CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Principal characters in the narrative
Preface Paris, 1900
Grosvenor Square London, 1890
1
2 From the Daily Chronicle, first edition, Friday, 14 March 1890
3 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
4 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
5 Letter from Arthur Conan Doyle to his younger brother, Innes Conan Doyle
6 From the Evening News, London, Friday, 14 March 1890
7 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
Marlborough House
8 Telegram delivered to Oscar Wilde at 16 Tite Street, Chelsea, on Friday, 14 March 1890 at 8.15 a.m.
9 Note from Oscar Wilde to Arthur Conan Doyle, delivered by hansom cab to the Langham Hotel at 9.15 a.m.
10 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
11 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
12 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
13 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
14 The Telephone Room
15 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
16 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
17 Notes written by Oscar Wilde on the back of the supper menu at Solferino’s restaurant in Rupert Street
18 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
Vermin in Grosvenor Square
19 Telegram delivered to Constance Wilde at 16 Tite Street, Chelsea, on Friday, 14 March 1890 at 10 p.m.
20 Letter from Arthur Conan Doyle to his wife, Louisa ‘Touie’ Conan Doyle
21 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
The Savoy Hotel
22 Letter from Bram Stoker to his wife, Florence, delivered by messenger at 11.45 p.m. on Friday, 14 March 1890
23 Notes from the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle on the subject of ‘Hysteria in Women’
24 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
25 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
High Tea
26 Telegram delivered to Oscar Wilde at the Albemarle Club, Albemarle Street, London W., at 11 a.m. on Saturday, 15 March 1890
27 Letter from Oscar Wilde to Rex LaSalle, care of 17 Wardour Street, Soho, delivered by messenger
28 Letter from Arthur Conan Doyle to his wife, Louisa ‘Touie’ Conan Doyle
29 Letter from Bram Stoker to his wife, Florence, delivered by messenger at 6 p.m. on Saturday, 15 March 1890
30 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
31 From the notebook of Inspector Hugh Boone of Scotland Yard, Saturday, 15 March 1890
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
32 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
33 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
‘We All Have Secrets’
34 From Reynolds’s Newspaper, Sunday, 16 March 1890
35 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
Mortlake
36 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
37 Letter from Bram Stoker to his wife, Florence, delivered by messenger at 9 a.m. on Monday, 17 March 1890
38 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
39 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
40 From the notebook of Inspector Hugh Boone of Scotland Yard, Monday, 17 March 1890
Duke of Clarence
41 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
42 Postcard from Arthur Conan Doyle to his wife, Louisa ‘Touie’ Conan Doyle, postmarked Monday, 17 March 1890, London W., 10 a.m.
43 Letter from Constance Wilde to her mother-in-law, Lady Wilde
44 Letter from Oscar Wilde to Rex LaSalle, care of 17 Wardour Street, Soho, delivered by messenger
45 Notes made by Arthur Conan Doyle following his visit to the Charcot Clinic at Muswell Manor, Monday, 17 March 1890
‘I am a Vampire’
46 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
Leicester Square
47 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
48 Letter from Arthur Conan Doyle to his wife, Louisa ‘Touie’ Conan Doyle
49
50 Extract from a letter from Bram Stoker to his wife, Florence, delivered by messenger in the early hours of Wednesday, 19 March 1890
A Duty to the Truth
51 From the Daily Chronicle, final edition, Wednesday, 19 March 1890
52 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
53 Telegram from Arthur Conan Doyle to his wife, Louisa ‘Touie’ Conan Doyle, despatched on Wednesday, 19 March 1890, at 7.30 a.m.
54 Telegram delivered to Oscar Wilde at 16 Tite Street, Chelsea, on Wednesday, 19 March 1890, at 7.30 a.m.
55 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
56 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
57 The Dark Penumbra From the notebook of Inspector Hugh Boone of Scotland Yard, Tuesday, 18 March 1890
58 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
59 From The Times, Wednesday, 19 March 1890
60 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
61 The Jersey Lily Telegram delivered to Constance Wilde at 16 Tite Street, Chelsea, on Wednesday, 19 March 1890 at 6 p.m.
62 Telegram delivered to Louisa ‘Touie’ Conan Doyle in Southsea, on Wednesday, 19 March 1890 at 6 p.m.
63 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
Upper Swandam Lane
64 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
65 From the Evening News, late edition, Wednesday, 19 March 1890
66 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
67 From the notebook of Inspector Hugh Boone of Scotland Yard, Wednesday, 19 March 1890
68 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
Jane Avril
69 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
Curious Questions
70 Telegram from Oscar Wilde, Gare du Nord, Paris, to Lord Yarborough, 117 Harley Street, London W., despatched at 1 p.m. on Thursday, 20 March 1890
71 Telegram from Oscar Wilde, Gare du Nord, Paris, to Constance Wilde, 16 Tite Street, Chelsea, despatched at 1 p.m. on Thursday, 20 March 1890
72 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
73 From the diary of Rex LaSalle
74 Letter from Constance Wilde to Oscar Wilde, care of Arthur Conan Doyle at the Langham Hotel, Langham Place, London, W.
