It was an honour, and better the prince open his heart to someone who really was trustworthy, than to one who would spread it round the court.
So he sat and nibbled bread rolls and ham, and listened as his companion elaborated on the perfections of Princess Marie Louise of Guéméné, and realised that for good or bad, she had rescued Prince Charles from a deep despondency, from the horror of having to gaze into a bleak and hopeless future.
And having realised that, he could not blame this charismatic, reckless young man for falling in love. He had spent his whole life believing he was the only hope for a Stuart restoration, had done his utmost to fulfil that destiny, had failed, in great part due to the broken promises of others, and then had had all hopes of another attempt swept away by his thoughtless and inconsiderate father.
To hell with it, Alex thought, let the laddie take his pleasure where he may. I’ll no’ admonish him for trying to find happiness. He has suffered so much disappointment in his life.
It was after three before Charles decided it was time for bed, but when Alex stood on shaky legs, hoping they would hold him up for long enough to get him to the room that had been prepared for him, the prince asked him to stay with him, his mood having once more swung to misery, as is common with the very drunk.
“When we were children,” Charles said, peeling off his breeches and snuffing all the candles in the room except one, “Henry would often creep into my room. We had our own rooms, because we were princes of the blood royal. But we were still very little boys, afraid of shadows and of monsters that might hide in closets. Of course because I was older I had to pretend to be brave, but it was a comfort to both of us to sleep in the same bed. We would talk into the night, sharing all our childish secrets and hopes.” He smiled, but his face was a picture of sadness. “Never would I have believed, had you told me then, that he would one day become my enemy. It is a hard thing to be an adult, Alex, especially when you cannot trust anyone, even those who claim to be your friends.”
He moved over to the bed and pulled back the counterpane and blankets.
“Did you share a bed with your brothers too, as a child?” Charles asked.
“Aye, I did, wi’ Duncan at least. We were close in age. Angus was too wee, and restless in sleep. We did much as you and Henry did as bairns, although we had to whisper, for we didna have the luxury of our own bedroom.” Alex smiled as he remembered the whispered confidences and sometimes the silent fights that had taken place under the covers in the dead of night.
God, but he missed his brother.
“Come, then,” said Charles. “We have both lost a brother, in our own way. Tonight, let us be brothers to each other.”
Alex, who had been eyeing up the relative merits of sleeping on the floor or the chaise longue, froze and looked at his prince in shock. His feelings must have showed clearly on his face in spite of the dim light, for Charles laughed.
“You mistake me, Alex,” he said. “I am not Henry, nor my ancestor James. But I am so—” He bit the word he had been going to say back, but Alex heard it, and identified with it too.
Lonely.
It was an honour, he told himself. In past times it had been commonplace for a monarch to show favour in such a way to a courtier and friend. It was a sign of absolute trust; no one is ever more vulnerable than when asleep.
The two men climbed into the bed, gasping at the initial coldness of the sheets, and lay down. Charles reached across and snuffed out the last remaining candle, plunging the room into darkness, and settled down. Alex expected the prince to continue talking, but instead he turned on his side and was soon asleep.
Alex lay there for a while, listening to the deep and regular breathing of the man whose cause he had embraced so wholeheartedly, who should, if there was any justice in the world, be sleeping in a palace in London, waking in the morning to a bright future. A bright future that he too had hoped for, with his wife in his arms and his clansmen around him, their name and lands restored.
How had it come to this? Two lonely, desolate young men with nothing left to hope for, sharing a bed in a strange house, in a strange land.
I’m drunk, he thought. He was. But it didn’t make his thoughts any less true.
He closed his eyes, then opened them again as the room swirled around him and the bed seemed to shift under him. He lay for a while longer then tried again, this time falling into a deep sleep.
When he woke again it was still dark, and he lay for a moment not knowing where he was or how he got there. Then he heard the man next to him moan in his sleep, and the events of the evening and night came back to him. His throat and tongue were parched and he felt the beginnings of a headache pulse against his temples. He contemplated getting up and trying to locate something to drink, but was reluctant to disturb his companion. So he lay quietly listening to Charles muttering incoherently, clearly dreaming, although whether a good or bad dream, Alex couldn’t tell at first.
After a few moments of this, it became clear that whatever the prince was dreaming about, it was not pleasant. He spoke in an Italian too fluent and rapid for Alex to follow, and then he flung his arm out to the side, narrowly missing breaking Alex’s nose, shouted “No!” and woke up suddenly, breathing hard.
Alex lay silently for another few moments, not wanting to startle his bedmate while still in the throes of the dream. Even though they weren’t touching, Alex knew that Charles was trembling like a leaf; the bed was shaking.
“Will I light a candle, Your Highness?” he said softly.
There was silence for a moment, then Charles said, “No. Give me a minute, and I will be well. I’m sorry to have awoken you.”
“Nae bother. I was awake already,” Alex said. He listened as Charles’ breathing started to return to normal, then he got out of bed, locating the wine decanter and glasses by the last embers of the fire and returning with them. He poured, and handed the prince a glass. Alex couldn’t see him, but the hand that touched his as it fumbled for the glass in the dark was cold and clammy, and the Scot nodded to himself.
