Forever Amber

by Kathleen Winsor

  Buckingham stood up, his own hat under his arm. "On a day hot as this? I marvel at your Majesty's industry."

  Charles smiled. "It's my daily physic. I need my health so that I may keep up with my amusements."

  The two men went out the door, Charles closed and locked it behind him and dropped the key into his coat-pocket. They crossed through several more rooms, mounted a narrow flight of stairs, and came at last into the great Stone Gallery. There, coming toward them with her woman beside her and a little blackamoor to carry her train, was Frances Stewart. She waved to attract their attention and as they paused to wait for her, she hastened her steps.

  Buckingham bowed, Charles smiled, and as she reached them he gave her a light careless friendly salute on the lips. But as Frances looked up at him her eyes were pathetic and anxious; she could never for an instant forget the terrible fact that her beauty was gone. All her manner had. changed, as if to compensate for the thing she had lost. Now she was eager, nervously vivacious, wistful.

  "Oh, your Majesty! I'm so glad we chanced to meet! It's been a week and more since I've seen you—"

  "I'm sorry. I've had a great deal to do—council-meetings and ambassadors—"

  She had heard him make similar excuses, many times before, to other women. Then she had teased him for lying and laughed about it, because in those days she had laughed joyously at everything.

  "I wish you'd come to supper. Can't you come tonight? I've invited ever so many others—" she added quickly.

  "Thank you very much, Frances, but I'm engaged for tonight, and have been for so long I dare not break it." Her disappointment was painful to see, and because it made him uncomfortable he added: "But I'll be free tomorrow night. I can come then if you like."

  "Oh, can you, sir!" Instantly her face brightened. "I'll order everything you like best to eat—and I'll bespeak Moll Davis to give us a performance!" She turned to Buckingham. "I'd like to have you come too, your Grace—with my Lady Shrewsbury, of course."

  "Thank you, madame. If I can, I'll be there."

  Frances curtsied, the men bowed, and then continued on their way down the corridor. For several moments Charles was silent. "Poor Frances," he said at last. "It makes my heart sick to see her."

  "She's considerably impaired," admitted the Duke. "But at least it stopped her infernal giggling. I haven't heard her giggle once these two months past." Then, very casually, he said: "Oh, yes—Lauderdale was telling me about her Majesty's escapade last night."

  Charles laughed. "I think everyone has heard of it by now. I didn't guess she had so much mettle."

  Catherine had put on a disguise and left the Palace with Mrs. Boynton to attend a betrothal party in the City—to which, of course, neither had been invited. Masked and wigged they had gone in boldly, mingled with the other guests, but had become separated in the crowd so that the Queen had been forced to return home alone in a hackney. It was the kind of prank the ladies and gentlemen were always playing—but Catherine had never dared go on such an adventure before and the Palace buzzed with shock and amusement to learn their mousey little Queen had finally braved the great forbidding world outside her castle-walls.

  "They said she was trembling all over when she first came in," continued Charles. "But after a few minutes she began to laugh and told it all as a good frolic. The chair-men who carried her there were devilish rude fellows, she said, and the hackney-driver so drunk she expected he would tumble her into the streets!" He seemed highly amused. "All the citizens were grumbling I'd led the country straight to hell! She makes a good intelligence-agent, don't you agree? I've a notion to send her out often."

  Buckingham's face had a look of sour reproval. "It was mighty indecorous. And worse yet—mighty dangerous."

  Now they emerged into the hot July sunshine and had to squint their eyes till they had accustomed themselves to the glare. They started off across the Privy Gardens toward the Tennis Court, passing several men and women who were strolling there or standing talking, and the King greeted many of them with a smile or a wave of the hand. Sometimes he paused to talk for a moment or called out a friendly greeting. Buckingham did not like these interruptions.

  "Oh, I don't imagine she was in any great danger," said Charles. "Anyway, she's safely back now."

  "But another time, Sire, she might not return safely."

  Charles gave a burst of laughter. "Sure, now, George—you don't think anyone considers me rich enough to make it worth their while to kidnap my wife?"

