Famous Last Words (38 page)

the Duchess, everyone wanted to touch the Duke, everyone wanted to kiss and taste her rings and look into his cornflower eyes. “Five hundred cats and a King,” said Adela

Rogers St. Johns.

At approximately two o’clock, a station wagon recognized by nearly everyone in the crowd attempted to make its way up the drive. Inside was a certain Nelson Kelly—known as

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“Little Nell” because he was under five feet tall. Nelson Kelly wanted to see the Duke at once because he had a story to sell. But at once, in the press of people and cars, was quite impossible.

Little Nell began to honk his horn, but it did no good.

“In the name of God,” he shouted out the windows, “let me pass!” But his words and their pompous urgency only made the others laugh. “No passing here, Little Nell!” they shouted back at him. “No passing here—no matter who you are!”

“But I have to get up the hill!” he cried.

“Then walk!”

They were all so mean; they were all so vengeful; they

were all so rich. It did not matter to them if they walked.

They had their time to take and none of them perspired: not one, in all their blue and white. But Little Nell had a living to make and the only way to make it was to sell his story.

That was his job, to delve and to dig for stories and to sell them, always selling to the highest bidder, sometimes selling twice, sometimes not being able to sell at all. Little Nell most often sold to the press, but other times he sold to husbands, wives and lovers; bosses; solicitors and even the Chief of Police. There was nothing about these people he did not know and nothing he would not sell. The trouble was, the people knew it and instead of being afraid, they scoffed. Nell was always saying, “just you wait. You’ll see. One day, I’ll find a story big enough to make you tremble: then I’ll sell it to Time Magazine,” he’d shout. “The New York Times,

the Boston Giobe! You’ll see…!” The very names were talismans and Little Nell would turn them over on his tongue

the way a miser turns his money in its jar.

Nelson Kelly tried to back the station wagon up but since his arrival three Rolls Royces, two Mercedes and a Bentley had all crowded in behind him. Still Little Nell was loathe to leave the car. If left, it might be pushed aside and overturned.

There were too many pranksters amongst the crowd—

playboys with nothing better to do than show off their skill at creating chaos—and Little Nell had suffered at their hands before. Sometimes he thought that pranks were the whole and only occupation of these people. Merciful heaven—

some of the things they had done! Once, Little Nell had found his Ford full of barking dogs; and another time with rolls and rolls of toilet paper, boxes of pencils and a pencil sharpener. Worst of all had been the prank in which some person had affixed a periscope to the roof and driven the Ford into the Bay. Still…a car was only a car and Nelson Kelly’s business with the Duke—or with someone in charge—

was far more important than that. He would have to chance it.

Honking his horn again, jamming it down with one little hand while he drove with the other, Little Nell shouted “Out! Out! Out! Get out of the way! “while he veered towards the verge of the drive.

Long-gowned women wearing picture hats and walking under parasols; men in blazers, white ducks and panamas; debutantes holding their tea gowns out of the dust and carrying their silver shoes; children playing hide-and-seek between the Royal Palms that lined the drive and policemen

in white pith helmets all bolted hither and yon to avoid his wheels. “Out! Out! Out!” shouted Little Nell above his horn.

Old men raised their walking sticks in alarm and rattled them across his offending fenders and banged against his doors. Women screamed. One man climbed on the hood of

the wagon and crawled right up to the windshield, shaking his fist in Little Nell’s face. “You bugger!” he cried. “You absolute shower! What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

But Little Nell paid no heed to the words. Instead, he gunned the motor and the man slid off and fell to the ground.

At last he brought the station wagon to a stop, having got it partway up the hill and a good way onto the grass. He was sweating profusely, even though he had already taken his jacket off. He was no longer presentable, but he still had his story to sell and someone must be made to pay attention.

Little Nell rolled up all the windows and climbed out into the blazing heat. One by one he locked his doors, burning his palms against the handles. Putting on his jacket, he checked its inner pocket to make sure the envelope with its dangerous message was still in place. It was.

