Devil Water (9 page)

Francis was subdued because his brother had given him a stern lecture on his want of manners, had forbidden him to speak French publicly, and suggested that he employ his time on something other than hazard, ombre, and basset. Study the Classics, for instance -- or English history. A ridiculous suggestion. Francis had no intention of going north and was brooding about the best way of handling James.

Charles was silent because his head ached, and he was already sick of his affair with Henrietta. He had spent part of three nights with her. Nights of surfeit. He thought of the shadowy firelit hours in the huge soft bed. Smothering whiteness and softness. The scent of musk gone fetid and mingling with sweat. The white softness of her body,
too
soft beneath its concealing wisps of rosy gauze. The sourness of wine on her breath. Her clinging avid insatiability, and the tricks she knew to reinspire lust. He thought of how she had looked when he left her at dawn today and lit a candle so that he might dress. She had shrunk from the light, but he had seen the raddled face, the slack mouth, drooping in lewdness as were the breasts, and even the half-closed black-shadowed eyes. He had escaped without promising the time of his return despite her pleadings. And outside the bedroom door, Juba, the Negro page who always stood on guard, had moved aside to let him pass, while the black face wore a look of knowing lasciviousness.

Charles leaned forward and grabbing the strap threw the coach window down. He inhaled deeply of the cold winter air. James looked around in surprise and Francis said in his languid drawl, “Damme, my dear Charles, I’m sorry you suffer for your interesting excesses, but I don’t see why
I
should.” He began to cough, raised blood-flecked spittle, which he examined on his handkerchief. Then he shrugged.
“Merde!
Shut that window!”

Charles obeyed. James said nothing, though he was distressed by both his brothers. Francis coughed often of late, and was growing thinner, yet he flatly refused to take Dr. Radcliffe’s prescriptions. As for Charles, one guessed of course that there was some sort of dissipation in progress, a whore, no doubt, somewhere -- natural enough later but at sixteen neither vigor nor common sense was well established. It would be necessary to caution Charles about the dangers of gleet or pox, or even blackmail. A prospect James found distasteful.

The coach passed the Palace guards, who saluted when the postilion had stated the Radcliffe business. In the courtyard they drew up before the entrance to the Royal Apartments. The Queen’s vice-chamberlain met them on the steps, and, ushering them up to a small tapestry-hung salon, said that Her Majesty would receive them presently.

There were two magnificent ladies already waiting in the salon. They had been conversing in low tones, but as the Radcliffes entered they both turned and stared at the brothers with open hostility. The elder lady was a stout handsome woman of fifty with graying hair, and golden keys dangling at her ample waist. She glared at the newcomers, then turned her back with a sharp rustle of taffeta. The younger woman -- fair-haired, with bright probing eyes -- seemed to hesitate, then walked forward. “The Earl of Derwentwater?” she said, accurately picking James, who bowed. “I am Lady Cowper, wife to the Lord Chancellor,” she continued. “We -- that is the Duchess of Marlborough and I -- have been discussing your arrival today.”

“Indeed?” said James gently, now understanding the hostility, for nobody in the land was more Whig and anti-Jacobite than the Duchess of Marlborough. He bowed again. “My brothers and I are most flattered to be topic of conversation between two such illustrious ladies.”

The Duchess gave a snort, and whirled around. “What does she
want
of you, that’s what I’d like to know! And who arranged this private audience, which sort of thing has always been
my
privilege. That serpent of a Masham, I presume, for there’s no limit to her insolence!”

“Madam, madam,” said Lady Cowper, anxiously. Everyone knew that the Duchess of Marlborough in a temper would say anything she felt like, even -- and apparently once too often -- to her royal mistress. The Whig cause was shaky these days, and tact would not come amiss with this young Earl who was cousin to the Queen.

“Bah!” said the Duchess. “What’s the use of beating round the bush. Let’s find out what my lord here wants, and then we can tell him that he’ll never get it from that guzzling, witless sack of meal in there.”

Charles stared, jolted out of his own broodings into shocked amusement. It had taken all of them a moment to realize that it was the Queen to whom the Duchess thus referred.

“Her Grace is not herself today,” apologized Lady Cowper quickly. “A touch of fever. My Lord Derwentwater, perhaps you didn’t know that I come from the North as your family does?”

