The King's Favorite

by Susan Holloway Scott

  I nodded, and dutifully raised my mouth to his. He patted the curve of my cheek, part of his habit with me, and turned to leave.

  I rubbed my fingers over the empty leather envelope in my hand, all that I’d left of so many dreams. “Sir?”

  He paused at the door, his expression already preoccupied with other matters as he looked back over his shoulder.

  “The Cham of Tartary,” I said. “That was a rare bit of foolishness, wasn’t it?”

  “It was indeed,” he said. “No one can make me laugh as you do, Nelly.”

  I forced myself to smile. “I’m glad of that, sir,” I said softly. “I’m glad.”

  But the king was already gone.

  Lord Rochester paused, his fork halted in the air halfway to his mouth and the roasted squab poised upon the tines forgotten. “What did you say, Nell?”

  “ ’Tis nothing, my lord,” I said, looking down at my own plate so he’d not notice the guilty flush on my cheeks. “I misspoke.”

  “You most certainly did not,” he exclaimed, his voice rising to fill our private dining room. “By God, Nell, if what you just told me is true, then I’ll go to His Majesty myself and demand satisfaction for your sake.”

  “Quiet, you blustering rogue, quiet,” I ordered in a furious whisper, “else the keep will call up the watch and have us hauled away for threatening the king.”

  After seeing a new play by Etherege done by the Duke’s Company, we’d come to dine here at Chatelin’s in Covent Garden. The door to our little room was shut, true, but the drawer or the potboy could return at any time, especially if Rochester kept shouting like this.

  Yet I was the one to blame for his racketing now, and I should have known better than to make such a confession to him. Having done so made me feel disloyal to Charles, as if I’d betrayed him instead of the other way around. Likewise I should have recalled how easily Rochester’s temper was sparked these days, set aflame by next to nothing. Whether this came from the copious amount of wine he took or from the pox that was slowly consuming him, I didn’t know: but the dear, witty gentleman I’d once known had mostly vanished, to be replaced by this vengeful hothead.

  He drank deep of his wine, glaring across the table at me as he thumped the empty glass down hard on the cloth.

  “Tell me true, Nell,” he said, his voice thankfully more moderate. “Did the king withdraw the title he’d promised to you?”

  “He didn’t exactly withdraw it,” I said carefully, “for now I realize he’d never really granted it, not so’s he couldn’t take it back. It wasn’t even a duchy, such as he’s given to Cleveland and Portsmouth. I was to be Countess of Plymouth.”

  The title that had once held so much magic to me sounded hollow and empty now, even foolish, to the point that I hated to speak it aloud.

  “Plymouth.” He shook his head and swore a black, powerful oath, strong even to my ears. “I doubt the king ever meant to give that particular title to you, Nell. I’ve heard it’s already promised to one of his early bastards, the boy by Lady Greene.”

  “Ahh.” That was all I’d say, for it was not my nature to be forlorn or full of pity for myself or my own little sons. “Most likely he forgot, that is all.”

  Pouring the last of the wine from the bottle into his glass, he gave me a withering look that made me feel an even greater fool. “Has Hewitt given you the leasehold to your house?”

  “Not yet,” I admitted. “Though the king has promised that—”

  “Then I trust at least he’s given you a respectable income to support yourself.”

  “Oh, aye,” I said proudly, for I was proud of my income, so great a sum that in the beginning I’d had trouble even conceiving of a sum so large. “I’ve four thousand pounds for my own use, and another thousand for the keeping of the boys.”

  “Do you have it for life, or only so long as is the king’s pleasure?”

  Faith, who would have thought the earl was so shrewd? “Only for the king’s pleasure,” I admitted, “on account of still being a commoner.”

  “Which is no doubt what the royal agents told you,” he said, sadly shaking the now-empty wine bottle. “Oh, Nell, Nell, how I’ve neglected your education in this regard!”

  “ ’Od’s blood, Rochester,” I said defensively, snatching the empty bottle from him to set it from harm’s way. “It’s not as if the king has purposefully tried to slight me, or wronged me in any way.”

