Mrs. Queen Takes the Train (32 page)

“Our last customer!” said the lady at the counter cheerfully when The Queen reached the front. “What’ll it be, my love?” She pretended as if she had a large selection of drinks and snacks.

“Well, I’d love a cup of tea, if you can manage,” said The Queen.

“You’re in luck, my darling. It’s all we have left.” The tea lady poured out dark tea. “And what about a bacon sarnie?”

“Well,” said The Queen doubtfully, “I dined quite well on the train earlier. I don’t think so. Thank you.”

The tea lady regarded this as an invention. Few of the homeless, in her experience, had actually arrived on trains, and none of them had eaten on board. She wrapped up a sandwich in a serviette and pushed it forward with The Queen’s tea. “You just put this in your pocket for later. You might be peckish in a few hours.”

The Queen put the sandwich into the pocket of Rebecca’s hoodie as she’d been instructed. She then took the cup of tea into both hands and held it, finding it warmed her chilly fingers nicely. “Have you done this long?” asked The Queen. Her instinct began to mingle with a genuine revival of curiosity.

The woman put down the kettle, and, as there was no one else to serve, folded her arms and leaned on the counter. “About fifteen years, I reckon.”

“Quite a long time to be staying up so late in the night. In a railway station too. In the cold. And damp.”

“Well, it’s not me. It’s the church, isn’t it? I’m retired now. Used to work in an office. And I get more thanks pouring out tea at midnight than I ever did turning up for the old nine-to-five, if you get my meaning.”

“Yes. I’m sure that’s so,” said The Queen. “And what hours do you do?”

“Well, we go to the church hall around nine of an evening to make the sandwiches and put tea things together for the van. Distribute some tea and sandwiches there first. Then come here. Afterwards we go to a few railway underpasses where they’re expecting us. Back to the church around two in the morning.”

“Quite a long night for you, then.”

“Well, it doesn’t feel long, because you’re helping out, you know? People are happy to see you. Grateful for a kind word along with the cuppa.”

The Queen felt it was time for her to be moving on. There must be someone else for her to acknowledge, if not in the van, then roundabout somewhere. So she put her tea down carefully on the counter and said to the woman, “May I just say ‘Thank you,’ on behalf of all of us, for what you’re doing?” She then reached up with her bare hand and took the surprised hand of the tea lady.

The woman was often thanked for the cups of tea she poured out, but seldom in such a formal way, and with such a distinctive, acknowledging handshake. “You’re very welcome, I’m sure,” she said, laughing. Something about the touch of the old woman’s wrinkled hand felt magical. She couldn’t say exactly why, but all of a sudden she felt quite giddy and as if she were glowing.

“No, I mean it,” said The Queen, who wasn’t used to laughter when she thanked someone. “I think you deserve an order.” The Queen noted the woman’s reaction to the touch of her hand and thought to herself, “The touch. May still be working after all.” She then added, because she was honest and needed to point out the difficulties, “Well, you need to be nominated first. It does take a while. I shall mention it in the right quarter.”

The tea lady was used to homeless people pretending that they had special access to the Prime Minister. “You do that, my love.” She meant to say it skeptically, but she couldn’t help smiling beatifically. The older woman nodded to her in a gesture that was in the middle distance between a farewell and a benediction.

S
hirley and Anne, having failed to find The Queen at Leith, climbed back in their taxi. At least they knew by her headscarf that she had been there. But where to next? Then Shirley remembered mentioning Waverley railway station in the same conversation in which they’d discussed
Britannia
. They decided to ask the driver to go there. On arrival in the station, they got out of the taxi, wondering what to do, when they heard what sounded like a barroom laugh coming from a group of people gathered around a van. The Queen was on the edge of the group, unrecognizable except for her shoes, and the lined hem of her Hardy Amies skirt. Shirley remembered laying it out for her that morning. Unable to speak, as she felt a kind of wordless horror, Shirley grabbed Anne’s bony elbow and pointed.

Anne looked, and she saw the same vision. The two women advanced on tiptoe across the station concourse and stopped short of where The Queen was standing. When The Queen turned away from the van, Shirley and Anne both hurried up to her.

“Ma’am, where on earth did you find that terrible jacket?” said Shirley in a voice that was frightened and angry and relieved all at once.

