The King Without a Heart Read online

  Lord Rupert’s father, the Duke, was furious, although he admitted that Iona was a lady and her father a respectable Chieftain of a small clan.

  “But that,” he shouted furiously to his son, “is not good enough for the Starbrookes.”

  It was doubtful if Lord Rupert listened or understood what was being said to him, as he was head over heels in love and merely counting the days until he could marry Iona.

  He paid his own family the compliment of taking her to Starbrooke Hall with her parents before the wedding actually took place.

  Because he behaved like a gentleman, the Duke was polite to Iona’s father and mother, but when he had his son alone, he raged at him.

  “All right she is beautiful, I am not arguing about that,” the Duke had thundered. “But all down the centuries the Brookes have married their equals and nothing you can say can make this woman our equal.”

  When Iona and her parents returned to Scotland, Lord Rupert travelled with them and they were married quietly by the Minister of the Kirk where Iona had been christened.

  When they left on their honeymoon, Lord Rupert took his wife first to Paris and then on to Venice, Athens and Cairo. He wanted her to see the world and he hoped it would amuse her as much as it had always fascinated and interested him.

  She loved every moment of their honeymoon and everything they experienced, just in the same way that she loved him.

  They were so perfectly attuned to each other that they never had to explain to the other what they were thinking or what they wanted as they each knew instinctively.

  When Titania was born, both Lord Rupert and his wife adored their small daughter and it did not worry him that it would be very difficult for Iona to have any more children.

  Her home was a home of love and joy because her parents were so supremely and completely happy and they both cherished their only child.

  Titania travelled with them, sleeping in many strange places. Sometimes in a tent or on the back or a camel.

  Occasionally she cuddled up between her father and mother in the open air, when they were exploring unknown territory and could find nowhere else to sleep at night.

  It was an education which most boys would have enjoyed, but most girls would have found uncomfortable.

  Titania enjoyed every moment of it and for her the whole world consisting of her father and mother was one of love.

  Then tragically Lord Rupert and his wife were killed in a railway crash when they were travelling home after a short visit to Wales.

  For Titania it was the end of the first part of her life.

  Overnight as it were, she ceased to be a child, because her parents were no longer alive and she became a woman with all the difficulties and troubles that lie in wait for those who have been forced to grow up too quickly.

  When the funeral was over, Titania’s uncle ordered her to pack her boxes.

  “You are coming to live with me at Starbrooke Hall,” he commanded.

  She tried to persuade him to allow her to remain in the house where she had been born. She had been so happy there with her father and mother, but he had told her curtly it was impossible.

  She was informed later that the house was to be sold with all its contents and she was not permitted to keep even some small pieces of furniture that she particularly loved.

  Only with Nanny’s help was she able to save some small ornaments, which her mother had always prized and Titania kept them hidden from her uncle.

  In fact there were only two things the Duke allowed her to take with her to Starbrooke Hall.

  One was Nanny who had looked after her since she was a baby and the Duke had said somewhat grudgingly she could be Titania’s lady’s maid.

  The second was her horse Mercury, which her father had given her the year before and which now she loved more than anyone else in the whole world.

  She told all her troubles to Mercury and he seemed to understand and it was Mercury who made life worth living because she could ride him every morning.

  The reason she was so unhappy at Starbrooke Hall was, to put it mildly, mental cruelty.

  Her father and mother were dead, but the people around her were continually in one way or another pointing out how wrong it had been for her father to make such an inferior marriage.

  And then of course to produce her.

  It was not what they said in words.

  It was the way they looked and the tone of her aunt’s voice when she spoke to her.

  Lady Sophie was a year older than Titania and she soon discovered how clever her cousin was at arranging hair and how beautifully she sewed.

  After that Titania became more or less an unpaid lady’s maid.

  It was – “Titania, do my hair – Titania, mend this lace – Titania, fetch my bag.”

  Titania was much quicker and much more effective than anyone who had looked after Sophie before and she was therefore in demand almost every hour of the day.

  The only time she could escape was very early in the morning and as her cousin slept late she could go riding alone on Mercury.

  Because her uncle considered her of no importance, she did not have to be accompanied by a groom.

  Titania often found it difficult to fulfil all Sophie’s demands, but at the same time she had her moments of happiness.

  Apart from riding Mercury she had discovered the library at the Hall and found all the books her father had prized so much, but which she had not been allowed to keep when their house was sold.

  There were also a great many others which she knew he had read when he was a young man and he had often quoted them to her when they were having one of their exciting and interesting discussions.

  Just as he had talked to his Scottish friend and then to Iona, Lord Rupert had talked to his daughter.

  He taught her far more than any governess could have done and the books that she had studied in her father’s library and now in her uncle’s completed her education.

  Lord Rupert had learnt a great number of languages because he loved travelling around the world.

