Kid Carolina

by Heidi Schnakenberg

  After watching those fishermen every night, Dick was in the mood to drink and sail. One night they were feeling mischievous and left their suite to go down to the fishing village. Dick had managed to convince some of the hotel staff to join them for a little boat party, and a collection of bellboys, waiters, and bartenders followed them. Dick boldly sauntered out to the dock.

  The local fishermen looked surprised to see the tipsy, well-heeled couple and their entourage, carrying a case of wine and headed in their direction. Dick made a deal with one of the fishermen to let them go sailing in his open boat. The man agreed, for a fee. Dick looked around at all of the boats and decided on one that could fit them all. The catch of fish from that day was emptied, and everyone snickered with amusement while Dick and Muriel helped their guests into the boat. Dick assured his passengers that he was a sailing pro as they floated out into the black Mediterranean night.

  A good hour passed and they had completely lost sight of land when the staff became nervous. But Dick sailed on, merry as ever. As the winds picked up, water splashed into the vessel and it listed heavily to starboard. Some of the passengers started shouting and begging Dick to turn the boat around. Broken from his blissful, nautical stupor, Dick whipped the boat around and quickly sailed back toward land. One man lay prone at the bottom of the boat and the rest looked pale and panicked, clearly wishing they had never come out into the sea, in the middle of the night, with a couple of drunken foreigners. Dick and Muriel, however, couldn’t stop laughing.

  It had been close to two hours since they’d left when the faintest line of the spiky mountain range began to emerge. Muriel smiled—she couldn’t believe Dick had managed to navigate them straight back to the village in the murky waters, with no compass, rough weather, and a weak little fishing boat. He was a pro, just as he said.

  Dick had been sailing along the coast for twenty minutes when he abruptly turned right. He’d found the precise harbor at the base of the mountains from which they came.

  Relief washed over the faces of the hotel staff. As Dick pulled the boat ashore, his guests kissed the ground as they disembarked. Dick and Muriel cracked open the wine and passed around the drinks to their now very happy passengers. The group became festive in their relief and partied with Dick and Muriel on the shore until three in the morning.

  After their rousing Naples adventure, Dick and Muriel decided to visit Pompeii. They filled up on Italian wine and fine food before hitting the streets.

  “Did you know that we once lived together in Pompeii? In another life?” asked Dick.

  Muriel gasped. “I have felt the same way! Doesn’t it seem as though we’ve been here before?”

  Perhaps it was reincarnation, déjà vu, or just whirlwind lust, but Dick and Muriel never felt more connected to each other than they did in that moment.

  By the time they arrived in Rome, Dick had fallen ill yet again. He said it was just his old lung problems from childhood. He told Muriel about the operation he’d had that removed all of his defenses, and dust would get into his throat and lungs, making it difficult to breathe. Perhaps it was the dust in the Italian summer countryside?

  Dick and Muriel checked into the Villa d’Este La Fontana dell’Organo in Tivoli outside Rome. Dick marveled at the dragon fountains that burst up from the organ terrace in the front of the hotel and pondered the engineering that was required to create them.

  “These were built hundreds of years ago. Amazing,” whispered Dick.

  He went on to explain in detail how they used hydraulic engineering to calculate the water pressure needed to create the fountain. Not only did Dick have a soft side—he loved poetry and riding horses—he was enthralled with design. With every engineering feat they came across, Dick could talk about the nuts, bolts, and mechanics of how something worked, whether it was a yacht, an airplane, a train, or a fountain like this. He stood there in front of the Villa d’Este and analyzed the construction of the garden—how it had been originally built, the planning that was required. When he was done, Muriel appreciated their surroundings in ways she never would have before.

  Over a lunch of fresh trout from the hotel’s pond, Dick told Muriel of his love for boats and airplanes in particular, and talked about his ventures with Delta Airlines back in the States. They wandered around Rome and strolled by all the breezy outdoor cafés, stopping for a glass of wine or a cappuccino. At the end of the day, they landed at the Casino Borghese Gardens, where there was a spectacular flower show. Dick and Muriel had dinner there, among hundreds of plants in full bloom. They drank and smoked cigarettes after their meal against the backdrop of live piano music and fragrant flowers while Dick told Muriel more stories about ancient Rome.