Little Nell lurched towards one side. For a moment he

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was lost and had to depend on gravity to tell him which way to go. The crowd was not a mob up here, but a slow-moving, silent mass of swimmers breathlessly struggling upward to the air above the swelter on the hill.

Even in spite of the heat, Little Nell kept moving. “Out!”

he muttered. “Out of my way…” And the horde was parted before him, gaping that anyone should hurry so. But on

seeing it was only Little Nell, the horde was unimpressed.

“He always behaves as if the world were going to end…”

they said of him. “He always behaves as if…” But surely it did not matter how Little Nell behaved. He was nothing more than a gossip monger, “nothing but a bitch! “This time, however, the horde was wrong. For the world was going to end and the thing in Little Nell’s pocket—sealed in its envelope—would have told them so.

Inside the Mansion, the Duchess of Windsor was looking in her mirror. There she was—in white. The white had been

her idea. Everyone in the Official Party would be dressed in white from head to toe. The Duke in his white Naval

uniform; she herself in this white Schiaparelli; Aunt Bessie Merryman from Baltimore just off white in a tea dress with jacket. And even though MarsdenFawcett, their aide, must abide by his khaki, she had asked him to bleach it down and now it was a nice pale beige and from a distance “white”.

The Duchess sat completely still, not even parting her lips to breathe. Down the hall, in his brand new apartments, the Duke was sipping wine and smoking cigarettes with a large blue bib around his neck. His face was still a mass of scars and he had to spend two hours at the make-up tables every time he made a public appearance. Nonetheless, he sat quite patient while the Duchess did her work—and when the artist departed, he always had to wait another hour to jell, staring at the empty place the Duchess left behind when she was gone.

MarsdenFawcett came to the Duchess of Windsor’s door

and spoke to the maid. All the Duchess could hear was his stuttering whisper; nothing important—nothing she could

not guess; the imminence of the event; the building up to “now”. She heard him go away; she heard the door being closed; she heard her maid say “ma’am?” She waved her

hand. She knew. She rose. The buttons must now be hooked on the back of her exquisite dress. She watched herself being closed and battened.

Sweet MarsdenFawcett, she thought. MarsdenF-F-F- she

called him. Not much more than a boy: a pleasant, stammering, eager child with enormous eyes—like a rabbit. Major

Gerrard, on the other hand, was hard and solemn. Grim. He was out there now on the lawns in charge of

Security… .Gerrard, who had fired his gun at the Duke of Windsor, who had “arrested” them for Churchill and brought them here to this dreadful island. Major Gerrard had commandeered a corner of one of the marquees—the one where

the Newsreel Films were showing the Fall of France, the Battle of Britain, the bombing of London and Coventry, films that were intended to whip up a frenzy of enthusiasm so the Spitfire Fund would be fully subscribed. The Duchess of Windsor hated these films. She thought they were despicable and had sanctioned Major Gerrard’s corner there in the hope, perhaps, the bombs would fall on him.

The buttons were now all done. She was perfectly contained in the white Schiaparelli—and had to shield her eyes

in order to see herself.

“I have to see the Duke!” said Little Nell to the man who was barring his way.

“Get away,” said the man—a giant to Nell—“We don’t

need your kind here.” And he waved his hands as if to rid himself of a gnat.

“But I have the most important news to sell!”

“They all say that—your kind,” said the man, whose job it was to open doors, and shut them. He was dressed in

impeccable livery, satin breeches and buckled shoes. His coat was a deep blue velvet trimmed with silver. Little Nell was standing on the crushed shell drive and the liveried gent was standing out of reach of the sun.

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“But the news I have is vital,” said Little Nell; “it’s the most important news of the day. And the Duke—or whoever it is who’s in charge—must see it right away. Otherwise.

. .”

“Otherwise what?” The giant, who was testy by nature,

as becomes a man whose job it is to open doors and shut them, did not care for threats. “Otherwise what, may I ask?”

“Otherwise you’ll be fired. Let go. Dismissed. When they hear what you have prevented from reaching the ears of His Royal Highness, the Duke of Windsor—or whoever it is

who’s…”

“I am in charge of this door,” said the giant, “and I am in charge of you and I say you shall not enter. Go!”

