Katya & The Prince of Siam

On Monday morning Vanya, Healey and I went to the bank. I took out £300. To change it into Hongkong dollars is very expensive. £300 gets only 1800 dollars. I gave 1,000 to Vanya in case he gets an opportunity to send it to Alla and Mathilda and my other relatives who have nothing to eat.’

 

It was still only May and Katya would not return home for another eight months – not until January 1919. Although she and Chakrabongse corresponded regularly, Katya in particular showering him with letters and picture-postcards (the latter also for Nou and the dogs), this long break in their relationship – as unshared experiences multiplied – distanced them from one another … .

 

Katya during her trip in China. In the centre is Ivan Desnitsky and on his left, Mr Healey.

 

 

Postcard of the Temple of Heaven from Katya to Prince Chakrabongse during her 1918 trip. Unusually the postcard is written in formal royal Thai, not Russian.

 

Postcard to Prince Chula from Katya

 

Postcard from Katya to Prince Chakrabongse.

 

After her departure, Chakrabongse’s life continued much as usual as, due to her breakdown, she had already slipped into the background of his rare leisure time. He was hurt and rather offended when all his invitations to Hua Hin were refused by Bimrambai, who felt it was wrong for her to stay there in Katya’s absence, despite his insistence that the married ladies always among his guests were more than adequate as chaperones. So, rather disconsolately, he asked her younger sister Princess Chavalit to stay instead. Chavalit did not share Bimrambai’s scruples and arrived with a devoted maid, who slept under her bed!

In 1918 Chavalit was only fifteen and, even prettier than her sister, she was as irresponsible as a playful kitten, tireless in pursuit of the pleasures of the moment. Her high spirits, her still childlike voice and a way she had of rocking on her little heels when she laughed, endeared her not only to Chakrabongse, but also to his son who, at ten years old, was not all that much younger than she was. The first summer days they spent together at Hua Hin – playing tennis, riding and swimming – with numbers of young relatives and friends, were so light-hearted and cheerful that Chakrabongse, forgetting his cares, felt young again, while Chula felt he had grown up.

On their return to Bangkok, Paruskavan without her quick darting presence, seemed so staid and dreary that Chakrabongse persuaded her to come there more often. In fact little persuasion was needed, with Chavalit’s mother eagerly encouraging what she saw as a very advantageous liaison. Soon Chavalit’s band of youthful friends began arriving with her, coming, as she airily explained, as company for Chula, who now openly adored her and wrote her many little notes to tell her so. These she pasted into an album together with his photo, and greatly daring, one of his father on the opposite page! Bisdar, Chula’s playmate recalled in his seventies that: ‘We were all in love with Chavalit in our boyish way … she was so full of fun, very pretty, not dark but with a complexion described in Siam as being ‘pale, like coffee with milk’.

Gradually the atmosphere of the house and gardens altered, alive with chattering voices and easy-going laughter, until a kind of frivolous anarchy prevailed. The ballroom with Katya’s favourite hyacinth blue curtains had become an indoor tennis court, bicycle races were won and lost along the well-swept gravel paths, and the latest dance tunes picked out on her piano. Chakrabongse smiled indulgently at the transformation of his home, telling himself it made life more cheerful for his sometimes lonely son, but beneath this assumption of a quasi-paternal role, other feelings – the stronger for being unadmitted – grew and flourished.

 

 

Princess Chavalit.

 

Soon their love affair became an open secret and, although on the surface decorum prevailed, not a glance, covert clasp of hands or whispered word, would have been missed by the respectfully lowered eyes of the retinues of servants. Everyone who was anyone in Bangkok knew of it, and speculated about what would happen when Mom Katerin returned. Most of the gossips were convinced that the affair was temporary – a husband on his own without a wife – it was surely nothing serious, it would all blow over.