by Jim Hutton
‘What do you mean, Rambo?’ he asked. ‘Watch him,’ I said. ‘He’s attacking all the other cats. He’s Rambo.’ It was a nickname which stuck.
In Ireland I didn’t know what to do about the flooring in our bungalow. In the end I asked Freddie what I should do. He asked what the options were and I mentioned white Canadian maple for the lounge, which I could get cheaply through a family contact.
‘Find out how much it will cost!’ he said.
Two weeks later Freddie returned to the subject. ‘Have you found out how much the maple will cost?’ he asked.
I told him the price I’d been quoted.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘I’ll pay for that. It will be a present to you.’
Soon we were back into a hectic schedule bouncing between Mountain Studios, Montreux, and Metropolis Studios in west London, where Freddie and the band were laying down tracks for their final album, Innuendo. For months we ate, slept and drank Innuendo.
In February Queen was honoured with an award for their outstanding contribution to British music by the British Phonographic Industry in a ceremony at the Dominion Theatre. Freddie didn’t look well even though he was caked in thick make-up for the television cameras.
After the ceremony, a party was held at the Groucho Club to celebrate Queen’s twenty-one years together. It was a celebrity-packed event, with guests including George Michael, Liza Minnelli, Barry Humphries, Michael Winner and Patsy Kensit. Freddie held court at a table at the back of the club. When Rod Stewart arrived Freddie introduced me to him as ‘My man, Jim’. I was reminded of Freddie’s joke about wanting to form a band with Rod and Elton John, called Teeth, Nose and Hair.
Martha Brett accompanied me to that party and was very dressed up. She was a huge Rod Stewart fan. While Freddie and Rod were talking she kept staring at him. Then Freddie in turn started staring at me.
‘Who’s that you’re with?’ he asked. ‘I don’t know her.’
‘That’s Martha!’ I said. From the Town House Studios.’
‘Is it?’ he asked. He looked a bit harder and then burst out laughing.
Later in the evening an extremely imaginative cake was wheeled out. It was of a Monopoly board, but all the property squares were Queen hits.
Before he became front-man for Queen, Freddie studied at Ealing College of Art in west London. He had long given up painting, but one day he got a sudden urge to try again. One of us was sent to buy up a small artists’ supply shop for brushes and materials.
For several weeks he would lose himself for hours at a time in his sketching and painting. He tried painting a portrait of Delilah but, like so many of his pictures, it was never finished.
He only ever finished two pictures, for Joe and Phoebe, and they came about quite by chance. Freddie was flicking through a Sotheby’s catalogue one afternoon and stopped at a modern portrait for sale, drawn in straight lines.
‘I could do that!’ he said.
He grabbed a sketch pad and a minute or so later he had finished. He held it up and it was a perfect copy.
‘Can I have it?’ Joe said.
Freddie signed it and gave it to him. Then Phoebe asked for the same again and after a few minutes Freddie had dashed off another copy.
Freddie loved art. He favoured Japanese and Impressionist paintings and had something of an aversion to modern art. If he came across modern pictures in auction catalogues he would scoff; his least favourites were massive expanses of canvass painted a single colour or featuring a couple of straight lines.
‘What’s the point of it?’ he’d say. ‘It’s not art.’
A few days later we went to Montreux. We arrived in the early evening and there was an absolutely stunning sunset falling over the lake. Freddie wanted to take a photograph of the two of us, standing in that romantic sunset, but we didn’t have a camera. He became agitated. He had set his heart on the romantic picture.
‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘We’ll get a photograph taken.’
It is one of my greatest regrets that we never did get around to it.
One of the first things Freddie liked to do when he arrived in Montreux was look at the swans on the lake. He referred to them as ‘my’ swans and as soon as he’d seen them he felt he could quickly settle back into the Swiss way of life.
That day, after strolling over to see his swans, Freddie sat at the water’s edge and was inspired to write a song called ‘A Winter’s Tale’. It was a Christmas song about Switzerland and life in the mountains. It was never heard. Freddie recorded the song, I’m certain of that, but the tape has never seen the light of day.
