Princes and Princesses

by Cartland, Barbara

  She knew that she would automatically do what was required of her, but, while she went through all the motions, she would in reality be dead because the light of the spirit would have gone from her.

  That was what the Prince was taking away with him back to Cephalonia, the light which the Greeks had seen in those they loved, the light that the Prince had said had enveloped her when she turned round to face him in the hall at the Ministry.

  It was the light, Angelina thought, that, as far as she was concerned, would never shine again.

  When she was dressed, putting on without looking at it, the dress that Emily had laid ready for her on the chair, she walked slowly downstairs to breakfast.

  Only when Ruston kept saying what a splendid day it was for the new King and how everyone would rejoice that he was well enough to be crowned, did she realise that she had on a very elaborate gown that her grandmother had bought for her to wear at a garden party.

  It was of lace and chiffon and made Angelina think, when she had first seen it that she looked like a Fairy Princess. But now, elaborate and beautiful though it was, she felt like a peasant and a pauper.

  ‘Without love I have nothing!’ she told herself.

  She went up to say ‘good morning’ to her grandmother and then took Twi-Twi in the garden for his first and shortest walk.

  She realised that the Prince had said he would not see her again and yet irrepressibly she felt tense and excited just in case he should change his mind.

  The sunshine was golden on the trees and the flowers, but the minutes dragged by one after another until it was time for her to go back to the house.

  Unreasonably disappointed she knew that, whatever the Prince might say, she was determined to see him when she came out later.

  He would be leaving for Westminster Abbey at eleven o’clock and she calculated at what time he would be returning when the long Ceremony was finished.

  The rest of the Ministry, who were not to be in the procession to Buckingham Palace would return by a quicker route and would therefore be waiting to receive him.

  Then, Angelina thought, there could be several hours when they might meet each other before the Prince left again for the banquet that was to take place in the evening.

  She suddenly felt frantically that she could not bear it, that she must speak to him just once more and must tell him again of her undying love.

  He had forbidden it and she felt like crying out that he did not really love her! Otherwise how could he let these precious moments pass when they might be together?

  Then she told herself that it was, because his love was so great and so overwhelming, that he had been strong enough last night to refuse to walk by the Serpentine because he might have upset or shocked her.

  No man, she thought, could have made a bigger personal sacrifice and it would be wrong for her to try and tempt him from the course he had set himself on.

  “I love you!” she whispered as she left the garden, hoping as she had hoped before, that her thoughts would reach him in the Ministry and he would know that she was thinking of him.

  There were all the usual things to do just as she had done them for months.

  She read the newspapers to her grandmother and even managed to remain apparently unmoved when Lady Medwin wondered curiously why the Prince’s name did not appear in any list of guests at the parties and Receptions that had taken place the previous night.

  “Perhaps he is secretly courting some Princess,” she remarked.

  “Why should you think – that, Grandmama?” Angelina asked.

  “Daisy Hewlett told me that he is here to find a wife. There are quite a number of eligible Princesses about, so he should have no difficulty.”

  Angelina did not answer.

  The agony she had felt before, when she thought of the Prince being married had now just become a dull ache that seemed to have spread over her whole body.

  “You look a little pale this morning,” Lady Medwin exclaimed suddenly, making her jump. “You had better go out into the sunshine and see if it will put some colour into your cheeks.”

  “I would like to do that, Grandmama.”

  “The King has certainly a fine day for his Coronation,” Lady Medwin said, “but I hope the whole long palaver of being crowned does not send him back to bed. If you ask my opinion, it is far too soon for him to be doing anything so strenuous.”

  They talked about the King for a short while, until at last Angelina could escape and ran downstairs with a little more liveliness than she had done earlier because now she would be able to see the Prince and watch him set off for the Abbey.

  As usual there was no one in the garden and she set Twi-Twi down before she pushed her way through the bushes to her usual secret place, from which she could watch the Ministry.

  The lilacs and laurels had grown very thick during the summer and it was quite a struggle to go through them, but finally Angelina could face the front door of the Ministry and could see without being seen.

  Already the red carpet was in position, but the front door was shut and she waited for quite some minutes before there was the sound of a carriage coming along the square.

  She saw that, drawn by two horses, it was closed and she realised that the Minister and other Officials, who would be in the Abbey, had not yet left.

  The carriage drew up outside the front door.

  Now a number of flunkeys in their colourful livery came hurrying out and a minute later the first carriage was joined by another also closed.

  Angelina watched with interest.

  She saw the Minister come out first and recognised him, because she had seen him on several occasions before.

  He was followed by another man who, she knew, was a high-ranking Official, although she was not quite certain what his position was and then two others.

  They all climbed into the first carriage and drove off and the next one moved into place.

  Now there was a dark bearded man who seemed of some importance and wore a magnificent and very impressive gold embroidered uniform.

  Angelina was certain that he was Kharilaos Costas, the Foreign Minister, and he was accompanied by three other Officials.

