Victoria Confesses (9781442422469)

by Meyer, Carolyn

  I skipped gleefully to my writing table and dashed off a triumphant note to Lord Melbourne.

  I was very calm but very decided. You would have been so pleased to see my composure! The queen of England will not submit to such trickery. If this was an attempt to see if I can be managed like a child, it has failed! Keep yourself in readiness, for you may soon be wanted.

  I sealed the letter and sent it off, confident that Lord Melbourne would applaud my firmness. But he immediately replied, sounding a note of caution.

  It is better to negotiate than to refuse to do so. I feel I must warn you that your defense of your rights could have some very serious consequences. It may be unconstitutional.

  I did not wish to hear this, and I would not back down. “They want to treat me like a girl,” I told Daisy, “but I will show them that I am queen of England.”

  “Absolutely right, my dear Victoria,” she agreed. “Remember—far better for a queen to be thought high and decisive than to be thought weak. You must stand firm!”

  When Sir Robert returned later that afternoon, nothing had changed. He again humbly requested that I give up some of my ladies. And I told him I would not.

  I waited nervously to see what would happen next, and passed another night with little sleep. Early the next morning, Lord Melbourne was announced and ushered into my sitting room.

  Lord Melbourne was smiling broadly. “You have carried the day, madam! Peel was unable to form a government without your support. He has resigned his commission.”

  “And you are once again my prime minister?” I asked.

  Lord Melbourne bowed. “At your service, your majesty.”

  Yes, yes, yes! I had triumphed! Lord Melbourne was back in my life and at my side, much more securely than before.

  I celebrated my twentieth birthday with a dinner at Windsor, followed by a ball. Among the guests was the excessively handsome Grand Duke Alexander of Russia, a delightful man only a little older than I. For that one evening I may have even been a little bit in love with him. Dancing the mazurka with the Grand Duke was SUCH fun! We were all so merry! I danced all night and did not get to bed until three o’clock in the morning.

  My mind was once again happy. I never enjoyed myself more.

  Chapter 28

  BLAME, 1839

  I had demonstrated my determination to Sir Robert and to Parliament and congratulated myself on my victory. But I soon learned that my trials were far from over. As I went out driving in the park, I was greeted with stares instead of cheers and even a few rude shouts of “Mrs. Melbourne! Mrs. Melbourne!” What were they suggesting? That I had some improper relationship with my prime minister? It quite took my breath away. I learned that even Baron Stockmar had expressed disapproval of what I had done. But I had succeeded in keeping the ladies in my household, and I had dear good Lord Melbourne at my side for many hours each day. I was more determined than ever to stand firm. There would be no weakness in this quarter!

  To keep up appearances, I breakfasted each morning with my mother, after which we walked out together briefly. I spoke to Mamma as little as possible, but she had not stopped speaking to me.

  “I have received Sir John’s letter of resignation,” Mamma informed me. Her voice trembled. “Because of your cruelty and selfishness, he and his family are leaving England. I tried very hard to persuade them to stay here, but they are firm in their decision. They go first to Germany, and then on to Italy.” She dabbed away tears, which I chose not to notice. “I shall miss them dreadfully.”

  I, on the contrary, thought this was a cause for rejoicing, though I said nothing.

  “Sir John and his wife and children have been my real family for twenty years,” Mamma went on. “You would not be where you are now, Victoria, were it not for that good man.”

  I broke my silence. “What are you saying, Mamma—that I would not be queen? How can he possibly take credit for that?” I demanded. “He and his horrid Kensington System, as he was pleased to call his attempts to bully me!” We kept on walking, eyes straight ahead, not daring to look at each other.

  “He worked very hard to be sure you got the proper kind of training to prepare you for the responsibilities that are now on your shoulders. And which, from the look of things, you are still too young to handle properly,” she said sharply. “You would have been better to rely on the advice of Sir John as your private secretary than on your beloved Lord Melbourne, who has allowed you to make a fool of yourself with this bedchamber business.”

  I refused to speak to her further, and we finished our walk in silence. By mid-June Sir John—that monster, that demon!—and all the Conroys were gone.

