by Tessa Arlen
Ma folded her arms under her bosom.
“You’re not going anywhere with my daughter until she has a good breakfast inside her. What about you, Mr. Hughes, have you eaten this morning?”
She put down three earthenware porridge bowls on the table and just as quickly followed them with cups, saucers, the milk jug, and a pot of tea. “Hope you can take your tea without sugar—there’s been none here for months. Cut some bread, Marion. How long did it take you to drive here from the south, Mr. Hughes?” She glanced out of the window at the preposterously huge car that filled the lane in the same spot that George’s Baby Austin had parked just hours ago.
“It’s a day’s drive, ma’am. I spent the night in Dunfermline. And thank you, ma’am, a good breakfast is always welcome.”
“No need to ma’am me; I’m plain Mrs. Crawford. There’s no bacon to be had, and the hens stopped laying in October. But there is oatmeal porridge, and we Scots eat it with cream and a little salt. So, sit yourself down, Mr. Hughes.”
Chapter Sixteen
January 1946
Sandringham House, Norfolk, England
I leaned forward to peer out of the window into the dark Norfolk night as Mr. Hughes steered the car through the gates of Sandringham. As we rounded the corner and the lights of the house came into view, I saw his shoulders droop from the tension of his long drive on icy roads. I caught his eyes in the rearview mirror: red-rimmed in a face lined with fatigue. We had stopped only twice and that was for petrol. I looked at my watch: we had been on the road for nearly twelve hours. With a sigh of relief, Mr. Hughes pulled up at the side door to the servants’ hall.
“Well, here we are at last, Miss Crawford.” He opened the door and helped me out of the car. My legs were cramped and stiff, my feet so cold I couldn’t tell if I was standing on them. I walked forward. So, this is how a sailor feels after weeks of being at sea. I turned to the man who held my arm in his supporting hands. “Thank you so much, Mr. Hughes, you must be exhausted.”
“Nice cuppa tea with a splash of whiskey in it, and I’ll do, Miss Crawford. Here’s Mr. Ainslie to welcome you.”
The door opened, and the king’s butler came down the steps. He took my other arm, nodding to Mr. Hughes that I was in safe hands.
“My dear Miss Crawford, I would say welcome to Sandringham, but what a sad occasion. The family are deeply distressed, as are we all.” In all the years that I had known him, I had not met a single baron, viscount, or marquis who possessed the considerate courtesy or gentle manners that Mr. Ainslie had. I felt as if I had been welcomed by a favorite uncle. He looked over his shoulder to the man who had driven nearly eight hundred miles in snow, black ice, fog, and sleet. “Mrs. Mundy has kept dinner for you, Mr. Hughes, whenever you are ready.” The chauffeur wished me a good night’s rest and got back into the Daimler to drive round to the stable block.
“You must be very tired, Miss Crawford; such a long, cold journey for you. Come along inside and let’s get you warm. I expect it’s much colder up in Scotland.” A shaft of Norfolk wind blew through the leafless trees, and I shook like an old woman with the ague. Mr. Ainslie ushered me into a chill, poorly lit servants’ hallway and up the back stairs to the second floor of the house. He pushed open a green baize door and we walked off cracked linoleum into a wide, thickly carpeted and brightly lit corridor. The scent of forced hyacinth filled the air: the queen was in residence.
“I have put you in the East room; we have no guests at Sandringham at present, only family. I hope you will be quite comfortable here.” He opened the door into a sumptuously furnished sitting room. A bright fire on the hearth, deep, comfortable chairs, heavy velvet curtains drawn against the frigid East Anglian night.
I stood, dazed and a little disoriented, as a footman carried in my suitcase; a maid followed close behind him to unpack it. They disappeared into my bedroom. I took off my hat and started to fumble at the buttons of my coat. Mr. Ainslie helped me off with it and handed it to the footman. My head swam; all I really wanted to do was to stretch out on the bed and sleep. Mr. Ainslie took me by the arm and steered me into a chair by the fire. “I will tell Her Majesty that you have arrived. She asks that you come down this evening, if you are not too tired?”
