The French Mistress (26 page)

Before Mr. Montagu could reply, I glanced swiftly back over my shoulder, as if hearing the summons of another in the room.

“Forgive me, if you please, but I’m wanted,” I said. “Good day, sir, and thank you.”

“You’re a rare, kind lady, mam’selle,” he said, his face full of admiration. “A gentle—”

“I’m sorry, sir, but I must go directly.” I dipped him a hasty (but graceful) curtsy, then turned and slipped away. I hurried my steps through the crowded room as if I truly had been called on some urgent errand, twisting and turning so I knew I’d be lost from the ambassador’s view.

As soon as I was certain he could no longer see my face, I smiled. I couldn’t help it, and why should I? The ambassador believed me to be a rare, kind lady. I might have erred once, true, but I’d proved to myself that I’d still a few cards left to play.

And for the present, I’d won.

Chapter Twelve

CHÂTEAU DE VERSAILLES
August 1670

 

 

 

R
estless as always, Louis shifted the Court from Paris to his château at Versailles soon after Madame’s death, to reside there until the funeral in Paris at the end of August. Monsieur agreed that his household should follow the king’s to the country, perhaps bowing to his brother’s insistence, perhaps simply because he’d wearied of having us all under his exclusive care. Whatever the reason, I was glad to leave the city behind, and glad, too, not to return to Saint-Cloud, where I sadly sensed Madame’s departed spirit in every corner of the house and gardens. By contrast, Versailles reflected only the king’s magnificence and an impersonal one at that, and in a strange way it was easier for me to find peace for my own reflections and sorrows if I were only an insignificant one among a crowd of many, than in the too-empty rooms of Saint-Cloud or the Palais-Royal.

As Ralph Montagu had warned me, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, arrived to join us later that week. He’d often come to Paris before to visit his sister, who served at the Court, or to avoid his own king’s disapproval over his latest mischief in London. But as Madame had often said with disgust, no matter what trouble His Grace contrived to find—and he found much—his king always forgave him.

Lord Buckingham’s appearance now was proof enough of that. In London he was living the most scandalous life imaginable, having cast out his wedded wife in favor of his mistress, the Countess of Shrewsbury, whose husband the duke himself had murdered in a duel. Now this wicked, unremorseful lady was said to be lolling in the duke’s house, great with his bastard child, yet still the king had sent Lord Buckingham to Paris as his official representative to Madame’s funeral, and as the minister in charge of negotiating a new treaty.

If a man of such low character and habits had been sent to Versailles at any other time, I would have expected Louis to take offense. Offense, however, was not an indulgence even the king could afford at present. Montagu had told me that Charles and the rest of England believed the princess had been poisoned, and it was whispered that the letters the English king wrote to his French cousin were full of accusations and uncomfortable questions.

Why was Louis so quick to accept that Madame had died a natural death, when all the circumstances seemed to suggest otherwise? Why had Louis not protected the English princess more closely, and instead left her to founder and languish under the attacks of her husband? Why hadn’t she been loved and treasured in France the way she had been in England, the way such a sweet and generous lady deserved?

Worse still, Madame had apparently confided the more sordid details of her wretched marriage to her brother at Dover, details she’d heretofore not trusted to letters. Charles was rightly appalled, and demanded answers that Louis did not possess. Charles’s raw grief overcame his more usual politesse, to the point that he’d threatened to withdraw England from any further talks and alliances with France.

Thus Louis was faced with the challenge of not only soothing a grieving brother, but also preserving his long-desired alliance with England, and the first step Louis took was to welcome the odious Lord Buckingham (and by extension all Britain) with a considerable show of regard. Despite our Court’s mourning, the duke was honored with receptions and fetes and suppers, and given a choice place at Louis’s side, whether whilst hunting or dining. When Louis opened the negotiations for the new treaty, he was expansive and accommodating, agreeing to most everything that Lord Buckingham proposed. Why shouldn’t he, considering everything of note had been decided earlier in Dover and these negotiations were an empty sham? But in his ignorance, the duke believed that the ease of the negotiations was due entirely to his own facility, and puffed his chest out all the more on account of it.

