‘To have peace in Europe—’
‘We must first have war? But there will not be peace in Europe if there is civiljwar here in England.’
I smile, and play a little more. We both know that it is not for me to comment on the policy of France.
‘Will you dine alone with me this evening, mademoiselle?’ he says abrupdy.
I keep my eyes fixed on my music. ‘Your Majesty knows I cannot.’
‘Why not?’
‘People will talk.’
He makes an impatient gesture. ‘Let them.’
‘I thought Your Majesty had just suggested that he is not, by nature, one to rush things?’ I suggest, with what I hope is an attractive mischievousness.
‘And yet you would have me jumped into this war.’ Suddenly, he is petulant. ‘You must not be hurried, it seems, but I must. You must keep your honour, but I must discard mine.’
I play without speaking for a minute. These flashes of irritation come on him sometimes. They usually pass just as quickly.
Not this time.
‘God’s nails, woman, how is this fair?’ he thunders. Across the room, Anne and Lucy look up from their sewing, startled. The spaniel, given no warning, scrambles hastily to the floor as Charles gets to his feet. ‘You would have me fight the Dutch, but with you . . . with you . . .’
I keep playing, anxious not to make this more of a scene than it already is.
‘With you I must play the lapdog,’ he says, aiming a kick at the dog. ‘I will dine elsewhere. As for your war - tell Louis I will attend to it.’
*
But he does not attend to it.
‘He is a man used to wielding power,’ Lady Arlington says. ‘His desire for you is such that you have the power now, not him. No man likes to be in that position.’
‘What must I do.>’
‘Yield, of course. Nothing restores a man’s tempter better than undressing a new mistress.’
But I will not yield. Neither will the king.
‘You have lost him,’ Lady Arlington says. ‘I hear that he has been seen going into Nell Gwynne’s house in Pall Mall. You might as well go back to France.’
I must be careful how I handle this. I see it in their faces Arlington, the ambassador: they all think that to make him declare war, there will have to be a trade.
My body, for an army. It is a deal which almost everyone involved would consider a bargain.
Carlo
>
An ice, properly stored, will keep for a month without spoiling.
The Book of Ices
The effort it was costing her, I was all too aware of. At the balls and ballets and suppers she smiled and joked and you would not have thought anything wrong - not unless you saw her, after the carriages had all departed, and the laughter left her eyes as abruptly as a candle being snuffed.
‘What must I do to regain his favour?’ she asked me wearily one evening, when I was clearing the ice goblets away from her apartments.
‘Nothing at all.’
‘You think it impossible?’
‘On the contrary - I simply meant that to do nothing is the best course. I think Charles is divided within himself. There is a part of him that would like to stop wanting you. But there is another part that knows he cannot. So he is angry, not with you for being virtuous, but with himself, for caring so much.’ I avoided her eye as I spoke. ‘Sooner or later that battle will be over, and then he will know what he feels.’
Her voice when she spoke was quiet. ‘And what is that. Carlo? What will he feel? Will the king love me, or hate me?’
I shook my head. ‘He will not hate you.’
‘I wish to God it could be neither,’ she muttered. ‘Oh, for a world without all this love.’
Louise
It is almost two weeks before he comes back to my rooms.
‘Your Majesty,’ I say, curtseying.
‘Oh, there you are,’ he says - as if I have been away; as if it is me, not him, who has been avoiding this moment. He holds out his fist. ‘Here. I have something for you.’
‘I do not need gifts, sir.’
‘Not “sir”. “Charles”. Unless we are in company, which I am glad to say we are not.’
‘Charles.’ The word slips from my mouth a litde awkwardly, a ‘sh’ where there should be ‘ch’.
He smiles. ‘My sister could never pronounce it either.’
I try again. ‘I do not need gifts . . . Charles.’
‘Better. But it is even prettier when you misspeak.’ He lifts his hand. ‘Now then.’
He leaves his fist closed, so that I must turn it over and open his fingers for him, unpeeling them one by one from his gift. A pocket watch, the smallest I have ever seen, an oyster of polished gold.
‘Open it.’ ;
I open the lid that covers the face. It is like no pocket watch I have ever seen. There are three hands', one of which is racing round the dial.
‘It tells the seconds,’ he says proudly. ‘A coil inside the mechanism that is wound tighter than any pendulum. And look at the reverse.’
I turn it over. An inscription. Waste not these hours with regret. A date.
It is the day I came to England.
‘My calendar started then,’ he says simply.
*
He wants to show me his apartments. We pass the royal bedchamber, where he never sleeps, and go through a door almost hidden behind a curtain. Inside there is a working room, no bigger than Madame’s, filled with clocks. The noise they make is like rain, a deafening downpour of time; seconds and minutes tumbling around our shoulders.
He brings out his favourites - the watch that tells the phases of the moon, the carriage clock that contains a carousel of tiny silver horses chasing a fox. They were made by one of his virtuosi, his gang of philosophers and men of learning. He has many gangs, I am coming to realise. He likes to slip between them, changing roles as he does so: here the rake, here the philosopher, here the statesman, but always eager for entertainment, for dialogue, for enthusiasm. Almost like a boy.
Certainly it is hard to believe that, of his brother James and he, Charles is the older. Or that he is more than twice as old as me. But a king is young at forty-two, a woman old at twenty.
He is called away on business, but bids me wait. As the hour comes, a dozen chimes ring out, the moment jumping from timepiece to timepiece.
Curious, a little bored, I inspect my surroundings. There is a door that leads to a padded privy stool. Another room contains his chemicals and machines. And then there is a light, square room in a tower, lined with wooden panels that reach from floor to ceiling.
One of the panels is ajar. I look more closely: it is hinged, like a cupboard.
I swing it back. Hung on the inside, so that he may choose whether or not it is displayed, is a painting. A woman, completely naked, reclines on a bed of cushions and velvets. Her pale skin seems to glow like moonlight against the dark, rich cloth. Around her are stage props, some painted theatre scenery. Red hair, a mischievous smile.
The actress.
Does he have all his women painted like this, I wonder.> I swing
open another panel. Another naked body, the face haughty. I recognise the woman who spoke to me at the French ambassador’s ball. And another - a woman with her gown rolled down beneath her breasts, smiling saucily. I turn back another, then another ... the panels sway and crash gently against each other, like the pages of some giant wooden book.
I hear voices from the other room. Quickly I swing them back again, one by one, ending with Miss Nelly. Hidden again behind the wainscot, the brown respectable wood, for the king’s pleasure alone.
Louise
He dances with me, and I feel the urgency of his desire. He kisses me during the dance, along with the rest, and his lips linger a little longer than they should.
When he has to release my hand so that I can turn to another partner, I sense his reluctance, my fingers slipping through his, until, with a sigh, he turns away.