To Marry a Prince

Chapter 15

‘Best and Worst Proposals’ – Girl About Town

Richard made Bella bundle up in warm clothes and took her out of a side door. Nobody noticed them go. The big off-roader was standing there, its lights on and the engine humming.

‘Thanks, Bill,’ Richard said, as a tall man in Highland dress got out of the driving seat.

‘You’re welcome, Sir. Miss. Have a nice look at the stars.’ And the man went off chuckling to himself.

‘The stars?’ echoed Bella, clutching the collar of her coat to her throat. ‘I don’t believe it.’

‘Don’t argue. Bill has been warming this car up for you for a good ten minutes. There’s a car rug, too, if you’re chilly.’

Richard helped her into the vehicle and it was indeed as warm as toast. Bella relaxed a little.

‘Where are we going?’

‘There’s a painting hut on the hill. It’s really good for looking at the stars.’

She looked at him suspiciously. ‘Are you winding me up again?’

‘I want to be alone with you without some member of staff, or courtier, or bloody nosy member of my family getting in the way,’ he said with sudden violence. ‘It seems like for ever since we had some privacy.’

‘I know.’

The painting hut was a small single-storey stone building. It might have started life as a shepherd’s cottage but now it had expanses of glass set into the walls and the roof. More important, there was smoke coming out of its chimney.

There were vehicle tracks leading up to it and Richard stayed in them, so that the off-roader swayed and bumped but did not slide on the midnight ice that was forming over the impacted snow.

‘In, quickly,’ he said when they got there.

The place was not locked. It too was as cosy as could be, with a wood-burning stove glowing in the hearth.

But Bella did not look at the stove. She gazed at the stars. Walls and roof had been carefully replaced by glass, so no matter which way you looked, you saw only the night sky. It was like being suspended in space. The stars were so close you felt you could touch them, and the moon had a frosty halo.

‘It’s amazing,’ said Bella, awed.

‘Yes. I come here to think. I always have. I was up here this afternoon before I came to meet you. And that’s when I realised I had to bring you here.’

‘So I’m here. And?’

He drew a deep breath and turned to face her. In the moonlight, he looked handsome and passionate and deeply serious. But his voice was level.

‘Bella, it’s been three months. I know I’ve already told you that I knew the moment I saw you … you must have thought that was crazy … but I did. I can’t explain it. I saw you, with your feet in the air, covered in bits of ivy, and it was like everything in me clicked into the right place at that moment. I know I thought: so she’s the one. That’ll be all right then.’ He stopped talking and she saw him swallow.

‘Only, of course, it isn’t. Anyone who marries me, marries the job, the family, the protocol.’ He almost spat the last word.

‘I think that’s always true though, isn’t it? I mean, if you marry a doctor, you end up answering the phone to an emergency in the middle of the night.’

What am I babbling about? thought Bella. I’m being proposed to, for God’s sake. Shut up, Bella Greenwood. She closed her lips firmly, and waited.

Richard said, ‘And then there’s the public.’

She nodded.

‘Bella, I know you don’t want to be in the spotlight. We tried to keep out of it, both of us, didn’t we? But you see – it can’t be done, or not for long. You’ve been brilliant, all the time, funny and tolerant and kind and … oh, all the things I knew you’d be, the moment I fell in love with you. But—’

But? BUT? Hey, am I getting my marching orders, not a proposal at all?

He said very quietly, ‘Bella, I love you. I want to marry you. But what you see is what you get. The job is me. I can’t not be what I am. If you can’t take that … and I won’t blame you. Honestly, I won’t. But if you can’t … then please, will you tell me now? And we can say goodbye tomorrow, with no hard feelings.’

She almost bounced with indignation. ‘No hard feelings? Are you out of your mind? Don’t I get a chance to say yes before you write my refusal speech for me?’

He stared at her in the starlit dark. ‘What?’

She calmed down somewhat. ‘Ask me to marry you. Go on. Just ask.’

For a moment he looked almost frantic. ‘Bella, I—’ Then, typically, he drew a long breath and was calm again. It came out with the precision of a shopping list, and about as much emotion. ‘I love you. I want to be with you. I want to make you happy. Please, will you be my wife?’

She had known what she was going to say; had known for days, been certain. Yet suddenly, all her doubts rose up and locked her tongue. she found she couldn’t say a word.

Richard searched her face.

‘Why?’ she managed at last. It was not much more than a croak. I’ve got cold feet, she thought, appalled at herself.

Scrupulously, he didn’t touch her. ‘I go to a lot of weddings.’ His voice was reflective. ‘They’re big promises. Heroic. In sickness and health. For richer, for poorer. They stop you dead in your tracks. You think: am I up to this? Can I really promise everything I have to give? And mean it, really mean it?’

‘Everything I have to give,’ Bella repeated slowly.

‘Yes.’

‘And that’s what you want?’

‘Only if it’s mutual.’

Still she hesitated, suspended between everything she’d known up to now and the unpredictable future.

