Previously: Mercenary Leon fails a mission because of David, better known as the Prince of Wales. Socialite Wallis Spencer is also a spy. MI6 makes them a team. David becomes king. David abdicates, they marry and he becomes Bahamas governor. David and Wallis meet the wheeler dealers over dinner.
Jessie Donohue lounged in her bed past ten o’clock one Sunday morning in December of 1940, which was her usual routine while wintering in Miami. She found, however, waking with a headache and aching arches were becoming the norm for her. Jessie realized she could not remain out after midnight at her favorite haunts drinking and dancing without some physical repercussion. But she so hated missing out on the best society gossip which usually slipped out of drunken lips in the wee hours of the morning.
Reaching over for her silver case on her night stand, Jessie took a cigarette out and lit it. She wondered where that girl with the unpronounceable name was with her breakfast tray and morning edition of the Miami Herald.
Where is that girl? If I could remember her name I’d have her fired.
Just then the door opened but instead of the girl entering with her tray it was her darling son Jimmy, with his usual twinkle in his eyes.
“Here’s your breakfast and newspaper, Mummy,” he announced.
“Oh, I’m so glad it’s you. What happened after I left the party last night?”
Jimmy adjusted the tray over her lap, took the tea rose from his lapel and placed it in her graying thick hair.
“Something quite unusual.” He pecked her on the cheek and then plopped into an upholstered chair next to her bed, throwing one leg over the arm of the chair. “I came straight home to you Mummy instead of with the handsome busboy.”
“Oh, that reminds me I’m quite cross with you.” Jessie sipped her coffee. “It’s cold. Even that awful girl, what’s-her-name, brings me hot coffee.”
Jimmy smiled with a glint of the devil in his eyes. “I was afraid you’d throw the hot coffee at me. You were in such a tizzy last night.”
“As well as I should have been.” She bit into her toast which was slathered with orange marmalade. “Imagine my horror to have Lord Beaverbrook stagger up to my table—of course, he had four or five too many martinis—“
“More like six or seven, but go on.” Jimmy rolled his eyes. “You remember I was right there and heard the whole thing.”
“That’s why I’m telling it to you again.” His mother sniffed. “It’s part of your punishment. Anyway, Beaverbrook, full in his cups, said Lord Mountbatten had told him about your little dinner party for his nephew the Marquess of Milford Haven.”
By this time both of Jimmy’s legs were over one arm of the chair and his head lolled back over the other. “Oh, it was just a joke for goodness sake. Haven is as dull as dish water. The tweedy type you know. I thought he needed something to loosen him up.”
“Imagine, a marquess of the British Empire having luncheon with a roomful of prostitutes.”
Jimmy lifted his head. “They were all very pretty prostitutes. Six boys and six girls who looked like they could have posed for Harper’s Bazaar.”
Jessie wiped a bit of marmalade from the corner of her mouth. “And then you asked him if he wanted to see my collection of bronzes. I’ve never had the least bit of interest in bronzes.”
“You wouldn’t have liked these either.” Jimmy laughed. “When Haven opened the door he saw six men covered in bronze paint posing like they were Greeks.”
Jessie picked up the newspaper, threw aside the news and sports sections to go straight to the society columns in the women’s pages. “Thank goodness Louis Mountbatten has a good sense of humor. He’s a bit of an odd duck himself.”
“So what’s all the fuss?” Jimmy faked a yawn.
“The point is that I had to pretend like I didn’t understand a thing Beaverbrook was saying. You know I don’t care what your predilections are, but they are illegal, and if you ever get into real trouble I’ll have to pretend I didn’t know anything about it.”
“I guess Wooly’s philandering with women is perfectly all right.” Jimmy curled up in a peevish fetal position.
“Your brother Wooly, when he knocked up a girl, had the decency to marry the girl, pay for the abortion and then divorce her.”
“Is that what decency amounts to these days?” Jimmy replied with a sneer. “I’d rather be indecent.”
Jessie without warning sat up in bed as she focused on a particular gossip item. “Shut up. Now this is something really important.”
Jimmy went completely prone in the chair as though he were in a coffin ready to be viewed. “Oh no. If it’s about another one of those tweedy types from England I’ll die.”
“Forget the tweeds. It’s the Windsors.”
“I told you I’m not accompanying you to Nassau. The Bahamas bore me to tears.”
“No, no. They are coming here. Wallis has an impacted wisdom tooth.”
“Is that all?”
“It’s worse than that. The tooth is infected, and the infection has spread to her jaw. She’s coming to Miami for surgery.” She lowered her newspaper for a moment. “I hope they don’t have to remove part of her jaw. It would ruin her looks.”
“I didn’t think she had any looks to ruin,” Jimmy sniped.
“A disfigured Wallis won’t help me break into the Four Hundred,” she murmured.
“Mummy, you have more money than all of the Four Hundred combined. What do you care if they don’t want to be around you? They’re the ones who should be groveling—“
“I don’t grovel,” Jessie snapped. “But a Duchess of Windsor turning into Quasimodo won’t help.” She shook her head. “I must stay positive that the operation will be a success. I can’t control the surgery but I can control how she is greeted when their boat lands.”
Putting her newspaper aside, Jessie stared at her son. “Straighten up. I have a job for you.”
Jimmy sat aright in the chair, but his drooping eyelids revealed he wasn’t happy about it.
“I want you to contact all your friends on the Miami party circuit and tell them to be on the pier when the Windsors land. Encourage them to bring as many people as possible, even if they have to bring all their maids and lawn attendants. Get all your special friends to participate, even those busboys.”
He leaned forward. “This is beginning to sound like fun.”
“Have the street lined all the way to St. Francis Hospital. Order tons of flowers for her hospital room. Put a different name on each bouquet. Plant positive articles in the newspaper columns about them. When they think of Miami I want them to smile.”
“Do you want me to wheedle you an invitation to visit her in her room?”
Jessie shook her head. “No, no. Too soon. Have the biggest flower arrangement sent from us. But we must respect their privacy on this first trip to Miami. Then we wait.”
“You love to wait.”
“Yes, then we wait until they decide to visit friendly Miami on a pleasant holiday. At that time, and not before, we will issue the invitation for them to stay at Cielito Lindo.”