The Duchess Of Windsor (67 page)
Read The Duchess Of Windsor Online
Authors: Greg King
After dinner, the Duchess and the ladies retired to the drawing room and library, leaving the Duke to preside over cigars and port. Within forty-five minutes, both groups had assembled together again, usually grouped around the baby-grand piano in a corner of the drawing room, singing popular songs. Like his niece Princess Margaret, the Duke loved to lead his guests, although, according to at least one guest, Elsa Maxwell, “he had no voice at all.” He liked show tunes, and his favorites included the score from the musical
Oklahoma!
which he sang at the top of his lungs and distinctly off-key
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Occasionally, he hauled out the record player. “Georges, where’s the gramophone,” the Duke would yell over his guests. Georges would duly appear with a very old, very battered portable machine on which the Duke would play more show tunes, records of Churchill’s speeches, and music from his youth. A few couples might dance or stroll on the terrace if the weather was warm.
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Oklahoma!
which he sang at the top of his lungs and distinctly off-key
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Occasionally, he hauled out the record player. “Georges, where’s the gramophone,” the Duke would yell over his guests. Georges would duly appear with a very old, very battered portable machine on which the Duke would play more show tunes, records of Churchill’s speeches, and music from his youth. A few couples might dance or stroll on the terrace if the weather was warm.
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While David was thus employed, Wallis held court on a corner sofa, laughing, exchanging the latest gossip or racy joke, or played bridge with her guests. Once, in the middle of a game, she famously declared, when asked why she had failed to support a fellow player with the three Kings in her hand during a no-trump bid, “My Kings don’t take tricks. They only abdicate.”
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Writer Gore Vidal described her “flapper’s wisecracking charm.”
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When asked why she and David never had any children, she shrugged and laughed. “The Duke is not heir-conditioned.”
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Writer Gore Vidal described her “flapper’s wisecracking charm.”
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When asked why she and David never had any children, she shrugged and laughed. “The Duke is not heir-conditioned.”
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Inevitably, such evenings showcased the talents of the Windsors’ servants, who were known to be among the best trained in Paris. Their demanding routine was duly rewarded every year at Christmas. “Since the Windsors had no family of their own,” the Countess of Romanones recalled, “they derived an enormous amount of pleasure from a big Christmas celebration for their servants.”
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Wallis regularly purchased hundreds of presents for those in her service; not only the men and women who worked in the house but those who worked on the grounds, those at the Mill, their husbands and wives, and their children, all received gifts from the Duke and Duchess. These gifts varied from year to year and according to the recipient’s position and length of service, but male members of the household typically received leather wallets, watches, gold cuff links, and shaving kits, while the women were given small pieces of jewelry, cashmere sweaters, leather purses, or in the years immediately following the Second World War, nylon hosiery Wallis had brought back from the United States. Their children always received toys and books, and the Duke and Duchess favored anything from Walt Disney.
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Wallis regularly purchased hundreds of presents for those in her service; not only the men and women who worked in the house but those who worked on the grounds, those at the Mill, their husbands and wives, and their children, all received gifts from the Duke and Duchess. These gifts varied from year to year and according to the recipient’s position and length of service, but male members of the household typically received leather wallets, watches, gold cuff links, and shaving kits, while the women were given small pieces of jewelry, cashmere sweaters, leather purses, or in the years immediately following the Second World War, nylon hosiery Wallis had brought back from the United States. Their children always received toys and books, and the Duke and Duchess favored anything from Walt Disney.
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In addition, the Duke and Duchess gave all of the household and staff an extra month’s pay each December and threw an enormous party and dinner for them in the villa in Paris. It was a chance for the Duke and Duchess to relax and enjoy themselves as well; they hired caterers, brought in a band, and happily danced with their servants in the candlelit foyer of the villa. “No one who ever spent their Christmas with Their Royal Highnesses,” recalled a former staff member, “had any doubt as to their happiness. It was infectious, and both took a great delight in the children, who, although warned by their parents to be on their best behaviour, inevitably wound up racing through the rooms. Once, a boy playing with some tin soldiers accidentally knocked over the vase which was serving as his castle. It broke of course and he burst into tears. But the Duchess took his hand, helped him clean up the pieces, and spent the rest of the afternoon playing soldiers with him on the Grand Staircase.”
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American. Adventures
E
ACH YEAR
, in the midst of the bleak Parisian winter, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor abandoned the chill winds and sleet of the French capital and sailed to America. Until the end of the 1950s, they always booked passage on the
Queen Mary
, where they had become well-known and respected additions to the valued Cunard client list. As the years passed, the Windsors became more comfortable in mixing with other passengers and even joined in the last-night dances, trading partners with anyone bold enough to approach and ask for a turn on the floor.
