The Regent's Daughter: (Georgian Series) (11 page)

The terraces had been built by Queen Elizabeth and the gallery was called Queen Elizabeth’s Gallery. My favourite part of the castle, thought Charlotte. I suppose because she made it.

It was not surprising that she thought so often of Elizabeth. There was so much here to remind her and at Hampton, Greenwich and Richmond. How thrilling to have been so often in fear of her life when she was young – and what triumph for her when at last she was proclaimed Queen of England. And those men
who danced attendance on her and whom she would not accept as her lovers!

Charlotte laughed aloud. I will be like her, I think, if I am ever queen.

If!
Why should she say that? She
would
be queen one day for her father and mother would never have a son – and no one could ever believe that that horrible child her mother doted on at Montague House could possibly have been sired by the Prince of Wales. So why should she say If? Because she had made a will recently? Because there was something eerie about the castle and the great forest? Because strange things happened to members of her family?

‘I
shall
be queen,’ she said aloud. And then looked about her almost defiantly. It was rather a wicked thing to have said because not only Grandpapa but her father would have to die first.

No one had heard. There was no one near. She looked towards the forest and thought of Herne the Hunter. He would not be abroad by day – if he ever was. She did not believe in such legends … not by day at any rate.

There was no Herne the Hunter; no one had ever seen him. But she did know that people were afraid to be alone in the forest by night lest they should come face to face with the ghost of Herne with the stag horns on his head. It was death to see him. She shivered. What dreadful things had Herne the Hunter done which had made him hang himself on an oak tree and haunt the forest for evermore?

There was so much romance at Windsor and yet living here was so dull … made so since she was not allowed to see her mother, because she was under the constant supervision of the Queen.

And now if she did not go in and allow them to prepare her for the Drawing Room she would be late and in disgrace – and not only herself but her attendants.

She grimaced. Who would be a princess? And yet … how angry she had been at the thought of that horrid little Willie Austin robbing her of her inheritance!

No, she would be a queen … as shrewd and clever … and perhaps as wicked as Elizabeth.

I wished they’d named me after her instead of after the old Begum, she thought.

The King was seated at his table turning over some State papers. He could not keep his mind on them; he could not keep his mind on anything. And it is getting worse, he admitted. What’s happening to me, eh, what? Perhaps I ought to abdicate. Give it over to George, eh?

He frowned; his face was scarlet and that made his white brows look whiter; they jutted out ferociously above his protuberant eyes. He was not in the least fierce; he was the mildest of men; he only wanted to live in peace – but events would not let him; and there was his family to plague him.

His sight was failing him; he could not read the papers without holding them closer to his eyes and then his mind would not concentrate on what was written there.

A poor fellow, he thought. And there’s no respect for me … not with my ministers, my people nor my family.

Yet there were some members of his family … his daughters for instance. Amelia most of all. Blessed Amelia, the delight of his life, who gave him so much pleasure and so much anxiety. Yet as long as he had Amelia he could find life worth living. The others too he was fond of … Augusta, Elizabeth, Mary and Sophia. Charlotte, his eldest, was living happily with her husband, which was more than he had hoped for, in Wurtemberg with her Prince, once the husband of Caroline’s sister Charlotte who had died mysteriously … at least they hoped she was dead, poor girl, for if she were not then that other Charlotte, Princess Royal of England and his eldest daughter, was not married at all. But the first Charlotte had disappeared mysteriously in Russia. She must have been rather like Caroline … the sort of eccentric young woman to whom dramatic things happen.

Caroline was another source of anxiety. All this scandal. Those men she entertained at Montague House and behaved so wantonly with by all accounts. The terrible scandals that happened in this family! His sons seemed to have no moral standards at all. And he had always been such a virtuous man.

And what was coming out of this Investigation he could not imagine. He knew what his son, the Prince of Wales, wanted. He wanted the case proved against his wife. He wanted a divorce.

‘Shocking, eh, what?’ said the King aloud.