“Why, no,” said James, who had never heard of Lady Cowper until now, though her husband, the Lord Chancellor, was a familiar and enemy name at St. Germain. “What part of the North?”

“Chopwell in Durham. I was Mary Clavering, and am kin to my Lord Widdrington, whom I hear you already know. You must understand however that I share neither Widdrington’s politics nor his religion.”

“Nor mine then,” said James. “We must agree to disagree, my lady.”

That was pretty cool of him, Charles thought, admiringly. Lady Cowper bit her lips. Even the formidable Duchess looked baffled. The small Earl in his lavish flaxen periwig, his blue embroidered satin suit, his amber gold-tipped cane, his shoes with high red heels in the French manner gave a first impression of effeteness. The Duchess, in fact, had just decided that he might be bullied, or possibly bribed into submission. The tone of James’s voice, and the expression of his gray eyes now made this seem unlikely. The Duchess lifted her chin and jingled her golden keys -- the keys Anne had once lovingly bestowed on her as Mistress of the Robes, Groom of the Stole, Keeper of the Privy Purse. Symbols of power, commensurate with the power Marlborough had won for himself at Blenheim, Oudenarde, and Malplaquet. Impossible that this power, so well deserved, might be threatened by a meaching chamberwoman. Abigail Masham! That viper whom the Duchess herself had put near the Queen as spy, and who now rewarded her benefactor with treachery. “What did you pay her, my lord, for this favor today?” said the Duchess through her teeth.

“Pay whom, your grace?” said James. “And I confess the reasons for your choler and insinuations quite escape me. We have no ulterior purpose here. We simply wish to present our respects to Her Majesty as she has requested. I believe our conversation need not be prolonged?” He walked over to the windows and gazed down at St. James’s Park, where Christmas mummers were gyrating in the snow before a few passing noblemen. Charles and Francis joined him at the window.

“Bravo!” said Charles.

“Quelle horreur que ces dames!”
remarked Francis, with a malicious chuckle. Lady Cowper heard in part, and she sent the Duchess, who was preparing to do further battle, a look of warning. French was the language of conspiracy, and the Radcliffes’ behavior appeared threatening.

The vice-chamberlain came in and said that Her Majesty was now prepared to receive His Lordship of Derwentwater and the Honorables Mr. Francis and Mr. Charles Radcliffe.

“Then I am coming too!” announced the Duchess, gathering up her skirts.

“Pardon, your grace,” said the vice-chamberlain. “Her Majesty said nobody else would be received, and she named you in particular.”

“God’s death!” the Duchess cried, color flaming up her cheeks. “What have I done to deserve such treatment -- monstrous ingratitude after a lifetime of faithful service! Oh, she shall hear what I think of this! Fetch ink, pen, and paper!”

As the brothers left the salon the angry Duchess was already sitting at a small desk, and Lady Cowper hung over her with soothing anxious sounds.

Queen Anne lay propped up in her gilt-canopied bed when the brothers were ushered in, and she was an appalling sight, so swollen with dropsy that the embroidered crown on the coverlet did not hide the enormous mound of her belly, and her features beneath a brown wig were blurred in fat. The weak eyes teared constantly, and the hand she extended, though still white and beautifully kept, was knotted at the joints from the rheumatism which had crippled her whole body.

James, Francis, and then Charles knelt and kissed the hand, while the Queen struggled higher on the pillows and peered at them through the dim light. She motioned to a quiet little woman in brown silk, who was the invidious Abigail Masham. “Open the blinds, that I may see better!”

The chamberwoman silently obeyed. Snowy daylight flooded the room and the Queen, blinking, stared from one to the other of the brothers.

“Indeed, Masham --there
is
a likeness, as we heard!” she whispered, dismissing Charles and Francis and turning back to James.
“You,
my lord, are very like him.” She sank back on the pillows and shut her eyes, while the chamberwoman closed the blinds. The Queen gave a shuddering half sob.

“There, there, ma’am,” said Mrs. Masham, gently patting the swollen hand which trembled on the bed. “Pray calm yourself. Here is your potion.” She gave the Queen a china teacup which contained straight brandy. The Queen gulped greedily, not from natural intemperance, as many a sly lampoon had suggested, but because it was the only thing which eased the continual pains of her wracked body.

