Too Many Notes, Mr Mozart

by Bernard Bastable

  ‘Reasons of vanity more than health,’ said the Princess, rather brutally. ‘Didn’t like people seeing him looking like he did, so fat and old. Poor George. He was good to his sisters. I have to keep telling myself that.’

  ‘All of this means,’ I said, ‘that the new King is much liked – not just in the streets of London, as everyone knows, but also at court, in good society generally. Only the very stuffy and starchy shake their heads. And it is not just a matter of liking: people feel almost protective towards him. They consider he is good-natured, and would not like to see him hurt by a snub.’ Seeing the Duchess purse up her lips, I added, ‘Since Your Royal Highness asked my opinion, I could only give it honestly.’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ she said, but a bit reluctantly. ‘Naturally the court now includes the King’s children.’

  ‘Yes, it does.’

  ‘It is out of the question for the Princess Victoria to meet the FitzClarences.’

  Here was the nub. The way she said it left no room for negotiation, but I had my hopes. In this matter Sir John’s interests coincided with the King’s. Sir John left the speaking to me.

  ‘Many of the King’s daughters have married gentlemen, members of the aristocracy,’ I said, meeting the Duchess’s disapproving eyes. ‘They go everywhere. It would be extremely awkward to insist that the Princess not meet them at court.’

  ‘It is not a question of who they have married, it’s a question of who they are, who their mother vas.’

  I knew Mrs Jordan. A more charming and generous creature never existed. And she had more genius in her smallest toe than this whole Royal Family had in their collected lumpy bodies. I boiled – but well under the surface.

  ‘It is surely a good principle to show disapproval of vice only towards the sinners themselves,’ I suggested, ‘not to the innocent results of the sin.’

  ‘Even Mama received George FitzClarence after he came back from the French wars,’ said Princess Sophia. ‘Wonderfully handsome he was then – still is, so I’m told, though I haven’t seen him for years.’

  ‘I don’t greatly like these loose modern notions,’ said the Duchess obstinately, unimpressed by our attempts to soften her moral tone. ‘These are bastard children. If I am to show disapproval only of the sinner, vy should I go visiting to the King? In fact I dislike – pardon me, Sophia dear – the whole idea of letting Victoria associate herself with her father’s brothers.’

  Since the Duchess’s own family had a pretty spectacular (and recent) scandal in it, that seemed pretty rich. I also felt in my more charitable moments that – the Prince of Wales apart – the Royal Dukes were notably domestic men who had had the misfortune to fall foul of the iniquitous Royal Marriages Act. However I could find no way of suggesting tactfully that the Duchess’s late husband had been notably faithful to his French-Canadian mistress until the need to provide an heir dragged him away from her into the Duchess’s arms. Fortunately Princess Sophia intervened.

  ‘We none of us could marry, unless we married royalty. The Continent was shut off by war. What could we do? William was only human, like the rest of us. I think you could swallow a few FitzClarences, my dear.’

  I thought it was time to be practical.

  ‘I suggest, respectfully, that if Sir John were to write – so as not to involve you, Your Royal Highness, too directly – and suggest it would be a little overwhelming for the Princess Victoria to meet too many hitherto unknown cousins at once—’

  ‘Cousins!’ said the Duchess.

  ‘I know the King is anxious to calm your fears and meet your wishes, no one more so,’ I said. ‘But he is a man of strong affections and quick temper. It would not do to try to dictate to him on anything.’

  ‘That seems a prudent and sensible course, Ma’am,’ said Sir John to the Duchess.

  ‘Particularly as Vicky has to know what a court is,’ said Princess Sophia, ‘before she has to lead one herself.’

  ‘That is in the lap of providence,’ said the Duchess, still very tight-lipped. ‘It may be that I shall be able to teach her by example how a decorous court should be run, so that it is an example to the nation.’

  It was time to be blunt.

  ‘All the more reason,’ I said, ‘not to risk unpopularity at the present time. A regency would be in the gift of Parliament. A Whig parliament might be expected to look kindly on the Duke of Sussex or the Duke of Cambridge – liberal thinkers both – as possible Regents.’

