“Stop fussing, my dear. Go, or you’ll miss your train.”
Julia kissed her grandfather’s cheek and followed the porter to the platform. She settled in her seat, grateful to occupy an empty first-class compartment. She had an uninterrupted ninety minutes to wonder what the day would bring. Susan’s three-line telegram had said, “HRM QV requests consultation. If able, take 9:20 a.m. from Waterloo for overnight stay. Bring dark dress for dinner.”
Julia had handed the message to Tennant. He’d read it, frowning. “I wish you weren’t going.”
“To Windsor Castle? Is there a safer place?”
“People keep saying that. There are enough soldiers to repel a small army, but the killer got past the Marlborough House guards disguised as a milkman.”
“Well, it’s only for one night. Packing for an audience with the queen will have Kate in a flutter.”
Tennant hadn’t returned her smile. “I’ll see you in two days,” he said gravely. He took her hand and raised it halfway to his lips. Then he released it abruptly and bowed.
Julia had closed the door behind him and watched through the sidelight window. She’d raised her hand, but he had ducked into the cab without a backward glance.
Julia looked out the train window, wondering about their recent encounters. Sometimes, they left her exhilarated; other times, flattened. She sighed and pulled out a copy ofThe Lancet.
Lady Styles and a porter were waiting for Julia on the Windsor Station platform. In the carriage, Susan said, “First, let me say that I have no idea what the queen wants of you. I am as astonished as you must be.”
“How did it come about?”
“Lord only knows. Only God and the queen. Somehow, she heard about Alix’s visit to you. I thought I was about to get a royal dressing-down. Or sent packing. Instead, she asked me to telegraph you.”
A short carriage ride brought them up Castle Hill, past the looming Round Tower, and through the double-towered entrance near the visitors’ apartments.
“Your bedroom is two doors down from mine,” Susan said as they mounted the stairs. “The footman will follow with your case.” At the bedroom door, she glanced at the doctor’s medical bag. “You have everything you need?”
“Yes, thank you.”
Susan opened the door. “I’ll come back for you in half an hour.”
Thirty minutes later, Julia and Susan walked past the glaring “absurd Scotsman in a kilt.” The doctor straightened her shoulders and followed Susan into the queen’s private sitting room, trailed by John Brown. Julia hadn’t much practice curtsying, but she acquitted herself reasonably well. Then the queen dismissed Susan and Brown. Silence followed as the queen surveyed her.
“Pray, be seated, Doctor.”
After some skirt-smoothing and rapid fanning, a perspiring Victoria explained her problem. What ailed the queen was simple: the change of life, coupled with a lack of sympathy from her male doctors. Victoria had all the classic symptoms of approaching menopause, a newfangled term that made a natural phase in a woman’s life sound like a disease.
“I trust the royal doctors are not telling the queen that Her Majesty imagines things?”
“That is precisely what they imply. The queen ‘exaggerates.’ The queen needs to ‘calm herself.’ The queen is experiencing ‘climacteric syndrome,’ never explaining what that means. One doctor used the term ‘hysteria’ for my …” The queen fluttered her hand. “For my unruly emotions.”
“The queen’s feelings are real and natural.” Julia thought for a moment. “I wonder if Your Majesty recalls late girlhood, the time on the brink of womanhood and just after. Perhaps the queen remembers those changeable emotions?”
“Yes. I was a trial to my governess. Poor Lehzen,” the queen said sadly. “How I plagued her, yet she loved me all the same.”
Julia smiled. “I remember being quite impossible when I was about thirteen. The two phases are rather like bookends.”
“Are there remedies? Treatments that might ease the discomfort?”
“Sadly, Ma’am, I know none that are effective,” Julia said. “Patent remedies are plentiful but worthless. But the queen may command that windows stay open and order her subjects to don extra layers if they are cold. Keep the bedroom cool at night and put aside heavy bedclothes. Avoid overly seasoned foods. As for clothing, less constricting—”
“You are advising the queen to dress like Princess Louise?”
“Well, looser gowns might give relief. If I may be blunt, ma’am, tight corseting will not help the queen feel less heated. But symptoms ease with time. Until then, women endure a trying period.”
The queen sighed. “Well, one’s mind is eased by information. And to be listened to without condescension is a relief, even if there is no ready cure.”
Julia nodded to John Brown, guarding the queen’s door, took Susan’s arm, and walked her beyond the Scotsman’s earshot.
