Isabella Rockwell's War

by Hannah Parry

  Alix laughed.

  “Yes, that’s right. Well worked out. And that…” she pointed to another window just down from Isabella’s “…is mine. Well actually the whole wing is mine.”

  “You have a whole wing? What for?”

  Alix looked thoughtful.

  “I don’t know really. My bedroom, my salon, my playroom, the schoolroom, my wardrobe, Mrs Jolyon’s rooms, a spare room (your room), a night kitchen, the bathrooms…”

  Now it was Isabella’s turn to laugh.

  “Enough! You’ve got more in your wing than I had in my whole house, though I can certainly see why you need a whole room for your wardrobe…”

  Alix threw a glove at her.

  “Just because I take pride in my appearance….”

  Their joking was interrupted by the sound of hooves and a noise Isabella would recognize anywhere – the jangling of sabres.

  “Oh no,” Alix hissed under her breath, “Uncle Ernest.”

  Out of the mist rode a straight backed man wearing a scarlet uniform, flanked by two soldiers. He was middle-aged, with a shock of white hair and a very hooked nose. There was a straight line running vertically between his black brows, which gave him a stern look, but the most arresting thing about him was a scar, white and raised, disfiguring the entire right side of his face, the puckering of his skin pulling his right lower lid downwards. He drew up beside Alix anyway and inspected her closely.

  “I hear you nearly had a nasty scrape,” he said in a clipped harsh voice.

  Alix looked at the ground.

  “Yes, Uncle, I did. I survived though. Thanks to Isabella here.” She gestured with her head towards Isabella who curtsied politely. Really, she was getting very good at this.

  The man nodded.

  “Hmm, quite the horsewoman I’ve heard.” He looked at her for a long moment without expression. “Where did you learn to ride like that?”

  “Rajputhana in India, sir.”

  “You’re a long way from home, soldier.”

  Isabella felt her cheeks turn pink, but she kept looking straight ahead.

  “Yes, sir, I am.”

  “An army brat, I take it?”

  “Yes, sir. My father served with King William’s First Horse.”

  “Served?”

  “Died in battle, sir…” She felt her lip start to wobble and she willed it to stop. “Last monsoon.”

  “I see.” His horse shifted beneath him. “Damn fine regiment though.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Served out there meself many moons ago, would have stayed too, but…” He gave a vague gesture of ownership to the air around him. “…duty called. Sustained an injury in battle, I see.” He poked at her sling with his crop.

  “Yes, sir, but it’s getting better.”

  “Good, good. Well then, carry on.” The next moment, the three men wheeled their horses around and without a word set off down the path to the stables.

  Alix exhaled noisily.

  “Phew. Sorry about that.”

  Isabella smiled.

  “It’s alright, don’t apologise, you goose. Who is he?”

  Alix gave a wry smile.

  “That is my Uncle Ernest, my father’s brother. If it helps, my father had five brothers. Papa was number four and Uncle Ernest is number five.”

  “Is King William number one?”

  “No he’s number two. My Uncle George died of consumption just after he inherited the throne, King William took his place.” Isabella raised her eyebrows. This was all very complicated. “Didn’t you ever do history with Mrs Parson?” continued Alix in a teasing tone.

  “I never learnt anything of real use from Mrs Parson, not that I’m aware of anyway.”

  She fell silent.

  “Yes, I know, schoolwork seems to have little bearing on real life,” replied Alix.

  “Anyway, what’s your uncle doing here?” said Isabella.

  “Oh, he lives here, with his wife Fredericka. King William is always getting cross with him saying he should pay more rent and not keep so many horses, but Uncle Ernest won’t leave. He doesn’t have any money and has a very expensive wife, so he has to stay. He only has a soldier’s salary really, though he is a very great soldier, but I’m not sure Uncle Ernest believes a General’s pay is enough for an heir to the throne to live on.”

  They walked between two high banks of yew to where the path doubled back on itself under an old oak. The sound of a stream came through the mist, but Isabella couldn’t see it. A crow cawed once, waiting for an answer.

  “I thought you were heir to the throne?” said Isabella.

  Alix laughed.

