The brothers were in his Majesty’s laboratory, surrounded on all sides by crucibles and alembics, retorts and matrasses. There were glass and earthenware jars full of powders, pastes, many-coloured liquids, oil of prima materia. Egg-shaped vessels of every size and substance lined the shelves. Piles of books bound in old leather, stamped with gold, stood on the floor or on the tables. Chemistry—which had not yet secured its divorce from the medieval witch-woman, alchemy—was one of the King’s chief interests. Even when he had had to beg a meal he had not been able to resist paying money out of his meagre store for almost every new nostrum recommended him by a passing quack.
“How the devil,” said Charles now, stirring the mixture but not looking around, “did you let her get you into such a mess?”
York gave a heavy sigh. “I wish I knew. She isn’t even pretty. She’s as ugly as an old bawd. Eyes that pop and a shape like this—” His hands described an ungainly female form.
Charles smiled. “Perhaps that’s what fooled you. It’s my observation a pretty woman seldom thinks it’s necessary to be clever. Anne Hyde is clever—don’t you agree?” He seemed amused.
James shifted his weight, scowling. “I don’t know what fooled me. I must have been out of my mind. Signing that damned marriage-contract!”
“And in your own blood. A picturesque touch, James, that one. Well—you’ve signed it and you’ve had her and she’s pregnant. Now what?”
“Now nothing. I hope I never see her again.”
“A contract of marriage is as binding as a ceremony, James, you know that. Whether you like it or not, you’re married to her. And that child she carries is yours and will bear your name.”
James heaved himself away from the fireplace, walked across the room and glanced at the concoction his brother had stirred up. “Ugh!” said the Duke. “How it stinks!”
“It does, I agree,” admitted Charles. “But the fellow who sold me the recipe says it’s the most sovereign thing for an ague ever discovered—and London and the ague, you know, are synonymous. This winter I don’t doubt you’ll be glad enough to borrow a dose of it from me.”
Restless, discontented, angry, James turned and walked away. After a moment he once more took up the subject of his marriage. “I’m not so sure,” he said slowly, “you’re right about that, sir. The brat may not be mine after all.”
“Now what’ve you been hearing?”
Suddenly James came back to him; his face was serious and growing excited. “Berkeley came to me two days ago and told me that Anne has lain with him. Killigrew and Jermyn have sworn the same thing since.”
For a long moment Charles looked at his brother, searching his face. “And you believed them?”
“Of course I believed them!” declared James hotly. “They’re my nearest friends! Why wouldn’t I believe them?”
“Berkeley and Jermyn and Harry Killigrew. The three greatest liars in England. And why do you suppose they told you that? Because they knew it was what you wanted to hear. It is, isn’t it?” Charles’s dark eyes narrowed slightly, his face shrewd. He understood his brother perfectly, much better in fact than James understood himself.
James did not answer him for a long moment but at last he said softly, half-ashamed, “Yes. I suppose it is. But why the devil should I think Anne Hyde is more virtuous than another woman? They all have a price—”
“And hers was marriage.” The King set the pan off the flame and turned down the lamp. Then he took his doublet from where it had hung over a chair-back and slipped into it. “Look here, James—I’m no better pleased than you are with this business—The daughter of a commoner, even if he is my Chancellor, is no suitable wife for the heir to the English throne. But it would raise a damned peculiar smell all over Europe if you got her with child and refused to marry her. If she’d been anyone but the Chancellor’s daughter we might have found a way around it. As it is I think there’s only one course for you: Marry her immediately and with as good a grace as you can.”
“That isn’t what the Chancellor wants. He’s locked her in her rooms and says he’d rather have her thrown into the Tower and beheaded than disgrace the Stuarts by marrying one of them.”
“Edward Hyde was a good servant to my father and he’s been a good servant to me. I don’t doubt he’s angry with her, but one thing you may be sure of—it’s not only the Stuarts he’s worried about. He knows well enough that if his daughter marries you he’ll have a thousand new enemies. Jealousy doesn’t breed love.”
“If you say it’s best, Sire, I’ll marry her—but what about Mam?” He gave Charles a sudden desperate look that was almost comical.
Charles laughed, but put an arm about his brother’s shoulders. “Mam will most likely have a fit of the mother that will go near to killing her.” “A fit of the mother” was the common term for hysteria. “She’s always hated Hyde—and her family pride is almost as great a passion with her as her religion. But I’ll protect you, Jamie—” He grinned. “I’ll threaten to hold off her pension.”
