Gone With the Windsors

by Laurie Graham

  1st August 1938, La Croe

  We got back here late last evening, and the help were all lined up outside the front door, crisp summer liveries and nice straight backs. Wally’s done such a good job on them.

  Pips and Freddie were here ahead of us. Freddie says General Franco looks like winning in Spain, which will mean Lightfoot is on the wrong side. What a fool.

  Pips says La Croe makes Fort Belvedere look like a flophouse.

  11th August 1938

  The Neville Chamberlains are at Balmoral. Monckton says HRH’s future is definitely on the agenda.

  15th August 1938

  No news from Balmoral.

  21st August 1938

  We closed Boite Noire at five and went on to Chez Zazzi for pancakes and coffee. Still nothing from Balmoral.

  24th August 1938

  We’re going back to Paris. Monckton wants to see HRH but is too pressed for time to come down to La Croe. Maybe this means good news. Wally says Monckton will never bring good news, from Balmoral or anywhere else. She says the man is a Jonah.

  Freddie said, “Well, this is hardly the time to be pestering the King about David’s future. I’m sure his mind is on the Sudetenland.”

  There’s always something. One thing about the United States. There aren’t all these little local disputes going on.

  Wally said, “If they don’t hurry up and do something for David, maybe we’ll give him something else to worry about. We could, you know? We could go back and set up there and create a fearful row. They’re completely outside the law, denying me my title.”

  She’s always like this toward the end of a vacation. Nagging and picking and revisiting old wrongs. I hope Maxi’s back in town.

  3rd September 1938, Meurice Hotel, Paris

  No word of Maxi.

  Wally and Freddie were both right about Balmoral. Monckton says it simply wasn’t the moment for Chamberlain to bring up HRH’s future. He says there are worrying rumblings from the direction of Czechoslovakia, which monopolized everyone’s thoughts.

  Wally said, “Another opportunity missed. Another winter on the way with David unemployed.”

  Monckton said, “Strictly off the record, Halifax thinks the Czechs are bound to have to cede something to Hitler, so it may be settled pretty quickly.”

  Wally said, “And then there’ll be something else. Everything gets settled except our affairs.”

  To Gerny’s, to hear young Charles Trenet. They say he’s going into movies, and no wonder, with those delicious golden curls and that angelic smile.

  7th September 1938

  The Ambassador von Welczeks to dinner. Also came: Bendor Westminster, the Lazslo Melchiors, and Elsie Mendl. I now understand all about the Sudetenland. Everyone who lives there is German anyway, so it makes no sense at all for the Czechs to hold on to it. Common sense must surely prevail.

  12th September 1938

  They say Germany troops are massing on the Czech frontier.

  14th September 1938

  Mr. Chamberlain is flying to Germany tomorrow to see President Hitler and ascertain his intentions. A perfect example of a job they could have given to HRH. As Wally says, Neville Chamberlain must have a hundred calls on his time, whereas HRH has spent the morning whistling through his teeth and watching the rain beat down.

  15th September 1938

  HRH’s cousin Arthur Connaught has died, but as he still has three months of his exile to serve, he’s not allowed to go to England for the funeral. It was cancer, apparently. I met the wife once, at Carlton Gardens. She’s very keen on hospitals and sits on various committees with Violet.

  Hitler told Chamberlain that the Sudetenland is a private German matter and nothing to do with the League of Nations. France says if so much as one German boot enters Czechoslovakia, it will take steps.

  Forwood says what France means is, it will issue a statement deploring Germany’s actions. He says they can’t possibly think of going to war, because they’ll find themselves marching alone. Britain is by no means ready for any military adventures, and America isn’t interested. It’s all so unsettling. Perhaps Ena Spain has the right idea. Move to Switzerland and stop listening to the wireless.

  18th September 1938

  Lunch with Kitty Rothschild and Winnie Gulliver. They think Hitler is playing with Neville Chamberlain as a cat plays with a mouse. Kitty says after Czechoslovakia it will be Poland, then Yugoslavia, then Romania, and so on, until the German flag flies all over Europe. Even France.

  Eugene is in New York, overseeing work on their Long Island property, because they foresee it becoming their only safe haven.

  Wally says the Rothschilds are one case, we’re quite another. She says we’d have nothing to fear in the unlikely event of Germany invading France.

  She said, “Don’t forget, David’s as much German as he is British, so it’d make no difference to us. In fact, it might be to our advantage. Adolf Hitler would certainly give him a job.”

  29th September 1938

  Neville Chamberlain is flying to Germany again for more discussions with the Fuehrer, and this time, Mr. Mussolini will also attend. Everyone is very tense. After great difficulties, I got a call through to Carlton Gardens, but neither Violet nor Melhuish were home. Left a message.

  Managed to speak to Pips, who says they’re digging trenches in Hyde Park and the War Office is recruiting women for the Home Defences. Cooks, drivers, typists. She’s going to volunteer.

  I said, “You’re too old.” She said, “I’m not a bit too old.”

  I’ll bet she is. She hasn’t looked into it properly. She doesn’t even know what the uniforms are like.

