Goddard said, “He most certainly is not. When His Majesty asked me to advise Mrs. Simpson in the matter of a divorce, I had absolutely no idea he had in mind to marry her.”
Herman said, “I see. And would you be uncovering your legal ass too much to advise Mrs. Simpson what she should do now?”
Goddard said, “She could withdraw her application. Or not.”
Wally said, “It’s obvious. I have to call the whole thing off. If I stop the divorce, Mr. Common Informer can go to hell, and they can keep their King. Ernest will understand. I’ll call David now.”
Perry went with her to the dining room to wait for her call to be put through, and we all sat in nerve-stretching tension, but it turned out HM wasn’t available, and he still wasn’t available by the time dinner was over. Wally said, “I’ll do it in the morning. If I tell him at this time of night, he’ll get drunk.”
Kath said, “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen David drunk.”
Perry said, “There was a time when we all drank too much. When we were young.”
Goddard is leaving in the morning with Wally’s new instructions. The question now is, how Ernest will take the news. I don’t imagine he’ll want Wally back when he has Mary Kirk waiting in the wings. In fact, he may absolutely insist on being discovered in adultery and divorced.
Wally said, “In the morning, Maybell, I want you to go into Nice and buy us tickets to somewhere. China. Anywhere.”
Herman said, “Do you want to go to China, Maybell?”
I’m not at all sure I do.
Wally was very sharp with him. She said, “China was the first place that came into my head. We can go anywhere. Maybell knows what to do. And the detective can go with her. He’s supposed to have a brain.”
Rain lashing against the windows. I haven’t been outside for two whole days.
Letters have begun to arrive. How puzzling people are, to take out their pens and write pages of abuse to a total stranger. We read a few, and when the tone of them became clear, Herman told his head gardener to take all mail addressed to Wally directly to the incinerator.
10th December 1936
Everything is falling apart. When Wally finally got through to HM and told him she was stopping her divorce, he said it would make no difference, because the papers for his abdication have been drawn up and he intends to follow her to the ends of the earth.
“To the moon!” she said. “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. He says he’ll follow me to the moon, if necessary. He’s really quite lost his mind.”
Herman and I drove in to Nice and purchased tickets for the overnight train to Brindisi on Saturday. There are plenty of sailings to faraway places from there. There’s a boat sailing for Ceylon on Sunday, which Herman thinks may fit the bill.
Wally took a pill after lunch and slept. News came from London in fits and starts.
Sometimes the telephone rang, but the line was so bad we couldn’t hear anything. It seems the lawyers are arranging the transfer of Balmoral and Sandringham to the Yorks.
HM has agreed to leave Britain for at least two years, and in exchange may be allowed to keep Fort Belvedere, except for the lawn-mowing machine, which Bertie York always coveted. Kath said it sounds more like a fire sale than the end of a reign.
HM’s new title will be His Royal Highness Prince Edward Duke of Windsor.
Herman said, “So, Wally still has a chance to become a Royal Highness. I say, Maybell, if I were you, I’d hold off ordering your tropical gear. Ceylon may be off.”
As far as I’m concerned, it was never really on. Wherever Ceylon is, I’m sure it’s inconvenient.
Ernest called, but Wally was still in a drugged sleep, so Herman asked me to speak to him. He was very civil.
He said, “I heard from my lawyer. Will you please tell Wally, I’ll do whatever seems best, but in the long run, I’d still like a divorce. I’m with Mary Kirk now, you know, and I want to be free to marry her. But if it helps Wally to delay things a little, till all this has calmed down, she has my word.”
I said, “There’s talk of going to Ceylon.”
“Is there?” he said. “Well, I’m sure she’ll be a great hit wherever she goes.”
Then Fruity got through to say that the abdication papers had been signed and Baldwin was making a statement to Parliament. Perry sat with his head in his hands after taking that call. He said, “His Majesty is to make a farewell broadcast to the nation tomorrow evening.”
Except I suppose he won’t be HM anymore.
