Nan Ryan
Authors: The Princess Goes West
The Princess Goes West
Nan Ryan
For
Pat Bost Lamar
My adored aunt who always makes me laugh
Contents
1
The Small Central European Kingdom of Hartz-Coburg, Spring 1880
“
You wake her.
”
“No,” said the royal exchequer. “It is
your
turn to wake her.”
“You are to wake her,” repeated Montillion, the princess’s factotum. “Once she has had breakfast, I will speak to her about the pressing matters at hand.”
The exchequer’s ruddy face screwed up into a terrible frown, and he vigorously shook his head. “I implore you, Montillion, do not make me go into the lioness’s cage this morning. I’ve a weak heart, and any undue stress is likely to—”
“Enough of this squabbling.” On hearing the familiar argument, the lord chamberlain, head of the royal household, had emerged from his study. “Montillion, either send a servant or else kindly go up yourself and wake Her Royal Highness.”
“Very well,” Montillion said irritably, surrendering to the inevitable.
There was, he well knew, no one he could call on to awaken Her Royal Highness, the fiery princess Marlena. All the palace servants staunchly refused. Even an aging lady’s maid had begged off, some years ago, after being struck one morning with a piece of marble statuary thrown by the irate princess.
The poor old dear hadn’t been badly hurt—a small superficial cut on her forearm followed by purplish bruising and soreness—but she had marched straight into the old king’s chambers, showed him the wound, and announced that she would
never
again awaken his spoiled royal offspring. Sympathizing, the king had assured the distraught lady’s maid that she would not be called on to perform such hazardous duty again, and furthermore she could rest assured he would harshly reprimand his misbehaving daughter, the spoiled princess.
Now resignedly climbing the palace stairs on this sunny May morning, Montillion shook his silver head sorrowfully. The old king was gone. That patient, caring, good-natured sovereign who had reigned over this small central European kingdom had passed away six short months ago at the ripe old age of eighty-one. His wife, the queen, had preceded him in death by more than a decade.
And so it was that the sleeping twenty-eight-year-old widowed princess Marlena was to ascend to the throne. Her crowning had been delayed for two reasons—a lack of funds and a royal request from her Dutch cousin William the Third to wait until after his own coronation.
Unless—Montillion reminded her daily—the crown princess accepted a marriage proposal from a wealthy, titled suitor, she would be sent to America on an extended bond tour, long arranged by the house of Rothschild, to raise money for her nearbankrupt kingdom. It was up to her. Marry immediately—or go to America.
A spirited, bossy young woman with a temper to match her flashing green eyes and ginger-red hair, the princess had no wish to sail to America, tin cup in hand.
A gala ball that very evening at the cliffside castle would afford her an opportunity to choose a proper husband from any one of several invited prospects.
Sheltered all her life from any and all unpleasantness, the pampered princess favored neither option open to her. She would have much preferred spending the season in exciting London, attending balls and parties with the smart set, including her dear cousins, England’s royals.
But even though the widowed redhead concerned herself mainly with the pursuit of personal pleasure, she was—to the bone—a blood royal, and as such, would do her duty. In fact, it had been to please her late father that Princess Marlena had, at age seventeen, married a middle-aged British duke. The distinguished duke, being old enough himself to have been her father, indulged and coddled the princess, catering to her girlish whims, demanding little, allowing his beautiful child bride to order him about as if he were a smitten school boy. Cedric Primrose, duke of Hernden, had been constantly careful not to annoy his tempestuous young bride and risk exposing himself to one of her terrible temper tantrums.
The widowed king, the kingdom, the princess, and her adoring prince consort might well have all lived happily ever after if not for the prince consort’s untimely death. The first son and heir to a vast fortune that would have saved Hartz-Coburg, Cedric fell quite suddenly ill and expired two days later. Rather unfortunately for Hartz-Coburg, he preceded his wealthy, aged father in death, thus leaving his young widow and her kingdom without a farthing.
Pondering what might have been, Montillion reached the castle’s second floor landing. Mentally girding himself for the unpleasant task before him, the faithful factotum threw back his shoulders and walked briskly down the long carpeted corridor beneath gilt-framed portraits of the departed royal line who had once dwelled in the old cliffside castle and ruled over the tiny Hartz-Coburg kingdom.
