Goddess of the Green Room: (Georgian Series) (38 page)

Five little FitzClarences and the three girls. Eight children in all.

‘No wonder I am getting too fat to play Pickle,’ she remarked to William.

William laughed at her. ‘You still look the same as you did when I first saw you romp on the stage as Pickle.’

That made her laugh with contented derision. So it was when one was observed through the eyes of love.

Danger in Drury Lane

SINCE THE BIRTH
of Princess Charlotte the tension within the royal family had considerably lessened. It was true that the Prince of Wales had grown most unpopular. The situation between him and his wife was considered to be unnatural and he was blamed for it. The Princess of Wales was a heroine who was cheered wherever she went; and the people always loved a child. Indeed the little Princess Charlotte was a bright engaging child and although little was seen of her there were anecdotes about her quaint sayings and her charm which pleased the people.

The King doted on his granddaughter and although he deplored the fact that George and Caroline did not live together he had to admit that George had done his duty and provided the heiress to the throne. As long as the little girl continued to thrive the brothers need not be harried into marrying.

Money was a subject which recurred constantly in the royal household, where expenses always exceeded income. The Princes – every one of them – were in debt. Every now and then there would be a piece in one of the papers about the Prince of Wales or one of the royal Dukes having to be dunned for money.

Money! It was the need for it which had driven the Prince of Wales to marry Caroline, and that was a disaster, if ever there was one. The Queen could never think of it without a certain smug satisfaction because George had ignored her advice and taken the King’s niece Caroline of Brunswick instead of her own, Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. At the same time she realized that it was a disaster which she should deplore. Caroline was eccentric to madness – and there would most certainly be more trouble there. As soon as Charlotte was a little older she should be taken from her mother’s care and put under that of the governess and tutors. chosen for her by the King or her father.

‘We are not seen in public enough,’ said the King. ‘We should perhaps go to the theatre now that they’ve opened this new Drury Lane.’

‘Well, you know how you always disliked Mr Sheridan.’

‘I always disliked Mr Sheridan and I always shall,’ said the King. ‘He is a profligate, eh? He is a man who drinks too much, gambles too much, spends too much and is unfaithful to his wife. Do you expect me to admire a man like that, eh, what?’

‘I do not. But George is fond of him and thinks him very clever.’

‘Hand-in-glove,’ said the King. ‘It was that fellow Fox. He was the one. Between him and this Sheridan they made George what he has become. And I say I don’t like Sheridan and you understand that, eh, what? But I shall not go to Drury Lane to see Sheridan. I shall go to see a play. And the people expect us to go. They like to see us. We should all go… you and I and the girls.’

‘That woman of William’s will doubtless be playing.’

‘Well, well, I hear she’s a good actress.’

‘You would sit in a box and watch William’s mistress?’

‘I would watch a good actress in a play and I hear she is that.’

‘But to live as they do.’

‘They live in the only way they can be expected to. I hear they are very respectable there at Bushy, that William does not drink to excess and I have noticed he no longer uses those coarse oaths he came back from sea with. I know he should be married to some German Princess – legitimately married – he should produce a son or two… but not too many to be a drain on the exchequer…’

The King looked worried. Once it had seemed so admirable for Charlotte to produce a child every year or so. And now look at them – all these sons living dangerously on the edge of some scandal that could erupt suddenly like an active volcano, all in debt, all leading irregular lives with women – and the girls no longer young, spending their lives waiting on their mother, fretful because they were not allowed to go out into the world. Too many of them, thought the King; and passed his hand over his brows. Too many worries, eh, what? But where were we. Theatre!

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘We should go to Drury Lane. The people expect it.’

‘To go would be in a way to show our approval of William’s… connection.’

‘You think William should marry?’

‘He’s the third son and George will have no more legitimate children and Frederick will have none. Shouldn’t William have a family… in reserve.’

