The French Mistress

by Susan Holloway Scott

  “I am,” Madame passionately declared. “And with God and my brother to guide me, I will succeed.”

  Thus, in the earliest hours of the sixteenth of May, I stood on the heaving deck of an English royal sloop, standing close to Madame’s side. Overhead the two flags—the red-and-white crosses on a blue background for England, and a silk banner with the golden Bourbon lilies in honor of Madame’s presence on board—danced and snapped in the stiff wind. The sloop was part of an English squadron that had been waiting for us at Dunkerque, and though the skies had finally cleared enough for the English captains to clear the harbor, our brief crossing to Dover had proved a rough and challenging one. We two ladies were as good as alone on the deck at this hour, with the crew so occupied with their tasks that they kept a respectful distance apart from us, though always ready to assist the princess if necessary.

  Not that they’d be needed. Proudly Madame displayed her ease at sea by clambering sure-footed up and down the companionways and across the slippery decks. She claimed such prowess was a natural gift granted to all English, on account of their being an island people and surrounded by water. It was certainly not a gift shared by her French ladies and servants. Every other member of her party save me was quaking and puking below, laid low in the most foul of circumstances by the rocking waves. Madame had been almost uncharitable regarding their distress, too, declaring it as proof of English superiority, at least where seafaring was concerned.

  Not having so much as a drop of English blood myself, I wondered aloud that I wasn’t stricken as well, but Madame had an answer for that, too. She gaily proclaimed I’d either sailors or fishermen in the distant reaches of my family tree, or, gazing toward the future, she said I must be destined to wed an Englishman. I scoffed at that, and reminded her of the empty foolishness of the Abbé Prignani’s fortune for me, which made her laugh.

  But then, on this day, it seemed most everything would make Madame laugh. She was that happy, that joyful, that relieved to be free of Monsieur. Like an old salt, she squinted into the blowing mist and rain, her dark curls limp from the spray and her fur-lined cloak beaded with seawater. Resolutely she turned her bare face (for she’d chosen to do without paint, rather than have it stream and puddle down her cheeks) toward the west, desperate for her first glimpse of England.

  “The sailors believe we’ll make Dover by dawn, Louise,” Madame said to me, though her gaze never shifted from the wet, gray horizon. “To think that I could dine with my brother this very night!”

  “Yes, Madame,” I said, shivering inside my plain woolen cloak. If Madame did not feel the cold, then I was not permitted to feel it, either. “Perhaps you should rest now, to be refreshed when you meet His Majesty.”

  She shook her head, her gloved hands tightening on the wooden taffrail as if she feared I’d try to pull her away by force. “My brother will find me worn and changed and will scold me for it, too, yet I also know he’ll love me still, just as I love him.”

  “Then please let me fetch another cloak to warm you, Madame, or—”

  “I’m well enough, Louise.” She sighed restlessly, slipping one hand inside her cloak to press the pain in her belly. In her excitement, she’d suppressed her many illnesses, but she couldn’t make them vanish entirely, as much as she might wish it. Her brother would find her much changed, and perhaps he could make her agree to see his own physicians.

  “You’re quiet, Louise.” Madame reached out to take my hand. “And here I thought you were the bravest of the lot.”

  “I’m not afraid, Madame,” I said, and I wasn’t. “I was trying to imagine England, that is all.”

  “England.” Her smile softened. “You will like it, I think. It’s a sweet, dear place, and now in the spring, everything will be lush and green and full of flowers.”

  “It must be very beautiful, Madame.” Green and lush would be a pleasing change from gray and chill. I had grown so cold, I doubted I’d ever feel my toes or fingers again. “You’ve spoken of England with such fondness that I can scarce wait to see it for myself.”

  She smiled absently, lost in her own musings. “And the gentlemen, Louise! The English gentlemen all follow the lead of my brother, which makes them the most charming gallants in the world. In turn they’ll judge you to be the most enchanting young lady they’ve ever seen. One look at your sweet face, and they’ll be lost—lost! Perhaps you’ll even find that special sailor you’re destined to wed. England is full of them.”

