Victoria in the Wings: (Georgian Series) (20 page)

They had known each other less than a year; theirs had been entirely a marriage of convenience; yet he found that he would be wretched if he had to face life without her. She was not beautiful. She did not arouse his passionate desire … and yet how he would miss her if he lost her.

It was very strange.

He was constantly in the sickroom; he talked perpetually to the doctors; he made a nuisance of himself as, poor William, he could not help doing. But she was aware of him and she knew it was due to his affection and this did help to sustain her in her great sorrow. But she was unhappy. She knew that she had longed for her child, but only now did she realize how passionately. Those waiting months had been the happiest of her life, because she had so longed for their fulfilment. And now … it was finished. She was delirious and the doctors said she was on the point of death.

William was at her bedside. He would nurse her. Only he! She must get well, he told her. What would he do if she did not?

Vaguely she was aware of him and his presence, while it encumbered her nurses, did give her comfort.

Augusta longed to visit her but hesitated. How would Adelaide feel if she, the successful mother, appeared to parade her triumph before her? So she did not come to the sickroom and the festivities which had been arranged to celebrate her little George’s birth were cancelled.

But with the coming of April, Adelaide’s condition began to improve.

William stayed at her side and would not leave her.

‘You must not fret,’ he said. ‘That doctor … those walks. That was what brought on your illness. And then the bleeding … and you lost our child. But you’re so young. There’ll be others. My sister, the Queen of Wurtemburg, has written sending affectionate messages to you. She says you will not want to stay in Hanover but will want a change of scene. She suggests that as soon as you are ready to travel we go and pay her a visit. Would you like that, eh? Because if you would not, we shall not go. I am going to take care of you now. Don’t you fret. The next time everything is going to be well. I can’t lose my wife. The children can’t lose their stepmother. Not when they’re beginning to be fond of her, eh?’

It was a little crude – the bluff sailor who spoke his thoughts aloud. But it was genuine and she was comforted.

And because she had lost this child, it did not mean that there would not be others.

Neither the Kents nor the Cumberlands could pretend to feel great grief when they received the news of Adelaide’s tragedy.

They reacted according to their natures.

‘
She
presents no difficulty,’ said the blunt Frederica. ‘She’s not the child-bearing type.’

‘It’s the will of God,’ said Victoria with the complacent air of one who knows herself to be the elect.

‘I think,’ she went on, ‘that it is time we returned to England.’

And as usual the Duke agreed with her.

They should, of course, have left before; but Victoria had been so anxious to remain in Germany as long as possible so as to have first-hand information of Adelaide’s confinement. It was very
convenient
that the birth should have been premature; and although she would not go so far as to apply the same adjective to the infant’s demise, it was in her mind.

But it was all part of the pattern of fate.

Money was a difficulty, of course. They had left England because of the Duke’s debts and as they were still unsettled it was a little dangerous to return; but the important child must be born in England.

They must borrow money for their journey; the Duke could drive the coach to save a coachman’s wages; and as it was an exceptionally large coach they could carry quite a lot of their baggage in it.

It was April when they left and the news had just reached them that Adelaide and William had started on a visit to Würtemburg.

‘She will have another try,’ said Victoria glumly, but the Duke so trusted his gipsy that he was sure nothing would come of that or any try.

‘We must take no chances,’ said the Duchess.

She would engage a midwife whom she had heard was the best in Germany and the woman should travel with them – in case of accidents.

Why, by all accounts, but for an accident, Adelaide might have a healthy girl to stand in the way of the child who was about to be born.

They must be prepared.

Fräulein Siebold was a most efficient woman. She told the
Duchess that she did not anticipate much trouble, that all was going well, and she had no doubt that the child would be as bonny as Charles and Feodore.

So they set out for England.

Apartments in Kensington Palace had been prepared for the birth; and on 19 May, with the utmost confidence of success, Victoria settled down to produce her child.

In the early morning the child was born.

‘A girl!’ The Duchess heard the voices about her bed.

