Goosy Murray was reputed to be plain and domineering but as she was never seen we were unable to verify the report. She was kept hidden in her father’s house in Berkeley Street and her secret royal husband used the back stairs when he called on her. The Queen, in her ignorance of all this, was in the best of moods. She had two sons at home, two at the battle front, and the Prince of Wales had pledged to pay his creditors and lead a more sober life.
Her Majesty’s great project that autumn was an afternoon party, to be held in her new Frogmore house and attended by the King himself, who never went to teas. Sofy said he was making an exception because Elizabeth had been so industrious in covering the walls of the new house with her botanical paintings and he wished to encourage her. The date was set, Elizabeth was at Frogmore every daylight hour perfecting her handiwork, and there was a good deal of discussion as to what cakes would be served. Then the news came from France. The French Queen was to be put on trial for acts of moral turpitude, for stealing from the Treasury and for conspiring to overthrow the Revolution.
At first Sofy chased away any dark thoughts. She decided Marie Antoinette would be allowed to go home to her own people.
‘It’s the only possible outcome,’ she said. ‘Poor dear. I’m sure she has no wish to stay where she’s not wanted.’
But everyone else guessed what lay in store for the French Queen. She had been taken from the Temple Prison to a new place of confinement, the Conciergerie, and I had heard of that from Miss Tod.
‘They say,’ she once whispered to my mother, ‘that Conshurgy is so terrible, death comes as a relief. They say …’
And Mother said, ‘Nein, nein! I kennot listen.’
But she did listen. Lice the size of fingernails, rats the size of dogs. Darkness and damp and the cries of its prisoners, day and night.
The Queen’s tea party was cancelled, Frogmore was closed up for the winter, and the Illustrious Personage withdrew to her apartments. This would usually have led to an outbreak of gaiety at Lower Lodge, but the significance of what was happening in France outstripped the joy of being excused attendance on a demanding mother. Even Sofy grew pensive.
She said, ‘It could not happen in England.’ It was more a prayer than a statement.
When I returned to London I learned in full what had happened to the French Queen: two days standing before her prosecutors, the sentence pronounced, then just three hours to make her confession and write her final letters.
Miss Tod said, ‘They say you wouldn’t have known her. Only thirty-eight but they say she looked like an old woman.’ Mother had already heard this several times but forced herself to listen again. ‘Der poor soul,’ she said. ‘Taken like pig to market.’
When they took King Louis to be killed they’d allowed him a closed carriage, but not his queen. She had been taken in an open cart, so everyone might enjoy her misery.
Mother said, ‘Perhaps der vurst iss over,’ but Papi said more likely it was just beginning. Next they would kill the Queen’s friends, then the friends of her friends, and when that was done they would begin to kill each other. They had dispensed with God too. There was no need for Him now the Age of Reason had dawned. Anything was possible.
Mother said, ‘Zen I sank Gott ve are English.’
So yet again Sofy’s birthday was overshadowed. She lay awake at night wondering what had happened to the French Royal Highnesses now the King and Queen were both dead. Princess Marie-Therese was fifteen, just a year younger than Sofy, Prince Louis-Charles was only eight. Some said they had been killed, some said they were behind bars and the key thrown away, others said they were already gone from France, spirited away in coffins bored with air holes. It was all the stuff of nightmares.
In fact Marie-Therese was miles away in Kurland, and although she was safe from the spiteful mob she can’t have found much joy there, hemmed in by exiled Bourbons. They dreamed of France with its throne restored and plotted how they could use her, how remorse might make the people take her to their hearts. It is possible for a pawn to become a queen, but in the meantime it does well to accept that it’s merely a pawn. She married a cousin—well, she would have done that anyway—and they lodged in England for some years, though Sofy never met her. And she did become Queen of France, but only for five minutes. They were soon on the road again, she and her King, perpetual exiles.
Remorse or no, the French are done with Royalties. Perhaps Marie-Therese preferred it that way, for how could she sleep easy with that blood-stained crown on her head? I believe she lives yet, very quiet and retired, in a wing of some relative’s castle. Her brother though was lost for ever. They say many stepped forward over the years to claim his name, but she rejected every one of them for the madmen and impostors they were. As if the sad creature didn’t have enough to haunt her.
