Charles the King (17 page)

Troops were being levied up and down the country; the Court expenses had been drastically curtailed; there was talk of war and a great deal of boasting by the younger men who were joining the King and imagined themselves marching unhindered into Scotland to return with riches and glory in a short campaign.

“Where the devil is the Archbishop?” the Queen said at last.

“Shall I go and see, Madam?” Lady Newport rose and curtsied. She had rewarded the Queen by becoming a Catholic, arousing such a storm with her husband and family that the King had been forced to intervene and protect her. Henrietta had made a friend and a convert for life, and Charles had made a mortal enemy of the rich and powerful Earl.

“If you please, Newport.”

“He has no right to keep you waiting, Madam.” Lucy Carlisle picked up the Queen's needlework frame and put it away.

“I expect he's with the King again,” Henrietta said.

“He's always with His Majesty,” Lady Carlisle began winding the silks. “It's such a pity he has no other confidant in the Church.”

“I have never understood the King's liking for him,” Henrietta leant back in her chair; her back was aching and she felt vaguely restless and unwell. “He's such an ill-bred little creature—and that dreadful laugh—always guffawing, you can hear him two rooms distant! Ah, Newport, is he here?”

“Yes, Madam. I saw him coming down the corridor and I ran straight back to tell you.”

“Good.” Henrietta stood up, supporting herself on the arm of the chair. “When he comes, you will all retire. I have certain things in mind which must be said to his Grace alone.”

The Archbishop came in, and kissed her hand. She did not return his smile or answer his enquiry about her health. She did not invite him to sit down and her dark eyes glared at him.

“It is not my habit to interfere,” she said abruptly and she was too angry to notice the gleam in his little grey eyes. “Nothing would induce me to send for you and ask an explanation of your conduct, except the hope that you can somehow undo the harm you have done to the King before it is too late!”

Laud's ruddy face flushed a dark red.

“God forbid that I should do the King harm, Madam. I'm afraid I do not understand your accusation.”

“You understand perfectly,” she snapped. “I thought only Jesuits were guilty of casuistry, my Lord Bishop. I am asking you to withdraw this Prayer Book and persuade the King to treat with the Scots Covenanters. Do you realize that we are about to go to war on account of this piece of authorship you undertook?”

He folded his thick hands in front of him and faced her coolly.

They had fought many battles in the past, battles when he had tried to explain her championing the Catholics and displaying her religion in terms of the harm she was doing to the King, and he had never succeeded in moving her. Now she accused him on similar grounds and he was not prepared to lose his temper. He had his faith, and it was also the faith by which Charles lived and reigned. He did not expect her to understand why its enforcement was important.

“It is not a question of my authorship,” he said quietly. “Believe me, Madam, I only put the Prayer Book into its form, and when I did so, I was following the King's instructions. The Church of Rome insists on uniformity among its people. Why should the Church of England be satisfied with less?”

“I am not interested in the Church of England,” Henrietta retorted. “I am only interested in the welfare of the King. Your heresy and the Covenanters' heresy are one and the same to me; I do know that the King would never have proposed forcing this Prayer Book on Scotland if you had not suggested it.”

“I did suggest it, Madam. And it was the duty of the King's subjects to accept it, whether they were Scots or English. I must point out to you that it is no longer a matter of my authorship or my opinions as Archbishop, whether they matter to you or not. It is now the King's authority which is in question. He cannot bow to the dictates of rebels; as a Princess of the Blood you see that as clearly as a poor commoner like myself.”

“I see that there was never any need to put his authority to such a test,” she said bitterly. “I see that you have encouraged him and brought him to the point where he must defend it with an army against some of his own people. I may be a Princess of the Blood, my Lord Bishop, but I am not a fool on that account! We cannot afford this war—we cannot afford any war! We haven't the money or the troops trained to bring it to victory. There is still a chance to stop it if you will go to the King and beg him to withdraw the Book. He will not listen to me; he may still listen to you!”

For a moment Laud did not answer. She lowered herself into the chair, feeling suddenly dizzy. Her time was very near.

