Royal

by Danielle Steel

  He took the train to London the next day and asked Annie to cover for him. He said he’d be back that night.

  “Where are you going?” she asked, curious.

  “To London, to see the queen,” he said, sounding as though he was teasing her, but he wasn’t. “Just like the nursery rhyme says.”

  “Very funny,” she said.

  He caught the train on time, and arrived promptly for the appointment with Sir Malcolm Harding, shook hands with him, and handed him the package.

  “These are all copies. I have the originals, but I don’t want them to get lost. I’ll be happy to turn them over to you, if it’s of interest to the queen, or the Queen Mother.” The secretary thanked him politely and set the bundle on his desk, and a moment later, Jonathan was back on the street, looking up at the palace where Annie’s mother had grown up.

  He took the train back to Kent and arrived in time for dinner. He was very quiet, and Annie noticed that he had worn a suit to go to town, and he seemed very formally dressed for a simple errand, but Jonathan volunteered nothing about how he had spent the afternoon. He wasn’t ready to tell her yet.

  The phone rang in his office in the stables, at nine o’clock the next morning. Jonathan was startled to hear from Sir Malcolm so soon. He went straight to the point.

  “The queen would like to meet with you tomorrow, at eleven in the morning, and she would like you to bring the girl.” They weren’t dignifying her with her title yet, and weren’t sure if she was for real. Jonathan hesitated for only a fraction of an instant, thinking that he would have to tell Annie the whole story sooner than he was ready to, but now there was no choice. He had until eleven A.M. the next day to do it.

  “Of course,” Jonathan responded about bringing Annie with him. He wondered if he was going to be arrested when he got there, and wind up in jail. Anything was possible, but he was too far down the road to back out now, and he didn’t want to. He had a bumpy stretch of road ahead of him, when he told Annie about her history, and tried to explain why Lucy had taken her in the first place, and never contacted the Windsors until now.

  He waited until he saw Annie return from exercising one of the horses, and then asked her to have lunch with him as she walked the horse back to his stall.

  “Something wrong?”

  “Not at all. I just have something I want to discuss with you,” like the fact that you’re a royal princess and part of the royal family, just a little thing like that.

  He made two sandwiches, put them on plates, and set them down on a picnic table near the barn, where they could talk.

  “Something’s up,” she said, looking suspicious after they had both sat down. “Is it something to do with Mom?” she asked.

  “Yes, and no. It’s actually old news, but your mom only told me about it two days before she died. I think you should know about it too.”

  “She left each of us a million pounds,” she teased him, and he laughed.

  “That would have been nice. Actually, it’s more complicated than that.” He wasn’t sure how to broach the subject with her, so he just plunged in and told her the story and the circumstances surrounding her birth. It got complicated here and there, but Annie followed, and at the end of his recital, she sat and stared at him, as though she’d seen a snake.

  “Stop. Let me see if I got this right. Mom was not my real mother, she didn’t give birth to me, and the woman who did died a few hours after I was born. She was a royal princess, and her mother was the queen when I was born. And the woman who is the queen now is my mother’s sister, and my grandmother is now the Queen Mother. If any of that is true, it sounds totally crazy to me. And what does that make me, if it is true?” she asked, visibly confused and more than a little overwhelmed.

  “It makes you a Royal Highness,” he said quietly. And it made Lucy, the woman Annie knew as her mother, an infant thief, a young girl who had stolen a baby and kept it a secret for more than twenty years. But Annie hadn’t absorbed that part of the story yet, and she loved the woman she knew as her mother, and the memory of her, no matter what. And Jonathan hoped she always would. Annie had been suffering terribly from her mother’s death.

  “Wait a minute,” Annie said holding a hand up, as though to stop traffic. It was all coming at her too fast. “You’re telling me that I’m a princess, that I’m royal, and related to the queen and the royal family.” He nodded and then she stared at him in disbelief. “And how did Mom get away with that for so long?”

