Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges Part 40

The bedchamber and the two rooms adjoining it, the closet and the apartment which was to be called my lord's parlour, were already lighted and awaiting their occupier; and the collation laid for my lord's supper.

Lord Castlewood and his mother and sister came up the stair a minute afterwards, and, so soon as the domestics had quitted the apartment, Castlewood and Esmond uncovered, and the two ladies went down on their knees before the prince, who graciously gave a hand to each. He looked his part of prince much more naturally than that of servant, which he had just been trying, and raised them both with a great deal of n.o.bility, as well as kindness in his air. "Madam," says he, "my mother will thank your ladys.h.i.+p for your hospitality to her son; for you, madam," turning to Beatrix, "I cannot bear to see so much beauty in such a posture. You will betray Monsieur Baptiste if you kneel to him; sure 'tis his place rather to kneel to you."

A light shone out of her eyes; a gleam bright enough to kindle pa.s.sion in any breast. There were times when this creature was so handsome, that she seemed, as it were, like Venus revealing herself a G.o.ddess in a flash of brightness. She appeared so now; radiant, and with eyes bright with a wonderful l.u.s.tre. A pang, as of rage and jealousy, shot through Esmond's heart, as he caught the look she gave the prince; and he clenched his hand involuntarily and looked across to Castlewood, whose eyes answered his alarm-signal, and were also on the alert. The prince gave his subjects an audience of a few minutes, and then the two ladies and Colonel Esmond quitted the chamber. Lady Castlewood pressed his hand as they descended the stair, and the three went down to the lower rooms, where they waited awhile till the travellers above should be refreshed and ready for their meal.

Esmond looked at Beatrix, blazing with her jewels on her beautiful neck.

"I have kept my word," says he: "And I mine," says Beatrix, looking down on the diamonds.

"Were I the Mogul emperor," says the colonel, "you should have all that were dug out of Golconda."

"These are a great deal too good for me," says Beatrix, dropping her head on her beautiful breast,-"so are you all, all:" and when she looked up again, as she did in a moment, and after a sigh, her eyes, as they gazed at her cousin, wore that melancholy and inscrutable look which 'twas always impossible to sound.

When the time came for the supper, of which we were advertised by a knocking overhead, Colonel Esmond and the two ladies went to the upper apartment, where the prince already was, and by his side the young viscount, of exactly the same age, shape, and with features not dissimilar, though Frank's were the handsomer of the two. The prince sat down, and bade the ladies sit. The gentlemen remained standing; there was, indeed, but one more cover laid at the table:-"Which of you will take it?"

says he.

"The head of our house," says Lady Castlewood, taking her son's hand, and looking towards Colonel Esmond with a bow and a great tremor of the voice; "the Marquis of Esmond will have the honour of serving the king."

"I shall have the honour of waiting on his royal highness," says Colonel Esmond, filling a cup of wine, and, as the fas.h.i.+on of that day was, he presented it to the king on his knee.

"I drink to my hostess and her family," says the prince, with no very well-pleased air; but the cloud pa.s.sed immediately off his face, and he talked to the ladies in a lively, rattling strain, quite undisturbed by poor Mr. Esmond's yellow countenance, that I dare say looked very glum.

When the time came to take leave, Esmond marched homewards to his lodgings, and met Mr. Addison on the road that night, walking to a cottage he had at Fulham, the moon s.h.i.+ning on his handsome serene face:-"What cheer, brother?" says Addison, laughing; "I thought it was a footpad advancing in the dark, and behold 'tis an old friend. We may shake hands, colonel, in the dark, 'tis better than fighting by daylight. Why should we quarrel, because I am a Whig and thou art a Tory? Turn thy steps and walk with me to Fulham, where there is a nightingale still singing in the garden, and a cool bottle in a cave I know of; you shall drink to the Pretender if you like, and I will drink my liquor my own way: I have had enough of good liquor?-no, never! There is no such word as enough as a stopper for good wine. Thou wilt not come? Come any day, come soon. You know I remember _Simois_ and the _Sigeia tellus_, and the _praelia mixta mero, mixta mero_," he repeated, with ever so slight a touch of _merum_ in his voice, and walked back a little way on the road with Esmond, bidding the other remember he was always his friend, and indebted to him for his aid in the _Campaign_ poem. And very likely Mr. Under Secretary would have stepped in and taken t'other bottle at the colonel's lodgings, had the latter invited him, but Esmond's mood was none of the gayest, and he bade his friend an inhospitable good-night at the door.

