“If you don’t, you’ll be crucified for not making his sacrifice for you worth it.”
“I never asked him to make the sacrifice, and now I’m stuck with it as much as he is, but he’s getting what he wants, while I’m getting the short end of the stick.” Wallis threw her arms out to the room, her usual stern composure slipping for the first time since Amelia’s arrival last week. “He and all those simpering courtiers said I’d be Queen or the woman behind the throne, then they all jumped ship the moment it started to sink, leaving me to go down with the captain.”
“A captain who’s devoted to you,” Aunt Bessie reminded.
“If he’d been devoted to keeping his crown we wouldn’t be in this mess but in Westminster Abbey.” Wallis sank into one of the silk-covered chairs and rested her head in her square hands, careful to keep her fingers arched out and not disturb her tightly parted, smoothed, and rolled dark brown hair. “He gave up with barely a fight. Instead of heads of state and hundreds of people watching and kneeling to us, I’m the cruel witch who stole Britain’s beautiful king. I’m hounded by the press, run out of Britain, and Cookie is doing everything she can to turn everyone against me.”
“You can’t think about that,” Aunt Bessie insisted. “You have to think of your future.”
“That’s all I think about.” Wallis stood and paced, twisting the engagement ring around her finger. “What is there for us? No home, no position, no real status. We have to make something of ourselves, and this marriage, and with the whole world watching and waiting for us to fail.”
“You won’t fail.” Aunt Bessie rested her hands on Wallis’s shoulders, settling her in a way no one else could. “You can’t afford to.”
Wallis clutched Aunt Bessie’s wrinkled hands to her chest. “What’ll I do when you go back to America? I can’t endure this without you.”
“You’ll have Amelia here to help you.”
They turned to Amelia, who wanted to bolt straight back to Maryland. Nothing in her Baltimore childhood, her married life in Wellesley, not even her year at the Katherine Gibbs School of Secretarial and Executive Training for Educated Women had prepared her to manage a duchess’s personal affairs, but she couldn’t run. There was nothing left for her in Baltimore or Wellesley. Like Wallis, she had no choice but to succeed. “Of course.”
Wallis pursed her red lips. “We’ll see.”
The door swung open and the Duke marched in clutching a letter with the royal crest emblazoned across the top. He waved it over his blond head, shaking it as if he could flick off what was written there. “Sir Walter just arrived and what do you think he brought me? This! Buck House’s idea of a wedding present.”
The dogs started barking, agitated by the Duke’s excitement. Sir Walter Monckton was the Duke’s former attorney and the go-between for the feuding King George and his brother, as Amelia had discovered the first day of work when Wallis had fired off a telegram to him complaining about how bad the British press treated her.
“Silence!” Wallis commanded, and the dogs stopped barking and settled back into the comforter.
“The Palace is denying you the title of Her Royal Highness,” the Duke fumed. “And they’ve cooked up some ridiculous legal reason why they can do it. A wife is entitled to her husband’s honors. I’m a Royal Highness and you bloody will be too.”
He flapped the paper in Wallis’s face and she snatched it out of his fingers, pinning him with a reprimanding glare that made him bow his head. Wallis read the letter while the Duke waited with his hands clasped behind his back like a chastened schoolboy.
“This is the Fat Scottish Cook’s doing. Your brother doesn’t have the backbone to stand up to his wife or insist on something this underhanded.” Wallis dropped the letter in the grate and it caught fire.
“I’ll call my brother and instill some backbone in him,” the Duke threatened in his high, nasally voice.
“You’ll do nothing of the sort. They’re trying to hurt us but they can’t, not when we have each other.” Wallis smoothed his lapels with quick circles of her broad hands. “We have our love, our life together. That’s worth more than any extra-chic title.”
“But . . . ?” The Duke cast a mournful look at the blackened letter.
“No, we’ll deal with this after the wedding. If we make a fuss now, Sir Walter will hurry back to Buckingham Palace and tell Cookie her blow landed. We can’t have that. See to our new guest as if you’re deliriously happy and no shadow can touch you. We’ll find a more appropriate time to argue our case.”
