by Jean Plaidy
Charles received him with pleasure and so did Lizzie Armistead. A delightful woman, Lizzie; she reminded him in some ways of Maria – a pale shadow of Maria, of course; but that serenity, that poise! And Charles had changed since they lived together in an almost respectable manner. It showed what the right kind of woman could do for a man. Charles, he believed, was more or less faithful to Lizzie; he still drank too much and gambled heavily – but he had changed. He had mellowed; it was as though he had found something well worth while in life.
The Prince sighed. It would be the same with him and Maria. He had sown enough wild oats; he wanted now to reap the contentment which should be the right of any man who was capable of enjoying it.
‘We are honoured, Your Highness,’ said Lizzie, sweeping a graceful curtsey. She gave no hint that they had once been very intimate indeed. Admirable Lizzie!
He embraced her with tears in his eyes.
‘I am happy to see you well, my dear. And Charles?’
Charles had heard his arrival and was coming out to greet him.
‘My dear, dear friend.’
Tears, thought Charles. This means he wants me to do something. How can I induce the woman to throw aside her principles and jump into bed with him?
‘Your Highness, you honour us.’
‘And envy you, you fortunate pair! I would give up everything to know contentment such as you enjoy in this little cottage.’
Cottage! thought Lizzie. It was scarcely that. It was a comfortably sized house and she was very proud of it. Compared with Carlton House, of course …
‘We are astonished that Your Highness should deign to visit such a humble dwelling,’ she replied.
‘My sweet Liz, it’s not the dwelling I come to see but you two dear friends.’
‘Your Highness will come into our humble drawing room doubtless,’ said Fox, ‘and perhaps partake of a little humble refreshment which will be served by our humble servants.’
The Prince laughed through his tears. Then he said appealingly: ‘The humility is all on my side, Charles. I come to beg of you to help me.’
He sat in the drawing room, diminishing it by his dazzling presence. His large plump form weighing heavily on the chair he had selected – feet stretched before him, glittering shoe buckles almost vying with the magnificent diamond star on the left side of his elegant green coat.
When wine had been brought he looked helplessly from Charles to Lizzie. ‘What am I going to do?’ he demanded. ‘She receives me. She is kind; she laughs; she is gracious; but she will not allow me to as much as kiss her cheek.’
‘Mrs Robinson held off for a very long time,’ said Lizzie. ‘I remember how she used to pace up and down her room and declaim: “His wife I cannot be. His mistress I will never be.” It is a quotation, from some play most likely. She was full of such quotations. But all the time she had a firm intention to give in. She was being reluctant in order to make you more eager.’
‘You cannot compare Mrs Robinson with Mrs Fitzherbert.’
‘Except that they are both women. Mrs Robinson had one husband and Mrs Fitzherbert has had two.’
‘Perdita’s husband was living. He was somewhere in the background. Maria has been twice widowed.’
Lizzie knew when to be silent. Charles said: ‘Has Your Highness tried offering her estates … er …’
The Prince laughed bitterly. ‘You don’t know Maria. She does not want money. She had made it clear to me that she is perfectly happy with her income. Moreover, she knows how to live within it which is more than we do within ours.’
‘If she were not such an admirable woman,’ said Charles, ‘we should not be confronted by this impasse. Virtue can have its drawbacks. A little sin is very convenient now and then.’
It was Lizzie’s turn to flash a warning at Charles.
‘We must try to find some solution to His Highness’s problem,’ she said. ‘He knows we would do anything … just anything …’
‘My dear, dear Lizzie, I know it well.’ The tears were in his eyes; he covered his face with his hands. ‘But what … what … what?’
‘Has your Highness explored every approach? Is there anything that would make the lady relent?’