  "It wasn't ransom I had in mind. Has it never occurred to you, Sire, that her Majesty might be kidnapped and sent to a desert island and never heard from again?"

  "I must confess, I haven't worried a great deal at the prospect." Charles waved his arm at a couple of pretty women sitting several yards away on the lawn, and they laughed and nudged each other, fluttering their fans at him in return.

  "There are many such islands," continued Buckingham, ignoring the interruption, "located in the West Indies. There is no reason why one of them could not be supplied with every possible comfort. A woman might live out the rest of her days at ease in such a place."

  A quick scowl crossed Charles's face and he looked sharply at the Duke. "Do I misunderstand you, Villiers, or are you suggesting that I get rid of my wife by having her kidnapped?"

  "The idea is by no means impracticable, your Majesty. I had given it considerable thought, in fact—even to the point of locating a suitable island on the map—long before her Majesty took to this indiscreet new pastime of masquerading."

  Charles made a sound of disgust. "You're a scoundrel, George Villiers! I don't deny that I desperately need an heir— but I'll never get one by any such means as that! And let me tell you one thing more: If her Majesty is ever harmed or molested—if she ever disappears—I'll know where to lay the blame. And you won't wear a head so long as an hour! Good-day!"

  He gave Buckingham a brief dark look of anger and then walked swiftly away from him into the building which housed the tennis-courts. The Duke turned on his heel and went off in the other direction, muttering beneath his breath.

  But that had by no means been the first, nor was it to be the last, of the schemes presented to Charles for getting Catherine out of the way so that he could marry again and produce a legitimate heir. Half the men at Court were busy plotting schemes, giving them to the King, then starting out to plot another as each in turn was rejected. The only persons of any influence who did not want Catherine to be replaced were York, Anne Hyde, their few adherents—and the King's mistresses.

  Annoyed with the King, Buckingham avoided Whitehall for several days and spent his time with the rich City men he knew. But he soon grew bored with that too. He had nothing but contempt for these fat credulous men who believed whatever he told them, and because it was almost second nature to him he began to hatch another plot.

  For the past few years the Duke had been hiring several different lodgings scattered about in various parts of the town, and he went to one or another as the mood took him. It was for greater convenience and secrecy in his political machinations, that he kept a trunkful of disguises and rented a dozen different apartments.

  In Idle Lane, just off Thames Street and hard by the Tower, a lodging-house had been left standing after the Fire had swept through. It now had for company three others, still in the process of building, another completed the year before and rented out to an ale-house keeper to entertain the workmen, and one other which had collapsed when half built because of bad mortar and bricks. (This was a common occurrence all over the City where new houses were going up.) The busy Thames ran nearby, close enough that the shouts of the bargemen and the girls hawking oysters in the street could be heard. Buckingham had rented three rooms on the fourth floor, using one of the fictitious names which it amused him to invent; this time he was Er Illingworth.

  The Duke, wearing a Turkish dressing-gown and turban, a pair of slippers with turned-up toes, lay stretched out sound asleep on the long strai
ght-backed settle near the fireplace where sea-coals had burnt down to a glowing red. There was no air in the room and very little light, for it was after dark and he had been asleep since mid-day.

  A knock sounded at the door and then was repeated as Buckingham's snore continued to rattle through the room. At the fourth knock he sat up with a start, his face flushed and swollen with sleep, gave his head a shake and got up. But he did not throw back the bolt before he had asked who it was.

  A fat short red-faced priest stood in the doorway, dressed in robe and sandals, a cowl over his tonsured head, a prayer-book in his hands.

  "Good evening to you, Father Scroope."

  "Good evening, sir." The priest was out of breath from hurrying up the stairs. "I came with all haste—but I was at her Majesty's evening devotions when I got the message." His eyes looked over the Duke's shoulder and into the half-lighted bedroom beyond. "Where is the patient? There is no time to be lost—"

  Behind him Buckingham closed the door, quietly turned the key in the lock and slipped it into the pocket of his dressing-gown. "There is no one sick here, Father Scroope."

