Chapter 1: The Reencounter of the Queen and her Lord M.
Lord Melbourne was standing, watching as the carriage drove away, his body still trembling and wondering how everything had gone so wrong, from the point of view of duty and wisdom...
His routine that day had begun like any other day since he had ceased to be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Since the popular verdict at the ballot box had consecrated a new conservative majority in the House of Commons that immediately threw him out of power to replace him with the Tory Robert Peel.
Since then Lord Melbourne's life had passed in peace, tranquility... and sadness, an infinite and deep sadness.
No, it was not the depression that afflicted the rulers who had been forced to relinquish power and who were desperate for the times when they had the destiny of the country in their hands. No, it was not the moribund ambition of a finished and retired politician, the painful abstinence from power that ex-ruler felt (similar to the abstinence that an alcoholic felt when he was deprived of alcohol). He had always been the most atypical politician and ruler, for he had never felt such an unhealthy love for power, that obsessive ambition so similar to lust that almost all politicians feel. He reluctantly took power and as an obligation, never as a pleasure for himself.
The reason for his sadness, in reality of his pain, was quite another. He loved a woman, loved her with infinite devotion, loved her as seldom a man loves a woman in real life, feeling that ideal love that seems to dwell solely on the lands of literary fiction. His love for that woman was as obsessive as the unhealthy ambition of power of his former political colleagues, and even greater. Such a love that could have made him the ideal husband of that woman.
But the woman he loved with religious devotion woman forbidden to him, because she was his Queen... Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
The almost adolescent girl whom he had become a worthy Monarch, with his advice and his practical lessons in politics and life. A rough diamond that he forged with his expert hands and his devotion to make it the glorious Queen who was at the head of a vast Empire. But he loved her... love her as a woman, knowing from the beginning that love was impossible, because it would could cost her the throne and her future, and the country could precipitate at a dangerous period of instability. So when she declared her love (because there was a time when it seemed that love was corresponded) he had to reject her and break her heart.
But her heart did not broken last long ("frailty, thy name is woman") because she fell passionately in love with her cousin Albert, and married him, and this time it was she who broke his heart.
After some time came his inevitable resignation, and Lord Melbourne had to stop seeing her almost daily as had been his routine when he was Prime Minister (especially when she was single and they both 'lived' together).
He thought that after seeing her married to another man and giving birth to children of him, the distance would not be as painful as seeing her in another man's arms and imagining her in bed with him... but he was wrong. Every day, every hour, he suffered for her absence. Time passed with painful slowness, like a desperate torture.
He was a broken man who had lost his only reason to live, the only reason to get up every day in the morning. He was a living dead who wandered without a horizon, an unburied corpse that seemed to complain that he could not rest in his grave. If living is a blessing for the one who has a reason to stand up and fight, it is also a curse for which he has only known tragedies in his existence and in the autumn of his life he sees die his only illusion, his last hope.
Locked in his country residence at Brocket Hall, Lord Melbourne resignedly accepted his fate as he had done on so many previous occasions and gathered strength to resist pain, loneliness, and boredom. He told himself that he should just calmly wait for death, which perhaps would not be long since his health had suffered enough from the depression and every day he looked older and emaciated in the mirror. In the meantime he dedicated himself to some activities to distract his mind from suffering and thus not go mad. So his days passed between drinking alcohol, reading books and working as a gardener in his greenhouse, that greenhouse where in the past he had cultivated with affection the flowers that he gave to his beloved Queen every day.
And that day he was busy with work in the greenhouse, when he received the biggest surprise of his life. He heard footsteps approaching the greenhouse door and sighed with some annoyance. He had ordered the servants not to disturb him when he was in the greenhouse, unless it was an emergency or an unexpected visit, so he thought it most likely would be second and that his brother or sister or some his few friends had decided to appear by surprise, and at that moment did not feel like talking, whoever it. But he prepared himself resignedly to wear the courtesy suit to attend to whoever it was.
