The Captive of Kensington Palace

Chapter IX AN ACCIDENT AT KEW

The Duchess of Kent was discussing with Sir John Conroy the new arrival to her household.

‘Of very good family,’ she said. ‘The eldest daughter of the first Marquis of Hastings and second Earl of Moira.’ The Duchess was knowledgeable about the family connections of those who served her, as, she assured herself, one needed to be when these people would live under the same roof as the future Queen. ‘The Marquis you know made quite a name for himself in the Army and he was a friend of the late King. So I think Flora will be quite suitable.’

Sir John Conroy agreed with the Duchess that this was so.

‘And since it is the King’s wish that Victoria should meet more people, I do not see why this should not be achieved in her own household.’

‘There is no reason at all.’

‘Lady Flora is not exactly young. She is twenty-six years of age and serious.’

‘And an excellent addition to the household!’

‘She knows that although she is a member of my retinue her main duty is to accompany Victoria.’

‘And how does Victoria like her?’

‘You know the child. She is overflowing with affection. She really must practise a little restraint.’

‘She does not overflow for all,’ said Sir John, smiling not very pleasantly as he recalled the Princess’s coolness towards himself. The Duchess sighed. She understood. Victoria could be difficult. She, too, was aware of her daughter’s coldness not only towards Sir John. Sometimes she could believe that the child was critical of her own Mamma – but this, of course, could not be possible. The Duchess felt sure that Victoria must love and admire her unquestioningly.

‘I cannot think where she gets her ideas,’ she said vaguely.

‘The Princess is aware of her destiny,’ replied Sir John. ‘So I suppose a little arrogance must be forgiven now and then.’

‘But not in her own home,’ declared the Duchess. ‘She must be guided and I believe that Lady Flora will have a good influence.’

‘A mild one, at any rate,’ said Sir John. ‘As usual, my dearest Duchess has chosen wisely.’

‘I will send for Victoria and ask how she likes her new companion.’

Victoria came and immediately felt embarrassed as she always did when in the presence of her mother and Sir John.

‘Oh, Victoria. Do stand up straight, child. You will be like the Princess Charlotte if you do not. She had to have one pocket loaded with heavy stones to stop her from being lopsided. How would you like that?’

‘I daresay it would be no worse, Mamma, than having a piece of holly tied round one’s neck to make one hold one’s chin up.’

‘Aha!’ said the Duchess. ‘You should be grateful, should she not, Sir John, to have a Mamma who cared so much for you to walk straight that she devised such plans.’

Victoria touched her chin recalling the jabs she had received from the branches of holly. She would never see the plant without remembering that particular discipline of her youth.

Yes, thought the Duchess, Victoria was becoming a little arrogant. She would have to be persuaded to be otherwise. It was difficult to remind her that she would soon be a Queen at one moment and then the next to teach her to be humble.

What a task! sighed the Duchess inwardly; and then remembered that she had dear Sir John to help her.

‘Victoria, I trust you will find the company of Lady Flora congenial. She is of very good family and suited to her new post. I have made sure of that.’

‘Yes, Mamma, I do like Lady Flora.’

The Duchess folded her hands together and with the pious expression of one who has done her duty added: ‘Perhaps that will satisfy His Majesty.’ She spoke the title with a touch of contempt which was of course not directed towards that but to the man who now bore it.

Victoria was thinking that Lady Flora was friendly enough and pleasant in her way, but old. Why could she not have young people about her, and of the opposite sex at that? They were so much more interesting, she thought. She fancied she liked a little flirtation. And what boys did she ever see other than Sir John’s young sons? And the only companions of her own age were Victoire and Jane Conroy.

There is too much Conroy in this household, she thought.

‘Sir John believes you should undertake some journeys,’ the Duchess was saying.

‘Journeys, Mamma?’

‘That you should travel a little.’

‘To the sea?’ Victoria’s eyes began to sparkle. How she loved the sea!

‘The sea and the countryside as well. It is fitting that you should know something of the kingdom you are to rule.’

‘Oh, Mamma, I should enjoy these journeys.’

The Duchess smiled. ‘You must not think of them as pleasure only, although I am convinced that you will derive some enjoyment from them. You will know that you are doing your duty, and that is always – or should be – a source of pleasure. Sir John and I have decided that you shall pay a round of visits. We are now deciding when you shall start and where you shall go.’