The Duke was at her bedside. She smiled at him faintly. ‘I’m sorry it was not a boy.’

But the Duke shook his head.

‘No,’ he said. ‘It was to be a great queen, you know.’

Now she believed in the gipsy’s prophecy as firmly as he did.

Three days after the birth of a princess to the Duke and Duchess of Kent, Frederica, Duchess of Cumberland, produced her child. To her great joy – and that of the Duke – it was a boy.

‘We’ll call him George,’ declared Frederica. ‘It’s a good name for a king.’

So during that year three candidates for the throne had appeared – two boys and a girl; but the girl being the daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, the fourth son of the King, was in the lead.

Only Adelaide had been disappointed.

‘But there will be another,’ she assured herself, ‘and the next time nothing shall be allowed to go wrong.’

It was her only hope of happiness; just as it was the prevailing fear of the brothers- and sisters-in-law.

Christening at Kensington

THE PRINCE REGENT
was feeling peevish. He was undoubtedly growing old; he was obliged to use a touch of rouge to give his cheeks some semblance of the delicate colour that had glowed in them in his youth. The gout worried him too frequently; he was prey to mysterious illnesses which the doctors did not understand and for which they prescribed perpetual bleeding, which made him feel weak.

His wife was behaving outrageously on the Continent and in spite of all his efforts he could not get the evidence against her he wanted. And now there was all this fuss about babies in the family.

He had one grand-niece and two nephews; and how much more fitting it would have been if he had had a son.

It was not too late. He insisted on it. If only he could rid himself of Caroline he could marry and produce an heir like the rest of them.

He was sorry that Adelaide had lost her child. If he himself could not provide the heir he would rather William did it. He had never liked Edward who was too self-righteous; and he had taken a dislike to Edward’s wife. Madame de St Laurent had been so much more charming and Madam Victoria gave herself too many airs. She was a typical German, he decided; arrogant, sure of herself and eager to lead everyone by their noses. She might lead Edward, but there it would stop.

Aggravating indeed that the woman should now be behaving as though she were the mother of the heiress to the throne. It was almost as though she was saying to him and his father and to William: Hurry up. Die please, so that my daughter can inherit the throne.

Madam Victoria of Kent must be relegated to her place. If he were to remain as unlucky as he had been since he met Caroline of Brunswick, then there was Adelaide and William and their child to come before Edward’s and hers.

Simply because he was tied to Caroline, and Adelaide’s child had died, did not mean that this infant was heiress to the throne.
Far from it. Madam Kent was counting her chickens before they were hatched.

He mentioned the matter to Lady Hertford who was constantly in his company and who, when she had become his devoted companion, saw that her family was there too. Her son, the Earl of Yarmouth, popularly known as the Yarmouth Bloater, was reckoned to be one of the Regent’s closest friends.

Lady Hertford, frigid, and eager that everyone should believe that the relationship was a platonic one, disliked the Duchess of Kent as much as the Regent did. The woman with her laces, ribbons and feathers was overdressed; she was constantly surrounded by a retinue of little dogs; and her hats with their drooping feathers were quite ridiculous. It was not to be expected that Lady Hertford, that leader of fashion and as elegant in her way as the Regent was in his, should approve of the flamboyant Duchess of Kent.

‘That woman is too sure of herself,’ she told the Regent.

‘As usual, my dear, we are in complete agreement,’ he replied. ‘It tires me merely to think of her.’

‘She is arranging the christening of her daughter as though the child were a young Queen. She is really quite impertinent. Do you know, she tried to humiliate me.’

‘My dear, how insolent of her! I think it is time Madam Victoria learned that we will not allow her to rule now as she believes her daughter will one day.’

‘The Duchess of Clarence is far more amiable.’

‘Far more, my dear.’

‘I hear they are going to call the child Georgiana, as near to Your Highness as possible, of course.’

‘They have not yet consulted me.’

Lady Hertford laughed coldly. ‘Your Highness, I do not believe they intend to. The Duchess of Kent is arrogant enough to believe she can dispose of all normal formalities.’

