Frances shook her head.
You aren't crazy.
“More totty than when you refused my sincere and gentlemanlike advances?” Put asked.
“Even more than that. But shouldn't even a king be called to account for murdering his wife?”
“Belle, it's not our place to be the king's conscience, nor his trial judge.”
“No, no, of course you're right.” She sighed. “These biscuits are truly heavenly, Frances. I'll be a stout old fishwife in no time by living with you.”
Frances beamed.
Yet the situation continued eating away at Belle. When Nash summoned her again to Brighton to reveal the finish of the North Drawing Room, she went alone. Easily enough managed, since Put and his workers were furiously trying to finish an entire houseful of furniture for a newly married woman given free rein by her husband to refurbish the family home.
Her first stop, though, was a visit with the charming Maria Fitzherbert, who welcomed her with genuine delight. It was difficult not to adore the effervescent Mrs. Fitzherbert, and to feel a tad sorry for the rotten way in which the king had treated her.
Although, in looking at Mrs. Fitzherbert's lovely surroundings, one saw she certainly had not suffered financially through the king's parting from her.
“I'm so happy to see you again, Miss Stirling,” Maria said over iced lemon cakes and tea.
“Actually, I'm Mrs. Boyce now. I was recently married.”
“Indeed? Tell me all about your new husband. Is he here in Brighton with you?”
Belle sketched out quickly for Mrs. Fitzherbert all that had happened to her, from Wesley's involvement in the Cato Street Conspiracy to Darcey's attempted assassination and her own marriage to Put.
Mrs. Fitzherbert gasped and leaned forward across the tea table in her parlor. “Remarkable! And you say you shot your brother's lover? You are a playwright's dream. We should plan a closet drama here at Steine House based on your adventures. How amusing it would be.”
“I hardly think I am the stuff of dramatic theatre, Mrs. Fitzherbert.”
The older woman laughed in her merry, infectious way. “My dear Mrs. Boyce, you hardly know how you've livened up my quiet days. What a joy to have you here.”
“I've come to be in attendance on the king when he views the opening of his new North Drawing Room. He has high expectations for it, and I believe Mr. Nash and Mr. Crace have succeeded well.”
“I'm sure you've provided well for it, too.”
Belle reddened under Maria's praise. “Thank you, but my part is so small compared to theirs.”
“Nonsense. No one's part is small when it comes to serving the king. Everyone does his part. Which reminds me, how is Mary Ann Nash these days?”
“I'm sorry? Mary Ann Nash reminds you of serving the king?”
“Hmm, perhaps I said too much. I just assumed that since you were friends with the Nashes and worked so closely with Mr. Nash, that ...” Maria sipped her tea to avoid completing her thought.
“Does Mrs. Nash serve His Majesty in some particular way?”
“Well, perhaps âserve' is not the correct term. The two have been ... special friends for many years.”
Belle nearly dropped her cup. “Pardon me? Are you disclosing that Mrs. Nash is the king's mistress? Behind my patron's back?”
Mrs. Fitzherbert laughed, an incongruously happy sound against such horrifying news. “Mrs. Boyce, you hardly understand the situation. The three of them are great friends.”
“What do you mean?”
“The king and the Nashes have had an arrangement for years. All of her children are actually the king's. His Majesty, in his kind effort to take care of her, recommended Mr. Nash as a good protector, and so he has proven to be one. In return, the king has granted Mrs. Nash's husband considerable architectural patronage. They are all quite happy in their business arrangement.”
“So Mr. Nash is a cuckold.”
“Not at all. The three of them have agreed to the situation, as it benefits them all in different ways. The king can visit his dear Mrs. Nash as he pleases, Mrs. Nash knows her children are taken care of, and Mr. Nash is successful beyond his wildest dreams.”
Belle was stunned. This was incomprehensible.
“Mrs. Fitzherbert, are you saying they are just a merry band of players together?”
Maria smiled. “You might say so, yes.”
Belle could hardly believe what she was hearing. Mr. Nash was an agreeable participant in this charade with the king in order to advance his career? Mary Ann Nash willingly watched the king flaunt his official mistresses around for the crumbs he threw her? King George IV happily ensconced his mistress and children with another man in order to openly pursue other women?
Really, why am I surprised about this in a man who secretly married one woman, then married another?
“But what of the king's other ... attachments?”
She lifted a shoulder. “He is the king and therefore privileged. Remember, there is great reward in always serving your monarch well. I, too, have served my king in the ways he needed. You, Mrs. Boyce, are just as indebted to the king for your livelihood as I am for my own circumstances, as well as that of my children.”
“Your children? I didn't know you had any.”
“I am a babbling brook of secrets today. Yes, the king and I have two daughters together, Mary Ann and Mary Georgina. Alas, the king desired that I send them out to be raised by others, so I did. They hardly know me now, and I don't intrude on their lives.”
For heaven's sake, was there nothing this king was incapable of? How many children had he farmed out to others?
Mrs. Fitzherbert laughed at her discomfort. “Come, come, no need to look so troubled. You've been let in on a great secret today, a great honor for you. Let it be. After all, didn't the great bard warn us that âdiscretion is the better part of valor'?”
Belle was still speechless. And in sudden need of a thorough scrubbing.
When she spoke again, it was slowly, as if in a murky fog of deception. “You once told me that the king could hardly stand his own daughter. I suppose you meant his acknowledged daughter.”
“I do try to honor the king's wishes in all things by not mentioning his other children.”
