The Widow of Windsor (47 page)

But the chief actor in the drama seemed to have been the Prince of Wales. Few people mentioned Gordon-Cumming while Bertie’s name was on all lips. His extravagance was discussed. Only a short while ago he had been moved by the state of the London poor. What a pity he did not spend some of his income on alleviating their condition instead of throwing it away on horses and baccarat. He was dissolute, the Press implied. It was such conduct as this which had brought about the downfall of the French Monarchy at the end of the previous century. Monarchy should beware.

The Queen was horrified. ‘Bertie’s conduct has brought us all into disrepute,’ she wrote to Vicky. ‘It was very distressing.’ She summoned Bertie; she spoke to him very severely.

‘This dreadful gambling must stop. What dearest Papa would have said I cannot imagine. It is very wrong of you, Bertie, to go to such houses … the houses of worthy middle-class people who have made their money by hard work. I gather Mr Wilson built ships which is a very laudable thing to do. You go there; you corrupt such hard-working people. Naturally they are delighted to have you because of the prestige Royalty always gives. But how much longer will it if we all behave as you do? It will not be for long I fear. I could almost be glad that dearest Papa is not here. This would have made him despair of you.’

Poor Bertie! He was indeed in disgrace.

Nephew Wilhelm made sure that the very most was made of the scandal.

The Prince of Wales had a new motto, said one German paper: ‘
Ich Deal
.’

Wilhelm even went farther. He wrote to dear Grandmama telling her how shocked he was by the scandal of Tranby Croft. He was very concerned because he had bestowed on his uncle the honorary rank of Colonel in the Prussian Guard. He did not care that his Colonels should be concerned in scandals of this nature, particularly with people who were of an age to be their sons.

Bertie spluttered with rage. ‘The insolent young puppy!’ he cried.

‘He is no puppy,’ said the Queen. ‘He is the Emperor of Germany and I may tell you that the Queen of England shares his disgust.’

The Time
s joined in the general condemnation of the Prince of Wales.

The gambling gentlemen had made Gordon-Cumming sign a pledge that he would play no more baccarat. Would it not be a good thing if someone could persuade the Prince of Wales to sign such a pledge?

To be treated like a naughty boy at his age was most humiliating. Bertie turned for comfort to Alix as he always did at such times, only to find that she had become aloof. He was deeply wounded and he kept remembering the insolence of that young puppy, his nephew, the Emperor of Germany.

Chapter XXVII

EDDY AND GEORGE

Alix was deeply wounded. It was not so much the Tranby Croft affair although it was very humiliating to read what was said of her husband in the papers; what hurt most was this persistent pursuit of women. When Bertie was a young man it was forgivable, but now that he was nearly fifty, there was something rather ridiculous in a squat fat man behaving like a young Casanova.

She decided to go to Copenhagen for a visit and take her two youngest daughters, Victoria and Maud, with her. It was pleasant to be in the old home but the health of her parents worried her, that of her mother particularly. Queen Louise was very feeble and now completely deaf. All the same it was pleasant showing her daughters the old haunts and telling them about her own happy childhood.

When the time came to leave Copenhagen Alix was in no mood to return to Sandringham. She wanted Bertie to understand that while he could be very happy without her, so could she be without him. He very much enjoyed the company of other women; she enjoyed that of her family; and as she had had a very pressing invitation from Dagmar she had decided to take her daughters to see their aunt at her Villa Livadia on the Black Sea.

Poor Bertie was nonplussed. Sandringham seemed empty although he had filled it with his noisy friends.

He no longer enjoyed the shooting; there was no point in having the clocks half an hour fast and that small matter seemed to change Sandringham completely. When he saw George and Eddy they kept talking about Mother dear and asking when she was coming home and what had possessed her to go straight to Russia after staying in Copenhagen. Why didn’t she come home to them?

Even Daisy couldn’t restore the Prince’s good humour. Daisy was beautiful, witty, astringent, but nothing seemed the same without Alix’s tolerant good-humour. And, he kept remembering, she had been a little aloof over the Tranby Croft affair.

He started to fret about the family. Eddy had always given him some concern because he could never learn anything. It was not that Bertie wished his son to be a scholar, he himself had never been that; but Eddy simply could not absorb anything; he could scarcely read and he was quite slow-witted. It was alarming to contemplate that he could be King one day. George was the bright one. He had always outshone Eddy; and he was a good boy, conscientious and humble too. Louise was now married to the Duke of Fife and the Prince wondered whether he was too old for her. She was twenty-two; he was forty. The Duke was a friend of Bertie’s; he was rich, had been a Member of Parliament and was a good man of business. The Queen had approved of the match and had in fact bestowed his Dukedom on him at the time of his marriage – although she had to be persuaded to do so. The two other girls, Victoria and Maud, were with their mother. Did they know of her disappointment in him and would it affect their feelings towards him?

He was discovering that he was very much a family man. It was true he loved his wild parties, and passionate friendships with women were essential to him; but he wanted Alix there in the background of his life, and he knew now how much he loved his family. He had always been kind and tolerant to them; making sure that they should never feel towards him as he had towards his own father, but he had not realised before how necessary they were to him. Sandringham had become lonely; the flowers didn’t look the same. Alix loved them and had done quite a lot of the arranging herself. Her dogs were moping; there was in fact a melancholy air about the place. Bertie wanted Alix to come home. It seemed as if the whole place was crying out for her.

