The Queen's Secret

by Karen Harper

  “Fear not, keeper of the keys,” he said, taking my elbow and glancing over at our eldest. “Not simply some rogue or layabout, I assure you. I spoke to him earlier. That’s Prince Philip of Greece, a cadet here now. I dare say you remember hearing of all his family woes.”

  “Oh, yes, that’s right. We met him at the Duke of Kent’s wedding several years ago. A handsome lad.”

  “Hardly a lad anymore and quite older than Lilibet, but she seems to have taken to him today.”

  I wanted to work my way over to her, snag her back, but we were pulled away by our hosts again. Bertie had teased me about the short, secret list I kept of eligible young men of the English nobility, for I had privately vowed that I was never going to follow in Queen Victoria’s footsteps, marrying my beloved children off to distant royalty, I don’t care one whit if it abetted foreign relations. Besides, the kaiser of Germany had been a cousin to King George, and did that stop the war to end all wars? But I did recall that this Prince Philip of Greece had rather a patchy background.

  I remembered now. He was the nephew of King Constantine of Greece, though he was also distantly related to the British royals through one of Queen Victoria’s many granddaughters, who lived now in Kensington Palace. He had a spate of older sisters somewhere, and his parents had fled his homeland after Greek rebels had sentenced his father to death. Philip might be a prince, but he would inherit no throne and obviously had made England his home.

  I also remembered that his parents had parted ways, and his mother had some sort of mental problems. Well, indeed, the Royal Navy could soon send Philip far away. After all, Elizabeth—dear heavens, I could hear her giggle from here—was entirely too young and inexperienced for that—for him. Surely, nothing would come of it, though I could not claim the same confidence about the encroaching threats of war.

  We had been informed that, back in London, the cabinet had met for a long session and Prime Minister Chamberlain had recalled Parliament, despite the summer hiatus. It had not been made public, but the king was going straightaway back to London while the girls and I were heading for a respite in Scotland. For once, I did not feel I would be at ease and content in the arms of my homeland. If worse came to worst, we would not stay long but hurry to be back with the king in London to face whatever might come our way.

  “Oh, Mummy,” Lilibet said when the cadets filed out and she finally came back to my side, “isn’t it just lovely here?”

  She was blushing. Her eyes were glowing. She bounced a bit when she walked.

  “It’s been a very nice visit,” I managed and shooed her and Margot out ahead of me, following their father.

  But why, oh, why, did I recall at that moment how I felt the night I had first danced twice with Bertie’s brother, David, Prince of Wales, so long ago? I’d had to fight to keep from grinning that evening. As much as I loved to dance and was adept at it, I had almost stumbled over my own feet when he’d asked for that second foxtrot and then a third dance—a romantic waltz.

  And then, as if to whet my silly, girlish passions and hopes, that dreadful London newspaper The Daily Star had dared to print the gossip that the unnamed daughter of a Scottish peer would soon wed the Prince of Wales. They meant me, and I was so shaken, not only because it was a lie, and some thought I or my family had released the news, but because I had actually wished it to be so. And then he had turned out to be the traitor of all time!

  Holding both my daughters’ hands as we walked toward where our yacht was moored, I felt myself blush at the mere memory. Although I’d been wretchedly embarrassed, Father had only been amused and Mother assured me it would not do my reputation one bit of harm. And later, Bertie, even when I’d already turned down his proposal of marriage twice, had never mentioned it. Nor, thank God, had it deterred his avid pursuit of me.

  Lilibet broke into my thoughts, nearly skipping along at my side while Margot, for once, was so much more subdued. “Mummy, wasn’t Prince Philip of Greece absolutely the most charming and handsome man there?”

  “Come along then,” I said and gave her hand a tug. “We’re off straightaway to Scotland, far away from foreign cadets, even ones who have made England their home.”