  The carriage drove away and now, from the direction of the mews, Angelina recognised Alexis driving an open carriage drawn by four horses.

  There was a footman on the box beside him, another standing up behind and, as they drew up outside the Ministry, Angelina found herself holding her breath, because at any moment she would see the Prince again.

  He came out onto the steps and her heart seemed to do a double somersault and she felt that she wanted to cry out and tell him how magnificent he looked.

  His uniform showed a number of decorations, which glinted in the sunshine, but she found it impossible to look at anything but his handsome face and she saw that his expression was stern and unsmiling.

  As he stood on the top of the steps, he looked for a moment towards the garden and she knew that he was thinking of her.

  ‘I love you! Oh, my darling, I love you!’ she cried in her heart.

  His expression did not alter and she felt sadly that he had not received her message.

  He stepped into the carriage sitting alone on the back seat where Captain Soutsos, very smart in his uniform, sat with another aide-de-camp opposite him.

  The Ministry footmen bowed as the carriage drove away and Angelina watched until it turned the corner of the square and was out of sight.

  ‘I shall see him just once more,’ she told herself dismally. ‘Then that will be the end!’

  She went to the seat where they had first sat together near the geranium-filled flowerbed and thought of how they had talked so casually to each other and how, even then, she had felt as if she vibrated to everything he said.

  It was as if a strange irresistible force drew them together so that she could never escape from him.

  She sat there for a long time thinking, then slowly she walked back to the house kno
wing that she had only one thing left to look forward to – the Prince’s return.

  Angelina had expected her grandmother to have her usual sleep in the afternoon, but, when she went up to see her after luncheon, Lady Medwin had other ideas.

  “It is too boring to sleep when I might have been in Westminster Abbey seeing the Coronation for myself,” she said. “What I suggest we do, dearest child, is that you read to me about Queen Victoria’s Coronation. It is in a book in the study. See if you can find it and then we can both feel that we are in the Abbey.”

  Angelina found the book without much difficulty and went upstairs again to her grandmother’s bedroom.

  As she read in her low sweet voice, her thoughts kept wandering to the Prince, seeing the colourful Ceremony taking place and surrounded by all the other Royalty like himself.

  It was, however, the newspapers reported sadly, not to boast the same glory and magnificence that would have been there in June.

  Then the trains had rolled into Victoria Station, almost every half-an-hour bearing Royal visitors who had come from all over the world.

  Angelina had then read out the full list of guests that had seemed like the pages in a Fairytale.

  She remembered how romantic His Imperial Highness the Hereditary Grand Duke Michael of Russia had sounded and His Serene Highness the Hereditary Prince of Morocco.

  She had stumbled over the pronunciation of the names of His Imperial Highness the Yi Chai-Kak, the Prince of Evi-Yang, Ras Makunan of Ethiopia and Said Ali of Zanzibar.

  But today a great number of the strange names and titles were not there. It had been too much to make the long journey twice.

  But Lady Medwin had laughed when they were told by The Times that the Abyssinian Special Mission were present for the simple reason that they had never dared to go home.

  “They would have lost face,” the newspaper explained, “if they had returned to Abyssinia without having seen the crowning of the great white Potentate!”

  Lady Medwin, who had not wasted her time with Lady Hewlett, had little pieces of information of her own to impart.

  “Daisy said,” she announced, “that the octogenarian Archbishop of Canterbury is looking so feeble that everybody is saying that he will never survive the Ceremony.”

  “How awful if the poor old man should die while he is actually crowning the King!” Angelina said.

  “It would certainly be a catastrophe,” Lady Medwin agreed, “and we must just pray that such a disaster does not happen.”

  Angelina remembered the Prince saying that incidents that happened in the Abbey were only amusing if one had someone to share them with.

  She wondered if tonight he would wish that he could share anything that had amused him with her.

  ‘I love you! I love you!’ she was crying in her heart until, with a sense of relief, she realised that it was time to take Twi-Twi into the garden.

  Unfortunately Lady Medwin was in one of her chattering moods.

  She kept Angelina talking about one thing and another until she felt frantic in case the Prince should return and she would not be there to see him.

  “Twi-Twi wants to go out, Grandmama,” she said at length, giving the Pekingese a little push with her foot.

  He was sleeping quite peacefully on the carpet and snorted indignantly at being treated in such a manner, but Lady Medwin said at once,

  “Then you had better go, dearest, but don’t be too long. I have a lot of things to talk to you about and I really feel better today. It must be because there is so much excitement in the air.”

  “I will not be long, Grandmama,” Angelina promised.

  She thought, as she spoke, that once the Prince had gone inside the Ministry there would be no point in staying in the garden.

  She went down the stairs, picked up her hat, which she had left in the hall as usual, and put it on.

  Ruston handed her the key and she crossed the road and let herself into the garden.