  She was at the House of Commons yesterday to hear Chamberlain speak. She says there were extraordinary scenes, everyone very emotional and braced for the worst. She said the House was packed. Even the old Queen was there. Chamberlain was on his feet for more than an hour, recounting all his visits with Adolf Hitler and preparing everyone for gloomy news, but before he got to the point, a message was passed to him, and he went into a huddle with his advisers. Pips says the atmosphere was electric. Then he announced that Hitler and Mussolini had responded to his latest telegram and were willing to talk again. She said the place erupted, members of Parliament standing on their benches, cheering and throwing their order papers in the air. Freddie told her he cried. He said Chamberlain looked a little tired as he left the chamber, but gave everyone a smile.

  Well, God bless Neville Chamberlain. If anyone can keep us from a silly war, he seems to be the man.

  30th September 1938

  Violet returned my call. They heard yesterday that Lightfoot has been injured in Spain, but not seriously, and is being sent home. No other information, except that it happened as long ago as August, so Doopie may find him on the doorstep at any moment. What a relief. I hope this has cured him of wars.

  Fruity Metcalfe is here. He wants to discus war plans with HRH, but I don’t think we have any.

  1st October 1938

  The warmongers have been routed! With the help of Mr. Mussolini’s diplomatic efforts, Neville Chamberlain has achieved a concord with Hitler. He’s to be allowed to have the Sudetenland, provided he promises to leave the rest of Czechoslovakia in peace. Exactly as Halifax predicted. It sounds to me as though Mr. Mussolini has earned that little piece of Africa that’s been such a bone of contention.

  Everyone is happy except Fruity. He says it’s like telling a burglar you won’t call the police if he puts back the diamonds and just steals the teaspoons. Of course, Fruity is itching to get back into uniform.

  7th October 1938

  Penelope Blythe has pitched up for a long weekend. She says she’d been looking forward to having Leake Priory requisitioned and being able to do some kind of daring war work, but everything has now gone off the boil. She’s seeking new excitements.

  Took her to lunch with Wally, who was at her most gruesome, nagging HRH to go to Boulevard Suchet and throw some Royal weight aro
und with the laggard electricians. The suite was full of red carnations, never Wally’s choice.

  “Just cordial wishes from the Fuehrer,” she said. “But no prizes for guessing the name of the delivery boy!”

  Von Ribbentrop, of course. He and his hausfrau are in town. Wally and HRH are dining at the German Embassy tonight.

  Penelope and I may go to Maxim’s and then on to the Revue Negre. Sylvie Vieille-Soiffarde is getting up a table.

  9th October 1938

  Poor Ena Spain has lost another son. He was in a car accident in Miami. She’s not in town, so I haven’t been able to speak with her. Anyway, what can one say? Her life has been nothing but tragedy. And still old Princess Baby hangs on. The grandmother burying the grandchildren. That’s not the way things are supposed to be.

  Penelope swears Sylvie was wearing a wig last evening. She also swears Alix Piston-LeRupin offered her Benzedrine pills and Lucien Ecornifleur squeezed her thigh.

  I said, “Start to worry when he squeezes your purse.”

  15th October 1938

  Joey Legh is over to play some golf with HRH. Wally’s relieved to have him entertained. He’s become very peevish lately about her lunches with Kenny Opdyke. She said, “David, I married you for better or for worse, but not for lunch.”

  The Communists are threatening strikes.

  17th October 1938

  A letter from Pips. Lightfoot is home and in a much worse condition than they’d been led to expect, having lost an arm. He’s in St. Thomas’s hospital, being seen to.

  20th October 1938

  A brief conversation with Violet. George Lightfoot has lost his right forearm. It could have been worse. Just as well though that he had settled for Doopie, because his chances with anyone else would now be reduced. One saw a lot of it after the war, men with an empty sleeve pinned across their chest. I never found it in the least dashing.

  Violet said, “I do wish you’d come home, Maybell.”

  I said, “I am home.”

  But I may visit. November is out of the question, because we have fittings for our spring gowns, and several important parties. Also, we’re threatened with the Harry Gloucesters, who may call in on their way home from prince-ing in Africa. Perhaps I’ll go in December, when Rory is home from school.

  4th November 1938

  Lily Drax-Pfaffenhof for the weekend. She says the Munich Accord was a simple case of common sense, because no one in Germany wants a war, not even Hitler. As for the way the Jewish folk are being bullied, she wonders whether the Fuehrer knows the half of what’s going on.

  Charlie Bedaux says I should buy francs while they’re such good value.

  7th November 1938

  Maxi is back! He announced himself with a bouquet of miniature calla lilies. He says our oilseeds will be in profit by the summer, and he’s found the very cork grove for me. He reminds me of Brumby in many ways. Always dreaming up business schemes, even on the threshold of the boudoir. Always alert to opportunities. Of course, Brumby never used brilliantine, and he was an early riser, whereas Maxi goes to bed with the lark.

  Tonight to Pigalle.

  9th November 1938

  Bumped into Winnie Gulliver buying envelopes in Samaritaine.

  She said, “Maybell, I hope you won’t think me impertinent, but are you in deep with Maxi Finto?”

