Opposition, however, was futile; the following evening the boy-Prince was in his father's arms, and the weeping mother was left disconsolate. Thus robbed of her darling "Sacha," it was not long before the second blow fell. The divorce proceedings were rushed through the Synod. A deaf ear was turned to Natalie's petition to be allowed, at least, to defend herself in person; and on the 12th October, 1888, the "marriage between King Milan I. and Natalie, born Ketschko," was formally dissolved. Well might this most unhappy of Queens write, "The position is embittered by my conscience assuring me that I have neglected no duty, and that there is not a single action of my life which could be cited against me as a grave offence, or could put me to shame were it brought before the whole world. My fate should draw tears from the very stones; but I do not ask for pity; I demand justice."
If anything could have increased Milan's unpopularity it was this brutal treatment of his Queen. The very men who, at his coronation, had taken off their cloaks that he might walk on them, and the women who had kissed his garments, now hissed him in the streets of his capital. In his own Court he had no friend except the infamous Christitch; the general hatred even took the form of repeated attempts on his life. If he would save it, he realised he must abandon his crown; and one March morning in 1889, after informing his ministers of his intention to abdicate, he awoke his twelve-year-old son with the greeting, "Good morning, Your Majesty!" Milan was no longer King of Servia; his son, Alexander, reigned in his stead.
Probably no King ever laid down his crown more willingly. He had put aside for ever his Royal trappings, with all their unhappy memories, and their present discomforts and danger; but in distant Paris he knew a life of new pleasure awaited him, remote from the wranglings of Courts and the assassin's knife. And within a week of greeting his successor as King, he was gaily riding in the Bois, attending the theatres, supping hilariously with ladies of the ballet, or dining with his friends at Verrey's "where his somewhat rough manner and coarse jokes (the legacy of his swineherd ancestry) caused him sometimes to be mistaken for a parvenu," until a waiter would correct the impression by a whispered, "That gentleman with the dark moustache is Milan, ex-King of Servia."
While her husband was thus drinking the cup of Paris pleasure, his wife was still doomed to exile from her kingdom and her son, with permission only to pay two brief visits each year. But Natalie, who had so long defied a King, was not the woman to be daunted by mere Regents. She would return to Belgrade, and at least make her home where she could catch an occasional glimpse of her boy. And to Belgrade she went, to make her entry over flower-strewn streets, and through a tornado of cheers and shouts of "Zivela Rufe!" It was a truly Royal welcome to the great warm heart of the Servian people; but no official of the Court was there to greet her coming, and as she drove past the castle which held all she counted dear in life, not even the flutter of a handkerchief marked the passing of Servia's former Queen.
Had she but played her cards now with the least discretion, she might have been allowed to remain in Belgrade in peace. But Natalie seems fated to have been the harbinger of storm. For a time, it is true, she was content to lie perdue, entertaining her friends at her house in Prince Michael Street, driving through the streets of her capital behind her pair of white ponies, or walking with her pet goat for companion, greeted everywhere with respect and affection. But her restless, vengeful spirit, still burning from the indignities she had suffered, would not allow her to remain long in the background. She threw herself into political agitation, and thus brought herself into open conflict with the Regents; she inaugurated a campaign of abuse against her husband, whom she still pursued with a relentless hatred; and generally made herself so objectionable to the authorities that the Skupshtina was at last compelled to order her banishment.
When the deputies presented themselves before her with the decree of expulsion, she laughed in their very faces, declaring that she would only submit to force. "I refuse to go," she said defiantly, "unless I am expelled by the hands of the police." A few hours later she was forcibly removed from her weeping and protesting ladies, hurried into a carriage, and driven off, with a strong escort of soldiers, on her journey to exile.
But the good people of Belgrade, who had got wind of the proposed abduction, were by no means disposed to look on while their beloved Queen was thus brutally taken from them. When the cortège reached the Cathedral Square, it was stopped by a formidable and menacing mob; the escort, furiously assailed with sticks and showers of stones, was beaten off; the horses were taken from the carriage, and the Queen was drawn back in triumph by scores of willing hands, to her residence.
Natalie's victory, however, was short-lived. At midnight, when her stalwart champions were sleeping in their beds, the police, crawling over the roofs of the houses in Prince Michael Street, and descending into the Queen's courtyard, found it a very simple matter to complete their dastardly work. The Queen was again bundled unceremoniously into a carriage, and before Belgrade was well awake, she was far on her way to her new exile in Hungary. A few days later a formal decree of banishment was pronounced against her, forbidding her, under any pretext whatever, to enter Servia again without the Regent's permission.
Only once more did Natalie and Milan set eyes on each other—when the ex-King presented himself at Biarritz, to bring her news of their son's projected coup d'état, by which he designed to depose the Regents and to take the reins of government into his own hands. Taken by surprise, the Queen received Milan, but when she saw him standing before her, an aged, broken man, her composure gave way. She could not speak; she trembled like a leaf.
With Alexander's dramatic accession to his full Kingship a new, if brief, era of happiness opened to Natalie. The Regents were no longer able to exclude her from Servia, and by her son's invitation she returned to Belgrade to resume her old position of Queen.