Hand in hand the sisters had come into the gardens.

‘Oh, Sissy,’ Victoria said, ‘it is going to be dreadful when we’re parted.’

‘Dreadful,’ agreed Feodora.

‘You will write to me?’

‘Such long letters that you will tire of reading them.’

‘How can you say that when you know it is not true.’

‘Vicky darling, I know. But I’m so frightened. I’m going to lose you all and have a new husband and I don’t really know him very well. But the worst thing of all is saying good-bye to you.’

Victoria wept openly. She displayed her emotions too readily, said Lehzen; but the Duchess was of the opinion that it showed a tender heart and the people would like it.

‘What is your Ernest like, Feddy?’ asked Victoria. ‘Is he handsome?’

‘Y … yes, I think he is.’

‘As handsome as Augustus d’Este?’

Feodora sighed. Victoria had reminded her of that passionate attachment which had not been allowed to continue.

‘It used to be such fun,’ said Victoria. ‘And Augustus was after all our cousin.’

‘But … he was not accepted as such by the family,’ Feodora reminded her.

‘It is all so complicated,’ complained Victoria. ‘I do wish people would tell me things. Why should Augustus be my cousin and yet not be regarded as such? You know how he always called us “cousins” when we went over into Uncle Augustus’s garden.’

Feodora nodded, recalling those days when she was quite a child, being just past eighteen – she was now a mature twenty-one – and she had been put in charge of Victoria and told not to let her out of her sight. There had been no harm in it. Uncle Augustus, the Duke of Sussex, had a garden among those of the Palace and Victoria had loved to water his plants. And how she used to get her feet wet in the operation and had to be smuggled in before Mamma or Lehzen or Späth saw and feared she would die of the effects. In the garden Augustus would often stroll. He was the son of Uncle Augustus and in truth their cousin, but not accepted as such because the ‘family’ did not regard his father’s marriage to his mother as a true marriage, although Uncle Augustus had been married to her both abroad and in London. It was something to do with that tiresome Marriage Act which said that the sons of the King could not marry without his consent. Well, Uncle Augustus had married without his father’s consent and as his father was King George III who had brought in the Act, the case of Uncle Augustus’s marriage was taken to court and the court gave the verdict that it was not legal. But Augustus the younger believed that it was and that he had every right to court his cousin.

They were happy days, with little Vicky wielding the watering-can and pretty seventeen-year-old Feodora sitting under the tree fanning herself and Augustus coming out as if by accident to talk to her and tell her she was beautiful. How exciting this was after the stern rules laid down in the Duchess of Kent’s apartments in Kensington Palace.

Sometimes the Baroness Späth was with them. Dear old Späth was not nearly such a dragon as Lehzen, and very romantic, thinking how charming it was with Victoria tending the flowers and Augustus and Feodora falling in love.

Victoria had been aware of the intrigue although she was not quite six at the time. In any case it was pleasant to get away from the strict observance of Mamma and Lehzen, for she was allowed deliberately to pour the water over her feet and no one said anything, Feodora being so wrapped up in Augustus’s conversation and Späth being so intent on watching Feodora and her cousin Augustus.

Cousin Augustus was old but very handsome, particularly in his Dragoons’ uniform. As for Feodora she had grown prettier than ever; she had been constantly receiving letters and the Baroness Späth was always tripping from their apartments in Kensington Palace to those of the Duke of Sussex carrying notes from Feodora to Augustus and from Augustus to Feodora.

Once when Victoria had walked in the gardens with Feodora, her sister had whispered that she was going to marry Cousin Augustus and showed Victoria the gold ring he had given her.

‘Then, Feodora, they will be your flowers I shall water.’

‘Yes, dear Vicky.’

‘I shall water them even more carefully because they are yours. And I shall come often to visit you, shall I not ?’

Feodora said solemnly that if Mamma permitted it Vicky should be her very first visitor.

Victoria went back to the nursery and told the dolls the exciting news; but shortly afterwards there was trouble in Kensington Palace. This was when Feodora had told Mamma that Cousin Augustus wished to marry her, at which Mamma was ‘Painly Surprised’, ‘Disagreeably Shocked’ and ‘Very Angry’. It was nonsense it seemed to imagine Cousin Augustus could marry Feodora because Cousin Augustus was not considered to be legitimate and Feodora was the daughter of the Duchess of Kent and although the Duke of Kent had not been her father – for her father had been the Prince of Leiningen, Mamma’s first husband – she was after all connected by her mother’s second marriage with the royal family and was half-sister to Victoria.