‘Oh, Mamma, who will come with me?’

‘You need not fear that I and Sir John will not accompany you.’

Victoria tried to compose her features so that she did not show her disappointment. Journeys had sounded so exciting. She had pictured herself visiting the King and the Queen, and perhaps sharing in Aunt Adelaide’s parties. But it was to be different from that. She was to travel with Mamma and Sir John, which meant of course that they would not be visiting the King and Queen.

‘You will hear more of this later,’ said the Duchess. ‘In the meantime I have a present for you.’

‘Oh, Mamma, how exciting!’

‘I hope you will appreciate it.’

The Duchess went to a table and picked up a leather-bound book.

‘Thank you, Mamma.’

‘Open it,’ commanded the Duchess.

Victoria did so and looked at the blank pages in some astonishment.

‘It is a Journal,’ said the Duchess. ‘You must write your impressions in it. I shall wish to see it at regular intervals so you will have to write your best. I am sure you will find it a rewarding exercise both at the time and in the future.’

Victoria was pink with pleasure. Yes, she would enjoy a Journal. What fun to write in it what she felt. Perhaps she could do some sketches in it. She did enjoy sketching and was really rather good. No, it would be for writing only. Oh dear, Mamma would have to see it, which would mean she would have to be very careful of what she wrote.

‘You may take it away now,’ said the Duchess, ‘and start writing your impressions on the day we leave. Very soon we shall have news for you.’

Victoria went from the room. Lehzen was waiting outside for her. They would never allow her to be alone even in the apartments. I’m nothing but a prisoner, thought Victoria resentfully, as she had done a hundred times before.

She told Lehzen about the Journal and Lehzen of course thought it would be an excellent exercise.

In the schoolroom Victoire Conroy was sitting on the floor blowing bubbles. Victoria caught a beautiful one which reflected the windows in a lovely reddish blue light.

‘I want to blow bubbles,’ she cried.

She took her clay pipe and sat down with Victoire.

Lovely soap bubbles, riding up to the ceiling, some reaching it only to burst when they touched it, others fading out before. She laughed with pleasure, vying with Victoire to blow the biggest and send them off farther than hers.

She dreamed as she always did when she blew bubbles; perhaps that was why she liked doing it. She saw herself growing up, sitting with the young Georges, being flattered by them, dancing with them, and both of them trying so hard to please her.

But of course Mamma would not allow her to see them. She had cousins but she must not play with them; she was going to be a Queen but she was a prisoner; she was going on journeys but her jailers would be with her, she had a Journal in which she could write everything she felt, but Mamma would see it.

It will not always be so, she thought; then she exclaimed with joy. She had blown the biggest and most beautiful of bubbles. It rose and fell and went sailing round the room. Victoire had stopped to watch it. There never was such a bubble; and then suddenly it exploded in mid-air and was gone.

The Queen called on the Duchess of Cumberland.

It was typical of the King and Queen that they called on their relatives and rarely summoned them regally as other monarchs had done. Imagine George IV calling on them! thought the Duchess of Cumberland. William and Adelaide had little dignity.

‘How delightful of you to come,’ said Frederica. ‘You must have known that I needed cheering up.’

Adelaide smiled. She knew it well enough. She had learned what it meant to have the scandal sheets directed against one.

‘And,’ went on Frederica, ‘I feel better already. But pray tell me, how is the King?’

Adelaide had seated herself comfortably on a sofa as she said: ‘Oh, not very well. His asthma is troubling him and his hay fever is starting again.’

‘Poor William. I feel for His Majesty.’

‘It is tiresome … with all his duties.’

She spoke, thought Frederica, like a humble housewife. How ironical that she should be the Queen. Obviously she cared little for the title and would have been happier as plain Duchess of Clarence for the rest of her life. Being fairy godmother to countless children pleased her more than anything else.

‘The children are at Kew,’ said Adelaide. ‘The children’ were never long out of her conversation. ‘They enjoy it there so much. The boys can play their wild games in the gardens and the little ones can have plenty of fresh country air.’

‘And you will soon be with them, I daresay.’

‘The King and I go to Kew tomorrow.’

‘How the old King and Queen used to love Kew!’

‘William says they always referred to it as “dear little Kew”. I must say I think that is very apt.’

‘And my boy is behaving well.’

