Past Imperfect (18 page)

'You can't keep a good man down,' said Lucy cheerily. But I wasn't inclined to see the funny side. Drowning in my youthful egotism, I could only fear that Damian's appearance might in some way damage me.

He, needless to say, was enjoying himself enormously. I could see at once that, like a child who will be naughty until it is smacked or a gambler who must play until he loses, Damian had to promote his uninvited appearance until somehow the law enforcers registered it. He danced first with Joanna, as if to announce his arrival. He was the best-looking man in the room and she was the best-looking woman in Europe, so they made quite a pair. Other couples turned to watch them and admire, parents glanced over and asked each other about the glorious duo. A little while later, the ball now well and truly under way, the band announced an eightsome reel. It may seem curious to a modern reader that we should have danced a Scottish reel in the middle of a perfectly normal party, not at some Caledonian festival or even a Burns Night in Kircaldy, but we did. In fact, we danced it at most of the parties that year and, with the steps demanding a less cluttered and less crowded floor, it was a sure way to be noticed, so it came as no surprise to see Damian walking forward to take his place in one of the sets with Terry Vitkov on his arm. She gleamed and beamed, this way and that, clearly enjoying her newly found status as troublemaker, as she leaned proudly on the arm of the rebel. I wondered later whether it was at this particular party that Damian's own position began to shift from social observer (or climber, depending on your generosity of vision) to subversive. From admiring student to hostile agent. Am I jumping the gun and did it remain in the balance that night? Or had he already decided he hated us all?

Watching them take their places, waiting for the chord that would start us off, it struck me then that he and Terry were rather a good pair. Both outsiders in their different ways, both with everything to gain from the future and nothing to lose with the vanishing past. I assumed she had money - she did, but less than I thought at the time - just as I assumed that Damian would make money - again, I was right. He did. And much more than I thought at the time. Might they not combine and conquer the world? They were both adventurers. Why should they not join forces?

I was partnering a rather dull girl from somewhere near Newbury and now we set off, marching round in our hand-held circles. Glancing across, I was momentarily impressed by the skills Damian had already acquired in this, so recently foreign, territory. He knew the steps and performed them well; he took his turn in the centre of the ring without a trace of self-consciousness, holding himself erect, executing the different parts of the reel with a degree of grace and dignity I could not have claimed for myself. He chatted to the girls around him and to the other men, part of their crowd now, part of their world, after only a few cocktail parties and dances. We had almost forgotten that we did not know him.

After that the pop group resumed, but Damian showed no sign of flagging. He danced with plenty of the girls, Lucy Dalton and a raucous, ruddy-faced Candida Finch among them. He was about to dance with Georgina Waddilove, who would certainly have betrayed her country to make him stay by her side, but in that instant, just as the music started he seemed to get a stitch and beg her, instead, to join him in a drink. I lost sight of him as they drifted away together into the room serving as a bar. It is hard, looking back, to state with any accuracy my precise feelings at that stage towards this cuckoo I had brought into the nest. As I have said, I'd begun to suspect he had an agenda more complicated than I had first understood, but I still admired his
chutzpah
, and never more so than when he returned to the ballroom that evening. Somehow, while he was away, a happy conjunction had allowed him to achieve what he came for. To my amazement and the admiration of all those present who knew he was there illegitimately, he reappeared in the open doorway leading the hostess, at least the girl who but for her indomitable mother should have been the centre of the evening, Princess Dagmar herself, onto the dance floor. It was a slow number. The lights were lowered, the band strummed away and, in full view of her guests, Dagmar slipped her arms round the interloper and pressed her tiny face into his chest. Lightly caressing her lank hair as they smooched, Damian noticed me watching him from across the floor. He caught my eye. And winked.

The trouble, which I suppose we all knew would come in the end, happened at the breakfast and in a way it was a miracle it was delayed until then. The custom, at every private dance, was to provide breakfast towards the finish, starting usually at about half past one or so. These repasts varied in quality and were sometimes, frankly, not worth waiting for but the Grand Duchess had clearly invoked the old proverb of 'in for a penny, in for a pound' and laid on the best the hotel was capable of, which was very good indeed. We waited in a group, rather than a queue, ready to help ourselves to eggs and bacon and sausages and mushrooms, all laid out before us in silver chafing dishes.