Poor darling Feddy! That had been a bad time. Victoria had done her best to comfort her sister. Poor Späth had been talked to very severely by Mamma and had gone about with averted eyes for days afterwards; Lehzen had clicked her tongue every time she saw her, and Victoria was not allowed to water the flowers in Uncle Sussex’s garden because he was in disgrace too.

It was all very sad and poor Feodora had wept and confided to Victoria that her heart was broken.

Victoria presumed it had mended again because Feodora soon began to look almost as she had before those afternoons – though never quite so gay as when she had sat under the trees in Uncle Sussex’s garden; and when not so long ago Uncle King – the most important of all the uncles – had expressed a desire to see his important little niece, Feodora had accompanied Victoria and Mamma to Windsor. Uncle King had been the most impressive man Victoria had ever seen. He was very very old and even fatter than he was old; and when she was lifted on to his lap to kiss him she had seen the rouge on his cheeks. Very strange, but she had liked him – better than Uncle William or Uncle Sussex – and most certainly better than Uncle Cumberland. Uncle Cambridge she did not remember seeing. He was abroad looking after Hanover. But the point was that while Uncle King liked his little niece Victoria very much and took her driving and smiled benignly on her, he could not take his eyes from Feodora and made her sit beside him and kept patting her knee and showing in several ways that he thought her very pretty.

‘I do believe,’ said Victoria, after having witnessed the effect Feodora had on Augustus, ‘that Uncle King would like to marry Feodora.’

Victoria was not the only one who thought that, and shortly afterwards Feodora was sent to Germany to stay with her grandmother, the Dowager Duchess of Saxe-Coburg, and there she had met Ernest Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg who, Grandmamma had made perfectly clear, would be a good husband for her; and what Grandmamma thought proper so would Mamma; and there was no fear of anyone’s being horribly shocked about such a union.

‘He’s a soldier,’ said Feodora, ‘and he’s past thirty … like Augustus.’

Victoria brightened. The more like Augustus the better.

‘He is a very good man,’ said Feodora. ‘There is no scandal about him. Not like Aunt Louise.’

‘What about Aunt Louise?’

‘I don’t know exactly except that Uncle Ernest has parted from her. I think she has done something very wrong. I didn’t see her, but I saw the two little boys. Ernest – named after his father – and Albert who is a little younger. Grandmamma told me he is three months younger than you.’

‘The little boys are our cousins, are they not?’

‘Yes, they are. I wish you could have seen them. Albert is much prettier than Ernest.’

‘I am not sure,’ said Victoria, ‘that boys should be pretty.’

‘Oh they may be at that age; he’s only eight years old, remember.’

‘Yes. Three months younger than I am.’

‘Dear little Alberinchen has the most lovely blue eyes and dimples. He will be very good-looking when he grows up.’

‘And who is Alberinchen?’

‘Albert. It is Grandmamma’s name for him. He is her favourite.’

‘I think I should prefer Ernest.’

‘Why, when you have never seen him?’

‘Because it seems to me that this Albert may be a little spoiled.’

‘Indeed he is not. It is only Grandmamma who shows how much she loves him; and she was the same with us.’

‘And we are not spoiled,’ admitted Victoria. ‘So why should Albert be? I should like to see our cousins.’

‘I am sure you will. Grandmamma was always saying how she would like you to be friends … with your boy cousins.’

Feodora looked at Victoria to see if she had grasped the significance of this but Victoria had ceased to think of her cousins and had remembered how sad it was going to be when Feodora went away.

‘How much happier it would have been if you had married Augustus and lived close by. I shouldn’t have minded your marrying then.’

‘Alas,’ sighed Feodora, ‘marriages are made for us. It will be so for you one day, darling.’

Victoria stared into the distance. That day was very far away.

‘And there is our brother Charles …’ began Feodora. ‘I believe he is going to find some opposition.’

‘Do tell me about Charles,’ said Victoria eagerly.

Feodora hesitated. She was reckless today; it was because she was soon going to leave her little sister. Victoria ought to know something of the world, she decided. How difficult it would be for her if she were suddenly thrust into marriage without any foreknowledge. She was busy with her tutors for a greater part of the day; she was taught music and dancing; but what, Feodora asked herself, did the child know of human relationships and life? She had almost blurted out the scandal just now concerning Uncle Ernest and his wife Louise; what if she had let slip that Louise was an unfaithful wife and that Uncle Ernest had divorced her? Mamma and Lehzen would have been furious. They wanted to protect Victoria; but could ignorance be considered a protection?