  I was voicing the unthinkable. Unfortunately for the Duchess it happened to be true. There was no way she could be sure, in the, event of the King’s death, that the Regency would be hers. She had been brought up in a sufficiently homely German court to be used to all sorts of people speaking their minds, little though she liked it. After a long pause she simply said, ‘Yes.’

  I think she may have been merely accepting the awful possibility that Parliament would refuse to make her Regent. But we took it to mean a consent to the Princess going to Windsor.

  ‘That is very satisfactory,’ said Sir John, rubbing his hands.

  ‘I’m sure that’s right, my dear,’ said the Princess Sophia. ‘And I shall be there to do any shielding of Vicky that may be necessary.’

  The Princess’s very poor eyesight made her unlikely to be of much use in guarding Victoria, but her words brought us to a most important subsidiary matter.

  ‘That is a point on which I would like to make a suggestion,’ I put in.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘The Princess will have her personal maid with her—?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘But the maid will inevitably be behind the scenes, as it were – forgive me: I am a man of the theatre and I think in theatrical terms. Your Royal Highness and Sir John will be much occupied, there will be many people to meet, much to talk about – people you should talk to, on your first visit to the new Court. I wonder whether the Princess should have someone else around her, someone to shield her from … unfortunate encounters.’

  I wasn’t being quite honest here. I was influenced in this suggestion by the words of Ned Dorkle, foolish and alarmist though I had thought them at the time. I did not care in the least about the possibility of the Princess talking with any of the FitzClarences or their offspring – unless of course it was they who constituted some kind of danger. But it was danger I was thinking about, though at the same time the idea of danger to her, at the heart of a brilliant court, anxious to pay homage to her as the heiress presumptive, seemed sheer nonsense. I hoped it was.

  ‘That is an excellent idea,’ said the Duchess, thawing.

  ‘Perhaps the Baroness Späth?’

  ‘Späth has gone back to Germany.’

  My heart sank. But she was, perhaps, too inclined to somnolence for the job.

  ‘The Princess’s governess? You could say she would be continuing with her lessons during her stay.’

  ‘An excellent idea. Lehzen could be with her all the time.’

  ‘And I wonder—’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I wonder if Sir John might express the hope that the Duke of Cumberland might not be invited to Windsor at the same time as the Princess. The King and he are on such bad terms that it surely wouldn’t give offence. No doubt the sensational newspapers are exaggerating when they talk about his hatred for the single person that stands between him and the throne, but—’

  ‘I don’t think they are exaggerating at all,’ said the Duchess firmly. ‘You are full of excellent ideas, Mr Mozart.’

  And there we left it. The lesson that day was watched over by Baroness Lehzen – prim, strong-featured, a woman of rigid principles and devotion to duty. She was not readily to be lulled to sleep. The Princess was boiling over with frustration. When finally the Baroness did nod off for a few moments, she said, ‘What are we to do?’

  ‘I will write you notes,’ I whispered. ‘Be ready to receive them as I change the music on the stand, or when I put my hand over to show you how a phrase should
go.’

  It was all very cloak-and-dagger, and more than a little absurd. So it was, too, when, as I was leaving the Duchess of Kent’s apartments Ned Dorkle whispered, ‘Under the copper beeches in ten minutes. The Princess’s maid will come.’

  I had little idea what a copper beech looked like, but I decided it was probably copper-coloured in its leafage. I made for the splendid specimen a few hundred yards from the palace, and there, soon after, came hurrying a respectably-dressed woman, with an intelligent face that was lined with cares – poverty, perhaps, or great loss were limned there.

  ‘Mr Mozart?’

  Her voice was contralto, Scottish, and tinged, even in such innocuous words, with drama. Without needing words we both took ourselves round to the side of the tree that was out of sight of the palace. She looked at me earnestly.

  ‘Mr Mozart, I can only tarry a few minutes. I hearr it’s almost sairtain that my little lass is going to Windsor and this grand party?’

  ‘I think I got the Duchess to look more favourably on the idea. The Princess will be pleased.’