And there was the child, Young Charlotte – all ears. She was a sharp one. His mouth curved into a smile. Little minx, that was Charlotte. But he was glad to have her here under his care.
She was his granddaughter. None of them must forget that, and although he was ill and his sight was failing – and his reason too, some said – he was still the King.

The Queen had come into the room. She came unannounced, as she would never have done before his illness. He had been the master then; but now, he was too old, too feeble.

‘Your Majesty, I have come to accompany you to the Drawing Room.’

‘Oh, yes,’ he said, but he continued to sit at the table.

She was looking at him anxiously. She was always watching for the signs. When he began to speak rapidly, when he was incoherent, when the veins stood out at his temples and his face was puce colour she really began to be frightened. It was not that she had a great deal of affection for him. She had never loved him. That had not been possible. When she had come to England he had been kind to her and had successfully hidden his disappointment to find a plain and gauche young German girl was to be his wife when he had dreamed of lovely Sarah Lennox with whom he was in love; he had at least not blamed her, but had meekly accepted his fate while at the same time he made it clear that she should have no power outside her own household; she had come to England to bear children and that was what she had done for twenty years – fifteen children and that didn’t leave much time in between pregnancies.

But when he had lost his reason and she had made her alliance with Mr Pitt against the Prince of Wales and Mr Fox, Queen Charlotte had become quite a power at Court; and when the King had recovered – though not fully – he had been too weak, too ill to oust her from the position she had made for herself.

‘Is there any news?’ he asked.

‘You mean of the Investigation. There is nothing fresh.’

The King shook his head. ‘I thought she was a pleasant woman. Not without good looks … ready to be a good wife …’

The Queen’s mouth shut like a trap; it was thin and wide and even had she possessed perfect features apart from it – which she certainly did not – it would have prevented any claim to beauty.

‘I knew it was wrong, right from the beginning. And so did George.’

The King shook his head and tears came into his eyes. There were almost always tears in his eyes. The Queen was not certain whether they were due to ophthalmic weakness or emotion.

‘I thought he was going to refuse …’ he began.

‘Better if he had,’ retorted the Queen. She felt a grim satisfaction because the marriage had gone wrong. She had had a niece, beautiful, accomplished Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz who had needed a husband at the time – and the Prince, to plague her, had chosen his father’s niece, Caroline of Brunswick, rather than his mother’s.

‘Perhaps it will come right between them,’ said the King.

The Queen gave a snort of laughter. ‘After this Investigation that is hardly likely. She’s a coarse and vulgar creature and George is the most fastidious prince in Europe.’

‘Too much time spent on prancing about in fancy dress. This fellow Brummell …’

‘Oh, you know what George is. He’s always been the same.’ Her expression was one of mingling pride and anger. She had loved her firstborn as she loved nothing else on earth – or ever would. She had craved his affection. And when he had scorned her she had deliberately sought to soothe her feelings by turning that love into a fierce hatred. They would be surprised, she often thought, all these people who surrounded her and regarded her as cold Queen Charlotte, incapable of emotion. There could never have been fiercer emotion than that she felt towards her eldest son. When he had been born she had believed that to be the happiest moment of her life; she had not been able to bear him out of her sight; she had a wax image made of him which she kept on her dressing table. Her beautiful George, her clever precocious son who had charmed everyone with his brilliance and arrogant manners and his fastidious ways as a boy. And when he had flouted her, shown so clearly that there was no place for his dowdy old mother in his life, love had turned to hate – but the love was still there smouldering. This doddering old man meant nothing to her compared with her brilliant magnificent son.

And the idea of marrying him to that dreadful creature! Thank God, she had had no hand in that and had in fact done all in her power to prevent it. Now perhaps they were sorry they had not taken her advice … and none more so than George himself.

‘The child’s mother swears that this … Willie … is hers. She gives details of the hospital where he was born. That makes a clear case for Caroline. They can’t accuse her of being his mother. How I wish … What’s the use? These scandals. They’re no good for the family, eh, what?’

‘The sooner she is sent back to Brunswick the better.’

‘We can’t do that.’

