‘It would be interesting to know who finally won the man’s black soul,’ said Catherine cynically, ‘the witches or the angels. But I have no doubt that he will cause a bloody conflict in Heaven or Hell as he has throughout France. Enough of him! Let us leave him to his rest or his torment, for he is gone, and it is with those who remain that we must concern ourselves.’

And so to Rheims, where Henry startled his mother by declaring his intention to marry without delay.

Catherine was horrified. ‘If you wish to marry, my son, we will find a bride worthy of you. But negotiations must take place. First there is your coronation to be taken care of.’

‘I intend to marry two days after my coronation.’

‘That . . . that is impossible.’

‘With me,’ said Henry in his new arrogance, ‘very little is impossible. Certainly not marriage.’

‘Henry, my love, I do not think you understand the dignity of your position. As King of France . . .’

‘As King of France, I, and I alone, will decide whom and when I will marry. Louise is eager to become my Queen and I see no reason for delay.’

‘Louise!’ cried Catherine in horror.

‘We are in love,’ said Henry, patting his curls.

She looked at him in astonishment. What had happened to him during those months he had spent in Poland? She was wondering with dismay whether he was tainted with that madness which had tormented poor Charles.

‘You are the King,’ she protested. ‘You must have a marriage worthy of you.’

‘I must marry and have children, Mother. Why, if I were to die tomorrow, Alençon would mount the throne. Such a calamity must never be allowed to fall upon France.’

‘You must have children, yes . . . but you must also marry in accordance with your rank.’

He took her hand and lightly kissed it. ‘My rank is such,’ he said, ‘that any raised up by me appear exalted. The marriage will take place immediately after the coronation. The people will be pleased.’

Catherine saw the petulant droop of his lips; she knew that he was defying her to attempt to frustrate him. She was unable to arouse fear in him, as she had been able to to do so effortlessly in her other children. She must not despair; she must try to rule by cunning. Why should she not? She had done so successfully before. But how alarming it was to discover this irresponsibility in him, for, in a person of his position, it amounted almost to madness.

The coronation did not go smoothly. He showed his annoyance at the way in which the crown was placed on his head. It hurt him, he said aloud; and he shook his head pettishly so that it almost fell off. He must learn to control his temper in public, thought Catherine. What had those Poles done to him? They had changed him. He must not behave before his French subjects as he obviously had before those barbarians. To the Poles he had been a glittering oddity; to the French he was a ridiculous pervert. Catherine’s fears grew with every manifestation of the strangeness of her son. The people were saying now that the incident regarding the crown was an evil omen. ‘Did you see the way it all but fell off his frivolous head? He’ll not reign long. That was a sign. A sign that need not cause us much concern.’ This was bad; a King should be popular, at least during his coronation. Henry was angered by the sullen ,attitude of the people. The Poles had been so proud of him; what was wrong with the French that they could not also be?

And immediately after the coronation the startled population was informed that he was to marry without delay.

His behaviour now became preposterous and it was obvious that he had become so arrogant, so conceited that he did not care what his people thought of him. He insisted that the Church should waive its customs, and that the wedding should be celebrated at night. ‘For,’ he explained, ‘we need to dress in daylight, and it will take the whole of the day to arrange our jewels and dresses.’

The Church was angry; the people were shocked. He had not only made this sudden decision but he had chosen as a wife a woman who was known to be the mistress of Francis of Luxembourg. The French were already beginning to despise this painted, perfumed King who did not seem to be able to make up his mind whether he was a man or a woman.

He committed a further indiscretion by summoning Francis of Luxembourg to his presence.

‘My cousin,’ he said to this young man, and he said it before so many that the story was carried through Rheims to Paris and circulated throughout France, ‘I am about to marry your mistress. In exchange I give you Mademoiselle de Châteauneuf, who was mine. You shall marry my mistress and I shall marry yours, for that is a very piquant situation, I think, which amuses me and will amuse my people.’

Francis of Luxembourg, completely taken aback by the proposal, bowed low and said: ‘Sire, I am indeed glad that my mistress is destined for such honour and glory. I beg you, however, to dispense with my marrying Mademoiselle de Châteauneuf.’

