As usual, gaming tables were set up at the other end of the vast chamber, but in the Queen’s far corner the little group around her unexpectedly enjoyed themselves, for Frances not only read but acted some of the parts. The other girls, though they could not match her ability, joined in. The Queen listened with pleasure, throwing back her ringlets as she laughed.
Meanwhile Charles questioned Barbara, who had for so long treated him with impunity that now when challenged she threw aside all caution and stated flatly that Frances had become impudent and treacherous, and that she had had enough of her.
“Nobody, not even you,” shrilled Barbara, “can force me to receive that girl in my own apartment or to have any private dealings with her.”
Time was when her rages had intimidated the King, but now he was unaffected. Two of his petted spaniels had followed him, and he seemed more engrossed with them than attentive to Barbara as she worked herself into a fury, conscious that these tornadoes but increased her beauty. Up and down the long, luxuriously furnished room flounced the beauty, her seductively exposed bosom heaving tumultuously, her great eyes flashing, her jewelled hands clenched.
No soothing or conciliating words were forthcoming from Charles, who watched her sardonically from beneath hooded lids, the while he pulled caressingly at his spaniel’s ears.
“A chit such as that to make game of me!” Barbara raged. “You should be indignant on my behalf, instead of defending her.”
“Barbie, you know well that you are using this mimicry as an excuse. There was no malice in it, and it amused you.”
“It did not! How could I make a scene in public?”
“It would not be the first.”
“‘I did not choose to let everyone see that I was hurt and offended. Oh, what a fool I was to draw your attention to that uncouth schoolgirl. She is little more.”
“Not in years, I grant you, but uncouth…she could never have been that. Frances had grace and beauty even when I first saw her at Colombes.”
“You are in love with her! You are faithless to me, Charles. Oh, how can you? Do you never give a thought to our sweet babes, now hidden away at Richmond?”
Barbara came to a standstill before him, allowing her worked-up fury to dwindle, throwing a plaintive appeal and a dulcet softness into her voice.
“What actresses you women are!” said an amused Charles.
“I am not acting. I mean every word. I will not receive Frances Stuart or have anything more to do with her.”
“In that case, my dear, you will also have nothing more to do with me. Continue to give your entertainments as you choose, but I shall not be seen at them.”
“Charles!” She wailed his name. “But you know…you know they are devised for your pleasure and are of your choosing.”
“The company should be also of my choosing.” Charles rose.
Barbara cast herself upon him, dislodging the one spaniel he still held, who yapped at her indignantly and tore at her skirt. Barbara, with her foot, thrust the little creature away from her.
“Have a care! Trix is due to whelp at any time!” the King said, rescuing his pet.
Barbara angrily examined a shredded frill on her skirt.
“A female! The spiteful little brute! I might have known it!” she cried.
Charles, his good temper restored, burst out laughing.
“Frances bears you no ill-will,” he said. “A word from you will be enough. See that you speak it.” He tapped her cheek good-naturedly and left her.
Barbara was incensed to the point of hysteria. Hitherto her rages had invariably brought Charles to heel. That peace-loving man, who hated scenes and was horrified to see the beautiful Barbara with panting bosom and bitten lips, had before now knelt to gather her in his arms, thereby incurring her everlasting contempt. But today it had not been so. He had patted her cheek much as he might have patted the head of the lumbering, pregnant Trix, and then he had left her to work off her rage at leisure. But if he thought for one moment that she could be so intimidated as to recall Frances…
Barbara had no illusions about Charles. From time to time since she had become his mistress there had been other women, as there had been other men for her; but no other woman had succeeded in holding him. How could she suppose that Frances would — a mere child, beautiful though she might be?
Controlling herself at last, Barbara commanded her maids to pack for her and for themselves. Her coach was to be ready for her in an hour’s time. She was leaving Whitehall for Richmond, and she stamped her foot when one and all protested that it would be impossible to be ready in so short a time. Nothing was impossible when she wished it. Not yet could Barbara believe that she was on the verge of eclipse. She might no longer love Charles — had she ever loved him? But he was essential to her. King he might be to all else, but not to her. Her beauty and vivacity had made him her slave. He had heaped honours and riches upon her and would heap more. When he realized that she had left Whitehall, not by anyone’s orders but by her own will, he would come tearing after her as he had done before.
But it was Frances, not Charles, who was dismayed when she discovered that Barbara had departed without a forgiving word to her. The play-reading group had now attracted an audience. One evening, when the Queen was indisposed and did not appear, it progressed to full acting, with Frances enjoying the role of Rosalind and wishing that she could instil some of her histrionic flair into Joan Wells, who was the Orlando.
The Tzar of Muscovy had recently sent an imposing Embassy to England, and on this occasion the Ambassador was present. So was the King, and he laughed immoderately.
“‘Alas the day! what shall I do with my doublet and hose?’” cried Frances in a panic, her eyes dilated and both hands pulling at her skirts, thereby exposing an exquisitely shapely leg almost to the satin-gartered knee. She broke off to giggle as she added: “It would be more seemly if I were dressed as a boy.”
