Wallis's War: A Novel of Diplomacy and Intrigue - Softcover

Auspitz, Kate

Softcover

ISBN 10: 022624038X ISBN 13: 9780226240381

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 2015

Synopsis

Scandalous divorcée. Nazi sympathizer. Style icon. Her Grace the Duchess of Windsor. Such are the many—and many times questionable—monikers of the infamous Wallis Simpson. And with Wallis’s War, Kate Auspitz adds another to this list: unwitting heroine.

The facts: reviled by the British as a social-climbing seductress even as Time magazine named her its 1936 Woman of the Year, Simpson was the American socialite whose affair with King Edward VIII led him to abdicate the throne on the eve of WWII. In this fanciful novel written in the form of a fictional memoir, Auspitz imagines an alternative history in which Simpson was encouraged by Allied statesmen to remove defeatist, pro-German Edward from the throne, forever altering the course of the war. A comically unreliable narrator who knows more than she realizes, and reveals more than she knows, Simpson leads us from historic treaties and military campaigns to dinner parties and cruises as she describes encounters with everyone from Duff and Diana Cooper to Charles Lindbergh, Coco Chanel, and Hitler—all the while acting as a willing but seemingly oblivious pawn of international intrigue.

A rare blend of diplomacy and dalliance, fashion and fascists, this meticulously researched satire offers witty and erudite entertainment and leaves us speculating: who really brought about the abdication and—always—what were they wearing?

About this title

About the Author

Kate Auspitz is a political historian and Oxford Fulbright fellow with a Harvard PhD. She taught at Harvard University and Wellesley College before leaving academia for practical politics.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Wallis's War

A Novel of Diplomacy and Intrigue

By Kate Auspitz

The University of Chicago Press

Copyright © 2010 Kate Auspitz
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-226-24038-1

Contents

Photo Credits, 
WALLIS'S WAR, 
Postcrip, 
Endnotes, 
Bibliography, 

CHAPTER 1

"JULY, 1936"

Harold Nicolson broached the idea of removing the King one evening in Biarritz. He was one of those people the Brits pay attention to. They may or may not be rich. They may or may not have important jobs. But they matter. Nicolson and his odd wife were both writers, and he was a Member of Parliament too at that time, I believe, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't in the Cabinet. He was important, though, I knew that much, so when he asked me to come for a stroll, I thought I'd better do it.

He suggested we walk to the lighthouse. I remember it was the day after Bastille Day and mobs of people were heading in that direction, so I chose the path on the other side of the Casino that leads to Saint Jean de Luz. 'Even in fine weather, dear lady,' he said, 'we cannot see England from these cliffs.'

'Tant pis,' I said. I was wearing an ivory bias-cut crepe de Chine evening dress with a midnight blue shawl. 'Who cares?' As I shrugged my shoulders, my shawl slipped to reveal my fine collarbones and my canary diamond necklace.

'You do not, as our French friends say, regret England?'

'Have we French friends?'

'Dear lady, you have friends everywhere.'

I smiled. I do have friends everywhere. My necklace came from an Indian friend. I took it from his wife's jewel case one afternoon when she went out shopping and we stayed in. He had some servants flogged so I could keep it. The Kashmiri shawl he bought to encourage local industry. 'You would not mind never again to see fritillaries in an English meadow?'

'I'm not interested in birds. Nor do I care if I ever again see the – what's it? The worm in the cabbage or the scowl on Queen Mary's face. Queens ought to be more pleasant. One makes an effort.'

'Perhaps they ought to do. But as you bring it up, my dear, you cannot, you know, be Queen of England yourself.'

'I don't care so much, though I want to be Empress of India. I like Indians.'

Harold's eyes had a faraway look. 'So do I, dear lady, so do I. Splendid fellows. Better than Arabs, whatever some may say. That is why the French cling to Pondicherry. The wind,' he said, 'is sharpening for a gale. Come, let us take shelter in this convenient grotto. It might hold a madonna, a vision as you appear tonight in your white frock and blue wrap.' He was always gallant.

'That's the sticking point, isn't it? King's bride has to be a virgin or a widow?'

'Alas, yes.'

I remembered a few things about the Episcopal Church from boarding school.

'If a woman's husband dies, she's a widow, right, even if they divorced before his demise?'