  “My dear, honesty is a luxury that only a rich man can afford,” he said, speaking with the patience that weary parents employ with slow-witted children. “Our king is exceeding generous—and honest—when his coffers are full of jingle, and a crafty old miser the rest of the time. Every favor is a result of politics and intrigue. Now, what of your leases, your incomes from your posts and appointments?”

  “I haven’t any.” Now truly I did feel shamed, though loath to admit it. “But I understand how impoverished the Crown is after the Dutch wars, and how there are only so many appointments to be granted, and—”

  “Stop making excuses for him, Nell,” he said crossly, tipping the wine left in my glass into his. “The king has more plums in his basket than you or I could count. Consider me, idle sot that I am, and all that I’ve accumulated. I’m a Gentleman of the Bedchamber, with a pension for life and lodgings at Whitehall whenever I please to occupy them. I’ve a commission as captain of horse in the army. I’m a gamekeeper in Oxfordshire, Deputy Lord Lieutenant in Somerset, and Master and Keeper of the King’s Hawks. All that, and I’ve not even fucked the man, as you have.”

  “But Danby’s said there’s to be no more money squandered on the misses, and that we must live within our incomes,” I protested. “His Majesty’s told me that himself.”

  “Do you believe he’s told the same to Cleveland?” he asked, incredulous. “Or to Portsmouth? You’ve been too forgiving to the old rascal, Nell, and too gentle by half. For years now you’ve prettily baited your hook, then let him wriggle free with the worm in his mouth. Now it’s time he was made to pay.”

  “You’re not to challenge him, my lord,” I warned, panicking. “Not on my behalf.”

  “No one challenges the king, sweet.” He laughed at that. “But do you love Old Rowley that much?”

  “I do,” I said fiercely, without hesitation. “I’d rather be left with nothing than have you harm him in any way.”

  His laughter faded to a quizzical smile. “A whore in love?”

  “Aye, you dog,” I said proudly, “as you know full well.”

  “Would that the king was the man you deserve, sweet.” He sighed and shook his head. “I’ll ask Buckhurst’s advice in this, as well, for he’s already found ways to pick Danby’s pocket with success.”

  “Buckhurst?” I couldn’t imagine my old lover from those long-ago summer days in Epsom beseeching the king on my account.

  “Yes, Buckhurst,” he said, clearly amused by my skepticism. “It will be sport for us, you see, rather like hunting wild boars. I’ll be honest with you, my dear. I’m too bully an Englishman to sit back on my heels and watch all that lovely French gold trickle into the greedy maws of the Catholic whores. Better I help divert a respectable share of it to you and your sons, in the name of everything Protestant.”

  He rested his head against his arm, as if the effort of both the speech and his promise had exhausted him, his wig tipped askew and his eyes so heavy-lidded that they were scarce open to see.

  “I told you, Nell,” he said, his voice little more than a rasping whisper. “It’s all politics and intrigue, intrigue and politics.”

  “Not entirely, you lying bastard,” I said with real affection. “You’ve more kindness in you than you wish to admit.”

  He wouldn’t be much longer among us, I realized to my sorrow. I could sense death hovering close to him now, an unwanted guest waiting to share his final revels, and it saddened me no end.

  Now he smiled and winked wearily. “Very well, then. I am a kind, lying bastard, just
as you are a generous, sweet-natured whore who has remained my friend when most others have cast me off. But that shall be our secret, yes?”

  “Aye, my dear, dear friend,” I said, and leaned across the table to kiss him lightly, the way old friends will. “That—all of it—shall be our secret, too.”

  The little dog stood just beyond my reach, her glossy head raised as she watched me, her plumed tail whipping with joyful challenge, and my yellow glove dangling from her jaws.

  “You shouldn’t have let Fan have it, Nelly,” Charles said, laughing at both me and his dog. “She’s a scamp, that one. You’ll never wrest it from her now.”

  “The hell I won’t.” I scowled at the little dog, who growled at me with her mouth full of my glove, a sorry sort of menace. I lunged for her and she danced backward, farther across the neat lawns of the Privy Garden. “Come back here, you! I’ll not be bested by some thieving little bitch!”

