“Welcome to Holland, Sir Henry.”

“I was loath to leave France for Holland,” he said, his warm eyes full of suggestions, “but had I known I should find you here, Mistress Lucy, my reluctance would have immediately changed to delight.”

“Men’s tongues become sugar-coated at the French Court, I’ve heard.”

“Nay, Lucy. They learn to appreciate beauty and are not chary of expressing that appreciation.”

Lucy signed to Ann to leave them. Ann was hovering, and Lucy knew that she was trying to remind her of her royal lover. Lucy did not want to remember Charles just now; she had remembered him for four months—an age for Lucy—and none but Charles could have kept her faithful so long.

As soon as they were alone Sir Henry was beside her, taking her hands and covering them with kisses.

“You … you move too quickly, sir.”

“Madame, in this world of change, one must move quickly.” “I would have you know of my position here.”

“Do you think I do not know it? Do you think I did not make it my first business to know it, as soon as I set eyes on you?”

“There is a child in the next room who is the King’s child.”

“Poor Lucy! You have been long alone, for indeed it is long since His Majesty left for Scotland.”

“I have been faithful to Charles …”

“Dear Lucy! What hardship for you! Come, I will show you that a knight in your arms is a better man than a king across the water.”

“That sounds like treason, sir.”

“Who’d not commit treason for you, Lucy!”

Lucy ran from him and made for the door, hoping he would catch her before she reached it, which he did very neatly. He kissed her with passion.

“How dare you, sir!” cried Lucy.

“Because you are so fair and it is a sin that all these charms should be wasted.”

“You shall pay for this, sir.”

“I’ll pay with pleasure, Lucy.”

“You will go at once and not dare come here again.” Lucy’s voice faded away; she gasped; she sighed; and she pretended to struggle as she was carried into the bedchamber.

So Lucy was no longer alone. Lucy had a lover.

The little Court, amused, looked on. What was Charles doing in Scotland? They wondered; they had heard rumors. Was he thinking wistfully of his exiled Court? From all accounts the Covenanters were keeping a stern eye upon him. He must listen to prayers and sermons each day; he must not walk abroad on Sundays; he must spend long hours on his knees. It was a big price, all decided, to ask of a man such as Charles, even for a kingdom. And what of the women of Scotland? How could he elude his jailors—for it seemed they were no less—to enjoy that company in which he so delighted? It was said that he was not permitted even to play cards, and that he had been seen by a pious lady sitting at an open window doing so, and that she had immediately complained to the Commissioners of the Kirk. The King was sternly reprimanded. Cards on the Sabbath! The Scots would not allow that. One of the Commissioners had come in person to rebuke him and had read a long sermon on the evils of card-playing at all times, assuring him that it was a double sin to play on the Sabbath. But this Commissioner had seemed to be aware of the strain the Scots were imposing on the gay young King, for it was said that he whispered before he left: “And if Your Majesty must play cards, I beg of you to shut the window before commencing.” From which it might be deduced that Charles had found some in Scotland to understand him a little.

He had not been crowned, and the Duke of Hamilton and the Earl of Lauderdale had been warned that he was not to mingle with the people on the streets, for that easy charm would, it was understood, win them to his side; and because he was such a feckless young man no one could tell what effect this might have. The Scots wished to keep Charles Stuart under their control; he was to be the figurehead they would use when they marched against Cromwell’s England.

But, said the exiled Court, if there was an opportunity Charles Stuart would have found a mistress, and there were always women in any country; so it was certain that the warmth of Charles Stuart’s charm would have dispersed even the frigid mists of Scotland.

In any case Charles might be hurt when he came back to find Lucy unfaithful, but he would understand. He could always understand. Warm and passionate himself, he would be ready to make allowances for Lucy’s warm and passionate nature. It was true, Lucy assured herself, that no one of her temperament—or Charles’—could remain faithful to an absent lover for so long. So, after the first reluctant submission which Lucy liked to imagine had taken place by force, she would make assignations with her lover; she would deck herself with finery; she gave herself up to the arts of loving which she practiced so well, and in a month after the day when Sir Henry Bennett called at her apartments she found that she was to have his child.

