Sweet Lass of Richmond Hill: (Georgian Series)

by Jean Plaidy

  So there he was back at Maria.

  As soon as he could conveniently leave Windsor he was on his way back to London, to write to Maria, to appeal to Maria, to beg her, implore her to come back to him.

  Maria would not see him. She was staying in the house of a friend who was also a distant connection of her family, the Honourable Mrs Butler, and with her was Miss Pigot – and both these ladies acted as her guardians.

  The Prince called; alas, she would not see him. It was unprecedented. Who else but Maria would not be at home to the Prince of Wales? He stormed and raged; then he pleaded; but it was no use. Maria was not to be seen. What could he do?

  He demanded to see Miss Pigot. She was an old friend of his as well as Maria’s and she told him at once that Maria had repeatedly said that she would not see him and there was nothing Miss Pigot could do to persuade her.

  ‘But she can’t mean it, dear Pig.’

  Dear Pig assured him that she did.

  ‘I have never seen her so distressed, Your Highness, as she was when she heard what Mr Fox had said.’

  ‘But she knows Fox.’

  ‘Yes, but he spoke on Your Highness’s direct authority. That’s what broke her heart.’

  ‘Her heart broken. What about mine. Sheridan spoke well of her. Did she hear that.’

  ‘Oh yes, sir, she heard of it; and she was mollified to some extent, but it didn’t alter what Mr Fox had said.’

  ‘Dearest Pig, tell me what I can do to convince her that I adore her.’

  ‘Well, there’s only one thing, and it seems it’s the only thing you can’t do. Admit to the King and the Parliament and the world that she’s your wife.’

  ‘There’d be trouble … great trouble … if I did.’ He thought of the King as he had last seen him. That peculiar look which was sometimes in his eyes. What could it mean? Glittering possibilities! And what disasters could follow if he admitted to marriage?

  ‘She’s a Catholic, that’s the trouble.’

  ‘It’s a sad state of affairs, Your Highness. And it seems there’s no way out.’

  ‘Pig, you’ll do what you can for me?’

  ‘You can be sure I will.’

  ‘Remind her of what a good husband I’ve been to her, will you?’

  ‘She doesn’t need to be reminded, sir. She remembers … She says so.’

  ‘She says I’ve been a good husband?’ he asked eagerly.

  ‘Yes, right up to the time you denied you were.’

  ‘I did not. It was Fox. Oh, he went too far. There was no need to go as far as that.’

  Miss Pigot shook her head at him sadly. ‘I’ll do my best. I talk to her, but at the moment it’s no use. If I saw that it was, you can trust me to let you know at once.’

  ‘Bless you, dearest Pig.’

  ‘I’ll tell her how downcast you are.’

  ‘Downcast! I’m broken-hearted. Honestly, Piggy, I shall do something desperate if she doesn’t come back to me.’

  But although she told Maria, it was no use. Maria was adamant.

  He had denied he was married to her; and if that ceremony had not been a solemn one to him, then her conscience would not allow her to live with him as his wife.

  The Prince was very ill. He suffered a violent paroxysm and had to be bled almost to the point of danger. Rumours spread through the Court that he was seriously ill.

  Miss Pigot brought them to Maria. She looked at her friend and mistress sadly.

  ‘He has brought this on himself because you won’t see him,’ she said.

  ‘He is too violent,’ said Maria. ‘He should learn to control his feelings.’

  ‘Perhaps they are too strong to be controlled.’

  ‘They weren’t strong enough for him to claim me as his wife.’

  ‘Oh, Maria, are you not a little hard on him? Consider his position. He could lose the throne.’

  ‘I told him that many times. I told him to consider carefully. You know I went abroad to escape him but he would not have that.’

  ‘He loves you, Maria. You forget that.’

  ‘I do not forget that he loves me in this way …’

  ‘In such a way that he is brought near to death because of you.’

  ‘You are a good advocate, Piggy. Has he asked you to plead his cause?’