  “Perhaps now you and your mother can heal your differences,” Lord Melbourne suggested.

  I was not so hopeful. “I dislike her,” I told him. “That will not change.”

  Even after his departure, Sir John’s shadow continued to haunt me in the form of Lady Flora Hastings. I unshakably believed that the two had behaved scandalously. Lady Flora was not recovered from her supposed illness, and I suspected that she might actually have been pregnant, no matter what explanation the doctors had concocted. Mamma and I were obliged to continue the empty ritual of our daily walks, and my mother used these outings as an opportunity to place the blame for Lady Flora’s illness at my feet.

  “Lady Flora is dying, Victoria!” Mamma insisted. “I see her every day, I spend hours by her bedside. Her fever remains very high, and she eats next to nothing. Meanwhile, Baroness Lehzen with her fine airs and rouged cheeks and your Saint Melbourne continue to spread rumor and innuendo about a pure and innocent woman who is utterly without fault.” The more Mamma spoke of Lady Flora, the angrier she became. She was spitting out her words, her voice shrill. People strolling by paused to stare at us. Even Dashy, who accompanied us, looked alarmed.

  “Stop it, Mamma!” I hissed. “You are an embarrassment! And it is not I, nor dearest Daisy, who has always shown me love when you have not, nor Lord Melbourne, the kindest, gentlest man in the world—none of us is responsible for Lady Flora’s unfortunate condition. It is Sir John Conroy, who undoubtedly had his way with her, just as I suspect he did with you!”

  Shocked, Mamma stopped in her tracks and stood still, mouth open, eyes wide in disbelief. Dashy and I continued determinedly along the path, leaving Mamma to make her way back to the palace alone. I was shaking. I had said too much, I knew. But there was no way to take back my words. They had been left unsaid for too long.

  I had planned to entertain at a ball at Buckingham Palace at the end of June, but Lord Melbourne advised me to postpone it out of consideration for Lady Flora.

  “I don’t believe she’s so very ill,” I said sourly.

  “Nevertheless, it would be very awkward if she were to die,” Lord Melbourne said. “There might even be a call for an inquest to determine the cause of death and to hold responsible those who denied the seriousness of her illness. The Hastings family is up in arms. They are looking for someone to blame.”

  “It is not my fault!” I insisted. “They can look elsewhere.” But at Lord Melbourne’s urging I did decide to postpone my ball. Others, however, saw no reason to delay their pleasure, and that evening I attended a ball to which I had been invited, and I enjoyed myself excessively.

  A week later I received a letter from Mamma. I refused even to read her messages but passed them on to Daisy, who let me know if there was something that I absolutely had to know.

  “Lady Flora is near the end,” Daisy reported. “The duchess begs you to visit the dying woman.”

  I sighed. There was no way to avoid it. “Very well, then. I shall go.”

  It was terrible, very much worse than I expected. I found poor Lady Flora stretched on a couch looking as thin as anybody could, a mere skeleton, but her body very much swollen. There was a searching look in her eyes, but she spoke in a friendly manner and said she was glad to see me. “I am very grateful for all you have done for me, madam,” she said, and
that made me feel uncomfortable, for in truth I had done nothing at all for her.

  I was most anxious to leave this upsetting situation as quickly as possible, and so I took her hand and said, “I do hope to see you again when you are better, Lady Flora.”

  She squeezed my hand and shook her head, as if to say, I shall not see you again.

  And then I fled.

  A week later, the fifth of July, Lady Flora was no more. The surgeon who performed a post mortem on her body found a large tumor on her liver, which is what had killed her.

  He also declared that she was a virgin, though I still had my doubts. He may have said it simply as a comfort to her family.

  That should have been the end of it, but it was not. The newspapers wrote about me as though I were responsible for Lady Flora’s death, stating that I had gone dancing while she lay on her deathbed and railing that I should be filled with remorse but showed none. Those parts of the public who are easily led by the press added their voices of blame, claiming that it was my cruelty that caused her death. The Hastings family made clear their loathing of me. When I drove to the races at Ascot, two foolish, vulgar women in the stands loudly hissed at me. There were more shouts of “Mrs. Melbourne,” making my cheeks burn with embarrassment. I could go nowhere in London without having insults hurled at me. Gentlemen did not lift their hats when I drove by, and I was told that when my health was drunk at dinners, the guests responded with silence.