“Madam,” he said slowly. “I am an old man; old enough, saving your pardon, to be your father and near the father of the King himself. I claim the privilege of age by speaking freely to you. Many times I have wondered to what extent you love His Majesty. Many times I have tried to persuade you to make some compromise with your faith for his sake, and I have never once succeeded.”

“Whatever my own beliefs,” Henrietta answered, “I would not pursue them at the cost of Civil War. I have tried to protect my Catholic people from being butchered like animals on a public scaffold for going to Mass or taking the cloth of the priesthood. I have refused to attend services which I believe to be wrong as the King has always refused to attend my Mass. But if the time came when my practice of my faith put the King in the danger he is in at this moment, I would abandon anything and trust my soul's judgment to God! If you love His Majesty, go and beg him on your knees before it is too late!”

Laud looked up at her, and his round ugly face had softened. “Madam, no man except Lord Wentworth loves the King as much as I do. And if I ever doubted that you loved him, I beg your pardon for it now. I wish,” he said simply, “that we had talked like this before. Much of our misunderstandings could have been avoided. The Prayer Book was my idea, Madam, and I made it in good faith, believe me. I wanted the King to rule as absolutely in his Church as he does in his State. I wanted the peace and benefit of that rule to shine through every aspect of his subject's life, beginning with the worship of God, where all men kneel as equals in His sight. But I had no idea that it could lead to this. And before I came to you this afternoon I went to see His Majesty. I went on my knees and begged, but he won't listen to me either.”

There was no sound or movement in the room for some moments. He looked up at the Queen sitting awkwardly in her tall chair, her face sallow and lined with fatigue, and on a sudden impulse of remorse for his bias against her, the Archbishop knelt and lifted her hand to his lips. He did not understand women; he had never remotely understood her or appreciated the strength of her love for her husband when so many of her actions seemed to be obstinately selfish. He was not sure of anything about her even then, except she loved the King with all her heart, and for that he could forgive her everything.

“Trust in God, Madam, your God and mine, for He is the same in spite of all our efforts to divide Him up. And pray for the King and the success of his arms. I shall never cease to do so night and day until he returns. It may be that God will listen to us both.”

Chapter 7

It was late and Charles had sent his attendants away; it was the custom for one or more of his gentlemen to sleep in his room as a precaution against the Scots. He had crossed the border and was staying at Berwick Castle with what remained of his army, a defeated army composed of discontented, untrained men, grumbling against a war with which none of them was in religious sympathy, officered by nobles and gentry quarrelling amongst themselves and secretly in league with many of the Scottish rebels.

Lord Holland, Henrietta's friend and his favourite, had taken his cavalry and foot-soldiers into Scotland and run from the superior Scots forces without firing a shot. There was no battle, only a disgraceful rout, and what was left of the Royal army's tremulous morale collapsed.

They were surrounded by the Covenanters, and the discipline and fervour of the rebellious Scots were a merciless reminder to him of the disloyalty and cowardice of his own people. He had met the Scottish leaders to discuss a treaty—the rough, suspicious Earl of Rothes and the younger, more courteous Earl of Montrose, and Charles had received them graciously and disarmed them with promises he had no intention of keeping.

His power was threatened, and he was a man and a King in spite of his gentle upbringing and peaceful instincts. He had been betrayed and flouted and Laud was not with him to remind him of the sanctity of the Christian Princes word.

He did not want his attendants with him. He could hardly bear to speak to Holland and to Arundel, who had mismanaged his fleet; he was sick of their excuses and their attempts to lay the blame on each other. He felt that night that if one of his advisers counselled him to give the rebels what they wanted, he would strike the speaker in the face. The room was bare and draughty, and he walked up and down to keep warm, measuring the paces, his mind in a turmoil of intrigue and counter-intrigue. Rothes wanted to abolish the Bishops in Scotland and set up a separate Scottish Parliament, far more independant than the English Commons. He could do nothing but agree and return to England to reorganize his forces for a second war. That was his only hope and his only aim, and he did not trust any of his nobles not to warn the Covenanters or babble about it in their cups if he confided in them. The more he saw of the lay preachers and ministers moving among the Scottish armies singing psalms and quoting fiery passages of scripture, the more he hated and resented what he saw. To him it was religious anarchy, rebellion against God and defiance of the Lord's anointed. It was especially embittering to know that his only reliable officers were Catholics, who had joined him in gratitude for the lenience he had shown them during his reign.

