Chapter Twenty-Four Alix
Chapter Twenty-Four
Alix
Conversation floated cheerfully around the dining table as everyone dug into their roast beef with mushrooms, forks scraping over Darmstadt’s finest porcelain.
The so-called two-night visit had stretched into a week.
Alix was pleasantly surprised how much she enjoyed hosting her cousins and Maximilian.
Most mornings, Ducky and Missy went out riding with Ernie; Maximilian usually stayed back with Alix, reading or walking around the village.
Just that afternoon they had all piled into a pony cart and driven through the countryside.
Alix had been eager to show Maximilian her childhood landmarks: the fields where she and her mother used to pick daisies, the crumbled old house that Ella had always said, in a spooky voice, was inhabited by a witch.
“We need to discuss the water chute.” Maximilian turned to Alix with a twinkle in his eye. “How long has that been around?”
“My father hired some loggers to build it when we were young.” Alix smiled, wistful for the days when their mother would climb with them into a rowboat at the top of the slope. Their boat would hurtle down the chute into the pond, drenching them all with the splash. Alix had adored it.
“I’d like to try it,” Maximilian declared.
“You’ll get quite wet,” Alix warned.
He smiled, unconcerned. “I wonder if one could build something similar for a sled in the snow? I have three nephews, you know; the princes of Sweden. What a delightful Christmas present for them…”
Maximilian trailed off as, across the table, Ernie rose to his feet.
“Thank you all for a lovely visit,” he began, and paused, waiting for conversations around the table to die down.
Alix shot her brother a curious look; she hadn’t known he was planning a toast. Though it made sense, since all their guests would be leaving for Potsdam the next day.
“The past week has reminded me of the importance of family, and of good friends,” Ernie added, nodding to Maximilian.
“Which is why I wanted everyone here to be the first to hear our fantastic news. Ducky?” He gestured across the table, and their cousin stood, tossing her unruly dark hair over one shoulder.
Like Ducky, Ernie was smiling, but the smile didn’t seem to reach his eyes. “Today I asked Ducky to marry me, and to my great delight, she said yes.”
There was a moment of startled surprise, and then the table erupted in noise.
Uncle Alfred grinned, pumping Ernie’s hand in both of his, while Aunt Marie laughed and ran around the table to hug Ducky.
They were clearly thrilled that their oldest daughter had chosen such an easy match—not the future King of England, perhaps, but a known quantity, a cousin who would keep her close to home.
Even Alix’s father seemed to have livened up a bit at the news, clamoring that one of the footmen needed to come at once.
When the footman arrived, it was Johann.
“Bring several bottles of champagne from the cellars!” Louis exclaimed, looking at Johann. “Ernest has proposed! We have a future Grand Duchess of Hesse!”
Alix saw the blood drain from Johann’s face—saw the way he glanced over at Ernie, hurt and bewilderment on his face. But Ernie was still smiling that broad, social smile, looking anywhere but at Johann.
It was only later, after endless toasts and congratulations, that Alix found her brother alone. He was walking down the hallway toward the front staircase, his steps slow, as if he’d depleted all his energy on that celebratory dinner and had nothing left.
“Ernie!” she whispered. “Are you all right?”
He turned around, heaving a sigh when he saw her. “I suppose the news must have caught you by surprise. I’m sorry I didn’t warn you.”
“What happened? Did Grandmother arrange this, or Father?”
Ernie nodded to the formal sitting room—the one at the front of the house that they almost never used. Alix followed him inside, not bothering to sit.
Her brother shut the door, then leaned against the frame, bracing his palms on the wood behind him.
“I know this is unexpected, but it’s for the best, really. And I have you to thank! You gave me the idea the other day, when you told me that Ducky is in love with her cousin Kiril.”
“I was just guessing!” Alix had told Ernie of Ducky’s strange comment about me and Kiril, and how May had helped her wriggle out of that engagement to Eddy.
“Well, your guess was correct. Ducky confirmed it for me.”
