Marrying Up

by Wendy Holden

  ‘Come on, Beano,’ the Queen coaxed, picking up a stick from the carpet of brown needles beneath the tree and throwing it for him. But instead of galloping off in an auburn blur as in his youth, Beano moved slowly across the grass, his lustrous white plume of tail – looking perhaps less lustrous now – waving less keenly than it had. ‘Come on, boy,’ urged Astrid, noting sadly the dog’s arthritic legs. Beano was not as young as he had been, but then who was?

  Beano didn’t seem to know he was old, though. He ambled towards her with his spaniel’s grin, the light of pride in his one working eye. She ruffled the top of his head; he dropped the stick and licked her hand. Astrid stooped and picked him up, not caring that his damp paws marked her dress. To bury her nose in Beano was the nearest she could now come to hugging her beloved elder son, without whom, it had to be said, Beano would very probably not exist.

  He had been the runt of the litter, and the intention had originally been that the royal dog would be the pride of his species. But once Max had seen the tiny, half-blind puppy cowering at the back of the breeder’s kennel, no other dog in the world would do. When, finally, he had left for England and the course he longed to take, his only regret, Astrid suspected, was leaving Beano. She had been required to make all manner of solemn promises to look after him, which she had fulfilled to the letter.

  Beano looked into her eyes; a question was there, as always. ‘He’ll come back soon,’ the Queen assured him. ‘There are holidays.’

  Astrid missed her son more than she had ever imagined or would admit, particularly to his father, who had been doubtful about the English veterinary course in the first place. But she was happy in the knowledge that Max was doing what he wanted. It was more than she had ever been allowed herself.

  She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the distant sound of the brass band thumping away. Astrid was not a fan of brass. But over the years she had trained herself to accept it, as she had trained herself to accept everything else about Sedona.

  At least so she had thought. Lately, however, she had been plagued by the same dream. It was twenty-five years ago and she was back in the palace of her parents, twenty-two and trembling as she was shown into the heavily furnished office of her redoubtable father the King. There came the doomy closing click of the double doors behind her. Her father looked up over a pile of state papers and regarded her sternly for a couple of seconds before brusquely gesturing that she should sit.

  Astrid could feel again the scratchy red brocade material beneath her fingers as she sank down to be told that she had, for the sake of her family, to break with the handsome American scholarship student she had met when presenting prizes at a university degree ceremony. He was not noble, he was not rich, and so she had to marry Crown Prince Engelbert of Sedona, who was both. As well as being perfectly nice and eminently suitable, but not what she had wanted, not at all.

  After this dream she would wake trembling and tearful, and Engelbert, concerned, would ask what the matter was. Astrid hated to lie, but telling her husband that it had been a nightmare about black spot on her roses seemed the lesser evil.

  Now, hugging the dog, she admired the surrounding flora. Jasmine bushes clustered thickly on the decorative balustrades beside the short flights of steps dividing one descending terrace from another. Astrid closed her eyes and inhaled the heavenly scent.

  At that precise moment, the band stopped. The Queen’s ears rang with the welcome silence. Then:

  ‘Astrid!’

  The King, his square, tanned face perspiring in the sunshine, was hurrying across the lawn in his grey suit.

  ‘Very useful meeting,’ Engelbert gasped, as he drew level. ‘We’ve had a marvellous idea.’

  ‘Good,’ Astrid said absently, her attention on her rose stems. Was that an aphid?

  ‘Don’t you want to know what it is?’ the King demanded.

  Astrid suppressed a sigh and forced a smile. ‘I’d love to.’

  ‘We’re going to generate world headlines, boost the monarchy’s popularity, attract massive numbers of visitors and promote a positive new image of Sedona.’ He rubbed his hands with glee.

  Astrid nodded. ‘Yes, I know. The marina.’

  ‘No, no, no.’ Engelbert was shaking his large head of thick, well-combed grey hair. ‘Not yet. Things must get moving financially first. And this will make them. At one stroke, Sedona will become the most glamorous place on earth. Visitors will pour in, the hotels will be full, the economy will take off like a rocket.’ He paused for breath. ‘It’s such a simple idea. I can’t imagine why I didn’t think of it before.’

