The Captive of Kensington Palace

Chapter V THE INDISCRETION OF A BARONESS

William, Duke of Clarence, had arisen early on the morning of Saturday, June 26th, leaving Adelaide in bed. He liked the morning air, he said, and nowhere was it fresher than at Bushy. He was inspecting the flowers when he heard the sound of horses’ hoofs and hurrying across the lawn he saw Sir Henry Halford, his brother’s doctor, dismounting.

He had no need to ask the news. He saw it in Sir Henry’s face. The King was dead.

The wonder of what this meant swept over William. Many times he had anticipated it, but how much more glorious was the realisation!

‘Your Majesty,’ began Sir Henry … and William did not wait for the rest. He grasped the doctor’s hand and shook it, which was a strange thing to have done. But William had never behaved in a conventional manner and the doctor was too excited to notice at the time.

‘The Queen must be told,’ said William, ‘but I shan’t tell her. She’s been dreading this. But she must be told.’

Sir Henry said he would ask one of her women to waken her.

William went into the house where he was shortly joined by Adelaide who looked more as though she were being told she were a widow than a Queen.

William muttered something jocularly about Her Majesty but Adelaide gazing at her husband and seeing the flush in his cheeks and the brilliance in his eyes was afraid for him. It was the worst thing that could have happened. While he lived quietly at Bushy with the family she could feel he was safe.

‘It’s early,’ said the new King. ‘We’ll go back to bed. I’ve never yet been to bed with a queen.’

Sir Henry looked startled but the King insisted and when the Duke of Wellington as Prime Minister arrived to make the official announcement to William that he was the King of England, he found him in bed.

The great Duke of Wellington, who was a less successful politician than he had been a soldier, cared deeply for the honour of his country. It was, he believed, his great task to guide the King; and there could have been few Kings who needed guidance more. It was not very long ago that William – as Duke of Clarence – had shown how foolishly he could behave when given some authority. Then he had been invested with the office of Lord High Admiral and had brought ridicule on himself and been forced to resign; how much more dangerous would it be to give him the powers of a King.

And yet King he was, by right of succession. Frederick, Duke of York, Wellington supposed, might have been easier to handle.

Only a short while ago the Duke and Robert Peel had been deploring the state of the country. ‘A most heartbreaking concern,’ the latter had called it and due to the conduct of the King and his brothers. Cumberland would have to be watched – a mischief-maker if ever there was one; and when it was considered that the new King had a tendency to his father’s malady, it was clear that there were stormy times ahead.

It appalled Wellington that William showed no regret for the passing of his brother, who had always been a good friend to him; William had known this and had been fond of George, but the prospect of being King so overwhelmed him that he lost all sense of decency.

The poor Queen was grieved and doing her utmost to restrain the King.

‘William, my dear,’ she implored, ‘pray do not be so overjoyed. Remember you have lost a dear brother.’

‘Dear old George! But he had his day. Now I shall wear an admiral’s uniform for my first meeting with the Privy Council. An admiral’s uniform, eh, Wellington?’

The King frowned at Wellington. He had not been a very good friend at the time of all that trouble over his office of Lord High Admiral. But he was a clever fellow and by God the country owed him something. They’d never forget Waterloo. So it was no use holding that other trouble against him. He needed Wellington, a good fellow, a fine soldier. A King must trust his ministers.

The FitzClarences were delighted. They were now the sons and daughters of the King. This was going to make a great difference. Lots of honours should come their way.

His daughter Lady Erroll with her husband and their children were in residence at Bushy at the time and they came out to look at him in his admiral’s uniform and listen to him rehearsing the declaration.

Wellington felt that never could a King’s accession have been received in such a way, but the only member of the household who seemed to be aware of this very odd behaviour was the new Queen.

Wellington was glad when it was time to leave for St James’s with William that they might attend the first Privy Council under the new reign.

On a hot July day George IV was buried. It was some three weeks since his death and during that time William had succeeded in making himself quite popular with his subjects. His complete lack of ceremony endeared him to them; in any case they were prepared to love anyone who was not George IV. He showed a lack of concern for ceremony; he walked about the streets; he would shake any man by the hand, and had a word for everyone. His red weatherbeaten face was unlike that of a King; he lacked the stature of his brother; and the people liked him for it.

It was going to be very different now he was the King. He was a faithful husband; it was true his wife was by no means beautiful but she had a royal air which was acceptable; and she was fond of him and he of her; and it was not her fault that she had not given him an heir.

He had declared that the royal parks should be opened to the public; they were for everyone to enjoy, he said; the public might wander through the grounds and look in at the windows of Windsor Castle. The Sovereigns belonged to the people; that was William’s maxim.

