“Darling, if the Queen decrees it, you will have to.”

“This is supposed to be a free country and a democracy!”

“Not where the Queen is concerned and you know if she is determined, the Prince has an obstinacy that is very German.”

The Duke knew this was true.

At the same time the Queen could if she wished be extremely dictatorial, even towards the husband she admired.

It flashed through the Duke’s mind that the Queen always got her own way.

When the Prince had become her husband, he had assumed, the Duke had always been told, that he would have a say in the choice of his own household.

But the Queen did not agree.

She had chosen the gentlemen who were to be closest to him and, when he had wanted a German as his private secretary, the Queen had been absolutely adamant.

In fact, she had already chosen young Mr. Anson and that he actually became a close friend of the Prince was just a matter of luck.

No one could be constantly at Buckingham Palace without being aware that the Queen when she became ‘Royal’ was quite prepared not only to be a ruler but also at times a tyrant.

Although as a Duke he might be omnipotent in his own particular sphere, he had the uncomfortable feeling that if he came up against the Queen on a subject on which she had set her heart, he would be the loser.

To be married to the Princess Sophie was so unthinkable that he could hardly believe that Aline was not making up the whole idea.

However, he supposed it was something he might have anticipated would happen, although it had indeed never entered his mind.

To begin with he was not only, as his father’s son, one of the most important and certainly the wealthiest Duke in the United Kingdom, but his grandmother on his mother’s side had been related to the Royal Family.

He would therefore be acceptable as the husband of a minor Royal and in this case a Princess who was not only of Royal Blood but related to the husband of the Queen of England.

As he thought of her plain face and the platitudes she had mouthed when he had talked with her, he could only fling himself down in the chair he had just vacated and ask despairingly,

“Having told me of the horror that is encroaching upon me, have you any idea what I can do about it?”

He did not wait for Aline to reply, but added,

“Other than to go abroad and stay there!”

She gave a little cry.

“Oh, Ulric, you cannot do that! I cannot lose you! That is why I have been thinking that there is just one possible way out of this.”

“I should certainly be interested to hear it.”

“It may sound a little crazy,” she went on, “but I have thought and thought about it. The only way I can think of how you could avoid marrying Princess Sophie and having to spend months of the year travelling backwards and forwards to Saxe-Coburg is for you to be married to somebody else!”