The Man Behind the Iron Mask (31 page)

When at the beginning of the month there is top-level talk of having a valet in London extradited and handed over to the French police at Calais,
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and when at the end of that same month a valet is arrested on the highest government authority by the garrison commander of Dunkirk, then it is ‘hardly conceivable', as Lang put it, that ‘the two valets should be different men.' The valet Martin and the prisoner Eustache Dauger, who was ‘only a valet', were in Lang's opinion one and the same. It is, of course, unlikely that Martin had anything of significance to contribute to what the French government already knew or suspected. His rôle in Roux's secret affairs, apart from carrying letters to and from people like Arlington's secretary, could not have been very important, and his knowledge of what was going on must have been limited to his assessment of the people he saw his master with and his interpretation of their overheard conversations. There, however, lay the tragedy described by Lang. The valet's worst fears were realized: the authorities assumed that he knew more than he did and ‘he was locked up for not divulging what he did not know'. Once in prison he was ‘caught in the toils of the system' and his ‘long and mysterious captivity … was the mere automatic result of the red tape of the old French absolute monarchy.'

Lang closed the case at this point, confessing himself as baffled by the solution as by the mystery. He was apparently unable to admit that he might have been misled by a simple coincidence, and was presumably unaware that in the middle of that same July 1669, the ambassador in London got word from the minister in Paris that the valet Martin was no longer wanted. On 13 July Lionne replied to Croissy's letter of 1 July explaining that, since Roux had been found guilty and executed, Martin's presence was no longer necessary and Veyras was simply not important enough to bother with. For the sake of argument one could always imagine that the ambassador went ahead with his plan to have Martin extradited anyway, that the English refused to co-operate and that the French then assumed that Martin was concealing important information damaging to the English; the minister, believing that any letter he sent to the ambassador would be intercepted, deliberately sought to deceive the English by saying Martin was no longer wanted, but soon after that letter was sent an agent, possibly Vauroy himself, was dispatched to England to kidnap Martin in secret. Even with such an hypothesis to buoy it up, however, the theory is still too full of holes to stay afloat.

Why was the prisoner's name changed from Martin to Eustache Dauger? What difference could it have made to Saint-Mars or anyone else that his real name was Martin? Why was there such concern that he might have revealed the secret of how he had been employed before his imprisonment? What difference could it have made to the French government if La Rivière or anyone else had found out that he had once been the valet of Claude Roux? It is difficult, even for the sake of argument, to imagine answers to these questions, much less to the key question: why the mask? Lang gave the disgruntled reader no help at all, but in a footnote to his conclusion he produced the next best thing: a suggestion for an altogether different theory. ‘One marvels', he wrote, ‘that nobody has recognized in the mask James Stuart (James de La Cloche), eldest of the children of Charles II. He came to England in 1668, was sent to Rome, and “disappears from history”.' Later in the same volume, Lang presented his version of this young man's story in an essay entitled
The Mystery of James de La Cloche
but, believing as he did that Eustache Dauger was ‘undeniably' the valet Martin, he made out no case for him as the Iron Mask. That case was championed just one year later, however, by Edith Carey in a book entitled
The Channel Islands
, and again as recently as 1965 by Marcel Pagnol, who in his book,
Le Secret du Masque de fer
, amalgamated both of Lang's suggestions and came up with the claim that ‘James de La Cloche … was Eustache Dauger after having been the valet Martin.' Clearly the story of James de La Cloche is rich in possibilities. The known facts and what must be the most reasonable interpretation of them are as follows.

