Courting Her Highness

by Jean Plaidy

  When Sarah read this letter she took it to her private sitting room and wept over it.

  Then she took it to John and sitting by his chair told him what it contained. He understood and nodded his head.

  “It will be good for you, Sarah,” he said in his slow and painful way.

  And she wept afresh—quiet tears unlike those she usually shed.

  “I shall write at once to Sunderland,” she said. “We will have the children here as soon as it can be arranged. There is Elizabeth’s girl, too. Perhaps I should bring her here. As my poor darling Anne has said: It is not good for children to be left to the care of servants.”

  John understood. He seemed happier than he had for a long time.

  This was Sarah’s new life—far from Court intrigues; a sick husband to nurse; a houseful of grandchildren to care for.

  AT LANGLEY MARSH

  n the Manor of Langley Marsh Lady Masham had become the gracious chatelaine. Samuel was an ideal lord of the manor; gentle, kindly, he quickly became popular with his tenants, who knew in the neighbourhood that they must not be deceived by the quiet manner of Lady Masham; she it was who ruled the household.

  She entertained frequently, yet she appeared to enjoy the simpler pursuits of the country. Her still room occupied some part of her time, and there was also the governing of the servants, the planning of dinner parties and of course, the bringing up of her children. When her son George died she was stricken with grief but she still had her Samuel, named after his father, and there was another son Francis to replace the one she had lost. She had her daughter Anne and looked forward to having more children.

  She was avidly interested in the news from Court but she saw it all from a long distance and with each passing month her nostalgia grew less, and there were days when she never thought for a moment of the intimacies of the green closet; she sometimes poured the bohea tea without hearing the echo of a beautiful voice murmuring: “Dear Hill … or dear Masham … you always make it just as I like it.”

  Those days were over but they had led to the present, and she must never allow the glory of Court power to obscure the degrading beginning. Abigail, Lady Masham, had come a long way from poverty and indignity and she was not the sort to forget it.

  Samuel understood, perhaps more than she had believed he could; he was gentle and unobtrusive.

  There came a time when she was restless; this was when she heard that Robert Harley, Lord Oxford was to be impeached for high treason and other crimes and misdemeanours.

  Unlike Bolingbroke he had not fled the country. He had stood firm and she was glad that he had. Yet she hoped that he would not be found guilty. What had he done?

  She waited for news with trepidation. Samuel knew it. He was watchful of her during that time—watchful and full of tact.

  “They cannot call him a criminal for pursuing a policy of which they don’t approve,” pointed out Samuel.

  “They will have other charges to bring,” answered Abigail.

  And so they had. They accused him of helping the Pretender to which he replied that everything he had done had been sanctioned by the Queen.

  But with the fears of rebellion and so much political activity, the Harley affair seemed unimportant. It was shelved and he was left a prisoner in the Tower for two years.

  Often Abigail in her comfortable bed would think of him in his prison in the Tower. Then she became pregnant again and his image grew faint.

  “You need not think,” Samuel told her, “that you could be involved in his affairs.”

  “I am not afraid,” she answered.

  And strangely enough she believed Samuel understood that her preoccupation with Harley’s affairs was not due to a fear of being accused with him. It was some subtle connection, some vague relationship between them which she was striving to forget.

  THE END OF THE FAVOURITES

  arah was making a busy life. The houses at St. Albans and Windsor as well as Marlborough House in London were always full of young people, and she was already planning grand marriages for her grandchildren. John’s health was a continual anxiety, for shortly after the first stroke he had another which was even more severe than the first, and yet Sarah nursed him through it. He found it difficult now to speak but he still clung to life. He must, Sarah told him, for what would she do without him?

  He would sit in his chair and listen to the talk of his grandchildren whom he loved as devotedly as they did him. Sarah never had their affection. They were afraid of her. The only one to whom she showed real tenderness was Anne’s youngest Diana, whom she called Lady Dye. Lady Dye was her favourite and reminded Sarah frequently of her mother; moreover, the child had her mother’s temperament which made it so much easier for them to get on together. This was particularly noticeable because Lady Dye’s elder sister, Anne, had a touch of Sarah’s temper. This was certain to make for trouble and it was not possible to have such a temper duplicated in one household, so Lady Anne Spencer was sent away when her father married again.

  This was another source of fury to Sarah. Only a year and a half after the death of her beloved Anne, Sunderland took another wife! He had left his Irish post and become Secretary of State which was all the more reason, Sarah believed, why he should have consulted her. She quarrelled violently with him over his marriage—to a nonentity, she declared. She could not bear it when any of the family escaped from her orbit; and she considered even son-in-laws, of whom she was not particularly fond, as part of her family.

  In addition to these family troubles, she was involved in a series of quarrels with Sir John Vanbrugh over the building of Blenheim. She was a fury, said Vanbrugh, and an impossible woman. No one could hope to work with her or for her and enjoy any harmony. She was suing the Earl of Cadogan, who had been a great friend of John’s and his comrade-in-arms through many campaigns, for misappropriation of funds which John had entrusted to him; Vanbrugh had written to her that he could no longer continue to work on Blenheim for her accusations were far-fetched, mistaken and her inferences wrong. He would give up, he wrote, unless the Duke recovered in health sufficiently to shield him from her intolerable treatment.

