Airborne - The Hanover Restoration

by Blair Bancroft

  Julian read my note, glared up at me. A sharp flip of his hand in my direction, and he turned back to what he’d been doing when Tillie interrupted him. My shoulders slumped, I heaved a sigh. But the next time someone’s hand slipped, he didn’t yell.

  All in all, not the best day at the Abbey.

  Late that evening, Tillie was brushing my hair when the dressing room door clicked open. Julian stepped into my bedchamber, closed the door behind him, and simply stood there. Tillie lowered the brush to the dressing table, bobbed a curtsey, and scurried from the room.

  He leaned back against the door, his face leached of color. As I’m sure mine was. Obviously, we hoped never to repeat the last twenty-four hours.

  “I failed you.”

  “You married me for my brain. I used it.”

  My inner voice, my common sense, and Papa all screamed, “Minta!” at the same moment. Fine. I know I should have been more conciliatory, but Rochefort wasn’t the only one who was exhausted.

  Oddly enough, my abrupt retort didn’t seem to offend. Not looking the least bit annoyed, Julian pushed himself off the door and crossed to the dressing table. I managed a rueful smile. “We both look like something the cat dragged in,” I offered.

  “Worse.”

  “But we’re alive,” I pointed out. “The mob could have overrun the house. The sneak attackers might have burned us out. We could be dead, Julian. Lexa, dead. The monarchy, dead. Aurora destroyed. And yet we’re all here, and Lexa may still be queen.” I reached out and clasped his hand. “Are you not the one who told me we had to be married immediately, that you needed me for your plot to succeed?”

  Julian pulled me to my feet, held me tight to his chest. “If not a complete failure,” he murmured against my hair, “I am certainly a fool. For I forgot we were a team. Partners. But believe me, Minta, I never anticipated you would be so actively caught up in this plot. I didn’t anticipate the danger.”

  I widened my eyes at him. “This, from the man who insists on considering ‘worst case.’”

  Julian groaned. “So wifely, my dear. You twist the knife with dexterity.”

  I rose on tiptoes and kissed him. “Come to bed. Forgive the platitude, but the world always looks better after a good night’s sleep.”

  “I doubt the morning sun will wipe away assassins and the Lord Protector’s troops. Or put our Miss Smythe on Britain’s throne.”

  “Hush.” I put my fingers to his lips. “Dawn offers fresh insight into our problems, not miracles. And in our present condition we are worthless, to others and to ourselves.” I tugged him toward the bed and tucked him in, pulling the bedcoverings up to his chin. Crawling in from the opposite side of the bed, I nestled spoon-like beside him. ‘Tomorrow’ is a beautiful word,” I whispered in his ear.

  A soft snort. “If I don’t spill a load of evangelicals on top of the Anglican cathedral.”

  “Julian!”

  His only answer was a snore.

  Astonishingly, the sun rose bright and clear, with scarcely a stray cloud on the horizon. A promise of better days ahead? I could only hope. The Abbey ladies, including myself, continued our recuperation, quietly re-stoking our wells of courage, which had been sadly drained by those long, crowded hours in the lift. Julian and Matt, naturally, had to inspect every inch of the airship, followed by long hours examining every machine in the Abbey workshop to make certain our unwelcome visitors had not tampered with them.

  The day after that, when we were all beginning to recover some spring to our step, Julian fulfilled his promise to make evangelicals fly. With a London agitator or two undoubtedly tucked up in the delegation of eight chosen men. Fortunately, it went well, for how could anyone, no matter how curmudgeonly, resist the joy of soaring over the treetops, villages, rolling farms, and pastureland of Hertfordshire?

  And when the chief agitators brought their tale of an airship capable of controlled flight back to London?

  From the windowseat in the west wing, I watched the airship return, the scramble to moor her securely. Watched as each man shook Julian’s hand as they descended from the ship. Watched each smile, hearty or feigned. My brain recognized what my heart did not want to see. The flight’s success confirmed the threat to whoever was behind these attacks. The airship worked, therefore it was dangerous.