'I'm not much of a churchman, but I gather that's the view taken by the C of E.'

'Well?'

'But, dear lady, there are two of them, or there will be after your second divorce.'

'Surely his chums are up to that. My God, he was in some hotshot Guards regiment, wasn't he?'

'But two husbands? I remind you of Lady Bracknell's observation.'

'I haven't had what I'm sure is the very great pleasure of meeting Lady Bracknell.' I supposed she was one of those hateful old dowagers who won't receive divorced women.

'Of course you have not. She died before you were born, but she is remembered for saying, apropos an orphan, that to lose one parent might be deemed a misfortune but to lose two seems careless.'

Rather heartless, I thought. But they are tough, the Brits.

'What I meant to suggest is that one man might meet with an accident, but two accidents would not go unnoticed.'

'Josephine was divorced.'

'Indeed she was. I didn't know you'd read History.'

'Oh, it's generally known. On dit. My manicurist told me. Josephine was divorced, and Boney told the Pope to bugger off and he crowned her himself.'

'His Majesty is not –'

'Not Napoleon. No, he's not.' I didn't want him to think I was an utter fool.

'His Majesty is a Christian gentleman and, constitutionally, the Defender of the Faith. He could not' – he stopped and then resumed, as if steeling himself to something pretty bad – 'not love you so, loved he not honour more.'

'And you want me to give him up? Fat chance.' I would not be gotten rid of so easily.

'You misunderstand me entirely. You must marry him as soon as ever you can and you must absolutely reject any sordid half measures.'

'What sordid half measures?'

'A morganatic marriage, for example, in which your children could not succeed their father.'

Fat chance, I thought again. I'm not the motherly sort, and the boy is not a stallion. 'I might agree to that if you sweetened the deal. I'd take Empress of India.'

'Impossible.'

'Why?'

'Queen and Empress – the titles cannot be separated.'

'Why not?'

'It does not matter in any case. We'll have to grant India independence after the war.'

I had heard a lot of silly talk about war and I did not believe a word of it. 'The world is going to the bow-wows, is it? You expect me to believe that? And because of this war of yours, the King can't marry me?'

'No, dear lady, because of the war he must marry you.'

CHAPTER 2

Nicolson said he would bring Duff Cooper for luncheon the next day so the three of us could talk. Tête-à-tête. I was pigging it in a rented villa with very few servants and an indifferent cook, so an intimate party suited me. Duff was Secretary for War or something like that. He was in the Cabinet, and he was married to one of the few really beautiful Englishwomen of her day. A duke's daughter, one of the girls the King ought to have married years ago, but somehow it hadn't come off. I'd had dinner with them and the King once or twice during the past months. He seemed a charming man, though bookish.

I ordered a simple menu: a cold soup, langoustines, which are always so good at Biarritz, a green salad, and peaches. I'd let the boys choose the wine when they came; the villa's cellar was pretty good, but the English butler was not. That left the rest of my morning free to look at the new press clippings that had just arrived from the States. My aunt Bessie Merryman and my girlfriends sent them, at my request. It's important to know what people are saying about you. Others, not friends, sent them too, almost every day, and I must say there was no difference at all in what came from supposedly loyal and hostile sources. At first I tried to sort them – the gold-digger ones; my legions of other lovers, male and female; our presumed sexual oddities (also his and hers, the King's and mine); the sermons about King David in the Bible and his sinful lust for another man's wife. It was too bad that the King's parents, who gave him five or six first names, chose to call him David. There were many religious rants about the emancipation of women and the destruction of the family and political rants about the Flapper vote.

One, sent by a girl I'd been at school with, quoted a man I'd never heard of saying that he'd be 'honoured to be selected to be the first Irish-American to represent the United States at the Court of St. James,' as he put it, 'but he could not ask his wife to dine with a tart.' Polly had begun to write nice long gossipy letters, and a lot of the clippings came from her. But they were all so nasty that I gave up trying to organise them and I just separated them by where they came from. I kept them in hat boxes, big ones for New York and Washington, smaller ones for Boston, the Middle West, and California.

Harold and Duff were to come at one, and at noon I began to change for lunch. I decided on pale blue linen, sleeveless, with my new chalcedony bracelets set with cabochon sapphires. I suspected they might think it common to wear faceted stones at luncheon. Both of their wives were extremely proper about dress, if not much else.