But when he looked at the door he was stunned by the surprise... Victoria was in the door threshold of the greenhouse, his beloved Victoria.
Behind her a servant retired slowly without turning his back on the Queen, until at a distance acceptable to the protocol he turned and left. Victoria had a sweet, lovely smile on her face, and Lord Melbourne thought he was in the presence of a heavenly vision. He saw her as beautiful as the day they met, even more, probably conditioned him by the time that it had passed since their last encounter.
"I think I surprised you, Lord M! " Victoria said happily, her voice a little broken by emotion.
"Certainly, Ma'am... It would not be the first time, though," said Lord Melbourne, his voice also a little broken with emotion, making an effort not to stammer.
"Yes... I recognize that I am adept at appearing in front you by surprise! " she retorted with amusement.
They both laughed, and for a moment it was as if everything had become as before, when life was simple and joyful.
"I needed to talk to a friend... I needed to talk to the person who best understood me in my life. And that's you," Victoria said with affection and devotion.
"For me that is a great honor, a great joy, Ma'am," Lord Melbourne replied, and he felt the emotion almost drown out his voice. "Do you want us to go the house?"
"No, if you do not mind I prefer that we talk here. I would like for us to speak with as much privacy as possible and in a relaxed atmosphere... And I wanted so much to know your famous greenhouse, whose flowers I so miss," answered her in such a way that Lord Melbourne felt like a teenager boy to which the girl he is in love would have said that she wanted to take a walk with him.
Lord Melbourne began to show her the whole greenhouse and to explain everything about the flowers he cultivated in it, and the methods he used for his gardening work. Victoria listened with deep and sincere interest, and often smiled like a little girl in awe as she discovered new and exciting things. She even encouraged herself to help him a little with work on some plants that were in pots, to his satisfaction he smiled as he had not done in a long time. At the same time Lord Melbourne could not stop seeing her, so elegant in her blue suit with embroidery and a bonnet, and was glad that he himself was dressed more than acceptable, with a vest, a white shirt (which he wore rolled up) and a black bow tie.
After a while Victoria sat on a wooden bench after he asked her if she wanted to. Meanwhile Lord Melbourne remained standing, finishing arranging a plant in a pot. They talked about the flowers he sent to Buckingham Palace, and Victoria was happy to remember those bouquets that came in punctually every day.
"It was one of the happiest times of the day... even in the saddest days, when I was upset or depressed for some reason, when the bouquet came from Brocket Hall I was happy to see them, and I took a breath, to face the rest of the day," Victoria said with longing and lost eyes, as if she was recreating in her mind those past times, "were happy times... much better than the current times... Those were the last times I knew what happiness was," Victoria added, and then her eyes filled with tears, and, unable to avoid it, she burst into tears like a little girl, in a very pitiful way.
Lord Melbourne was surprised, and immediately his surprise became concern, and he left what he was doing and quickly wiped his hands with a cloth, and went to sit on the bench next to Victoria.
"What's wrong, Ma'am?... Why are you like this? " Lord Melbourne asked anguished, as he saw her face in profile bathed in tears, wanting to touch her but not daring to do so, by protocol.
"I can not stand it anymore, Lord M!... My life is hell, and my marriage is a nightmare! " cried Victoria, crying almost hysterically and pouting like a child.
Lord Melbourne was puzzled, shocked by the surprise of what he had just heard.
"Come on, Ma'am... it can not be that bad. I'm sure..." Lord Melbourne tried to comfort her.
"You do not understand, Lord M!... You are not there to see it... I can not stand the pressure anymore. Everyone presses me, they all drown me, they take my breath away and they do not let me breathe." Victoria turned to look at him, her face disengaged with pain and anguish, still crying.
"Ma'am, if it's Peel..." Lord Melbourne tried again.
