Page 95 of The Heir
“Yes.” Victoria did not let herself look away. She had said this thing, and she would face what came next. She would look her aunt in the eye, and she would hear whatever she had to say. Even if she fell into one of her screaming fits. Even if she burst into tears. “You . . . you had a child when you were younger.”Out of wedlock and out of sight. You had a secret lover and a secret bastard. Just like your brothers did.“And you’d been working to make sure Dr. Maton was paid extra beyond his stipend from the household, and Sir John and Mr. Rea were helping you.”
This was what she’d learned from the letters she’d stolen. Aunt Sophia had been a young and lonely woman. Her father’s madness had kept marriage out of reach for her and her sisters. The fact of her being a woman had kept her from having her own home, a luxury that all her brothers had been allowed.
There had been a great deal of sighing over the boredom and isolation of that time, of the endless days with nothing to do but sit with her sisters and her mother and embroider or play solitaire, waiting—for hours, for days, for years—for their father to get better.
There had been more. Victoria had read veiled hints about what King George III did in his madness and about her brother the Duke of Cumberland. Things she could not quite understand.Or perhaps I don’t want to.
What she did understand was that Aunt Sophia had fallen pregnant and she had given birth. It was all meant to be in secret, but that secret had escaped. That was why she was exiled here to Kensington Palace, with no one except one disgraced brother to keep her company.
Victoria waited for Aunt Sophia to shout or cry or accuse her of being ungrateful, selfish, and a host of other epithets. But she just sighed.
“I would ask how you found out about my son, but I have a feeling I don’t want to know.” She shook her head sadly. “But to answer your question, no. Dr. William Maton was not my son. However, he was there when my son was born.”
Victoria’s breath hitched.
“I had wondered when you’d find out about Tommy. That’s his name, by the way. Thomas Garth. Would you like to see his picture?”
Victoria nodded. Aunt Sophia reached beneath her wrapper and pulled out a gold locket that hung on a chain around her neck. She opened it carefully. Inside waited a painted miniature. The man it depicted was round-faced and popeyed and was wearing an officer’s scarlet coat. His brow, his eyes, and the dark waving hair all declared he was related to Sophia, to the rest of the royal family.
To me.It was the first time she had seen any of her illegitimate cousins, and Victoria felt a strange frisson inside. Because he looked exactly like the few legitimate ones she had met.
Aunt Sophia seemed to be waiting for her to say something. What could she possibly say?
“He’s very handsome.”
“Thank you.” Sophia gazed at the portrait, her wide eyes swimming with tears.
Victoria knew she should cringe back from her aunt. There could not be any sympathy. Aunt Sophia had permitted herself to be ruined. She deserved her lonely life and should be grateful that the family had continued to support her at all. The man in the portrait—despite how normal he appeared—was tainted by the nature of his birth.
Mama had said all this and more about Uncle William and his mistress and his children.
But somehow, as Victoria sat here beside her old aunt, with the chocolate pot and toast crumbs and her spaniel dozing between them, the outrage and horror she knew were proper responses refused to manifest.
“Do you ever speak?”
“Oh, not directly. Not in years.” Aunt Sophia snapped the locket shut. “My brothers were all allowed to raise their bastards, at least until they had to join the race to produce a legitimate heir. I was never even permitted that much time with my son. I gave birth in a public house, and within hours he was taken from me to be raised elsewhere.” She closed her bony hand around the locket and held the image of her son close for a moment before she hid it away again. “Every so often a letter still finds its way to me. Mostly asking for money.”
“Do you give it to him?”
“When I can. I have a bit of my own, you know. Living locked in a tower is a marvelous way to husband one’s income.” She chuckled, and she pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and wiped at her eyes. “I’ll have some more chocolate, there’s a good girl.”
Victoria filled her aunt’s cup and put a slice of toast on the saucer. She kept her gaze averted while Aunt Sophia mopped her eyes and her nose and generally pulled herself together. In fact, she did not look up at all until her aunt took her cup and downed half the contents in a single gulp.
“Ah!” Aunt Sophia threw her head back and sighed harshly up to the canopy. “Say what you will about tea, but it’s chocolate that saves one at such times.”
Victoria smiled, but just a little, and only for a fleeting instant.
“Aunt, I have . . . I have another question.” She stopped. She steeled herself and began again. “Aunt, did my father . . . Were there any outside children?”
“Like that whole litter of Fitzes belonging to dear William?” Aunt Sophia’s mockery was sharp. “Or Sussex’s pair away off in Germany or Italy or wherever it was?” The sneer slid across Victoria’s skin, and it felt prickling. Dangerous. Victoria reminded herself that Aunt Sophia had a right to her anger, particularly on this subject. “What makes you ask now?”
Sir John says his wife is my sister. Sir John tells his children that they are my blood relations because she is my father’s natural daughter.“It’s simply that . . . when I am queen, I should not like to be . . . surprised.”
“Mmm . . . yes. There’s sense in that. No other reason?” She cocked her head. “A reason from Sir John, perhaps?”
Victoria froze. Aunt Sophia patted her hand.
“You found out his ridiculous delusion about his wife, didn’t you?That’swhat’s behind this sudden interest in all our bastards.”
