Authors: Lady Colin Campbell
‘How can he give you the rights to something that is mine? Colin,’ I commanded, ‘tell him that the rights to my life story are mine. Only I can give them to anyone, and if I were going to give them to someone, it wouldn’t be him.’
Colin stood there silently, red and sweaty from alcohol.
‘Tell her,’ Wilde said. ‘Tell her, goddammit.’
‘I don’t see how he could have done something like that when he knows how much I loathe you. You falsely said that I changed my sex and even had the audacity to quote me saying that.’
‘Your husband said you wouldn’t mind. Without it there wouldn’t have been a story. No serialisation of your life story, no story.’
‘You have the gall to stand here, in front of me and my husband, and say that he authorised you to lie about me?’
‘He didn’t say it was a lie. He said it was the truth.’
‘He couldn’t have done that, Mr Wilde, because it is most certainly
not
the truth. And he knows it.’
I looked from Wilde to Colin and back. I couldn’t tell which of the three of us was more furious.
‘Are you going to stand there like a spineless jerk and let him say this about you to my face and yours, or are you going to behave like a man?’ I demanded of Colin.
‘He misquoted me in the article and he’s misquoting me now,’ Colin said, knowing very well that to have said anything else would have meant instant ejection from the apartment and my life.
‘I did not misquote you,’ Wilde insisted, and they started squabbling over who had said what to whom. Oaths flew for a good few minutes and then Colin began pummelling Wilde with his fists. Soon they were on the floor, and Wilde was coming off the better. Displayed on the wall beside the sofa was a Fijian war club which Colin claimed had been given to him by a descendant of the last warrior king. I grabbed it and swung it behind Wilde, screaming to him to get up, otherwise I’d club him. He spun around, saw the club, sprang off Colin and jumped towards me, seizing the weapon. He hit Colin with it once on the forehead, threw it down, screamed obscenities at us and ran out of the door, adding for good measure a few blows to my body as I clung on to his sleeve. ‘Stop that man,’ I screamed all the way down the stairs, through the lobby, past the doorman and into the street. This being New York, of course no one did a thing.
Rushing back upstairs, I saw that Colin’s wound was only superficial. I challenged him about what Wilde had said. He categorically denied every word.
‘In that case, you won’t mind pressing charges against him for assault. I certainly will, if the few punches he gave me qualify. This might be a blessing in disguise. He’ll have to be tried. We can tell the court, and all the newspapers
you
will get to attend, how he’s conned us into this sorry pass.’
The police arrived within fifteen minutes. ‘If we take a statement tonight, we have to report your husband’s condition,’ they said. Colin was so drunk he could barely stand. ‘My advice is, let him sleep it off. Tomorrow he can go downtown and make a report.’
So we rose bright and early the following day and Colin filed a complaint against Wilde for assault. We then went with the police to serve the papers. I was jubilant. The truth would be established and my reputation restored.
But things are not always cut and dried especially if you cannot be sure where the allegiances of others lie. Two days later, I returned home in the afternoon and overheard Colin on the telephone. I did something which would have been unthinkable even a few weeks before: I eavesdropped. He was speaking to his brother, who seemed to be insisting that I had definitely changed my sex, and that it had definitely been at Johns Hopkins.
Colin was saying that he had no doubt I was speaking the truth, but I was stonewalling him about the details. Implying that there were plans for other stories in the pipeline, he said I had no idea what was happening. I felt faint.
I opened the door noisily. ‘I have to go now,’ Colin said. ‘I’ll call you later.’
‘Hi,’ I said. ‘Who was that?’
‘Get out, you fucking bitch. Get out. I want you out of here right now.’
‘What’s got into you?’ I inquired pleasantly.
‘You tricked me into marriage. I want you out of here. Get out, get out, get out!’ he screamed.
‘Are you insane? How could I have tricked you into marriage when you’re the one who made all the running?’
‘I never knew anything about your past until after I married you.’
‘That’s a lie, and you know it.’
‘Get out. If you don’t get out right now, I’ll throw you out bodily. This time I might kill you, so you’d better do as I say.’
