Exit Lady Masham (8 page)

"I'm tied up like a cow for a rutting bull!" Masham was almost shouting. "I'm trussed and garroted! All that little jade has to do is dab an ink patch on her temple and tell Great Anna that I smote her. And then, thank you very much, poor Sam here will be dispatched to some hellhole of a Carib isle to sweat out his days overseeing a troop of blackamoors. Was ever a man so had? Why, if the new Mistress Masham so much as sighs in the royal presence, she will be asked: 'What has the fiend been doing to my little dove?'"

"You're like Bertram in
All's Well,
" Harley observed with equanimity, and I remembered that the Queen herself had referred to this title of Mr. Shakespeare's.

"I'm telling you I bleed to death, and you talk of Bertram! Who's Bertram? Some literary character, I suppose. Do you
live
in books, Harley?"

"He's the hero of one of Mr. Shakespeare's comedies," Harley replied, unruffled. "Helena is the poor cousin who loves him, but who cannot look so high. However, when she cures the King of France of his fistula, she is rewarded by being allowed her pick of the royal knights for a husband. She chooses Bertram, of course, but he protests to the King that she is not his equal."

"And the King lets him off? It's easy to see he didn't have a
queen
to deal with!"

"On the contrary, the King commands him to marry her. Bertram can avoid his fate only by stealing off to the wars." Here Harley winked at me. "We shall have Sam in Flanders yet, Abigail."

"I may well come to it! Think of it! To marry a chambermaid! And why? Has
she
cured the Queen of a fistula?"

"She's cured her of something just as bad: ennui. Sam, you're making a great fuss over nothing. If your name is ever in the history books, it will be as Abigail's husband. When will you learn, my lad, that in the game of power it's not title that counts, but proximity to the royal ear?"

"But the Queen doesn't govern.
You
should know that. Doesn't everyone say she's putty in the hands of her ministers?"

Masham came over to Harley now and straddled a chair, leaning over its back to face his interlocutor. I reflected sourly what a poor creature I was about to marry. His present indignation was as feigned as his erstwhile ardor; he had no passions at all, only a mild acquisitiveness. If Harley could convince him that I was an asset in disguise, he might very well prove an amicable if uninteresting spouse. But, oh, my dear mistress, my afflicted, worried sovereign, with what greatness of heart had she intervened to save her servant 1 As my mind rocked back and forth between Masham and my liege lady, I wondered if I should ever love any person, even the babe beginning in me, as I was now learning to love Queen Anne.

"Many bigger men than you have made that mistake about Anne Stuart," Harley expounded patiently. "Take it from me that, in the last ditch, she has a will of iron. She can be pushed just so far, kicked just so hard, and then, bang, you find that your foot is shattered. There are many great peers, many great Whig lords, but don't forget it is
she
who prorogues or dissolves Parliament and
she
who picks and discharges her ministers. She could reduce the great Marlborough to a simple ensign tomorrow. She could..."

"Don't forget what happened to her father!"

"And don't you talk treason, my friend! King James used his power stupidly. But he had it to misuse; that's my point. His daughter isn't going to make that mistake. In fact, she isn't going to make any mistakes. She bides her time. Bide along with your wife-to-be, Sam, and you may yet see great things."

"Great things for whom?"

"Great things for all of us."

"Give me one instance."

"Come, doubting Thomas, you must learn some faith! But, anyway, how else can you play your hand? The Queen wants the marriage; it would be folly to refuse her. If you perform it in a sullen fashion, you will lose all credit with her. Therefore be cheerful! Act as though it were the highest honor in the land to marry a woman of her bedchamber, and..."

"And?"

"And who knows? You may yet be a peer."

Masham turned and bowed to me. "Greetings, Lady Masham!" he exclaimed mockingly.

But at least he was smiling now; I was to wed, it seemed, an easygoing man. Love? Of course he did not love me. He would never love any woman. After all, did I love him? I might deem myself fortunate to have a father for my unborn child. I think it was at that moment that I had my first premonition of what my matrimonial life would be: Masham would keep me always pregnant to show the world that I belonged to him. And that as soon as I began to swell he would desert my bed for any other that was offered. As Harley had said, he was one of those males that can mate at any time with any female. There are worse husbands. At least he has never beaten me, and if he ever reads these pages, it will be too late.