  At the villa in the Casino Borghese Gardens, Dick professed his love to Muriel again. He got down on one knee.

  “I feel like I’m already married to you, Muriel. In fact, let this be our first day of marriage.” Dick declared Muriel his first and only wife and told her they would be together forever.

  Their brief Italian idyll had officially put a halt to Dick’s post-Marianne dream of a lasting, solitary escape at sea.

  CHAPTER 10

  On the Run

  1951

  Dick abruptly decided they must go back to England at once so he could continue work on his yacht before the summer’s end.

  He checked into the Dorchester Hotel and offered to buy Muriel a new apartment in her neighborhood. While Dick went to Gosport to inspect the Aries, which Muriel named after Dick’s zodiac sign, Muriel looked for a new place. She settled on 15 Grosvenor Square, which had once belonged to the Duchess of Westminster.

  When Dick got back from Gosport, he went straight to Muriel’s apartment with another bad cold and fever. Muriel put him to bed, and Dick asked her to retrieve his belongings from the Dorchester and check him out of his room.

  “But what will we say if people see you here?” asked Muriel.

  “I don’t know—say I’m your husband.”

  “We can’t say that.”

  “Okay, say I am Richard Greenough,” joked Dick.

  “All right, fine. But if the gossip columnists hunt you down here, don’t blame me.”

  Return to America

  Dick had to return to Winston-Salem for his niece’s wedding, and he wanted to get back to New York and find a way to shake Marianne into an agreement as quickly as possible. Now Marianne had become the woman who was in the way of his future with a new love. But, as always, Dick underestimated his opponent. Dick was well aware that if Marianne found out about his affair with Muriel, he’d lose his infidelity grievance in the divorce. The pair again went on the run, catching a train from England to Naples, where they caught up with the Saturnia, which was bound for Halifax. Their antics aboard the ship were reminiscent of an I Love Lucy episode. They had adjoining cabins, but they weren’t connected, so each cabin had its own separate balcony. Dick was still paranoid that they were being watched, even on the boat—he had Marianne under constant surveillance and assumed Marianne had hired private investigators as well.

  Each night, no matter how rough the mid-Atlantic waters were, Dick climbed out the window of his cabin onto the balcony, and then stumbled over to Muriel’s balcony where she reeled him in through the window as his legs kicked in the air. Every time, Muriel worried that Dick would fall into the sea. One morning, when Dick was climbing back out of her window to return to his room, Muriel caught the eye of an elderly couple staying in the cabins above them, who were glaring down at them in horror.

  Upon the Saturnia’s arrival in Canada, they headed straight for Montreal, where Stratton Coyner was waiting for them at the Ritz. Dick talked with Strat for hours about the divorce, and he convinced Dick to meet with Marianne personally to sort out the details.

  First, Dick had to go to Winston-Salem to see his niece, Mary Katharine Babcock, marry Kenneth Mountcastle Jr. He reunited with his family and paid a visit to his ailing Uncle Will, who had slipped into a coma. Just five da
ys after Mary’s wedding, Uncle Will died at age eighty-eight. The entire city of Winston-Salem mourned Will’s passing, and he was honored for the many gifts he left behind for the city—a hospital named for his wife, millions of dollars to the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, and the donation of his estate, Tanglewood, to the city to use as a public park.

  Just a month after Uncle Will’s death, one of his and Dick’s wishes would soon be filled. With the help of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, Wake Forest University would be moved to Winston-Salem, and President Truman was due to arrive for opening ceremonies. But Dick didn’t stick around long enough to greet the president. He wanted to get back to New York and deal with his marital problems.