When Morphew came to drive me home from Windsor I found not only Papi seated in the berlin but Mother too, in her best bonnet and very gay considering how far she was from home. We were bound for Hammersmith, to see a house Papi thought of taking. It was called Seagreens and it had a number of features to recommend it: spacious, light rooms, parterres and orchards, a clear view to the water meadows at Barnes and, above all, the best possible neighbours: Uncle Christoff and Aunt Hanne lived in the house next door.
My uncle lived in the country to be as far away as possible from the smell of his business. After he and Papi gave up the Coconut Tree Uncle Christoff had gone into the night-soil trade. His men collected it and delivered it to the saltpetre factories where it was turned into money and, Uncle Christoff being the man he was, the money was spent on a bright, airy river-front house filled with pretty things. And now Papi had decided to be a country gentleman too. He and Mother were like sweethearts, planning a new life that took no account of my wishes, for wasn’t I engaged to Jack Buzzard, wouldn’t I very soon be off their hands? There was a bone-chilling wind blowing off the river that day and it seemed as though it was directed entirely at me. Even the excellent dinner at Uncle Christoff’s house didn’t comfort me. Mother was burbling like a merry brook.
‘Oh Hanne,’ she said, ‘Ludwig says ve vill grow artishoke und epples, und ve vill heff ein milch cow but I sink Tvyvil vill not like it. In London, you know, der milch comes in ein kann.’
Papi said he had a mind to give Twyvil notice and be done with her airs and graces. Damned if he wouldn’t milk the cow himself.
Aunt Hanne couldn’t believe that Papi would truly be happy to leave, as she saw it, the splendour of working for a prince, but I’d seen enough of royal households to understand. The days were long, everything must be conducted according to a tangle of rules, and the principal occupation was waiting, always ready, never impatient. Papi had had enough. He could see anyway that before much longer there would be changes at Carlton House.
He said, ‘Der time comes. Soon Prince of Vales vill marry.’ Aunt Hanne, who was from Marburg, said he couldn’t do better than choose a good, strong Hessen princess. Mother was staunch for Brunswick.
If Papi knew anything he wasn’t sharing it with us.
‘I am steward,’ he said. ‘He doss not tell me. Only I know ziss, he vill do vat he moss do.’
I said, ‘But there’s still Mrs Fitzherbert. What’s to be done about her?’
And after a long pause while he puffed and grunted and enjoyed a mouthful of beef he said the knot the Prince had tied with Mrs Fitz was a loose one and easily undone. Without the King’s permission all the priests in Christendom couldn’t make the contract stick. I thought of Prince Gus’s secret wife, kept out of sight on Berkeley Street, and wondered whether she had yet understood the hopelessness of her position.
Papi went to the attorney, the papers for Seagreens were signed, and we rode back to London in the dark with Mother gripping my hand and begging Papi not to let Morphew take us through Hyde Park to have our purses taken and our throats cut. The further behind we left Hammersmith the more subdued she became, and when we were safely back in our warm parlour she burst into tears.
She said, ‘Ludwig. If ve go to Hemmersmit, I vill neffer see my friends no more.’
I imagine Papi regarded a life free of Miss Tod and Mrs Lavelle’s daily visits as a wonderful prospect but he kissed Mother’s hand and promised to bring her to town once a month at least and regale her with a glass of ice cream at the sign of the Green Pineapple.
November 13th 1793
The world is busy rearranging itself without consulting my feelings. Soho Square is to be let. The only home I have ever known. Worse still, Jack has found premises. Now I have to choose: to be an old maid in Hammersmith and a reproach to my parents or to marry and never have a minute to call my own.
12
The shop Jack took was on Park Street, by the corner with the Oxford road. It had stillrooms and stores enough for his needs and an ice pit, and a yard where a cart could be kept. What it lacked was a place for us to live. The rooms above it were already occupied.
Jack said, ‘It’s a plum of a position and I’m loath to pass it up but I’m stretched as far as I dare go, Nellie. It’s the shop or a house. I can’t take both. We can’t marry yet a while.’
I know how to play a part. I could have acted on a stage like Dora Jordan.
I said, ‘You’re right, Jack. The business must come first. I understand.’
He thought me a diamond for saying that. It would never have occurred to Jack that I was in no hurry to be chained to a shop counter. But there remained another difficulty. Even though Mother was nervous and Twyvil predicted nothing but misery and mud for her ten guineas a year, my family was removing to the country.
Jack said, ‘Here’s the thing, Nellie. You’ll be out in Hammersmith and I’ll be working all hours. I’ll never see you.’
