The Royal Governess

by Wendy Holden

  She wondered if it was, really. Sometimes she felt that she was under a great strain, one she could not talk of even to Ivy. Even to her mother; especially to her mother. A wild urge possessed her to tell him exactly what it was like, the feeling of trying to fit two different, conflicting sides of herself together; of being a mother and not being one; of being part of a family yet outside it; of coming home and not being able to relax. Of the guilt and responsibility; above all, of the loneliness. She gave Peter a bright smile. “Yes,” she said. “It’s marvelous.”

  She asked him about his job. He had moved schools and was now at one in Leicestershire, as head of the classics department. That he loved it was clear; his pale eyes shone as he spoke about his pupils, decent strapping chaps to a man. She answered his questions about her own pupil briefly and reluctantly, giving as little away as possible. “You can trust me, you know,” he said at one point, clearly hurt. “I can keep a secret.”

  “But, Peter”—from the other side of the glass wall, she met his gaze unblinkingly—“there are no secrets to keep.”

  He smiled in an accepting sort of way and opened another flank of inquiry. “Are you married?”

  She laughed. “They don’t do marriage in the Royal Household. Unless you’re actually royal, you have to leave their service.” But even this, once it was out, felt like a confession too far. Although it had done the job, made it clear she was unavailable.

  She cut into her cake with a fork. “How about you?”

  He shook his head, which was almost hairless these days. “Married to my job, I suppose.” He smiled again.

  Afterward, they hugged and went on their separate ways. She envied him his straightforwardness, the uncomplicated nature of his work. Hers, increasingly, seemed the exact opposite.

  * * *

  • • •

  NINETEEN THIRTY-THREE TURNED to 1934. “I’ve got some news,” Ivy said.

  Cold horror went through Marion. “You’re not leaving!”

  Ivy cackled. “Only to Buckingham Palace.”

  To be with Alf, obviously. She looked so happy and radiant that Marion felt a sickening rush of envy. Ivy was so lucky to have found someone to love. And on the inside as well. Within the glass wall. It was not a fate she looked likely to share.

  “Don’t look like that, Maz. I’ll get the hottest Prince of Wales gossip. The Buck House lot know all there is to know.”

  “But I’ll miss you.” The gossip was nothing beside the companionship. “Who’ll I have a mother’s ruin with in the rub a dub?” Or a gin in the pub, in Ivy’s East End argot. They had sometimes gone, in the evenings, when Alf was on duty.

  Ivy squealed. “Blimey, Maz. You’ve got the rhyming slang off now, aintcha?”

  With Ivy gone, and no one to laugh with, things that already seemed serious now seemed utterly dire. In Germany, Jewish shops were being boycotted. Hitler, claiming that they were plotting to overthrow him, had murdered Roehm, his former best friend, and Schleicher, the former chancellor. Hundreds of others had died in this “purge.” Most shockingly of all, Nazis had broken into the Chancellory in Vienna and shot dead Dr. Dollfuss, the Austrian leader. Meanwhile, in the House of Commons, Chancellor of the Exchequer Neville Chamberlain ordered MPs to be of good cheer. Things, he insisted, were about to improve. “We have now finished the story of Bleak House and are sitting down to enjoy the first chapter of Great Expectations.” Marion threw the paper across the room. She tipped her head back and massaged the tight muscles at the back. Pain beat at her temples. How long was it all going to hold together?

  She did her best to look interested when Ivy’s Buckingham Palace contacts did, as promised, produce the very latest news on the Fort Belvedere front. Lady Furness, one of the Prince of Wales’ mistresses, had gone to America. She had asked Wallis Simpson to look after her royal lover while she was away.

  “Talk about puttin’ the bleedin’ fox in charge of the henhouse!” chortled Ivy.

  Marion still could not believe that the good-natured woman she had met at the Fort was so ruthless. However, when Thelma Furness returned, the scene Ivy reported suggested that she was.

  “They was all at dinner together, and Wallis was next to the prince. Jokin’ and slappin’ ’is ’and.”

  “Slapping his hand?”

