Kitty and Lotte at Annabel's

It was the first night of the London season and Kitty and Lotte had been invited to a champagne dinner at Annabel’s nightclub in Chelsea.  They had both been a little hesitant about accepting the invitation (‘such a vulgar place, darling’) but needs must.  They couldn’t expect to live a champagne lifestyle without paying their dues - after the crash of ’29 everyone in London seemed to be in a bit of a tight fix.

  As they descended into the subterranean basement their hearts sank at the sight of the braying, chinless wonders who quaffed champagne like oxygen.  The Duke of Tewksbury stood with Sir Randolph of Pennyweather and they swayed together in inebriated unison.  As a waiter passed the disheartened girls he proffered glasses of Ruinart Blanc de Blanc, which they accepted with almost indecent haste.

  ‘Oh darling, perhaps this was a terrible mistake’ whispered Kitty.  She looked resplendent in a midnight blue gown of Hong Kong silk and her signature peacock brooch (made by the Maharajah of Pondicherry from his own personal vault of emeralds and diamonds).  Lotte was equally stunning in a cream satin gown that she had borrowed from Marlene Dietrich and simply forgotten to return.  Around her neck was a coil of diamonds.

  ‘It is so frightfully dull’ Lotte agreed in response to Kitty’s lament, ‘but now that father is in a bit of a pickle I need to think about finding a husband.’ As she spoke the pair turned towards Lord Dudley of Chalfont-Under-The-Water, who was throwing olives from his martini and trying to catch them in his mouth - failing miserably at every attempt and guffawing loudly.  Next to him was Nicholas van Custard, who was so incredibly inbred that he could hardly see, let alone speak.  His fat jowls wobbled as he spluttered with laughter at Lord Dudley’s tomfoolery.  On  a nearby burgundy chaise longue the Earl of Chichester snored loudly, a glass of port slipping precariously form his hand.

  It was not just the blighted, soused elite of England that caused such malaise for Kitty and Lotte.  They were also confronted with the sight of nigh on 200 paintings of puppies and kittens in various guises.  Here were some labradors sitting in a basket of poppies; next to them a luckless kitten with a bowl of milk on its head.  The sort of ill-executed nursery paintings that bring comfort to the swaddled banking heirs who would soon be running the country.

  ‘Let us sit for dinner my dear’ said Lotte and she took Kitty’s arm.  The pair walked through the crowds of buck-toothed wonders and their aged mothers, who had been powdered and primped to within an inch of their lives.  Kitty and Lotte were a positive breath of fresh air in a sea of mummified gentry.  Lustful gazes followed them across the room as they walked through, leaving a trail of jasmine and lilies in their wake.  

  At the centre of the room the ladies found their table.  They had been seated with a motley crew of socialites and minor royalty.  To Lotte’s left was Pascal Strathclyde, a French/Scottish hybrid who had a penchant for shooting, shortbread and Persian valets. 

  ‘Dull, dull, dull’ she crowed to Kitty, who herself had had the misfortune of being placed beside The Right Boring Augustus Kierney, whose family owned half of Cork but had never set foot there.  He was preoccupied with spraying Kitty with breadcrumbs as he recounted family holidays in rural France.

  ‘I have an idea, dear’ whispered Kitty.  ‘What we really ought to do, instead of wasting our time with these bores, is seek the ones who will be worth our while.  You know, the diamond heirs or the champagne magnates.’  At this both girls  turned towards the top table, where the snow-haired president of Ruinart sat holding court.

  Ferdinand de Reims was indeed quite a catch if all the urban rumours were to be believed.  He had married his first wife, Arlette, a mime artist, at the age of 19, much to the chagrin of  his champagne-producing family.  The pair had lived in Genoa in mild poverty for several years, and were soon parents to twin boys who they named Alphonse and Domenico.  The boys were cherished by their parents and could not do wrong in their eyes.  This, of course, led to innumerable incidents in their childhood, not least the occasion on which Phonso and Mimo, as they were known, nearly burnt down the Vatican.

