Famous Last Words (47 page)

with a newspaper folded over her head to ward off the flies.

Wallis had, early in 1941, established a Thursday night poker game at which the regulars were Harry Oakes, a man called Gillie Laidlaw, and, once every month, Elsa Maxwell, who “popped down” from her suite at the Waldorf in New York more or less on a regular schedule. She had come to be

known as the “Waldorf Washerwoman”—always numbering

among her many pieces of luggage the six to eight boxes containing Wallis’ best French lingerie and on occasion (he Duke’s dress shirts. Returning to New York, Miss Maxwell would then be encumbered with the same set of boxes neatly filled with the previous month’s soiled linen. In the hotter months the number of boxes would double, since Wallis,

not being able to abide the feel of perspiration, changed her undergarments three or four times a day. Miss Maxwell,

however, was never heard to complain of this errand—perhaps because she could raise, when her purse ran dry, a

little something—or a lot—by renting out the famous lingerie at a fee. Her motto for this enterprise was a pun on a wellknown song: “you can dance in the slip that danced next

the shirt that was worn by the Prince of Wales.”

The poker game took place in one of the private rooms

where the public was never admitted. The only servants

allowed at these sessions were the ever-faithful Henderson and the ever-faithful Mister Howard, Wallis’s private secretary.

Henderson and Mister Howard were barely on speaking

terms. It was said their rivalry was based on the fact that

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while Henderson was allowed inside the Duchess of Windsor’s apartments, Mister Howard was forbidden to cross the

threshold of the Duke’s. Henderson barred the way and once, it is reputed, even went so far as to say: “there are certain things we men don’t want the other sex to see…” And Mister Howard had run away and was livid for a week.

The table was set in a corner under a pair of lamps, the heat of their bulbs being dispersed by a battery of humming electric fans whose gently weaving faces (white) created the impression of a small select audience watching a slow-motion tennis match. They were all lined up (about six or eight of them, depending on the humidity) along the top of a

refectory table. This table, drawn in close to the players, was always set with an array of bottles and tumblers and buckets of ice. Throughout the evening, Mister Howard and Henderson provided plates of sandwiches, headache pills and—

whenever the situation called for them—smelling salts. Gillie Laidlaw, whom I never came to know, was especially

susceptible to taking his losses badly. Five hundred down and his hand would go to his forehead; eight hundred down and he would be forced to loosen the collar of his shirt and stuff his chest with a bib of towels; one thousand down and he became distracted, losing track of the ante and being unable to add or to multiply; fifteen hundred down and he had to stick his fingers into his ears to stop the ringing; two thousand down and he would faint. Elsa Maxwell said that Gilbert Laidlaw ought to learn the difference between a simple pass and passing out. I think he was some kind of broker.

Retired in 1929.

Poker night, June 17th was one of the hottest nights that season. Everyone said so, and I believed them. Mavis Boodle, leaving that evening to walk back into town—none of Sir Harry’s servants slept in the house—got only halfway down the drive and had to stop and untie the strings that held her dress in close against her body. Watching, after my bath, from the upper verandah, I could see the dress swell up with the sweet, hot breeze from the sea and Mavis Boodle sail

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away like a woman in a tent. But the breeze soon fell and there was a dreadful stillness everywhere. I could not get dry no matter how many towels I used.

I have spoken already of Harry Oakes’ precocious son. His name—I believe derived from his mother’s Australian background—was Sydney. Sydney was never called “Syd”. It

was thought unbecoming and lower-class. He was a handsome boy, but troubled in some way. I believe he was then

about fifteen or sixteen years old and ripe; very ripe.

Sydney and Alfred de Marigny had been friends ever since de Marigny and Nancy were married. Sometimes the boy

went over and stayed with de Marigny even after Nancy had gone away to Boston. This was perhaps nothing more than juvenile hero-worship—an adolescent fixation on an alder man. de Marigny, after all, cut a dashing figure not unlike the film star Errol Flynn. He was master of a racing yacht and had been almost around the world and he stayed up late at night—and there was always music on the gramophone

and ladies from the Porcupine and Emerald Beach Clubs

dropping in for drinks. How could a boy of fifteen or sixteen years resist? Especially when his father wouldn’t let him walk downtown alone—or drive the car—or have a girl.