"I have done the deed," thought he, sleepless, and looking out into the night; "he is here, and I have brought him; he and Beatrix are sleeping under the same roof now. Whom did I mean to serve in bringing him? Was it the prince, was it Henry Esmond? Had I not best have joined the manly creed of Addison yonder, that scouts the old doctrine of right divine, that boldly declares that Parliament and people consecrate the sovereign, not bishops, nor genealogies, nor oils, nor coronations." The eager gaze of the young prince, watching every movement of Beatrix, haunted Esmond and pursued him. The prince's figure appeared before him in his feverish dreams many times that night. He wished the deed undone, for which he had laboured so. He was not the first that has regretted his own act, or brought about his own undoing. Undoing? Should he write that word in his late years? No, on his knees before Heaven, rather be thankful for what then he deemed his misfortune, and which hath caused the whole subsequent happiness of his life.

Esmond's man, honest John Lockwood, had served his master and the family all his life, and the colonel knew that he could answer for John's fidelity as for his own. John returned with the horses from Rochester betimes the next morning, and the colonel gave him to understand that on going to Kensington, where he was free of the servants' hall, and indeed courting Mrs. Beatrix's maid, he was to ask no questions, and betray no surprise, but to vouch stoutly that the young gentleman he should see in a red coat there was my Lord Viscount Castlewood, and that his attendant in grey was Monsieur Baptiste the Frenchman. He was to tell his friends in the kitchen such stories as he remembered of my lord viscount's youth at Castlewood; what a wild boy he was; how he used to drill Jack and cane him, before ever he was a soldier; everything, in fine, he knew respecting my lord viscount's early days. Jack's ideas of painting had not been much cultivated during his residence in Flanders with his master; and, before my young lord's return, he had been easily got to believe that the picture brought over from Paris, and now hanging in Lady Castlewood's drawing-room, was a perfect likeness of her son, the young lord. And the domestics having all seen the picture many times, and catching but a momentary imperfect glimpse of the two strangers on the night of their arrival, never had a reason to doubt the fidelity of the portrait; and next day, when they saw the original of the piece habited exactly as he was represented in the painting, with the same periwig, ribbon, and uniform of the Guard, quite naturally addressed the gentleman as my Lord Castlewood, my lady viscountess's son.

The secretary of the night previous was now the viscount; the viscount wore the secretary's grey frock; and John Lockwood was instructed to hint to the world below stairs that my lord being a Papist, and very devout in that religion, his attendant might be no other than his chaplain from Bruxelles; hence, if he took his meals in my lord's company there was little reason for surprise. Frank was further cautioned to speak English with a foreign accent, which task he performed indifferently well, and this caution was the more necessary because the prince himself scarce spoke our language like a native of the island; and John Lockwood laughed with the folks below stairs at the manner in which my lord, after five years abroad, sometimes forgot his own tongue and spoke it like a Frenchman. "I warrant," says he, "that with the English beef and beer, his lords.h.i.+p will soon get back the proper use of his mouth;" and, to do his new lords.h.i.+p justice, he took to beer and beef very kindly.

The prince drank so much, and was so loud and imprudent in his talk after his drink, that Esmond often trembled for him. His meals were served as much as possible in his own chamber, though frequently he made his appearance in Lady Castlewood's parlour and drawing-room, calling Beatrix "sister", and her ladys.h.i.+p "mother", or "madam", before the servants. And, choosing to act entirely up to the part of brother and son, the prince sometimes saluted Mrs. Beatrix and Lady Castlewood with a freedom which his secretary did not like, and which, for his part, set Colonel Esmond tearing with rage.