  Before she did so she looked at the Ministry and saw that the red carpet was down and there were several footmen standing at the top of the steps.

  She guessed that the Prime Minister and the other Statesmen would have already returned and now there was only the Prince to arrive. Doubtless he would have to join them in yet another long conference that he would find so boring.

  ‘They will talk to him about his marriage,’ Angelina thought.

  She knew how much he would hate the continual discussions over a subject that was now even more painful than it had been before he had met her.

  There was no doubt that he would have to marry.

  Even Lady Hewlett was expecting him to take a wife, which showed that his choice was being discussed in Paris and doubtless in the other Embassies and Ministries all over Europe.

  Once again, Angelina thought, the day would come when she would read of his Wedding and knew that it would be a sword thrust into her heart, inflicting a wound that could never heal.

  She locked the garden gate behind her and then moved towards the bushes where she had concealed herself that morning.

  As she did so, she had the idea that she might watch the Prince’s carriage coming along the other side of the square first.

  It would give her a chance to see more of him and, if she hurried, she could run across the lawn and be back in her usual place opposite the Ministry door by the time he arrived.

  As if he knew exactly where he was going, Twi-Twi walked towards the clump of lilac bushes where she had been this morning.

  Angelina, however, walked past them.

  She had proceeded quite a little way across the lawn before she looked back to see if Twi-Twi was following her.

  ‘He is a creature of habit,’ she thought to herself. ‘He will think it strange if there is any change.’

  For a moment she could not see Twi-Twi, then she heard him bark and it flashed through her mind that he might have had a glimpse of the Ministry cat.

  She turned round ready to go back and fetch him and then she saw that Twi-Twi was not running as he would have been if the cat was in sight, but standing outside the bushes barking.

  ‘I wonder what can be upsetting him,’ she thought.

  Then, pushing his way through the lilacs and the laurels as she had done so often, came a man.

  She could not see him clearly, but he was hatless and wearing what appeared to be a black mackintosh.

  As he was free of the bushes, Twi-Twi barked at him again and, to Angelina’s horror, the man’s right foot shot out and kicked the Pekingese, rolling him over on the grass.

  She hurried forward, furious at what she had seen happen, but, even as she reached Twi-Twi, the man had walked swiftly towards the gate, let himself out and vanished into the road.

  She picked up the small dog in her arms and hugged him.

  He was growling in his throat and shaking with anger at what had occurred.

  “Poor darling! How dare he do such a thing!” Angelina said soothingly, holding him close against her.

  He was slightly appeased by the fuss that she was making of him, but she knew that his dignity had been upset and he would not forget in a hurry how badly he had been treated.

  There was no time now, she thought, to go to the far side of the garden, as she had intended. She had much better go to her usual place and take Twi-Twi with her.

  She parted the leaves of the lilac bushes gently so as not to frighten the Pekingese and she was just stepping forward when suddenly she saw something that made her stand very still.

  There was already somebody in her usual place of vantage.

  She could see the back of a man’s head through the leaves.

  For a moment she felt affronted that anyone should take what was her special lookout. Then she remembered that she did not own the garden and that every other householder in the Square had the right to use it.

  Obviously someone besides herself wanted to watch the Prince’s return from the Coronation.

&nb
sp; ‘I shall have to find somewhere else,’ Angelina thought.

  Then, even as she was wondering where she should go, the man in front of her moved and she saw something shine.

  For a moment it seemed so incredible that she thought she was dreaming and then she realised that the man watching the front door of the Ministry held a rifle in his hand.

  It seemed so impossible that Angelina took another long look to make quite certain.

  Then she drew in her breath.

  Very gently, so as not to make a noise, she backed away from the bushes where she had parted the leaves.

  Standing again in the sunshine with Twi-Twi in her arms, she thought frantically what she should do.

  Her first impulse was to run to the Ministry to warn them of the danger.

  Then, she told herself, in that case the assailant would know that he had been discovered and would disappear.

  ‘He will simply try again later,’ she thought and at that she moment knew what to do.

  She ran across the lawn, with Twi-Twi snorting indignantly against her breast, to the opposite gate.

  She let herself out and then started to run down the road as swiftly as she could towards Grosvenor Crescent.

  She knew that this was the way that the Prince would return and she could only pray that she would not be too late.

  She was terrified that by the time she reached the corner of the square the carriage might have already passed and be proceeding towards the Ministry.

  But there was no sign of it and Angelina thankfully crossed the road and walked a little way up Grosvenor Crescent.

  Ahead she could see the traffic at Hyde Park Corner, carriages, wagons and horse-drawn omnibuses all filled with people.

  She knew that there would be huge crowds down The Mall and clustered outside Buckingham Palace, who had waited all night to cheer the King who at last, after so much delay and anxiety, was now actually crowned.

  But Angelina could think of nothing but the Prince.

  His life was in danger, the revolutionaries he had spoken about had not waited for him to return to his own country, but were prepared to kill him here in England!