  Chapter Three

  Ghosts and Monsters

  One golden August afternoon at Glamis, I mounted my favorite mare Forfar, and Lilibet and Margot rode quite easily on their ponies. Four men from our mews rode behind, one the girls’ Scottish riding master. After a lovely picnic at the edge of the forest, we cantered back on the long drive toward the turreted castle. Although we were having a fine time, my heart was with the king in London, for he had written that the international situation was deteriorating.

  “Mummy, I’ve something serious to ask you,” Lilibet said and, excellent rider that she was already, reined in her horse a bit so I pulled back too. Hoping it was not more about Prince Philip, I nodded my encouragement. Margot, a bit of a daredevil, went on ahead with her riding master hurrying to catch up with her.

  “It’s about the monster of Glamis,” Lilibet said, her face and voice so serious. “I overheard some of the kitchen staff, a cook said—”

  “You are not to bother any of the cooks, my dear. Those kitchens just breed gossip.”

  “I wasn’t bothering them. They gave me some scones and milk for Margot and me. You said the cooks used to do that for you, but maybe that wasn’t here but at Walden Bury, so—”

  “What about the monster of Glamis?” I prompted before she could go off on that tangent. “You know all self-respecting, old estates—especially a castle—must have stories of ghosts and monsters. Most of them are mere poppycock only to please tourists and keep children up at night until their parents tell them that they are mostly mere fairy tales.”

  “But I must ask. Is it true that back years ago one of our ancestors here at Glamis bore a terribly disfigured child and the family hid him in a kind of a bricked-up room until he died years later, and the word got out it was a terribly deformed monster?”

  “Perhaps there was some birth defect, but nothing dire like that. Dearest, electric lighting was only installed here ten years ago, so you can imagine how the shadows and darkness bred rumors—ghostly and ghastly, but untrue.”

  “But I overheard that, in later years, someone of the Bowes Lyon family had servants hang a towel or cloth in each window of the castle, but when they looked from the outside, there were spaces where certain windows had no cloth—and that area would be where the bricked-up monster rooms were, but no one could find them from inside,” she said in one breathless rush.

  “Lilibet—Elizabeth—people love stories like that, to dwell on the frightening and dreadful, even if untrue, and that is all. I thank you for asking this of me without your sister being all ears, for she is sometimes excitable as is.”

  “But in a family that had a former lady of the castle burned at the stake for witchcraft . . . I mean, someday, when I marry, I actually would not like my husband to know all that—such a terrible thing in the past of my family. Why, it might make him hesitate to propose.”

  I almost laughed. If anything would make a man hesitant to propose to our eldest someday, it would be that she would be queen and he not more than a prince, walking several steps behind her. Still, what she had said hit me hard, not so much that she was actually thinking of a future marriage at her age—and no doubt with that Greek prince again. But she had reminded me of how I’d hidden my birth mother from everyone, including Bertie, or at least that was my continual prayer despite David and that woman somehow uncovering that fact and taunting me with the nickname Cookie. I had no illusions that their intent was to shame and threaten me, for that gibe went deeper than referring again to my fondness for bakery goods and all sorts of sweets.

  “This is not like you,” I told Lilibet, trying to keep my temper in check. “Not a bit like our sensible, reasonable daughter and someday queen to be sorry for such things—rumors and legends. Royalty must rise above superstitions and curses with
ghosts, monsters, and the like. The only monster we all need to worry about lives in Berlin and is named Adolf Hitler. And I must tell you I am planning to take the night train to London to be with your father in all this talk of war, so I will leave you two with Crawfie and the staff here—but that does not include the kitchen help from whom you might hear silly rumors, my dearest.”

  “Yes, Mummy. Well, you know, even with the electric in the castle, some parts of Glamis still seem very dark and frightening at night.”

  I reached over to pat her shoulder as we jogged into the massive shadow of the castle. “I understand, Lilibet, really I do. But Glamis, just like Buckingham Palace, is a place of light and warmth and love, because we are a strong family. I am happy you asked me about those rumors, really I am, and I am so grateful we can be honest with each other in all things.”