  ‘But what is it?’ Astrid pressed.

  Engelbert beamed. ‘We’ll put on a royal wedding.’

  His wife stared. ‘Wedding? But whose wedding? No one in the royal family is getting married.’

  ‘On the contrary, my dear,’ the King said gleefully. ‘Max is.’

  Chapter 11

  The Queen was so surprised, she dropped her secateurs. ‘What!’ One hand flew to her mouth. ‘I knew nothing . . . he didn’t tell me . . .’ She felt confused, but more than this she felt wounded, sick even. Why had her beloved son, to whom she had always considered herself close, not confided in her?

  Engelbert chortled. ‘Of course he didn’t tell you! He doesn’t know himself!’

  ‘Doesn’t know . . .?’ None of this was making sense to Astrid. She glanced warily at her husband. Had worry about his country’s future finally driven him out of his wits?

  ‘He’ll understand, once it’s all explained to him,’ the King claimed bumptiously.

  ‘Once what is explained?’ queried the Queen.

  ‘That it’s his duty to get married. That a royal wedding is exactly what we need to bring glamour back to Sedona and give the economy a boost.’ Engelbert began talking about hotel revenues and modernising the legal framework for business.

  ‘Understand?’ Astrid was aghast. ‘But Max is at unversity! He’s not even halfway through his course. He . . . he . . . loves it,’ she added, her voice rising as she saw that none of this had any impact on the King. ‘He doesn’t want to leave. He doesn’t want to get married; I’m not even sure he has a girlfriend.’

  Engelbert snorted. ‘Well we’ll find one for him.’

  The Queen gasped. ‘Find one for him?’

  ‘Absolutely.’ The King nodded vigorously. ‘There’s bound to be some suitable gel knocking about spare in one or other of the royal houses. We just need to make some enquiries.’

  ‘Enquiries? Suitable gel?’ Astrid shook her head disbelievingly. ‘Engelbert,’ she said, after taking a deep breath. ‘I don’t know what to say. Except that you sound like a complete dinosaur.’

  The King looked unabashed. ‘Dinosaurs are big business, my dear. People can’t get enough of them. The Natural History Museum in London being just one example.’

  There was silence for a few minutes.

  ‘Of course he can’t come back,’ Astrid said furiously, deadheading rapidly to relieve her feelings.

  The King squinted angrily at his wife in the sunshine. He really needed glasses, she knew. The perfect eyesight of his younger days had long since blurred at the edges. But as Sedona monarchs traditionally never wore spectacles – weak-sighted men being by definition poorly bred and thereby unfit to rule – Engelbert must stumble through the rest of his public life more or less unable to see. Monocles were acceptable, apparently, but to Astrid’s secret relief, even Engelbert drew the line at those. In private, he wore bifocals, but whipped them off whenever a servant entered the room.

  ‘Do you mind if we go back inside?’ the King grumped. It was unforgivingly hot.

  As the Queen did not reply, he drummed his fingers testily against the warm stone. His crested signet ring flashed agitatedly. ‘My dear, our son is going to be King of Sedona. Sooner or later, he needs a suitable queen. Preferably a rich one,’ he added, thinking of the marina project. While it would be funded mainly by the rejuvenated state, a private f
ortune would undoubtedly be useful.

  Still the Queen said nothing. Engelbert looked at her crossly. Astrid was wonderful in every possible way, from her even temper to her never-altering slender figure, clad today, as always, in one of her well-cut sleeveless dresses in flattering shades of pastel. But there was no doubt she could be difficult to get through to at times. He leant against the lichened urn beside which his wife was working and tried to shade his glistening head behind a bulge of Floribunda.

  ‘We should never have sent him to university in England,’ he complained. ‘That was your idea.’

  ‘He wanted to be a vet. It’s a very good course,’ the Queen said shortly.

  ‘Well you should never have encouraged him. Vet! What business has a future King of Sedona got being a vet?’

  ‘He’s doing brilliantly well,’ Astrid reminded her husband tartly. ‘He gets top marks in every exam.’

  Her robust defence of her son masked a growing terror. Engelbert was obviously serious. And Max, she was certain, would refuse point blank to obey his father. Come back and marry a stranger, when he was doing the course of his dreams in England? There was no possibility, no chance at all.