  “Because no one knew that you existed. Tragically, everyone died, your mother, your father in the war, and both his parents. The only other family you have are the royals. And me, of course.” He smiled at her. “And I want you to know that I think what your mother did was wrong. She did it because she loved you, but just taking a child is not the way things should be done. She told me about it two days before she died. I think she would have told you herself if she hadn’t been so ill. I’m not judging your mother, but what came clear to me is that you have a right to meet your relatives, and at least know who they are. And your mother felt that way too at the end, which was why she told me the whole story. What you do after that is up to you.”

  “What if I don’t want to be a princess, Papa. I don’t think I’d like it. And what if they hate me on sight? Or don’t believe you?”

  “They might not. But why would they hate you? You’re the daughter of their beloved sister and daughter. They owe it to her to be civil to her child, and welcome you after you’ve been lost to them for so long. They never knew that you were born.”

  “I wasn’t lost. I was with you and Mama, where I belong. I don’t want to be a princess, Papa,” she said, sounding like a little girl.

  “You don’t have that choice. That’s who you are, and who you were born. We don’t get to pick and choose our families, although being related to the Royal House of Windsor is a pretty cool thing to be.”

  “When am I going to meet them?” She looked afraid.

  “Tomorrow at eleven A.M., at Buckingham Palace.”

  “Oh my God,” she said and immediately looked panicked. “I don’t think I want to be a princess, Papa. It sounds hard. I think I’ll renounce my title. Can I do that?”

  “Technically, yes. In real life, I wouldn’t. Why not enjoy it and try it out for a while? And get to know your Windsor relatives first. You might all love each other, and somehow I think it would make Lucy happy.”

  They threw away their paper plates from lunch then, and Annie left him to walk slowly back to the house. She needed time to think about everything her father had said. She was a royal princess, and had been stolen at birth by the woman she knew and loved as her mother. It sounded like a fairytale, and Annie didn’t know what to believe.

  Jonathan saw her walk into the barn later that afternoon and saddle up one of the horses. She took a horse he had discouraged her from riding before. He was a stallion who was barely broken, skittish and hard to manage, although she had never had any trouble with him. He saw her leave, heading toward one of the trails at a slow trot, and then he saw her take off across the hills at a blistering gallop, riding as hard as she could. He stood watching her for a minute, hoping no harm would come to her, as she flew across the meadow at breakneck speed, and for once, knowing what she was wrestling with and had to face the next day, he didn’t blame her a bit, or try to stop her. She was riding like the wind.

  Chapter 10

  Annie was almost silent on the brief hour’s train ride from Kent to London. She sat staring out the window, thinking of the only mother she had ever known, trying to understand who she had been at nineteen, to take a baby she believed no one wanted, and claim it as her own for twenty years. Annie couldn’t fathom why Lucy had never told her the truth. She had done it out of love for Annie, and in time, the lie had become too big to admit. She had in fact been a wonderful mother, and perhaps she
had been right and saved her from an orphanage, if the royal family had rejected her as an infant. She would never know now what they would have done.

  Annie could even less understand her place in the family she had inherited overnight. She was suddenly a royal princess with all the burdens, responsibilities, expectations, and confusion that entailed. She had no idea what was expected of her, if they would accept her, or accuse Jonathan of having concocted a lie, and Annie of being an imposter. What if the royal family didn’t believe them? Annie still couldn’t believe it herself.

  And what had her “real” mother been like? Princess Charlotte, who died at seventeen, hours after Annie was born. She didn’t know what to think, or believe, or who she was now. It was all so confusing, and she wondered if they would treat her like a fraud at the palace. Why would they believe a history as complicated as hers? She was twenty-one years old, and it was a lot to absorb. Whatever would happen at Buckingham Palace, both of her mothers were dead now. She felt like the motherless orphan she was as she stared out the window, and then turned to Jonathan with an unhappy expression.

