by Diane Haeger
Worst of all was that they softly chuckled when her laughter erupted quite beyond her control, highlighting the great difference between them.
Nell’s general discomfort was made all the more intense by the round of unrelenting invitations from the wives who knew Queen Catherine and Lady Castlemaine. Nell knew they tolerated her, in her new, daringly low gown with her swelling bosom and awkward new hairstyle, only because she was in the highest favor with the king. But they made it clear, as they smiled at her while she forgot not to say “ain’t,” that she would only ever be an actress and a jade.
Still, they played cards in her company, and did needlework beside her in the privy gardens, with its clipped yew hedges and blossoming rosebushes. And they gossiped incessantly. Mary Fairfax, soon to marry the Duke of Buckingham, was the least abrasive. She sewed, smiled, and said little. Anna Maria, Lady Shrewsbury, with her thick, pursed lips, turned-up nose, and deep-set eyes, made up for it. Nell thought she, Buckingham’s new mistress, was the worst.
“Poor dear madame, as they call our own Henrietta Anne in France,” Shrewsbury scowled as she exchanged a glance with the Duchess of York. “I do not know how she can bear her days at the French court, with a husband who finds greater worth in the company of young men than in her.”
Their heavy skirts rustled as they moved, and the air was too full of perfume.
“It is a scandal,” Isabella, Lady Arlington, concurred, tittering obnoxiously behind an intricate lace fan. She had raised it suddenly, as if there was even a modicum of modesty about her. Her position as wife of the secretary of state had made her more bold than wise.
Margaret Ashley, wife of the chancellor of the exchequer, did not do needlework, she said, as her eyesight was poor; she could focus exclusively on stirring scandalous topics for a group of bored women to contemplate and laugh over.
“His Majesty’s sister does her duty to the English Crown, first and foremost. But the Duke of Orléans much prefers to do his duty to the chevalier de Lorraine,” said Lady Ashley, bringing a bawdy fit of laughter up from all of them.
Nell bit her lip and tried again to focus on the mass of thread and fabric on the hoop before her, making it resemble something near to a rose. She had no idea how so tedious an endeavor could be either entertaining or relaxing, or how they might have spent a lifetime practicing.
They sat collected on a wide flagstone path at the center of a lush flower garden, brimming with fat, fragrant pink roses and clematis, accented by huge statues of Greek goddesses. Beside them was a stone pond full of moss and water lilies. It had been the garden of Queen Henrietta Maria, the king’s mother, before the murder of her husband, before the dark days of Oliver Cromwell, and her exiled years in France, when all of the flowers were allowed to die, and the joys at court passed away behind sober form and prayer. Now the garden was back, and for the use of anyone at court, to gossip in, or while away the hours, since the new queen was away so often.
“Poor dear. Do you suppose she has the good sense to take her own lover yet?” Isabella asked.
“Hopefully, not a young coxcomb like Lord Buckhurst,” Margaret Ashley cackled, tapping her knee. “That truly would be going from the kettle into the fire!”
They were like crows, Nell thought. Elegant, silk-clad crows. Nipping back and forth. Harsh. Crude. She was struggling not to spring up, toss down her needlework hoop, and run all the way back to London at the very moment she heard Buckhurst’s name.
His image came flooding back at her. Their time together…the awkward parting. He was in France? At the court of Louis XIV? That was why he had never spoken to her after her return from Newmarket? “Why is Lord Buckhurst in France?” she heard herself ask.
“Sent by His Majesty personally, sweeting. Official business for the Crown,” replied Lady Ashley nonchalantly.
“Business?”
“Trickery business only, I’ll warrant you!” Shrewsbury laughed, and the sound was very like fingernails scratching brick. “’Tis what he gets for daring to tamper with someone who’s already caught the king’s wandering eye!”
