I've been writing stories for my next book of short stories, which I plan to publish this spring. This story is a preview.
THE LAST OF THE ROYAL LINE
She was eighty-eight years old. She had long white
hair and a thin, petite frame. She was standing barefoot by the leaded glass
window, wearing a long-sleeved white Victorian nightgown that once belonged to her
mother.
He was her new doctor. There had been a few others over the
years. When he entered the room, she glanced over her shoulder at him with just
a passing interest. Her mind, as always, was somewhere else.
“Papa, my feet won’t touch the floor!”
“You are sitting on the throne of a great queen,
Helen. Charlotte’s feet are not on the floor either.”
“Hers is the king’s throne?”
“Yes, little one.”
The adventurous little girl had easily climbed up
while Papa had helped her older sister. They lived in a castle, but the ornate carved wooden thrones they sat upon were in a far away palace that
their father told them was the home of their ancestors.
Their mother had passed away from tuberculosis, and
their father was later killed in the war. So at ten years of age, Helen went with
twelve-year-old Charlotte to live with their grandparents in a collection of
castles with foreboding atmospheres, located deep in the woods or high on hills
overlooking lakes or treacherous ravines.
In all of the homes there were books filled with old photographs,
but there was not a single photo of their father. Grandfather referred to him
as “that lunatic,” despite being repeatedly hushed by his wife.
There were many photos of their mother from the time
she was an infant until just days before she died. Helen had few memories of her. Looking at one of
the photographs, she saw that she was wearing a ring with a large stone.
She remembered Papa telling her he had given her a ruby ring that was his
grandmother’s. He said it had once belonged to the princess who married their ancestor the prince. Helen could vaguely remember holding her mother's hand and gazing at the big beautiful ruby on her finger. Papa said Mama had been buried wearing the ring.
Helen and Charlotte both thought their mother looked very much like a queen. Charlotte’s most vivid memory of her was sitting with
her and Helen on the stairs when she first became ill.
“She told us she loved us, and she'd married Papa
because she loved him, and she didn't care that he wasn't rich.”
The sisters grew up in their mother's world of elite schools and mansions with halls that echoed, and they married men of good breeding and social standing.
They each had children of their own, though sadly
Charlotte did not live to see her children grow up.
As she lay on her sickbed at The Elms, one of the homes the sisters had inherited from their grandparents, Helen came into the room
and lay down beside her.
“I wish we could go back to our palace again, and sit
on the thrones like our ancestors.”
Charlotte sighed. “Grandmother and Grandfather told
us, Papa was not related to that royal family. You know that. They investigated.
Papa’s ancestors were just common folk. We don’t have a drop of royal blood.”
“Papa said his father told him the queen was only able
to have one child. Her son the prince and his princess had five children, but only two
boys survived, and one was kidnapped as a child. Don’t you remember?”
“Papa was just telling us fairy tales, Helen. He
wanted to comfort us after Mama was gone.”
Tears were pouring down Helen’s face. “Everyone is
gone. And now you are leaving me too.”
Charlotte sounded very weak. “Helen dear, there is
something you need to know. I found out something a few years ago. I hope you
will forgive me for not telling you about it.”
“What is it, Charlotte?”
“Look in the attic of the North House. In the old
trunk. There is an envelope full of papers.”
“What are they? Charlotte?”
She had fallen asleep.
The next day, Charlotte passed away. After the
funeral, Helen drove by herself to the North House, one of their homes which
stood on a hill overlooking a lake. She let herself in and climbed the winding stairs all
the way up to the attic.
As it turned out, there were three old trunks, but only one contained an envelope full of paperwork. It looked
important. Official documents from the military.
Sitting on a dusty ottoman by a window, Helen read the papers, which detailed her father’s
experiences during the war. She read how he was wounded and hospitalized.
Hospitalized?
“Patient is recovering from leg wound,” the notes
read.
One of the pieces of paper described an incident in which
the patient had led his men into battle proclaiming, “We fight in honor of my
queen, Charlotte, queen of Prussia and the Netherlands!” The reports indicated
that he had repeated a story about being a descendant of a royal family line
that had died out, and then had begun to demand an audience with the long-deceased queen and king at the royal palace. There was a letter advising his in-laws of the patient’s transfer to a mental institution.
Helen was in tears again. There were other letters, from
doctors at the mental hospital, giving her grandparents information on her
father’s condition. The words “patient is delusional” kept appearing. There was
even a photograph of her father, grey-haired, seated in a chair, a nurse and a
doctor standing at his sides. He looked haggard, and as though he was in a
stupor. Helen wiped at her tears. There was a telephone number
at the bottom of the letters.
She called the hospital and found out that her father
was still there. She went to see him, and a nurse let her into his room. He was
sitting on the bed looking out the window. Trembling, Helen went and sat next to her
father.
“Papa?”
He turned to look at her, a vacant look in his eyes.
“It’s me, Helen,” she said, putting her hand over his.
He didn’t recognize her. She sat and talked to him for
a while, telling him about her husband and children and Charlotte. He didn’t
react.
She visited from time to time, always hoping for a
sign of recognition. The closest she came was one day when they were sitting
together outside and she said, “I wonder if there is another chair nearby, this
one is uncomfortable.”
“It is the throne of a great queen, little one,” he
said.
Helen burst into tears and hugged him. “Oh, Papa.”
“Is it lunch time now?” he asked.
The nurse came to take him back inside.
The following year, he passed away of natural causes.
Helen was inconsolable. She went to the palace alone and stood there looking at
the thrones, thinking about the queen and king.