The guests had not been three days in the house when poor Jack Lockwood came with a rueful countenance to his master, and said: "My lord, that is-the gentleman, has been tampering with Mrs. Lucy" (Jack's sweetheart), "and given her guineas and a kiss." I fear that Colonel Esmond's mind was rather relieved than otherwise, when he found that the ancillary beauty was the one whom the prince had selected. His royal tastes were known to lie that way, and continued so in after-life. The heir of one of the greatest names, of the greatest kingdoms, and of the greatest misfortunes in Europe, was often content to lay the dignity of his birth and grief at the wooden shoes of a French chambermaid, and to repent afterwards (for he was very devout) in ashes taken from the dustpan. 'Tis for mortals such as these that nations suffer, that parties struggle, that warriors fight and bleed. A year afterwards gallant heads were falling, and Nithsdale in escape, and Derwent.w.a.ter on the scaffold; whilst the heedless ingrate, for whom they risked and lost all, was tippling with his seraglio of mistresses in his _pet.i.te maison_ of Chaillot.

Blus.h.i.+ng to be forced to bear such an errand, Esmond had to go to the prince and warn him that the girl whom his highness was bribing, was John Lockwood's sweetheart, an honest resolute man, who had served in six campaigns, and feared nothing, and who knew that the person, calling himself Lord Castlewood, was not his young master: and the colonel besought the prince to consider what the effect of a single man's jealousy might be, and to think of other designs he had in hand, more important than the seduction of a waiting-maid, and the humiliation of a brave man.

Ten times, perhaps, in the course of as many days, Mr. Esmond had to warn the royal young adventurer of some imprudence or some freedom. He received these remonstrances very testily, save perhaps in this affair of poor Lockwood's, when he deigned to burst out a-laughing, and said, "What! the _soubrette_ has peached to the _amoureux_, and Crispin is angry, and Crispin has served, and Crispin has been a corporal, has he? Tell him we will reward his valour with a pair of colours, and recompense his fidelity."

Colonel Esmond ventured to utter some other words of entreaty, but the prince, stamping imperiously, cried out, "_a.s.sez, milord: je m'ennuye a la preche_; I am not come to London to go to the sermon." And he complained afterwards to Castlewood, that "_le pet.i.t jaune, le noir colonel, le Marquis Misanthrope_" (by which facetious names his royal highness was pleased to designate Colonel Esmond), "fatigued him with his grand airs and virtuous homilies."