Freddie usually arranged to start work around noon. He was suffering from a drastic loss of weight. Still, he insisted on getting up by himself in the morning, and he took no longer than usual to dress and have his cup of tea before setting off for the studio.
Increasingly he would ask Terry to stop somewhere on the way to the studio. ‘I want to get out and walk from here,’ he’d say.
The first time it happened Freddie appeared to be deep in thought. He asked Terry to park by the lake. He wanted to be alone for a few minutes and he walked very slowly to the opposite side of the lake to the swans. He stayed with them for a few minutes, then slowly walked back to us.
‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘I’ve had enough. Time to go to work.’
After a while Freddie found walking very difficult. I gave him a walking stick, but he wouldn’t use it. He agreed to try it just once, but that was the only time. Nor would he use a crutch. Managing without help was part of his strength. He had to keep doing it on his own for as long as he was able.
I’m going to keep going until Mother Nature says, “No, you can’t go any further”,’ he said.
One day back in London Freddie and I headed out with Graham Hamilton and his boyfriend Gordon because Freddie wanted to buy some glasses from Thomas Goode’s, in Bond Street. He also bought a canteen of cutlery for our bungalow in Ireland. I told him I was popping out for a cigarette but went straight to the Lalique glass shop in nearby Mount Street. I knew the woman there as Freddie was one of their regular customers. The manageress came over.
‘I want to buy a little surprise present,’ I told her. She knew at once who it would be for.
‘How about a cat?’ she suggested. The cat she had in mind was glass and mounted on a plinth. It was ideal. I bought it and they wrapped it.
When Freddie and I went for tea, at Richloux, I gave him the present.
‘What did you buy that for?’ he asked.
‘It’s just a little present for you,’ I said.
Once, Freddie was invited to Lalique shop in Mount Street when Madame Lalique herself made a rare visit. She was the managing director of the company and had arrived in London to engrave her signature on a few pieces of her expensive lead crystal for favoured clients.
Freddie took Mary with him and returned with three beautiful clocks. His was signed ‘To Freddie’ and he had given one to Mary, which was also signed. Mine, which wasn’t signed, was engraved with delicate irises running down both sides of the clock-face. Our two clocks took pride of place in his bedroom on either side of the bed.
When Mary gave birth to her baby son, Richard, in 1990, Freddie was thrilled. We visited mother and son in Queen Charlotte’s Hospital many times and, when they went home, made many quick trips to Mary’s flat to see how they were doing. We all gave Richard something special. Freddie arrived with armfuls of designer baby clothes bought during our trips to Switzerland as well as a small mountain of soft toys. I made a traditional wooden rocking cradle and then stencilled carousel horses and smiling clowns on the outside. To complete the cradle, Phoebe bought some beautiful linen bedding for it. Sadly the cradle was never used for Richard, but it was put to some good use – for storing the scores of cuddly toys.
Freddie was really delighted for Mary when Richard came into the world. He loved holding him for a few minutes at a time but it was clear Freddie wasn’t one of life’s natural
fathers; he liked children but from a safe distance.
9
PRUNING PALS
On a flying visit to Montreux in 1990, Freddie and I stayed at the Montreux Palace Hotel with Joe and Barbara Valentin. It was on that trip that he wrote his song ‘Delilah’, dedicated to his favourite cat.
The shops were still open when the four of us were walking back from the studio at the end of the day. Freddie was now on the look-out for beautiful linen, mostly tablecloths. Displayed in one shop window was something so camp we all burst out laughing. It was a Minnie and Mickey Mouse night outfit with shirt, shorts and a Wee Willie Winkie bobble hat. Barbara slipped back to buy it as a present for Freddie, which she gave him back at the hotel.
Later Joe and I turned in, but Freddie and Barbara didn’t. They were in the mood to talk all night.
I got up at seven in the morning and went into the sitting room where Freddie and Barbara were still wide awake and going strong. He looked a sight. He was wearing his new Minnie and Mickey outfit, including the Wee Willie Winkie hat.
‘Oh, it’s that time already,’ he said. ‘Jim, I’ve written a new song. It’s about my Delilah.’
