Lady in Waiting

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Lady in Waiting Page 9

by Anne Glenconner


  Back at the beginning of our marriage, returning home from our honeymoon after three months, when we should have been away for six, meant we had nowhere to live. Since I was expecting our first child, Colin’s solution was for us to move in with his mother, Pamela. Although I liked her, I wondered what it would be like to start married life living with my new mother-in-law, who was quite a character.

  Pamela loved to dress up, too, told funny stories, and also attracted attention. As for her driving, it was even more appalling than Colin’s. She would reverse out of the drive extremely quickly and without looking in any of her mirrors. If any pedestrians had a close shave with the car, she would dismiss them entirely, or not even notice them in the first place. Once Colin and I were walking down the road near her house and a car shot past us, taking off all the wing mirrors of the parked cars. “God, that driver’s as bad as my mother!” Colin said, then realized it was his mother.

  Pamela had set an unruly example for Colin that knew no bounds. It seemed to me that her flamboyant characteristics, and those of other members of the family, had managed to weave themselves into Colin’s DNA, alongside the sturdy foundations of an intelligent eye for business formed during the Industrial Revolution. It had been Colin’s great-grandfather, Charles Tennant, 1st Baron Glenconner, who had made the Tennant fortune through his discovery of bleaching powder in 1798. Somehow this large fortune had survived, despite the extravagant tendencies of the following generations.

  Eccentricity ran in the family: there were stories of bacon rashers being used as bookmarks, of the rooftops at Glen being climbed at night, and of horses being ridden into the house. Colin’s paternal grandmother, Pamela Wyndham, was one of the Wyndham sisters immortalized in John Singer Sargent’s painting The Three Graces, which now hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Both Pamelas, despite not being blood-related, had uncanny similarities and, like all of Colin’s relations, had a palpable charm and would use it to seduce a room effortlessly. And, like Pamela Wyndham, they all behaved like spoiled children. It was a trait that defied age. Apparently, Pamela Wyndham would turn around from the table in stubborn silence if she felt she wasn’t being paid enough attention—Colin used to tell people that she was known to lie down and bite the carpet when lost in a rage. She had dressed her child, Stephen Tennant, Colin’s uncle, as a girl throughout his early childhood because she had wanted a daughter instead of a son.

  When Colin first took me to see his Uncle Stephen just after we were married, I was in for quite a shock. Arriving at Wilsford Manor, his house in Wiltshire, we were greeted by the housekeepers, Mr. and Mrs. Scull, who referred to Stephen as though he was a child, even though he was in his sixties. “Master Stephen is upstairs, longing to see you,” they told us.

  We climbed the stairs of the very dusty old house, which was covered with fishing nets and shells and collections of feathers and false flowers, and lit by huge chandeliers. As we neared his bedroom, Uncle Stephen called out, “Come in! Come in, darlings! How lovely to see you!”

  And there on the bed lay Uncle Stephen. Although he had been a beauty in his youth, he certainly wasn’t by then. Bloated and heavily made-up, he had arranged himself so he was surrounded by shells and flowers. Behind us came Mr. Scull, who had staggered up the stairs with a tea tray upon which sat a solid silver teapot, a kettle, cups, and saucers. Uncle Stephen gazed up forlornly and said to me, “Oh, darling Anne, I’m not strong anymore. Do you think you could be Mother?”

  I could hardly lift the teapot either, and as I laboriously poured the tea, he turned his attention to Colin. “You’re looking a bit pale, darling boy. Don’t you remember what I told you? You must put on a little eye shadow and a touch of pink on the lips.” Uncle Stephen reached for his makeup and beckoned Colin over. I watched in horror. “Come here, darling boy!” he said, proceeding to dab the carmine on Colin’s lips.

  I assumed Uncle Stephen was too poorly to get out of bed but it turned out he was perfectly healthy, he just didn’t get out of bed at all, except in June to see his roses. “Well, there’s nothing to see, but I simply can’t resist the roses,” he explained. There I was, thinking Colin was rather unusual, but within minutes I had reassessed my new husband.

