The stench of death already clung to the salmon pink walls of Queen Victoria’s bedroom; it assaulted Colin Hargreaves the moment the footman opened the massive oak doors. Not death, he corrected himself, but dying, when musty decay had not quite given way to the cloying foul rot soon to come. He hesitated for a moment, not because of shock at seeing how small Her Majesty looked, as if a child had been placed in a formidable marriage bed, but because the odor sent him reeling as he remembered the first time he had smelled it, on a snowy afternoon at Anglemore Park. He was home for Christmas during his first year at Eton and had found his grandfather in the library. The old man, sitting in his favorite high-backed leather chair, read aloud from Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur until Nanny came to fetch him for supper. Colin had noticed the odd scent, but didn’t think anything of it until the next morning, when his father delivered the news that Grandfather had died overnight. He smelled it again when he was summoned home from Cambridge to his father’s sickbed. Then, too, for just an instant, he had felt like a schoolboy stunned by his first loss.
He shook off the feeling and approached the queen. Her enormous bed faced windows with a sweeping view of the countryside, a stark contrast to the paintings on the walls, nearly all of which depicted religious subjects. She was sitting, propped up by pillows, beneath a favorite portrait of her long-dead husband and a memorial wreath. Her eyes, dull, stared ahead, and he wondered if she knew he had entered the room.
“Your Majesty,” he said, his voice low as he bowed. “You asked to see me.”
She managed a half smile and nodded. “There are things I would like to settle, but I fear I shall not be given enough time to accomplish them all.” She coughed, cleared her throat, and motioned for him to give her the glass of water sitting on her bedside table. He held it to her lips as she drank, swallowing with difficulty. “One never knows, does one, what shall happen in the end? My dear Albert…”
Sir James Reid, her physician, standing on the other side of the canopied bed, met Colin’s eyes and shook his head, exhaustion and worry writ on his face.
“How can I assist, ma’am?” Colin asked.
“So much, so much to be done,” she said. “And the dogs … I do not see them. Are they here?”
“No, ma’am, they are not,” Sir James said. “Shall I have them brought to you?”
“Why are you here?” Her voice, though weak, grated with a tone of scathing disapproval. “We are not in need of your services. I must speak to Mr. Hargreaves privately. Disperse.” Sir James shot Colin a pointed look and left the room. When she heard the doors close, the queen pushed herself up on the mountain of pillows. “It is too much to be borne. The loss of Lady Churchill…” Her voice faded and she stared out the windows. A lady of the bedchamber for nearly fifty years, Lady Jane had long been one of the queen’s closest confidantes. Keenly aware that learning of her death, on Christmas Day less than a month ago, would come as a tragic blow to the already ailing monarch, Sir James had done his best to deliver the news gradually, trying to shield Her Majesty from suffering the shock all at once.
“It was devastating to lose her,” Colin said. “I know she was a dear friend—”
“That is of no significance now,” she said. “No death matters but that of Albert.” Her eyes clouded. She raised a hand, its skin yellowing and dry. “Nothing has been right since then, and now I am left to summon you and demand a service that only you can provide.”
“Of course, ma’am, whatever you need.” He shifted on his feet, wishing he had been able to speak to the doctor before seeing the queen so that he might better understand her condition.
“Take this and do as it says.” She pulled an envelope from under her pillow and handed it to him. “All will be clear in time. We need you for this. There can be no one else. I had five others during my reign, but he will need no one save you. He’s never been so strong as I.” She dropped back onto the pillows, the effort of holding up her head too much. “I shall not see you again, Mr. Hargreaves, but I have always valued your service above all others and thank you for your devotion to the Crown.” She lifted her hand again, holding it up as if to be kissed, but lowered it almost at once. “Tell no one of this meeting, of what we have discussed. Discretion is of the upmost importance, as you shall know when you read my note. Albert would concur, and will, I am sure. Have you seen him of late? He is such a fine gentleman.”
“The finest, ma’am,” Colin said, seeing no reason to acknowledge her confusion.
“That is all,” she said, her voice so low he could hardly make out her words. “Disperse, Mr. Hargreaves, with our thanks.”
He did as ordered and found Sir James waiting in the corridor outside. “She has been struggling since December and is growing more muddled by the day,” the doctor said. “I fear she does not have long. No one but the family and the household here knows of her illness yet. I trust I can rely on you to keep what you have seen to yourself?”
“Of course.”
“Soon enough we shall have to notify the press,” he continued, “but I should like to delay that while I can.”
“Understood,” Colin said. “If I can be of any further service, you need only ask.” He took his leave from the physician and retired to an empty sitting room, where he opened the queen’s envelope, ready to follow her instructions, but the words scrawled on heavy linen paper inside did nothing to illuminate her desires:
Une sanz pluis.
Sapere aude.
One and no more.
Dare to know.