Royal - Danielle Steel Page 0,5
stable master and one of the stable boys three days before, and when they returned, they reported that the spirited Thoroughbred Charlotte liked to ride had settled well into his new home. He seemed to like the grazing land available to him. There was only one very old man, previously retired, and a fourteen-year-old boy managing the stables at Ainsleigh Hall, the Hemmingses’ estate, and the Earl of Ainsleigh’s seat. They had reported that there were few horses left in the stables. There was one hunter for the Hemmings boy to ride, and a few older horses. Neither the earl nor the countess rode anymore. The earl had been master of the hunt, but all of that ended with the onset of the war, and the countess had had a bad fall ten years before, the ancient stable master told them, broken her leg badly and hadn’t ridden since. It reminded Charlotte of what Charles had told them, that the Hemmingses were not young. Their son, Henry, had come to them as a surprise late in life, when the countess was forty-nine. She was sixty-seven now, and the earl in his early seventies.
Charles had mentioned that the boy was the love of their life, and they were dreading when he would leave and go to war in a few months. He had joined an infantry regiment, and was waiting to be called up right after his eighteenth birthday, which wouldn’t be long now. By Christmas, he’d be gone, and the Hemmingses would be left with their two young female guests for company.
Charlotte knew almost nothing about the girl who’d been staying there for two years, only that she came from the East End of London, and both her parents had been killed in the bombings right after she left. She was an orphan now, like so many other British children. She was the same age as Charlotte, which would be pleasant for her, if they got along, and Charlotte couldn’t imagine why they wouldn’t.
Charlotte had never gone to a proper school herself, and had been tutored at home. It was tedious at times, particularly once her sisters left the schoolroom, and she had to do her lessons alone, with a French governess who tutored her in French, drawing, and dance. A professor from Eton College taught her history and the basics of mathematics, and another from Cambridge taught her literature, all by British writers and poets. She hoped that she wouldn’t have to continue her studies in Yorkshire, although she had promised her father she would read all the books available to her, and a few he had given her about the history of Parliament, to take with her. He wanted all his daughters to be well versed in the process of British government. He said it was their duty as daughters of the king.
Charlotte much preferred riding her horses, and needed no lessons there. She was a bold, skillful rider, and had joined her father numerous times at the royal hunts he’d attended before the war. Her sisters were far less adventuresome. She intended to ride astride in a normal saddle now, like the men, instead of sidesaddle, with no one to stop her or complain about the impropriety of it. She’d been reprimanded every time she’d tried it at Windsor, with her own and her father’s horses. She couldn’t do it at the royal training centers, but she could occasionally at their country retreat, but whenever her parents found out she was scolded and told to ride sidesaddle like her mother and sisters.
Queen Anne was an avid rider too, but not as much so as her youngest daughter, and the queen was content to ride sedately in their park. The king and queen frequently rode together, while Charlotte rode early in the morning with one of the grooms, so no one could observe her pushing her stallion to his limits and riding like the wind. She planned to do some riding in Yorkshire, and hoped that the earl and countess wouldn’t organize schoolroom lessons for her, if they didn’t have a teacher for her, which she fervently wished would be the case. She wondered if her young female contemporary liked to ride as much as she did, or even knew how. If not, perhaps she could teach her.
They arrived at Ainsleigh Hall as the Hemmingses were finishing lunch, and the earl and countess and their son, Henry, came out to greet her and introduce themselves. They