Part 18 (1/2)

Budge had sent a note in response to my request for more information on Howard. 'No time. Mtng tonight. Await carriage.'

I paced the floor alone for a few minutes, longing for a pipe. It was not satisfactory, pacing a floor so heavily covered with thick silk rugs. I wanted to hear the stamp of my feet, to feel the jolt of it through my body. I would suffocate in this warm, quiet room with its tapestries and terracotta busts and marble furniture. I should pick up a gold-legged footstool and throw it through a window. At least the cold air would help me to think.

d.a.m.nation, I needed that pipe.

What was I supposed to tell the queen? My encounter with Howard had ended in disaster. Perhaps she would dismiss me and find another poor fool to resolve the matter. Yes, yes and perhaps she would knight me and shower me with diamonds.

'Mr Hawkins. How pleased I am to see you, sir.' Henrietta Howard glided into the room in a dove-coloured damask gown, embroidered with a burst of silver flowers. The gown creaked a little as she moved, stiffened beneath with glue to push out the skirts. Her expression was serene, her lips parted in a half-smile of welcome. What did it cost to bury one's feelings so deep? Was she not afraid she might lose them one day? Treasure sinking slowly to the ocean floor and nothing left but the surface, becalmed for ever. 'You met my husband last night.'

I bowed my head.

'He spoke of me.' A statement, not a question. She must know the foul stories he spread about her around the town.

'Nothing of consequence.'

She did not believe the lie, but seemed grateful for it. She paused, then added, 'My son?' Somehow she made the question sound quite casual, though no doubt she longed for news of Henry.

I bowed again, thinking of the young rake spewing vomit into the Thames. His dumb astonishment when I put a blade to his throat. 'A good-natured young gentleman.'

She smiled. This she chose to believe. 'He was always a merry child and quite devoted to me. It infuriated Charles. He would abandon us for months in our tiny hovel. Henry and I muddled along together well enough, I suppose. It's strange I thought myself quite wretched, then. But perhaps I was happy.' Her brow furrowed, as if trying to remember an old acquaintance.

'It is very cruel of Mr Howard to keep your son from you.'

'He is a cruel man,' she agreed with a shrug. 'D'you know, Mr Hawkins, I have not seen Henry since he was ten years old.'

I stared at her, aghast.

'We were separated when the two courts split. I was forced to make a decision to remain with Her Majesty, under her protection or return to live with my husband. I couldn't . . .' she trailed away. 'I had to leave Henry behind, with Charles. I couldn't save him.'

And Howard had spent the next eleven years poisoning the boy against his mother. He had shaped Henry in his own image: a drunken brat with a fathomless, sprawling hatred of Henrietta.

'I've always hoped that one day Henry would understand why I had to leave him,' she added. 'Surely reason would prevail and he would be released from his father's spell. Even now I still hope. But the reports I receive of him, his wild behaviour . . . I fear Charles has taught him too well.'

'He's just a boy one and twenty. I'm sure I was just as wicked at his age.'

'And now?'

'Oh much worse.'

'I do not doubt it.' She laughed, and I caught a glimpse of how she might look stripped of all her burdens light and happy. A soul made for suns.h.i.+ne but lost in shadow.

There was a soft clunk as the door to the queen's chamber opened. Budge peeped through the narrow gap, like Mr Punch peering around the curtain. He beckoned me with a crook of his finger, then opened the door wider.

I stepped back to allow Mrs Howard through first, but Budge stopped her with a subtle shake of the head.

'I am not required?' Four words, laced with meaning. This meeting was of great significance to Henrietta. For weeks she had been held under siege, a prisoner in the palace all because of the man who had tormented her for more than twenty years. Was she not ent.i.tled to hear my report on the matter? But no she was not required. The queen and her games of power and revenge, played out in small denials, countless cruelties, day after day.

The room was stifling; thick, ta.s.selled drapes sealing in the heat from the fire. Behind them the windows rattled in their cas.e.m.e.nts, under attack from a violent rain storm. The queen sat at her desk, dressed in a loose green velvet gown a curtain in human form. She dropped her quill as I entered and pushed herself slowly to her feet. I bowed and she held out a gloved hand to kiss.

She settled down on her sofa, lifting her feet onto an ottoman. She picked up an ivory fan pocked with jewels and flapped it about her bosom in a gay fas.h.i.+on. I'd heard the queen described as a grave, devout woman, but in private she and Budge shared a mischievous, pantomime humour. It sat strangely upon them both tonight a merry jig played over a battle scene. An enormous plate of confectionery rested just within her grasp a jumble of sugar biscuits, macaroons and candied ginger too large even for her prodigious appet.i.te. Presented for comical effect again, I was sure a parody of her own gluttony emphasised to grotesque proportions. A joke only she was ent.i.tled to make.