  I felt my face grow hot with miserable shame, the way it always did whenever anyone teased me about marriage. I was nearly twenty, monstrously old to be unwed, without so much as the breath of a suitor hovering about me. At a time when most young ladies were considered in their prime at sixteen, I was perilously close to becoming a spinster, and a disgraceful disappointment to my family.

  I dared to have great hopes for England. For the most part, I’d liked the English gentlemen that had come to call on Madame in Paris: they were often clever and amusing and handsome, too, if brash by French standards.

  But not a sailor. “If you please, Madame,” I said, glancing pointedly at one of the less savory of the sloop’s seamen, a greasy, grimy rascal with a long, tarred queue and a single eye who’d been bellowing orders to the men aloft. “Not a sailor.”

  She laughed merrily, the light from a nearby lantern slipping into her hood to wash across her face. “There are sailors, Louise, and then there are sailors. Recall that all my brothers have loved their boats and ships. Why, my brother James is the Lord High Admiral of the Navy, as fine a sailor as any to be found, and he fought with great bravery in the last Dutch war.”

  I nodded, thoughtful. I’d forgotten how these English gentlemen embraced their navy. In France, the army was the gentleman’s service, but in England it seemed that even the king’s brother, the Duke of York, went to sea by choice. Perhaps there was some merit in the abbé’s fortune after all, at least when it was combined with Madame’s prediction, and I’d find myself loved by a seafaring peer.

  But Madame misread my thoughts. “A sailor, yes, but not James,” she cautioned. “I’m certain he’ll be taken with you, as he is with most pretty young girls. But he is well and duly married, Louise, though he amuses himself with mistresses as if he weren’t. Your parents trust me to do better than that for you.”

  “No, Madame.” I was thankful that the overcast night now hid my face as I blushed again, though this time with guilt, not regret. I’d never once imagined myself with Madame’s second brother; by her telling, he sounded dull and stubborn, if brave, and I’d not been taken with his fair-haired, ruddy face in the portraits she kept. But her oldest brother, Charles—that was another matter entirely, and I prayed she’d not ask me questions outright regarding him.

  “No, no, indeed,” she said firmly. “I’ve not brought you with me to see you commit a folly like that.”

  “Oh, Madame,” I exclaimed, “I’m so grateful that you’ve brought me with you at all!”

  She smiled, pleased to be thanked, as all noble folk were. “I always told you I would, Louise. It’s an honor you earned with your loyalty to me, and one you deserved.”

  “But it’s also one that many other ladies coveted,” I said, which was entirely true. When the names of those chosen to accompany Madame had been made known, there’d been a good many who’d been grievously disappointed, and who’d shown that disappointment by spitefully attacking me as unworthy. “And for you then to grant me an allowance for new gowns—why, Madame, I can never thank you enough.”

  Though I’d known Madame to be most generous, I’d never expected her to do that, a rare gift indeed. She’d never said anything to fault my dress, humble though it was in comparison to all her other attendants, and while she had on occasion made me small gifts of gloves or scarves or gilt drops for my ears, there’d never been any munificence on this scale. I’d been able to have a half dozen new gowns made in the latest fashion and of the costliest cloth, with slippers and stocki
ngs and ribbons to match. For the first time, I shone among the other ladies, and I proudly knew I’d be noticed.

  “I’m glad the things made you happy,” she said. “You deserved them, too.”

  “They do,” I admitted shyly, and with my arms outstretched, I spun lightly on my toes on the deck to make the skirts of my new traveling gown flare out around my legs. Not so much that I’d draw undue attention from the sloop’s crew, but enough to show Madame my pleasure in my new wardrobe, and my gratitude, too.

  But instead of delighting along with me, as the giver usually is with a gift, she only sighed, her smile faint.

  “Oh, Louise,” she said, “I wasn’t supposed to tell this to you, but because I believe in my heart that it’s better you know than not, I am going to share a secret with you. The gold for your clothes did not come from me, but from His Majesty.”

  “His Majesty?” Abruptly I stopped my dancing steps. “Not you?”