  When they boys were young Arlette had suddenly absconded one winter morning with a travelling soap salesman by the name of Roberto Buittoni.  Ferdinand had been terribly distressed for about 3 days and then set up with a young Italian actress from Rome.  That particular union lasted for 4 years until Ferdinand tired of melodramatic outbursts and weeping pleas, not to mention the flagrant infidelity.  It was at this stage that he returned to champagne to discover that his father was on his deathbed and he would soon be the sole heir to an unimaginable empire. 

  Kitty and Lotte knew all of this as they walked over to Ferdinand’s table.  With brazen confidence Lotte whispered into the ear of Margot von Ronson, ‘Dear, there has been a most dreadful mix up with the seating plan, I do believe that you are on table 5.’  Meanwhile Kitty asked the man to Ferdinand’s left if he would be a darling and fetch her a gimlet, as she was absolutely parched.  In his absence she settled herself in his seat.

  Ferdinand was bemused to suddenly find himself in the company of such beguiling creatures.

  ‘To what do I owe this particular pleasure?’ he asked Lotte as he smoothly poured her a glass of champagne.  His dulcet voice sent shivers down her bare spine and she gazed back into his coffee-coloured eyes.  

  ‘We just thought you liked frightfully bored old chap, truth be hold’ interrupted Kitty, brandishing an oyster, ‘didn’t we Lotte?’

  Lotte nodded coquettishly, all the while holding Ferdinand’s gaze.  She felt quite positively besotted with this man, and she was sure it had nothing to do with the Dom Ruinart Rose that she was drinking or the vast fortune he was in possession of.  Ferdinand, in turn, thought that Lotte might just be the ticket after all the high histrionics of his former paramours.  It was evident that he did not read the social diary of The Times or he might have reconsidered.

  The evening wore on with more oysters and pheasants and sorbets and gin and all manner of delightful things.  Just after midnight Ferdinand announced that he simply must go dancing and would Kitty and Lotte join him?

  ‘Of course darling’ exclaimed Lotte delightedly, grabbing Kitty’s weary arm before she had a chance to refuse.  Kitty had been a little less fortunate in her quest and had resorted to playing poker with the drunken buffoons around her.  Still, she had won near on 5 thousand pounds which would keep her in ermine and kid skin gloves until the spring.

  ‘Oh if we must dear’ she sighed, ‘I do find it so terribly hard to turn down a foxtrot.’

  So it was that they found themselves in a cab speeding towards some clandestine venue.  It was not until they were all happily ensconced that Kitty and Lotte realised that there was a fourth member of their party.  

  ‘Ladies, it is my pleasure to introduce you to my dear friend and business partner, Maxime Gevrey-Chambertin.  He owns the Ritz’  Thus introduced, Maxime kissed the hands of both the ladies and smiled a seductive French smile.  

  ‘What treats you have here!’ he said to Ferdinand, who had the courtesy to wince.  Maxime looked lasciviously at Kitty and proffered his his hip flask of absinthe, eyebrows raised quizzically. Oh Lordy, thought Kitty, this is all rather too much.  

  The group arrived at The Deuce club and were immediately led to the ballroom.  As Ferdinand and Lotte danced, Maxime proffered champagne and amusing anecdotes to Kitty.

  ‘My family were once in the wine industry, yes. We own five chateaux in total, and some villas too but I can never remember quite how many.  Of course when my wife and I divorced she was granted some of the property but what a small price to pay!’  

  Kitty smiled politely and then asked the passing waiter for a double Glenmorangie straight up.  She was getting rather bored of all these divorced men who expected her to think them frightfully avant garde.  It was all rather dull.  

  ‘And now you have the Ritz?’ she asked as pleasantly as she could muster.

  ‘Ah yes,’ enthused Maxime, ‘just a little hobby of mine.  My real passion is for truffles.  I own the best truffling pigs in Alba, make an absolute fortune!’  He laughed again,  and placed his hand on Kitty’s silk-adorned knee, waiting for her to fall, simpering, under his spell. 

  Kitty Moncrief was not one to fall under the spell of just any man, certainly not one who was so evidently in love with himself above all else.  She took a sip of her whiskey, removed Maxime’s hand and smiled her most ravishing smile. 

