My Name is Victoria

by Lucy Worsley

  ‘I hear that you would have given the princess your life if you could,’ he said, in a light and joking tone. ‘Your governess has just been telling us of your brave exploits in seeing off an intruder into the palace, back when you were just a little girl.’

  I shivered with sheer pride and tried to think of a response that would not seem boastful. But perhaps he took my bashfulness for coldness, for he turned and returned to the communal table.

  Yet each time after that when I raised my head from my work, I found that those playful, glowing eyes were upon me. And each time I noticed, I grew stiff and self-conscious. I feared that a blush was ebbing and flowing up and down my throat all afternoon. There was something about this new young prince, with his perfect, self-effacing manners, that was deeply, unsettlingly attractive.

  At length there was a call for lamps, the better for the four of them to play a game of cards, and I volunteered quickly to go to fetch them. But as I stepped along the carpeted corridor in search of Adams, I heard a soft tread behind me. I knew who it was even before I had turned to see.

  ‘I shall come to your assistance with the lamps!’ Albert said in his low, melodious voice. He stopped and bowed again and placed his hand upon his heart. ‘Now that we are alone, let us introduce ourselves less formally. I am Albert, of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.’ I inclined my head as graciously as I knew how. Of course I knew who he was, and this was hardly an informal introduction, but it was very modest and generous of him to assume that I didn’t know his name.

  Again I felt a ridiculous smile forcing my cheeks upwards.

  I was smiling so broadly that I could hardly speak, but eventually I bowed my head and whispered out the words.

  ‘And I am Victoria.’

  For some reason it felt completely natural – as it had never done before – to tell him my name. I had been called ‘Miss V’ for so long, but I wanted him to know who I really was.

  ‘Victoria,’ he said. ‘A beautiful name.’ I expected him to comment that it was the same as the princess’s.

  But he didn’t.

  ‘Victoria,’ he said again slowly, as if savouring it.

  I realised that I had allowed myself to become distracted. A bit later than was polite, I curtseyed to thank him for the compliment. But at the very same moment he bowed, and simultaneously our heads, reaching forward, actually clashed slightly. I felt the brush of his hair on my forehead. It could have been immensely awkward, the kind of difficult situation for which a response should be sought in an etiquette book, but Albert simply laughed. So I did too.

  ‘Oh Lord!’ he said. ‘I hope I have not injured you within seconds of making your acquaintance. Here, let me see.’

  He led me along the corridor, despite my protests, to where an oil lamp stood burning on a side table. Under its light he looked at me closely and became so still that my own agitation and protestation was silenced.

  ‘I see you have blue eyes!’ he said quietly. ‘And I also see that you are not hurt. Indeed, you are quite unblemished and perfect.’

  At that moment, I felt a little click inside my chest. I believe that was the first moment in my whole life when my heart truly began to beat. I was worried that the vast thumping sound of it would deafen both him and me.

  ‘Oh, nobody is perfect,’ I said at once, which made him smile. At the same time, though, I was thinking that he was very perfection itself.

  We went on along the corridor together towards the servants’ hall and the lamp room, and now we said nothing as we walked. But I sensed that something important had happened, and I could tell, from his careful tread beside me, that he was still looking at me.

  As we drew near to the shadowy place under the curve of the stairs, he stopped me again.

  ‘Excuse me for my ignorance,’ he said, ‘but am I correct in assuming that you are indeed the Miss Victoria Conroy of whom my Uncle Leopold spoke of back in Germany? Sir John is your father, is that so?’

  ‘Perfectly correct, sir.’

  Strangely, I did not mind the impropriety of our standing talking almost in the dark, although if Adams or one of the servants had come past I would have felt deeply discomfited.

  ‘My uncle has often said,’ he continued in a soft voice, ‘that you are a loyal and devoted friend to the princess. That you will always serve the princess and the country as best you know how.’

  Never had I thought to hear such words! And from the mouth of this man who was almost a stranger as well.

  ‘I … hardly know what to say,’ I stammered, again feeling a hot blush rising up my cheeks and towards my hair.

