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The girls were in her rooms, trying on her gloves and shawls. Amelia had invited them in—she thought it important to teach them the lesson of looking one’s best on such occasions as this. “A princess should always look like a princess,” she’d said.
“Will you wear a crown?” asked Maisie.
“Or carry a stick?” Mathilda asked.
“I think you mean a scepter, and no. The crown and scepter are carried by the sovereign. As a princess, I will carry only myself, but in a regal manner, of course.”
“I want to carry one,” Peg-leg Meg said. “I want a ree manner.”
“Me too!” Maisie shouted.
“All right. Here’s what you do—everyone find something to balance on top of your head.”
The girls looked at each other—Mathilda pounced on a discarded shoe. Maren and Maisie found a glove and a hat, respectively. Peg-leg Meg began to wail, so Mathilda plopped a small needlepoint frame on her head and watched it slide down over her eyes.
“Watch me,” Amelia said. She lifted her chin. Held out on arm like a dancer, and with the other hand, she daintily lifted the hem of her skirt. She slid one foot along the floor, then the next. “Don’t let it fall from you head,” she instructed, then turned around to adjust the four of them as they made their way slowly around her salon, their regal manners perched on their heads, following after her like little ducklings. “There, you see? Now you all know how to make a proper impression at the picnic. One never knows when one’s future husband may be standing nearby.”
“Like Cendrillon?” Maren asked hopefully.
“Who?” Amelia asked.
“Cendrillon was a maid, and the prince found her and made her a princess.”
“That’s not what happened,” Maisie said. “Shefound theprinceand then he married her.”
Amelia frowned thoughtfully. “That sounds a bit like my grandmother’s story of Ashenputtel.She said Ashenputtel wished for a prince, and then warned me never to lie, because if I did, I might have to cut off my toes to fit a gold slipper.”
The girls stopped walking.
“You don’t remember that part of the story? The stepsisters wanted to marry the prince, and so they claimed to be Ashenputtel.But their feet wouldn’t fit the dainty slipper of gold, so they had to cut off their toes to make the shoe fit.”
The girls looked horrified.
“The moral of the story is that some people will do anything to win. All right then, off with you lot so that I might dress.”
The girls bounced out of her room, and only Peg-leg Meg left under protest, quite upset she had to leave her regal manner behind.
Amelia had settled on a gold gown with blue embroidery. It was made of lightweight lawn linen, the perfect fabric for a warm day, and was cinched so tightly at the waist that she looked impossibly svelte. Lordonna arranged her blond hair at her nape in a snood made of gold silk knit so fine that the snood itself was almost indistinguishable from her hair. When she was dressed, Lila came into her rooms, wearing a plain blue cotton dress. “Shall I have the coach brought round, Your Royal Highness?”
“Not for me,” Amelia said, taking one last look at herself. “I intend to ride.”
“To ride?”
“Je,madam.It’s not very far, is it, and I think it will make a more notable entry. Don’t you?”
Lila laughed. “I think it’s already rather dramatic to have a royal princess attend this picnic.”
“It certainly is. But nevertheless, I intend to ride. Why not?”
“I can think of a few reasons why not.”
“I knew you’d understand.” Amelia smiled in a way that she hoped Lila would interpret correctly—she would do as she pleased.
So it was, then, an hour or so later, after everyone else bundled into coaches and drove off, that Amelia and her guards mounted horses. She was given a spirited roan mare to ride, and that delighted her. The horse kept tossing her head, ready to get on with it. Amelia leaned over her neck to rub her face. “I’m ready, too,” she whispered.
And they were off, trotting along the road. Today was probably the happiest Amelia had been since arriving in England. She was eager to make new friends. And for once in her life, she’d be entering the fray without Justine by her side. She missed her sister terribly, but she didn’t miss always being in her shadow. Justine said it was quite the other way around, that she tended to fade to the background when Amelia was about.
Maybe when they were younger. But people came to see a queen.