Apparently, he’s giving a little dinner tonight. The Erlangers, the Crokers, Fruity and Baba. The old faithfuls. “The Last Supper,” Perry said.
Wally came down, still groggy from her pill, and took a call from HM. We heard her say, “But where will you go? You can’t come here.”
She put Perry on. She said, “You talk to him. He says he’s going to a hotel in Zurich. He can’t go to a hotel. The man is clueless.”
She paced around while Perry was on the phone. He suggested the Westminsters’ place in Normandy, or Schloss Pfaffenhof. I heard him say, “Sir, a private house would be much more suitable.”
It was Herman who thought of the Eugene Rothschilds.
Wally was shouting, “Tell him the Rothschilds’ll have him. Tell him Herman’s going to wire them and arrange it. Tell him he absolutely must not come here. And tell him I’ve gone back to bed.”
Perry looks quite gray. Kath said, “Does anyone else have the feeling they’ve slipped through the looking glass? Is this really happening?”
I said, “It’s a pity a sweet little King like David can’t be allowed to marry the woman he loves.”
Kath said, “If you ask me, the real pity is that he doesn’t love a better woman.”
Herman spoke with Kitty Rothschild. Eugene is away in Paris, but she’s happy to put Schloss Enzesfeld at HM’s disposal, if he doesn’t mind sharing it with her. More calls to and from the Fort. It seems there’s nothing left to be done. David has given up his throne so he can have Wally, but Wally doesn’t really want him without his throne.
Herman answered a final call just as I was preparing to come upstairs. He said, “If you look in on Wally, please tell her Rex Quondam says ‘sweet dreams.’”
I found her on the bed, still in her clothes and sobbing quite pitifully. Such tears. I’ve never, never known Wally to go to bed without putting on a fresh nightgown and having Burke take everything away for brushing and hanging.
“He’s ruined everything,” was all she’d say. “The goddamned fool has ruined everything.”
She was so distressed. I didn’t even mention Mr. Quondam. Perhaps he’d be willing to go with her to Ceylon. Whoever he is.
11th December 1936
This has been the saddest day. HM, or HRH, as we must now revert to calling him, left Fort Belvedere this afternoon. He went up to Windsor Castle to dine with his mother and his brothers and then made his wireless broadcast from a room in the Augusta Tower. We heard it in Herman’s library, relayed by French radio. He said that he had felt unable to do the job of King without the help and support of the woman he loved, and so he had been succeeded by his brother, the Duke of York. He didn’t actually say Wally’s name. He called her “the other person most nearly concerned.” He said the decision to abdicate was his and his alone, and that she had tried to dissuade him from it. Then they played “God Save the King.” It was all over in five minutes.
I cried, and so did Perry and Kath. Wally remained very composed, but I guess she’s already done her crying.
Pips called us later. She said everything seemed muffled in London, like after a fall snowfall. She said there were crowds outside Buckingham Palace, but all very orderly, just standing there, trying to take in the news. Freddie thinks once everyone is over the shock, they’ll take quite happily to the new management, especially with them having those two little girls. They’ll be able to trot them out in pretty little dresses, and the newspapers will adore them. Th
is could be a big opportunity for Flora, if only she’d stop wearing Rory’s old sweaters and learn to get along nicely with the York girls. There must be great excitement at Carlton Gardens today. Violet will be getting her coronet out of storage.
Bertie York is going to be known as King George VI. I wonder what they’ll do with all those Coronation items they’ve already had manufactured? They’ll have to start over now, with new pictures.
The telephone has now fallen silent. I guess HRH must be on his way to the Rothschilds.
12th December 1936
The Brindisi train, for which we held tickets, left without us. All the pep seems to have gone out of Wally. She said, “Maybe I’ll go to Argentina. I know people there. I think I’ll talk to David. See what provision has been made for him. I think he’d rather like it there. He likes ranches, and they have good golf there, too.”
Herman says she’s been doing her math. Wally minus David equals middle-aged outcast living off her capital. Wally plus David equals a title and an income for life. He said, “I think, Maybell, you may soon be off the hook, Kath and I will be left in peace, and Perry will be able to go home.”
