The Duke, with uncharacteristic sternness, slid the plate out of Wallis’s fingers and laid it on the stack with the others. “Mrs. Montague is right, it’s safer here. After I get you settled in the south and am on my way back to the regiment, I’ll speak to Ambassador Bullitt about placing the house under American protection. I’m sure the French Army will stop them and we’ll be back in no time.”
Amelia waited for Wallis to tell him he was a fool to think their precious things would be protected simply because an ambassador marked their house with a red notice stating it was under American jurisdiction. However, with their luggage already overwhelming the truck and the three cars taking them, the dogs, Mr. Hale, Mr. Phillips, Mr. Ladbroke, and Mademoiselle Moulichon to Biarritz, Wallis listened to him.
“All right, I’ll leave it. But I’m not leaving my linens.”
“That’s fine, darling.”
He might be all right with it but Amelia and Mr. Metcalf wanted to scream in frustration at the additional delay caused by packing and loading them into the already overstuffed cars.
It was well past noon by the time they drove away from Boulevard Suchet. The busy avenue was eerily quiet and the large houses lining it closed up and deserted. It was slow going getting out of Paris and the road to Biarritz was choked with everything from horse-drawn carts and bicycles to wheelbarrows. People walked with suitcases, others pushed prams full of household goods while older children carried their infant siblings. Those lucky enough to have a car sat bumper to bumper in traffic, the whole teeming mass forced to pull off to the side of the road every few miles to allow army vehicles to pass on their way north. Broken-down cars were abandoned or their owners sat dejected on the running boards, unable to move their haphazardly packed things.
At sunset, the line of traffic stopped and people climbed out of their cars to prepare to bed down on the side of the road for the night.
“There must be somewhere more suitable than this.” Wallis slammed the car door closed. “I won’t sleep on the ground.”
The Duke stepped out on the other side, followed by Mademoiselle Moulichon, who took the leashed dogs into the field to do their business.
“We’ll find you something, darling. Mr. Ladbroke, see what’s near here. There must be a château or a respectable house willing to put us up for the night.”
Mr. Ladbroke, the lines of his face much deeper since he’d driven them away from Paris, trudged off toward a group of small buildings in the distance.
“He’s sending him on a fool’s errand,” Mr. Metcalf grumbled, but Amelia didn’t have the energy to agree with him as she sat against the car to eat a can of tinned sardines and crackers. Two hours later, Mr. Ladbroke returned to say there were no respectable lodgings to be borrowed or purchased and they’d have to sleep on the ground or in the cars. Wallis didn’t argue this time, but allowed the Duke, Mr. Metcalf, and Mr. Phillips to remove some of the suitcases from the back seat and make a bed for her with her precious linens.
The Duke was shaking out one of the fine sheets when a radio announcement echoed through the line of cars and made him stop.
“King Leopold of the Belgians has formally surrendered to the Germans. Belgium is now German-occupied territory.”
Quiet settled over the road of refugees. Belgium was the last defense between the German Army and France.
“If I were still King I could do something to help them; instead look at me, at us.” The Duke opened his arms to the small group of tired servants sitting on old blankets in the beaten-down grass. “I hate being this useless.”
He slumped beside the car, buried his head in his hands, and sobbed. Wallis marched up to him and yanked his hands away from his face.
“Stop it, stop it this instant, do you hear me? Stop it! You aren’t useless. You’ll have your chance to do something. I’m sure of it.”
“Yes, darling.” He tugged a wrinkled handkerchief out of his coat pocket and wiped the dust and tears off his face. “You’re right, as always.”
The Duke couldn’t fall to pieces at a time like this, but Wallis’s conviction made Amelia wonder. If she weren’t so tired and overwhelmed by the misery in every face around her, she might think more about it. Instead, she lay on her jacket, tucked a sweater under her head, and fell into a fitful sleep.
Their caravan rolled into Biarritz the next afternoon and any relief at having reached safety vanished. The seaside resort was packed to the gills with fancy cars overloaded with things and people, many of whom Amelia recognized. Some planned to remain in Biarritz to see which way the winds of war blew. The rest were trying to secure whatever passage they could find out of Europe. Amelia had no idea where the rest of the refugees had fled but the rich were apparently coming here.
The Duke paid more money than he was comfortable with to rent four rooms at the Hotel du Palais, one for the male staff, one for the female staff, another for Wallis and himself, and the fourth for their luggage. Mr. Metcalf and Amelia were ready to chuck the luggage in the Mediterranean when they were forced to find footmen willing to carry it into the hotel because Wallis was afraid it would be stolen from the cars.
“For once I have an ocean view.” Mademoiselle Moulichon pushed aside the lace curtains in her and Amelia’s room. “How long do you think we’ll be here?”
