Victoria Victorious: The Story of Queen Victoria (29 page)

But now there was this charming young man, and I did find his society amusing.

He was very Russian, which meant that at times he could assume a very melancholy countenance, and then he would be very merry and light-hearted; which made one a little unsure of how one was going to find him. But that made him interesting.

He danced divinely. He taught me the mazurka—a lovely dance I had never seen before. It was amusing, for the Grand Duke was so agile that when one was required to run around, one had to be very quick to follow him. Then, when we were close together, he whisked me around in a valse.

Another dance he taught me was the
Grossvater
which was a country dance performed a great deal in Germany. The men had to jump over a pocket handkerchief which was very tricky and often resulted in a fall for some of them. I laughed and laughed. I used to stay up dancing until after two in the morning; then I would be unable to sleep for very excitement, lying in my bed, remembering how the Grand Duke leaped and some of the dancers had fallen over. It was very amusing and I was growing more and more fond of the Grand Duke.

I could not help writing of him to Uncle Leopold who wrote back rather coldly, begging me not to be rash. I knew he was thinking of Albert.

Lord Melbourne was a little critical too.

I told him it was good for me to have a little excitement. There had been much to plague me lately.

“Excitement is not very desirable if one is to suffer for it afterward,” was Lord Melbourne's comment.

But I continued to dance the new dances and to stay up until after midnight. I threw myself into a frenzy of excitement. I felt I was half-way to falling in love with the Russian Grand Duke.

I needed the excitement for underneath it I was still uneasy. I had passed out of that mood of enchantment. I had learned that life could suddenly take an unexpected turn to disaster. Flora Hastings still went about the Palace. Ladies, meeting her in the corridors, said she made them shiver; she was like a ghost from another world; and she looked at them with staring, accusing eyes. She looked, as they said, “like death”; and those who had been most active in stirring up gossip about her, were really afraid of her.

She hung over me like a dark shadow. There were still reverberations in the Press about the case, and the Hastings family were most dissatisfied; and as they were Tories they would not let the case be forgotten.

In the House of Lords, Lord Brougham was constantly attacking Lord Melbourne and his Cabinet and making sly allusions to me and my fondness for the Prime Minister. The wicked hypocrites insisted on their loyalty to the
Crown
while they made their subtle attacks upon the
Queen
.

The matter of the Bedchamber Ladies was not allowed to pass into oblivion. It was a very tense situation.

The Duke of Wellington came to see me about Sir John Conroy.

“I have long been working to put an end to his case, Ma'am,” he said, “and I am of the opinion that it would be well for all concerned if he were out of the country, and I believe I am working toward a settlement with him.”

I was so relieved. I had a notion that once I was rid of that man my troubles would be over.

“We shall be obliged to pay him a pension of three thousand pounds a year and offer him a peerage. Lord Melbourne will make the arrangements and this peerage will have to be an Irish one.”

“If he has an Irish peerage that will mean he can come to Court. I never want him in my Court. I shall never forget all the mischief he has caused me.”

“Quite so, Ma'am,” said the Duke. “But it seems likely that the Irish peerage could be long delayed, and it may be that when one does come, there may be a prime minister other than Lord Melbourne, in which case that prime minister would not feel it incumbent upon him to agree to terms made by a former prime minister.”

More abhorrent to me even than Conroy's having a peerage was the thought of there being a prime minister other than Lord Melbourne.

However, the Duke prevailed on me to agree to these suggestions, which I did think might have been completed earlier and in that case we might have avoided all the horrible complications of the Hastings affair; I was sure there would not have been so much talk about the Bedchamber Ladies if Sir John Conroy had not been at hand to foment trouble.

So I agreed, and Lord Melbourne and I celebrated the occasion of Sir John Conroy's departure.

“Although,” said Lord M dolefully, “we have yet to see whether he
will leave us entirely in peace. Still, it is good to have him removed from Court.”

But even though he was removed, the effect of his evil remained. Lady Flora continued to move about the Palace like a gray ghost. She appeared in public too. There were those who encouraged her in this, and wherever she was seen there were cheers for her, and her frequent appearances helped to keep the story alive.

Lord Melbourne continued to say darkly that we must wait and see. I am not sure whether he believed she really would produce an infant in time or implied it to comfort me. If only she would! What a difference that would have made! Public opinion would have swung around and we, who had been called the villains, would be proved to have been maligned.

But Lady Flora continued in her ghostly appearances, and she looked so wan that she inspired pity in everyone who saw her.

There was one distressing incident at Ascot that I shall never forget. It was humiliating. I rode up the course as was the custom with Lord Melbourne, and as I did so I distinctly heard a hissing. Then came those terrible words. I could not believe my ears. “Mrs. Melbourne!”

The implication filled me with horror. How could people say such wicked things! As though my relationship with my Prime Minister was not entirely honorable.

Lord Melbourne was quite unperturbed. He had always said one should not attach importance to insults. They were like the weather. Everyone forgot how it had rained when the sun came out.

But this was something I could not easily forget.

I heard later that it was the Duchess of Montrose and Lady Sarah Ingestre—both ladies—no I will not call them
ladies
—in my mother's service, and active in the feud against me—ardent Tories, both of them.

But this was an indication of the state of affairs. The seeds sown by that arch-conspirator Conroy were beginning to ripen, and the continued sickness of Flora Hastings did not help matters.

One day I noticed that it was some time since I had seen her.