  The priest turned and looked at him in surprise. "No one sick? But I was told—the messenger told me that a man was dying—"

  He sat down in a high-backed chair while the Duke poured two glassfuls of canary wine, handed one to his guest, and then pulled up another chair so that they sat face to face.

  "I wanted you to come as quickly as possible—so I sent a message that there was sickness. Don't you know me now, Father?"

  Father Scroope, who had already drunk down his wine and was holding the glass in his pudgy pink hands, peered closely at Buckingham, and slow recognition came to his face.

  "Why—your Grace!"

  "None other."

  "Forgive me, sir! I vow you're so altered by your undress I didn't recognize you—and the light, of course, is dim—" he added apologetically.

  Buckingham smiled, reached for the wine-bottle and filled both their glasses again. "You say you've just come from her Majesty's devotions?"

  "Yes, your Grace. Her Majesty has learnt a great many new habits, but never to retire without evening prayers for which God be thanked," he added, with a pious roll of his eyes.

  "You hear her Majesty's confessions, as well, if I'm not mistaken?"

  "Sometimes, yes, your Grace."

  Buckingham laughed shortly. "Much she can have to confess, I imagine! What could her sins be—coveting a new gown or gambling on Sunday? Or perhaps wishing that his Majesty's child was in her own belly and not in some other woman's?"

  "Ah, well, my lord—poor lady. That's but a venial sin. And I fear we all of us commit it with her." Father Scroope drained his glass again, and again the Duke filled it.

  "But wishing won't cure the matter. The fact remains she's barren—and always will be."

  "She's been with child, I'm convinced. But there's somewhat amiss keeps her from carrying to term."

  "And always will. His Majesty will never have a legitimate heir by Catherine of Braganza. And if the throne goes to York the country's ruined." Father Scroope widened his popped blue eyes at this, for York's Catholic sympathies were notorious, and Buckingham was well known for his hatred of the Church. But the Duke said quickly, "Not because of his religion, Father. The case is more serious far than that. His Highness has not the means to govern the country. It would fall into civil war again within six months if he came to the throne." The Duke's face was passionately serious. He leaned forward, the hand holding his wine-glass clutched on his knee, pointing with the forefinger of the other at Father Scroope's bewildered round face. "It's your duty, Father, as you love England and the Stuarts, to lend me aid in what I propose—and I may as well tell you frankly that his Majesty is behind me in this but prefers, for obvious reasons, to remain out of it altogether."

  "You've mistaken your man, your Grace! I can't take action against her Majesty—no matter who's behind it!" Father Scroope was scared; even his plump cheeks quivered. He began to get out of his seat but Buckingham, with a gentle but persuasive hand, pressed him back again.

  "Not so hasty, Father, I pray you! Hear me out first. And remember this—you owe your first allegiance to your King!" As he spoke Buckingham looked like all the magnificent selfless patriots of history, and Father Scroope, thoroughly impressed, sat down again. "We do not intend to harm her Majesty in any way at all—make yourself easy on that score. But for the sake of England, the King, my master, and I have devised a plan for getting him another wife. This he can do and have an heir for England in a year's time if her Majesty will agree to return to the fife she once lived and enjoyed—the life of the cloister."

  "I don't think I quite understand your Grace's meaning—"

  "Very well, then, this is it: You're her confessor. You talk to her in private. If you can persuade her to make a voluntary retirement from the world, go back to Portugal and enter a nunnery, his Majesty will be free to marry again. And if you succeed," continued Buckingham hastily, as Father Scroope opened his mouth again to speak, "his Majesty will endow you with a fortune great enough to support you in any style whatever throughout the rest of your life. And to begin—" Buckingham got up and once more he went to take a leather bag from the mantelpiece and handed it to Father Scroope. "You'll find a thousand pound in there—and that's only a beginning." Father Scroope took it, feeling the weight of the money, but politely restrained himself from opening it. "Well, Father—what's your answer?"

  For a long moment the priest hesitated, thoughtful, worried, unable to make up his mind. "His Majesty wants this done?" he repeated, dubiously.

  "He does. Sure, now, Father, you don't think I'd dare act in so important a matter without his Majesty's instructions?"

