by Priya Parmar
“Mistress Gwyn.” It was a statement. Not Ellen.
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Slick sweat trickled down my back.
“Yes, that fits,” she said flatly. She was looking down at my slippers—my shell-pink slippers.
December 1, 1668—Official Notations for Privy Council Meeting on This Day to Be Entered into the Log-book
Notations taken by Secretary of State Henry Bennet, Earl of Arlington
Discussion in the Council today of His Majesty’s growing reputation for licensed behaviour and the possible repercussions on the country, and the stark contrast to his sister, the Princesse Henriette-Anne, and King Louis’s court at Versailles. The princess is acting as principal hostess and the first lady of the French court while Queen Maria Theresa is in her confinement, and her gracious deference to the absent queen has been much noted throughout Europe. Unfortunately, during our session we received word that His Majesty’s companions Lords Sedley and Buckhurst were arrested for being drunk and disrobed in a London street on a Tuesday in the mid-afternoon.
Also further discussion of His Majesty’s increasingly difficult financial embarrassment. Mr. Baptist May presented the household accounts, and there were several extravagant expenditures that the king was disinclined to discuss.
The Duke of Buckingham became animated over the subject of the unpaid seamen and the state of His Majesty’s Navy. The Lord Admiral, His Grace, the Duke of York was not available to discuss the matter, as he was meeting with Lords Brouncker (recently reinstated) and Sandwich over the matter of Tangier. York’s clerk, Matthew Wren, delivered a message to the Council: the returned formal request to immediately find funds for payments in arrears (for the previous three years) that the Duke of Buckingham had drawn up and strongly called for York to endorse. It was returned without York’s signature. As the Council is still waiting for Parliament to pass a bill granting His Majesty three hundred thousand pounds, we are unable to currently meet such a demand without the assistance of Parliament.
It was mentioned by the Duke of Buckingham that perhaps Lady Castlemaine could contribute a portion of her considerable personal income. His Majesty did not acknowledge this request but instead alluded to a solution coming from France.
The Council as a whole was not aware of such an arrangement. The duke went on to suggest that perhaps the Lord High Admiral himself, His Grace of York, could alternatively donate a portion of his personal income. King Charles and the Duke of Buckingham stepped outside to speak privately after the Council meeting was adjourned.
Nothing further to report.
Secretary of State Henry Bennet, Earl of Arlington
December 2, 1668—Theatre Royal (The Usurper, by Ned Howard—another playwrighting Howard boy)
“You’ve got to talk to him, Nelly!” Buckingham thundered away in my tiring room—my private tiring room that never seems to be private these days.
I winced as he banged his fist down upon my delicately carved dressing table—it was new, a present from Tom.
“He listens to you. You must make him see sense! He must dissolve this Parliament and call another—one that will grant him proper funds!”
“So tell him that!” I said, exasperated.
He will not listen to me on this matter,” Buckingham snarled. “Get on with it, Nelly! Today!”
Everything is always today! with Buckingham. Everything is always imperative! Urgent! One grows deaf to his impassioned nagging. He has no sense of subtlety or timing. But then I suppose one who feels utterly entitled to everything has no need of timing. “I can’t speak to him today; he is Touching for the King’s Evil at Greenwich all afternoon.” I shuddered. It was a bizarre and, I am quite sure, ineffectual ritual as the same batch of afflicted sufferers showed up every week.
“Ha!” Buckingham snorted. “As if that cures anyone. If he would charge for his services, that would be useful at least.” I held my tongue. For once I agreed with Buckingham and have lately mentioned to Charles the possibility of establishing a proper modern hospital instead of this weird enchanted nonsense.
I watched Buckingham pace about the small room like a caged panther. I waited. Eventually he would exhaust himself—although he had been going on for some time. I heard a rustle of skirts and looked up to see both Marshall sisters casually loitering by the open door. I stood and firmly shut it.
