The Queen Must Die Read online

  James bent down, and taking up a pair of tongs, prodded the fire, while muttering to Katie through the hole in the Chinese chest. He prayed no one would look at him. ‘The last person you should be talking to is Bernardo DuQuelle. He’s one of the great survivors at court. No one remembers a time when he didn’t have an eminent position. He’s the Prince’s Private Secretary, the Keeper of the Royal Archives, and the Curator of the Queen’s Collections. But he’s also a gossip, a meddler and a man who would do anything to stay on top. You’d be out of the Palace and into a straitjacket before he could finish kissing your hand.’

  ‘James, I think he’s key in all of this,’ Katie said. ‘Not only is he in your time, and in my visions, but also – James – he’s the guy who saved me, in the river, when you blew it.’

  ‘I didn’t blow it, as you so charmingly say,’ James grumbled. ‘I tried to get to you. Maybe DuQuelle is key, but this isn’t the time. You’ll have lots of opportunities. It’s not as if he’s going anywhere. DuQuelle just loves being at court.’

  Joseph Paxton had finished answering questions and was bowing to the Queen and Prince Albert. ‘We are ready to show the Prince the building site at his convenience.’ Turning, he bowed to the tiny Prime Minister, ‘And we extend the invitation to our Members of Parliament who have shown such interest and generosity towards this project, the newly named – what was it – the Crystal Palace?’

  Katie poked James through a hole in the lacquer box. ‘We need to go too. I’ve got to see the Crystal Palace – and maybe DuQuelle will be there.’

  Why would she need to go to the Crystal Palace? James had no idea, but several courtiers had turned to stare at him as he talked to the Chinese chest. Best to placate her until everyone else had left. With a final ‘be quiet, Katie!’ he stepped forward and muttered something into the back of Princess Alice’s neck. Alice neither looked at him, nor seemed to hear him. She didn’t move a muscle. ‘She could be the Queen herself,’ thought Katie, catching Alice’s still face in profile, ‘such cool.’ At that moment, Alice moved forward and curtsied to her father. ‘Please forgive the forwardness of my request. But I would like ever so much to see the construction of the building too. May I go on the excursion?’

  The Queen gave Alice a stern look. For such a young girl to speak out like this in public – it was not acceptable. She turned to Albert to see his response – and as Albert began to smile, she smiled too. She would always trust dear Albert on the children, as on everything. Prince Albert pinched Alice’s cheek. ‘As you have just named the Crystal Palace, you must definitely see it. You may go, and Prince Leopold too, if he is well enough. Baroness Lehzen will attend you and the Reverend Robinson Duckworth and Dr O’Reilly will travel with us for Leopold’s health.’

  The Prince, seeing James O’Reilly standing behind Alice, added, ‘So the young master O’Reilly has an interest in Crystal Palaces too. He shall come as well. We will pack a hamper full of goodies and make it a day of instruction and play for the children.’

  The Prince was not by nature a spontaneous man, but the Crystal Palace had fired his imagination. ‘In fact, we will go tomorrow,’ he suddenly announced. ‘We shall meet Mr Paxton along with the Royal Commission and the parliamentary delegates at Hyde Park. I suggest three o’clock tomorrow afternoon to be an excellent time.’

  The Queen now beamed from ear to ear. ‘My husband is right,’ she said, ‘a bit of learning and a bit of fun for the children. I wish I could go myself, but the red boxes of state are filled with government decisions I need to make. They will keep me at my desk when I would rather be in the open air, enjoying the success of my husband’s great project.’

  The royal couple glowed with satisfaction, but Katie noted the rest of the room looked fairly glum. Paxton, though a supremely confident man, was worried. A royal visit, at this short notice – they’d want to see something fairly spectacular, an arch going up or a roof being raised. Plus, he needed to redesign the central transept. The site itself was a sea of mud – totally unsuitable for a party containing the Royal Family. He and the builders would be up all night preparing. The Members of Parliament were vexed. A government Bill was going through the House of Commons tomorrow, and now they would have to spend another day kowtowing to this foreign prince and a parcel of children. All this for a project that was sure to be a costly failure. The Reverend Robinson Duckworth was worried that Leopold was still in his wheelchair and not well enough so soon after a bleeding attack, and Dr O’Reilly wondered what the devil his son James was doing, putting himself forward like that. Social climbing was well and good, but one mustn’t try to aim too high. Baroness Lehzen simply hated the idea of the children having any type of treat.

