Love and the Gods Read online

  “You are quite right, Jenkins. If nothing else, this voyage will bring us new ideas and new interests.”

  They drove on in silence.

  Only when they neared the Thames did Jenkins say excitedly,

  “There be The Mermaid! I can see her sure enough through them trees.”

  The Duke knew that the Captain of The Mermaid would tie up as near as he could to the House of Lords, which had always been a favourite place for those who were rich enough to possess yachts.

  As he drew up on the Embankment, three of his seamen, who were obviously on the lookout for him, ran towards the carriage.

  Glancing up at Big Ben, the Duke saw that it was just after two o’clock in the morning.

  Having handed over his horses to the groom, he now walked aboard, leaving Jenkins to instruct the seamen to carry the luggage to his cabin.

  Next to the Master cabin there was a smaller one that was usually used by the most important guest.

  It was the most comfortable and quite the prettiest of all the other cabins in the yacht.

  Jenkins had the large case containing Apollo put in there. Then he locked the door and handed the Duke the key.

  “Although Your Grace’s said nothing about it,” he said, “I thinks that everyone that sees that big packing case is going to be curious as to what’s inside it. If you asks me, I think it should be under lock and key.”

  “You are quite right and I should have thought of that myself. But as you know, Jenkins, I can always rely on you.”

  Jenkins did not reply and then quickly unpacked the Duke’s nightclothes and laid them ready for him in the Master cabin.

  Then, as the Duke had ordered in his letter to the Captain, they cast off and the yacht moved out into the middle of the Thames.

  By the time the Duke was undressed and in the very comfortable bed that he had chosen himself when he was building the yacht, The Mermaid was already some way down the river.

  The Duke thought as he lay down that everything had gone as if on greased wheels. He could hardly believe himself that it had all seemed so simple.

  His letter to the Queen purported to explain how sorry and disappointed he was to have to rush away to the deathbed of one of his relatives and he said at the end that he would keep Her Majesty well informed of anything that happened during his journey.

  He felt sure that she would also like to know the condition of his relative when he arrived at his destination and he thought to himself it was a letter that told the Queen everything she would need to know.

  There would be no hint of its inner meaning if anyone else read it and no one would find anything strange or particularly interesting in it.

  He was confident that no one at Windsor Castle would have any idea that he had taken out more than he had brought in.

  When they heard the reason for his leaving, none of the house party would be particularly curious as to why his departure had been at night.

  ‘At least I have set off on the right foot,’ the Duke mused to himself.

  Then, because it had actually been a long and tiring day, he quickly fell asleep.

  *

  When he awoke, they were already out to sea and small waves were breaking over the bow of The Mermaid.

  As he sat up in bed, he realised that he had done it and he could congratulate himself on a very neat and smart piece of work.

  He was sure that no one at Windsor Castle would guess that anything was missing from the large collection of different objects in the room from which he had taken the statue of Apollo.

  No one on board would give a thought to the extra luggage he had brought with him even if it did seem heavy.

  The only difficulty now was to convey the statue of Apollo to the King of Greece without anyone realising it came from England.

  He had not yet thought this problem out clearly.

  But he was sure that having gone so far he must not now fail in delivering the precious goods without anyone knowing where the statue had come from.

  ‘I must think of something,’ the Duke reflected. ‘It will certainly give me a puzzle to occupy my mind until we reach Athens.’

  Equally he felt excited at what lay ahead.

  He told himself that so far he had succeeded in one of the most difficult tasks that had ever been set for him.

  In the past he had taken many of his friends on The Mermaid and he had also been accompanied occasionally by some particularly attractive young woman.

  But he had found, as many men before him had found, that few women were at their best at sea and most of them were seasick if it was at all rough.

  The Duke therefore had either travelled alone on The Mermaid or had been joined by a man as interested as he was in visiting new places and new countries.

  There was now one last fence to surmount.

  It was he and he alone who must now convey to the King of Greece the present that the Queen had sent him, without anyone else being aware of where the statue came from.

  It was not going to be easy, of that he was quite certain.

  He hoped he would find an answer to the problem before they reached Athens or at least soon after his arrival.

  He was quite sure that there was not a single person in the whole of England, except the Queen, who knew that the statue had left Windsor Castle and was actually lying in the cabin next to his.

  What he had to do now was to give it back to the country from which it had come without anyone realising that their most beloved God had been brought home.

  It was just the sort of problem the Duke enjoyed solving.

  He thought with a little thrill of excitement that, as the first fences had been taken without any disaster, he had to take the last fence as if was a triumph.

  ‘I have to think of a way,’ he told himself.

  However, just for the moment he could only think with satisfaction that he was at sea and no one was the slightest bit interested in what lay locked in the cabin next to his.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The Duke woke with a feeling of satisfaction.

  Although he would not admit it, he was thrilled to be aboard his yacht again.