  “I want to go to Australia,” she said in a dead voice.

  “Now? Why? What brought that on?” It was an odd idea to him.

  “Female jockeys can ride in amateur races there. I want to see what it’s like and sign up.”

  “How about an apprenticeship at the queen’s stables here instead? She has some fabulous racehorses and the best stables in the country. You could do worse.” They might be open to that idea, if they believed her story at all.

  “I’d rather go to Australia,” she said, trying not to think of the meeting they were going to. She had worn her only appropriate dress to meet the queen, who was supposedly her aunt. It was the black dress she had worn to her mother’s funeral, and Jonathan recognized it immediately. It suited Annie’s somber mood, as they headed for their fateful appointment in London. He was nervous too, but tried not to show it. He wanted to give Annie the courage to face whatever came next. His worst fear was that they would be blamed for Lucy’s youthful but very grave mistake. However innocent her intentions, she had robbed them of a child. It explained to him some of Lucy’s obsession with the royals.

  “I can’t afford to send you there,” Jonathan said apologetically about Australia. “I think you should stick around here for now, until you get things settled.”

  “What if they think I’m a fraud?”

  “They might. But then you’ll be no worse off than you were before.” He had brought the original documents with him, at their request, and all the letters, and kept handwritten copies and photographs of the documents and letters for himself, and a set made for Annie too. He had brought the leather box with him in a bag too, in case it added to their credibility.

  “Do they pay you to be a royal princess?” she asked with a mischievous look and he laughed.

  “They give you an allowance. The entire royal family gets an allowance. It would be nice for you.” There was an upside to this for her, if Lucy’s story was true and they believed her.

  “Is that why you did this?” She was worried when she said it.

  “No, I did it because they’re your family, and you deserve to know them, and they have a right to know about you.” It had crossed his mind that if they accepted her, she might not want to live with him anymore. He wasn’t her father and he had never adopted her officially. It hadn’t seemed necessary, but he might lose her in the process. Even if he did, he knew that what he was doing was correct, for her. She had a right to a life he couldn’t give her, and they could. He wanted the best for her. And in her own naïve way, Lucy had too. Jonathan was just grateful that Lucy had told him the truth before she died. Otherwise, they would never have known.

  They were both quiet as they got off the train, and he could see that Annie was anxious, and so was he. People probably tried to claim that they were part of the royal family every day. He wasn’t sure who would be there, the queen or the Queen Mother, or only the queen’s secretary.

  They took a cab from the station to Buckingham Palace, to the same entrance he had used two days before, when he had dropped off the copies of the letters and documents.

  A security guard checked their ID papers at the desk and called Sir Malcolm and told him they were there. “Miss Walsh and Mr. Baker.” She hadn’t been accepted as royal yet, and a moment later Sir Malcolm hurried down a hall, and they followed him into an elevator after Jonathan introduced Annie. He saw the secretary staring at her, as Annie gazed at the floor, and then they walked down a long carpeted hallway with portraits of members of the royal family all the way back through several centuries. They stopped at a tall door, where two uniformed palace guards opened the door and announced them, and Jonathan could feel his heart catch as he realized that at the end of the room Queen Alexandra was sitting at her desk. She stood to greet them as Jonathan bowed and Annie curtsied, and she invited them to sit down. An older woman walked into the room, and they both recognized Queen Anne the Queen Mother, for whom Annie realized now she had been named, since she was her grandmother. She was wearing a simple black suit. Jonathan and Annie stood and bowed and curtsied again. The Queen Mother had a photo album with her, and after a few moments of polite superficial conversation, she handed it to Annie.