“Ye dreamt of the battle,” he said.
“How do you know that?” Charles asked. “Did I speak of it?”
“No, or at least if ye did I couldna understand you. You spoke in Italian, and I’m no’ fluent in the language. I dream of it myself sometimes, and wake much as you have.”
“You do?” the voice came from the darkness. “I thought…I thought I was the only one. I thought I was…” His voice trailed off uncertainly.
“It’s no’ a weakness to have nightmares about such things,” Alex said. “Many a brave man has such dreams, afterwards. Ye wouldna ken that, I’m thinking, sleeping as ye do in a room alone, but when ye’re sleeping in a field or a wee cottage wi’ twenty other men who’ve seen such horrors, it’s no’ unusual to be woken by someone screaming in the night. I’ve done it myself.”
“You have?”
“Aye. It’s no’ something we talk about. It’s like a secret, but one that we all ken.”
He felt Charles slump back against the pillows.
“They are terrible dreams,” he admitted. “Sometimes I am afraid to sleep in case they come. You have experienced more fighting than I have. How do you make them stop?”
“Ye canna make them stop, Your Highness. For me, once I accepted that they were part of fighting, like wounds and scars, they didna fash me so much.”
The silence went on for so long that Alex thought Charles had fallen back to sleep. He drained his glass, put it down on the floor next to the bed and lay down again.
“You told me earlier that Louis would assist in another expedition to Scotland.” Charles’ voice came from the darkness, making Alex jump. “That is true. Lochiel is in favour of it, as I guess are you.”
“I am, Your Highness. The Highlanders have been treated so badly by Cumberland and his men, that many who did not rise last time probably would now. With French support ye have a chance of taking the Scottish crown. Altho
ugh it would be more difficult now, wi’ Henry declaring for Rome.”
“Yes, I know. But you do not think I can take the English crown too.”
“No’ without a large French army, and Louis willna accede to that.”
“I cannot do it, Alex. I know what happened to the Highlanders because of my actions. I saw some of it myself, and I have heard much more since.”
“We knew the risks, Your Highness, and we took them gladly, and most of us would again.”
There was another silence, and when Charles spoke again his voice was so soft that Alex barely heard him.
“How can you not hate me, for what I have done to your country?” he asked sadly.
Alex sat up.
“Charles Stuart, you are our prince, the rightful heir to the throne,” he said. “You came to Scotland because you believed that you could win the throne back from that usurping bastard, and by doing so, give us a better life. We believed that too. It is my firm conviction that if we hadna turned back at Derby, we would have succeeded.
“But even if we’d carried on to London, and failed still, I wouldna hate you, and no man I ken would. You were following your destiny, and we were following ours. Ye couldna ken what would happen if we failed – after the ’15 and the ’19, we were allowed to go home, to carry on wi’ our lives. It’s no’ you that we hate, but George, and Cumberland, for trying to destroy our way of life forever. Ye couldna have foreseen that; nobody could. Ye mustna blame yourself for what others have done.”
“You really believe that?”
“I do, with all my heart.”
“Thank you,” the prince said.
There came a third silence, and this time Charles did not speak again, and after a while Alex closed his eyes and finally drifted back into sleep.
Alex stayed for another three days with the prince, and although they went out drinking again late into the night, Alex slept in his own bed when they got home, and neither of them made any reference to the conversation they had had on that first night.
When Alex was leaving, Charles came down to the courtyard to say farewell to him.
“Are you sure you have to go so soon?” the prince asked. “You are welcome to stay as long as you wish.”
“I think ye’ll enjoy the company ye’re expecting more if I’m no’ here, Your Highness,” Alex said, smiling. Charles had told him the previous day that Princess Louise was about to come and stay with her great-uncle, the ageing Duc de Gesvres, who conveniently happened to reside next door to the house Charles was staying in.
“Not at all,” the prince protested, but his eyes were alight with joy at the thought of seeing his cousin again, and Alex knew it was the right decision to go now. They were very different, these two young men, but two things they did share; they were both desperately unhappy, and both of them had been brought up to be rulers of men, each in their own way.
The prince had no men to rule and looked unlikely to acquire any in the near future, if at all. Alex, however, did. He had a clan at home and he needed to return to them, at least for a while, until his purpose was fulfilled.
Let the prince seek happiness where he can, he thought.
“Farewell, Your Highness. May we meet again in happier times,” Alex said. He bowed, turned and prepared to mount his horse, but Charles’ hand on his arm stopped him.
“Before you leave, Alex, I need to thank you. You cannot know what you have done for me. I will never forget it,” Charles said fervently. Alex nodded. There was no need for words; both of them knew to what he referred. “If you ever need my help, you have only to ask,” the prince continued. “I would give you this as a token of my affection for you.”
Alex took the item that Charles handed to him. It was a snuffbox made of wood covered with gold, with an enamelled lid. It seemed innocuous enough until Alex opened it. Underneath the first lid was another, painted with an exquisitely detailed miniature of Prince Charles Edward himself. It was entirely possible to open the two lids together as though they were one if offering a pinch of snuff to a Hanoverian, or to reveal the owner’s true loyalties to a fellow Jacobite by showing the portrait first.
