Wallis sat at her dressing table doing her morning facial exercises. In the adjoining room, Mademoiselle Moulichon supervised the German maids in the packing of Wallis’s things. Despite the late night, Amelia had been up early to make sure the Windsors’ massive amount of luggage was delivered to the train station. There’d be no fanfare for their departure and Amelia was glad. She’d seen enough German flattery to last a lifetime.
“You mean the witch who drove me from Washington.” Wallis rubbed Elizabeth Arden cream into the delicate skin beneath her eyes. The hectic pace of the trip had taken its toll and she appeared more tired and drawn than usual. “Oh, she played at being my friend, but when Felipe left me for that ugly woman with more money than brains, Alice made sure to tell everyone I’d thrown myself at a man who wasn’t interested in me. She humiliated me in front of D.C. society. I had no choice but to leave and salvage what was left of my reputation. But I don’t suppose she told you that.”
“No, she didn’t.” No wonder Wallis hadn’t wanted to speak to her. It’s why Amelia had hesitated about returning to Baltimore after Jackson’s death. After they’d eloped, there wasn’t a lie so awful that her old friends and even Mother wouldn’t repeat it.
“Hypocritical cowards, all of them, judging me as if they don’t have a hundred skeletons in their closets. I know what Alice got up to in the twenties and heaven knows what she’s mired in now. She’s probably a government spy. Here’s a lesson for you. It’s not the diplomats but their wives you have to worry about. No one suspects a woman but the women are connected to everyone and everything. Why, the government paid me to carry secrets to China when I went out to join Win, and I assure you I wasn’t the only one. Don’t think Alice is any different. Mark my words, she’s already told everyone what she saw and heard last night. It’ll be all over the diplomatic community by the time we reach Paris, and for once, I’m glad. Everyone can hear how I brought European royalty to their feet.” She rubbed cream onto her neck with quick upward motions, willing her skin to defy gravity.
Amelia couldn’t blame Wallis for wanting cheers and adoration, especially after the way she’d been maligned by the world and the royal family, but it was a mistake to search for it here.
“Let me share another lesson I learned in Washington.” Wallis leaned into the mirror to apply her makeup. “A woman is nothing without money and standing. It’s why I wasn’t about to slink off to some dark corner to die in shame and anonymity when all this abdication nonsense started. No, I married David and became a duchess and I’ll have the extra-chic title if I have to nag Sir Walter about it forever. I suggest you follow my lead and catch a titled man or millionaire of your own. It’d make your life a great deal easier and give all the naysayers back home something to chew on.”
Amelia doubted that. She’d seen something of the aristocrats and millionaires floating around Europe. They exchanged partners like gloves, suffering through one public divorce or scandal after another. No title, standing, or revenge was worth that trouble and heartache.
“Look at the press coverage. It’s marvelous.” The Duke slapped the German newspaper with the picture of Wallis at the Nuremberg dinner. “Our trip was a success.”
“‘A divine woman in a divine dress,’” Mr. Axel Wenner-Gren’s heavily accented voice carried above the hum of the train wheels as he read over the Duke’s shoulder. Herr Hitler had offered the Windsors his private plane to take them home but Wallis’s fear of flying more than prudence had forced them to politely decline the offer. Mr. Wenner-Gren had stepped in with his private Pullman car, which they’d gladly accepted. The Duke and Wallis were experts at getting other people to pay for things. For once Amelia didn’t mind, simply glad they were leaving, and she breathed a little easier with every mile the train placed between them and Germany.
“She’s number five on the International Best Dressed List,” the Duke boasted.
“She deserves the honor,” Mr. Bedaux complimented. “And the opportunity to shine again. You should do an American tour.”
Amelia paused in organizing correspondence at the back of the Pullman. She was looking forward to the peace and quiet of her mundane Paris schedule and wasn’t wild about the extra work of another trip. She also wasn’t ready to venture back across the Atlantic and see how well her new confidence stood up under the old scrutiny and criticism.
“I’ve spoken to a number of entities in America who are eager to host you,” Mr. Bedaux added, sweetening the pot.
Wallis set down her detective novel. “Who?”
“I’ve received a cable from the Women’s National Press Club inviting you to their annual luncheon, and the Secretary of the Interior sent a list of housing and reclamation projects you could both tour. You might even meet the president.”
“I’ve never cared much for Washington or its people.” Wallis tucked a bookmark in the novel. “They can never let go of anyone’s past.”
“All the more reason to tour America and show them you aren’t the old Wallis.” Mrs. Bedaux leaned forward and rested one elbow on her silk-stocking-clad knee. “Imagine the faces of everyone who’s ever snubbed you when you return home a duchess feted by the president. They’ll be green with envy.”
