Queen in Waiting - Plaidy Jean. Страница 81

"Doubtless she feared to."

"Am I such an ogre... ?"

Henrietta smiled. "You are the Prince. None would care to displease you."

He laughed, but was serious suddenly. "And you, Henrietta, you vould not care to displease me?"

"I hope I never should. Your Highness."

"Henrietta," he said, "you are von good woman."

"I am glad Your Highness finds me so."

"I have enjoyed very much our ... friendship." He looked at his watch. "It is time we make love," he said.

After she had left Henrietta Howard's apartment Mary went to find her lover. As he was in the Prince's household this was not difficult, but she was anxious that no one should see them together for as one of the reigning beauties of the court she was also a favourite subject for the lampooners and she was watched closely. She was anxious that no one should discover that the man to whom she had betrothed herself was John Campbell and write a verse about it. She met Sophie Howe who seeing her flushed cheeks and that she came from Henri-

etta Howard's apartment wanted to know what she had been doing.

"I've just done a bold thing," she said.

Sophie laughed. "I'm always doing bold things. Don't tell me you've taken Henrietta Howard's place with His Highness."

"How dare you say such a thing! As if I ever would! "

"Of course not. There's dear John, I know."

"Don'i speak of it. If it got to his ears..."

"Who? His Royal Highness's? Oh he'd like as not be ready to give John a title and lands in exchange for his complaisance."

"Which John and I would not accept. Listen Sophie, there has just been such a scene. I knocked his guineas all over the floor."

"What! Did he offer those guineas again?"

"Yet again! And this time I was so angry ... besides I was there alone with him and Henrietta Howard and it seemed so horrible. So I told him to leave me alone because I was in love."

"Oh, Mary Bellenden!"

"And now I'm afraid, and I want to see John and you must go and tell him."

"And why don't you go?"

"Because I don't want anyone to see us together and make a noise about it so that it gets to his ears "

"I see."

"Please Sophie."

"Very well. I'll go and see if I can find him."

"And bring him here ... while we can talk in peace."

"And when I bring him would you like me to stay and chaperone you?"

"It won't be necessary."

"Guard your virtue, for what if you lost it? He might not be so eager to marry you if you do."

"Save such warnings for yourself. You need them more than I do. And if you ever say such a thing to me I'll never speak to you again."

"Well wait until I've brought him to you otherwise

M

you won't be able to tell me where I'm most likely to find him."

**In the Prince's apartments. Go now, Sophie."

Sophie was goodhearted and always ready for intrigue; she sped off and it was not long before John Campbell was with Mary.

**Sophie Howe said you wanted me ... urgently," he said as they embraced fondly.

"Always," she answered.

"And you know it is the same with me."

She nodded. "But I'm afraid."

When she recounted what had happened in Henrietta's apartment, John was grave.

"He'll not be prepared to give you up, I know it."

"He'll have to. But he may make trouble. If he attempts to I shall run away from court."

"If we were married..."

"Oh John, is it possible?"

"It would be in secret. Mary, would you?"

"Yes, John. I would."

"Then if he approached you again, you could tell the Princess."

"Do you think it wise, John?"

He laughed softly. "I've been trying to think of an excuse for a long time. This is it. Remember the Churchills. They married in secret. Why shouldn't we?"

"No one must know."

"No one shall know."

"Sophie may guess."

"Not she. She's about to embark on a new flirtation."

"How do you know?"

"When she came to find me I was with Nunty Lowther."

"I don't know him."

"Lord Lonsdale's young brother. They're rather taken with each other. I fancy that for a while Sophie's going to be too preoccupied with her own affairs to think about us."

The Prince of Wales left his mistress's apartments at precisely the same time as he always did and made his way to the royal quarters.

Henrietta was a good mistress. He would never desert her. Meanwhile Mary and John Campbell had made their plans for their wedding which was to be kept a deadly secret.

Caroline, playing cards in the reception room which she had changed into a state apartment at Leicester House, was a little uneasy. She had just heard the latest story about Mary Bel-lenden and the guineas. The girl had been subdued lately and she guessed it was true. How she wished that George Augustus had a little more sense.

She was pregnant again. She thought often that her life was becoming a little like that of Queen Anne who had conceived regularly each year and as regularly lost the child she bore almost as soon as it made its appearance, with the exception of the little Duke of Gloucester who had not survived his boyhood. No, she was different from that. At least she had her dear Fritzchen and her girls. But somehow in the last years everything seemed to go wrong and she had now begun to think she would never again bear a healthy child.

She was afraid that again she would fail, that the King would never treat them properly and would live for years; meanwhile the conduct of the Prince made people titter at court and whisper behind their backs while the more fearless scribblers of the coffee houses made lampoons about him.

This was a passing phase, she assured herself ... a momentary depression. It was due to the fact that she longed for her children. If she could have them, she would be ready to face anything, and the cruelty of the King and the humiliating follies of the Prince would mean nothing to her.

She looked about the room, at the card players intent on their game; at handsome Lord Hervey talking to a group of her women; she caught sight of Molly Lepel's lovely face and Margaret Meadows was looking a little prim, no doubt shocked by something the brilliantly wicked Lord Hervey was saying. Henrietta Howard was in a party playing cards with the Prince. If only, thought Caroline, he would be content with Henrietta! She could trust that woman who never gave herself the slightest airs and was always so discreet. In fact her dis-

cretion had made much less of the guineas incident than might have been the case.

There was a temporary lull in the music and from a group of young men and women surrounding her a burst of laughter.

Young Lord Stanhope was being witty as usual, she supposed. She did not greatly care for the little man, who was almost a dwarf and so odd looking with his large head that seemed as though it would overbalance his body; he had a high falsetto voice which was as unattractive as the rest of him. But his tongue was poisonous.

"Vot is the joke?" asked Caroline.

"We were speaking of Madam Kielmansegge Your Highness," he told her.

"It was so amusing?"

"It is enough to look at that lady to be amused," replied Stanhope.