As the years went on, her life deteriorated. Her
husband left her for another woman. Her two adult sons spoke to her less and
less. She started drinking, and was always claiming that her father was a descendant of
royalty, but no one had ever believed him because there were no records and his
claim could not be proven.
She had inherited the original castle where she had
been born and lived with her parents. She returned to live there, surrounded by
all their things, often pretending she was still a child and they were still
alive. She spoke of Charlotte as though she were still living.
Her only daughter
Sylvia and grandson Bryce were the only people to occasionally visit. Sylvia
hired all the doctors and nurses her mother needed and controlled all of her
affairs. Some of the houses had been sold over the years. Helen never asked
about them or even about any of her other family members, only concerning
herself with the ones who were gone, but still living in her head.
The doctor asked her to sit in a nearby armchair and
he took out his stethoscope and listened to her heart.
“How have you been feeling?” he asked her.
“I feel very well. Mama is ill with tuberculosis. Papa
never gets ill. He says it’s because he has royal blood.” She smiled up at him.
“My sister Charlotte is named after a queen who was our ancestor.”
“And where is Charlotte?”
“Lessons,” she said, making a face.
He smiled. He tested her reflexes, and she giggled.
“Papa says our royal blood makes us strong so we do
not get sick.”
The doctor came downstairs to talk to her family members.
Sylvia looked up as he entered the room. “How is she?”
“She seems to be in good spirits,” he said. “Her
physical health is good.”
“The crazy old girl is going to outlive us all,” Bryce
said.
“Bryce!” Sylvia shouted.
“Her mental condition is inherited?” the doctor
inquired.
Sylvia nodded. “My grandfather was in a mental institution
for several years. We never even met him. My great grandparents concealed it
from my mother and her sister.”
“She does seem to be living in the past,” the doctor
said.
“That’s putting it mildly,” mumbled Bryce.
Sylvia hushed him. The doctor didn’t ask what Bryce
had meant. Bryce and Sylvia had already talked to Helen’s psychiatrist about
her ongoing delusions, the acting as though she were a queen, even once thinking
Bryce’s girlfriend was a maid and asking her to fetch her some wine.
The girlfriend, a well-known blonde fashion model, was
offended.
“The demented old bag thinks I’m the maid! I don’t
know why your mother doesn’t just put her in a home.”
“Mother will never do that,” Bryce said. “Don’t worry;
we don’t have to come back. She doesn’t know who I am either.”
Of course Bryce had come back with his mother. He’d been there every time she had explained his grandmother’s delusions to a new
psychiatrist. She always said the same thing.
“My mother’s maternal grandparents were wealthy, but
we aren’t royalty. My maternal grandfather was from a family of very modest
means, yet he always believed he was related to the Hamburg royal family line.”
Like his mother, Bryce knew his great-grandfather hadn’t been the first in his lineage to suffer from mental illness. It was a branch of their family tree they’d rather not
talk about.
The doctor left, and Sylvia went upstairs to say goodbye
to her mother. She came back down, that same sad look on her face.
“I don’t know why I keep hoping she’ll find her way
back,” she said as she and Bryce walked out the door.
Upstairs in her room, Helen sat at her desk for a
while, looking at old photographs of herself, Papa, Mama, and Charlotte. She
was tired.
Still, she opened a drawer and took out a sheet of
stationery, an envelope, and a fountain pen.
She wrote to the royal family to send her best regards
and to let them know that she held no animosity toward them for not
acknowledging her father’s relationship to them. She addressed the letter to
the palace. She knew they were long gone, but she wondered if another long lost
family member would someday read it.
She thought about Papa, and his father before him, and
all the generations of unrecognized royal descendants
that had resulted from one royal
family member. Perhaps a child was taken and later learned the truth. She imagined a small boy being stolen from his bed in
the dead of night, never to return. Or perhaps a secret love affair resulting in a child was what had led to men shouting in asylums throughout the years about having
royal blood in their veins.
Helen went to her closet, where she kept a stash
of bottles the maids and her nurses didn’t know about. Gin, scotch, bourbon, it didn’t
matter. She grabbed one and sat on the bed and took a few gulps.
She opened the bedroom door and looked out into the
hall. There was no sign of anyone. She walked out of her bedroom and went to
the staircase.
She stood at the balustrade and looked down on the
foyer, with all its marble glory, the huge, elegant round marble-topped table
in the center, the crystal vase upon it filled with white roses.
As she looked, she suddenly saw the two royal
thrones from the palace appear out of nowhere. Seated upon them dressed in royal robes and wearing their bejeweled crowns were the king and queen. Then Papa and Mama appeared, standing beside each other near the queen’s throne. Papa looked very regal in his gold-buttoned white jacket with gold epaulets and rows of medals. Mama was wearing an exquisite white gown with gold embroidery, a lustrous diamond tiara, and the ruby ring. Then Helen saw Charlotte, who was a child again, dressed in a
sparkling white gown, standing beside the king.
“Hers is the king’s throne?”
“Yes, little one. And you are both beautiful little
princesses.”
With tears in her eyes, Helen climbed up onto the wide
railing. She stood there, looking down at everyone. They all smiled at her, and
Papa raised his hand to beckon to her.
“Come, little one.”
Helen was a little girl again. She stepped off the
railing and floated down into the royal setting in the foyer. She landed on her
feet, which were now in shiny white slippers that matched the gown she was now
wearing. She ran to embrace Papa and Mama, and Papa lifted her up and he and Mama kissed her. He set her down, and then she and Charlotte gathered
up all the white roses from the floor and laid them in the queen's lap.
Just so you know, the characters and the estates in this story are products of my imagination. If there is any similarity to actual estates or to persons either living or deceased, that is purely coincidental.
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