To Marry a Prince (38 page)

He glanced up when she came in and surged towards her, almost lifting her off her feet with the strength of his hug.

‘I’m glad you’re here,’ he said, too quietly for anyone else to hear. ‘So glad. I wished I hadn’t gone off last night the moment I got into the helicopter. I wasn’t thinking straight.’

‘You were worried. We both were. What’s this?’

He took her hand and led her towards the table. ‘My father’s schedule. He doesn’t hold with computers. He likes to see it mapped out in front of him.’

It resembled nothing so much as a giant campaign plan. It was even colour-coded. One of the blocks of colour started in three days’ time. She looked at it hard.

‘But that’s—’

‘Australia,’ said Richard levelly. ‘Yes. My father and mother were due to fly out on Thursday on the first leg of an Asian Pacific Tour. Six weeks away. They’d get back just over a month before our wedding. It’s out of the question now. The King has to be under medical observation for at least a month.’

‘You’re going to cancel?’

He held her hand very tight by his side. ‘No. Can’t do that. I will take over their schedule. Nell will accompany me to Australia and fulfil my mother’s programme there. My mother may join us later, depending on my father’s rate of recovery.’

‘So you don’t want me there?’

‘Oh, I want you all right,’ he said, with such bitter weariness that she had to believe him. ‘I just can’t have you. It’s not
done
. It’s not protocol, God help me. You’re not Royal yet.’

‘They’d be getting a substandard product?’

He gave a snort of laughter and immediately looked better for it. ‘Yeah, I s’pose.

‘So I take over my father’s diary. George is supposed to be studying, but he doesn’t have another exam this year, so he can take over mine. He’s cleared it with his supervisor. Maybe you’ll help out?’

‘Me? Even though I’m not Royal?’

‘Always helps to have a bit of skirt, though,’ said a voice from Richard’s other side, and Bella realised that her future brother-in-law was among those present.

He lurched round Richard and gave her a hearty kiss. ‘We’ll keep the world on its toes while you’re away, Magister.’

That was when she realised, truly realised, that Richard was going away and she would be left on her own. And knew that she could not make a fuss. It would only make things worse for him.

‘Yes, sure. I’ll stay here and keep on with the pre-Royalty arrangements, counting down to the wedding.’

‘And I’ll phone you every night.’

‘I’m banking on it.’

They spent Richard’s last two nights in England together. He sat up late at his desk, working through things. Sometimes typing at the computer. Sometimes staring into space, thinking. Bella brought him a drink or coffee or, once, cocoa because he said he couldn’t
remember what it tasted like. So she pulled on her outdoor clothes and slipped out to the Late, Late Store attached to the big local garage and came back with a tin of cocoa, sugar, because she had never seen any in his kitchen, and enough milk to sink a battleship. She made it carefully and then frothed it up as a treat.

He was writing again, but turned at her arrival by his desk. ‘What?’

‘Cocoa.’

He stared at the mug in her hand. ‘But we haven’t got any cocoa. I’ve never seen any in the Palace. I didn’t even know it was still made.’

‘Late-night garage shop,’ she said smugly. ‘And it is made by me. Taste it and see if it’s sweet enough.’

He inhaled the aroma first. ‘Oh, heavens, yes. I must have been about six the last time I had this.’ He tasted and a look of bliss came over his face. Then he lowered the mug.

‘What is it?’ Bella said. ‘Too hot, too cold? Needs cream? What?’

‘You,’ he said in an odd voice.

‘Me? Yes?’

‘You – think about me.’

‘So?’

‘You don’t understand. Lots of people take care of me, smooth my path, give me things. But that’s their job, or else they’re being polite to my father’s representative. You – think about me and then go and do what you see I want.
Yourself
.’

She stood quietly in front of him, her hands by her sides.

‘Of course,’ she said softly.

He leaned forward and rested his head against her. Bella stroked his hair. She could feel all the worry and effort and alertness drain out him, and he stayed there, just being in the moment, for the longest time. Eventually he stirred.

‘You’re wonderful,’ he said in a matter-of-fact voice, as if it were so obvious, it was just something you said to remind yourself. Like, check door key, or turn off iron.

Bella felt her heart would spill over, it was so full. This, she knew, would carry her through the next lonely six weeks without him.

It would have to.

‘The Hen Night!’ –
Daily Despatch

Richard was due out on a mid-morning flight from Heathrow on Thursday. He and Princess Eleanor were travelling on a scheduled flight, albeit first-class of course.

Neither Richard nor Bella slept very well the night before, though neither of them mentioned it – nor did they know that the other was in the same state. They were both awake early, though Richard’s manservant had packed his bags and sent them over to the Palace the day before, from where the whole party would leave.

‘Walk with me before I go?’ Richard said quietly.

There was a hazy mist over St James’s Park and the lake was as still as a mirror. Office workers were already striding through the walks, on their way to their offices in Whitehall or Piccadilly or the Strand. It seemed that only Bella and Richard had time to stop on the bridge and look at the ducks.

‘I’ll take you to Sydney another time,’ he said with sudden passion.

‘Any time you say.’

They wandered on, beneath cascading fronds of
young willow, catching the faint warm scent of crocuses in the air.

‘You will be all right. George will help. He can be a prune but his heart is in the right place.’

‘Of course I’ll be all right. I’m an independent woman. If I can survive Francis and the fish, I can survive anything.’

His fingers almost crushed hers.

At last Bella said reluctantly, ‘We’re going to have to go. You know what the office is like about punctuality.’

‘My poor love. You’re learning the hard way, aren’t you?’

They turned their back on the fantastic skyline of Whitehall and the London Eye and strode out for the Palace.

