Perdita's Prince: (Georgian Series) by Jean Plaidy Read Free Book Online

her.’
    ‘George, you remember Uncle Cumberland’s letters. They cost our father thirteen thousand pounds.’
    ‘Don’t mention my Mary in connection with my Uncle Cumberland, I beg of you.’
    ‘But there were letters.’
    ‘Do you think that Mary would ever use my letters against me. Not that I could write as our uncle did. My love for Mary is pure. It will remain so.’
    ‘But will that be very satisfactory?’ asked Frederick, who had come to expect a certain line of action from his brother.
    George sighed and went on: ‘I have written to her telling her that I am in love with a lady of the Court. I have mentioned no names. I have begged her not to be offended by my confidences.’
    ‘Why should she be?’
    The Prince of Wales was too blissfully happy to be angry with his brother’s obtuseness. If Fred could not see that this was different from anything that had gone before, it was because he was too young to appreciate this strange and wonderful thing that had happened to him.
    ‘I have written to her. You shall read the letter Fred. I fancy I have a way with a letter.’
    Frederick took the paper and read:
I now declare that my fair incognito is your dear dear self. Your manners, your sentiments, the tender feelings of your heart so totally coincide with my ideas, not to mention the many advantages you have in person over many other ladies, that I not only highly esteem you but love you more than words or ideas can express …
    Frederick said: ‘But how do you know about her sentiments and the tender feelings of her heart?’
    ‘I spoke with her when I was in our sisters’ apartments.’
    ‘But only briefly.’
    ‘My dear Fred, one can fall in love in an instant. I have assured her of my friendship.’
    Frederick glanced down at the paper.
Adieu, dearest Miss Hamilton, and allow me to sign myself him who will esteem and love you till the end of his life.
    Frederick whistled, but George impatiently snatched the paper from him, sealed it and summoned Lord Maiden to take it to the lady.
    *
    The Duke of Cumberland rode out to Kew and when he demanded to be presented to the King none dared dismiss him.
    George, being told that his brother was asking for an audience, was uncertain how to act. He thought he had made it clear that he had no wish to receive his brother who had so disgraced the family. And yet how could he send Cumberland away? He shouldn’t have come of course. He should have written and ascertained first that the King would see him.
    George paced up and down his chamber. He thought of Lady Grosvenor and the letters Cumberland had written to her. No, he’d not see his brother. Cumberland lived riotously with that Duchess of his and she was a woman he would not receive.
    It was sad, of course, that there should be quarrels in the family, but sadder still that members of it should behave as disgracefully as Henry had.
    Then George thought of his mother who had dominated him, and with her lover Lord Bute put him into leading strings until he had broken free of them. She had loved him, though; he was certain of that. And she had died so bravely hiding the fact that she was in terrible pain from the cancer in her throat.
    ‘Forgive your brothers, George,’ she had said. ‘Don’t have quarrels in the family if you can avoid it. Your father and his father … Your Grandfather and his …’ Quarrel, quarrel, quarrel … Father against son. And it was no good to the family; no good to the monarchy.
    Yet he had refused to receive Cumberland although he had accepted Gloucester – but not his duchess.
    He called suddenly: ‘All right. All right. Tell the Duke I’ll see him.’
    Cumberland stood before him, a little sheepish, a little truculent. He should be ashamed, thought George, writing those disgusting letters to Lady Grosvenor … and making me pay thirteen thousand pounds’ damages to the woman’s husband. And now he had this woman with the fantastic eyelashes. Eyelashes, eh what? thought