Виктория Холт - Loyal in Love - Henrietta Maria, Queen of Charles I

Mamie looked at me and raised her eyebrows. She was a little breathless jumping off and on the bed and having to play the two parts in the drama.

“Poor Bassompierre!” She was herself now, the wise storyteller. “He saw that it would be impossible to go against the King’s wishes, and when he told Mademoiselle de Montmorency what was planned she cried: ‘Jesus. The King has gone mad!’ But very soon she grew accustomed to the idea and after a while she quite liked it. The whole Court was talking about the change in bridegrooms, and very quickly Mademoiselle de Montmorency became the Princesse de Condé.

“Now this led to other complications. The Queen accepted the fact that the King must have many mistresses but she hated there to be one who could influence him so much. She had never been crowned and a monarch always feels insecure until the crown has been placed on his—or her—head in solemn ceremony. So the Queen cried: ‘I want to be crowned!’ and because of the guilt he felt about Charlotte de Montmorency the King, who had brushed aside this matter of the Queen’s coronation whenever it was raised, had to give way to save himself from violent recriminations. Then to make matters worse, the Prince de Condé became so enamored of his wife that he decided that he would no longer stand aside. She was after all his wife, and he secretly left the Court with the new Princesse and took her to Picardy, and since that might not be far enough he carried her on to Brussels.

“The King was desolate. He was mad with grief and threatened to follow her. Now a king cannot move far without everyone’s knowing, and who would have believed that a king who had been on most excellent terms with so many women at the same time, should take such steps for one. People were saying that it was a secret move to go to war. So the King found himself in the center of a controversy. The Duc de Sully was worried and he told the King that his conduct over the Princesse de Condé was destroying his reputation…not his reputation for being a rake…that was unimportant and he already had that in any case. It was only when his amours intruded into statecraft that there was danger.

“The affair had made the Queen more restive than ever. She was demanding her coronation, and the King, feeling he owed her some recompense, at length agreed that it should take place.

“Now at this time the King had a strange presentiment. Kings’ lives are always in danger so perhaps it is natural for them to have presentiments. Well, some time before, the King had been told that he would only survive a few days after the Queen’s coronation, and it was for this reason that he had never wanted her to be crowned; and if it had not been for his guilt about the Princesse de Condé, he would never have agreed to it. However, now that she was to be crowned, the feeling of disaster grew and grew and he became so certain of his imminent death that he went to see the Duc de Sully about it, which shows how strongly he felt, for the Duc was not the man even a king would go to with a story like that.

“So the King went to the Arsenal where the country’s weapons were stored and where the Duc de Sully had his apartments.” She was acting again; the same role for the King, but Bassompierre had been replaced by the Duc de Sully. “‘I don’t understand this, Monsieur le Duc, but I feel in my heart that the shadow of death is right over my head.’ ‘Why, Sire, you alarm me. How can this be? You are well. Nothing ails you.’ The Duc de Sully had had a special chair made for the King to sit in when he visited him. It was low and very regal. The King sat in it, and looking very grave, he said: ‘It has been prophesied that I shall die in Paris. The time is near. I can sense it.’”

“Did he really say that?” I asked. “Or are you making it up?”

“It is all true,” Mamie assured me.

“Then he must have been a very clever man to see into the future.”

“He was a very clever man, but this is apart from cleverness. It is the special gift of clairvoyance, and magicians and sorcerers had been saying that the King would meet his death in Paris, and if ever the Queen was crowned, then the blow would fall.”

“Then why did he allow my mother to be crowned?”

“Because she would give him no rest until he did; he felt guilty about the Princesse de Condé and he hated to deny a woman anything—even the Queen. He thought: Once I have given the Queen her coronation—which is what she wants more than anything—she will leave me to pursue my heart’s desire.”

“But if the prophecy was coming true how could he have his heart’s desire with the Princesse de Condé?”

“I can tell you no more than what happened. In fact, the Duc de Sully was so impressed that he declared he would stop the preparation for the Queen’s coronation as the thought of it so filled the King with foreboding. The King said: ‘Yes, break if off…for I have been told that I shall die in a carriage, and where could it be more easily done than at such a ceremony?’ The Duc de Sully gazed earnestly at the King. ‘This explains much,’ he said. ‘I have often seen you cowering in your carriage when you pass certain places, and yet I know that in battle, there is not a braver man in France.’”

“But they did not stop the coronation,” I pointed out, “for my mother was crowned Queen of France.”

Mamie continued with her narrative. “When the Queen heard that the coronation was to be canceled, she was furious.” Mamie did not attempt to imitate my mother. She would not dare go as far as that. But I could imagine my mother’s rage.

“For three whole days the matter was disputed. There will be a coronation. There will not be a coronation. And at last the King gave way in face of the Queen’s demands and the coronation was fixed for the thirteenth of May at St. Denis.”

“Thirteenth,” I said with a shiver. “That is unlucky.”

“Unlucky for some,” agreed Mamie portentously. “So she was crowned and it was arranged that on the sixteenth she should make her entry into Paris. Now…”

She paused and I watched her with rounded eyes for I had heard the story before and I knew that we were approaching the terrible climax.

“Now…on Friday the fourteenth the King said he would go to the Arsenal to see the Duc de Sully. He was not sure whether he wanted to go or not. He hesitated. First he would go and then he thought he would not…but in the end he made up his mind. It was just to be a short visit after dinner. ‘I shall soon be back,’ he said. When he was about to get into his carriage, Monsieur de Praslin, Captain of the Guard, who always attended him even on the shortest journeys, came forward. ‘No need,’ said the King. Mamie waved her hand imperiously. ‘I don’t want any attendance today. It is just to the Arsenal for a brief visit.’ Well, he got into the carriage and sat down with a few of his gentlemen. There were only six of them, not counting the Marquis de Mirabeau and the equerry who sat in the front of the carriage.

“Now comes the dramatic part. As the King’s carriage came into the Rue de Ferronnerie close to that of St.-Honoré, a cart came into the road, and because this blocked the way a little, the King’s carriage had to go near to an ironmonger’s shop on the St. Innocent side. As the carriage slowed down, a man rushed forward and hoisted himself onto the wheel and thrust a knife at the King. It entered right here….” She touched her left side. “It went between his ribs and severed an artery. The gentlemen in the carriage cried out in horror as the blood gushed forth. ‘It is nothing,’ said the King. Then he said that again so quietly that it could scarcely be heard. They took him with all speed to the Louvre. They laid him on his bed and sent for the doctors—but it was too late. To the sorrow of France, the King passed away.”