  “My lady, my lady!”

  Tillie’s raised voice sent shivers through me. What now?

  “Soames sent me to find you, my lady. A grand carriage is coming up the drive. With a crest on the side. Soames couldn’t quite make it out, but he thinks it looks royal.”

  “Royal?” I echoed. “But we don’t have royalty any more, Tillie.”

  “Aye, my lady, but that’s what Mr. Soames said.”

  Fortunately, thinking I might encounter some of the delegation from the village, I had donned one of my better mourning gowns, the one that was lightened by a white fichu at the neck. Royalty? Impossible. And yet . . .

  “Send a footman for Lord Rochefort,” I told her. “But first make sure Lexa stays in her suite. The other ladies as well. They’re not to come out until I say it’s safe.”

  Tillie dashed off. I drew a deep breath and hastened toward the staircase.

  When I reached the front hall, Soames was standing there gawping, looking as if he’d fade into the woodwork if he could. A young man stepped through the door, resplendent in his scarlet officer’s uniform. A captain, if I read his insignia correctly.

  “I beg your pardon for the lack of ceremony,” I burbled. “I am Lady Rochefort. My husband will be here directly. The young officer glanced about the hall. Failing to find a butler, major d’omo, or anyone but the cowering Soames, he drew himself up to his considerable height of six feet or more and announced in stentorian tones: “His Highness, Colonel Prince George William Frederick Charles.”

  I gulped and dropped into my deepest curtsey as an elaborately uniformed young man the same age as Lexa and myself strode through the door, his shako tucked under his arm.

  Chapter 18

  I was barely ten when Wellington, hero of the long battle with Napoleon, seized the government. Frankly, the fate of the King George III’s surviving sons held little interest for me, even less the fate of the king’s grandsons. I knew that the eldest surviving son, Prince Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, had settled for being King of Hanover. I knew his son George, born three days before Lexa, was blind. But I knew nothing about George III’s youngest son, the Duke of Cambridge, or his son, who was now bowing over my hand. If asked, I would have guessed the duke and his family were living quietly in the country somewhere, or even in exile. That the erstwhile Prince George was a colonel in the British army was more than a bit of a surprise.

  Nor did the irony escape me. The three cousins—two Georges and Lexa—were born within two months of each other, as George III’s sons attempted to produce a future monarch after the shocking death of Charlotte, the Princess Royal, in childbirth. The result—three baby Hanovers born the year before the old king died, with Alexandrina Victoria taking precedence over her male cousins because her father, the Duke of Kent, was born before Cumberland and Cambridge.

  Yet standing before me now was the son of the Duke of Cambridge, youngest of the many sons of George III. A young man, older than Lexa by two months, with royalty writ large across his solid form.

  I gaped, like some country bumpkin at a magic show. Three potential candidates for the British throne, and two of them were under the Abbey roof, my roof, at this very moment.

  “You appear astonished, my lady.”

  “I–I beg your pardon, Your Highness. Not only is your visit unexpected, but I had not expected to see you in uniform.”

  The young man in front of me, so obviously built to the model of his Hanoverian uncles, would undoubtedly go to flesh as he aged, but at the moment his body was lithe, his smile quick, if rueful, his eyes revealing both intelligence and wry humor. “Our Lord Protector is nothing if not an extraordinary strategist,
my lady. He has undoubtedly read Sun Tzu, who said, ‘Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”

  Devil take it, I liked him. But was he, too, practicing Sun Tzu’s advice?

  In vain I listened for Julian’s quick steps on the tiled floor between the hall and the lift. “Please come into the drawing room, Your Highness. I have sent for Rochefort and am certain he will be here shortly.” As I turned, I cocked an eyebrow at Soames, who hastened off to check on my laggard husband. “And, Jacob,” I said to one of the hovering footmen, “please ask Lady Thistlewaite to join us in the drawing room.”

  A call for help, I admit it. One of the few times when I would appreciate the presence of my formidable mother-in law, for clearly our contretemps of two nights ago was producing repercussions already. Was Prince George here on his own business, or had he been sent by our Lord Protector to whom he clearly owed his livelihood?