Shortly after eight, I heard a lot of banging of bureau drawers and slamming of doors in Sydney’s room. Used to his

habits by now I fully expected him to crash any second

through my room and out to the verandah on the other side.

I stood against the wall and waited, dressed in my shirt and undershorts and socks, with my new white trousers in my hand.

What I got, however, instead of Sydney was Sir Harry

Oakes himself, in a state I can only describe as “appropriate”.

If heat precedes the storm, here was the hurricane. Oakes was soaked from head to toe and I thought he must have

been standing in the shower in all his clothes. But the wet was only perspiration. His face was red with fury and I truly feared for his life. He was so enraged he could hardly breathe and had to gasp for air between each phrase of what he said.

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In his hands—in both of them—were pieces of paper, crumpled and torn and surely about to burst into flames.

“That—that—that—” he rasped “—god damned pervert

Freddy de Marigny! Get—get—get your coat! Come with me!

We’re going to…agh!” He raised both his arms above his head so he could breathe “…save my boy!”

“But tonight is a poker night,” I said. “We’ll be late.”

“Late? Who cares?” he gasped. “The Duchess can wait.”

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“He’s gone. GONE, And my wife found this letter…”

—waving it back and forth in front of his face, as if to verify its existence.

“Sydney is gone?”

“Yes. And this letter: this letter is horrible. HORRIBLE.

. .”

Oakes burst into tears.

“Dear heaven. Please…” I said “…sit down.”

“I can’t,” he said. “We have to get him. Quick. Before that Freddy…”

Harry Oakes turned and bumped into the door as he tried to leave the room. “Come on,” he said, still weeping—blind. “Come on!”

He stumbled out along the verandah, squishing the pieces of paper into balls and stuffing them into his pockets. “Hurry!”

he yelled at me.

I pulled on my trousers and grabbed my tie and jacket and hurried as best I could.

“What is it? What?”

I followed him into the car.

“That pervert Freddy stole my daughter! Now he’s stole

my son?”

The motor car leapt forward.

Harry Oakes was driving, still weeping.

From what I could gather in between the dozen fiery

deaths we nearly died that night and the blasting of the horn and the screaming of the wheels, Alfred de Marigny had

written a letter to Sydney, filled with “horrible, dragatory remarks…”—Oakes had also lost complete control of his language. All these dragatory remarks had been about Oakes

himself and had been, apparently, inflammatory enough to convince young Sydney he should run away from home and

go and live with “that…Freddy.” Lady Oakes had found the letter in Sydney’s pocket and had fainted when she read the letter. “Read it! You’ll faint, too!” Oakes roared. But I could not even begin to decipher what was written on the scrunched-up bits of paper, soaking wet from Oakes’ pocket.

At last we arrived at de Marigny’s abode—a surprisingly modest bungalow with a wooden exterior step and a porch that might have been stolen from Rampart Street in New

Orleans. Every light was blazing and music—also stolen from Rampart Street in New Orleans—was blaring from all the windows. Alfred de Marigny liked his music loud, apparently, and his lights bright red.

“I’m going in to get him,” Oakes announced. “You stay

here and guard the car.”

Aside from de Marigny’s music, the street was relatively quiet. But all at once the music stopped and the sound of shouting and banging leapt through the windows—falling, like two men struggling, onto the lawn below. I could hear no other voices save the two: Sir Harry’s caterwaul and, I presume, de Marigny’s relatively dignified shouts of denial.

He must have said: “/ did not” twenty times in the course of three or four minutes.

At last the front door opened and there was Sydney, hustling—being hustled—down the steps by his father. Alfred

de Marigny, hugely tall and thin, was a mere silhouette in the doorway.

“Don’t let him lie about this, Sydney!” he shouted. “Don’t let him lie about it!”

Sydney, blank-faced and weeping, was pushed into the

back of the car and Oakes raised his fist at the house and all its occupants. “Whores! Perverts! Bastards!” he roared.