  ‘He should have gone to university in Paris,’ the King was grumbling. ‘We wouldn’t have had to look for anyone then. Paris is choked with eligible heiresses. Rich, beautiful girls from the very best families. You can hardly avoid them.’ There was a wistful note in his voice.

  ‘Is that so?’ The Queen’s secateurs gleamed in the sunlight.

  ‘Absolutely it is,’ her husband affirmed. ‘When I was at the Sorbonne, I was going out with a duchesse, a princess and a comtesse all at the same time. At the same time . . .’

  It was at this moment, meeting the uncharacteristically icy glare of his wife, that the King realised to whom he was speaking. ‘But of course,’ he added hurriedly, ‘none of them could hold a candle to you, my dear.’

  The Queen snipped viciously at her bushes. ‘Max will refuse, and there’s an end to it,’ she said tightly.

  ‘Well he’d better not,’ Engelbert riposted.

  ‘He will. It’s out of the question. He’s a good boy,’ the Queen said, ‘but he will not be forced. Please don’t make him,’ she added, impassioned.

  The King smacked his forehead. ‘Where,’ he groaned, ‘did I go wrong with Max?’

  ‘When you put him in military uniform at the age of six?’ the Queen suggested icily.

  Her husband rounded on her furiously. ‘All crown princes of Sedona wear military uniform from the age of six. It’s—’

  ‘Traditional?’ offered the Queen, meeting his gaze boldly.

  The King stared irritably at the manicured lawns before him. ‘It’s not a question of forcing.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’ Astrid fought not to sound shrill.

  ‘No,’ Engelbert said decisively. ‘We need to encourage him. He’ll be twenty-one soon, the age at which all de Sedona princes get married.’

  ‘Used to get married,’ Astrid corrected. ‘We’ve dropped that particular rule, remember?’

  The King looked her boldly in the eye. ‘Well the PR man thought it would be a good time to bring it back. Have a competition for his hand, almost. Like one of those TV talent shows.’

  ‘Never!’ Astrid’s hand, holding her rose clippers, was shaking. ‘Never that.’

  ‘All right, all right, perhaps that’s not appropriate.’ Engelbert’s plump hands were held aloft. ‘But we need a wedding,’ he said stubbornly. ‘That’s the bottom line.’

  Astrid recognised one of the PR man’s stock phrases. Out of sheer desperation, an idea now struck her. ‘If someone has to get married, why can’t it be Giacomo?’ she suggested.

  ‘Giacomo?’ The King seemed stunned. ‘My dear, where do I begin? Because he’s not the Crown Prince? Because he needs to learn how to behave first? According to Hippolyte, Giacomo was just going to bed as he came into the office this morning.’

  Monsieur Hippolyte was the King’s long-serving private secretary, now doubling as the palace press officer. The PR consultant had been unable to believe, on arrival, that the royal family had no media representative whatsoever.

  Astrid suppressed a groan. Their younger son’s all-night visits to the local nightclub, La Cage Aux Princes, seemed worryingly frequent. Whilst the place was exclusive in the sense that only the richest were allowed in, this did not, she feared, make for the most morally elevated company. Still, as Engelbert would remind her, young men had to sow their wild oats, and at least Giacomo’s club of choice wasn’t Madame Whiplash, an establishment of even more doubtful morality than La Cage and whose existence in genteel Sedona the Queen did her best to ignore.

  ‘He’s not doing anything else,’ the Queen pointed out with persuasive speed. ‘Marriage would give him a role, do him some good.’

  But the King was shaking his head.

  Astrid felt desperate. She had to save Max somehow. Having experienced it herself, she knew the full horror of the situation now threatening him: sudden marriage to an unknown someone for the sake of the future of the state. Yet the state in question was her state; she was queen of it.

  What should she do?

  At her coronation she had sworn under oath, before the Archbishop of Sedona, to put her country first in all things. Nursing her firstborn in the quiet of the palace nursery, she had put her lips to his downy head and sworn to protect him and love him for life. Whose side should she be on? Her country’s good versus her son’s happiness. Her duty as a mother versus her duty as monarch. To which of her responsibilities should she be loyal?

