American Duchess

by Karen Harper

  “Behind your back. Hm, let me see. I call our son Bertie rather than Blandford when I cuddle him. Of course, then, too, I have made peace with the Blenheim ghost, the first duchess, and—”

  “Do not be flip with me. You and Gladys can giggle all you want, but this is serious!”

  “Your Grace, Duke of Marlborough! You disapprove too much of charity, and can there be too much Christian charity? You have often told me these are your people. They were in need. I did not think you would object to their working to earn money rather than being on the dole or receiving funds through the church. It is payment for work to keep their spirits up and their bellies filled.”

  “You will not do such again!” he ordered, leaning toward me across the table. “This Angel of Woodstock thing has gone too far.”

  “But they obviously think their payment is coming from you, so I plan to take no credit. It increases the already good feelings toward the Marlboroughs, of which I and my son are now a part.”

  “But you are acting like a bloody socialist when I am going to stand for conservative office.”

  “I would certainly vote for you—for Winston too—if I could, but we women cannot, so we do what we can.”

  As calm as I sounded standing up to him, my stomach was tied in knots. He was actually quivering with frustration and rage. Poor Gladys had confided in me that her father used to beat her mother. If I were not with child again—if Sunny did not have that note of gratitude waded up in his hand—I wonder if he would have dared to strike me. I was sorry for one thing, though, that I had ruined our unspoken peace treaty.

  And so continued the battles at Blenheim.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Our second son was born on October 14, 1898. This birth was easier for me. I teased Sunny that it was because “the spare” did not have to enter this world dragging quite so many names behind him. Ivor Charles Spencer-Churchill was small and pale at birth, but I was so happy all had gone well. Exhausted, I slept for nearly two days straight, but I was far from ill.

  For this birth, we were at Hampden House, owned by the Duke of Abercorn—he of the sable-lined coat. He had kindly vacated for us and our entourage as, like last time, Sunny wanted his child to be born in a home tied to the Marlboroughs. Why that did not mean staying at Blenheim for the births, I never could completely grasp. At any rate, it made not only the Spencer relatives happy, but, of course, the Churchills too.

  Ivor was named for Sunny’s cousin who had been his best man at our wedding. I had considered asking that the baby be named Winston, whom I liked far better, but I did not want the nickname of Winnie. Sunny said Winston did not mind a bit and was pleased Ivor would continue the name Churchill.

  “Winston,” I told him when he dropped by on the third day after Ivor’s birth, “I admire how you seem to take everything in stride. Here you are off again for who knows where as a war correspondent. I am in awe of your sense of adventure and self-confidence.”

  I was resting on a chaise in my sitting room while he perched on a chair nearby after having spent a good deal of his visit with Sunny.

  “Compliments are always welcome,” he told me with a smile. “Now, I brought you a present, Consuelo. You have told me how you love to hear the songbirds in the Blenheim park and that nothing but doves or pigeons hang about the eaves of the palace itself. So,” he said, getting to his feet, “I have brought you a canary so you can always hear a tuneful bird.”

  He went out into the hall and brought in a covered cage and removed the cloth to reveal a beautiful golden bird with green hues on the tail. “A female, they say,” he added.

  “Well, it—she—is lovely. I shall call her Golden. Thank you for your kindness.”

  “She is keeping quiet for a while, I see, but she sounded lovely before. I say, have you heard that ballad about a bird in a gilded cage? Very popular for those who buy sheet music—written by Americans, too. It is some sort of tear-jerker about a girl who married for money but not for love.”

  “No, I have not, but I shall look for that. Perhaps I shall rewrite it to be about a duke who married for money and not for love.”

  Winston cleared his throat. “Well, I am sure little Blandford will like Golden, too, but best she stay in her cage with a new baby around. I am sure the doctor will get little Ivor over his breathing problem. Little lungs, as they say, will grow.”

  I stopped fussing with the bird. Breathing problem? Little lungs? I knew Ivor was especially small and pale, but . . . “Excuse me, Winston, and thank you for all that,” I told him. I jumped up, kissed him on his cheek, and made straight for the door, just as the canary started to warble.

