The Queen and the Courtesan (5 page)

She became aware that the Grand Duke was still speaking, offering her his valuable counsel, as he so loved to do.

‘You must remember to exercise restraint and learn to submit to the King's will. Keep your thoughts private and your temper cool.'

‘You know that I am not hot-tempered, Uncle, but I shall expect to be treated with respect, my opinions listened to.'

Ferdinand gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. ‘I'm sure that will be the case, so far as state affairs allow. I know that you are ambitious, my dear, which is a natural family trait and necessary in any would-be queen, but do not be impatient, or too impulsive, which can result in poor judgement.'

Marie frowned. ‘I will not be his cipher by saying and doing nothing to displease him. I am as royal as Henry, and a true marriage should be a partnership.'

‘Indeed, in an ideal world that would most certainly be the case. Sometimes life is not quite as perfect as we would like it to be. Henry is a good man with an easy nature, one who loves women but is also desirous of a pleasant domestic life. If you can but be tolerant of his flaws, you will do well together.'

She troubled him somewhat, this beloved niece of his, as there was a paradox in her. Marie longed for marriage and was needy for love, yet she bore some of Joanna's hauteur, and was instinctively distrustful of men. A natural reaction, perhaps, to losing a mother so young, and considering the mysterious circumstances of her death. Outwardly proud, but emotionally vulnerable. ‘You are strong and healthy. Once you have given Henry a dauphin for France, he will look at no other woman.'

Marie hoped and prayed that would be true. She did not think she would be very good at sharing. She remembered the suffering her own mother had endured at the hands of the scandalous Bianca, her father's young mistress. And her own, after the unexpected and convenient death of Bianca's husband had allowed the two lovers to marry.

As if a neglectful father had not been bad enough, her young life thereafter had been ruled by the tyrannical regime of an overambitious stepmother. Marie knew that it was expected for a king to keep a mistress, but she made a private vow that she would never allow herself to be so ill-used.

Henry was well aware of Rosny's machinations on his behalf but had chosen to ignore them. He never questioned his advisor as the minister had been with him a long time. Born at the Château de Rosny near Mantes-la-Jolie of a noble Flemish family, Rosny had been brought up in the Reformed faith. As a young man he'd been presented to Henry of Navarre in 1571 and remained loyal ever since. Now he worked quietly and speedily, using every means at his disposal to bring about the marriage of his sovereign to a European princess worthy of sharing his throne. No obstacles had been put in the way of a successful outcome as the King was too taken up with the delectable Henriette to pay proper attention. So on Rosny's return from signing the articles with the Italian Ambassador, who had recently arrived in Paris, the King asked, with careless curiosity, where he had been these last few days.

‘We come, Sire, from marrying you.'

Henry stared at him, too shocked to speak. It was some moments before he could find the words to demand an explanation.

The superintendent of finance answered in bland formal tones, as was his way. ‘I mean that I have come from meeting with Baccio Giovannini, an envoy from the Grand Duke of Tuscany. It took a few days of negotiation but, as a consequence, the articles of marriage are signed for Your Majesty to marry with his niece, Marie de Medici, and a dowry agreed.'

Henry sank into a chair as if his knees had given way, only to at once leap up and start pacing about the chamber, nibbling on his nails, lost in thought. He paused before Rosny. ‘There is no way out of this?'

The minister raised a brow in polite enquiry. ‘Why would you seek one, Sire? Your Majesty had agreed that you must marry, for the sake of the nation. The treasury has been saved.'

‘There is no escape?'

‘None that will not greatly offend or create possible conflict with the Grand Duke, as well as leave us in a poor bargaining position against the Duke of Savoy. A contract will be drawn up and signed, and a proxy marriage held in due course, in Florence, before the princess sets sail for France.'

‘Can it not be delayed a while longer?' He was thinking of Henriette, and how she had hopes of fulfilling her part of the bargain by giving him a son in just a few months' time.

‘No longer than it takes for these matters to be arranged: a few weeks, a month or two at most.'

