Royal Harlot (16 page)

“Am I to surrender my forfeit, sir?” I asked, holding my head high. “Or are you to claim it?”

Now he rose, too, coming to stand before me, while the other gentlemen around us continued their raucous encouragement.

“In the Christian spirit of compromise and diplomacy, Mistress Palmer,” he announced, “we shall meet in the middle.”

Before I could answer, he’d taken the last step necessary to close the space between us, circled his arm around my waist, and pulled me close to kiss me. He meant to startle me, I know, and to demonstrate that he was still my king and master no matter how I’d amused him beneath the table’s cloth. Doubtless he expected me to sputter and squirm, and try to shove him away, for the entertainment of his friends. Men were always alike in such matters, wanting to make a great show of their manhood whether highborn or low.

But among ladies, I was different. Instead of fighting him like a half-drowned cat—and losing, too, for he was vastly larger and stronger—I slipped my arms about his neck and kissed him as boldly as he was kissing me. Perhaps more boldly, truth to tell, for female passion is sorely undervalued.

And he
was
surprised. I could taste it in his mouth. Surprise, yet excitement, too, as his grasp upon me tightened. So he’d not been left unaffected by our play, nor by me. Oh, most delicious thought! He wanted me, and because he was king he now expected me to remain with him this night, and warm his bachelor bed.

How unfortunate for His Majesty that he’d not get his wish!

I was at last the one to break the kiss, and slip free. While the gentlemen applauded, I curtseyed, and bowed my head in a pretty gesture of acquiescence. “Your winner’s spoils, sir.”

He smiled down upon me with anticipation. “A fair beginning, yes,” he said. “But surely not all. I won far more games than that, Mistress Palmer.”

“I am sorry, sir,” I said with a sigh, “but our wager was for a single kiss, and no more.”

He frowned, the black brows drawing sharply over blacker eyes. “Surely not, madam.”

“Surely yes,
mon sire,
” I said, adding the melting softness of French regret to my voice. “As loyal a subject as I am to you, I fear I must remain more loyal still to my absent husband, and beg leave to retreat to my lodgings for this night.”

With that one sentence, I doused the jollity from the room. Nothing will spoil rollicking male pleasure faster than the protestations of a faithful wife, or at least the pretense of one.

“I mean no insult to Mr. Palmer, of course,” the king murmured, watching me closely and hoping, I suppose, for a change of heart. “But can you not be persuaded to linger in our company?”

I shook my head and demurely lowered my gaze to the floor.

The king grunted with disappointment. As much as he wanted me, I knew he wouldn’t toss me over his shoulder and carry me off, like the pagan kings of old, or at least he wouldn’t before so many witnesses.

“You are certain in your decision, madam?” he asked gruffly. “You will not change?”

“A thousand apologies, sir, but my refusal must stand,” I said softly, my head still bowed, my tender white nape displayed before him. I’d only a view of his large square-toed shoes with the worn red heels and the trailing ribbon lace that he’d neglected to retie in his earlier haste. “I must remember my husband.”

“Your husband is a most fortunate man,” he said and sighed. “As you wish, Mistress Palmer. You have my leave to go.”

“Thank you, sir.” I rose gracefully and began to back from his presence and from the room, as was proper. At the last moment, I looked at him once again, to offer him one final glimpse of my longing and regret.

Surrounded by the others, his face was composed, his expression even and regally distant. Yet in his eyes I discovered such rare merriment that I nearly laughed in return, surprising proof that he’d seen through my demure protests as easily as if they’d been fashioned from the clearest water. And further: he was not angered by my ruse, but entertained no end.

“Sleep well, madam,” he said softly, his eyes bright with amusement and fresh regard. “We shall want you refreshed for tomorrow.”

Tomorrow: ah, I could not wait, nor, I suspected, could the king.

 
I called my maidservant Wilson to my room as soon as I returned to my lodgings, to learn what she’d culled from the servants who waited on the king. Wilson was good that way, most useful to me. She was a clever-witted woman, the spinster daughter of a Chester squire who’d lost both his life and his estates to the war. Roger paid Wilson’s wages, but she’d been quick to realize that the wind would blow in my favor long before it graced Roger, and she trusted me to carry her with me. I trusted her, too, because she was so plain of face: and thus are the best alliances made between women.

