My Life

My Life - Oswald Mosleygentler entourage included two well-known characters of the period called Johnny andTony who were always at her festive board, and had a more delicate appreciation ofhaute couture than of high politics. However, the natural shrewdness of Johnny'sHighland origin - the younger generation nicknamed him the Highlander - came outstrong on one occasion. The American Election of 1932 was approaching, and thetycoons assembled at Elsie's dinner-table were covering Roosevelt with ridicule andobloquy, when up piped Johnny: 'I think Roosevelt is going to win'. 'Silly littleJohnny,' echoed round the board in diverse tone and accent, 'What makes you thinkthat?' 'Because all our friends think Hoover will win,' responded the Highlander. Thedemise of Tony was said in shadowy legend to have evoked Elsie's strongest qualitiesof spartan resolution: Tony is dead and we are a man short for dinner—the old guardmight die, but Elsie did not surrender. Most of the tales were probably apocryphal, butshe certainly combined the hard, cutting qualities of a good diamond with one of themost voluptuous settings it was possible to encounter. Consequently, into this delicatescene of beautiful women and young men, almost as exquisite as some of thespecimens we see today, were continually intruded the toughest tycoons of WallStreet and American industry. It was a theatre of interest.Elsie married my friend, Charles Mendl, whom I knew well after my first visit toParis in 1920 and last saw there a few years ago just before he died, well in hiseighties. It was a marriage as remarkable as it was unexpected, for both were gettingon and she was some twelve years the senior; a marriage of scent and old brandy, aswe called it. But he had considerable qualities in addition to being one of theoutstanding bons vivants of our time. After a rough, cattle-punching youth in theArgentine - he was a most manly figure - he had turned up by some inexplicableprocess during the First World War as an official at the British Embassy in Parisresponsible for dealing with the Press, and there he remained until the Second War.Sinister rumours attached to his activities, but I soon became convinced they werequite untrue. There was much talk of the Chevalerie de St. George, a reference to theold allegation that British diplomats abroad always tried to bribe the foreign Press andhad ample funds available for this purpose.Mendl had at his flat in the Avenue Montaigne one of the best cooks and was himselfone of the best judges of wine in Paris. He invited me frequently, and as a young M.P.and later as a Minister I met there some of the most interesting personalities of France.One day he asked me to meet Tertinax' —his real name was Gerault—and to try todisarm some of the hostility he showed towards Britain in his newspaper articles. Ifound him charming, and we got on all too well, for when I was returned toParliament at a by-election in 1926 he wrote a leading article entitled 'Le retourd'Akibiades' in a mood of hyperbole which ascribed to me among other moreacceptable qualities capacities which would be more appreciated in French than inEnglish politics. These thoughts no doubt occurred to him because we met in thehouse of Charles Mendl, who was preoccupied with this side of life. When I used tosee Charles alone in his old age, his mind was still running to some extent on one ofhis chief life interests. He had an exchange one day with his doctor, who combined intrue Gallic fashion a considerable professional capacity with much charm and wit:'Doctor, I still think a good deal about women'—'You must keep on thinking, SirCharles, keep on thinking.' Charles was a gay and lovable person, and I miss him withall the happy clamour of Versailles in those far-off days.72 of 424