Taki's Mag

Mari-Cha III

ISLE OF ISCHIA—On a bright, windy June morning this beautiful island’s church bells rang out to welcome the most ostentatious concourse of sailing boats to have arrived at its shores since Commodore Thomas Troubridge sailed into the bay of San Angelo in 1799. Troubridge, dispatched by Lord Nelson to quell an island revolt, had brought great distinction to the family. They upheld that distinction for 200 years until in a moment of madness “Poor Tom” Troubridge was lured into marriage by the highly ambitious daughter of an Australian librarian and an Austrian POW guard, Marie-Christine Reibnitz, presently known as Princess Pushy and then some. Poor Tom’s liaison with the Australo-Austrian bitterly disappointed Ischia’s people, who consigned the Troubridge name to a cheap and watery grave. The Ischians, however, are a forgiving lot, and ever since Marie-Christine found another sucker, the Troubridge name has been revived and restored to its proper place.

Thus on that bright and windy morning last week the crowds gathered to watch the annual Pug’s Club regatta, with enough moolah in that bay to pay off the Greek national debt. The big favorite and defending champion was billionaire Bob Miller in his trans-Atlantic record-setting Mari-Cha III. The evening before the race we met onboard the magnificent 260-foot Talitha, owned by Mark Getty and acting as the committee boat, where Mark laid down the rules, the course, and the handicaps. Just as well everyone was drunk, because the long-shot underdog Tim Hoare threatened to boycott the race after balking at the defending champion’s generous handicap. That is when the president of Pug’s, Nick Scott, deftly changed the subject and brought up club business.

The business was easy to deal with but extremely unpleasant. It was about a man’s appalling behavior toward HRH Princess Marie-Chantal of Greece, wife of a Pug member, at Arki Busson’s charity party the week before. Someone who shall remain nameless had the gall to put the man, art dealer Larry Gagosian, up for membership. All 17 of us blackballed him at once, which tied the record for blackballs held by Jeffrey Epstein, child molester and friend of Prince Andrew. What egregious act had Gagosian committed? While looking for his seat he had pushed the Greek princess aside and had failed to excuse himself. Princess Pavlos may look fragile, but she knows how to defend her territory. She called him a nouveau vulgarian who should learn manners to go along with his billions. Gagosian didn’t know what hit him. Back in the Big Bagel, billionaires such as Gagosian are allowed to push poorer people and women aside; in fact, it is a sine qua non of having new money.

Pushing a lady in full view of the Duchess of Cambridge is a first, even in the Bronx. After the 17 blackballs were retrieved from the 18th-century Fabergé box, a member was heard to say that “where the princess comes from is a far, far better place than that man has ever known.”

But back to the race. Bob Miller slaughtered us as predicted, although Tiger Lily, owned and captained by Roger Taylor of the rock group Queen, gave him a run for his moolah. Bushido won a great victory by not coming in last—we were next to last—followed by the humiliatingly handicapped Commodore Hoare’s gallant vessel. The champagne party onboard the winner’s boat was a tame affair, as was the Getty party on the first night. The Taylor party on the second had turned most of us into zombies. The racing, the relentless sun, Frankfurt, and the E. coli had aged me by ten years. My friend Leopold Bismarck wrapped me up in an Imperial German Flag, its iron cross on the upper left corner helping restore my balance and equilibrium.

This has not been a good year for me. I have tasted defeat everywhere. In judo. In sailing. My Stalingrad finally came on June 8th, 2011, after my Asprey’s party. I am as ashamed of it as if I had been caught stealing from a church collection box, but I have never kept secrets from Speccie readers. Late that evening executive editor Andrew Neil and the sainted Spectator editor Fraser Nelson accompanied me to the Brompton Oratory, where Cardinal Gaetani Lovatelli was waiting. We waited for my fiancée, the Spectator’s deputy editor, but after two hours a messenger arrived with a letter to me about having to miss the wedding because of her mother. I was too ashamed to tell my two witnesses, but the Cardinal, an old friend of my family, said it all as he walked off in a huff: “Vaffanculo,” or words to that effect. Humiliated and destroyed, I walked down the Fulham Road and ran into Tim Hanbury with by far the two most beautiful girls in England, Georgie Wells and Lily Robinson, the latter dressed only in a towel. I don’t know why Lady Luck suddenly decided to favor me, but I am engaged to both of them—as a Greek Orthodox, I am allowed three—and I consider myself the luckiest man on this planet. So there.