Виктория Холт - The Widow of Windsor

‘Sound of horses,’ said Brown. ‘Someone’s coming this way.’

To the delight of the party it turned out to be Kennedy, another of the grooms who, fearing that some accident had happened since they were so long in returning to the Castle, had come out with the ponies to look for them.

How very thoughtful! said the Queen. Albert had always said what a good servant Kennedy was and Albert as usual was right.

So they were able to leave at once and only when they arrived at Balmoral did the Queen see how bruised her face was. There was something very wrong with her thumb too.

She was so exhausted that she wished to retire at once to her room and ordered that a little soup and fish be sent to her.

She was soon fast asleep but in the morning realised that she had a rather black eye and her thumb really felt as though it were out of joint.

* * *

There was a great deal of fuss about the accident. Vicky and Fritz came over to Balmoral to inquire how the party had survived. The Queen’s bruises were greeted with horror and the doctors were attending to her thumb, which they feared had been put out of joint.

The Queen brushed it all aside and when she returned to London Lord Palmerston took her to task for endangering her safety by driving at night through wild country.

‘My dear Lord Palmerston,’ she said, ‘I have good and trusty servants. I can rely on them absolutely.’

‘Begging Your Majesty’s pardon, I must point out that they did not prevent the overturn of your carriage.’

‘Accidents will always happen, but there was no alarm whatsoever. John Brown behaved with absolute calm and efficiency. I do assure you, Lord Palmerston, that I feel safer driving through the Highland lanes by night than I have sometimes felt on Constitution Hill in broad daylight.’

‘There have been most regrettable isolated incidents, M’am, and these have happened to other sovereigns because there are certain madmen in the world; but the hazards faced on poor tracks in mountainous country could be avoided, and I, with the backing of your Majesty’s ministers, would ask you to desist from placing yourself in danger.’

‘Nonsense,’ said the Queen. ‘The Prince Consort delighted in driving at night. It never occurred to him that there was any danger, and I am sure if there had been he would have been the first to be aware of it. He was always solicitous for my safety.’

She was an obstinate woman, thought old Pam; and with the backing of the defunct Prince Consort she was immovable; so there was no point in wasting further time on that subject. They must let her continue with her night drives and be thankful for the Prince of Wales who was taking on far more of the royal duties than the Sovereign herself.

* * *

The Prince and Princess of Wales had taken a great fancy to Sandringham. It was Bertie’s pleasure to bring with him friends from London to pass a very gay week or so in this royal residence which had never held the same place in the Queen’s affections as Osborne or Balmoral. Perhaps, he said with a grimace, this was what he liked so much about it. It seemed at Osborne and Balmoral that his father still lived on; everywhere in those houses his influence was apparent. It was quite different at Sandringham.

Alix loved it too; there she could have been very happy indeed. It could have been a sort of Rumpenheim, but wherever Bertie was, there must be people. He took the utmost pleasure in arranging house parties. His friends would go and shoot and then return for lavish banquets and gay parties with dancing, drinking and gambling which went on far into the night.

Her pregnancy was causing her a certain amount of discomfort, and although Bertie was as kind and tender as she could wish for, she sometimes had the notion that he was rather glad for her to retire early. He himself never seemed to tire; he would stay up half the night and then be out early in the morning in search of some fresh amusement. She hardly ever emerged from her room until eleven o’clock and she was sometimes late for luncheon. Bertie was occasionally faintly reproving and she promised herself that she would overcome her habit of unpunctuality. She often thought of how her father would disapprove.

Then one day she and Bertie were about to ride out to the hunt when a messenger arrived at Sandringham with news. King Frederick of Denmark was dead and Prince Christian, Alexandra’s father, had now become King.

Alexandra clapped her hands with excitement. Papa, King of Denmark. It was wonderful. Then she thought of poor old Uncle Frederick who had always been so kind to them all in his odd way; she wondered briefly what would become of Countess Danner.

But she was the daughter of a king and she could not help being excited about that.