‘She will discover,’ said the Regent grimly.

His irritation had increased. They had desired him to be the infant’s godfather and indeed he must be. He was, after all, her uncle. William’s affairs always went awry. He even had to marry a woman who lost her baby, and since this was so, nothing could
alter the fact that, for the time being, the most important royal child was this girl of the Kents.

But not for long, he promised himself. Next time William must succeed. It would be a pleasant day for him when the Duchess of Kent’s daughter was obliged to take a step backwards for the sake of William’s child.

The Duchess of Kent was in a state of exultation. Her child was in the lead – her ‘plump little partridge’, as someone had called her; a perfectly formed little girl, with a lusty pair of lungs and a look of smug satisfaction with the world as though she had come to stay in it for a very long time. When she thought of poor Adelaide’s failure she pitied her; but the very fact that the Duchess of Clarence had not produced a living child could only add to the glory of this little one.

She and the Duke stood by the child’s cradle, admiring. It was wonderful how she had fascinated Edward so that he had completely forgotten – or at least he gave no sign of remembering – that woman with whom he had lived all those years. He was absolutely devoted to his new family; and now that she had their little daughter and Feodore and Charles were with her, the Duchess could admit that she had acted wisely when she had accepted the challenge to give up her freedom and become the Duchess of Kent, for she had relinquished little compared with what she had gained.

‘Georgiana,’ she murmured to the Duke. ‘A queenly name for a queen.’

‘William and Adelaide still have to be considered.’

‘Nonsense,’ declared the Duchess. ‘Adelaide will never succeed.’

The Duke believed her, as he was beginning to believe everything she said. Besides there was the gipsy’s prophecy.

‘Named after her illustrious godparents,’ went on the Duchess. ‘Georgiana after Uncle George and Alexandrina after the Tsar of Russia.’

‘It is always wise to choose names with care.’

The Duchess nodded.

It was while they were discussing the baby’s names that a note arrived from the Regent. It concerned the christening of their child. He could not allow them to give the child the name of Georgiana, he wrote, because they were also naming her Alexandrina. Surely it would be a breach of etiquette for his name to appear before that of the Tsar of Russia – nor would he wish it to appear
after
that sovereign’s. In the circumstances he could not allow the daughter of his brother Edward to be given the name of Georgiana.

The Duchess looked at the Duke with horror when he translated the note into German for her benefit, for she had progressed scarcely at all with her English.

‘Not Georgiana!’ she cried. ‘But it is her name. I have always thought of her as Georgiana. It is the only name for her.’

‘The Regent forbids it.’

‘Oh, he hates us. He hates our little girl.’

‘I would not say that,’ protested Edward mildly. ‘But there is no doubt that he hopes Adelaide and William will forestall us. He is not going to accept our baby as the heir if he can help it.’

‘He will have to,’ declared Victoria fiercely.

‘It’s true. If Adelaide and William fail he will have to.’

‘They
will
fail and he
will
have to,’ repeated Victoria firmly. ‘But what of my little Georgiana’s names?’

‘He says he will talk to me about them at the christening.’

‘At the christening! But then he will choose just what
he
wishes.’

‘We must abide by his decision, of course.’

The Duchess stamped her foot. ‘The Regent is no friend of ours,’ she declared.

‘I never thought I was his favourite brother.’

‘It is your wife he does not like. Your wife and your little baby daughter.’

‘Oh no, you take this too much to heart. It is only a matter of a name.’

‘Too much to heart. This is my daughter! Never mind. I will fight the whole world for her … and that includes the Regent.’

The Duke took her hand and kissed it. She was magnificent in her anger against the Regent and her zeal for the child.

‘No matter if she cannot have a grand-sounding name,’ he said. ‘She has the finest mother God could have given her.’

And the Duchess was somewhat mollified.

A font had been set up in the Cupola Room and those who were to attend the christening of the daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Kent had gathered there.