  When we were leaving, Uncle Stephen clutched both my hands and said, “Anne, you’re a pretty little creature. I stay in touch only with the people I really love so I think you will be getting one or two letters from me.”

  To my absolute horror, he sent me lots of letters, which smelled appalling—he had clearly gone to great effort, including a silk handkerchief, doused in scent, inside the envelope. I don’t know what the postman thought. The letters were filled with obscene drawings of sailors in frightfully tight trousers. Perhaps he thought it would do me good to look at pictures of extended penises. I hid them, not wanting the maid to think I was encouraging vulgar correspondence from one of Colin’s elderly relatives.

  Uncle Stephen’s mother, Pamela, had been part of a close-knit group of aristocrats known as “the Souls,” who were flirtatious and intelligent and carved themselves out of stuffy society. In his youth, Uncle Stephen was described as the “brightest thing” in the set that became known as the “Bright Young Things.” Colin had been at the heart of the “Princess Margaret set” before settling down with me. A pattern had emerged. No wonder Colin was eccentric.

  Not surprisingly, living with Colin and his mother for the first three months of our marriage was almost as hard as being on honeymoon. I once asked Pamela for advice about how to respond to Colin when he lost his temper. She told me it was easy to calm him: “All you need to do is give him a lovely cup of cocoa at bedtime.” I could never work out whether she was in total denial, or whether Colin only behaved in his peculiar manner to me. Either way, I knew that cocoa was not going to help.

  Thankfully before too long, our friend Patrick Plunket, who was a great favorite of the Queen and was, at the time, her Equerry, later becoming Master of the Household, suggested we move into his brother’s house, since he was away in Africa. Leaving Pamela in London, we moved to Kent, and a few months later, in February 1957, Charles, our eldest son, was born.

  Colin and I were thrilled. Charlie was much admired and, of course, since he was a boy, I was praised for having managed to produce an heir for Colin immediately. The relief was tangible.

  Life subsequently settled into a routine. Every morning Colin commuted from West Malling station into the City to the merchant bank his father owned. He wore a bowler hat and carried an umbrella—the City uniform of the day. I stayed at home looking after Charlie and organized fundraising events for various charities I had started to become involved with. This was the pattern I expected our lives to follow.

  But behind this conventional façade, Colin was a man who was troubled in ways I never fully understood. No one had told me before our wedding that he had had two nervous breakdowns and been taken off by his beloved and equally eccentric Aunt Clare to a clinic in Switzerland. Once, he had run barefooted through London in his pajamas to hospital, claiming his heart had stopped. The doctors must have wondered how he had got there if that had been the case.

  But there were also many great things about Colin: he taught me all sorts of things I knew nothing about, and he was the best conversationalist around, his stories vivid and energetic. When he was in a good mood, there was nobody as much fun as him to be with. The problem was that all the time he was being fun and engaging, I would be wondering at what point his mood would change. From one moment to the next, Colin could change completely, his face becoming mad, like a werewolf’s, exploding. Anything in his vicinity became hostage to a cataclysmic bombardment of anger. Once, when in the office of C. Tennant & Sons, he cut an artery in his leg by kicking a plate-glass window through the stress of trying to give up smoking.

  It was usually something trivial that set him off, and once he’d flipped, he would insist that I didn’t move, not an inch, until he had calmed down. If I moved it would provoke
him more so I learned to stay still, like a rabbit, holding my breath until he had finished. He would then act as though nothing had happened. For gas bombs, people carried gas masks; for rain, umbrellas: solutions, armors, defenses. But for Colin, there was nothing.

  Not long after we were married, sparked by one of Colin’s outbursts, I did run home to my mother, thinking I had made a big mistake in marrying Colin. I don’t know what I expected her to do but my thoughts of separation were stamped out immediately, she telling me in no uncertain terms, “Go straight back. You married him.”

  I think she knew that if she had shown even the slightest bit of sympathy, I would have clung to it, and since I had married him, and was pregnant with Charlie at the time, leaving him was not a good option. This was how my mother dealt with things: she just got on with life, whatever it threw at her. Everyone did. My mother led from the front—a true role model, prioritizing practicality over sentimentality, favoring denial over confrontation.

