Perdita's Prince: (Georgian Series) Read Online Free PDF Page A

you,’ she told him. ‘I daresay you are very occupied.’
    ‘Your Majesty knows the plans laid down by my father. It gives us little time to do anything but follow his orders.’
    Oh, yes, he was resentful. She wondered whether she dare tellthe King that the boys were growing up and should no longer be treated as children. When had George ever taken any notice of her? When she had first come to England George’s mother, the Dowager Princess of Wales, had made it very clear that no interference was expected from her. And George had supported his mother. Bear healthy children and that is all that will be expected of you. And they could not say she had not fulfilled their expectations. But listen to her advice on any subject, treat her like an intelligent being? Never. The only place in which she had any power was her own intimate circle. She could dismiss her maids; she could go over the accounts and find them too great; she could make her economies and take her snuff and look after the younger children. There her duty ended. That had been made clear to her. So it was no use her thinking she could speak to the King about George.
    But she could speak to George – and she was going to find out if these rumours were true.
    ‘So you have no time to visit your mother,’ she said wistfully.
    ‘Very little, Madam, very little.’
    How haughty he was and how she loved him! She had difficulty in assuring herself that this glorious young Apollo was the fruit of her plain little body. She and George between them had produced this beautiful creature! Stolid George and plain Charlotte. It seemed incredible to her. If he would confide in her, if he would show a little affection … she would do everything in her power to give him what he wanted.
    But he showed so clearly that he had no need of her. Yet she would have to prevent his quarrelling with his father. He would have to be made to realize that even he must not indulge in a love affair under their very noses.
    ‘You find life a little … monotonous?’ she asked.
    He inclined his head and suppressed a yawn.
    ‘I have often thought,’ went on the Queen, ‘that our maids of honour lead very dull lives.’
    ‘I agree with Your Majesty,’ said the Prince. ‘How dull merely to be one of a formal procession from the presence chamber to the drawing room and never allowed to speak unless one is spoken to.’
    ‘Some may have nothing worthy to say.’
    The Prince had warmed to his subject. ‘Poor ladies! What a life! To make an occasional one of large hoops in a royal coach. I believe they make two new court suits a year and now and then appear in a side box in a royal play.’
    ‘But she does not have to pay for her seat at the theatre,’ the Queen reminded him.
    He looked at her slyly.
    ‘Save gold, which in her own opinion
    Alone could rival snuff’s dominion.
    he thought. Trust his mother to think a free seat compensated for a good deal.
    ‘I agree, Your Majesty, that a maid of honour goes to concerts and plays … and oratorios free. Your Majesty will no doubt remind me that she does not have to pay her physician and gets her medicines for nothing.’
    ‘You have forgotten one important thing.’
    ‘No doubt, for the acts of a maid of honour formed no part of my education.’
    ’I will tell you one,’ replied the Queen. ‘Perhaps you have recently had experience of this. She may flirt with Princes and go to meet them in the moonlight. Is that also … free?’
    The Prince was for once discountenanced, and his mother was certain now that Schwellenburg’s hints were true. The Prince had been meeting Harriot Vernon in the moonlight. Heaven knew how far this affair had gone, but if it reached the King’s ears His Majesty would be furious. She was terrified of the King’s anger; it took him so oddly nowadays and she was always afraid of where it would end.
    She must act quickly and for once she dismissed the Prince. It was usually he who pleaded his duty to the