The Bishop of Rochester, and other gentlemen engaged in the transaction which had brought the prince over, waited upon his royal highness, constantly asking for my Lord Castlewood on their arrival at Kensington, and being openly conducted to his royal highness in that character, who received them either in my lady's drawing-room below, or above in his own apartment; and all implored him to quit the house as little as possible, and to wait there till the signal should be given for him to appear. The ladies entertained him at cards, over which amus.e.m.e.nt he spent many hours in each day and night. He pa.s.sed many hours more in drinking, during which time he would rattle and talk very agreeably, and especially if the colonel was absent, whose presence always seemed to frighten him; and the poor "_Colonel Noir_" took that hint as a command accordingly, and seldom intruded his black face upon the convivial hours of this august young prisoner. Except for those few persons of whom the porter had the list, Lord Castlewood was denied to all friends of the house who waited on his lords.h.i.+p. The wound he had received had broke out again from his journey on horseback, so the world and the domestics were informed. And Doctor A--,(17) his physician (I shall not mention his name, but he was physician to the Queen, of the Scots nation, and a man remarkable for his benevolence as well as his wit), gave orders that he should be kept perfectly quiet until the wound should heal. With this gentleman, who was one of the most active and influential of our party, and the others before spoken of, the whole secret lay; and it was kept with so much faithfulness, and the story we told so simple and natural, that there was no likelihood of a discovery except from the imprudence of the prince himself, and an adventurous levity that we had the greatest difficulty to control. As for Lady Castlewood, although she scarce spoke a word, 'twas easy to gather from her demeanour, and one or two hints she dropped, how deep her mortification was at finding the hero whom she had chosen to wors.h.i.+p all her life (and whose restoration had formed almost the most sacred part of her prayers), no more than a man, and not a good one. She thought misfortune might have chastened him; but that instructress had rather rendered him callous than humble. His devotion, which was quite real, kept him from no sin he had a mind to. His talk showed good-humour, gaiety, even wit enough; but there was a levity in his acts and words that he had brought from among those libertine devotees with whom he had been bred, and that shocked the simplicity and purity of the English lady, whose guest he was. Esmond spoke his mind to Beatrix pretty freely about the prince, getting her brother to put in a word of warning. Beatrix was entirely of their opinion; she thought he was very light, very light and reckless; she could not even see the good looks Colonel Esmond had spoken of. The prince had bad teeth, and a decided squint. How could we say he did not squint? His eyes were fine, but there was certainly a cast in them. She rallied him at table with wonderful wit; she spoke of him invariably as of a mere boy; she was more fond of Esmond than ever, praised him to her brother, praised him to the prince, when his royal highness was pleased to sneer at the colonel, and warmly espoused his cause: "And if your Majesty does not give him the Garter his father had, when the Marquis of Esmond comes to your Majesty's Court, I will hang myself in my own garters, or will cry my eyes out." "Rather than lose those," says the prince, "he shall be made archbishop and colonel of the Guard" (it was Frank Castlewood who told me of this conversation over their supper).

"Yes," cries she, with one of her laughs,-(I fancy I hear it now; thirty years afterwards I hear that delightful music)-"yes, he shall be Archbishop of Esmond and Marquis of Canterbury."

"And what will your ladys.h.i.+p be?" says the prince; "you have but to choose your place."

"I," says Beatrix, "will be mother of the maids to the queen of his Majesty King James the Third-_Vive le Roy!_" and she made him a great curtsy, and drank a part of a gla.s.s of wine in his honour.

"The prince seized hold of the gla.s.s and drank the last drop of it,"

Castlewood said, "and my mother, looking very anxious, rose up and asked leave to retire. But that 'Trix is my mother's daughter, Harry," Frank continued, "I don't know what a horrid fear I should have of her. I wish-I wish this business were over. You are older than I am, and wiser, and better, and I owe you everything, and would die for you-before George I would; but I wish the end of this were come."

Neither of us very likely pa.s.sed a tranquil night; horrible doubts and torments racked Esmond's soul; 'twas a scheme of personal ambition, a daring stroke for a selfish end-he knew it. What cared he, in his heart, who was king? Were not his very sympathies and secret convictions on the other side-on the side of People, Parliament, Freedom? And here was he, engaged for a prince, that had scarce heard the word "liberty"; that priests and women, tyrants by nature both, made a tool of. The misanthrope was in no better humour after hearing that story, and his grim face more black and yellow than ever.

Chapter X. We Entertain A Very Distinguished Guest At Kensington

Should any clue be found to the dark intrigues at the latter end of Queen Anne's time, or any historian be inclined to follow it, 'twill be discovered, I have little doubt, that not one of the great personages about the queen had a defined scheme of policy, independent of that private and selfish interest which each was bent on pursuing; St. John was for St. John, and Harley for Oxford, and Marlborough for John Churchill, always; and according as they could get help from St. Germains or Hanover, they sent over proffers of allegiance to the princes there, or betrayed one to the other: one cause, or one sovereign, was as good as another to them, so that they could hold the best place under him; and like Lockit and Peachem, the Newgate chiefs in the _Rogues' Opera_ Mr. Gay wrote afterwards, had each in his hand doc.u.ments and proofs of treason which would hang the other, only he did not dare to use the weapon, for fear of that one which his neighbour also carried in his pocket. Think of the great Marlborough, the greatest subject in all the world, a conqueror of princes, that had marched victorious over Germany, Flanders, and France, that had given the law to sovereigns abroad, and been wors.h.i.+pped as a divinity at home, forced to sneak out of England-his credit, honours, places, all taken from him; his friends in the army broke and ruined; and flying before Harley, as abject and powerless as a poor debtor before a bailiff with a writ. A paper, of which Harley got possession, and showing beyond doubt that the duke was engaged with the Stuart family, was the weapon with which the treasurer drove Marlborough out of the kingdom. He fled to Antwerp, and began intriguing instantly on the other side, and came back to England, as all know, a Whig and a Hanoverian.