75 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
A Nest of Vipers
76 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
77 Letter from Bram Stoker to his wife, Florence, delivered by messenger at 6 p.m. on Friday, 21 March 1890
78 Letter from Professor August Onofroff sent to Oscar Wilde, care of Arthur Conan Doyle at the Langham Hotel, London W.
79 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
‘This is Where it Ends’
80 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
The Truth
81 From the journal of Arthur Conan Doyle
Case Closed
82 From the notebooks of Robert Sherard
83 Telegram sent to Constance Wilde at 16 Tite Street, Chelsea, at midnight on Friday, 21 March 1890
84 From the Evening News, London, first edition, Saturday, 22 March 1890
85 Telegram sent from the Langham Hotel, London, to Louisa ‘Touie’ Conan Doyle in Southsea, at 9 a.m. on Saturday, 22 March 1890
Author’s Note
OSCAR
WILDE
and the
Nest of Vipers
Gyles Brandreth
www.johnmurray.co.uk
First published in Great Britain in 2010 by John Murray (Publishers)
An Hachette UK Company
© Gyles Brandreth 2010
&
nbsp; The right of Gyles Brandreth to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher.
All characters in this publication – other than the obvious historical figures – are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library
Epub ISBN 978-1-84854-459-8
Book ISBN 978-1-84854-247-1
John Murray (Publishers)
338 Euston Road
London NW1 3BH
www.johnmurray.co.uk
In memory of my mother
Alice Mary Addison
1914–2010
Freedom is the only law which genius knows.
Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
Oscar Wilde and the Nest of Vipers
Drawn from the previously unpublished memoirs of
Robert Sherard (1861–1943),
Oscar Wilde’s friend and his first and most
prolific biographer
Principal characters in the narrative
London, 1890
Oscar Wilde, poet and playwright
Constance Wilde, his wife
Robert Sherard, journalist
Arthur Conan Doyle, author and physician
Bram Stoker, theatre manager
HRH the Prince of Wales
HRH Prince Albert Victor, his son
General Sir Dighton Probyn VC, Comptroller
and Treasurer of the Prince of Wales’s Household
Harry Tyrwhitt Wilson, equerry
Frank Watkins, page
The Duke and Duchess of Albemarle
Mr Parker, butler at 40 Grosvenor Square
Nellie Atkins, the Duchess of Albemarle’s maid
Lord Yarborough, psychiatrist
Rex LaSalle, artist
Father John Callaghan, priest
Sister Agnes, nurse
Antonin Dvorak, composer
Louisa Lavallois, dancer
Professor Onofroff, mind-reader
Mrs Lillie Langtry, actress
Jane Avril, dancer
Inspector Hugh Boone, Metropolitan Police
Preface
Paris, 1900
‘I remember nothing.’
‘You must remember the nest of vipers.’
‘I remember nothing. That is my rule.’
‘Don’t be absurd, Oscar.’
My friend smiled and ran his forefinger slowly around the rim of his glass of absinthe. He gazed at me, his eyes full of tears. ‘What else should I be, Robert? I am absurd. Look at me.’
I looked at him as he sat slumped on the banquette like a debauched tart in a painting by Toulouse-Lautrec. His face was grey, blotchy, with patches of green and ochre beneath his eyes and starbursts of crimson where veins had broken in his cheeks. His auburn hair, once so lustrous, was lank. His uneven teeth were stained with mercury and nicotine. His body had run to fat. His appearance had gone to seed. Two years in prison, with hard labour, and three years in exile, without employment, had brought him to this.
‘I remember nothing,’ he repeated, ‘as a matter of policy. The artist must destroy memory, Robert, and interest himself only in the moment – the hour that is passing, the very second as it occurs. The man who thinks of his past has no future.’ He raised his now-empty glass towards the barman. ‘Personally, I give myself absolutely to the present.’
We were in Paris, the city of light, sitting in semi-darkness at the back of the old Café Hugo on boulevard Montmartre. It was Friday, 16 March 1900 – five months to the day since his forty-fifth birthday; eight months and a half before his untimely death. We were having lunch: bread, cheese, salami. I had finished mine; Oscar had not touched his. He preferred absinthe. ‘It makes the heart grow fonder,’ he said, smiling and pressing his hand over mine.
Oscar Wilde and I were not lovers, but we were the best of friends. We met in Paris in the spring of 1883, when I was young and idolatrous and he was on the brink of becoming the literary sensation of the age. I was flattered by his friendship (I was twenty-one at the time), charmed by his generosity (Oscar was a profligate spender), and overwhelmed by the brilliance of his intellect and his way with words. From the day of our first encounter I kept a journal of our times together. In due course, I published Oscar Wilde: The Story of an Unhappy Friendship (1902) and The Life of Oscar Wilde (1906). In 1900 I hoped to publish the tale of Oscar Wilde and the Nest of Vipers.
