Queen Jezebel Read online

  ‘This wedding will be blood-red,’ said the people of Paris. And the King knew that they whispered those words.

  The Cardinal of Bourbon had been persuaded to perform the ceremony; he had been shown that he would find extreme disfavour in the eyes of the King and, what was more serious, in those of the Queen Mother if he did not comply with their wishes. Charles and his mother had had the news spread through Paris that the Pope’s dispensation was in their hands. So there was nothing now to delay the ceremony.

  So the King trembled, and as he was dressed in the most magnificent garments yet seen—for his clothes, with his jewelled cap and dagger, alone cost six hundred thousand crowns—those about him wondered how long he would be able to smother his smouldering madness and whether it would break out before the wedding was a fait accompli.

  * * *

  Busy as she was, Catherine found time to admire her darling. How beautiful he was! More beautiful than any, and more. magnificent than the King himself. His dark beauty was set off by a hundred sparkling jewels; and he was as delighted with himself as his mother was.

  Catherine admired the cap with its thirty pearls, each one weighing twelve carats. How soft the pearls looked in contrast with the sapphires and rubies and the hard glitter of diamonds—and how they became her darling!

  She kissed him tenderly. ‘If I could have one wish granted, my dear,’ she whispered, ‘it would be that you were King of France this day. To think that you were born one year too late hurts me deeply.’

  ‘But one day, Mother . . .’ he murmured, his long eyes alight with ambition.

  ‘One day, my darling. Your brother looks sickly today,’ she added.

  ‘He has looked sickly for so long.’

  ‘Have no fear, my darling. All will be well.’

  She smiled, but, in spite of outward calm, she was uneasy. She felt like one who, imagining herself to be a goddess, had stirred up a troublous sea, only to find that she was no goddess, but merely a frail human being in a flimsy craft. She was determined to steer to safety. Let them get the wedding over and then, as compensation, Philip should be offered Coligny.

  ‘The marriage at least was not of my making,’ she would say, as though to imply: ‘And that other deed was. I did it to show you that I am your friend.’ That would satisfy Philip. But would it? Fanatic he might be, but he certainly was no fool.

  She was never one to think more than a move or two ahead, and today she must think only of the wedding and Coligny. After that? . . . There were gathered here in Paris a mighty force of Huguenots and Catholics. She had said: ‘When the time comes, I shall know what to do.’ And she would know. She had no doubt of that. So much for the present.

  * * *

  The bride was haughty, pale-faced and sullen. She stormed at her women.

  ‘I have prayed all these nights and days. I have begged the Virgin and the saints to help me. Is it all of no avail? It must be that this is so, for here is this most hateful day, the day of my wedding. I have spent my nights in weeping . .

  Her women soothed her. They knew that her, nights had been spent in love-making with the Duke of Guise, but Margot often managed to convince others as she convinced herself. Now she saw herself as the reluctant bride, the tool of her brother and her mother, forced to marry a man whom she hated. Did she hate Henry of Navarre? He was not without his attraction. She had felt mildly interested when he had cocked a shrewd eye at her and winked in an extremely vulgar and provincial manner. Perhaps she did not exactly hate him; but it was far more dramatic to hate than to feel mildly indifferent, therefore she must declare she hated Henry of Navarre.

  For all her misery she could not help but delight in her own appearance. She touched the crown on her head. How well it became her! By this marriage she would be a Queen, and even her beloved Henry of Guise could not have made her a Queen; yet this coarse fellow whom she hated was a King. She put on her cape of ermine; then she stood still admiring herself while the blue cape glittering with the crown jewels was put about her. She looked over her shoulder at the long train which would need three to carry it—and they must be Princesses. Nothing else would be suitable for a Queen. She laughed with pleasure, and then remembered that she was a most reluctant bride.

