"G.o.d's a.r.s.ehole, Johnny," Nell cried, "he's only just forgiven you for destroying his favorite sundial. Are you longing for a stay in the Tower?"

"What possessed you to do that, anyway, Johnny?" Dorset asked. "Beat down the sundial, I mean?"

"I could not abide to see it there," Rochester said, drinking. "Standing there like some great stone p.r.i.c.k, f.u.c.king the sky, f.u.c.king time. It had to be laid low."

"You were drunk, I suppose?" Nell asked.

"Drunk?" Rochester blinked at her. "I've been drunk for five years."

"And see where it's got you! Why do you do it?" she demanded.

"If all be true that I do think," Rochester declaimed, "There are five reasons we should drink:

Good beer, a friend, or being dry,

Or lest we should be, by and by,

Or any other reason why."

"Excellent!" cried Dorset. "Yours?"

"No, Aldrich." Rochester waved his hand. "But the sentiments are much my own. Do you know, George, of the three businesses of this age-women, politics, and drinking-the last is the only exercise at which you and I have not proved ourselves arrant fumblers."

"Speaking of women," Dorset said. "Are the rumors of your impending fatherhood true, Johnny?"

"Yes." Rochester looked glumly into the fireplace.

"A son and heir?" Buckingham grinned.

"Alas, no," Rochester said. "It's not my wife but Betty Barry who's shortly to be brought to bed. You'll have noticed she's been absent from the stage of late?"

"I hope you intend to provide well for her and the child?" Nell demanded. "Because if you have any thought of playing her a dog trick, you'll answer to me."

"Good girl," Dorset applauded.

"And upon that score," Nell continued, "I had to dismiss Fleetwood Sheppard. He got one of the maids with child, you know."

"Really?" said Rochester. "How very ambitious of him."

"Don't make light of it, Johnny," Nell chided. "It's a poor example for the boys, and now I'm at a loss to know what to do."

"Well, why not give Thomas Otway a try if you're in the market for another tutor?" Rochester said. "You're little Charlie's trustee, Charlie, what do you say?"

"Yes, good thought," Dorset agreed. "He's not finding much of a market for his plays at the moment and would probably be glad of a position."

"GUY HAS ASKED ME TO MARRY HIM." ROSE'S EYES SPARKLED AND HER cheeks were flushed, and Nell was relieved to see her looking so happy.

"That's wonderful, Rose. He's a good man, and you deserve much joy, after all the hardship you have suffered. It would give me pleasure if you would let me give you the wedding here at the house."

Rose hugged Nell. "Nothing would make me happier. You are the dearest sister I could imagine having, sweetheart."

The wedding took place at Christmas, and Nell reflected that the year had ended on a good note. Rose was happy, the children were healthy, and Eleanor was behaving as well as could be expected. Charles had forgiven Buckingham, and Buckingham was once more contentedly waging war against his enemies in Charles's cabinet and in Parliament. The Duke of York's fifteen-year-old daughter Mary had been married with great ceremony to the rea.s.suringly Protestant William of Orange, which seemed to have mollified even the most rabidly anti-Papist intriguers. Charles had been able to use the excuse of the threat of war to increase the size of the standing army, and because he breathed easier, all around him did as well.

But the new year of 1678 began badly. Nell returned home from a visit to her mother to find the house in an uproar because of a burglary. Dozens of pieces of her prized silver table service were gone, and advertising for their return produced no results.

Sick at heart, Nell was struck down by blinding headaches and nausea and lay for days in her darkened bedroom, unable to eat or to sleep comfortably. She was grateful that Rose spent much time sitting with her and keeping company with the children, but was frightened at how ill she felt and how long the malady continued. No sooner would the headaches dissipate and she would begin to believe she was well again, than they would return with greater vengeance.

Little Jemmy took to crawling into bed with her in the afternoons, lying still and quiet so he would not disturb her, and she was comforted by feeling the small warm body against her, and smelling the sweet scent of his hair. When her headaches were not too bad, Charlie read to her from his lessons, and she praised him, full of unfeigned admiration for his learning.

