“I have no doubt they will.” Frau Goering sipped her tea as if they were discussing finding a good maid, not the tenuous future of Germany and Europe. “Mrs. Montague, will you join Their Royal Highnesses at Berchtesgaden to meet the Führer? It’s an honor any German girl would die for.”
“If Amelia wishes to come, she’s more than welcome to join us,” Wallis said, waiting for her response with the same eagerness as Frau Goering.
Amelia set her teacup and saucer on the table so they wouldn’t clatter in her hands. She should agree and prop up Wallis’s standing with the highest-ranking woman in Germany, as expected of any good employee, but she couldn’t. Everything giving her the willies here would be ten times worse at Berchtesgaden, and she wasn’t a talented enough actress to hide it. Amelia lowered her gaze to her lap and assumed the most subservient attitude she could muster. “The honor of meeting a head of state is for royalty, not for private secretaries.”
It shouldn’t be for Wallis either but with Frau Goering puffing her up and rattling on about what a grand honor it was to
meet Herr Hitler, there’d be no talking Wallis out of it. How she could ignore the death’s head insignia, the anti-Jewish
signs they’d seen on the way out of Berlin, and the constant flattery, she didn’t know, but if there was one thing Wallis
was good at, it was seeing only what she wanted to see. Right now, all her cousin could focus on was the honors being heaped
on her by the German heads of state, even if those heads stunk to high heaven.
Chapter Nine
Nuremberg, October 20, 1937
“I can’t tell you how pleased this will make His Royal Highness.” Mr. Forwood beamed as bright as the Duke. He and Amelia stood on the fringes of Wallis and the Duke’s conversation in the Grand Hotel receiving room waiting for a call to duty, the two of them more like furniture than guests. “Duke Charles Edward is the first European royalty to acknowledge Her Royal Highness. It’ll encourage others to follow, perhaps even His Majesty and his brothers.”
Amelia doubted the acknowledgment of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Queen Victoria’s grandson and His Royal Highness’s cousin, carried much weight with the royal family. His coziness with the German hierarchy gave royals all over Europe palpitations but it didn’t appear to trouble the Duke. He chatted with his cousin, who was much taller than him with thinning white hair, a high forehead, and a full mustache. Duke Charles Edward wore a military uniform adorned with more medals and ribbons than anyone else in the room. His Royal Highness stood out in his somber black tuxedo beside Wallis in her cream silk dress with a fitted bodice, slightly flared skirt, and a black sequined jacket that covered her wide shoulders. Her diamond and emerald set outshone the tiaras of the titled women who rushed to curtsey to her.
“Mr. Forwood, it’s a pleasure to see you again.” An older woman in a long navy-blue dress, her blond and gray hair twisted into a fancy chignon, greeted the equerry. “Will we see you in London this spring?”
“Not this year, I’m afraid. Lady Williams-Taylor, may I introduce Mrs. Montague, the Duchess of Windsor’s private secretary.”
“A pleasure. You must meet Miss Heastie, my private secretary. She couldn’t accompany me to Berlin but you’ll see her at my parties in Paris. The two of you will get on splendidly,” she assured in her posh English accent. The seventy-year-old socialite was the queen of Bahamian society and the wife of the manager of the Bank of Montreal and spent her time among her homes in Nassau, England, and Paris. She was also one of the few socially prominent people who hadn’t shunned Wallis. Seeing her in Germany, Amelia finally understood why. “Ah, there’s Frau Goering. I must say hello. Enjoy your evening, darlings.”
The Duke motioned to Mr. Forwood to assist him, leaving Amelia to stand by herself. She smiled at passing guests, thankful for the pale pink and silver-trimmed Schiaparelli dress Wallis had bought for her. She didn’t shine as grandly as the wives of the dignitaries around her but she held her own.
“You must be Mrs. Montague.” A woman with an American accent approached Amelia and shook her hand. “I’m Alice Gordon.”
Amelia recognized the name. “You knew Her Royal Highness in Washington in the twenties?”
“Back when she was plain Wallis Warfield. What an interesting place to see her again.” Mrs. Gordon accepted a glass of champagne from a passing server. “My husband is the American minister to The Hague. It’s how we received the honor of being here tonight. Ask if Her Grace will speak to me.”
Amelia wondered why Mrs. Gordon didn’t simply approach Wallis herself, or why she hadn’t gone through the receiving line, but it wasn’t her place to ask questions. She was here to carry out orders and requests. She approached Wallis and while the Duke spoke to Herr Goering, she whispered in her ear, “Mrs. Alice Gordon, an old acquaintance of yours, would like a word with you.”
Wallis locked eyes with Mrs. Gordon, and the sparkle that’d ignited them the instant they’d stepped into the Grand Hotel vanished. “I have no desire to talk to her.”