His Grace of Buckingham was listening with courtly attention to the Ambassador, and then retailed his remark. The Ambassador had thought that only Russian women had such handsome legs.
“I vow you would find none to compare with those of La Belle Stuart,” said Charles jocularly.
Fond though Frances was of the Queen, there was no doubt that her absence brought with it a sense of freedom, and, intoxicated by the general admiration, La Belle Stuart lifted her skirts a shade higher and executed a pas seul. The youthful bravado was ingenuous rather than provocative, and the laughing girl made a charming picture as she whirled down the long room.
The Duke of York alone was critical.
“Too slender,” he pronounced; “the perfect leg should be shorter and thicker and, for perfection, should be encased in green silk stockings.”
There was general laughter. Frances’ stockings were of shell-pink. Milord Chesterfield uttered an explosive exclamation, and Lady Chesterfield made a hurried withdrawal. She was wearing green stockings of the finest silk, and most of those present knew that the Duke of York had of late been paying her marked attention.
“You will see,” prophesied Mary Boynton later, “that milord Chesterfield, who is the most jealous husband in Christendom, will soon whisk her ladyship out of London.”
“And he’ll take her further than Richmond, where the Castlemaine has gone in the sulks,” said somebody else.
Frances was struck to silence. She had been planning ways by which she might conciliate Barbara, and the news that she had left Whitehall was a shock. She was distrait when the King complimented her on her acting and her dancing.
“I should have more dignity,” Frances said. “I get too excited.”
“Not in the way I would have you excited,” Charles said meaningly.
Frances evaded the fixed gaze of those hot brown eyes. She said: “But now I feel sober enough. Why has Barbara left London? Is she in disgrace with you?”
“More likely the jade would say I am in disgrace with her. What matter? She will return when it
suits her — and chastened, let us hope. For once Barbie has failed to get her own way. My lovely romp, did you think I would countenance the slight she put upon you?”
“Did you send her away, Charles?” Frances persisted.
“No — but I told her that if she refused to receive you, then I should seek my pleasures elsewhere.”
Frances was startled and distressed.
“Oh, but no! It mustn’t be that way. I was giving Barbie time to cool, and then by some means or other I would have made my peace with her. I thought…well, I thought as you gave me several presents at Christmas, and as Barbie admired that gold belt clasp with the rubies…”
“My sweet Frances, I have given Barbara many jewels. All you possess would not fill one shelf of her smallest coffer.”
“All the same, she did admire the clasp,” Frances said stubbornly. “Rubies are her favourite gems, she said. I could not give it to her without your permission, but I hoped if I asked you…”
She broke off, and Charles gazed at her with a baffled expression. She acted like a child, yet not a child. She was tenderly yielding when he put an arm around her, though it occurred to him that the opportunities afforded him were strangely few. Her lips were the most promising…
Although there were watching eyes upon him, he stooped and kissed her. An innocuous kiss for the great room was still adorned with the Christmas decorations, and he had only to steer her a few paces towards a sheaf of mistletoe depending from a rafter. That evening, more than one of the Court ladies had been saluted beneath it.
The promising lips promised nothing at all as his touched them. They were cool and uninterested — a child’s lips.
“Have it your own way — give it to her, then, as a peace offering,” he said.
“But I shall have to take it to her at Richmond. Suppose she has me turned away from her door?”
“I warrant that even Barbie would scarcely go so far, but if you have set your heart on this reconciliation, you must have an escort.” And Charles beckoned to young Lord Berkeley, who was a general favourite at Court, and gave him instructions to take Frances to Richmond the following day.
“And bring that foolish jade Barbara Castlemaine back with you,” Charles commanded, “since it seems that this equally foolish jade cannot be happy without her.”
Although he spoke brusquely he was not ill-pleased. Barbara was still the mistress of revelry, and she had so much life and vitality that she inevitably made herself missed.
Young Lord Berkeley contrived to convey as much when the next day, after an insolent, long delay, Barbara consented to see him and Frances. Hearing that they were there, she had made a careful toilet and received them in state, with two women of her household in attendance. She had noticed, or believed she had noticed, a lack of deference in her servants since her hurried flight from London, almost as though the fools fancied she was no longer in the King’s favour. Now they would see that he could not do without her, that he had sent his emissaries to beg her to return. Berkeley, a born diplomat, made it appear as though this was the case, and there was nothing in Frances’ manner to contradict it, for she gazed at Barbara with entreating eyes.
Secretly Barbara was much relieved, for when three days had passed and the King had made no move she had been apprehensive, the more so when Buckingham had paid her a visit and, hearing an account of the scene she had inflicted on Charles, had told her she was a fool. He had not, he assured her with brazen insincerity, had any serious intention of using Frances as a bait to induce a royal divorce. It was a passing thought only, and even with Barbara’s co-operation would have gone no further. It was no more than a fantasy and she had been wise to set her face against it, but not wise to provoke a quarrel with the King, and to so exasperate him that he would all the more readily be persuaded by his more sober advisers that it was time he reformed and treated the Queen with tenderness and consideration.
At this Barbara had scoffed.
