‘Oh, Albert, my precious love, why are you not here to manage these matters? What can I do without you? What can England do without you?’

She told her wardrobe maid, Annie MacDonald, that she longed to join him in the mausoleum at Frogmore. But Annie replied in that rather curt way which some of her favoured servants used towards her, ‘Well, M’am, you’ve got your duty to do. You’ve got the country to look after. And going and lying down there in Frogmore is not what the Prince would have wanted. He’d rather you stayed up here and got on with the work.’

‘Oh, Annie, you are right,’ she cried weeping.

And she wondered what she could do without people like Annie and John Brown (dear Scots both of them) up at Balmoral who spoke to her in that familiar way which endeared them to her because it showed how faithful they were.

She was certainly worried about Bertie. When had she not been worried about Bertie? Their eldest son had been an anxiety to them both. But for Bertie’s wicked conduct at the Curragh Camp … But she should not think of that because it made her so angry and she must try to think of what was best for the country – as Annie so rightly pointed out.

Albert had said that if there was a match with Denmark the Princess Alexandra would have to understand that the Prince of Wales was marrying her and not her relations, which meant of course that whatever happened about Schleswig-Holstein would be no concern of England’s – that was no family concern. It might well be a political one.

Did Alexandra understand this? The girl seemed docile. But she had that dreadful mother. A woman who painted her cheeks. What would Albert have said!

This must be made clear; and she herself must see that Alexandra’s position was absolutely clear to her before she could be allowed to become the Princess of Wales.


* * *

The family was back at the Yellow Palace. Alix and Dagmar shut themselves up in Alix’s bedroom and Alix told her sister what had happened at the Laeken Palace. It was all very exciting. Bertie was wonderful. He loved her – for herself – and she loved him; and they were going to live happily ever after.

Dagmar listened wide-eyed; she knew that her turn would come very soon. Thyra they decided was too young to share their confidences. She merely knew that Alix was going to be married and everyone was very excited about it.

The gong was sounding for luncheon. Alix had been looking at her dresses and wondering what alterations she could make to some of them. Though of course she would probably have a new trousseau. Her eyes sparkled at the thought. She would choose the colours and consult the dressmaker. What fun that would be. To have exactly the material one wanted – not to have to makeshift.

She realised that it must have been some minutes since the gong had sounded. She would be late again.

She was right: she was, and the family were all at table. Her father looked at her with tender reproach. She was getting a little old now to be denied a second helping, or to stand while drinking her coffee. Prince Christian realised that all his attempts to cure her besetting sin had failed.

So he said nothing and she slid into her seat. Conversation was a little strained, she sensed, though the younger ones were not aware of it, so she was not surprised that when the meal was over she was asked to step into her father’s study.

There her parents said that they had something to tell her and it was obvious from their expressions that it was not very pleasant.

‘We have had a letter from Queen Victoria,’ said Prince Christian.

‘An ultimatum,’ retorted his wife.

‘Dear Alix,’ said Christian tenderly, ‘I’m afraid this is going to be something of an ordeal. The Queen wants you to go to England without us and to spend a month with her.’

‘Oh?’ said Alix.

‘Can you imagine it?’ cried Louise.

‘Yes, Mama. It will give me an opportunity to get to know her.’

The parents exchanged glances. Truly Alexandra was a strange girl. She seemed to have no fear of the forbidding Queen and her house of mourning.

‘You mean to say that you don’t mind?’

‘I think we shall be all right together, Mama,’ said Alexandra.

She couldn’t of course realise what it meant, thought her parents. Or was she so besottedly in love with Bertie that she was prepared to face any ordeal for his sake?

‘You will have to be punctual in England,’ her father warned her.

‘I shall try hard, Papa, but I daresay I shall slip up now and then,’ she replied with a smile.


* * *

Bertie was horrified. Poor Alix to be submitted to that. Oh God, he thought, I must save her.