"Peel is a nuisance, but it's the least of my problems! I'm used to his stupidity and his disloyalty to me, I'm used that he behaving as if the King were Albert... No, it's not him, it's worse... Since Vicky was born, I... I do not know how to explain it, but I hate the maternity. Pregnancy is a nightmare, it's horrible, it makes me feel like a dying woman about to die, it happened with Vicky and also to Bertie. And those around me only make it worse, especially with Bertie, because at least with the first pregnancy still I had you more or less close, all pregnancy, and you encouraged me... But after giving birth, things do not get better, but they get worse..."
Lord Melbourne saw her with concern, seeing the pain reflected in the tormented gesture on her face and in her desperate gaze, and the rivers of tears running down her cheeks, knowing that Victoria was releasing a pain, long repressed.
"Everyone believes and tells me that I must be happy for the birth of my children, but it is not so... after giving birth I feel deeply depressed and dejected, I feel that I sink into a dark abyss, and my head is full of terrible thoughts and of an unbearable anguish. I have no peace or comfort, I do not feel like doing anything. And what is worse, I feel repulsion for my children... God forgive me but I feel that I hate my children!... When I see them newborn I do not feel tenderness and love, I only see the suffering that they cause me with their arrival in the world. I feel rejection, their presence distresses me, and that is why the children are more with Lehzen, Skerrett and the nannies than with me. Maybe if I had a husband who understood me and helped me to overcome it, it would be better, but it is not, because Albert is my greatest source of suffering..."
Lord Melbourne held his breath.
"Now I know that marrying Albert was the biggest mistake of my life... now I know that I no longer love him, if I ever loved him..." Victoria said with absolute conviction and with a hard gesture on her face, without ceasing to cry. "Albert it is cold as ice, it is so cold that it is inhuman, it is mechanical and empty, it is a capricious and spoiled child, it is unbearable... His only concern is to claim more power for him, to constantly demand a greater role in the Court, and to complain because I do not give him more prerogatives at the expense of my own prerogatives. And his only desire is to control me, tell me what I have to do as Queen with the complicity of the fool Peel... Sometimes I think he want to take me the Crown for he reign... And he never gives me the love and comfort I need, he has never understood me... on the contrary, his behavior only causes me more restlessness and depression. It harasses me, it annoys me. That's why I think he does not love me, although maybe he thinks he does... Albert is only the younger son of the Monarch of a small and poor principality, whom they educated with the idea that he had come to the world to be my husband, and that through his marriage with me he would reach the greatness to which he would not be entitled by birth. That is why he is obsessed with having a great role as Consort, to write his name in History with capital letters. It's just a frustrated little prince because he would want to be a great King... I know that maybe I'm measly, but it's the truth. And now I think he was not in love with me, he was in love with what I represented, the abstract concept of love and greatness that I embodied. I think he was in love with the romantic ideal but not with the flesh-and-blood woman behind it, and I think that something similar happened to me, I fell in love with the concept of romantic and idealistic love, but not with the man who is Albert..."
Lord Melbourne listened with sadness and compassion.
"But the harsh reality, Lord M, is that I am very lonely... it is ironic that the Queen of the Empire most rich and powerful of world, perhaps the most envied woman in the world, is so lonely and so unhappy. Every day I struggle to overcome pain and depression, to resist the pressure of my unbearable husband and the burden of motherhood, to coexist with a Prime Minister who together with my husband only sabotages my reign instead of serving me and helping me... I fight to fulfill my obligations as Queen, wife and mother as best as I can, and all that while I have to hide my real feelings and put my best smile. And when night comes I'm so tired, so overwhelmed, and I have no one to comfort me and on whose shoulder I can cry... and when I wake up in the morning I feel scared and desperate, cursing the new day that is about to begin. And I can not even trust my doctor, because he would surely say that it is only the fragile constitution of a woman and that I have only to delegate more responsibilities to my husband, to leave everything in his hands, because women only serve to bring children to the world. I am so overwhelmed that sometimes I have sinister desires, I want my children to die, or that Albert falls from his horse and breaks his neck so that he can finally leave me alone... or even wish some insane person to return to attempt against my life, but this time use real bullets and take my life," said Victoria pausing in her tears, and with a cloudy look and hard gesture.