I stared up at him, my face blank. I had been received at Sandringham with the sort of deference only extended to the royal family. I must pull myself together. “Thank you, Mr. Ainslie; yes, of course, I will go to Her Majesty immediately.”
I am not here for her, I reminded myself. I am here for the girls.
“As soon as you are ready, Miss Crawford, just ring, and I will take you to the family.”
The footman set a silver tray down on the table: ham sandwiches, a pot of coffee, a covered soup tureen. It was clearly going to be a long night. I drank two cups of coffee liberally laced with fine white sugar. It was hot, sweet, and strong. I went into my bedroom to wash my face and hands. A white face, topped by untidy hair, looked back at me in the looking glass. I found my comb, put on some lipstick, and rubbed some onto my cheeks. I rang for Ainslie and followed him the length of the house and down the great staircase to the drawing room.
The king was nowhere to be seen, but the queen, Margaret, and Lilibet were sitting in front of an immense fire in the salon; its light danced on beige silk damask walls, dark wood paneling, and huge armchairs and sofas upholstered in floral chintz: the Edwardian taste of the king’s grandfather lingered everywhere in the house.
“Crawfie.” The queen lifted a heavy head. She looked exhausted, from her slumped shoulders to the hand that listlessly held her customary gin and Dubonnet. Stunned by Alah’s abrupt death, they looked like survivors of a shipwreck washed up on a lonely beach—orphans of the storm.
Any rancor I had felt toward Her Majesty evaporated at the sight of her round, forlorn face as she said my name again. “Crawfie, thank you so very much for making time for us,” she said, as if I had popped over from next door.
“My condolences, Your Majesty. Such a terrible shock.”
I turned to the two girls. Lilibet reached out a hand to me. “Crawfie, such an awfully long way . . . in this terrible weather.” Her eyes swam with tears; she drew in a breath and, in complete control of herself: “Thank you so much for coming.” She came over to me and, taking my hand, led me to the sofa. I gave hers a squeeze as we sat down together. If we had been alone, she would have laid her head on my shoulder as she used to when she was ten and Margaret was plaguing her.
“Your Royal Highness,” I said to Margaret, and she was up out of her chair by the fire and beside me on the sofa. With the two girls on either side I looked across the room at the queen.
Queen Elizabeth was always poised to take command of every situation, with the robotic serenity of a woman who has weathered countless royal tempests, but tonight she was deeply unsettled. There were dark circles under her eyes, and a network of lines around her mouth and chin puckered as she tried to smile reassurance that all would be well. Her wavering gaze hovered on the faces of her stricken children. She lifted her glass to her mouth and took a sizable sip of her drink. She was shaken to the core by her nanny’s death; the stability and security the old lady had provided all three women had gone. Alah’s brand of loyalty cannot easily be bought in postwar England.
Her Majesty’s gaze flicked over to me, rested briefly on my face with a smile of new recognition, and then passed on to the hot, clammy-handed, and snuffling Margaret. Her smile faltered, confirming everything that I had thought during the long, cold hours of my journey to Norfolk. She needs my help, and she particularly needs it with Margaret. Bobo and Ruby were stubbornly loyal to the queen, but Bobo worshiped Lilibet and had no time for Margaret except to criticize, and Ruby was easily bullied. I held the only other position of trust in Her Majesty’s life. I was her daughters’ teacher and companion of many years: providing unquestioning care, dedicated guidance. Why, even up until last May, I was th
ought to be utterly reliable, the queen’s ally.
The queen’s weakening smile became a valiant one. She took in a breath, and I saw her shoulders lift. “It does my heart good, Crawfie, to see you here with us again. The girls have been most awfully distressed; we all have. Poor Alah, we had no idea her health was so bad. She was such a stalwart soul, always ready to soldier on. Kind, dear Alah.” She lifted her glass. Her sad gaze was fixed on my face—there was no challenge, no cool assessment of my flaws, reflected there. Just the hope that I would rally to the cause.
I nodded and said, “Yes, Your Majesty,” and watched her shoulders come down a notch or two.