A pretty girl of about seventeen was playing a game of chess against herself at a small table. One of the queen's daughters Princess Caroline or Amelia I guessed, from her age. Her blonde hair was powdered white and decorated with silk flowers, her lithe figure robed in a lavender gown fringed with pearls. She bore a close resemblance to her mother a beguiling hint of Caroline's own youth, when her beauty matched her wit. But, whereas the queen's expression settled naturally into bright interest and amus.e.m.e.nt, her daughter appeared sullen, slapping the chess pieces down upon the board as if she might like to crush them beneath her fingers. She caught my glance and frowned at the impertinence. I took a hurried interest in the ceiling.

'He is not at all handsome, Mama,' she complained, as if she had been sold a ruined bolt of silk. 'I do not like his arms, and his feet are too big. His legs are tolerable.'

The queen chuckled. 'Emily, ma cherie, opinions are vulgar. You must be more like Mrs Howard. She has said nothing of consequence since . . .' she fluttered her fan, considering, ' . . .1715?'

'I would rather die than be like Mrs Howard.'

'Of course you would. Life is wretched. The world is hateful. How uncharitable of G.o.d to make you a princess.'

Princess Amelia rolled her eyes. 'He should have made me a prince.'

The queen grunted in agreement. 'And poor Fritzy a princess. Laissez-nous maintenant, cherie. I must speak with Mr Hawkins about something of tremendous interest.'

'Oh!' the princess exclaimed, sweeping the chess pieces to the floor. 'Order him to tell me something interesting, Mama. Or I swear I shall die of boredom, right here on this horrid rug.'

The queen's lips twitched. 'Well, Mr Hawkins. Something interesting for the princess. Not too interesting,' she added hastily.

I thought for a moment, then smiled. 'Has Her Royal Highness ever heard of a female gladiator?'

Princess Amelia had not. I described Neala and her fight at the c.o.c.kpit, how she had used her strength and stamina to defeat her opponent in very few clothes. The princess sat with her large blue eyes fixed on mine, enraptured.

'I should like to meet this Irish woman,' she said, when I was finished.

The queen removed her glove and reached for a bonbon. 'And you never shall,' she promised. She dismissed her daughter with a wave, but then called her back and kissed her on both cheeks. When Amelia had left, she turned her gaze on me. 'A shrewd choice of story, Mr Hawkins. Rather too shrewd, I think. And now you have one for me, I believe.'

'Your Majesty,' I said, and began to describe my meeting with Mr Howard. She stopped me mid-breath. 'No, no. I wish to hear first about your neighbour. Mr . . .' she pretended to reach for the name. 'Beadle? Boodle?'

'Burden, ma'am.' She remembered the name well enough. Teasing again. I told her as much as I could, given that I could not mention Alice's bloodstained arrival through the wall, or Sam's midnight prowl around the house. Burden was murdered and I was suspected that was the crux of the matter.

'You threatened him with a sword? In front of witnesses? A little rash, sir.'

'It won't happen again, Your Majesty.'

'Clearly. No need to threaten a dead man.'

'I only mean-'

'Yes, yes. Don't be dull.'

I paused before speaking again. It was not enough to be useful to Queen Caroline: one must be entertaining as well. I supposed this was to counteract the many hours she spent in the king's tedious company. He had I believe only two topics of conversation: either detailed discussion of historic military campaigns or the wonders of his beloved Hanover and how it eclipsed England in every respect. So I must make up for her husband's failings. Grat.i.tude might do the trick. 'I must thank you, ma'am, for securing my release from custody yesterday.'

The queen glanced at Budge, sweating by the fire. 'Did I deign to do that, Budge?'

'Either that or find a new recruit, ma'am. And that would have been diff-'

'-tedious. And now here Mr Hawkins stands on his tolerable legs, expressing his grat.i.tude. Mon dieu. We have indeed been generous. He might be languis.h.i.+ng in gaol were it not for our generosity. He might be sentenced to hang.' She wiggled her fingers over the teetering pile of confections and selected another macaroon, smiling in triumph when the rest stayed miraculously in place. 'So I'm sure he has discovered something tremendously helpful about Mr Howard.'

'Your Majesty. Forgive me, I-'