“Ernie. What did you say?” Alix asked, staring at him.
“I told her that I was looking for a wife who would not expect fidelity from me, and that in return, I would offer her the same courtesy.” He let out a breath, seeming amused.
“It was so nice, speaking frankly with the opposite sex, instead of all the useless social niceties we were taught. Honestly, you should try it.”
“Surely you didn’t tell her about…”
“About Johann?” Ernie’s expression fell, just a little.
“I’m not a fool, Alix. I merely said that I suspected she held affections elsewhere, and that I was in a similar situation.
That it could benefit us both to be married.
I intend to keep pursuing my own relationships, and will make no objection if she does the same.
” He shrugged. “I told her that she can invite Kiril here all she wants, entertain him personally.”
That was a shocking offer—and far more than any other husband would give Ducky. Alix bit her lip. “Are you sure?”
“What other options do I have? Follow Grannie’s orders and marry Maud?”
“Grandmother won’t make you marry her if you don’t wish to!”
“Of course not.” Ernie seemed to slump lower against the door.
“But if it’s not Maud, it will just be someone else.
Princesses will keep being paraded before me, ‘coincidentally’ invited to Balmoral when we are there, turning up unexpectedly at Darmstadt.
” He refrained from pointing out that Maximilian had done exactly that, turning up on Alix’s doorstep uninvited.
“The matchmaking won’t stop until I marry.
Ducky is the best option available to me. ”
“Oh, Ernie.” Alix felt tears pricking her eyes.
“I don’t understand. Why aren’t you congratulating me? This is a good solution for me, and for Ducky.”
“Because you’re talking about your marriage as if it will suffocate you, as if it’s a—” Alix fumbled for the word. “A prison!”
“Don’t you get it? For me, it will be a prison.”
The bleak truth in his words made Alix’s heart ache. She looked out the window at the darkened sky. Far overhead, the moon was a pale sliver.
“I would have expected a little more understanding, from you of all people,” Ernie said impatiently.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“That you know what it’s like to resign yourself to the inevitable!”
“I thought you said I did the right thing, walking away from Nicholas!” she shot back.
“Because you might fall in love with someone else!” Ernie exclaimed. “Maybe Maximilian—who adores you, by the way, and seems like your perfect match. Or maybe someone you haven’t met yet. But at least you have a chance of marrying someone without the whole thing being a lie.”
Alix ignored what Ernie had said about Maximilian, though some part of her tingled with awareness at the thought he might adore her.
“You should have seen Johann’s face when he heard the news,” she said softly. “He was devastated.”
Ernie ran a hand through his hair, frustrated. “What do you want me to do, Alix? Put a tiara on Johann’s head and tell everyone he’s the Grand Duchess of Hesse?”
“I want you to be happy!”
At her outburst, Ernie’s tension seemed to deflate. He nodded in acknowledgment of her words.
“Maybe someday the world will be different, and people like me will have a chance at real happiness,” he said softly.
“In the meantime, I’m lucky to have found Ducky.
She fits all the criteria that I need in a wife, and has agreed to let me live on my own terms. She won’t ask any inconvenient questions.
As for Johann—I’m doing this for us, to give us more time together.
To protect us. He has always known the demands on me, and what is possible. ”
As well as what is impossible, Ernie didn’t need to add.
There were a thousand things Alix longed to tell her brother: Please be careful, and I worry for you, and I hate to see you settling for a pale imitation of love when the real thing is within reach.
But of course, a real relationship—a real marriage—wasn’t within reach. Not for him.
“If you’re happy, then I am happy for you,” Alix promised.
Ernie stepped forward then, pulling her into a hug. She was startled to realize that he was close to tears.
“Thank you, Alix,” he mumbled, his words muffled. “I don’t know what I would do without you.”
“You’ll always have me,” Alix swore. Her arms closed tight around her brother—as if somehow, against the odds, she could protect him from society, from the world. From the future that was careening ever faster toward them both.