  While Dick was away, Muriel was at her house in Oyster Bay, Long Island, preparing for an extended stay. Dick had ordered a new green Buick for her and she stocked up the place with groceries and supplies. Dick soon joined her and worked on a divorce strategy.

  For weeks, Dick had meetings on and off with Marianne, who, according to him, was uncooperative. Dick at least took advantage of the meetings to see his two baby boys, whom he hadn’t seen in months. One night, Marianne begged Dick to go out with her for a few drinks and promised him she would come to some sort of agreement.

  They agreed to meet at a bar on Third Avenue. Before he left for the night, Dick asked Muriel to call the police if he didn’t return by midnight. He feared that Marianne was trying to kill him using her Mafia connections. This paranoia would become yet another hallmark of Dick’s.

  Trouble at One Beekman Place

  Police burst into an apartment at One Beekman Place at three in the morning. They had received a frantic call from a Long Island woman who begged them to check on Dick Reynolds. The police officer from the Fifty-fifth Precinct was familiar with Dick. He’d answered so many domestic calls for Dick and Marianne Reynolds that Dick had given him a key to the apartment and told him to help himself to the bar or food at any time. He got calls from both Dick and Marianne, but mostly Marianne when she was drinking. There was always some fight, which required nothing less than a police presence to end. Still, the officers never arrested either of them but took on recurring roles as referees.

  Tonight the officer was worried by the Long Island woman’s urgency. She said she was a friend of Dick’s and that he had asked her to call the police if she didn’t hear from him.

  The officer knocked on the door a few times, but there was no answer. Using his key, he opened the door and went inside, searching the beautiful twenty-two-room duplex on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. All the lights were on. He cracked the door to the bedroom and discovered Dick passed out on the bed. A notorious drunk, Dick likely had had one too many, as usual. The officer repeatedly tried to wake him up, as he’d done so many times before. But he wouldn’t budge. He was out cold.

  The officer walked out of the apartment and gently closed the door behind him. When he reached the station, he called the woman back. Muriel Greenough was her name.

  “Ma’am?”

  “Yes! Is he all right?” gasped Muriel.

  “Yes, he’s just fine, Mrs. Greenough. He just had too much to drink, and he’s sleeping.”

  “Did you wake him?” asked Muriel.

  “Well, I certainly tried, but I couldn’t shake him. I’m sure he’ll be fine, Mrs. Greenough.” The officer hung up the phone.

  As Muriel placed the phone on the hook, she felt a sense of panic. Dick could always be woken up, at least when he’d been with her. What if Marianne tried to do something to him? What if she poisoned him, for God’s sake! Dick swore to Muriel he wasn’t planning on drinking, but they both knew that was a promise he would find hard to keep. Maybe Marianne deliberately tried to get him so intoxicated that he blacked out. Maybe she was trying to lure him back to the apartment and commit some terrible act.

  After Muriel had dropped Dick off earlier that evening, she went to a local bar to have a few drinks with friends for a couple of hours. On her way back out to Oyster Bay, she crashed her new emerald-green Buick in a frightening head-on collision on Route 25. Muriel had a bad cut on her forehead and the car was totaled. It was a miracle that Muriel wasn’t seriously injured. Still in shock, she left the car on the highway and took a taxi the remaining distance to her home. When she got there, she lay down in the dark house, feeling shaken and unwell. Dick didn’t know about the accident.

  Now Muriel was so worried about him, she couldn’t concentrate on her own injuries. Muriel waited until 3:00 A.M.—she knew that with the upcoming divorce from Marianne, anything could have held him up and she didn’t want to interfere. Then Muriel panicked over the thought that perhaps Dick had decided to get back together with Marianne. Maybe she would never hear from Dick again. With the pressure of his family and his kids, maybe he had changed his mind.

  So she had called the police and gotten the unsurprising news that Dick had broken his promise not to drink. There was nothing she could do about him now but go to sleep and hope he would call her back first thing in the morning.

  At five the next morning, the phone rang.

  “Dick! Are you all right?”

  “I’ve been up since four A.M. and I can’t find my clothes. Looks like Marianne hid my wallet, too.”