M
asham and I were married in Dr. Arbuthnot's apartments in St. James's Palace in the presence of the good doctor and his wife, my sister Alice (whom I had now established in the royal household), Mrs. Danvers and the Queen. None of us wore a wedding garment, and the ceremony took place in an almost conspiratorial silence and haste. Dean Thompson, who officiated, started reading the service as soon as my mistress, assisted by her trusty companion, Danvers, had hobbled through the doorway to take her seat in the armchair by the improvised altar. The moment he had delivered the benediction, the Queen rose, embraced me and took her leave. Masham, mollified by the royal presence, was an almost passionate lover that night.

The next day my duties were resumed in normal fashion, and the Queen made no comment on what had happened. My husband and I continued to dwell apart, but as the Prince's apartments adjoined the Queen's, visitations were easily arranged and, at least in the first months of my pregnancy, were frequent. Nobody need have learned of the marriage until my condition betrayed it, had not the Queen's wedding gift of two hundred pounds showed up on the household accounts and attracted the immediate attention of the Duchess of Marlborough, as dutiful to the royal finances as she was negligent of the royal person.

I was informed of this by the Queen herself. She seemed upset when I came to her chamber that morning and pulled me close to her when I knelt to tie her slipper.

"The Duchess knows about your wedding. She found my gift in the accounts and challenged me about it. You should have heard her! I might have been a housemaid caught with her hand in the till. When I told her what it was for, she really burst out. Why had you not come to her first? I told her I had advised you to."

This was not true, but was it up to me to contradict the Queen? I nodded.

"Shall I go to her, ma'am?"

"Yes. Right now, I think. But aren't you scared, child?"

"How can I be scared when I married with Your Majesty's blessing? What can the Duchess do to me?"

"She can make a great racket."

"I shall survive it."

I curtsied and took my leave. But my heart failed me for a moment when I faced the Duchess, magnificent in blue, seated on a divan of white damask in her apartment. Her tone was loud and harsh as she fixed her lustrous eyes on me.

"Well, Mistress Abigail! Is this the way you treat your nearest kin? By letting your cousin Sarah, who rescued you from penury and an early grave, learn that you have taken a husband by reading of the Queen's gift?"

"I crave your pardon, Cousin. I wanted you to be the first to know..."

"And not the last, miss!"

"I wanted you to be the first, but I lacked the courage to intrude my little news on the attention of one who must bear the world on her shoulders. And when the deed was done, I was so terrified at not having told you, I resolved to keep it a secret!"

The Duchess appeared to consider my excuse. For a moment I almost hoped that she would accept it. But this hope blew away with her next response.

"Surely you know me better than that. Have you ever seen me neglect the least of my duties because of greater responsibilities?"

"I dared not think that I was one of your duties, Duchess."

"You are my kin. Did you think I might disapprove your choice?"

"I thought it possible."

"It was more than possible. I
do
disapprove it. Very much. Was Masham a man to wed the cousin of Lord Marlborough's wife?"

"I hadn't presumed so to think of myself."

"Well, you may be sure Masham had!" The Duchess's laugh was half snort, half cackle. "You may be sure he saw the Captain-General behind the red nose of the bedchamberwoman!"

I flushed. Even from her I had not been prepared for such rudeness. "Mr. Masham is a worthy man," I murmured.

"A worthy man to smirk at the Prince's jokes. And to skip to open a door for his betters!"

"Cousin, you are severe!"

"Do you think I don't know the man? You've picked an ass!"

I had to take a deep breath to guard my temper. "It was not in my sphere to look higher. Mr. Masham is all I want."

"Well, even if your aim is as lowly as you say, I'm surprised that
his
is. What made him take you so poor? Are you pregnant?"

"And if I were," I retorted, frankly angry now, "how would that have aided me? Had I a father to protect my honor and march a man to the altar? Had I anyone but a cousin who insults and reviles me?"

"You had your bully of a brother Jack. He's quick enough to quarrel. I don't suppose your gallant would have relished that. Masham's sword, I daresay, is more for show than use."