They were prompt and we had drinks on the terrace. Gin for them, champagne for me. We talked of this and that during the meal. There is a taboo among such people about talking business at meals. When we returned to the terrace for coffee, Harold began: 'You are a most extraordinary woman.' And he did not begin well, for any number of people had repeated to me his opinion that I was a 'perfectly ordinary American' who presented 'no danger.' And that the lovely dinners I planned for the King and our friends were 'second-rate'. But I listened. People should never know how much you know about them. 'And your husband is a patriot.'

Duff Cooper spoke, with all his warmth and charm. 'He left Harvard in 1917 to volunteer for the Coldstream Guards. The Americans who fought before you declared war meant a great deal to us all.'

'One hears too,' Nicolson said, 'that he is uxorious.'

'He is not.' I was furious. 'And even if he were, I don't see what's so bad about lending money and taking interest. Plenty of rich Christians do it every day.'

They were taken aback. Neither spoke for a minute or two. My defence of Ernest shamed them into silence. I was so sick of the rumours that my husband was a Jew. I think that possibly one of his grandfathers may have been, and his father was certainly a horrid old lecher, mean about expenses and very stingy with Christmas presents.

Nicolson broke the silence. 'We are, as Oscar Wilde observed, divided by the same language. I've spent time in your country, as you know, dear lady.' I didn't know, but I continued to listen. 'There are words in common usage among us that you do not use. Like "lift" for "elevator".'

'Exactly.' The colour was returning to Duff Cooper's face. 'Or "boot" for the place one puts luggage in a car. Or "bonnet", for that matter, for the part that lifts up in front.'

'"Petrol,"' Nicolson proposed.

'"Petrol" indeed, and "lorry".'

'"Braces",' rather than "suspenders".'

'"Biscuits".'

I thought they would spend the rest of the afternoon compiling a dictionary, so I cut them short. 'Or "loo" for "powder room". I don't see what any of this has to do with my husband's religion.' I was still angry.

'"Uxorious", as we use it here,' Nicolson said, 'means that a man is devoted to his wife. Like our friend Duff, for example.'

'Easy to be devoted to Diana, I should say, and you worship Vita, old man.'

'Absolutely.'

I was glad they cleared that up, and they went on to say that it had never struck them before how much the word sounded like usurious, 'practising usury.' Quite another thing. Not the same thing at all. And no people had a monopoly on that, as I'd so rightly said.

'I see.' I'd have to check to find out if they were telling the truth, but for now, I decided to let it pass.

'What I had meant to say was that both of you – you, my dear, and the excellent Mr Simpson – cannot be supposed to be in the least ordinary people,' Nicolson began again.

I saw what they were getting at. 'I am not a man, if that is what you are hinting at so delicately.'

'I have always known that, my dear. You could not have fooled me,' said the famous pansy.

'No man could see you as anything but a beautiful and desirable woman,' Duff Cooper hastened to add. I had yet to hear of a woman in polite society he hadn't found desirable. 'We have come, alas, not to speak of love, but of war. It is coming, and soon. We are not ready. France is not ready. Hitler took the Rhineland while they were distracted by a bitter election. Blum's a brave man.' He paused to make sure I was following.

'The little Jew who's premier now? Isn't he a socialist?'

'Yes, but not a fool. He sees the danger, though most of his party don't. They object to all forms of militarism except the one that will kill them as soon as it can.'

'And as a Jew, albeit a freethinker,' Nicolson said, 'there are things he can and cannot say about Hitler.'

'The King says Hitler poses no danger to England.' I had heard him say it time and again. War talk irritated him more than almost anything else. Lukewarm shaving water too, but few things irked him more. 'No danger to England whatsoever.' He'd made a speech last summer to the British Legion where he said nothing was worth fighting for, or words to that effect, and people talked about it for weeks.

'I know.' They said it almost in unison.

Nicolson continued, 'The King, for all his excellent qualities, cannot remain where he is. Too many Tories share his point of view, and the danger grows greater every minute. A new German ambassador is due next month – Ribbentrop, who tacks a "von" onto his name and charms arrivistes as vulgar as he is himself. And Heaven knows whom Roosevelt will send after the election. He may send Kennedy. He certainly owes him something for getting Coughlin off the air.'