Lady Arlington’s gaze darted from Shrewsbury, who hushed suddenly. Nell’s eyes shifted from one woman to the next. Slowly, all the court wives lowered their heads and went intently back to their needlework. But not before Nell saw a mocking smile, then two, as their chins hit their chests. It felt as if a huge stone in her throat was preventing her from speaking further.
It had been far simpler back in London, with her own house a protective barrier from this harshness. The king might care for her, but a future of trying her best to spar with these women, who had made a career of it, seemed at the moment a high price to pay.
“Forgive me, my dear,” Isabella Arlington said insincerely. “We’d all forgotten that it was your favor from whom His Majesty sent the boy abroad.”
Nell reddened. “Of course you ’ad.”
Her corset cut into her rib cage. The shoes pinched her feet. She thought how the true Nell Gwynne had vanished. This strange concoction of a court girl remained. Even royal desire and a king’s influence cannot make a lady from a common wench, that was becoming all too clear.
At the very moment when Nell felt certain she would either say something horrid or run foolishly back to her apartments, a small contingent of young men approached, wearing periwigs, smart summer cassock coats in brightly colored silk, and broad-brimmed, fashionable hats plumed with ostrich feathers. They looked like the fops and dandies back at the theater in London—wealthy, idle, and utterly condescending.
“Ah, there they are,” said one, a thin young man with coal-black hair, his face and hands the color of a tallow candle. “Our own pack of she-wolves and a new lamb ready for slaughter.”
“Well, if it isn’t the merry band, come to taunt us,” Shrewsbury countered dryly, then looked back at her needlepoint.
The other men laughed subtly as he drew nearer and extended a hand to Nell. “Do be cautious of this group, Mrs. Gwynne,” he said in a low, cultured voice. “They will eat you alive, and smile all the while as they do it. Allow me to introduce myself, and my friends. I am John Wilmot, informally called Rochester by those who do not find me as entertaining as do my companions. And this is my closest friend, Henry Savile. Our squinting friend over there in the red cravat is Sir Carr Scrope, and our fourth is Laurence Hyde, son of the poor wretch who was once His Majesty’s greatest friend. Now, thanks to Lady Shrewsbury’s own good friend, the Duke of Buckingham, he is, alas, a father in exile.”
Everyone at court knew of the torrid affair between Buckingham and Lady Shrewsbury, so the reference was lost on no one. Yet here she sat, unashamed, and right beside the naive girl Buckingham was poised to marry, Nell realized.
“Careful, Rochester,” said John Maitland’s wife, Elizabeth. “I’ve heard the king himself say he only finds your poems and your sense of humor moderately entertaining these days.”
Nell was feeling as if she had been rescued. “You’re a poet, Mr. Rochester?”
At that, the ladies around her laughed cruelly. “Mrs. Gwynne, this libertine before you, quite inexcusably, is no mister, but the second Earl of Rochester.”
“Forgive me,” she said.
“’Tis a tiresome old family title, useful only to give me passage into court, and out of less-fortunate entanglements.”
“Since you are here now,” said Lady Ashley, “do share a poem with us. It can be so tedious without the men around.”
“Not that again, Margaret. I’ve never understood any of his obscene trifles.” Lady Arlington rolled her eyes.
“That’s only because you live such a remarkably dull life,” Henry Savile joked.
Rochester smiled slyly and sank onto the ground, sprawling out, his head propped up by an elbow. A moment later, his companions joined him in various states of repose. Plucking a blade of grass and inserting it between his lips, Rochester thought for a moment, then began:
“Naked she lay, clasped in my longing ar
ms,
I, filled with love, and she all over charms;
Both equally inspired with eager fire.
Melting through kindness, flaming in desire.
With arms, legs, lips close clinging to embrace,
She clips me to her breast, and sucks me to her face.
Her nimble tongue with—”
“My Lord of Rochester!” Margaret Ashley gasped. “I believe we have heard quite enough!”
“What do you call that?” Nell asked. She was feeling suddenly among friends at last.