He did sleep for a few hours that morning but, when he got up, he would spend his whole time tweaking his Delilah lyrics and trying out different lines on me. My favourite line was included in the final version: ‘You make me slightly mad when you pee all over my Chippendale suite.’
For Joe’s birthday in 1990 Freddie despatched me to New Convent Garden market, in south London, with £500 to buy as many different blooms in as many different colours as possible. I bought so many I filled the Volvo completely. When I got back to the house, Freddie was waiting. Joe was out and we spent the next two hours arranging all the flowers. We filled every vase and jug we could find. The house had never seen so many arrangements at one time and when Joe got back he was bowled over.
‘Surprise!’ Freddie said. ‘Happy birthday!’
Later that night we all went out for a celebratory supper with the birthday boy. But Freddie and I didn’t stay long as he said he was feeling too tired.
That same month Joe told everyone in Garden Lodge that he had some bad news. He, too, was not well.
‘You mean you’re HIV?’ I asked.
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’ve actually got full-blown Aids.’
What can you say? I’m sorry? Nothing of any use came into my mind. It would be another blow to contend with in Garden Lodge. We were all worried about what the press would make of it if they discovered that Joe was also ill. We had visions of the sick headlines and guessed our house would be dubbed ‘Aids Lodge’. It all made us more determined than ever to pull together and stay optimistic.
Despite putting a brave face on things for everyone else’s benefit at Garden Lodge, privately I began to get very anxious about my own health. I thought I could be HIV positive as well. The more I reluctantly thought about it, the more it seemed likely. So I decided to have an Aids test but to tell no one. I did it in total secrecy under a pseudonym. On the excuse of going to see a friend, I slipped out of Garden Lodge for a day and travelled to a hospital in Brighton.
Before the doctor would agree to take a blood sample for testing I had to undergo special counselling. The full implications of proving positive were explained honestly and compassionately. I told them I realised all the consequences and wanted to proceed.
That night back at Garden Lodge I found it impossible to sleep. I had told the hospital that I could handle the news if it was going to be bad. But I wasn’t so sure in my own mind that I really could. What would I do?
A few days later I rang for the results.
‘I’m very sorry, you’re positive,’ said the doctor. But I didn’t have full-blown Aids.
I was dazed. I didn’t tell Freddie. He had enough to cope with; my news could only upset him. I buried myself in work in the garden and workshop and put thoughts of my own future out of my mind. But the thought of it kept coming back to me each night as I struggled to sleep and stop my mind from racing.
Freddie and I went out to Syon Park one day and bought bedding plants for the garden. As Terry was loading the plants into the car, a photographer from the Sun who had been following us took a picture. It appeared the next day, with a story claiming, incorrectly, that it was the first time Freddie had been out of Garden Lodge for two months.
Whenever Freddie saw the television commercial for cat-food featuring snowy-coated Arthur he said how much he’d like a white cat. Then he dismissed the idea because he thought it would be impossible to keep such a cat clean.
I went to the pet shop in Kensington High Street one morning and in the window there were five kittens from the same litter. Each was completely white save for a few marks which were hardly noticeable.
It was as much as I could do to stop myself buying one there and then for Freddie.
I went back to Garden Lodge, put on my waders and started cleaning out the isolation tank for the koi. Joe and Phoebe came through the back door.
‘We’ve got a favour to ask you,’ said Joe.
‘Oh yes?’ I replied.
‘I’ve just come from Kensington High Street and …’ he began.
‘And you passed the pet shop and saw the kittens?’ I said.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘They’re only £25 each. Phoebe and I will give you the money. Will you get the whitest one for Freddie?’
‘Why don’t you buy it?’ I asked.
‘We decided to ask you,’ Joe said, ‘because if you buy it then Freddie won’t scream and shout if he’s annoyed.’
‘I’ll go,’ I said. ‘But only on one condition: that if Freddie does start screaming and shouting, you’ll share the blame.’
So I set off for the shop at once and hoped to get back to the house before Freddie got out of bed.
