As if to prove her right Dagbert appeared from under the trees, and hailed them. “My friends! How nice to see you!”
He was full of bonhomie, demanding an introduction to Mike, bowing very correctly to Dottie. She greeted him coolly, remembering his air of dismissive contempt earlier that day, but tonight Dagbert was on his best behavior. He began to tell Dottie about the city, especially the cathedral, “where your coronation will be held.” She began to wonder if she'd misjudged him.
“It's getting a little chilly,” Harry said at last. “Perhaps we should find some entertainment indoors?” He smiled at Dottie. “We also have excellent nightclubs. Robin Anthony, for instance, is singing at The Birdcage.”
“Robin Anthony?” Dottie exclaimed in delight. “I've been madly in love with him for years.”
“You never told me,” Mike observed mildly.
“Yes I did. You took me to one of his concerts for my seventeenth birthday, and snored all the way through.”
“Oh yeah, I remember now.”
“But could we still get in?” she asked anxiously. “His concerts were always sold out.”
“They won't be sold out for you,” Dagbert observed.
“Oh yes, I forgot. Maybe, I'm going to enjoy this.”
Dottie wasn't sure what he told the manager but they were ushered to a table at the front, and she was treated with a discreet deference that she had to admit was pleasant.
“The trouble is,” she confided to Mike in an undervoice, “that after one day I'm already becoming spoiled. I warn you, when we get home I'll expect it.”
“Don't you worry Dot. I'll bring you a cuppa in bed every morning.”
Dottie squeezed his arm, overwhelmed by tenderness and affection for him. How could she have imagined anything would be better than being married to Mike?
Robin Anthony was a disappointment, past his best, putting on weight and living on his reputation.
“Oh dear!” Dottie sighed as he bowed his way off. “Goodbye my teenage dreams.”
“May I have the honor of dancing with my future queen?” Dagbert asked as the band struck up.
“I never learned posh dancing,” Dottie protested.
“It's only a waltz. I'll teach you.”
She let him lead her onto the floor. As he'd promised she found the steps easy, and was beginning to get the hang of waltzing, even to enjoy it.
“Don't keep looking down at your feet,” Dagbert urged her. “Have confidence. Head up.”
She raised her chin and her feet seemed to find their way of their own accord. The glittering lights of the club spun around her, tables, faces. Two faces that she knew.
“Steady!” Dagbert said. “You nearly tripped.”
“I-just missed my footing,” she stammered.
Another turn of the dance and the little scene passed before her eyes again. A far table, discreetly near the wall, a man and a woman, holding hands, leaning forward so that their heads were almost touching, talking intimately. Randolph and Sophie.
“I'd like to sit down now,” she said.
“But I thought you were enjoy-”
“Now,” she said sharply. All her original distaste for him was rushing back. This might have been a coincidence, but she would have bet her kingdom on Dagbert having known where his sister would be tonight.
He'd counted on being the king's brother-in-law, and probably milking that for all it was worth. This was a warning to her that he wanted the old order restored, and the battle wasn't over.
But then, she too wanted the old order restored, so there was nothing to mind about. And if Randolph's
“other duties” included a romantic dinner with his fiancée, that was just fine by her.
Just the same, she suggested that they all return to the palace, and since her word was law, everyone agreed.
Over her breakfast the next morning, Bertha informed her that Randolph would wait on her to discuss the day.
“You mean he'll come and tell me what I've got to do?” Dottie asked wryly.
“Well, His Roy- I mean, Randolph-”
“Why did you stop yourself?”
“He isn't a 'Royal Highness' anymore,” Bertha confided.
“What is he?”
“Nothing. Nobody. It's hard to know how to treat him. We all keep curtsying out of habit, but he gets very cross and tells us not to.”
How much self-discipline would that take? Dottie wondered. Perhaps a royal upbringing helped you to go through life smiling when you had to, behaving beautifully when your heart was breaking and concealing your thoughts and feelings. She tried to imagine herself acting so coolly, and retired, defeated.
Emerging from her bath she found Aunt Liz ready with a riding habit, “for your first lesson.”
“Am I going to learn to ride?”
“Those are my instructions.”
So Randolph gave orders over her head and relayed them to her via a third person. Dottie reckoned you didn't have to be a queen to be annoyed at that. But it was hard to stay cross when the snugly fitting habit showed off her trim figure and neat behind. She was admiring herself in the mirror when Randolph's voice said, “You are one of those rare women who can wear tight pants.”
“I can, can't I?” she said gleefully. This was no time for false modesty.
His own riding pants were also snug-fitting, confirming what she'd only suspected before, that his hips were narrow, and his stomach flat. His long legs, the thighs heavy with muscles, might have been created for such a garb. He was standing in his shirtsleeves, leaning against the wall, smiling like a man without a care in the world. But who could tell? she thought, remembering Bertha's words.
“Why riding?” she asked.
“Riding is a social grace, like dancing. When a foreign head of state visits you, you dance with him, and ride with him.”
“Then I'll need dancing lessons as well.”
“Yes, I heard about last night. I gather you managed very well.”
“Didn't you see me fumbling around? You were there with Sophie.”
“Yes, I was there with Sophie. Is there any reason why I should not have been?”
His eyes had lost their warmth and become as bleak and chilly as a moorland fog. For a moment she had a glimpse of a hostility that was all the more alarming for being usually hidden.
He seemed to realize that he'd given himself away for he recovered at once, and smiled. “Forgive me. I'm just not used to having my actions questioned.”
“But I didn't question your actions,” she said indignantly. “I merely mentioned having noticed you. There was no need to get fired up.”
“True. I'm a little oversensitive. I apologize if I offended you.”
The face was friendly but the tone was formal, and it impelled her to say, “Don't talk like that.”
“Like what?”
“As though I was the queen.”
“But you are the queen,” he said quietly, “and I never can forget it.”
“Then the sooner I'm gone the better. I couldn't live like this, people treating me as one person when I feel like someone else inside.”
“Not a person, a monarch.”
“Well a monarch's still a person.”
“No, a symbol,” he said quickly. “And if behind that symbol a person lurks, then she-or he-must keep that a secret, and never allow it to influence their behavior. The only thing that matters is what's good for your country. For that good, you must learn to be ruthless, to yourself first of all. Sometimes also to others, but mostly…” his voice grew heavy, “mostly to yourself.”
But in a moment he became cheerful again. “But that's enough dull stuff for today. Just now I want you to enjoy your new life.”
“So that I become so seduced by the goodies that I can't bear to give them up?” she said cheekily.
“Remind me never to underestimate you,” he growled. “Enough. Your instructor is waiting at the stable. Let's go.”