  ‘I speak as I see,’ said the blunt Miss Pigot. ‘And I see this, Maria: If he admitted he was married to a Catholic he would have put the succession in danger. There might even be a war. Have you ever thought of that? You say you love him; he says he loves you. He cannot give up his crown. There is too much involved. It is like asking you to give up your religion. Why should all the sacrifice be on one side?’

  ‘Piggy, what are you saying?’

  ‘I’m telling you the facts as I see them. You want him to tell the world that he has married you – that’s just for your satisfaction, to make things right for your religion, you say. All well and good. Well, he is asking you to give up your pride, your religious convictions … not all of them, only those that concern the open acknowledgement of the marriage. He can’t and you won’t … or perhaps you can’t either. But I don’t see how one is being more self-willed than the other. For obvious reasons he can’t proclaim you his wife.’

  ‘He made his vows to me.’

  ‘And you to him.’

  Maria was silent.

  ‘And now,’ said Miss Pigot, ‘he’s ill because of you … fretting for you.’

  ‘If it’s one of his paroxysms,’ said Maria, ‘it’s a fit of rage and anger because everything he wants doesn’t fall into his lap.’

  ‘I’ve had it on very good authority … from his doctors no less … that his condition is very dangerous.’

  Maria turned away and went out of the room.

  Miss Pigot, watching her, thought: Perhaps this is the time. A message to His Highness? Perhaps she could explain to him that if he were very careful … there might be a chance.

  The Prince of Wales called at the House of the Honourable Mr Butler.

  He was very pale and looked a little thinner. His doctors had advised him that he should not go out but he had insisted.

  Mrs Butler received him with great respect and he was delighted to see that she was shocked by his appearance.

  ‘Your Highness is well enough to be out?’

  ‘I have managed to get here,’ he said feebly.

  ‘I beg of Your Highness to be seated.’

  He sank gracefully into the chair.

  ‘And I beg of you, my dear friend, to tell Mrs Fitzherbert that I am here and to say that I wish to see her. It may be for the last time.’

  ‘Your Highness …’

  He waved a delicate white hand. ‘That is what I wish you to tell her.’

  Mrs Butler said she herself would go to Maria, which she did, and shortly afterwards conducted the Prince to Maria’s sitting room where she gently shut the door on them.

  When he saw Maria he was so overcome by his emotion that he felt dizzy and as though he would faint. Maria ran to him and caught his arm. Oh, to be touched by Maria again! He leaned against the chair, prolonging the moment.

  ‘I … I have been very ill,’ he said. ‘I am still weak.’

  ‘Pray sit down,’ said Maria.

  He allowed her to put him into the chair and sat there, his eyes closed.

  ‘You should not have come out,’ she said.

  ‘I wanted to see you. I felt … it might be my last chance.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ she demanded almost angrily.

  ‘You may not have heard, Maria. But I have been very ill. I have been profusely bled and it has weakened me. My doctors despaired of my life.’

  He was delighted to see the concern in her eyes.

  ‘You will be distressed when I am gone, Maria.’

  ‘This is nonsense,’ said Maria, ‘to talk of dying. Why should you?’

  ‘Because I have lost all that is worth living for.’

  ‘But you have
not lost your hope of the Crown,’ she told him with some cynicism.

  ‘Oh, Maria, Maria … what is that to me if you no longer love me.’

  ‘It seems a good deal … since you betrayed me for the sake of it.’

  Still angry, still hurt, still unforgiving!

  He sighed. Then he covered his face with his hands and sobs shook his body.

  ‘What can I say to you, Maria? If you wish it to be goodbye then I shall go back to my bed and … die. For there is nothing to live for.’

  ‘I have already reminded you once that there is a crown.’

  ‘A crown! It is others who care for that, Maria. You must listen to me. Yes, yes, I insist. Fox … you know what Fox is. Haven’t you always known? I have been deceived by the fellow. He’s clever. I don’t deny it. But he it was who made the announcement … without telling me, Maria. What could I do?’

  ‘Denied it.’