  The more I was hounded for my lack of remorse, the more strongly I denied any fault. But the damage had been done. My spirits, already low, sank lower. I took no pleasure in the duties that only a year or two earlier had given me such deep satisfaction. Nor did I find enjoyment in the entertainments I had always loved. I no longer cared to go out riding—my handsome equerry failed to charm me. I did not want to go anywhere or do anything. I hated even to leave my bed in the morning. Several times I shouted at poor Maggie when she was doing my hair and reduced her to tears. This went on for the weeks of summer, until finally the press and the public lost interest and turned their attention to other matters.

  I had done nothing wrong! I was convinced of it!

  Despite my innocence, a worm of guilt gnawed at my conscience. I was in no way the cause of Lady Flora’s illness, but was it possible that I might have behaved differently toward her?

  Dearest Daisy assured me, over and over, that I had acted correctly. “Lady Flora brought it all on herself by her conduct,” she said. “Not her illness, of course, but the rumors and gossip. She was most indiscreet.”

  Dear Lord Melbourne offered a different view. “I must shoulder most of the blame for what has happened,” he said. “I did not advise you as well as I should have. Much of this pain could have been avoided. But now we must take steps to get beyond it.”

  “What can be done?” I asked miserably. “I’m no longer their beloved little queen. All of that is gone! The world seems to me a very black place.”

  “Your best days are still ahead of you, Victoria,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “You need to spend time with people who care deeply about you, to restore your confidence.”

  “And who would that be?”

  I wished that Fidi were here. She would have known exactly what to say to me. She would have known it was that monster, Conroy, who was truly at the root of the trouble.

  “Permit me to suggest that you invite your cousin Albert and his brother to come over for a visit, as King Leopold has been urging.”

  Lord Melbourne’s suggestion took me by surprise. “My cousin Albert! Really, my dear Lord Melbourne, I have no wish to see Albert. The whole subject of marriage will undoubtedly come up, and I find it an odious one. I hate even having to think about it.”

  “Very disagreeable,” Lord Melbourne said sympathetically. “A very serious question.”

  “I know that I said I would see him, but I’d prefer that the visit be postponed indefinitely. I am in no mood to contemplate marriage. Please, no Albert, not now—perhaps not ever.”

  “I understand.”

  “I would rather not marry at all!” I went on heatedly, thinking again of Queen Elizabeth, who had managed so successfully to avoid it.

  “Now, that’s a very different matter,” he said.

  Lord Melbourne was trying to soothe me, but I did not wish to be soothed. “Albert should understand that absolutely no engagement exists between us. I have made no promises to him, and I would not even contemplate making any sort of final promise this year. I have great repugnance at making such a drastic change in my life, and if marriage were even to be contemplated, it would not take place for two or three more years. I believe that was made clear.”

  “Quite so,” said Lord Melbourne.

  There the matter was left. In a letter to my uncle Leopold I laid out in great detail my reluctance to give any sort of assurance to my cousin or to anyone else. In fact, I wished the whole matter could simply be dismissed. But letters flew back and forth, the court moved to Windsor in mid-August, and despite my deep misgivings and vehement protests, plans moved forward for a visit that I would have given ANYTHING to avoid.

  PART III

  THE PRINCE

  Chapter 29

  PRINCE ALBERT, 1839

  Albert and his brother, Ernest, would arrive on the tenth of October, a Thursday. I did not want them to come, and yet I did. In truth, I didn’t know what I wanted. I felt very LOW and spoke harshly to my servants. Poor, patient Maggie again bore the brunt of my bad temper. I was cross even with Lord Melbourne when he made the mild suggestion that I might introduce a few Tories to Albert and Ernest while they visited.

