Royal D.P.s

The air last week was loud with the snapping and unsnapping of luggage clasps, as royal and distinguished D.P.s busily packed and unpacked their traveling bags.

King without a Country. Belgium's tall, balding, repudiated King Leopold III was winding up an enforced St. Wolfgang vacation which had really been no vacation at all--just a parade of visiting politicians and prelates exhorting him to return to, or keep out of Belgium. But the Belgian Parliament had decided that he should not come home to Brussels. Last week the Swiss Government gave him permission to move into Switzerland, probably to his late father's chateau on Lake Lucerne. It was from there that he had set out ten years ago on the fatal motor tour which resulted in the death of Queen Astrid. Moodily, the King gave the order to pack the royal bags.

Caudillo without a King. As Leopold prepared to enter Switzerland, another royal scion was asked to leave it. To the modest Lausanne villa of Don Juan, the Spanish Pretender, came two august emissaries from Generalissimo Francisco Franco. They were reported to bear the Caudillo's long deferred invitation to return to Spain. Aspiring Don Juan had waited patiently for 14 years. Perhaps it was time for him too to pack.

King without a Visa. In Brazil, another royal D.P. had been sitting on his packed bags for months. While they waited for visas to Portugal or France, Carol of Rumania and his statuesque friend, Magda Lupescu, dallied extravagantly at the Quintandinha, a lavish State casino outside Rio de Janeiro. With Carol and Madame dallied the royal Chancellor Ernest Udarianu and his wife, a Cuban valet de chambre and his wife, and the dogs--two black poodles, two Pekingese, a Doberman and a dachshund.

The King and Madame were devoted to the dogs. The dogs were devoted to the royal suite--so much so that after four months all the carpets had to be taken up and cleaned. But "it was beautiful," said the valet of Carol and Madame Lupescu. "The greatest thing they have in common is the dogs. The only thing they talk about" is the dogs. But the dogs won't go outside to the trees."

Last week the royal Rumanian household was told that it could not go to Europe. Indignantly the refurbished suite reserved on the Lisbon-bound Serpa Pinto was canceled. Wailed Madame Udarianu: "The trip was stopped. The trip was stopped." Rumor had it that the U.S. and Britain feared that Carol's return might upset delicate balances in the Balkans. Officially, the trip was off because Madame's health was "uncertain." Gloomily Carol ordered the bags unpacked.

Ex-King with a Flutter. But the Duke and Duchess of Windsor were gay. After five years of living death in the tranquil Bahamas, the world's most publicized hedonists were fluttery with the anticipation of returning to Paris. Their elegant mansion at 24 boulevard Suchet in the fashionable Passy quarter had not been molested by the Germans. It was ready to receive the ducal pair. Weeks ago the Duchess had cabled her instructions to the decorators (her bedroom was to be midnight blue and white). Another cable had brought the Paris hat now in the high hatbox in the hall.

Of course, Paris was not exactly as they had left it. There was no electric current to work the elevator between the two main floors. But there was enough fuel for heat. If famine threatened, the Duke's chef de cuisine, Maitre Le Laurin, a magician with truffles and morilles, was assured of rations from the British Embassy. And the Germans had not drunk all the vintage wines. From the boulevard Suchet they could go down again to the Cote d'Azur, to long walks in the grounds of their villa La Croee and basks in the Mediterranean sun.

Home to Jail. In a very different mood was another prominent D.P., haggard Countess Edda Ciano, daughter of the late Benito Mussolini, widow of the Jate Count Galeazzo Ciano. From her Swiss refuge (a nerve hospital), she had watched the collapse of Fascism. Now she had to go home. In a closed car the Countess was driven by night across the Italian frontier, flown to Rome, then shipped to the Lipari Islands, once one of her father's favorite penitentiaries. Only thus could the authorities be sure they could save Edda from her father's fate. On her island she would be confined to an "apartment' until the "final disposition of her case."

King of the Cocos. In London, the youngest, strangest royal D.P. of all packed his own bags. He was John Clunies-Ross V, 19, King of the Cocos Islands (TIME, June 11). Ross V has the lean, long countenance of his Scottish seafaring ancestors. His brother favors their Malayan grandmother (a royal Sulu princess in her own right). Their sister manages to look like both of them.

With his Cockney mother, Queen Rose, the young ruler will sail to his kingdom as soon as passage can be arranged. Meanwhile he is brushing up on his Malay.

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