  ‘Say nothing!’ he said. ‘I can see that it almost pains you to receive praise. That, too, is the sign of a noble, unselfish character.’

  We stood there smiling at each other for such a long time that I felt almost dizzy and had to reach up my hand for the balustrade of the stairs. And then the door of the servants’ hall was swinging open, and light and voices were spilling out.

  ‘Oh, Adams,’ I said, quickly stepping forward, ‘we have come for the lamps if you please.’

  I hoped he would not see the glow in my cheeks or the sparkle that I knew to have come to my eyes. I hoped that Prince Albert would pay us a very long visit.

  Chapter 29

  Sir Walter

  And so it proved. They stayed for weeks. I had to admit that these two princes were less glamorous than Ferdinand and August, but to me – unlike Victoria – romance was not everything.

  I found Ernest to be of good sense, and Albert – why, Albert was well travelled, well educated and delightful. I grew to learn that his burst of lively conversation on the day of the reception was out of character, and that he had forced himself to it in order to make a polite first impression. But that was typical of him, to give of himself.

  Each evening, he and I usually found ourselves the most silent members of the family party. But often our eyes would meet and lock as the duchess and the rest went about their lively teasing, scolding, playing and gossiping. Even Victoria could be jollied into laughter on a good day. However, I could also tell that the plaintive, repetitive note in the duchess’s conversation pained Albert as it pained me, and sometimes he would be the first in the evening to rise and say that he must go to bed.

  ‘What a grouch my brother is!’ Ernest would say. ‘Albert the Grouch. It should be his name in the history books. Early to bed, early to rise, makes a grouch happy, wealthy and wise.’ It made me smile, for Albert seemed far from grouchy to me. And of course Ernest meant it affectionately, for he was devoted to his younger brother.

  One morning I came into the German apartment early, there to find Albert alone in the drawing room and deep in Scott’s The Bride of Lammermoor.

  ‘Are you also a devotee of Sir Walter?’ he asked as he saw me looking at his book. ‘Her Royal Highness, my cousin, has lent me this volume, which I am finding most diverting. She says it is a favourite. I was pleased and surprised to discover that she is fond of reading.’

  I could not help but smile, for it was my own copy, and Victoria, never a great bookworm, knew the story only because I had read it aloud to her.

  Albert instantly noticed my reaction. ‘Oh …’ he said slowly, ‘I believe that I might have understood. Perhaps the book is yours?’ He flipped upon the title page. ‘Yes, I am right! “Miss V. Conroy”, you have written. How enigmatic of you not to share your Christian name, even with Sir Walter.’

  ‘Sir,’ I said, ‘pray do not mock me. I am of low station. People don’t need to know my name.’

  ‘Modest and gentle!’ he said. Then he sighed. ‘I’m afraid that people do know your name, at least your surname. Please – will you sit?’ He got up out of the armchair, patted it to show that I should sit, and positioned himself on a footstool near my knee.

  ‘May I be completely open?’ he asked. He waited with his head bowed and his hand upon his heart with continental courtesy until I had begged him to go ahead.

  ‘I have already
told you some of what my Uncle Leopold has said about you,’ he began. ‘He believes that you are to be trusted utterly – a person in a thousand, he says.’

  During this speech my eyes had become trained intensely downwards towards my lap, my burning gaze almost searing through the skin on the back of my hands. There was no conceivable way that I could meet his gaze while he was talking in this painful manner.

  But at the same time the discomfort was exquisite.

  ‘Say nothing!’ Albert said quickly. ‘I can see what you feel.’ But now it was his turn to glance towards the ground. ‘Yet I’m sorry to say,’ he continued, more reluctantly, ‘that my uncle does not hold your father in such high regard.’

  He lifted his eyes back to mine. I stared back, and despite the shameful stain that must remain in my cheeks from his earlier flattery, I was unable to look away. ‘I fear that the princess is not always … well advised,’ he said, groping for words, ‘by those around her.’