He went to the fireplace, where a heap of logs were smoking and smouldering in the freezing draught of the old-fashioned chimney, and pulled on the bell rope. His valet Parry came into the room and bowed. He alone knew the King's mood, and he did not venture to speak.

“Bring me some pens and ink and paper,” Charles said. “And tell Lord Hamilton I shall not need him in my room tonight; I don't think I shall go to bed at all.”

“Yes, Your Majesty. Will you require him or any of your household? They are waiting in the ante-chamber.”

“I want no one,” the King said, “except only you, Parry. You can keep me company tonight when I have finished writing.” The valet brought him paper and some freshly-cut quill pens and ink and did his best to coax the fire with a pair of ancient bellows which wheezed so loudly that Charles told him irritably to stop and leave the room.

He wrote first to his wife.

“My own Dear Heart, I think of you constantly in the midst of my troubles, and so my thoughts are the only consolation I find here. I am beset by vexations and quarrels and the demands of my enemies for all that is ungodly and rebellious, and I must perforce bear with them and even try to smile, for fear that they should see what is in my heart concerning them. God did not mean that His Princes should be tried as I am, nor that such a one should lie and forswear in order to preserve His peace, but so it is, and being so, mine own beloved, I do what must be done as fairly as I can, strengthened as always by my thoughts of you and the hope of being quickly in your arms once more. Do not distress yourself, or put the well-being which is dearer to me than life itself into peril by listening to rumours or losing trust in him who is your husband, and could not survive without support from you. I have left my kingdom in your hands; cherish it and guard it against my return for there is much to be done before this stain of shame is wiped away. I would to God that you were with me,” he wrote, as he had written every day since leaving London, “I would that I might find the sweetness of my life in your arms and the strength of my soul in your wisdom. I beg of you with all the need of my love and the humility of my heart, that you will write to me as soon as you receive this …”

He ended as always in his letters to her, “Farewell, my dear Heart, from him who is your loving husband, Charles.”

He sanded the letter and sealed it, and then wrote a short letter to the only man in whom he could put trust, the man who had accomplished in Ireland everything he had failed so wretchedly to do in England or across the border. He wrote to Wentworth in Dublin and ordered him to return to London immediately.

The summer passed and the King and his army made their way slowly back to London. It was a depleted force, thinned out by desertions, its loyalties shaken by contact with the Scottish rebels and their preachers, conscious of waste and failure and ready to blame the King for everything.

The nobles were no less affected. Those who had lost their reputations like Holland and Arundel, and those who had sided with the Covenanters like the Puritan Lords Brooke and Say and Essex, spread rumours of the King's perfidy in dealing with the Scots, for nobody believed in the validity of the promises made when he left Berwick. He was going back to build up his army and return to subdue them, and the rumours were confirmed by the news that Wentworth was returning. The iron disciple of absolute rule, fresh from his subjection of Ireland, was being brought back to perfect his system in England and prepare the King's army for war.

Wentworth had been the most bitterly hated man in England, when he was President of the Council of the North and the reputation he had earned in Ireland had preceded him before he landed again on the English coast. Here was the one man strong enough to put a sword into the King's hand; the one man rich enough and fanatical enough to override the corrupt officials and the lazy Courtiers who were weakening Charles and dividing his government. And the King was not chastened or hesitating, as so many of his people had hoped. He had not seen his reverse as a warning from the Lord to desert the unrighteous. He was committed to evil and beyond the reach of grace. His people hardened against him and huddled together in fear of his revenge upon them. Most of all they feared the ruthless actions of Lord Wentworth. The Court favourites trembled and busied themselves intriguing uselessly against the Lord Deputy and each other, and many of Charles' nobles began frequenting Lord Warwick's house and making contact with Pym and the Puritan leaders. They felt the approach of danger, each to their own interest, and all were united in a common resistance to absolutism. With the exception of the King himself, the only two people who were glad to see Wentworth were Archbishop Laud and Henrietta.