  “Would you like to take a look?” she asked, and Annie nodded, almost too intimidated to speak. “They’re photographs of your mother as a little girl and before she went to Yorkshire. You’re only a few years older than she was then.” Annie’s eyes grew wide as she carefully turned the pages. The photographs were old, but it was easy to see that Annie was the image of her. They looked like twins. The Queen Mother had seen it too when she walked into the room, and Queen Alexandra spoke to Jonathan and Annie then. She noticed the leather box that Jonathan was still holding, and she asked to see it. He handed it to her, and she opened it carefully, moved some of the contents aside to look for the initials, and stared at Jonathan with amazement when she found them.

  “My father gave me this box on my eighteenth birthday. I gave it to Charlotte for her correspondence when she left for Yorkshire,” the Queen Mother said quietly. She looked deeply moved when she said it. “It’s a very unusual story,” the queen admitted. “But wartime can create some very odd situations. Our phone lines weren’t secure then, and Charlotte and our mother communicated entirely by letter during the time she was away. The news of her early marriage, and your impending arrival,” she smiled at Annie as she said it, “is not the sort of thing you want to write about to your mother at seventeen. She was meant to stay in Yorkshire for a year, to get away from the air raids in London, and she suffered from severe asthma. But things apparently got out of hand while she was away. It must have been an awkward situation for the countess too. It was a heavy responsibility shepherding young people that age. I don’t envy her.” She smiled at both of them again. “The tragedy for us was when she died, whatever the cause, whether from pneumonia, or…other causes in the circumstances. We knew nothing about you, Anne, until two days ago,” she said solemnly, and Annie nodded. “It’s been a shock for my mother.” The Queen Mother appeared to be fighting back tears when Annie handed the album back to her. “And for my sister, and for me as well. Charlotte died twenty-one years ago, but it seems like yesterday to us. We’re going to authenticate the documents your stepfather brought to us. Her Majesty, my mother, recognized the letters, and the leather box with the crown. They’re genuine. And once we verify the documents, so there can be no doubt about who you are, and if indeed you are my niece, and Her Majesty’s granddaughter, we’d like to introduce you to the rest of the family. But we need to be sure first. I trust that’s agreeable to you,” she asked, looking at Jonathan, and he immediately agreed.

  “I’d like to make one thing clear, Your Majesty,” he said to the young queen. “There is nothing I want from this for myself. If in fact everything check
s out, your niece should be restored to you. You all lost a great deal and it was a tragedy when Her Highness Princess Charlotte died, and Anne should know who she is and who her relatives are. There is nothing more we want from any of it.”

  “Is that true for you as well?” she asked Annie directly, and she nodded, in awe of the woman who was allegedly her aunt. She looked every inch a queen in a navy velvet suit with a string of pearls around her neck.

  “Yes,” Annie confirmed in barely more than a whisper, and then, “My father says you have wonderful horses. I would like to see them one day.”

  “That can be arranged.” The monarch smiled at her. “Do you like horses?” Annie beamed and her father laughed and relaxed a little. The meeting had been very formal so far.

  “It’s the only thing she cares about,” he answered for her. “She’s been horse mad ever since she could walk. She’s a bruising rider, and extraordinarily skilled.”

  “I want to be a jockey,” Annie added bravely, “but women are not allowed.”

  “Maybe you will be one day. And I’d be happy to arrange a tour of our stables in Newmarket with Lord Hatton, the royal racing manager.” She smiled at them both. “We have some rather famous horses there. I’m horse mad myself. And your mother was too. She was just about your size. If the papers are genuine, you both take after my great-great-grandmother Queen Victoria, who was no taller than you are. You’re the perfect size for a jockey if they ever change the rules.”

  “I hope they do,” Annie whispered and the queen smiled and stood up, and then something caught her eye.

  “You’ll be hearing from us as things proceed,” the queen said formally, but she was staring at Annie’s arm. She was wearing the gold bracelet with the heart that Lucy had given her. “May I look at your bracelet?” she said in a voice softened by emotion as Annie extended her wrist. Queen Alexandra recognized the bracelet immediately as the one she had taken from her own wrist and given Charlotte when she left for Yorkshire. “May I ask where you got that?”