The Queen's Husband (30 page)

Her pretty pink and white complexion faded during those months; she looked pale, even sallow. Her nose looked longer, her eyes less blue and her mouth sullen. I’m quite plain, she thought, and Albert is beautiful.

She noticed then how pretty some of her ladies were. How foolish she had been to choose them because she liked the look of them. If she did, other people might – people like Albert, for instance.

Albert had always disliked the society of women and she had at times been a little critical of his awkwardness with them, but she fancied that this was changing.

She had heard him chattering away with Miss Spring-Rice in German. That very pretty young lady spoke the language quite well and gave herself airs because the Prince naturally liked to talk in his native tongue.

‘I trust you enjoyed your conversations with the young lady,’ said the Queen after she had listened to them as she said ‘going on and on’.

‘It was very interesting,’ replied the Prince. ‘Her accent is not at all bad. She has an amusing way with her verbs which I have to correct.’

‘And there is something I have to correct. I don’t care to hear you giggling with that silly frivolous creature.’

‘We talked in German,’ said the Prince. ‘I do not think that could be described as giggling.’

‘
I
describe what you were doing as such,’ said the Queen haughtily and left him. In her room she looked into her mirror.

‘I was never pretty,’ she said, ‘but being pregnant has certainly
not
improved my looks.’

Lehzen said that when a woman was going to have a child nature did something to her, put an aura around her, gave her special attractions.

‘Don’t talk nonsense,’ snapped the Queen. ‘Where is this aura? Show it to me.’

‘It is something you can’t point to.’

‘No, it is something to pacify me. It doesn’t exist. Sometimes, Lehzen, I think you imagine I am a child in the nursery. This is no longer so, and please remember it. I will not be treated as though I’m a querulous child.’

Lehzen looked so sad that Victoria cried: ‘Oh, Lehzen, I’m sorry. I’ve become terrible lately. And what’s worse I quarrel all the time with Albert.’

‘Well, as he’s responsible for your condition, he must understand.’

‘He does. He is an
angel
.’

She must try to be reasonable; she must make Albert see that it was this violent temper of hers and the fact that she was so soon to have another baby which was affecting her.

She was charming to Albert for a few days and he, the dear good angel, behaved as though nothing unusual had happened, and then she began to be jealous because he seemed to enjoy the company of Miss Devereux who was really very beautiful and dignified and rather like Albert in temperament.

‘It’s the first few months that are the worst in a pregnancy,’ comforted Lehzen. ‘After that you’ll settle down and become quite serene as you did last time.’

‘
You
can all take it very calmly,’ retorted Victoria. ‘You don’t have to go through it all. You’re like Uncle Leopold.’

‘My precious love!’ cried Lehzen aghast. ‘You must know that I suffer all the time … with you.’

Victoria threw her arms about the Baroness and said she was a beast. She did not deserve her dearest Daisy nor that dearest and kindest of husbands. And she felt better comforting Lehzen.

But she was soon irritable again.

She came upon Albert talking to Miss Pitt, one of the prettiest of her maids of honour – a rather reserved young lady with whom Albert had often had a friendly word.

Miss Pitt was carrying a very beautiful bouquet of flowers and the Prince, who was passionately interested in horticulture, had paused to admire it.

‘The spring flowers are perhaps the most beautiful,’ he was saying, and Miss Pitt was agreeing with him. Miss Pitt was holding the flowers out to him to smell when the Queen came in.

Victoria’s expression was stormy, and Albert, noticing this, tried to soothe her.

‘Look at these beautiful flowers, my love,’ he said, smiling. ‘I think we should grow more flowers in the gardens.’

The Queen took the flowers and looked at them distastefully.

‘They are yours, Miss Pitt?’ she enquired.

‘Yes, Your Majesty. I was passing through when His Highness stopped to admire them.’

To admire
them
, thought the Queen looking at Miss Pitt, whose prettiness was enhanced by her blushing.

‘Well, leave them with me,’ said the Queen with a nod, and Miss Pitt, interpreting this correctly as dismissal, curtsied and retired.

The Queen’s angry eyes met those of Albert over the flowers. Then deliberately she tore the bouquet to pieces, scattering the flowers all over the floor, and went to the door.

At it she paused. ‘There. Now you may gather them up and take them to Miss Pitt. It will give you a chance to see her again and tell her how much you admire her flowers … and her.’

Albert merely looked at her sadly and she ran to her room, threw herself on to her bed and burst into tears.

Albert asked Lord Melbourne to call on him and when the Prime Minister arrived, he told him that the Queen was unaware of this meeting.

‘I am seriously concerned,’ said the Prince, ‘and I feel that owing to your friendship with the Queen and your affection for her, you are the one best to advise me how to act.’

Lord Melbourne, who had grown to respect the Prince, replied immediately that he was at his service. He understood. Baron Stockmar, the Prince’s chief adviser, was out of England at the time, and it pleased the Prime Minister that the Prince should turn to him.

‘I am very anxious about the Queen,’ went on Albert.

Lord Melbourne nodded gravely.

‘Her present mood will pass, I know,’ said the Prince. ‘It is entirely due to her condition and, although this year it is more exaggerated than last, it springs from the same source.’