“Perhaps,” said Lord Melbourne significantly, “the time has come when she is in need of a little retirement.”

I really came to believe that one day I should hear that Flora Hastings had been delivered of a child. Perhaps it was wrong of me to long for this; but I did feel so much depended on it.

I found that on every occasion when Lord Melbourne and I were together, the name of Lady Flora crept into the conversation.

I sent a kind message to her—rather against my will—but I thought it politic to do so. I expressed my sympathy for her suffering and asked her to visit me. She thanked me for my concern but regretted she was not well enough to come to me.

There was no alternative. I must go to her. So, putting aside the disinclination and even repulsion I felt, I went to visit her.

I was astonished when I saw her. She was lying on a couch and obviously could not rise to greet me. I did not think that anyone could be so thin and still be alive. She was like a skeleton; but at the same time her body was swollen in one part and I thought she must be pregnant.

I asked solicitously how she was and she replied that she was feeling comfortable.

She added, “I am very grateful to Your Majesty for your kindness and I am glad to see you looking so well.”

I replied, “When you are better we will meet… and talk.”

She smiled gently and shook her head. “I shall not see Your Majesty again,” she said.

I felt a shiver run through me, for indeed she looked like a woman close to death.

In a terrible state of uneasiness I left her.

Two days later a note came from Mama. She advised me that I should postpone the dinner party I was giving that evening because Lady Flora had taken a turn for the worse, and she felt it would be rather unseemly if I were merrily entertaining guests while Lady Flora was so ill.

I remembered that occasion at Kensington Palace when King William's daughter was dying and my mother had gone on with
her
dinner party. She had been condemned for that. I must not provoke more criticism, so I gave the order that the party was to be canceled. I decided that my only guest that evening should be Lord Melbourne.

He was a little more grave than usual. In fact he had been so since the affair of the Bedchamber Ladies, and I realized that although he had come back as a result of it, it could only be temporarily, unless there was an election and his party came back with a big majority.

I was not naive enough to believe that would be easy—desirable though it was.

We were a little solemn that evening and even Lord Melbourne had given up the belief that Lady Flora would produce a child who would vindicate us all and bring back my popularity.

Shortly after two o'clock the next morning, Lady Flora died.

N
OTHING COULD BE
more disastrous. Lady Flora Hastings caused us more concern dead even than she had alive.

It seemed as though the whole country went into mourning for her. To make matters worse there was an autopsy over which five doctors presided and the verdict was damning…to me. Flora had had a tumor on her liver that had pressed on her stomach and enlarged it.

The Press took up the matter. Lord Hastings kept them supplied with a continual flow of information. Everywhere all over the country the martyrdom of Flora Hastings was discussed, together with the heartlessness of the Queen.

She had died, announced one paper, not of a deadly tumor on the liver but of a broken heart.

Pamphlets were sold in the streets: “A Case of Murder at Buckingham Palace.” “A Voice from the Grave of Flora Hastings to Her Gracious Majesty the Queen.” The
Morning Post
was openly critical of my behavior in the affair and Lord Brougham continued to thunder against me in the Lords.

Even Lord Melbourne was downcast, but he tried to put on a brave face.

“Ignore it,” he said. “Think of how the people behaved to your ancestors. Your grandfather, your uncles… none of them escaped.”

“But the people loved me,” I wailed.

“The people are fickle. This will blow over. They will love you again.”

“It seems as though they will never forget.”

“The mob is fickle. They hate today and love tomorrow.”

“I should never have allowed myself to listen to scandal about her.”

“A queen must look to the morals of her Court.”

“Yes, but she was not immoral. There was never a child. She was truly a virgin. She was ill and we maligned her. I shall never forget her lying on that couch. She looked dead already. She knew she was going to die. She said, ‘I shall never see you again.' I do not think I shall know peace of mind again.”

“Your Majesty is very young. In a short while this will be forgotten, I promise you. It will pass. But meanwhile there is her funeral. A tricky matter. It is a pity she died in the Palace.”

“She is to be buried in Scotland. They are taking her body to the family home.”

“It is a pity she did not die there. That would have saved a lot of trouble.”

“I shall have to go to the funeral.”

Lord Melbourne was silent for a few moments. Then he said, “I do not think that would be wise.”

“But what will the people say if I am not there?”

“I am concerned with what they will say … and even
do
if you are there.”

“You think they would harm me?”

“It is not so very uncommon for the common people to show their annoyance with sovereigns.”

I covered my face with my hands.

“Look upon it as experience,” soothed Lord Melbourne.

“Do you think that if I had not listened to gossip … if I had been on her side …”

“Well then, there would have been no complaint. You would have been on the side of the angels.”

“How I wish I had been!”

“I think,” he said, “that you should send your carriage. But on no account should you go yourself. I would not allow that.”

I was about to protest but there was a note of firmness in his voice— yes, and even fear. This matter was of even greater importance than I had thought and the people who will cry “Hosanna” one week will be calling “Crucify Him” the next.

Lord Melbourne said, “They are taking her body to Loudon by barge and unfortunately the cortège will have to leave the Palace. Peel's policemen will be guarding it all along the route. The plans are for them to set out at six am, and I think I shall give orders that they start two hours early. Even so, there will doubtless be a crowd waiting, for I am sure some of them will have been there all night to get a good view.”

I thought how careful he was, and how fortunate I was to have him with me. And then the horrible doubt came back to me. For how long?