Victoria Confesses (9781442422469) (2 page)

Of course Sir John would interfere! I understood that very well.

“Sir John had several candidates in mind. There was even a rumor that King George himself was showing a great deal of interest in me.”

“Uncle King wanted to marry you?” I shuddered at the very notion. King George IV was a gouty old man who wore a thick layer of rouge plastered on his flabby cheeks and a corset to hold in his fat stomach. Uncle King was very kind to me and
once gave me a lovely diamond badge, but I could not imagine my beautiful sister wed to him.

“It was only a rumor, but Mamma and Sir John were taking no risk that it might be true. They settled on Prince Ernst, though he has no wealth to speak of. I was told about it only after everything had been arranged. Now, in just two months I will marry a man I scarcely know and do not love, and be sent away to ensure that I will never again see the man who has my heart.”

“Dear, dear Fidi!” I cried, my heart breaking for her. “How
very
sad!”

“Sad for me, but sad for you as well, dearest sister! I fear that Sir John will do the same to you some day, and I can do nothing to prevent it! Oh, Victoria, I'd take you with me if I could, but that's impossible!”

“But surely—”

Suddenly a voice startled us. “Surely it is time for you to dress for dinner, Victoria.”

Daisy had appeared at the door. How much had she heard? “And you as well, Feodore,” she added briskly. Daisy had been Fidi's governess before she became mine.

Fidi leaped to her feet, kissed the top of my head, and rushed away.

Daisy closed the door and leaned against it. She was tall and thin with a stiff, straight back and sharp features. It was her duty as my governess to instruct me in matters of deportment. She corrected me when she thought I had been naughty or stubborn or had behaved in any way she did not approve. Yet beneath her stern manner was the warmest heart in the world. Daisy had always been devoted to me, and I returned her devotion without limit.

“So Feodore has told you her news,” she said. “We must be happy for her, Victoria.”

“It's so unfair,” I complained. “Just because Mamma disapproves of Captain d'Este's parents.”

“The duke of Sussex has defied moral standards,” my governess said firmly. “Your mother is quite right to disapprove.”

“But Fidi is leaving!” I wailed. “She's not at all happy, and so how can I be happy for her? How can Mamma allow it?”

“The duchess believes it's for the best,” she said. “Sir John has convinced her of it.” Daisy touched my cheek gently. “Now, come, we must wash your face—all that weeping!—and choose which dress you shall wear to Feodore's celebration.”

Daisy took my hand as we went down to the Red Salon—I was not permitted to descend the sweeping marble staircase without holding the hand of a trusted adult—and pages in royal livery opened the double doors with a flourish. The walls of the salon were covered in red silk, a trifle faded. A steward cried, “The Princess Alexandrina Victoria!”

“Smile, Victoria,” Daisy murmured as we prepared to enter, and everyone turned to watch.

Sir John and the entire Conroy family were already present: his round-faced wife, Eliza, their three sons, and their two daughters: Victoire, who is just my age—she was named for Mamma—and her older sister, Jane. I found both girls rather tiresome.

Several of my papa's brothers arrived, among them William, duke of Clarence, and his kind wife, Adelaide, who it turned out was a cousin of Prince Ernst. Naturally, none of Uncle William's many children by his former mistress had been invited. I acknowledged several other uncles and aunts and those few
cousins who were fortunate enough to have the proper parents.

I was happy to see Uncle Leopold, my very favorite uncle. He had married Uncle King's only child, Princess Charlotte, but poor Charlotte and her newborn infant had died before I was born.

How
very
sad that was!
Does he know about Fidi's broken heart?
I wondered. Surely Uncle Leopold, who had himself suffered great loss, would not insist that my sister give up the man she loved to marry a man she did not—merely to satisfy Sir John!

Fidi and Mamma made their entrance. My sister was lovely but very pale. Mamma was dressed in the fur-trimmed blue velvet gown that she claimed gave her confidence. We sat down to dine, and after many courses had been served, Mamma rose and the company fell silent. She always felt uneasy about speaking in public. Her German accent was heavy, though she had lived in England since just before I was born. Sir John had written a little speech for her with the pronunciation of each word spelled out.

“It is with great pleasure,” she said,
with
sounding like
vit
, “that I announce the engagement of my daughter, Princess Feodore of Leiningen, to Prince Ernst of Hohenlohe-Langenburg. The wedding”—
vedding
—“will take place here at Kensington Palace on the twenty-first day of February.” Mamma paused, glancing at Fidi, who wore a brave smile that I knew was utterly false. Sir John jumped to his feet and began to applaud, a signal to everyone else to do the same. I could not bear to look at my sister.

“How excited you must be, Victoria,” murmured Jane Conroy close to my ear. “It will be a splendid wedding. I do so look forward to it.”

“I am not in the least excited, Jane,” I told her sternly. “Feodore will be leaving. I do not look forward to that.”

And it is all your father's doing,
I thought, turning away, my lips pressed tightly together.
I hate Sir John Conroy.

Ten days before the wedding Prince Ernst and his family arrived from Germany, along with Fidi's older brother, my half brother, Prince Charles of Leiningen. Prince Ernst made it a point to speak to me very kindly. I wanted to loathe him as much as I loathed Sir John, but in truth I did not. He seemed an amiable person, though no more handsome than I remembered, and Fidi was beginning to seem at ease with him. I saw them walking together in the garden, talking with their heads close together. He even succeeded in making her laugh! She appeared to like him, or at the very least not to find him odious.

As the day of my sister's wedding drew closer, I tried to shut her departure for Germany from my mind, but could not. Fidi was leaving, and I had to stay at Kensington. I would have no one close to my age but that dull and insipid Victoire Conroy. Dear Daisy, sensing my unhappiness, gave me a gift: a little
wooden doll she had dressed in a tiny costume made of scraps of lace left over from my sister's wedding gown.