  I very much like Winnie, but really!

  She said, “I won’t pry, but I think you should know there was a widow from Michigan who got rather badly burned. Something to do with trading in Peruvian bird poo.”

  10th November 1938

  To the Bricktop Club with Maxi. There is a bird poo industry, apparently, so Winnie G. was half-right. But the Michigan woman got jittery and pulled out her money prematurely, always an unwise thing to do. As Maxi says, you need strong nerves to stay ahead of the crowd in business, and I have nerves of steel.

  Wore my new magenta jacket. Two women at the next table were wearing tuxedos and smoking cheroots.

  11th November 1938

  The Harry Gloucesters to lunch with Wally and HRH. They toyed with their sweetbreads, she whispering to me that they prefer simple food. What a mixed bag these Royalties are. King Bertie York and Gloucester and the sister are so dull, and HRH and Kent are so vivacious, or at least they used to be. The only sign of animation in Gloucester came when HRH told him he’d sold off his Canadian livestock.

  “Oh no!” he said. “Not the shorthorns! What a tragedy! Damned fine herd! How much did you get for them?”

  I just hope he carries the story back to the New Bunch. It’s high time they realized homes fit for a royal duke cost a great deal more money than they’ve allowed him, and sacrifices have had to be made.

  After lunch, we showed them Boulevard Suchet, which smells of fresh paint but is almost ready for the drapes to be hung, then HRH went with them to the airfield to see them off.

  12th November 1938

  Mr. Ataturk died yesterday. We had such an agreeable time with him in Istanbul. Wally is wearing her Turkish choker in remembrance.

  13th November 1938

  Lunch at Brasserie Lipp and then to the bank with Maxi. I’m taking a rain check on cork groves but have plunged a little deeper into oilseeds.

  He gave me a blue topaz pendant and a paperweight that contains earth from his ranch in Paraguay. As he says, now I’ll have a little piece of him while he’s gone. And he predicts that next year he won’t need to travel quite so much. We’ll have time to get to know one another, and time to enjoy all that money we’ll have made. If things work out, I may let HRH in on it. Wally says he’s far poorer than he thinks he is.

  23rd November 1938

  The Neville Chamberlains are dining here tomorrow. HRH hopes they’re bringing news of a thaw at Buckingham Palace. Wally says as well look for a thaw at the North Pole.

  25th November 1938

  If Mrs. Chamberlain possesses any good jewelry, she elected not to wear it last evening, and her gown was le dernier cri. She was caught between the glitter of my diamonds and flash of Wally’s sapphires, and looked like a dazed woodland creature. Still, at least she bobbed a curtsy.

  Despite our best efforts, conversation was like a slow game of handball, and when the men joined us after their brandy, HRH looked ominously deflated. Apparently, Chamberlain’s talk had been of nothing but international tensions, and his only word on the subject of David’s exile had been that “now didn’t seem quite the moment.”

  Wally said, “It’ll never be ‘quite the moment,’ David. Why don’t you face facts? We’re never going back.”

  HRH says he found Chamberlain very sound on the important points. One, war against Germany is unthinkable, because the French are in no state of readiness and we can’t start hostilities without them. And two, we should anyway be addressing the more urgent question of how best to deal with the Soviet bear.

  We just heard that his Aunt Maud has died. They’re taking her back to Norway, so, strictly speaking, he could attend the funeral without breaking any promises, but he’s decided not to. He doesn’t want to travel without Wally, and even if Wally could be persuaded to climb aboard an airplane, he knows when they got there none of the Royalties would speak to her.

  He said, “I burn with shame, Maybell, every time I think of the wrong they’re doing her. Her only offense has been to be loved by me.”

  Of course, there’s more to it than that. They hate her because she’s American. They hate her because she won’t be fenced in by their silly old rules. But none of it matters anymore. Anyway, he wasn’t close to Maud Norway.

  Claridge’s has reserved me a nice junior suite. Wally’s shopping list grows longer. Marmalade, dog treats, ink, Mrs. Spry special flower-arrangement wire, magnesia tablets.

  I’m going to try to coax Violet and Melhuish out of their rut and give them dinner. I’ll bet they haven’t been to a restaurant in years.

  6th December 1938, Claridge’s Hotel, London

  Dear Lightfoot
is in a very bad way. He’s thinner than ever and racked with pain from the arm he no longer has. Still full of jocularity though, in spite of it. He said, “I suppose I should change my name to Lighthand.”

  He’s quite unrepentant about going to Spain. He said, “My only regret is that the British Battalion didn’t stay until the job was done.”

  I said, “Well, please promise you’ll stay at home from now on.”

  He said, “No choice. If it comes to another war, the army won’t have any use for me now. Can’t even push a bloody pen.”

  Doopie loved the scent I took her.

  8th December 1938

  Violet may still be a little starchy with me, but I seem to have reestablished full diplomatic relations with Melhuish. He actually kissed me as they were leaving. A roast partridge can work wonders.

  He asked after HRH. I said, “He’s fit and well but underoccupied. Why doesn’t the King give him a job?”