The Prince's Secret (The Royal Biography Cozy Mystery Series Book 2) (6 page)

A week later, I walk down a long sterile hallway that runs underneath Buckingham Palace. Mr. Schnipps was reluctant to acquiesce to my request, but I informed him that I would not be able to work anymore on the Mary Beaton confessional if he did not agree to give me direct access to the Prince’s memoirs.

“I am terribly far behind on the biography,” I told him when I called.

“But I have only sent 15 more pages, surely that wouldn’t take you long to translate,” Schnipps had responded. That’s when I knew he had it bad. The man is a bona fide history junkie. He is tantalized by the idea that we could find some previously unknown fact about one of Mary’s principal ladies-in-waiting. He was dying to know what Mary Beaton had done to harm Mary, Queen of Scots. We were both waiting for the reveal, but the next 15 pages were only more musing about Mary Beaton’s secret love meetings with Bothwell.

“I am very slow at deciphering 16th century French…and I am so far behind on the biography…getting fed bits and pieces of info from Ms. Tate. What I really need is unfettered access to the Prince’s files for a day or two. Then I could crank out enough of the biography to keep my publisher happy and return to devoting more time to the Beaton book,” I told Schnipps, even though I had already read and translated everything he had sent me.

Schnipps relented with a heavy sigh. So on this very rainy Friday, I find myself in Buckingham Palace following the giraffe-like Elaine Tate. I am 5’9 but Elaine towers over me. She is very jovial as she talks a mile a minute about absolutely nothing. We turn down one twisty, sterile hallway after another and then stop at a very unassuming door with the numbers 705 painted in gold.

She motions me through the door and I enter a narrow, windowless room with row after row of boxes on cheap metal stands.

“All this stuff,” I begin, “is about the Prince?’

“Spot on!” She replies merrily, “All sorts of stuff. Birthday cards from well-wishers, news articles, letters, photos etc. Memorabilia in general. I have digitized everything I possibly can on the computer. Anyway, I think you’ll find the filing system straightforward.”

She points to a long row of boxes marked “Birth.”

“My, that’s a lot of stuff.”

“Yes, the newborn Prince was extremely popular. There’s lot of goodies in there. I tried to send you the best. Cherry-picked them all specifically for the biography.”

“Oh… well….you did a wonderful job. Just thought it would go faster if I could have a look around.”

“Suit yourself,” she says merrily, but to my consternation, she plops down in front of her computer in the front corner of the room and begins scanning what looks to be a stack of letters.

Wait a minute, isn’t she going to leave?

Right then, I’ll have to do this with her along for the ride. I begin to inch my way slowly down a row of boxes marked “Year 1.” I open a box, and find stacks of birthday cards. Trying to look like I know what I am doing, I open an envelope from a Mrs. Avery Ryhter-Ames, and out falls a card, which falls open on the floor. Then it begins to sing:

“Happy Birthday to you,

Can you wee in the loo?”

I am horrified, but Elaine laughs merrily, “Ah British humor, those singing cards are the best. Although they drive the Queen’s Pomeranians mad. You should see them bark and howl when they go off.”

I reach down and close Mrs. Avery Ryhter-Ames card with great celerity.

“Year two, year three,” I mumble to myself as I pass rows of boxes. I reach the end of a row and turn the corner. Whoa! There is only a single box marked year 4.

I pull it off the shelf while Elaine twitters away about “the insane weather.” This is London; is rain in June really so unusual? I sit down cross-legged on the ground with the box on my lap, and begin to peruse its contents. There are pictures of an absolutely cherubic little lad sitting on blankets at impromptu picnics, riding in a pedal-car, chasing a young blond-headed Rose, all dressed up and dashing about at an Easter egg hunt, all dressed up and dashing about at a Christmas party, all dressed up and sulking at some birthday party etc. I go through the entire contents of the box, and yet there is not one single reference to the disaster of his brother’s death which struck halfway through the Prince’s fourth year.

“Tea?” Elaine pops around a corner unexpectedly and I jump.

Oh goody, is she going to go for tea? If she leaves, maybe I’ll be able to find a few more boxes for year four hidden away somewhere.

“I’d love some, thanks,” I answer.

“Great!” She smiles down at me from the end of a long row of boxes. “I’ll ring and have some sent down.”