  Almost all things, I thought, as we jogged a bit faster to rejoin Margot. Because I had told no one—not even Bertie—that one of the major reasons I was rushing to London was because he had noted in a postscript to his last letter that there had been discussions amongst parliamentary leaders like Chamberlain and Churchill about David and that woman coming back to England in case there was a war, so the Germans would not get their hands on them in Europe.

  I saw David as a dangerous deserter, one who might even have conspired with Hitler, during their trip to Germany, to replace my Bertie should the Germans bomb or invade Britain. I would bide my time for now about insisting that the Duke and Duchess of Windsor remain in permanent exile, but I must find a way to keep my hand in all those decisions. For to have that American adventuress even on English soil again, let alone queen . . . Never!

  I tried to stem the flood of memory from the time I first saw her true, cruel colors, her disdain for Bertie and me. We were still the Duke and Duchess of York then and trying to keep up a relationship with the future king. We had gone to Fort Belvedere, David’s refuge near Windsor Castle, where he entertained his sophisticated friends and more or less held social court with that woman as his hostess. Wallis in Wonderland, I had heard some courtiers had called her. His parents disapproved of it all, but what was that to him? The man was absolutely besotted.

  Bertie loved his older brother, for they’d been through thick and thin together in their boyhood years. Their father had been sarcastic and brutally critical, and it had damaged them both, though in different ways. They had three other brothers who had been harangued with his insistence on perfection and taken his wrath too. The last son, John, had died young, and the other two had tried to cope in their own ways. The brother who was now Duke of Kent had rebelled with drinking, drugs, and wild affairs, so all had been damaged somehow. But, even if we were loved, weren’t we all?

  At any rate, I put up with that woman David adored and later married, but that night when we walked in, we clearly heard her entertaining some of their female, so-called steamer set with an imitation of how I walked, swaying a bit. She stuck her bum out and feigned to wear a fussy hat.

  “Old-fashioned and dowdy—the dowdy duchess!” she laughingly dubbed me. “I swear, she might as well be wearing a fancy sofa cover most of the time. Dreadful clothes in an attempt to hide a too-full chassis,” she crowed amongst peals of laughter from the group.

  I was absolutely appalled at the public mockery, and Bertie was too, though we were quickly greeted by David, as if to block out the tittering, slender, supposedly fashionable women across the room. She did not have the decency to look one bit ashamed, though she avoided me the rest of that dreadful evening. My dear Bertie swept me away as soon as he could and said nothing of it all but “I love you just as you are, my d-dearest.”

  “And he loves her just as she is, evidently.”

  “He’s b-bewitched, not himself.”

  “I fear he is very much himself. You know, it has nothing to do with that woman’s spiteful statements, but I have been thinking of changing designers. Norman Hartnell has done some lovely day dresses and gowns lately.”

  “I’m s-sure you would look smashing in any of them.”

  “But perhaps not at the fort again. I’ll not have her thinking she’s won if I change designers.”

  “I f-fear—f-fear,” he’d said, stuttering as he did if he was distressed or distraught. He swallowed hard and went on, “In our family war, Wallis, twice married as she is, believes she has won. But she’ll n-n-never be accepted, never marry David and be queen.”

  “Never say never,” I said, too late realizing I’d spoken aloud here at Glamis and that both Lilibet and Margot were staring at me.

  “What was that, Mummy?” Lilibet asked as we dismounted.

  “Just hoping we do not go to war, my darlings. Never.”

  * * *

  I traveled back and forth between Buckingham Palace and Glamis, always taking the night train with our private car. I must admit I liked that timing, because the Scottish conductor knew I might be a bit tardy and always waited for me. Yes, I might move slowly and savor each moment and person, but was that so bad? Being late was a sad habit I had never tamed, but Bertie just smiled, and even his irascible father approved of my calming effect on my husband’s nervous temperament enough to put up with me. Early in our marriage, when I made Bertie and myself slightly late for a luncheon at the palace, I had apologized to the family.

  To everyone’s amazement and Bertie’s elation, rather than the usual lecture and scolding, King George said to me, “You are not too late, my dear. I believe we have sat down two minutes too early.”