  Her only hope, for the moment, was that Engelbert would not insist she became directly involved. If she were given time, she might think of a way round this appalling dilemma. A way out, even.

  ‘Obviously. So if you could just ring Max,’ the King was saying, with a casual expectation that made her see red.

  ‘Me! Why me?’ Astrid flared. ‘It’s your idea. Why don’t you ring him?’

  The King looked surprised. ‘Because you’re the best at talking him round,’ he said. ‘Max will do anything for you.’

  His words twisted the knife so agonisingly that Astrid wanted to scream. Because he loves me, and because he knows I love him and want the best for him. I don’t want to ‘talk him round’, as you put it. I know what it feels like to be made to do what you don’t want to.

  ‘I won’t,’ she muttered stubbornly, slashing at the bushes with her blade.

  Her husband watched her for a few minutes.

  ‘You have no choice,’ the King said. His tone was light, but matter of fact. ‘You’re Queen of Sedona. Your duty is to your country. You should keep your personal feelings – which I don’t pretend to understand, by the way – out of this. Max’s marriage is a matter of state, and you must support it – and me. I’m your husband, remember.’

  Astrid looked up; Engelbert’s eyes were flinty and his square, rather heavy face was set in a manner that brooked no argument. The royal mind was made up. Even so, Astrid thought hotly, she would resist it all the way.

  ‘So you’ll call Max?’

  ‘I can’t,’ she said stubbornly. ‘He’s at Oakeshott House, at Stonker Shropshire’s.’

  A mighty jolt of panic now shook Engelbert’s composure. He swallowed, and his myopic eyes narrowed. Stonker Shropshire! That settled it. If Max was with Stonker Shropshire . . .

  The handsome English duke, with his imposing height, silver hair, libidinous reputation and the allegedly enormous manhood to which his nickname referred, was something of a ladykiller even in his mid sixties. He and Astrid had been friends for many years. Had they ever been more? the King often wondered.

  For all his bombast and bluster, Engelbert was deeply insecure. He was aware that in marrying Astrid, he had strayed significantly out of his league lookswise. He adored his wife, but the fear that she had never really wanted to marry him lurked deep within, and sometimes, like now, it rose to the surface.

/>   ‘What’s he doing with Stonker?’ the King growled.

  ‘I did tell you about it,’ Astrid snapped back.

  ‘When? When?’ the King demanded. Had he really been informed? He cast Astrid a suspicious look.

  ‘I’ve told you several times,’ the Queen snorted. ‘But the only person you seem able to listen to at the moment,’ she added, her voice rising sharply, ‘is that ghastly PR man.’

  ‘He’s not ghastly,’ the King retorted. ‘He’s saving Sedona. Look, just tell Max he has to come home and get married. He’s the eldest. The Crown Prince, the heir. It’s his duty to his king and his country. He has no choice.’

  Chapter 12

  In a garden square just south of Oxford Street in central London, a dark-haired woman in a red coat and high black heels was sitting on a bench. She was keenly watching the entrance of an imposing thirties office block across the road. Above the revolving door were the words ‘Fashion House’, although, strictly speaking, the building did not require this announcement that it was the home of Fashion, the hugely influential glossy magazine. The leggy, polished creatures who kept the door in a constant spin were proof enough.

  Alexa had watched them arrive, one by one. In Porsches, Ferraris and Aston Martins they had come, driven by glamorous men who kissed them lingeringly before roaring off round the square in a cloud of smoke and money. None of these sophisticated creatures seemed to walk from the Tube, as she had done.

  She knew, however, that to feel bitter was an indulgence she could not afford. She had nowhere to stay that night, nor did she have a job. And if she didn’t get both before the end of the day, she was lost. She could either sleep on the streets or return to Mum and Dad’s; the former option seemed by far the most attractive.

  She looked glumly across at Fashion House. Fashion magazine was not her quarry; a job on its sister publication, Socialite, was her aim. On the train, it had seemed a possibility; Alexa had pictured herself swanning in, passing security with a light sally and ascending in the lift to waylay the Socialite editor, impress her with her irresistible chutzpah and talk her way into a job.