A Princess Runs Away Read online

  The Marquis thought that that was putting it mildly.

  The Prince’s love affairs had been repeated round the Embassies of Europe and they had not lost anything in the telling when the stories reached London.

  Prince Godelov had buried his first wife over seven years ago and he had not been anxious to marry again until he realised how the Russians were undermining his rule in his Principality.

  Then he panicked and immediately sent an Envoy over to London to beg the help of Her Majesty

  the Queen.

  It would have been, the Marquis of Salisbury knew, somewhat humiliating to admit that on this occasion, and it was certainly the first, the Queen was helpless to assist in any way.

  He could see by the expression on Her Majesty’s face that she was as glad as he was that the Prince’s plea could be satisfied.

  As if she was thinking aloud, the Queen then said,

  “Send someone to Hampton Court at once to collect the Princess and I think you had better talk to her as soon as she arrives. And I will, of course, see her later in the afternoon.”

  “Very good, ma’am. Your Majesty’s wishes will be carried out immediately,” the Marquis said. “I admit I am extremely relieved that we have thought of the Princess even if it has taken a little time.”

  “Of course,” the Queen observed meditatively, “my grandmother was her mother’s first cousin and her father, Prince Nicholas of Kazana, was a Russian.”

  “And he was Georgian, ma’am,” the Prime Minister corrected her. “If you remember, he was killed during a revolution in his Principality because he refused to become a mere puppet in Russian hands.”

  “It was disgraceful, utterly disgraceful!” the Queen exclaimed. “Just as the way that they are behaving now is seriously appalling.”

  The Prime Minister had heard all this many times.

  “I do agree with you, ma’am, and at last they have woken up in India to the danger that the advance of the Cossacks over Asia is threatening.”

  “I am aware of that,” the Queen said, “and I have written very strongly to the Viceroy, saying that he must be on his guard and that much more attention must be paid to our frontier defences there.”

  The Marquis of Salisbury well knew that India was ‘the jewel in the Crown’ of the Britain Empire and was coveted above all else by the Russians.

  Their activities in the Balkans had merely been the first step in the insatiable ambition of the Czar and no one in England had paid very much attention at first.

  The fast-riding Cossacks had begun to sweep across Asia and one by one the Khanates and Caravan towns of the Old Silk Road fell in their path.

  The Czar’s Empire was expanding at a rate of fifty-five square miles a day.

  It was only this year, the first one since the Prime Minister had taken office, that he had drawn the Cabinet’s attention to the dangers that were threatening India.

  At first the Ministers had thought it impossible.

  How could the Russians even conceive so fantastic a plan?

  Then came the reports of the Cossacks being nearer than they had previously thought!

  They learned of the unrest that the Russians were stirring up against the local tribesmen on the North-West Frontier and their infiltration into Afghanistan made even the most complacent member of the Cabinet take notice.

  Strict instructions had been sent to the Viceroy, the Marquis of Dufferin, to be on his guard and secret reports from India were reaching the Prime Minister almost daily.

  In the meantime the problem of Russian infiltration in the Balkans was no less important and it was, of course, nearer home.

  There was a short silence between the Queen and the Prime Minister and now she said,

  “I expect that I shall have to give Princess Vasila her trousseau and it would be sensible, Prime Minister, for the marriage to take place just as soon as possible.”

  “I shall carry out Your Majesty’s commands,” the Prime Minister replied.

  He bowed and started to back out of the room.

  He was thinking, as he had often before, that it was a difficult manoeuvre since the room was so congested with furniture.

  Anyone entering Queen Victoria’s sitting room for the first time was usually surprised into silence.

  The state of confusion in what was a private room was unbelievable.

  The Royal furniture, which was fairly impressive, was almost completely concealed under a large profusion of books, photograph-frames and bibelots of all kinds.

  On two large wooden cabinets were statues, models of favourite animals, flowers and, of course, photographs.

  It was with great difficulty that the Prime Minister, who was a large man, managed to reach the door. He had rather skilfully avoided falling over one waste-paper basket and several stools.

  He had actually brushed against a small table which held leading books of reference for the coming year. They were uniformly bound in red Morocco and stamped with Her Majesty’s cipher in gold.

  It was with an air of relief that he managed to reach the door and, when he was outside, he drew a deep breath as a man might have done who had swum a wide river.

  Then he walked quickly down the corridor to give his orders.

  *

  Completely unaware that her future life was being planned for her by the Queen at Windsor Castle, Princess Vasila duly said ‘goodbye’ to her French teacher.

  Swinging her lesson books, she began to walk back to the small Grace and Favour house at the far end of the Courtyard where she lived with Baroness von Bergstein.

  All the people living in Grace and Favour houses in Hampton Court were very old. But as Princess Vasila had lived there for the past four years she thought of them as her friends.

  She had no idea of how much they relied on her to bring sunshine and laughter into their lives.

  When, after her father’s death, her mother had died in England as she always believed of a broken heart, she had nowhere to go.