  “The devil take the Tories!” I cried. “There is not one I will tolerate under my roof!” I stalked out of the room, leaving Lord Melbourne looking startled and speechless.

  What could have possessed me to speak so sharply to that dear excellent man, who was kindness and forbearance itself, and whom I loved MOST dearly!

  On the morning of the tenth, I awoke feeling unwell and out of sorts. While I was out walking in an effort to clear my head, a note was delivered from Uncle Leopold; my cousins would arrive that evening. Somehow I got through the day, trying and failing NOT to think about what lay ahead. At lunch I could eat nothing, and by five o’clock I was ravenously hungry and sent for an egg and toast. When Daisy brought me the tray, I looked at the yellow yolk staring up at me and my stomach turned over.

  “Then please eat the toast, Victoria,” Daisy pleaded, whisking the offending egg out of my sight, “or you will be ill.”

  I did as she asked and felt a little better.

  Maggie was waiting to help me dress and to do my hair. I had decided to wear the rose-colored silk gown sent by my dear Aunt Louise, but after studying my reflection in the looking glass I changed my mind. “The blue-striped taffeta, then,” I told Maggie. Off came the rose silk, on went the striped taffeta. That did not look right either. “Perhaps the purple velvet?” I was nearly in tears. Albert and Ernest would soon be here, and I was not READY! Maybe I could send word that I had fallen ill and would see them the next day. “Oh, Maggie, I don’t know what to do!” I cried.

  “The rose silk suits you perfectly,” Maggie said.

  Off came the striped taffeta, on went the rose silk. My hair still needed doing.

  I had been wearing my hair with two little puffs in front and a false braid like a crown on top, and I wanted something more sophisticated. Maggie suggested plaits coiled round my ears—“As Lady Harriet wears hers”—and I consented.

  At twenty-five minutes past seven, Maggie fastened my pearl necklace and diamond earrings, and I drew on my long gloves and took one last anxious look at my reflection. I liked what I saw, but in any case it was too late now to change. At half past seven I stood at the top of the Grand Staircase and waited to greet my cousins. It had been three years since I’d last seen them, when I had just turned seventeen. A GREAT DEAL had happened in the past three and half years. In all that ti
me we had not exchanged a single letter. I had not the least idea what to expect.

  The Coburgs arrived, and in that instant everything changed.

  Ernest looked quite pale after a stormy crossing from Brussels. Perhaps Albert did, too, but I failed to notice. All I saw as he climbed the marble staircase toward me was how BEAUTIFUL he was! Everything about him was so excessively handsome—his blue eyes, his pretty mouth, his exquisite nose, his delicate mustachios, his very slight whiskers, everything! Tall, but not too tall, and not at all fat, as I had thought on his earlier visit. He had been just a boy then, a few months shy of his seventeenth birthday, but now he was a man, with broad shoulders and a very fine waist. In those first moments there was nothing about him that did not please me. A smile spread across my face without my even trying. I could not help wondering what he thought when he had his first look at me—no longer a young girl but a woman and a queen.

  The customary greetings were exchanged, but when Albert bent to kiss my hand, I felt—or imagined I felt—that his lips lingered there a bit longer than was quite necessary. I returned to my apartments while the visitors were settled in their quarters, and prepared for dinner. Lehzen was waiting for me, her eyes questioning.

  “Oh, Daisy,” I said breathlessly, “Prince Albert is superb! Just wait until you see him!”

  A knock at the door interrupted before I could describe my first impression, and a servant delivered a message from the princes: Their trunks had not yet arrived, and they did not have the proper clothes in which to appear at dinner. They offered apologies; their traveling clothes would not do. And so I had to wait until after dinner, which I thought would NEVER END, to have the chance to converse with him.

  As the hours of our first evening together flew by, I discovered that Albert was clever, charming, intelligent, and thoroughly agreeable. He spoke English very well, and his French was even better than mine. The trunks had finally been delivered, and Albert’s dress that evening was elegant—I particularly admired his red top-boots. He had with him a sleek and obedient black greyhound with a white muzzle called Eos, for the Greek goddess of the dawn. She never left his side and was the subject of some VERY lively conversation.