  ‘And started a possible conflict? Think of that, Maria. Don’t think I haven’t implored them to put this right. Sherry will tell you. I spoke to Sherry. I begged him to do something and, God bless him, he did his best. But Fox had already done the mischief. What could we do? Maria, my beloved, don’t blame me for the sins of others. You know Fox. My God, didn’t you show me that you had no liking for him?’

  ‘I heard he had a letter from you … written just before the ceremony … saying that there would not be one.’

  ‘Fox would say anything. I may have written a letter. I have been forced to do so many things. They were on me like a pack of wolves. Oh, Maria, let’s forget them all. If you would love me again I should be completely happy. We will go to Brighton together; everything you want will be yours.’

  ‘All I wanted was to live in peace and happiness with the man I thought was my husband.’

  ‘You shall, Maria. You shall.’

  ‘No,’ she cried. ‘You should go. It is over. I understand everything. You should have listened to me in the first place. Perhaps it is my fault. I wanted us to be together so I pretended all would be well.’

  ‘Oh, Maria.’ He had flung himself at her feet. ‘Love me, Maria. It’s all I shall ever ask again.’

  ‘Pray get up,’ she said. ‘You will do yourself an injury.’

  ‘So much the better. I have been the victim of wily politicians and I am now the victim of love.’

  She sat down on a sofa and he was immediately beside her.

  ‘It was wrong of you to come out,’ she said. ‘You look so pale.’

  He closed his eyes; his heart pounding with hope.

  She touched his brow. ‘You should rest a while before you go. You should never have come.’

  She was concerned, alarmed for his health.

  ‘Maria,’ he said, ‘if you love me I would get well again … quickly.’

  ‘You are going to get well,’ she said briskly.

  ‘I am beginning to feel alive again.’

  He clasped her in his arms. He wanted, he said, to lay his head on that magnificent bosom which had so long been denied him.

  She was weeping. Maria was not one to weep easily so it showed how deeply moved she was. He had been right to come. This was going to be the reconciliation. He would not go out of this room until he had Maria’s promise that all was well between them.

  He wanted, he said, to stay close to his Maria for ever. He wanted her to know he would die if she would not return to him.

  He embraced her; she returned his embrace. He was forgiven.

  Return of the Duke of York

  THEY ARE TOGETHER again. Society could talk of nothing else.

  The Prince’s recovery was miraculous. The very next day he was well enough to drive Maria down to the Epsom races in his phaeton, singing as he went, the healthy flush back in his cheeks, the radiant Mrs Fitzherbert beside him.

  He kept declaring that he had never been so happy in his life. And indeed there was every reason why this should be so. His debts were paid; he had a grant for Carlton House; there had been an addition to his income; his succession to the throne was no longer in peril – and crowning glory, he had his Maria back, as loving as she ever was, admitting that the separation had been as painful to her as to him and that he, Prince Charming, had been in no way to blame. It was all the fault of the villain Fox.

  Poor Charles! The Prince felt he had been rather unjustly treated, but he was enjoying life in Italy with the very charming Lizzie and he guessed Charles wouldn’t grudge him his happiness.

  That evening the Duchess of Gordon gave a ball and naturally she craved the honour of the Prince’s company and that of Mrs Fitzherbert. They came together; he danced almost every dance with her, only leaving her side when duty demanded it. Everyone smiled on them, implying pleasure in seeing them together and happy again. And at the end of the ball the Prince was heard to say, as he had said so many times before: ‘Madam, may I have the honour of taking you home in my carriage?’

  And regal, dignified Mrs Fitzherbert graciously gave her permission.

  All was well. The balls and banquets would start again. The Prince was the leader of society and Princess Fitz, as they called her, shared that honour with him. It was realized that if one wished to entertain the Prince of Wales one must be on terms of friendliness with Mrs Fitzherbert.

  The Prince took a house for her in Pall Mall; and the carriages of the nobility were seen constantly stopping at her door. At dinner parties she was put at the side of the Prince in the place of honour: it was as though everyone was determined to treat her as the Princess of Wales, in spite of Mr Fox’s denial – because it was quite clear that that was what the Prince wished.