  “No.” She smiled, but sadly, or perhaps it was only a trick of the lantern’s shifting light. “His Majesty was pleased with how you’ve served me, and wished you to be rewarded.”

  “That is most kind of him,” I said, the answer I was expected to give. But the awkward silence that now fell between Madame and me betrayed expectations of a different kind entirely. We’d spent too much time in each other’s company not to know the difference, and likewise we were too familiar with His Majesty not to recognize this as atypical of him. Louis was not a man given to act on kind impulse alone. With him, every action and word had a purpose and a reason.

  But what reason could Louis have had for giving rich clothes to a lowly maid of honor like me?

  “Charles has always preferred fair women with dark hair, and thus has set the fashion for them. You’ll be regarded as a great beauty.” She wasn’t teasing me about sailors as she had before, but offering a warning that she expected me to heed. “There are a good many rogues among my brother’s Court who will regard you as a delicious sweet-meat, to be gobbled up in one bite.”

  I nodded, and she reached out to cradle my chin with her gloved hand. “I am as serious as I can be, Louise. I would never forgive myself if any harm befell you.”

  “Yes, Madame,” I said, so touched by her concern that tears stung my eyes. “I thank you, Madame, for everything.”

  “Everything,” she said wistfully. “Oh, my sweet Louise, you don’t begin to know what that means.”

  Yet even as she spoke, a flash of white in the watery distance caught my eye, and I gasped with excitement just as the lookout in the crosstrees over our heads called out the landfall.

  “Forgive me, Madame,” I said, “but look there! Boats, Madame, a flock of little boats coming toward us!”

  “And land!” She made a wordless cry of purest joy. “Oh, Louise, that’s England, there, that dark shadow on the horizon. England, my England at last!”

  With land sighted, it felt as if the very vessel beneath us jumped to fresh life. The crew bustled at their stations, while Madame’s servants and attendants recovered sufficiently to join her on the deck so that they would be in evidence when we made Dover. This last bit of water seemed to take forever to cross, with the changing winds making us cross back and forth as the captain strived to reach our destination. Slowly the sun broke clear of the horizon, a fresh dawn and a new day that made Dover’s famous chalky cliffs glow with promise.

  I feared my poor frail lady would expire from anticipation before we could arrive, she was in such a fever of excitement, and as the smaller boats from the port drew close to us in welcome, tears streamed down her pale cheeks. I remained close at her side, supporting her as best I could and blotting her face with her lace-edged handkerchief so she wouldn’t look forlorn, but not once would she look away, so intent was she on that first glimpse of her brother.

  At last a barque, sleekly elegant and flying an English lion on its royal pennant, drew alongside us. This vessel’s deck was likewise as crowded as our own, but even among so many, one man seemed to make all others around him disappear.

  He was a head taller than the rest, dressed in rich but somber dark colors that made him appear taller still. His skin was dark, too, nearly as dark as the sailors who weathered their lives in the sun, his features strong and manly beneath his long black hair. Even across the water I could sense the intensity of his presence and the power that lay behind the easy way he stood the deck, as if he’d been born at sea and not in a palace.

  Because this, I knew, I knew, was the English king, Charles Stuart, and never for a moment did I doubt it.

  He didn’t wait until we’d moored to come aboard, or even for the sailors to throw a gangplank between the two vessels. Instead he jumped over the gap without hesitation, and bounded across the deck to Madame. He seized her in his arms, brother and sister reunited after so long apart. They laughed and cried and spoke over one another’s words, then laughed and cried again, and their happiness was so complete that all of us who witnessed it wept with them. Another man, not so tall nor so dark that I guessed he must be her other surviving brother, James, Duke of York, stepped forward to embrace her. He was followed by a rough-faced older gentleman, who was her cousin Prince Rupert, and finally the young Duke of Monmouth, and all of it making for as fine a reunion of a family, royal or otherwise, as can be imagined. It was such a pretty sight that I watched with tears of my own, not just for Madame’s joy, but for my own lost brother, Sebastien, knowing our only reunion would now be in heaven.