  “Consuelo,” he called after me, “I thought, of course, you knew.”

  I did not turn back and nearly twisted my ankle in my haste. One slipper came off my foot, so I kicked the other off and hurried barefoot down the carpeted corridor. I could feel the packing the doctor had put between my legs begin to loosen, but I did not care if I bled all over this house. I felt a bit dizzy and wobbly, but that hardly mattered.

  They had told me the baby was sound asleep after that first day I held him. He had seemed fitful and fussy but breathing problems? Why had they not told me? Why had they said I should just rest even as the baby was each time I asked for him?

  I did not knock on the door of the room we had made the nursery but simply swept it open. Nanny hovered over the cradle—not the baroque one. The doctor was leaning over it, too, and Sunny was pacing.

  The door banged behind me. Everyone turned my way and gasped, so perhaps I looked like the avenging fury, just as I felt. But I forced myself not to shout at them as I strode in. “Why was I not told?”

  “Now, Consuelo,” Sunny said, making a grab for my arm, though I shook him off. “We did not want you to regress, to have a long recovery like last time.”

  “But little Ivor’s recovery is of much more importance. Doctor, tell me flat out. How is he, and what can I do?”

  “It’s just a breathing complication, and you can see, Your Grace, he is holding his own.”

  “Now that I am not being misled and kept from him I can see that he is pale and fussy.”

  Ivor began to cough, more like a sporadic wheezing.

  “I want to hold him,” I said. “Perhaps that will ease if he sleeps upright against me.”

  I shouldered the doctor away and looked down at the little mite. Not robust like his older brother, and not the heir, but how I loved him. How my heart went out to him as I carefully gathered his small frame in my arms.

  Nanny pushed a chair close for me. Sunny put his hands out to steady my shoulders as I sat barefoot and—I could feel I was bleeding again. Yet nothing mattered but holding and comforting this blessed little boy who needed his mother. I felt a fierce protective bond that—God forgive me—I had never felt before, not even with my firstborn.

  Little Ivor suddenly seemed to breathe easier, and I did too.

  TWELVE MONTHS PASSED, and when Blandford was two and Ivor just turned one, we received a message from Queen Victoria that she would be sending a large party including the visiting Kaiser of Germany, Wilhelm II, and his son, Crown Prince Wilhelm, to visit Blenheim. They’d be accompanied by the Prince of Wales, called Bertie, who was uncle to the Kaiser. But at the last minute, she decided to keep Princess Alexandra, whom I was eager to see again, and the Kaiser’s wife, Empress Augusta, at home with her.

  “I am sorry,” I told the butler at nearly the last moment, “but the entire table setting will have to be redone. Still use the gold service, but I will give you the new seating chart as soon as I can.”

  It was even more difficult than the Prince of Wales’s first visit, since Sunny fretted about how touchy the Kaiser was about being treated properly. “And,” Sunny warned me as we set off in carriages to meet the party at the railway station, “be your charming best when the prince sees he will have to ride backwards in the carriage on our return ride. I, of course, will ride along beside.”
r />   “I shall ride backwards so the prince does not.”

  “No, as duchess and hostess, you must ride facing front with the Kaiser instead of with Bertie beside you. The two men detest each other—I thought it best not to tell you that, but I see I must—and Bertie absolutely will not ride beside his rude, pompous nephew unless he is cajoled or convinced. I have heard,” he said, lowering his voice, evidently so our own staff did not hear, “the Kaiser refers to our Prince of Wales as ‘that old peacock.’”

  Sunny was right that the ride back was a nightmare. But we soldiered on, trying to please them both at dinner, even though the Kaiser—who had the largest handlebar mustache I had ever seen—dominated the conversation with self-aggrandizement and insisted on telling us all about the Battle of Blenheim, no less. He was only silent during the organ concert for which I had ordered German music.

