Jean Plaidy - The Regent’s Daughter

William called at Warwick House as he was now making a habit of doing. Every day she saw him and she became more and more convinced that she would not marry him. She kept thinking of him the worse for drink; and sometimes it was quite clear that he was recovering from a drinking bout of the previous night. He came to her once slovenly dressed, and she was sure it was on this account.

She had complained because he had not been lodged at one of the royal palaces or at Carlton House but had merely been given lodgings over a tailor’s shop in Clifford Street. Now she was glad. Serve him right, she thought. It was all he deserved; and since Leopold of Saxe-Coburg had had to lodge over a greengrocer’s shop, Clifford Street was good enough for Orange. But she had stopped thinking of Leopold, she reminded herself, when she had recognized the superior attractions of her darling F.

She had made up her mind. She was not going to marry Orange, and she could be bold because she had friends and supporters. She had her mother and her mother’s friends.

She was in a truculent mood on this day. He was a little astonished for he did not realize that she had steeled herself to this.

‘You are in a perverse mood today, Charlotte,’ he said.

‘I often am,’ she replied.

‘You are always frank.’ He smiled, implying that he liked her frankness.

‘I am thinking of my mother. You know that I am not allowed to visit her as I wish. I have to have permission. Do you think that is a reasonable manner in which to treat me?’

She was disconcerting. He wanted to please her, but he did not want to say anything that might be reported to the Regent and annoy that important gentleman. He was in awe of the Regent who was grand, so friendly sometimes yet so imperious. His intended father-in-law could be jocular; with his passion for nicknames he had given William the one of ‘Young Frog’ which William was not sure that he liked; but there seemed to be a certain amount of affection in it so he accepted it with a good grace. Indeed how could he do otherwise? He had to keep in the Regent’s good books until the marriage had taken place. When they were in Holland he could be more free.

‘I am sure your father knows what is best,’ he said diplomatically.

She gave him a withering look. Chinless William, who had no spirit either. Slender Billy, Young Frog! And this was the mate they had chosen for her when there were princes in the world like F … and Leopold.

‘When we are married,’ she said, ‘I shall expect to see my mother when I please.’

‘I am sure that then your father will have no objection.’

‘We shall receive her in our house whenever she wishes to come. Do you agree to that?’

‘I don’t think that we can allow her to visit our house.’

‘So you will not have my mother in our house?’

‘I do not think it would be wise, Charlotte.’

‘Then if you cannot accept my mother I cannot accept you as my husband.’

He looked startled. But now she was in a truly militant mood. She had started and she was not going back.

‘When we are married, you will expect me to live in Holland, I suppose?’

‘For some part of the time, yes. It will be necessary.’

‘Then let me tell you at once that I have no intention of leaving England … ever. My place is here and here I shall stay.’

‘Your place is with your husband.’

‘That may be, but since my place is in England I will not marry a man whose place is not there also.’

‘Charlotte, what can you mean?’

‘I should have thought I had made it very clear. But I see I have not. I shall put it on paper. Yes, that is the best way. I shall write it. Then you will know that I mean what I say.’

A bewildered Prince of Orange drove away from Warwick House. Charlotte was extraordinary. Sometimes he wondered whether she was as mad as her mother was reputed to be.

Her Uncle Augustus, the Duke of Sussex, one of her favourite uncles, called to see her.

He had heard that all was not going well between her and Orange.

‘The plain fact is,’ said Charlotte, ‘that I don’t like him. We are not of a kind and I have no intention of leaving this country.’

Uncle Augustus applauded her decision. ‘Your father wants you out of the country, I fear. That’s why he’s so eager for the marriage. He doesn’t like your popularity and you know that he wants to divorce your mother so that he can get a son.’

She felt hurt and angry. She had begun to think that he had some affection for her, and it was all a pretence to get her married to William so that she would have to go to Holland.

‘I won’t leave the country,’ she said firmly.

‘You are right,’ he said. ‘You must not. Your whole future depends on your staying here. Why, if you went you could lose the Crown. You must stay, but at the same time don’t anger your father. I am worried about his health. It is not good, you know.’

How like Uncle Augustus – at one moment he was all for her, then he swayed to his brother. At one time he had married his Augusta and given up everything for her sake; but that did not last and he and Goosey were no longer together. It was their son Augustus d’Este who had gazed longingly at her. He was rather charming and Charlotte was sure he would have liked to marry her. But he was too much like his father and was not the man she would look up to as a husband. She wanted a strong man like F … or Leopold. How stupid to think of him. He was not strong. He had run away rather than face her father’s anger. What she wanted was a prince who would be prepared to live in England and be consort of the Queen; she would choose her own husband and if F offered for her and if it were possible, she would take him. Most willingly, she thought fiercely, and refused to think of that handsome young man who had made such an impression when he had handed her into her carriage at the Pulteney Hotel.

But if she could not take Uncle Augustus very seriously, it was different with Brougham and Whitbread.

They called. They had heard that she wished to break off the Orange match. Then perhaps she would allow them to draft the letter for her.

She had gone so far and there was no turning back. In any case it was what she had decided.

