Charles and I were becoming more friendly, and he even talked a little about what was on his mind. He was always against the Parliament. What right had these men to tell a king what he should do? He was constantly asking that question.

“I would go without a parliament altogether,” he said, “but I have to get them to grant me money. How can we carry on the country’s affairs without money?”

He believed that he and his beloved Steenie could manage very well without those dreary men who were always putting obstacles in the way.

He tried raising money without the aid of Parliament by making every one of his subjects pay a tax. If they refused they were imprisoned. He raised an army and the men were billeted in private houses whether the owners wanted them or not. Fortunately they blamed this on Buckingham. How they hated that man! I would laugh inwardly every time I saw a sign of this. Charles, however, continued to love him. It used to make me so angry when I heard his voice soften as he said his name.

In spite of all his efforts Charles found it necessary to call Parliament, which immediately made him surrender his right to billet soldiers in private houses and to exact loans without the consent of Parliament.

How he raged against them! But he needed their help if he was going to take part in the siege of Rochelle, and he was forced to accept their terms.

I was relieved when the siege of Rochelle was over and ended in triumph for the French, partly because in my heart I liked to see my own countrymen triumphant and because it was another failure for my old enemy Buckingham. I was so delighted when I heard him reviled. There were satires and pasquinades written about him and stuck on buildings all over the country.

To try to make the people like him again and to show how he upheld the Protestant Faith he started to plan a new expedition. This time it was to relieve the people of Rochelle.

He came to see Charles, and I don’t think he was very pleased to realize how much better we were getting on. He was delighted, of course, that I had lost my friends; and I wondered what fresh unpleasantness he could plot against me when he was free from his present project, for at that time he was concerned with little else but his expedition to Rochelle and he was going down to Portsmouth to make sure that all the provisions and ammunition they would need were on board.

Charles came to me after he had left.

“Steenie is in a strange mood,” he said. “I have never seen him gloomy before. He is usually so sure of success.”

“His lack of success has probably made him doubt his powers after all. In which case it would be a good thing, for it is always well to see oneself as one really is rather than how one would wish to be.”

Charles was a little hurt as always when I criticized his beloved Steenie, but he refused to be drawn into an argument and ceased to talk of Buckingham and became my loving husband.

It was not long after that when it happened.

The King was prostrate with grief and I was very sorry for him because I knew what it meant to lose someone one loved perhaps as deeply as one had ever loved anyone. Had I not lost my own beloved Mamie?

It was ironic that the King who had robbed me of my dearest companion should now find that fate had robbed him of his.

William Laud brought the news from Portsmouth. Laud was a priest and a great favorite of both Charles and Buckingham. My husband had shown him great favor and perhaps because Buckingham had thought so highly of him, he had made him a privy councillor and promised him the Bishopric of London. He was already Bishop of Bath and Wells. He had grown very friendly with Buckingham because Buckingham’s mother had shown signs of becoming too interested in the Catholic Faith and Charles had sent Laud to be her priest and bring her back to Protestantism. This Laud had tried to do, and while he was under Buckingham’s roof had formed a great friendship with the Duke, and as the King liked to share everything with his Steenie, Laud was his friend too.

So it was Laud who came with the news.

There was tension throughout Whitehall. I had never seen the King look as he did then. His face was quite devoid of color and his eyes stared ahead disbelievingly as though pleading with someone—the Almighty, I suppose—to tell him that it was not true.

But it was true.

“He had a presentiment that death was close to him,” Laud told us. “He called me to him the night before. He was very serious and Your Majesty knows that was not like him. He begged me, Your Majesty, to commend him to you and request you take care of his wife and family.”

“Oh, Steenie,” murmured the King, “as if I would fail you!”

“I said to him,” went on Laud, “‘Why do you say this? You have never before suggested that you are going to die. I have never seen you, my Lord, but when you are full of high hopes and good spirits.’ He answered me, ‘Some adventure may kill me. Others have been killed before me.’ I said to him, ‘Is it an assassin you fear?’ And he nodded. I suggested that he wear a shirt of mail under his clothes, but he laughed the idea to scorn. ‘That would not protect me against the fury of the mob,’ he said. So he would take no precautions.”

“Oh, Steenie,” moaned the King.

I wanted to know how it had happened, every detail. The King covered his face with his hands while I asked the questions. Laud whispered to me that the King could not bear to hear more.

I could very well bear to hear more. I could listen and exult so I insisted that he proceed.

“He was staying at the house of Captain Mason in the High Street,” said Laud. “It was convenient for the supervision of the loading. His Duchess was staying at the house with him before he sailed. He had come down to breakfast and partaken heartily of it. Then he went into the hall and paused for a moment to exchange a word or two with Sir Thomas Tryer who had come to see him. Suddenly a man stepped forward. He cried out: “God have mercy on thy soul!” and brandishing a knife he thrust it into the Duke’s left breast.”

The King moaned softly and I went to him and took his hand. He pressed mine warmly.

“The Duke himself withdrew the knife,” went on Laud. “He was bleeding profusely and there was blood spattered everywhere. My Lord Duke took two steps as though to go after the man. He cried, ‘Villain!’ and then fell to the floor. The Duchess came running into the hall. Poor lady, she is three months with child. She knelt beside him, but he was dying and I could see there was nothing we could do. I gave him what comfort I could and it was then that he again begged me to commend him to you and ask you to look after his family.”

The King was still too overwrought to speak.

I said: “Have they caught the assassin?”

“Yes, a certain John Felton—a discharged officer who thought he had a grievance, and when the House of Commons showed their disapproval of the Duke he believed he was doing his country a service.”

He was, I thought. Oh good John Felton!

But I had learned my lessons. I said nothing; and then I devoted my time to attempting to comfort the King.

How strange it was that the man who had done so much to drive a wedge between us in life, in death should be the means of bringing us together.

I understood Charles’s grief so much and because for once I could see through someone else’s eyes, I could console him, because his was the greater pain. Steenie had gone for ever but I could still write to Mamie and I hoped to see her one day.

He talked to me a great deal about Steenie and I had to control my impulses to say something derogatory about him, and then after a while I saw how comforting it was for him to talk about this beloved friend whose faults he could not and never would see.

Life for him had lost its savor and it seemed that I was the one who could make up for that. I took a great pleasure in this and he could hardly bear to be away from me. I felt tender toward him. I sensed a certain weakness in him and instead of being critical of it, it endeared him to me.

I treated him as though he were my child instead of my husband and he was grateful for that. Charles was not a man who enjoyed exerting his will. He was serious in his intentions to do right; he wanted to be a good ruler and a good husband. He had not enjoyed sending away my attendants but he had done so because he had thought it was the best for us all.

I began to understand so much and each day I looked forward to our talks, and at night, in the privacy of our bedchamber, I think we truly became lovers.

I began to wonder whether there had been two reasons why we had had such a stormy beginning to our married life. One was undoubtedly Buckingham and the other…could it really have been my attendants? Sancy had led me into some difficult situations culminating in the visit to Tyburn; my ladies had always reminded me that I was a French-woman among the English, and a Catholic in an alien land.

Of course Mamie had done her best to help me, but she was apart from the rest.

A few weeks passed while Charles mourned Buckingham deeply, but I knew his sorrow was passing because he was finding great pleasure and the deepest satisfaction in the new relationship which was springing up between us.

Then I discovered that I was with child.

I was very excited at the prospect of having a baby, and Charles was delighted.

“It must be a boy,” I said. Then he smiled gently at me and told me I must not be disappointed if our first child was a girl. We would get boys in due course, he was sure.