Part 23 (1/2)
She looked startled and he went on, ”I have a matter to discuss with you which I think will be of great interest ... to us both.”
”Why ... yes,” she murmured.
”I will wait in the ante-room. Come when you can.”
Shortly afterwards she made her way there to find him patiently waiting for her.
”I knew you would come,” he said, his voice warm and friendly.
”You said you had a matter to discuss.”
”Yes, I have made a very pleasing discovery.”
”About ... me?”
”You and myself. We are cousins.”
”Cousins! Is it indeed so?”
”You are in the same relations.h.i.+p to me as you are to the d.u.c.h.ess of Marlborough. Your father was my cousin.”
”Mr. Harley, is it really so?”
He laughed. ”You seem more surprised than pleased. But I can prove it to you.”
”But of course I am honoured to be so ... so well connected.”
”It was your name that caught my attention. Abigail is my mother's name. It is a popular name in our family.”
”It is scarcely unusual.”
”But that was what interested me and then ... I discovered the connection. I was ... delighted, and I could not refrain from telling you so.”
”It is a pleasure for me,” said Abigail, ”but for you ...”
”You are indeed as modest as I have always heard you are. There is one thing I wished to say to you and it is this: Cousins should meet now and then, should they not? A relations.h.i.+p is a bond. Do you agree? I hope therefore that we shall meet often in Her Majesty's green closet.”
”I am sure Her Majesty will be pleased to see you at any time.”
”And you too?”
”I, of a certainty,” said Abigail with a blush.
She went back to the Queen a little bewildered but pleased. What exalted relatives she possessed! And how much more charming was Mr. Harley than the d.u.c.h.ess of Marlborough. He talked to her as though she were a friend-not, as the d.u.c.h.ess did, like a poor relation only fitted to be a glorified servant.
Abigail was excited. Why, she asked herself, had Mr. Harley seemed so pleased by the relations.h.i.+p? He was not a young man to be easily excited. He was a very ambitious middle-aged one.
A thought came to her. Could it possibly be that Robert Harley, one of the leading politicians, believed the acquaintance of a chambermaid was worth cultivating?
What did Harley want? Abigail was no fool. He wanted a closer relations.h.i.+p with the Queen and he believed he could reach it through his cousin. People were noticing the Queen's fondness for her. This must be the case. It had come to Robert Harley's ears, and because of it he was proud to recognize his cousin.
For, pondered Abigail, I have been his cousin for a very long time, but it is only now that he has taken the trouble to find out.
She could think of nothing else but Harley's pleasure in his discovery, the courteous manner in which he had spoken to her.
I am important, thought Abigail. Not only to fetch and carry for the Queen, but for the influence I can have with her. I am becoming a little like my cousin Sarah.
What if one day I should be in Sarah's position?
Samuel Masham noticed the change in Abigail.
”Something has happened,” he said when she joined him in the ante-room after the Queen and her husband had retired for the night. ”You are different.”
Did she then betray her feelings, Abigail wondered, she who had always prided herself on so successfully hiding them. She studied Samuel shrewdly. They were very close friends; he sought her company whenever possible and she trusted him as she did few people.
”Nothing has happened,” she told him. ”I have, though, discovered a new cousin.”
”Who is that?” asked Samuel sharply.
”Mr. Harley.”
”The Secretary of State?”
”Yes, he asked to speak to me and then told me he had discovered the relations.h.i.+p. He seemed very pleased about it. I have been wondering why.”
”People are beginning to appreciate you, Abigail. I was afraid ...”
”Yes, of what were you afraid?”
”That perhaps ... someone was paying court to you ... and you were rather pleased about it.”
”No, no one is paying court to me, Samuel.”
”You are wrong, Abigail,” he told her vehemently. ”It is what I have been doing for a long time.”
She lifted her green eyes to his. ”But, Samuel ...”
”I think we could be very happy together, Abigail.”
”You mean ...”
”I mean in marriage.”
Marriage! She considered it. The Prince's page and the Queen's chambermaid. Their children growing up at Court. She remembered the marriages of the Churchill girls and how Anne had presented them all with handsome dowries. They would make good marriages ... if their parents were important at Court. No, not their parents. It would be their mother, for Samuel would never be important. Perhaps he knew it. Perhaps that was why he admired her. If she married Samuel-and if she were to have a husband it would have to be Samuel, for who else would want to marry her?-she would guide his destiny as well as her own, as well as their children.
And the Queen was fond of her. Not as fond as she was of Sarah Churchill, of course; but the Queen was capable of great fondness for her female friends. People were noticing.... That was what she kept coming back to. Robert Harley was anxious to claim her as cousin because people were noticing her, Abigail Hill.
”Well, Abigail,” he said. ”You don't hate me, do you?”
”No, Samuel. You know I'm very fond of you.”