Henry continued his pacing, scratching his head and muttering to himself. Finally reaching an acceptance of his fate, he heaved a great sigh and slapped his hands together. ‘Very well then, so be it. There is no alternative, since for the good of my kingdom you say that I must marry.'

‘I am glad to see Your Majesty so amenable,' Rosny drily remarked. ‘We will proceed with the arrangements,' and after bowing low, quickly departed before the King could change his mind.

Henriette was sitting up in bed enjoying a late breakfast when the King came to her. She instantly reached out her arms to him, her mood warm with affection for she had recently discovered she was
enceinte
. The King's marriage with Marguerite de Valois had been dissolved to allow him to marry his darling Gabrielle. But with that plan dying with his former mistress, Henriette was quite certain it would now be herself who would soon be Queen of France. Did she not have his signed promise of marriage tucked safely away?

Henry came to sit beside her on the bed, declining the sliver of peach she offered him. ‘I have already breakfasted, thank you, dearest, some hours ago before my ride.'

‘I insist. It is but a small morsel of my love,' she said. Henry let her feed him the piece of fruit, her mouth coming to his to nibble it with him, her tongue sliding between his lips in a most erotic fashion. She smelled of musk and the sex they'd enjoyed only an hour ago. How could he refuse her anything?

With steadfast resolve he brought himself back under control and tried again. ‘My love, you are aware that attempts have been made to negotiate a marriage with the Grand Duke of Tuscany's niece, Marie de Medici?'

Henriette sighed. ‘Who could not be? Your ministers have been attempting to bring about that union for years, even in the time of your little Gabrielle. And consistently failed.' She sucked on another sliver of peach, uncaring. Rosny's politicizing did not trouble her in the slightest. The sour-faced minister may well make his dislike of her very apparent, but she had almost achieved her object. A few months of careful rest and her future would be assured. She took the King's hand and smoothed it over her belly. ‘Feel how your son grows in strength daily. He will be a fine boy, like his father.'

Henry felt only a flat stomach. It was far too early for her to be showing, or to be certain a child would even be born. He withdrew his hand. ‘My dear, do you still have the promise of marriage I gave you?'

‘Of course.'

‘May I see it?'

‘Why would you wish to?' She laughed, offering him another slice of fruit, which this time he wisely declined. ‘You are familiar enough with its contents. You are my affianced husband.'

‘Dear heart,' and here he paused to clear his throat, or gather his courage. ‘The fact of the matter is, I fear I must insist that you return it to me as I am now unable to comply with that promise.'

‘Not comply . . .' She stopped, her green eyes narrowing with suspicion. ‘Why would you not?'

‘Because, my love, quite without my realizing it, a marriage agreement has been signed with the Italian princess. The contract is even now being drawn up, and the proxy wedding will take place within weeks, a few months at most.'

For several long seconds Henriette did not respond, only stared at him in stunned silence. Then she let out a horrendous scream. It echoed around the cavernous bedchamber, carrying all her fury and torment with it. The King almost fell off the bed in alarm but when he rushed to calm her, he managed only to catch the dish of peaches that she flung at him.

‘How could you do this to me?' she yelled. ‘You liar! You cheat! You promised me most faithfully! This is Rosny's doing. I insist you dismiss him forthwith, and that cringing Villeroy who does his every bidding.'

‘Villeroy is still with the Tuscan envoy.'

‘Then dispatch the greedy fool back to Italy.'

‘You must be calm, my love. Think of the child.'

‘Why did not
you
think of this child?' she cried, in a frenzy of temper. ‘Your
son
!
I will not be ignored!
' And falling into his arms she began to sob. Her distress was such that Henry had not the first idea how to deal with it. Fortunately, on hearing the disturbance, her maid came running and he made good his escape.

Henriette was not a woman to give up easily. She thought perhaps her tantrum had been unwise on this occasion, and as her sobs had failed to move him she sent for her father and brother, certain they would be on her side. They listened in horror to the awful news.

Auvergne was outraged. ‘He cannot be allowed to get away with this. Do you still have the King's signed promise of marriage?'

‘I have it safe. He demanded I return it but I refused.'