Though the treasurer turned out of the army and office every man, military or civil, known to be the duke's friend, and gave the vacant posts among the Tory party; he, too, was playing the double game between Hanover and St. Germains, awaiting the expected catastrophe of the queen's death to be master of the state, and offer it to either family that should bribe him best, or that the nation should declare for. Whichever the king was, Harley's object was to reign over him; and to this end he supplanted the former famous favourite, decried the actions of the war which had made Marlborough's name ill.u.s.trious, and disdained no more than the great fallen compet.i.tor of his, the meanest arts, flatteries, intimidations, that would secure his power. If the greatest satirist the world ever hath seen had writ against Harley, and not for him, what a history had he left behind of the last years of Queen Anne's reign! But Swift, that scorned all mankind, and himself not the least of all, had this merit of a faithful partisan, that he loved those chiefs who treated him well, and stuck by Harley bravely in his fall, as he gallantly had supported him in his better fortune.

Incomparably more brilliant, more splendid, eloquent, accomplished, than his rival, the great St. John could be as selfish as Oxford was, and could act the double part as skilfully as ambidextrous Churchill. He whose talk was always of liberty, no more shrunk from using persecution and the pillory against his opponents, than if he had been at Lisbon and Grand Inquisitor. This lofty patriot was on his knees at Hanover and St.

Germains too; notoriously of no religion, he toasted Church and queen as boldly as the stupid Sacheverel, whom he used and laughed at; and to serve his turn, and to overthrow his enemy, he could intrigue, coax, bully, wheedle, fawn on the Court favourite, and creep up the back-stair as silently as Oxford who supplanted Marlborough, and whom he himself supplanted. The crash of my Lord Oxford happened at this very time whereat my history is now arrived. He was come to the very last days of his power, and the agent whom he employed to overthrow the conqueror of Blenheim, was now engaged to upset the conqueror's conqueror, and hand over the staff of government to Bolingbroke, who had been panting to hold it.

In expectation of the stroke that was now preparing, the Irish regiments in the French service were all brought round about Boulogne in Picardy, to pa.s.s over if need were with the Duke of Berwick; the soldiers of France no longer, but subjects of James the Third of England and Ireland King. The fidelity of the great ma.s.s of the Scots (though a most active, resolute, and gallant Whig party, admirably and energetically ordered and disciplined, was known to be in Scotland too) was notoriously unshaken in their king. A very great body of Tory clergy, n.o.bility, and gentry, were public partisans of the exiled prince; and the indifferents might be counted on to cry King George or King James, according as either should prevail. The queen, especially in her latter days, inclined towards her own family. The prince was lying actually in London, within a stone's-cast of his sister's palace; the first minister toppling to his fall, and so tottering that the weakest push of a woman's finger would send him down; and as for Bolingbroke, his successor, we know on whose side his power and his splendid eloquence would be on the day when the queen should appear openly before her council and say:-"This, my lords, is my brother; here is my father's heir, and mine after me."