On 11 April 1668, a strange young man turned up at the central Jesuit novitiate in Rome and asked to be admitted as a postulant. He had no money at all and, apart from a hairbrush and a few extra clothes, no personal belongings of any kind. He gave his name as James de La Cloche, his age as twenty-four and his nationality as English, though in fact he spoke nothing but French. Presumably the Jesuit authorities were not very enthusiastic about accepting him, but their reservations were quickly dispelled when he produced three extraordinary documents for their perusal: two in French, handwritten by Charles II of England, and one in Latin, handwritten by Queen Christina of Sweden, to all appearances authentic in style, signature and seal. The young man, it emerged from these papers, was an illegitimate son of Charles II, secretly recognized and protected by him. The Jesuits, realizing the immense possibilities of having such a remarkable young man in their midst, were now only too eager to welcome him into the Society. And remarkable he certainly was, though not for the reasons they supposed. The documents were forgeries.

The earliest in date was a certificate written by Charles at Whitehall on 27 September 1665, in which he recognized the young man to be his natural son, James Stuart; by the King's command, he had lived all his life under the name of James de La Cloche du Bourg de Jersey in France and other countries outside England and was to continue to live incognito, keeping the secret of his birth until after his father's death. The second document in date was a bequest written by Charles at Whitehall on 7 February 1667 in which he willed that after his death the sum of £500 per annum should be paid to his son, James de La Cloche, on condition that he lived in London and remained an Anglican. The third was an attestation written by the ex-Queen of Sweden in Hamburg on 26 July 1667 in which she declared that James de La Cloche, whom she knew to be the natural son of Charles II, born in Jersey and raised in the Protestant religion, had renounced his Calvinistic faith and become a Roman Catholic.

The Jesuits, like the true writer of the letters, seemed unaware that Charles and his court were not in Whitehall in September 1665. In that month the population of London had been reduced to half its normal size by the ravages of the Great Plague. In June there were 590 deaths, in July 6,137, in August 17,036, and in September 26,230. No one stayed in the city unless he had to, and the King and his court were in fact in Oxford. Pepys, recording the desolation of London in September, observed that ‘grass grows all up and down White Hall court'. Nor did the Jesuits seem to appreciate that in April 1668, when the young man gave his age as twenty-four, Charles himself was not yet thirty-eight; to have been the father it would have been necessary for him to conceive a child at the age of thirteen which, though not impossible, was nonetheless unlikely. In addition, the Jesuits did not find it suspicious that Charles should refuse public recognition to this illegitimate son, his supposed eldest, when for many years he had publicly recognized another. In 1668 the other illegitimate son had already been at court for six years and, at the age of nineteen, was Duke of Monmouth and Captain of the King's Bodyguard.

Who the young man really was is not known. That he was an imposter using false credentials is certain, but like all convincing liars his stories were constructed on a basis of truth. For example, the starting point for his hoax had its foundation in a real state of affairs in Jersey. There, just twelve years before his arrival in Rome, a certain Jean La Cloche had ennobled his name, at least in appearance, by changing it to Jean
de
La Cloche, following his marriage to Marguerite de Carteret, a daughter of the most noble family on the island. Ten years before his marriage, that is in 1646, it was this same Marguerite who, at twenty years of age, had first fired the heart of the then Prince Charles, visiting Jersey at the age of sixteen. By all accounts this youthful romance was altogether innocent, and certainly there exists no evidence or tradition that a child was born to Marguerite as a result. In any case the young man would have been two years old when Charles and Marguerite met. There is moreover no reason to believe that Marguerite had a child before she met Charles. The story told by the young man had evident links, however forged or forced, with the history of Jean La Cloche and his wife Marguerite, but in fact there exists no record nor rumour of anyone on Jersey called James de La Cloche.

