The Quality of Mercy (3 page)

She went to Spitzer for her dress. Fortunately, the manager spoke good English and, when she had explained her predicament, he was most helpful. An hour later she came out with a gown of shimmering moiré, the colour of ‘lake water’ as the manager put it, and a black evening cloak. She wished Edward was there to reassure her but the dress looked all right, she thought. Gloves she bought from Zacharias – long white kid gloves so sensuous she wanted to stroke her face with them. She found shoes at Otto Grünbaum and an evening bag – so small it would hardly take a handkerchief – exquisitely decorated with hundreds of tiny pearls. Flushed with success, she also bought a fan made from peacock feathers, which she practised opening and closing with a twist of her wrist.

Georg had said he would pick her up from her flat at eight o’clock but the hour came and went with no ring at the bell. At first she was anxious and then angry. Here she was all dressed up with nowhere to go, as the saying went. She had been made a fool of and she was not someone to take that lying down. Just as she was about to tear off her finery and go to bed in a sulk, there was a violent knocking on her door.

It was Georg, unusually flustered and almost be-draggled. ‘I am so sorry – forgive me, please – I was delayed – unavoidably delayed,’ he added as though grabbing at the phrase for support.

Verity’s anger dissipated. He had obviously been in a fight. His evening dress was stained with mud and his tie was all awry. He had a cut on his cheek and his hair was mussed up. ‘Have you been attacked?’ she demanded.

‘I . . . I met some youths . . . I will tell you later.’

‘Wait a minute – before we go anywhere, let me tidy you up.’

She made him take off his coat and sponged the mud off it. She brushed his hair and gently bathed the cut on his face. As Georg calmed down he seemed to see Verity for the first time.

‘You are so very kind and beautiful, Fräulein Browne . . .’

‘You may call me Verity,’ she said graciously, ‘if we are to enjoy the evening.’

The ball was in full swing when they arrived and she was relieved to find that she was dressed correctly. As Georg said – whatever the prejudices of the Viennese, they were certainly not going to spoil the ball by exhibiting them. He introduced her proudly to several distinguished-looking elderly men as ‘my English friend, the journalist, Verity Browne’. By no means all of his friends – to judge from their names – were Jewish and she met and danced with diplomats and government officials who urged her to come to them for information on the political crisis. On the whole, they seemed complacent. They would muddle through – they used the verb
fortwursteln
– Austria always did. Britain would support the Chancellor. Hitler would not prevail. Verity was triumphant. This was just the breakthrough she had been looking for. Virtue, she told herself smugly, was its own reward but if helping Georg led her into Viennese society she would not complain.

Panting, Georg and Verity polkaed to a halt. She was suddenly aware of a buzz of conversation around them and she asked him what was the matter.

‘There’s a rumour that Chancellor Schuschnigg has been summoned to meet Hitler. Here’s Manfred Schmidt. He’s an old friend of my father’s – not a Nazi, you understand. He’ll tell us what’s happening.’ He grabbed by the sleeve a bearded man with a worried frown on his face. ‘Onkel Manfred, what’s the news from the Ballhausplatz?’ The Ballhausplatz was the Austrian foreign ministry.

‘Ah, Georg, my boy, it is time you and your parents left for England. I hear that your father will soon be released from prison but the Nazis . . . who knows . . . ?’ He hesitated. ‘Hilter has ordered Schuschnigg to cancel the plebiscite’ – this was the popular vote on whether Austrians wanted to become part of a greater Germany.

Suddenly, to Verity’s horror, she heard outside the building a rising chant of
Sieg heil
. They went on to the balcony and looked out over the square. It was cold and wet but the
Platz
was illuminated by hundreds of torches borne aloft by young men wearing the white stockings and lederhosen of the outlawed Austrian Nazi party. They wore swastikas on their arms, which until then had been illegal, and chanted, ‘Germany awake, Judah perish.’ As Verity watched, the crowd swelled and began to sing ‘
Deutschland
,
Deutschland
,
Über Alles
’ and then, lifting their arms, the ‘
Horst Wessel
’, the Nazi Party anthem.

Georg turned to Verity and said grimly, ‘It was youths like these who beat me up on my way to your apartment. It is as I feared.
Osterreich ist kaputt
.’

