Page 27 of The Heir (A Young Queen Victoria Mystery #1)

W hen Jane entered the royal apartments, carrying her basket with the bottle of cordial, she saw Lehzen sitting beside the open windows. A welcome breeze stirred the draperies. A table with a tea tray had been placed in front of her, along with a second chair.

“Miss Conroy.” Lehzen folded the letter she had been reading. “I see you have completed Her Highness’s errand.”

“I, um, yes.” Jane fumbled with the basket. “This is the cordial she asked for.” She held it out. Lehzen took it with thanks.

“Her Highness and her grace are still on their visit to the Matons. But I have some fresh tea here, as you may see.” She smiled. “Will you take a cup?”

Jane wanted to refuse. She did not like Lehzen’s smile or the light in her eyes. But what excuse could she possibly give? And besides, she was thirsty.

So, Jane sat down and accepted the cup. Lehzen pushed the milk and the sugar bowl toward her. She also glanced at the door, which was open, so that they might be plainly seen and, incidentally, see anyone who came in.

Jane added milk and a sugar lump to her cup.

“Things have been strange the past day or so, would you say?” Lehzen remarked.

Jane added a second lump to her cup. And a third. Mother would have sighed dramatically and rolled her eyes. Lehzen, however, seemed to have things on her mind beyond Jane’s overindulgence.

“I think we may even call them unsettled,” Lehzen went on, her tone somehow both bland and pointed. “And yet it all seems to have created a new sympathy between you and Her Highness.”

Jane kept her attention on her teacup. Silence was the habit of a lifetime. She had waited out her father hundreds of times when he was in a talking mood. She could wait out Lehzen.

“What was behind this business with your errand this morning?”

That surprised Jane. She jerked her head up and sloshed her tea. “She didn’t tell you?”

Lehzen shook her head.

I thought she told you everything.

Jane shifted. She looked out the window; she looked into her tea but found no answers. Father hated Lehzen. He would go on at length about her duplicity, her sneaking ways, her gossip, her bribery of the servants.

As near as Jane could tell, Father’s real objection to the woman was that the princess trusted Lehzen and did not trust him

Jane made her decision. “I had someplace I wished to go, but I did not want my father to know,” she said.

“A servant of ours had been dismissed without wages. I didn’t think she deserved it.

I wanted to see if I could help her and to give her some money.

I couldn’t let Father know, so I asked Her Highness to send me on an errand. ”

“That was very thoughtful of you.” Lehzen cocked her head toward Jane, and Jane got the impression the governess was trying to see her with fresh eyes.

“Miss Conroy, I realize that despite all the time we have spent together, we do not know each other well. That is in part my fault, and I find I regret it now.”

“You regret it because now you don’t know if you can trust me.”

“Yes,” replied Lehzen. “Just so.”

The calm answer surprised Jane. She assumed Lehzen would try to cover up her true meaning with some platitude about wanting to be friends.

“But it is more than that,” Lehzen went on. “I don’t know if Her Highness can trust you.”

“She believes that she can.”

“She has been very sheltered.”

Jane felt her mouth twitch. “Has she, ma’am? Has she really?”

They sat like that for a while, holding each other’s gaze, cups and saucers forgotten in their hands, the table and their mutual silence between them.

Jane drew a sharp breath. She braced herself. “Ma’am, what do you think is happening?” She spoke quickly, as if she needed to get the words out before someone caught her. “Why did my father lie about Dr. Maton?”

“I don’t know,” said Lehzen. “I was hoping you might.”

Jane shook her head. “All I know is that he came to dinner at our house with the men of the Kensington board. But you see everything. You watch everyone for the princess. What was Dr. Maton’s relationship to my father?”

“Well, let me see. I know that Dr. Maton was always the duchess’s first choice to attend the princess, which, I admit, surprised me.”

“Why?” asked Jane.

“Because he attended her husband on his deathbed. I am not sure I would choose the doctor who failed to save my husband to look after the health of my child.”