“But Shirley, what are you doing in Edinburgh in the middle of the night?” said The Queen, with some confusion in the pale pockets around her eyes. She looked at Anne. “And Lady Anne too? Not good for your rheumatism, surely?”

Anne saw The Queen’s confusion and said, “We’ve found a bed for you, Ma’am,” as if she’d been a part of The Queen’s Scottish planning all along. Shirley immediately understood Anne’s plan of not requiring any explanations of The Queen right away. So she went to The Queen’s elbow and began making small encouraging noises in her ear. “Now, Ma’am, we’re just taking you to a warm bed. Won’t that be nice? A soft pillow. What a long day you’ve had. Where on earth did this awful hood come from?” It was the first time Shirley showed real irritation, as she saw the skull and crossbones on the back of The Queen’s hoodie. She felt a proprietary air about The Queen’s clothing and was shocked to find her mistress clad in something so unsuitable.

“Rebecca from the Mews lent it me. It’s all right, Shirley,” said The Queen gently. She didn’t like to see Shirley upset.

“N
ow what, you oaf?” said Rebecca miserably, having surveyed Waverley station and found no one remotely resembling The Queen or her former companions.

“I was an ogre earlier. You seem to specialize in these medieval insults,” said Rajiv.

“Look, there’s no time for fooling around. We
have
to find her.”

“Well, I don’t think there’s much point in racing off somewhere unless we know where she went. Doesn’t she have a palace here, then? Or maybe she’s up there,” he said, nodding toward Edinburgh Castle, which was above them, alit in the night, outside the station entrance.

“She has a place to stay in London. I don’t think she would have come all the way up here just to spend the night at Holyrood. Edinburgh Castle’s not hers.”

“Well, if you want to go into it, Holyrood isn’t hers either. Belongs to us. The people.”

“When this is over I’m going to make sure she steers well clear of you. The republicans do well enough on their own. She doesn’t have to buy her cheese off one.”

“Hang on! I’m pro-Queen, but this is constitutional, not absolute, monarchy. She takes her orders from us.”

“Yes, and you’re William Shakespeare.”

This cut him to the quick. She didn’t know how much that hurt. His silence would have given her a small indication if she had been paying attention. What’s more, he was afraid she was right. He’d begun calling himself “a poet” too soon, before he was actually sure he could do it. Maybe he was just good at appreciating poetry, rather than writing it.

Rajiv began more formally, addressing her from an injured distance, which he hoped she noticed, “Well, perhaps you’d better telephone
Equus
and tell him where we are. Where we last saw her.”

She took out her phone and stepped away from him into a corner of the station’s entrance so he couldn’t hear her conversation. She telephoned Major Thomason. No answer. She left a message to say that she was at Edinburgh Waverley, that The Queen had arrived on the same train, but disappeared. She didn’t know where. She thought it best to say she would stay in the station until she had some further contact or instructions from him. She then turned and went back to rejoin Rajiv.

“Well?” said Rajiv.

“We stay here.”

“Is that what he wants us to do?”

“You can do whatever you like. I must stay here until I hear from him again.”

It was a rather cold way for a railway journey to end, especially one that had begun with such unexpected promise.

They both slid down onto some plastic seats in the waiting area. Two unhappy young people. Feeling tired, not a little disillusioned, and hopeless. Soon, in spite of their mutual determination to stay alert, they were both asleep.

Rajiv awoke with a start more than an hour later. On the other side of the station, on the edge of a group with white cups, was a small figure with silvery hair under her blue hood. She’d evidently lost her headscarf.

“Wake up. She’s back. Wake
up
.”

“Leave me alone.”

“No, darling, not about you, not this time. The Queen. She’s here.”

“Where?” said Rebecca, straightening up right away.

“
Là-bas. Avec les homeless.
”

“God!”

“She’s all right. No one’s bothering her. Must be some charity. Wonder what they’d think if they knew they’d just poured out tea for Mrs Sheba?”

Rebecca took out her telephone. Still no calls from the equerry. Very odd. She tried his number. No answer. Just the voice mail. She rang off without leaving a message. “Damn it.”

“Not there? What’s the palace good for? They’re not even taking your calls, are they, sweetheart?”

