Now Face to Face (71 page)

Thérèse was telling Montrose and Caesar about the slaves at First Curle, how they would not cross the river until they had obtained permission of its spirit.

“If this river has a spirit, it is a mild one,” said Caesar.

“We must give it an offering, as we did in Virginia,” Thérèse teased. He and she were good friends. “Your wig,” she suggested.

Barbara pulled a patch from her face and threw it into the water, thinking, All Robin’s letters, all his assurances—Roger is my friend, I will see to him—were they lies? She had left it to Robin. She’d not even thought to go to London and sit through the hearings.

Swans floated by, majestic, stately, undisturbed at sharing their river. Gardens and lawns ran right to the river’s edge, where willows and reeds grew.

“Look,” said Montrose, pointing. “He’s made himself one of them.”

There was a goose in among the swans, his long neck dark, his bill bumped and ugly, not beautifully shaped like the swans’. As if he heard Montrose, the goose honked at them.

Duncannon, thought Barbara, Jamie’s gosling among the swans. Goslings were the sons of the Irish nobles who’d fled Ireland in 1689, after King William and his generals Marlborough and Tamworth had defeated them in one disastrous battle after another. James II had made a last stand for his throne from Ireland, and it had been futile. Hundreds of Irish fled with him. They went with James to make a home in France, under Louis XIV. The exodus had been called the flight of the wild geese.

Irishmen—and Scots, who also fought—filled European courts serving as everything from ministers to mercenaries. The goslings, grown to manhood in foreign courts, served as spies for James, elite and secret, their loyalty renowned.

King George would want to know there was a gosling, would clip his wings and imprison him in the Tower, show him off to crowds, the way the lions at the Tower were shown, or the elephant. Barbara shut her eyes tight against the sight that rose in her mind of Duncannon, a rope around his neck, being paraded before a crowd, which pelted him with rotten fruit and vegetables. Do you lie, too, Duncannon? she thought.

They were at the river stairs that led into the gardens of Hampton Court. It had been the favorite palace of Henry VIII and his daughter Queen Elizabeth, she who, it was said, died a virgin. Hampton Court was a favorite of this king, too. There were soldiers along the stairs, stationed at intervals along the great façade of the house. I should have stayed in London, thought Barbara. I should have seen the hearings for myself. O, Robin, I will never forgive you. And I will make you pay.

“T
HERE YOU
are.”

The voice made Bathsheba shiver.

“It’s no good hiding. Come out and show yourself. I know all about you.”

Bathsheba moved from the corner of the stillroom in which she was standing.

“So,” said Diana, “you’re the witch, are you? A witch and a Gypsy, with an idiot for a child. Is this your idiot?”

Diana bent down to a basket.

Bathsheba tensed, but after one glance Diana had moved, hobbling, to the shelves of the stillroom, touching the jars and crocks, the drying roses and fern fronds. Bathsheba edged the basket under the table with her foot.

“How fortunate for me that you’ve come to stay at Tamworth. I had no idea, you know; I came upon a whim. But then, someone must be watching over me, I do vow.” Diana laughed, small teeth white against crimson lips. “I want a favor, witch. I’ll pay you for it, more than you’ll ever see in a year here. I want to be rid of something, you see.”

Diana rummaged among the drying potpourri, picking up the lavender and cardamom seeds to smell, then dropping them as something else caught her eye.

“You’re the one to help me, I know.”

I
NSIDE
H
AMPTON
Court, Barbara gave her name and a small bag of coins to a servant, then waited in a chamber filled with others who, like her, came to see the King. She stood at the windows and stared out at the gardens, not joining Thérèse and Montrose and Caesar in their talk and laughter. Several men were walking through the chamber, and there was a stir of whispers and movement among the waiting crowd as they recognized various ministers to the King. Barbara walked from the window and put her hand on the arm of one of the men.

“Robin.”

He turned, eyes widening under those preposterous, thick brows. “I cannot believe my eyes.”