"Please do not say that, Ma'am! You can not wish for your own death," Lord Melbourne replied, taking one of Victoria's small hands and pressing it between his two large hands.
"You do not understand, Lord M!... You do not understand what it is to live in despair and no reason to live! " Victoria exclaimed, bursting into tears again, and unable to contain herself, she embraced him and buried her face in his chest.
Lord Melbourne was surprised at first, but then he overcame his prejudices and responded to the embrace, and with one hand began to caress the small back of her while with the other hand caressed Victoria's head. He held her in his arms, forgetting that it was his duty to keep the physical distance from the Queen.
"Ma'am, I understand you better than you realize," Lord Melbourne said sadly. "I also live in disquietude and sadness, I also know what it is not to have a reason to live and yet to have to go on... But Ma'am, you do have reasons to live even though you can not see it now... Your children will grow and you will see that all the suffering they caused you with your arrival into the world will become love and happiness, because although you can not believe it now, I am sure you will be a great mother, and they will reward you with their love. And you have the love of the whole country, of a people who adore you... there will always be reasons to live, Ma'am. You should not give up in despair, you are more loved than you believe... How could you not be loved an angel as beautiful and sweet as you? " He added, comforting her.
"Only you have told me, only you have understood me... only you have made me feel loved," Victoria replied, sobbing and pouting, her face against his chest.
"But it does not mean that only I can love you, love comes into our lives in very different ways. But above all things, we should never surrender to pain, never... As I once said, when my son died I felt that I had lost my only reason for living, but then life gave me another reason to live," said Lord Melbourne.
"You told me that I was your reason to live," Victoria said, raising her head, to meet his eyes, with her beautiful blue eyes full of tears.
"Yes, it was you, Ma'am... You gave me a reason to live and so I will never allow you to want to die. Your life gives meaning to mine," Lord Melbourne answered, his voice broken with emotion.
"Truly? " she asked excitedly.
"How can you doubt it, Ma'am?... From the day I met you in Kensington, I knew you were the strength I needed to live. My brave girl, my Queen, worthy and strong. But most of all, the woman I admire... I am proud of you, and I believe there is no better reason to live than you," replied Lord Melbourne.
And then it happened... to Lord Melbourne's surprise, Victoria kissed him. She put her lips to his lips, and kissed him desperately. Lord Melbourne took a moment to react, his eyes wide with astonishment. Then he tried gently to push her away.
"No, Ma'am, we must not! " he exclaimed, but she silenced his protest with passionate kisses.
Victoria was on top of him, kissing him desperately, with hungry... strong Lord Melbourne could have taken Victoria's small, fragile body off, but something within him made his strength falter and remain almost motionless. He just tried to move back, but then he lost his balance and fell backwards from the bench to the floor, with Victoria on top of him. She was startled, but then she resumed her frantic labor of kissing him in the mouth, now lying face down on top of him.
It was not long before Lord Melbourne began to correspond her... His sanity disappeared in passion. He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her tightly, pressed his lips against hers, then thrust his tongue into Victoria's mouth. She also tried to stick her tongue inside his mouth, and both tongues rubbed. Lord Melbourne's mouth "devoured" Victoria's small mouth, and sometimes nibbled at her lips.
Blind of passion, Lord Melbourne rolled over her and lay on top of her... Victoria was twisting in pleasure, feeling immobilized by the weight of his body on hers, feeling "subdued" by him, moaning while she did not stop kissing him. Lord Melbourne descended with his mouth and kissed and nibbled on Victoria's neck, causing Victoria groan more.
Victoria grabbed his bowtie with one hand and tried desperately to undo the knot, until he himself tugged his bowtie with skill. Then she jumped the first buttons of his shirt with her anxious hands, and she could see Lord Melbourne's bare chest. Victoria put her hand inside his shirt and caressed his chest, and lifted her head to kiss him.