“The poem is called ‘The Imperfect Enjoyment,’ my dear. Do you like it so far?”
“Quite. Only what is imperfect about it?”
“As it goes on, I’m afraid the poor boy spends himself in her hand and, alas, cannot give her the great joy they both desire.”
“A lamentable problem of the very young,” Scrope remarked cleverly.
“Not always exclusively,” Hyde put in, which brought laughter from the three other men, even the tawdry Lady Shrewsbury. But Margaret Ashley was stone-faced.
“Presenting filth as poetry is as vulgar as you are!”
“I follow only the dictates of our good king, Lady Ashley. He enjoys lewd humor, so I simply indulge him in what he desires. Rather, I suppose, as does Mrs. Gwynne here, or anyone else who expects to remain in his favor.”
“He does have a point, milady,” chuckled Henry Savile. “What do you give him, a girl like you, who has him so entirely besotted?”
“Clearly, there is great power in low charms,” Scrope laughed.
When Rose and Jeddy returned from a walk around the grounds, the vast bedchamber was shot with the pink light from the sun setting bold and vivid through the windows. The room itself was littered with a spray of dresses. The bed was covered with a silken rainbow of topaz, emerald, violet, and crimson, the floor held a tidy pile of shoes, and Nell was in the center of the disarray. Before her stood William Chiffinch, doing his best to help. The king’s page of the back stairs was a thin, square-shouldered man. His face was dominated by a high forehead and a neat little pointed beard, and his salt-and-pepper-colored hair gave him a fatherly impression.
“Those women are vultures! Bugger ’em all!”
“You must give as good as you get, Mrs. Gwynne,” said Chiffinch, “and do it with a smile. It is the thing that fascinates His Majesty about you.”
A woman came through the same door then and sank against the jamb, looking weary. Mary Chiffinch, a royal seamstress, had a kind, middle-aged face and a small, blunt nose. Her hair had gone gray, but her genuine smile recaptured a spark of her youth. “My husband is right, child. It has been years since either of us have seen His Majesty so truly contented.”
Rose brought Nell a small cordial and led her gently to a chair.
“’Tis difficult to believe ’e’s ’ad women for the choosin’ since ’e was old enough to know what to do with ’em. I’ve been a dalliance to powerful men, and I’ll not be that again!”
“There is a difference, my dear, when it is someone about whom he cares. It’s just bedmates my husband finds for him; he hates to be alone at night, you see. His Majesty, poor man, has nightmares.”
Chiffinch held up his hand. “That’ll do, Mary. The girl has enough on her mind without hearing all of that. Fact is, I have been in His Majesty’s service for a very long time, and I tell you, you have a great opportunity here. You can walk away, if you must. I have already seen to the coach you requested and it waits out in the courtyard. Or, you can meet His Majesty, as he wishes, for a sunset ride down on the river on his private barge.”
“I don’t know…”
“Take my advice, my dear. I know the king’s habits well. When he is smitten, the world belongs to the object of his affections. He longs to care deeply for a woman. Truthfully, he longs to be in love, though if you tell him I said so, I shall deny it forcefully,” Mary Chiffinch said.
“He told me so ’imself.”
“Did he now?” Mary smiled.
“But Lady Castlemaine?”
“That was over with long ago,” Mary interjected again. “It was only milady’s cruel threats that carried it on for as long as it did.”
“And Moll Davies?”
“Och.” She chuckled, slapping her thigh. “She was a diversion, only an actress!”
“I am only an actress…”
“You are much more to His Majesty than that,” William said calmly, commanding the moment. “He wishes to see you beside him in the morning. That, my dear, speaks volumes. Now, my wife here can teach you all you need to know. She may not be a lady herself, but she has known enough of them to help you.”
“Where do we begin? I ain’t got the first idea!”