I drove to the shop in the Volvo. There were only three kittens left. I picked one out, drove back to Garden Lodge and slipped the kitten into my jacket as I walked in. Freddie was in the garden, so I walked slowly towards him, beaming. Freddie scowled at me.
‘You bastard!’ he said. ‘You’ve got another cat, haven’t you?’
‘How did you know?’ I asked.
‘His tail is sticking out from under your jacket!’ he said. I took the kitten from my jacket and put her on the ground. Freddie bent down, stroked her and couldn’t resist picking her up. Freddie quickly christened our sixth cat. ‘We’ll call her Lily!’ he said. So Lily it was.
Although he adored the new kitten, he wondered whether her arrival would upset the other five cats. Oscar was a cat who preferred his own company, and the arrival of the latest kitten proved to be the final straw. Increasingly he would roam off to visit other homes in the area and adopted one neighbour especially. He even started sleeping out at night, but Freddie didn’t mind.
‘If Oscar’s happy, then that’s all that matters,’ he would say.
Freddie’s health continued to deteriorate. He was now very thin and found it difficult to sleep, so I decided to move to my own room permanently. Some nights I would still sleep with him, but usually I just lay next to him on top of the bedclothes. He’d snuggle up next to me for comfort. Freddie nicknamed my new bedroom the Ice Box as I slept with the window wide open, even in the middle of winter.
A typically comic birthday present – a gardener’s apron. Freddie was beside himself with laughter.
The gardener at work in Garden Lodge.
For Christmas 1989 I gave Freddie a silver cut-glass caviar bowl worth its weight in the stuff.
Boxing Day 1989 in the dining-room at Garden Lodge, wearing matching his-and-his shirts.
New Year at Graham Hamilton’s home. Left to right: Freddie struggling with a party-popper, Mary and our host.
Barbara Valentin and Freddie the night he wrote the song ‘Delilah’, dedicated to his favourite cat.
The two of us with Barbara Valentin in Switzerland, 1990.
A break during filming for Breakt
hru in Cambridgeshire, Queen’s first ever outdoor video shoot.
The last birthday Freddie ever celebrated was in September 1990 – a grand, dressy affair held at home.
Left to right: Mary, Freddie and Barbara during his last lavish birthday supper. I sat opposite.
Freddie’s birthday, 1990. Left to right: Tony Evans (a friend of Joe’s), Trevor ‘B.B.’ Clarke, Freddie’s doctor Gordon Atkinson and Graham Hamilton.
Freddie’s last Christmas, 1990, with Joe and his bird.
Collapsing at New Year’s Eve – the two of us with Graham Hamilton in 1989.
A typically lavish flower arrangement in Freddie’s bedroom. He’d call ‘cooee!’ to me every morning from that window.
Freddie’s flat in Switzerland (the top floor of the building on the right). The last trip we made was in October 1991 and I know that’s when he decided his battle against AIDS was over.
Freddie in the spring of 1991, looking frail and thin. This was the last time he posed for a photograph.
Freddie Mercury – my man!
One Sunday he got up and went downstairs to discover I hadn’t got out of bed. I had the flu. He came to see me, got into bed with me and cuddled up. He kissed me.
‘Oh, you poor thing,’ he said.
He certainly didn’t seem worried about catching flu from me. We were all conscious of his need to avoid any infection and especially colds and flu as they might prove fatal, but that day he didn’t worry about himself at all. He didn’t catch the flu from me and remained resilient.
It was while he was nursing me through my flu that Freddie decided it was time he did something about my room. He settled on the idea of commissioning contemporary Biedermeier-style furniture to be made for me by a company in Chelsea. He would design a coffee table, then a bed surround, himself. He flicked through books on Biedermeier to get ideas and started outlining his thoughts for the coffee table on a sketch pad. It looked wonderful. It was round and two-tiered. The legs were round ebonised wood balls decorated with little gold stars. The bed surround looked great, but Freddie felt it needed a few of his finishing touches. He returned with his bag of ormolu fittings and found a few large ones to decorate it. Freddie also bought me a new looking glass and three antique Biedermeier chests of drawers. A few weeks later he reserved more pieces of furniture from the supplier.