The next moment she was being pulled forward into a ruthless hug, Robert Walpole both laughing and wiping at the sentimental tears rolling down his cheeks as he held her out from him, looked her up and down.

“You’re safely returned. When? How? God’s blood, Barbara, it has been a continual prayer of mine to know you are safe. You are acquainted with my brother-in-law, Lord Townshend, and this is Lord Carteret. Gentlemen, I give you Lady Devane.”

“I’ve only just returned, Robin. I’ve come to present myself to His Majesty.” She felt cold as ice. Surely he could sense it. She made herself smile. Never tell another all you know.

“Give me your arm, my girl. I will take you in to see His Majesty myself. He will be as pleased as I am. Not a week goes by but that he asks after you.”

They walked down a long corridor, he smiling, expansive, talking all the while. People approached him with rolled-up petitions, but he waved them off.

“Why are the Virginia planters sending letters of complaint because our tobacco merchants have added a charge to honor bills of exchange?”

“They were never charged before, and they are afraid tobacco will sell low. Therefore they watch their pennies and want no new charges.”

“They’ll have to accept it. God’s blood, it is good to know you are back. How I have fretted about you, blamed myself for your going to Virginia. Now, I’ll tell you once and for all that your fine is going to be reduced. I swear it. I have to deal with this plot”—he laughed and corrected himself to include the other men with him—“we all do, but I can command the votes in the Commons to see the fine reduced, and I intend to do it. Ah, what a friend Roger was to me, Bab. How I have missed him, missed his counsel. He was a wise man, could always twist the Duchess of Kendall around his little finger. She doesn’t like me. If I suggest south to the King, she whispers north into his other ear.”

His sincerity, his forcefulness were immense. It was like being carried upon a wave. You’re good, thought Barbara, very, very good at this. Well, so will I be.

“You,” Walpole said to the dwarf, who was sitting in a chair. “Go and tell His Majesty that his Lord Treasurer desires an immediate interview because he has brought him a treasure from one of his colonies. At once, little man.”

And as the dwarf ran to open one of the heavy, double doors, “Did you grow tobacco while you were in Virginia, Barbara?”

“I did, and one day I intend to have the best snuff in all of England.”

Walpole threw back his head and laughed, as pleased as if she’d told him she was growing gold. “I told your mother you weren’t going to pine away over there. I told her you’d find something to keep yourself occupied, that likely the whole adventure would do you good, and so it has.”

“My servant was lost over there. Is that good?”

“The boy—what was his name?”

“Hyacinthe.”

“Hyacinthe. Yes, too bad.”

The heavy doors swung open, and there was the King of England, standing before huge windows.

“Your Majesty,” Walpole said, “look what I’ve brought you.” With a flourish he pulled Barbara forward.

The King had been solemn, but at the sight of Barbara, a smile of real pleasure broke across his face. He walked to her and pulled her up out of her curtsy and kissed her cheeks, a rare spontaneous gesture of favor not lost upon Walpole nor the other men.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “I will allow myself the pleasure of an hour or two of this lady’s company, that is, unless you have some news for me that cannot wait.”

“No, of course not,” everyone was saying, bowing a good-bye, smiling at Barbara, who signaled for her servants to leave the gifts and go themselves. When the door was closed, and she was alone with the King, he said, in rapid and flawless French, “Your husband was one of my most faithful servants. I have grieved over your leaving England in a way you cannot imagine, grieved over your sufferings. But now you are back, and things will be different, that I promise you. I am so delighted to see you here”—he looked around this chamber, with its high, ornately decorated ceilings, its walls of priceless paintings, its heavy gilded furniture, its huge fireplace—“where you belong.”

“Thank you.”

“Tell me about my colony of Virginia.”

She heard herself describe the rivers, the trees, the largeness and abundance, as if she were not enraged and in shock. She described the huge bay, the dolphins that accompanied ships as they neared shore; she told him of growing tobacco, of the care and time it took, going through each step of it as if he were a tobacco planter and as interested as she.