It was now that I made my mistake. It was not like me to be indiscreet, but, really, her arrogance was more than flesh and blood could bear! That she, married to the greatest soldier in Europe, should jeer at my husband's courage! Were
no
insects too small for her treading heels?

"Do you really think, Duchess," I demanded in a cooler tone, "that if mine had been the forced match you suppose, the Queen would have honored us with her presence?"

Well, if I was an insect, at least I had stung! Sarah made no effort to conceal her astonishment. "The Queen was there? The Queen went to your wedding!"

"There were only six persons present. It was at Dr. Arbuthnot's apartments at Saint James's."

"And the Queen went without letting me know! Are you trying to tell me, Mistress Masham, that you have supplanted me in Her Majesty's affections?"

In my embarrassment and confusion I failed to sense the heavy sarcasm of her tone. "Oh, I'm sure Her Majesty will always be kind to you!" I exclaimed.

"Kind to me!" The Duchess rose, dark of countenance. For a few moments she seemed actually unable to speak.

"Get out of this chamber!" she shouted at last, and I fled before the tempest.

A
week later I was seated by the Queen in her drawing room at Hampton Court. Her armchair had been pulled up before the bay window so that she had a full view of the great fountain, which was in full play. Never had I been more conscious of the contrast between the monarch and the woman. My poor mistress was having bad twinges of gout. One of her feet rested on a footstool, tied up in a poultice, and she clasped a dirty damp bandage in her right hand. Her robe was loose and stained in front from saliva that she had just coughed up, and her face was red and mottled. It was almost impossible to keep her clean. But on the ceiling, over her chair, she was painted, erect, majestic, on a throne floating amid clouds, adored by the Graces, attended by the Muses, a bright sword held upright in one hand, the scales of justice dangling from the other, while at her feet a cornucopia spilled out the riches of her realms.

"The Duchess is very wrathful," she said in her flat tone. "She wants me to dismiss you. I asked what you had done. She said you had been guilty of the basest ingratitude. That you owed her the smock on your back; nay, your very life."

"It is true, ma'am."

"Then you
have
been ungrateful?"

"While I was employed by the Duchess, I served her loyally."

I knew better than to get ahead of the Queen. In her good time she would ask me all the questions that she wished answered. Royalties are not like other persons. They are naturally suspicious, even of those whom they most wish to trust. From childhood they have been surrounded by masks.

"What about after your employment had ceased?"

"I was then in the service of Your Majesty. Does the Duchess suggest that my first duty was still to her?"

The Queen grunted. "She says you deserted her for me."

"It was she who placed me in Your Majesty's household. Did she mean my first duty still to be to her?"

"She claims that having proved a deserter once, you may prove so again. That you are not to be trusted."

"Assuming me to be treacherous, to whom could I betray the Queen of England?"

"To France. To my brother at St. Germain."

When the Duchess threw stones, she certainly picked large ones! But I wondered if even she would have made so reckless an accusation. Could it have been the Queen's idea? I shuddered, recalling as a child being dragged by my brother Jack to see a man hanged and quartered for treason. I had screamed and closed my eyes and put my hands over my ears, but not before I had witnessed horrors that I still think of when I wake up in the early morning.

"I have no friends in the court of St. Germain, ma'am. The Duchess has a sister there."

The Queen was silent for several moments. "I told her I was going to keep you," she said at last.

"Bless you, ma'am!"

She looked at me in her steady, sad way. When I say there was something cowlike in that gaze, it sounds impossibly impudent. Yet there it was, the hurt, suspicious, resigned look.

"You don't want to leave me, child?"

"Forgive me, ma'am." I leaned over to press my lips upon her gouty hand. "I love Your Majesty. I love Your Majesty, God forgive me, more than I love my husband. More even than I loved my poor father."

It was true, and the Queen believed it. That was the whole secret of the rise of Abigail Hill. The Queen had become my life. People will say it is impossible to love a queen entirely for herself, that the desire to approach a monarch is too strong an urge not to pre-empt a good part of what might otherwise have been a natural affection. And then it may be argued that Queen Anne lacked the personality that would have inspired such devotion had she been born in a humbler sphere. These things may be valid, yet the love that was inspired in me, as a subject or a servant or even a nurse, was still a complete and abiding love. However it came, whencesoever it came, it was the force of my existence.