‘It is an extraordinary story, Oscar,’ I said. ‘Lurid, bizarre.’
‘I don’t recall, Robert.’
‘You must,’ I persisted. ‘It’s only ten years ago. If I write it up now and get it published, we can share the proceeds. You are in want of funds, Oscar.’
‘That I do recall.’ My friend laughed and gazed into his refilled glass of absinthe.
‘Think how much Arthur Conan Doyle is making with Sherlock Holmes,’ I continued, pressing home my advantage. ‘He gets a pound a word, I’m told.’
Oscar swirled the green-gold liquid in his glass. ‘I’ve not seen Arthur in a year and he rarely writes. I think he regards my condition as pathological. He pities me: he does not condemn. He is a decent fellow. You know that he has a sick wife to whom he is devoted and a young friend who is the love of his life – and they are not the same person. That is a difficulty for a gentleman like Arthur.’
‘Arthur is part of the story, of course. That will add to its allure.’
Oscar put down his glass and looked towards me steadily, a sudden gleam in his watery eyes. ‘You cannot publish the story, Robert. Not in your lifetime. Not in my lifetime. Not in the lifetime of the Prince of Wales. Nor for a hundred years thereafter. You know that.’
‘You see,’ I said, smiling. ‘You do remember.’
‘I remember nothing,’ he insisted. ‘But I do know that you can’t disguise the Prince of Wales as the Prince of Carpathia or Bohemia or some such nonsense. That’s what Conan Doyle does and Conan Doyle is writing fiction – while this is fact, is it not?’
‘Yes, that’s what makes it so remarkable. It is a murder mystery and yet it’s fact, beyond dispute. I have gathered all the papers – the cuttings, the correspondence. Arthur will allow us to quote from his journals. I have LaSalle’s diary and Bram’s letters – and even one of the policeman’s notebooks. I have included the telegrams from Marlborough House. It’s all here.’
From the floor beneath my chair I produced a foolscap file, two inches deep.
Oscar was laughing at me now and, at the same time, lighting one of his favourite Turkish cigarettes. ‘You cannot publish, Robert.’
‘Who is to stop me?’
‘In England? The courts.’
‘And here? In France? In America? Doyle was paid ten thousand dollars for his last book.’
Oscar blew a thin plume of blue smoke into the air and grinned. ‘Indeed. I had heard it wasn’t very good.’
‘I have all the papers,’ I bleated, ‘in chronological order.’
‘I am sure that you do, my dear friend. Chronology has always been one of your longer suits. Keep the papers safe.’
‘I have done that,’ I said, tapping my file of foolscap with my forefinger. ‘But I need your help, Oscar. I need to provide a linking narrative.’
‘Oh no, Robert. Spare us the linking narrative! Present your evidence, lay out your material in chronological order, and leave it at that. Let the facts speak for themselves.’
‘In that case,’ I said, sliding the file across the table towards my friend, ‘the book is done. Here they are – the facts. Make of them what you will.’
Oscar stubbed out his cigarette on a small circle of salami an
d sat forward to look me in the eye. ‘You are proposing that I should read this material, Robert?’
‘I am, Oscar – if you would be so kind.’
‘It is a true story, you say?’
‘It is – and you are part of it.’
‘And you wish me to read it? Today? This very afternoon? When Dante calls and Baudelaire lies waiting?’
‘Yes, Oscar, today – this very afternoon. Dante and Baudelaire will still be here tomorrow.’
‘In that case, Robert,’ he said, his fingers slowly untying the red ribbon around the file, ‘I’ll succumb to the temptation. Fetch me one more glass of absinthe, mon ami, and I will begin. As I remember nothing, the story will at least have the charm of the unexpected.’
Grosvenor Square London, 1890
1
TO HAVE THE HONOUR OF MEETING
THEIR ROYAL HIGHNESSES
THE PRINCE OF WALES AND PRINCE ALBERT VICTOR
THE DUCHESS OF ALBEMARLE
AT HOME
THURSDAY, 13TH MARCH
RSVP
TEN O’CLOCK
40 GROSVENOR SQUARE, LONDON W.
DECORATIONS
2
From the Daily Chronicle, first edition, Friday, 14 March 1890
HRH the Prince of Wales honoured the Duke and Duchess of Albemarle with his presence last night at a reception at Their Graces’ London residence, 40 Grosvenor Square, W. HRH Prince Albert Victor, newly returned from India, accompanied his father. General Sir Dighton Probyn VC, treasurer and comptroller of His Royal Highness’s household, and Mr Harry Tyrwhitt Wilson, equerry, were in attendance.
Among the many guests, representing the worlds of art and science, were Lord Leighton, President of the Royal Academy, and Sir George Stokes, President of the Royal Society, as well as such notabilities as Professor Jean-Martin Charcot from the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris, Lord Yarborough, the physician and nerve specialist, Mr Oscar Wilde, the poet, and Dr Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of the popular detective, ‘Sherlock Holmes’.