“I will be careful, Fraser. Thank you,” she added, touched almost beyond words.
He nodded, and then sighed and closed his eyes. “I am tired now. Go away and leave me alone.”
Vivianna crept to the door, but she was smiling. Perhaps there was more to Fraser than met the eye. Perhaps, somewhere in that tough and prickly heart, there was a small, warm patch with her name on it. Perhaps there was something in him to like, after all.
A liveried servant showed Oliver into a sitting room at Buckingham Palace and closed the door. The royal couple stood together, he tall and handsome, she shorter and plumper. Both men bowed deeply. It was the queen who spoke first, her slightly protrudent eyes fixed on Oliver.
“I believe you have done us a great service, Montegomery.”
Oliver stepped forward to take the queen’s outstretched hand and sketch a kiss upon it. “Your Majesty, it was my pleasure.”
“A most unpleasant business,” Prince Albert said with his thick German accent, shaking his head gloomily. “I believe you have given up a year of your life to find the perpetrator of your brother’s death.”
“My brother was murdered, Your Royal Highness. I always knew he had uncovered a secret concerning Lord Lawson—he had hinted as much to me. I…Unfortunately he never had a chance to tell me exactly what that secret was. But I knew he had found some letters, personal letters, incriminating letters. It was only a matter of finding them.”
“We have seen the letters you found hidden at Candlewood.” Victoria pursed her lips. “What took you so long to find them?”
“I did not know of my grandfather’s secret hiding place, Ma’am, although my brother did. At first I believed the entire house would have to be taken down to find them, but fortunately that will no longer be necessary.”
“I can hardly believe it,” the queen said in a bewildered voice. “I know that Sir John had plans to run the country through me, and for years he tried to dominate me and intimidate me. However, I was made of stronger stuff, and when I came to the throne I threw off his attempts, and now he is banished. But Lawson, too? Once he was prime minister, did he mean to bully me, just as Sir John Conroy bullied me and my mother?”
Albert patted her hand comfortingly.
“I liked him, Albert, almost as much as I like Lord Melbourne.”
“Never mind. I am sure, in time, you will grow to like Sir Robert Peel, too.”
The queen looked unconvinced.
Albert gave her a fondly exasperated look, and then turned to Oliver. “You have done Her Majesty a great service. It doesn’t bear thinking that a man such as Lord Lawson might have remained unmasked and eventually have become prime minister. A man who would kill another to prevent a scandal. You have our deepest gratitude, but tell me, is there something you would like in return? Some service we can render you, my lord?”
Oliver tried to clear his thoughts. He had avenged Anthony’s murder, brought to justice the creature whose hunger for personal glory and ambition was so great that he would have done anything to feed it. And yet there was someone else. Someone who very much needed the assistance of the Queen of England and her consort, Prince Albert.
Oliver told them what was in his mind.
The royal couple exchanged a glance. “A very odd request,” Victoria said primly, her eyes flashing with disapproval—she was clearly not amused.
“We owe Montegomery a great deal,” Albert reminded her.
Victoria sighed, and bowed her head regally. “Very well, then. It shall be done.”
Vivianna looked down at her hands in their long white gloves, clasped in front of her white satin gown. Her chestnut hair was dressed in ringlets with ribbons, and Lady Greentree had given her a string of pearls to wear about her neck for this most auspicious occasion.
She knew she looked as unlike Vivianna Greentree from Yorkshire as she had ever looked. She felt like a stranger, too. It did not seem real, any of it.
Who could have imagined that she would be introduced to the queen? By particular invitation? It was almost the same as being presented at one of the queen’s drawing rooms.
“Better,” Lady Greentree had informed her, “because you will not have a lot of other hopefuls pushing and shoving. There will be just you, Vivianna. Oh, I am so glad! Do you realize what this means? All the gossips, all the people who have cut us, will be silenced. If the queen will accept you, then so must everyone else!”
Once Vivianna would have declared that they must take her as she was, and she still might have, but not when her family had suffered so for her sake.
She wondered if she would forget her name or trip on her hem. It was such a great honor for a girl of her dubious background, and she did not want to spoil it.
Fraser was aware of that, too. He had insisted on seeing her in the gown Elena had made for her. He had been propped up in his bed, the big tabby cat sitting beside him. Both pairs of eyes had watched Vivianna cross the room. Fraser had nodded, his lined and yellowy face suddenly almost benevolent as he had smiled. “Aye, ye’ll do,” he had said with quiet pride. “Ye’ll do, daughter….”
Vivianna, who had thought herself prepared, found that when she arrived at Buckingham Palace she was woefully nervous. She was led into an elegant anteroom, and there waited for half an hour before she was taken to the drawing room where the royal couple were awaiting her.
She came forward, as she had been instructed, trying to remember the intricacies of the curtsy. She seemed to get through it without too many wobbles.