ACH YEAR
, in the midst of the bleak Parisian winter, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor abandoned the chill winds and sleet of the French capital and sailed to America. Until the end of the 1950s, they always booked passage on the
Queen Mary
, where they had become well-known and respected additions to the valued Cunard client list. As the years passed, the Windsors became more comfortable in mixing with other passengers and even joined in the last-night dances, trading partners with anyone bold enough to approach and ask for a turn on the floor.
From the middle of the 1950s onward, the Duke and Duchess switched their allegiance to the
SS United States
, the proud, sleek flagship of the United States Line and holder of the coveted Blue Riband for fastest Atlantic crossing by any ship. The decision was primarily financial; unlike Cunard Lines, which charged the Windsors the full price for the suites aboard the
Queen Elizabeth
and
Queen Mary
, the United States Line allowed the Duke and Duchess to occupy a special suite of rooms, whose ordinary cost would have been $1,200, and pay only the regular first-class passage of $340.
1
In return, the Duke and Duchess agreed to attend at least several of the onboard functions during the voyage, pose for the ship’s photographer, and hold a small end-of-voyage press conference in the tourist lounge.
SS United States
, the proud, sleek flagship of the United States Line and holder of the coveted Blue Riband for fastest Atlantic crossing by any ship. The decision was primarily financial; unlike Cunard Lines, which charged the Windsors the full price for the suites aboard the
Queen Elizabeth
and
Queen Mary
, the United States Line allowed the Duke and Duchess to occupy a special suite of rooms, whose ordinary cost would have been $1,200, and pay only the regular first-class passage of $340.
1
In return, the Duke and Duchess agreed to attend at least several of the onboard functions during the voyage, pose for the ship’s photographer, and hold a small end-of-voyage press conference in the tourist lounge.
The Windsors always occupied cabins U87, U89, and U91, known as the “Duck Suite.”
2
This consisted of two bedrooms, with a sitting room between; for the valet and maid, they took inside cabins nearby, and a third cabin was always booked to serve as a wardrobe and linen room. As on all of their voyages, the ship’s linens in their suite were always replaced prior to sailing by the Duchess’s maid, who also supervised the placement of the framed photographs, bits of porcelain, and other souvenirs with which they traveled.
3
“They were always very easy to travel with by my standards,” recalled Comdr. Leroy Alexanderon, captain of the ship. “They never made any special demands and it was a feather in our cap to have them.”
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2
This consisted of two bedrooms, with a sitting room between; for the valet and maid, they took inside cabins nearby, and a third cabin was always booked to serve as a wardrobe and linen room. As on all of their voyages, the ship’s linens in their suite were always replaced prior to sailing by the Duchess’s maid, who also supervised the placement of the framed photographs, bits of porcelain, and other souvenirs with which they traveled.
3
“They were always very easy to travel with by my standards,” recalled Comdr. Leroy Alexanderon, captain of the ship. “They never made any special demands and it was a feather in our cap to have them.”
4
The Windsors’ favored first destination was Palm Beach, where, in the warm tropical climate, they could relax and forget the harsh weather they had left behind in Europe. They often stayed at the Everglades Club, in a special suite set aside for their use. Inevitably, upon their arrival, they were greeted with large, cheering crowds, and Wallis and Edward would make appearances on their balcony and wave to the sea of faces that greeted them with rounds of applause. Their arrival usually marked the start of the Palm Beach social season, during which the Duke and Duchess were guests of honor at the massive balls given in the extravagant Biltmore Hotel and the Breakers.
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In the afternoon, Wallis often disappeared to shop, while David played golf with friends. Occasionally, there were less expected adventures. Wallis was forever curious about life in the country she had left behind and tried to keep abreast of the latest changes. In Florida, she often ventured into supermarkets—an exotic discovery which was unknown in Paris. After exploring the aisles, she would purchase slices of meat, salami, smoked cheese, and crackers from the startled attendants, return with her prizes to the Duke, and share an impromptu picnic in their car alongside the ocean.
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After Palm Beach it was off to New York, where the Duke and Duchess moved into their regular suite, 28H, in the Waldorf Towers. In 1948 they had shipped many of their own furnishings, pictures, souvenirs, and housewares to the hotel, and these helped fill the drawing room, dining room, bedrooms, study, and guest rooms that constituted the apartment. The Waldorf Towers, atop the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel but with its own, discrete entrance and aristocratic patrons was the ideal base for the Windsors in the city.