  The 18th of August, she thought, and my wedding day . . . the day I. shall become the Queen of Navarre. She had left behind her that girl who had thought her heart was broken when they took her lover from her and married him to Catherine of Cleves. She thought fleetingly of that girl—only a little younger than the bride of today, but how different, how innocent! She wept a real tear for that girl, for now she recalled something of that desolation which had come to her when she had known that the dream of her childhood, that dream of marriage with the most handsome man in France, was ended. That girl was a charming, tragic ghost who watched the women preparing her for a wedding which would make her a Queen.

  ‘Your Majesty, we must go,’ whispered one of her women.

  The ghost retired and the actress was there in her place. ‘You are premature,’ she said coldly. ‘I am not yet a Queen to be addressed thus.’

  The girl’s eyes filled with tears and Margot kissed her. ‘There, let there be no more tears. Those I have already shed will suffice.’

  As she walked along the platform which was draped with cloth of gold and which led from the Bishop’s Palace to Notre Dame, she held her head high. She could see the masses of people below, and she knew that many were dying of suffocation in that crowd, and that before the ceremony was over many would be trampled to death. And all for a glimpse of a royal wedding, and in particular for a bride who was noted not only for her beauty, but her profligacy. She knew what they would be saying about her, and yet they would not be unkindly. They knew of her love affair with their hero, and the Catholic population would murmur together because she was being married, not to Catholic Henry of Guise, but to Huguenot Henry of Navarre. There would be coarse jests about her. She could imagine their saying:

  ‘Oh, it was not only Monsieur de Guise, you know. There was Monsieur d’Entragues and a gentleman of the King’s bodyguard, Monsieur de Charry. Some say there was also the Prince de Martigues.’

  It seemed impossible to keep one’s affairs from the public. Were the walls of the châteaux no protection at all?

  Ah well, she would amuse them; and the people of Paris loved those who amused them—although they might not be pleased with her infidelity to their beloved Duke.

  Yes, Margot had no doubt that she was providing gossip for the streets and markets of Paris today.

  They did not enter the church, because it had been agreed that the bridegroom should neither hear Mass nor cross the threshold of Notre Dame for the ceremony; the crowd murmured loudly at this and there were jeers and cries of ‘Heretic!’ But it was soon seen that it was more interesting to have the ceremony performed outside the church than inside, since it could be seen by more people. So, before the western door of the church, Margot knelt by the side of Henry of Navarre.

  The bridegroom looked handsome enough, magnificently attired as he was, but his bride was quick to notice the lack of elegance to which she was accustomed in the gentlemen of the court and which even cloth of gold and jewels could not give. He wore his hair en brosse, à la Béarnais; no delicate perfume hung about the man; and yet with his lazy smile and his cynical eyes he was not altogether unattractive.

  But as she knelt beside him, Margot caught sight of her lover, and it seemed to her that never had he looked so handsome as he did today. She knew that the shouts of enthusiasm which she had heard as they walked along the platform had not been so much for her and her bridegroom as for her lover. In his ducal robes he was magnificent. He towered above those about him, and the August sunshine turned his hair and beard to a ruddy gold. Memories came back to Margot and she was once more a broken-hearted girl. Oh, why had they not married her to the man of her choice? If they had let me marry Henry of Guise, she thought, there would have been none but
he. D’Entragues and de Charry and even the Prince of Martigues—what did I care for them? It was only because my heart was broken and they had taken my true love away that I turned to them.

  How distasteful was this man beside her! She would not marry him. She belonged to the golden giant, the beloved of the Parisians. He had been her first love and he would be her last.

  The ceremony had begun. Henry of Navarre had taken her hand.

  I will not. I will not! she thought. Why should I not marry whom I choose? Why should I be forced to a marriage with this oaf? I will have Henry of Guise. I will have none of Henry of Navarre.

  They were waiting for her responses and she felt the silence all about her. She must say that she agreed to marry the man beside her. But mischief had caught her; her love of drama overcame everything else. The whole of Paris should know that at the very last moment she had refused to marry the man they had tried to force on her.

  The Cardinal was repeating his questions. Margot’s lips were tightly pressed together. I will not. I will not! she thought.