The Prince looked hopeful. ‘She is fond of me. I am certain that the objection has nothing to do with my person. But she is a strict Catholic and this is at the heart of the matter. How lucky those of you are who are not born royal. You can marry where you will. You do not have to be dictated to. You are not at the beck and call of an old tyrant. The State does not decide with whom you shall spend your life, who shall bear your children. Oh, you most fortunate people. They will soon be trying to marry me to some hideous German woman. I know it. I shall be expected to fawn on her and pretend to be in love with her. I tell you there is no one I want but Maria … Maria … Maria!’
Charles said: ‘There must be a way. We will find it, Your Highness.’
The Prince’s smile was immediately sunny. ‘You will, Charles, I know you will, my dear good friend. I don’t know what I should do without you, and you too, Lizzie. God bless you both.’
The Prince rode away from Chertsey in a happier state of mind from that in which he had come, but Charles was grave.
‘The Guelphs,’ he said, ‘have always been able to turn on the tears at the least provocation; but this is a perpetual flow. I don’t like it, Liz. He’s getting desperate. God knows what he will do. He’s capable of the utmost folly. Why can’t he have the sense to fall in love with a nice sensible whore. Why does he have to choose this respectable, deeply religious, highly virtuous matron?’
‘What are you going to suggest to him?’
‘God knows. I saw marriage in his eye. You heard what he said about the hideous German. It shows which way his thoughts are turning. This will give Papa a hundred sleepless nights where he suffered but twenty before.’
‘He can’t marry Maria Fitzherbert. What about the Marriage Act? It wouldn’t be a legal marriage.’
‘No, and the woman’s not only a Catholic. She’s a Tory.’
‘He surely would never go over to them. It would mean being on the side of the King.’
‘I think his desire for Maria is greater than his hatred of his father. Most definitely we are up against a tricky situation. Action will have to be taken in a very short time.’
‘At least,’ said Lizzie, ‘sorrow does not affect his weight. I thought he was going to break my chair when he sat there creaking on it.’
‘Your very humble chair, Liz.’
‘At least,’ said Lizzie with an air of pride, ‘it is paid for.’
‘Oh, admirable Lizzie. If only H.R.H. were as lucky in love as I!’
Charles was going to help him and that was something; but this was a devilishly tricky situation and he decided to call in the help of his dearest Duchess.
Georgiana received him with great sympathy and when he had wept a little in her beautiful drawing room at Devonshire House, which was very different from that in Chertsey, he demanded of Georgiana what he was going to do.
Georgiana shook her head. ‘Maria seems adamant.’
He covered his face with his hands.
‘Dearest Highness, there must be a way out of this.’
‘What, Georgiana, what?’
Georgiana was silent. Why had the woman come to Court? Why had she not married another old husband and stayed in the country nursing him? That was the life which would suit her. She was beautiful in her way, thought Georgiana, but there was nothing especially wonderful about her. Her nose was too long and prominent anyway … quite an aggressive nose. Georgiana wondered that the Prince couldn’t see it. When she thought of her own rather pert and pretty nose, her own beauty … she could not understand it. Why should he have to be so enamoured of this … matron? There was no other word for her. She had not borne children but she was like a mother. She would be fat in a few years time, Georgiana prophesied. And she must be nearly twenty-nine. Thirty, possibly, a
nd he twenty-two! It was a ridiculous situation. It was not that Georgiana disliked Maria Fitzherbert. Far from it. She was an interesting and pleasant creature. But she was a little tiresome in her virtue. After all, a love affair with the Prince of Wales would not have impaired it all that much, and what she lost in virtue she would have gained in prestige.
Poor dear Prince, he was so distrait and he was such a darling spoilt boy who was bewildered because here was a woman who did not fall to his grasp as soon as he held up his pleading hands.
She, Georgiana, had refused him, and that had kept him eager for her; but this was different; he was obsessed with Maria Fitzherbert as he never had been for the Duchess of Devonshire.
Still, she must not allow her pique to interfere with her friendship because she was discovering that she really was genuinely fond of him.
‘I have an idea.’
