On August 27, 2010, three days after I’d left him, Colin died. When he had called out in the night to Kent, Kent had driven him to hospital but Colin then had a massive heart attack and was dead by the time they got there. Kent was inconsolable when he rang to tell me.
I was left completely shocked, finding the news hard to comprehend. Only a few nights before we had spent the evening recalling our lives together, and Colin had been uncharacteristically loving, talking about how he thought we had been a good team. “It wasn’t all bad, was it?” he had asked me before I left him for the last time, as though he was trying to make amends for the harder times we had gone through.
As I flew straight back to St. Lucia to organize the funeral, I found it hard to imagine a world without him. Colin was a uniquely difficult and brilliant man in equal measure. But somehow, despite his endless affairs and histrionics, there was an overriding loyalty, a friendship that bound us together, no matter what. He was right: we had made a good team and I knew I would miss him terribly.
Christopher and the twins were devastated and it was particularly hard for Amy. The last time she had seen Colin, he had said goodbye to her before getting into a taxi, only to stop the vehicle and get out to give her another hug. Perhaps he had had a premonition, especially considering it was very unlike Colin to be tactile, but, of course, Amy hadn’t known it would be the last goodbye. Not only had she just lost her father, but she had also just lost her future. Instead of flying to St. Lucia to start her new life, she was flying there to attend her father’s funeral.
May, too, was heartbroken. She had often been on the receiving end of his impatience, but their relationship had improved, and their last meeting, in the Portobello Hotel, had been a huge success, Colin remarking how much he had loved spending time with her.
Christopher had had perhaps the easiest relationship with his father, whom he described as a “demigod,” so was devastated but, once again, he rallied round, supporting the rest of us, reminding us that although Colin was gone the love would continue, just like he had done when Henry and Charlie had died.
All I could think about was when we had all been together as a family nine months to the day before Colin had died, staying with my friend Josephine Loewenstein. It had been Josephine’s idea to commission a statue and she had arranged for a huge bronze to be made by the sculptor Philip Jackson of Colin in his signature clothes, hat, and cane. It was unveiled on Mustique in recognition of all Colin had done for the island. Colin was thrilled, and afterwards we all went to the lagoon and sat on the beach in a line with our legs stretched out, our toes in the water. And now, less than a year after that happy day, and less than a week after I had seen him, I was back to bid my final goodbye.
The funeral was a spectacular St. Lucian affair, far removed from the traditional English services that I was used to. Colin would have enjoyed it. There wasn’t a hint of black anywhere. Inside the big white church, the atmosphere was distinctly Caribbean. There was a carnival atmosphere and the whole thing was redolent of Colin’s endless parties. He had always loved grand entrances and the funeral was his big exit. It had begun with his lying in state in The Great House a few days before, after he was moved from the Lazarus Funeral Home, and now he arrived at the church in a beaten-up old pick-up truck, which had been crudely converted into a hearse, complete with a neon cross on the roof.
He had chosen “Lord of the Dance” as one of his sending-off hymns, but instead of people standing stiffly and solemnly, the congregation swayed to the music. Kent was in floods of tears so I held his hand and swayed along with him. Outside, crowds of people had surrounded the church and were singing too. When Bryan Adams sang “He Was a Friend of Mine” inside the church, the congregation joined in and they raised a framed photograph of Colin above their heads.
The heat hit us as the doors of the church opened at the end of the service. I followed the coffin, draped with the St. Lucian flag and with Colin’s hat on top of it, as it was taken to the graveyard. I had inadvertently picked the heaviest coffin because it had been the only one that wasn’t decorated with gold or silver or with ghastly handles. Euan, Henry’s incredibly tall son, who clutched a bunch of Scottish heather, had to crouch to balance the coffin, while the rest of the pallbearers, including Cody, puffed and sweated, surrounded by local people in colorful fancy dress and painted faces. They had practiced earlier that morning, around the pool, using sun-loungers, which weren’t nearly as heavy.