‘Well, if she is not found to be the mother of this boy there are many other things she can be accused of. It’s quite shocking. The Princess of Wales living apart from her husband and entertaining men!’

‘It was he who refused to live with her, you know. I spoke to them both. “Never,” he said. “I’d rather die.” And as for her, she said if he didn’t want her he could stay away. But I could see she would have had him back if he would go.’

‘Nothing can be done until the Investigation is completed. But I do think that woman should be kept away from Charlotte.’

‘The little minx,’ said the King fondly.

‘Indeed so and in need of correction which she shall have. There is an improvement since she has been here at Windsor.’

‘Good fellow, Fisher. Nott too … She’s bright, eh, what?’

‘Far from brilliant but by no means foolish. I do not like the stammer though; and she is too impulsive and most ungraceful. I have seen her father shudder when he looks at her.’

The King’s face grew a shade more puce. ‘His conduct has not always been so … so good … that he can afford to be critical of others, eh, what?’

The Queen said: ‘I was speaking of deportment. Charlotte is gauche and clumsy. It must be rectified.’

‘She dances prettily.’

Fond and foolish where the young were concerned, thought the Queen.

She said: ‘She must spend more time with her aunts.’

Her aunts. His daughters. His darling love Amelia – kind and gentle, always affectionate to her own father, and yet he could not think of her without alarm, because of all the family she was the invalid.

‘Amelia’s cough …’

‘Is better,’ said the Queen.

They always told him it was better. But was it?

‘And that pain in her knee?’

‘It is nothing. The doctors say it will improve.’

He couldn’t really believe them. They had to soothe the poor mad old king.

‘It is time we went,’ said the Queen. ‘We shall be late for the Drawing Room.’

Ugh! thought Charlotte. What a family!

Lady de Clifford was close to her, praying she would do nothing to bring disgrace on herself and her governess. There seated on her chair was the Queen and beside her the King. No one need be frightened of him. He was simply poor old Grandpapa who was always kind and liked to be told one loved him. The old Begum was a different matter.

Lady de Clifford had made her practise her curtsey at least twenty times.

‘But Cliffy, I know how to curtsey.’

‘This is the Queen, my dear Princess.’

Indeed it was the Queen. How ugly she was! When she had been a little girl Charlotte had said: ‘The two things I hate most are apple pie and my grandmother.’ Someone had repeated that. They thought it funny. And on another occasion when they gave her the most horrid boiled mutton she had compared the Queen with that. ‘There are two things I hate most in the world, boiled mutton and my grandmother.’ The dish had changed but the grandmother remained. That was significant.

She must advance across the room which seemed enormous. Her hair hung in long ringlets and she was wearing a pink silk dress. There were a few pearl decorations on it. She felt stupid in it and would have been much happier in a riding habit. But of course one did not attend the Queen’s Drawing Room in a riding habit.

She almost tripped and righted herself in time. She was aware of the sudden silence. All the Old Girls ranged round Grand-mamma’s chair were watching her. Mary would be sorry. Mary was the prettiest of the aunts and she was always charming to Charlotte, but she had begun to wonder whether Mary repeated to the Queen some of the things she said.

She was close to the Queen; she made her curtsey. Yes, it was a clumsy one and the Queen had snake’s eyes; you almost expected a long darting poison-tipped fang to come out of that ugly mouth.

The thought so amused Charlotte that she began to smile unconsciously.

She turned to the King. She should of course have greeted him first. He would not notice though and perhaps the Queen would be pleased even though it was a breach of etiquette. He put out his hand and she grasped it.

‘Dear Grandpapa,’ she said with great affection because he was not like the Queen.

Oh dear, he’s going to cry, she thought. He looked awful when he cried; his great eyes looked as though they were going to pop out of his head. She did not curtsey – the one she had done would do for them both. That would show that it had really been meant for the King. She went and stood close to him and kissed his cheek. It was wrong of course but he did not care. He put an arm about her and said: ‘Well, and how’s my granddaughter, eh, what? Getting on with all those lessons, eh? Leading Fisher a dance? And Nott, eh, what?’