Five cups of tea later and I’m really hoping Elaine will leave for the bathroom. I have located only one more box pertaining to the time period of Albert’s death and yes, it was full of more photos and singing cards, but nothing about the whole tragic accident.

Trying to spur Elaine on to the loo, I talk about all things water related, especially the copious rain falling outside and how much I love Niagara Falls.

“Never been, must be a beautiful sight,” Elaine twitters, soldiering on with her data entry at the computer.

I talk about the mighty and powerful Victoria Falls. Same response.

Clearly Elaine has been told not to leave me alone in this room. Since she won’t leave, I need to get her to trust me, so she doesn’t mind my intense snooping. To this end I pull out the fluffy white tea cozy.

“Elaine, you have been such a great sport to help me all morning like this. I want you to have this. I made it myself,” I plop the tea cozy down on her desk.

“Ooh, what is it?” she questions jovially.

“It’s a tea cozy. You know, you put it over your favorite teapot to keep it warm.”

“So retro. My grandmother used to make them,” she coos. Then, a moment later she adds, “It looks like a tiny, snow-covered mountain.”

I know. I tell her about the yak.

“Thank you,” she says, “so nice. Nobody ever gives me things, everything is just for his nibs.” She jabs in the direction of the Prince’s memorabilia.

“It shall keep my tea most toasty,” she murmurs, and then unbelievably she pretends as if she is holding the tiny yak between her thumb and forefinger, making it jump its way up the cozy.

Oh my, the great towering Elaine Tate is totally bonkers. Although hadn’t I done the very same thing? Anyway, even after all that tea, Elaine never leaves to go to the bathroom.

I return to scanning the contents of boxes, feeling positive that under Elaine’s watchful eye, I’m never going to find anything that will help Alex. With a sigh, I shift through an enormous pile of birthday cards.

Why on earth would anybody keep all this stuff? It’s just junk.

Perhaps I am looking in the wrong room. There must be a room full of Albert’s memorabilia, but how would I get admitted to that room?

I don’t know. I sit down on the floor, after making three trips to the bathroom, (escorted by Elaine,) and start searching through the only box marked year 5. It is more of the same, except tucked between the photos and birthday cards, I find a small folded over piece of paper that doesn’t look like it belongs. I unfold it quickly and find that it isn’t a letter at all; it’s a memo. The subject line reads: Margery Tannebaum. The rest of the memo is impossible to read. Somebody had taken a Sharpie and blocked out everything that is written on the page, except for the two words TOP SECRET that are splashed across the page.

Making sure that Elaine doesn’t see me, I fold the paper until it is very small, then I shove into my pant pocket.

A moment later I pop up like an inflatable bouncy castle and glide towards the door. Dear, sweet Elaine has placed the cozy on her head.

“What do you think? Do I look like I am at the top of the fashion tree?” she calls to me.

The fashion tree? What? Why would anyone put a tea cozy on their head?

“The tippy-tippy top of the tree, I would say. What say next time I’m in town, Elaine, we go somewhere for tea?”

“Shall I wear my new hat?” she asks and smiles so wide that I think she just might be mad enough to wear it out in public. Nonetheless, she scribbles down her email. I tell her I will be in contact and she escorts me out of Buckingham to my car with the cozy still on her head. Other Buckingham employees smile to themselves as she passes, as if it is all perfectly normal. Really, what would the Queen say? What would Alistair say? Even worse, what would Hollister Schmidt, snooty secretary to the King, say?

I guess I don’t need to worry about it. I have enough problems. I wave goodbye to Elaine and drive off. Since the Prince isn’t in London today (he’s in Liverpool flipping pancakes or serving punch or giving a speech or something), I drive back to the Cotswolds in a hurry. I can’t wait to examine the paper under a better light to see if I can read what was blocked out by the Sharpie. Along the way, I swear I end up behind the same truck that ran Lady Jones off the road. Once again, the driver seems in a tremendous hurry, anxious to overcome anything in his path. I lean forward as I drive, trying to get a glimpse of his license plate. It is indeed the same truck. I recognize the first two numbers from having memorized them at the scene of the accident. But there’s no way to read the rest of the license plate today, it’s splattered with mud. Stupid truck driver…with a license plate like that he’ll soon be stopped by police. I watch as the truck surges forward into the other lane, dangerously passing the car ahead of him.

