Victoria Confesses (9781442422469) (16 page)

I hated to see my uncle leave after his short visit. We enjoyed our shared silences as much as our important talks. He spoke so mildly, yet firmly and impartially. I could have listened to him speak on virtually any subject. His advice was always perfect, and I would often recall one bit in particular: “Royal persons are a little like stage actors; they must always make efforts to please their public.”

A long winter stretched dully before me. My singing lessons with Maestro Lablache had ended and would not resume until spring. I finally succeeded in teaching my parrot, Norris, to say his own name, plus “pretty bird.” My days were monotonous, and I yearned for some diversion, some gaiety. There was nothing.

In mid-February we left Claremont to return to Kensington. We came to a railway, where our carriages were stopped by a signalman. A train flew by, the steam carriage striking sparks as it raced along the iron rails, enveloped in clouds of smoke and making a loud noise. It was the first time I had seen a train, a curious thing indeed that gave us all a great deal to talk about.

I did wonder if King William had seized our apartments while we were gone, but he had not—dear Aunt Adelaide must
have prevailed upon him. On the surface all was peaceful and quiet. I was able to enjoy music, opera, and theater. I resumed my lessons with Maestro Lablache. My studies with Mr. Davys continued, and dear Daisy and I read together. Still, the palace seemed caught in a web of ill feeling, the strong but often invisible strands spun between Mamma and King William; King William and Uncle Leopold; Uncle Leopold and Conroy; Conroy and Lehzen; Mamma and Lehzen; Lehzen and Lady Flora. I was the helpless fly trapped in the web.

My eighteenth birthday was coming. In a short time I would reach my majority and become my own mistress, unless Mamma somehow managed to intervene and delay it for three more years. I watched Sir John carefully, knowing that he was still determined to take the post of my private secretary. I was equally determined that he would not.

Mamma must have realized that I would not surrender easily, and she asked my brother, Charles, to come to Kensington to argue in Sir John's favor. I had never felt close to Charles, who was at school in Switzerland when I was born, and his recent visits had not made me feel any warmer toward him. Charles had a GREAT fondness for Sir John, and in my opinion anyone who championed John Conroy was to be viewed with deep suspicion.

Daisy and I discussed the situation endlessly. Like me, she did not look forward to Charles's arrival. She knew that Sir John had expressed hatred for her, and as a result of his influence Mamma nursed a bitterness against her old friend. Charles would certainly hear all about it. Daisy's own situation was precarious, but she was more concerned about me.

“Sir John sees a position as your private secretary as a way to
establish his whole family at court,” she said. “He wants a place among your ladies for Miss Victoire Conroy, too.”

Miss Conroy as a lady-in-waiting? Unthinkable! The idea almost made me laugh.

“You must be prepared for the most awful pressure to be brought to bear on you,” Daisy warned. “I fear that Sir John will find ways to force you to bend to his will.”

“He will not succeed,” I said. “I promise you that, dear Daisy.”

But I really had no idea how my mother, my brother, and Sir John might conspire to force me. If only Uncle Leopold could help me! He was far away in Belgium, though he wrote encouragingly, “Be steady, my good child. Be not put out by anything.”

I would have to manage somehow on my own.

Soon after Charles's arrival at Kensington he came to my rooms, full of smiles and good cheer. “May we have a word in private, dear sister?” he asked, with a slight nod indicating that I should dismiss Lehzen.

“The baroness can hear whatever you wish to say to me, dear brother,” I replied.

Charles frowned and waited, no doubt hoping Lehzen would excuse herself and leave of her own will. But I caught her eye and she stayed where she was.

“Very well then, Victoria,” Charles grumbled. “It has become my role to try to bring some sort of acceptance to this situation. I understand that there are tensions, resulting no doubt from misunderstandings. Let's not complicate those tensions with unnecessary stubbornness.”

“I'm not being stubborn, Charles.”

“Surely you understand how it would damage your reputation among your future subjects if they thought that you and
our mother had had a falling out.” He folded his arms and leaned close, his face only inches from mine. “The people want to see a warm feeling between mother and daughter. Ill feeling would surely upset them.”

“Ill feeling has not been caused by
my
words or deeds,” I told him firmly.

Charles heaved a deep sigh. “I am suggesting that if you were to accept John Conroy as your private secretary, the situation would right itself. Or, better yet, to recognize that you are indeed too young and inexperienced to rule. It would be for the good of the country, as well as for yourself, if you asked for an extended period in which a regency would be in effect until your twenty-first—”

“I will not consider such a thing,” I interrupted.

Charles tried again. “It has been suggested that you must be coerced into taking Conroy into your favor.”

“Coerce me!” I exploded. “Who dares to suggest such a thing? John Conroy has called me a termagant! Don't believe what Mamma tells you about him! Our uncle Leopold refers to him as Mephistopheles.”

This was too much for my brother. “If you will not listen to reason, then the devil take you!” he shouted as he stormed out of my sitting room, slamming the door and leaving Daisy and me staring at each other.

The mood at Kensington did not improve. I would not speak to Mamma or to Charles. We received word that King William's health had been failing. Later we learned that he was rallying. Then, a week before my birthday, I was summoned to my mother's sitting room. Mamma and Sir John waited with
Francis Conyngham, lord chamberlain and senior official of the king's household. Lord Conyngham looked VERY ill at ease.