‘Think of the cost of bringing a German Princess over for him? Our ambassador to go to negotiate… a wedding… And for a third son! No. It’s not as though this actress of his costs him a great deal. She’s a rich woman herself… earns large sums, so they tell me. And some of these have paid William’s debts.’

‘So in Your Majesty’s opinion Mrs Jordan is a good financial proposition?’

‘Has to be considered, eh, what?’ said the King. ‘Seems a good woman… All those children. Never hear of a scandal. As for William, better for him to be living like a husband at Bushy than racketing around with George and Fred.’

‘I see the point of that,’ said the Queen. ‘But it keeps him from court and he scarcely lives like a royal Prince.’

The King looked a little sad. These days his mind took strange journeys into the past which often seemed more real to him than the present. He tried to hide this from the Queen, but there were occasions when he lost track of time and was not sure whether he was in the past or the present. Now he was thinking of the beautiful Quakeress whom he had loved secretly and often it seemed to him that he had been happier then than ever since; and if he could have lived quietly like a country gentleman in a house like Bushy Park with a good woman whom he loved and their children about him he would have been a very happy and contented man. No ceremonies, no state occasions, no pressing responsibilities. Colonies! he thought. Gordon Riots! Mr Pitt and Mr Fox! Addington and Burke, Canning and the rest… all like a lot of wild beasts snarling at him behind the courteous homage they paid to the King. And sons to plague him… with their debts and their gambling and their erotic adventures with women which he had never been able to enjoy and which he might have done… as well as they did. There were the girls, his girls, with whom he would never part. He would keep them all, particularly Amelia, the youngest, the best loved, his darling, affectionate Amelia who sometimes made everything seem worthwhile. But even she added to his anxieties with her delicate health. What had life brought him: a crown that was too heavy for him, a plain German Princess whom he could never love but by whom he must do his duty, a family of fifteen with thirteen now living who plagued him and gave him sleepless nights.

Where were they? The theatre.

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘we will go to Drury Lane and take the eldest girls with us. They shall send me a programme and I will choose the play.’

William was amused.

‘Dora,’ he said, ‘you are to be honoured, my darling.’

‘What is this?’ she demanded to know.

‘My father is coming to see you play.’

‘Why William… is that really true?’

‘Yes, he has sent for Sheridan and he is choosing the plays. He will pay several visits and every one is to be a play in which you perform.’

‘What does it mean?’

‘It means that he does not think badly of us, I suppose.’

She was elated. Somewhere at the back of her mind had always been the fear that there would be some royal command to whisk William away from her. She knew that William’s brothers were sympathetic; the Prince of Wales never failed to treat her as a sister; but she could not expect approval from the King and Queen. But now it seemed she was to have, if not that, acceptance.

When she arrived at the theatre it was to find Sheridan in a merry mood, and she guessed the reason.

‘Royal Command performance,’ he told her with a bow.

‘I know. The Duke told me the King and Queen were coming.’

Sheridan nodded. ‘They have chosen three plays – and all in which you appear. Now that seems significant to me. Oh, Mrs Jordan, you are rising in the world! To have won the approbation of a Royal Highness is an achievement, I grant you. But of a Majesty – that is very rare. This is the wish of His rather than Her Majesty, I’ll guess.’

‘It is good news. I confess I shall be a little nervous.’

‘Not you, my dear. Believe me, His Majesty is more easily pleased than any of their Royal Highnesses. He has accepted your situation. I don’t doubt for a moment that he will be enchanted with your person… and your acting, of course.’

‘What has he chosen?’

‘Three plays, if you please.
The Wedding Day, Love for Love
and
She Would and She Would Not
.’

‘I should have thought he would have chosen Shakespeare.’

‘On this occasion he has clearly chosen what he likes, not what he thinks he ought to like. Which gives a pleasant family flavour to occasions, do you agree?’

He looked at her sardonically and wondered whether even at this time she was carrying a little grandson or granddaughter for His Majesty.