“I see. So what the king does not like gets put away, much as a toy that a child has outgrown.” Belle put down her plate. She'd lost all appetite for food.
“Mrs. Boyce, it's not quite that severe. Iâ”
“And we know that the person the king was most tired of in this world was his wife, Caroline. His wife who is now dead. Who fell ill the very night of her husband's coronation, and was dead three weeks later, swelled up mysteriously into a bloated, black corpse. Do you not find that just a little odd, Mrs. Fitzherbert?”
“If you are suggesting that the kingâ”
Belle sighed. “I suppose I'm not suggesting anything. How could it be proven? Even if I could, of what value is the opinion of an Oxford Street draper whose brother was hung for plotting against Parliament, and who herself recently killed an intruder in her store?”
Maria put down her own plate. “You did a courageous thing against your intruder. Your concern now is perhaps a little less ... wise.”
Perhaps that is so, but can I live with a soiled conscience? How have you done so all these years?
“It seems to me that aristocrats and royalty are a world unto themselves, are they not? We lesser mortals are not to question their actions or intentions. If we fly too close, we risk getting singed by the flame, or being swept into their virtueless world.”
Maria spread her hands. “All I can say is that you simply don't understand the intricacies of the king's life.”
Belle stood. “Mrs. Fitzherbert, I must leave before I become ill from this conversation. You have been very gracious to me, and I thank you, but I believe this is all just too much for me to grasp. I need to walk and clear the cobwebs from my mind.”
She left after a flurry of kisses and embraces from the king's previous wife and mistress. Escaping into the open air along the Steine, she paced back and forth along the fence for an hour, yet still had no solution to her quandary.
It was time to attend to the king inside the Pavilion to reveal the North Drawing Room to him. Steeling herself for what was to come, she walked over to the palace, and found that the Nashes, Mr. Crace, and the king's other designer, Mr. Robert Jones, were already assembled to welcome the king. She made the barest polite acknowledgments of the others while they waited for His Majesty to arrive in his opulently furnished and decorated room. It carried the same busy and colorful chinoiserie flavor as incorporated in many other rooms. Immense columns down the center of the room contained a vibrant pattern of Chinese dragons in vibrant reds and blues. Another sumptuous room in a breathtaking palace.
The king was jovial and puffed out to twice his normal personality today as he entered, flush from the success of his trip to Ireland. “And what a pleasing vision this all is. How distressing that our dear friend, Lady Conyngham, couldn't be here to see it, but she was unwell and wanted to rest at her town house.”
The king's architect and designers offered their regrets that dear Lady Conyngham couldn't be present for the occasion.
Belle glanced at Mary Ann Nash's calm composure. Was there a flicker of jealousy in her eyes at the mention of the king's mistress?
“Felicitations are due to you on your happy occasion, is that not so, Mrs. Boyce, I believe it is?”
Belle curtseyed. “Yes, Your Majesty. My husband greatly regrets that he couldn't accompany me to Brighton.”
“Pity. We would like to meet the man who tamed you.”
“Tamed, Your Majesty? I don't believe my husband would think he accomplished such a feat.”
The king laughed, his eyes disappearing into slits. “Your husband is a wise man. For what bold and brazen woman can be tempered by her husband, eh?”
It depends on whether your husband is the king.
“Indeed not, Your Majesty.”
“Take my friends, Mr. and Mrs. Nash here. I daresay Mr. Nash has never quite mastered his wife's spirit.”
“No, sir.”
Belle's stomach churned at all of their duplicity. How they must laugh behind cupped hands whenever Belle left the room, amused at her rustic naiveté over the ways of her betters.
She took in John Nash, plump and aging but always smiling. He'd profited greatly by taking in the king's mistress all those years ago. He lived nearly like a prince himself, and didn't seem to mind that he was rearing his patron's children.
And what of Mary Ann Nash? For years raising the king's children while playacting as Nash's wife. Sitting on the sidelines while the king carried on with his public mistresses. What was it like to live year in and year out, watching your children grow up without knowledge of their real father? To know that his interest in them was no more than handing over a purse of gold to your caretaker, while you were still expected to bring him pleasure when he demanded it?
She didn't know Mr. Jones, but Frederick Crace was no more than a fellow tradesman who had somehow developed airs of grandeur from working on the palace, as though it were his own residence. Did Mr. Crace believe that as an artist-designer he somehow had more knowledge of his craft than she had of hers as a draper?
She looked at the king, the very center of all of the deceit and effrontery. He was a glutton for food, attention, and women, and expected all those in his orbit to satisfy those needs. And they did. Everyone in this room had sold his soul for the favor of the king.
I won't do it.
She needed to escape it all, but how?
The king had a surprise for her. “My dear Mrs. Boyce, you have so spectacularly assisted us on our beloved Pavilion that we have decided to grant you the royal warrant for provision of cloth to the Crown.”
Belle held her breath. The royal warrant! Her shop would be secure forever. It would be a worthy establishment to pass to her children one day. She self-consciously placed a hand on her midsection at the thought.
Does the royal warrant equate to giving up my own spirit and moral fiber?
“But more important, Mrs. Boyce, in light of my great respect for your downright pluck in the face of many prospects of ruination, I've decided to release you from your obligation to me that came due upon your marriage.” The king winked at her exaggeratedly. “You thought I might have forgotten our delectable arrangement, eh? But how could I, now that I am a happy bachelor once again?”
The room went silent at the crass reference to Caroline.