‘Very wise. We must guard it well. Surely such a promise is equally binding in law as any contract that Rosny could produce?' He looked to his father for an answer.

Balzac, equally alarmed by this threat to his carefully devised plan, promised to secret it away where it could not easily be found, and hurried off to discuss the matter with lawyers forthwith.

‘If the document has indeed been drawn up in proper form, it might well invalidate any marriage agreement between the King and Marie de Medici, certainly in the eyes of the Church,' he assured them on his return some time later. ‘So if the proxy wedding could be delayed on the grounds of your needing to comply with what is stipulated in that document, and you do successfully present the King with a son, then he could do naught but comply with it and make you his queen.'

‘Then all we have to do,' Auvergne agreed, ‘is to devise some way to delay the proceedings until Henriette has given birth. In the meantime, sister, you must keep the King content. Make yourself indispensable to his happiness.'

Henriette had sat avidly listening through all of this, growing increasingly certain of success. How could she fail? Did she not have the King eating out of her hand? She would not allow her resolve to weaken. But her brother was right, she must make more effort to behave with proper decorum, and to please him.

Going at once to Henry she sank in a deep curtsey before him. ‘Sire, I have come to prostrate myself before you. I fear I may have offended you by my reaction to your glorious news. In my own defence I can only say that the shock I displayed was born out of my great love for you. I cannot think what I would do were I to lose your love.' She allowed tender tears to slip down her pale cheeks and Henry's heart softened, as always at sight of a woman in distress.

‘My love, the fault is mine, I should not have told you so bluntly.' He'd been miserable these last days without her. She so livened his life with her risqué jokes, her indiscreet gossip, love of dancing and derring-do attitude to life. ‘There will always be a place for you in my life, and in my heart. Come, let us not consider the matter again. It is forgotten.'

But not by me, Henriette thought, as he raised her up to kiss her and led her to his bed. Even as she let him peel off her silk stockings and pleasure her beneath her skirts, her mind was busily devising how to dispose of the Italian threat.

Assistance came in the shape of Charles Emmanuel, Duke of Savoy, a son-in-law and ally of Philip II of Spain. He arrived at Fontainebleau on the fourteenth of December with an entourage of his most important ministers and nobles, and twelve hundred horse. Henriette took a dislike to him on sight.

‘What a strange little man he is,' she whispered to her brother as the court gathered in the cold courtyard to receive him. ‘Like an ugly dwarf with that humpback, and overlarge head with its abnormally broad brow.'

‘Hold your waspish tongue, sister. He is a powerful man, and whatever his deficiencies, rumour has it that he has enjoyed as many mistresses in his time as Henry of Navarre, and consequently acquired as many children.'

‘Poor souls,' Henriette giggled. ‘I trust they do not resemble their father. His head looks like a brush with that great tuft of bristled hair atop it.'

‘Be nice to him,' Auvergne warned. ‘He could be important to us. He bears many grudges against both France and the King. Apart from ongoing disputes about land, he had hoped to marry one of his daughters to Gabrielle's son, little César, whom, had she lived, would have become the next Dauphin. Now that alliance has been lost, which he sorely regrets.'

Henriette considered this titbit of gossip with eager interest. ‘You think he might help us then?'

‘It would not be in his interests for the Italian alliance to go ahead as the huge dowry offered might well be deployed by France to start a war against himself. Much of the territory he once captured from the French in the religious wars has now been restored, save for the Marquisate of Saluzzo. We, of course, regard that piece as of great strategic importance to our nation, being situated as it is on the Italian side of the Alps, but he resolutely refuses to surrender it. So guard that virulent wit of yours, sister, and practise more charm.'

The Duke was given a warm welcome by the King, and made much of with endless balls, jousts, masques and hunting-parties. After a week of this the court moved to Paris where the festivities, many devised by Madame la Marquise herself, continued over Christmas and into the New Year of 1600. Henriette was striving to be agreeable, and to please Henry, which was in her own best interests, after all. She even allowed the Duke to lead her out in a dance, although she returned to her brother's side with a sardonic curl to her lip.