2

‘You can do what you want, Ned, but I flatly refuse to go anywhere near Broadlands and nor will Connie.’

It was breakfast and Edward had just read aloud a note from Lord Louis Mountbatten, delivered by hand, inviting them all to lunch that very day. Connie studied her eggs and bacon, refusing to look her brother-in-law in the eye. His nephew, Frank, was still in bed. He had arrived the day before, exhausted after a punishing week of dancing and flirting on the
Normandie
. Edward looked at his brother with dismay. He knew Gerald could be obstinate but his refusal to consider being Mountbatten’s guest seemed ridiculous.

‘It’s not like you to be discourteous,’ he chided. ‘I agree that from all accounts the man is rather too pleased with himself but he’s said to be a good naval officer. He’s not just a playboy.’

‘I’m sorry, Ned, I don’t want to be rude to your friends but there it is. I don’t wish to discuss it.’

‘He’s not my friend but Sunny is and I certainly can’t refuse him. What about Frank? Surely he can go? You know he will be bored here. This will give him something to think about.’

‘I would rather he did not go but he’s not a child any more. He can make his own decision.’ The Duke looked even sulkier. ‘I hate that word “bored”,’ he said suddenly angry. ‘Most people are bored but they have to earn their living as best they may in “boring” jobs. They don’t gad around the world picking up unsuitable girls. I am very much afraid my son is turning into a spoiled brat. He seems to think life is just one long party. Well, it isn’t and the sooner he finds that out the better.’

‘I say, Gerald, steady on! There’s a war coming sure as eggs is eggs and we’ll all have our duty to do but young men like Frank will carry the worst of it. You shouldn’t begrudge him the chance to sow a few wild oats.’

‘I’m not against the boy sowing a few wild oats . . .’ He caught the expression on the faces of his wife and brother. ‘Well, I’m not,’ he said stoutly. ‘Being a duke is a damn dull business. You’d agree with that, wouldn’t you, Connie?’

She hardly knew how to answer him. She had indeed felt constricted on occasion by what was expected of her and, if she were honest, she did think her husband had become dull but she was well aware that most women would give their souls to be where she was.

‘We have Frank and we have Mersham,’ she said diplomatically. ‘We have no cause for complaint when I think of what some people have to put up with.’

Edward looked at her with affection. Connie was not one of those indolent, whining women he met sometimes who could talk of nothing but how difficult it was to get good servants.

‘You still haven’t told me why you don’t like the man,’ Edward demanded, a trifle plaintively.

The Duke said nothing but opened
The Times
noisily and pretended to read. He hated gossip but what he had read about the Mountbattens had shocked him.

Lord Louis Mountbatten, known to his family and close friends as Dickie and to other friends and acquaintances as Lord Louis, was Queen Victoria’s great-grandson. There was a photograph to prove it in an ornate silver frame on a side table in the drawing-room at Broadlands of him as a baby sitting on her lap. It was the hinge upon which his life swung and never for one moment did he forget his position as a member of the Royal Family or allow anyone else to. He was tall – over six feet – with a ramrod-straight back, a fine head and a strong jaw. He had very little imagination and no intellectual curiosity. When he went to the theatre it was to admire the actresses and – some spiteful gossips would add – good-looking young actors. He had no sense of humour, which occasionally made him ridiculous, but he was by no means stupid. He possessed one of those highly focused minds which, when presented with a problem, worry at it until it’s solved. He had suggested several technical improvements to his naval superiors on subjects such as wireless telegraphy and gun aiming.

He was ambitious both in his chosen career and in his determination to be treated not just as a minor royal but a leader in high society. He was not particularly interested in politics but, when he thought about it at all, saw himself as a liberal. He loved sport – particularly dangerous sport in which he could prove himself to be a man among men. He drove fast cars and fast boats and played polo with only two things in mind – he must win if at all possible but above all he must put on a ‘good show’. His vanity led him to make mistakes. He was not a good judge of character and preferred to be surrounded by men who would not criticize or challenge him. His closest friend was a man called Peter Murphy who supplied him with girls while making no effort to conceal his preference for his own sex.

Mountbatten had made himself a boon companion of his cousin David, the Prince of Wales, and it seemed a moment of personal triumph when the Prince became Edward VIII. The triumph was short-lived, however, and when the King was forced to abdicate to marry Mrs Simpson, Mountbatten dropped his cousin with, some felt, undue haste and went to considerable lengths to assure the new King of his loyalty.