‘Don’t you try to frighten me with threats, you big bully,’ I said. ‘Lay a finger on me and I’ll have the police here quicker than you can say boo.’ I made towards the telephone. He blocked my way, glowering. I serenely opened my handbag to take out a cigarette. ‘If that’s what it takes, I have all day,’ I said calmly, reaching into the bag, lighting the cigarette and inhaling deeply. He stormed off to the desk, grabbed the telephone, and dialled.
‘Barbara, it’s Colin. You’d better come over here and talk some sense into your friend. If you don’t, I can’t be held responsible for what I might do.’
Within minutes, Barbara Taylor Bradford had arrived to find Colin shrieking that he would kill me if I didn’t do as he wanted. I was adamant that I would not leave.
‘This apartment was furnished with my family’s money. I’ve paid the rent. If you want to leave, you leave,’ I said.
‘Barbara, if she doesn’t get out, I’ll kill her,’ Colin threatened.
‘Georgie, he sounds like he means it. Please come with me.’
‘Absolutely not,’ I said.
‘Please. I’d never forgive myself if I left you here and he harmed you.’
‘OK, Barbara,’ I said. ‘I’ll leave. Not because this lout is threatening me, but because I don’t want you involved in yet another of the sorry sagas he creates.’
I went inside to pack an overnight bag. Afterwards, I walked over with Barbara to her apartment. From there, I called Mary Michele Rutherfurd and went to stay with her.
I did not expect Colin to succeed in selling me out to the gutter press – after all, he had none of the information Wilde wanted. But I was beside myself; I felt so betrayed, so defiled, after all the kindness and decency my family and I had shown him. And he knew only too well that he would not only be hurting me, but also my family. They, too, found the publicity distressing; they, too, loathed having their names trawled through the mud.
I was still in a state of distress when my literary agent telephoned me the next day. ‘Georgie, I have some bad news for you. Colin has dropped his complaint against Wilde and has sold a story about you to the
Sunday People.
He’s claiming he knew nothing about your medical history until a week after your marriage. He says that’s the reason why your marriage has broken up.’
The shock was so severe that my system seemed to fuse for a split second. It was as if my internal motor had switched off momentarily, and when it restarted, it did so at half the power and half the speed. For the next seven years, nothing I did could rid me of this sensation. But medical science had yet to recognise post-traumatic stress syndrome, so one simply had to dust oneself down and try to rev oneself up. At times the inability to see what the future holds is merciful. I am glad now that I had no idea how long and dreadfully slow my climb out of the pit which Colin Campbell dug for me would be.
Each day I thought, If I do this, or that, things will fall into place and I’ll begin the ascent back to the spiritual plane I inhabited before. I never doubted I would regain the lost territory, but to have known in advance how long it would take would have daunted me. The first and most immediate effect of Stephanie’s news was shock. This has its benefits, for you can actually function automatically when you are dazed, and this is that I did.
‘Georgie, Wilde wants an interview with you to rebut Colin’s claims,’ Stephanie said.
‘That will only give him an even bigger story,’ I replied. I felt as if I were talking to her from somewhere far away.
‘Not necessarily. How you handle it will determine what he can use. I’ll come with you if you want. But you must speak to your lawyer about this, for Colin is now threatening to sue you for divorce on the grounds that you are a man. You have to give this interview, Georgie. It will be so damning if you don’t.’
I telephoned Charles Dismukes, a respected lawyer. He confirmed Stephanie’s advice. ‘Give the journalist one quote and only one. “My husband knew all about my medical history right from the outset.” Answer questions so that he can’t quote you as having said anything else. You want to make it clear that you’ve been dragged into this article against your will. You mustn’t co-operate with any other aspect of it. You want it to remain Colin’s article. Later, we might use it as grounds for divorce. It should qualify as cruelty.’
Appalling as I found the idea of granting Wilde an interview, I consented. ‘He mustn’t set foot in this building,’ Mary Michele’s father, Boss, cautioned. I asked Stephanie to arrange for us to go to Wilde’s office. The date was set for two days hence, the day after Colin’s final interview.
Mary Michele and her mother Jacqueline were standing nearby when I put down the phone. I promptly collapsed into their arms, the floodgates opening. ‘There, there,’ Jacqueline said, patting my shoulder gently. ‘Let it out. It will do you good.’ Poor Jacqueline could have had no idea how literally I would take her recommendation.