  A colonel at twenty-one—payment for his loyalty? Or was his advancement merely a sop to the monarchist movement, a casually tossed bone to keep him quiet?

  Impossible to tell.

  Interestingly, Prince George’s aides stationed themselves in the hall, standing stiffly upright in full military attention. A point in the prince’s favor, for he must have ordered them to allow him to venture in the dangers of the Abbey drawing room without escort.

  Lady Thistlewaite had barely made her curtsey when Julian came charging through the door, as if he feared the prince might be holding a sword to our throats. Alas, my husband was still wearing his work clothes, his hair mussed, his workboots scuffed. He skidded to a halt and stared. Bowed. “I beg your pardon, Your Highness, but I was occupied in my workshop. If I had known you were coming . . .” Having made his point, he left the sentence hanging.

  “My apologies, Rochefort. When I heard what happened here two nights ago, I felt the matter was of some urgency. May we talk?”

  Julian waved the prince back to his seat and settled into a chair, facing him. “You may speak before my wife and my mother, Highness. What brings you to the Abbey ventre à terre?”

  The prince’s rueful smile was back. If he hadn’t been so well trained, I suspected he might have squirmed in his seat. “You are correct, Rochefort. I came here with a sense of great urgency, but I failed to prepare the words that need to be said. I open my mouth and realize that almost anything I say could be treasonous or, at best, suspected of inciting treason.” He sighed. We waited, not daring to encourage him one way or the other.

  Prince George’s gaze flicked over the entrances to the drawing room. Someone had thoughtfully closed both doors. He nodded. “Then let us have no roundaboutation,” he said at last. “I am here on behalf of my father, Cambridge, and for myself. Let us simply say that we wish to deliver a message to the monarchists and hope you may be able to direct that message where it belongs.”

  Lady Thistlewaite could not quite stifle a gasp. As for myself, I felt doom closing in. We had known, after all, that agitators sent down from London could only mean the monarchist plot was known. And then there was the assassination attempt, whose target was still a mite uncertain.

  His face grim, Julian offered no more than a tiny nod, encouraging the prince to continue. Shouldn’t he be denying any knowledge of monarchist conspirators?

  “My father and I wish the monarchists to know we have no ambition for the throne. Even if the monarchy still existed, I would be fifth in line, after Kent’s girl—and, yes, we’re quite certain Alexandrina Victoria lives—and Hanover, his son George, and my own father. And I assure you, to rise to general in the British Army is my sole thought for the future.”

  Even Julian was tongue-tied. To accept the message was treason. An admission that we were in contact with the monarchist conspiracy.

  Contact? We were the monarchist conspiracy.

  And young George had known exactly where to come.

  The whole thing could be a trap.

  Was most likely a trap.

  And yet . . . I liked him.

  The silence lengthened. Julian crossed his arms over his chest and turned his most enigmatic scowl on the scarlet-coated young prince. “Would you be willing to swear, Highness, that you represent only your father and yourself?”

  Prince George’s chin shot up, his chest swelled with indignation. “I would. I do.”

  I believed him, but knew I shouldn’t. The big question: was the prince loyal to the House of Hanover or to the man acclaimed as the world’s greatest general, the man who had obviously favored young George’s promotion to the rank of colonel by the time he was twenty-one?

  Were Wellington’s troops just waiting the prince’s return with a confirmation of treason that would put all our heads on the block?

  If Julian had been an automaton, I couldn’t have heard more clearly the gears inside his head spinning, weighing his options, while each pregnant moment he kept his gaze locked on Prince George. “You have perhaps heard,” he said as the silent seconds grew ominous, “that I am something of a dabbler in machines. Perhaps you would care for a tour of my workshop?”

  Workshop! Julian would show Aurora to a colonel in the British Army? To a rival for the throne, no matter how many fine words he tossed before us?

  But of course not. He had used the singular. Workshop. The one in the cellars held many wonders, but nothing that could be misconstrued as treason.