I don’t know that it’s going to be so simple.
Walter Monckton called this afternoon with a progress report on HRH. He drove with him as far as Portsmouth, saw him aboard the destroyer that was taking him to France, then said good-bye. David is traveling with just one valet, a detective, Joey Legh as equerry, and Wally’s dog. Monckton said the final moments were quite heartbreaking. The royal party, such as it is, should be at Enzesfeld sometime tomorrow.
“Twenty-four hours without pointless phone calls,” was Wally’s only comment.
I still can’t believe it’s over. We all know about revolutions and the havoc Communists can wreak, but I’d never realized a king can just stop being king.
14th December 1936
HRH—just when I’d grown accustomed to calling him HM—HRH is now installed at the Rothschilds, but there’s already a problem, because neither Joey Legh nor the detective nor the valet speak German, and Kitty R. hasn’t trained her servants to understand English. If I married a Rothschild, even a minor one, like Eugene, the first thing I’d do is import a smart American staff.
Wally is in a softer mood. Now the throne is well and truly gone, I think she’s preparing herself to become the Duchess of Windsor. She’s certainly told Goddard to go ahead with the application for her divorce to be finalized.
She said, “I’ll take my chances with this Common Informer. I didn’t go through the hell of Felixstowe to have some hired monkey deprive me of my divorce. I want it, Ernest wants it, and anyway, what can they do to David now? Send a constable to Austria to arrest him?”
Perry B. is leaving for Enzesfeld in the morning. Herman drove me and Wally into town to shop for Christmas gifts for him to take for David. Cigars from me, cashmere sweaters and a possum leather coat with a fur lining from Wally.
More rain. The press are packing up and leaving.
18th December 1936
A difficult day. Wally is down in the dumps. She says she’s committed no crime and yet she’s been sentenced to life. She says she felt in constant danger yesterday while we were in town, as though at any moment some mad person might shoot her or throw acid in her face. Of course, if she’d just dress “down” a little, no one would even notice her. So many jewels before luncheon is guaranteed to draw attention.
I said, “People will soon forget.” Even that was the wrong thing to say.
She said, “I’m not the kind of woman people forget. Those Yorks are probably planning to have me assassinated.”
Herman said, “Wally, dearest, if that’s what they wanted, they’d have had it done while you were handy. I don’t think the Yorks would go to the expense of sending an assassin to Cannes.”
She said, “None of you has any idea. I’m stuck here in this freezing house, weeks and weeks of it stretching before me, and at the end of it, nothing but uncertainty. It’s all very well for you. You can come and go as you please. You can go back to your old lives. But I’ve given up everything. I’m a prisoner here, and I’m going through absolute hell.”
She slammed the door and went to lie down. Herman slammed another door and went to burn some more of her hate letters. As Kath says, we seem doomed to pay for each of Wally’s gayer moments with ten of Lady Macbeth’s.
She said, “I don’t know how you put up with her, Maybell.”
Well, we go back a long way. I’m the sister she never had, and she appreciates me a good deal more than Violet Melhuish does. And Wally may be going to be the Duchess of Windsor, but I still see that desperate little girl from Biddle Street.
Kath says she should look for a house in the New Year. She said, “She needs her own establishment. She’s driving all our help to distraction, and it’s going to be months before she can join David, if that’s her plan.”
I said, “I know. I’ll suggest it. Are you worried about a repetition of what happened in Peking?”
She said, “Nothing happened in Peking. Not that it wasn’t offered and not that Herman mightn’t have been tempted by a beautiful woman, but Wally had far too much mileage on the clock even then. She was really known as quite an old drab, you know? And that voice! Of course, she’s toned it down since she moved to England, but it still reminds me of a buzz saw.”
20th December 1936
Perry Brownlow is in Enzesfeld and reports that HRH is very happy and optimistic. “Demob fever” Perry called it. That nice young attaché, Forwood, has agreed to act as German-speaking equerry. Wally’s happy about the appointment.