“Your highness,” he said, “I have a letter addressed to you from his majesty, King William.” He added with peculiar emphasis, “The king desires that it be handed to you and to no other.”

“Very well. I thank you, Lord Conyngham.” I glanced at Mamma and Sir John, wondering why they were here at all.

“Sir John Conroy insists that your mother be present when you read the letter,” the lord chamberlain explained uncomfortably, and handed me the letter.

I broke the seal. In a weak and unsteady hand King William wrote that he had asked Parliament to grant me the sum of ten thousand pounds a year for me to do with as I wished, commencing on the day I came of age. I would have the right to appoint my own keeper of the Privy Purse to oversee this considerable sum. In addition, I had the right to appoint the members of my own household.

This letter meant that in just seven days, the twenty-fourth of May, my eighteenth birthday, I would indeed be my own mistress, able to choose my own ladies and pick my own servants. I could barely suppress a smile.

“The letter, please, Victoria,” Mamma said, reaching for it.

I clutched the letter to my chest, shaking my head. Sir John took one menacing step toward me. “Give the letter to your mother, Victoria.”

Gritting my teeth and throwing Sir John a scornful look, I did as I was ordered.

Mamma's face darkened as she read it. “This is an outrage!” she cried.

Sir John turned to the lord chamberlain, who waited stiffly. “Our thanks to you, Lord Conyngham, for delivering this letter to the princess. Kindly carry expressions of our gratitude to his majesty, King William.”

The lord chamberlain cast me a long and, I thought, sympathetic look, bowed, and left the room. The door had scarcely closed behind him before the battle began.

“I am utterly humiliated,” Mamma wailed. “The king obviously intends to insult me yet again, and he has succeeded. But I mean to tell you, Victoria, that it is not possible for you to be given such a sum of money for your own uses! You are not prepared to handle it discreetly—”

“I am to have a keeper of the Privy Purse to administer it, Mamma,” I said, struggling to control my temper. I wanted to lash out at her but felt that nothing would be gained. “The king offers Sir Benjamin Stephenson.” I extended my hand for the letter, in order to point it out.

“A thoroughly detestable man!” Mamma exclaimed, snatching the letter out of my reach.

Struggling to maintain calm, I suggested my tutor, Mr. Davys, for the post. “You could find no man more scrupulously honest than he.”

“Absolutely not,” Sir John cut in. “Out of the question.”

“Why not?” I demanded, too loudly. Whomever I suggested would receive the same response:
no
. My restraint was slipping away. “Perhaps you will allow me to consult with Lord Melbourne on the matter,” I said in one last attempt to bring reason to the table.

“The prime minister will doubtless go along with whatever King William wants,” Mamma raged.

The argument went on and on with no one willing to bend. Mamma's fury increased, matched by what Sir John called my obstinacy—“A sign,” he claimed, “that you are simply a stubborn child unfit to rule or do anything on your own.”

I could endure no more. I was exhausted. It was the two of them against me. I fled to my room, too upset even to explain the reasons to dearest Daisy. I refused to go down to dinner and would not eat what Daisy brought up to me. I fell into bed very early and cried myself to sleep. I did not hear my mother come to her own bed, but woke during the night to the sounds of her tossing and turning and muttering to herself.

If I thought matters would improve, I was wrong. The next day I was summoned once more to my mother's sitting room. At first I refused to go, but then thought better of it. I needed to find out what new devilishness Sir John had concocted and then persuaded my mother to agree to.

They had composed a letter to the king—Sir John's ideas, taken down in my mother's words and by her own hand, like a dutiful secretary—and they presented the letter to me. “It is my wish,” said my mother coldly, “that you copy this letter and sign it as though it were your own.”

I stared at her, scarcely believing what I heard. “You want me to put my signature on a letter that is not my own?” I had not yet read the letter, but I could guess at its content.

“It will be your own, Victoria, the moment you sign it. There is nothing here with which you should disagree. You are well aware that due to your youth and inexperience it is essential that you remain in my care for the next few years.”

There it was again: your youth and inexperience.

I read the words that my mother and Sir John had put forward as my own:

I wish to remain in every respect as I am now, in the care of my mother. In the matter of money, I should wish whatever sum your majesty deems advisable to be given to my dear mother, who always does everything I want in financial matters and will certainly put it to the best use for me.

“I will not sign it,” I said. “I disagree with nearly every word of it.”

“Of course you will sign it, my dear Victoria,” said Sir John smoothly.

Over the next hour, as I continued to refuse, Conroy wheedled, cajoled, ordered, and threatened. My mother wept crocodile tears as she reminded me that I owed her
everything
, everything, for the sacrifices she had made, for her endless devotion. In the midst of the heated argument, my brother, Charles, joined us. He sided with Mamma in reminding me how much she had done for me and with Sir John in berating me for my obduracy.

Now it was three against one.

Worn down at last, I gave in. I sat at my mother's writing table, took the paper and pen Sir John provided, and copied the letter. I signed it, placed my seal on it, and rose. “I shall have nothing further to say to either of you,” I said curtly, tossing the pen aside. “Or to you, Charles,” I added, and stalked out of the room as Sir John was summoning a messenger.