Jean Plaidy - Victoria in the Wings

Victoria was on her mind today, and when she had finished the embroidered flowers she went indoors out of the hot August sun to write to her.

She sat at her desk and wrote thanking her for the well-written birthday letter and the gifts.

It gives me great satisfaction to hear that you are enjoying the sea air. I wish I could pay a visit there and see you, my dear little niece … Your Uncle desires to be most kindly remembered to you and hopes to receive soon also a letter from you, of whom he is as fond as I am. We speak of you very often, and trust that you will always consider us to be among your best friends.

God bless you, my dear Victoria, is always the prayer of your truly affectionate

Aunt Adelaide

She sealed the letter and sent it; but she could not get Victoria out of her mind.

She could not talk to William of this sudden fear which had come to her. It obsessed her. And it concerned William too.

It was true that William had been over-excitable; it was true he made long, rambling speeches, that he was eccentric; but there was a long step between such conduct and … madness.

It was always as though there had been a force at work which was trying to send William mad.

There! She had faced it.

A force? She might go farther and bring out what was truly in her mind: the Duke of Cumberland.

It was so clear, so simple. The motive could not have been plainer. There was a crown and the Cumberlands wanted it – first for themselves and then for their son. Poor innocent young George, that charming boy whom she loved. God preserve him from the influence of his parents!

They shall never drive William insane, she thought. I will prevent that. I will stand between him and them. I will nurse him. I will not let it happen. It need not, I know – and yet the alarming thing is that it could.

William is safe … with me.

And Victoria?

Oh God, she thought, the child is in danger. Those rumours of her illness. What could they mean?

Whenever she thought of Victoria she saw a great shadow hanging over her, and she was afraid.

The Duchess of Kent and her daughter were back at Kensington Palace after the seaside holiday and Victoria, blooming with health, took her daily walks with the Duchess as far as Apsley House and back and the people cheered her as she passed.

Adelaide called at Kensington Palace. She had brought the dress she had been embroidering for Victoria who was enchanted with it. She must try it on at once, she declared.

‘You shall,’ said the Duchess. ‘Go and do so now and your Aunt Adelaide and I will have a chat while we await your return.’

As soon as she had left Adelaide looked over her shoulder furtively.

‘Is anything wrong?’ asked the Duchess.

‘I have been waiting for an opportunity to talk to you. Perhaps I am being foolish but I feel this is of such great importance to us all. Forgive me if I am stupid, but it is out of my love and concern for the child.’

‘For Victoria!’ cried the Duchess.

Adelaide nodded.

‘Pray go on.’

‘I am anxious. I believe that there is some … evil at work. I cannot forget those accounts of her weakness which were so false.’

The Duchess had turned pale. ‘Nor can I forget them,’ she said.

‘Who started those rumours? Who saw that they were circulated?’

The two women looked at each other and it was Adelaide who spoke first. ‘I believe it to be the Duke and Duchess of Cumberland.’

‘My dear Adelaide … sometimes I am terrified.’

‘I too. And there is William. Those reports about him. Oh, it is so clear . They want William put away.’

‘And Victoria?’ said the Duchess.

‘I don’t know, but I fear some evil. I beg of you, never let the child out of your sight. Keep her with you or that good woman Lehzen … all the time.’

The Duchess had put her hand to her heart. ‘Oh God, it is a terrifying thought.’

‘It is not, alas, so unusual. Crimes have been committed for a crown before. How I wish we were not so close to it. I can see great danger.’

‘I shall see that the child is guarded night and day.’

‘My thoughts will be with you.’

‘My dear, dear Adelaide!’

‘You know I love her as though she were my own daughter.’

The Duchess nodded. ‘If you should discover anything …’

‘Never fear, it is my concern too. Both for William and the child.’

‘They shan’t succeed.’

‘No,’ said Adelaide firmly. ‘We shall protect them and there is none who could do it as we can.’

‘She is coming back now.’

Victoria came in wearing the dress with the hand-embroidered flowers.

‘It is most becoming,’ said the Duchess.

Victoria turned round smiling, but she was not thinking of the dress so much as she pretended; she was wondering what they had been discussing while she had been out of the room. It was something frightening. She could see it in their faces. And she believed it concerned her.

Yes, there was certainly something mysterious going on.

They were afraid for her. It was obvious. If when she was riding her pony in the park she tried to stray a little from her attendants they were immediately beside her.

Orders, she thought.

And then Mamma’s sleeping in her room; and the Baroness’ sitting there until Mamma came. That was the most unusual thing of all.

Could it be that she was in danger?

She thought a great deal about the Princes in the Tower. They had been kept there and suddenly they disappeared, stifled in their beds and their bodies were buried under a stair.

What if someone was trying to murder her?

She told it to her dolls; she wondered whether Lehzen could make the little Princes for her. Mamma said she was getting too old for them, but they were not ordinary dolls. They had been with her so long; they were her family; besides, many of them actually represented her ancestors.

Thinking of her dolls she decided to visit them; and she rose and went to the head of the stairs. The apartments occupied by her mother’s household were on two floors and the staircase which led from one to the other was a spiral one. She had always felt it was rather an exciting place because it twisted so and if anyone were coming up and you were going down, if they were silent-footed you would suddenly find yourself face to face with them.

You could stand on the staircase and look right up to the little window in the roof at a patch of sky; she had always found that fascinating.

But now as she started down the staircase she was thinking of the little Princes in the Tower. Under a stone stair, she had heard, they found their bodies years later. What had they felt when they woke up in the night and saw murderers at their bedside? Did they scream out? Or were they too terrified to open their mouths? Or were they just suffocated in their sleep?

Poor little boys! Had they any suspicions on that last day when they heard the hammering going on close by that it was their murderers preparing the secret hiding-place which was to be their grave?

They were murdered because someone wanted what was undoubtedly theirs – a crown. It was that same crown which would be Victoria’s one day if no one took it from her.

Why was she standing here, looking up at the skylight? She was trying to frighten herself.

And then … she thought she heard a step on the stair behind her. She caught her breath and gathering her skirts in her hand she sped down the stairs.

At the foot of the staircase she almost fell into the arms of Baroness Lehzen.

‘What has happened?’ demanded the Baroness.

Victoria was too frightened to pretend.

‘I … I thought someone was coming after me … on the stairs.’