“Now,” I said soothingly, “you know what he is like. There is no talking to him until he is ready. I’m sorry,” I said, turning back to my make-up box, hoping that would be the end of it. I was on this afternoon and could not find my new pot of silver eye paint—I suspected the light-fingered Becka Marshall.
“But this is what you are supposed to do for me. This is why you are where you are: in his bed instead of mine.”
I ignored the crass remark but took his meaning clearly. He had got me into the king’s bed, and now I am therefore in his service—otherwise, he assumed I would be in his bed and at his service: not true, but that was not the quarrel to pick today.
I turned and said carefully, “Your cause is a good one, and as far as I can tell it is relatively free of self-interest—surprising for you.” The acclaim he would garner for solving the navy problem would increase his growing popularity with the common people, but I did not mention that.
“Nelly!” he exploded. I held up my hand; I had no time for this today. Buckingham has never been one to see himself clearly, and this afternoon was not the moment to make him do so.
“I care for you a great deal and will help if I can, but I will not push him. You of all people should know that is not wise.” He had evidently forgotten his recent stay in the Tower and could not see that he was balanced on a knife’s edge with the king at the moment—childhood companion or not. He had traded too long on their history of affection, and their fathers’ affection before them, to heed the warning signs. I knew (from Johnny) that he had already dangerously bullied the king’s brother James: trying to force him to sign a request for funds he did not want to sign, and then humiliating him in the council chamber.
“Patience,” I said, putting a placating hand on his arm. He is not ready yet.”
“Well, he should be bloody ready!” he bellowed. “These are the men who are supposed to die for him if the need arises. You’d think he’d be able to pull his prick out of my cousin’s cunny long enough to notice that!”
With that, he slammed out of the room, scattering the eavesdropping Marshall sisters like geese. I sighed, stung by his crude remark. In anger or frustration George will say anything. It was no good telling him that it was not a matter of not noticing, but of not knowing how to go about obtaining the funds and saving face.
Note—Hilarious rumour of Johnny Rochester having his clothes and money stolen while he was with a wench, walking home stark naked, only to return (clothed) to find that is was the wench who had stolen the clothes in the first place (and stuffed them into her feather-bed). She ransomed them back to him for a good sum. All was returned and good humour restored. It is said that it was Savile who put her up to it. It sounds like him. Charles never tires of repeating this story. Johnny laughs along. It is good to see them together. Charles loves him so.
Note—Home in Drury Lane. The rain is leaking though the roof above the window. The paint has almost entirely peeled from the damp walls. It is a strange thing to spend so much time in the royal palaces of this country and then return to my dreary childhood home. As I am hardly here, it hardly matters, I suppose. Mother is rarely home; she has set up a temporary “establishment” at the Cock and Pie tavern. I try my best not to think too much about it and can only hope it never becomes known at court. I have learned to take all her improprieties in stride. A family is a messy, unwieldy thing bounded only by blood and—beneath all the embarrassment—affection.
December 10, 1668, Saturday—Ham House
Rainy day in the country with Charles. He was distressed over a letter from his sister, Minette (well, not Minette to me, but the Princes
se Henriette-Anne, the Duchesse d’Orléans, the Madame of France, married to King Louis’s notoriously mean and effeminate brother Philippe, the Duc d’Orléans, the Monsieur of France).
“He bullies her, beastly man. How can anyone bully my sister? She is an angel. She writes to apologise that in her official letters she is no longer permitted to express affection for me, as her husband has deemed it un-seemly and disloyal.”
“Disloyal to whom?”
“Him, of course. Ridiculous.”
Charles was pacing in front of the fire, waving the letter about as he spoke. The letter was brought by one of the special fleet of couriers Charles employs to ferry secret correspondence betwixt them. The pugs and spaniels, recognising this mood and not wanting to be stepped on, had taken refuge under the sofa. I leaned over to check that Ruby and Scandalous were safely among them. Satisfied, I returned to my reading.