Perry was supposed to go home directly from Enzesfeld, but he’s agreed to make a detour to come back here and deliver Wally’s Christmas gifts. Wally tried to wheedle out of him what he’s bringing, but he wouldn’t even give her a hint.
23rd December 1936
Perry B. got here late last night with a mink cape and a choker of baroque pearls. Wally says the cape is of a rather old-fashioned cut, but she’ll probably be able to have it remodeled once she gets to Paris.
She gave Perry quite a grilling on the state of negotiations over HRH’s money and was far from satisfied with his answers. He said, “These are complicated affairs, and without precedent, so we must just be patient. His Royal Highness is hardly on the breadline, Wally.”
She said, “Don’t you Wally me. You’ll call me ‘ma’am’ from now on.”
We were all speechless. He left for the aerodrome immediately, anxious about getting home for Christmas.
Kath gave her a piece of her mind. She said, “How could you speak to him like that? Perry’s been a tireless friend to you and the loyalest of servants to David.”
Wally said, “I know that, and he knows I know. But he still better get used to calling me ma’am.”
Kath said, “Don’t you think that’s a bit premature? Don’t you think you ought to count your friends and your blessings while you’re still Wally Simpson?”
Herman said, “And Perry’s borne heaven knows what expenses out of his own pocket.”
She said, “He can afford it. It’s only for the time being. David will take care of things when his money comes through.”
I don’t know. David doesn’t usually take care of anyone except himself and Einum Meinum.
I hope they’ll have patched things up by dinnertime. We’re supposed to be going to the Palm Beach Casino. Daisy Fellowes is giving a party, and the Cavetts will be there.
25th December 1936
All the church bells were ringing as we drove to the casino last night. It was wonderfully picturesque. I gave Wally a set of silk lingerie bags, which are going to be embroidered with her monogram. As she says, whether she becomes the Duchess of Windsor or reverts to Wally Warfield, a W will see her through the rest of her life. She gave me Vetiver cologne and the Rogerses a little silver card tray. I think I remember it from Fort Belvedere, but Herman and Kath don’t need to know that. Pe
rhaps they’d be thrilled though.
I put a call through to South Audley Street and spoke to Lightfoot. He said things are so calm in London you would never believe how people felt only two weeks ago. He said, “It’s all going to turn out for the best. Bertie York didn’t want the job, but now he’s got it he’ll settle down to it.”
He and Flora were about to leave for luncheon at Carlton Gardens. Doopie was with Marina Kent, who is expected to give birth today.
He’s still talking about volunteering for Spain. I said, “What about Doopie? You can’t get married and then go off fighting other people’s wars.”
He said, “Perhaps she’ll volunteer, too. I think she’d make rather an angelic nurse, don’t you?”
Wally was on the telephone with HRH for more than an hour. The tone seemed to be intimate. Herman says a pearl choker is a well-known aphrodisiac. Tonight to Cap Ferrat, for dinner with a neighbor of the Rogerses, who writes books. A Mr. Maugham. Wally insists that I’ve heard of him. Apparently, he used to be married to Syrie Maugham, but now lives in an unnatural alliance with a secretary from California. Poor Syrie. She was the one who did Pips and Freddie’s sitting room in bone and buttermilk. It was considered the height of fashion for about five minutes.
26th December 1936
Wally says she enjoyed last evening, but I found Willie Maugham rather rude. I asked him all the questions one knows to ask a writer. Are they at work on their next tome? Where do they find their inspiration? I even offered him some of my own ideas, but he didn’t thank me for them. And Wally may think he found her very witty, but I think his tone was rather mocking. Also, the secretary kept interrupting dinner with abrupt entrances and exits and silly remarks to no one in particular. I believe he may have been tight. Not surprising, because the martinis were stiff ones, but still, a secretary should be kept busy at his typewriter. He should have no occasion to go anywhere near the drinks’ tray.
Gone With the Windsors Page 33