Damian was standing a little ahead of me. He appeared to have resigned his charge of Dagmar, who was nowhere to be seen, but moved on to the equally great, or greater, prize of Serena, who was as animated as I had ever seen her, laughing and chatting, and leaning her head close to his. I remember I was surprised at the time to register how well they appeared to know each other. She had come as Caroline Lamb dressed as a page, taken from the famous portrait by Thomas Phillips and, of course, the trim tailoring of her velvet coat, displaying, as it did, her wonderful legs in stockings and knee breeches, made all the other girls present look stuffy and dowdy by comparison. Damian, at her side, was a convincing Byron and perhaps that had been the original idea behind his costume. In fact, they could almost have planned it, they made so well-matched a pair. Serena was not as beautiful as Joanna Langley - no woman was - but she had a fineness of feature that offset it. In short, they looked wonderful together and once again Damian found himself the cynosure of all eyes. 'Excuse me, Sir, but do you have an invitation?' The voice, loud and with a trace of a Midlands accent, transcended the chatter and hung like a seagull in the air above us.

The question had come so entirely out of the blue that it succeeded in silencing everyone present. I saw one girl stop dead, half a fried egg hanging from a spoon until it slipped and fell back on to the plate beneath. A suited man, presumably a manager or something similar, was standing next to Damian. He was standing too close, impertinently close. So close that he was obviously using his closeness to express that he belonged there, in this room, in this hotel, but that in his opinion Damian Baxter did not. Of course, the truth was more complicated. Most of those present knew that Damian did not have an invitation, but he had been present at the party for so long by that stage that for the majority this argument seemed to have become semantic. He had not created a disturbance, he had not got drunk, he had not been rude, all the things that people dread from gatecrashers had simply not happened. Besides, he knew many of the other guests. He had come as a friend and chosen the correct costume. He had danced and talked and even partnered the girl whose ball it was, for heaven's sake. What more did they want? The answer to this was, apparently, proof of an invitation. He blushed, something I do not believe I ever saw him do again. 'Look,' he said softly, laying a placatory hand gently on the man's grey, worsted sleeve.

'No, Sir.
You
look.' If anything the voice was getting louder and word had spread. Couples drifted into the breakfast room from the dancing next door to see what was going on. 'If you do not have an invitation I must ask you to leave.' Ill-advisedly, after shaking Damian's hand away, he tried to take hold of his elbow, but Damian was too quick for him and almost danced backwards to free himself. At this moment Serena, alone in that company decided to intervene. In my craven silence I admired her enormously.

'I am perfectly happy to vouch for Mr Baxter, if that would make any difference.' Judging by the man's expression it did not look at first as if it would. 'My name is Lady Serena Gresham, and you will find it on the guest list.' Now, what was peculiarly interesting about this was Serena's mention of her rank, something she would normally never have done; not if it meant having her tongue torn out. It is hard to understand for those who were not there, but the years of the 1960s were an odd, transitional period when it came to titles. I mean, of course, real titles, hereditary titles. Because at that precise moment of our history nobody quite knew what their future might be. An unspoken agreement between the parties not to create any more of them seemed to have been reached in about 1963 and the belief at that time, certainly outside aristocratic circles, was that the world was changing into a different place and that, among these changes soon, perhaps very soon, the status of a life peerage would far exceed that of an inherited one. In short, that the prominence of the ancient, great families would be vastly diminished in favour of the new people on their way up. But alongside this official doctrine (promoted by the media at the time and still touchingly upheld today by a few politicians and the more optimistic worthies of the Left), there was nevertheless a sneaking suspicion that despite confident pronouncements from the pundits on the subject, this would not prove quite true and that a historic name would continue to have muscle in modern Britain. It was not unlike Mr Blair's attempt to rebrand the country Cool Britannia. There was a period when everyone thought it might work, then a second chapter when the media would insist the experiment was working even though we all knew it wasn't and finally a universal acknowledgement, from Left and Right, that it had been a ridiculous and colossal failure.