  Only Bernardo DuQuelle seemed truly happy. Katie had seen him looking keenly at Alice throughout her conversation with Prince Albert. DuQuelle now stepped forward and doubled into a theatrical bow. ‘On behalf of the Royal Household, may I say we are delighted that such a large number of the Royal Family will be in attendance.’ Bowing again, he added, ‘And so many of the Royal Family’s friends as well.’ Katie could have sworn that DuQuelle’s second bow was aimed directly at her Chinese lacquered box.

  Later that evening, Alice sat in a muslin nightdress and flannel wrapper – far from the silks and bows of a royal presentation – sharing her nursery supper with Katie. James ambled into the room, looked flustered, and began to back out. ‘What,’ said Katie, ‘what now? Oh yes,’ she added clicking at the sight of Alice hastily throwing another shawl around her shoulders, ‘I can’t believe you two. Alice is wearing more clothes than an Eskimo in a blizzard. And I’m drowning in this cloak of hers. Get over it.’

  ‘Grumpy,’ said James as Alice wrapped the shawl more tightly around herself and passed Katie another spoonful of shepherd’s pie. ‘Why is Katie always so grumpy? Doesn’t she like our century?’

  ‘I’m making the best of your century that I can,’ Katie said. ‘And since I’m here, I’d like to see one of the great wonders of your time – the Crystal Palace. Now you two get to go and I have to stay cooped up behind a screen in the schoolroom or shoved under Alice’s bed. Bernardo DuQuelle will be there. I just know he has the answers we’re looking for. It’s the perfect opportunity to question him.’

  ‘You’re not just grumpy, you’re rather stupid,’ said James. ‘Can’t you even see that the Princess has worked things out perfectly; isn’t that right, Alice?’

  ‘I just thought if I could get there myself, I could get you there too,’ Alice replied. ‘James didn’t give me a lot of time, hissing into my neck, and I’m not that quick on my feet, or that clever.’

  James grinned. ‘But you thought of the picnic hampers?’

  Alice laughed. ‘I hadn’t, but of course, you are right. Dear Katie, we will pack you with the game pies and fruitcakes – or bundle you in with the picnic blankets. They’ll travel in a carriage with the junior household staff. The servants will be too busy enjoying a day out to notice much.’

  ‘I’m awfully heavy,’ Katie commented, thinking about her big bones. ‘Won’t they notice such a heavy hamper?’

  ‘You’ve obviously never had a palace fruitcake,’ James said. ‘They weigh a ton.’

  The idea of the day out and the great building excited them all. Katie felt her anxiety lessen. ‘Baskets, boxes and chests,’ she joked, ‘I’m beginning to think I live in a basket – a regular basket case.’

  Chapter Eight

  Amongst the Girders

  The next afternoon Katie was rolled in several blankets and lashed to the back end of a carriage. The wooden wheels hardly guaranteed a smooth ride, particularly when pitted against cobblestones. Lying on her back, almost crushed by the heavy wrappings, Katie was being shaken about like one of Mimi’s favourite martinis. As she jolted along half suffocated by the blanket and choking on the dust raised by galloping horses, Katie thought she’d like to be back home, in New York, hailing a taxi and sitting comfortably in the back seat. This was so
bad, she’d even have settled for the subway.

  They’d spent most of the morning finding something for Katie to wear on her first public outing. Nothing Alice had would fit, so in the end Alice sent James to filch some things from the Honourable Emma Twisted’s wardrobe. ‘I know they are too grown up for a girl your age, but they are your size, Katie.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Katie, ‘I’m definitely built on a more robust twenty-first century model. Oh, Jamie,’ she added, just to be mean, ‘don’t forget to bring me a complete set of girl’s underwear.’

  So there she was, dressed appropriately for a governess in serviceable dove-grey cashmere with a touch of good lace at the neck and wrists. She even had a little mesh reticule with a few sovereign coins inside. Her waist had been cinched in so that she could hardly breathe. ‘Otherwise,’ Alice explained, ‘there won’t be a dress in the Palace you will fit into.’ She’d been lucky to get away with four petticoats.