  ‘I cannot help but agree, sir,’ I said simply and sincerely. ‘I do everything I can to counteract the influence of my father, which is sometimes … overbearing.’

  It was the first time, I think, that I had spoken of my fears to anyone who was not Lehzen. Yet here I was, sharing them out loud to someone I had only known for a short time. But then, I reassured myself, Albert was very far from being a stranger. In fact, it felt like I had known him forever. It was a warming thought.

  ‘I can see that it is complicated.’ He sighed again. ‘I can see that it is difficult for you, this loyalty you feel.’

  I nodded. He understood. He was a friend.

  But then a less pleasant reflection made me suddenly stand up from the chair and prepare to change the subject. Of course, we could not go on being friends like this when he was married.

  ‘It is my fate, perhaps my burden, to care deeply for the princess,’ I said. ‘Not only out of duty, but also from affection. I really do want nothing more than her happiness.’

  I was thinking now of her wedding to this prince with his mobile mouth and his expressive hands, and for the first time it was a grim prospect. Their marriage would cut me off from both of them.

  It was becoming inescapable to me that Prince Albert would be an excellent influence upon Victoria. He was calm; he was wise. Even the duchess could see this.

  The next morning, she came into the drawing room as I waited for Victoria, and asked me where he was.

  ‘In the gardens, I believe, Your Grace,’ I said.

  I had observed him from the window a few moments before, chatting good-naturedly to one of the gardeners. In fact, I had been wondering if I had enough courage to go out to join him there.

  ‘Ah, then I must send Vickelchen outside,’ she said. ‘She must spend more time with this suitor of hers.’ The word ‘suitor’ came as a little shock, for her daughter’s marriage had never been discussed directly between us before. She had spoken as if I were privy to Uncle Leopold’s plan and in support of it. I supposed that I was. After all, it was months since he had told me of what he intended. And I could see that Albert was perfect.

  ‘Indeed,’ the duchess said to herself, so softly that I could hardly hear. ‘You shall not spoil this, Sir John.’ She misted the window glass with her breath as she searched outside for her nephew. Perhaps she belatedly realised her indiscretion, for she turned suddenly towards me.

  ‘Miss V!’ she said sharply. ‘I know that my brother Leopold has confided in you. You must do everything you can to help the match proceed smoothly. That is my royal command. Your father disagrees, but I cannot allow him to wreck it. There have been … painful scenes.’

  At that she bustled off to find Victoria. Left by myself, I wondered for a few regretful moments what kind of quarrels and confusions had taken place between them. Then, as if some superior power was exerting its hold over me, I forgot to worry, and my eyes were drawn out of the window once more in search of a dark blue morning coat topped by a curly brown head.

  I knew that Victoria herself scarcely gave Albert a second glance. ‘Oh, Prince Ferdinand!’ she would say to me each morning in the sitting room before her cousins came in to join us. ‘Beautiful Prince Ferdinand! When will it stop hurting, Miss V? I have given my heart utterly and forever to Ferdinand. Ferdinand! What a wonderful, romantic name it is.’ But she admitted that Prince Ernest, with his lively conversation and good spirits, was a pleasant companion for whiling away the hours.

  And each morning I would smile at her and say nothing, though one time I had casually asked her what she thought of Prince Albert.

  ‘Oh, I know that Uncle Leopold wants me to marry him,’ she’d said dismissively. ‘But he’s such a prig! So interested in books and lectures. I could never live with a man like that.’

  This had made me both outwardly smile and inwardly wince. She may not have liked it, but it seemed that if Uncle Leopold willed it, then their destiny was to marry.

  All at once I felt a little sick inside. The thought made me horribly jealous.

  I was beginning to think that it would be utterly delightful to live with a man like Albert. I imagined us sitting each side of the fire in some small apartment like my father’s own at Kensington Palace, not in the splendid surroundings of the princess and duchess’s rooms; each of us reading a book, discussing what we would have for breakfast the next day … The thought seemed both charming, and very, very wicked. He was to be Victoria’s husband! I carefully packed my thoughts away in my mind to turn over later, at night, when I was alone in bed.

