George Washington's Ghost

“You must understand that Alonso and I grew up together, or rather, when we were teenagers, we moved about within the same fringes of the same court society. In another age we would have married and lived happily ever after but,” a waving away motion of her right hand, “it was not and could never be. It would have been, literally, the death of us both. But I still remember the way I felt about him; and I am confident that his recently expressed, foolishly suicidal loyalty to my person, reflects that he too shares that memory. But…”

“But,” Melody echoed, utterly confused.

Am I really having this conversation?

She was tempted to pinch herself.

The other woman took pity on her.

In fact, Melody got the distinct impression, that she was a little guilty to be unburdening herself to a stranger.

“I will never again be the Queen of Spain,” the other woman said, “and while I live, there will be no government in exile, or pretender to the Catholic Throne of Madrid. Not in my name. In time, I will negotiate a truce, and accept whatever penance must be served to guarantee the safety of my daughters. Alonso must accept that. I will have no more bloodshed in my name to recover a throne which almost certainly cannot survive another generation. To be frank, I tried my best to nudge and to tempt my country into the modern world, and I failed. I must live with that. Even if it breaks my dear Alonso’s brave heart.”

The women began to walk, very slowly down aisles bordered with freshly planted shrubs and colourful borders. They were in a walled garden with lemon and lime trees interspersed around the walls, and the spring air hummed with the buzzing of bees.

“This palace was the seat of the House of Braganza. The last King of the Portuguese of that house, gifted it to the nation when he went into exile in London. His grandson practices law, at the Lower Bar of Lincoln’s Inn, I believe. Perhaps, one day my family will find something useful to do with themselves. Presently, I am an embarrassment to the government in Lisbon, reliant wholly on the charity and forbearance of the present Royal House of Portugal.”

They reached a corner and began to walk back towards the Orangery.

“A Papal Bull has been promulgated excommunicating my person, and that of Alonso, and his heirs, in perpetuity from the Grace of God and the communion of the Mother Church. The King, my husband, has already seized the estates of the Medina Sidonia family, and taken Alonso’s former wife, the Duchess Amelia, under the protection of the Crown.”

Melody tried to work out what all that meant in practice; coming to the general conclusion that things had worked out as badly for Alonso as she thought they had.

Queen Sophie sighed.

“Alonso is no longer married to his wife. Ironically, he only married her because my husband, Ferdinand, willed it. I think that at the time, he was terrified that I would elope with him. Amelia is pious to a fault, a beauty of the cold, dreary sort and she and Alonso’s two daughters have maintained a separate house for the last ten years. My husband, the King is also a similarly pious, not very clever man and I would not be surprised if he does not, at some stage, seek to set Amelia up as some kind of platonic mistress cum confessor.”

Melody was starting to think she had had a reality bypass.

“In any event, in the sight of God, and the Spanish state, Alonso is no longer married to Amelia. He is a free man. Free to re-marry. His old career is over. His new life is before him and now that he has been reunited with his son, I can have no further claim on him. At least not as his Queen, if not his friend for that I can never cease to be.”

Queen Sophie, realising Melody was a little bit shell-shocked by all of this, took sympathy on her.

“So, for his sake and for Pedro’s sake, Alonso must marry a strong woman to keep him on the straight and narrow. Plainly, it seems to me that this is a thing much complicated, and obliquely, much simplified by the self-evident fact that he is clearly bewitched by two such women!”

Melody was blinking uncontrollably.

The exiled Queen Empress smiled, halting at the door to the Orangery, her gaze following the progress of her daughters, the two Infantas, as yet just children unaware of the maelstrom they had escaped, gleefully chasing each other around the garden.

“You will need to discuss this with Lord De L’Isle’s daughter, obviously,” the other woman said, taking Melody’s right hand in her own and fixing her with a stare that was nothing if not regal, “but please, do not delay overlong. People will begin to talk and that would cause us all much pain which frankly, is best avoided at this time.”

Melody did not remember walking back into the Orangery, or sitting down, or a footman materialising to pop the Champagne cork, or to half-fill the fluted glasses with the bubbling, fizzing issue from the chilled bottle.

The Infantas had run in, breathless.