She shook her head and answered: “Dearest, you will have to curb your temper. You must, you know; it could lead you into difficulties.”
“Again you seem to be on his side.”
“Never…never. But you are wrong, my love. You must learn to be diplomatic.”
“I hate them all. Heretics! Savages!”
Mamie looked very distraught. “This will not help at all,” she said.
A few days later Buckingham came to see me again. I was on the point of refusing to see him but Mamie was with me when he was announced and she advised me against a direct refusal. “Try to be calm,” she said. “Listen to what he has to say and reply to it with tact and calm.”
“I shall grant him nothing.”
“Perhaps not, but do it as a queen would, not as a rebellious schoolgirl.”
Buckingham came in looking elegant and handsome. It is a pity I cannot like him, I thought. He dresses with such taste that he looks almost like a Frenchman.
“Your Majesty!” He bowed low and kissed my hand. I could feel the anger surging up in me and I guessed my eyes were beginning to blaze as they did at such moments. “May I say,” he went on, “that you are looking even more beautiful than ever. The air at Hampton suits you.”
“You are good to say so,” I replied, so far quite calm.
“I come from His Majesty.”
“Oh? Is he so far away that he cannot come himself?” My temper was beginning to rise. I must remember Mamie’s warning and try to keep calm.
“He has given this commission to me,” he replied suavely, “and I have a special request to make.”
I thought: What insolence! You to make a special request to me…after our last meeting. But I said nothing and he went on: “His Majesty thinks that now you have become his wife and Queen of England you should have Englishwomen in your bedchamber.”
“I am very satisfactorily served at the time,” I replied.
“I am sure of that, but His Majesty is hoping that you will soon master the English language and adopt some of our English ways. Therefore he thinks that if certain ladies came into your bedchamber they would be of service to you…if you would graciously allow them to.”
“Oh? And whom does he suggest?”
“He has been most gracious to me and declares I have done him great service. As you know I was the main instrument in arranging this most desirable marriage. His Majesty cannot thank me enough for bringing him such a beautiful bride, and I hope that you too, Your Majesty, feel a little gratitude toward me.”
I was seething with rage and I knew I could not contain it much longer. He did not give me time to speak but went on: “The King has honored me by agreeing that my wife, my sister and my niece should occupy these coveted posts.”
I stared at him disbelievingly. He would put his women about me. For what purpose? Their aggrandizement certainly…but to spy on me!
I burst out: “My lord Buckingham, I already have three ladies of the bedchamber. I do not need more.”
“They are Frenchwomen,” he said, “and the King would like your ladies to be English.”
“You may tell the King that I am perfectly satisfied with what I already have and I intend to remain so.”
He bowed and left me.
Seething with rage I sought out Mamie and told her what had happened. She was greatly distressed. She saw further than I did. She did not want to worry me but I did make her tell me that she feared she, among the others, might be sent back to France. It was the custom when a princess married into a foreign country that the attendants who accompanied her went back to their own country after a few days or weeks at the most.
“This is different,” I cried passionately. “This was the arrangement. I am not to be surrounded by heretics. It was agreed that my own people should stay with me.”
Mamie comforted me and assured me that I had nothing to fear and that I had done right in refusing to accept the Englishwomen into my bedchamber.
I felt very relieved when the Bishop of Mende, who had come with me among my clergy, called on me with Father Sancy and told me that he had had to make my position very clear to the King.
“It was decided,” said the Bishop, “that you should have English ladies to wait on you in your bedchamber. I have explained that this is quite out of the question.”
I clasped my hands together in delight, which I tried to make appear as religious fervor.
“We cannot have heretics living so close to you,” went on the Bishop.
“They might attempt to corrupt you,” added Father Sancy.
“I would never allow that,” I assured him.
“Nevertheless we cannot afford to run risks,” said the Bishop. “I have made it clear to the King that my masters in France would take a very grave view of having these Huguenots in your bedchamber.”
“Thank you, my lord,” I said, “I am grateful for your care.”
“You must never forget your duty to the Church,” said my confessor.
And I assured them both that I would not forget. I would keep about me my own French attendants who were good Catholics. I would fight with all my might against the heretics.
“Let us kneel and pray that you will be successful in that which God has sent you to England to bring about,” said Father Sancy.
The Bishop was less fanatical, but he was determined—even as Father Sancy was—that I should keep the Protestants out.
I was very cool with the King in our bedchamber at Hampton on the night following the visit of the Bishop and Father Sancy. He knew why, of course, and he was very anxious to placate me. I think he enjoyed those intimacies of the bedchamber far more than I did, and I thought it was perverse of him to show a little rancor because I could not share the same pleasure as he did. The fact was that I should have preferred to go home and live as I had before my marriage. True, to be a queen was gratifying, but I sometimes felt it was not worth all that it entailed.
The King stroked my hair and said it was beautiful. He loved my flashing dark eyes and my clear complexion, even my short stature. I was feminine, he said, all that a woman should be…save in one thing. I did not love my husband enough.
I was silent and he sighed deeply. He said: “It is only because I wish you to learn to speak English…and to love this country that I want you to have English ladies about you.”
“I would not love it the more for that,” I said. “I can accept life here because my friends are with me.”
“But I would be your friend,” he said, “the very best friend you have. I am your husband.”
“I would not lose those who have come with me from France for anything.”
He sighed. He did realize that it was never any use trying to convince me. He believed now that I was the most illogical, unreasoning young woman imaginable, a creature of whims and fancies, lacking completely in control of my feelings.
I know I was the main cause of all the unhappiness of those years. But I could not see it then.
So we retired to bed for our nightly ritual, which I longed to have done with so that I could sleep.
The discord between us continued and it seemed impossible to find an end to it. I knew there was a great deal of comment about the way I and my French friends behaved. We were allowed to celebrate Mass because that was part of the agreement between our two countries and my religious entourage made sure that this was carried out. But it was accepted with resentment. Mamie said the English could never forget that Mary Tudor had burned Protestants in Smithfield and at that time they had made up their minds that they would never be ruled by Catholics again. Then some of their sailors had become prisoners of the Inquisition and brought back tales of torture. The country had turned its back on Catholicism and forgotten, said Mamie, that the Protestants had not always been so kind to the Catholics among them. The English, she decided, were not an intensely religious nation. They were said to be tolerant, but their tolerance was in fact indifference. But although they might not object to Catholics on religious grounds, they were determined not to have another monarch like Mary Tudor, who was fiercely Catholic, having been brought up by her Catholic mother, Katherine of Aragon.