It was a perfect gift for one who had been Sir Anthony Peters, who had concealed his true identity under a veneer. Alex smiled, and an intense wave of love for this star-crossed young man washed over him. Although it broke all the rules of courtly etiquette, he reached out and took the prince in a warm embrace, which was returned.
“Thank you, Your Highness,” he said. “I will treasure it forever.”
He broke the embrace, mounted his horse, and rode away. At the gate he looked back, and as he did the prince raised his hand in a final wave before turning and going back into the house.
For the rest of his life, through all that was to happen, Alex would never forget his last sight of that lost and lonely young man on whose head so much responsibility had been placed by an unappreciative father, who had abandoned him at a time when he needed a father more than he ever had before.
And because of that, Alex would never cease to love the man he had hoped one day to call his king, but who he knew now, deep in his heart, never would.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Fort Royal, Martinique
“Elizabeth! Beth!”
Beth had just dismounted from the carriage that Pierre had kindly loaned to her so that she could travel to Fort Royal, with the dual purpose of shopping for her trip to France and visiting the Marquis de Caylus to say goodbye and thank him for all he had done for her.
She looked round to see Elizabeth Clavering waving frantically and hurrying up the street towards her. The two women embraced, then Beth held her friend at arm’s length and surveyed her. The last time they had met Elizabeth had been dressed in borrowed clothes which had been too big for her. Now she was wearing a beautiful emerald-green silk dress, heavily embroidered with gold thread, with matching shoes. Her hair was elaborately styled and powdered, and emeralds sparkled in her ears and at her throat. Beth, dressed in a pretty but serviceable pink cotton dress, her hair, now grown below her shoulders, tied back with a ribbon, felt positively dowdy by comparison.
“You’ve done very well for yourself,” she said. “You wouldn’t look out of place at Versailles!”
Elizabeth laughed.
“Aye, I suppose I am a wee bit overdressed for taking a stroll through town, but when I’m at sea I wear breeches and shirts like the men, so I make the most o’ things when I’m on land.”
“It’s good to see you,” Beth said, and meant it. “So how is life as a pirate suiting you?”
“Privateer,” a male voice said from behind her. She jumped, turning to look into the laughing brown eyes of Paul Marsal.
“I stand corrected, Captain Marsal,” she amended, curtseying deeply. He responded with an elaborate courtly bow, while Elizabeth looked on with amusement.
“My name is still Paul,” he said, smiling at her. “And it is delightful to see you, Beth. I thought you were living near Sainte Marie now.”
“I am, but I am about to leave, “Beth replied.
“To leave? Do you have another place to stay?” Paul asked.
“No. I am leaving Martinique,” she replied, causing matching expressions of surprise to appear on her friends’ faces. “It is a long story,” she added, “but I intend to sail for France as soon as I can. I came here to see the marquis, amongst other things.”
“I am sure the marquis will be as delighted to see you as we are,” Paul said.
“I’m not certain of that,” Beth replied, looking along the drive at the distant house. “I’m afraid I need to ask him for a favour.”
“Why are ye afeart o’ that?” Elizabeth asked. “Yon man was much taken wi’ ye, was he no’?”
“He said he was, but he has already done so much for me. I hate to ask him to loan me money, but I have no alternative.”
“Ye’re needing money to pay for your passage tae France?” Elizabeth asked.
�
�No. My employer has kindly offered to pay for that, and I have the allowance he gave me to live on when I first arrive in France. No. I wish to buy a slave.” She looked around at the busy thoroughfare. This was not the place to discuss such things. “It’s complicated,” she finished.
“Is the marquis expecting you to call on him now?” Paul enquired.
“No,” Beth said. “I was going to ask if I could make an appointment to see him, and then do a little shopping before going to my hotel. I have taken a room for a week.”
“Excellent!” Paul said, taking her arm and tucking it under his. “Then you have plenty of time to visit the marquis tomorrow. Tonight you are going to be our supper guest on L’Améthyste, which by happy chance is just over there.” He pointed to the forest of masts in the harbour, presumably some of which belonged to his ship. “You can tell us your complicated story and we can tell you ours, and give you a little advice too, perhaps. Are you agreeable?”
As he was already turning in the direction of the harbour and showed no sign of relinquishing Beth’s arm, it seemed he had already assumed her response would be in the affirmative.
Which assumption was indeed accurate.
They dined in the captain’s quarters, which were, as Beth remembered him describing to her in May, very tasteful. The mahogany panelling, bookshelves and burgundy silk upholstered chairs and curtains made her feel as though she was sitting in a library in an English country house. Only the temperature told her otherwise.
They sat at the dining table eating crayfish soup followed by oyster pie and orange pudding from silver plates, washing it down with fine wine poured into crystal glasses. While they were eating, Beth related to her interested audience the events of her life since she had last seen them.
“I don’t know your opinion of slavery,” she said after explaining why she was so desperate to buy Raymond, having already received the papers confirming her ownership of Rosalie.
Tides of Fortune (Jacobite Chronicles Book 6) Page 33