BY AUGUST, NELL WAS FEELING MUCH BETTER AND ACCOMPANIED Charles first to Windsor and then to Newmarket for a week of relaxation and entertainments. The air of the country and getting away from London refreshed her spirits. Charles was in good humor, putting on his oldest coat and taking Jemmy and Charlie with him for an early morning visit to the stables to see his horses that would race that day and to watch the training gallops, and they returned for breakfast ravenous and full of prattle.

"Father's going to ride Flat-Foot himself today!" Jemmy cried, his eyes bright with wonder.

"I know, poppet, he's a man of rare talents, your da is!" Nell laughed, pushing back the mop of dark curls from his forehead.

"The trainers let me sit astride Rowley," Charlie bragged. "They said he usually stands still for no one but Father, but he stood gentle as a little pony for me!"

"That's my brave boy," Nell smiled. "You'll be old enough to ride in the races soon yourself." Charlie beamed at her praise, and she laughed to see his resemblance to Charles as he drew himself up straighter in his chair and thrust out a little booted leg in a posture of exaggerated masculine repose.

In the afternoon, Charles rode Flat-Foot to victory, beating a field that included the best horses put forth by the dukes of York, Monmouth, and Buckingham. The boys, beside themselves with excitement, screamed themselves hoa.r.s.e as Charles thundered to the finish line, and rushed to greet him. He laughingly pulled them up into the saddle with him and let them hold the great silver flagon he had won, and looked as proud of them as they were of him.

"I hope I shall have your company at night, shall I?" Nell called to him happily.

"a.s.suredly, Nelly. And if you can contrive to serve me some pigeon pie for supper, my day will be complete!"

THE DUKES OF YORK, MONMOUTH, AND BUCKINGHAM JOINED Charles and Nell for supper at the Newmarket house Charles had taken for Nell. The children had at last gone to bed, exhausted by the excitements of the afternoon, and the grown-ups lingered around the table over wine. It had been a perfect evening to end a perfect day, and no one wanted to stir and break up the gathering.

The pounding at the door was unexpected and insistent, and Nell's porter, Joe, came into the dining room followed by a young messenger who brought a cloud of dust and sweat-scented air with him.

"The council summons you back to London, Your Majesty," he said, handing Charles a sealed letter as he rose from his bow. Charles scanned the paper and twitched it onto the table in irritation.

"I thought this was handled long since?" he demanded. "Surely it can wait?"

"What is it, Charles?" Nell asked before the stammering messenger could answer.

"The lot of old grandams that form my council are in a fuddle because of some groundless story of a plot to kill me. I know I told you."

"I know you didn't," Nell retorted, on her feet now, as were the others.

"This matter of Christopher Kirby?" asked Buckingham, looking grim.

"Yes," said Charles.

"Charles, tell me!" Nell cried, feeling her blood running cold at the look on the men's faces.

"Just before we came to Windsor," Charles said. "This Kirby came to me in the park, said there was a plan afoot to a.s.sa.s.sinate me. Then and there it might happen, he said. I took my walk as usual, and no harm came to me, of course, and I told Danby to look into it. Now he writes of some new witness, with wild tales of a vast conspiracy of Papists, and declares nothing will do but I must haste me back and hear the man myself."

"You should have a greater care for your life, Charles." The Duke of York had that prim look on his face that Nell knew Charles found so annoying, and sure enough, he threw a withering glance at his brother.

"I am sure, James," he said, "that no man in England will take away my life to make you king." The Duke of York looked as though he had been slapped, and the others looked away in embarra.s.sment.

"And who is it, this new witness?" Buckingham asked. Charles took up the letter again and thrust it at him.

"Someone by the name of t.i.tus Oates. It will come to nothing, you will see. A storm in a cream bowl."

BUT THE STORM SWIRLING IN LONDON COULD NOT BE CONTAINED in a cream bowl. When Nell returned to her house in Pall Mall the next day, the servants were in a panic.

"It's a great plot by Jesuits, madam." Meg's hoa.r.s.e voice was urgent. "My sister heard it from the baker's boy, who had it from his uncle, madam. Priests-ten at least, all in black and abroad at midnight, with knives as long as your arm, right there in Cheapside and making for the palace!"

