Now Face to Face (59 page)

“‘To keep my hands from picking and stealing, and my tongue from evil speaking, and…’” The Gypsy spoke so softly. “I forget the rest.”

“You’d best remember.”

Bathsheba the silent outcast, accepted by none of the other servants, eating alone, working alone, always alone. The Gypsy had braided apple blossom into the willow of the basket in which her baby slept. There was something not right with the child. Annie saw it in the set of his eyes, the shape of his mouth and nose. The Gypsy would have him on her hands forever.

The foreboding did not go away. A dark cloud merged into another one outside the window, and there was a rumble of thunder. The church felt damp and cold to Annie.

“Storm coming.”

Bathsheba’s voice was soft.

Yes, thought Annie, Bathsheba feels it, too.

Chapter Thirty-two

A
PRIL
. I
N
L
ONDON
, S
LANE SHOOK HIS HEAD
. “N
O, NOTHING
else, Louisa. You’ve fed me as if I was a prince.”

There were candles burning everywhere, a long tablecloth of Belgian lace on the table at which he sat, before him the remains of a feast: roasted chicken, quail, fish. He was only just back from France. Aunt Shrew had all but fed him herself, so glad was she to see him. She poured more wine into his goblet.

“The physician in Paris said I must not drink too much wine.”

“And what else did he say about your hurt?”

Ride nowhere on horseback. Rest every day in a darkened chamber. Slane crumbled a piece of bread to nothing. “To take care.”

“And you’ve been on horseback since you arrived. We have some time before Lord North and the Duke of Wharton arrive. Tell me how you found Rochester.”

Arrogant, melancholy, somehow pitiful.

“Distraught about his wife, who is near to dying.”

His wife’s illness had pushed Rochester to the edge. He had not the courage for both the invasion and her death. Time, thought Slane, lessens courage. I see that. If we live long enough, we become cowards. He rubbed his brow. The choice of Rochester to lead had always been fraught with risk. Everyone had known it, only no one wished to pay the forfeit.

“He wished to know if I despised him.”

“He wanted absolution for abandoning us.”

“He does not abandon us.”

“I hope you didn’t give absolution to him. You did, I see it.”

Slane sidestepped her. “He voices what are true concerns for our success, supports us in any way possible—”

“Except to lead us? You may forgive him, but I never will. I don’t like the new plan, Slane, this waiting until King George goes upon his summer pilgrimage to Hanover. It takes the edge off, to wait too long. Disgusting is the only word for what King George’s ministers have made of the election. There were riots in Westminster and Coventry over how voting went. Never has there been such open purchase of votes. Besmirched, I feel besmirched by it all, as if everything, every one of us, might be bought at the market. I am not the only one who feels that the tone of our court is ugly and venal. The time is ripe. Why can they not invade as planned?”

He did not answer.

Rochester’s letter had shocked those in Paris and Rome and Madrid who were feverishly pulling together the last threads. The letter made them cautious. It was his duty to persuade those here to the new plan, but like Louisa, Slane did not like it that the invasion was put off.

Ormonde had ships, solders, arms ready in Spain. King James was poised to join him. They were confident France was going to supply thirty thousand troops. Slane had argued as forcefully as he could that Rochester’s letter should be ignored, that they should proceed as planned, that those in England would not fail, never mind what Rochester thought.

“So, the invasion is put off until May, you come to pull us all into obedience again, and who, in their great wisdom, have those in Paris decided will now lead the rebellion here?”

Slane told her the name. It did not matter. What was necessary now was simply a figurehead, a symbol. The man who had agreed to lead, to take over for Rochester, was an old Tory lord whom time had mastered. Once he had been the wiliest of Queen Anne’s ministers, but he’d been sent to the Tower of London after King George came to the throne. The man had listened carefully to Slane, who explained how the plot was in its last stages. I’m not what I once was, he had told Slane.

No one has to know that, Slane had replied. Simply tell the others what I ask you to. It is your name I need, not your vigor. Aunt Shrew was pleased. If she accepted, so would the others. Slane felt relieved.

“It’s a good choice,” she was saying. “He is the only man every one of us respects. It is, in fact, a brilliant choice. I feel more hopeful myself, knowing he has agreed. Well, what a busy man you’ve been, Laurence Slane. Did you call upon King George himself and request that he leave early for his journey to Hanover? Was that among your instructions for salvaging us? What is it, Pinchwit? I told you I was not to be disturbed.”

“Tommy Carlyle asks to see you, madam,” the servant said, and to Slane, “The little dog is crying. We’ve given it milk.”

“We have time before the others come,” said Aunt Shrew. “Carlyle will have some gossip no one else yet knows. I’ll go hear it, and then I’ll send him on his way. You know, Tony has taken Carlyle as his creature. Still waters may run deeper than we know. What dog?”

“A little spotted dog. A gift.”