  Ivy nodded. “So they say. And Lady Furness gives ’er such a look, but she gives ’er another look back and the next mornin’ Lady F flounces out. ’Asn’t been back since.”

  “But there’s still Mrs. Dudley Ward,” Marion pointed out. “Mrs. Simpson hasn’t got the field to herself quite yet.”

  But a few weeks later Ivy reported Mrs. Dudley Ward had been blocked on the palace switchboard. “Sixteen years of devotion!” Ivy shook her head in wonderment. “Snuffed out with an order to an operator!”

  That night, Marion lay awake, worrying. She could hear, down the nursery landing, the rasping snores of Mrs. Knight. In and out, like the crashing of great waves. But also something else. Marion sat up, listened and swung her legs out of bed.

  There was a light under the door of Lilibet’s room. Marion pushed it open. “What are you doing?”

  The princess was not in bed, but crouching by it in her rose-printed nightgown. In the candlelight, her alarmed eyes shone through the rumpled gold of her hair. “I’m straightening my shoes.”

  “Straightening your shoes? But it’s the middle of the night!”

  “They weren’t quite straight.”

  Marion’s heart sank. The compulsive behavior was back with a vengeance.

  She lowered herself down and pulled the child to her, inhaling the warm scent of soap. “Don’t worry,” she murmured.

  Lilibet stiffened in her arms. She jerked backward and stared wildly at Marion. The reflected candle burned in her eyes. “But I am worried! He’s going to marry her!”

  “Who?” Marion held the child’s shaking shoulders. “Who’s going to marry who?”

  “Uncle David and the wicked witch!”

  “What? That can’t possibly be true.” Even Ivy had never mentioned that, and she mentioned everything.

  “It is! I’ve heard Mummy and Papa talking!”

  But where is Mummy now? Marion couldn’t help thinking. It wasn’t her comforting Lilibet, was it?

  “Your uncle Edward is the Prince of Wales,” she said soothingly. “He could marry any woman in the country; anyone in the world!”

  “Yes, but he only wants her! The wicked witch! I’m so worried about it. What’s going to happen?” She began to sob, gulping for breath. She had been upset before, but this was different.

  Marion rubbed her back and held her close. It felt intimate, such a motherly embrace. Feeling the stiff little body relax, she felt a rush of protective love. “Don’t worry,” she muttered into the warm, silky hair. “Nothing’s going to happen. Everything will be fine.”

  Lilibet did not reply. Her breathing, formerly fast and shallow, became slow and deep. She’s going to sleep, Marion thought.

  “What’s an adventuress?” Lilibet murmured.

  “What?” Marion, almost asleep now herself, woke up sharply. The blue eyes were looking at her with quite their old interest. The flames had gone. “Is it someone who goes on adventures?” Lilibet pressed.

  “Er . . . it sounds like it, doesn’t it? Why do you ask?”

  “I heard Grandmama say it.”

  Marion could not think of a reply to this, although it was easy to imagine on whom the unflattering epithet had been bestowed. She looked at the brogues gleaming in the candlelight, placed precisely together, their laces exactly equal lengths. “Well, your shoes look very neat now. I think you can go back to bed, Lilibet.”

  The princess looked at the shoes. “Yes, Crawfie. I think I can.”

  Marion waited for the small figure to hop back between the sheets before retur
ning to her room, where sleep evaded her the rest of the night. This could not go on. She had to do something.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  A public swimming baths?” The duchess was doubtful.

  “Yes, ma’am. It will do the girls good to mix with those their own age. Margaret can come too.”

  “But princesses should never disrobe in public!”

  Marion took a deep breath. “It’s not possible to swim without doing so, ma’am.”

  The chosen mixing and disrobing venue was the exclusive Bath Club in nearby Dover Street. But Miss Daly, the club’s fresh-faced young swimming teacher, was doubtful too. “Do I have to curtsey at the end of every length they swim?”

  “Really not necessary.” Marion smiled. “We’re all the same in the water.”

  The lesson quickly became the highlight of the children’s week. Marion would sit on the wrought-iron viewing balcony while, below, Lilibet happily trod water and Margaret, plump in her dark blue swimming costume, stood on the edge, gripping the stone flags with her toes, obviously reluctant to jump in.