  But even in the English Channel, the protocol of Court ruled all. At last Madame began to present her people to the king, one by one, each bowing or curtsying before him on the wet deck in order of rank and importance, as was proper.

  My place would come next, near the end. For luck I touched my grandmother’s small gold crucifix at my throat, and whispered a quick prayer for guidance. I was determined to put aside my usual shyness and be brave. I would not falter. I pushed my hood back so my face would show, and licked my lips one last time. I stepped forward and sank into the most graceful curtsy I could manage on the unsteady deck, my head bowed so deeply that all the king could see were my glossy black curls and the white nape of my neck.

  “Mademoiselle Louise de Keroualle,” Madame was saying. “You must be kind to her, Charles. She is my favorite maid of honor.”

  “Mademoiselle.” His voice far over my head was deep and rich, ripe with amusement. To my shock, he took my hand in his and raised me to my feet, a gesture of favor far beyond my station, and one that scattered all my bold resolutions into disarray. Though I now stood as tall as I ever would, he held my hand still, as if he’d no wish to let it go, as if he’d every right in the world to claim my hand and me as his prize.

  “Mademoiselle,” he said, addressing me in French, “if you are one of my sister’s favorites, then I am sure you must be one of mine as well.”

  Daring greatly, I lifted my gaze to meet his. He was smiling, smiling at me.

  And oh, may the Blessed Mother preserve me, my fate with him was cast.

  Chapter Eight

  DOVER CASTLE, DOVER

  May 1670

  Because Madame’s visit to England was to be only a month long, Charles had decided not to squander any of their time together in traveling, and to remain in Dover. Our lodgings were in the royal keep of Dover Castle, on the heights overlooking the harbor. We were told the castle was so vastly old that parts of its walls and towers had been erected by the conquering Romans of ancient times, and when I saw the worn stone walls and bluff square towers, I could well believe it.

  Madame’s bedchamber was in the corner of one of these towers, with the room I’d share with her other ladies nearby. Though the rough stones had been whitewashed in advance of our visit, I’d still the feeling of being inside a cave, carved and clawed from the rocky cliffs outside, and every bit as damp, too, with the rain that had plagued us in France following us to Dover. The ceilings were low, a series of vaulted arches, and the windows narrow
slits that had been designed for defending the fortress with bows and arrows, rather than for admitting sunlight to a lady’s chamber.

  There could, in short, be no place less like the lavish and modern palaces where I’d spent my last eighteen months. And yet, because everything about this journey was an adventure, the castle seemed exactly right, like the magical keep of some fairy princess awaiting the return of her knight—or, as I thought with giddy anticipation, perhaps her king.

  “Let me see you properly, Louise,” Madame said as I joined her while she was having her hair dressed. She shifted her gaze without moving her head as the coiffeur in his black satin apron pinned a looped bow of red ribbons and pearls in the curls over her ear. “Come, stand here, directly before me.”

  I did as she bid, eager to show my new gown. I’d resolved not to consider too closely why His Majesty had chosen to make a gift to Madame for my clothes. Most likely it was because he wanted our party to outrival his cousin’s Court in beauty and grace, and he’d deemed my humble wardrobe to be a sooty spot on so much French magnificence and style. No matter; what I said or thought would never have an impact on His Majesty, and thus I might as well accept this unexpected largess with grace.

  Besides, I’d never worn a gown of such quality before, one fashioned precisely to my form by the Court’s favorite seamstress in Paris. Sewn of satin the exact color of new leaves in spring with trimming of rosy pink, the close-fitting gown had exuberant slashed poufs for sleeves and deep cuffs and a collar of point de Venise patterned with lilies. My stomacher glittered with silver embroidery, and was clasped with glistening glass pearls set in more lilies. In fact, as I’d stood before the glass with a maid to dress me, I’d thought I resembled a spring flower myself, my beauty enhanced to glow with a delicate vibrancy that was enticing, and yet suitable for a maid of honor. If Louis had in fact wished me to be an admirable reflection of France, then tonight even he would have been satisfied.