  Bertie beamed with relief and joy. The rest of the family and our closest friends also credited me with a calming effect on my stuttering husband. Now Bertie tripped over his words only when he was completely distressed, and seldom in public.

  I believed Bertie’s father, His Majesty, also forgave my foible of being late because he credited me for seeking the professional help of a therapist for that speech impediment that had shamed Bertie since childhood. His stuttering brought his father’s wrath down on his head more than once, which I felt only made the situation worse. I can recall the king shouting, shortly after we were married, “Speak up, boy! Get it out. Get it out right and right now!”

  I had even accompanied Bertie to all his therapy sessions with our now dear friend Lionel Logue in 1926 and 1927, and was proud to see that Bertie did so well in public speaking on our Australian and Asian tour, as well as on our more recent visit to Canada and the United States.

  But now in late August over ten years later, I felt I must stay longer in London, for war fever was in the air, and decisions were yet to be made on the David-Wallis situation.

  * * *

  Despite drowning in final preparations to deal with Hitler, Bertie met me at the station with two security men and held hard to my hand as we motored back to the palace. I had taken the night train again to have a lovely last day with our daughters and so that fewer people, including the newspapers, would know I felt the need to keep going back and forth. And because Bertie had said a very early-morning arrival was better: Evidently there were swarms of Londoners at train stations in the daytime, sending their children into rural shires or even to Canada for protection against possible bombing attacks. Panic, though yet controlled, hovered in the air.

  On the darkened streets—no total blackouts imposed yet—I was horrified to see sandbags piled around public and government buildings, including the palace. All this in the week I had been away this time? My favorite poster I saw here and there as our headlights slashed against it read, Keep Calm and Carry On.

  “Chamberlain has said the right moment is not yet here to write a desperate letter for peace to Hitler,” Bertie told me suddenly when I took a breath after giving him a detailed report of how the girls were doing.

  “I feel I must stay longer this time,” I told him. “I have asked my sister Rose if she will become guardian of our girls if war comes here, or worse than that happens to the king and queen. After all, she trained as a nurse in the war, has a da
ughter herself, and has always loved the girls. We can hardly put that on your mother.”

  “Yes, fine, but we must think on the upside,” he insisted, with more force than I had heard from him.

  “Speaking of your mother, I have had a lovely letter from Queen Mary,” I added as we motored through the palace gates and they were quickly closed behind us. “She said she is appalled that the world should be faced with another war because of the wickedness of the Nazis. Poor dear, she suffered so as queen in 1914 when that bloody German war began. Bertie, I want to help, to do what I can here.”

  We held hands even tighter. He hesitated before he said, “You might help to oversee the wrapping and stowing of the palace’s precious paintings and other works of art, the nation’s heritage. Churchill tells me the Nazis have, to put it nicely, ‘a very acquisitive nature,’ not to mention a possible Luftwaffe bombing attack could wreak havoc. He suggested too that there will be a time for both of us—you and me—to speak on the wireless to the nation, me in a general speech and you to the women of the Empire and beyond. Years ago, that would have bothered me, but—thanks to you and dear Logue’s lessons—I shall rise to that occasion.”

  “Indeed you shall.”

  “Also, with your fine French, perhaps you might even address the women of France.”

  Foolish me, but I wondered if the long-retired Walden Bury cook Marguerite Rodiere back home in France would hear that speech—and remember me and be awestruck—for even I was that—at who I had become. But I only said, “A fine idea. Has Winston Churchill begun to advise you then?”

  “The man is a force of nature and will be in our wartime government one way or the other. I fear Chamberlain cannot last as P.M., not after his misreading and misleading in the appeasement situation. I would favor Lord Halifax, a more peaceful man, like Chamberlain, of course.”

  “But there is a chance Churchill could become P.M.?”

  “We shall see. We have signed a pact with Poland, that if the Nazis invade there, we are at war with Germany again. Hopes are fading, my darling,” he said with a sigh and put his arm around me as the motorcar pulled up to our private entrance in the courtyard.