  It amused him when Titania was small to speak to her in French and make her try to pronounce the words after he had said them.

  The same applied to other languages and when she grew older she found that a number of books in her father’s library were in a variety of languages. As she was intelligent she forced herself to understand them, just as her mother had done when she found where her husband’s interests lay and was determined to share them.

  Another factor she had found almost intolerable at Starbrooke Hall was that neither the Duchess nor her daughter ever talked about anything except the latest gossip or what the newspapers were reporting about the social entertainments in London.

  Titania often thought that if she could not go to bed to read one of the books from the library, she would have wanted to scream at the boredom of it all.

  None of the family had the slightest idea that she was reading books that her father would have enjoyed, but which would have been considered completely and absolutely incomprehensible to any other young woman.

  Equally it was a very lonely life.

  There was only Mercury to hear which exciting incidents in history she had discovered the night before or a poem she had found written by an ancient Greek, which was ringing in her ears so that she must recite it to him.

  *

  Now as she finished her breakfast, Titania was thinking that she had been unexpectedly fortunate in not being scolded very angrily for being late for prayers, although her aunt’s words had scalded her.

  Her uncle usually considered lateness to be an unforgivable sin.

  However this morning having reproved her, he was reading a letter which lay on top of his pile and apparently had no more to say to her.

  She was just contemplating whether she could slip away from the table without being noticed when the Duke announced,

  “I have something to tell you all, which I think will surprise and at th
e same time please you.”

  “It sounds most intriguing,” muttered the Duchess.

  She glanced at her daughter Sophie as she spoke and Sophie who had been thinking of something else, immediately turned her head towards her father.

  Titania realised it would be impossible for her to leave the room and therefore sat waiting expectantly for what the Duke had to say.

  “I have received,” he began, as he put his glasses on again, “a letter from Velidos, which I am sure you will all find extremely interesting.”

  Thinking quickly Titania remembered that a month ago the Crown Prince Frederick of Velidos had come to stay after a visit to London, where apparently he had met her uncle and aunt and Sophie.

  She had thought him a rather plain, dull young man and there had been something else about him which she had not liked.

  She could not explain exactly what it was, but she had her mother’s gift of being fey and was seldom wrong when she summed up a man or woman with whom she came into contact.

  She had not been particularly interested in Prince Frederick and therefore apart from curtsying to him she had not had any close contact with him.

  “Of course we all remember the Crown Prince,” commented the Duchess. “A charming young man and with the good manners that so many Englishmen lack.”

  It was the sort of remark she often made when she compared the English to the men of her own country who were always spoken about as if they had every talent under the sun.

  “I have here a letter from the Crown Prince,” the Duke was saying somewhat pompously, “in which he asks that Sophie shall proceed as soon as possible to Velidos, where to his great delight his brother, the King, has given permission for their marriage.”

  The Duchess gave a little exclamation of delight, but Titania was completely astonished.

  She had no idea or else she had not listened very carefully that the Crown Prince wished to marry Sophie or that it had been arranged by her uncle.

  He was quite obviously delighted at the idea of his daughter being united with a Royal family, even though it was not at all an important one. Because the bridegroom was a Crown Prince there was obviously some likelihood that he would later become King.

  The Duke was waiting for his daughter’s response to his announcement and Sophie simpered demurely,

  “I am delighted at the news, Papa. How soon will we be leaving for Velidos?”

  “You will be leaving, my dear,” replied the Duke. “Your future husband has of course invited your mother and me to accompany you, but I am afraid it is impossible for me to get away immediately, which is what he requires, because of my duties at Windsor Castle.”

  Titania was aware that the Duke’s attendance at Windsor Castle was something he looked forward to and nothing or no one could prevent him from being there.

  From what she gathered his duties were hereditary and not very arduous and he had no intention of trying to change them or failing to do what was expected of him.

  “If you are not coming with me,” said Sophie plaintively, “it will be very frightening going to a strange country when I cannot even speak the language.”

  “I said I cannot go,” added the Duke testily, “but your mother will of course accompany you and your future husband says in this letter that a member of the Cabinet will be in attendance on you as well as two Ladies-in-Waiting, a gentleman usher and several other members of the Royal Household.”

  “Well that will be all right, I suppose, but I shall miss you, Papa.”

  “And I shall miss you, my dear, and I regret not attending your wedding, but as soon as possible you must bring your husband to stay with us here, perhaps for the shooting or hunting in the autumn.”

  Sophie looked pleased at this suggestion and then unexpectedly, she looked across the table.

  “And I shall take Titania with me,” she asserted haughtily. “No one else can do my hair as well as she can.”

  “But I cannot go,” Titania exclaimed quickly without thinking.

  “Why ever not,” Sophie asked aggressively.

  “I would have to leave Mercury behind and I am sure there will be excellent hairdressers in Velidos.”