  ‘Oh, the Princess will be over the moon!’

  ‘But?’ She frowned and shook her head.

  ‘Mr Mozart, you’ve no idea what a hairmit the little lass has been. Seeing no one her own age, hardly seeing a morrtal soul except her ain mother and her household. It’s no natural. It is no way to brring up a future queen!’

  ‘I would agree entirely about that. But isn’t this a step in the right direction?’

  ‘All at once, after such an upbrringing, to land her in the middle of a host of fine ladies and gentlemen? Think how bewildered the puir lassie will be!’

  ‘I think the poor lassie has a much stronger head on her shoulders than you give her credit for.’

  ‘Aye, mebbe. But she is but a child. You’ll need to shield her, Mr Mozart. Not just from doing anything foolish, but from danger.’

  ‘I really don’t think—’

  ‘Aye, from danger! From folk who wish her harm!’ There was entering a touch of Mrs Radcliffe into the conversation that I deplored. Aged servants with prophecies of doom and destruction were staples of her novels that I greatly disliked. They were not in my line at all.

  ‘I’m sure you are needlessly worried.’

  ‘Remember there’s none of the family that wish her well.’

  ‘Oh, surely that’s an exaggeration. Apart from the Duke of Cumberland—’

  ‘And none of the King’s family wish her well.’

  ‘Oh, but they can’t profit by harming her. And the King is good nature itself.’

  ‘Aye. And have you thought about that, Mr Mozart? Mebee it is in the King’s good nature that the greatest danger lies.’

  With which lugubrious warning she twitched her skirts and hurried back towards the palace.

  6. Festivities

  The King could look quite king-like if he chose.

  If he stood quite still, and if you were looking at him from below, and couldn’t see the pineapple shape of his head, and if he was wearing, as now, a decoration in the form of a sash across his chest, you could imagine him as a sovereign of the last century, a benevolent despot, loved and respected by his people.

  Then he would bustle forward, and he would become a plump, fussy old gentleman in garish fancy dress.

  These reflections were prompted by watching the King as he waited for his guests to arrive at Windsor Castle.

  ‘Damned woman, she’s late already and not a sign of them coming through the park,’ he said. He looked at his wife with affection. ‘Edward made a shocking bad choice of wife, that’s the truth of it, and I made a damned good one.’

  The Queen, who was standing beside him, returned his look and gave him a watery smile.

  ‘If I may make a suggestion, Your Majesty …’ I ventured. He turned at once towards me, with the utmost good humour.

  ‘Do, Mr Mozart. Everything you’ve suggested so far has been damned sensible – eh, Adelaide? You’ve got a sharp brain in your head, anyone ever told you that? I intend to be guided by you this whole visit.’

  I had no illusions that he intended any such thing, or that if he did it would last more than a minute. But I tried.

  ‘I suggest that when the Duchess and the Princess arrive, Your Majesties should receive them as formally, as regally, as possible.

  I suspect that Your Majesty’s instinct would be to go down into the courtyard, give the Princess a hug—’

  ‘Certainly it would, eh, Adelaide?’

  ‘It would, it would, William. I honour you for it.’

  ‘But children like the idea of a king,’ I went on determinedly. ‘Even a little girl who is a princess and who will one day be Queen likes the thought of meeting a real king. She is too old for fairy tales, but she reads her Shakespeare, and the idea of kingship will excite her. But the important one is the Duchess. The more familiar you are to her, the more she will think she can take liberties. The more remote and king-like you are, the more – forgive the plain speaking about your sister-in-law – she will be shamed into good behaviour.’

  The King drew his finger across his nose, a habit he had when in a state of doubt or anxiety.

  ‘It’ll be damnably difficult, eh, Adelaide? We’d like to be a second father and mother to the little girl.’

  ‘I think Mr Mozart is right,’ put in the Queen, gently but forcibly. ‘You must try to enforce a proper respect for the Crown. The Duchess has never behaved respectfully to her English relatives.’