  ‘Well that is just as well then, I should think.  The Ritz is such a vulgar little place.  All that gold leaf and marble.  Positively horrid.  Now please do excuse me, I simply have to dance’

  With that she got up and sashayed across the dance floor, where Ernest Mulvanney, a dear old friend of her brother, was waiting eagerly to dance with her.

~

On a bright and fresh May morning Kitty Moncrief stood on the steps of Chelsea registry office.  She wore a cerise dress adorned with poppies and little white gloves with pearl buttons.  Her new ermine bolero kept her warm from the latent spring chill.  In her hands Kitty held pink roses and peonies.

  Just behind her stepped out Lottie Bonnington and Kitty smiled at her friend, who had never looked so beautiful.  One passing cyclist clearly thought so too and very nearly collided with the no. 72 bus to Parson’s Green.

  Lotte wore a gown of duchesse satin in a deep, golden shade of cream.  A tulle underskirt whispered as she walked and she wore silk Givenchy shoes on her foot.  A floor length hand-stitched lace veil was held in place by an enormous diamond tiara that had once belonged to Queen Victoria (quite how it came into Lotte’s possession was something that only Lotte and Kitty knew).

  ‘Well darling, that was simply marvellous,’ said Kitty as she turned to her friend, ‘I have to say that I very nearly cried.‘  

  ‘So did I dear’ agreed Lotte, ‘but then I remembered that we are honeymooning in Portofino and then I couldn’t stop smiling.’

  ‘So what shall we do now?’ asked Kitty.  Lotte turned to her new husband and smiled.

  ‘Champagne for everyone!’

Kitty and Lotte on Safari

It was the red dust and the baobab trees that greeted Kitty Moncrief’s tiny plane as it landed in Nairobi.  The sun was setting over the African skyline and the night creatures were beginning to stir.  One such creature was the delectable Lotte, who had come to meet her dearest friend.  In the tin hut of an airport the two embraced in a fug of Chanel no. 5 and cool silk.

‘Oh darling, how lovely to see you,’ cried Lotte, gaily swinging her large bamboo and mother of pearl bag, ‘how was the flight?’

‘It was a little hairy at times but thank god for my trusty hip flask’ answered Kitty, patting the pocket of her oyster Schiaparelli silk jumpsuit.  She has accesorised the outfit with oversized tortoiseshell glasses and natty little Hermes headscarf.  Lotte was in a very fetching Azur blue dress with huge pockets.  Diamond bands hung around her wrist in the most nonchalant fashion.

The two walked out arm in arm to the awaiting truck. ‘Sorry darling,’ whispered Lotte out of earshot of the burly driver in khaki overalls, ‘Daimlers simply won’t do out here.  So much dirt and what not.  Best to stick with something a little sturdier.’  The truck drove off into the darkening sky with the two women cackling mischievously in the back.

~

‘Well well well,’ said Kitty slowly as she surveyed the building in front of her.  Far from the simple farmhouse that she had been anticipating, Lotte was obviously enjoying a rather more fanciful lifestyle.  The entire compound was gated and had luscious gardens that belied the arid land beyond. 

‘Yes, isn’t it just divine?’ crowed Lotte as she passed her friend a Fallen Angel cocktail, ‘wait until you see the swimming pool.‘  As the two walked towards the terrace, lit with large bamboo flambeaux, a handsome man dressed in a dapper linen evening suit approached.  He was older by ten or so years and had a slicked moustache and piercing blue eyes.

‘Hello darling,‘ he said to Lotte as he took her arm and kissed her bejeweled neck.  He extended his gaze towards Kitty and kissed her hand.  Then he walked off towards the house humming some Cole Porter tune to himself.

Kitty and Lotte sat drinking their cocktails and staring at the myriad stars.  After a while Kitty ventured, ‘tell me, dear, whatever happened to that man you married, Hugo?’  Hugo Burlington, sometime journalist,  sometime banker.  Terribly well off and charming in a way only an English man can be.