  So that was that. I went back to Colin straightaway, accepting my fate. He used to keep me awake all night, talking and lying on the floor in a fetal position. I wasn’t used to this. Not surprisingly, I had no experience in dealing with a grown man who carried on in this odd manner. Colin didn’t behave normally at all, objecting to things that seemed perfectly reasonable to everybody else. He hated going to the theater because he couldn’t stand the interval, so he would always leave before the second half. And he rarely ate from a plate, preferring to eat out of paper bags—at one point he had a passion for jellied eggs of all things, which I couldn’t stand. Then there was the habit of buying houses. I had to learn to accept and deal with this, as much as having to cope with his histrionics—I had no choice. Suddenly, he would announce he had bought a new house and we would move, often almost straightaway, sometimes after just having arrived at our current house. He never consulted me, so I just had to get used to it. I’ve lost count of how many houses in London we lived in.

  My father observed this flaky characteristic and suggested I should buy one of the redundant farmhouses from the Holkham estate so that I had my own stable base, thinking it might make my life easier. There were two to choose from. One was right on the marshes with Dutch gabling, but I imagined bleak winters and Magwitch appearing. So I chose the other, further inland, a few miles from Holkham. I had to buy it, but I got it at a discounted rate. Colin, who had been in control of our houses in London, picking and decorating them as he wanted to, was a bit unsure about coming to stay at my house but I was desperate to show it to him once I had finished decorating it because I was very house proud.

  The bathrooms were brand-new and had carpets, and when Colin first came to see the house, I kept the plastic covering on them: whenever Colin had a bath, most of the water was on the floor by the time he had finished. When he went to have a bath, and discovered the plastic, he got very cross. “How dare you put plastic down because of me?” he fumed. “Protecting the carpet against me. Typical.”

  And with that, he dressed and disappeared. I had no idea where he had gone, and eventually, when I started looking outside, I heard moaning coming from a dilapidated farm building on the opposite side of the road. I followed the noise and, to my horror, I saw Colin crouched right at the back behind two rotting tractors. He refused to come out and I began to panic in case the people in the village heard what was happening.

  I rang my mother, who came round with the doctor. He managed to crawl under the tractors to give Colin an injection. The sedative worked and the moaning stopped but then the doctor, who was utterly bemused, had to drag Colin, who was now limp, out from behind the tractors. My mother and I helped lug him inside, put him to bed, and thanked the doctor, who left as quickly as he could. The next day Colin acted as though nothing had happened, as did my mother.

  Despite their ability to carry on as if nothing had happened, this behavior had alarmed me and I subsequently persuaded Colin to let me take him to see a doctor, hoping he, and I, might get some support. The doctors explained his condition by describing him as having one less skin than the rest of us. He was too sensitive and too highly strung, they said. This polite explanation didn’t help with the reality. So, after months of my suggesting he go to a psychiatrist, he eventually agreed. He went through several very quickly, seeing them once and never returning, but then he found an old man who suited him. When I asked what happened during the sessions he said, “I do nothing. I just lie there. Very cross. Very cross and silent.”

  I didn’t think that was much good. The whole point was to talk but he insisted that lying there and being cross did the trick. It sort of did for a while. But then one day the old man died so, once again, I had to deal with Colin, who carried on having tantrums all over the world for the rest of his life.

  Once we were in Russia with his cousin, the writer Susanna Johnston, known as Zannah. Colin had been invited to give a speech, live on Russian television, at the unveiling of a plaque dedicated to his grandmother, Lady Muriel Paget, who was being honored for her war work and specifically for having set up the Red Cross in the Balkans. On the way, Colin had been overflowing with enthusiasm, telling me and Zannah about how his grandmother had once hidden Tomáš Masaryk, the first President of Czechoslovakia, under her skirt while traveling through Russia. “When the Soviet guard came to inspect the carriages, ordering everybody to stand up, my grandmother refused,” Colin explained, with evident admiration. “She simply replied, ‘How dare you ask Lady Paget to stand up?’ and waved her umbrella.”