  “Oh I am. It’s just Uncle Ernest would be next in line if something were to happen to the King and then to me, seeing as though he’s the king’s closest brother.”

  “I wonder when he served in India?”

  Alix urged her mount forward.

  “I’ve lost count of all the countries he’s fought in, sorry, I don’t know when he was there. You’ll have to ask him, I’m sure he’ll be at dinner.”

  “There’s a dinner?”

  “Don’t look like that, Isabella. There is dinner every night.”

  “What for everyone?”

  “No, not usually, but tonight we are visiting King William. We’re taking presents.” For a moment Alix looked more like a ten year old than a twelve year old. “But actually I think he wants to meet you. He and his wife, Adelaide, have always been kind to me. He complains he doesn’t see enough of me….” Alix stopped herself from continuing.

  “And why doesn’t he?”

  Alix made a wry face.

  “He doesn’t get on with mother or …” There was a long pause.

  “Mr Conroy?”

  It was a stab in the dark, but sure enough Alix’s cheeks flamed.

  “Since Mr Conroy arrived, we have visited St James’s Palace less and less. So now the king must come here to Kensington, and he is not well, so the journey is difficult for him. It doesn’t seem right.”

  “He must have been very fond of your father, to be so fond of you,” replied Isabella, wanting to make it a little better for Alix.

  “Oh yes, he was. He’s fond of Ernest too, despite their rows, they’re quite similar really. Oh look, there’s Mrs Jolyon.”

  She waved at the small dark figure, wrapped in a dark cloak on the path up ahead and walked on towards her. Isabella increased her pace, dying to ask how Ernest had got his scar, but felt it might be bad manners in front of Mrs Jolyon, so held her tongue. Mrs Jolyon gave Isabella a careful hug, and placed a gloved hand on the mare’s neck.

  “Good morning, girls. You are up early. Well done, your majesty, for getting back aboard.” Mrs Jolyon’s face was upturned to Alix’s and full of admiration. “How do you feel now? Better?”

  Alix smiled.

  “Yes, thank you Mrs Jolyon. Much better. I knew if I took my lucky charm with me I’d be brave enough to get back on.”

  Mrs Jolyon hugged Isabella again.

  “That’s just right, Princess, that’s exactly what she is.”

  “We saw Uncle Ernest….”

  Mrs Jolyon smiled and looked at Isabella.

  “And what did you think of our Captain Courageous?” Isabella snorted with laughter though she tried hard to control it.

  “Mrs Jolyon!” Alix’s voice was shocked, but there was a hint of laughter to it. Simon, Isabella noticed, could barely keep a straight face.

  “I’m sorry, your majesty,” said Mrs Jolyon, looking nothing of the sort, “but he is ridiculous. I know he’s a hugely decorated soldier, but really! He rides around here as if we were moments from invasion, with all his soldiers and his swords. This is Kensington Palace, not the front line at the battle of Waterloo. He’s nothing more than a small boy.” Now Alix was laughing openly as they came back though the bricked arch into the stable yard.

  “Sssh, Mrs Jolyon. His staff might still be here.” Mrs Jolyon raised her eyes to heav
en. Alix went to dismount, but Mrs Jolyon stopped her.

  “Not here dearest. Simon, can you take her majesty to the dismounting block.”

  Alix looked bleak.

  “Is Mother watching again?”

  “Yes dear, she’s in her study.”

  Alix pulled a face. “Come into my parlour said the spider to the fly…”

  “Now, now dear.”

  Alix turned toward Isabella. “I expect you’ll be summoned to the Blue Salon at some point. It’s mother’s study and I seem to spend my life staring at its floor being lectured.” Her voice was bitter.

  Isabella smiled. “I used to get lectured too, if that makes you feel any better,” but her mind was spinning. The Blue Salon! Wasn’t that where Zachariah had said the painting was?

  Alix smiled back. “A bit.”

  Isabella looked back through the arch. One hundred feet away stood the grey stone sundial. Should she go back and see if she could still see the duchess? Then if she did decide to take the painting, she would know where it hung. Not that she had decided, but hadn’t her father always said reconnaissance was never wasted?