Victoria squirmed and rubbed against him, and she felt the lump growing in his crotch... then she lowered her hand and tuged on her skirt and petticoat, and lifted her leg to leave her thigh naked. Lord Melbourne watched with lust the leg offered by Victoria and with his hand caressed it, causing Victoria to shudder. Lord Melbourne came down and thrust his hands into Victoria's skirt, rummaging into her legs, caressing the part covered by her stockings, then her bare thighs, rummaging through the drawers, until one of his hands found and probed the most intimate part of the Queen…
Victoria moaned with pleasure, and her moans grew as Lord Melbourne explored her. Until Victoria started begging him to make her his own, and then, Lord Melbourne came back to reality and backed away, almost horrified by what they had done.
"We can not... we can not, Victoria! " exclaimed Lord Melbourne, sitting on the floor, snorting, breathing and heartbeat racing, and a tormented gesture on his face, not realizing that he had first called her by her first name.
"My sweet, Lord M!... My beloved, I wish it, that's fine," Victoria said with sweet gesture on her face, approaching him, crawl on all fours in a very unworthy pose for a Queen.
"Victo... Ma'am, I beg your pardon, I..." began to say Lord Melbourne trying to return to "normality".
"Do not you dare ask for forgiveness!... I forbid you!... I do not accept that you repent and that you ask pardon for what has just happened between us... and I do not accept that you call me Ma'am again in private," Victoria said in anger, hardening the gesture of her face.
"Victoria, I would never do anything to harm you... that's why this can not be... you're a married woman and you're the Queen," Lord Melbourne said with anguish.
"But you want me, you've shown it... and you love me... I know you love me, or will you deny it? " Victoria said imperiously.
"You know... I can not deny it," Lord Melbourne replied, looking away and with a sad expression.
"And I want you... and I love you," Victoria replied with tears in her eyes as she reached out a hand to stroke Lord Melbourne's face.
"But everything stands between us," Lord Melbourne said bitterly, his voice cracked with emotion.
"Lord M... I'm no longer a virgin," Victoria said, embarrassed and blushing.
"You do not have to remind me! " said Lord Melbourne with anger in his eyes and face, as he turned to see her.
"I remind you, because that means that the consequences of losing my virginity are no longer an obstacle for us to have... a full relationship," Victoria replied with her face red as a tomato, but with determination in her eyes.
Lord Melbourne softened his gesture, and felt the storm of conflicting feelings inside him.
"Victoria... you know that kind of relationship can have other undesirable consequences," Lord Melbourne said affectionately.
"You mean, that I can stay with a child of yours? That is not an impediment either, being a married woman, even if it is with another man," Victoria replied quietly.
"Do not talk like that, it's not like you," Lord Melbourne answered, looking down, embarrassed and with some disgust.
"Why? Because you have idealized me... Lord Melbourne, I am not a saint. I am a woman of flesh and blood, with her defects and her sins... I am tired of suffering, and if to stop suffer, I must become myself an indecent sinner, I am willing to do it... Whatever with such not to continue living this nightmare," said Victoria harshly.
"If Albert finds out..." said Lord Melbourne.
"He will not dare to expose me publicly, he appreciates his own image, his beloved honor too much," Victoria said almost contemptuously.
"But he could part with you, in fact, stop living with you," Lord Melbourne said almost desperately.
"In that case, he would do me a favor," said Victoria. "I can bear it less and less, even that he touches me, it's like a dead, a cold corpse."
"Victoria, you can not be an adulteress Queen... If the people will know, it would be a disaster for your image, you would lose the love and respect of your subjects, and that could cost you the Crown," Lord Melbourne argued increasingly desperate, because not only was he trying to convince her but himself.
"Because I'm a woman... if I'd be a man, they'd even applaud me. But I have studied History, Lord M, and many adulteress Queens have got away with it... One has only to be cunning and discreet, and above all determined," she argued stubbornly.