He sent a note to Mrs Fitzherbert telling her that the late King had been thinking of her at the last and that she was to put her household into mourning for him. This was another popular move. Maria was a respected figure; the late King had been disliked for treating her badly and for the new King to behave as though she were indeed the widow of George IV appealed to the people’s sense of chivalry.

In those first few weeks William could do no wrong.

It was true Adelaide had to remonstrate with him to curb his high spirits. It was unseemly to go to a funeral in such a jocular mood. But there was no subtlety about William; he was overjoyed to have reached his goal and he was not going to pretend otherwise.

And so, amidst rejoicing and a certain amount of frivolity, the remains of George IV were laid to rest in St George’s Chapel at Windsor.

In the late King’s apartments his effects were being sorted out. Such a medley of souvenirs had rarely been seen. He had been a great letter-writer and had revelled in his correspondence with numerous women with whom during a long and amorous life he had believed himself to be in love. He had been a hoarder who could never bring himself to destroy anything. There were thousands of letters tied up with ribbons; there were women’s gloves and locks of hair, all carefully preserved. He had cared passionately for clothes and had in fact designed many with and without the help of Beau Brummel. It had been impossible for him ever to lose sight of these garments on which he had expended so much loving care. Now they were hanging in good condition and in chronological order in his wardrobes. His servants said that he never forgot one of them and was apt to ask to see some garment which he had not worn for fifty years. With regard to money he was less careful. Among his possessions were found five hundred wallets each containing sums of money the total of which amounted to £10,000.

This strange collection caused some amusement, and was discussed throughout the Castle; and then William began to change everything. He dismissed his brother’s French chefs. English cooks were good enough for him, he declared; he would have musicians – English ones – but by no means the number who had served his brother.

George had been a connoisseur of the arts and had filled all his houses with priceless treasure. ‘What are these?’ demanded William. ‘Cost money, did they? Well, they belong to the people and the people shall have them. They should be put in galleries and museums, and the people should look at them … if they wanted to.’

He was a man of the people. He was a jolly, unpretentious old fellow who wanted the people to know that he had their good at heart.

There was no one to grieve for the death of King George, except Maria Fitzherbert who in her household of mourning dreamed of long ago days when the young Prince Charming had met her along the river bank and called her his ‘Sweet Lass of Richmond Hill’.

The Duchess of Kent was in urgent conversation with Sir John Conroy. Surely now Victoria must be proclaimed the heiress to the throne. William might die tomorrow and then … It was ridiculous that she, the Duchess of Kent, should be expected to live in obscurity on the bounty of her brother Leopold when she was the mother of the future Queen … and not the distant future either. Victoria was eleven years old, a minor. Should there not be some arrangement made in case there was need of a Regency?

This, Sir John agreed, would be a very desirable state of affairs. He wanted to act with some caution, however, for the situation was a delicate one; and the new King was a clumsy man who prided himself on his frankness, which meant of course speaking and acting without consideration for others.

‘A buffoon!’ said the Duchess. ‘I always had the utmost contempt for him.’

Sir John nodded. That was what he wished. The more the Duchess was estranged from her relations, the better he liked it, for if they decided to befriend her what could his position be? He believed it was most advantageous to him for her to be in conflict with them and it should be Conroy and the Duchess against the royal family.

‘The King must realise our Princess’s position and the need for a Regency,’ he temporised.

‘Of course he does and I shall see that he is made aware of his duty.’

Conroy smiled at her. How magnificent she was in her ambition for her daughter; how single-minded; how completely unaware that by reminding the King of the Regency she was reminding him of his more or less imminent death. Victoria was eleven and in seven years she would be of age. Oh yes, his dear magnificent Duchess was scarcely the most tactful of women.

But let it go. The King would be incensed; the breach between them would widen; and the deeper it was the more the Duchess must turn to Sir John for guidance and consolation.

He leaned forward and taking her hand drew her gently towards him. ‘Well?’ she asked.

‘I was thinking how beautiful you are in your anger.’ Victoria had come into the room with the Baroness Späth a few paces behind her and the Duchess drew back from Conroy a little guiltily, while Victoria, startled, looked from one to the other in dismay.

‘Pray,’ said the Duchess collecting her wits, ‘do not enter a room so boisterously. And what are you doing here at this hour?’

‘I had come to ask, Mamma, if I might sing for the company this afternoon in Aunt Sophia’s apartments. Aunt Adelaide will be there with my Cumberland and Cambridge cousins. And as Aunt Augusta will also be there she would regard it as a compliment if I sang one of her songs.’

