Kathleen Winsor - Forever Amber

There seemed to be only one thing left for her to want, and finally that wish too was granted. Early in December Almsbury wrote to say that Lord Carlton expected to arrive in England sometime the following autumn.

SPRING THAT YEAR was somewhat dry and dusty. There was too little rain. Nevertheless by May the meadows about London were thick with purple clover, bee-haunted, and there were great red poppies in the corn-fields. Cries of “Cherries, sweet cherries, ripe and red!” and “Rosemary and sweetbriar! Who’ll buy my lavender?” were heard once more. Summer gowns, tiffany, sarsenet and watered moire in all the bright colours—sulphur-yellow, plum, turquoise, crimson—were seen in the New Exchange and at the theatres or stepping into a gilt coach that waited in St. Martin’s Lane or Pall Mall. The warm windy delightsome months had come again.

Nothing in years had caused so much excitement and indignation as the spreading gossip that York had at last become a confirmed Catholic. No one could be found to prove it; the Duke would not admit it and Charles, who must know if it actually was true, shrugged his shoulders and refused to commit himself. All the Duke’s enemies began to scheme more furiously than ever to keep him from getting the throne while at the same time it was observed that York and Arlington seemed suddenly to have become good friends. This gave impetus to the rumours of a pending French-English alliance, for though Arlington had long been partial to Holland he was thought to be a Catholic himself, or at least to have strong Catholic sympathies.

As these rumours began inevitably to seep out into the town Charles found it difficult to conceal his annoyance and was heard to make some bad-humoured remarks on the meddlesomeness of the English people. Why couldn’t they be content to leave the government in the hands of those whose business it was to govern? Ods-fish, being a king these days was of less consequence than being a baker or a tiler. Perhaps he should have learned a trade.

“You’d better to begin to study something useful,” he said to James. “It’s my opinion you may have to support yourself one day.” James pretended to think that his brother was joking and said he did not consider the jest a funny one.

But certainly there could no longer be any doubt that unless the King married again York, if he lived long enough, would succeed King Charles. Catherine had had her fourth miscarriage at the end of May.

A pet fox frightened her by leaping into her face as she lay asleep and she lost her child a few hours later. Buckingham bribed her two physicians to deny that she had been with child at all, but Charles ignored their testimony. Nevertheless both King and Queen were in despair and Catherine could no longer make herself believe that she would someday give him a child. She knew now beyond all doubt that she was the most useless of all earth’s creatures: a barren queen. But Charles continued to resist stubbornly all efforts to get him to put her aside, though whether from loyalty or laziness it was difficult to say.

There were several young women to whom these discussions of a new wife for the King caused apprehension and almost frantic worry—they had so much to lose.

But Barbara Palmer, at least, could listen with an amused smile and some degree of malignant pleasure. For even she knew now that she was no longer his Majesty’s mistress, and the hazards of that position need trouble her no longer. But that did not mean she had dropped into obscurity. Barbara had never been inconspicuous. While she had her health and any beauty left, she never would be.

For though she was almost thirty and far beyond what were considered to be a woman’s best years she was still so strikingly handsome that beside her the pretty fifteen-year-olds just come up to Court looked insipid as milk-and-water. She remained a glittering figure at Whitehall. Her constitution was too robust, her zest for living too great, for her to resign herself placidly to a quiet and dull old age after a youth so brilliant.

Very gradually her relationship with Charles had begun to mellow. They were settling into the pattern of a husband and wife who, having grown mutually indifferent, take up a comfortable casual existence fraught no longer with quarrels or jealousy, passion or hatred or joy. They had their children as a common interest, and now there was between them a kind of camaraderie which they had never known during the turbulent years when they had been—if not in love—lovers. She was no longer jealous of his mistresses; he was relieved to be out of the range of her temper and found some mild amusement from observing, at safe distance, her freaks and foibles.

Amber waited impatiently for the months to pass and wrote one letter after another to Almsbury at Barberry Hill, asking if he had heard from Lord Carlton or if he knew exactly when he would arrive. The Earl answered each one the same. He had heard nothing more—they expected to reach England sometime in August or September. How was it possible to be more explicit when the passage was so variable?