“Charles,” she said, “would not know how to reform. If there is anything he detests it is boredom, and who could be more boring than Catherine of Braganza, with her prayers and her pruderies, and her eyes following him as sentimentally as one of his wretched spaniels?”
“Charles is devoted to his spaniels,” Buckingham reminded her, “and there is a rumour abroad that the Queen is pregnant. An heir to the throne is what he desires above all things.”
Buckingham had left Barbara in a rare state of self-doubt. If the Queen were pregnant it would have a salutary effect on Charles, at least for some months. He might not be so urgent to recall her, and she certainly could not afford to stay away from Court until after the Queen’s delivery. By then she would be practically forgotten, and there were others besides Frances eager to step into her shoes.
Frances was not eager. This, Barbara, who was shrewd enough when not giving way to temper, admitted. Frances was not in pursuit of place or power. She was harmless enough and would remain so unless Buckingham involved her in the mesh of his intrigues. Since he had dismissed the wild idea of so inflaming the King that he would be prepared to put her in Catherine’s place, Frances might as well be forgiven, Barbara concluded, unaware that Buckingham’s original plan would have been carried out without her help had it not been for the rumour of the Queen’s pregnancy.
Therefore, when Frances pleaded, Barbara listened to her relentingly, and her eyes glistened covetously when Frances brought forth the case containing the ruby clasp.
“Please do take it,” Frances begged, “and forget all this foolishness. It is wretched without you.”
“It will certainly be wretched for us if you insist on staying here,” Berkeley said. “The King’s orders must be carried out on pain of his displeasure, and we were ordered to bring you back with us at all costs.”
Barbara smiled at them and accepted the ruby clasp. “As a peace offering, then,” she said, “though indeed I am happy enough to be here, where all is so quiet and restful and I have time to bestow on my babies. In this rustication I had intentions of giving sittings to Mr. Lely — a family portrait with my little ones. If I return with you that must be postponed, for I would not have them exposed to the unwholesome London air.”
“Can we not see them?” Frances asked eagerly and Barbara graciously assented. A messenger should be sent to the nurse to bring them down from the nursery.
Joyful to be restored to favour, Frances flitted about the room, admiring Barbara’s many beautiful possessions. There were pictures that ravished her, cabinets containing ivories and miniatures. There was a large portrait by Huysman of Charles, which had been commissioned as a gift for Barbara when she had first become his mistress.
Then the three children were brought in, attended by two nurses, and Frances saw another facet of Barbara’s character. The little girl and her brother ran to her with love and confidence, and Barbara caressed them and displayed them with pride. The baby boy was taken from the arms of his nurse and Barbara crooned over him. The two younger children bore a marked resemblance to the King and this was pointed out by their mother.
“Catherine of Braganza will never give him such lovely babes,” Barbara said. “If she has a family, they may well look like little black savages, he and she both being so swarthy. They will never mean as much to him as my beautiful babes. He dotes on them.”
“How could he help it?” Frances said, popping a sugarplum into each willing mouth.
Barbara’s maternal pride touched some hidden chord in her heart, though when she thought of having children it always evoked a shudder of fear and repulsion.
It might be worth it, she supposed, if one loved the father of one’s children, and if they were as beautiful as these, though it might be that she could be just as fond of children who were not her own.
Eleven
The rumour of the Queen’s pregnancy was well founded, but a few weeks later she suffered a miscarriage; and although the young maids-of-honour were hustled out of the way while doctors
came and went, afterwards, when the Queen shed bitter tears, Frances was in the room, and her soft if heedless heart suffered for her.
“Oh, what a miserable business this child-bearing is,” she said rebelliously to Mary Boynton. “I hope I shall never have a sign of one.”
“Then your marriage is not like to be happy,” said Mary in her superior way, “for all men, of whatever degree, desire a son and heir.”
“And as often as not quarrel with their heirs and disinherit them, or try to,” Frances retorted. “Why should not a man and woman find themselves sufficient if they love? Why should one worry about the generations that come after?”
“It is natural to be proud of one’s family and to wish to see it continue. As for the King, it is most important for him to have a legitimate son, otherwise the throne will pass to the Duke of York and his children, and as yet they have only girls.”
“What matter? Wasn’t Elizabeth a great Queen? It must have been wonderful to be her. Above all others, and refusing to give herself to any man. That would have suited me. All the power and the glory and the balls and the pageants, and men kneeling to kiss my hand, and promising those who courted me, but never being forced to keep the promise.”
Mary, who was eager for her own wedding and looked forward to producing a family, eyed the Stuart girl with mingled scorn and wonder. If Frances thought she could plan her life on those terms she was even sillier than she appeared to be. By now there was a good deal of surreptitious gossip about the King’s fondness for her, and it was not to be expected that she could hold him off for ever.
“Kissing her hand and being content with promises. Not King Charles,” thought Mary sardonically, yet a shade enviously, for it seemed as though with every day careless Frances blossomed into greater beauty.
The King was kind to his wife over her disappointment and cheered her by saying that such mishaps often occurred early in marriage. In no time at all she would be hoping again. Barbara shrugged nonchalantly and cared not at all that for some weeks the King neglected to sup with her. Buckingham was smugly jubilant.
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