“He believes that before Christmas she arranged the dismissal of his wretched lover—what’s his name, Chevalier de something or other—and now he seeks his petty revenge upon her.”
“De Lorraine, I think. What is he like?” I asked, lowering the script I was hopelessly behind in learning. Rumours about Minette’s vicious husband were legion.
“The Monsieur? He is vain, frivolous, spiteful, vindictive, and possibly the worst husband my mother could have found for her,” he said, dropping wearily onto the sofa and laying his head in my lap, knocking my script to the ground. Heigh-ho. “She ought to have married our cousin King Louis, instead of his dreadful brother, but at the time Louis wasn’t interested in her. Like dancing with the bones of holy innocents, I think he said. Very rude.”
“But I thought she and Louis—”
“Oh yes. Later, after she was married, Louis was terribly interested in her, declaring his undying this and everlasting that, praising her slender frame, exquisite taste, and flawless complexion, on and on. Which of course only enraged her jealous little husband more. Fey Philippe is petty by nature and has been encouraged to wear frilly dresses and face paint and be a silly pastry puff of a man since birth—pettiness and vanity, awful combination. He is not even interested in women and has publicly either mistreated or ignored my sister since their wedding. Not to imply that he does not privately hound and torment her. She writes that he has daily reports brought to him recording all her activities and correspondence—to whom she speaks, what she reads, where she goes—and so she must be extra cautious when writing to me. Any loyalty to me angers him greatly. Of course she is loyal to me, her own brother. How absurd!”
“Philippe wears dresses?”
“Mmm, two sons can be very dangerous. The Queen Mother, my aunt Anne of Austria, trained one to be an inconsequential, spangled circus bear. That way, Louis can reign unchallenged. God help us should anything ever happen to Louis.”
I did not know what to say to that and so called for Mrs. Chiffinch to bring a collation and the strong coffee Charles favours, hoping to tempt him out of his ill humour.
“Now Minette’s lady-in-waiting, the little la Vallière, is Louis’s mistress, plain but sweet, an excellent horsewoman, if I remember, and Philippe’s dreadful lover—that greasy Chevalier—is returned to court, and Minette is virtually a prisoner at St. Cloud. And I am unable to help.”
“Can your mother not do something? She is, after all, there,” I asked, reaching over him to move the books and clocks—everywhere he goes, Charles brings clocks—out of the way to make room for the coffee tray.
“My mother? My mother firmly believes that those whom God has joined together, let no man … on and on. Totally forgetting that it was not God, but she and my dreadful aunt Anne, who did all the joining together. I doubt God was consulted. Ugh,” he groaned, closing his eyes in disgust.
The subject of his family always leads to noises like that.
“Well, I shall send her something,” I said brightly.
“My mother?”
“No, your sister. Her wicked husband can hardly object to a gift from a common actress in London, can he? What would be the harm? And it may cheer her to know how deeply you worry for her and fondly you think of her. Yes, I shall look for a gift tomorrow. Toady husband be damned.”
Charles threw back his head and laughed. “Ah, Nell, there is truly no one like you.”
He sat up and twined his arms around my waist. I giggled archly, wiggling deeper into his embrace. By the time Mrs. Chiffinch brought the lemon cakes she found the door locked.
Note—Together we picked out several lovely gifts for the princess: an inlaid music box, sapphire ear-drops, and several miniatures of Charles’s favourite spaniels, done in oil. Charles wrote a touching letter and tucked it inside the music box. I wrote a brief note, introducing myself and humbly wishing her well.
Undated
Missed three rehearsals in a row, as I was literally ordered by the king to stay in bed. How delicious. I am sure I will never be cast again. We’ve stayed up the past three nights until three or four, either roistering with the Wits or simply curled up, the two of us, on the royal sofa with the royal spaniels, whispering until dawn. Yet each morning Charles rises at six for his customary constitutional: a five-mile walk and a one-hour swim. His poor councillors scramble to keep up with him, reading their reports aloud to him as they trot along, and then must shout their counsel from the side of the lake each time he comes up for air. He ends with feeding the ducks in St. James’s Park, by which time his advisors are quite winded and need to sit down.