To further the good feelings of the English, Louis even went so far as to grant Lord Buckingham’s lover, that wayward harlot countess, a gift of ten thousand gold livres for their unborn child. Louis guessed that all of this would be reported back to Charles and, more, that the vainglorious duke would likely embellish the largesse even further in his telling.

Louis’s judgment proved right. To anyone who’d listen, Lord Buckingham boasted of how well he was being treated, and how he was certain no other English peer had ever been received with so much pomp and awe: all of which, of course, he deserved.

I suppose that once he’d been a handsome gentleman, for in his aging, debauched face I could sometimes glimpse the remnants of a faded charm and comeliness, but despite his strutting pride, I found little left in his appearance to impress me. His vulpine face was often puffy and lined with the marks of the previous night’s excess, several of his teeth were brown and broken, and there were streaks of gray in his wispy ginger-colored mustache and beard. He was careless in his dress, too, with the cuff of a costly shirt trailing lace and greasy spots from a long-ago supper scattered over the breast of his well-tailored coat.

Out of the duke’s hearing, there was much amusement made at his expense, a sport that I did not share. I remembered too well how Madame had distrusted him for his cunning and cleverness as well as for always having her brother’s favor. While others mocked the duke’s dress, I watched how he rode to the hunt with great skill yet also a wild intensity, and considered, too, how he’d a reputation as a masterful duelist. Gentlemen with those skills are often reckless with their lives, and pursue everything they do with the same abandon, as if always with a blade in their hands. Reckless men make for dangerous men, and, like Madame, I resolved to avoid Lord Buckingham as long as I could.

It should have been an easy resolution to keep. Though I’d been introduced to him as one of Madame’s attendants, I was relieved that he seemed to have no memory of me now. Even if he had, I doubted he’d pay me any court. I was far too insignificant a creature for him to bother with.

But though in France I’d no way of realizing it, my value had risen dramatically in England since His Majesty had taken so much notice of me in Dover. Because Monsieur had made his exclusion a condition of Madame’s visit, the duke had not been there, but he’d heard much about our visit, and most specifically about me. And, like the excellent hunter that he was, it didn’t take him long before he’d tracked me down.

It was late in the day, at the end of a long, tedious, and hot afternoon. As powerful as His Most Christian Majesty might be, not even Louis could control the weather, and ever since the Court had returned to Versailles, we’d been plagued by a relentless heat. As the sun had dropped lower in the sky, the day had grown more bearable, and I’d agreed to go walking with several other ladies and gentlemen beside the Grand Canal.

The canal was an enormous rectilinear pond, crossed by a second, lesser one, that the king had had created in the château’s park. The canal served several purposes: not only did it contribute to a pleasing, glittering vista from the château’s windows, but it also acted as a kind of reservoir, collecting and storing the water that was pumped to the many fountains throughout the gardens and park. In addition, it was a place of amusement, the setting for elaborate fireworks and mock sea battles, as well as a collection of gilded gondolas, much in demand for flirtations, that had been sent to the king as a gift from the Doge of Venice.

On this particular evening, the canal offered a pleasant retreat for a promenade. The wide, flat expanse of water made the air seem more agreeable, and the rustle of the evening breezes through the tops of the tall Italian poplars was more sweet than any choir. Sweet, too, was the freedom of this hour, a rare thing at Versailles, where most of the day’s activities were minutely ordered for us courtiers. From six to nine thirty, His Majesty would be occupied with his private secretary, and none of us would be expected to attend him until ten o’clock, when we were all required by ritual to stand in the antechamber of the king’s suite and watch him dine with the rest of the royal family. Until then, our time would be our own.

Our little party walked in the shade of the poplars, though we ladies still carried parasols and wore wide-brimmed lace hats against any errant sunbeam. The company was acquaintances, not true friends, and when I wearied of their chatter, I let my steps slow so that I lagged behind, yet no one took it amiss. I paused and closed my eyes, relishing how the breeze played over my face and ruffled my skirts around my ankles. Alas, I was not alone for long.