  “Mrs Jolyon, I’ve dropped my glove, I’ll be back in a moment.” Surprised at herself, Isabella shot back down the path they way they’d come. At the sundial she made a great show of bending and retrieving a glove she’d slipped from her sleeve into her hand. Then she turned and walked back slowly toward the stables, eyes moving from window to window and then… there! What luck! She could see flash of spoilt face and chestnut hair between heavy blue curtains. The Blue Salon lay on the ground floor, two floors beneath Alix’s apartments.

  There was a sound of hooves and footsteps and Alix and Simon came back into the yard and tied the mare up outside her stable. Isabella was loathe to leave the horses and rubbed Shadow’s nose over the stable door as he good naturedly chewed a ribbon on her cloak, his good humour fully restored.

  “Shall I untack the mare?

  “Go on then, Miss,” said Simon with a smile. “Why don’t you do the bridle and I’ll do the saddle.”

  A moment later, despite her arm, Isabella took the bridle into the large tack room. She stood for a moment admiring the rows and rows of gleaming tack, of all different types, carefully labelled. She walked over to a row of saddles all covered with scarlet blankets the same colour as Prince Ernest’s jacket. Well, Mrs Jolyon could say what she liked about his behaviour, but his riding equipment was faultless. She went back to search out the peg for the bay mare’s bridle. Here it was, next to Shadow’s. What a lovely horse he was. He must have a bad back to have behaved like that today.

  Alix’s saddles all had dark blue rugs covering them, each embroidered with her coat of arms – a lion and a unicorn. Isabella lifted her sleeve to polish the end of Shadow’s saddle and then, putting her hand beneath the padded cheek of the saddle, lifted it to push it further back onto its rack. A searing pain shot from her finger, all the way up her arm and she jerked her hand back quickly, feeling the pain disappear as an object, sharp as a needle, withdrew from her hand. Lifting the saddle with her good arm, she leant down to look closely at its underside. When she saw what was there, selfishly, her first thought was pleasure that her instincts had been right. Careful not to pinch and so dislodge more of its spines, she eased the burr from beneath the saddle. The Star Burr lay undamaged in her palm. What on earth was it doing here, tangled in Shadow’s tack?

  Well, this certainly explained why he’d bolted twice. Then another thought came to her, dark and sticky, which she forced from her mind almost as soon as it had entered. Could it be someone wanted to harm Princess Alix?

  Chapter 8:

  Be Careful!

  Back in her room, Isabella fumbled under her mattress for where she’d hidden her bag and took out her pouch. Abhaya had put the Star Burrs with the other poisons within the pouch, though as far as Isabella could remember, they weren’t poisonous. They didn’t need to be with spines like that. Maybe the spines came off? In her palm the Star Burr she’d found in the padded under-side of Shadow’s saddle, resembled nothing so much as a spiked acorn, but it was tough, and the spines, as she pushed against them, were hard as oak and would pierce, rather than break. She checked it against the one she found in her pouch, but she hadn’t needed to; she was right, they were identical.

  She took out a bag of comfrey and placed it in the tea she’d found waiting when they’d returned from the stables and then forced it down, it’s bitter liquorice taste sitting for a moment at the back of her throat. She looked down at her arm. Alix had been right, it did look better, but it was still annoying to be so out of action. There was a knock.

  “Just a moment,” she replied hurriedly wrapping up her pouch, and shoving them back in her bag. It was Mrs Jolyon who, to her delight, addressed her in Hindi.

  “Would you like to come to the schoolroom, dearest one? Or do you need to rest? I know the Princess would love it if you sat in on her lessons with her. She already dreads your leaving and wishes to make the most of every minute.”

  “I don’t need to rest, Sahiba, I would love to come…I like her majesty very much too. She is one of the kindest people I think I ever met.”

  “She is indeed,” Mrs Jolyon held the door open for her.

  “How did you come to meet the family, Mrs Jolyon? It makes me laugh when I think of the Moleseys and Mrs Trotter, how impressed they’d have been if they’d have known you were to be part of the royal family.”

  Mrs Jolyon laughed.