  Blenheim was not yet completed although vast sums had been spent on it; it was going to cost £300,000 pounds before it was finished and although the country supplied four fifths of this sum the remaining fifth had to come from the Marlboroughs. This gave Sarah the firm belief that she had every right to dictate what should and what should not be done.

  So quarrelling with Vanbrugh, Cadogan, Sunderland and her grandchildren Sarah found her days lively. John had no idea of all the strife which was going on about them; as for Sarah, she constantly assured him that all was well; she would not have him disturbed in any way and on the occasions when he suffered relapses she remained in the sick room day and night.

  Nor did she neglect her grandchildren. They were now growing up and much entertainment took place at her various houses. It was amusing to act plays—for the Duke loved to watch his grandchildren performing, and they played for his benefit All for Love and Tamerlane.

  Even so she must expurgate the plays before she allowed the children to perform them.

  “I will allow no bawdy words to be spoken in my house,” she warned them. “And I shall have no unseemly fondling and embracing in my house even though you tell me it comes in the play.”

  So they argued together and often the sound of high words would come to the Duke’s ears as he sat in his chair. There must be these quarrels wherever Sarah was, and he had to accept this. It was part of her nature. And he would rather hear her voice raised in anger than not hear it at all.

  She was alternately triumphant because of some conquest over an enemy or wildly vituperative. She would not have a friend left in the world, he feared, when he was dead. She quarrelled incessantly; her two daughters were on bad terms with her; this upset her but she could not curb her violent tongue—and nor could they; moreover they were not of an age now to fear her. She had her
favourites among her grandchildren but there was trouble with them too—and there would be more as they grew up.

  She was as fond of money as he was. He wondered if he had taught her that. They were rich and growing richer. When the South Sea Bubble exploded Sarah was one of the few who sold out in time. While others lamented that ruin had come upon them Sarah was boasting that out of her adventure in speculation she had made £100,000. Yes, they were rich now, but that could not make Sarah happy.

  She lived in constant anxiety for John and although her assiduous care for him was such a comfort to him, even he, who loved her devotedly, was made uncomfortable by her. If she disagreed with doctors she would threaten to pull off their wigs and drive them from the apartment. They were incompetent ninnies, she told them, when she fancied that John did not respond to their medicines.

  Her daughter Henrietta, Lady Godolphin, and Mary, Duchess of Montague—neither of them having the sweet tempers of Elizabeth and Anne—decided that they would no longer allow her to bully them and made a point of visiting their father when Sarah was not at home.

  John reasoned with them; their mother would be hurt, he pointed out.

  “Dearest father,” replied Henrietta, “it is no use. We are not children any longer and we will not be treated as such.”

  “Your mother has nothing but your good at heart.”

  Mary kissed him. “You are the sweetest man on earth and where she is concerned the blindest. She makes it so unpleasant for us that frankly we have no wish to be with her.”

  But seeing how such remarks distressed him they allowed him to tell them how good their mother was, while they promised that they would try to understand her.

  But even for his sake they could not tolerate her interference in their lives and whenever they were with her flew into rages almost as violent as hers.

  The Duke was aware of the atmosphere of his home and thought how characteristic of his life it had become. He had married the woman he loved and his love for her had been like a thread of gold running through the dark web of his life; she was with him now at the end which he knew could not be far off and her devotion and care for him was all he could have asked; and yet there must be this continual strife in his home—and not only in his home but in all his affairs. The building of Blenheim, the dismissal of Vanbrugh, the trouble with Cadogan … the quarrels with Sunderland.… But these belonged to Sarah and wherever she was there would be tempest.

  As he sat in his chair he would hear the sound of family quarrels. Sarah’s shrill voice arguing with her daughters or expressing her contempt for her grandchildren. Lady Dye seemed the only one who was not at some time or other in the cloud of Sarah’s displeasure.

  As the spring of the year 1772 passed into summer John felt himself growing weaker and tried to keep this from Sarah. His tenderness for her was as great as it had been in the days of their courtship and his greatest concern now that he knew death to be near was for her future. He knew that he had held her back from even greater recklessness; he admired her; she was in his eyes brilliant, but he could not be blind to the fact that she made trouble for herself and everyone around her.

  Without him to restrain her what would become of her? Her daughters could help her—if they would. But she would never accept help from them; nor did they love her sufficiently to give it.

  Whenever they came to see him he would turn the conversation to their mother; he tried hard to make them see her virtues.

  “You have the best mother in the world,” he told them.

  Mary, the franker of the two, replied that they had the best of fathers and that was all they could expect.

  Their love for him pleased him but he would have transferred that devotion to Sarah if he could have done so.

