The Widow of Windsor Read online

  ‘Alix, my love,’ said her mother, ‘you’ve grown thinner.’

  ‘I’ve been so worried about you all.’

  ‘We needed help … badly … and it didn’t come,’ said Louise shortly.

  ‘Mama, dearest, you must understand that I did everything, just everything I could.’

  ‘I know you did, my love.’

  ‘And so did Bertie. There were such quarrels but he did all he could …’

  ‘We won’t talk of it now, Alix.’

  The Burgomaster welcomed the visitors with a speech which might have been a reproach to the Prince of Wales.

  ‘Abandoned as Denmark is by all the world,’ he said, ‘and crushed by overwhelming superiority, I hope that the visit of our Princess and her husband will be the beginning of brighter days for the country.’

  Bertie applauded imperturbably so all accepted the fact that what had happened was no fault of his.

  They drove to the royal Palace of Fredensborg, a beautiful residence on the lake of Esrom, which now that Christian was King had fallen to him.

  It was a bitter-sweet experience for Alix to be home with her family. There was so much to remind her of the old days and yet how changed it was – how sadly so in spite of the fact Christian and Louise had become King and Queen.

  Alix liked to walk in the gardens with Dagmar and talk of the past. But Dagmar wanted to hear about life in England and Alix found herself talking freely. Staying at Fredensborg was the young Czarevitch Nicholas who was courting Dagmar.

  Dagmar liked to hear about Alix’s arrival in England and was wondering what hers would be like in Russia. She loved little Eddy and thought it was marvellous that Alix had a baby of her own. So did Alix. She wanted lots of children, she told Dagmar, and to look after them herself so that she had a happy family as theirs used to be in the Yellow Palace.

  She was so happy to be there with Bertie. She wished they could stay for ever. Bertie was charming, they all agreed, and the simple life suited Eddy. The countryside was so beautiful and she kept asking Bertie if he didn’t admire this and that. Bertie always said he did but she could see the glazed look in his eyes which meant that his thoughts were elsewhere; and she knew that he found the homely Danish Court very different from Marlborough House. The simple country life was not for him. Where were the practical jokes, the lavish banquets, the racing, the gambling, the flirtatious pretty women? They were lacking, and although he was ready to endure a little of this for Alix’s sake he was longing to go home.

  One day one of the men of his suite said to him, ‘Surely there is no place in the world as boring as Fredensborg?’

  ‘Oh,’ replied the Prince of Wales, ‘haven’t you been to Bernstorff?’

  Bertie’s habit of yawning without opening his mouth was of good service to him. ‘Never mind,’ he would say to members of his suite, ‘we’ll soon be home.’

  At home the Queen eagerly read accounts of how the Prince and Princess of Wales were being received in Denmark; and because she thought they had been there long enough and she was getting reports of Bertie’s outspokenness with regard to the Prussians towards whom he displayed a venom which almost matched that of his wife, she ordered them to leave at once for Stockholm. There they were to travel incognito and to stay at hotels and afterwards they must on no account omit a visit to their German relations.

  Christian and Louise begged to look after little Eddy while they went to Sweden where it was already known that they were to arrive. Therefore the King of Sweden immediately invited them to his palace and treated them as honoured guests. He insisted on taking Bertie on an elk hunt and this was such a grand occasion – after Bertie’s own heart – that it was talked of not only in Sweden but beyond.

  At home the Queen was fuming with rage. No sooner did she let Bertie out of her sight than he was in trouble. Had she not clearly said incognito; and there he was staying with the King of Sweden and attending public functions. As for Eddy, she was horrified that he should have been left behind with King Christian and Queen Louise. It was incredible. That child belonged not only to them but also to the nation and if he was not with his parents his place was at Windsor with the Queen. He should be sent back immediately. Lady Spencer could bring him home to Windsor.

  Bertie was beginning to realise that he was entitled to have some say in the way he conducted his affairs. He wrote that it was undignified for the heir to the throne to stay at squalid hotels and they were all squalid in Sweden; as for the child, Alix could not bear to be parted from him and after all she was his mother. Surely the Queen would not wish to make Alix wretched and to slight the King of Sweden.

  Bertie was getting impossible, said the Queen. In future she would have his orders made very clear before he was allowed to leave England.

  On their return to Copenhagen they found that Dagmar had become officially engaged to Nicholas. There were congratulations and great rejoicing. The occasional banquet seemed to the Prince of Wales very meagre, but then of course the Danish royal family had just fought a losing war but he doubted whether they had ever been accustomed to much else. He was amazed that in spite of the humble manner in which she had been brought up, Alix could look as elegant as any woman he had ever seen in any company.

  Nicholas invited them to Russia for the wedding.

  ‘It would be lovely if we could go, Bertie,’ said Alix.

  Bertie said they would. He had always wanted to go to Russia.

  The two girls spent a great deal of time together discussing weddings and trousseaux. It was so like the old times and if Dagmar had not been as delighted with her grand marriage as Alix had been with hers it would have been heartbreaking.

  One day when Alix and Bertie came in from a ride the King said to them: ‘I have a visitor here to see you, Alix. I couldn’t let you leave Copenhagen without seeing him. He would be so upset.’