“I need to report that guy!” I bluster. But I forget all about the truck driver after I pull my car into the garage and hurry inside. Pulling the paper I found out of my pocket, I examine it under my bright desk light. Unfortunately, whomever took a Sharpie to it did a good job; I can’t make out a single word.

Then, an inspired idea comes to me. I pick up the phone and dial Lady Margaret as fast as I can.

Later that evening, I find myself pouring over the early days of besotted love trysts between Mary B. and Bothwell. Mary’s confessional seems to backtrack, and she writes about when their romance first started. She writes of her despair when Bothwell leaves court and sails off to marry Anna Tronds of Denmark. At that time, Bothwell was a penniless admiral who forced his new wife to sell all of her possessions. When that money ran out, he had Anna ask her wealthy family for more. Bothwell continued to sail around Europe, occasionally coming back to Scotland and resuming his affair with Mary Beaton.

I read a few more pages before googling James Hepburn. I want to see the picture of the man Mary Beaton describes as the most handsome in all of Scotland. Whereas the pictures I have seen of Lord Darnley show a pompous man, the picture of James Hepburn is of a brooding, cruel-looking, mustachioed creature. I read the Wikipedia article that accompanies the pictures. The author appears very knowledgeable about Bothwell. He describes how James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, leaves his first wife Anna (whom he never divorces) and marries again. This time, he chooses the English woman Jean Gordon. I return to read more pages of Mary Beaton’s confessional, which is full of her jealousy of Jean. This jealousy was short lived, however, because one year after their marriage, Bothwell abruptly divorces Jean. According to both Wiki and Mary Beaton, Jean was very happy to be rid of the philanderer. Mary Beaton writes, “As the Earl explained to me, she was given to nagging about his romance with others, including myself and a servant who was in the employ of the Gordon household.”

If you ask me, Jean was the only smart person in this tale. Although, if my history serves me correct, Anna Tronds is going to reemerge at the end of the story and have the ultimate revenge. And what of Mary Beaton’s revenge? I read on. Only eight days after his divorce to Jean, Earl Bothwell marries Mary, Queen of Scots. From what Mary Beaton writes in her book, this is when she begins to unravel.

“He visits me not,” Mary complains. “He has become dedicated to the Crown and to the Cause.”

I feel sorry for Beaton as I translate the 16th century French in my head. She never hears from Bothwell again. Claiming that he stole her youth and her innocence, she vows revenge. She offers her services to the Queen’s half-brother, James Moray.

“Together we devise a plan that will be the end of the Queen,” Beaton writes on one page. This declaration is so bold that I let out an audible gasp.

Oh Mary Beaton, how could you…how could you betray your Queen?

******

So, do you think you can help me?” I ask Lady Margaret Jones the following day on the phone. I offered to bring back her evening dress, but she told me not to bother, telling me that she would stop by my place.

“I have to run errands anyway. I’ll be by in the afternoon.”

It’s about two o’clock when she knocks on my door.

“It’s high tourist season at Blenheim and it’s a total mess. There’s no privacy there,” she says, as she steps over the threshold of my cottage door. She is dressed again in a finely tailored suit complete with a matching hat. I offer her some tea. She agrees, and I hurry off to put the kettle on. I return to find her glancing about my living room.

“It’s marvelously devoid of any decoration. Not even a picture of a loved one.”

It’s true. My cottage is empty. I haven’t had much time to spruce it up. I’ve been working like crazy on the biography, and I’ve also become wrapped up in all the problems of the Prince, and to a certain extent, the problems of the long-dead Mary Beaton.

“You need some pictures of your family in simple silver frames,” she proffers. This makes me wonder, should I put up pictures of my parents? I should. And I should bring that black and gray cat in from the mean streets of Bourton and call him my own.

“So,” Lady Margaret begins as she pulls her gloves off her hands (who wears gloves in the middle of summer?) “what is it you want to talk about? What’s the big secret you said we couldn’t discuss on the phone?”

I’m not sure how to begin the conversation; whatever I do, I can’t give up the Prince’s secret.

I pussyfoot around. I mutter some nonsense about the Prince’s biography.

“I’m not quite sure what you’re getting at.” Margaret sounds confused as I return five minutes later with a tea tray that I set on the coffee table.

I cut to the quick. I hand her the piece of paper.