But, at the time this contradictory attitude towards hereditary rank meant that as a weapon, titles had to be used circumspectly and that all public display was self-defeating. Just as anyone who shouts 'Do you know who I am?' at a hotel or airline employee immediately forfeits what little advantage they might possibly have gained from their position.

Forty years later all this has altered. After half a century, while a life peerage is a perfectly respectable honour, it is only really meaningful in a political context. In smart society it has failed to garner any real aura or kudos beyond that of a knighthood. Mrs Thatcher tried to acknowledge this with a few hereditary creations in the early 1980s, but she was not supported and after that the nobility remained shut, despite continuing to dominate the social pyramid unchallenged. In fact, when toffs
are
given life peerages they tend to wear them lightly as if anxious to show that they do not take their new rank seriously. 'We're just the day boys,' said one to me recently. Obviously, the old system should either be reopened or abolished, since the present situation should be judged untenable in any democratic society, but there is little sign of reform. Instead, today, up and down the land the descendants of some lucky mayor or banker in the Twenties, reign graciously over us, while the great of our own day, often with far more significant achievements than the forebears of the grandees present, give place and sit forever below the salt.

The point is that today Serena would never question the advantage of her position and using it in this context would almost certainly work. But in those days, forty years ago, it was an act of bravery for her to hold it up and risk a potshot. She was right to be diffident, since it was clear her intervention wouldn't do the trick. The man stared at her officiously. 'I'm very sorry, Your Ladyship,' he started, 'I'm afraid--'

'This is absolutely ridiculous!' Dagmar's shrill cry rang out across the room. One of her striking and even poignant qualities was the absolute Englishness of her voice, making her foreign name and rank feel even stranger. And it was not just English, but a sound from the England of sixty years before, the voice of a miniature duchess opening a charity bazaar in 1910. She strode towards the table, pushing the crowd apart as she came, like a Munchkin general. 'Of course Damian does not have to go!'

This complication really flummoxed the man. 'But Her Royal Highness asked most particularly--'

'Her Royal Highness doesn't know anything about it!'

'Oh, I think I
do
!' The vast bulk of the Grand Duchess was now added to the mix. The guests fell back as she swept majestically through the room, a re-enactment of Sherman marching through Georgia, scorching the earth on her journey, accompanied by, interestingly, Andrew Summersby, who hovered beside her like a small and ugly tug in the shadow of an ocean-going liner. 'I'm very sorry, Mr Baxter, I am sure you did not mean to offend in any way.' She paused for breath and I saw Damian try to cut in, presumably with a view to improving his chances, but she was not interested in a dialogue, only in a statement of policy. 'However, I feel there are rules in these things and they must be adhered to.' She smiled to sugar the pill. 'We can't risk Society crashing down about our ears. I hope you won't think too harshly of me.'

'No, indeed,' said Damian waggishly, still hoping to regain his balance.

'But Damian
was
invited!' The cry came from a hideously embarrassed Dagmar. Naturally it made an interesting contribution to the argument. The crowd's eyes swung towards her, like the audience of the tennis match in Hitchcock's
Strangers on a Train
. 'I invited him!' I am sure everyone present knew this was a lie, but it was a gallant and generous lie, and it sent her higher in the estimation of her guests, most of whom were not particularly fond of her before that night, despite their readiness to take full advantage of her hospitality. I say this so you may know that her intervention did achieve some good. As an argument against her mother's decision it was of course completely fatuous.

'Excuse me, my dear, but Mr Baxter was
not
invited. Not by you. And, more to the point, not by
me
.' The Grand Duchess's tone brooked no argument. She had not finished. 'This was something he made quite clear within earshot of Lord Summersby, who was good enough to bring it to my attention. I would go so far as to say that Mr Baxter was
boasting
of his lack of invitation.' The shade of the Grand Duchess's face was darkening and it was not a becoming alteration. Coupled with the primary colours of her costume, she was beginning to resemble a blow-up Santa Claus hovering between the buildings in Regent Street at Christmas; but, as always with her, there was a quality to be reckoned with. I especially enjoyed a slight flavour of Eastern Europe in her voice as her rage intensified, as if her duty towards her people - subjects in a country which, lest we forget, she had never even visited - had somehow infused her with a new and different past, washing away her healthy, early years in West Yorkshire and making her Moravian in spite of herself.