“I don’t know.” Amelia fell on the clean bed, eager to sleep after the hard ground last night. There’d been no talk of anything except getting south. Now they were here and she hadn’t heard any plans about what they intended to do next. “I suppose we’ll wait until we can get to England.” Assuming the Windsors decided to go to England. After last year, Amelia wouldn’t put it past them to refuse to return, but with real bombs and bullets flying she couldn’t imagine them being foolhardy enough to stay.
“It’s too crowded,” Wallis complained three days later while she and Amelia walked back to the hotel after refugee beggars had driven them away from a pleasant stroll along the boardwalk. The poor people moved among the rich, who sat in beach chairs while waiting for news of passage on the next ship out of Europe. It was the strangest gathering of the wealthy on the Riviera she’d ever seen, all of them overdressed and over-jeweled in a desperate attempt to leave France with as many of their valuables as possible. “There’re too many of the wrong sort here.”
“Are there really a right and wrong sort at a time like this?” Amelia was too tired and worried to follow Mrs. Bedaux’s fifth rule. Whatever Wallis and the Duke’s next move, they hadn’t shared it with her or Mr. Metcalf and neither of them appeared to be in a hurry to get to England.
“There are a right and wrong sort in every situation.” Wallis sidestepped a woman with a baby sitting in a shop doorway begging for money or food. “One of the many things I learned on my way to Peking, when the American diplomats were in a tizzy because there was fighting around there, is that war doesn’t make anyone give up their prejudices. You should have heard the things those diplomats said about me because I wouldn’t cower in fear but insisted on traveling.”
“You were very brave.” Amelia slipped the beggar woman a coin, raising her finger to her lips to silence the woman’s gratitude so Wallis wouldn’t hear.
“A woman has to take a few chances if she wants to get anywhere in life.”
They strolled into the hotel lobby, where every chair and bench was filled with people. A radio on the porter’s counter blared reports of the war. They could hardly go anywhere without hearing news from one wireless or another. They weren’t two steps into the lobby when the BBC broadcast was interrupted by a German voice reading the latest Nazi propaganda.
“No one is beyond the reach of the Third Reich. We know the Duke and Duchess of Windsor are staying in suite 305 of the Hotel du Palais. Herr Hitler hopes they enjoy their holiday and will soon see them in Paris.”
Everyone turned to glare at Wallis and Amelia. Amelia hadn’t endured this much hate since the day she’d walked into Hutzler’s department store with Aunt Bessie and run into her old debutante friends. The disgust on their faces had been nothing compared to this. With that single announcement, Wallis had gone from the crème de la crème to one of the wrong sort.
“We’ll be bombed to bits because of them,” a woman whispered to her friend.
“There must be spies here. How else did they know she was here?”
“She’s a Nazi lover. You saw those pictures of her and Hitler.”
Wallis pretended not to hear the nasty remarks but raised her chin and straightened her shoulders as she walked to the elevators, collecting more suspicious looks and sneers from the well-heeled guests. Amelia mimicked her as best she could as the whispers about Wallis and the danger she posed to the other refugees flew through the hotel.
“How did they know you were here?” Amelia asked in a low voice as they stepped into the elevator and the operator slid the grate closed.
“I have no idea, but we can’t stay.”
“We won’t go to England,” the Duke insisted. “We’ll go to la Croë.”
“I would strongly advise against it, sir.” Mr. Metcalf tried to reason with him and Wallis as they sat in their room surrounded by Louis Vuitton trunks. They’d gone round and round about it for the past half hour and gotten nowhere. “We have to find passage to England before the situation in France turns dire.”
“Nonsense. Sir Walter paraded in here last year carrying on about risks and nothing came of it. It’s the same this time. I refuse to run like a scared rabbit back to England only to be treated with the same disdain as before. I’m a prince, I have my pride.”
“Your pride,” Mr. Metcalf scoffed. “France is falling, women and children are being shot on the roads, and all you care about is yourself and your pride. Stop being so selfish and start seeing what’s around you. Europe is at war.”
“Amelia, where are you?” Robert’s sturdy voice sounded over the crackling phone line. She’d risked the long-distance charges to call him, willing to pay for them out of her own salary to hear his voice. She wanted his opinion so she could tell Wallis the situation, gain more ammo, as it were, to convince them to leave France before it was too late. What she wouldn’t give to be in his arms and indulging in the strength of him instead of here, but she couldn’t fall to pieces.
“La Croë.” Through the open gatehouse windows, she could see the sloping lawn leading down to the cobalt-blue ocean. With the crashing waves and seagulls calling to each other, she could almost pretend the world hadn’t gone mad, but it had.
“What are you doing there? You should be in England or on the next ship to America.”
“Good luck convincing them of that. The Duke went back to his regiment but only because Mr. Metcalf guilted him into doing it. I doubt he’ll stay there. No one can stop him from doing what he wants and he wants to be with Wallis. What about you?”