‘Oh yes, darling, do you know I had quite forgotten about Hugo.  What a sweet man he was.  He had a rather unfortunate run in with a lion one night and all that was left was his mustard cravat.  Such a shame.  I did then inherit his entire fortune, lucky me, much to the dismay of his silly family.  Keeps me in champagne, which is so terribly hard to come by here.’

Kitty mulled this over whilst taking a sip of her cocktail.  ‘So tell me dearest, who is that man? The one who greeted you at the door in such a familiar manner?’

‘Oh Wilhelm! Yes, he is my new husband! Met him in Nairobi a few months ago when I went to sort out the will.  Isn’t he just dear?  Does something with diamonds.  Completely besotted with me.  I suppose my surname now is Oppenheimer, to all intents and purposes.’ 

Kitty was rather put out that she had not been invited to the wedding.  She had always imagined that she would have made a great bridesmaid in some gorgeous Vionnet creation.  Playing second fiddle to the bride, of course.  Lotte noticed her friend’s discontent and jumped up from the table over to the glass and crystal cabinet by the door.  She walked back to the seats and passed Kitty a beautiful jet box, sleek and smooth.

Kitty undid the clasp and gasped as the box opened.  Inside, on a bed of crimson velvet, lay a bracelet of diamonds and sapphires.  Beautiful, emerald cut stones.

‘Just a little something darling,’ smiled Lotte. ‘Honestly, Wilhelm has so many contacts, he was so happy to be able to rustle it up for you.’  Kitty laughed as she slipped the jewellery onto her fine boned wrists. ‘Well dear, it is delightful.  Thank you ever so much.’  

‘I think this calls for champagne,’ said Lotte and she rang the little bell beside her.  A few moments later an elderly gentleman entered the courtyard carrying a silver tray festooned with vintage Krug.  He bowed momentarily as he placed the champagne down upon the table.

‘Thank you Lawrence’ said Lotte as the man retreated.  She turned to her friend. ‘He used to work at the Savoy.  Utter dipsomaniac.  Complete thief, I am forever finding my diamonds in his quarters.  Sadly for him he knows that if he ever tries to leave he would be devoured by the African wildlife.  But what can you do, he makes such a good Gimlet.’

The rest of the night passed in a blur of gin and champagne and tiny little diamonds that might well have been stars.

~

The following morning Lawrence had prepared a breakfast of boiled ostrich eggs with caviar and Bloody Marys (for the vitamins, naturally).  One they had eaten the ladies changed into their safari outfits and donned large sunglasses to keep out the already searing sun.

When the truck eventually stopped at the safari range Kitty and Lotte eyed the other couples who were to join them on their tour.  These seemed to comprise mainly overstuffed, middle aged men straining in their dun shirts and ridiculous shorts, their red faces already slick with sweat.  The women were invariably thin and wan and looked very uncomfortable with the men and the guns.

‘Oh darling isn’t it a shame that they feel obliged to wear linen.’ whispered Kitty to her friend, ‘it really is the most unbecoming fabric and makes one look like a used handkerchief.’  Lotte giggled at this and swept away a marauding fly with her giant ostrich plumed fan.  Our ladies were, comme d’habitude, the belles of the ball.  Lotte, avant garde as ever in wide flared trousers in a bright burnt orange and a gorgeous turquoise shirt handmade for her in China.  Her hair was in a turban and pinned through with peacock feathers.  Kitty was dressed in a white cotton Dior dress bedecked with large poppies and cornflowers.  She twirled an antique parasol in one hand.  Around her neck was a lapis lazuli crucifix, a gift from a one time lover in Rome with close links to the Vatican.

Once assembled the party were directed to awaiting cars to take them across the plains in search of the big kill.  Kitty and Lotte were driven by a dreamy-eyed youth who couldn’t quite believe his luck.  He tried in vain to make conversation, pointing out he giraffes and zebras but the ladies were more interested in the champagne that Lawrence had so thoughtfully packed for them.

After some time the pack of cars regrouped near a small waterhole offering blessed shade.  As soon as the trucks had stopped the accompanying house boys unpacked  wicker baskets and laid out vast rugs and ottomans. Lunch was cold meats, lobster and pineapples, served sweet and ice cold.  Champagne lubricated the group and before long a rather paunchy fellow with sizeable moustache approached them.  Kitty and Lotte could not help notice that all the other women looked over at them with envy.