“They will, won’t they?” Wallis trilled her fingers on the novel cover.
“You can meet the president without setting foot in Washington,” Mr. Bedaux assured. “My family’s New York home is next door to Mr. Roosevelt’s and we know them well. I can arrange a meeting with him there, all very informal and chummy.”
“Think what you can accomplish by speaking to President Roosevelt, sir,” Mr. Wenner-Gren proposed to the Duke, who’d been forgotten in this discussion of Wallis’s potential American triumph. “You could be a voice of reason in this insane world, a figurehead for Americans eager to stay out of a war. A prince of peace.”
“A prince of peace.” The Duke rolled the phrase across his tongue, getting a real taste for it before reality quashed the fantasy. “An American tour would be expensive. I can’t afford anything so extravagant.”
“I can arrange it as I did this one but we must act fast, ride this wave of momentum, keep Your Royal Highness and workers everywhere foremost in everyone’s mind.”
“I think it’s a marvelous idea,” Wallis said. “If your brother won’t give you a position worthy of your skills and talents then you must create one. You, surrounded by hundreds of adoring Americans, will show the world you’re still popular and a force for change. If America is eager to welcome and listen to you on workers’ welfare and the need for peace, it’ll encourage more countries to do the same. Everyone who was afraid to come to our wedding will flock to you and we’ll show Buck House we’re too important to be ignored.”
“Quite right,” the Duke said, breaking his fruit tart lunch into pieces and eating one.
This isn’t right at all, Amelia thought, pretending not to listen but hearing every word. Buckingham Palace had fretted over their German trip. They’d
be livid at the Duke acting as an unofficial British ambassador to President Roosevelt. Sir Walter’s warning about Wallis
being flattered by people with questionable motives, and her desire to lift up a man she’d helped pull down, echoed in Wallis’s
words. Of course, it was all talk. Wallis could barely get French or British notables to call on her. The idea she could suddenly
summon them to raise the Duke to some grand height was ridiculous, or was it? Her ego more than the concerns of the working
class were driving this new idea, and where Wallis was concerned, that was rarely good.
Chapter Ten
Paris, November 1937
“Seventy of the one hundred thirty-five trunks were sent to Calais yesterday. The rest will go by truck with us when we leave to board the SS Bremen,” Amelia reported to Wallis, who sat in bed with a breakfast tray and a stack of morning papers. She didn’t lean against the large pillows behind her but sat ramrod straight. Simply looking at her hurt Amelia’s back. Detto, Prisie, and Pookie lay at her feet, their square bodies covering the embroidered WE topped with a coronet on the satin blanket. Wallis had stamped the crown and their entwined initials on everything from the silverware to bathroom soap cakes. “Speaking of which, Sir Walter cabled to say His Majesty’s Government doesn’t approve of you sailing on a German liner. They think it sets a bad example.”
“They think our simply breathing sets a bad example, but they have no one to blame but themselves. If they hadn’t insisted we not darken their shores we could’ve sailed on another liner but the Bremen is the only one that doesn’t stop in Britain on the way to New York.” Wallis ignored the grapefruit on the tray as she thumbed through the newspapers. “Another splendid article on our German trip. Paste it in the scrapbook with the others.”
She folded the newspaper and handed it to Amelia, who motioned to the ones on the floor. “And these?”
“Their stories aren’t nearly as delightful.”
Mrs. Gordon was right; not everyone was impressed with Wallis and the Duke visiting Herr Hitler and they said so in print. However, there were enough flattering stories to keep too much censure from tarnishing what Wallis believed was the first of many glorious triumphs.
“Aunt Bessie wrote you.” Amelia handed her the letter then sat at Wallis’s writing desk to open and sort the rest of the morning mail.
“Let’s see what the old gal has to say.” Wallis opened the letter and began to read before gasping in horror. “Listen to this, someone purchased the East Biddle Street house Mother and I used to rent and turned it into a museum to me. People pay twenty-five cents to sit in the bathtub in Mother’s old room and have their picture taken. Can you imagine?”
“It’s outrageous. They should charge at least a dollar for the honor.”
Wallis covered a laugh with one hand. “That’s what I love about you, your pep and sense of humor. You can see it in even the most ghastly situations.”
“Oh, it’s simply good clean fun, that’s all.”
“Stop it or I’ll never finish this letter and I can’t lounge in bed all day.” Wallis turned to the second page and her already pale skin went a shade whiter.
“Is something wrong?” Amelia asked, afraid Aunt Bessie might have had another stroke.