‘Yes, yes …’
‘I am fond of Maria …’
The Prince seized her hands and covered them with kisses. His dearest Georgiana! Such good sense …! So clever …! Besides being beautiful she was the wisest, best woman in the world … next to Maria.
‘I think I could talk to her. I could discover if there is anything that can be done. If there is a way out … I could perhaps speak more frankly on this rather delicate matter than you … and if you would give me your permission …’
‘My dearest, dearest Georgiana, you will be my saviour, I know it.’
‘You know that I will do everything in my power to help you.’
‘I know it. God bless you.’
He was in tears again.
The Duchess’s carriage had taken her to Richmond.
Now, she thought, to talk with the Sweet Lass of Richmond Hill. Not such a lass. It would be easier if she were.
‘My dear Maria!’
‘Welcome, Duchess.’
The Duchess surveyed her appraisingly. It is because she is different, she thought. That must be the answer. Those eyes are good and her hair is lovely, of course; her complexion clear and fresh and the bosom … well it’s very fine. Marble hills indeed. But soft and billowy. He’ll be able to weep on that in comfort.
‘Maria, you know what I have come about. The Prince has been to see me.’
Maria sighed. One had to admire her. She is genuine, thought Georgiana. She really means she will not become his mistress.
‘His Highness is in a very sad state.’
Maria had taken the Duchess to her drawing room, which was very elegant though of course very small and by no means to be compared with Devonshire and Carlton Houses.
‘I have been thinking of what will be best for me to do and I have come to the conclusion that if I went away for a while he would turn his attention to someone else.’
She spoke in a matter-of-fact voice. What a calm and sensible woman! How different from that dreadful actress who had imagined herself on a stage all the time. Georgiana remembered how that vulgar little upstart had tried to wrest from her – Georgiana – the title of leader of fashion. The thought infuriated her even now, to think of that woman parading herself in the Mall or at the Pantheon and the Rotunda in her outrageous costumes … all in an endeavour to make people look at her instead of at the Duchess of Devonshire.
Georgiana smoothed the velvet of her skirts made specially to her own design. No fear of Maria Fitzherbert being so foolish. She was really what one could call a very nice, sensible woman. No airs – complete sincerity. Georgiana had seen that her mission would be in vain; she had had a lurking suspicion that if Maria were offered a large enough reward she would have succumbed and she would have been the one to discover it and so bring happiness to the Prince. But no. Maria was sincere in her determination not to enter into an irregular relationship with the Prince.
‘Wherever you went he would follow,’ said the Duchess.
‘Not if I went abroad. He cannot leave the country without the King’s consent. I have lived a great many years of my life in France. I was educated there and when my second husband was ill I took him to Nice. We lived there for almost a year. I have friends in France. I speak French as well as I speak English. So … it seems a natural choice.’
‘And when do you propose to go?’
‘Within the next few days. I have in fact made all my arrangements.’
‘Heaven knows what the Prince will do.’
Maria smiled, a little sadly Georgiana noticed, and she said quickly: ‘You are fond of him?’
‘How could I help it?’ Maria was by nature frank. ‘This has all been so … flattering. And he has been charming to me. I have been surprised that one in his position could be so … so humble … so modest … and so kind.’
‘You sound as though you are a little in love with him.’
‘If circumstances were different …’
‘Ah,’ said the Duchess promptly. ‘If he were in the position Mr Weld or Mr Fitzherbert had been in … you would not hesitate.’
‘No,’ said Maria, ‘I would not hesitate. Yes, I am fond of him. It is impossible not to be. He has great charm. He is so young … and I …’
‘And your husbands have been so old. Oh, Maria, how cruel is fate. If only he were Mr Guelph with a pleasant estate in the country all could end happily.’
‘My dear Duchess, how kind you are to concern yourself with our affairs.’
‘Is there nothing that can be done?’
‘Nothing. The Prince is pressing me to become his mistress. I could never agree to that. It is against my beliefs … my religion. I could never be happy in such a position and therefore nor would he be. I have thought a great deal of this. It saddens me. I shall miss him sorely, but I know that my best plan is to leave the country. In time he will turn his attentions to someone else … and then I shall return.’