“She will fit into your pocket,” Fidi said when I showed her the doll. “You can carry her everywhere, or tuck her beneath your pillow. She will listen to you when you whisper your secrets to her, and you can be assured that she will never speak of them to anyone else.”

I named the doll Fidi. She was my secret, and so she remained, even during the time when I was permitted to have no secrets.

The night before Fidi's wedding Mamma entertained guests at a large dinner in the Red Salon. The menu included two soups, two kinds of fish, two roasts, several entrées, numerous entremets (my favorite was the maraschino jelly), and a variety of desserts. After the dinner—I fear I ate too much—Daisy accompanied me upstairs to the bedroom I shared with Mamma. My maid, Bessie, removed my velvet dress and helped me into my nightgown. She bustled about, laying out my stockings and undergarments for the next day. After she had banked the fire and snuffed out all the candles but one, Bessie made a curtsy, wished us good night, and left. I sometimes wondered about Bessie, what her life was like, but I was not allowed to have a conversation with her. “A princess must not speak personally to a servant,” Daisy said. It was against the rules. I did not need to ask whose rules. Sir John's, of course. He made all the rules—too many to remember.

Daisy sat beside me, hands forming a pious steeple, and listened as I recited my prayers. I was not allowed to speak privately even to God! When I had said “amen” and was lying in my bed with the satin coverlet pulled up to my chin, Daisy
settled in her usual chair close by. She opened a book and began to read silently by the light of the single candle left burning.

I closed my eyes, but thinking of the wedding the next morning, I was too excited to fall asleep. Dear Daisy began to snore gently. I heard the door open quietly. I kept my eyes closed, believing it was Mamma. Someone was standing close by my bed, but I sensed that it was not Mamma. I opened my eyes the merest slits. It was Fidi!

“Shhhhh,” she warned. “Mamma is still with her guests. They're speaking German and having a fine time.” Wearing only a thin shift, Fidi was shivering. “Let me come in next to you,” she whispered, and I lifted the coverlet and made room for her. “I wanted to have just a few minutes alone with you,” she said, curling up cozily next to me. “This is the last night I'll spend here at Kensington. Tomorrow we'll be at Claremont. Uncle Leopold had a suite of rooms prepared for us. We're to stay there for a few days, and then we will leave for Germany.”

“We,” I heard her say. “Us.” In a few hours Prince Ernst would become her husband. “When are you coming back to Kensington?” I asked.

“I don't know. But I'll write to you as often as I can, and you must promise to write to me, as well.”

“I promise. But oh, Fidi, what shall I ever do without you?” I had forgotten to whisper. Daisy stirred slightly. Fidi placed her finger on my lips. Daisy sighed and resumed her snoring.

“I wish I could go to Germany with you,” I said, for perhaps the tenth time, or maybe the twentieth.

“Darling Vicky, let me tell you a story—the last I shall tell you, for you're getting too old for my stories.”

“I will never be too old for your stories,” I insisted.

Fidi began her story with the part I already knew: There was once a duke named Edward, a son of the king of England, who married a German princess named Victoire. When the princess learned that she was with child, the duke brought her to England so the baby would be born here. I was that baby.

“This is the part I haven't told you,” Fidi continued. “A gypsy fortune-teller had once told the duke he would have a child who would grow up to rule England, and Edward believed it. He wanted the baby to be English enough to inherit the throne.”

“And you believe it, too?”

“I do,” Fidi said. “The king's only child died before you were born. The rest of your papa's brothers are old and fat and gouty, and not a single one of your older cousins is legitimate. As Mamma is fond of pointing out, they are all
bâtards
and cannot succeed to the throne. It's very likely that you will someday become queen, Vicky. Your papa planned on it. Mamma wants it. Sir John counts on it, and that's why he wants to control you.”

I listened silently to what Fidi was telling me.
Can it be true that I shall be queen?
Fidi would not lie. Yet the idea was so astonishing that I could scarcely grasp it.
I, queen of England?

“I shall miss you terribly,” Fidi was saying. “But I'm also very glad to be leaving Kensington. I've felt like a prisoner from my first days here. I can escape—I'm not important to their plans. But I truly fear for you, dear Vicky, for you're now a prisoner as well.”

Her words shocked me.

“You will have the title of queen,” Fidi went on, “but Mamma hopes to be appointed regent, and if she gets her wish, it is Sir John who will actually rule England until you are eighteen—and
long after that. He will try to control you the way he controls Mamma. Sir John is determined to have the power it will bring him. That's why he has so many rules for you—his so-called Kensington System—and why Mamma allows it.”

Daisy muttered in her sleep. The book slid off her lap and fell to the floor with a thump. Fidi and I lay still as mice, hoping she had not awakened.

“I believe they're trying to break your will,” Fidi said when it was safe to continue, “or at the very least to bend it so that you will always do exactly as they want. You must be strong, Victoria! Lehzen can't be of much help to you, for if she resists, Sir John will dismiss her with a snap of his fingers. It won't be easy for you, but you can depend on Uncle Leopold to do what he can to help you.”

My head was whirling with questions, but before I could ask them, Fidi stroked my hair and kissed me tenderly. “I must leave, before Mamma comes up. Give me your solemn word that you will not tell Mamma or Lehzen or anyone else what I've told you. When they do tell you themselves, you must act very surprised. Do you promise?”

Solemnly, I crossed my heart and promised.

“Then tomorrow we shall be happy, shan't we? I'll pretend to be happy on my wedding day, and you must pretend to be happy for me. Know that I shall always hold you in my heart, and we will exchange letters often, and someday you will be free of these invisible bonds that now hold you so tightly.”