He was delighted with the prospects of his marriage. She was a real beauty and she had charm too and poise. He would have found it very difficult to discover a Princess as attractive as Alix. He was in a way in love with her; he could easily fall in love with pretty women; they interested him more than anything else. He liked gambling, jolly company, practical jokes, lots of fun – all the things he had been deprived of by his parents so far, but women came first. All that would be changed once he was married. The Queen could scarcely treat a married man as though he were a child.

Alix – dear, jolly, beautiful Alix – would be the means of giving him his freedom, so naturally he was in love with her.

He really must care about her quite a lot for he was very indignant at the thought of her having to face that ordeal. Imagine being shut up for a month with Mama at dreary Osborne or Windsor – or Balmoral with that tiresome John Brown hovering over the Queen as though she were incapable and he was her keeper, and anywhere was dreary where Mama was nowadays. Poor Alix, she would have to listen to accounts of the perfections of the Prince Consort, his virtues, the lack of appreciation, how he had lived, how he had died. Surely she wouldn’t bring up that incident of the Curragh Camp? He’d soon explain that away if she did, and in any case he fancied Alix was not so strait-laced as not to understand that there was no great harm in sowing a few wild oats before marriage.

Poor dear Alix – he had to save her if he could. He appealed to Uncle Leopold, who saw his point.

Oh no, said Leopold, that was too much. Poor Alix would need to be at home to prepare herself for her wedding. She could not be expected to come to England in the winter of all times and share in the Queen’s mourning. He promised to write to the Queen, which he did.

Victoria read his letter and threw it aside. Dear Uncle Leopold, she loved him so much, but he did have a tendency to look upon himself as the head of the family, the head of Europe for that matter. Albert had said so. And what had Albert said of Alix? She must be made to understand that Bertie would be marrying her and not her family. There would be no involvement with Danish affairs, unless it was for the good of England that this should be.

She wrote to Prince Christian. She would expect Alix at Osborne on the 7th of November. He might bring her and stay for two days; then he should return to Denmark and come over to take her back in December. The Queen wished to have Alix to herself for a month.


* * *

Alix arrived at Osborne on a cold and misty November evening.

The Queen and her daughters were waiting to receive her. Alix, in spite of the weather, managed to look charming and the Queen noted this with pleasure.

‘My dear, dear child,’ she murmured, embracing her. ‘You must be perished with cold and worn out with the journey.’ She acknowledged Prince Christian’s greeting and said that Lenchen should show him to his room. She herself took Alix to hers.

‘How pretty you look,’ she said. ‘I am glad you came. There is much we shall have to say to each other.’

Alix looked at her and thought of her sad loss and how unhappy she would be if Bertie died; and she remembered how important her own father and mother were to each other, and she believed she understood a little of the Queen’s grief. Victoria was aware of this and was certain that in Alix she was going to find a new daughter.

When they were all together in the Queen’s sitting-room after supper had been served the Queen explained to them all what Osborne had been like before Prince Albert had changed it. ‘His one idea was to give me a house which he considered worthy of me. Everything he did he did to perfection. There were many roles he could have played in life, but he was taken from me.’

The tears began to flow.


* * *

Christian took his leave of his daughter.

‘My dearest daughter,’ he said, ‘if it becomes intolerable you must let me know. I wouldn’t have you unhappy for the world.’

She flung her arms round his neck. ‘Dearest Papa, you are an angel.’

‘Oh no, not that!’ he said and she smiled with him.

‘Poor Queen, how desolate she is. I shall do my best to cheer her.’

‘Good-bye, my child. Try to be punctual.’

‘Oh, I will, Papa, I promise you.’

Then he was gone.

There were many interviews with the Queen. Alix understood, she hoped, that when a Princess married, her family was that one which was her husband’s. A Princess came into a new country. That country’s ideals became hers. That country’s customs and so on. Alix must understand that.

Yes, said Alix, she did.

‘It was different in my case. I was the Queen. Albert was a second son of the house of Saxe-Coburg, as you know. It was his duty to come and live here. I shall never forget the day he arrived. I stood at the top of the staircase at Windsor and I thought an angel had come to me …’