Murder at the Villa Byzantine

10

Vie de Chateau

The story of how Miss Hope had become involved with the Bulgarian royal family in the early years of the war, how she and her parents had idled in the wilderness while the face of Europe was being changed, was quite remarkable, to say the least.

Tancred Vane found himself thinking about it, going over details, as he lay in bed in his darkened room, unable to sleep. It had been such a vivid account. He now felt the irresistible urge to listen to it again. He wanted, nay, longed, to hear Miss Hope’s voice once more.

He had actually recorded her story on tape and the cassette recorder stood on his bedside table, so all he needed to do was to reach out, locate the button and then press it – voila.

‘It was back in 1941. My father was appointed Head of Chancery at the British legation in Sofia. Mother had the gravest doubts about living in Bulgaria and so did I, if I have to be perfectly honest. A girl at school had told me Bulgarians were cannibals. She said Bulgarians were grim, gnome-like and extremely ferocious and that they liked nothing better than drinking blood. I think she must have been thinking of Borneoans.

‘My poor mother dreaded becoming marooned in a strange country, among people with whom she’d find no common bond. She feared she might be made to feel like Keats’ Ruth. That’s my favourite poet, yes – fancy you remembering! The sad heart of Ruth, when sick for home, she stood in tears amid the alien corn.

‘Well, we’d been warned that life in these parts of the Balkans lacked the choreography and grace of Western civilization, that wealth was rare, and either impossibly ostentatious or hidden – that no sponsoring of arts and letters or any form of cultivated living ever took place.

‘Glory and prosperity were said to have eluded Bulgaria. Bucharest had acquired a pseudo-Parisian sheen and Athens a Levantine cosmopolitanism, which is better than no cosmopolitanism, but Sofia – alongside Belgrade and Tirana – never amounted to more than a dull, quasi-oriental provincial capital, lacking aristocracies of the blood or the spirit.

‘The reports, however, turned out to be inaccurate and Sofia came as a most pleasant surprise. It was a thoroughly decent place, you might say. We were given a fine house made of yellow stone and hordes of servants. There was a marvellous well-tended garden with roses proliferating like a tapestry of Burne-Jones! We were befriended by the ruling elite, whose members, my mother discovered soon enough, had been educated in France, Germany and even in England. And immediately my parents started receiving invitations to the palace – to luncheons, soirees, garden parties and charity galas.

‘Well, in a couple of months, as you know, Bulgaria was to abandon its neutrality and join the war as Germany’s ally. Consequently, all the British subjects living on Bulgarian territory would leave and the British legation would close – but that time had not come yet.

‘Officially at least, we were not yet the enemy.

‘The third of August was the anniversary of King Boris’ ascension to the throne. That was when the annual garden party took place at the royal palace in Sofia. My parents were certainly invited and on that occasion they decided to take me with them. I was just fifteen – a very mature fifteen, I must emphasize.

‘Dr Goebbels had come from Germany especially for the occasion. I have the most vivid recollection of him limping nimbly through the glittering throng. Although temperatures that day couldn’t have been higher, an icy wind seemed to blow as he passed me. It was as if an evil, solitary, cruel god had clambered down among the bustle of pleasure-seeking, cowardly, pitiful mortals!

‘Prince Cyril had with him his maitresse-en-titre, a cabaret singer of Magyar extraction called Victoria Kallassi, and their infant son Clement, known as Clemmie. To bring a bastard baby – what they used to call a badling – to the King’s anniversary garden party was not the done thing of course, but Cyril enjoyed being outrageous. Cyril had a talent for getting away with things.

‘That poor badling! He died five years later – fell in Lake Garda and drowned, or so I heard. I vividly remember the swan-shaped white pram and his corpulent and rather peevish-looking Austrian nanny. Her name was Fraulein Guldenhove.