“Good day, Mademoiselle de Keroualle,” a gentleman said behind me, an English gentleman, for all that he spoke French. “Here you are at last.”

I was so startled, my eyes flew open, and I drew back. “Your Grace,” I murmured. Swiftly I closed my parasol and curtsied. “You surprise me.”

Sweeping his hat from his head, Lord Buckingham smiled warmly, and placed one hand over his heart. “You surprise me, too, mademoiselle. Descriptions of your beauty didn’t begin to prepare me for the magnificence I find before me at this moment.”

“You honor me, Your Grace.” I did not smile, not wishing to encourage him. Instead I glanced toward the rest of my party, twenty paces away. “Pray forgive me, Your Grace, but I should rejoin my friends who—”

“They can wait.” With forceful grace, he stepped close to me, blocking my way of escaping to the others. “I cannot.”

I stood my ground, fighting my instant urge to bolt and race away. That would not do, of course, for ladies did not run like country hoydens. He was tall and thick, a formidable figure. I did not flinch before him, but slowly furled my parasol to hold square before me in my hands. I was not so foolish as to believe that I could overpower him with my humble weapon of ivory, silk, and bone, or that I’d even try to defend myself. Rather I wished to demonstrate my composure, and prove to him I’d not be flustered by his bullying. Besides, I wasn’t in any real danger from him; the others of my party were increasingly distant, but still within hearing, and if I called out to them in distress, I was certain they’d come to my rescue.

“Then speak, Your Grace,” I said evenly. “I wait for your every word.”

That made him laugh. “You pleased my king, mademoiselle. He has spoken of you incessantly since Dover, of your beauty, your charm, and your wit, but most of all, of your innocence. You drove him quite mad, you know.”

“Indeed,” I said, determined not to betray my true feelings for the king again, as I had with Ralph Montagu. “I am sorry, for that was not my intention.”

“No?” He raised his ginger brows in disbelief, but also amusement. “There’s scarcely a young woman in England who doesn’t wish to set the king to lusting for her.”

I smiled ingenuously. “But I am different, Your Grace. I am French, and I am a lady.”

“Oh, you are that,” he said, studying me closely, like a connoisseur with a new acquisition. “You’re that, and more.”

I felt my cheeks flush beneath his scrutiny. “Are you disappointed, Your Grace? Did you wish me to be otherwise than I am?”

“You surpass all my wishes, and my expectations, too,” he said, nodding with satisfaction. “You’re as fine a French lady as I’ve ever seen. I’m thoroughly enchanted.”

To my surprise, he held out his arm to me. “Will you walk, mademoiselle? I’ve found that conversations are often more agreeable when they’re not planted square on the ground to take root.”

I smiled, for I’d not expected him to make so light of his own restlessness. No wonder he’d such a reputation for charm when he wished to employ it. I was flattered that he thought me worth the effort. Perhaps, I thought, it would be better to have him as my ally than otherwise, particularly if I wished to see His Majesty again.

“Thank you, Your Grace, you are most kind.” I slipped my hand into the crook of his arm, and let him set an ambling pace beneath the lengthening shadows of the poplars.

His conversation, however, moved much more swiftly.

“As beguiling as you are, mademoiselle, you are not the only woman claiming His Majesty’s attentions,” he said. “Little Nelly Gwyn has just last month presented him with his latest bastard son.”

“She is the actress, yes?” I said. “Madame feared she was too much below the king. She said such a . . . connection was debasing to both the king and his crown.”

“Ah, well, poor Nell can’t help that she was born in a brothel, can she?” he said with such ripe condescension that I almost felt sorry for the woman. “But yes, she’s the actress. A merry little soul, but she hasn’t enough substance to occupy the king for long.”

“I should have thought Lady Castlemaine did that.” I glanced up at him from beneath the lacy brim of my hat. The duke was a large man, but not so tall as the king, which I suspected must vex His Grace mightily. “She is a most beautiful lady, Your Grace, and His Majesty appears most attached to her.”

He grunted. “Barbara is a most beautiful, greedy, lascivious, old shrew, and I should know, since we’re cousins.”