“Is that all I am to get for my pains … after risking my life to be near you as I did?”
“Please go. I am afraid the Colonel will arrive.”
“You are beginning to make me fear the Colonel. Are you fond of him, Lucy? Is he good to you?”
“He is good to me and I am fond of him.”
“But not so fond that you cannot spare a smile or two for a passing fancy, eh? Lucy, do you think you could grow as fond and fearful of me as you are of the Colonel?”
“You forget I do not know you. I saw you for the first time only a few minutes ago.”
“We must put that right. From now on we will see a good deal of each other. I will risk Colonel Sydney’s displeasure. Will you?”
“I might,” murmured Lucy.
He took her hand and kissed it. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen,” he said; “and I have always been a close observer of women. Why, I remember an occasion—in the town of Oxford it was—when I was in church with my father, and he smote me on the head with his staff because, instead of listening to the sermon, I was smiling at the ladies. I am older now, but I have never ceased to smile at the ladies, and no amount of smiting on the head will stop me. So you see I know what I am talking about.”
“I am sure you would always give a good account of yourself to women. There is no need to tell me that. Now go, I beg of you. I will order my maid to take you down by the back staircase. You must go at once.”
“But I will have a kiss before I go.”
“Then … you will go?”
“I swear it. But do not imagine we shall not meet again.”
“I would do anything to be rid of you before Colonel Sydney returns.”
“Anything!” His warm brown eyes were alert and hopeful.
“I would kiss you,” she said firmly.
So he took her into his arms and kissed her, not once but many times, and not only on the lips as she pretended to intend. Lucy, flushed and struggling, was nevertheless laughing. It was an amusing adventure with the most fascinating man she had ever met. She hoped he would keep his word and visit her again.
She called Ann Hill.
“Ann,” she said, “show this man out of the house … quickly … by way of the back staircase.”
“Yes, mistress,” said Ann.
Lucy watched him go regretfully. At the door he turned and bowed. He bowed more elegantly than any man she had ever known. “We shall meet again … very soon,” he promised. “But not too soon for me.”
Then he turned and followed Ann.
At the door he looked at Ann. She had lifted her face to his, for Ann too felt the power of his fascination. The warm brown eyes softened. Poor Ann! She was not well-favored, but she had seen the kiss he had given her mistress. ’Od’s Fish! he pondered. She’s envious, poor girl!
And because, ever since the days when his father had smitten him for his too-open admiration of the girls in church—and perhaps before then— he had been unable to slight any woman, pretty or plain, lowly or highborn, he stooped quickly and lightly kissed Ann’s cheek.
Robert announced that Lucy was to be presented to the Prince.
“He has heard much of you,” said Robert. “The talk of Algy’s paying his fifty crowns and then being recalled before you arrived seems amusing to Charles. He says he must see the heroine of the story. So put on the dress I gave you and prepare yourself. You’ll have to go to Court some day. In a place like this … all huddled together … exiles must necessarily mingle.”
While Ann helped Lucy to dress they were both thinking of the tall dark man.
“Do you think he’ll come back, mistress?” asked Ann.
“How can I know? He was too quick, was he not? He had the manners of a practiced philanderer.”
“But of a gentleman too,” murmured Ann.
“They often go together, I believe. Come, girl, my kerchief and my fan.”
Even when she reached the palace in which the Prince had his apartments Lucy was still thinking of the tall dark man. She entered the palace with its wheel windows and gothic towers at either end; she walked up the staircase into the hall where the Prince was waiting to receive her.
She thought she was dreaming as he smiled at her, and kneeling before him she could not help lifting her eyes to look into that dark face with the glowing brown eyes which were now shining with mischief. She felt bewildered and, in that moment when she had knelt, she had not believed that he could really be the Prince. She thought it was some hoax, the sort of game he and his friends would like to play.
All about him were men—some young, some old—but he towered above them all, not only because of his height, but because of that overwhelming charm, that easy grace. It seemed incredible, but it must be true: the young man who had climbed through her window was Charles, Prince of Wales, and no other.
He was laughing merrily. “So, pretty Lucy,” he said. “I stand exposed in all my perfidy.”
“Sir …” she began.
He turned to those about him and said easily: “Lucy and I have already met, we find. We also find that we have a fondness for each other.”
“Your Grace, I do not understand,” said Robert.
“Then we must acquaint you with the facts, and as a good soldier, Colonel, I am sure you will know when the moment has come to retreat.”
All those about the Prince began to laugh. Only Robert looked dismayed.
He bowed with dignity. Then he said: “I understand Your Grace’s meaning and realize that I am in a position from which the only possible action is retreat.”
“Wise Robert!” cried Charles. “And speaking of retreat, that is an order I give to the rest of you gentlemen.”
Much laughter followed, and one by one the gentlemen left the apartment, pausing only to throw appreciative glances at Lucy.
So Lucy was alone with Charles.
And thus she became the willing mistress of the exiled Prince of Wales.
She loved him truly; he was more to her than any other lover had been, for he was more than mere lover. It was that tender quality in him which moved Lucy. He was easygoing, full of wit, and if he did not always keep his promises, it was due to sheer kindness of heart which would not allow him to refuse anything which was asked of him.
As Prince’s mistress her life changed yet again. It was true that he was a Prince in exile, but he was England’s heir for all that. Although his eyes would never fail to light up when they rested on a pretty woman, he became devoted to Lucy; she was his chief love, and was content that this should be so. These weeks, she decided, were the happiest of her life.
She made the acquaintance of men whose names she had heard mentioned with awe; she heard the plots and intrigues which were in motion to win this second civil war, begun this year, and which one of these men—George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham—had helped to bring about. Buckingham had recently joined the Prince and was his closest companion. Charles told her that he and Buckingham had been brought up together, and when the elder Villiers died, King Charles I took his children into the royal household and Lord Francis and Lord George—as this Buckingham was then—had played with the royal children.
Lord Francis had been killed recently, as many people were killed in England; and the young Duke had escaped to join the Prince.
Charles enjoyed unburdening his mind to Lucy. He felt it was unimportant what he said to her, for Lucy only half-listened. He would smile on seeing the vague look which would come into her eyes at times, when she would nod and express surprise even when she had little notion about what he was talking.
“Why, Lucy,” he said, “you’d never betray my secrets to others, would you, for the simple reason that you have never heard me betray them to you.”
That amused him. Some might have been angry at her obtuseness; Charles was rarely angry. If he was inclined to be, some spirit of mischief would seem to rise within him and make him see himself partly in the wrong.