But Amber could not think or care about anything else. Once more the old passionate and painful longing, which ebbed when she knew she could not even hope to see him, had revived. Now she remembered with aching clarity all the small separate things about him: The odd green-grey colour of his eyes, the wave in his dark hair and the slight point where it grew off his forehead, the smooth texture of his sun-burnt skin, the warm timbre of his voice which gave her a real sense of physical pleasure. She remembered the lusty masculine smell of sweat on his clothes, the feeling of his hands touching her breasts, the taste of his mouth when they kissed. She remembered everything.

But still she was tormented, for those piecemeal memories could not make a whole. Somehow, he eluded her. Did he really exist, somewhere in that vastness of space outside England, or was he only a being she had imagined, built out’ of her dreams and hopes? She would throw her arms about Susanna in a passion of despair and yearning—but she could not reassure herself that way.

Yet in spite of her violent desire to see him again she had stoutly made up her mind that this time she would conduct herself with dignity and decorum. She must be a little aloof, let him make the first advances, let him come first to see her. Every woman knew that was the way to prick up a man’s interest. I’ve always made myself his servant, she chided, but this time it’s going to be different. After all, I’m a person of honour now, a duchess—and he’s but a baron. Anyway—why shouldn’t he come to me first!

She knew that his wife would be along but she did not trouble herself too much about that. For certainly Lord Carlton was not the man to be uxorious. That was well enough for the citizens, who had no better breeding, but a gentleman would no more fawn upon his wife than he would appear in public without his sword or wearing a gnarled periwig.

Lord and Lady Almsbury were back in London in July to put their house in order, hire new servants and prepare for the entertainment of their eagerly expected guests. The Earl came to see Amber and, determined to show him how nonchalant she was at the prospect of seeing Bruce, she chattered away furiously about her own affairs—her title, her great house abuilding in St. James’s Square, the people she had invited to supper for that Sunday. From time to time she asked him what he did in the country and then hurried on without letting him answer—for everyone knew there was nothing to do in the country but ride and drink and visit tenants. Almsbury sat and listened to her talk, watched her vivacious display of mannerisms and hectic charm, smiled and nodded his head—and never mentioned Bruce at all.

Amber’s conversation began to slow down. She grew perplexed and quieter, and finally—realizing that he was teasing her—she became angry. “Well!” she said at last. “What’s the news!”

“News? Why, let me think now. My black mare—the one you used to ride, remember?—foaled last week and—”

“Blast you, Almsbury! Why should you use me at this rate, I’d like to know! Tell me—what have you heard? When will he get here? Is she still coming?”

“I don’t know any more than I did last time I wrote to you—August or September. And, yes, she is coming. Why? You’re not afraid of her?”

Amber shot him a dark venomous glare. “Afraid of her!” she repeated contemptuously. “Almsbury, I swear you’ve a droll wit! Why should I be afraid of her, pray?” She paused a moment and then superciliously informed him: “I’ve got an image of her—that Corinna!”

“Have you?” he asked politely.

“Yes, I have! I know just what she’s like! A plain meek creature who wears all her gowns five years out of the style and thinks herself fit for nothing but to be her husband’s housekeeper and breed up his brats!” The portrait was a reasonably accurate one of Almsbury’s own wife. “A great show she’ll make here in London!”

“You may be right,” he admitted.

“May be right!” she cried indignantly. “What else could she be like—brought up over there in that wilderness with a pack of heathen Indians—”

At that instant a weird and raucous voice began to screech. “Thieves, God damn you! Thieves, by God! Make haste!”

Involuntarily both Amber and the Earl leaped to their feet, Amber overturning the spaniel which had settled on her skirts for a nap. “It’s my parrot!” she cried. “He’s caught a thief in there!” And she dashed toward the drawing-room with Almsbury beside her and Monsieur le Chien yapping excitedly at their heels. They flung open the door and burst in, to find that it was only the King who had strolled in unannounced and picked out an orange from a bowl of fruit. He was laughing heartily as he watched the parrot prancing on his perch and teetering back and forth, squawking frantically. It was not the first time the bird, trained to apprehend intruders, had mistaken his man.