During the whole of the previous year the queen had had many and repeated fits of sickness, fever, and lethargy, and her death had been constantly looked for by all her attendants. The Elector of Hanover had wished to send his son, the Duke of Cambridge-to pay his court to his cousin the queen, the Elector said;-in truth, to be on the spot when death should close her career. Frightened perhaps to have such a _memento mori_ under her royal eyes, her Majesty had angrily forbidden the young prince's coming into England. Either she desired to keep the chances for her brother open yet; or the people about her did not wish to close with the Whig candidate till they could make terms with him. The quarrels of her ministers before her face at the Council board, the p.r.i.c.ks of conscience very likely, the importunities of her ministers, and constant turmoil and agitation round about her, had weakened and irritated the princess extremely; her strength was giving way under these continual trials of her temper, and from day to day it was expected she must come to a speedy end of them. Just before Viscount Castlewood and his companion came from France, her Majesty was taken ill. The St. Anthony's fire broke out on the royal legs; there was no hurry for the presentation of the young lord at Court, or that person who should appear under his name; and my lord viscount's wound breaking out opportunely, he was kept conveniently in his chamber until such time as his physician should allow him to bend his knee before the queen. At the commencement of July, that influential lady, with whom it has been mentioned that our party had relations, came frequently to visit her young friend, the maid of honour, at Kensington, and my lord viscount (the real or supposit.i.tious), who was an invalid at Lady Castlewood's house.

On the 27th day of July, the lady in question, who held the most intimate post about the queen, came in her chair from the palace hard by, bringing to the little party in Kensington Square, intelligence of the very highest importance. The final blow had been struck, and my Lord of Oxford and Mortimer was no longer treasurer. The staff was as yet given to no successor, though my Lord Bolingbroke would undoubtedly be the man. And now the time was come, the queen's Abigail said: and now my Lord Castlewood ought to be presented to the sovereign.

After that scene which Lord Castlewood witnessed and described to his cousin, who pa.s.sed such a miserable night of mortification and jealousy as he thought over the transaction; no doubt the three persons who were set by nature as protectors over Beatrix came to the same conclusion, that she must be removed from the presence of a man whose desires towards her were expressed only too clearly; and who was no more scrupulous in seeking to gratify them than his father had been before him. I suppose Esmond's mistress, her son, and the colonel himself, had been all secretly debating this matter in their minds, for when Frank broke out, in his blunt way, with:-"I think Beatrix had best be anywhere but here,"-Lady Castlewood said:-"I thank you, Frank, I have thought so too"; and Mr. Esmond, though he only remarked that it was not for him to speak, showed plainly, by the delight on his countenance, how very agreeable that proposal was to him.

"One sees that you think with us, Henry," says the viscountess, with ever so little of sarcasm in her tone: "Beatrix is best out of this house whilst we have our guest in it, and as soon as this morning's business is done, she ought to quit London."

"What morning's business?" asked Colonel Esmond, not knowing what had been arranged, though in fact the stroke next in importance to that of bringing the prince, and of having him acknowledged by the queen, was now being performed at the very moment we three were conversing together.

The Court-lady with whom our plan was concerted, and who was a chief agent in it, the Court-physician, and the Bishop of Rochester, who were the other two most active partic.i.p.ators in our plan, had held many councils in our house at Kensington and elsewhere, as to the means best to be adopted for presenting our young adventurer to his sister the queen. The simple and easy plan proposed by Colonel Esmond had been agreed to by all parties, which was that on some rather private day, when there were not many persons about the Court, the prince should appear there as my Lord Castlewood, should be greeted by his sister-in-waiting, and led by that other lady into the closet of the queen. And according to her Majesty's health or humour, and the circ.u.mstances that might arise during the interview; it was to be left to the discretion of those present at it, and to the prince himself, whether he should declare that it was the queen's own brother, or the brother of Beatrix Esmond, who kissed her royal hand.

And this plan being determined on, we were all waiting in very much anxiety for the day and signal of execution.

