Young and proud and flippant as I was, Leopold's talk filled me with hearty contempt for the "Coburger" long before we were introduced. And as to his ambassador, who was forever dancing attendance upon me, I hated him. Yet the Imperial "Fillons" kept up their clatter, and one fine morning Prince Ferdinand was announced.
He wasn't half bad looking, but struck me as too much of a mother's-boy. Princess Clementine seemed to decide everything for him. Anyhow, I wouldn't have him and he marched off again.
I next reviewed, as another Balkan matrimonial possibility, Prince Danilo of Montenegro, a small, thin person, looking like a Jew counter-jumper in holiday dress—Vienna "store-clothes."
Danilo spoke the worst table d'hôte French I ever heard in my life, and I told mother I would rather marry a rich banker than this crowned idiot. For once she agreed with me and said his father was only a "mutton-thief," anyhow.
Finally there was talk of King Alexander of Servia, six years younger than I. Queen Natalie, who a few days ago celebrated one of her several reunions with ex-King Milan, spoke feelingly of her "Sasha" to mother, lauding him as the best of sons and the most promising of sovereigns, but the oft-divorced Majesty was less communicative when mother asked how many millions she would pass over to Alexander on his marriage day. That settled "Sasha's" ambitions as far as my hand was concerned. Marry a Balkan King and the née Keshko holding the purse-strings! Not for my father's daughter! I didn't want to marry into a Russian Colonel's family, anyhow. I believe Queen Natalie's father was a colonel, or was he only a lieutenant-colonel?
These marriage negotiations aside, Anna and myself had a mighty good time in Vienna (I forgot to say that Emperor Francis Joseph agreed with me that Danilo and Alexander were quite impossible and that henceforth Balkan marriages should be taboo).
"I have ordered a dozen young officers to report for tonight's dancing," said my Imperial uncle one evening. "Select from among them your tennis partners, girls." Baron Cambroy of the Guards was my choice, and a mighty handsome fellow he is. He seemed pleased when I commanded him to tennis duty every afternoon during our stay. He is tall and spare in appearance and I might have fallen in love with him sooner, but for his dark skin. I am an Italian and, by way of contrast, prefer blondes to any other sort of man.
Anna, myself and our ladies bicycled to the tennis court every afternoon, and on our way back to the castle were escorted by the Baron and the other officers.
Trust a girl with a dress reaching an inch below her knees to find out scandals! On the second day after our meeting with the Baron, Anna told me that he was the lover of Draga Maschin, lady-in-waiting to Queen Natalie of Servia.[4]
Draga was in attendance upon Queen Natalie when she called on us, a beautiful girl, somewhat too full-bosomed for an unmarried one, like my great-aunt, Catharine, who became the wife of that upstart, Jerome Napoleon. At home we have her picture, and mother, who was rather skinny as a girl, never failed to point out that it was painted before Queen Catharine's marriage, despite her voluptuous bust.