“For whom?”

“For Rochester.”

She bristled. “For Rochester! From whom?”

“King James.”

“Since when does King James give gifts to cowards?”

“Its leg has been hurt on the journey. I’ve brought it to London with me to heal. It is sent to Rochester’s wife. Such is called, I believe, respect for another’s grief; called, also, not biting off one’s nose to spite one’s face.”

He spoke evenly. Jamie played all sides against the middle. He would need the Bishop of Rochester to solidify loyalty within the Church of England when he was on the throne. And so he would not punish him. Yet.

“I’m going to show you my Easter gown, Slane, once I see what Carlyle wants. I looked very handsome in it.”

She left in a rattle of jewelry and hiss of skirts. It was the custom to wear new clothes at Easter, which had just been celebrated. Walpole had not resigned as a minister. He hung on, despite their plots. There had been a scandal over one of his men’s actions in the Treasury in February, and he’d survived it. There had been an uproar over the news about Barbara’s kidnaped servant. The Duke of Wharton had done a wonderful broadsheet, making everything Walpole’s fault. Walpole had survived that. If Walpole was tired of it all, he was not so tired that he walked away. That was the good thing about Lord Sunderland, though. He never gave up, either. He would continue to invent scandal, to harass, to maneuver until Walpole was gone. Even Wharton was impressed with Lord Sunderland’s single-mindedness.

Slane closed his eyes, wanting to rest a moment from machination and plotting. When he opened them, she was standing before him, and her face was grim.

“Sunderland is dead. That’s what Carlyle came to say.”

Slane felt cold move up his back.

“This morning,” she was saying. “It is a great surprise to everyone. The King is in great distress.”

As are we. The Jacobites’ key to the inner workings of George of Hanover’s English ministry was gone, like the blinking of an eye. Sunderland would have betrayed the King, had betrayed him, in a dozen small ways.

Slane stood, walked to the window, looked out to the night, the river; a few boats rode on it, lanterns to light their way.

Every instinct in him said, Go back to Paris, now. Tell them they must invade now. If he could have willed Ormonde to appear on the next river tide, he would have done so. He touched his brow, tender, a dull ache always there, sometimes terrible pain.

What was the saying from his childhood? Bad news came in threes. Here was the second. He was going to Paris. What was the saying about April? Some country saying of it being the cruelest month.

Chapter Thirty-three

A
PRIL
. S
EVERAL DAYS LATER, THE
P
RINCESS OF
W
ALES SAT IN A
parlor at Leicester House, where she lived when in London, pretending to read, but her mind was very much upon her husband, and upon a summons he had received to attend his father at St. James’s Palace.

Nothing unusual in that. The King was going to Hanover in another two weeks, was pleased about the journey, for he’d not been there in two years. The South Sea Bubble had not allowed it. The Prince would be regent in his place. There were doubtless many details to discuss. She herself was looking forward to the summer, to the power that would be theirs. It was like stretching her wings in anticipation of that time when she would be Queen. Hard to fold the wings back in when the King returned, but she who has patience may compass anything, may she not?

So.

Little tendrils, lightest of tendrils, most delicate of tendrils, out to Robert Walpole: Was it in the best interest of the kingdom that the Devane fine even be discussed in the next Parliament?

Might it not be better to let sleeping dogs lie just a while longer—a year, six months? Nothing more, of course; we are too fond of Lady Devane for it to be longer.

What can we do, she asked the King, to make our dear Lady Devane’s stay in Virginia more pleasant? The Princess would retreat now that Sunderland was dead, allow the dust to settle, see who pushed closest to the King, base her further conduct on that.

She walked out to her terrace, raised her face to the sun. What did the death of Sunderland mean? Carlyle swore that Walpole and his brother-in-law, Lord Townshend, would be the chief ministers within two years, now that there was no Sunderland as competition. She thought of some of the other ministers, shuffling them in her mind, considering what she knew of them. Possibly Carlyle was right. Sunderland had possessed a truly remarkable deviousness and longevity.

Ah, there was her husband.

The Princess smiled, genuinely pleased to see him, though he would soon spoil that with some rough word or some slight, which she would have to pretend to ignore but which would be added to the burden of those already borne.

“I’ll talk a moment with the Princess.”

He spoke rudely to the attendants who followed him, gentlemen of the bedchamber, constant companions. Foolish to offend when offense was not necessary. But he could not learn that.

She scanned his face. Something had happened. He was breathing too heavily. His face was too red. The fingers of her hand, resting upon the balustrade of the terrace, gripped it a moment. Had he quarreled with his father? This was not the moment, when in another month they would for all purposes be upon their own. But when had the moment of something ever mattered to him? She had to guide him in everything.

“There is to be an invasion,” he said.

The Prince was looking out over the terrace to their gardens as he spoke to her. Fear clutched the Princess’s heart.