‘Ernest’ said the man, in an easy American drawl, by way of introduction.  He set himself down beside the women with a confidence that bordered on affront. Never easily won over by the men who pursued them, Kitty and Lotte were nonetheless intrigued by the charismatic stranger.

‘And what brings you to Kenya, Ernest?’ asked Lotte by way of introduction.  The man smiled out over the plains.

‘The game  The hunt.  The wild.‘ was his rather succinct reply.  He uncorked a bottle of Romanee Conti and offered the ladies a glass, which they could not refuse especially as the cheeses and figs were being brought forth from the hampers. ‘I find champagne a little girly after a while.’ Ernest explained.

It turned out that Ernest was quite the hunter, brooding with unconcealed machismo. The fishing in Florida, the wilderness of America, the lions and other big cats of Africa.  It seemed that no living creature was safe from his gun.  And no women was safe from his alcohol-loosened tongue.  The man could talk.  Whether it was the sun or the red wine or the stories he told, before long the ladies were enthralled.  

The more Ernest spoke the more he drank and soon his speech was blurred and he was having trouble focusing.  Kitty and Lotte matched him drink for drink but thanks to their gloriously decadent upbringing in London they remained a model of control.  Soon the rest of the party had continued with their quest to bag a bloodied lion’s head, something, incidentally, that Kitty and Lotte found utterly repulsive.  It was one thing to hunt, quite another to kill their prey so unfairly.

Ernest speech continued unheeded in the background.  Kitty and Lotte did wonder if they were even required in this overinflated monologue.

‘I do find, dear girl’ whispered Lotte to her companion, ‘that his tales are rather outlandish. I mean really, cub reporter, ambulance driver, bull fighting.  Suggesting he might join all that trouble brewing in Spain.  Methinks dear Ernest may protest too much.’  Kitty agreed hurriedly, spilling a drop of the wine on her dress. 

‘I know! And all that nonsense about being a novelist! He would just go on and on.  Not a patch on dear Evelyn I reckon.’ Kitty recalled her distant cousin, who was quite the toast of London.

A sudden, ominous roar bellowed very close.  The two stopped talking instantly and reached with seasoned speed for their rifles.  Anticipating a male lion, they were terribly relieved to see that it was, in fact, just Ernest fast asleep at their feet. 

‘Oh dear, it seems poor Ernest is a little under the weather,’ mused Lotte as tttshe regarded the clearly inebriated American.  He lay in an ungainly sprawl on the picnic rug, an unsightly dribble falling down his chin.  His continued snores were loud enough to frighten off any beasts curious enough to approach.

‘Silly thing, what was he thinking?’ asked Lotte, ‘perhaps he is not used to the heat here.’  The ladies called for their driver who was only too happy to help and before long Ernest had been dispatched to his hotel and the ladies were on the veranda drinking negronis in the setting sun.

And because they were, after all, ladies, and because it amused them so, Kitty and Lotte never told a soul that there were the only two known women ever to drink Ernest Hemingway under the table.

THE END  

Kitty and Lotte on the Orient Express

Winter, for Kitty Moncrief and Lotte Bonnington, meant St Moritz and the lure of brandy-laced hot chocolate and politically immune Swiss millionaires.  Le tout London would be there in their glory and the ladies had received a personal invite from the banking heir Friedrich Hottinger.

So it was on a biting January morning that Kitty and Lotte arrived at the Gare du Nord in Paris.  Only vast swathes of ermine and mink could keep them from the great chill.  That and the little hip flask of gin that Kitty always carried about her person in cases of emergency.

‘I do think we did frightfully well to only take five trunks each’ said Lotte gazing at their hand-initialed Hermes leather luggage.  Van Cleef and Arpels had also been very kind to make them both a set of mother of pearl and tortoise shell minaudieres for the journey.  Kitty lit up her first cigarette of the day and surveyed the scene.  Burgundy clad porters with peaked caps ran along the station as steam plumed forth from the mighty engines.  Towers of valises trundled past them along with the busy chatter of the other passengers.