‘Admirably,’ said Adelaide. ‘A dear boy! How proud you must be of him!’

Frederica admitted this was so. ‘His father is, too.’

‘But of course. What a great comfort!’ Adelaide spoke wistfully.

How amusing, thought Frederica, if Adelaide was with child after all. No, it was not really amusing. Ernest would be furious, because if it were the case their son’s marriage to Victoria would be of little significance. And William was unwell. If William died and Victoria was Queen, the Duchess of Kent would be Regent. That would never do, and what chance had Ernest now of getting in and taking the throne? The people would never let that happen. Circumstances changed one’s desires. At one time Ernest – and she with him – had wanted William put away as insane, but not now. The Duchess of Kent’s regency would be far worse than William’s rule. For that woman would never permit a marriage between Victoria and the Cumberlands’ son, George.

‘Our George really is a bright boy,’ went on Frederica. ‘I know all parents think that of their children but I don’t believe Ernest and I are deceiving ourselves.’

‘Indeed you are not,’ Adelaide declared warmly. ‘He is a bright and charming boy. As you know, I love him well. It would be impossible not to.’

‘And he loves you. You should hear him talk of the perfections of his Aunt Adelaide. Sometimes he calls you Queeny as the little ones do.’

Adelaide smiled. ‘The darlings!’ she said.

‘And Victoria … she is never there,’ said Frederica.

‘Never. Such a pity. Poor child. They are bringing her up so strictly. I believe she rarely has any fun.’

‘She should be meeting her cousins.’

‘That’s what William says. But to tell the truth I rarely broach the subject of Victoria to him. It upsets him.’

‘And George Cambridge is well?’

‘Very well and happy I’m glad to say.’ Adelaide’s expression softened even further. Young Cambridge was the favourite … he and little crippled Louise. They were the Queen’s special charges because they were always with her, the parents of both those children being overseas.

And how, wondered Frederica, are we going to oust Cambridge from first place? That will be difficult. The only one who could do it would be Victoria herself. Surely she must prefer her cousin Cumberland. Was there some way of bringing their son to Victoria without young Cambridge’s being there?

That was something which could not be discussed with Adelaide.

‘The two boys are the best of friends … your George and mine,’ said Adelaide.

Her George! Oh dear! She would try to marry Victoria to Cambridge and the King would do the same. She and Ernest would have to think of something.

‘Such a good boy! He writes to his mother regularly. Poor Augusta! I fear it is a sad wrench to part with him. I do not know how she does it. I tell her that her loss is my gain … but how I feel for her!’

Adelaide would run on for hours about her precious children if allowed to but Frederica found it particularly galling to listen to an account of the virtues of George Cambridge, her son’s chief rival for the hand of Victoria.

‘I know,’ she said, ‘that you came to comfort me. Dear Adelaide, you are such a good soul. But there is no need to remain silent about all these distressing matters. They are uppermost in our minds, we both know.’

‘My dear Frederica, I too have suffered from these wicked scribblers.’

‘They delight in taunting us. That affair took place years ago. It is wicked of them to revive it now.’

Frederica was referring to a recent pamphlet printed by a certain Joseph Phillips which had revived that long-ago scandal concerning the Duke of Cumberland and his valet Sellis. Sellis had been found in his room in the Duke’s apartment at St James’s with his throat cut; the Duke had been badly wounded. The Duke’s story had been that the valet had attacked him and then cut his own throat because he feared the consequences. ‘He went mad suddenly,’ was the Duke’s verdict, but as Sellis had a pretty wife and the Duke’s reputation was quite evil then as now the general opinion had been that the Duke had been discovered in the woman’s bed by her husband who had understandably remonstrated. The Duke had then murdered Sellis and inflicted a wound on himself to attempt to make good his version of the affair. This had happened more than twenty years before; but the Duke had become very unpopular during the agitation over the Reform Bill because he had been one of its most enthusiastic opponents. Then of course there had recently been the charge of incest with his sister Sophia which had been brought up against him, in addition to which there was the suicide of Lord Graves, with whose wife the Duke was conducting an affair. No member of the royal family had a more sinister reputation than the Duke of Cumberland; but never had the people been so much against him as when he opposed the Reform Bill.

Cumberland, angry that Phillips should have dared print this pamphlet particularly at such a time when, with the help of the Orange Lodges, he hoped to be the King of England, prosecuted Phillips who had just been found guilty and sentenced to six months’ imprisonment.