  Her mother’s relations who lived in the North were too old to have her.

  The problem had been taken to the Queen, who had asked the Baroness von Bergstein to look after the child.

  The Baroness, who was German, had married the British Ambassador to Germany and when he had retired, he was given a Grace and Favour house at Hampton Court.

  They had lived there happily until the Ambassador died when he was eighty.

  The Baroness was younger than he was and, after his death, she used her German rank and name, but had no desire to return to her native land. She had therefore been allowed to stay on in the house.

  But in return Her Majesty the Queen had required her to take care of the orphan daughter of Prince Nicholas and Princess Louise of Kazana.

  The Baroness had been only too glad to know that she did not have to leave England and she was in fact, as the Prime Minister had thought at the time, absolutely the right person to bring up a Royal Princess.

  Vasila had indeed been very happy with her.

  It was only as she grew older that the Baroness, as well as her other friends and Teachers in Hampton Court, wondered what would happen to her.

  Her mother had been a beauty and Vasila took after her. She had just the same fair golden hair and the same pink and white complexion and the only thing that she had inherited from her father was her eyes.

  They were very large and, instead of being blue like her mother’s, had something dark and a little mysterious about them.

  They most certainly made her even more beautiful than she would have been otherwise. And they gave her a look of mystery that was not usual in an English girl.

  Now, swinging her books on the leather strap which held them together, she was humming happily to herself.

  She almost danced down the Courtyard that a good number of houses opened onto.

  She knew who lived in every one of the houses and several of them had helped her with her education.

  The elderly retired British Ambassador to France spoke French and his French friends said, ‘like a native’ and he had loved teaching Vasila to be as he claimed ‘a perfect Parisienne.’

  She had, of course, learned to speak German with the Baroness.

  She spoke excellent Italian with the Italian wife of a Diplomat, who, after long years of serving his country, had been grateful to be granted a Grace and Favour house.

  He sadly was crippled with rheumatism, but in his Bath chair could be pushed round with no difficulty.

  Vasila used to visit them once or twice a week and, as the two women laughed and often sang Italian songs, the old Diplomat would watch them with a wide smile and said that they made him feel young again.

  But it was the Baroness who was most particular as to Vasila’s behaviour.

  “You must never forget, my dear child,” she said over and over again, “that your blood is Royal and you are a Princess. People have to treat you with respect and you must keep your place as they must keep theirs.”

  “What is my place?” Vasila enquired. “And what will happen to me when I grow older?”

  She really meant if the Baroness grew too old to look after her or died, but she was too tactful to say so.

  The Baroness, of course, knew the answer.

  But she thought that it was too soon for Vasila to understand the part she would have to play in the world as it was today.

  ‘She would be frightened by the idea of an arranged marriage,’ the Baroness mused. ‘And, as she is still very young, it would be a mistake to make her worry about it.’

  Vasila had almost reached the little house that she called ‘home’.

  Then she remembered that there was an old Peeress in one of the other nearby houses, who had been taken ill the previous week.
br />   ‘I will ask how she is,’ she decided.

  She rang the bell and a servant who looked after the old lady came to the door.

  “Oh, it’s you, Princess!” she exclaimed. “And her Ladyship was askin’ me only this mornin’ where you was. You come in and cheer her up, that’s what she wants.”

  “I surely will, Gladys,” Vasila said, “but you must give me one of your delicious chocolate cakes because I am so hungry.”

  “You can have two if you’re a good girl,” Gladys replied with a smile.

  “Thank you, thank you,” Vasila cried as she ran up the stairs. “And please a glass of your special lemonade.”

  She heard Gladys laugh as she went to the kitchen and, knocking on the bedroom door, Vasila went in.

  The old lady, who was over eighty-five, looked up from her pillows with a smile.

  “I hoped you would come and see me,” she sighed.

  “I wanted to come before,” Vasila answered, “but I was told that you were too ill to see anyone.”

  “It was just a stupid attack. Now sit down, my dear, and tell me what you have been doing.”

  “I have been having my French lessons and today the Ambassador told me how exciting Paris was before the Prussians walked in.”

  “That is indeed very true,” the Peeress said, “and the men spent thousands of pounds on parties for the pretty ladies who took every penny they could off them.”

  “Why did they give them so much money?” Vasila asked innocently.

  The Peeress smiled.

  “You will find out when you are a little older that, if you are pretty, a man will spend a fortune on you.”

  She gave a little sigh and added,

  “I had my admirers, but, of course, they were only allowed to give me gloves, scent or a fan.”

  Vasila put her head on one side.

  “Those are funny things to give as a present.”

  “And, of course, flowers,” the Peeress added. “I just wish you could see the beautiful baskets of orchids I used to receive. They were lovely! I often lie in bed now and think about them.”

  “Orchids are very expensive,” Vasila then pointed out. “Perhaps one day someone will give them to me.”