For the remainder of that day, and the whole of the following one, I was either crying or bent over the lavatory bowl being sick. Unable to keep down the soup she kept spoon-feeding me, by the weekend I had lost twenty pounds in weight.
Colin Campbell burst into this torture chamber of his own creation with all the sensitivity of a psychopath. At about seven o’clock on Friday morning, Mary Michele came into my bedroom and shook me awake. ‘Colin’s on the phone.’
‘Hi,’ he said jauntily, as if I were a fellow conspirator. ‘I phoned to say it’s OK for you to come back now.’
‘Ah,’ was all I could manage.
‘The interview with Jolyon went great guns. Come back tomorrow after he drops my cheque over. But don’t come before in case they’re watching the apartment. We can’t be seen together until after the story appears on Sunday.’
‘Is this some sort of joke?’ I asked.
‘Why the fuck do you always have to spoil everything by being so uptight? I’ve made us enough to keep the Priory quiet for a while. Ian won’t have to sell the Park Walk house if we milk our reconciliation for a few more thou’. I’ll let everyone know Wilde misquoted us. We’ll all be happy.’
‘Well,’ I said bitterly, ‘I’ve lived to see the day when green is grey and bad good.’
‘Christ, you’re a fucking pain. Are you or aren’t you coming back?’
‘Absolutely not. Just give me one reason why.’
‘Because you love me,’ he said.
‘You really are sicker than I thought.’
Early that afternoon, Stephanie picked me up and took me downtown to Wilde’s office. At least, I thought, I will be able to pick his brain. By now it was clear that there had been a conspiracy to sacrifice me on the altar of greed and penury, but I still had nothing but unproven suspicions and dropped hints to go on.
Wilde, it transpired, also wanted something from me. He hoped to draw me into a public slanging match with the jerk I was married to.
‘We know Colin is an alcoholic and has mistreated you,’ he said. ‘Just tell your side of the story.’
‘Mr Wilde, one does not slag off one’s husband in the gutter press. Not even if one’s husband deserves it. It is just not done,’ I said. On and on and on we danced for about four hours, until Wilde realised that there was no way I was going to relent.
‘I have to tell you,’ he said, ‘I admire you. You’ve got guts and you’ve got class.’
I wondered if he had any regrets about the things he’d written, but not for long.
I succeeded in gaining some valuable insights into how the whole business had been set up.
‘We could never have written the story if we hadn’t got that tip about your two birth certificates,’ he said. ‘I really swallowed your line when you showed me the one in your apartment.’
‘What tip?’ I asked.
‘The one from the informant who said that you had two birth certificates: one amended, the other abridged.’
‘Was he the same person who told you I’d been treated at Johns Hopkins?’
‘Yes.’
‘When you said “we” got the tip, did you mean yourself here in New York, or the
Sunday People
in London?’ I inquired chattily.
‘London. The informant was never in touch with me. He was in direct touch with London. He’s the one who revived the story after you killed it dead by showing me the birth certificate.’
My head spun as I tried to work out who the hell would do something so awful. It must have been Colin, and Wilde must be covering for him, I decided.
It was not until later that I learned from Colin that Ian was the person who passed that crucial bit of information to the
Sunday People
. Obviously he believed that I had been a patient at Johns Hopkins, a fact he confirmed to me in writing shortly afterwards.
Colin, meanwhile, was on the attack again. When I went to the apartment with Mary Michele to get some clothes, he confirmed what I’d heard from Stephanie.
‘Ian’s advised me to divorce you on the grounds of being a man. The
Sunday People
have provided him with the proof we need. We have chapter and verse on you. You can’t escape us now. Ian says the case will cause an even greater sensation than Pa’s divorce. The $2,500 the
Sunday People
paid for the story of our separation is chickenfeed compared to what we’ll make.’
‘I only hope he’s going to be handling your financial arrangements,’ I said. ‘Stephanie tells me you could’ve got ten times what you did. Not only did you sell me down the drain, you sold yourself as well, you inadequate jerk.’
‘He is. He helped Pa with his divorce. He flew over from Canada – he was at McGill University,’ Colin explained to Mary Michele, ‘to be with him throughout the trial.’ He turned to me. ‘You didn’t know that, did you?’ he said proudly.