The Memoirs of the Duchess of Windsor (Installment Seventeen) – Settling Down After the Storm

— Settling Down After the Storm —

I was comforted by the settled air that David showed in his new life, so much so that it seemed to me he was not in the least conscious of all the vexations confronting him as a result of this change in his way of living. His situation pleased the former Spanish king, Alfonso, who was spending a few days at a nearby hotel...

King Alfonso had married David's cousin, Princess Victoria Eugenie, and David had visited the Spanish court when he was Prince of Wales; that was in the reign of the king, who had lost his throne six years earlier and was the last of the line of the House of "Bourbon"...

One evening Alfonso accepted our invitation to dinner at the château, and in the course of the evening Alfonso looked at David and said, smiling: The attitude of the courts of Europe toward our case will not be a kindly one. Let me tell you this story: years ago, when I was still on my throne, I made it my custom to pay a yearly visit to England. I adored sport and followed its great events eagerly, and the sporting committee would reserve a place for me in the royal family's box. Two years after the Spanish revolution I went to England, meaning to attend the sporting event; the committee was kind and favored me with a card entitling me to enter the royal box. During the play, one of the stewards of the occasion came up to me and asked, with every politeness, that I move back to the seat behind and yield my place to a member of the royal family... A little later he came back again to ask me to move back once more... And to tell the truth, David, I did not know your family was so numerous until I found myself in the very last seat...

David laughed, repeating: "That is what they mean by kicking a man upstairs..."

We decided to return to Paris after touring Austria and its surroundings, and we took a suite at the Hôtel Meurice while we searched for a suitable dwelling. And we ran into a problem, for David preferred the country, while I love city life...

In the midst of this perplexity Charles Bedaux appeared, bringing a new project which he laid before David, connected with a scheme for building housing in Germany. Our friend assured him that this undertaking had nothing whatever to do with the Nazi propaganda then being spread... Nor did David himself trouble about that aspect, since he was no longer in a position that barred him from visiting any country he pleased... and he did not reckon that such a journey would one day be turned against him.

We traveled to Berlin at the beginning of November.

It appeared to us that the British government did not acknowledge the moves he was making; that became plain to us the moment we set foot on German soil...

The ambassador sent a note affirming that he had received special instructions from the British government not to recognize our presence there officially... During the visit we made the acquaintance of the leaders of the Nazi movement, and Hitler invited us to a luncheon... On that occasion he asked to be alone with David for half an hour, which stretched into an hour; then the two came back murmuring in German... I did not lift my eyes from Hitler, in his dark official dress, with a face that rarely relaxed... His appearance was among the strangest my eyes have ever fallen upon: long, powerful hands, and fingers like a musician's; and eyes that glittered with an astonishing strangeness, as though within them a furnace of fire were blazing... His glances reminded me of Kemal Atatürk. I noticed that he turned his eyes toward me twice, and each time I answered the look, whereupon he turned his gaze away—which made me feel that this strange man cares nothing for women...

When I was alone with David I asked him whether the conversation had been interesting. He assured me it had, and that he had not entered into any political talk with Hitler, but had spent most of the time listening to him and to the plans he was preparing for the new Germany...

We returned to Paris, having decided to rent a dwelling rather than buy one, since we might change our minds about the French capital.

The winter of 1937 came, cold and stormy... while I moved from quarter to quarter, searching for the dwelling whose plan David had drawn... and still we had not found it...

At last we found a house at Versailles that pleased him, though it was not the ideal home he had wanted in the country...

In the late spring of 1938 we moved to the Riviera, where we learned that the château of "La Croë" stood vacant, and we leased it for ten years. It was like a beautiful villa, white in color, looking out over the sea, with a tennis court about it, a swimming pool, and a spacious garden...

"La Croë" was half furnished, so we brought over our own furniture to make up the lack. And though the work piled up on me, I felt a great peace of mind as I watched David return to his gaiety and to the free surroundings he adores... And he began to feel a husband's duty—but in a kingly way.