  “You can be certain of that,” she replied. “You are very lovely, my child, and very sweet. I pray that you will marry a man who will love you and you will love him.”

  “I would never marry anyone unless I loved him,” Vasila asserted.

  The Peeress did not say anything. She was thinking that all Royal marriages were inevitably an arrangement of convenience.

  Love was the very last thing that those who planned them thought about for the two people concerned.

  “What I would like, dearest,” the Peeress then said, thinking that this conversation was getting rather difficult, “is for you to read me some of the poems by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. I enjoy them so much and I hope that you like them too.”

  “Of course I will read them,” Vasila smiled.

  She jumped up from the chair that she was sitting on and walked over to the bookcase. She found the book of poems and sat down by the Peeress’s bed.

  The poems by Elizabeth Barrett Browning were not in the Baroness’s library and were therefore new to Vasila.

  “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways,” she began to read in her soft musical voice.

  “I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach.”

  She read until she realised that the Peeress had now fallen asleep, but still she went on reading to herself.

  ‘I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach.’

  She was now fascinated by the way that Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote about love.

  ‘I love thee with the smiles, tears, of all my love and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.’

  Vasila was very moved and the words seemed to fit in with her dreams. She read on until she reached the end of the poem and then carried on to read many more.

  Then she closed the book of poems with a sigh of satisfaction and put it back on the shelf.

  She tip-toed out of the room so as not to wake the Peeress and went downstairs.

  “Whatever happened to you?” Gladys asked her as Vasila went into the kitchen. “I were expectin’ you to come down an hour ago.”

  “I was reading to her Ladyship,” she replied, “and when she went to sleep I went on reading.”

  “Well, there be your chocolate cakes,” Gladys said, “and a nice glass of lemonade.”

  “You are a real angel,” she smiled, “and you make the best chocolate cakes of anyone in the whole world.”

  “That’s just what you always says,” Gladys replied, “and I knows you be a-flatterin’ me to make me give you another one.”

  She was moving about the kitchen as she spoke and then went on,

  “I’m glad you’ve been to see her Ladyship. She’s been a bit down these last few days after bein’ so ill. I was half-afraid we’d lose her.”

  “Oh, you must not do that. It is so lovely to come here to talk to her and you.”

  “If you asks me,” Gladys said, “it’s time you were with young people of your own age and someone should do somethin’ about it.”

  “I have always thought it would be fun to have a girl friend to talk to and, of course, a young man I could dance with. But they don’t come to Hampton Court.”

  “Then sooner or later you’ll have to go to them,” Gladys said. “It’s not right that you should be boxed up here with us olduns when you’re ever so pretty.”

  “I am quite happy and you are all so kind to me.”

  She had eaten the cakes and now she was drinking the lemonade.

  “That was really delicious and thank you so much, Gladys. Now her ladyship is better I will come tomorrow. Will you tell her when she wakes up?”

  “She’ll look forward to that. As I’m bakin’ tonight, which’d you prefer a chocolate cake or an iced one?”

  “Oh, an iced one would be absolutely wonderful!” Vasila exclaimed. “You have not made one for me for a long time.”

  “I ought to be makin’ a big one for your Weddin’,” Gladys said, “that’s what I should be doin’.”

  Vasila laughed.

  “I don’t think that there is anyone here in Hampton Court who wants to get married, and if they do, they have not asked me!”

  Gladys laughed too.

  “You’d have to push ’em right up to the altar in a wheelchair.”

  “That is not the sort of Wedding I am looking for.”

  “Well, maybe a handsome young man’ll drop down the chimney or appear unexpected-like at your front door.”

  “If he asks me to dance with him, I will accept with alacrity,” Vasila answered.

  “You do that, Princess, and I’ll then make you a Weddin’ cake that has three tiers and a wishbone on top.”

  “I shall not let you forget. Goodbye, Gladys, and thank you again.”

  She blew her a kiss from the door.

  Then, picking up her books, she let herself out.

  As she started to walk towards her own house, she saw to her surprise that there was a smart carriage drawn by two horses outside it.

  This was indeed exciting because the Baroness very seldom had visitors.

  ‘I wonder who it can be?’ Vasila asked herself.

  She hurried along the path towards the horses.

  She then saw that the Royal Coat of Arms was on the doors of the carriage and there was a coachman and a footman on the box.

  As she opened the front door, she was aware that they were both looking at her.

  ‘Who can it be?’ she then asked herself. ‘It must be someone very important to come in a Royal Carriage.’

  She could hear someone talking in the sitting room and, as she put down her books on a chair, the Baroness came out into the hall.

  “Where have you been, Vasila? You are nearly two hours late and I wondered what had happened to you.”

  “I have been eating delicious chocolate cakes with Gladys,” Vasila replied. “Who is here?”

  “I might have thought that you would be there,” the Baroness said. “Two Equerries have arrived from Windsor Castle and they have been instructed by the Queen to take you to her immediately.”