They were talking to each other now, ignoring me. 'One hears he was useful when Pacelli was in the States, convincing him Coughlin was doing the Church no good, and all in all, Roosevelt may think he's less dangerous in London than at home. My God, it could be Kennedy.'

'From Boston,' I said.

'You know him?' They spoke as one once more.

'No, I don't, but a school friend of mine does. She says he's a pig and a huge hypocrite. She saw his mistress at his house in Palm Beach, while his wife and several of his countless children were there for Easter.' That was the name, Kennedy. I would remember it.

'The two of you discussed this last night,' Duff said. 'And I entirely concur. The best plan is for the King to marry you and abdicate, or rather, to abdicate in order to be free to marry you.'

'But why should he have to abdicate? This prejudice against divorcées is so old-fashioned. At one time a divorced woman could not be presented at Court, and they've gotten over that. You just have to be innocent, the injured party.' I knew all about that. It had taken boatloads of documents from America. 'I was presented at Court five years ago.' I'd worn a lovely white satin dress and train, borrowed, funnily enough, from Thelma Furness. She was another American girl the silly boy was crazy about until she jilted him for Aly Khan. I added afaux aquamarine and crystal necklace and hair ornament to the outfit. I looked very nice. As everyone said, the dress looked better on me than on Thelma, and no one suspected my jewels weren't real, but I swore I would never, ever, wear fakes again. I had a gold charm bracelet back then, of course, but nothing gem-studded to hang on it. Now I had a nice assortment, including a jewelled frog that would never turn into a man no matter how many times you kissed it.

'There is an immense difference,' one of them said, 'between bowing to the King and Queen and being the Queen yourself.'

The other elaborated. 'People have divorced women to dinner, or many people do. They are not the pariahs they once were, but no divorced person, man or woman, may be married in the Church of England.'

'It's simply not on,' Duff Cooper said. 'The shot is not on the board.'

'He wants to marry me, but why should I marry him if I can't be Queen? What would I do?'

'I've no doubt you could fill your days with delight, and not just domestic felicities – with many worthy and dignified occupations that would keep you in the public eye and make you universally admired and loved.'

'The underprivileged,' Nicolson said. Somebody'd warned me he was pink if not actually Red.

'Art,' Duff Cooper suggested. 'Patronage, connoisseurship, collecting.'

'He likes to design jewellery. He buys gems and gives a lot of thought to how I should wear them. He practically lives at Cartier when he's in Paris.'

'And those are happy hours,' Nicolson said. 'My friend is right that His Majesty is an aesthete, far happier with creative persons than with politicians.'

'He will be a happy man with you as his muse.'

'He could do all that and still be King. He's determined to brazen it out, and I don't see why he shouldn't.'

'He cannot be King of an England at war.'

'He doesn't want to be,' I reminded them.

'Gentlemen in England now abed will stay abed if it's up to him.' Hard words from Duff Cooper.

'It cannot be up to him,' Harold Nicolson said. 'It will not be up to him.'

'I'll think it over. But I don't see what's in it for me.'

The butler appeared at the French windows that led from the dining room onto the terrace. 'A call from London, madam, for the Secretary of State for War. Most urgent, they said.'

CHAPTER 3

Duff Cooper ran to the phone as quickly as a polite man can leave a lady and returned a few minutes later.

'There has been an attempt on the life of the King. A constable seized the man before he was able to fire, thank God, and no one was hurt, but you see, my dear, time is not on our side.' He bent over me sweetly. 'Shall I ring for some brandy?'

I did not feel faint. After all, nothing happened, and I never bother about things that don't happen.

'If we don't remove him, others will,' Nicolson said.

I thought he might be bluffing, but for the moment I took his word for it.

'Who was it?' I asked.

'The man in custody is an Irish national.'

'That's a nice touch,' Nicolson said. 'With de Valera braying for a new constitution. Very nice.'

'So, I repeat, my dear' – Duff had a lovely voice, a seducer's voice – 'the King can abdicate or someone will kill him. It's really up to you.'

I would not be pushed around. 'He's already settled a considerable sum of money on me.'

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Wallis's War by Kate Auspitz. Copyright © 2010 Kate Auspitz. Excerpted by permission of The University of Chicago Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Edition details

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 022624038X
• ISBN 13: 9780226240381
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 220