His hat went back to his head and both men gave a gentle slap of their reins; the horses started off. For a long moment Amber sat in frigid stillness, and then with a bursting sob she flung herself back in the seat. “Drive away!” she cried. Slowly the coach circled about and began to move. For several seconds she fought with herself, but at last she could stand it no longer. She turned, jumping to her knees, and scrubbed with one moist palm at the tiny dusty pane above the seat. They were far in the distance now, cantering, but the thick fog which drifted in shreds obscured them both and she could not tell which one was Bruce.
At noon the page came again. He told her that Lord and Lady Carlton had just sailed on one of the royal yachts which carried persons of quality across the Channel.
The next afternoon a letter was brought to her from Lord Buckhurst, who had sailed on the same vessel. Amber tore it open without much interest. “Your Grace,” she read, “I believe this may be of some concern to you. Lady Carlton, during the crossing, fell suddenly ill and was dead by the time we reached Calais. His Lordship, they say, intends to set sail immediately for America. Your very humble and obliged servant, madame, Buckhurst.”
It was not easy to book passage just then, for most of the merchant-ships sailed in great convoys that set out three times a year, but at last she found a captain who was going to America in an old vessel he called the
“I’ll shut up my house and pretend I’m going into the country,” she told Nan. “I can’t take much with me—but I’ll send for whatever I want once we’re settled. Oh, Nan! It’s—”
“Don’t say it, mam,” warned Nan. “It’s bad luck to be made happy by another’s death.”
Amber sobered immediately. She was afraid of that herself, afraid to be as happy as she felt, afraid to be grateful now that the one thing she had wanted had come to pass. And so she refused to think about it. She was too busy, and too excited, to think very much anyway. But she told herself it had happened because God had willed it—had always meant them to be together. It was just as she had said to Bruce after the Plague—they had been fated for each other from the beginning of time. Only it had taken him so long to find it out. Perhaps he didn’t realize it even now—but he would, when he saw her again. Even the unwelcome pregnancy of which she was now convinced, fitted into the pattern. That had been fated too—their child would help him forget.
Amber spent the night at Whitehall, pretending that everything was just as usual, while Nan was at Ravenspur House packing and getting the children and their nurses ready to go. They would be ten, altogether: Amber, Nan, Big John, Tansy, Susanna and Charles and their four nurses. And of course Monsieur le Chien. She did not even try to sleep when she came back at midnight from watching a play in the Hall Theatre, but instead changed her clothes and spent her time nervously going through some of her belongings to decide what she would have sent.
But she was not able to think coherently or make any real decisions. Just before five, her footman came to say that the
Amber snatched up her cloak and flung it on, dropped her gloves and picked them up again, started out the door and ran back for her fan and when she was halfway down the corridor remembered she had forgotten her mask. Automatically she turned and started back, then suddenly muttered, “Oh, the devil take it!” and ran on. Her coach had been kept in readiness all night at the Palace Gate and Nan and the others would meet her at the wharf.
Entering the Stone Gallery from the narrow corridor she ran directly into a group of men just emerging from Lord Arlington’s suite of rooms across the way. It was still half dark in there and a footman who accompanied them carried a torch. Startled, Amber stopped still, then abruptly she started on again. She did not notice who they were and would have passed them without a glance had not a familiar voice spoken to her.
“Good morrow, your Grace.”
She looked up into the Baron’s face and for a sudden panic-stricken moment she wondered if the King had found out her plan and sent him to stop her. In another moment Buckingham, too, had come out of the shadowy group to stand beside his Lordship. Now she was sure it was some plot! But nothing should prevent her from leaving—nothing on God’s earth. Ignoring the Duke, she raised her head defiantly and looked at Arlington.
“My lord?” Her voice was cold, sharp.
“Your Grace is abroad early.”
Unexpectedly she was ready with a facile lie. “Lady Almsbury is ill—she sent for me. And isn’t this early for you, too, my lord?” she inquired tartly.
“It is, madame. I go on a mission of the gravest importance—I’ve just got word the King’s sister died yesterday morning.”