  "Certainly not, your Grace." Father Scroope got to his feet, placing the wine-glass on a nearby table-top. "Well—I'll try what influence I can have, your Grace." He frowned, shot a quick glance across at the Duke. "But suppose I fail? These gentle little women are sometimes stubborn."

  Buckingham smiled. "You won't fail, Father Scroope. I'm sure you won't. For if you do you'll get no more money—and you'll give all of that back. And needless to say, if this conversation is ever repeated it will go hard with you." The relentless glitter in his eyes suggested more than he said.

  "Oh, I'm altogether discreet, your Grace!" protested Father Scroope. "You may trust me!"

  "Good! Well—go along now. And when you have information send it to me by some random boy you find on the street Write in it that my new cloth-of-silver suit is finished and sign it—Let me see—" The Duke paused, stroking his mustache. Finally he smiled. "Sign it Israel Whoremaster."

  "Israel! Whoremaster! Your Grace has a nimble wit!"

  "Come now, you old villain," said the Duke, strolling beside him toward the door. "Don't try to wheedle me. I've heard tales aplenty about you and your girls."

  But Father Scroope did not think the jest funny. He looked both angry and worried. "I protest, your Grace! They're all lies! Damned lies! I'd be ruined if such a tale gained general credit. Her Majesty wouldn't retain me an hour's time!"

  "Very well, then," drawled the Duke, bored. "Keep your virginity if you like. Only don't miscarry in this business. I'll expect word from you within the week."

  "A little longer, your Grace—"

  "Ten days, then."

  He closed the door on Father Scroope and slammed the bolt.

  Amber stood listening to Father Scroope.

  At the price of fifteen hundred pounds he had just sold her Buckingham's plot against the Queen. For, whether his Majesty was in it or wasn't, he had no intention of talking himself out of a comfortable place at Court—if the Queen went into a nunnery he would be left drifting and unprotected in an England hostile to the Catholics. Charles, it was true, had tried repeatedly to gain toleration for all religions, but Parliament hated that policy and Parliament could force obedience by refusing to grant money.

  "Good Lord!" she whisper
ed in horror. "The devil's going to be the ruin of us all! Have you talked to her?"

  Father Scroope closed his fat lips smugly, crossed his hands on his stomach and slowly shook his head. "Not one word, your Ladyship. Not so much as one word. And I was alone with her Majesty in the confessional booth today, too."

  "And you'd better not speak one word, either! You know what would happen to you if her Majesty left! Oh, damn that varlet! I wish someone would slit his throat!"

  "Will you tell her Majesty?"

  "Tell her? Of course I'll tell her! Maybe he's paid someone else to talk to her already!"

  "I don't think so, madame. Though I doubt not he will if he finds he's failed with me."

  At that moment Nan entered softly and beckoned to Amber. Amber started out. "Come on," she said to him. "The way's clear. You can go now."

  They left the room and went into a very narrow dark corridor. The two women knew their way but Father Scroope had to feel with his hands along the wall until they came to a door. There Amber and the Father waited back out of sight while Nan opened the door, peeked, and then motioned for them to follow her. Outside they could hear the quiet washing of the river as it came up into the reeds and rushes which grew along the banks. Amber had the same trouble everyone else did who lived on the side of the Palace next to the water; the lower floor of her apartments was sometimes invaded by the overflowing Thames.

  But Father Scroope had scarcely set one foot out the door when there was a sudden splashing and—so close that it seemed to be almost upon them—the sound of heavy breathing and struggling and men's voices in low muttered curses. Quick as a jackrabbit, the Father jumped back inside and Amber froze where she was, reaching out to grab hold of Nan's hand.

  "What was that!"

  "John must have caught someone snooping," whispered Nan. She spoke a little louder, just enough to be heard a few feet away. "John—"

  He answered, his voice also low and cautious. "I'm here— Caught a fellow hiding in the reeds. He's alone—"

  "Go on," whispered Amber to Father Scroope, and he streaked out the door and disappeared; they could hear the loud sucking noises of his feet as he hurried away through the mud. "Bring him in here," she said to Big John, and went back herself into the small room out of which she and Father Scroope had just come.