  “Come on, Margaret! Don’t be a limpet!” Lilibet stuck out a hand and grabbed her sister’s ankle. Margaret squealed in horror.

  Ker-splash. Margaret was finally in now, and screaming hysterically. Lilibet was laughing. It was good to see, and even better to hear.

  The warm, chlorinated air made her feel tired, suddenly. The last few weeks especially had been very strained. Marion bent forward and rested her forehead on the rail.

  “Miss Crawford?” Miss Daly suddenly sat down beside her.

  Marion jerked her head up and looked into a pair of clear green eyes, like swimming-pool water.

  “Can I have a word?” She flicked a meaningful gaze over the balcony.

  Marion peered over to look. “Not again!”

  Miss Daly’s smile was as white and reassuring as her crisp sportswear. “I’ve tried to tell her to stay in the changing room but it might be better coming from you.”

  “Oh, much,” Marion agreed ironically as she followed Miss Daly down to the poolside, where Mrs. Knight, not for the first time, had camped out beside the water with a pile of towels, hairbrushes, talcum powder and even boxes of chocolates. “There’s enough to equip an expedition,” Marion muttered, as the two of them walked across the tiles. “I can’t think why she hasn’t included a lifeboat.”

  * * *

  • • •

  SUMMER CAME. THIS year the Prince of Wales was conspicuous by his absence at Balmoral. He was cruising the Caribbean with a party including Mrs. Simpson. Ivy had a story about her making the prince beg like a dog. “You’re making it up,” Marion said, irritably.

  Ivy gave her a wise look. “Am I, Maz? You’ll be telling me next that Prince George don’t like to dress up as a woman, didn’t used to be a drug addict and ain’t being blackmailed by one of his ex-boyfriends in Paris.”

  Marion snorted disbelievingly. Prince George, the youngest of the king’s four sons, was tall and gloriously handsome. A less sordid sight was hard to imagine.

  “And who ain’t bein’ teed up to marry this Greek princess as quick as yer like.”

  Marion shook her head. “Your problem, Ivy, is that you don’t know where to stop.”

  A day or two later, the duchess swept into the Piccadilly dining room. “Exciting news, Lilibet! Uncle George is getting married! To a beautiful princess from Greece, called Marina.”

  Marion looked at the white tablecloth, hard. She must on no account catch the eye of Ivy. Her friend was standing against the wall waiting to begin the service, looking as if butter, especially that stamped with the royal crest, wouldn’t melt in her mouth.

  “You are to be a bridesmaid at the wedding, and wear a special frock,” the duchess went on.

  Lilibet looked uncharacteristically mutinous. “I don’t like special frocks,” she muttered. “You can’t climb trees in them.” She looked down at her kilt and jersey. “I like these clothes best.”

  Marion hid a smile. Her charge had come a long way since the days of frills and ribbons.

  The duchess was still smiling brightly, but Marion detected irritation. “You can’t wear them in Westminster Abbey though, darling sweet. Crawfie will take you to the fitting tomorrow morning.”

  It was Marion’s turn to be dismayed. “Tomorrow morning?” Tomorrow morning was supposed to be spent in the schoolroom. She had thought the days of interruption were over.

  The duchess’s gaze was glassy blue. “With Mr. Hartnell in Bruton Street. I’ve ordered the car.”

  “No thank you,” Marion said firmly.

  The duchess looked astonished. “What?”

  “Bruton Street is only round the corner, ma’am. We can walk.”

  Lilibet went dressed to the nines in quite the old way, with a white coat and fussy frills. “Don’t touch those dirty railings with your gloves, Lilibet!” Mrs. Knight warned.

  Marion scowled as she hustled the princess out the door. There was no need for gloves at all in her view, let alone snow-white ones with pearl buttons at the wrists. There was no need for this whole outing, especially not during her teaching time.

  But a small part of her, even so, could not help being interested. Norman Hartnell was an up-and-coming couturier. She had seen his clothes in magazines; they were beautiful.

  Lilibet was skipping at her side. “Mr. Hartnell’s a what?”

