 The incident in Madrid, and Clarke's love of theatrics, raised awkward questions about his sexuality. His arrest was somewhat hushed up at the time, which may have raised more questions than it prevented. There is no indication that Clarke was homosexual. He was involved in two bad relationships with women. In 1922 he met a Slavic woman called Nina in Wiesbaden, but she disappeared after Clarke smuggled currency to her friend in Bulgaria. Then in the late 1920s a woman in Sussex, who "meant everything in the world" to him, refused an offer of marriage. He often claimed to hate children and never married. Despite this Clarke was known for having beautiful female acquaintances, to whom his friends referred as "Dudley's Duchesses".