  ‘All this effort to look like “a lady” and it’s being rumpled beyond saving by heavy wool blankets,’ she grumbled to herself. ‘I’m sweating like a pig. And Alice pulled the stays so tight, I can barely breathe. How do women eat in these corset things? One slice of pizza and I’d burst all the lacings.’

  Hyde Park was only a ten-minute walk from Buckingham Palace, but based on the supplies and carriages provided for the excursion, it might have been a trip to the North Pole. Prince Albert and Bernardo DuQuelle shivered in an open landau. The Prince would have preferred a closed carriage, but the Queen was fanatical about fresh air, and tenderly entreated he get as much as possible. Alice and Baroness Lehzen travelled in the next. Prince Leopold followed in a third closed carriage with the Reverend Duckworth, Dr O’Reilly and James. Behind the carriages were five additional brake carts carrying hampers, blankets, chairs, tables, awnings, wind breaks, plates, cutlery, linen napkins and two complete tea sets. At least a dozen servants bounced along on the wooden benches or clung to the running boards. Someone had to serve the picnic.

  As the entourage turned into Hyde Park, Katie’s blankets lurched and swayed. Was she lashed on tightly enough? Trying to readjust her weight, she wiggled her head free of the blanket folds. A burst of sharp air hit her and she looked up to see a cold, bright sky, big billowing clouds chasing across it. She could hear the building site before she could see it: a clamorous din of both man and machine. The royal carriages drove through the hoardings and directly into the centre of the construction itself. Katie just had time to burrow back into her blankets before two footmen picked her up and dumped her unceremoniously behind a pile of timber. Scrambling out of her wrappings she navigated the mud and, balancing on a joist, took in the scene before her. She’d never seen anything like this before, and neither had anyone else from her own time. They could not have imagined this epic Victorian building site.

  The columns and girders of the construction interwove a hundred feet above her like a huge iron web. Hundreds of workmen clambered up ladders and hung from high beams, like so many tiny spiders spinning away. On the ground, even more men worked in groups, their foremen shouting orders through speaking trumpets. They rolled huge timber planks on wheels along the ground and hammered columns into iron pipes dug deep into the mud. A scalding white vapour poured from the steam engines used to power drills and saws, and the enormous boilers that generated steam for the engines were red-hot. Interspersed between the wood and iron, glass and machines were the elm trees the Prime Minister had intervened to save. They looked out of place in the midst of this modern industry, but would probably outlive the whole project by hundreds of years.

  Amongst the grime-streaked workers were pedestrians – ordinary Londoners who had come to see the building of glass. As Katie watched, a well-dressed man in black frock coat and top hat leaned forward to observe the work of a mechanical saw. It bit into a piece of iron, covering the man in thick metallic dust. A boiler then doused him in hot steam. ‘This is a health and safety nightmare,’ Katie thought, ‘I’ve never seen a lawsuit more ready to happen.’ But the man just wiped his face with a handkerchief and walked away through the mud. ‘I’m safer here than any time since I arrived at Buckingham Palace,’ Katie thought, strolling about to have a good look. ‘With all these people and all this activity, no one will notice me.’

  As Prince Albert descended from his carriage, Joseph Paxton came forward, motioning to his supervisors. The foremen barked through their speaking trumpets and a silence fell, as tremendous as the noise had been a moment before. Only the horses continued to whinny and snort. Prince Albert turned and turned again, then bent backwards to the sky. His shoulders squared, his stoop was gone and his tired eyes were wide awake. ‘He’s never even seen a skyscraper,’ Katie realized. ‘This must be even more awesome for him than it is for me.’

  Albert bowed his head and clasped Paxton’s shoulder. ‘This is an accomplishment that will reverberate throughout the world. I am proud to know a man who can create such a thing.’

  Paxton bowed in return. He’d have to write to the wife about this. Paxton was a man of simple origins. His father was a farmer and he himself had been an ordinary gardener’s boy. ‘What a time we live in,’ he thought, ‘when a man like me has the opportunity to create such a building, and is honoured by a Prince.’ He cleared his throat and pointed to the far end of the construction. ‘We are raising the trusses, the ribs of the central roof,’ he said. ‘The workmen have waited until you arrived. Does your Royal Highness have time to watch?’