Queen Jane had insisted she was going to see her children off at the airport. She had dressed very carefully in a trim scarlet coat worn with a black pill-box hat. This was a cheerful woman, you would have said, who had no fears at all for her husband’s health. But when you got close, you saw how thick and careful the make-up was, how strained her eyes.

‘You look very handsome,’ Bella said involuntarily. ‘My grandmother Georgia would say that coat was giving a message of good cheer.’

There was an indrawn breath from Lady Pansy and a couple of others in the assembled entourage. Oh, bother, thought Bella, remembering Lady Pansy’s folder on how to address Their Majesties. Page one said, among other things, don’t address them unless Their Majesties speak to you first. Page two covered subjects
which should never, ever be raised with Their Majesties. High on the list was their personal appearance. So five minutes here and she’d broken two rules. Well done, Bella.

But, although the Queen looked surprised, her tired eyes smiled. ‘Thank you, my dear. How kind of you. I certainly hope so.’

Bella was all set to travel in the second car with Princess Eleanor, and was even moving towards it, when the Queen stopped her with a gloved hand on her arm.

‘No. You go with Richard, Bella. Stay together as long as you can.’

They drove in a convoy through Central London. As well as the two Royal cars there were also security cars in front and behind them, and motorbike outriders. All through the city traffic stopped and drew to one side to let them through. Six months ago Bella could never have imagined such progress. Now it didn’t seem to matter. She held Richard’s hand tightly all the way there. The journey didn’t take long. They didn’t speak.

At the airport they were driven to a small VIP room, where quiet, efficient officials completed passport and flight formalities painlessly. And then the two limousines drove out on to the tarmac and came to rest beside the waiting plane.

Everyone got out. Bella could feel her throat thicken with tears. This was crazy. It was six
weeks
, for God’s sake. And Richard had much more to worry about than she had; not just the trip and all the briefings he would have to catch up on as he went along, but his father’s health, too. She had seen how genuinely fond he and his
father were of each other, though neither of them ever expressed it of course.

I must not make a scene and make this harder for him, she thought.

She said brightly, ‘I want lots of photos and a kiss a day.’

He kissed her formally. But there was a smile in his eyes that was worth all the repressed sobs in her chest. ‘You’ve got it.’

He and Eleanor went up the steps. Turned at the top and waved. But not to me, thought Bella, suddenly desolate. This one is for the cameras.

When they had disappeared and the cabin doors were being closed, the Queen turned to Bella. ‘Ride back to Town with me?’

As soon as they set off, the Queen pressed a little button and a soundproof glass partition slid up between them and the chauffeur.

‘My dear, I wanted to say how grateful I am for the support you have given us all, especially Richard, over the last few days. It cannot have been easy.’

Bella did not think she could say anything without blubbing like an idiot, so she just made a vague you’re-welcome gesture.

‘Quite,’ said the Queen, understanding. ‘You behaved beautifully back there. I was very proud of you. Proud of you both. I know this is the worst time for you to be apart. I’m just so sorry that circumstances—’

Bella couldn’t take any more. ‘How is His Majesty?’ she said swiftly.

The Queen smiled. ‘Not very pleased with life. He
feels fine. But the doctors won’t release him until they know what happened. He says he’s become a lab rat and is being difficult about blood tests. The doctors have all my sympathy. He’s on fighting form.’

‘That’s good news.’

‘Yes. Now, I wanted to ask you whether you would like to move into the Palace soon? With Richard away and the wedding approaching …’

Oh, Lord, thought Bella. Is this my punishment for encouraging him to play Viking and promote Morgan’s Ginger Thins?

She said in a small voice, ‘I’m very happy sharing a flat with Charlotte Hendred.’

The Queen looked as if that surprised her. ‘Are you sure? Don’t the paparazzi make a nuisance of themselves?’

Bella grinned. ‘They stood around outside the block of flats for five days and saw Lottie and me leave to go to work every morning and come back from work every night, except for Saturday when we bought food and went to our parents’. They got bored.’

The Queen smiled perfunctorily. ‘That might change now.’

‘Now? Why?’

‘While Richard’s away. They will be watching to see who you amuse yourself with.’

For a moment Bella didn’t understand. ‘Catch me two-timing him, you mean?’

‘Not necessarily. They will be more interested as it gets closer to the date anyway. And with this unfortunate business of the promotional tee-shirt—’

‘I knew it! This is my Ginger Thins punishment.’

Queen Jane smiled. ‘No question of punishment. That was entirely Richard’s own fault and so I told him. But we thought that after that incident, especially with him away, you might find yourself a little – exposed.’

Bella was certain that ‘we’ included Lady P. Interfering old bat.

She said carefully, ‘You may be right. Can we see how it goes?’

‘Of course, my dear. I only want to help. Just remember that if the pressure becomes too great, there are always rooms at the Palace for you. We can protect you, you know.’

The only pressure, thought Bella, was from Lady P and the Meringue Party. But she did not say so. She thanked the Queen warmly instead.

‘I narrowly escaped incarceration today,’ she told Lottie that evening. ‘With Richard gone, Lady P made her move. The Queen invited me to live in the Palace.’

‘Cardiganville?’ said Lottie, who had rather taken against Lady Pansy at the Great Wedding Dress Round Table.

‘Oh, worse than that. It’s cold and dark with acres of corridors, deserted except for some pictures of men in uniform or killing animals. The Cardigan Sphere is quite cosy by comparison.’

‘Cardigans can suffocate you though,’ said Lottie darkly. ‘Now listen. I need to talk to you about the Hen Night. What do you want to do?’

Bella cheered up. She hadn’t had a really good
session with her girlfriends since they all went off to Greece the summer after college. She had seen a couple of them since she got back from the island but she had been so absorbed, between Richard and job hunting, that there were at least half a dozen girls she had still to catch up with.