In a moment she sighed with relief and opened her eyes. “Your pardon, my lord,” she said looking at James. “The resemblance upset me.” Her voice, no longer gasping, was clear and pleasant, even sweet in tone, and James, seeing that he was expected to answer though not certain of his ground, said, “Indeed, Your Majesty, I know I somewhat resemble my cousin the King --” He broke off, as he saw Anne start, and emended hastily, “The Chevalier Saint George, that is, of course.”

The Queen sat up. She spoke with a flash of regal indignation. “Surely you could not think me so moved by any likeness you may have to -- to him they call
the Pretender!
And whom I have never seen.”

“I crave your pardon, ma’am,” James said, quite at a loss.

“ ‘Tis my little William, that I speak of,” said the Queen reproachfully. “The Duke of Gloucester! The erstwhile hope of England, and the only one of my poor children to live past infancy. Ah -- he would have been your age now. Though taller, I warrant, as your brother is.” She gestured towards Charles. “Bring the picture, Masham,” she added.

The chamberwoman took a red velvet case from a drawer and opening it gave the Queen a miniature bordered with diamonds. The Queen held it close between her quivering hands. “See,” she whispered, tracing each feature with her finger, “the large gray eyes, the roundness of the chin -- yet more than that--there is an expression which you share that the painter has not caught.”

James bending respectfully over the miniature, saw a general Stuart look about the eleven-year-old boy but no startling resemblance to himself. He murmured in sympathy. “ ‘Twas the Will of God, to be sure, that Your Majesty lost this poor child; yet everyone must feel for your bereavement.”

“Seventeen times,” said the Queen in a flat, weary voice, “have I quickened with child, and not one has lived. Tis the Will of God -- but I wonder --if it is the punishment of God as well.” Her voice trailed off, she pressed the miniature to her mountainous breasts, and shut again her inflamed eyes.

James thought that the Queen’s illnesses and tragedies might indeed be a judgment on one who had supplanted her father, and had so far refused to recognize the rights of her brother. His heartbeat quickened as he said, “When wrong is done, punishment follows. But wrongs may be repented of, and rectified. There is still time for that, Your Majesty.”

For a moment Charles, who was watching from a little distance beside Francis, thought that James’s grave sincerity had succeeded. That the Queen would speak some hopeful word about the future of the exiled King. A tremor passed over the swollen face, a look of yearning and uncertainty, then it was gone. The weak mouth closed to a stubborn line, and she spoke in querulous displeasure. “So, you too, my lord, must badger me, and remind me of how short a time you think I have to reign. Ah, that they’d let me be -- these dogs and foxes ever yapping and snarling at each other. All that I want, or have ever wanted, is the true good of England.”

“I’ve no doubt of that, ma’am,” said James gently. “I love England too. And I thank you from my heart for the permission to return you gave me.”

“Yes, yes,” said the Queen. “ ‘Twas because they told me you were like my poor little Gloucester, and that you were no intriguer, and would be content to live peaceably upon your great estates up North.”

“I shall, Your Majesty,” said James with utmost conviction.

The Queen stared at him hard for a second. “Were you not Papist I might wish to keep you near my person. There are so few I can trust. Many other peers have turned Anglican -- which is the
true
church. Will you consider it?”

“No, Your Majesty,” said James.

The Queen slumped back again, with a sigh. “Then you may go. Masham, my potion! My knee is aching so. Will you rub it for me? Oh, Abigail, what should I do without your kindness, when all the world else is pain!”

Dr. Radcliffe was greatly disappointed in the account of James’s interview with the Queen. “So you found out nothing at all, except she fancies you look like that hydrocephalic little prince she once had! I might have known ‘twas for some such dim-witted reason she wanted to see you. The woman’s got a mind like a hen -- flutter here, flutter there, never settle anywhere.”

“Her Majesty is ill,” said James with reproof. “Physically unable, I believe, to cope at present with the jangling factions around her.”

The Doctor had the grace to look slightly ashamed. “Oh, no doubt. I kept her well enough in the days when I was her physician, wouldn’t let her gourmandize and swill spirits all the time, though I couldn’t keep her litter of little weaklings alive. ‘Tis a tainted stock. But never mind that. Did she offer you any place or preferment?”