It was gratifying to know that the old charm was not lost and at the age of fifty-eight he could have this effect on a young girl.
There had been three great influences in his life – politics, literature and women; and perhaps women came first. It was not that he was a particularly sensual man; he indulged in female friendships and nothing could be proved against him in two divorce cases in which he had figured. When his wife had shocked London society with Lord Byron he had remained at home studying the classics; no man in Parliament had so many Greek and Latin quotations at his fingertips. His conversation was both racy and erudite; he peppered it with oaths and salted it with quotations; hostesses clamoured for his company knowing that any party at which Lord Melbourne was a guest would certainly be stimulating.
He could not have felt the same interest in the new monarch if her sex had been different. A young boy would not have been half as appealing, nor so susceptible to the charms of Lord Melbourne, he was sure. Therefore he was glad that the new monarch was a girl, but was he being premature to find a few short meetings in one day so significant? He did not really think so. They had in truth been overwhelmed by each other. But for the differences of age and the fact that she was a queen and he a Prime Minister one might have called it love at first sight. The phrase brought a smile to his lips.
How fanciful and yet not exactly untrue. He was looking forward with the greatest exhilaration to further meetings. It was just the fillip he needed to resume his appetite for living.
He had not been altogether surprised by his success although he had not expected it to be so unreserved. She really was a delightful young creature. It was that candour, that innocence, which made her so; all young, intelligent girls were attractive for their very youth if nothing else; but Victoria had a great deal besides youth – including a crown.
He supposed his life had been dominated by women. First there had been his mother. An unusual woman, brilliant and attractive, though scarcely moral, she had guided him through his childhood, surrounding him with cultivated people, made him into the man of fastidious taste that he had become. He could not say the same for Peniston Lamb, the first Viscount Melbourne who as his mother’s husband was reputed to be his father, but his mother (according to some reports) had obligingly supplied him with a sire far more distinguished than her own husband. It had been a long-standing matter of gossip that his real father was the Earl of Egremont. Well, he considered, it might well be so, for who the devil could tell who was anyone’s father? And the first Viscount Melbourne had never had the same feeling for his second son as he had for the other members of the family; but his mother had made up for any lack of affection her husband may have felt towards the boy whom he no doubt considered to be a changeling.
Yes, he owed a great deal to his mother. What an amazing woman and one to be proud of. Her salons were a centre for the wits of the day and she had entertained lavishly in both Melbourne Hall, near Derby, and her London residence, Melbourne House. The Prince of Wales had been a frequent guest and it was said the friendship between him and Lady Melbourne was of a very intimate nature.
Lady Melbourne doted on William, who was far more intelligent than Peniston her firstborn. Gracefully he had passed through Eton and Cambridge and had spent a year or so at Glasgow University where work was taken more seriously than at Oxford and Cambridge. He emerged as cultured a product as Lady Melbourne could wish, ready to take his place in the world of high society.
He remembered the talk they had had together in her boudoir at Melbourne House where he supposed she had entertained a lover or so. The Prince of Wales perhaps? The Earl of Egremont? How proud of her he had been! She was such a fascinating woman with sharp wit and knowledge of affairs.
‘William,’ she had said, ‘you are a son of whom to be proud, but a second son, alas.’
He murmured that she was deuced hard on poor Peniston who had done nothing but get himself born first.
‘A second son, William,’ she had said. ‘It’s not what I would have wished for you. I’d like to see you inherit the title and that which goes with it.’
‘Well, that will be Pen’s, of course.’
She had looked up at the picture of herself and Peniston at the age of one year. Poor Pen in chubby nudity was embracing her and she was looking serene and presumably at Sir Joshua Reynolds who was responsible for the painting.
‘A pity,’ she had said briefly. ‘Because it means, William, that you will have to have a career. I have been thinking a great deal about it.’
He had waited without undue concern. He was lazy by nature he supposed; and at that time would cheerfully have adopted almost any career she chose for him.
‘I had considered Holy Orders.’
‘Good God!’ he had said, startled out of his calm.
‘You always did use too many oaths, William.’
‘Sorry, Mamma, but Holy Orders! Do you really think I’d be suitable for such a calling?’
‘No. Neither does Lord Egremont.’
He had not asked why the Earl should be consulted, because the inference was obvious.
‘He is all for the Bar,’ she had added.
The Bar! It was not displeasing. The idea of studying law interested him. It seemed a profession ideally suited to his character. He had said so and she had been pleased.
‘You will be brilliant. You could become Lord Chancellor with your ability and my influence.’
He had agreed.
‘You should not, of course, consider marrying as yet.’
He had looked at her sharply and knew that she was thinking of Caroline, for he had met Caroline by then and been fascinated by her. Caroline had been only thirteen when he had first seen her – a strange elf-like creature, wild eyed and fey. She had looked like a slim young boy with her short hair and those enormous brilliant eyes.
‘William Lamb,’ she had said to him, ‘I have heard of you. Your mother talks a great deal of her brilliant son. He is good as well as being brilliant.’ She had laughed; he would never forget her laughter which had so often ended in hysterical tears. ‘Good people fascinate me,’ she had gone on. ‘Because you see I am far from good.’
She had been thirteen and he twenty. She had mocked him for his virtuous way of life even then. Good William Lamb, she called him and the adjective was disparaging.
‘I fell in love with you before I met you,’ she told him once. ‘You were so good … and I was bad … so that made an attraction of opposites.’
Looking back he wondered how he had allowed himself to become her victim, for that was what he had been. He should have been wiser but if he had been, what an experience he would have missed.
She had been strange from her childhood. Her grandmother, Lady Spencer, had feared that her eccentricities amounted to madness and had consulted a doctor about her. That was when she was a child. So he should have been warned.
His feelings for her were known. Caroline talked constantly and freely about her emotions and her experiences. She made no secret of the fact that she was in love with and intended to marry good William Lamb.
The Bessboroughs, Caroline’s parents, were not very pleased. Who were the Lambs? demanded Lady Bessborough and her husband, the third Earl, echoed her words. Their origin was wrapped in obscurity but there was money there; and Lady Melbourne had a place in high society. She was the only daughter of Sir Ralph Milbanke and came from Yorkshire. But who were the Lambs? They had somehow acquired a fortune, but one could not see very far back into their ancestry and Caroline was the daughter of Frederick Ponsonby, third Earl of Bessborough, and his wife had been Lady Henrietta Spencer, daughter of an Earl. No, the Bessboroughs were not exactly delighted with the possibility of a match with a second son.