The last of the royal line was very much alive and sound asleep inside her chambers.
Standing before the princess’s closed door, Montillion fished his gold-cased watch out of his dark vest pocket and noted the time: 10:32. He had ordered the princess’s breakfast to be brought upstairs at precisely 10:35 A.M. Montillion drew a deep breath, raised a gloved hand, and rapped lightly on the solid mahogany door. He did not wait for an answer from within but went quickly inside and crossed the silk-walled salon to the open double doors of the royal bedchamber.
He glanced across the spacious room to the big white-and-gold hung bed. And, despite himself, he began to smile. A head of sleep-tangled bright ginger-red hair was swirled about on a satin-cased pillow, and an unseen face, a fair, youthful-looking face of great beauty was burrowed deeply into the pillow’s feathery softness.
Montillion crossed the shadowy bedroom thinking how sweet, how youthful she looked in slumber. More like a fourteen-year-old girl than a twenty-eight-year-old monarch. But she wasn’t fourteen. She wasn’t a child. She was a grown woman who was, by common consent, one of the great beauties of Europe. She was the heir apparent. A princess of the blood. And it was up to her to save her kingdom.
Montillion moved to the front windows. He drew apart a set of heavy velvet drapes, instantly flooding the room with brilliant sunshine. A sound came from the bed—muffled, unintelligible—and the princess burrowed deeper into the pillow.
“Your Highness—” Montillion’s voice was soft, modulated as he neared the bed, “it is past ten in the morning. Time for you to rise.”
No reply. No indication she had heard him.
“Princess Marlena, I have ordered your breakfast and—ah, yes, here it is now,” he said, turning to smile at the anxious servant bearing the tray and motioning her forward.
Without glancing at the princess, the uniformed servant placed the silver tray—as indicated by Montillion—at the foot of the huge bed, turned, and scurried out of the room. When she was gone, Montillion said in a slightly louder voice, “Please, won’t you wake up, Your Highness.” And then louder still, “Princess Marlena, it is time to get up.”
Roused at last, the highly annoyed princess hissed, “I am not getting up! You get out!”
“I’m going nowhere until you are up and we’ve had a talk,” said Montillion, clasping his gloved hands before him. A satin-cased pillow, aimed in his direction, came flying from the bed. He nimbly sidestepped it. The tossed pillow was followed by dire threats and vicious scoldings, to which Montillion paid no mind. He began pouring hot black coffee into a gold-trimmed china cup.
The angry Princess Marlena, struggling up and onto her elbows, her wild red hair spilling forward and covering her frowning face, yawned and muttered, “Coffee! Where’s my coffee? If you must wake me in the middle of the night, might I at least have a cup of coffee!” She groaned then, flopped over onto her back, sat up, pushed her tangled hair off her face, and looked at her factotum through narrowed emerald eyes.
He said simply, “Good morning, Your Royal Highness.”
She did not respond to his greeting. She began to make little mewling sounds that meant her pillows were to be fluffed up and arranged against the tall headboard. Montillion lost no time in doing her bidding. Soon the princess was comfortably propped against the pillows and sipping her coffee.
Montillion drew up a lyre-backed chair, sat down, and, without preamble, reminded her—again—that unless she accepted a marriage proposal from a wealthy, titled suitor right away, she must go to America on the extended bond tour.
Shaking her head no to the offer of a piece of buttered toast, Princess Marlena made a sour face. “I have no desire to marry again,” she said, as much to herself as to Montillion.
“Very well. We shall go to America and—”
“No,” she interrupted. “As distasteful as the prospect of matrimony is, it is not as abhorrent as the thought of going to America to beg.”
“I couldn’t agree more, Your Highness.”
“I will choose a proper suitor and rush him to the altar.” A touch of wistfulness in the depths of vivid green eyes, she said resolutely, “It is the least I can do for crown and country.”
“Spoken like a true princess,” said Montillion, smiling for the first time all morning. “Perhaps at this evening’s ball you will find your Prince Charming.”
It was Princess Marlena’s turn to smile. “As long as he is very, very wealthy, he doesn’t have to be all that charming.”