  “Oh, my God.”

  “Well, it’s quite all right, dear. I checked into the Vanderbilt Hotel and borrowed the butler’s overcoat. I even got a pair of shoes and trousers from him.”

  “What on earth happened to your clothes?”

  “Never mind that. Can you get me some clothes here at the hotel? I need to sleep at the moment. I’m taking a couple of sleeping pills—I feel awful.”

  “I’ll come into the city this afternoon and bring you a suitcase. But I can’t come in the Buick. I got into a terrible wreck last night and it’s totaled.”

  “What!”

  Dick was shocked and worried. He grilled Muriel about her injuries before he was satisfied that she was all right. He immediately sent for a new Buick to be delivered to Muriel’s home within hours. Once it arrived, she drove into the city to retrieve Dick and drive him back to Oyster Bay.

  When Muriel picked Dick up in the city the next evening and drove him back to Long Island, he relayed his ordeal. He said Marianne had been friendly and cooperative over drinks, which she continued to order for him. Dick claimed that he couldn’t remember anything after the first drink, except that he felt very sick. Dick wove a dramatic tale for Muriel, whether or not it was true. The next thing he knew, he said, he was back at the apartment with Marianne and he blacked out. “She probably put something in my drink. I really don’t know how I got there.”

  Muriel gasped in disbelief. She told Dick that she had called the police to check on him. They simply informed her that he was drunk and passed out. Dick regained consciousness about an hour later and vomited blood.

  Dick convinced himself that Marianne tried to lure him back to the apartment to have him “taken care of” as she used to enjoy telling him.

  Dick said, “I don’t want to go anywhere near her after this.”

  In addition to his clothes, Marianne had also stolen his passport and his wallet, which contained a bearer’s check in the amount of $15,000. Apparently Marianne thought taking Dick’s passport would force him to stay in the country, but he’d find a way around that.

  “What were you doing with $15,000?” asked Muriel.

  “I meant for it to be a gift to you. I’d been meaning to buy you a beautiful piece of jewelry for weeks, but I hadn’t found anything that I liked for you yet. When you mentioned that bracelet you saw at Van Cleef & Arpels, I had the check made out that day so I could give it to you when I got home. As matter of fact, I need to contact Van Cleef and tell them not to honor the check.”

  Dick made up for the lost check by buying Muriel a Golconda diamond and $100,000 worth of jewels.

  The next week, Dick invited Muriel to meet his good friends Mr. and Mrs. Robert Garland of Dick’s favorite yacht builde
rs, Sparkman & Stephens. Dick had worked with Garland when he built the Lizzie McCaw. Garland told Muriel that he had been with Dick during some of his most dazzling races, and the Garlands greatly respected Dick’s sailing skills.

  The couple would hide out in Muriel’s Oyster Bay home for weeks, cooking, leaving the curtains drawn at all hours, and sneaking in and out of the house at night so people wouldn’t see them. But Dick was impatient for his precious boats, especially after reminiscing with the Garlands. He justified the purchase of another boat by telling himself it was the best way to hide from Marianne. Dick asked Garland to help find a local motor sailor. With the Aries in Gosport nowhere near completion, Dick decided to purchase the White Heron, a forty-five-foot sailor that Garland recommended, at a shipyard in Long Island, and Dick brought Peter Barber to New York to oversee the work. He gutted and remodeled the ship’s galley and ordered new instruments. Muriel chipped in and ordered, at Dick’s expense, all of the china, flatware, and covers for the interior. It was a project for Dick to sink his teeth into for the next couple of months. His goal was to have it finished by Christmas.

  In November of 1951, Dick had fallen so ill again, Muriel checked him into a hospital in New York. Dick was advised again by doctors to quit drinking and smoking immediately. He had advanced liver damage, a weak heart, and weak lungs, which they traced to his childhood lung difficulties. It took Dick a week to recover in the hospital, but when he did, he ignored doctors’ orders and went right back to abusing himself and spending money.