I stood between the tombs, next to the plot Colin had chosen. The final party was in full swing, but this time without input from the ringmaster himself. And then, as if this wasn’t all odd enough, suddenly, from behind the other tombs, came all these people with their faces painted white, wielding scythes. The grim reapers came up to me and beckoned. “Come, Lady, Come, Lady, Mr. Tennants’ wife. You must dance with us.” Horrified, I said no, but they just took me along anyway. And before I knew it, I was weaving in and out of the tombs, half dragged, half dancing. As they danced, they let go of dozens of black balloons, which floated up over the sea. It was utterly bewildering and exhausting, but it was the local tradition so I went along with it.
Eventually Colin was interred, as the local gospel choirs sang “Swing Low Sweet Chariot,” and we all went back to the wake at The Great House, which was filled with rows and rows of tiny little cakes covered with bright pink icing—enough to mistake it for a confectionery shop. It looked more like a birthday party than a funeral. The sound of steel bands and singing, of banshee-like wailing, of clapping and drumming, of every note in every octave being played in one form or another, filled the hot Caribbean air. In the surrounding villages, while the local people sang and danced to mark the passing of “Mr. Tennants,” as they called him, I thought of him with love, his death finally beginning to sink in.
I stood, clutching a vodka tonic, underneath the pink and white streamers, making small talk with government officials, policemen, soldiers, magistrates, and locals. Everybody from the island seemed to be crammed into Colin’s beloved home. Only then did Kent tell me he had wanted Colin to have a state funeral, which was not unknown for grand people on the island, but apparently I had organized it too quickly. When I heard that I had a flash of regret—Colin would have been disappointed that I had inadvertently denied him a police escort.
On St. Lucia it is customary for a will to be read quickly so that night I waited for the lawyer. I was apprehensive and a little worried about it, as Colin’s lawyer had warned me that he didn’t have the latest will, telling me: “I believe Lord Glenconner made a new will seven months ago with a lawyer from Soufrière.”
My heart sank when the new lawyer turned up. There was something shifty about him—he barely kept eye contact and was very fidgety. I stood with my daughter-in-law, Sheilagh, whose son Cody was the heir presumptive. The lawyer scrabbled around in his briefcase and got out a single piece of paper. He looked down at it and then read aloud: “I hereby leave everything to Kent Adonai, and I trust he will carry out my wishes towards the family.”
I thought my heart was going to stop.
Afterwards I found Kent, who had been told by the lawyer, and as calmly as I could, I said, “Well, Kent, I hope you will carry out Lord Glenconner’s wishes to us all.”
He looked at me, shrugged his shoulders and said, “I don’t know what Lord Glenconner meant.”
I knew then that my worst fears had come true and that we truly stood to lose everything. The surreal wake was nothing compared to the feeling that ran through my blood in that moment and afterwards.
Later that night I stood on the balcony of the house that no longer belonged to us. Normally, in the Caribbean, the night sky is filled with stars but that night the sky was completely black. As I stood there, my entire married life flashed before my eyes. Fifty-four years. Five children. A marriage filled with Colin throwing as many tantrums as he threw parties. And now, after all I’d been through—this. This last attention-seeking gift. It was such a ter
rible humiliation. And to do it to our children… I despaired. Going against everything my mother had always taught me, I let emotion take over and I screamed and screamed and screamed into the pitch-black night.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Whatever Next?
IT TOOK A long time for the dust to settle. Friends were horrified by the will and encouraged me to contest it.
In the UK, primogeniture law normally means the majority of an estate is handed to the heir, who in this case was Cody, Charlie’s son. Incidentally, this was the same law that had prevented me from inheriting Holkham as a daughter. This time, it dismissed me for being a wife, but that was not what I minded. I had accepted long ago the reality for me as a woman, but I had expected Colin to leave me and the children the chattels and for Cody to inherit Colin’s estate.
The only thing the family had left was Glen, which was in trust to Henry’s son, Euan. Colin’s huge fortune had dwindled over the years but on his death he still owned land and hotels on St. Lucia, but everything that belonged to him, whether sentimental or valuable, he had left solely to Kent.
The reality was that Kent immediately put the contents of The Great House up for sale, including a lot of things that belonged to me. He had been approached by the lawyer, who had shown him outstanding bills that needed to be paid, and when it had been suggested that an auction would raise enough money to settle the debt and more, Kent agreed. I found this out through a friend, who rang up shortly after the funeral and said, “Your silver bed is on the front cover of Bonhams’ catalogue.”