“So come, come, tell me all,” I said eagerly, sitting before her so she could tend to my hair while she spoke. Though it was close to dawn, I was not weary. How could I be? I was far too enraptured with the memory of what had occurred between the king and me, and the anticipation of seeing him again. “What are the secrets of His Majesty’s household?”

“His Majesty’s household, madam?” Wilson dug her fingers into the thick tangle of my hair, searching for the few last pins that might be buried within the chestnut waves. “Or the secrets of his bedchamber?”

“Don’t be pert, Wilson,” I said sharply, in no humor to be teased. “Tell me what you heard from his footmen or the others in the kitchen.”

“Yes, madam.” Carefully she began to comb out the knots and curls, beginning at the ends where she wouldn’t pull. “They say that though His Majesty enjoys the company of ladies, and they him, he is not nearly the libertine that the gossips say.”

“Parliamentary tattle, that’s what that is,” I said with a contemptuous sniff. “Cromwell’s men would link Saint Andrew himself to the queen bawd of a Moorfields brothel if they thought their masters would profit from it.”

“Yes, madam, too true,” Wilson said. “Which is not to say His Majesty has abstained from sowing the royal seed while in his exile. He has acknowledged several bastards, as well as their mothers.”

“Tell me of the mothers, not the bastards,” I demanded, wincing as the tortoiseshell comb caught my hair. I needed to hear these facts now, like a bucket of deep well water tossed in my face, to keep my thoughts clear and sharp. “What are their names, their ranks? Has he kept to Englishwomen, or taken these whey-faced Dutch creatures to his bed?”

“Mostly His Majesty has preferred English ladies, madam,” Wilson said, “those who have followed him into exile for one reason or another. He chooses ladies who have experience in worldly matters, whether with husbands or not. They say his tastes for pleasure were honed here on the Continent, madam, and that he relishes a spirited lady who will not be shocked, and likewise enjoys exploring the French and Italian manners.”

I nodded, my anticipation quickening to hear my intuitions about the king thus confirmed, and I thought too of the size and strength and imagination that he’d surely bring to any bout of lovemaking. It had been many months now since I’d last been with Philip, and I’d sorely missed his adventurous inventions whilst in bed with my tediously straightforward Roger. I was, in short, as ready for diversion as I was to advance my future.

“They say the king has no interest in callow virgins,” Wilson continued, “and will scarce remark a too-young lass, no matter how fair. He’s not like some gentlemen for whom chasing maidenhead’s the greatest sport imaginable.”

“Not like some, indeed,” I said, trying not to think of Philip and his unfortunate taste for ever-younger maids. Better to think of what my future could bring than the hard lessons that had come with past pleasures.

“No, madam,” Wilson said, pointedly saying nothing to echo my own thoughts any further. “The first lady in his exile was quite some time ago, an older woman named Betty Killigrew, and sister to the chaplain of His Royal Highness the Duke of York. She gave him a daughter for his efforts.”

“Hah, sing a psalm to that,” I said, amused by the image of a gentleman in orders struggling to reconcile his loyalty to his king with his holy teachings. “Who else, then?”

“In Bruges, there was a Derbyshire lady named Catharine who bore him two more children,” Wilson continued, beginning to draw the brush through my hair in long, sweeping strokes, “and in Paris, the twice-widowed daughter of Viscount Kilmorey. They say she was too old, beautiful but past fecundity, else she would have borne His Majesty a bastard, too.”

I tipped the mirror in my hand so I could see Wilson’s face over my shoulder, as plain as a common pudding wrapped round with her white linen coif. “Why should I care for his nameless brats?”

“Because if you lie with him, madam,” Wilson said, “then you must consider the possibility of bearing a nameless brat of your own.”

“Don’t be impudent,” I said tartly. “I know how to keep myself safe and my belly empty.”

“Whores’ tricks, madam, and not to be trusted,” she said succinctly. “Leastways not with a man so potent as the king.”

