High life
Pavement artist
Taki
New York
I've just spent one of the happiest weeks of my life, yet my horoscope had predicted a crucifixion of sorts. I guess it just goes to show that whoever started this fortune telling business — and I suspect it must have been an Arab conman — knew as much about the future as Gaddafi knows about peaceful demonstrations. And speak- ing of Gaddafi, if the Thatcher Govern- ment allows the cold-blooded murderer of WPC Fletcher to go free, it will in effect mean that Orwell's prediction for 1984 has come true, i.e. people can commit murder and, under the guise of some diplomatic mumbo-jumbo, can walk away free hav- ing been fed by their intended victims. Which reminds me. I thought the remarks of the British Ambassador's wife in Libya were highly inappropriate. 'Oh, we're so sorry to have to leave just as we were settling in.' What rot. Why can't diplomats ever say anything that resembles the truth? Like not wanting to leave anywhere in the vicinity of a murdering shit like the Libyan madman. Maybe if a striped-trousers type had been killed she would not be so sad to leave Tripoli. Although it seems indecent to write about fun and games in the same breath as I write about the martyred WPC Fletcher, life nevertheless goes on. And what a life it was last week. It all began with one of the best parties I've been to in a long time. It was a seated dinner for 40 of a rich Brazilian's closest friends, and, as rich Brazilians tend to, there were more princes, playboys and high-class tarts at the dinner than can be found in my latest book, which incidentally goes under the title of Princes, Playboys and High Class Tarts. My host gave the dinner at Club A, the latest in-place in a city that switches in- places as often and as quickly as Elizabeth Taylor changes her mind about men. I was seated next to the celestial Cecilia Chancellor, the 17-year-old daughter of our former editor, a girl who makes more money in a day than her father made in eight years of editing England's best week- ly. Needless to say, Cecilia is taking three months off to model in the Big Apple. Next to her was Albert Grimaldi, the heir to the casino of Monte Carlo, while opposite her sat Serge of Yugoslavia, the heir to the lands that Tito expropriated 39 years ago without compensation.
Both princes seemed very smitten by the
celestial ry al Cecilia, so much so, in fact, that they momentarily forgot what I had written about their families in the past — or perhaps they simply don't, read that much — and greeted me like a long-lost uncle. Which I am sure they thought I was. Cecilia's. What 1 noticed about Albert were his good manners and politeness, until a photographer came into view. Then he began acting like a mafioso, threatening to have the poor man's head. I believe it was just about the same time that another genius in California was spraying western paparazzi with paint, which the taxpayers of England will have to pay for to the tune of some 15,000 US dollars. Well, wiser men than me have pointed out in the past that Royals are not supposed to be smart — and rarely are — but in the case of the Falkland's 'hero' it is downright ridiculous. Instead of raising money for the British Olympic team he cost them untold loss of good will, plus the amount it takes to train a team of quarter milers for one year. I gave a dinner the next day, for my book, and, surprise, surprise, more than 400 people showed up. I never suspected I had so many enemies. And they must have been enemies because of the dent they put in my already depleted pocketbook. In order to create a proper dolce vita look, Mortimer's was decorated like a Fellini scene, with purple and black balloons floating under the ceiling, guards dressed as carabinieri, and waiters garbed as gon- doliers and nuns. There were about 50 peo- ple who read and write, while the rest were part of the title of the book. The eggheads were led by the incomparable Tom Wolfe, whose foreward to my book is the reason it has sold out in all the chic book boutiques of Madison and Fifth Avenue. When the unruly crowd spilled out on the pavement, a passing policeman pointed out that in America an establishment did not own the pavement rights. 'Yes, but a Greek goes for the sidewalk like Michelangelo went for ceilings,' was the way my friend George Plimpton appeased him, and I must say there was something to what he said. The trouble is that it is only a short step from the sidewalk to the gutter, and that is where the mother of my children found me at the end of the very unbookish party. Still, it was well worth it.
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