“She was all alone . . .” Margaret’s breathy voice broke. “She died alone. She had lunch with Bobo and Ruby . . . then went to her room to do some mending. That was at half past two in the afternoon.” A deep, gusty sob. “No one knew she had died until her maid took her tea . . .” I put out my hand to hold Margaret’s hot one. I will not let this happen to me. I will not soldier on, long past my useful life, to die alone in some little-used corner of one of their houses like poor Alah.
“Margaret, dear, she wasn’t alone. She was with us, surrounded by those who loved her.” The queen closed her eyes briefly and then treated me to a gentle smile of gratitude. “I said to His Majesty, we must ask Crawfie to come, and thank heaven you did. You can only imagine what a state poor Bobo and Ruby are in. Alah was like a mother to them too—to all of us.” Her voice wavered, just a little. Margaret forgot she was far from being a woman of the world and trembled beside me as a fresh torrent of tears broke.
I could feel Lilibet next to me, struggling to keep control. Poor little thing, I thought. Why on earth shouldn’t she give way to her grief? I turned her to me and stroked the damp tendrils of hair back from her forehead. She gulped back her tears and pressed my hand.
I reached into my handbag and distributed the clean handkerchiefs that nannies and governesses always carry. Margaret mopped her face. “The doctor said she wasn’t in any pain, she just went”—a shuddering sob—“in her . . . s-s-sleep.” Margaret desperately needed to talk about her nanny’s death. However much Alah worshiped Lilibet—diligent in her training, watchful of the respect accorded to the heir presumptive—she had adored fat, pretty baby Margaret Rose. So much in fact that she kept her corralled in her pram, playpen, or high chair when she was long able to walk.
I smoothed the palm of Margaret’s hand. “It must have been such a shock for you, Margaret. I can only imagine how sad you must feel.”
Margaret lifted a tear-streaked face to me, desperate to confide. “I was so unkind to her the other day. But I didn’t know; I just didn’t know.”
“Of course you didn’t, Margaret.” I put my arm across her bowed, shaking shoulders. “Alah probably didn’t know how ill she was either. She was happy and purposeful looking after her girls. She loved you both very much.” I turned to Lilibet to include her. “She always told me that you were her own little girls. She was so proud of you both.”
“We’ll miss her terribly,” Lilibet said; her eyes brimmed and she blinked hard.
“Yes, we . . . will,” choked out Margaret.
“Of course you will; of course you will.” Margaret trumpeted into the handkerchief again. Her hair stood up in the front in damp tufts.
“Why didn’t we know that she was so ill?” she asked her mother—her challenge rang out across the room. “We should have known, Mummy. Doctors or something . . . then we could have looked after her—properly.”
“There, there, Margaret.” The queen put her empty glass down on the table and looked around the room. She could probably do with another drink. God knows I could do with one.
I held the girls’ hands in mine.
“Just remember Alah with a glad heart,” I said, remembering the stern rules and comportment she imposed on them: rewarding the three-year-old Lilibet with a sugar biscuit when she managed to control her bladder for an entire morning.
“Remember her often, with gratitude.” Two-year-old Margaret might only play with one toy at a time, returning it to the cupboard before choosing another. In my mind I saw the patient face of a woman who unswervingly accepted the rigid class divisions of her generation: her strong jawline, her frown of admonition, how cross she became when she was worried or unsure. Kind enough in her own stoic way, but a woman with little to no imagination. Rigid loyalty, consistent rule.
And the result? Lilibet was far too self-controlled and often controlling. Margaret’s frustrations as a toddler led her to throw tantrums of such monumental fury that the two nursemaids, Bobo and Ruby, caved instantly when Alah was not there, teaching Margaret a vital lesson in how to bully.
Clara Knight—Alah, such an absolute name. A mispronunciation of Clara made decades ago by the queen when she was a child. Allah means “the God” in Arabic. The two-year-old Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon had named her nanny after the Almighty. No wonder the entire palace staff walked in fear of Mrs. Clara Knight. No wonder she had insisted on creating her own protocol among nursery servants, where she was treated with the same deference as the queen.
Margaret blew her nose again, and her breath came more evenly. Lilibet let go of my hot hand.