The key piece of invention in the young man's confidence trick was also founded upon a circumstantial truth. He fabricated a major rôle for himself in a perfectly plausible story based upon a secret which Charles II had shared with only the highest authorities of the Roman Catholic Church. Any uncertainty the General of the Jesuits might have had would have been removed the moment the young man gave him to understand that he knew this secret. How the young man had got access to such knowledge one cannot say, but presumably he or someone helping him had managed to acquire inside information on a special mission sent by Charles to Rome in November 1662. The King's envoy had been Richard Bellings, the private secretary of the King's mother, Henrietta of France, and he had been commissioned to make two requests: one, known to the King's ministers, was to solicit a cardinal's hat for the chaplain of the Queen; the other, known to no one but the King, was to beg dispensations which would allow Charles to declare himself a Roman Catholic and bring his kingdom back within the Roman Catholic Church. The dispensations had not been granted and without them Charles had not dared to change his religious allegiance, but the fact that he had been frustrated in his wish to become Catholic at that time formed the basis of the story with which the Jesuits were to be swindled.

For four months, while the young man played the part of earnest postulant, there were no further developments, until in August two letters arrived by some secret means, both supposedly written by Charles II himself; one was addressed to the Father-General, the other to ‘the Prince Stuart'. The writer of the letters did not realize that never under any circumstances would the illegitimate son of an English king receive the title of Prince, but fortunately for him the Father-General was not aware of this either. Both letters, moreover, spoke of the King's mother as being with him in London, whereas she had been living in France since 1665.

The letter to the Father-General was dated from Whitehall on 3 August and was written in French. In it, Charles confided that for a long time he had been a Roman Catholic by conviction, but as head of the Anglican Church he had been unable to embrace his faith openly and afraid to practice it secretly. The only priests at court were those in the service of his mother and his wife, and no matter how discreetly he might have arranged to see one of them, the suspicions of his anti-Catholic ministers and courtiers would have been aroused. How providential it therefore was that his own son should wish to become a Roman Catholic priest and might in the future join him at court to administer the sacraments to him in secret. His ordination, however, was not to take place in Rome. Charles himself could arrange for that to take place in London. Meanwhile, the Father-General was not to contact Charles directly for any reason nor to speak of his son's true identity to anyone, not even to the Queen of Sweden. As soon as possible, he was to send the young man to London so that Charles might talk with him, and if there was any way in which Charles could secretly help the Jesuit Society, he would be only too pleased to hear about it from his son when he arrived.

The second letter was also from Whitehall and dated the day after the first. Though addressed to the Prince Stuart, it was obviously meant like the other to be read by the Father-General. In it Charles declared that the Queen and the Queen Mother were both delighted at his son's decision to become a priest and eager to see him, but anxious about his weak constitution. He should visit London in autumn only if his health permitted, otherwise he should wait until spring. In the near future Charles planned to recognize him publicly and at that time, since his mother was noble, he could expect to receive precedence over the Duke of Monmouth. Indeed one day, if the kingdom were to return to the Roman Church and Charles and his brother were to die without issue, the crown of England would fall to him. Charles was well aware of his obligations to the Jesuits and it was his intention to recompense the Society in some important way. Meanwhile, the large sum of money which Charles had set aside for his upkeep and had given into the care of Queen Christina of Sweden had been borrowed by her for her own use. He was in the process of rearranging the matter, but in the meantime unfortunately there was no way that he could secretly send money to him in Rome.

Nothing then until the beginning of September, when unexpectedly the young man's plan hit a snag. News reached the novitiate that the Queen of Sweden was on her way to Rome. To save the situation the plan had to be advanced and so another letter suddenly arrived, supposedly sent from Whitehall on 29 August, in which Charles warned the Father-General not to let Queen Christina meet his son. He had written to her himself, he said, and told her that his son was leaving Rome for England so that Charles could arrange some financial settlement for him, a bank deposit of 40 or 50,000 écus. She was so badly in need of money that, if she saw his son, she might raise suspicions by trying to borrow money from him. Charles had told her that his son had not revealed his true identity to the Jesuits and that so far as they knew he had gone to Jersey to visit his mother, who had expressed a wish to become a Roman Catholic. His son was to leave Rome for London as soon as possible. Secrecy was of the utmost importance and the Father-General was to communicate with no one on the matter except Charles himself, through the intermediary of his son.