“First, you must stand up straight. But a better corset will help with that. You will meet with the royal dresser tomorrow. Then curtsy not for the stage, but more modestly. I can show you that as well. And you must never, ever again say, ‘ain’t,’ if you can possibly help it.”
Nell paused for a moment, reflecting. “Why would the two of you do this for me?”
“Truthfully, because we have great experience with the alternatives,” Mary Chiffinch replied. William smiled kindly. “Let us only say it is our little attempt to help His Majesty find a bit of peace. If you succeed in the bargain, so much the better.”
“And you believe I can do that for ’im when the queen ’erself, and a long parade of other women, ’aven’t?”
They looked at one another, then back at her. “But then none of them were quite you, were they now, Mrs. Gwynne?”
Buckingham was reviewing petitions on a painted desk when William Chiffinch rapped softly on the door to the duke’s private paneled closet. The small room overlooked an inner courtyard at Windsor, and the splashing stone fountain there.
“Has it been done, then?” Buckingham asked. Sun shot golden light through the windowpanes across the side of his face. “Have you convinced Mrs. Gwynne to take on a bit of…refinement in order to withstand the impending challenge here?”
“I believe she convinced herself, Your Grace.”
“Splendid,” Buckingham replied without emotion.
With Nell Gwynne in the royal bed, there would be no true risk of serious competition for the king’s influence. Castlemaine was gone. Lady Stuart as well. Even Moll Davies. Things had worked out brilliantly. Now came the real challenge. He had begun things with her at Newmarket, befriending her, gaining her trust. Now she must be educated in how to succeed for the long term. Above all else, he must make her believe she required him to help her succeed.
He had heard the report about the needlepoint gathering. Shrewsbury had been brilliantly insipid, breaking her down in order for him to build her back up in the manner he required. Lord, but she could seduce him with her cruelty as well as her body! She was so like Castlemaine, only decidedly better. “Has Mrs. Gwynne gone with His Majesty out onto the barge, then?”
“She has.”
“Splendid news.” He pushed a pouch full of silver crowns across the long desk without looking up. “And you will keep me abreast of all things between them?”
William Chiffinch took the coins and slipped them into an inside pocket of his waistcoat with ease. “I do believe she will be good for him, your Grace. This one, it seems, truly does care for the king, which, if I may say, is a welcome change.”
Buckingham glanced up with a changed expression. “When I want your opinion, Chiffinch, I shall ask for it. In the meantime, keep your eyes open and your mouth shut, as always, and the continued extra money shall be yours.”
William Chiffinch bowed deeply. “I am Your Grace’s humble servant.”
“Excellent,” Buckingham said. “See that you remain so.”
The king’s barge silently slipped down the river at sunset, cutting through the motionless water like glass as crickets chirped in the reeds along the muddy incline of shore. Nell reclined on a banquette of crimson-colored velvet and a spray
of cushions, while Charles sat beside her. He propped a shoe heel on a tufted stool and gazed at her intensely. “I want Lely to paint you.”
“The painter who did that lovely portrait at Whitehall of Lady Castlemaine?” she asked, unable to seem too cavalier for the surprise in it.
“The very same.”
“A right grand honor.”
“I want an image of you beside my bed on any night we might be parted.”
Nell smiled slyly. “I’ll just bet you tell that to all the mistresses, wives, doxies, and jades.”
“It would be an awfully crowded wall if I did.” Charles moved across the banquette, took up her hand, and kissed her palm. Nell felt herself grow hot. His touch alone had that power over her now; she wanted only to give in to him. She would deny herself, and him, nothing any longer.
“You are so wonderful.”
“And you are very drunk!” she purred as he arched over her, brushing a hair the breeze had blown across her cheek. She hoped he would say he loved her because she wanted to say it to him. She would feel so much more confident about remaining his mistress if he did. But she could see, by how carefully he chose his words at moments like these, that he was far from ready to love her. She was to be fun for him, a diversion. And she had risen higher than an orange girl should. So a diversion she would be.