Was it my empty stomach or Margaret’s that growled? “Margaret, have you eaten anything at all today?” I asked. She shook her head; silent tears still seeped from the corners of her swollen eyes. “Do you think you could manage a wee bite?” She shrugged and snuffled into the handkerchief. “Let’s ask Mr. Ainslie to arrange for some soup to be sent up to the schoolroom.”
“No need to go the schoolroom, Crawfie.” The queen was on her feet. “I will arrange something for you in the dining room.” She smoothed the front of her skirt. “I must go and see that the king has everything he needs.”
She hesitated in front of her youngest daughter and, bending down, lifted Margaret’s chin to dry her cheeks with a tiny scrap of lawn and lace. “No more crying now, my darlings; best foot forward.” A motherly peck on two blotchy cheeks. I remembered how much Alah had dinned into the royal princesses that displays of any sort of emotion at all were vulgar. This is why self-disciplined Lilibet has managed to gulp down her tears more completely; her training at Alah’s hands was far stricter than that of Margaret’s.
The queen turned in the doorway. “Crawfie, will you talk with Ruby and Bobo?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. “I will pop in and see them first thing tomorrow.”
“Good,” said the queen, as if everything was now settled. “They have been asking if you would come.” I realized in that moment that Alah’s death heralded a new era for the Windsor family. Bobo was already Lilibet’s dresser, and now Ruby would continue as Margaret’s maid. The Windsor nursery would be disbanded until Lilibet married and had children of her own.
Chapter Seventeen
February 1946
Buckingham Palace, London
I bent over my desk, crossing through lists I had made all week, so furiously engaged I didn’t hear Lilibet come into my room. “What’s happening, Crawfie? You look so desperate. Has Margaret . . .” I looked up into her face.
“No, Margaret is delightful these days . . .”
“But something is bothering you.”
“Bothering” was putting it mildly. I fretfully crossed out another item on my list. I had left it too late to organize George’s visit to London properly, and now I was in a right tizzy. “A family friend, Major Buthlay, is coming down for the weekend, and I have left it too late to get tickets for The Winslow Boy. I had no idea the play was so popular, and I can’t even get tickets for anything else. And on top of that, I have no idea where to go to dinner or where the poor man will stay.” I had no need to add that palace inmates were like schoolchildren when they were let out in the great wide world.
“A visitor from Scotland!” I glanced up, expecting to see curiosity; all I s
aw was concern. “You must be looking forward to showing him London.” And as the rest sank in: “I wish I could help you, but I don’t know anything about that sort of thing either.” She sat down and considered. “We must talk to Papa’s equerry, Peter Townsend. He is so helpful, and very approachable. Mummy says he can make anything happen.” She knew that I would rather die a thousand deaths than bother the senior palace staff; they could be so very . . . chilling was probably the kindest way to put it. “Let me ask him if he can help, and if he can, he’ll let you know.”
The last thing I wanted was the rumor mill whispering that Miss Crawford was entertaining a male friend. “I don’t want to be any trouble.”
“How could you be any trouble?” She got up and came over to my desk, where I was frowning at my crossed-through lists of hotels all in the wrong neighborhoods or else, to my dismay, terribly expensive. “Peter can help with everything, Crawfie. Don’t worry about where Major Buthlay can stay. Peter has a genius for organization. Mummy and Papa call him the wizard!” She put her hand on my shoulder and glanced down into my panic-stricken face. “Oh, I see. Yes, I understand. I think we can trust Peter; he is very discreet and would completely respect your privacy. What have you planned so far?”
I cleared my throat and picked up my plan for George’s arrival on Thursday. It looked like a schedule for a school outing.
“Most of it is really simple: we both enjoy wandering around museums and galleries. Do you remember our visits to the Victoria and Albert and the National Gallery before the war, Lilibet?”
She nodded. “Yes, but my most favorite outing was when you took us to Woolworths to shop for our Christmas presents, and we went there on the top of a double-decker bus. Do you remember that? And you gave us both our tuppences so we could pay the bus conductor ourselves. Margaret and I played passengers and bus conductors for weeks. But let’s concentrate on you, for once. The play you want to see, what’s it about?”