‘All this toing and froing is making me rather tired old girl, shall we go to our cabin?’.  Without further ado the two boarded the train and made their way along the train to their first class quarters.  Not very long afterwards the train pulled out of the station.

~

At midday, having spent the morning playing cribbage and looking at cows through the window,  it was decided that luncheon was very much in order.  Once they had changed into more suitable clothing it was nearer 1pm and they were given the very last table in the dining carriage.  Lotte wore a cerulian kimono adorned with a large diamond brooch in the shape of a flamingo.  It suited her newly bobbed hair and lacquered nails.  Kitty wore tweed knickerbockers with a teal silk blouse and her new Christian Dior laced boots.  Heads, as ever turned.

‘Champagne, ladies?’ proffered the waiter in what was evidently a rhetorical question.  Crystal coupes clinked and the ladies settled into a feast of oysters, lobster, guinea fowl and syllabub.  As they ate the attracted the gaze of a terribly dashing young man in dinner suit and bow tie.  He waited until they were enjoying their cognacs before he made his way over.  He proferred a silver cigarette case engraved with the initials ‘I. F.’ along with an unnerving stare of his dark dark eyes.

‘Cigarette, ladies?’ asked the gentleman.  Quite used to such interruptions Kitty and Lotte cooly accepted and were not surprised when their new acquaintance sat down.  He really was desperately attractive with his almost black hair and easy manner.  

‘And where are you headed, young man?’ asked Lotte.  The chap raised his eyebrows and laughed. ‘Young man?’ he asked, ‘I shouldn’t think I am any younger than the two of you.’  Kitty giggled at his insolence.  They were, after all, women of the world and here was some green upstart trying to find his place in it.  Still, they were on a long train journey and needed something to amuse them so they let him tell them his stories of studying in Moscow and joining the Foreign Office.  Lotte, naturally, was rather taken with this confident fellow and swirled her cognac lasciviously with dreams of troikas and log fires.

~

Much later that afternoon Kitty retired to her cabin for a post prandial nap and to make inroads into her latest novel.  Kitty had found that she had a knack for colourful prose, and in fact not much of it need be considered fiction.  She had recently begun a story of lust and betrayal in Pondicherry but the hypnotic chug of the train and the rhythmic music of the typewriter soon lulled her into a cosy sleep at her desk.

‘Wake up, wake!’ Kitty’s velvet smoking gown was being tugged urgently by a rather dishevelled Lotte.  She looked up, emerging through a dreamy fog of sultry Maharajas and rubies.  ‘What on earth is the matter?’ she asked her companion, whose rosy glow could surely not be contributed merely to an afternoon of passion with the mysterious young civil servant with whom Lotte had absconded from the lunch table. Lotte, all a-flush with excitement, could hardly contain herself.

‘Well, we were just smoking a most delightful post-coital cigarette when there was a sudden knock on the door.  I thought it rather odd, it being mid afternoon and surely not quite time for tea yet.  Well, my young lothario jumped out of bed and told me to hide under the covers.  What a giggle, I thought! What larks!  But then there was a smash of glass and some sort of rumpus and rough exchanges in what I could only imagine was Russian.  And then more glass was broken and there was a sudden rush of arctic air through the cabin.  And then the covers were drawn back and my dear boy was standing there, not a hair out of place.  No sign of the other chap, but the cabin window was smashed to bits!  My companion calmly informed me that there had been some sort of misunderstanding and he was going to see if the porter could do something about the window.  And then he left.  And, well, I waited a bit but he never came back.’

Kitty eyed Lotte suspiciously ‘and what, dear, do you possibly imagine that was all about?’  

‘Not a clue, my darling, not a clue.’  But both women had moved in enough circles to have more than just the faintest inkling. 

‘I’m sure we will hear more of your young man one day.’ smiled Kitty.