Mountbatten was well connected but not rich so in 1922 he married Edwina Ashley. She was beautiful, intelligent and fabulously wealthy. Her grandfather was the millionaire financier Sir Ernest Cassel and, through her father, she was descended from the Earl of Shaftesbury, the nineteenth-century philanthropist, and the dashing Lord Palmerston, Foreign Secretary and later Prime Minister to Queen Victoria. The marriage brought him two fine houses: Brook House – a huge mansion on Park Lane – and Broadlands. In every respect it was a brilliant match and, if Edwina chose to take lovers from almost the moment they were married, it did not seem to affect their mutual affection. On their honeymoon they had gone to Hollywood where they were treated as royalty which, of course, Mountbatten considered himself to be. He adored the shallow glitter of the world of movies which appealed to his exhibitionist side. The glamorous young couple were fêted by stars such as Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford. Cecil B. de Mille taught Mountbatten how to use a 35mm cine camera and, it was said, how to satisfy a woman.

It was hardly surprising that the ‘old guard’, personified by Edward’s brother, loathed him.

When the Duke had left the breakfast table, Edward eyed Connie quizzically. ‘Aren’t you even the least bit curious to meet the man?’

‘Of course, but Gerald’s right – it’s not our world and we would stick out like sore thumbs. Take Frank by all means but I wonder . . .’ She hesitated.

‘You wondered?’ Edward prompted.

‘I wondered if . . . Oh, I know it sounds silly . . . if the Mountbattens won’t steal him away. You said yourself he will be bored here with just us.’

She sounded bitter and Edward looked at her with concern. Her only son and the light of her life had left Cambridge without taking his degree and, under the influence of an American woman Edward had detested on sight, went to America to work with Dr Kinsey, an American academic with an interest in codifying sexual preferences. Edward was profoundly grateful that neither his brother nor, he believed, his sister-in-law had any notion of the nature of the ‘research’ in which their son was involved.

Frank had returned without his American so Edward guessed – and certainly hoped – that his nephew, who was a sensible boy at heart, had had enough of such people. He told himself that at Frank’s age he too had wanted to shock his father and prove his independence. In his case, his rebellion had never even been noticed. The old Duke was only concerned to see Gerald properly educated to take over the title and the estate. As the second son, Edward was of no importance and his father ignored him.

‘I didn’t mean that he could ever stop loving being at Mersham. How could he?’

‘I know! He’s a good boy. We’re so proud of him.’

‘You think Frank might be drawn into the fast set of which you so disapprove?’

‘Yes, I do. It would be quite natural if he found it . . . alluring.’

‘Look, don’t worry,’ Edward said comfortably. ‘I’ll keep an eye on him. Don’t you trust me? The fact is, I have a scheme. Frank wrote to me a couple of weeks ago and mentioned in a PS that, if he had to join the armed forces, he was quite taken with the idea of the navy. If Mountbatten noticed him it might be no bad thing. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll go and dig him out of bed.’

Connie was not quite sure she approved of ‘pulling strings’ but all she said was: ‘Of course I trust you, Ned. Do what you think is right.’

Although Mountbatten’s life was the navy, he never lost his taste for film stars and, as they were ushered into the drawing-room at Broadlands a few hours later, Edward noticed a glamorous woman standing by herself clasping a glass of champagne who ‘reeked’ of Hollywood. Frank saw her too and whispered stagily, ‘Tell me, Uncle, isn’t that Garbo?’

It was not, but she was obviously making an effort to be taken for her. She was smoking a cigarette through a long holder and staring vacantly into space. Like Greta Garbo, she possessed the type of face that the camera loved. It was beautiful – indeed it was one of the most beautiful Edward had ever seen – but it was completely blank. She had either learnt to hide her emotions or she was so bored she was almost comatose. Before he could decide which, he was greeted by Sunny who, beaming away, introduced him to Mountbatten.

‘My brother and sister-in-law were so sorry they could not come,’ Edward lied smoothly. ‘This is my nephew Frank. I wondered if you might have a moment to talk to him about the navy. He’s a great admirer of yours and is thinking about volunteering.’