"Victoria, you do not realize I just want to protect you! " exclaimed Lord Melbourne, almost losing his temper.
"Protecting me!... How you protected me that day when you broke my heart, right here in Brocket Hall!... If you had fought for me, if you would have fought for our relationship with me... if, only we would have made the attempt to convince Parliament, the people... maybe I should not have lived the hell I've lived, I would not have had to suffer this loneliness and this pain... Why did not you fight for me! ... You should have fought for me... damn coward! " Victoria exclaimed, almost hysterical, crying and throwing herself on him, beating him with her small clenched fists.
"Victoria, please!"
Lord Melbourne held her by the wrists so she would not keep hitting him as she writhed. Finally he drew her to him, and held her tightly, until she stopped resisting and burst into tears with her face buried in Lord Melbourne's chest.
"Forgive me... Forgive me Victoria, my beloved Victoria," Lord Melbourne said tenderly, kissing Victoria's head on her hair. "But my life without you has been hell as well, and my only consolation was to think you were happy. Now I know I was wrong."
"Then make me happy now," Victoria said, raising her head to meet his eyes.
"God, Victoria... you're going to be my perdition! " exclaimed Lord Melbourne with love and anguish.
"That's what I want... to lead you to perdition in my arms," Victoria replied with a sad smile, and then they kissed sweetly on the lips.
After a few minutes Lord Melbourne helped Victoria to her feet, and helped her find her shoes and put them on, since she had lost them in the outburst of passion. He also helped her put on her bonnet, and gently wiped the dirt from her clothes. Victoria also helped him a little, but both laughed because Victoria had ripped the buttons off his shirt in the frenzy and could not tie the tie.
"I'm coming back, William. I'll be back here," Victoria said decisively, enjoying herself by calling him by his first name.
"Victoria," Lord Melbourne answered in anguish.
"Swears for the memory of your late son that you do not love me and that you do not want me to return, and I will not return! " she exclaimed.
"You know I can not do it, and I will not," Lord Melbourne said, looking down.
"Then I'll go back to Brocket Hall as many times as I want, and if you go somewhere else I'll look for you there. You will have to leave Britain to flee from me... what will happens in my visits will depend on you, but you know I will not give up my happiness again... Now kiss me while we are still alone."
They kissed each other on the lips with passion. Lord Melbourne then accompanied Victoria to her carriage, where young maid Skerrett was waiting for her. At the carriage door Lord Melbourne kissed the back of Victoria's hand, and they both trembled with excitement and desire, remembering the kisses and caresses they had shared.
"I'll be a little happier tonight, because I'll dream of Brocket Hall, Lord M... Especially with its beautiful greenhouse," Victoria said, her eyes bright and damp.
"I will, too, Ma'am. Because your visit has reminded me that I am still alive," responded Lord Melbourne excitedly.
"Good-bye, Lord M," Victoria said good-bye.
"Goodbye, Ma'am, " Lord Melbourne said goodbye, offered her his hand, helped her into the carriage, and closed the door.
Lord Melbourne felt his body shaking and his heart racing, and he felt contradictory emotions... and then he saw Victoria poking her head through the carriage window and turning back to see him standing as she walked away. Lord Melbourne smiled and waved, tears rolling down his cheeks. Victoria did not turn her head until they had come a long way, and she already saw him away from her, still standing watching the carriage away. When Victoria straightened in the seat, she took Skerrett's hand and resting her head on the servant's shoulder, she burst into tears.
"Why is life so cruel, Skerrett! " Victoria exclaimed.
"I do not know, Your Majesty... I do not know," said Skerrett affectionately, stroking the Queen's head in a hint of how intimate the relationship between the Queen and her maid had been.
At Brocket Hall, Lord Melbourne was sitting in his favorite armchair, crying and laughing at the same time, drinking liquor, not being able to take Victoria's image out of his mind and the taste of her from his lips.