‘The mistress, Victoria, was a tempestuous beauty. She had flashing eyes, raven-black hair and sculpted scarlet lips. Her complexion exuded a rose-and-amber glow. She wore a scarlet dress that day. Very tight in the waist. Elbow-length gloves but bare legs. She sported a diamond necklace that had once belonged to Princess Clementine, Prince Cyril’s Bourbon grandmother.

‘Someone – the wife of the Austrian charge d’affaires, I think – drew a parallel between Victoria and Sylvia Varescu, the heroine of The Czardas Queen. The Kalman operetta, you know. It’s on the joint subject of misalliance and true love. It was enjoying a tremendous success at the local musical theatre at the time. It was, as they say, all the rage.

‘Victoria was the proud owner of a bed that had once belonged to Napoleon’s mistress Josephine, complete with fragrant linen and pillows of unparalleled softness. I liked to sit on that bed when she was not around – but that was later, when I became their nanny. Sorry – mustn’t jump the gun!

‘Prince Cyril strutted about in a white mess jacket. He wore the Grand Cross Collar and Badge that went with the Order of the Bath. The decoration had been awarded to his late father, King Ferdinand, by Edward VII. My mother took rather a shine to his well-trimmed moustache, much to my father’s annoyance. My mother thought Cyril looked like a character out of The Chocolate Soldier. In my father’s opinion he looked like a bounder.

‘The presence of the badling – poor little Clemmie – was causing particular tension. The Queen, puritanical, Catholic, Italian-born Giovanna, had been driven to distraction by her brother-in-law’s indiscretions. She cared an awful lot what Sofia high society might be saying. Rather suburban of her to mind, I remember my mother saying. Well, Sofia high society, like most enclosed high societies, had more than its fair share of busybodies, gossips and intriguers. I imagine little else was being discussed that day but the mistress and the badling.

‘Giovanna sported a sort of redingote of pale moth-coloured chiffon with a pelisse covered in solid sequins, a big pearl and diamond necklace and tiara. She only needed a wand to fly to the top of a Christmas tree! But her expression was sour – oh so sour – not fairy-like at all! She was said to be controlling and manipulative and to demand absolute conformity to her narrow views.

‘Hundred of photos were taken that day and they later appeared in various illustrated Continental magazines. I cut them all out and pasted them in my scrapbook. All gone now, alas, vanished without a trace!

‘What was King Boris’ reaction to the badling’s presence? Well, in characteristic style he pretended he hadn’t noticed anything amiss. He went on walking about rather stiffly, smiling, shaking hands, making small talk.

‘The King was a thin, mild-mannered man with a high balding forehead, and, like his younger brother, he sported a well-trimmed dark moustache. He was a decent chap, but scarcely an entertaining one. His two much-publicized passions were for steam trains and Bavarian cream, but he was best known for never telling people what he really thought.

‘The King was dressed in a white general’s uniform and had white gloves on. He was covered in glittering decorations and had a sheathed sabre at his right thigh. Good thing too – otherwise he might have been mistaken for a bank manager taking it easy at some Continental spa!

‘The palace was adorned with flags of all sizes. Brightly coloured tapestries hung from the windows and the balconies. There were flowers everywhere – white freesias, lilies of the valley, parrot tulips, pansies, morning glory and roses. A hussar band played a pot-pourri of Viennese waltzes and polkas. Trays of chilled champagne were carried round by footmen in splendidly frogged silk coats and silver-buckled shoes.

‘The food was scrumptious. I remember something called norde pole – extra-special vanilla ice-cream on a pedestal of clear ice – and an “architectural” cake with ramparts fashioned after the bastions of the palace of Darius! I remember the great glazed slabs jewelled with scarlet cherries glistening on fine porcelain plates…

‘The next day the Sofia papers were to describe the event in the most gushing of terms. “A scene of profuse hospitality and festivity… a most elegant repast… a brilliant display of loveliness, beauty and style”.

‘I believe it was the kind of saccharine prose that was churned out on every grand occasion of the time.’