Jane hadn’t known Dr. Maton had been there when the duke died. “Was it my father’s idea? To have Dr. Maton look out for the princess?”

“He did not object certainly.”

“But did Father want him? Did he choose him?”

“Is the distinction important?”

“It could be.” Jane knew she was betraying her father a little more with each word. She was explaining him to his enemy, talking out loud about things that weren’t even supposed to be whispered.

But she kept talking.

“If Father just lets a thing happen, it’s because he believes it’s harmless. If he encourages it, it’s because he believes it will help some plan of his. So, if he urged the duchess to make sure it was Dr. Maton who attended the princess . . .”

“It was because he personally had reason to trust or to use Dr. Maton,” Lehzen finished for her.

Jane nodded. “Father gossips to people about the princess’s behavior, about her weakness.”

“And perhaps he believed that Dr. Maton was one who could be counted on to agree with his assessments?”

“Or at least that he could be convinced not to contradict them,” Jane said.

“Convinced,” echoed Lehzen. “An interesting word.”

“Did you ever hear Dr. Maton go along with my father’s lies?” She felt reckless speaking this way. Dangerous. She was appalled. She was also elated.

“There was one time,” said Lehzen. “I came upon them unexpectedly. I had been looking for her grace . . .”

You wanted to eavesdrop.

“And I found Sir John was speaking with the Earl of Dunham. Dr. Maton was there with them. I remember Sir John said, ‘It is a deep shame, I tell you, but her legs are terribly weak, bordering on a true malformation.’”

Jane’s whole face puckered.

“Sir John turned to Dr. Maton and said, ‘Would you not agree, Doctor?’ And I remember Maton replied, ‘She is badly undergrown for a girl her age. The consequences may become more evident and more severe as she matures.’”

“Father would not have liked that,” said Jane. “He would have wanted something more definite.”

Lehzen shrugged. “But it does sort with your theory that Maton was your father’s creature.”

Jane found this idea left her very cold.

“Ma’am . . . ,” she began.

“Yes?”

Everything in her screamed at her to keep quiet. If she spoke, she would be laughed at. She would be shouted at.

“I haven’t said this to the princess yet. But . . . what if Dr. Maton was talking about her with someone else? Or what if he was talking to Father about . . . well, other people?”

“You mean what if the good doctor was trading secrets about the household?” Lehzen’s voice dropped. “About the princess herself?”

“Yes. If he was getting information for Father and then spreading around what Father wanted known or believed—”

“Gossip is the currency of all courts,” said Lehzen.

“Even when it is counterfeit. That is something worth thinking about.” Lehzen set her teacup down and did not refill it.

Nor did she offer Jane anything more. “For years, I have looked after Her Highness, have tried to be her friend and to care for her as if she were any other young girl in this world. But that is not possible, because she is not any other girl and never will be.”

“I understand.”

“Do you?” Lehzen cocked her head toward Jane.

It was a quizzical look and highly skeptical.

“I confess I am at a loss, Miss Conroy. It was my intention to ask you to stop acting as the princess’s aide in this .

. . this dangerous campaign she has begun.

I had planned to threaten you with exposure—to the duchess, to your father.

To say to them it was all your idea and you had put Her Highness in jeopardy. ”

Guilt and anger shot through Jane. She kept still and kept her gaze steady. She could hear what Lehzen had to say. She would endure it, with her head up.

It’s time I learned how to do that.

“Now I do not think I will do this,” Lehzen went on. “Now I think I will ask you to keep me informed as to what you learn.”

Jane’s jaw dropped open. She closed it hastily and swallowed all her surprise. Lehzen smiled, but it was a kind smile that acknowledged a silent shared joke.

“And we must find a way to make sure the princess has heard what you have suggested to me about the late Dr. Maton,” Lehzen went on.

Jane’s mouth twitched. Then, slowly, as if unused to this particular exercise, her lips bent into a smile of their own.

“Her Highness has already thought of that.”