‘Oh, God, Bella it’s the one thing I’m certain of. I can do it with you.’

Still she waited, not quite trusting herself.

His voice suddenly ragged, he said, ‘How can I explain? I want to make you those promises. It just seems right. Not easy exactly, but natural.’

‘Yes,’ she said, her doubts falling away as she recognised the feeling and the strength of it. ‘The next big thing in my life. Our lives.’

He held his breath as if he couldn’t quite believe what she was saying.

Bella leaned into him and kissed him, gravely and deliberately. It was acceptance and a promise, and they both knew it.

‘Yes please, Richard. I would very much like to marry you.’

Afterwards he was in tearing spirits. They bounced down the hillside, with him singing ‘Scotland the Brave’ at the top of his voice. He was all for bursting in on George’s barn and announcing their news at once. But Bella, remembering the Queen’s unhappy glances in her direction, said, ‘No, you have to tell your parents first.’

So he settled for a wild boogie instead.

‘But I’m rubbish at it,’ wailed Bella. ‘I bump into things, you know I do. And I’ve got two left feet.’

But nothing could curb Richard’s enthusiasm. ‘I got you through the Eightsome Reel, didn’t I? Stick with me, baby. You ain’t seen nothing yet.’

The party was in full swing when they ran in, hand in hand. Grace Kelly style, Bella found, worked just as well for dancing in a barn as for reels. George and his team had hung tartan rugs over the walls of what must once have been a cow byre, and there were several glitterballs and a lot of blue lighting. Also a table full of drinks where you could have a simple beer or invent your own cocktail. Mothers had been baking for weeks and there were sausage rolls, sandwiches and a competitive selection of cakes. The dance floor was a patchwork of stone slabs and old floorboards but nobody seemed to care much.

There was no DJ but a local band could, and did, do everything from heavy rock to punk hop. The lead singer did a passable imitation of Springsteen, too.

‘Dance, with you,’ said Richard, not taking no for an answer.

And he was right, she didn’t fall over or kick anything. In fact, it was while an astonished Bella was delivering some eloquent pelvic thrusts to ‘I’m on Fire’ that Richard stopped her dead and said breathlessly, ‘Enough already. I’ve got a bad desire.’

Her smile was blazing. ‘Let’s go.’

The night, as she afterwards told Lottie, should have been torrid. They were both wracked with lust and had been behaving well all evening. And they hadn’t seen each before that for what seemed like a lifetime.

Only it was very difficult to do torrid passion in a house with a frugal central heating system and draughts to make the North Wind slink away, outclassed. After they twice lost the mountainous covers and Bella screamed for the wrong reasons – acute and agonising cramp in her right calf – they collapsed into laughter and put lust on hold.

‘I’ll take you to Barbados,’ promised Richard. He got out of bed and brought her the sapphire kimono that she had left over the back of a chair. He tied a big bow at her waist and then got back into bed, cuddling her up to his chest and tucking the heavyweight blankets round her ears. ‘Or the Sahara.’

‘I’ll hold you to that.’

They were asleep almost at once.

They were awoken by a discreet scratching on the door. Bella came awake to find Richard out of bed, shivering and swearing. She didn’t blame him. She had no idea what time it was, but from the scrap of window she could see where the curtains didn’t meet, the sky was still as black as a coal cellar outside. She put on the light.

‘Take my robe. I’m warm now.’ She pulled off the kimono and threw it towards him.

He pressed it appreciatively to his face, before pulling it on. Of course, it gaped across his chest, but it was better than nothing, thought Bella. The bedroom was icy. He thrust his feet into his dress shoes at the same time. ‘Thank you.’

He opened the door, indifferent to the rules, scandal, or even his own dignity.

‘What the f*ck?’ he said with pardonable asperity.

It was Julian Madoc. ‘I’m really sorry, sir.’ He even sounded it. ‘But the King says, please will you join him in the study as soon as possible? There’s been a development.’

‘What sort of development?’ demanded Richard disagreeably.

‘More internet comment, I’m afraid. And an unfortunate photograph of Her Majesty. The Press will be here any time.’

‘Here? You mean you’ve set up a Press Conference?’

Madoc was clearly shocked by the suggestion. ‘Certainly not. But outside, you know. In the village. Asking people for their stories. Bringing their chequebooks. We need – that is, the King feels we need an agreed line.’

There was a pregnant pause. Then Richard said, ‘Oh, very well. We’ll be down as soon as we’ve climbed into our Arctic weather wear.’

He closed the door firmly. Bella pulled the covers up to her nose and watched appreciatively.

‘I fancy you in blue silk.’

He grinned briefly. ‘You fancy me in anything. Thank God. Damn, I’m so tired of worrying about the bloody Press. Oh, well, I suppose we’d better get dressed and join the Council of War. Have you got a good thick sweater, or shall I bring one back for you?’

She liked the idea of wearing his clothes. ‘Almost certainly mine isn’t thick enough.’

He nodded. ‘Right. I’ll bring you one.’