  And there was Hans Christian Andersen bowing and smiling and looking overcome by the honour.

  Alix was delighted and began telling Bertie how Hans had come to the Yellow Palace and told them stories and how he used to bring his books to show them when they appeared in foreign editions.

  Bertie was gracious as he well knew how to be.

  ‘The Princess will be telling your stories to our son as soon as he is old enough to understand,’ he said.

  * * *

  With reluctance Alix said good-bye to her family.

  The royal yacht sailed away and they came into Kiel harbour into those waters which until this year had been Danish and were now German, and according to nautical custom the Prussian flag was hoisted.

  When Alix saw it she turned pale with anger.

  ‘That flag is to be removed at once,’ she said.

  Bertie looked up at it, shrugging his shoulders. It was only courteous to fly the flag of a country when a ship was in its territorial waters, he pointed out.

  ‘These are Danish waters,’ she retaliated.

  ‘They were,’ said Bertie sadly.

  ‘They are,’ she insisted.

  ‘There’s nothing we can do about it,’ he said.

  He was unprepared for her vehemence.

  ‘There is,’ she said. ‘I shall not leave this yacht until that flag is removed.’

  Bertie sent for the Captain and asked him to explain the custom to the Princess of Wales. He left them together. Trust Bertie, she thought sadly, to escape from an unpleasant situation.

  The Captain explained that while they were in Prussian waters the flag must fly.

  ‘It shall not fly,’ she said. ‘They are waiting for me on shore but I shall stay on the yacht until that flag is taken down and you know that.’

  The guns were firing their salutes of welcome and the Captain recognised the determination in Alix’s eyes.

  He gave orders that the flag should be lowered.

  * * *

  Alix was very uneasy. She thought the Queen should have spared them this. They did not go to Berlin of course. That would h
ave been most unwise, for some of Bertie’s criticisms of the Prussians had been repeated there. Vicky and her husband, however, did have a brief meeting with them at Cologne. It took place on the railway station through which they had arranged to pass at the same time. At least they would satisfy the Queen that they had met.

  Vicky was cool and restrained, remembering the unwise things Bertie had said about the Prussians. As for Alix she felt so sick at heart when she thought of her father’s sufferings that she could scarcely bear to look at them, especially as Fritz had come in uniform, wearing medals he had won in the war. It was fortunate that the meeting was so brief.

  November had arrived by the time the Osborne brought them back to England. Alix was pregnant again.

  * * *

  While Bertie and Alix were still abroad the Queen had a pleasant surprise.

  Her doctor, William Jenner, called on her and asked for her indulgence because after consulting with Sir Charles Phipps, the Keeper of the Privy Purse, he had taken an action which she might well feel he should not have taken.

  ‘Pray be more explicit,’ said the Queen.

  ‘We have been concerned for Your Majesty’s health,’ said Jenner, ‘and it is my firm belief that you need more fresh air. When you are at Balmoral you are so much better than you are here and we believe it is because you take more exercise. Now up in Scotland we know that you have a very trusty servant and they are hard to come by. We have taken the liberty of sending for one of your servants whom we trust to take the utmost care of Your Majesty.’

  The Queen looked from one to the other in astonishment. That her doctor and the Keeper of her Privy Purse should decide on what servants she should have was incredible. Had they gone mad?

  Dr Jenner said: ‘Of course if Your Majesty does not approve, Brown can be sent back without delay.’

  ‘Brown!’ said the Queen, her voice changing without her realising it.

  ‘John Brown, M’am, to whom we both feel we can entrust Your Majesty’s safety in the Highlands – so why not in the South as well.’

  The Queen smiled. ‘Brown,’ she said, ‘is a very good and faithful servant.’

  ‘Your Majesty should get out more. He could drive you, or ride with you, as Your Majesty wished.’

  ‘It is quite a good idea,’ she admitted.

  And when they had gone she felt elated. He really was the perfect servant.

  Very soon he arrived and she asked that he be brought to her at once.

  ‘So here you are, Brown,’ she said. ‘I hope you’re going to like the South. I am sure you will find it very interesting.’

  ‘It’s nae the Highlands,’ said Brown.

  ‘Of course it is not the Highlands. But I’m very glad to see you here. I hope you are pleased to come.’

  ‘I’ll nae be knowing that till I’ve tried it,’ said Brown.

  * * *

  How she laughed when she was alone. He was so blunt. Of course he was so faithful, so loyal, no respecter of persons, not even that of the Queen, whom he would guard with his life. Albert had always said that he was the best gillie he had ever had – he and Grant that was, and Grant had been the head gillie.

  Albert would be very pleased that she had this good and faithful servant with her at Osborne. After all, Jenner and Phipps were right. Why keep him in Scotland? Why should he not be with her wherever she was.

  Everyone was noticing the change in her. She smiled more frequently; those about her were astonished by the calm manner in which she allowed Brown to discard ceremony. She would smile at him, admiring his firm chin. She had always admired firm chins and remembered how she used to study her own in the looking-glass until the Baroness Lehzen reproved her vanity. ‘It’s not vanity,’ she would say. ‘It’s the opposite. I dislike my chin. It’s so weak.’ It was the family chin, of course. Some of her uncles had had it; some of her children had it; so she could not be surprised that she had it. No wonder she admired Brown’s chin.