‘I think,’ said the Duchess, ‘that this might be arranged if you can learn how to enter a room in a fitting manner.’

It was strange, thought Victoria; but there was something a little embarrassed in Mamma’s attitude; and there was a slyness about Sir John which she did not like at all.

Afterwards she said to Späth: ‘Mamma was standing very close to Sir John Conroy.’

‘And pray’, said the Baroness. ‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Why should I mean anything other than what I say? Mamma was standing close to Sir John. I believe he was on the point of kissing her.’

The Baroness caught her breath with horror and put her hand to her mouth.

‘And,’ went on Victoria, ‘she immediately began to reprimand me which, I have noticed, is a habit of people when they seek to defend their own conduct.’

The Baroness was amazed. Did Victoria realise that she was talking about her own Mamma, she demanded.

Victoria retorted that she was at a loss to understand to whom else the Baroness thought she might be referring.

Indeed, since Victoria had been aware of her position she had become a little imperious; and the death of George IV had, she knew full well, heightened the importance of that position. Strangely enough this had been more apparent in her feelings towards her own mother.

It was a situation which the Baroness thought extremely dangerous and, as soon as Victoria was safe in the hands of Mr Steward and was deep in the arithmetic lesson, she hurried to the Baroness Lehzen to tell her what had happened.

Lehzen shook her head. She disliked Sir John as much as Baroness Späth did. He had insulted them by insisting that his wife take precedence over them. But what could they do? He was firmly entrenched in the Duchess’s household – and affections; and they must try to turn a blind eye to what might be going on. It was always better not to see something that was faintly shocking and there were occasions when ignorance could be so much more comforting than knowledge.

They were both very comfortable at Kensington and they both adored Victoria.

But it was Victoria who had noticed, pointed out the distressed Späth.

Lehzen said it was a matter which should never be discussed with the Princess, and left it at that. She was wiser than Späth and determined that she was not going to lose her position, for she could not imagine a life that was not dominated by her beloved Princess Victoria.

Victoire Conroy was a vivacious child with a look of her father. She clearly believed that her father’s importance in the household entitled her to very special treatment. The Duchess was after all her godmother and the Princess Victoria her playmate.

The Princess was very imperious and was not very fond of her. A fig for that! thought Victoire. They couldn’t get along here without my Papa.

Victoria had said: ‘I may call you Victoire but you must not call me Victoria. You should address me as Princess or Your Highness.’

‘But …’ began Victoire.

‘There are no buts about it,’ declared Victoria, and swept away.

Victoire put out her tongue at the departing figure.

‘The airs some people give themselves!’ said Victoire to her sister Jane. ‘Victoria is far too haughty towards us considering what she owes to Papa. The Duchess depends on him and is very fond of him – so is the Princess Sophia who colours and twitters every time she sees him.’

Victoire took dancing lessons with the Princess because Papa said it was good for the Princess to have companions of her own age. But Victoria preferred her cousins the two Georges because, as she had remarked to Späth in Victoire’s hearing, they were royal. Victoria was becoming very arrogant since the last King died. But Victoire and her sister were going to make sure that she kept her haughtiness for others.

She had spoken to her Papa about it and he laughed. ‘You’re the Duchess’s goddaughter,’ he said. ‘You have a right to respect in this household; and if that woman Späth – or Lehzen for that matter – insults you, stand up for yourself.’

That was Papa’s advice and as Papa ruled the household, Victoire was determined to put it into practice.

Old Späth was sitting knotting – the ridiculous occupation of senile old women, thought Victoire contemptuously. Victoire was angry. She had not been invited to the Princess Sophia’s apartments where Victoria was going to show off how well she could sing. Victoire could imagine the Princess in her white silk dress trimmed with lace and the wide blue satin sash and the little white satin slippers, looking pretty in an insipid sort of way with her plump white arms and her wide blue eyes – and Lehzen would have dressed her fair hair in ringlets.

Victoire was sure that the Princess Sophia would have extended the invitation to her because she would know that to do so would please Papa. She was sure too that the Princess Victoria had deliberately withheld it because now that she was heiress to the throne she felt herself so important that she could go against her mother’s wishes. The Princess, who could never completely mask her feelings, had shown quite clearly that she did not like Sir John.

Victoire sat down beside the Baroness Späth.

‘What are you knotting?’ she asked rudely.

‘That is no concern of yours,’ said the old woman pursing her lips.

‘Do you think I care?’

‘Then why ask?’

There was silence. Then Victoire said sullenly: ‘I wanted to go to the Princess Sophia’s party this afternoon.’

‘Then it’s a pity – from your point of view – that you were not invited.’

‘Was I not invited?’