  The Bay of Biscay was fairly rough, but not as bad as it had been on other occasions.

  He spent a great deal of time on the bridge with the Captain, as he found that when he was there he forgot the problems that lay ahead.

  But, when he went to bed in his comfortable Master cabin, he wondered again how he could possibly give the statue of Apollo to the Greek King without anyone being aware that it came from England.

  He turned the problem over and over in his mind and felt there must be a solution if only he could find it.

  The Mediterranean was calm, blue and warm.

  It was a joy to feel The Mermaid rushing through the water and not to have to think, for the moment, of anything but enjoying himself.

  Yet inevitably the conundrum was back again in his mind.

  He knew that whatever else he did he must not let the Queen down.

  They arrived at Piraeus, the port of Athens, rather sooner than he had expected, which pleased the Duke and he congratulated the crew.

  He left Jenkins in charge of the locked cabin and went ashore, finding a suitable carriage to take him the five miles to the Palace in Athens.

  He had been rather afraid that the King and his family would be at Tatoi, their heavily wooded estate in the country.

  He had heard from visitors that the King felt this was their home rather than the immense German-Grecian Palace that King Otho had built in Athens.

  However, the driver of the carriage that conveyed him through new streets, which had not been there on his previous visit, told him that the King and Queen were in Athens.

  The Duke wondered if, in fact, he would find a large party at the Palace, but he knew from what he had heard that King George kept the formality of his Court to a minimum, insisting on as little pomp and ceremony as possible.

  The Duke had
met Queen Olga on his previous visit and was looking forward to meeting her again.

  He knew the romantic story of the way she had met the King and how they had fallen in love with each other.

  The first visit of King George to the Court of Czar Alexander II was in 1861, the year before he became King of Greece and it was there he first met the Grand Duchess Olga, who was only twelve years old at the time.

  Olga was the only daughter of the Czar’s brother Constantine, and her mother was Princess Alexandra of Sachsen-Altenburg.

  She was very bright and intelligent, spending her time between the Imperial Court and her father’s estate and as she grew older, she developed into the prettiest and most charming Princess.

  It was not until the spring of 1867 that King George left to pay a State Visit to Russia accompanied by a large retinue.

  There he met the young Grand Duchess Olga again, now grown up.

  He fell in love with her straightaway and she with him and by the time he left to return to Greece the marriage was fixed for the following October.

  The ceremony took place according to the rites both of the Orthodox and the Lutheran Churches and the Czar celebrated it with great pageantry and circumstance.

  The Winter Palace and the whole Capital blazed with illuminations and endless festivities.

  At the conclusion of the Thanksgiving Services, balls, State dances and other Court functions, the newly married bride and bridegroom retired to Tsarskoye-Selo.

  A little later they set out for the new Queen’s future home and then the Greek people received their young and beautiful Queen with wild enthusiasm.

  The Duke thought Queen Olga’s great popularity was due not only to her charming simplicity, but to her sympathy and understanding, which had not been present in the previous reign.

  The Duke had been told repeatedly that the Queen gave sympathetic assistance wherever it was needed and ever since she had set foot on Greek soil, she continually made the people aware that she was always there to listen to them if they were in trouble.

  What was more and what had astonished the other nations round them, was that she had been untiring in her endeavours to raise the position of women in Society.

  All these thoughts passed through the Duke’s mind.

  While he was impressed, as he always had been by her, he was really wondering how the Queen could help him in his present difficulties.

  As the Duke drove up the hill to the Palace and saw it ahead of him, he realised, as he had the first time he visited Greece, that it had been built on a very large scale.

  It was more than capable of accommodating two or three Royal Families, but the German architect had not been a very practical man.

  Two large inner courtyards took up nearly half the total area and the Duke remembered the system of passages and corridors that were as broad as some of the new streets in Athens.

  Looking back, he well remembered that, besides the Banqueting Hall on the ground floor, the Royal Family had a large dining room on the first floor.

  He hoped that he might be asked to share a meal with them, but it depended on how long he was to remain in Athens.

  It would be a great mistake, as Queen Victoria had pointed out to him, for him to be welcomed too publicly by the Greek King.

  One thing he remembered on his last visit was that, although the King and Queen talked Danish to each other, the conversation was usually in English.

  The carriage came to a stop outside the impressive entrance and, as the Duke then climbed out, servants in distinctive uniforms threw open the door.

  When he informed them that he wished to see the King and gave his name, he was taken along the corridors that seemed almost more elaborate and complicated than they had on his first visit.

  There were several equerries on duty outside what was obviously the King’s private sitting room.

  In a surprisingly short time, the Duke was ushered in.

  It was several years since he had seen King George.

  Now he had grown somewhat in stature and as the Duke remembered when he faced him, they were not only the same age but almost identical in height.