‘My dear Maria, what a noble creature you are! How I wish that you were a Protestant German Princess. Then I think His Highness would be the happiest man alive.’
Georgiana went straight to the Prince.
‘I have seen Maria. I have very bad news for Your Highness. I had been better tell you at once. Maria is planning to leave the country.’
The Prince wailed in his anguish.
‘She is leaving in two days’ time. That gives us a very short space for some action.’
‘Georgiana, she must not be allowed to go. She must not.’
‘We’ll have to think of something. Never fear, we shall. Charles and I will put our heads together. But one thing I have discovered; she will never be your mistress. You’ll have to have some sort of marriage.’
‘I’d marry her tomorrow.’
Oh dear, thought Georgiana, I’d better see Charles at once.
‘Don’t go to her today,’ pleaded Georgiana. ‘You might drive her into leaving earlier. We have a day or so to think of something.’ He looked so desperate that she said: ‘But she is in love with you. That much she has admitted.’
‘Georgiana!’
‘Oh yes. She couldn’t hide it from me. She is very unhappy to leave you. But it’s this religion of hers. She can’t live in sin. She’d rather be miserable for the rest of her life than that. That’s the situation.’
‘But she loves me! She loves me! She has told you this, Georgiana, dear, dear Georgiana. What did she say?’
‘That you were charming and modest and irresistible. In fact I suspect that is why she is running away … because she is afraid that her reserves might break down.’
‘But this is the best news I have heard for weeks.’
‘She is leaving, remember, for France.’
‘She must be stopped.’
‘How? You cannot stop one of His Majesty’s subjects from leaving the country unless you have a very good reason for doing so.’
‘A very good reason! I shall die if she goes.’
‘His Majesty would not consider that a valid reason,’ said Georgiana tersely, ‘because Your Highness would not die. You would only be brokenhearted.’
‘And you think that is not a good reason?’
‘I … I would change the laws of this country to make you happy. I was talking of the King.’
‘Damn the King!’
‘Treason! And His Majesty’s damnation has nothing to do with our problem. We have two days in which to think up a plot. And I believe we are going to succeed. There is one indisputable fact which brightens the whole situation to my mind.’
‘Georgiana, dearest friend, what is it?’
‘Mrs Maria Fitzherbert is in love with His Highness the Prince of Wales.’
‘Oh, Charles,’ cried the Duchess, ‘how good of you to come so soon. I am distracted. I fear that the Prince is capable of anything … simply anything.’
‘By which, dear Duchess, you mean marriage?’
‘That is exactly what I mean.’
‘It would have no meaning. You’ve forgotten the Marriage Act. Besides, the woman’s a Catholic. That in itself is enough to lose him the throne.’
‘I know. Arid so does he. But he does not care.’
‘He behaves like a child.’
‘Or a very romantic lover,’ said the Duchess softly.
Fox burst out laughing. ‘You know, do you not, that the woman is a Tory.’
‘I know it,’ said the Duchess sadly.
‘A Tory and a Catholic. My God! It might be a plot of His Majesty’s to plague us if it wasn’t even more plaguing to him.’
‘Do you think he knows what is happening?’
‘He successfully manages to shut himself away in his Palace of Purity at Kew, and is more interested in how his farmers make butter than how his son makes love. The Fitzherbert must become his mistress by some means. Then in the natural course of events the affair will come to its logical conclusion.’
‘But she holds out for marriage.’
‘That’s the point. We’ve got to make her give in.’
‘She is adamant, Charles. I’ve spoken to her. It’s her religion. I really think he is capable of following her to France.’
‘He can’t do it. It’s impossible for the Prince of Wales to leave the country without the King’s consent.’
‘He’s capable of anything. He has never been so mad about any woman before, Charles. Let’s face it. Perdita was the nearest, but he never talked of marrying Perdita.’