This post is inspired by Tilar Mazzeo's history of Paris' Ritz, The Hotel on the Place Vendome, a story of the hotel between the Wars and during the Occupation. I enjoyed it but don't recommend it as a purchase, which is ironic since not only did I snag this as a freebie from the 'take me' shelf of my local charity, it's a version with the author's signature plate on the flyleaf. So someone else felt the same way.
I don't recommend it as a purchase because it sells itself as more than it is. Life, death, betrayal at the Hotel Ritz! The questions you are asking are more treacherous than you think. This book about the Hotel Ritz and the story of the occupation, you should not write it … Yet what's between the covers is a mannered and at times pleasant history of a famous hotel. Rich people doing rich things and pretending to be more interesting than they are, as though money can buy you a personality. There's little to quicken the pulse or excite the imagination. It's useful as a history, if you plan to set a session there, and worth borrowing from the library or buying second hand, but don't rush out to get it.
However there is one incident after the War that intrigues me enough to borrow for a Dracula Dossier story seed.
In 1936 Edward Windsor abdicated so he could marry American divorcee Wallis Simpson. During the war the two royal Nazi sympathizers went to live in Bermuda (gee, thanks ever so, gosh what an honor). After the War they returned to Europe and settled in Paris for a time, because Edward had his sights on the throne again and wanted to be close enough to London to dash over whenever necessary.
His brother George IV was sickly, and his successor Elizabeth was barely 18, saddled with a Greek princeling husband that none of the British establishment cared for, not least because they suspected he might be a Greek bearing gifts, in the form of ne'er-do-well relatives. Under ordinary circumstances Edward didn't have a chance at the throne, but these were not ordinary circumstances. It was felt in certain circles that Edward had a shot, so long as he behaved himself.
Edward had a reputation for sexual adventures. His liaison with Wallis was only the last in a string of unfortunate dalliances. If Edward hoped to replace Elizabeth when her father died, on no account could he be linked with any kind of scandal, particularly sexual scandal.
In steps Wallis. The great love affair had cooled by this point. She didn't precisely hate him, but the marriage was more a convenience than anything else. In 1951 when Edward rushed to his dying brother's bedside, she embarked on a romance that sank Edward's chances altogether.
American socialite Jimmy Donahue, close friend of the Windsors, Woolworth heir and flamboyant homosexual, was the one who drove the wedge in. His friend Barbara Hutton, herself a Woolworth heir, frequent divorcee and, at the time, Princess Troubetzkoy, provided the safe haven at her grand suite at the Ritz. While Edward was in Paris Jimmy and Wallis were discreet, but once Edward left …
That weekend, when the Duke was in London, things in the nightclubs on Montmarte escalated at last into some very public dirty dancing - and into a weeklong fling that took Wallis and Jimmy from one hot spot or another across the capital by night and found them in the afternoons cavorting in delicto at the Ritz, in the lavish suite lent to him for the purpose of some privacy by his millionaire cousin. "I knew it was physical," Barbara Hutton's personal secretary, Mona Eldridge, later admitted … And once the affair was out in the open anyhow, the Duchess made a display of it.
By the time the Duke returned to Paris on June 9, 1951, he stood no chance of usurping Elizabeth. When her father died on February 6, 1952, the princess became Queen Elizabeth II.
All that's the history, However if you're running a Dracula Dossier game then you have the option of giving history some fangs. Where did Edom stand in the succession debate? Did Dracula have any interest? What about personalities like the Legacies, particularly Lord Godalming - did the then heir have a dog in that fight? What exactly is Jimmy's role in this - what was it about Wallis that persuaded him to change preference?
Option 1: Edom Skullduggery. There are powerful interests in London that want to see Edward on the throne, but Edom sees this as an unmitigated disaster. Those same London interests are in bed with Dracula's Satanic Cult, and see Edward as their chance for the ultimate advancement. With his patronage, the Satanic Cult will put its catspaws into positions of utmost sensitivity and importance. Edom can't permit that, so it sends a team - possibly including an SBA - with one goal in mind: sink Edward's chances, but don't kill anyone or do anything that might reveal Edom's hand in this. Edom plays Cupid, using Dracula's own weapons of seduction to do it.
Option 2: Dracula's Spite. Edom wants Edward on the throne. It knows Edward is biddable, and can be persuaded to double Edom's budget, advance its Dukes to high positions in the establishment, and generally make Edom a force to be reckoned with. Dracula, or possibly the remnants of his Conspiracy if the great bloodsucker is indisposed, does not like this idea one bit. Moreover George IV is going in and out of his sickbed like an indecisive corpse - will he or won't he finally die? As it turns out the Conspiracy has two agendas: first, keep George alive until his brother can be dealt with. Second, sink Edward - and the best way to do that is through Wallis.
Option 3: Outside Influences. Jimmy Donahue is the dark horse in this scenario. Erzabet Bathory is the catalyst. This could also work as a sequel to the Carmilla Sanction from Edom Files, assuming Carmilla got away. It would need to be quick work; as written the Carmilla Sanction takes place in 1948, and Wallis' big romance is in 1951. Bathory is fascinated by Jimmy, and Jimmy's money. A liaison with him could refresh her empty coffers, and he is a pretty little thing. Such a pity he's gay, but under Erzabet's influence anything is possible. Trouble is, Erzabet's tinkering sets Jimmy along an entirely different path, and things spiral out of control when a sexually liberated and vampire-influenced Woolworth heir goes on a mad Dionysian spree across Paris. A suspicious Edom sends some minders over, just in case this turns out to be one of Dracula's ploys. The remnants of Dracula's war-torn Conspiracy is also interested in what's going on, because they know vampire activity when they see it but they don't know who's behind it all. Cue a Pink Panther-esque romp across Paris, as everyone joins in the chase from nightspot to hotspot to bedroom, all trying to find out what's going on.
Enjoy!
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