  But I did have to admire that he had managed to hide his withered left arm even when he ate. He had a special fork with a knife attached to his good hand so he didn’t need his left hand. That deformity must have caused him much embarrassment and shame, though he was just the opposite of a quiet, shrinking personality.

  “Consuelo,” the prince whispered and pulled me aside after dessert and drinks, “I do not care if that pompous German is the queen’s eldest grandchild or my nephew, he drives me to distraction. I will not ride in the inferior position again when we leave tomorrow.”

  “I have already told Sunny I will not go, but that means you must sit beside him, sir.”

  He puffed his big cigar, enveloping me with a cloud of sharp smoke, though I dare not cough or wave my hand to clear the air. “Good thinking, of course, but then you are a real benefit to the duke in so many ways. I shall not cause trouble for the lovely hostess you have been here under duress, though I have a good nerve to put tobacco in the Kaiser’s breakfast tomorrow—just teasing, of course. Better it be something stronger than tobacco, but I shall behave.”

  He winked at me. I smiled. Ah, families not getting on, and Queen Victoria had one of the largest. At least, as Sunny had said, the prince had been convinced or cajoled to sit beside the Kaiser.

  “You do Marlborough and Blenheim proud,” he told me with that look of his that made me feel he was not only taking me all in, but undressing me with his eyes. “Two sons in the bargain, too.”

  A little bell went off in my head that Sunny had once said the prince would never approach a woman for a liaison until she had borne children.

  I stepped back a bit and curtsied as if he had dismissed me. Holding his cigar behind his back, he reached down with his other hand to raise me. He kissed the back of my hand, then the palm. “Damn German royal relatives,” he muttered. “I much prefer Americans. Good evening, then, dear duchess.”

  With that, he turned about and headed back into the smoke-hazed room where the men were gathered.

  I WOULD NOT say Ivor flourished, but he grew. We watched him closely, especially since his older brother had such energy. I always kept an eye on my Ivor.

  Things went on quite well with the children until one day when I scolded three-year-old Blandford—I had temporarily lost the battle to call him Bertie—for throwing stones at the footmen, who were taught to stand like statues, until needed. They were both strapping young men, six feet tall but, when Sunny did not react, and one of the stones hit too near Ivor, I said, “Blandford, stop that. You will hurt someone! Bad boy!”

  Nanny was only tut-tutting as she was wont to do when Sunny was around, but I took Blandford’s hand and tugged him off and away from the blanket. We had set up near the lake for a picnic while the footmen hauled out the food. I made Blandford drop the last stone and smacked his hand. And nearly went off my feet, when Sunny yanked me upright and away with him. He half-dragged, half-marched me to the far side of a big oak.

  “He shall not be punished or told he is evil,” he hissed at me.

  “Evil? I just scolded him for being a bad boy for his own good, as well as that of others. We do not need him thinking he can stone our footmen, and what if he causes a wound or puts out Ivor’s eye? Not be punished? Do you want to have the next duke be a heathen with no—”

  He seized my wrist and pulled me farther away. “My father punished me cruelly! Berated me and hated me! Called me evil! I will not rear my son like that!”

  He looked livid, wild-eyed and trembling. I was stunned. Of course I had heard the whispers that Sunny’s father was a roué, an immoral man, but had he actually brutalized his heir?

  “We can discuss this later,” I told him. “I had a very strict parent, too, you know.”

  “And you hated her for it! Spare the rod and spoil the child is a lie from the pit of hell.”

  “Perhaps, then, this Bible verse is better,” I insisted, still keeping my voice down. “It’s one my father told me, though I was a daughter and not a son. For whom the Lord loves, He corrects, just as a father the son in whom he delights. Sunny, we do not want to rear an heir who knows no boundaries.”

  He was still shaking. Despite the differences between us, I almost wanted to gather him in my arms and pat his back and tell him he was not evil and was dearly loved.

  Almost.