She looks at the paper and arches an immaculate brow.

“Margery Tannebaum, Top Secret” she reads all the visible words on the paper.

“Hmm, I didn’t know anyone stamped ‘Top Secret’ on papers anymore. Couldn’t have been us. We were smarter than that at the SIS. Scotland Yard might have stamped such a stupid thing across the paper. If you want everyone in the world to read something, stamp it ‘Top Secret.’” She puts the paper down on my coffee table and sits on the white lounge chair that matches my couch.

“What exactly is the SIS?”

“Oh, dear. That’s right, you’re such an American. The SIS is the Secret Intelligence Service, commonly known as Mi-6.”

“Well, what do you make of it?” I ask as she stares at the paper.

“Nothing,” she answers, but when she picks up her teacup I notice a little tremble in her hand.

“Nothing? This is the nanny who--”

Margaret holds out a hand to stop me. “My dear, I know exactly who Margery Tannebaum is. The world knows who she is. She is the poor unfortunate creature who was blamed for the death of Prince Albert. How did you get this?” She holds the paper aloft. She no longer looks like my precious Fairy Godmother who gave me a dress to wear for the charity ball. She looks like the hardnosed field agent she must have been once upon a time when she worked for Mi-6.

“I…um…I found it when I was going through the Prince’s Year Five box of memorabilia.”

“Sloppy…very sloppy…” she mutters under her breath, and then she leans back in my lounge chair and closes her eyes.

“Margaret?” I ask, wondering if she is feeling alright.

She opens her eyes. “My dear girl, I have no idea how this got in the Prince’s Year Five box of memorabilia, as you call it. And I have no idea what it means but that poor woman deserves to rest in peace.”

I say nothing. I must look quite forlorn because suddenly Margaret adds, “Why do you want to be involved with any of this…this nonsense? Sometimes the past is best left in the past.”

“And sometimes learning the truth about the past helps set us free.”

“Oh my God!” Margery claps a hand over her mouth. “This is about the Prince, isn’t it? Did you tell him that you found this paper?”

I don’t know how to answer the question without betraying the Prince’s secret, so I simply stare at my shoes.

“That poor boy. I’ve heard rumors that he always held himself responsible. That’s nonsense. That’s stuff that was planted in his young, impressionable mind by conspiracy theorists. I mean, goodness knows, if you google the young Prince’s death today there are rumors that Prince Alex pushed his brother out the window. It’s garbage, and that poor boy has grown up under that specter for his entire life.”

“That poor boy has grown into a man,” I say, feeling as if the cat is entirely out of the bag now, “and he deserves to know what was written on this piece of paper. Margaret, I am asking you straight out; do you know anything about this?”

“I do not,” Margaret affirms, and takes another sip of her tea, but her hand betrays her by shaking again.

“Lady Margaret Jones,” I huff, “I’ll just get your dress and then I think it best you go. I have no time for liars.”

******

It’s not like me to be so rude and I think Margaret was very angry when she left. But I could tell by the look on her face that she does know something and it incensed me because…

Why? Why was I so rude?

Because Alex deserves to know the truth. That’s why. Whatever happened in the past, he deserves better than everyone running around telling him that it was all fine, all an accident. If it was all an accident then why is there a paper stamped “Top Secret” with Margery Tannebaum’s name on it? A paper that was shoved in his Year Five box of memorabilia?

I sit down at my desk. It’s not every day I call perfectly respectable women liars and ask them to leave my home. I need to compose myself. After a long period of staring blankly at my computer, I turn it on and google Margery Tannebaum again. This time, I am searching for her death record. I’m not sure why, but I want to know where she’s buried. I search all afternoon but find nothing except an article that says, given all the conspiracy theories about her murdering Prince Albert, Margery’s family buried their daughter in an undisclosed location in an unmarked grave.

How sad. I read on about Margery and learn that both her parents succumbed to cancer soon after she died, adding fuel to one of the conspiracy theories that the Tannebaum family were foreign spies and were murdered by His Majesty’s Secret Service.

“The only surviving member of the family, is a sister, Agnes Tannebaum,” I read in Margery’s mother’s online obituary

“Agnes Tannebaum, I’m coming to find you,” I say, and quickly google her name, but to my surprise, the name “Agnes Tannebaum” returns no results.