Little Nell was now very close to tears. “Listen,” he said—

and he reached inside his pocket.

But the porter cut him off. “If you are about to produce a coin,” he said, “I think you should know I have never accepted a bribe in the whole of my career… .”

Just then, a young lieutenant with a pleasant face and a faded uniform appeared behind the giant. “What’s all the f-f-f-.. .?” he said.

“No fuss,” said the porter. “Just this dwarf, that’s all.”

“Oh, it’s you, Nelson Kelly,” said MarsdenFawcett, who had dealt with the little man before. “You always choose the most awkward moments to show your f-f-f-…Couldn’t you come back some other time?”

“Please, Lieutenant,” said Little Nell. “I really do have the most important news to sell the Duke…”

“No,” said MarsdenFawcett, who had still not deigned

to emerge from behind the screen door, “I’m af-f-f-you’re out of luck. Not a chance. Their Royal Highnesses are cloistered and out of reach; and nothing—no one shall disturb

them.”

“But…”

“No,” said MarsdenFawcett.

“No,” said the giant—barring the door.

“You’ll regret this,” said Little Nell. “You will. You wait and see… .” And he stomped away.

They were just like all the rest, he thought in his fury.

ryf^”-^

Careless of every life but their own: arrogant and aloof and selfish. Well: he would make them pay. He would not divulge the contents of his pocket. Not for any price. No, not

even for ready money. He would stand aside and watch them suffer the consequences of their foolishness. But—of course—

how could someone like MarsdenFawcett be expected to

know about foolishness when he couldn’t even say it?

The Duchess, seated now in the salon where the Official Party had begun to gather, was profoundly aware of all the clocks and watches surrounding her. Everything, it seemed, was ticking. She looked across at her Aunt Bessie Merryman—the only remaining relative she had in all the world—

and she thought; thank heaven J will never look like that.

But at once she regretted thinking it. It was Bessie the Duchess had been named for; her mother’s sister and her own

most loyal and staunch supporter; faithful through every crisis up and down the map of time. Up and down, up and down: all their lives had been up and down, like a wild and dangerous dance where the dancers dance in peril, like a polka danced in the dark. And, even now she noted Aunt

Bessie’s toes were tapping…keeping time.

The Duchess blinked.

My mother died, she thought, of a cancer in her eye. Of a tic… .1 am so afraid of the dark. And if I blink again, the floor might disappear.

She stared.

Aunt Bessie Merryman’s toes were tapping down in the

shadows under her skirts. All the clocks were ticking. Time is darkness—time is light. You either dance, or fall.

But the Duchess of Windsor sat very still and she thought; or you stop all the clocks.

Out on the lawns, waiting with everyone else for the Windsors to appear, Little Nell was busy with his notebooks.

Wherever he went, wherever he sat—in streets, in bars, in public toilets—Nell made notes. He listened with a steth—

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oscope and he watched through a magnifying glass. He collected graffiti. His theory was that you could sum up the age

you lived in by reading its walls. The truth, which loves to hide, had found the perfect hiding place. It was just another bit of gossip in amongst the litter of names and dirty jokes on the partitions of a comfort station.

Little Nell never missed a trick. His eyes were like two wooden discs on an abacus: clickety-click—they moved so fast a pair of Chinese fingers might have been hitched to his brain. He watched and listened and waited. He was very

poor. The thing was, there wasn’t much of a market for

pranksters’ tricks and the lazy, unimaginative dreams of part-time whores. But he gathered what he could and he

sold what he had—and he waited for the moment when the giants would begin to stir.

In the meantime, he marvelled at what he overheard and

at what he found on the walls. Round and round the stories went, and the hands that wrote them were never seen. Who were these ghosts, whose sources you could never check, who could only be identified by what they wrote, but who always wrote it m the dark, like God. The only trouble is, he thought—recalling the eternal twilight of the world’s latrines and the rows of feet beneath the cabinet doors—the

only way I’d know it’s God is if I recognized His shoes.

Due west of the town of Nassau lies the island of Andros—

far enough away to lie below the horizon. Not that any vantage point in Nassau would present a view of anything due