One of the most persistent allegations made against the Windsors is that they avoided paying their bills, sought out discounts, accepted questionable gifts, and never tipped. The Duke and Duchess, living on investments and on the annual allowance of £21,000 David received from the Royal Family, were never as wealthy as many imagined. The Duke had never had to deal with money; as Prince of Wales and as king, he had had an equerry to take care of his financial concerns. He therefore had little practical experience and constantly worried over his economic affairs. Wallis, too, having been raised in genteel poverty and reminded at nearly every turn of the importance of money, was careful with her expenditures.
But, these factors aside, the Windsors never avoided their financial obligations. In New York, for example, bills were regularly sent to their suite in the Waldorf Towers, where the Duke himself would carefully make out the checks and send them off to his creditors.
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They occasionally accepted special rates, but these were the exceptions rather than the rule. “I would like to state here once and for all time: the Duke and I pay our bills!” Wallis wrote in February 1961. “Oddly enough, the slanderous gossip that we do not has only recently reached my ears, and I was completely bowled over by it.”
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They occasionally accepted special rates, but these were the exceptions rather than the rule. “I would like to state here once and for all time: the Duke and I pay our bills!” Wallis wrote in February 1961. “Oddly enough, the slanderous gossip that we do not has only recently reached my ears, and I was completely bowled over by it.”
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The arrival of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in New York would be cause for immediate excitement in the society columns as hostesses vied with each other for the couple’s presence at their parties. Wallis and David themselves took the lead at least once or twice; with the assistance of society lion Elsa Maxwell, Wallis managed to found a permanent event, the Windsor Ball, which was designed to raise money for a number of charities under the Duchess’s patronage.
The alliance with Maxwell was a curious one. Both she and Wallis were strong, independent, stubborn women, and inevitably they clashed repeatedly when one trod on the other’s ego. If Wallis offended certain refined sensibilities with her brash charm and wit, Maxwell was something altogether different. She made the Duchess of Windsor appear to be a paragon of good breeding. Diana Vreeland called Maxwell an “enormous mountain of a woman.... Elsa wasn’t a vulgar woman. This is hard to explain to someone who never knew her, because she
looked
vulgar. You see pictures of her where she looks like a cook on her night out.”
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looked
vulgar. You see pictures of her where she looks like a cook on her night out.”
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The first Windsor Ball took place in the Grand Ballroom of the Waldorf-Astoria on January 5, 1953. In addition to the work Elsa Maxwell did, Wallis asked Cecil Beaton to design the decorations, which included coral-pink ornaments, tables covered with pink satin cloths and draped with pink satin bows, and banks of pink carnations and tea roses. The ball, given to raise money for the Hospitalized Veterans Music Service, was attended by a host of famous guests: John F. Kennedy dined at a table near Salvador Dali, while Ethel Merman and Beatrice Lillie provided the entertainment. Wallis was escorted by Prince Serge Obolensky, while the Duke presided at a nearby table over a meal of channel sole, filet mignon, and pasta. After the dinner, Wallis disappeared; she changed into a $1,200 white-and-coral taffeta gown and, to the strains of the specially composed “Windsor Waltz,” led a string of society beauties, all modeling the latest Parisian fashions, onto the dance floor.
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The evening was a great success, but Wallis and Maxwell found working with each other exceedingly difficult. A year later, when Maxwell organized another charity event, she pointedly neglected to invite the Duchess of Windsor. Instead, she declared that
her
event would include
four
Duchesses—the Duchess of Argyll, the Duchess de Brissac, the Duchess of Alba, and the Duchess of Sera. When Wallis was asked about these choices, she remarked caustically to the press, “It would take four ordinary duchesses to make one Duchess of Windsor.”
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her
event would include
four
Duchesses—the Duchess of Argyll, the Duchess de Brissac, the Duchess of Alba, and the Duchess of Sera. When Wallis was asked about these choices, she remarked caustically to the press, “It would take four ordinary duchesses to make one Duchess of Windsor.”
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Maxwell retaliated by writing her memoirs and speaking most ungenerously of her former friend to the press: “I no longer see the Duchess of Windsor. She has become so completely engrossed in herself and in her pursuit of pleasure that she neither knows nor cares what others are thinking or feeling. Had she been more conscientious about her position in history, she would not have to search so constantly for excitement and amusement. She would have found peace within herself.... It’s my considered opinion that many of the things she has done in this search, largely because of the high-handed, selfish way in which she has done them, have contributed to her final frustration—the fact that the Windsors’ prestige is not what it was—what it used to be.”
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“Elsa was just horrible about the Duchess,” recalls a friend. “She used to delight in spreading any kind of malicious gossip she heard, and with her damn big mouth, it went a long way I don’t think she ever really wanted to hurt Wallis, but she sure didn’t help her cause, either. No one had much sympathy when she complained that the Duchess wouldn’t see her any more.”