  “I have never heard such nonsense,” intervened the Duchess sharply. “If your cousin wants you to accompany her, Titania, you will go and think yourself extremely lucky. Most girls of your age would be delighted to travel abroad.”

  She rose from the table as she spoke and Titania recognised that it was no use arguing.

  However her heart sank as if she once left England and Mercury and Nanny, which were all that remained of her life, what would happen to her in the future?

  Almost as if the Duke was reading her mind he said,

  “You will go with your cousin, Titania, and, as your aunt says, you should think yourself a very fortunate girl. When Sophie has settled down perhaps in six months or a year, you will come back and I shall find a suitable husband for you.”

  He paused for a moment before continuing,

  “Unfortunately not someone very grand, seeing what a bad marriage your father made, but at least you have the advantage of being my niece and that should count for a great deal.”

  Titania drew in her breath.

  She had always been afraid that this was what her uncle would say to her one day.

  She had known, when he had been busy arranging Sophie’s marriage, he was determined it would be with someone grand and then that he would eventually come round to arranging hers.

  She had no intention of marrying someone chosen for her by her uncle and someone she did not love.

  She could remember her father saying over and over again,

  “I am the luckiest man alive, Titania, because I married your mother who I love so deeply and who loves me. I was not pushed up the aisle with some stupid woman who wanted my title or whose family considered themselves the equal of mine.”

  He had laughed when he finished speaking and then added,

  “Your mother to me is the Queen of Love and the Princess of Happiness. What man could ask for a finer pedigree than that?”

  Titania had smiled at him and became determined that when she married she would be as happy as her father and mother were together.

  If ever her father had been away for the day, her mother would wait for his return and when she heard him come in at the front door, she would then run towards him, put her arms round his neck and pull his head down to hers.

  “You are – home! Oh, darling, how – much I have – missed you.”

  Titania could now hear her voice saying those very words.

  “As I have missed you, my precious one,” her father would reply.

  Then he would kiss her mother and it would be some time before he would stop kissing her.

  That was love!

  That was what living meant with someone you adored and who adored you.

  It was what Titania wanted to find, even if she remained unmarried until she died, but she knew it was no use explaining her feelings to her uncle.

  She must wait until her bridegroom had been chosen for her and then she would have to be brave enough to insist that she would not marry him.

  She could imagine only too well how furious her uncle would be and how disagreeable her aunt.

  That, however, was not the problem at the moment.

  As if her father was prompting her, Titania knew she must accompany Sophie, even though it meant leaving Mercury behind.

  She did not say any more, but followed her aunt and Sophie from the dining room. Only when they were outside and walking towards the hall did Titania slip away.

  She ran down the passage and up the secondary staircase which led up to the first floor and there was another flight up to the second. She was running so quickly that she was almost breathless when she reached the top.

  She opened the door of the sewing room where she knew she would find Nanny.

  She was an elderly woman who had come to Lady Rupert when
Titania was born. She had loved the small baby who had been placed in her arms and she had given Titania her whole devotion over the years.

  For one terrifying moment, after her mother and father had died, Titania was afraid that her uncle would not allow Nanny to accompany her to Starbrooke Hall.

  “Nanny will not only look after me,” she had told him, “but help the seamstress if you have one. She is wonderful with a needle and Mama always said there was no one like her.”

  It was fortunate that at that moment the Starbrooke seamstress was growing old and the Duchess was already talking of having to look for a new one.

  So Nanny had gone with Titania and she made the parting from her home a little easier to bear than it might have been.

  Now she opened the door of the sewing room to find Nanny, as she expected, sitting by the window mending a pillowcase.

  She ran across the room towards her and before Nanny could even move, Titania flung her arms around her neck.

  “Oh, Nanny! Nanny!” she cried, “I cannot bear it.”

  “What is it, dearie?” asked Nanny. “What can have upset you so?”

  “Sophie is to marry the – Crown Prince of Velidos,” sobbed Titania, “and I have to go with her – just because I can do her hair.”

  Nanny did not say anything, she only held Titania tightly.

  “How can I go away and leave – Mercury?” wept Titania, “and how can I leave – you? Uncle Edward says I can come – back when Sophie is settled, but only because he – intends to find a – husband for me. Oh, Nanny, I cannot bear it.”

  “Perhaps it won’t be as bad as you expect, dearie,” Nanny soothed her. “And it will be a change for you to travel abroad as you used to do with your father and mother and loved every moment of it.”

  “But that was because – I was with them and – not with Sophie.”

  “Well you never know there might be interesting things to see and I’ll remind His Grace that he said you could come home when her Ladyship’s settled down.”

  Titania wiped away her tears. “I suppose you will think – I am not being sensible, Nanny, but I have – lost Papa and Mama – and the house where I was so happy, and now I have to – lose you and – Mercury and there is nothing left – nothing.”