I protest [wrote Bute to the King] I could scarcely believe my eyes when I read your letter. It is possible that you cannot see the difference between men setting up to be leaders of a party for seditious or ambitious purposes and me. I shall never be in politics in any way, and I should not ask any man to follow me since I have lost your royal favour. But I must insist that I am everlastingly devoted to Your Majesty. And I end by entreating my dear Prince to forgive me for troubling him with so tedious a letter. But I trust and pray Your Majesty will believe that I am more devoted to you than any man in this country ever was before.
Having sealed the letter and sent a messenger off with it, Lord Bute sat down heavily in his chair and leaned his elbows on his table. His mind went back to days long ago, when that other Prince of Wales, George's father, had been alive, and one rainy day at the races he had been brought into the royal tent to play whist while they waited for the rain to stop. That had been the beginning; then he had been ‘persona grata’ with the family; even the Prince of Wales had been fond of him; and when he had died it was true Bute had seen possibilities of ingratiating himself with the simple young boy who was destined to be king when his ageing grandfather died. Then of course the boy's mother, the Dowager Princess of Wales, had fallen in love with him.
What a happy situation for a Scottish peer, debarred in so many ways from promotion simply because he was Scottish and not English, to find such favour in high places! And it had continued for so many years; there was a cosy domesticity about his relationship with the Princess, who was as devoted perhaps even more so to him as he was to her; and George had treated him as a father.
And now... it had all changed.
He must report at once to the Princess for she might throw some light on the matter. As he rode through the streets he sat well back in his carriage. The people were slightly less hostile now, but they still talked of the jackboot and petticoat and could become offensive. If they made a riot, as they were constantly threatening to do, and it reached the King's ears, he would be more against him than ever. He might even forbid him to see the Princess Dowager. Oh, no, she would never allow that; and she still had some influence with the King. The Princess received him as warmly as ever.
"Why are you disturbed?" she said. "Please tell me what is wrong. Come and sit here, beside me, my dear. I do not like to see you look so worried.”
The Princess's servants had all discreetly disappeared as they had been doing for years on the arrival of her lover; and they could be sure of privacy.
"A most disturbing letter from the King. He does not wish to see me any more.”
"Oh, no.”
"It is true. Here it is.”
The Princess read it and made clucking noises. "George is a fool!" she said "He was always and always will be. He has no idea how to be a King.”
"He is developing those ideas," retorted Bute.
"He now believes he knows how to be a certain kind of king and, by God, he is going to be that kind of king. He has grown very stubborn. He makes up his mind and once it has been made up nothing on earth will shift him. And ... he has turned against me.”
"Something happened to George during that illness of his," mused the Princess.
"He has grown very odd. That abrupt way of speaking ... It's almost irascible. He was never like that before. He was rather slow and even stuttered now and then. The illness has changed his personality, I fear. But perhaps he will change again and become more like his old self.”
Bute shook his head. "I do not think he will. He seems to have taken a great dislike to me and when I think of the affection he once had for me ...”
"My dear, he is ungrateful; but we have each other.”
"I was afraid that he might attempt to stop my visiting you.”
"That is something I would never allow.”
Bute smiled and turning to her embraced her warmly. But he was thinking, a great deal of the excitement had gone out of the relationship. Now they were almost like a staid old married couple.
When he left the Princess Dowager, Lord Bute called on Miss Vansittart, a young lady of good family who had been extremely pretty and still was, although she was no longer young. But she was still much younger than Lord Bute, who was over fifty.
She received him with pleasure and without surprise for in fact he had been calling on her for some time, finding her company a change after that of the Princess Dowager. Miss Vansittart was humble and admired him whole-heartedly. She made no demands and that was very pleasant. First they had talked and then it seemed so natural that they should become lovers in a quiet rather desultory way, which suited her nature and Lord Bute's declining years.
He told her that the King had turned against him and she was incredulous that the King could be so lacking in gratitude. She soothed him and he told her that the Princess Dowager was as devoted to him as ever and that theirs was too strong a relationship for the King to stop it, although he might try. Who but I trust the Princess. She would never wish to part from me.
Miss Vansittart plainly adored him and he told her that he would speak to the Princess, and when there was a vacancy in her household it should go to Miss Vansittart.
Miss Vansittart shivered with delight at the prospect of serving the woman who for so many years had been a wife in all but name, to the wonderful Lord Bute; and he soothed the hurt the King had done him by basking in her admiration and explaining to her all the perquisites which fell into the laps of those who served in royal households. She would learn, for he would teach her, how to come by these rewards. When he left her he felt better, but when he returned to his house his wife, that most accommodating of women, demanded to know if he had been visiting Miss Vansittart.
He admitted this was so, for since she had never complained of his relationship with the Princess Dowager why should she with Miss Vansittart? But it seemed this was different.
"This will have to stop," she told him. "This woman is no Princess Dowager. This is quite a different matter.”
"I believe you are jealous," replied his lordship.
"Of course I'm jealous.”
"Of this poor young woman?”
"Exactly. What has this poor young woman to offer but herself? With the Princess Dowager it was different.”
"What a sordid view," he commented with distaste. But his wife laughed at him and said that she was not prepared to have to listen to gossip about her husband and Miss Vansittart.
Lord Bute felt melancholy. Life had ceased to smile on him.
Four days after William Pitt had received the King's letter he was asking for an audience with His Majesty.
"Bring him in, bring him in," cried George. "Don't you know I wouldn't wish Mr. Pitt to be kept waiting, eh, eh?”
So Mr. Pitt came hobbling in and the King looked at him with emotion. The greatest mistake he had ever made, thought George, was to allow Bute to persuade him to banish Mr. Pitt. But Mr.
Pitt bore no grudges. The King asked after his family and gave news of his own.
"Young George is growing more bumptious every day. Frederick is imitating his brother; and I doubt not young William will be the same. As you know, the Queen is expecting another in September, ha! Well, well, we shall soon have a quiverful, eh? What?”
Mr. Pitt, elegant in spite of his afflictions, gracious and ceremonious, made a little speech about the blessings of family life and added that the royal family set an example to all the families in the land.