He watched her mouth as she spoke the words; and although he had heard them before they had never seemed beautiful until then.
“It is you,” he said, “who make them beautiful.”
“I only repeat what is in the book.”
“You love them; you believe them and you make them good.”
“They comfort me. There is much in the book that comforts me.”
“It does not comfort me.”
“But it could.”
“You mean if I loved it … and believed it as you do?”
“You can. Say it with me.”
He did, and he found that the words were beautiful. He wanted to know them so well that he would be able to say them when he was alone without her to prompt him.
He learned quickly. Then he learned other psalms and to say the Lord’s Prayer.
And each day he was more and more with the old lady.
The Princess Anne liked him to be present while she was at her toilette. She was delighted to see the fair skin, which he had inherited from his Danish father, tanned with the sun and air. There was a sprinkling of freckles across his nose; and his eyes seemed several shades more blue than before: but for the fact that his head was so large he would have been extremely handsome, for he had the Stuart features which matched up charmingly with his fairness of skin.
“So my boy is happy at Twickenham?” asked Anne.
He smiled. “Very, very happy, Mama.”
“Come here,” she said. He came and she kissed him and held him tightly for a moment. He endured the embrace with fortitude. He knew that out of many, he was the only child who had survived, and that made him very precious.
“Confound it, Mama!” he said. “You are not old like Mrs. Davies. You will have many children yet; then you will not have to watch over me with such care.”
Anne wanted to say that however many children she had he would always be infinitely precious to her, but to hide her emotion she said: “And pray where do you learn such language?”
“What language, Mama?”
“ ‘Confound it’, you said.”
“Oh, that is nothing. It is not like ‘God damn you to hell, sir.’ ”
Anne was truly shocked.
“I demand to know where you heard such talk,” she said.
“It was Lewis, I think …”
“Lewis! Then he shall be dismissed.”
“Oh, Mama, no … it was not Lewis. I am remembering now.”
“I want to know where you learned such talk.”
He hesitated then, “Why, Mama, I remember now. I invented it myself.”
He smiled at her disarmingly and once more she had to fight to resist the temptation to embrace him and cover him with kisses.
Anne sent for her treasurer, Sir Benjamin Bathurst, the husband of her great friend, Frances Apsley, whom her sister Mary had loved so dearly. Frances had remained Anne’s dear friend and naturally Anne had wanted to honor her husband and this she did by bestowing on him the post of treasurer of her household.
“Sir Benjamin,” said Anne, “we have been here some four or five weeks and all this time we have enjoyed the hospitality of Mrs. Davies. I want you to pay her a hundred guineas, for although she is a wealthy woman, I and my son and our servants must have been a great drain on her.”
Sir Benjamin said that he would see to the matter without delay and the next day he returned to the house with a hundred gold guineas.
Gloucester was with the old lady when Bathurst came in and when he saw that the treasurer wished to speak to her he retired to a corner, and both seemed to forget that he was present.
“Her Highness wishes to recompense you for your hospitality during the last weeks,” began Sir Benjamin.
“To recompense me? I need no recompense.”
“Her Highness believes that to feed so many people must have been costly.”
“I am not in need. I have plenty here for my use and for that of my friends.”
“Still it is Her Highness’s wish that you should take a hundred guineas.”
“I pray you return to Her Highness and tell her that I have no intention of accepting payment.”
A hundred guineas, thought Gloucester. A great deal of money. How many muskets could one buy with it? Was the old lady wondering? But she would not want muskets, of course.
Sir Benjamin, believing that Mrs. Davies merely wished to be persuaded, emptied the bag of guineas into her lap.
“There,” he said, “with Her Highness’s thanks.”
Mrs. Davies stood up and the guineas rolled in all directions. Then she rose and walked from the room without even looking where they went.
Gloucester watched Sir Benjamin on his hands and knees gathering them up. Some had come close to him so he took them to Sir Benjamin.
“So Your Highness saw what happened?”
“She told you that she did not want it.”
“People say of money ‘Take it away. I won’t have it.’ But they are only waiting to be pressed.”
Gloucester considered this.
“But she is not people,” he said gravely. “She is Mrs. Davies.”
“Mama,” said Gloucester, “may I come to church with you?” Anne opened her eyes very wide. “I thought my boy did not care to go to church.”
“I wish to go now,” he said.
“I am pleased.”
“She is pleased too.”
Anne knew that he meant Mrs. Davies.
“I can say ‘Our Father’ now. And I know the Commandments. She says them and I say them after her. The psalms too.”
“You once said that you would never say the psalms.”
His face puckered for a while. It was true. Then he smiled. “I shall have to sing them.”
Anne thought then how happy they had been at Twickenham. It was a strange little interlude in her life—perhaps it would be in his, too. To live quietly in the country, like an ordinary family, walking across the fields to church; and she felt so much better that she was able to walk that little distance. The fruit and vegetables had seemed to do them all good—and to be away from Court in this quiet house of an old lady who could not live much longer, away from bickering and strife, ambitious men and women, the ranting of Sarah.…
What was she thinking? She was longing to be back with her dear Mrs. Freeman. Heirs to thrones could not endure the quiet life forever.
“You must be eager to be back with your men,” she said to her son.
His expression was intent. He thought of his soldiers marching up and down in the Park, while he took the salute, and the excitement made him tremble.
Then he thought of sitting with the old lady and enjoying her talk or her silence.
He was unsure.
He was very sad when the time came to say good-bye to his friend, and, understanding how he would feel, his mother had ordered that his soldiers should be posted as sentinels at Campden House to give him a welcome back.
As he rode up they presented arms and he felt a great joy to be back.
The old lady and her quiet house at Twickenham seemed like part of a dream, something to think about when he was in bed at night, when he could close his eyes and repeat the Lord’s Prayer and the psalms and recall every inflection of her beautiful but sometimes quavering voice.
This was real. This was living.
There was a new pistol waiting for him which delighted him. It was made of wood, but there was a trigger which could be pulled so that it looked like the real thing.
Yes, he was glad to be back.
GARTER AND GOVERNOR FOR GLOUCESTER