  Bunching up my skirts, I tore off my wide-brimmed hat and shoved it at Charles to hold. The dog took another step, and I charged after her. Around and around we raced about the garden, until at last I grabbed her and swept her trembling body into my arms. I worked my glove free of her teeth, and carried my prize back to Charles.

  “There, sir, there,” I said breathlessly, releasing the dog so I could wave my glove in proper triumph. “I told you I’d get it back.”

  “You can’t wear it like that, Nelly,” he said as the guilty dog and her pack of fellows began running more circles about us. “It’s full of holes.”

  “Those aren’t holes.” I waved my hand with a flourish before him, as if the glove weren’t sadly tattered or pocked by dog teeth and sodden with dog spit. “They’re the noble scars of battle, honorably won.”

  He took my hand, drawing it close to his face to offer a frowning inspection of the damage. “I’ll buy you another.”

  “Will you, now?” I asked, teasing. It wasn’t much past dawn, and we were alone in this garden behind the palace, if we chose to amuse ourselves.

  “You know I always make good on whatever mischief the pups cause,” he said mildly. “Or would you rather bring in Rochester and Buckhurst to see that I do?”

  I flushed, caught by surprise. “I will, sir, if I must.”

  “Rochester claims it was his notion, not yours.”

  “He offered to be my agent with you.” I raised my chin, resolving, as Rochester’d said, not to let Charles wriggle away with the worm again. “He believes you treat your other whores better than me, and faith, he’s right.”

  “Nelly,” he said softly. “You’re far more than that to me.”

  Holding my gaze steady, I said nothing, to see if his conscience would work for me instead.

  “Haven’t I shown you proof of my regard, Nell?” he asked, sad and disappointed. “I thought I had. God knows I’d meant to. I’d thought you trusted me to do what was best. I won’t let you want, or our boys, either.”

  Still I kept silent, a mighty challenge for me and a painful one, too, and finally, finally I was rewarded.

  “But so it shall be, my own wicked little sprite,” he said, tracing his finger along my nose. “I’ve listened to your agents. You’re now the mistress of two fine Irish properties, at Dundalk and Carlingford, that should make you and the boys richer by another thousand pounds or so a year.”

  My eyes widened, and I hopped for joy. “Oh, sir, thank’ee! Thank’ee!”

  He grinned with relief, pleased that I was pleased, and I kissed him, too, to show how happy I was with his generosity and with him. He pulled me close, making his desire known, and I eagerly agreed.

  It wasn’t until later that morning, when I’d wakened alone in his great bed of state upstairs, that I realized he’d still made no promise of a title, or the leasehold of the house, either.

  As fast as good news would fly about Whitehall, bad news could make the journey even more swiftly. When it was bad news about bad folk, why, the words seemed borne on veritable wings of quicksilver.

  So it was in November, when the only news on everyone’s lips and ears concerned the Duchess of Portsmouth. When it reached me, my first response was guarded surprise, for the tale was so scandalous, so delicious, so useful to me, that I didn’t dare hope it could also be true. But true it was, and validated by no less a source than His Majesty’s own personal physician.

  The Duchess of Portsmouth had the pox.

  Mortified, Louise kept to her chambers, receiving no one except a constant parade of physicians, surgeons, apothecaries, and even a midwife or two. Louis sent her a magnificent necklace of diamonds and pearls, a consolation, I suppose, for having been poxed in the service of France. Publicly Charles expressed his regret and his sympathy, but everyone noticed how he was not among her visitors. Gallant that Charles was, he’d accepted the blame for poxing her, and given his tastes for occasional visits to the most common of brothels, he could easily have been the culprit.

  But during the time that Portsmouth accused him, Charles had been much more often with me, and I’d never shown any of the symptoms that were plaguing her. A more likely version of the truth was that she’d dallied with a gentleman (or more than one, depending on the storyteller) other than the king, and received this particular souvenir of her infidelity. Some said it had been Danby, for the Lord Treasurer was often seen in her rooms. Some said it was a French gentleman. No one, not even Portsmouth herself, likely knew for certain.