  He would make up for that denial by making sure that she received every honour which would have been hers had she been his wife; he could not of course make the King and Queen receive her, but who cared for the King and Queen? The Prince of Wales was the leader of society – and his ‘wife’ with him.

  Whig hostesses were eager to show their loyalty; and Tory ones were even more ready to accept her as the Princess of Wales because that would show that Fox had lied.

  The Duke and Duchess of Cumberland hastened to pay their respects and show their affection for Mrs Fitzherbert and to treat her as though she was their niece of marriage. Her triumph seemed complete when the Duke of Gloucester – Tory that he was and more friendly to the King than his brother Cumberland was – wrote to her from Florence where he preferred to live since his wife was slighted in England by not being accepted at Court. He sent her a present to show his cordial feelings and Maria was delighted when she read it.

  ‘H.R.H. The Duke of Gloucester to Mrs Fitzherbert

  Florence, May 24th, 1787

  ‘Dear Madam, I take the opportunity of a private hand to desire your acceptance of a Cestus done in oyster shell. I hope you will think it pretty. Pray send us some account to trust to of the present negotiation. I hope the Prince will be made easy in his affairs. I sincerely hope you are happy and well for I know you deserve it. I remain, dear Madam, your humble servant.

  ‘William Henry.’

  So since the Gloucesters and Cumberlands accepted her, surely this implied that although Fox had emphatically denied that she was married to the Prince and nothing had been done to contradict it, the world believed in the marriage and were determined to accept her as the Prince’s wife.

  She would not have believed a short while ago that this would have been possible.

  It was true there were some who whispered against her. Gilray’s Dido Forsaken was insulting, yet that in a way implied that she had been ill used and that Fox had lied. There she was on a funeral pyre on the shore, the Crown and the Prince of Wales’s feathers floating away from her; making off from her was a little boat on the prow of which was written the word ‘Honour’. Pitt was steering the boat and in it were the Prince and Fox. From the Prince’s mouth came a balloon in which were the words: ‘Never saw her in my life.’ And from Fox’s: ‘No, damme, never in his life.’

 
; ‘Well, of course every well-known figure was a target for the cartoonists and lampoonists and Maria dismissed the insults with a shrug.

  They left London for Brighton – the Prince to inhabit his Marine Pavilion, and she to the house with the green shutters which was almost in the Pavilion gardens; and there society was gayer than Brighton had ever known it. London was deserted. The centre of the fashionable world was Brighton. The inhabitants of that town, delighted with the prosperity which the Prince’s preference had brought to them, cheered him and Mrs Fitzherbert when ever they appeared. The Prince could be seen strolling along by the sea in the company of Maria and a group of friends, riding through the town, taking his morning dip under the surveillance of Smoker, walking in his gardens, dancing there in one of the houses of his noble friends – almost always in the company of that lady known by some as ‘Princess Fitz’ or by the name Smoker had given her – ‘Mrs Prince’.

  Humble houses were hastily transformed into mansions. Not only were the builders of Brighton making fortunes but so were the lodging houses and shop-keepers. Everywhere the Prince of Wales’s feathers were displayed; and the theme was ‘God Bless the Prince of Wales’.

  The Prince constantly reiterated that he had never been so happy in his life and Maria echoed those sentiments. The Prince was full of high spirits yet Maria was having a decided influence on him. Her dignity was undeniable. She might not have been the most beautiful woman in Brighton but her grace and regality were unique. No one could doubt which of the ladies bore the title of Princess Fitz; Maria, said the people of Brighton, looked like a queen. Seated on a garden chair in the Pavilion grounds she was indeed like a queen on the throne. There she would watch the Prince play cricket in his flannel jacket, trimmed with blue ribbon, and very tightly fitting white trousers, his face under the white beaver hat beaming with pleasure in the game while his eyes were constantly going in Maria’s direction to make sure she was not missing any part of his performance. He was proud of the costume which he had designed himself, proud of his game, proud of Maria, proud of the way he had arranged skilfully his life so that he could keep his place as the prospective King and at the same time his hold on Maria and the people’s affections.