Two mornings after that supper, it being the 27th day of July, the Bishop of Rochester breakfasting with Lady Castlewood and her family, and the meal scarce over, Dr. A--'s coach drove up to our house at Kensington, and the doctor appeared amongst the party there, enlivening a rather gloomy company; for the mother and daughter had had words in the morning in respect to the transactions of that supper, and other adventures perhaps, and on the day succeeding. Beatrix's haughty spirit brooked remonstrances from no superior, much less from her mother, the gentlest of creatures, whom the girl commanded rather than obeyed. And feeling she was wrong, and that by a thousand coquetries (which she could no more help exercising on every man that came near her, than the sun can help s.h.i.+ning on great and small) she had provoked the prince's dangerous admiration, and allured him to the expression of it, she was only the more wilful and imperious the more she felt her error.

To this party, the prince being served with chocolate in his bedchamber, where he lay late sleeping away the fumes of his wine, the doctor came, and by the urgent and startling nature of his news, dissipated instantly that private and minor unpleasantry under which the family of Castlewood was labouring.

He asked for the guest; the guest was above in his own apartment: he bade _Monsieur Baptiste_ go up to his master instantly, and requested that _my Lord Viscount Castlewood_ would straightway put his uniform on, and come away in the doctor's coach now at the door.

He then informed Madam Beatrix what her part of the comedy was to be:-"In half an hour," says he, "her Majesty and her favourite lady will take the air in the cedar-walk behind the new banqueting-house. Her Majesty will be drawn in a garden-chair, Madam Beatrix Esmond and _her brother_, _my Lord Viscount Castlewood_, will be walking in the private garden (here is Lady Masham's key), and will come unawares upon the royal party. The man that draws the chair will retire, and leave the queen, the favourite, and the maid of honour and her brother together; Mrs. Beatrix will present her brother, and then!-and then, my lord bishop will pray for the result of the interview, and his Scots clerk will say Amen! Quick, put on your hood, Madam Beatrix; why doth not his Majesty come down? Such another chance may not present itself for months again."

The prince was late and lazy, and indeed had all but lost that chance through his indolence. The queen was actually about to leave the garden just when the party reached it; the doctor, the bishop, the maid of honour and her brother went off together in the physician's coach, and had been gone half an hour when Colonel Esmond came to Kensington Square.

The news of this errand, on which Beatrix was gone, of course for a moment put all thoughts of private jealousy out of Colonel Esmond's head. In half an hour more the coach returned; the bishop descended from it first, and gave his arm to Beatrix, who now came out. His lords.h.i.+p went back into the carriage again, and the maid of honour entered the house alone. We were all gazing at her from the upper window, trying to read from her countenance the result of the interview from which she had just come.

She came into the drawing-room in a great tremor and very pale; she asked for a gla.s.s of water as her mother went to meet her, and after drinking that and putting off her hood, she began to speak:-"We may all hope for the best," says she; "it has cost the queen a fit. Her Majesty was in her chair in the cedar-walk accompanied only by Lady --, when we entered by the private wicket from the west side of the garden, and turned towards her, the doctor following us. They waited in a side-walk hidden by the shrubs, as we advanced towards the chair. My heart throbbed so I scarce could speak; but my prince whispered, 'Courage, Beatrix', and marched on with a steady step. His face was a little flushed, but he was not afraid of the danger. He who fought so bravely at Malplaquet fears nothing."

Esmond and Castlewood looked at each other at this compliment, neither liking the sound of it.

"The prince uncovered," Beatrix continued, "and I saw the queen turning round to Lady Masham, as if asking who these two were. Her Majesty looked very pale and ill, and then flushed up; the favourite made us a signal to advance, and I went up, leading my prince by the hand, quite close to the chair: 'Your Majesty will give my lord viscount your hand to kiss,' says her lady, and the queen put out her hand, which the prince kissed, kneeling on his knee, he who should kneel to no mortal man or woman.

" 'You have been long from England, my lord,' says the queen: 'why were you not here to give a home to your mother and sister?'

" 'I am come, madam, to stay now, if the queen desires me,' says the prince, with another low bow.

" 'You have taken a foreign wife, my lord, and a foreign religion; was not that of England good enough for you?'