  ‘I wouldn’t miss it for the world,’ Albert replied. He clapped his hands together. ‘Children, come – you must see this.’

  The workmen laid down planks for Leopold’s wheelchair to roll along. Prince Albert watched with Leopold on one side and Alice on the other as a team of six horses was harnessed to a series of pulleys and ropes. These in turn were fed across a high mast and attached in three places to a long iron truss. The foreman gave the order, and the workman urged the horses forward – straining and pawing the ground under the great weight. Slowly the huge iron truss rose, swaying back and forth. Then one of the horses bucked and the onlookers held their breath as the truss tilted dangerously. ‘Steady now,’ Paxton muttered as the horse was brought back into line. Up, up, up went the truss, until it was almost parallel with the top of the mast. The workmen clinging to the side columns quickly hoisted it into position. A cheer went up from the ground.

  ‘We have two teams of horses working from either end of the building,’ Paxton commented. ‘I estimate we’ll be able to get eight roof trusses up per day. This most difficult part of the project will be accomplished in a week.’

  ‘It is a miracle of modern construction,’ Prince Albert reflected.

  To Katie’s eyes, it was the most curious mixture of ancient and modern. The workmen in smocks with their harnessed horses could have been building a medieval cathedral. Yet the steam-powered machines were just one step from those used by workmen in her own time. Alice, standing next to her father, was stiff with excitement. Prince Leopold’s mouth was slightly open as he stared and stared. ‘To them it’s like the first rocket launch,’ Katie thought. ‘And I have to agree, it is amazing.’

  For James O’Reilly it was a life-changing experience. Now he knew; this was how knowledge should be used. For him the Crystal Palace wasn’t just a sea of mud with shouting men and horses and pulleys and planks. It wasn’t even a great building of inspirational design made with new materials. This was science, technology and industry: all working together. This was the vision of modern man. This was the future.

  A temporary platform had been built and curtained off, and the royal party now ascended to take tea. The servants bustled about, laying cloths and plates and emptying hampers of their delicious cargo. They had even packed Indian carpets to cover the wooden flooring. Katie couldn’t help noticing what a hindrance this was to the construction going on around them, but Paxton now seemed delighted with the visit, and the workmen were excited to get a peek at royalty
.

  As Katie wasn’t officially a member of the royal party she had to stand back and watch as Alice and James sat down to a large selection of sandwiches, pies, scones and cakes. As usual, she was hungry. And as usual, she wasn’t going to get fed. Alice caught her eye, and tried to signal some kind of plan, but Leopold was demanding her attention. His blankets were askew and he wanted a toasted crumpet instead of the carefully measured glass of port Dr O’Reilly was trying to give him – for medicinal purposes, of course. James was being treated to a mini-sermon from the Reverend Duckworth on ‘how the might of God could be seen in the works of man’. While James shifted from foot to foot, impatient to see more of the building site, the Reverend ate and talked and waved his hands, using the Crystal Palace as his example, and scattering fruitcake all over James. It did look heavy.

  The sight of all that steaming tea and lovely food was too much for Katie. She had turned away to examine some of the machinery when she spotted Bernardo DuQuelle. He looked unreal, even sepulchral in the bright cold sunlight. While he had seemed theatrical at Buckingham Palace, his artifice was both menacing and absurd on a construction site. Walking casually over to the royal carriages, he looked around to see if anyone was watching. The servants left to oversee the various boxes and baskets had abandoned their posts, too. They too wanted to take in the wonders before them. DuQuelle had the field to himself. He began to open hampers, unroll blankets and peek into ice chests. His hooked nose was everywhere, and it was sniffing. ‘He’s up to something,’ Katie thought, ‘but is it good or bad? He’s obviously looking for something. What could it be?’ She remembered the river, the arms reaching out to save her, and realized with dread – he was looking for her. She screwed up her courage to approach him.

  Two footmen, seeing this distinguished member of the household amongst the litter of the picnic, dashed back to their duties. ‘May we help with anything Monsieur DuQuelle? A cup of tea? Or perhaps something stronger?’