* * *

The Queen, still nursing a sore thumb, was hoping that John Brown’s knee had improved, for the faithful man when he had jumped out of the carriage had injured it and he had limped for days afterwards. She was very sorry to have been obliged to leave Balmoral and come back to Windsor and all the trials which that entailed. Lord Palmerston, who had called on her, hinted that it would be far more convenient if she were in London; but she had no intention of going to London. Lord Palmerston had something very grave to discuss.

‘Schleswig-Holstein again, M’am,’ he said. ‘It was inevitable that there should be trouble when Frederick died.’

‘I’m afraid I haven’t a very high opinion of the new Queen of Denmark.’

‘She can hardly be blamed for what has happened,’ replied Palmerston. ‘It’s Frederick of Augustenburg who has marched into Holstein.’

‘But he was exiled years ago.’

‘His father was beaten when he was, Your Majesty will remember, by King Frederick. But King Frederick is dead and there is a new King and Queen, the parents of our Princess of Wales. This is what the Prussians have been waiting for. They want Augustenburg set up as a puppet of theirs.’

‘We can’t allow that,’ said the Queen.

‘It’s a tricky situation. Schleswig-Holstein has always been an uneasy spot.’

‘And what do you suggest should be done?’

‘For the moment,’ said Lord Palmerston, ‘wait and see.’

This sounded a little like Lord Melbourne.

She was very uneasy, though, for trouble between Denmark and Prussia, which this obviously was, was really trouble in the family.

Alix was plunged into great unhappiness. She could imagine what was going on at home. Her dear father, a few weeks King of Denmark, to be plunged into war, and such a war. She knew that the Germans were determined to set up Augustenburg in Schleswig-Holstein. She dreamed of Schleswig-Holstein; it had always been a kind of bogey in her life. She remembered as a child hearing those dreadful words at the time when Papa had gone away from home for so long fighting the enemy. But on that occasion they had won the battle; and she had thought it was over; now she realised that all that happened was an uneasy truce.

Everything had seemed so wonderful; herself Princess of Wales, William King of Greece, Fredy the heir to the crown of Denmark and Dagmar courted by the Czarevitch of Russia. So important they had become which was good for Denmark, for it was, after all, only a very small country. And now the mighty Prussians were threatening to crush it.

This had happened at the worst moment. She was feeling the discomforts of pregnancy: she was beginning to understand that the romantic relationship between herself and Bertie was somewhat superficial and that if she were to keep his affection she must never ask too many questions or attempt to discover what his activities were when he was not in her company; and now she had this anxiety about her father. She realised how deeply she loved her parents and because Bertie had told her something of his own childhood she could be grateful for what she had unquestioningly accepted as natural; a happy childhood with parents who had loved her and brought her and her brothers and sisters up with a discipline that had its roots in love. That precious security which children needed more than anything had been hers. Poor Bertie had sadly missed it. Perhaps that was why he now so fervently pursued what he called pleasure.

She knew her father well. Although he had been trained as a soldier he was not meant to fight. One comfort was that her mother would be beside him to help him; and her mother had always believed that she was born to rule.

But it was worrying and her happy world had disintegrated.

Now she could not complain of Bertie’s attitude towards her. He joined in her indignation; it was monstrous, he said, that Prussia should support that upstart Augustenburg. England ought to come to the assistance of little Denmark. When she awoke in the night after some dreadful nightmare in which she had seen soldiers storming the Yellow Palace and poor Papa trying in vain to fend them off, it was Bertie who bent over her whispering comforting words.

‘Don’t fret, Alix,’ he said. ‘England will do something. I happen to know old Pam’s on our side.’

Our side. Oh yes, she had a great deal to be thankful for in Bertie.

But she went on worrying; she couldn’t eat and her sleep was often disturbed. Those dreaded words Schleswig-Holstein seemed to hammer continually in her brain.

* * *

When the Queen considered the problem she naturally thought of Albert. What would he have thought had he been here now? Albert had always been patriotic towards his own country, so he would have been on the side of Germany and that would be against the Danes.