Page 255 - Sweet Embraceable You: Coffee-House Stories

Duchess Berlin 1928 243

face pulls back
MEDIUM SHOT
TEUFEL sits at linened table elegantly smoking a cigarette,
European-style, and sipping a small coffee. Activity and
atmosphere people fill the set. American reporter JOHN
WILSON enters.
Wilson: Frau Teufel?
Teufel: (Ever the coquette) Mein Herr.
Wilson: John Wilson of the New York Blade.
Teufel: Such an eager Mr. Wilson. Americans are always eager
where money is concerned.
Wilson: You write a persuasive letter.
Teufel: My letter was accurate.
Wilson: The Grand Duchess may be the Woman of the Century.
Teufel: Her whereabouts is very valuable to your newspaper?
Wilson: The Duchess is a good human-interest story. A young
girl. Exile. Assassination. Lost identity.
Teufel: A melodrama.
Wilson: A fairytale.
Teufel: The Duchess sells newspapers.
Wilson: Frau Teufel, you deliver her to me. You deliver half what
your letter promised, and I guarantee your picture on the
cover of our Sunday supplement.
Teufel: You perhaps flatter all women, Mr. Wilson. Spare me. I
am a faceless nobody.

WILSON makes no comment. A WAITER saves the
dead moment between them by serving him a coffee and
TEUFEL a pastry.

Teufel: All that concerns me is my dear Anna. I must protect her.
She is very valuable to me.
Wilson: Returning her true identity will be her best protection.
Teufel: The Red Communists wish her dead.
Wilson: She will be safe in Paris or London. She may be in exile.
But she can enjoy even exile in New York.

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