  THINGS BECAME EVEN more stilted between Sunny and me after that, perhaps because he had shown me the frightened child within the man and duke. More than once, I tried to have him tell me about his brutal father, but it was as if the outburst over Blandford had never happened. Now that I knew his secret, his insecurities, it seemed Sunny avoided me unless we had special engagements together. And that included one of my lesser favorites, the annual winter Quorn foxhunt meet in Leicestershire.

  I loved to ride and had a mount I adored named Greyling—a great jumper—but I could not see pounding after yipping hounds to tear a fox apart. But after both boys were born, there was no excuse for me not to chase the Quorn hounds, one of the world’s oldest fox hunting packs. And so, decked out in a fashionable dark blue, tailored jacket and long-skirted Busvine habit, tall hat and veil, I settled sidesaddle onto my horse brought from Blenheim.

  But I was still upset with Sunny for not scolding Blandford when he was naughty and nearly ignoring Ivor when he got his occasional coughing fits. So I vowed to myself, if I could not outride my husband, who prided himself on his horsemanship, I would at least match him.

  Like all the men astride, Sunny did look elegant in white jodhpurs, red coat, and black hat. He looked smug, too, so sure of his riding prowess.

  At the shrill sound of the horn and yipping of the hounds, we were off! The wind bit cold, and I could see my breath, but I gripped the reins with my leather gloves as Greyling smoothly vaulted the first railed fence in the crowd of other horses. I actually blessed my mother for my years of riding lessons. I had to duck low branches more than once. One ripped my hat back so it hung by my pins and veil, but I became one with the movement of the horse.

  The nearly fifty hounds barked incessantly as we followed the blur of their brown and white bodies with the wagging tails. The fox was heading for the thicket, running into the wind, which made his scent easy to follow. More fences appeared, over which I nearly flew, trying to keep up with Sunny. I saw I had no hope of beating my husband, only staying with him, so that would have to do. He turned his head once, surprised to see me yet there before we both sailed over a hedgerow together.

  I heard one of the women just behind us shout, “I am not going on. Oh, wherever is Louisa? Oh, no, unhorsed!”

  I spotted the fox ahead, a red flash tearing through a dry grass field with the hounds closing in. It was then I lost my heart for this, the powerful people chasing an innocent, however much foxes preyed on other animals. I reined in and pulled Greyling off to the side and let the rest sweep by.

  Our own groom dashed past, with a word of praise for my riding. I felt I had done well and hoped Sunny would say so. Later, after I stayed with the woman who had been unhorsed until a doctor came and finally went back to the barns, I heard Sunny say, �
�Mostly the ladies, the duchess, too, have acquitted themselves well.”

  He never told me such, but I was used to that. And used to the occasionally deep emotional valleys I found myself wandering in as if chased by hounds. But my spirits lifted when I received word that my father was coming soon for a visit.

  I WAS SO happy for my father because he was happy. He still had a yacht but mostly lived in France and bred and raised racehorses there. He had a new circle of international friends—lady friends too. The few times I visited him, we went to the track to see his stable of horses race, and I could not wait to tell him how well I had ridden to the horn at the hunt. His mere presence cheered me.

  I took the large carriage to meet him at the station, and a second one came behind because he was bringing four friends, all French so I would be able to practice that beautiful language with them, however much Papa and I spoke American English when alone. He had teased me the last time I saw him that I was starting to sound “terribly bloody British uppercrust.”

  I met him on the platform when he disembarked with the other gentlemen behind him. As we hugged, I fitted my chin perfectly on his shoulder.

  “I have missed you terribly and am so happy to see you,” I said.

  And found myself looking into the handsome face of the man close behind as if I said that to him. Although I had not seen Papa’s guest for years, I knew at once who he was, and my insides cartwheeled. It was the man who had promised me a ride in the sky while we whirled around the ballroom years ago, Jacques Balsan.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The first evening of my father and his friends’ two-day visit spun by. Jacques and I chatted but in the presence of the others. We told everyone we had met briefly once, in Paris, long ago.

  “Yet what a coincidence,” I told Jacques after dinner their first evening at Blenheim when I had a moment to talk to him alone. We had not spoken in French so far, but I did now.