The Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë (42 page)

Before the Prince Consort could react, the captain of the royal guard hurried to my aid. Captain Innes was a soldierly man some fifty years of age, resplendent in uniform. He grabbed Bertie, hauled him up, and set him on his feet on the deck.

“There, Your Highness,” he said. “Safe and sound.”

His bright blue eyes twinkled at me from beneath his bushy grey eyebrows. His bushy grey mustache didn’t quite hide a sympathetic smile as I murmured my thanks and the assembly breathed a collective sigh of relief. “No harm done,” he assured the Queen.

Bertie, overwhelmed by all the attention he was getting, began to cry. The Queen hugged him. “Come along, my darling,” she said, and held out her hand to her daughter. “We’ll have some cake.” She shot me a look so acid that it could have dissolved steel. “Take better care of them in the future, Miss Brontë.”

She, the Prince Consort, and both children went into the cabin. The crew returned to their duties, and the entourage to whatever their business. I sensed everyone’s unspoken disapproval. I had almost let England’s future monarch drown. Standing at the rail, gazing at the sun-dappled waves and coastline, I felt a gloomy amusement that such twists of fate had landed me in a profession at which I had always been incompetent. I had disgraced myself in front of employers more exalted than any others I had served. To them I must seem an unlikely person to save the kingdom from evil, when I could not even control a seven-year-old boy.

The Queen’s chief lady-in-waiting came beside me. She was the Duchess of Norfolk, a woman whose elegant dress and poise intimidated me. Now she smiled at me in a friendly, conspiratorial fashion.

“Don’t feel that you’re to blame, Miss Brontë,” she said. “The fault is Her Majesty’s. She is prone to spoiling Bertie. How can anyone expect him to learn good behavior when she constantly rewards him for bad?” The Duchess shook her head, which was crowned by an upswept mass of yellow hair and a wide-brimmed hat laden with flowers. “I fear he will grow up to be the worst tyrant that England has ever known.”

“You are too kind, Your Grace,” I murmured.

“Oh, there’s no need for such formality between traveling companions,” she said. “Please call me Mathilda. May I call you Charlotte?”

“Certainly,” I said.

She chatted with me, attempting to put me at ease and make me feel welcome. I was grateful to her and to Captain Innes, who had saved Bertie and spared me the ruin that would have followed had any harm come to the boy. Yet I remembered that someone among the royal household was Kuan’s accomplice. Until I knew who, I dared trust no one.

While on this exhilarating journey, I had not forgotten those dear to me whom I’d left behind. I often wondered how Papa, Anne, Emily, and Branwell were faring in my absence. I judged that my pretense of cooperating with Kuan would protect them from him, and that I was the only one in danger. I remembered the parsonage as a haven of tranquillity.

How wrong was I!

I present my sister Emily’s account of events at home during the night I spent aboard the royal yacht:

T
HE REMAINDER OF THE VOYAGE TO SCOTLAND PASSED WITHOUT incident. The Queen and Prince Consort kept Bertie by them, relieving me of his irksome care; I had only the well behaved Princess to amuse. If there was danger on the royal yacht, I saw no sign of it. Indeed, I felt safer than I had since before Isabel White’s murder. Thirty-seven peaceful hours after setting sail, we arrived at Aberdeen on 7 September. Carriages and horses that had been shipped to Scotland ahead of time conveyed us to the new royal estate at Balmoral.

The Queen was as popular in Scotland as at home. Along our way, the Scots turned out to greet her. The Queen, Prince Consort, and their two elder children rode in an open carriage at the head of our procession. Crowds cheered them uproariously. The entrance to each village was decorated in the Queen’s honor with a triumphal arch made of barley or wheat sheaves, flowers, evergreens, or stags’ heads. The day was a whirlwind of happy faces, voices shouting greetings in a strange dialect, music from bagpipes, speeches by local gentry, and guns firing salutes. Riding in a carriage with the Queen’s other attendants, through a landscape of farms and distant, snow-capped peaks, I felt myself part of a grand, historic spectacle. In the joy of our reception, I was temporarily distracted from the horrific events that had brought me to this very place.

We reached Balmoral to find a Scottish Regiment’s Guard of Honor waiting at attention. Balmoral, located on the River Dee, on the eastern side of the lofty Cairngorm Mountains, comprised ten thousand acres of fields, woods of towering birch and pine trees, and meadow. The Forest of Ballochbuie abutted its northern border; on the south rose the dark crags of Loch-na-gar. The pretty white castle had many turrets and gables, gingerbread trim, an ancient square tower surmounted by a battlemented parapet, and a glass conservatory. It was surrounded by expansive gardens that sloped towards the river in a series of natural terraces.

Inside the castle was a hall paved with Dutch tiles; a broad staircase led to the upper floors. The rooms were furnished like a grand country house, with chintz upholstery and curtains; they were fewer and smaller than I’d expected, insufficient for the royal family and entourage. The servants and attendants—Mr. Slade, Lord Unwin, and other Foreign Office agents among them—were quartered in neighboring cottages. I had a tiny chamber upstairs in the castle, near the children’s nursery and the Queen’s chambers. The gentlemen of the household had rooms above us; the ladies-in-waiting below. After lunch in the crowded dining room, I walked behind the royal family on an inspection of the estate. Not until that evening did I have a chance to speak with Slade.

Local citizens staged a celebration for the royal family. A huge bonfire was lit upon Craig Linne. Fireworks spangled the sky above Balmoral. We gathered on the terrace to watch. Bertie and Vicky jumped up and down, squealing with excitement at the glowing streamers, rosettes, and exploding bursts of colored stars. Rockets boomed, echoing off the mountains. Guards, courtiers, and ladies-in-waiting cheered. The Queen and Prince Consort smiled happily. I stood apart from the others, an interloper. My presence could only remind the Queen of the threat that haunted her and spoil her enjoyment. Presently, Mr. Slade appeared at my side.