He walked out of the room and for an instant Nelly hesitated, gulping hard once, her heart pounding until she felt scarcely able to breathe; then with sudden resolution she lifted her skirts and followed him. They went out into a dim hall-way. Chiffinch lighted a candle from one which was burning there, stuck it into a brass holder and, turning, gave it to her.
“Here, this will light you up the stairs. At the top there’s a door which will be unlocked. Open it and go into the ruelle, but don’t make a sound until his Majesty comes for you. He may be occupied in talking to one of the ministers or writing a letter.”
She stared solemnly at him, nodding her head, and glanced up uncertainly toward the invisible door. In her trembling hand the candle sent shaking shadows across the walls. She looked back to Chiffinch again, as if for moral support, but he merely stood and stared at her, thinking that the King would never send again for this unkempt creature. Slowly she began to mount the stairs, holding up her skirts with her free hand; but her knees felt so weak she was sure she would never be able to reach the top. She kept on and on, feeling as though she mounted some endless flight in a terrifying dream. Chiffinch stood and watched her until he saw the door open, her profile silhouetted as she paused to blow out the candle, and then with a shrug of his shoulders he went back to his supper guests.
But he was mistaken, for not many nights later she was there again, clean this time and dressed in her blue satin and silver-cloth gown. There was about her still, however, a certain joyous carelessness, as though her spirits were too exuberant, too buoyantly full to take time with trifles. And this time Chiffinch greeted her with a smile, caught in her spell.
Nelly could not get over the wonder of this thing that had happened to her; she felt almost as though she were the first mistress Charles had taken. “Oh, Mary!” she cried breathlessly that first night when she came back out to the coach. “He’s wonderful! Why—he treated me just like—just like I was a princess!” And suddenly she had burst into tears, laughing and crying at once. I’ve fallen in love with him! she thought. Nelly Gwynne—daughter of the London streets, common trollop and public performer—in love with the King of England! Oh, what a fool! And yet, who could help it?
Not long after that Charles asked her what yearly allowance she would want and though she laughed and told him that she was ready to serve the Crown for nothing, he insisted that she name a price. The next time she came she asked Chiffinch what she should say.
“You’re worth five hundred a year, sweetheart—just for that smile.”
But when she came downstairs again she seemed sad and subdued and Chiffinch asked her what had happened. Nell looked at him for a moment, her chin began to quiver and suddenly she was crying. “Oh! He laughed at me! He asked me and I said five hundred pound and—and he laughed!” Chiffinch put his arms about her and while she sobbed he stroked the back of her head, telling her that she must be a little patient—that one day soon she would have much more than five hundred pounds from him.
She did not care about the money, but she did care a great deal that he should not consider her to be worth five hundred pounds—when he had spent much more than that on a single ring for Moll Davis.
Nelly and Moll Davis were well acquainted, for all the actors knew one another and knew also everything that happened in that small bohemian world which hung on the fringes of the Court. And because she liked people and was not inclined to be jealous she liked Moll despite their rivalry in the theatre —and now in another sphere—until she heard that Moll had been making fun of her because Charles had refused her the price she had asked.
“Nelly’s a common slut,” said Moll. “She won’t amuse him long.”
Moll herself made great capital of the rumour that she was the illegitimate daughter of the Earl of Berkshire, though actually her father was a blacksmith and she had been a milkmaid before coming to London to try her fortune.
“A common slut, am I?” said Nelly, when she heard that. “Well, perhaps I am. I don’t pretend to be anything else. But we’ll see whether I know how to amuse his Majesty or not!”
And she set out to visit Moll with a large box of homemade candy tucked under her arm. She threaded her way up one narrow crooked little alley and down another, flipping coins to a dozen beggars, waving an arm in greeting at various women hanging out their windows, stopping to talk to a little girl selling a platter of evil-smelling fish—she gave her a guinea to buy shoes and a cloak, for the winter was setting in. The day was sunny but cold and she walked along swiftly, her hair covered with a hood, her long woollen cloak slapping about her.
