ruth had insisted she join them, leaving her with no other choice. The filtered light beneath the trees in the Luxembourg Garden made it feel as though they were passing through a huge crystal dome; it was one of literature’s most frequented walks. Out of nowhere, Ruth ran beneath a horse-chestnut. Wearing a maroon-colored coat, she rested her back up against its trunk and smiled. Click. She had a talent for posing. From an angle, her face resembled one you would see in classic art. The sky cropped above her head like the jaw of an antelope. Click. With her coat collar lifted, she took three steps forward and then back, making a funny face to the camera, her head tilted to one side. Click. Without batting an eye, she passed right by the statues of the great masters: Flaubert, Baudelaire, Verlaine … bowing her head slightly when she came upon the bust of Chopin. Click. The sunlight scattered itself, like in a painting, over the tallest branches. Along the central path, her footsteps crunched over the gravel. The French were always so concerned with rationalizing spaces, putting up iron gates on the countryside. She ran her fingers over the surface of the pond and playfully splashed the photographer. Click.
Gerta observed and remained silent, as if this had nothing to do with her. Ultimately, she had gone only because her friend didn’t fully trust the Hungarian. Although there was something about the spectacle that fascinated her. She had never been interested in photography, but to predict the invisible selection process of the mind when framing a shot seemed to her an exercise in absolute precision. Just like hunting.
The camera was light and compact, a high-speed 35-mm Leica with a focal-plane shutter.
“I just rescued her from a pawnshop.”
The Hungarian excused himself, smiling, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. His name, André Friedmann. Black eyes, very black, like a cocker spaniel’s, a small, moon-shaped scar over his left brow, a turtleneck, a film actor’s good looks, upper lip slightly curled in an expression of disdain.
“She’s my girlfriend,” he joked, caressing the camera. “I can’t live without her.”
He had come with a Polish friend of his, David Seymour, who was also a photographer and Jewish. They called him Chim. He was thin and wore the glasses of an intellectual. It appeared as if they’d been friends a long time; both the kind who come off as uncouth, who place their glass on the table and never turn away anything that comes their way. Theirs was a friendship like Gerta and Ruth’s, to some degree, although different. It’s always different with men.
As they strolled around the Latin Quarter, they all took turns telling their stories, where they came from, how they ended up there, their refugee adventures … There was also the decorative part: Paris, September, the tall trees, the time that passes quickly when you are young or far away, or, better yet, when you’re next to the Rue du Cherche-Midi, the sound of an accordion rising like a red fish over the pavement … By then Gerta had enough time to study the situation up close. Walking alongside André as if this was the natural order of things. They kept each other’s pace, without tripping or getting in the way, though keeping their distance. Gerta took her time smoking and talking, without looking at him directly, focused solely on her analysis. She found him to be a bit conceited, handsome, ambitious, and like anyone, overly predictable at times. Seductive, without a doubt; also a tad vulgar, rough around the edges, and lacking in manners. That’s when, while crossing Canal Saint-Martin, his hand reached under her blouse to touch her waist in an invasive manner. It didn’t last more than a tenth of a second, but it was enough. Pure phosphorus. Gerta was immediately put on guard. But who the hell did this Hungarian think he was? She was brusque in her approach, looking as if she were about to say something unpleasant, her pupils radiant with green embers of rage. André just smiled a little, in a way that was simultaneously sincere and helpless. Almost shy. Like a child who has been wrongly accused. There was something in his eyes, a look of uncertainty, and it imbued him with charm. His desire to please became so evident that Gerta felt a vulnerability inside of her, like when she had been scolded as a child for something she hadn’t done and sat on the porch steps fighting back the tears. Careful, she thought. Careful. Careful.
At least the photo session was informative. André and Chim discussed photography like members of a secret sect. A new esoteric sect of Judaism, whose course of action could extend from a meeting with Trotsky in Copenhagen to a European tour with the North American comedians Laurel and Hardy, whom André had recently photographed. To Gerta, it seemed an interesting way to earn a living.
“Not really,” he said, disillusioning her. “There’s a lot of competition. Half of the refugees in Paris are photographers or aspiring to be.”
He spoke about inks for printing, movies in 35 mm, diaphragm apertures, manual dryers and tumble dryers, as if they were the keys to a whole new universe. Gerta listened, taking it all in. She was happy learning something new.
The day extended itself through plazas and into cafés. It was the perfect moment, when the words have yet to mean so much and everything transpires with levity; like André’s mannerism of cupping his fingers to protect the flame for his cigarette. Hands that were tanned and confident. Gerta’s way of walking, looking at the ground and veering a little to the left as if she was giving him the opportunity to occupy that space, smiling. Ruth was also smiling, though her smile was different, tinged with fatalism and resignation due to her friend’s leading role, as if she were thinking,