Henry frowned, ‘Why so? Mademoiselle de Châteauneuf was good enough for me. She is, therefore, good enough for you.’

‘That is so, Sire,’ said the discomfited gentleman, ‘but I would beg time to consider a step which, Your. Majesty will agree, is an important one.’

‘I cannot give you time,’said the arrogant King, ‘I insist that your marriage to Mademoiselle de Châteauneuf takes place at once. I wish there to be two speedy marriages. It is a romantic and saucy situation which pleases me, and will make my people understand the man who is their King.’

Henry was married with great pomp to Louise de Vaudemont, but Francis of Luxembourg was missing from his apartments a few hours after his interview with the King; and later it was discovered that he had fled with all speed to Luxembourg.

Henry shrugged his elegant shoulders; he was too busy with his new clothes and the entertainments he was planning to think very much about his kinsman’s flight. But the people were shaking their heads in disgust and asking themselves what lay ahead for a country with such a King on its throne. ‘Have we finished with one madman, only to set another in his place? They are vipers, these Valois. What can you expect? Remember who their mother is!’

And from coronation and marriage in Rheims came Henry to his capital city, there to indulge in more orgies, more processions of the Battus through the streets.

The Parisians watched the antics of their King with sullen eyes. It seemed to them that nothing but evil could come from the domination of such a man as Henry the Third, who would rule them with the Italian Jezebel at his side.


* * *

The King continued his frivolous existence unaware of the storms which were rising all about him. Catherine watched him with apprehension and offered advice which he pretended to act upon and then allowed himself to forget. He had his special young men always about him; the people of Paris had begun to call them his mignons. There were four whom he seemed to favour more than any others: du Guast, Caylus and the Dukes of Joyeuse and Epernon. They scarcely ever left the King’s side; they enjoyed his confidence and shared his pleasures. Catherine often heard them laughing together as they planned some ludicrous amusement or discussed the new styles in clothes and jewels or told each other of the antics of their lap-dogs.

All over Paris the people were becoming restive. Two cold summers in succession had caused a famine in wheat. The Huguenots, as ready with their assurances that God was on their side as the Catholics were that He was on theirs, declared this to be a result of the massacre. One ill which could, without doubt, be attributed to the massacre was the plague of wolves which harassed the countryside; they had been attracted by so much carnage and looked for more. The Huguenots had been clever and industrious merchants and France was missing the prosperity they had created. Epidemics were raging through the land; lepers roamed the countryside, spreading their terrible afflictions; and still there was perpetual strife between the remaining Huguenots and the Catholics.

Moreover, the King needed money, and declared he must have it. He and his favourites had planned many amusing entertainments, but these would be expensive. The people were heavily taxed now; and in particular, the people of Paris murmured against the King; they were on the spot and they saw the extravagant processions; they glimpsed the expensively dressed guests, the lavish banquets that took place in the palace of the Louvre.

They had never hated any as they hated this King and his mother; but it was Catherine whom they blamed for the King’s misdeeds, as they would continue to blame her for all the ills which befell France. The King they despised; his mother they feared and loathed.

The people of Paris were hungry, and when they were hungry they were reckless. Lampoons were scrawled on walls; coarse jokes about the King and his mother, Alençon and Queen Margot, were circulated. France was simmering on the point of revolt, and this showed itself in small eruptions. Once the carriage in which Catherine and Margot were travelling was stopped by students, who ordered the two women to alight; realizing that it would have been dangerous not to obey, they did so, when obscene remarks were shouted at the Queen Mother, and some students thrust their hands into the bodice of Margot’s gown. Only the haughty demeanour of the two Queens prevented more rough handling; and displaying a dignity which eventually overawed the young rioters, they stepped calmly into their carriage: which was driven speedily away. On another occasion the King stopped to see the fair at Saint- Germain, and he found the place full of students burlesquing the mignons in long chemises with grotesque frills made of white paper. They minced through the town, calling each other ‘mignon’, stroking and petting each other. Those mignons who were with the King wept with anger, and the only way of pacifying them was to place the students under arrest. Catherine arranged that they should be quickly released; but she was alarmed by Henry’s irresponsibility.