One day a fire broke out in the house and there was a possibility that it would be completely destroyed. That seemed fitting, he thought. Everything had changed. If Sandringham went it would seem like a part of his married life being wiped out. It was symbolic. The house was saved although quite a number of their valuable possessions were lost. Nothing went right without Alix.

George was not well. Bertie worried a great deal about the boys and more so now that Alix was away. During a house party at Sandringham at which George was present, Bertie noticed that the young man was unduly flushed and seemed a little vague, which was unlike George.

Bertie was afraid that his son had a fever and since his own attack and those which Leopold had suffered, and of course the death of their father, Bertie was always alarmed when one of the children showed signs of a high temperature.

He told his friends that the house party was over. He thought George needed quiet and he certainly could not have that with a house full of guests. He was going to take George to London.

No sooner were they installed in Marlborough House than the doctors diagnosed enteric fever.

Bertie was distraught; but at least it gave him the chance to send for Alix.

The thought of her beloved son in danger brought Alix with the girls in great haste back to London. By this time George was beginning to recover and there was great rejoicing. Bertie, delighted to have Alix back, had no desire to see Lady Brooke – in fact he had no desire to be anywhere but in the heart of his family.

Alix was happy; but experience had taught her that it was a state of affairs which would not last. Bertie would continue to be the kind, tender and considerate husband; but nothing could wean him from his pursuit of beautiful women.

At the end of that year Alix had a surprise which made her very happy. Eddy had been spending a few days at Luton Hoo where the Danish ambassador and his wife were having a house party. Alix’s old friend Princess Mary of Teck was there with her daughter May. May was a forthright girl, quite attractive and of course royal. She had naturally been a friend of Alix’s children all her life for Alix and Mary had never forgotten those early days at Rumpenheim, and often talked of them.

So what a pleasure it was when Eddy wrote that he had asked May to marry him and she had agreed.

Bertie was all for celebrating the occasion, when Alix reminded him that it would first be necessary to get the Queen’s consent.

‘She’ll give it. She’s fond of May,’ said Bertie.

‘Yes, but no one must be told before she has given it. You know how she hates to be left out of these matters.’

So Bertie went to see the Queen at Windsor.

Memories of Tranby Croft still rankled and the Queen’s greeting was cool, but when he told her that Eddy wished to marry May of Teck she smiled.

‘An excellent arrangement,’ she said. ‘Dear Eddy needs a
strong
wife and he’ll get one in May. She’s well educated and of good character. I believe she helps her mother who is devoted to good works. A good steadying influence.’

The engagement was announced and there was a house party at Sandringham to celebrate it.

How different, thought Bertie, from what it had been like recently! All the damage occasioned by the fire had been put right and it was just like the old Sandringham, with the clocks half an hour fast and Alix still not being punctual. Bertie chided her affectionately and they laughed about her inability to overcome it.

‘I’m glad you have it,’ said Bertie. ‘It’s just a little something to set against all my sins.’

Alix was happier than she had been since the early days of her marriage. Her darling Eddy – whom she could not help loving more than any of her other children, perhaps because he was her firstborn, perhaps because he was a little simple and not as clever as his brothers and sisters and therefore seemed to need her care – now had dear capable May to look after him; and it was wonderful to think that Mary’s daughter and her son should be united. It brought those early days at Rumpenheim into greater significance. And in the far distant future Eddy would be King of England and May Queen.

It was a bitterly cold winter and one or two people at the house party developed influenza. This was a particularly virulent type and quite a number of the guests were smitten with it. Princess May had a bad cold and her mother insisted that she remain in the house. It was not long before Eddy caught it.

Alix was an excellent nurse and she did not realise at once that this was any more than an ordinary attack but in a day or so the doctors began to show some alarm and it was clear that Eddy had something more than ordinary influenza. They were soon talking about the approach of the crisis; and then it became widely known that the Duke of Clarence was very ill indeed.

Alix was frantic. Her best-loved firstborn was in danger. Eddy lay listlessly in bed; he had never had a great deal of mental or physical energy and now it all seemed to have deserted him.

The crisis came; Eddy did not rally. It was incredible. He could not be dying. He was a young man who had just become engaged to be married.

She stood by his bed and saw life slowly ebb away. She felt numb with misery. Eddy … gone.

The nation was stunned. He was so young. He had not been sickly. It had seeped out that he was no intellectual giant and that his inability to learn had worried his family and tutors. But death was the last thing that had been expected.

She knew that some zest had gone out of her; nothing would ever be quite the same again. She had lost her beloved son; her husband was not what she had dreamed romantically that a husband should be; she could not view the future with any great joy. She loved the simple life; her happiest days had been spent at Sandringham with her family, without the crowds of noisy smart people with whom Bertie so liked to surround himself; that life was not for her. The Queen was growing old. Surely even she could not live much longer and when she died great responsibilities would descend upon her and Bertie.

There was another one whose life would be changed; her son George. Dear George, who had always been such a devoted son and had longed so much to have the place in her heart which she had given to Eddy! George had always been so much more worthy – a good boy, hard-working, not really clever – only seeming so in comparison with Eddy – and now he had taken a step towards the throne.

She asked George to come to her and when he did she embraced him tenderly.

‘Darling George,’ she said, ‘you know what this means? We have lost dearest Eddy and you are now the eldest son.’

‘I know, Mother dear. I shall have to work hard. I shall have to try to be worthy.’