  Colin stayed in a high state of excitement as we walked to the rehearsal. The plaque was to be unveiled at the Dmitry Palace in St. Petersburg, which Lady Muriel had turned into an Anglo-Russian hospital for wounded soldiers during the First World War. But we got lost on our way there. Colin quickly blamed me for going in the wrong direction, and before long he had started to shout. A passing group of Japanese tourists looked on bemused.

  I carried on over a bridge towards a tourist shop to get directions. From behind me, I heard ghastly screaming and raced back to find Zannah bent over Colin, who was lying in a fetal position on the pavement. The same group of Japanese tourists stood around taking photographs as they watched Colin, curled up on the ground in the middle of St. Petersburg, until he suddenly got up and sped off. Zannah and I looked around for him but, realizing we would be late, we continued to the palace. When the organizers asked where Colin was, I said, “He’s got a headache,” at the same time that Zannah said, “He’s got a stomachache.” They looked at us suspiciously. They had never met Colin.

  The following day, at the event itself, Colin got awfully cross with the interpreter when it became apparent, because the audience wasn’t reacting, that his jokes weren’t being translated. Despite being on live television, he stopped his speech, had a go at the interpreter and complained to the organizers that the whole speech was being ruined. By now I wasn’t surprised, but naturally I was mortified.

  Years later, when Colin and I were in India with our three youngest children and our American friend, who lived in India, Mitch Crites, Colin lost his rag spectacularly. We had ridden rickshaws into the middle of Delhi to go shopping, and Colin and Mitch arrived at the shop first. By the time I got there with the children, I could hear Colin’s screaming coming from the shop. I found Colin having an enormous row with the shopkeeper, whom he was grappling with. Within minutes the street was filled with angry Indians. Mitch shouted at me as soon as he saw me, “Take the children, get back in the rickshaw, and leave!” So I grabbed the children and made a dash for the hotel on the rickshaw, which stalled many times before I got away. By that point, I didn’t care whether Colin was torn limb from limb but, luckily for him, Mitch—a calm but imposing man, fluent in Hindi—defused the situation.

  “What happened?” I asked Mitch, later that afternoon.

  “Colin was really nasty. It’s so dangerous. He must learn how to behave,” Mitch said, still not knowing what had sparked the rage.

  I
approached Colin gingerly, unsure what state he would be in. “You could have been lynched. You can’t behave like this.”

  That wasn’t the first or the last time he had got into a bad situation and I always wondered whether anybody would one day turn around and retaliate, but Colin never changed. He remained generous and, on his best form, got on with people from all walks of life. He always insisted on throwing parties, he was a complete shopaholic—a magpie of the first degree—and his temper stayed a part of him. I once asked him why he screamed at people, and he replied, “I like making them squirm. I like making them frightened.”

  It was a shocking sentiment that I couldn’t begin to relate to, but I concentrated on the good things about him, which Colin had predicted I would do. I once asked him why he had picked me, when he had millions of sophisticated girlfriends. He could have married any of them. Why was it that he wanted to marry me?

  He replied, “Well, I knew that with you, you would carry on, you would never give up.”

  This was quite true because I was married to him for fifty-four years and I didn’t give up—although I continued to have many moments when I thought that I might.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The Making of Mustique

  IN 1958 COLIN took me with him to Trinidad to see the land that his family owned, leaving Charlie behind in the care of a nanny. I was very excited, having never been somewhere so exotic—the days of grand tours were over and my family had not had the money to travel much. Colin, on the other hand, had traveled extensively and had fallen in love with the West Indies on his many visits. Not all of the Tennants had taken to life in Trinidad: Colin’s father, Christopher, had been only once, in the twenties, but didn’t like it so never returned. He had, however, shipped back a few caimans and given them to his brother Stephen (the infamous Uncle Stephen), who kept them in his house before reluctantly giving them to a zoo. Although the caimans were put on the hotplates in the dining room to keep warm, they were always escaping and the housekeeper spent a great deal of time going round the house with a broom, discovering them behind doors and under sofas.

 

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