Playing Lady Contest in
The Wedding Day
she was conscious of the pair in the royal box. The watery protuberant eyes of the King were on her all the time – kindly and benevolently.

She would have been surprised if she could have read his thoughts. Pretty woman, he was thinking. Lucky fellow, William.
Fine figure… a little plump but all the better for that. And they live there at Bushy with those children. I hear little George FitzClarence is a fine young rascal. Like to see him. Shouldn’t send for him, though. The Prince of Wales goes and sees them. Takes presents for the children, Why should he have everything? Making a mess of it, though. Back with that Mrs Fitzherbert now. Wishes he’d never left her. Did he marry her? Good woman. Lovely woman. Catholic, though. What a mess, eh, what? He must remember he was in public. Must think of what was happening on the stage. Must watch William’s woman. Not difficult. Easy to watch. Good actress. Pretty creature. Small and womanly. Charming. Lucky fellow, William.

He glanced at the Queen’s sour face beside him. Why should they have pretty women while he had to remain faithful to Charlotte?

The play was over. Pretty little Mrs Jordan was taking the bow. She curtsied charmingly at the royal box. The King smiled, nodded and clapped; and everyone cheered. They liked him for liking their Mrs Jordan.

The Queen clapped perfunctorily.

But the evening was a success.

‘The King thought you a first-rate actress,’ William told Dorothy delightedly. ‘He sent for me to tell me so. He said: “Pretty woman, charming creature…” and I answered: “The best in the world, Sir.” ’

Yes, that was triumph.

Love for Love
went off with equal success and the next month the Command performance of
She Would and She Would Not
was scheduled to take place.

On the morning of the day an unfortunate incident occurred in Hyde Park. The King was reviewing a battalion of the Guards when one of the spectators who was standing quite close to him was hit by a ball cartridge. After assuring himself that the victim was not fatally wounded and giving orders that he should be attended to without delay, the King continued with the review. But speculation was great. The attempt had evidently been made by one of the soldiers who had fired the volley but it was impossible to discover which one.

The King’s cool courage made it possible for the incident to pass off lightly, but it seemed certain that the cartridge had been intended for him.

That evening there was a full theatre. The people might laugh at Farmer George, the Royal Button Maker, but he had an aura of royalty and that was enough to give glamour to any occasion.

But the fact that he had escaped assassination that very morning made people all the more eager to see him.

Sheridan rubbed his hands together gleefully and remarked that the would-be assassin could not have timed his attempt more to the advantage of the theatre.

Dorothy was playing the role of Hypolita in the play and it was one of those which she had made very popular. In her plumed hat, with her quizzing glass and her breeches she was still attractive, although her increasing weight did worry her and, dressed as she was, she could not help wishing that the King could have seen her in this costume as she had been when she had first made the role popular; but she must console herself with the truth that although her figure might not nowadays fit so well into such a costume she could make up for that by the finesse of her acting.

The King and Queen with the four eldest Princesses were in the foyer. Sheridan was greeting them, bowing, smiling, murmuring that the whole company was honoured.

The King glared at him, his face slightly redder than usual, his eyes seeming as if they would pop out of his head.

The Queen acknowledged Mr Sheridan’s greeting unsmiling. The man who had helped lead George to his downfall – not, she was ready to admit with something between exasperation and admiration, that George needed a great deal of leading. George would always go his own way; and if Mr Sheridan had not been there to lead him someone else would. But she did not like this clever gentleman who was reputed to be the greatest wit in London.

The four Princesses could not take their eyes from him. The wicked author of
The School for Scandal,
the man who created scandals of his own, who had eloped with his beautiful wife and then betrayed her a hundred times with other women, and above all was the friend and confidant of their fascinating brother the Prince of Wales – who was even more startling in his adventures than Mr Sheridan.

‘If Your Majesties will allow me to conduct you to the royal box…’

‘Lead the way,’ said the King.

When Sheridan threw open the door of the box, bowed and stood aside for the family to enter, shouts and cheers rang through the theatre.