  I also did not allow myself to dwell on the fact that this visit must inevitably come to an end. If I thought about it at all, I encouraged myself with the notion that it would become easier and more satisfying once again to concentrate on Victoria’s correspondence, her dresses, our meals. I had been skimping my duties, but only because there were so many new things to think about.

  But for now, I told myself firmly, I had the excuse that the princes were still here, demanding our attention. For once, I would live from day to day and enjoy each one of them.

  Chapter 30

  Princess Sophia in Danger

  One evening, as spring moved into early summer, the dining table was set and dressed with flowers, and the family were gathered in the drawing room. The duchess tapped me on the shoulder with her fan. ‘Miss V,’ she said in what, for her, was a low voice. ‘We are expecting the Princess Sophia tonight, and dinner is ready. Please go and ask Adams to find out where she is.’

  ‘Of course.’

  I gave my curtsey and discreetly wove my way between my father, Prince Ernest and Victoria, who were vigorously discussing horses, and slipped out through the big double doors. I was wearing a new silk dress in very pale primrose yellow, and I thought it quite the prettiest thing I had ever owned. It had been ordered in a hurry last week and delivered just this morning. I had decided that I really needed several more outfits than my rather limited wardrobe contained – after all, Victoria had been telling me for years that my clothes were dull. At last, it seemed, I could dimly perceive what she had been saying.

  Out on the landing, I almost bumped into Prince Albert. ‘Good evening!’ he said, snatching my hand in his strong warm grip and carrying it up to his lips. ‘I haven’t seen that dress before, have I?’

  I bowed my head, chagrined that my little manoeuvre had been detected. I didn’t want him to think I had dressed up for him. And yet I was glad he had noticed.

  ‘I am just going to call upon the Princess Sophia across the courtyard,’ I explained. ‘She is expected to dinner but has not yet arrived. I could send Adams, but I think she would prefer it if I went myself.’

  ‘The lady with the cat?’ said Albert. ‘She is a friend of mine. Permit me to accompany you.’

  I wondered how on earth he had made the acquaintance of the old and rather batty princess. Most young men, I thought, would have run miles rather than permit themselves to be enticed into her musty drawing room. In fact, the imagined th
ought of the horror on Prince Ferdinand’s face, if summoned to the princess’s abode, made me smile.

  ‘Of course,’ I said again, leading the way by running lightly down the stairs.

  Out in the courtyard, darkness was falling. Now that it was May, the air was much warmer and more fragrant than on the inhospitable March night of the ball. But I detected something of the same atmosphere in the palace, of anticipation, of pleasure to come. The very lamps seemed to wink through the various windows in a friendly fashion, and the geraniums in the pots on the steps seemed to nod in the slight breeze. Or perhaps, as I came to think of it, the pleasure and anticipation lay not in the palace, but in myself, relishing the evening that lay ahead. An evening in the company of Albert.

  I led him quickly across the cobbles to the front door of Princess Sophia’s apartment, and knocked. There was no reply, which did not surprise me. She was very deaf, and I believed that her still more elderly maid was even deafer.

  I made as if to open the door, but Albert gripped my arm. I looked at him in some alarm. ‘Can you smell … smoke?’ he asked. Together, we craned to look in through the window of her drawing room.

  Instantly my good humour fled and my palms tingled with a strange sensation.

  The room was full of light, yes, but it was not the friendly light of hearth or lamp. Red, flickering flames were climbing the wall – I could see their very tongues attacking the wallpaper – and the furniture was only dimly to be seen through clouds of smoke.

  Even as I looked, there was a crash. Albert had used his shoulder to burst his way through the door, retreating almost at once with his sleeve across his face.

  ‘I can see her!’ he said, between retches and coughs caused by the smoke. He stood by me, with his palms placed against the wall, and spat a horrible smoky mixture out of his lungs. ‘But I cannot hold my breath for long enough to reach her. It looks like she is lying down on the hearth rug, or where it used to be.’