I talked about the child practically all the time with my women. One of them said she was sure it would be a boy by the way I was carrying it.

“How I should like to know for sure,” I said.

One of them whispered to me: “Why not consult Eleanor Davys.”

It was the first time I had heard the woman’s name and I had no idea then that she would be the cause of frictions between Charles and me.

I talked over the matter with those three who had become my special friends among the English ladies of the bedchamber: Susan Feilding, Countess of Denbigh; Katherine, Buckingham’s widow; and my favorite of the three, Lucy Hay, Countess of Carlisle. Poor Katherine was very sad at this time; she could not get over the shock of losing her husband. It was strange to me that anyone could love that man, yet she had apparently done so—as had my own husband. She told me how she would never forget coming down the stairs and seeing him lying there in the hall with his blood spattering the walls. I could quite understand why she had nightmares nowadays. We did our best to cheer her and somehow that brought us all closer together.

“Why not call in Eleanor Davys?” said Susan. I think she looked upon it as a diversion for me as well as for Katherine.

Lucy said that Eleanor Davys had foretold her first husband’s death. “She said he would die in three days,” she added, “and he did.”

We were all awestruck.

“She would know then whether I was carrying a boy or a girl,” I said.

“Why not wait and see,” suggested Katherine. “Wouldn’t it be nice to surprise yourself?”

“I should like to know now,” I said. “Moreover I should like to put this wise woman to the test.”

“Let us bring her in then,” suggested Lucy.

“Who is she?” asked Katherine.

“She is the wife of Sir John Davys, the King’s Attorney General,” Susan told us.

“Her second husband,” I added, “since she foretold the death of her first husband. I wonder if she has told Sir John how long he has to live.”

We were all laughing together and even Katherine managed to raise a smile.

However it was arranged that Lady Davys should be brought to me and she was only too delighted to come. In the meantime I had found out certain facts about her. She was the daughter of the Earl of Castle-haven and was quite renowned for her prophecies. If the letters of her name—Eleanor Davys—were arranged differently and her first name spelt with two lls as it often was and her surname Davie instead of Davys (which one could say was used occasionally) the result would be “Reveal O Daniel.” This seemed very significant.

We all became very excited thinking of the revelations to come and when the lady was presented I was greatly impressed by her. She was a big woman, dark-haired with enormous luminous eyes—just the sort, I said to Lucy afterward, which a seer ought to have.

She was not in the least overawed by me. I supposed as a prophetess a queen did not seem so very important in her eyes.

She told us that she had a mission; she was in touch with powers. She could not explain them; she merely knew that she had been selected by some great force to be able to look at that which was not revealed to ordinary people.

I made her sit down and I told her that I had heard of her miraculous powers and there was a question I wanted to ask her. She folded her arms and looked at me steadily while I asked about the child I was to bear. There was a breathless silence round the table while we all waited for her words. She did not hurry. She sat back for a while and closed her eyes. When she opened them she gazed steadily at me and said: “You will have a son.”

There was a gasp of delight round the table.

“And,” I cried, “shall I be happy?”

She said, speaking very slowly: “You will be happy for a while.”

“Only for a while? How long?”

“For sixteen years,” she replied.

“And then what will happen?”

She closed her eyes and at that moment the door opened and the King came in.

Although I was so much fonder of him now I was irritated by the interruption, particularly as he assumed one of his most serious looks. I thought then what fun it would have been if he had joined us and listened with us and giggled and enjoyed the excitement of prophecy. But that was not Charles’s way.

He stood by the table and my ladies all rose and curtsied.

He was looking straight at our soothsayer and he said almost accusingly: “You are Lady Davys.”

“That is so, Your Majesty,” she answered with pride, and I must admit showing very little deference to the King.

“You are the lady who foretold her husband’s death.”

“Yes, Sire. I did that. I have the powers….”

“I can scarcely believe that he welcomed the news,” said Charles coldly. “Indeed it might well have done much to hasten his end.” He turned to me and offered me his arm.

There was nothing I could do but rise and leave with him, though I was fuming with irritation at having that interesting session cut short.