  Then from behind she felt a hand on her head.

  ‘Speak!’ said the savage voice of the King in her ear, and defiantly she shook her head.

  ‘Fool!’ went on Charles. ‘Bend your head or I will kill you.’ He roughly forced her head forward; and she heard him mutter to the Cardinal: ‘That’s good enough. The nod will do. Our bride is too shy to speak. The nod means that she agrees.’

  But many had seen what had happened, and they marvelled at the courage of the Princess; and so the ceremony proceeded while the bridegroom turned his cynical smile upon his bride.

  * * *

  Now for the rejoicing, the feasting, the balls and the masques.

  Coligny longed for the quiet of his home at Châtillon. How he wished that he might join his family, even while he knew he must stay in Paris! He reproached himself, reminding himself that he should be grateful that his influence with the King had been rekindled.

  As soon as was possible he escaped from the tumult and the lavish shows to his apartment, there to write a letter to Jacqueline.

  ‘Dearest and well-beloved Wife,’ he wrote, ‘today was completed the marriage of the King’s sister with the King of Navarre. The next three days will be passed in pleasure, in banqueting, masques, ballets and tourneys; after which the King, so he assures me, will give up several days to the hearing of divers complaints which arise in many parts of his kingdom. I am therefore constrained to labour to the utmost of my power; and although I have the greatest wish to see you, I think we should both of us feel a strong remorse if I failed in my duty. But I shall get leave to go forth from the city next week. I would far rather be with you than sojourn at the court, but we mutt think of our people before our private happiness. I shall have other things to tell you when I see you, the which joy I desire night and day.

  ‘And now dearest and well beloved, I pray God to have you in His keeping.

  ‘Written at Paris this 18th day of August, 1572. Rest assured that amid all these feastings and gaiety, I shall not give offence to any—least of all to God.’

  As he sat alone, he could hear the music from the palace, the laughter and the singing. From the streets he could hear the sounds of the roystering of the people, and the air seemed full of their shouting.

  * * *

  Catherine noticed the absence of Coligny. Our revels give such a pious man little delight, she thought. She knew that he was in his apartments writing—doubtless to his equally pious wife. That matter should be discovered later. It would be amusing to read the love letters of such a man. Well, let him write as long a letter as he pleased and as full of passion as he could manage. With luck it would be the last he would write.

  She watched the ballet. Margot was dancing with the Duke of Guise, and Henry of Navarre with Charlotte de Sauves. Catherine could not help smiling cynically as she surveyed those four. Well, one thing was certain: neither bride nor bridegroom was in a position to blame the other for infidelity. The cynical pair! It was perfectly obvious that they were both considering the violation of their marriage vows on the very night of their wedding! It was a situation worthy of the pen of Boccaccio or of Margot’s namesake, that other Queen of Navarre.

  For a few days she could rest content. The marriage was effected. In the remote possibility of a Huguenot ascendancy over Catholics and a suppression of the House of Valois by that of Bourbon, she would have a daughter who was Queen of France. She had managed to get a foot in both camps—she would be the Queen Mother whether Catholic Valois or Huguenot Bourbon sat on the throne of France.

  As for Philip, he must have Coligny. The Governor of Lyons had been instructed not only to let no mail into France, but to let no mail out. Philip and the Pope should not know that the wedding had taken place until she could also send the news of the Huguenot leader’s death.

  Imperceptibly, she lifted her eyebrows, for Coligny had entered the great hall.

  Catherine made her way to him.

  ‘Dear Admiral, how delighted I am to see you join our foolish revels. They are gay and a little silly, are they not? But I doubt not that you were amused by such things when you were the age of these young people—just as I was. It is pleasing to see our young pair so fond—so charming, is it not? And, Admiral’—she laid her delicate white hand on his arm—‘Admiral, I know you pray with me that this marriage will bring to an end the strife in our land.’

  ‘Amen, Madame,’ said Coligny.