He was interested.

She told him of the Iroquois, of their splendor and fierceness, and of Governor Spotswood’s feeling that the English must ally with them.

“I have a letter from Governor Spotswood,” she said. “May I present it?”

Spotswood was begging for his old position of governor back. You see me made governor again, he’d said, and I’ll see Bolling fined for the smuggling somehow.

The King took the letter from her, listened to her describe the mountains, the large creatures with wooly heads that were said to roam vast plains that had no end.

“I would like to see Virginia,” he said. “When I came here as king, my English ministers tried to tell me I could not visit Hanover once a year. It was quite a quarrel between us. I won, but can you imagine what they would say if I now told them I also wished to see my colonies? And yet I do. Your dress today is magnificent. Tell me about the feathers in your hair, about the waistcoat you wear.”

Barbara told him about counting coup and taking scalps, about warriors said to run lithely through woods, never breaking a twig. As she talked she brought the King a war club, a knife whose handle was a long bear claw, and a scalp, all of which pleased him, particularly the scalp, which seemed to fascinate him.

She brought out a bear’s head, the teeth long and grimacing. It had been made into a headdress, magnificent and fearsome; the fur came down over one’s shoulders, like a cloak.

“Their wise men wear this before they go to hunt for bear. They dance a certain dance and sing to the bear’s spirit.”

At once, he tried it on.

She brought out a long rattle that wise men used to cure illness, and a peace pipe; he examined the pipe’s carving and beads and feathers.

“They smoke tobacco only to show reverence for a treaty made or a friend come,” she said. “They sprinkle tobacco in the river to make safe crossings. They aren’t prodigal with it the way we are.”

She spread open a large square of beaver skins sewn together, describing the creature to His Majesty. He stroked the dark, soft fur, as she began to talk about the slaves.

There was a knock upon the door, which opened to show three girls, accompanied by the King’s mistress, the Duchess of Kendall. The girls glanced curiously at Barbara and went at once to the bear’s head, touching the long teeth, making faces to one another.

“Come and greet Lady Devane,” the King said to them.

Nine, eleven, and thirteen, they were his granddaughters. By his express command, they lived with him, rather than with their parents, the Prince and Princess of Wales. He knows it breaks the heart of the Princess, the Prince had once said to Barbara. He does it to crush my pride.

This royal family was not a peaceful one. Before Barbara had returned to England in 1719, all the talk in Rome and Venice had been of a public quarrel between the King and the Prince. There had been a rumor that King George would make James the heir, rather than his own son. Roger had been part of reconciling them. But the King did not allow the Prince’s daughters to return to their father.

“The cloak you sent me was beautiful. It is quite my favorite thing,” the Duchess of Kendall told Barbara. Queen in all but name, she was very thin, with dyed dark hair, and dark drawn around her eyes. Talkative, full of her own opinions, she had been the King’s mistress for years.

“How handsome you look, Lady Devane,” she said now, and, bowing her head to the compliment, wordlessly, Barbara took off the waistcoat she wore. Kendall put it on at once and went to a mirror to admire herself, the girls clustering around her, touching the beading, the tail of feathers and fur.

Barbara turned back to the gifts, uncovering three small reed cages in which redbirds sat.

“These are for you. These cages were made by the slaves on First Curle. Have you ever seen birds this color?”

The girls ran to Barbara.

“An old woman among the slaves on the plantation on which I lived was said to understand the language of birds and beasts, and that of the trees and wind. She said these redbirds will bring you good fortune. There are many wonderful animals in Virginia. One of my slaves captured a raccoon, a beast with dark about its eyes, like a masked highwayman. How I wish I might have brought you the tiny, tiny birds, no bigger than my thumb”—Barbara held up a thumb to show their size—”that come in summer to feed on certain flowers in the colony. They dart about so quickly that it is almost impossible to see them. They never rest, it is said; they fly continuously.”