‘At least,’ soothed Adelaide, ‘the man was found guilty.’

‘Yes, yes,’ said Frederica, a little impatiently, ‘but people forget that the man was sentenced and they go on thinking Ernest a murderer.’

‘They cannot do that.’ But Adelaide spoke half-heartedly. She was remembering how she had once feared that Ernest was planning some harm to little Victoria. She had herself spoken to the Duchess of Kent and begged her to be careful not to let the child out of her sight.

It was hard to think of dear George being the son of a murderer. He was such a delightful boy and she loved him dearly, nearly as much as George Cambridge.

Frederica sighed. ‘We must resign ourselves to being targets for the wits,’ she said. ‘But there are some who are determined to blacken Ernest’s name.’

To blacken it? thought Adelaide. That would be difficult. It was really as black as possible already.

‘Brougham,’ went on Frederica, ‘insulted him in the Lords the other day.’

‘Is that so?’

‘I am afraid it is. He referred to him – and Ernest was present at the time – as “the Illustrious Duke – illustrious only by courtesy”.’

‘And what will Ernest do about that?’

‘What can he do? He can’t prosecute Lord Brougham. But he’ll remember it if ever …’

Oh dear, she was being led away by Adelaide’s sympathy.

‘It is so distressing,’ she finished on a pathetic note.

‘My dear Frederica! And my purpose in coming here was to comfort you! Let us talk of happier things. Shall I tell you about the children’s ball I am planning?’

‘Please do. And will Victoria be there?’

‘She shall be invited.’

‘I’ll tell you a secret. My George is very taken with her.’

‘So is mine … dear Cambridge! He could talk of nothing else after their meeting. She is a charming creature. Oh, how I wish her mother would be less tiresome. In fact, I believe the King will be firm and insist on her coming out of retirement. It is ridiculous … the heiress to the throne!’

‘Quite!’ agreed Frederica.

She was wondering whether to speak to her son. He was something of an idealist. She could imagine his saying: ‘Well, if she prefers Cambridge, she must marry him.’ How did we produce such a son … such an intelligent, charming, good boy? But he was not really very ambitious. Doubtless he would be happier so. And I want his happiness above all things, thought Frederica, but I want him to rule England as well.

When Adelaide left she was turning over in her mind how she could bring Victoria and her son together. If only she could ask Victoria to visit her. As if that would be allowed! Well, that was Ernest’s fault. He had at one time had rather wicked ideas about her and as he had been too indiscreet and not clever enough people had got wind of his intentions. No, little Victoria would never be allowed to escape her watch-dogs. And to come to the wicked Cumberlands! That was a joke!

Never mind; she would discuss this with Ernest and they would think of something. She would not despair. Her plan now was to see Ernest King of Hanover and George consort of Victoria.

If that happens I shall be content, she told herself.

She was musing on this when a messenger came from Clarence House. It was from the Queen. She was setting out for Kew immediately and she believed that the Duchess might wish to come with her. There had been an accident in the gardens. George Cumberland had been hurt.

The Duchess set out at once.

Adelaide comforted her. The reports had been exaggerated she was sure. They would find this so when they reached Kew. Frederica must not imagine the worst.

Adelaide’s message had not been very clear. All she knew was that there had been an accident.

‘A … serious accident?’ whispered Frederica.

Adelaide put an arm about her. ‘I beg of you … don’t despair. Wait and see. I know he is going to be all right.’

So on that anxious journey down to Kew, the Queen comforted the Duchess of Cumberland, and when they arrived Frederica was taken straight to the room in which her son lay. His head was bandaged so that she could not recognise him. She took his hand and sank down by the bedside.

‘Your Grace,’ said the doctors, ‘His Highness will live. You need have no fear of that.’

She wept quietly and meanwhile the Queen had called the doctors aside.

‘Pray tell me the worst,’ she said. ‘I want the truth.’

‘Your Majesty, His Highness is in no danger of death.’

‘Then …’

One doctor looked at the other who said, ‘We fear that he has damaged his eyes so badly that blindness may result.’

The Queen felt as though she would faint.

‘Pray,’ she said, ‘do not tell the Duchess yet. It must be broken gently … gradually. Leave this to me.’

And they were content to do this.