  “Oh I doubt it. I’d still be servant class to them, but I wasn’t allowed to discuss it. It was all a bit cloak and dagger.”

  “Did you meet them in India?”

  “No, I didn’t meet them at all. I was recommended to the Duchess of Kent by my previous household. Their children were all grown and, though I could have stayed with them, I thought a change would be good for me.”

  “Weren’t you worried about leaving India?”

  “I knew I would miss it, but I always knew I would return. It’s where my husband is buried, after all, and it holds most of my adult memories. I was barely older than you when I first went out there, so it is my home.”

  They brushed past a thick tapestry of red and gold.

  “We are the same then, for I cannot imagine living anywhere else,” said Isabella, as Mrs Jolyon opened the door to the schoolroom.

  Mrs Jolyon smiled down into Isabella’s eyes.

  “It would appear we are.”

  The temptation to tell Mrs Jolyon about the Star Burr was overwhelming, but her father’s words came back to her rolling through time and space. “Don’t show your hand too early… ever.” Of course, there was probably an explanation for the presence of the Star Burr. There was no need to go jumping to conclusions, but her stomach felt unsettled and she was on her guard.

  That evening after a trying time watching Alix try on most of her wardrobe before deciding on a cherry velvet dress, Isabella scratched at her own neckline of unyielding lace. True to her word, Alix had raided her cousin’s wardrobe and Isabella was dressed in midnight blue with soft kid slippers and cream stockings. To her eyes she was unrecognizable.

  “Shall I go down and wait for you?’

  Alix was sitting in front of a gilt mirror having her hair threaded with pearls.

  “Yes of course… sorry is this very boring?”

  “No Alix, I just hadn’t been aware that there are so many different hairstyles, and that you’re trying them all out in one evening.”

  Alix laughed.

  “Go on then. Go and wait for the carriages. You can talk to Uncle Ernest and Aunt Fredericka, then you’ll be sorry.”

  Isabella smiled and left the room, moving swiftly down the corridor to the stairs to the hallway below. She was in luck. There was no one there. Her feet made no sound as she crossed beneath the sparkling chandelier to another corridor, at the end of which, by her calculations, lay the Blue Salon. Not that she was going to take the painting, but it couldn’
t hurt to just have a look? If Alix was still dressing, the duchess certainly would be – now would be a good time.

  Two footmen in blue satin stood outside the Blue Salon’s door. Isabella’s heart sank. How was she going to get in? There was nothing for it. Throwing her head and shoulders back and walking with intent, as she’d seen the Maharajah’s daughters do, she approached them. To her great surprise one of the footmen leant across and threw open the door for her. She nodded her head, remembering not to say thank you – royalty didn’t ever seem to say thank you, she had observed – and walked in. The door was closed behind her.

  The room was feminine with ruffled curtains and deep sofas. A large escritoire stood casually littered with papers, a small comfortable chair stood just behind it. A fire burnt in the grate, and lanterns were lit around the room, giving off a soft glow. Careful not to touch anything, she looked at the walls. There it was, surely that was it. Much smaller than she had thought it would be, the Caravaggio, hung in one corner of the room, just next to the fireplace.

  Hardly aware of what she was doing, she reached up and took it down from its position. It was barely larger than her hand span, but it was heavy and beautiful, the Madonna’s face gentle as she looked at her new baby. She replaced the picture not a moment too soon as the door flew open and in came Prince Ernest and a stern looking dark haired woman, beautifully dressed.

  “My dear, this is the little heroine.” He said gesturing towards Isabella. The woman walked over to her and held out a limp hand. “Isabella, this is my wife, Princess Fredericka.”

  “The pleasure is all mine,” the princess said. Isabella curtsied, trying, and failing, to take her eyes from the diamond necklace at the princess’s throat. The Prince caught her eye.

  “Indian diamonds, Isabella. A gift to me from a grateful Maharani for saving her husband.”

  He lifted them from his wife’s neck.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen diamonds as fine as these.”

  “No sir.” Isabella’s voice was small, and she felt hypnotized by the light, which flashed and danced across the diamonds’ facets.

  Ernest’s wife smiled.

  “Even the Duchess hasn’t jewels which can touch these.”