force, a drama about a woman whose husband had gone to war. A soldier appeared at her
home one day telling her that he was a comrade of her husband with whom he had served
on the Russian Front. As the play developed, the woman fell in love with the soldier,
unaware that he was a psychopathic killer and that her life was in danger. It was a great
acting role for the wife, and Gautier agreed to direct it immediately, on condition that
Noelle Page play the lead. The backers were reluctant to star an unknown but agreed to
have her audition for them. Gautier hurried home to bring the news to Noelle. She had
come to him because she wanted to be a star and now he was going to give her her wish.
He told himself this would bring them closer together, would make her really love him.
They would get married and he would possess her, always.
But when Gautier had told her the news, Noelle had merely looked up at him and
said, “That is wonderful, Armand, thank you.” In exactly the same tone of voice in which
she might have thanked him for telling her the correct time or lighting her cigarette.
Gautier watched her for a long moment, knowing that in some strange way Noelle
was sick, that some emotion in her had either died, or had never been alive and that no one
would ever possess her. He knew this and yet he could not really believe it, because what
he saw was a beautiful, affectionate girl who happily catered to his every whim and asked
for nothing in return. Because he loved her, Gautier put his doubts aside, and they went to
work on the play.
Noelle was brilliant at the audition and got the part without question, as Gautier had
known she would. When the play opened in Paris two months later, Noelle became,
overnight, the biggest star in France. The critics had been prepared to attack the play and
Noelle because they were aware that Gautier had put his mistress, an inexperienced
actress, in the lead, and it was a situation too delicious for them to pass up. But she had
completely captivated them. They searched for new superlatives to describe her
performance and her beauty. The play was a complete sellout.
Every night after the performance, Noelle’s dressing room was filled with visitors.
She saw everyone: shoe clerks, soldiers, millionaires, shop girls, treating them all with the
same patient courtesy. Gautier would watch in amazement. It is almost as though she were
a Princess receiving her subjects, he thought.
Over a period of a year Noelle received three letters from Marseille. She tore them
up, unopened, and finally they stopped coming.
In the spring, Noelle starred in a motion picture that Armand Gautier directed, and
when it was released, her fame spread. Gautier marveled at Noelle’s patience in giving
interviews and being photographed. Most stars hated it and did it either to help increase
their box office value or for reasons of ego. In Noelle’s case, she was indifferent to both
motivations. She would change the subject when Gautier questioned her about why she
was willing to pass up a chance to rest in the South of France in order to stay in a cold,
rainy Paris to do tiresome poses for Le Matin, La Petite Parisienne or L’ll-lustration. It
was just as well, for Gautier would have been stunned if he had known her real reason.
Noelle’s motivation was very simple.