He went, leaving Bella to wonder dreamily whether any returning adulterer whom he met on the way would keep quiet about the fact that the Prince of Wales darted about Drummon House in a blue silk kimono.

By the time Richard returned, Bella had pulled on all the clothes she had brought with her, pretty well. He was wearing thick tweed trousers, double-knit socks and walking boots, and a green military jumper over several layers of natural fibre.

Bella purred. ‘Love the combat gear. Not as swashbuckling as a blue silk kimono, of course, but you look ready for action.’

He eyed her consideringly. ‘I can always take my Aran sweater away again.’

‘No, no, please. Please. I didn’t mean it.’

The big white thing was as solid as a horse blanket and just as cosy. Bella pulled it on over her stylish but inadequate cashmere and instantly felt her frosted muscles start to thaw. It was ludicrously too big, of course. The sleeves hung over her hands, but it smelled of Richard’s shampoo and she knew that smell.

‘Thank you,’ she said, basking a bit.

He put his arm round her and they went to face the music.

The study turned out to be a relatively small room, so that the big fire there did actually have some effect. The Queen was sitting beside it, looking elegant as always but concerned. The King was reading a printout.

George had been wrong about the absence of mobile phones. There was a photograph of the Queen with her tiara over one eye. It had been all over the Twittersphere by midnight.

The King handed the print out to Richard.

‘I don’t understand some people. Don’t they have anything to do except criticise others?’ he said irritably.

Richard ran his eye down the messages Julian Madoc had printed out.

‘Someone called LoyalSubjekt101 said Bella attacked the Queen last night and has posted a photograph of Mother with her tiara coming off at the party,’ he sighed. ‘And then a bunch of idiots who need to get a life started arguing about whether it was deliberate or an accident, political or personal, spite or a republican gesture.’ He cast the sheets away. ‘Oh, this is just ludicrous. Why are we wasting our time on it?’

‘Exactly,’ said the King with gloomy satisfaction.

But the Queen said, ‘We can’t just ignore it, Richard. These are very nasty allegations. Someone might actually try to hurt Bella, in retaliation. Pansy tells me there have been rumours for weeks.’

‘Then let’s kill the rumours,’ said Richard calmly. ‘Tell ’em we’re getting married and they can bloody well like it or lump it.’

The Queen put a hand over her eyes.

Bella said frostily, ‘Excuse me? Do I get a vote on this?’

The King gave a bark of laughter. ‘You mean, he hasn’t asked you?’

‘Yes and no. Yes, he’s asked me. No, we didn’t talk about any public announcement.’

‘Well, he mentioned it to me last week,’ said the King, stirring it.

‘Oh, really?’ Bella narrowed her eyes at Richard.

‘Thought you were running a bit of a risk there, lad,’ said his father, starting to enjoy himself.

Even the Queen said, ‘Good grief, what’s wrong with you, Richard? You go to war with me when I say I think it’s too soon … and you still haven’t asked Bella properly? I give up. I really do.’

‘Shut up, Mother,’ he said, still calm.

He went down on one knee in front of Bella. ‘Please will you marry me and let me announce it to the world? There, we’re sorted now, aren’t we?’

She was outraged. ‘Sorted?’

‘Mistake,’ said the King.

‘Shut up, Father. Bella, you know that dating a Prince of Wales isn’t all joy. And you’ve spat on your hands and given it your best shot. If you’ve enjoyed it as much as I have, please, please, please, let me tell the world you’ll marry me?’

She stared down at him, transfixed.

He said softly, ‘I’m not complete without you. You know that. Why shouldn’t everyone else know, too?’

The Queen said, ‘You’ve only known each other three months.’

Richard did not stand up and he did not take his eyes off Bella’s. ‘Best three months of my life,’ he said.

Bella felt as if she were in a high wind. ‘You didn’t like all of it,’ she pointed out, trying to get her feet back on the ground. ‘You stalked out in a huff.’

‘And you got your revenge by not answering my messages.’

‘You know that was an accident—’

‘I know that it made me feel desperate. Hell, I even offered to write poetry to get you back.’

‘Ho,’ said the King. ‘Big mistake.’

‘Father, we don’t need audience participation. Shut up or go away.’

Bella said, ‘Yes you did promise me a poem. A … a … a trillet or something. And you’ve never delivered. Don’t you keep your promises? What sort of omen is that?’

She waited for a torrent of denials. She had underrated Richard.

‘I was negotiating,’ he said blandly. ‘A triolet sounded good.’

‘I’m holding you to it. If you love me.’

Their eyes locked. There was a long pause.

Richard looked very serious.

‘What about a limerick?’

Bella was so startled she gave a shout of laughter and bent and kissed his nose. ‘You are a shocking, devious man and I love you.’

At once he leaped to his feet and took her in his arms.

‘So can I tell them you’ll marry me?’ he whispered, for her ears alone. ‘It’ll be good, I promise.’

‘Yes,’ she said blissfully. ‘Yes.’