The royals - Kitty Kelley [122]
Princess Margaret’s friends, who describe her as the houseguest from hell, also receive a list of instructions: tune the piano, get lots of Ella Fitzgerald records, import some young men who like to sing and dance, and have a recording of “Scotland the Brave” by the Royal Highland Fusiliers. Most important: provide potables—Gordon’s eighty-proof gin and tonic for midmorning through midafternoon, and from midafternoon until midnight, Famous Grouse Scotch whiskey. “You must make sure she has jammy dodgers for tea,” said one of Margaret’s hostesses. “Jammy dodgers are little circular sandwiches cut out of white bread with raspberry jam in the middle. The raspberry preserve must be seedless because Her Royal Highness does not like seeds stuck in her teeth, so you have to purchase imported preserves.
“Royal weekends are such a nightmare. The worst pressure is if you have the Queen to stay. Then you must lock your cats in the stable because Her Majesty abhors cats. You have to have barley water for her because that’s what she uses to cleanse her face. You have to send your children away because the royals can’t stand children. My son hates when the royal family descends on us, especially Margaret. He says she’s like the front of Notre Dame—all gargoyles—and should have water spouting out of her mouth.
“All members of the royal family believe the prestige they bring to their hosts justifies the inconvenience and expense of their visit. It’s an arrogant assumption but indisputably valid because I don’t know anyone within the aristocracy who has ever turned them down, myself included. Lord Douglas of Neidpath threatens to bar Margaret’s next visit, but so far he hasn’t.”
The prospect of a royal visit can turn a household upside-down. “Every time that call came from the King’s [George VI’s] equerry or the Queen’s [Elizabeth’s] lady-in-waiting, my mother would go into a faint,” recalled the daughter of a marquess. “ ‘Oh, God, oh, God, they want to come for tea.’ You couldn’t say no. You just couldn’t. So we’d rush around for biscuits, unearth the Earl Grey, and find some clotted cream. Then we got cleaned and scraped the horse muck off our shoes. We dreaded their arrival, but we were ready.
“In they’d pounce. The first visit I remember was King George VI, Queen Mary, the Countess of Athlone [Queen Mary’s sister-in-law], Princess Elizabeth, Prince Philip, and Princess Margaret. I was eight, my brother was three. We stood to attention when they arrived. I had to curtsy to the floor and he had to bow with his neck, bringing his chin to his chest….”
Over the years Princess Margaret came to rely on the largesse of rich friends like the Aga Khan and Imelda Marcos to provide villas and yachts for her pleasure. She especially enjoyed visiting Italy and regularly invited herself to stay with Harold Acton at La Pietra in Florence and Gore Vidal in Ravello. She also expected to be paid to attend certain overseas charity events and demanded first-class accommodations—planes, hotels, limousines, hairdressers—in addition to a personal appearance fee. She acted as though this were her due. The royal presence deserved royal compensation, especially from rich Americans.
“I remember when one of her best friends arranged for Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon to be guests of honor at a charity ball in New York,” recalled writer Stephen Birmingham. “The Snowdons charged us $30,000 as their personal appearance fee, but we couldn’t pay them because we couldn’t raise enough money from ticket sales. They left New York feeling exploited and we felt robbed. Worse, the Princess never spoke to her friend again—all because of a lousy $30,000.”
Even her friends described her as temperamental. “Margaret is operatic,” said one man. “I’ve known her all my life. I’ve escorted her places, been entertained in her home at Kensington Palace, even stayed with her in Mustique. Yet I’m utterly dispensable. I’m there only for her entertainment and amusement when she needs to be entertained and amused. Beyond that, I’m nothing to her. I’m not otherwise