Read Online Mrs Midnight and Other Stories by Reggie Oliver - Free Book Online
Authors: Reggie Oliver
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but I was also curious. So I waited while she allowed me to accompany her to theatres and receptions, showed me precious family papers and photograph albums, and made me welcome at the ‘Sunday Afternoons’ she held at her house in Holland Park.
Helen is in her thirties, has no children and is married to a very wealthy Q.C. whom I have met only once, very briefly. He does not seem to intrude much on her social life, but the arrangement appears to be perfectly amicable. Though somewhat plump and dumpy, Helen is not unattractive and she has a habit of fixing her big, lustrous brown eyes on you, as if you are the only person in the world she wants to talk to. At a first meeting she may give the impression of being a placid, amiable, perhaps even a rather dim person. This is not the case, as I discovered when she invited me round for ‘a drink’ one Thursday evening in May.
I was surprised to find that I was her only guest, but, having got over this shock, I was not surprised to find that she had invited me there because she wanted me to do something for her. In short, she wanted me to go out to Switzerland to help her father King Kyril of Slavonia—the notion of an ‘ex-king’ was, of course, anathema—to write his autobiography. My writing skills and particular historical expertise would be invaluable, she told me.
It had already been arranged, apparently. She had spoken to my agent; she had even made enquiries about flights to Geneva. Of course, there was nothing I could do to resist, even if I had wanted to. I asked if King Kyril himself had approved his choice of assistant.
‘I have written to him and told him you would be perfect,’ said Princess Helen with a charming smile.
I knew at once that this was her exquisitely courteous way of hinting that I should not enquire too deeply into the whys and wherefores of the matter. A little later on she did let fall something, perhaps deliberately, which suggested that there might be a hidden motive to my mission.
‘My father has an apartment in Lausanne, but now my mother is dead he is spending more and more time at St Germain with the Institute for Psychic Health. I’m sure the I.P.H. people are all very admirable in their way, but I think it would be good for him to be involved with someone who is not in that milieu. You know how cliquey and closed these people can be.’
‘Do you get out to see him often?’ I asked. The princess frowned. She had picked up my own subtle implication: ‘if you’re so concerned, why don’t you go and sort it out yourself?’
‘I wish I could, but I have such a busy schedule here. There are all my charities which mean so much to me, as you know. I do my best to keep in touch. But e-mail and phone are so unsatisfactory. You never know who might be looking or listening in.’
That last remark struck me as slightly odd, but I let it pass. Princess Helen then embarked on a brief résumé of her father’s life, much of which I already knew. When Hitler had invaded Slavonia in 1941 Kyril’s father, King Bogdan III, had made some accommodation with the Nazis. Prince Kyril, still only a young boy, was fortunately away from the country with his mother in America following a marital disagreement. King Bogdan had been assassinated by communist partisans towards the end of the war, and by the time Kyril was able to return to Slavonia as its new king, the nation was in Stalin’s iron grip. For the rest of his life King Kyril of Slavonia had been wandering the earth, waiting for the call to return to his realm, a call which, even with the death of communism, had not come. ‘Exile,’ as the saying goes, ‘is the wound of kingship’.
The night before I flew to Switzerland Princess Helen took me to see Parsifal at Covent Garden. We sat in a box, and had champagne and caviare sandwiches in the interval. I was reminded of the treats my parents used to give me at the end of the holidays, before I had to go back to my hated boarding
Helen is in her thirties, has no children and is married to a very wealthy Q.C. whom I have met only once, very briefly. He does not seem to intrude much on her social life, but the arrangement appears to be perfectly amicable. Though somewhat plump and dumpy, Helen is not unattractive and she has a habit of fixing her big, lustrous brown eyes on you, as if you are the only person in the world she wants to talk to. At a first meeting she may give the impression of being a placid, amiable, perhaps even a rather dim person. This is not the case, as I discovered when she invited me round for ‘a drink’ one Thursday evening in May.
I was surprised to find that I was her only guest, but, having got over this shock, I was not surprised to find that she had invited me there because she wanted me to do something for her. In short, she wanted me to go out to Switzerland to help her father King Kyril of Slavonia—the notion of an ‘ex-king’ was, of course, anathema—to write his autobiography. My writing skills and particular historical expertise would be invaluable, she told me.
It had already been arranged, apparently. She had spoken to my agent; she had even made enquiries about flights to Geneva. Of course, there was nothing I could do to resist, even if I had wanted to. I asked if King Kyril himself had approved his choice of assistant.
‘I have written to him and told him you would be perfect,’ said Princess Helen with a charming smile.
I knew at once that this was her exquisitely courteous way of hinting that I should not enquire too deeply into the whys and wherefores of the matter. A little later on she did let fall something, perhaps deliberately, which suggested that there might be a hidden motive to my mission.
‘My father has an apartment in Lausanne, but now my mother is dead he is spending more and more time at St Germain with the Institute for Psychic Health. I’m sure the I.P.H. people are all very admirable in their way, but I think it would be good for him to be involved with someone who is not in that milieu. You know how cliquey and closed these people can be.’
‘Do you get out to see him often?’ I asked. The princess frowned. She had picked up my own subtle implication: ‘if you’re so concerned, why don’t you go and sort it out yourself?’
‘I wish I could, but I have such a busy schedule here. There are all my charities which mean so much to me, as you know. I do my best to keep in touch. But e-mail and phone are so unsatisfactory. You never know who might be looking or listening in.’
That last remark struck me as slightly odd, but I let it pass. Princess Helen then embarked on a brief résumé of her father’s life, much of which I already knew. When Hitler had invaded Slavonia in 1941 Kyril’s father, King Bogdan III, had made some accommodation with the Nazis. Prince Kyril, still only a young boy, was fortunately away from the country with his mother in America following a marital disagreement. King Bogdan had been assassinated by communist partisans towards the end of the war, and by the time Kyril was able to return to Slavonia as its new king, the nation was in Stalin’s iron grip. For the rest of his life King Kyril of Slavonia had been wandering the earth, waiting for the call to return to his realm, a call which, even with the death of communism, had not come. ‘Exile,’ as the saying goes, ‘is the wound of kingship’.
The night before I flew to Switzerland Princess Helen took me to see Parsifal at Covent Garden. We sat in a box, and had champagne and caviare sandwiches in the interval. I was reminded of the treats my parents used to give me at the end of the holidays, before I had to go back to my hated boarding
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