I contacted Bonhams and told them they couldn’t sell things without the owner’s consent. They were apologetic but reluctant to stop the sale so I flew back to St. Lucia to see what was going on. When I got to The Great House, everything had been packed up and the people from Bonhams were in the process of organizing shipment to London for the auction.
In the end I came to an agreement with Bonhams, who assured me the money made from the sale of items I owned would be mine.
The auction went ahead, and I was glad to see that Colin’s iconic hat and cane were bought by the Mustique Company. Kent raised more than enough money to pay off the debts, and I got the proceeds from the sale of my silver bed.
Once the auction was over Cody and his mother disputed the will. In the end it took seven years to resolve. While Kent kept a huge amount of land and money, about half of Colin’s estate was handed to Cody.
If I think about it now, I still find it impossible to tell whether Colin intended to leave us all with nothing. It is entirely possible that he decided to do it on purpose, as some sort of horrible stunt, which would secure his reputation as a memorable eccentric. It is also possible he didn’t understand what he was doing in the last few months of his life, when he had become frail and vulnerable. I will never know for sure. It was hard not to dwell on this question, hard not to feel betrayed, not just for myself but for our children.
Obsessing about this would have driven me mad so, instead, I made a decision to move on. I was in my late seventies when Colin died and I realized time was of the essence for me too. Determined not to be cast down, I turned my attention to the future.
It’s now been almost ten years since Colin died and nearly twenty since Princess Margaret died. Christopher is fifty-one and the twins are forty-nine. No longer do I hop between a life in the West Indies, Glen, and big houses in London. I am back in my farmhouse in Norfolk, the place that feels more like home than anywhere else. I owe a lot to my father’s sound judgment all those years ago when he told me I should buy a house of my own due to Colin’s flaky character. If I hadn’t bought it, I have no idea where I would be now.
There is a family saying that the Cokes come back to Norfolk and, since I can see the boundary wall of Holkham Hall from my window, it must be true. Norfolk is a great draw especially because I love being by the sea. Glen was lovely in its own way, and hills and mountains are beautiful, but I always felt slightly closed in there and, like Mustique, I could never see the weather coming, the unpredictability governing a sense of unease.
I surround myself with my children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and my life is no longer full of endless parties, dinners at Kensington Palace, and royal tours. Although my days now might seem rather pale in comparison, at the age of eighty-seven I am very happy, doing whatever I feel like doing.
Instead of endless extravagant fancy-dress parties, I socialize with my many kind friends in Norfolk who live nearby, like Patricia Rawlings, who gives wonderful long lunches, and Tim, whom I met through my sister Carey, and his husband Menno. I was “best man” at their wedding and have enjoyed evenings with them that go on into the night, sometimes involving singalongs around the piano. In the summer we sit outside drinking Tim’s world-class Bloody Marys and it was he, as well as my cousin Tom and his wife Polly, who gave me my two eightieth-birthday parties—days when I felt quite spoiled and completely relaxed, quietly relieved that Colin wasn’t looking over my shoulder. I still spend time at Glen. Henry’s wife, Tessa, sadly died in 2018, but I stay with Bill, whom she went on to marry, and Euan with his flame-haired children William and Ruby. I visit Cody in Edinburgh—and finally David and my darling sister Sarah, near Perth.
I still go abroad, to Mustique most years to stay with Josephine Loewenstein and catch up with another great friend, Georgie Fanshawe. I also love to go to Turkey to stay with Ömer Koç. Ömer is the son of one of Turkey’s most successful businessmen, Rahmi Koç, whose former wife, Çiǧdem Simavi, was a friend of mine and used to invite Princess Margaret and me on her boat, Hallas, every year. There was always a small group of us, including Rupert Everett whom I’ve known all his life, I having been his mother’s bridesmaid, and Nicky Haslam, also a great friend. Princess Margaret would always have the master cabin, which had a four-poster bed. The bed was too high for her to get in and out of it so I would heave her in at the end of each evening, leaving her with a bell. She would ring it in the night if she needed to go to the bathroom, whereupon I would come and help heave her back out and in again.
