High life
Memory Lane
Taki
In May 1965 I was living in Paris, a newly' wed. My wife lived at home, on avenue Raymond Poincare, with her mother, her, dog, and her nanny, and I lived in a small suite at the Plaza Athenee. The reason fot this living arrangement was simple. Both, Cristina and I were very independent an' were convinced that if we lived together im- mediately it would traumatise us to such ao extent that our marriage would fail. And vie had good reasons for not wanting that to happen. Everyone, including her father — 3 man known never to be right ah°II,t anything — had predicted that it wouldn last a year. My ambition was to have MY cake and eat it too; hers was to prove her father wrong yet again. Needless to say, the arrangement suited me perfectly. The Plaza-Athenee was a great place l° those days. There were no Arabs, except for the ones who swept up the Relais after it closed at 2 a.m., and the manager would make an exception for a young couPlec where prices were concerned (an unheard °I phenomenon today). Another great Place was Madame Claude's, situated a quarter of a mile away, on the rue Marignan. The Sixties were Claude's best years, with a virl' tage crop of girls, most of whom ended IIP either as successful actresses or married tcrd rich if phony French counts. I use Claude's place quite a lot that year because I was under tremendous pressure fronl UI father. I had convinced him that a tennis" mad public would tear him apart if Ile forced me to leave the circuit and go t°t work. He had believed it for nine years in! by 1965 he was starting to doubt my veraer ty. 'Do something in the French ChamPl0r1,; ships or the honeymoon is over,' he ha" warned me, and little did he guess how PO' phetic his words were. (As everyone WII° has been under pressure knows, nothill$ relieves it better than a visit to a brothel.) As luck would have it my Greek double! partner and I drew the top seeded America' team in the first round of the French Chant; pionships that year. The day of the match decided to lunch in my suite in order to eory1 centrate. My wife decided to lend gut support and showed up for company. we didn't have too many things to ta'r about in those days, she brought along her best friend, Denise Short° — now bettef known as Baroness Thyssen, the wifel. Europe's richest man, according to the knowing Nigel Dempster.
Denise was beautiful then, so I –I d mind the interruption. What I did rrl'he while I brooded about my bad luck in draw was her and Cristina's topic of C0.11,1; versation (which had something to do wl`vi who was rich and who was not). N° remember, I was under tremenclod Pressure. So I did something rather Juvenile. I sprayed the two girls with my s°uP and laughed sophomorically. Cristina went bonkers. She always had a terrible temper and I should have known better. She grabbed a large plate and threw it with all her might toward me. She was two feet away. I blocked it but it cut a deep gash on rnY arm. Blood squirted out like Saudi oil and the girls began to scream and feel faint. on the other hand, was relieved. I had my excuse for playing badly. When the doctor arrived he asked me 1-,439/ it happened. 'Well, doc,' I told him, one of those girls is my wife, the other my Mistress, and they finally got smart.' (It was MY idea of a joke, as Denise was as platonic a friend as I ever had.) `Ah, monsieur, vous est an homme formidable,' the doctor responded. He was really impressed. That afternoon, relaxed in the knowledge that I had a perfect excuse, Nick Kalo and I had t,,wo match points against the Americans, Kalston and Richi, but I managed to lose them both. When I got back to the hotel the doctor had left a message asking me to din- ner any time that week. Bring your friends, said the message. The reason for my reminiscence is that I am once more looking for an excuse before a Competition, one which takes place in Athens next week, and because, having 1°ved to my new flat and opened some 15)11g-forgotten boxes, I have found the note 1.°rn the nice doctor and an old French Lhampionship score card. Tempus fugit.
Previous page