‘You could answer that question better than I.’

‘I believe I was and that the invitation was withheld.’

‘You are accusing someone?’

‘Victoria may have decided that she did not want me.’

‘Which might be understandable.’

‘If I had been invited I should have been told.’

‘You are acting foolishly, child.’

‘Why? Because I say I should have gone to the party? Of course Victoria did not want me. She only wants to be with people who are royal. She prefers to have her cousins, the two Georges, all to herself. She likes boys much better than girls.’

‘How dare you speak so of the Princess!’

‘I will speak as I wish.’

‘You will not criticise the Princess in my hearing.’

‘My father says we should speak the truth.’

‘Do not quote your father to me.’ The Baroness had risen. Her knotting had fallen to her feet; her lips were quivering; she was angry and alarmed. One day there would be a big scandal concerning Sir John Conroy and that was going to be harmful to the dear Duchess and the even more dear Princess Victoria.

‘Why not? He is important. He could have you sent back to where you belong, you old German woman. And he will. He says he will.’

It was more than the Baroness could endure; she walked away catching the knotting string about her ankle and pulling her work along the floor as she went. Victoire broke into peals of laughter and the Baroness picked up the work, her face scarlet, her lips moving angrily as she tried to extricate herself.

When she had done so she walked away to look for the Baroness Lehzen. She was going to tell her at once what had happened and ask her advice as to what action should be taken because she was sure some action must.

The Baroness Lehzen had accompanied Victoria to the Princess Sophia’s apartments and so was not in her room.

How dared that insolent girl say what she had! She was like her father. Oh, why could not the dear Duchess see what vipers she had allowed to enter her household!

She must be made aware … Oh, why wasn’t calm levelheaded Lehzen here.

It was unfortunate for the Baroness that the Duchess of Kent should have chosen to send for her at that time. There was some matter concerning the Princess Victoria she wanted to discuss but the sight of Späth’s indignant flushed face drove the matter from her mind.

‘What has happened?’ she demanded.

‘I have just left that … that insolent child,’ spluttered Späth.

‘Insolent child?’ The Duchess knew very well to whom Späth referred and Späth should know from experience how she disliked anything connected with Sir John Conroy to be disparaged.

‘Victoire Conroy. She … she dared to criticise the Princess Victoria. She said she preferred the company of boys …’

‘I believe that to be true. Victoria is always talking of those two cousins of hers.’

‘I could not stand by while that girl made such observations about the Princess.’

‘You are being foolish again,’ said the Duchess coldly. She had never let Späth forget how stupidly she had behaved over Feodora and Augustus d’Este.

Späth’s colour deepened. ‘I am not,’ she said recklessly. ‘And there is something I have to say to Your Grace about … about yourself and Sir John Conroy.’

Späth was too excited to notice the expression on the Duchess’s face and to be aware of the ominous silence.

‘I do not forget my place …’ began Späth.

‘Do you not?’ said the Duchess sarcastically. ‘You surprise me.’

‘No, I do not forget it and I speak only out of love for Your Grace and our dear Princess.’

‘Pray continue.’

‘The Princess has noticed the … er … friendship between Your Grace and … this man.’

‘The Princess has long been aware of the friendship between myself and Sir John. Indeed, I hope she feels similarly towards one who has been such a good friend to her and the entire household.’

‘God forbid!’ cried the Baroness.

‘My dear Späth,’ said the Duchess, and her voice showed clearly that the Baroness was far from being dear to her, ‘are you mad?’

‘I am very anxious,’ went on the Baroness, ‘because the Princess has noticed that Sir John Conroy is on very familiar terms with Your Grace.’

‘How … dare you!’ cried the Duchess. ‘Pray go at once to your room. I will deal with your … impertinence later.’

The trembling Baroness left her. At least, she assured herself, I told her the truth.

The Duchess went at once to Sir John.

‘My dearest lady, what has happened?’ he asked looking up from the papers on his table.

‘That … impertinent old woman … That Baroness Späth. Oh dear, and I placed such confidence in her. She was a good nurse to Feodora and afterwards to Victoria and now … now … I will not allow her to remain here. She must go.’

Sir John smiled. He would like to be rid of the two old ladies. Lehzen more than Späth, for Späth was an old fool compared with Lehzen.

He rose and taking the Duchess’s hands kissed them. ‘Pray be seated and tell me exactly what happened.’

‘She was … insolent. She said that Victoria had noticed that you and I …’

‘What is this?’

‘That Victoria had noticed that you and I were … friends.’

‘This is … monstrous.’

‘I think so too.’

‘There is only one thing to be done.’

Sir John nodded sagely. The old fool had played right into his hands.