Amelia returned to Mrs. Gordon, remembering Mrs. Bedaux’s advice to be kind to everyone. Wallis might not want to see her old friend but it didn’t mean Amelia should be rude. “I’m sorry, Her Royal Highness is unable to meet with you this evening.”
The sting of the slight hung in the air like the woman’s Chanel No. 5. “She’s mistaken if she thinks she can erase her past by ignoring it. She was a penniless nobody when I launched her into Washington society and introduced her to Felipe Aja Espil. I’m sure she’s mentioned him.”
Amelia shook her head. Wallis enjoyed name-dropping but she’d never said his.
“He was first secretary at the Argentine Embassy back then, with a promising ambassadorial career ahead of him and quite the looker. Everyone was stunned when he took up with her, but her talent for collecting influential men is impressive. However, an ambassador needs money, and she had none. The woman he married did.”
Amelia listened, amazed again at how free people in social and diplomatic circles were with gossip. They might not say anything above a whisper but they certainly whispered. Of course, if Mrs. Gordon had been the making of Wallis in D.C., back when helping her had gained her nothing, then no wonder she was mad at the snub. Wallis should have at least greeted her. A simple acknowledgment would have smoothed some old wounds instead of reopening them.
“I’ve always admired Wallis’s ability to social climb, but, as George Mallory learned the hard way, not all climbers are successful. Sometimes they topple down before they reach the summit.” Mrs. Gordon sipped her champagne then nodded at the very tall, silver-haired man bowing to the Windsors. “There’s a mountaineer Wallis should stay away from. Mr. Axel Wenner-Gren, owner of Electrolux, among other businesses, and a close friend of the Nazis. He and Frau Goering knew each other in Sweden before Frau Goering shot to prominence in Germany.”
“The Bahamas is a delight this time of year,” Mr. Wenner-Gren said to Wallis in his thick Swedish accent. “The heat is finally gone and construction on my estate’s deepwater harbor can resume.”
“What do you need a deep harbor for?” Wallis asked.
“My yacht, of course. One’s yacht can never be too large or too well-appointed.”
“Just as one can never be too rich or too thin.”
Mr. Wenner-Gren’s deep chuckle joined Wallis’s gratingly high laugh.
“Let me give you a piece of advice to pass on to Her Grace,” Mrs. Gordon said. “Photos of Their Royal Highnesses giving Herr Hitler the Nazi salute are circulating in newspapers everywhere and people aren’t happy about it. Lie down with the dogs and rise up with the fleas. Also, be wary of Her Grace’s friendship. She isn’t as good at keeping friends as she is at cultivating them.”
She walked off, leaving Amelia to chew on that bit of wisdom. She didn’t have long to mull it over as the banquet hall doors opened and everyone spilled in to find their places.
The Grand Hotel’s belle epoque banquet hall was breathtaking. Large gilded mirrors reflected the gleam of the white tablecloths, china, and gold silverware laid out on the long tables beneath the heavy crystal chandeliers. Magnificent paintings of Wagner’s operas adorned the walls below the arched white ceiling and gilded columns.
“This is amazing,” Amelia said to Mr. Forwood as the two of them took their places well below the salt.
“This is nothing compared to the state dinners we use to have at Buckingham Palace.”
“I’m glad I didn’t have to make those seating arrangements.” It’d be a nightmare getting everyone and their titles and positions straight.
Wallis and the Duke sat at the head table with the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, who stood and settled the room into silence. “I can’t tell you what it means for relations between our two countries for me to have my cousin in Germany. All of us who desire friendly relations between Germany and England know that his presence here represents a new and fruitful element for cooperation between the two nations.” Duke Charles Edward raised his champagne glass. “To the friendship between Germany and Britain, and the continued ties between the House of Windsor and the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. To His Royal Highness and the very beautiful Her Royal Highness.”
“To Her Royal Highness!” The cry went up along with a hundred champagne glasses.
Amelia and Mr. Forwood stood with the rest and raised their glasses.
Down the table, Mrs. Gordon stood but didn’t toast the guests of honor. Her warning about the pictures of Wallis in the newspapers rang with the guests’ cheers. The Windsors giving the Nazi salute sat badly with Amelia. She could imagine how it must look to people outside Germany. Wallis was oblivious to the brewing trouble as she beamed in triumph at the head table, no longer Wallis Warfield Simpson, the twice-divorced American who’d toppled a king, but the most important woman in the room, the wife of royalty and royal in her own right. A woman too important to greet an old friend, assuming that’s what Mrs. Gordon really was. Very little about Wallis and her life and past were straightforward. There was no telling how much of what Mrs. Gordon had said was the truth and how much was spite.
“What happened between you and Mrs. Gordon?” Amelia asked.
