Fehr looks shocked. The king’s upstanding private secretary, whose father was the queen’s upstanding private secretary for thirty years before him, is attempting a bit of petty smuggling? It takes a minute but then Fehr adjusts. “Oh, yes, of course, sir, I understand, sir. We will just keep it between us, sir, and don’t concern yourself with the Custom House men this time. I will handle them,” he says.
“Much obliged, Fehr,” says Ponsonby, walking him to the door, where they shake hands. As he watches Fehr retreat down the hallway, he wonders what the man imagines the boxes contain.
Rattled, he lays his forearms down on the desk to rest his head for ten minutes before returning to work.
ON THE MORNING, two days later, when the king is departing for London, the kaiser sees them off. He presides at the foot of the stairs talking loudly about the relative merits of the German railroads versus the English ones, and his own prowess as a railway engineer and, for that matter, as a sailor and a horseman. The king is still upstairs saying a final goodbye to his sister, and Ponsonby listens and nods. Out of the corner of his eye, he monitors suitcases, dispatch boxes, baskets, and trunks passing through from the back landing, across the entrance hall, and out the front door, where three wagons wait to be filled. At last, the two boxes containing the letters go by, looking conspicuously different from everything else. Ponsonby sees servants place them, one on top of the other, on the back of the last wagon. The grooms throw canvas covers over the first two wagons, and tie these down, but the third wagon, closest to the door, remains uncovered. Surely someone will notice the anomalous boxes and insist on investigating? He spots Fehr out there, chatting with the grooms, at one point casually leaning his elbow on the top box.
The kaiser drones on, oblivious to the loaded wagons other than to welcome evidence that the English visitors are leaving. He can’t imagine that Ponsonby, essentially a servant, would dare intrigue against him here, in Germany, where all quiver at his command. As for the empress, he long ago sidelined her, and now she is dying. The kaiser’s not thought his mother might call upon the loyalty and discretion of a friend to remove from beneath his nose letters he’d like to destroy forever.
Ponsonby is swaying slightly, straining to betray nothing as the anxious moment stretches on and on. Then, without warning, a pair of grooms throw a cover on the last wagon, and it rolls away. Exhilaration and relief course through him. Together they—he and she—have thumbed their noses at the odious kaiser. In future those who seek to pass judgment on his godmother will have to contend with her own testimony.
The first carriage, ready for passengers, rolls in under the portico. Fehr bustles through the door and whisks by Ponsonby with a brief nod, heading for the back hall. There’s a heavy step on the stairs, and Ponsonby looks up to see the king descending, his nieces following behind, white handkerchiefs pressed to their weeping eyes. The king’s face is grim and set. He gives his nephew a quick, wordless embrace. Then he takes Ponsonby by the elbow and says, “Come, ride with me. I want to speak of other things now.” And they are off.
LATE THE NEXT afternoon Ponsonby arrives at Windsor railway station with all his luggage, having been helped onto the local train at Paddington by a skeptical Barlow and a friendly porter. He had wired ahead to his wife and asked her to send the local drayman to the station with his wagon. At Cell Farm his wife looks on as he and the driver, between them, ferry the boxes up the stairs and into the attic, and stack them under the eaves.
The boxes remain there, unremembered and unremarked upon, for twenty-seven years.
Part I
Daughter
1
The Isle of Wight, June 1847
Vicky stood in the dining room of Osborne House, legs wide apart, balled fists on her hips, striking what Mama called her “little madame attitude.” She scowled up at a large painting on the wall. Some months ago Papa had declared it time a portrait be made of them all, and she recalled the artist, Herr Winterhalter, coming to Windsor to do sketches of everyone in the family. But she’d never imagined the finished picture would look anything like this.
Herr Winterhalter had placed Bertie right in the center next to Mama—who had her arm around his shoulders—while Vicky was pushed far down into the bottom corner, watching over Lenchen in her cradle. It was as if Bertie were eldest and best, which was certainly not true.
Vicky was the oldest in the family, and the cleverest, everyone knew. Mama and Papa often wished aloud that Bertie would be more like Vicky. In the mornings, when she and Bertie went to visit Mama and Papa in their tall bed hung with emerald-green curtains, and Papa read poetry aloud to them or talked about the Greeks and the Romans, Bertie would fiddle with the wooden soldier he carried in his pocket and sometimes pluck at the knots of the silk bedcover. Mama snapped: “Bertie, don’t fidget while Papa is speaking. Look at your sister, she is not fidgeting.”
At such moments Vicky would beam at Papa and he would beam right back. He didn’t have to worry about her not listening. What a good and pretty girl she was, Papa often said. And while Mama never praised as much, she liked to summon Vicky to sing for her ladies, or recite, or speak in French. Her accent was much admired, also the way she could express herself so clearly in English and in German.
Of course, Bertie spoke German, too—they all did. Papa had come from Germany to marry Mama. She called him “angel” and because of him, Mama said, she had forgotten all about her sad childhood, when, without brothers or sisters, she’d lived with only Grandmamma and her governess for company in Kensington Palace. Her own father had died and Grandmamma had been very anxious to keep Mama, who was heir to the throne, far away from “bad influences.”
“Why were you heir?” Vicky had asked her once.
“Because my uncle King William had no children,” Mama said.
“How did Grandmamma keep the bad influences out? Did she lock the door?”
Mama laughed. “This is too complicated for a child to understand, Puss. Grandmamma tried, I will say that.”
Now Mama was queen, and Papa helped her. Perhaps because she’d had no papa, Mama could be very irritable. And she didn’t seem to care for little children, though she had so many. After Vicky, who was six, came Bertie, five, and Alice, four. Then Affie, really Alfred, who was two, and a new baby, Lenchen, whose proper name was Helena. Because she was eldest, Vicky was the Princess Royal, so much better than being plain Princess Alice like her little sister. But Bertie was a boy, the oldest boy, and that appeared to be best of all. Mama called him “the nation’s child” and Papa talked about his “special destiny.”
How very aggravating—vexing and not right. As Vicky stared at Herr Winterhalter’s picture she began to wonder how things could be arranged differently. Papa always said royal persons must be dutiful and committed to the welfare of the nation. Mightn’t it be her duty to explain to him the better way? No use talking about this with Mama. She never had patience for long, serious discussions, as Papa did.
Vicky cast her eyes around the room, thinking. Like the picture, most everything in it was new. The long mahogany dining table gleamed, highly polished, with eight matching chairs lining either side, like soldiers at attention awaiting people to come in to eat and converse. A thick flowered carpet had been laid down underfoot. The walls were painted a rich blue, the color of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, the senior knighthood of England. Papa had designed this house on the Isle of Wight for them because he didn’t like how at Windsor there were no proper walled gardens for children to play in, and ministers and tradesmen paraded in and out all day long—which was so very disruptive. He pronounced: “We are a growing family and we need a home that is comfortable, peaceful, and most of all private.” But Papa had made sure Osborne House was properly regal and fittingly decorated. One of his very favorite pieces, a Roman bust of a lady, had been placed in a white alcove on the dining room’s far wall, directly opposite a large window. Vicky admired how graceful and confident the lady looked, wearing a diadem, presiding over the whole high, elegant space.