When Titania walked on a little further, she found to her surprise a terrace and steps leading down to a small lake. She guessed it had been constructed at the same time as the Palace and it too was very beautiful.
She sat down on a marble seat beside the lake and opened her letter.
It was from Nanny and Titania had been so longing to hear from her as it would tell her news about Mercury.
She read what Nanny had written and read it again and then she put her hands up to her face and started to cry. She could not help it nor could she stop the tears from running down her cheeks.
She felt as if the sky had crashed down on her head and that the whole world surrounding her had become darkened.
Then unexpectedly a man's voice behind her asked,
“What has upset you? Why are you crying?”
She thought it was Darius and without answering she picked up the letter which lay in her lap, turned and handed it to him.
She covered her face again and tried to control her tears.
She became aware that Darius had sat down beside her and was reading the letter. Titania felt as if the words were burning in front of her eyes. Nanny had written,
“My Dearest Miss Titania, I have been to see Mercury every day as I promised you I would. He misses you very much, as I do, and the stable boys tell me that at seven o'clock every morning he's waiting at the door of his stall expecting you to come in from the yard.
They're exercising him as you'd want them to do, but at the same time he won't eat his food and has got a little thin. He's so pleased to see me and nuzzles against me, but he wants to be with you.
Now I have some bad news although I don't want to upset you. His Grace sent for me last night and said that now you've gone abroad there's really not enough work for me to do at the Hall. He therefore suggested I should find other employment and he gave me a month in which to do so.
You knows as well as I do, dearest, that I've never been with anyone except you and your dear mother, and I don't know how to begin to serve anyone else.
I'd go to my own family, but I've lost touch with them these past years and have no idea where I can find them.
I expect I'll be all right, but I am really too old to start a new life all over again.
I'll write to you again in two days time as I promised, and I'm sure Mercury will be better by then.
Take care of your precious self and God be with you.
Your loving, Nanny.”
Titania had heard the rustle of the paper as Darius turned the letter over.
Then a strange voice said,
“Stop crying and let us discuss what we can do about this problem.”
Titania was astounded that it was not Darius beside her and she took her hands away from her eyes and turned her head round.
To her amazement she was looking at the
King
!
He was gazing at her and she had no idea how pitiable yet at the same time how lovely she looked. There were tears in her large grey eyes running down the soft white skin of her cheeks.
“I â thought â you were â Darius, Your â M-Majesty,” she managed to stammer.
As she spoke she began to rise and curtsy.
The King put out his hand and laid it on her arm.
“Do not move,” he said. “I have read this letter from your Nanny and of course it is something you cannot allow to happen.”
“What â can I â do?” asked Titania in a broken voice. “My uncle said I would â only be â here for six months and I had â no idea he would â send Nanny away. She is getting on for sixty and it is â cruel and wicked of him to make her â try to find somewhere â else to work.”
“I agree with you,” said the King. “That is why I will suggest a solution which I am sure you will agree with.”
“I thought,” murmured Titania tentatively, “that perhaps â you would â send me home. If I was back in England â Uncle Edward would have to let â Nanny stay with me, and if he grudges her money â I have some of my own, but he has â control of it.”
“I have a much better idea than that.”
“What â is it â Sire?”
As she spoke she realised she had not yet addressed him correctly, so she added quickly,
“I am sorry I am not â being very polite, but it is difficult to think of â anything but the two people in the world I have, who â love me as I â love them.”
“Why are there so few?”
“It is a long story which I am sure would bore Your Majesty,” she answered.
“I want to know,” insisted the King. “Darius told me that you are at the beck and call of your cousin and your aunt.”
“They are ashamed of me and to punish me for what my father did, Uncle Edward is sending Nanny away â and I am terrified that he may now sell my Mercury.”
“I am sure no one could be so cruel as to do that,” the King told her firmly. “But what I am going to suggest will prevent him doing anything so wrong and from sending your Nanny away.”
Titania tried to wipe away her tears.
She did not have a handkerchief and so the King drew a white linen one from his pocket and handed it to her.
She rubbed her eyes and looked at him pleadingly, wondering what he could possibly suggest, feeling there was nothing that would prevent the Duke from doing what he wished to do.
“You were telling me why you are treated so badly by your relations?”
“Because Papa, when he was a young man, fell very much in love with my mother. She was very beautiful, but her father was only the Chieftain of a Scottish Clan. My grandfather believed that all his family must marry into families who were as important and blue-blooded as his own.”
The King smiled.
“I have heard there are English aristocrats who feel that way, but I thought it was just a fairy story.”
“No, Sire, it is not and Uncle Edward is just like his father. Nothing to him is more important than one's ancestry and that is why they do not consider me as anything but a blot on the family tree.”
The King smiled again.
“I am sure no one could think of you as a blot on anything. You are very beautiful, as you must be aware, and I do not like to see anyone in my household in tears, especially someone who looks as if she might just be a Goddess from Mount Olympus.”
Titania could not help giving a little laugh.
“Like your Majesty's mother!” she exclaimed. “I have been told how very beautiful she was and that she was Greek.”
“I can only just remember her because I was only three when she died. But I know exactly what you are feeling, because my stepmother never liked me. She was angry that I should be more important to the country than her son.”
“Was she unkind to you?” asked Titania, remembering that the Queen in question had been German.
There was a little pause before the King said,
“I understand from this letter that you love your horse Mercury and he loves you. I once owned a dog that I adored. In fact after my mother died he was the one thing I had to love and who loved me.”