So in his rooms in Clifford Street a bewildered Prince of Orange read a letter from his affianced bride which set down her refusal in such terms which might have been composed by a lawyer – which indeed they had.

CHARLOTTE WAITED FOR the storm to break.

There was only one thing to do. She wrote to Mercer begging her to come to Warwick House will all speed. She needed her now as never before.

Mercer arrived and when she came it was to find that the Prince whom Mercer knew through Charlotte’s letters as F was with the Princess.

‘Alone!’ cried Mercer, shocked.

Cornelia admitted that this was so.

‘But this is madness,’ said Mercer coolly. ‘For heaven’s sake go in and put a stop to this.’

‘I dare not,’ said Cornelia. ‘The Princess has changed lately. She would be very angry and she does not listen to me as she used to.’

Mercer looked at Cornelia in surprise. What had happened to the strong-minded woman whom she had grudgingly admired and made her ally?

She herself strode into the room and broke up the tête-à-tête.

It was not difficult, for at the sight of her friend Charlotte gave a cry of joy and flung herself into Mercer’s arms.

‘Thank God you have come, Mercer,’ she cried; and for a few moments she even forgot F in the joy of having her friend with her.

Mercer took charge. Had Charlotte written to her father? Charlotte explained that she had thought William would have done so; but apparently William had not.

‘You must write to your father without delay,’ said Mercer. ‘You must tell him that you have broken the engagement. We will compose the letter immediately and send it to him.’

Charlotte obeyed as always and when the letter was written she felt so frightened that the pain in her knee was almost unbearable and on Mercer’s suggestion she went to bed.

The Regent would be reading the letter now! she thought. It would only take a very short time to deliver it, as Warwick House was next door to Carlton House and if he were at home it would be in his hands now.

Several days passed during which Charlotte found the suspense intolerable.

The foreign visitors left England. The Duchess of Oldenburg – slyly delighted at the thought of the impending storm which she had helped to raise – took a fond farewell of Charlotte and wished her all happiness in the future.

F was leaving with the Russian party. He came to see Charlotte but Mercer would not allow a private tête-à-tête, insisting that Cornelia be present.

F was not entirely sorry to go; he knew that trouble was imminent and he was not sure that the life of a Prince Consort was one which would suit him; he liked to roam the world in search of romance; he could see how stultifying to a man of his temperament marriage – even such a brilliant one – would be. Moreover, Charlotte’s naïveté was delightful, up to a point; he preferred the cultured company of Madame Récamier. But he was automatically ardent. Charlotte did not know it but it was a habit of his with the woman of the moment and his great success was due, as he was well aware, to his ability while he was with a woman, to make her feel that she was the only person in the world of any consequence to him. Whereas F, being a realist, admitted to himself that the only person of any consequence in the world to him was F himself.

‘You will write to me,’ said the young Princess.

‘Nothing will prevent me.’

‘Cornelia will arrange that your letters reach me and mine reach you.’

Cornelia swore that she would do so; and on that guarantee the lovers parted.

A few days passed. It was Mercer’s opinion that the Regent had been waiting for the departure of the visitors, whom he had accompanied to Dover with great pomp and ceremony, before allowing the storm to break. He would not want to have his visitors laughing at his domestic troubles behind his back.

‘It’ll come now,’ said Mercer; and as usual, Mercer was right.

The Prince Regent commanded his daughter Charlotte to come to Carlton House in the company of Miss Knight.

Charlotte, pale and trembling, rose from her bed and immediately collapsed into the arms of Louisa Lewis.

‘It’s my knee, Louisa. I can’t stand.’

Mercer was called. ‘You must write at once to your father and tell him that you are too ill to go to him and beg him to come to you.’

The letter was sent and a day of anxiety followed. Charlotte got up and found that she could walk more easily.

It would be better to face him standing up than lying down.

At six o’clock in the evening the Regent arrived accompanied by the Bishop of Salisbury. He ignored everyone and strode into the drawing room. Then he cried in a voice of thunder: ‘Pray tell the Princess Charlotte that I command her presence here without delay.’

Cornelia, trembling, turned to Mercer who stood whitefaced though calm.

‘What can I do, Mercer?’ implored Charlotte.

‘There is only one thing you can do,’ said the intrepid Mercer. ‘Go down and see him. He commanded you to go in any case, and you must go quickly for his mood will not be improved by delays.’

‘Oh, Mercer …’

‘If you stand by your decision, he cannot force you. Remember that.’

Charlotte turned away and went into the drawing room.

He was standing by the fireplace, his back to it, his arms folded behind as though warming himself although there was no fire on that hot July day. The Bishop of Salisbury stood by, self-righteous, resigned, firm ally of his Regent, prepared to support him in whatever action he decided to take against his recalcitrant daughter.

Charlotte looked imploringly at her father, but his expression was cold and it was clear that at this moment he hated her.

He took first the familiar self-pitying role. ‘What have I done to be treated in this way?’ he demanded plaintively. ‘Have I deserved such an ungrateful child?’

The Bishop gave a sympathetic little cough but Charlotte wanted to shout: Yes, you have. You have never loved me as I wanted to be loved … as I needed to be loved. If you had, everything would have been different.

But she was silent.