A small and solemn party was riding slowly towards Carisbrooke Castle. There were guards before and behind; there were a few servants and a tutor, and in the center of the party rode two children, the elder a girl of fifteen, the younger a boy of eleven.

As they rode along the boy would take surreptitious glances at the girl down whose cheeks the tears were quietly falling. The pale face of his sister frightened him; her tears worried him, for he knew that she was now even more unhappy than she had been before.

He had always been afraid of his sister, afraid of her passionate courage as well as her frequent tears. She could not be reconciled to their way of living as he could have been. He could have forgotten that he was a prisoner if she would do so.

“But no!” she cried passionately. “You must not forget. You always remember who we are, and above all you must remember Papa.”

At the mention of his father’s name the little boy was always moved to tears. When he was in bed at night he would make a pact with himself: “I will not think of Papa!” And to his prayers he added “Please God guard me this night and do not let me dream of Papa.”

He was Prince Henry, but no one but his sister Elizabeth ever referred to his rank. To the servants and his tutor he was Master Harry, and his sister, instead of being Princess Elizabeth, was Mistress Elizabeth. It was said that they were to be made to forget that they were Royal Stuarts. Elizabeth was to be taught button-making and Henry shoe-making, that they might eventually become useful members of the Protector’s Commonwealth.

“I would rather die!” cried Elizabeth, and indeed it seemed that if grief and melancholy could kill, Elizabeth would soon be dead.

Mr. Lovel, the little boy’s tutor, whispered to him when they were alone that he was not to be afraid. The Protector’s bark was worse than his bite, and he uttered these threats in order to humiliate the little boy’s mother and brothers.

So, with Mr. Lovel to teach him and to give him comfort in secret, Henry could have borne his lot; but his sister was always there to remind him of what they had lost.

She, who was older than he was, remembered so much more of the glorious days. He scarcely remembered his mother; his father he remembered too well. Charles, James and Mary he had scarcely known, and his youngest sister, Henriette, he had never seen at all. Moreover he was physically stronger than Elizabeth, who had broken her leg when she was eight years old and had remained in delicate health thereafter; she grew paler and thinner, but her spirit of resentment against her family’s enemies burned more fiercely every day.

“Elizabeth,” he whispered to her now, “Elizabeth, do not weep so. Perhaps we shall be happy at Carisbrooke.”

“Happy in prison!”

“Perhaps we shall like it better than Penshurst.”

“Shall we enjoy living in that very place where he lived just before … just before …”

Henry’s lips trembled. It would be impossible to forget Papa in the castle where he too had been a prisoner.

Elizabeth said: “They took Papa there before they murdered him, and now they take us there.”

Henry was remembering it all so clearly as they rode along. He was sure that he would have more vivid dreams in Carisbrooke Castle. Perhaps he would ask Mr. Lovel to sleep in his room. Elizabeth would be angry with him if he did so. “You are afraid to dream of Papa!” she had cried scornfully, when he had told her of his fears. “I wish I could dream of him all through the days and nights! That would be almost like having him with us again.”

Now the little boy was crying. He remembered it all so vividly, for it had happened only a year ago when he had been ten years old. One day—a bitterly cold January day—men had come to Syon House, which was the prison of his sister and himself at that time, and they said that the children were to pay a visit to their father.

When Elizabeth had heard this she had burst into bitter weeping, and Henry had asked: “But why do you cry? Do you not want to see Papa?”

“You are too young to understand,” Elizabeth had sobbed. “Oh, lucky Henry, to be too young!”

But he was no longer young; he had ceased to be young that very day.

He could remember the sharp frosty air, the ice on the water; he remembered riding beside the frozen river and wondering why Elizabeth was crying since they were going to see their father.

And when they had arrived at the Palace of Whitehall, Henry had felt his father to be a different man from the one he had known before, and in his dreams it was the father he saw on that day who always appeared. Henry remembered vividly every detail of that last meeting. He could see his father’s face, lined, sad, yet trying to smile as he took Henry on his knee while the weeping Elizabeth clung to his arm. He could see the velvet doublet, the pointed lace collar, the long hair which hung about his father’s shoulders.