  “What a surprise to see you, David!” King George exclaimed. “But I am so delighted you are here and I hope you will be staying for a long visit.”

  “I hope so too, sir,” the Duke replied. “And I have brought a number of messages for you from your friends in England that I know you will want to hear.”

  As he spoke, he glanced over his shoulder to make quite sure that the door into the passage was closed and he had not been followed into the room by an equerry.

  As if he sensed their conversation was to be private, the King walked to the fireplace, which it being summer was filled with flowers, at the other end of the room.

  He sat down on a sofa.

  “If you join me here, David,” he said, “nothing we say to each other can be overheard.”

  The Duke smiled.

  “So you realise, sir, that our conversation is to be secret.”

  “I had the impression that you had something to tell me as soon as you entered the room, and I am right, am I not?”

  “You certainly are, sir!” Then, lowering his voice so that it was barely above a whisper, he told the King exactly why he was there.

  King George’s eyes widened.

  The Duke realised that it had never entered his head for one moment that he should receive such a present from Queen Victoria.

  Only when the Duke had finished his story, did he exclaim,

  “I cannot believe it! How could Her Majesty be so kind and so understanding?”

  “She was thinking of Your Majesty with admiration and feeling sure it was something that would help you.” “Help me! It is what I have been longing for and praying for. We have excavated a large amount of the Island of Delos, but while we did find bits and pieces of statues that had been smashed by pirates and the Turks, there was no a sign of Apollo himself.”

  “I have not actually seen the statue I have brought with me,” the Duke told him, “but I do believe it is almost intact and I am sure it is one of the most important statues of the God ever sculpted.”

  “I really don’t know how to thank Her Majesty for her kindness,” the King sighed.

  “There is one great problem,” added the Duke.

  “What can that be?” the King asked.

  “No one, either here in Greece or in England, must know where the statue has come from or that Her Majesty Queen Victoria has had anything to do with your receiving it.”

  The King nodded.

  “I can understand. The British would be extremely annoyed to find that anything so precious had been taken away from them.”

  “Of course,” the Duke agreed. “Therefore, sir, we have to think of how I can give you what is hidden in my yacht without some curious eyes spying on us.”

  “Now I see your problem, David, but we have to think of a foolproof solution.”

  There was silence for a moment and then the Duke suggested,

  “I was thinking last night that perhaps the best idea would be for me to deposit it secretly on Delos.”

  King George gave a shout of delight.

  “Of course! How clever of you, David! And if you sail on to some other destination, no one need connect you with the statue when by some lucky chance we uncover it.”

  “That is what I would hope, sir, but you will have to be very careful that people do not connect the finding of the statue with my visit to you here.”

  King George was thinking and there was silence for some minutes before he remarked, “There is always digging activity on Delos to see if anything was left behind by the thieves and brigands who destroyed the beautiful Temples, but they could not destroy Apollo himself.”

  “I am sure of that, sir, and he is still alive in the minds of anyone like myself, who has been lucky enough to visit the glories of Greece.”

  King George smiled at the Duke.

 
“I doubt if any of my subjects go to bed without saying a prayer to the God of Light.”

  “Then, as I have brought him here safe and sound, and according to Her Majesty only a little injured in one leg, you will require a Temple in which to worship him.”

  “Strangely enough there is a Temple already under construction,” the King pointed out. “And now that you have come here with the God in whose honour it is being erected, I can only think that a mind greater than ours has planned that all this should happen.”

  He spoke quite simply.

  The Duke thought that like the people over whom he reigned he had a respect and love for their Gods that was impossible to put into words.

  “Now what I suggest,” the Duke said as the King was silent, “is that I spend only a very short time here with you, just a passing visit so to speak. I will then announce that I am on my way to Constantinople.”

  The King nodded.

  “What I must do and the plan now seems to be coming into my mind – is dig a hole for the statue and you must tell me where I can hide it.”

  He saw the King’s eyes light up as he continued,

  “When I have sailed away, you can find it quite by accident, or better, someone you can trust will do so, and your people will see it as a miracle.”

  “They certainly will, David, and, of course, you are quite right. This is a simple way of making sure that Her Majesty is not in any way involved in its discovery.”

  “What we have to guard against,” the Duke added, “is that someone who is not one of your own people finds it first.”

  “I was thinking of that,” the King replied, “and we cannot stop people visiting the island because it is Apollo’s birthplace. People from all over the world are anxious, if they are in the vicinity, to set foot on Delos.”

  “You must tell me where I can lay the God. But Your Majesty is aware that no one, not even Queen Olga, should know that I have brought anything with me but my good wishes.”

  King George laughed.

  “I don’t think that any man could receive such a magnificent and unique gift and be able to keep the news to himself.”

  “But you must try very hard. You know, as well as I do, that if one whisper reaches England that I was in the area, there are always people who put two and two together and make it five!”