‘I know Your Highness is capable of exercising great patience and realises the absolute necessity to do so.’

‘That is true,’ replied Albert gravely. ‘I am thinking of the inevitable change of government.’

Lord Melbourne nodded gravely. ‘It can’t be delayed much longer. In fact, but for the Queen’s action, we should have been out two years ago.’

‘That is my point,’ said Albert. ‘There must not be another bedchamber incident. I believe that if the Queen were to behave once more as she did on that occasion the Crown would be in danger.’

Lord Melbourne looked grave. ‘It should certainly be prevented.’

‘It must be prevented.’

‘You have surely not spoken to the Queen of this matter?’

‘It is impossible to speak to the Queen. She flies into a temper it often seems without reason. To mention such a matter to her now would have disastrous consequences, I fear.’

‘Then what do you propose?’

‘That this must be settled without the Queen.’

‘You cannot mean that her bedchamber ladies can be dismissed without her knowledge.’

‘Sir Robert Peel will find himself in a similar position to that which confronted him two years ago. What if there is an election and your Ministry is defeated?’

‘It is almost a foregone conclusion that it will be,’ Lord Melbourne said wryly. ‘The Queen would, of course, be obliged to accept a government which had been elected by the people.’

‘And if she refused to change her household and if Sir Robert Peel refused to take office until she did?’

‘The Queen would be obliged to obey the Constitution. She would have to give way.’

‘What a humiliation for her! I want to spare her that.’

‘I would wish that, too.’

It was true, thought Albert, that Lord Melbourne saw the danger and wished to spare the Queen; but Lord Melbourne’s way was always to let things go and hope that they would work out all right. That was not Albert’s way.

‘Lord Melbourne,’ said Albert earnestly, ‘how long can your Ministry continue in office?’

‘We shall certainly be out before the end of this year. Long before the end of it, I think.’

‘And there will be an election?’

‘It seems inevitable.’

‘And Peel’s party will be returned?’

‘I fear so.’

The Prince believed so too, though he did not fear it. He believed Sir Robert Peel would make a better Prime Minister than Lord Melbourne.

‘My plan is,’ said Albert, ‘that before there is a Tory Government the chief Whig ladies of the Queen’s bedchamber shall already have tendered their resignations. Then the Queen will be spared the humiliation of having to bow to Sir Robert’s wishes.’

‘But how will you bring about these resignations?’

‘Would you have any objection to my consulting Sir Robert Peel on this matter?’

‘I would have none and indeed am entitled to have none. I believe Sir Robert will welcome your suggestions.’

‘Then I will see what can be done.’

‘All this is to be secret from Her Majesty?’

‘Absolutely. It would be quite impossible while she is in her present mood to discuss it with her. You think I am foolish to attempt this.’

‘I think you are very brave,’ replied Lord Melbourne.

The Prince discussed the matter with his secretary Mr Anson, who, discreet and astute, grasped the situation immediately and agreed with the Prince that there was only one way of dealing with it and that was as the Prince proposed.

If Peel came into power the bedchamber ladies would have to be changed, and as the Queen would have to bow to this it would be a humiliation for her and a triumph for Sir Robert.

‘We must remember,’ said Mr Anson, ‘that Sir Robert was deeply humiliated by the Queen two years ago and if he were a ruthless and vindictive man he might insist on retaliation.’

‘I do not believe Sir Robert Peel to be that kind of man,’ said the Prince, ‘and I want to do everything in my power to save the Queen from humiliation.’

‘And Your Highness would wish me to approach Sir Robert on your behalf, and sound him as to his course of action should he become Prime Minister.’

‘That is what I wish,’ said the Prince.

‘Then shall we decide exactly what I shall say to Sir Robert?’

The Prince bowed his head. There was no doubt that like Lord Melbourne, Mr Anson considered the Prince to be a very brave man to risk rousing the Queen’s anger which, over such a matter which she would consider an interference with her personal concerns, could be more fierce than it had ever been before.

Sir Robert Peel was very interested when George Anson told him that it was the wish of a ‘common friend’ that he should put a certain matter before him, particularly so when he discovered that that friend was the Prince Consort.

Sir Robert Peel, a man of great courage and high ideals, knew that it was almost certain that before the year was out he would be Prime Minister; although he believed this would be the best thing possible for the country he was not looking forward to being sent for by the Queen and having to face a humiliating situation such as that which had confronted him two years ago when the Queen had refused to give up the ladies of her bedchamber who were all related to prominent Whigs. These Whig ladies were still in their positions but the situation would be different now. On that other occasion Lord Melbourne had resigned although the government had not actually been defeated, but in view of Lord Melbourne’s small majority he had decided it was impossible to carry on. Therefore in taking over from Melbourne, Sir Robert would not have had a majority in the House – until there was an election of course – and in those circumstances he had not felt it possible to form a government which would incur the hostility of the Queen. It was different now. The Melbourne Ministry would soon be defeated in the house; a general election would be called; the Tories would get a big majority and it would then not be possible for the Queen to defy them. If then Peel insisted on her changing her bedchamber ladies she would have to do so. It was an unpleasant situation which Sir Robert Peel would have given a great deal to avoid.