“Child molesters! Monsters of Sodom and Gomorrah! You

have ruined my children—and I shall ruin you!”

As he got into the driver’s seat he said to me, “Lock all the doors!”

The drive that followed was even more alarming than the first, though we did not speed so fast and Harry Oakes, at

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last, had his eyes wide open. The only weeping now was

Sydney’s—not any longer the weeping of a child but of a young incoherent animal flayed of all its protective skin.

When we had driven only a little way, I discovered with some apprehension we were not driving to Westbourne, but on to Government House.

In the poker room, the players had foregathered—Elsa Maxwell among them. They were wondering how it could be

that Sir Harry Oakes, who was never late, was well over half an hour behind schedule.

“I suppose,” said Elsa, who was always saying this, hoping to draw some hint from the Duchess as to why it really was the Duke would not come down and play, “His Royal Highness wouldn’t consider dropping whatever he’s doing, and

play a round or two—at least until Sir Harry arrives…”

Wallis made a lot of noise with the ice in her glass, pretending she had not heard the remark.

At this point, there was a screeching sound outside of a car being rammed to a halt on the shells of the drive.

“Harry,” Elsa muttered through the smoke of the cigarette that dangled from her lips, “has just remembered it’s Thursday.”

The

car door slam-banged and the front hall suddenly

filled with noisy activity, as if a troop was being deployed.

One of the aides could be heard, at some distance, informing Sir Harry the others were in their places awaiting

him.

The Duchess fanned the cards and set them aside.

Out in the hallway Sir Harry’s voice was rising and falling in a tirade.

Everyone waited for him to burst into the room, but he

did not come.

An aide appeared in the doorway. “Forgive me,” he said, “but Sir Harry Oakes has arrived.”

“We gathered that,” said Elsa.

I, meanwhile, had been left on the drive not knowing which way to turn or what to do. Sir Harry’s behaviour had gone so far beyond the pale already.

Sydney was huddled in the back of the car, staring at his father with a look of hatred quite alarming.

Oakes had marched to the portico, pushed the constable

aside and banged through the doors.

Wallis rose from the poker table and went out into the hall.

Outside, lightning flashed and thunder crashed and a sudden rain was poured out of heaven by the bucketful.

The hall was empty. So where was Sir Harry Oakes?

Wallis reached up and pulled her ear in order to hear the rest of the house. Far away, upstairs—just as she had feared—

she heard the voice of the Duke and then the unmistakeable obscenities of Harry Oakes. Wallis let go her earlobe.

She began to walk—with purpose and speed, but silent—

up the steps towards the landing. Her hand on the balustrade was wet with perspiration and she paused to wipe it on her skirt, and to remove the noisy bracelets, dropping them into her bosom before she continued to rise.

The aide came into the hallway below her, watchful, but silent; tactful at least to that degree. Wallis turned, and wordlessly, she pointed up in the direction of the Duke’s private

suite. The young man nodded. Wallis nodded back and cautioned him, by raising her hand, not to follow her.

Wallis stood, quite unnoticed, in a tiny alcove that served as a vestibule between the Royal quarters and the rest of the house, and luck being with her, she discovered that the door had been left ajar.

Looking in through the crack which made a bright incision straight down the centre of her face, Wallis could plainly see the Duke, who was seated, and Harry Oakes, who was

pacing in and out of view. Oakes was wearing his dress shirt and tie and the trousers usually worn with his yachting jacket—trousers of cream-coloured flannel caked with mud and soaking wet. His shoes made a squelching noise as he

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paced and his hair was plastered flat from his dash through the sudden storm and the tip of his nose was plagued with a steady stream of water pouring down his forehead.

Wallis looked at her husband. He was seated at the dressing table, wearing his kilt and cardigan. Chilly again. She noted the woollen scarf around his neck and the worn-out expression on his face, a man preoccupied with fear and helplessness. And with that thing he was making… .

Wherever it was.

Was it there in the room? Would Harry Oakes see it? God—

if he did…