  He sighed. His daughters were as strong-willed as their mother—or almost; and he knew that he was too tired and sick to attempt to bring peace between them.

  He would lie in his chair listening to Sarah discussing his case with Sir Samuel Garth, a doctor whom she respected, or sneering at Dr. Mead, whose methods she described as useless; he knew that there was trouble about a rumour concerning Sarah’s support of the Pretender; she would always have her enemies. It was very troubling and, most of all, the knowledge that he could do nothing about it.

  It was June and from his window in Windsor Lodge he could see the green of the forest and hear the bird song. Everything fresh and renewed, and he so old and tired! He was seventy-two. A good age for a man who had lived such a life as his; and something told him that the end was very close.

  Sarah found him lying on his bed and she knew the worst.

  “John, my dearest love,” she whispered.

  And he looked at her unable to speak but the devotion of a lifetime was in his eyes.

  “What shall I do without him?” she murmured.

  Then she was all briskness. Send for Garth. Where was that fool Mead? The Duke had had another stroke.

  Henrietta and Mary came and waited in an ante-room, and Sarah left the sickroom while they were there.

  “We want no quarrels over his death-bed,” said Sarah.

  It was too late for him now to plead with them; he was failing fast. His daughters took their last farewell of him and Sarah came to be with him to the very end, which was what he would wish.

  On the 16th June in the year 1722 the great Duke of Marlborough died.

  He lay in state at Marlborough House and was later buried with military honours in Westminster Abbey.

  Sarah gratified at the honours done him, for none, as she repeated frequently, deserved them more, faced the world with a defiant glare, but inwardly she felt that her life was over, for what could it mean to her without him?

  The news of Marlborough’s death came to Langley Marsh bringing back old memories.

  The affairs of the Marlboroughs were often discussed at the table when guests were invited. Abigail would amuse the company with stories of Sarah’s antics; but as the years passed they seemed more like her imaginings of some fictitious creature than truth. But when news of Sarah’s latest adventures came, Abigail realized that she had not exaggerated.

  Now the Duke was dead, and Sarah would no longer be supported by that wonderful devotion on which Abigail had built an ideal. Sarah had lost her most precious possession, and Abigail could even feel sorry for her.

  She ceased to think of Harley now who, when he had been taken from his prison in the Tower and faced his judges, had been acquitted, though forbidden to come to Court or to go to the House of Lords. This meant that he was cut off from any hope of continuing his political career and passed into obscurity.

  She occasionally heard stories of Bolingbroke, how he had married his French mistress, after the death of his wife and continued to live in France.

  So they, who had been so close once, were widely separated to live lives of their own.

  She was content with hers.

  It was two years after the death of Marlborough when news reached her of Robert Harley’s death. He was at his house in Albemarle Street when he had been taken ill.

  Memories came flooding back as they did when such events occurred. John, her brother, who had been a constant visitor to them since they had lived at Langley Marsh, kept talking of the past.

  “It brings it all back,” he said. “It’s odd how you forget … until something like this happens.”

  But John forgot more easily; he went off riding with young Samuel who was a favourite with him and was doubtless telling him stories of the old days when he had a command in the Army, and how he had lost it when the Germans came. Abigail remembered how she had fought for John against Marlborough—and lost. It was natural that when Anne was dead and Marlborough high in favour that John should lose his command.

  But he was reconciled. He was not rich but he had a comfortable income and that would go to young Samuel in due course.

  But as Abigail went about her duties she was thinking of the house in Albemarle Street and how she h
ad gone there in secret to warn, to advise … and to hope.

  She thought of Harley often during the months that followed, asking herself whether she would ever be completely rid of this nostalgia for the past which was like a physical pain. But when in October of that year her youngest daughter Elizabeth, who was only fifteen, was taken ill, she nursed her night and day and all past longings were obliterated in fear for the present.

  Elizabeth died; and Abigail’s grief overwhelmed her; but it taught her one thing: her life, her emotions, her loyalties were there in Langley Marsh.

  Sarah had not realized, until she lost him, how deeply she had loved her husband. He had been the one to show affection; she had accepted it as her right; she had stood fiercely by him, she had schemed for his sake; but only now did she know how much she needed him.

  There was no one in the world who could take his place. The Earl of Coningsby tried. He was a man she and John had known for many years and six months after the funeral he wrote to Sarah offering her marriage.

  Sarah read his letters through with astonishment. That anyone could think to take the place of Marl—and so soon! But she wrote to him gently, declining.

  It was shortly afterwards that she received another proposal. This amused her because it came from the Duke of Somerset, whose wife had been that lady who had shared the Queen’s favour with Abigail Hill. Moreover, the Duke was a man obsessed by his nobility; he was known as the Proud Duke and some of the court wits had said that his pride in his birth amounted almost to mental derangement. Of course he was one of the premier dukes, sharing that honour with Norfolk; but it was rumoured that even his own children had to stand in his presence and one of them who thought he was asleep, daring to sit, was immediately “fined” £20,000 which was cut out of her inheritance.