But how did that fit with this cauldron?
His next move was clear.
Time to pay a visit to Lord Nigel Yourstone.
CHAPTER FOUR
Yourstone dialed the phone resting on the corner of his desk. The line on the other end was answered after the third ring and he said, “We have a problem.”
The gravelly voice seemed unsurprised.
Over the course of the last decade they’d routinely communicated, the voice supplying otherwise unobtainable information—Yourstone ensuring that the resulting scathing stories about the Prince of Wales appeared in the media. The story about Richard’s presence at Lauder Place with the daughter of Lord Bryce had come to light thanks to the man on the other end of the phone.
“My and Lord Bryce’s comments on the monarchy will make an excellent story for tomorrow,” Yourstone said. “Buckingham Palace will have to make some sort of statement, and there’s the next day’s story. The media can then rerun the tryst photos with a comment from the darling-daughter-Bryce the following day.”
“I do believe you’ve come to both understand and appreciate this sordid business.”
“All I want is for that bloody peckerhead to be as welcome as yesterday’s coffee.”
“Such resentment for our future king Richard.”
“I hope such a title is never attached to that man’s name.”
“Based on the latest polls, you’re not alone in that sentiment.”
He’d read the same statistics. “I’ve always possessed a great deal of faith in the English people.”
There had been four Saxe-Coburg monarchs. The line was created in 1840 when Victoria I married a German prince of the Saxe-Coburg line. Edward VII, Victoria I’s eldest son, became the first Saxe-Coburg ruler. His son, George V, toyed with the idea during World War I of changing the family name to Windsor—a way to distance the royals from marauding Germans—but never did. The next son was Victoria’s father. But his sympathy to Germany in World War II, while Hitler’s bombs exploded over London, made him extremely unpopular. Victoria II was actually the first of the Saxe-Coburg line to rule with both popular support and no cloud of scandal.
Richard, though, had clearly inherited his grandfather’s weakness for women and a political ineptness.
His public gaffes were legendary.
Once he characterized the greenhouse effect as poppycock. He then recommended that all of the old terrace houses and Georgian buildings of London be razed and replaced with more modern structures. He openly criticized the gentry for driving gas guzzlers while being chauffeured about in a Bentley that offered less than ten miles per gallon. He regularly consulted a psychiatrist and gulped down antidepressants, neither fact he thought private enough to ever refuse comment upon.
But his most offensive and alarming statements concerned Catholicism.
Since the 1701 Act of Settlement, no Catholic, nor anyone married to a Catholic, could succeed to the throne. Richard had made no secret of his fondness for the faith. He’d made several trips to Rome for audiences with the Pope. He’d been photographed attending mass and courted the disfavor of the Archbishop of Canterbury by recommending a full reconciliation between England and Rome, forever ending the schism Henry VIII created in the 16th century. Britain was a Protestant nation, and the sovereign was the symbolic head of the Church of England. The coronation oath called for absolute loyalty to the Anglican faith. For a monarch-to-be to doubt the validity of the national religion bordered on treason, and editorials in major newspapers had many times hinted at that conclusion.
Richard was surely a disappointment to Victoria, but in her customary manner never had she publicly commented. Yourstone recalled what George V was known to have said regarding his son—after I am dead the boy will ruin himself in twelve months. More than likely Victoria had privately repeated that same prediction about her eldest. Which was why Richard could not be in a position to inherit the throne once the queen died. So, for nearly a decade, he’d made sure Richard Saxe-Coburg stayed in the news.
London’s tabloid press had blossomed thanks to the heir apparent’s exploits. Photographs of him in various parts of the world with a variety of women kept the British people talking. He was a weak soul who could not appreciate the good fortune life had bestowed upon him. Nor did he seem to mind that he was a nearly constant source of ridicule.
Which made him excellent prey.
“There’s a new problem,” Yourstone said.
And he told his accomplice what he knew about Cotton Malone and the Magellan Billet.
“I’ll investigate,” the voice said. “And report back.”
A knock on the study door interrupted his call. “I have to go,” he said. “Let me hear from you soon.”
He ended the call.
The door opened and Eleanor entered the room.
He stood from the desk and approached his daughter-in-law. She was wearing a full-length silk charmeuse gown that tightly gripped her shapely frame. The bodice was trimmed in cream-colored lace, and her bare legs slipped in and out of a seductive slit cut high on her thigh. A kimono-style robe covered her shoulders, open in front. Its gold coloring matched her hair.
“Strange attire for the middle of the day,” he said.
She approached his desk.
He stepped toward a red lacquer cabinet that housed a bar, dropped a couple of ice cubes into a crystal tumbler, and splashed vodka over them.
“Anything for you?”
She came close and nodded.
He took in her perfume as he poured her a vodka with no ice. Aragon was truly one of the world’s great scents.
He handed her the glass.
She always drank her liquor straight and behind closed doors, and he caught the swell of her breasts as she savored a sip.
“You
haven’t answered my question about the gown,” he said.
“I was lonely.”
“Where is your husband?”
“Your son is out. At the races today, I believe. He so enjoys his life of leisure.”
He knew better. “You accept your husband’s infidelities with great patience.”
She sipped her drink and appeared unaffected by his crude declaration. She was like that. Able to misdirect her emotions with the skill of a parlor magician.
“My only concern is that he be discreet,” she said. “I assure you, his sexual prowess is not worth fighting for.”
He chuckled. “You do your family proud.”
“I do what is necessary. As do you, my loving father-in-law.” She finished off her vodka. “How is your plan progressing?”
The Act of Settlement proclaimed that a male heir always inherited the throne first, which meant Richard and Albert stood in Eleanor’s way. Shortly before her marriage to his son, he’d explained what he had in mind and was gratified to learn that she, too, wanted to be queen of England.
And she’d proven herself invaluable.
She was the link to Richard.
The hapless fool cherished his sister and regularly sought her counsel. Through her, Yourstone possessed a direct line into the prince’s innermost thoughts and fears, and it had been easy to manipulate both.
“We are less than twelve hours from completion,” he said in a hushed tone, though there was no one who could possibly overhear them. His town house was empty, save for them. He employed a house staff, but only during certain hours, and none lived on the premises.
“My precious mother could die at any time. The bloody doctors can’t say anything for sure. If that happens and we are still where we are now, this whole thing is over.”
“I’m aware of the risks.”
“So has the deal been made?”
He nodded. “Our South African friend has assured me it will be done.”