BooksBarbecue
Back The Summer Queen Save as PDF
Chapters (54)
  1. Cover
  2. The Summer Queen
  3. Dedication Page
  4. Family Tree of King George III
  5. Family Tree of Queen Victoria
  6. PART ONE
  7. Chapter One
  8. Chapter Two
  9. Chapter Three
  10. Chapter Four
  11. Chapter Five
  12. Chapter Six
  13. Chapter Seven
  14. Chapter Eight
  15. Chapter Nine
  16. Chapter Ten
  17. Chapter Eleven
  18. Chapter Twelve
  19. Chapter Thirteen
  20. PART TWO
  21. Chapter Fourteen
  22. Chapter Fifteen
  23. Chapter Sixteen
  24. Chapter Seventeen
  25. Chapter Eighteen
  26. Chapter Nineteen
  27. Chapter Twenty
  28. Chapter Twenty-One
  29. Chapter Twenty-Two
  30. Chapter Twenty-Three
  31. Chapter Twenty-Four
  32. PART THREE
  33. Chapter Twenty-Five
  34. Chapter Twenty-Six
  35. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  36. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  37. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  38. Chapter Thirty
  39. Chapter Thirty-One
  40. Chapter Thirty-Two
  41. PART FOUR
  42. Chapter Thirty-Three
  43. Chapter Thirty-Four
  44. Chapter Thirty-Five
  45. Chapter Thirty-Six
  46. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  47. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  48. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  49. Chapter Forty
  50. Chapter Forty-One
  51. Acknowledgements
  52. Select Bibliography
  53. The Summer Queen
  54. By Margaret Pemberton

From out of nowhere, memory smote him with vivid, physical force. There had been such a time. It had been at Osborne when, five years ago and on an otherwise deserted beach, he had come across Ella’s little sister sobbing her heart out because she thought it was her own, and her siblings’, fault that their mother had died of diphtheria.

If Alicky hadn’t been Ella’s little sister, would he have stopped to comfort her? Willy didn’t know. The thing was, he had stopped and he had tried to comfort her, and whilst he’d been doing so, May of Teck had run up to them and from then on, whenever he’d been with her and Alicky, he’d forgotten all about being the pretend Willy. ‘Kindred spirits,’ Alicky had called the three of them, and beneath the childish tosh there had been an element of truth. Never before had he revealed so much of his inner self to anyone as he had to May and Alicky when their mutual confidences had begun. Being himself, instead of his pretend self, had been a unique, extraordinary experience – as had the scoring of their wrists with his 1st Foot Guards medal brooch-pin and the mixing of their blood. Even now he still mentally prefaced May’s name with the words ‘Kindred Spirit’, just as he did Alicky’s name.

He breathed in deeply, aware that his pulse was no longer pounding, his heart was no longer racing and he was no longer sweating. It was over, thank God. Day had fully dawned, the miasma of nightmare had fled and his pretend personality was rushing headlong through his veins and along his nerve endings. He could feel himself becoming once again the Willy the world knew; the Willy who was braver and cleverer than anyone else; the Willy who was invincible.

He swung away from the window, slammed his fist on the bell that would summon his valet and was in such good humour that it occurred to him that he could, just for once, return to the palace after his morning at headquarters and take Dona for an after-luncheon carriage ride. She would like that and would be deeply grateful – and when it suited him, he liked people to be grateful to him. It increased his sense of superiority.

As his valet stumbled hurriedly into the room, Willy roared at him for not having entered the room sooner and then, full of satisfaction at his magnanimity where Dona was concerned, His Royal Highness Prince Wilhelm of Prussia embarked on his day.

Chapter Nine

image

JUNE 1884, NEW PALACE, DARMSTADT