"I heard the same and more from the butcher's man this morning," Bridget agreed. "He heard it from Mrs. Knight's cook, who heard it from the porter. And the French are behind it, too. We'll all be murdered in our beds."

"Nonsense," Nell declared.

But when Sir Edmund G.o.dfrey Bury, who had taken t.i.tus Oates's deposition, was found murdered on Primrose Hill in October, even people who were not usually credulous began to listen uneasily to the rumors that swept from one house to another.

"My Lady Clifford says she'll not stir out of the house without she carries a pistol in her m.u.f.f," Sam Pepys told Nell, biting with appreciation into an almond cake. "Sir Christopher Wren is searching the House of Parliament, looking for gunpowder and another Guy Fawkes. And the Duke of York's own secretary has been taken up for questioning. And that's just the start."

"Is it all true?" Nell demanded of Charles, no sooner was he in the door that night. "Should you not leave town again?" He shook his head wearily.

"Lord Arundell of Wardour is arrested, along with his wife," he said, "and four other Papist peers, all of them aged and surely harmless. I cannot think it true that they would plot against my life, but they must be questioned. Poor old man, Arundell. I recall him at the palace when I was a boy, a good friend to my father. And now this."

The climate in the streets was uneasy, and Nell found herself wanting to remain shut in at home with her family gathered around her. Jemmy was sick again, and worried as she was about him, caring for him distracted her from the troubles bubbling around her. Rose was happily pregnant, but as Guy was spending more time on duty and she was nervous to be home alone, she spent many of her days and nights at Nell's house, and the household became a little island of determined calm.

Guy Fawkes Night arrived with special vengeance. As Nell's chair carried her to Whitehall, Pall Mall was thronged with crowds howling around a burning effigy of the Pope. The flames curled around the grotesque white face and rouged lips and tore through the straw wig that dressed the figure of the prelate as the Wh.o.r.e of Babylon. An unG.o.dly shriek rent the night, curdling Nell's blood. She cried out and Tom, her chair man, looked back at her in alarm as she leaned out the window.

"What is it, Tom?" she begged him. "For the love of heaven, what noise is that?"

"Cats, madam. Live cats put inside, to make it more real-like, do you see, when the wh.o.r.eson Pope is burning."

CHRISTMAS CAME, BUT DID NOTHING TO QUELL THE TORRENT OF PANIC, terror, and recrimination. There had been three eclipses of the sun and two of the moon that year, bad portents, and all were anxious to see the end of 1678. On the second-to-last night of the year, Charles supped with Nell. He drank heavily and though he attempted good humor for the sake of the boys, Nell could see that his bleak mood infected his very soul.

"Come to bed," she cajoled after the boys had gone to sleep, her fingers working at the knots in his neck. "Put it all out of your mind, until tomorrow at least."

"You're right, sweetheart," he muttered, downing the last of his wine and staggering to his feet. "Come and see can you not make me forget what a h.e.l.l has come to me here on earth." He pulled her to him, his mouth on hers hard and insistent, as though he could lose himself within her.

A heavy knock sounded at the door. Charles and Nell froze as Groundes's footsteps hurried through the hallway. Charles relaxed only fractionally when they heard Buckingham's voice.

"Come in, George," he called.

Buckingham entered, his face set as though against a coming storm.

"Your Majesty. Sorry, Nell, it couldn't wait."

"What now?" Charles's voice was weary beyond Nell's believing, and she hovered at his side.

"The whispers have become shouts. Shaftesbury is claiming that the queen is involved in the conspiracy and has tried to poison you, and he is demanding that she be banished from court."

There was a moment's pause, pregnant with pent-up energy as the instant before a clap of thunder, and then Charles kicked over the chair from which he had risen, picked it up, and hurled it into the fireplace, shattering its legs and making it prey to the voracious flames that instantly danced up the cane seat.