~

It was 9pm and somewhere near the Swiss Alps.  Or maybe French.  Kitty and Lotte were caught up in a pleasant blur of digestifs and stirring violin concertos, courtesy of the gramophone, and hadn’t really paid much attention to the scenery.  Both, tonight, were dressed in black silk gowns.  Lotte wore a magnificent diamond tiara that she had been given by an Italian automobile heir, much to the chagrin of his mother.  Kitty wore an exotic bracelet in the form of a snake that wrapped around her slender arm in a dazzle of jet and emeralds. They had dined on veal with morels and were just ruminating on the the possibility of ordering a bottle of Dom Ruinart Rose before dessert when there was suddenly a commotion at the entrance to the car.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, I must ask that you vacate the dining car immediately, we have the most important of guests aboard who demand absolute privacy.’  The poor man dabbed at his brow furiously and urged his guests to leave.  Most acquiesced and began to depart with a modest sigh and the promise of complementary champagne in their cabins.  When, however, he reached Kitty and Lotte they were steadfast in the refusal to leave.

‘I think not,’ retorted Kitty incredulously, ‘if they wish to dine they can jolly well dine with us. Or retire to their cabin.’  Kitty Moncrief was not a woman to rile, at anyone’s behest.

Much tumult ensued. Porters and flunkeys rushed around and the maitre d’ was quite beside himself.  After an absolute age there was a hushed reverence as none other than the Prince of Wales and his consort entered the dining cabin.

‘Gosh, she looks terribly thin,’ breathed Lotte on her first view of Wallis Simpson, ‘what a pinched little mouth she has.’  Kitty couldn’t help but agree.  Here was the woman who had said one could never be too thin and there she was, living proof of the contrary.

‘You would think that the Prince would rather a more, well, womanly woman’ said Lotte, unable to hide her contempt.  Kitty was staring with her beguiling eyes straight at the aforementioned Prince.  And he was smiling right back. ‘Oh, my dear,’ she laughed quietly, ‘I think he does.’

Quite unexpectedly to all except Kitty, the Prince and Wallis made their way down the cabin and stopped at the very table where the ladies were enjoying their dinner.  Wallis Simpson, prune-faced and ghastly white, did little to hide her contempt at the sight of such lovely creatures holding her David in thrall.

‘May we join you?‘ asked the Prince nonchalantly.  Wallis’s mouth fell upon like a dumb goldfish and fury burned in her eyes but she could do very little as the Prince slide down next to Kitty on the banquet seating.  ‘Waiter!’ he barked, ‘a bottle of Dom Perignon 1921’, looking at Kitty’s dark eyes he added ‘and some Osetra caviar!’

~

‘So,’ squealed Lotte the moment they entered Kitty’s cabin, ‘are you the mistress of the Prince of Wales?’  Kitty looked at her friend incredulously and took a sip of the Napoleon Brandy that she had procured from the bar on their way.

‘Don’t don’t be utterly ridiculous! Of course I am not, I would never associate myself with someone so interested in the politics of the fascists or in pseudo-masochistic relationships with older women.  And in case you hadn’t noticed, he already has a mistress.  I am not interested in being merely one plaything in a coterie of women.’

‘But they way he looked at you!’ exclaimed Lotte, ‘the way he talked to you!  I thought that Simpson woman was going to spontaneously combust all over the velour banquets!’

Kitty sighed and sat down.  ‘I was acquainted with him once, yes, years ago.  When he was young and I was foolish.  Mentioned marriage but I was never going to be tied down to such a ridiculous establishment as the monarchy.  Or indeed, to such a silly man.  He really is quite peculiar.  Did give me an awful lot of diamonds though darling.’

‘Do you think he still loves you?‘ asked Lotte, hardly daring to breathe in her excitement at such a revelation.’

‘Don’t be daft, of course he does.  Many a man will spend years trying to convince himself that he doesn’t care one jot about lost love but somewhere very hidden away they always do.’

~

The following morning the Orient Express pulled into Innsbruck and the ladies adjourned to the awaiting Bentley that would take them on to the snowy hills of St. Moritz.  As they drove high into the mountains the journey that had taken place seemed more and more like a fanciful dream.  Kitty and Lotte were the most discreet ladies in London and therein lay much of their appeal.  For who would believe the stories that had befallen them?