  ‘She does not speak of them respectfully,’ I ventured. ‘And she forgets that in her own family there is a scandal—’

  ‘Oh ho!’ roared the King, in high enjoyment, slapping his thigh. ‘The mother of Ernest and Albert. Frolicsome filly. If I’d been her husband I’d have given her a jolly good spanking, not let her bolt off with her … Well, well, least said. We take your point, Mr Mozart. We’ll do as you say.’

  And there we left the matter. I was not hopeful of my advice being followed.

  I had arrived at the castle that morning, which I had spent rehearsing the actors for Victor and Victoria. In the early afternoon they, and Mr Popper, had returned to London for the evening performance at the Queen’s (to the great regret of the King, who clearly enjoyed their company more than he enjoyed the company of his courtiers). My joy at seeing the back of Mr Popper was tempered by the knowledge that he would be returning for the performance next day, though for all he would contribute to it he could better have stayed away.

  The Duchess and her party arrived an hour and a half late, by which time all the other guests were in the castle, including George FitzClarence and his children and the Errolls, the two families of the King’s natural children who were invited to the gathering. The Duchess and the Princess were shown to their rooms by the castle’s flunkeys (a decidedly chastening experience, as I knew to my cost). They only emerged from their apartment and came down to be received by the King half an hour before dinner.

  King William was warned of their approach by a sign from the footman at the door. He disengaged himself from a bundle of little FitzClarences and Errolls and stood in the centre of the room to receive his niece and his sister-in-law. The Grand Reception Room gradually fell silent. The Duchess, holding the Princess by the hand, was advancing into the room with apparent confidence, then seemed to lose it a little as she saw the King and Queen standing in the middle of the room, with everyone silent and space made for them to come forward and pay their respects. She swallowed and proceeded forward, clutching her daughter who was wide-eyed and clearly both intimidated yet enjoying herself. When they reached the King and the Queen the Duchess curtsied, and the Princess quite theatrically followed suit. The King broke down.

  ‘Wonderful to see you, my dear!’ he said, bending down to kiss his niece, and obviously wanting to heave the doll-like little thing up into his arms to swing her over his head. ‘We don’t see enough of you, not by a long chalk!’ He turned to her mother, and kissed her
. ‘We are very pleased you have come, my dear Victoria.’

  It was the first time I had heard anybody call her by her name. Mostly people close to her called her ‘Duchess’, to avoid confusion with her daughter, who had been called after her. It was, in my view, a most unfortunate choice of name for a princess close to the throne. Who could imagine a Queen Victoria? Elizabeth or Mary would have been much more suitable.

  Queen Adelaide behaved admirably, as in her dowdy way she generally did. She kissed the Duchess, then took the Princess a little aside for a chat. After a minute or two she led her over to introduce her to the other children in the room. The Duchess’s face darkened, but she was held in conversation by the King, and she had been sufficiently awed by the formality of his initial reception of her to make no protest. Mere tact, I suspected, would not have made her hold her tongue.

  The Duchess had delayed her entry so long that there was little opportunity for parleying before it was time to go in to dinner. This was probably going to be her strategy for the whole visit. The King led her in to dinner (a compliment she gave the impression she could very well have done without), and the Queen was taken in by George FitzClarence, a fact which gave a fleeting expression of satisfaction to his handsome, brooding face. The children were taken off to eat elsewhere, but, by a happy touch which I suspect he often displayed where children were concerned, the King had decreed that Princess Victoria was to eat with the grown-ups, and had given her a companion to sit beside her: the young Prince George of Cambridge. Since he was the only one of the King’s brothers to have led a blameless life, this boy’s father, the Duke of Cambridge, was put at the Duchess of Kent’s side at the top of the table, so she had nothing to complain about, beyond, probably, the rambling and scurrilous nature of the King’s conversation.

  I was, of course, seated in a position of great obscurity, if any position in the Waterloo Chamber could be regarded as obscure. Even so I was surrounded by people who wondered why I was there at all. It had its advantages, however. For example, Sir John Conroy was three places up on the other side of the table, and when talk died down around me (as it frequently did, since none of the people by whom I was surrounded had anything in common with each other), I could hear his conversation with Lord Howe, the new Queen’s Chamberlain.