  “I would be delighted.” The prince bounded to his feet. Enthusiastic over Julian’s inventions, or thrilled to be fulfilling his role as spy?

  Men! And they claimed females were difficult to understand.

  “He’s gone mad,” Lady Thistlewaite hissed the moment Julian and prince started down the corridor toward the lift.

  “Perhaps when Prince George sees all Julian’s inventions,” I ventured, “he will be more willing to believe that his time is fully occupied, rebellion the furthest thing from his mind.”

  “I wouldn’t wager on it,” my mother-in-law returned with a decided snap. “Our Great Protector is undoubtedly hovering in his palace, just waiting to unleash his troops. The only problem with Rochefort’s fine escape tunnel—where do we go from there, with all Britain on alert to capture the traitors?”

  An excellent question. Could we make it to Balmoral, where Lexa had spent the last few years? Scotland, after all, was always a hairsbreadth from rebellion and sympathetic to English traitors.

  Perhaps if we left immediately . . .

  And gave up all thought of restoration of the monarchy while Wellington lived. And that could be a decade or more. Though one and seventy, he was proving to be remarkably tenacious of life. An old soldier who had sunk his teeth in the juicy bone of Britain and refused to give way.

  My mind conjured a picture of Elbert chugging out of Euston Station with soldiers squeezed into every carriage, even hanging on between cars. As many as four or five hundred if an extra carriage was added on. And there were now four locomotives on the London & Birmingham, two in regular use, two alternates, so no matter what repairs were needed, the trains ran on time. If all four were sent to London and loaded with soldiers, we could have two thousand troops on us in a matter of hours.

  Merde!

  Slowly, I shook my head. “I don’t think the prince was lying,” I said. “We can’t run from what could be a phantom army.”

  “Do you actually believe That Man has lost his touch? That the mind that crushed Bonaparte is not determined to do the same to us?”

  “No, Ma’am. But did you not say the whisper campaign has already started? Word of the princess being alive and well is spreading through London and beyond. And surely I had heard Lady Carlyon mention broadsheets and songs, rallying cries for those who hold the monarchy in their hearts. Even the circulation of sketches of a young woman wearing a crown.”

  “Indeed, the town criers have been exceedingly busy. We pay them well.”

  And would you have Lexa run away when triumph is within her grasp?”

  “Her Highness’s safety is
of paramount importance,” Lady Thistlewaite proclaimed, “even if we must wait for another day.”

  “The time is here. Now. We can do this!”

  “Then you’re as mad as he,” my mother-in-law cried. “You will kill us all.”

  She had a point, which was why “young” was so often coupled with the word “foolish.” I sighed. As much as I espoused the cause of women of independence, this was a moment when I was relieved to fall back on tradition. “We will wait for Rochefort,” I said. “Perhaps he will learn more from Prince George, something that will help us decide what must be done.”

  With what could only be described as a lethal look, Lady Thistlewaite sailed out of the drawing room, no doubt to consult with the Carlyons and the Wandsleys, leaving Lexa as a helpless pawn instead of the queen she should be. Which meant Lexa, Phoebe, and I would have a discussion of our own.

  “Mama says Prince George is here,” Phoebe burbled as Tillie ushered my two new friends into my bedchamber. “What is he like? Is he handsome? Did he ask to see Lexa?”

  Truly, until this moment, I hadn’t been certain Phoebe knew who Lexa was. While we settled into the cozy sitting area in front of the fireplace, I struggled with the facts, emotions, and possible fantasies battling each other in my head. The obvious seemed a good place to start.

  “He is reasonably handsome,” I said. “Earnest, with good manners and a touch of military stiffness. I found him likable.”

  “His purpose here?” Lexa inserted, obviously not put off by trivialities. I repeated our conversation almost word for word. “And you believed him?” she cried, clearly incredulous.

  “Rochefort has taken him off to see his workshop. I believe he hopes to further probe the prince’s mind. Lady Thistlewaite,” I added, “does not trust him and has gone off to confer with our noble peers. I . . . I fear she is convinced we should postpone our plans.”