Lilibet by A.N. Wilson

Author:A.N. Wilson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bonnier Publishing Fiction

8: Dartmouth

I

N THIS HAPPY PHASE OF sleep, she was sniffing the sea air, as she stood on the deck of the Royal Yacht.

Just before their annual summer departure for Balmoral, in that last month before the outbreak of war, the King and Queen had sailed on the Royal Yacht, Victoria and Albert, on a visit to Dartmouth Naval College, where Papa had trained as a midshipman before the First World War.

They loved sailing on the large, gold and white yacht, a true survivor of the old days, with its massive figurehead, rich Victorian fittings and its cabins decorated with cretonne. Lilibet loved the yacht. She loved her neat little cabin, which was next to Margaret’s. (Mummie and Papa slept amidships.) She loved being at sea. Papa had been in the Royal Navy, and he always looked happier when he was in uniform.

Memory would paint that August, the last month of peace, as a glorious, sunny, happy few weeks. The wind was in the quarter-deck. Every day on the yacht felt like a special holiday. The little girls were allowed to eat in the dining room with their parents, a truly sailor-like experience, since the main mast came out and up through one end of the dining table.

After only a day at sea, they reached the mouth of the River Dart and approached the vast redbrick of the college. The estuary, which glittered with silver sunlight, was crowded with little sailing boats.

The King was to inspect the officers and cadets on their parade ground; then they would file into the chapel for a service of thanksgiving, and the two Princesses would be given the chance to meet the cadets. Margaret and Crawfie had been singing ‘Every Nice Girl Loves a Sailor’, which, though she considered it highly amusing, Lilibet felt was a little lacking in dignity.

And then came the awful news. A motor-launch pulled up alongside. A young officer came aboard the yacht, and the grown-ups had grouped into a huddle.

It was Mummie who broke the news.

‘Girls – you are not to be coming with us—’ There was the explanation, interrupted before it was quite finished by Margaret asking, ‘What’s mumps?’

Without medical explanation, Crawfie told them that they did not want to be catching the mumps just before their summer holiday. There had been several cases in the college and it was considered unwise that the Princesses should come into the chapel and risk infection.

‘Very kindly indeed,’ said Mummie, ‘the Dalrymple-Hamiltons have offered to give you both tea, while Papa and I go to the chapel service.’

But who were they? And how could meeting the Dalrymple-Hamiltons be any possible consolation for the pain of missing a visit to the cadets?

The family lived in the Captain’s House at the college, and there were two children. They had laid out a clockwork railway on the nursery floor. Lilibet was thirteen years old! Far too old for a toy railway. But with her usual politeness, she knelt down and pretended to be interested. Margaret chattered merrily to the children, who were a little older than they were.

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