High life
Touche
Taki
Spetsai Oh dear. Odysseus has finally been taken in by a geriatric Circe. After 30 years of carefully negotiating social obstacle courses and jet-set minefields, I was booby-trapped last week by the oldest trick in the book. An invitation to lunch by a lady whose sincerity has never been ques- tioned, or even mentioned come to think of it. But before I give you all the gory details a bit of background is necessary.
During the late Fifties and early Sixties the rich white trash (RWT) of the French Riviera had two social leaders. The first was Eddie Gilbert, the second Rosemary Kanzler. The former was an American who owned a house named Villa Zamir, in Cap Martin, and who kept open house for lun- cheon each Sunday. The latter was a Swiss- born woman, an alleged ex-bar-keeper, who threw her house open every Sunday in Villefranche. In 1962 Gilbert was sent to Sing-Sing for fraud. His crowd moved over to Rosemary's. At the time she was married to a very nice man named Ernie Kanzler, an uncle of Henry Ford, who soon after obliged by dying and leaving her all his for- tune, which was considerable.
I was married to my first wife at the time, and I guess I was part of the RWT as much as anyone. Cristina liked homosexuals, male interior decorators, dress designers and gigolos. She also adored people whose IQ was lower than their age. Cristina was very happy whenever she was at Rosemary'! for lunch, which was often. By 1962 I was beginning to catch on, however, and I went very, very rarely. After Ernie Kanzler died I never set foot in the merry widow's house again.
When the French Riviera became chic for sheiks only, Rosemary Masseuse-Merciere, as she was now called after having married her fifth husband, decided to move to Greece. To Spetsai to be exact. Now I am the first to admit that there are far worse people than the Masseuse-Mercieres in Greece, fortunately, however, I don't run into them often. That is not the case with the Masseuse-Mercieres. Three years ago somebody brought them to a party I was giving at Aspinall's. They were out of place but welcomed by me as I had, after all, had plenty of free lunches from Rosemary in the past. A couple of years ago she threw a party in her Greek house which I dubbed the Pansy Ball as most of the guests were of the RWHT persuasion. (rich, white, homosexual trash) I heard that she was disturbed, I didn't care. Greece is a disaster area where politics and environmental mat- ters are concerned, but the foreigners who live here, or who have summer houses, are among the nicest. Rosemary's friends have always been the type for whom no humilia- tion is too shaming, no insult too wounding to endure in order to be with what they often mistakenly consider to be their superiors. Her houses have always been fill- ed to the brim with climbers and parasites, which tranquil little islands like Spetsai can do without. That was all I had against her. Until last week.
My friend Yohanes Goulandris, his wife Aliki, the Soldatis, Anthony Haden-Guest, and half a dozen other English guests were staying with me when an invitation came to a luncheon at Rosemary's. Although I was on my boat some of my guests were staying with Eleni Zographos, my best friend's sister who has a house on the island. The English contingent wisely refused the invita- tion. Eleni and the mother of my children insisted I go. In fact Eleni said that if I didn't go no else would either. 'It is too `I guess they're Russian tourists.' boring,' she said. 'You'll raise some hell and we'll laugh.' Like a fool I said yes. But as I had refused at first I had the mother of my children ring back and say that I would come after all. On the day of the lunch mY English guests left early for a picnic and I was busy doing my exercises when the telephone rang once again. It was Rose- mary's husband insisting we come early because some of the other guests had to leave right after lunch. Grumbling, we corn- plied. I arrived on my boat and with mY guests, dropped anchor in front of her house, and went ashore in one of her dinghies. Eleni and the mother of MY children greeted her first. I was third and about to say hello when her painted face sagged like a collapsed cake. 'How dare you come into my house,' she screamed at the top of her voice. 'Nein, no, you leave mien house,' she bellowed in Swiss German. Now Rosemary is past 70 years of age and I was not about to talk back to a very distraught woman. I smiled at her however, and said something to the effect that I con- gratulated her on her cunning stunt but not on her inability to learn manners after hav- ing worked so hard for her money. We all then turned and beat a rather dignified retreat to my boat. The reason I am boring you, dear readers, with all this is simply cathartic. No one, least of all myself, likes to be traPP0, in a situation like the one I have just told you about. Perhaps the ex-bar frau thinks she has won a famous victory. Perhaps she has. I was, and am, angry. By staging her little drama she managed, she thinks, to In- sult me. That she has not done, she has onlY managed to prove yet again that multiple face-lifts and multi-millions do Ot necessarily a lady make.
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