“Of course. You’re always so levelheaded. I don’t know what I’d do without you.” He pulled her close to kiss her but she turned and his lips landed on her cheek. He either didn’t notice or didn’t mind the dodge but let go and rubbed his hands together in delight. “I’ll give Sir Walter nothing but reports of our joy to take back to Queen Elizabeth.”
He practically skipped out of the room.
“That bitch,” Wallis muttered. “I’ll have my revenge on that old Scottish Cook and her entire country for the hell they’ve put me through.”
“For the moment pretend to be in heaven,” Aunt Bessie advised.
“That’s all I ever do.” Wallis flashed a million-dollar smile then left to join her fiancé, the dogs trotting behind her.
“Does she love him?” Amelia asked. Some American newspapers had called Wallis and the Duke’s affair the love story of the century. The British ones on the Atlantic crossing had blamed Wallis for ruining their beloved king. They’d claimed she’d mesmerized him with strange sexual techniques she’d learned in China in the 1920s and divorced Ernest Simpson in her quest to become queen. They’d reveled in her failure to capture the crown.
“She cares for him, in her own way, but Wallis has never been content with her situation.” Aunt Bessie’s ample chest rose and fell with a resigned sigh. “She’s always aimed high, too high this time. Now she must play the cards she’s been dealt and it’s put her under a terrible strain. It makes her say things she doesn’t mean. I’m sure you understand her position better than anyone else.” Aunt Bessie sat on the edge of the bed and motioned for Amelia to join her.
“I do.” Amelia opened and closed her left hand. Her ring finger still felt light without the gold wedding band. She’d sold it to pay for her first semester of secretarial school. “You didn’t tell her about my debts, did you?”
“I told her enough to secure your employment but we never discussed the nitty-gritty, just as you asked, but you’ll have to tell her eventually.”
“Not yet. I don’t want her to worry I’ll swipe the silverware to pay my attorney fees. She already thinks I can’t do the job.”
“She thinks nothing of the sort. Once things quiet down and you both settle in, you’ll get on splendidly, the way you used to at Cousin Lelia’s. You’ll learn a lot from Wallis. She’ll make you one of the most sought-after private secretaries in Europe. That’s more than you’d have had in Baltimore. She’ll also throw eligible gentlemen in your path. Perhaps one of them will sweep you off your feet and take you away from this life of drudgery. He might even have a title.”
“No thanks. From what I’ve seen of aristocrats, they aren’t worth the effort.”
“I agree.” They giggled together before Aunt Bessie sobered. “I’m so relieved you’ll be here when I go home. Wallis needs all the support she can get, especially from family she can trust. Promise me you’ll do what you can to stop her from giving in to her worst inclinations. I’ve tried and failed enough times to know it isn’t easy, but if you can’t save her from herself then learn from her, especially her mistakes. Those lessons could serve you well.”
“Haven’t I learned enough over the last three years?”
“Everything except how to trust in yourself and your abilities.” Aunt Bessie covered Amelia’s fidgeting hands. “Promise me you’ll try that too.”
Amelia wasn’t sure she could. She wasn’t any better at following her instincts than Wallis, but she’d do what she could for Wallis and make Aunt Bessie proud. She was one of the only family members who hadn’t judged her after she and Jackson had eloped, and especially after his death. Without her help, she might’ve sunk to who knew what indignities to survive. She turned her hands over in Aunt Bessie’s and clasped them tight. “I’ll do what I can.”
“That’s all any of us can do.”
Chapter Two
Amelia approached Château de Candé’s large stone-and-iron front gate. She’d walked to the village post office after breakfast, eager to see if the carnival of reporters had grown since last week. They blocked the road, waiting for anyone with the faintest connection to Wallis or the Duke in the hopes of getting details for articles. Some reporters sat at makeshift tables under the large trees, coats off, shirtsleeves rolled up, fingers flying over their portable typewriter keys. Amelia wondered why they bothered to sit here day after day, since they made up most of what they wrote, but she supposed they had to make a living too.