"No! No, no, by G.o.d and all that's holy, no! I have banished Papists from Parliament and from London and kept them barred up at home like common thieves. I have cast out my own brother from the Privy Council and the Foreign Affairs Council, I have watched while they hounded poor Louise in terror from her home, I have stood by while that wretched wh.o.r.emaster Montagu stirs the Commons to bay for Danby's blood. I have agreed to subject all to oaths of supremacy and to speak against their own conscience for fear of their lives. I have sent men to their deaths. I have smiled while the dogs have sought to make me disband the army and put the militia under their control, putting myself at their mercy as did my father, but by Satan's thunderous a.s.s, this is a step too far!"

Nell had never seen Buckingham at a loss for words, but he appeared so now in the face of Charles's wrath, and they exchanged a hasty glance of horrified amazement as Charles paused for breath.

"No," he repeated. "No." He grasped Buckingham by the front of his coat and pulled him close.

"Hie you back to those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds. Tell them that from this moment, Parliament is no more. It is prorogued. Until the pleasure of the king should be otherwise. Tell them that. And tell them to get them home to their wives and beds, and G.o.d help them if they but cross my shadow once the New Year is come."

JANUARY CAME AND THE SPECTER OF REBELLION, CHAOS, AND MURDER still stalked the land. Three conspirators were hanged, and then three more. Louise, in an effort to mitigate the rising hatred against her, had dismissed her Catholic servants. But at the Duke's Theatre, she was booed so ferociously that she retreated in terror before the play began, then fled to France. Charles sent the Duke of York away for a three-year term as high commissioner of Scotland, both fearing for his safety and hoping his absence might help to quell the storm.

Public opinion stood against Parliament, and Charles's minister Lord Danby persuaded him to dissolve it and to hold new elections, hoping that a more malleable and friendly house might result.

"Perhaps," he said, glancing nervously at the king, "there may be a chance, can we but find men to stand who will defeat those now in power."

Charles emitted a bitter laugh. "A dog would be elected," he said, "if it stood against a courtier."

But the new house that a.s.sembled in early March was, if anything, more hostile. Charles's new and expanded council, designed to keep his enemies within view, wrangled and hissed in contention and resentment. Charles refused to receive Buckingham or his letters.

"Why should I?" he retorted to Nell's expressions of dismay. "He supported the election of men who would cut my throat. I must look to myself now, and trust none."

Parliament focused its rage on Danby, furious that he had succeeded in excluding the Duke of York from the act barring Catholics from official positions, and resentful at the marriage of his daughter to the king's son by Catherine Pegge, called Don Carlo. His downfall came when Ralph Montagu, amba.s.sador to France, revealed Danby's intrigues with the French king, Louis, nearly implicating Charles himself.

Danby resigned and, heeding Charles's warning, fled to avoid arrest. But he could not run forever and the king could do little to protect him; in April Danby surrendered. A flood of Papists were removed from their positions at court. Summer came, with the execution of five Jesuit priests convicted of treason, but still there was no sense of calm or resolution. Nell had never seen Charles so grim faced and exhausted.

"Let us to Windsor," he said. "I can stomach no more of this blood."

WINDSOR WAS AN OASIS OF GREEN AND PEACE. THE HUNDREDS OF trees that Charles had had planted when he came to the throne had grown tall and strong, and the old trees, pruned and well tended now, had regained their health and strength. Nell held Charles's arm as they walked in silence through the royal park, the whisper of the summer breeze in the leaves like the distant sound of water. The boys ran ahead, the pack of spaniels tumbling around them.

"You need a proper house here," Charles said. "That little place is not enough now that the boys are so big. Hard to believe that Charlie's nine, and little Jemmy nearly eight, isn't it? You shall have the new house near the church. And the continuation of your five thousand pounds a year."

NELL LOVED HER HOUSE IN PALL MALL, BUT THE NEW HOUSE IN WINDSOR was truly grand. It stood near the castle, three stories of rich red brick, surrounded by gardens and orchards, with the royal mews between it and the town. She stood looking out a window on the third story. The royal park stretched away to the south and east, and to the west lay the river, meandering through the countrywide toward London. There was more than enough room for her growing household-the boys, their tutors and nurses, the dogs and the ponies, and the small army of servants she now employed.

Charles came to her side.