  The king offered her the services of his own private physician. At once she was taken from Whitehall to the more salubrious air of Windsor, and her treatment begun. From there she began a lengthy progress across the country, searching for relief. She tried the waters at Tunbridge Wells, at Epsom, at Bath. Nothing worked, and for the next eighteen months, the only appearance made by the duchess at court was as the centerpiece in bawdy jests and songs.

  Now, I know it is wrong to gloat over another’s misfortunes, and a temptation to the Fates to settle the score. But with the Duchess of Cleveland fallen so far from favor, and the Duchess of Portsmouth poxed and removed from the court, I was at last unchallenged. With giddy joy I reigned as the king’s favorite in every possible way, by his side and in his bed, and for the next fourteen months, I was the happiest I’d ever been.

  Until one old friend was banished from court, and another welcomed to London, whilst a third—but ah, in time, in time.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON June 1675

  I stood a little apart from the king, there with the others who’d likewise been called as witnesses, and together we stared down at the wreckage of broken glass, twisted brass, and painted porcelain that littered the grass of the Privy Garden.

  Though the garden stood in the middle of the palace, with King Street directly to the north and St. James’s Park not much farther beyond, the walled-in space had an unearthly silence this morning, as if the very stone galleries, grass, and walkways had somehow sensed the magnitude of this senseless destruction. Even Charles’s dogs were quiet, sitting meekly in the arched shadows of the gallery. No one dared speak and disturb the king’s anger, or his grief over such a loss, either.

  Last night, when I’d left the palace with several of my friends, we’d walked through the garden on our way to my carriage. Then this scattered shambles had been one of Charles’s most treasured and celebrated possessions, the King’s Sundial, an elaborate scientific device to measure the movements of the sun and the planets in the heavens above. Charles had once proudly explained its workings to me with excruciating detail, considering the sundial to be every bit as fascinating as the dozens of clocks and other timepieces he’d collected. Not comprehending such weighty notions, I’d merely judged the thing to be a pretty garden bauble, especially when the sunlight made the tower of blown glass spheres glisten like giant soap bubbles.

  But now—now the sundial was smashed and broken beyond all repair. If the black look on Charles’s face was any sort of weathercock, then the court w
as going to be a grim, stormy place until the villains were discovered and duly punished.

  “You say this was done by a party of gentlemen,” Charles said to the quaking watchman who’d seen the attack. “Did you recognize them to tell their names?”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” the poor man said, so frightened that I prayed for his sake he’d not tumble in a faint at Charles’s feet. “Mr. Fleetwood Shepherd, Mr. Henry Savile, Lord Sussex, Lord Buckhurst, and Lord Rochester.”

  The king’s mouth tightened, the lines on either side deepening. Those same gentlemen had been his guests the night before, invited by him to his rooms for convivial drinking and debauchery. It wasn’t hard to imagine that pack of rascals afterward, weaving and staggering drunkenly in the moonlight toward the sundial.

  “Did they speak?” the king asked. “Did any of them take the lead, or did they fall upon it by accident?”

  The watchman nodded eagerly, now caught up in the telling of his lurid tale. “Yes, sir, that would be His Lordship the Earl of Rochester. He drew his sword from his scabbard, sir, and went direct to the dial and challenged it like an enemy.”

  He glanced uneasily toward me, the only woman in attendance, then decided I’d not be offended. “His Lordship cried out at the dial, sir, saying, ‘Dost thou stand here to fuck time?’ ”

  Oh, my poor, drunken, half-mad friend! I’d no doubt at all that Rochester had spoken exactly thus, it sounded so much like him, or rather, the wine that had surely flowed like blood through his veins. Had it given strength to his ravaged body, as well, for such wanton destruction?

  “Then he began knocking at the dial with his fists,” the guard continued, “striking and knocking at it, and the other gentlemen joined him until all was in ruins. Oh, a terrible sight, sir! ‘Kings and kingdoms tumble down, and so shalt thou’; they shouted that, too, swearing oaths and laughing like devils.”