  “Couturier. Dressmaker.”

  “Isn’t that a funny job for a man? That’s what Alah says.”

  “She would.”

  “What?”

  “I said good, we’re here.” Marion pressed the shining brass bell to the side of the imposing double doors.

  She had not known what to expect of a designer’s studio—perhaps a small room with scissors and bits of material everywhere. But Hartnell’s atelier was a very grand Georgian house. The large hallway rose to a tremendous height, a great chandelier filling the space below. There were huge, gold-framed mirrors, tall white doors, long windows to let in natural light and an elegant staircase with wrought-iron balustrade.

  A man appeared, moving quickly toward them, heels clicking on the black-and-white marble floor. “Good morning,” he said briskly. “I’m Norman Hartnell.”

  Marion had anticipated someone tall, thin and aesthetic. The man before her had the build of a sailor with a broad, tanned face and light brown wavy hair. His burly body was encased in a gray double-breasted suit of perfect fit and his shoes were polished to a brilliant shine.

  “We’re here to get my frock for Uncle Prince George’s wedding,” Lilibet announced grandly.

  “Yes, isn’t it exciting.” Norman Hartnell’s hazel eyes gleamed with amusement. “Would you like to see Aunt Princess Marina’s wedding gown?”

  Lilibet’s red mouth opened in an O of amazed delight. “Yes please.”

  He nodded at a pair of closed doors behind him. “It’s in there. Off you pop, then.”

  Lilibet popped off. The doors crashed noisily behind her. Marion shot an apologetic look at Hartnell. “Sorry.”

  The hazel eyes gleamed. “Never mind. I don’t expect she’s used to opening her own doors. And my dear, what is she wearing? The skirt of her mother’s dressing table? Why do all royal women dress so badly? I’ve seen sacks of potatoes with more style than the Duchess of York.”

  Marion stared. She had never heard anyone criticize the duchess before. It felt like heresy. It felt naughty and delightful. “Her nanny put her in it.”

  “Oh, so you’re not the nanny, then.”

  “I’m the governess.”

  “Governess? My dear, how antiquated. I didn’t realize they still existed!”

  She stared back, affronted. She was a young and modern woman, didn’t he realize?

  He had folded his arms and was looking her up and do
wn. “Mmm. I can see it now, though.”

  “See what?”

  “The governess thing.” He cocked his head to the side. “Frumpy. Mousy.”

  She felt a flash of fury. How dare he? “You try looking gorgeous on what the Yorks pay!”

  He raised a weary eyebrow. “Believe me, dear, I do. They don’t pay me much either.”

  Marion was hurt. She had always kept pace with fashion. But possibly not lately. The days of flippy pink frocks and Eton crops were far behind her.

  There was a full-length mirror on the wall close by. She studied her reflection, as now she rarely did. Looking back at her was someone she barely recognized: a tall woman without makeup and with hair in a practical bob. Her suit, of a stout, hard-wearing material in a serviceable color, was in a style that would not date but would never be fashionable either. Her shoes, again for practical reasons, were cheap, clumpy and flat. Pure horror seized Marion. Had she turned into Mrs. Knight without realizing it?

  Hartnell was standing behind her. He was picking at the worn shoulder seams of her jacket, inspecting them. “But there’s no excuse for this. Just what is this color? Less eau de Nil, more eau de sludge. Make it yourself, did you?”

  “No, my mother did,” Marion snapped.

  She watched, in the mirror, as Hartnell let go. His eyes were full of apology. “I do beg your pardon. That was very rude of me.”

  “Yes,” she said. “It was.” He deserved it being rubbed in, odious man.

  “Perhaps I can help. This is quite good material, really.” He pulled at the jacket again, bringing it in on either side of her. “I could nip in the waist, shape the skirt, raise the hem.” He came round to the front and winced. “And recut those lapels. It’s sharp and narrow at the moment. New buttons would make a difference too.”

  No thank you was on the tip of Marion’s tongue. She bit it back. Hartnell was a famous couturier. The suit had seen better days. If he wanted to make amends by entirely transforming it, then let him.