  ‘Brown,’ she said one day, ‘one can see you’re an obstinate man, by the way in which your chin juts out. It betrays a firmness of purpose.’

  Brown fingered his chin and gave her that look which so amused her because it was half contemptuous, half protective. It made her feel that she was a woman rather than a Queen – a very pleasant feeling at times.

  ‘Ye manage to be an obstinate woman,’ was his comment, ‘with no chin at all.’

  So very funny! ‘Really, Brown, you are amusing.’ She was frequently laughing now. Sometimes she pulled herself up sharply and thought of Albert. Then she would go to her room and read her journals and brood on the past until Brown said that she was looking sickly and he’d saddled Flora and it was time they were riding.

  There was no doubt at all – Brown made all the difference.

  Chapter X

  THE END OF PAM AND THE RISE OF DIZZY

  The Queen was secretly dismayed. For several hours of the day she would not even think of Albert. It had happened since Brown had come to Osborne and she realised how right they had been to send for him. Now of course when she went to Balmoral he would go with her, and if she had to go to London he would be there. The prospect of going to London was not nearly so distasteful when she considered that Brown would be there.

  Brown was so reliable, so courageous, so amusing, with his dour Highland ways, such a relief after ordinary people. Of course, none of the people who surrounded her appreciated him and they were astonished by what she ‘put up with’ (as they expressed it) from a servant.

  ‘Brown is no ordinary servant,’ she would say with a laugh. ‘One does not get devotion like that from ordinary servants, I do assure you.’

  He looked after the horses and the dogs, but that did take up a great deal of his time and she really needed him to have a more personal post. He was to have a salary of £120 a year – rather large, it was true, but the man needed some compensation for leaving his home. How amusing it was to see his delight when she talked of going to Balmoral. She had arranged that each morning he should come to her room to receive the orders for the day. She looked forward to seeing him and hearing his dry comments on the weather – always so amusing. He had a contempt for the South of which he made no secret which showed how loyal he was to his native land.

  Bertie and Alix didn’t like him. Poor Bertie, he was so superficial he could not see the sterling worth of Brown. She was afraid that he was mixing with the wrong sort of people and Lord Palmerston had hinted to her that Bertie’s gambling debts were reaching alarming proportions. She did not believe Parliament would increase Bertie’s allowance, and she could understand their being reluctant to do so. What would he spend the money on? Horse-racing and fast women.

  Poor Alix, the Queen was afraid she had to put up with a great deal, and Alfred was turning out to be almost as bad as his elder brother. Who would have thought that with the example Albert had set them they could behave as they did.

  So it was natural that Bertie and Alfred should not appreciate Brown. Alice from Darmstadt had written that she thought it an excellent idea that Brown should have come South. It must mean a great deal to dearest Mama to have a servant about her on whom she could rely.

  As for Lenchen she was very much aware of the virtues of Brown. She remarked to her mother that his blue eyes were so penetrating and missed nothing and how well they went with that curly beard. He was so strong too. Lenchen at least appreciated John Brown.

  * * *

  June had come and Alix’s confinement was near. She had been quite well and after a reception went to a concert. During it she began to experience mild pains and was eager to get back home. She went to bed immediately and very shortly after another son was born.

  The Queen was delighted. Two boys in such a short time was excellent and it seemed as though Alix was going to be as fruitful as she was herself, always a comfort for a Queen – which Alix would one day be, of course. Although one could have too many. She often thought of those seemingly perpetual pregna
ncies when she remembered she had been a little irritable and rather a trial to poor Albert.

  The new baby was of course much stronger than poor fragile little Eddy; and it was so pleasant to see dear sweet Alix sitting up in bed looking so pretty and happy too, because there was no doubt that Alix was born to be a mother.

  The baby was to be called George.

  ‘George!’ cried the Queen. ‘Why George?’

  Alix explained that the Cambridges had always been great friends of hers in the days when Cousin Mary came to Rumpenheim and Alix was only three years old.

  ‘Poor Mary Cambridge,’ said the Queen. ‘So large and still unmarried.’

  ‘I thought it would please them to call the baby George after the Duke.’

  ‘Poor George!’ said the Queen. ‘There was a question at one time of my marrying him.’

  ‘As there was of my father,’ said Alix with a smile. ‘There were so many eager to marry the Queen of England.’

  The Queen admitted this. ‘And how fortunate I was to have succeeded in marrying the most perfect angel that ever existed. But then his very virtues make me miss him all the more.’

  Alix hoped the Queen was not going to lapse into one of her monologues on the virtues of Albert, which Bertie had said had become slightly less frequent since the arrival of Brown. At least, he added, that was one good reason for bringing Brown south. Bertie was so irreverent.

  Alix talked about the beauties of little George and how it was easy to see even at this stage that he was remarkably intelligent.

  The Queen smiled fondly. Little babies were not a subject she greatly enjoyed. So his names were to be George Frederick Ernest. But she thought that every member of the family should bear Albert’s name.