The fury continued, and Charles temporized. He gave way to demands. He did all he could to save Danby, but was forced to submit to his imprisonment in the Tower. He found it necessary to dismiss the Duke of York and send him into temporary exile in Brussels. Louise, sick both mentally and physically, could not make up her mind whether or not to leave for France. Hortense continued to play basset and amuse herself with a lover. The people realized that Hortense should not give them cause for concern. It was Louise, the spy of Catholic France, who was the real enemy of the country.
There was talk of the Queen’s attempt to poison the King. Charles characteristically intervened and, although he would have welcomed a new wife and a chance to get a son which he felt would have solved most of his immediate troubles, gallantly stood by the Queen and saved her life.
Nell continued to receive the Whigs at her house. She was cheered wherever she went. People crowded into a goldsmith’s shop, where the goldsmith was making a very rich service of plate, admired this greatly and were pleased because they believed it was to be presented to Nell. When they discovered it was for Portsmouth, they cursed the Duchess and spat on the plate.
Nell was immersed in family affairs. Rose had married again on the death of John Cassels. This time her husband was Guy Forster, and Nell was working hard to get a bigger pension for Rose and her husband.
While Nell was at Windsor news came to her of her mother’s accident.
Madam Gwyn had moved to Sandford Manor where, at the bottom of her garden, was a stream which divided Fulham from Chelsea. One day she had wandered out to her garden and, well fortified with her favorite beverage, had slipped and fallen into the stream. It was a shallow brook but, being too drunk to lift herself out of it, she had lain facedown and drowned.
Nell hurried to London where Rose was waiting for her. They embraced and wept a little.
“’Tis not,” said Nell, “that she was a good mother to us, but she was the only mother we had.”
So Nell gave the old lady a fine funeral and many gathered in the streets to see it pass. Madam Gwyn was buried in St. Martin’s Church, and Nell ordered a monument to be erected over her grave.
Whigs and Tories gathered in the streets. The Whigs called attention to the virtues of Nell; the Tories jeered. There was a new spate of Tory lampoons on Nell’s upbringing in her mother’s bawdy-house.
Nell snapped her fingers and went back to Windsor to join the King.
Charles knew that he was passing through the most dangerous time of his life. As an exile he had longed to regain his kingdom, but then he had been young. Now he was aging; he had enjoyed almost twenty years of that kingdom, but he knew that if he did not walk with the utmost care he would lose it again; and he wondered whether, if he lost it, he would ever have the strength to recover it.
He tried to lead the life he loved—sauntering in his parks, his dogs at his heels, feeding his ducks, exchanging witty comments as he went. He sat for long hours fishing on the banks of the river at Windsor. He wished that he could prorogue Parliament and prevent its ever sitting again. If he had enough money with which to manage the affairs of the country, he believed he could rule in peace; he could put an end to this terror which hung over his country. He would demand freedom of thought in religious matters for all men. He saw no peace for any country when there was religious conflict. He wished to say: Think as you wish on these things, and let others go their way. He himself would never feel bound to any religion; he merely wished for freedom for all his subjects.
He wanted peace, and while Whig was at Tory’s throat, and vice versa, there would never be peace. Let a pleasure-loving man such as himself rule; let the people take their pleasures as he did; give him enough money to fit out a navy which would hold all enemies from his shores, and there would be peace and plenty throughout the land.
But this terror had come upon the country, and there was nothing he could do to prevent it. He was powerless in the hands of his Parliament; he was caught between the Whigs and Tories, the Protestants and the Catholics.
James had reproved him for wandering too freely in his parks alone. “Would his little spaniels protect him from an assassin’s bullet?” James demanded. “Do not worry on that score,” Charles had said. “They will never kill me to make you King.”
He had said it with a laugh, but there was a great sadness in his heart. He feared for James; he greatly feared for James.
Oh, James, he mused again and again, if you would but turn from your holy saints, if you would but declare yourself a Protestant, England would accept you as my successor, and young Jemmy’s nose would be out of joint. All this unrest would die down, for it flows out of the curse of this age—religious conflicts, and the curse of Kings: the inability to get sons.
He went to Nell for comfort.
Young Charles—my lord Burford, thought the King with a chuckle—came running to greet him.
“It is long since you have been to see me, Papa,” said Charles.
“’Tis but a few days.”
“It seems longer,” said the boy.
Charles ruffled the hair so like his own had been when he was a small boy roaming in the grounds of Hampton Court or lying on the banks at Greenwich watching the ships sail by.
“It was wrong of me.”
“You should pay a penalty for your sins, Father.”
“What would you suggest for me?”
“Stay all the time.”
“Ah, my son, that would be my pleasure, and penances are not for the pleasure of the sinner, you know. You and I will go to Portsmouth to watch the launching of one of my ships, shall we?”
Charles leaped into the air. “Yes, Papa. When? … When? …”
“Very soon … very soon … I’ll tell you something else. Ships have names, you know, just as boys have. What shall we call this one?”
Little Charles looked shyly at his father, waiting. “Charles?” he suggested.
“There are so many Charleses. Who shall say which is which? Nay, we’ll call her Burford.”
“Then she will be my ship?”
“Oh, no, my son. All those which bear our names do not necessarily belong to us. But the honor is yours. It will show the world how much I honor my son Burford. ’Twill make your mother dance a merry jig, I doubt not.”
“Shall we tell her?” asked small Charles with a laugh.
“Come! We’ll do so now.”
And hand in hand they went to find Nell.
Charles, determined to follow the old life as far as possible, gave up few of his pleasures. He could not stop the execution of the accused, though he had managed to save the Queen. The mob had allowed him that, for such was his charm that he had only to appear before them to subdue their anger, and he had gone in person to Somerset House to bring Catherine to Whitehall at the very time when the mob was howling for her blood. But he could not save others, for Titus Oates, it seemed, was King of London during those days of terror.
So he sauntered and fished and played games, as he had always done. He had forgotten that he was fifty, he had enjoyed such robust health that he seemed to have a notion that he always would.
He had played a hard game of tennis and, walking along by the river, he had taken off his wig and jacket to cool down.
This he had done effectively enough at the time, but when he went to bed that night he became delirious and his attendants hurried to his bedside, to find him in a high fever.
Shaftesbury, Buckingham, and the whole of the Parliament were filled with consternation. If Charles should die now, there could be no averting civil war. James would never stand aside, and, although Monmouth had his supporters, there were many who would die rather than see a bastard on the throne.
James’ friends sent word to Brussels, telling him that the King was on the point of death and that he should return immediately. James left Brussels at once, leaving Mary Beatrice there and taking with him only a few of his most trusted friends—Lord Peterborough, John Churchill, Colonel Legge, and his barber.