When we were outside the door he said: “I do not wish you to consult that woman.”

“Why not?” I cried. “She is clever. She told me that I would have a son and be happy.”

He was a little uplifted but persisted in his condemnation of her.

“She probably hastened her husband’s death.”

“How could she? He did not die of poison. He just died…as she said he would.”

“It is dabbling in the black arts.”

I was afraid that he was going to forbid me to see her and I knew that if he did my temper would flare up and I should disobey him. It was a pity. We had been getting on so happily until now.

Perhaps he was thinking the same for he said no more. But there was an outcome. Left alone with the ladies, Eleanor Davys talked a little more and what she said was not nearly as pleasant as that which she had told me. When I returned to my women I noticed that they looked very grave.

I said: “Did Lady Davys stay long after I left?”

“A little while,” Lucy replied, not looking at me.

“I was so annoyed to be taken away like that. I felt quite angry with the King.”

“He certainly did not like her,” said Susan.

“Did he forbid you to see her?” asked Katherine.

“He did not. And I would forbid him to forbid me. I will not be told, you must not do this and you must not do that.”

“Yet it would be awkward for her, I suppose,” suggested Susan, “for he could forbid her to come to Court, and of course there is her husband to be considered.”

“Do you think Lady Davys is a woman to be told by her husband what to do?”

“No,” said Susan. “She would probably tell him he had three days to live if he offended her.”

“That isn’t fair,” I protested. “I think her prophecies are true ones. She promised me a son.”

There was a strange and ominous silence round the table which immediately aroused my suspicions.

“What’s the matter?” I cried. “Why are you looking like that?”

They remained silent and I went to Lucy and shook her. “Tell me,” I said. “You know something. What is it?”

Lucy looked appealingly at Susan, and Katherine shook her head.

“No,” I cried stamping my foot. “You had better tell me what is wrong. Is it something Lady Davys said…eh? Was it about me?”

“She er…” began Katherine. “She…er…said nothing of importance.”

“And that is why you look as though the heavens are about to fall in? Come on…I command you…all of you…tell me.”

Susan lifted her shoulders and after a few seconds of silence Lucy nodded and said resignedly: “Well, it is just talk, you know. It doesn’t mean anything.”

“What?” I cried. “What?”

“It is better to tell the Queen,” said Lucy. “If it should come true…and I do not believe for a moment that it will…it is better for her to know.”

“Know what?” I screamed, my patience at an end; and now a certain fear was creeping into my mind.

“I think she made it up because she was angry about the King’s interruption,” said Susan.

“If you don’t tell me soon I’ll have you all arrested for…conspiracy,” I shouted.

Lucy said quietly: “She told us that you would indeed have a boy.”

“Well, go on. That’s what she told me. There is nothing new in that.”

“But that he would be born, christened and buried all in one day.”

I stared at them in horror. “It can’t be true.”

“Of course it can’t,” soothed Lucy. “It is just that she was angry. She was so annoyed that the King came in and showed he did not approve of her.”

I stared ahead of me. I was seeing a little body wrapped in a shroud.

Susan said: “Don’t tell the King what she said or that we told you.”

I shook my head. “It is such nonsense,” I cried. “She is a madwoman.”

“That is what so many people say,” said Lucy quickly. “Your son will be a beautiful child. How could he be otherwise? You and the King are both handsome.”

“My son!” I murmured. “There will be a son.”

I had so firmly believed her when she said I was to have a son but if the first prophecy was correct, why should the second not be?

Now I began to be haunted by fears.

I don’t know whether that prophecy preyed on my mind but whenever I thought of my baby, instead of seeing a laughing lively child I saw a little white one in a coffin. I could not eat much and at night my dreams were disturbed. The King was very anxious about me.

“Perhaps,” he said, “you are too young to have a child.”

Too young! I was eighteen and would be nineteen in November. That was not so young to have a child. I did not tell the King about the prophecy. He would have been very angry with Lady Davys and I am sure he would have made some complaint to her husband. I tried to disbelieve her. After all, how could she possibly know? It had been a coincidence about her first husband. Perhaps he had been very ill and she, as his wife, knew exactly how ill.