  ‘I rejoice to see the influence you have with my son. His Majesty, I know, consults you in all things. Ah, my dear Admiral, you have a mother’s gratitude. Promise me you will stay with us . . . stay long and use your benign influence to bring peace to our land.’

  She looked up into the noble face, at the widely set eyes, the fine high brow, the firm lips and the clearly moulded features. It was, she thought lightly, his nobility of countenance which made the Admiral such a handsome man. I will send his head to Rome. It should arrive almost as soon as the news of the wedding.

  * * *

  They had been put to bed in royal state—the cynical groom and the indifferent bride. His Huguenot gentlemen had now retired; so had her Catholic ladies; and they were alone.

  The candlelight flattered him, Margot thought; but she did not believe she could endure him near her. She did not wish those thick hands to touch her; the coarse hair reminded her of the soft natural curls of Henry of Guise by their very contrast. Why did he not use some perfume as he did not appear to be over-particular with his toilet?

  He was watching her, determined to match her indifference with his own.

  ‘Well, you see,’ he said at length, ‘the marriage did take place. I remember long ago, when we rode to Bayonne together, you pulled my hair and swore that you would die rather than marry me.’

  ‘I am not sure,’ she answered with a touch of melancholy, that I would not rather be dead than here at this moment.’

  He laughed aloud. ‘You . . . dead! And before the ceremonies are over!’

  She laughed suddenly. ‘Well, perhaps I should have said immediately after.’

  Some understanding seemed to be established between them at that moment. She betrayed a humour which matched his, a humour so strong that she had been unable to suppress it and to play the role which she had planned for herself.

  ‘I never saw one less melancholy than you in the dance this night.’

  ‘I have learned to play many a part which has been forced upon me. Your pursuit of Madame de Sauves was disgraceful. It was noted, I assure you, by many. That is not a seemly manner in which to behave on your wedding night, Monsieur. At least not in Paris. Perhaps in your remote state of Béarn . . .’

  ‘Which is now your state, Madame.’

  ‘Perhaps in our remote state of Béam, courtesy, elegance and the manners of a courtier do not count; but here in Paris, I would have you treat me with respect. I have become your wife.’

  ‘Most reluctantly,’ he rem
inded her.

  ‘And Queen of Navarre.’

  ‘Less reluctantly,’ he put in, and she permitted herself to smile.

  ‘I would have you know that this marriage ceremony of ours was, as far as I am concerned, performed but to please the King and my mother, and it is my wish that it should be a marriage of state only . . . by which I mean . .

  ‘Your meaning is perfectly clear to me,’ he said, resting on his elbow to look at her.

  ‘I trust that you will respect my wishes.’

  ‘Have no fear on that score, Madame. May I wish you goodnight?’

  ‘Goodnight,’ she said.

  She was angry with him. He might at least have shown some sign of regret, even if he had made no attempt at persuasion; he had no manners; he was an oaf, a provincial. It was an insult to have married her to such a man even though he was a King. She looked at the ornate curtains of the bed while she trembled with anger.

  He said, after a pause: ‘I perceive your inability to remain still, Madame. Should I attribute this to anger at my unworthiness to occupy this place in the bed, or may I put it down to your desire for me?’

  ‘You may certainly not put it down to the latter,’ she said sharply; but she was glad he had started to talk again.

  ‘Do not be too harsh with me, I beg of you,’ he pleaded. ‘We of royal blood cannot choose our wives and husbands, and it is well to make the best of what are chosen for us.’

  ‘Make the best! What do you mean?’

  ‘To smile instead of fume. To enjoy friendship, since love is out of the question.’

  ‘So you feel friendship for me?’

  ‘If you will but extend the hand of friendship, I shall not refuse it.’

  ‘That,’ she agreed, ‘would, I suppose, be better than being enemies. But is friendship possible between us? We are of different faiths.’

  He lay back on his satin pillow and folded his arms behind his head. ‘Faith?’ he said with a laugh. ‘What has faith to do with us?’