I’ll admit that this litany of royal bastards did give me pause, and I did not question its veracity, having met His Majesty and felt for myself the blatant force of his virility. I hadn’t factored a misbegotten child into any of my happy, hazy schemes and plans, though I’d seen how other women had bound their lovers more closely to them by bearing children. And a royal bastard was not like the spawn of a Covent Garden whore. A child carrying half the king’s blood could be legitimized, favored, and granted titles and estates, advantages that no child I might conceive with Roger could ever claim.

Not that I’d confess such thoughts to Wilson. “I’ve never said I intended to lie with His Majesty, have I?”

“No, madam,” Wilson said dutifully, but the extra sniff she added said far more.

“Do not presume to know my mind, Wilson,” I warned. “Tell me instead more of the king’s past lovers.”

“Yes, madam,” she said, unperturbed by my chiding as she separated my hair into sections for braiding for the night. “I’ve told you all who were mentioned by name below stairs. There have been others, too, that were of no lasting note beyond a night or two. Yet they say, madam, that at present no single lady holds the king’s attention.”

I smiled slyly at my reflection in the glass in my hand.
That
would change.

“And of course they’ve all followed after the king’s first mistress, madam,” Wilson continued, “when he was still a prince. You recall her, madam: that Welsh creature Lucy Walters. She died last year in Paris, they say of drink and the French pox.”

“Lucy Walters,” I said, reflecting upon poor foolish Lucy’s fate. I’d heard the king had been her great love, yet she’d sadly neglected to make certain he felt the same for her. I’d not make the same mistake. “Once everyone knew of Lucy Walters, just as everyone’s forgotten her now.”

“You’re the one they’re speaking of tonight, madam,” Wilson said as she plaited my hair. “Even as I sat among them, they whispered of nothing else but your beauty, your grace, and how you’d fascinated the king on so short an acquaintance.”

I smiled with satisfaction, stroking the long braid between my fingers. I’d only another day before I must return to England, but when I recalled how the king had already shown his interest in me, I knew that would be enough to make a good beginning between us.

“Let them whisper, Wilson,” I said with fresh resolve. “I mean to give them plenty more to say, and soon.”

Chapter Seven

BRUSSELS, SPANISH NETHERLANDS
February 1 6 6 0

 
The letter was brought the following morning, before I’d risen from my bed. I’d been expecting such a missive, yet when Wilson drew back the bed-curtains to put it into my sleepy hand, I still felt a shiver of amazement when I recognized the king’s seal pressed into the wax that held the sheet closed. The message within was brief, more a command than any sweet-worded wooing.

 
Come to me tonight,
Carolus R.

 
Carolus R., Carolus Rex, Charles the King, King of England, Ireland, and Scotland: what woman wouldn’t tremble to be summoned by so mighty a person?

“Ha, Wilson, he’s asked me,” I said with a small huzzah of triumph. “The king’s invited me for tonight!”

“Congratulations, madam,” Wilson said. “That was your wish, wasn’t it?”

“Of course it was, you foolish creature, as you knew perfectly well.” I sank back against the pillow-bier, all thought of sleep now gone. “Ah, sweet tonight!”

Wilson sniffed and began to loop the bedstead’s curtains up for the day. “You would not stay with him last night, madam. How was I to guess that this night would be so very different?”

“Because you and I must leave Brussels for home tomorrow,” I explained, though any woman who understood the habits of licentious men would have found it most obvious. “This way, His Majesty can have my company for the single night and no more, and I’ll leave him with the wanting so keen he’ll not be able to put me from his mind.”

Wilson bent down, stuffing the mattress and trundle in which she’d slept at my feet beneath my taller bed.

“That’s a prideful bit of confidence,” she muttered into the bedclothes, “to think she’d so beguile a man such as the king.”

“I heard that, Wilson,” I said swiftly, rolling over in the bed to swat at her arm. “And if I weren’t so certain I would beguile His Majesty, as you said, I’d have you thrashed for it.”

Primly she folded her hands across her apron, as if she’d said nothing wrong. “What if the king never does come back to London, madam? What if Parliament refuses to bow down and send for him to rule again, and all your confidence and cunning come to naught?”

“Then I will have gambled and lost,” I said, stretching my hands over my head. “It won’t be the first time, nor the last. But if I am not willing to stake such a risk for the sake of my future, why, then I truly deserve to be no more than
Monsieur’s
drab. Did you bring chocolate with the letter?”