Ömer is the same age as Henry would have been, and when I met him, just after Henry’s death from AIDS, he was so sympathetic and kind to me. We struck up a close friendship, and nowadays he invites me on his yacht every summer with a group of friends, including Christabel and Jools Holland. Christabel and I love swimming so every day we set off together. Ömer is so conscientious that he organizes a little boat to follow us around just in case we get into trouble.
It was through Ömer’s mother that I met Bettina Graziani, the eccentric former supermodel, business partner of Hubert de Givenchy, and the fiancée of Prince Aly Khan, the socialite son of the Aga Khan. A few years ago, she invited Tim and me to stay with her in Paris. Ever since my honeymoon, I’ve always been wary when I’m invited to Paris, but I brushed off the absurd thought—I was almost eighty and was going without Colin.
Even in her eighties, Bettina was excessively glamorous. She had tea ready for us when we arrived, all set out in her supremely elegant flat in the rue de Grenelle, scented by Rigaud candles and masses of fresh flowers. The evening started off like a Parisian dream: we drank champagne in front of the fire before Bettina took us out to dinner at Brasserie Lipp. Afterwards, when we had assumed we would go home, she took us to a party given by the boyfriend of an ambassador, who was entertaining in the ambassador’s absence.
A butler in a white coat let us into a hall lined with birdcages full of brightly colored finches, and on into a hot, rather dim room full of people sitting about wrapped around one another. Briefly and languidly, they looked us over and then looked away again.
Bettina led me and Tim through the interconnected rooms, and as we walked, we passed some of the guests and looked at each other, appalled, realizing we were at an orgy. There were men in drag mincing around, and women very skimpily dressed, and some people oiled up wearing nothing at all. We passed a bedroom, and on the four-poster bed, a couple of lesbians were w
rithing around. They took an interest in me, so I clung to Tim, whispering urgently, “Tell them we’re married!”
I don’t think being married would have made much difference, especially as everybody was high: the bathroom was full of bowls of cocaine, the glass-topped table by the basin crisscrossed with lines. Tim and I sat on a sofa, close together, rather helplessly. Meanwhile, Bettina seemed oblivious to the difference between the first part of the evening and the second, finally taking us home at three in the morning.
When Tim and I returned to Norfolk, we were both rather glad. I haven’t been back to Paris.
The best trips have undoubtedly been with my friend Margaret Vyner. Together we have gone to India many times and we always have great fun, although we have wound up experiencing some rather unforeseen things. Once we were at a hill station and decided to cross the Deccan desert. The hotel owner was rather surprised when we mentioned our plan. “That’s very brave. Be very careful,” she said, her eyebrows raised, probably thinking it rather strange to see two such adventurous old women. We set off, thinking nothing of her concerns, focusing more on the peculiar taxi we found ourselves in, which was decked out in red velvet and had a chandelier. Somewhat relieved when the taxi pulled up at a wood, though surprised to see trees in the middle of the desert, we started gathering our things. “No, no,” said the taxi driver, in no uncertain terms. “You stay here. Do not get out. Bad ladies in the wood. Bad, bad ladies in the wood.” Before we could say anything, he jumped out of the car and disappeared among the trees.
It turned out it was a prostitute stop where all the truck drivers came. I suppose the taxi man thought if we got out the other men might think we had joined the woodland prostitutes. Eventually he came back, obviously having had a marvelous time spending the money we’d given him for the journey on the “bad ladies.” Off we went again with the chandelier swinging, but by nightfall, we still hadn’t reached the smart hotel we had booked. It was getting late and we had no choice but to find a place to sleep in a tiny town, not wanting to risk driving in the dark. The taxi driver took us to the only hotel in the area, which was absolutely filthy. In all my time in India, this was the only hotel that was so dirty we had to use the field instead of the bathroom if we wanted to go to the loo. It had an odd atmosphere, emphasized by a bell that kept ringing outside our room, and every now and then somebody would bang on the door. It was while we were discussing these peculiarities that the penny dropped: we’d gone from an outside brothel, to an inside brothel. The men were given half an hour with the ladies and then the bell would ring. All that was missing was the call, “All change.”
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