Robert Wainwright - Nellie: The Life and Loves of a Diva

Praise for Robert Wainwright

The charm of Wainwrights biography is that he makes us see what an engaging, admirable and sometimes heroic quality it is to be a life-enhancer like Sheila Daily Mail on Sheila

As social history Sheila Chisholms life is fascinating its undeniably enjoyable to read of all that glitter and gold The Spectator on Sheila

A marvellously entertaining story that at times resembles a glossy television period drama Daily Express on Sheila

Muriel Matterss name is apt: she certainly does matter [a] highly readable biography Daily Mail on Miss Muriel Matters

[A] compelling biography As a study of a man whose greatness we would do well to remember and applaud, it sparkles Independent on The Maverick Mountaineer

Wainwright chronicles it all with aplomb Wainwright has done a fine job of rescuing his protagonist from the footnotes of climbing history Telegraph on The Maverick Mountaineer

Robert Wainwright has conjured up the rasp of crampons on sheet ice, the taste of peaches eaten from the tin, and the bitchiness endemic among the frozen-bearded tribe of climbers and explorers The Spectator on The Maverick Mountaineer

Also by Robert Wainwright

Enid: The Scandalous Life of the Formidable Lady Killmore

Rocky Road: The Incredible True Story of the Fractured Family Behind the Darrell Lea Chocolate Empire

Miss Muriel Matters: The Fearless Suffragist Who Fought for Equality

The Maverick Mountaineer: The Remarkable Life of George Ingle Finch

Sheila: The Australian Ingenue Who Bewitched British society

Born or Bred? Martin Bryant, the Making of a Mass Murderer

The Killing of Caroline Byrne: A Journey to Justice

The Lost Boy: A Search for Life, a Triumph of Outback Spirit

Rose: The Unauthorised Biography of Rose Hancock Porteous

First published in Australia in 2021 by Allen & Unwin

This hardback edition published in Great Britain in 2022 by Allen & Unwin

Copyright Robert Wainwright, 2021

The moral right of Robert Wainwright to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

Every effort has been made to trace or contact all copyright holders. The publishers will be pleased to make good any omissions or rectify any mistakes brought to their attention at the earliest opportunity.

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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Hardback ISBN: 978 1 83895 509 0

E-book ISBN: 978 1 83895 510 6

Printed in Great Britain

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To my mother, Rae

25 March 1919
London

Philippe sat at the desk beside the window, barely noticing the hotel rooms opulence. Staff had drawn the heavy curtains for the night but the faint clop of harnessed horses could still be heard in the street outside, mingled with the chug of early-model cars and overladen buses taking office workers home.

London was beginning to reopen in the lee of the Great War, the world at an uneasy peace as the terms of Germanys surrender were thrashed out in what would become the Treaty of Versailles.

But Philippes mind was elsewhere this night, head bowed in concentration and pen poised over a sheet of hotel stationery, excited and yet uncertain about what he should write.

He was normally a man of supreme self-belief, even though others had prevented him from attaining what he considered his birthright. Philippe dOrleans, pretender to the French throne, had lived most of his life in exile from his Paris home, a fate he regarded as worse than a prison sentence. He was locked outside rather than locked within.

Philippe was used to writing about complex political affairs but the task tonight was different and deeply personal. Although the words he chose would have no public consequences, they would determine what might happen next in an important relationship that had been lost and only now rediscovered. Other than the title he would never officially bear, this loss had been the greatest disappointment of his life.

Finally, he scrawled a dateline at the top of the letterFrom the Ritz Hotel, Piccadilly. It was unnecessary given that it was here, in the citys most famous hotel, just a few hours before that he had met the woman he once adored and even wanted to marry. But formality was the way of the world for both of thema blessing and a cursehe a king without a crown and she in the twilight of a stage career that had shone like few others. And he wanted her to know that he had sat down to write immediately after she had left, the feelings still warm and unsettling.

They had first met thirty years ago. They were young back then; he was a wilful prince with thick blond hair dusted with faint rust, pale blue eyes and a square jaw and she was a striking, powerful soprano taking the London opera by storm with her golden trill and feisty colonial spirit. Their affair had risked all, burned brightly and was then extinguished before the flame could take hold.

It all seemed so long ago and yet this afternoon those same feelings had returned. They were both older, of course, each successful but worse for wear, physically and emotionally, from lifes rigours and uncertainties. He still had the bearing of a man used to an active life but a waxed moustache and pointed beard flecked with grey hid a middle-aged chin while she had arrived at the hotel wrapped in chinchilla that only served to enhance the inevitable widening of a once lithe frame.

But the changes only served to confirm that their love was more than just lust, and that behind the tingling pleasure of their reunion there had been regret, on his part at least and he hoped on hers. What might have been if not for the demands, antiquated rules and expectations of others.

Both had married others and neither relationship had lasted. She had one child but he had no heirs and his title, for what it was worth, would pass to a nephew when he died.

Who could say if their union might have been different if it had been allowed to flourish and settle, but if his feelings these long years later were any test, then the answer was surely yes.

Their meeting today had been all too brief, barely enough time to confirm with a touch of hands that the passion they had held for each other so many years before had not disappeared. But there was so much more to say, to express and to explore. He wanted to see her again, not to reignite the fires of their brief love affair but to re-establish their friendship. Tomorrow they would dine together and talk, he hoped, as he finally put pen to paper.

My dear Nellie,

What can I tell you of the tender emotion that I have felt again after so many years? It seemed to me that it was yesterday that I said au revoir to you and that I found myself near to you the same, in spite of the age I then had nearly thirty years ago. I was so happy to find you in spite of your sufferings, moral and physical the same Nellie who has never changed and who remains in my life, sometimes so sad, the only constant and faithful friend whomeven in the delirium of death that I so closely escapedmy soul and heart reached across space. For you know me and understand me! In spite of all the world has done to separate the one from the other, I am satisfied because the confidence you give me is my recompense. Thank you again for the few moments in which you have really made me happy in evoking the best years of my youth that I have relived through you and with you. I count the minutes that separate me from the moment when I will see you tomorrow evening. I hope for longer than this evening? I have so many things to say to you that I cannot write. But that tomorrow evening will come of themselves from my lips when I am near to you. I do hope you will give me time to tell you all that I have in my heart. Meanwhile, my dear Nellie, I kiss most affectionately your pretty hands and am always your old Tipon.