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But Maxwell got her ultimate revenge on the Duchess in 1957. The Duke and Duchess were the guests of honor at the April in Paris Ball at the Waldorf-Astoria and as usual were the focus of everyone’s attentions. Maxwell, who arrived late, brought with her possibly the only ammunition which could detract from the glow of the Windsors: She entered the ballroom between the arms of playwright Arthur Miller and his new wife, actress Marilyn Monroe. The result could not have been greater had Maxwell herself choreographed it. The press, which had concentrated on the Windsors all evening, made a mad dash across the floor, camera bulbs flashing, to capture the arrival of the famous actress, leaving Wallis literally in the dark.
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In New York the Duke and Duchess often stayed with the Winston Guests. Guest, wealthy heir and renowned polo expert, was married to the beautiful Lucy Douglass Cochrane, known to her friends as C.Z. Like Aline, the Countess of Romanones, C. Z. Guest was to become both a confidante to Wallis and also something of a substitute daughter. Wallis and David enjoyed their time at Templeton, the Guests’ Long Island Georgian mansion, “considered to be one of the most palatial of the North Shore residences.”
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“There is so much garbage written about the Duke and Duchess,” says C. Z. Guest, “that I don’t even bother to read it any longer. It’s just god-damned nonsense, people trying to dig up scandals. But I saw them, they stayed with Winston and [me], and they were perfectly charming and gracious and easy to get along with. Just two very nice people. And they were always perfect guests.”
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Nevertheless, it was, in fact, one of these Long Island friendships which was to lead the Duchess of Windsor into one of the most sordid affairs of her later life. During the fall of 1955 the Windsors were visiting New York as usual; Edith Baker, widow of the president of the First National City Bank, had arranged to give a party in their honor at her house, Viking’s Cove, in Locust Valley, on the evening of October 29. At the last minute, however, the Duke felt ill, and C. Z. Guest suggested that a twenty-four-year-old bachelor and polo player named Michael Butler escort the Duchess in his place. Wallis, not wishing to let her hostess down, agreed and duly appeared dressed in a tight, floor-length navy blue gown.
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Also present that evening were thirty-five-year-old sportsman and racehorse owner William Woodward Jr. and his wife, Ann. Wallis had met the couple several times before, both in New York and in Paris, where she had shown Ann the villa in the Bois de Boulogne. The Woodward marriage was known to be unstable; Woodward, egged on by his imperious mother, Elsie, did little to make the less privileged Ann feel welcome in their elevated social circles and never let her forget her own humble beginnings. In Paris, Wallis had witnessed how uncomfortable Ann seemed to be and deliberately tried to compliment her in front of Woodward.
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This evening, Ann spoke pointedly of reports of a local burglar loose on Long Island. When the Baker party broke up, the Woodwards returned to their own house in Oyster Bay. What happened next has never been determined with any certainty. Just after two that morning, the local police received an emergency call from a hysterical Ann Woodward, saying that she had just killed her husband. When police arrived, they found Woodward’s naked body, facedown on the bedroom floor, shot through the temple. Above him, perched jauntily on an armchair, was a pillow which Ann Woodward had copied from one Wallis had shown to her in Paris: “Never Complain, Never Explain.”
Ann Woodward declared that she had been getting ready for bed when she heard her dog barking; fearing that the burglar was trying to break in, she grabbed a loaded hunting rifle which she had previously stood next to her bed and walked toward the closed door. When it suddenly flung open, she fired, killing her husband instantly. The next day, police arrived at the Waldorf Towers to question Wallis, who had danced the previous evening with Woodward several times and also spoken to his wife. She knew very little, and at the grand-jury hearing, which was set up to investigate the shooting, her evidence, such as it was, was not even presented. Ann Woodward was cleared of any guilt in the death of her husband; but suspicion that it had not been an accident continued to linger on. In particular, author Truman Capote hinted heavily that his infamously “unwritten” book Answered Prayers would detail the truth of Ann Woodward’s guilt. It is difficult to say what effect this had on Ann Woodward, but she found herself whispered about, suspected of any number of offenses, and ostracized by many of her former friends. She eventually committed suicide. The story later became the subject of Dominick Dunne’s fictionalized treatment
The Two Mrs. Grenvilles
. “How sordid that business was,” Wallis commented to a friend. “And poor Ann. I know what it’s like to be ostracized for no reason.”
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The Two Mrs. Grenvilles
. “How sordid that business was,” Wallis commented to a friend. “And poor Ann. I know what it’s like to be ostracized for no reason.”
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