Note—Charles asked me tonight what sort of hospital I would like. “A hospital for unwed mothers? A surgical hospital? A leper hospital?”
“Ex-servicemen,” I answered promptly, surprising him. For my father.
December 17—Drury Lane
It began all right: Charles and I went to the Theatre Royal, where we saw Catiline’s Conspiracy—thank goodness I was not cast in that. Doom and gloom for three hours, Ben Jonson or no. Hart was good as Catiline but a bit stiffin his right leg. I wonder, has he injured himself? He never will admit a weakness. And Nick was convincing as Cicero, but it is a part I know he loathes. After the performance we went backstage to congratulate the cast. There was a moment of terrifying awkwardness when my former lover (Charles) bowed to my new lover (King Charles), and then Johnny Rochester and Buckhurst (also Charles) turned up and began to giggle at the tableaux.
“Remind me never to introduce you to a man named Charles,” the king whispered playfully in my ear, slipping a protective arm around my waist as we left.
In the carriage I broached the subject: “Buckingham stopped by the theatre the other day,” I opened.
“Mmm,” the king responded mildly, fastening and unfastening the catches on the curtained windows. He must always take everything apart to see how it works.
“He told me what has happened—about your brother and the navy.” I sensed danger but decided to press ahead. “Maybe you should—”
“He told you what?” he asked in a tight voice. “That he and Arlington have banded against me? That they are trying to discredit my own brother, my heir, for not better financing the navy—with what money, I ask you?” He pulled the tassel off the curtain fabric in his agitation. “That when he talks of being off with his women, he is, in fact, secretly meeting almost daily with the republican parliamentary leaders Wildman and Owen? Men who supported Cromwell! That he is filling my son Monmouth’s head with ideas of legitimacy and kingship? Impossible ideas that will only lead to his ruin. That Buckingham, my oldest and dearest friend, whose father was my father’s oldest and dearest friend, is bullying my brother—the heir to the throne—and single-handedly trying to strangle my government? What? What is it that Buckingham told you?”
I sat back, shocked at this outburst. “No, he said—”
“Buckingham always has an axe to grind—he only grinds for himself alone—so careful, my dear, when you throw your lot in with him,” he said brutally.
“I’ve thrown in my lot with you!�
�� I protested, catching at his sleeve in my panic.
He turned away and did not respond. When we arrived at the palace he alighted alone, without waiting for a footman, slamming the coach door closed behind him.
Kissing my hand formally, he wished me good night. “See the lady back to her lodgings,” he told the coachman, and rapped on the roof before I could argue.
And then I understood. Our time was a refuge. I was a refuge. With that benign question I had become one of the many who wanted to manipulate him—to profit from him. Alone in the coach, I wept into my expensively gloved hands.
Later in my little room under the eaves, I realised: he knew and understood everything. He had all along. He was always ahead of them. He wants his courtiers and advisors to underestimate him—it is how he controls them. If it is not too late, I must never follow suit.
When I Try to Make Amends
December 18
Drury Lane
To be delivered by hand to Whitehall Palace, care of Jerome, the page My darling,
I trespassed where I had no right. Please forgive me.
Your Ellen
December 20, 1668—Theatre Royal
I am not cast, but I hang about the theatre anyway. It is my refuge, my family. Teddy, my anxious shadow, tries to cheer me out of my unhappiness. His remedy is food. All day he has brought little cakes and sweetmeats to tempt me. I am too agitated to eat. Tom sees my malaise and does not ask questions but instead engages me in small meaningless tasks and decisions.
“Best not to brood!” he says with determined gaiety. Together, we plan the Christmas festivities and decorate the theatre for the holiday season. Despite myself, I wound up giggling watching Nick, Michael, and Tom argue—in their booming, classically trained voices—how best to hang the ball of mistletoe.