Titania drew in her breath. There was a note of pain in the King's voice, which she understood only too well.
“What happened?” she enquired almost in a whisper.
“When I was sent to boarding school, I could not take my dog with me. But I asked all the servants to look after him and they promised me they would do so.”
“So what happened?” asked Titania again.
“As he whined and barked continually because he missed me, my stepmother had him destroyed.”
Now his voice was hard, but Titania could see the pain in his eyes.
“I am so sorry. I know how much it â must have hurt you. I now am frightened that my Uncle Edward, because he dislikes me, may dispose of Mercury. I think I would rather he died than he was sold to someone who â might ill-treat him.”
“I agree with you there and it is something we must definitely prevent.”
“How can we do so, when I am here and Mercury is â in England?”
The King chuckled.
“I am going to send a cable now to my Ambassador in London instructing him that I personally wish a horse called Mercury and â“
He paused.
“What is your Nanny's name?”
Because she was listening to him so intently, Titania found it hard to answer for a moment.
Then she said,
“Tucket â Miss Tucket.”
The King continued,
“ â that he and Miss Tucket be sent immediately to His Majesty in Velidos.”
Titania clasped her fingers together.
“I do not believe it,” she sighed. “I must be dreaming.”
“What I have said is the truth and I will also send a cable to your uncle, making it very clear it is a Royal Command that your horse and your Nanny should join you immediately.”
For a moment Titania could not speak and then as the tears came back into her eyes she said,
“How is it possible that â you could be â
so kind
?”
“You can thank me when they arrive in Velidos, and as that will take a little time, I suggest you try out my horses and see how they compare with yours.”
“Do you mean I can â ride with â Your Majesty?”
The King pulled his watch from his waistcoat pocket.
“It is now ten to seven,” he said. “I will give you exactly ten minutes to meet me in the stables. Darius will wait for you in the hall to show you the way.”
Titania jumped to her feet.
“You are the most â wonderful King that ever existed,” she enthused. “But I do not believe â you are real.”
She did not wait for the King to answer, but she heard him laugh as she ran across the garden and back towards the Palace.
It was fortunate that Titania was used to dressing and undressing quickly.
She rushed into her bedroom and to her relief she found that the maid who was looking after her had hung up her riding habit in the wardrobe.
It only took her a minute or so to put it on and then snatching up her hat with its gauze veil she left the room and ran down the stairs.
Darius was waiting where she expected to find him in the hall.
He smiled at her and said,
“I thought you would break the record and if we run, the King will be surprised how quick you have been.”
Even as he spoke they started to run down the long empty corridors and left the Palace by a side door that led directly to the stables.
When Titania arrived at the stables she saw the King inspecting a horse equipped with a side saddle and knew it was for her. As she reached the King he looked round in surprise.
“You are certainly much quicker than I had reckoned! An example to every other woman I have ever met!”
Titania smiled at him.
“I hope, Sire, you have chosen a spirited horse for me.”
“I would not insult you with anything that was not as fast as mine,” the King answered.
Titania thought she would have to mount from the mounting-block, but to her surprise the King put his hands on her waist and lifted her onto the saddle.
As she picked up the reins she reflected that this was something she could never have expected.
Yet it was one of the most exciting adventures that could have happened to her.
The King mounted quickly. As they rode side by side to the end of the stables, he told Titania,
“The horse you are riding came from Hungary. And, as I am sure you know, Hungarian horses are internationally famous.”
“I have seen them and ridden them.”
The King looked surprised.
“You have been to Hungary?”
“I travelled to Hungary with my father about six years ago and I realised then what I had heard about the horses had not been exaggerated. It was fascinating to ride over the Steppes.”
“I had not expected you to be a traveller, Miss Brooke.”
“And I had no idea, Sire, that you are a magician and could sweep away my unhappiness with just a touch of your magic wand!”
The King laughed.
“I have been called many things, but never a magician!”
“I can think of a lot of other names for you, but I know this must be a dream and I shall wake up crying, as I was when Your Majesty found me.”
“It is something you will never do again,” he asserted. “I like you when you are smiling and pretty. Women should never cry.”
“Nanny said that it made me look ugly, so I will definitely try not to do so.”
“I doubt if anything could make you look ugly. In fact you make the world lovelier just because you are in it.”
He paid his compliments in a sort of dry unemotional voice, which did not make Titania feel at all embarrassed, but she did wonder if he was really laughing at her for making such a fuss.
Then as they moved swiftly over the low ground she looked back to see that they were followed by two horsemen. She could not see them very clearly, but she was sure that one of them was Darius and guessed the other would be Kastri.
As if she had asked him a question the King informed her,
“I am not allowed to ride without an escort, but I tell them to keep as far away as possible because I like to feel free and unencumbered.”
“Am I not preventing you, Sire, from feeling so this morning?”
“It's a new experience. You may think it strange, but this is actually the first time I have asked a woman to come riding with me.”
“Then I am most flattered, Sire, but I think my Nanny would say it is very bad for you not to be more sociable.”
She thought as she spoke that she had been too daring and the King might take offence.
Instead of which he said,
“I expect your Nanny is right, but at the same time I like doing things the way I want to do them.”
“Like writing a book?”
“So you have heard about that?” exclaimed the King. “Darius told me that is what Your Majesty is doing.”
“And I suppose, like most people, you think that it is a terrible waste of time.”