One Enchanted Evening

Anton Du Beke

Chapters (50)

Cover

Dedication

To Hannah, George and Henrietta the loves of my life

Prologue

31 December, 1936

The Grand Masquerade Ball

FOR THE LORDS AND LADIES of London town, the dukes and duchesses of every English shire, the counts and countesses of the continent – and even beyond – there is only one place to be seen on this New Year’s night. The doors of the Buckingham Hotel are open, for this is a night to be remembered.

It is an age of splendour. It is an age of magnificence. For some, it is an age of elegance and grace – and here in the Buckingham’s Grand Ballroom, crown princesses and sirens of the silver screen have come to toast the New Year, government ministers and landed gentry have come to forget, if only for a moment, this year of wars abroad and the increasing threat at home. The band is playing. The dancers are swaying. The hall is filled with the great and the good. Others watch discreetly from the sidelines . . .

In the heart of the ballroom, the principal dancer, hidden behind his Venetian mask, twirls away from his partner and seems to glide as he crosses the dance floor. The orchestra prepares to strike up another serenade but not a soul in the ballroom notices the silence in between songs. They are transfixed, every eye trained upon the mysterious dancer who approaches the mahogany stairs and, lifting his hand to the Crown Princess of Norway, beseeches her to join him on the dance floor.

‘Your Highness,’ he ventures, in a rich, dulcet tone, ‘shall we?’

Some of the faces around him flicker. There is surprise, even consternation, in their eyes.

On the other side of the ballroom, the band strikes up their new number. It is time for the waltz to begin.

The dancer takes off his mask . . .

Five Months Earlier . . .

August 1936