Chapter 1 #2
He took her on a grand tour of Europe after her first season, privately celebrating the fact that she had rejected all her suitors.
There had been some handsome and titled young men among them.
A marquess, several counts, an earl, and the eldest son of a duke.
She could have been a duchess, but preferred not to be.
She was happy at her father’s side, and took good care of him.
He grew frail in the years after her presentation.
He had weak lungs and caught bronchitis every winter, and she would nurse him back to health.
She was a strict and loving nurse, and was devoted to him.
When he was well, they stayed up late playing cards, and dice, laughing and talking while he explained something she had inquired about, or told her about the tamer adventures of his youth. There was never a woman in his life after Philippa, except Victoria.
He took her to the coronation of King Edward VII when she was twelve years old, in 1902.
Edward was the eldest son of Queen Victoria.
He was still king six years later when Victoria was presented at court, her official entrance into society.
And three years later, when she was twenty-one, she attended her second coronation, that of King George V, Queen Victoria’s grandson, after his father King Edward had died of pneumonia.
King George was much younger than his father had been when he became the sovereign. He was only forty-five years old.
Alfred was in better health then than he had been in several years.
He was seventy-nine years old, and took Victoria on many trips to Italy and Germany, and whenever possible to Paris, Victoria’s favorite place to shop and buy her clothes.
She also came home with beautiful silk and satin fabrics from their trips to France, and had a dressmaker make beautiful creations with them.
She had several magnificent evening gowns made for her by the famous designer Paul Poiret in Paris.
Victoria was always elegantly dressed, and had exquisite taste.
She was one of the first women to wear Poiret’s romantic designs in London, and Jeanne Paquin’s.
Her father was proud of her when she went out for an evening with him.
He took her to New York for the first time when she was twenty-one.
Her closest friend Delphine Montague had married and moved there after she and Victoria were presented the same year.
Delphine had three children under the age of four now, and Victoria was thrilled to see her.
She had a few friends in London, but most of the time preferred to go out with her father.
They always had a good time, and he made her laugh.
He often took her on short trips, like to Vienna to see the opera, or to attend a ball given by the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria.
She loved dancing the waltz with her father and was a proficient dancer, thanks to her dancing master before her presentation to society.
The following year, early in 1912, her father fell ill again, and Victoria nursed him back to health.
His frequent bronchitis turned to pneumonia and it took him months to recover.
He turned eighty-one that year and he felt guilty when he looked at Victoria, and realized how unfair it was of him to keep her bound to him, nursing him.
He had taken away her chances for a happy marriage, but she had no desire for a life other than the one she led with him.
She had more freedom and independence than her friends who had married and were tied down with husbands and children, which seemed like a life of slavery to her.
Her father was kind to her, and she loved running their homes in London and Hampshire.
She could do all the reading and studying she wanted, and attended all the grandest social events and balls with her father.
The men she hadn’t married still looked at her longingly when they saw her.
She had her mother’s beauty, and a style all her own.
Her independence, fascination with politics and world events, and intellectual pursuits daunted most men.
She hadn’t had a proposal in the last two years, and would have turned it down anyway.
She ran Alfred’s homes beautifully, and had been doing so for the last five years since she turned eighteen.
She liked to be busy and useful, and she never tired of being with her father and helping him.
Alfred loved her company, but was well aware that he had robbed her of the opportunity to marry.
After being so ill for several months, he was worried about what would happen to her when he was no longer there and she would be alone.
He had never thought of it before, but now realized how selfish he had been, when it was too late to do anything about it.
He didn’t want her to marry a man as old as he had been when he married her mother.
She deserved a young man who was as alive and interested in the world as she was.
But he couldn’t think of a single man whom he thought deserved her.
She was a very special young woman. After years of living with him, she thought more like a man than a woman, and he felt guilty about that too.
He had talked to her about subjects that no woman should be aware of, like business and politics.
She should have been tending to her children and running her own home, with a husband to take care of her, instead of caring for her father and running his.
But he provided her protection and a wonderful life she loved.
It was a subject that came up often between them now, ever since he’d been sick.
He wished he could find a suitable husband for her, but there was no one she was interested in, and there was no one Alfred thought was good enough for her.
She had a brilliant mind, and was a beautiful woman.
Even in the modern world of 1912, it was a combination that terrified most men, and was the main reason why Victoria was still single.
Her ability to discuss serious male topics had been frightening the men she met since she was eighteen.
She wasn’t willing to pretend to be stupid, as some of her friends did.
It was what most men expected, even in the modern world of the twentieth century.
She was as intelligent, well-read, and well-informed as any man who had attended Oxford or Cambridge, she just didn’t have the degree, or the life experience they did.
She led a sheltered life in her father’s homes.
Her father had encouraged her intellectual pursuits, and in doing so he had made her unsuitable as a wife. He was well aware of it now.
“You’ll just have to live forever, Papa,” she said smugly, when he brought the subject up again at dinner one night.
Ever since he’d been sick, he had been acutely aware of the challenges she would have to face one day.
She was giving up her youth for him, and it didn’t seem right.
“I think we should go to New York again,” she said blithely.
“There’s a beautiful new ship being launched by the White Star Line in April.
You’ll feel fine by then, and the sea air will do you good.
” She sounded cheerful and enthusiastic, and he smiled.
She was always wanting to do something for him, to keep him engaged and interested and part of life.
His mind was sharp and clear, only his body was failing him.
“I’m too old to travel anymore,” he said. “I can’t run around with you the way I used to.”
“That’s ridiculous. That’s the pneumonia talking.
You’ll be fine again in a few weeks.” She loved to travel, especially with him.
They went to interesting places, and he knew people everywhere.
And she loved New York, and visiting her friend.
Delphine was married to a perfectly nice man, who seemed boring to Victoria, although Delphine said she was happy.
She had written recently to say she was pregnant again with their fourth child.
They had had three girls, and they were hoping for a boy.
Delphine said that if her husband got a son, he might not insist on having more children.
Victoria had a dread of having babies, since her mother had died having her.
Being a spinster and living with her father seemed far less ominous to her.
It was yet another reason why she didn’t want to marry.
“Why don’t I check and see what kind of staterooms they have left on the new ship? Everything might be booked by now. It’s sailing in April for the maiden voyage,” Victoria said to her father.