“Quit. Fooling. Around. We can’t lose her this time. We’ve got to go after her.”

“You said we couldn’t go up to her unless we’d been invited.”

“Well, it’s different if she’s surrounded by thugs and bums.”

“They’re just on the street. They’re not thugs or bums. They choose to be that way, most of them. Nothing to fear from them. It doesn’t look like she’s in trouble.”

Rebecca didn’t have a better idea. So she sat where she was on the edge of her plastic seat, next to Rajiv, and watched until two strange women approached The Queen directly. One was shorter and a little frail, the other was taller and sturdier. They appeared to have recognized her.

This was enough for Rebecca. She said fiercely to Rajiv, who was also watching the two women, “Okay. Now we move.”

“Hang on a sec. Look, they seem to know her.”

The Queen talked with them briefly and then the three started off, arm in arm, toward a waiting taxi.

“No, now we go. We can’t lose her again. We’ve got to go after her,” said Rebecca.

Rajiv followed behind as Rebecca loped in her riding boots across the station to the three women who were on the verge of climbing into the taxi.

“Um, I’m sorry,” said Rebecca as she reached the three women.

“Ah, here you are again,” said The Queen, recognizing Rebecca. “And you,” she said, nodding at Rajiv. “Glad to see that you’re,” she said, pausing, and then happening upon a friendly tease, “sticking together.”

“And who are
they
, Ma’am?” said Shirley thoroughly annoyed. Having just rescued The Queen from a group of the homeless, she was hardly going to give her up to more strangers.

“Oh, why it’s Rebecca from the Mews. And this young man works at Paxton & Whitfield. Or did. He’ll probably be given the sack for leaving his post and following his friend to Scotland. Can’t remember your name, Cheddar.”

Rajiv beamed. The Queen had just given him a nickname.

Rebecca was less pleased and unsure about what to do. It was clear by her “Ma’am” that Shirley knew The Queen, and the frail one seemed to be on equally familiar-formal terms with her. What was her responsibility if The Queen had been recognized and collected by senior members of the Household? Perhaps she was no longer wanted? But she hated to withdraw without first establishing that The Queen no longer needed any protection.

Rajiv saw Rebecca’s wordless confusion. So he put in, “Well, Your Majesty, I certainly did follow her to Scotland. You’re quite right about that. But, she just wanted to look after you. And to be utterly honest with you, I was also following you. Just wanted to make sure you were okay. That sort of thing.”

“Oh dear,” said The Queen, returning to a semblance of her former self. She felt a sudden revival of clarity about who she was and what she was doing. What she had done. “You were all looking for me, weren’t you? You, Shirley, and you, Anne? And now Rebecca and Cheddar too? What a nuisance.”

At the same time Rajiv said, “Not at all,” Anne said, “Well,” and Shirley said, “That you have been.” Rebecca said nothing.

Anne continued, “Perhaps we’d better all have a little sleep. My nephew has a flat near here. Several bedrooms. Enough for all of us. Why don’t we all go there and see if we can’t have a few hours’ horizontal.”

There was enough room for all five of them in the taxi if four squeezed in the back and Rajiv sat up in front with the driver. All four women crowded together and began apologizing for the tight fit. “Nonsense,” said The Queen, beginning to enjoy herself. “Isn’t this cozy? More adventure,” she said, separating the syllables with enthusiasm. The taxi’s taillights disappeared in the direction of Charlotte Square as it sped through Edinburgh’s empty streets.

O
nce they’d arrived, William and Luke couldn’t find a taxi outside the coach station. They consulted a map they found mounted on the wall inside the station and decided to walk to Charlotte Square. There was no other choice. Walking through the dark streets together, with a destination in mind, they were on somewhat better terms with one another, but they both felt a little disconsolate as well. They had no idea how they’d find Anne’s nephew’s flat once they got to the square, or if The Queen would be there if they did. While Luke was looking in his pocket for a scrap of paper, to see whether Anne had given him the precise address, and whether he’d written it down, an envelope, with an American stamp, addressed in a woman’s sloping script, fell on the pavement.

William looked briefly at it as he picked it up and handed it silently back to Luke. As they’d got on to dangerously intimate territory earlier in the evening, William was determined not to ask about it.