Royal Harlot by Susan Holloway Scott Read Free Book Online Page B

hers, a richer title, jewels and gowns and carriages.
    Such a prediction from her, and such a promise to myself: and yet how strange to think that, in time, both would come true.
    I never learned if that thwarted frolic disappointed Philip (for of course I told him of it, fool that I was) so much that he drew back from me, or if, more likely, he acted simply in the pattern of such gentlemen and his fading interest with me was as natural to him as the changing of the seasons. For though I tried every amorous fancy I knew to keep him bound to me, his letters and poesies became less frequent, and worse, he began to invent a score of petty reasons for us not to meet.
    He first removed himself to Tunbridge Wells, away from London and from me, and then retreated farther to his estate of Bretby, in the Peak District. I seldom knew exactly where he was, let alone in whose arms he chose to dally. To my misery, I heard his name linked with many others, including Lady Elizabeth Howard, the daughter of the Earl of Berkshire, a lady far my superior in rank and fortune, if not beauty. Yet my poor heart was so wounded that my pride swallowed that indignity, too, for the sake of but hearing his dear name.
    When at last he returned to London, matters were no more improved between us. On the few occasions when he would summon me, I would fain run to his faithless embrace, and forgive him every other transgression. His skill at lovemaking could still make me so weak with trembling delight that it clouded every other thought and common sense. Again and again I suffered these humiliations for what I perceived was his love, with no lasting proof to show for it other than a handful of empty words—a hard lesson for any woman, most especially for one of my still-tender years, yet one I would not forget.
    I’ve often considered what would have become of me if Cromwell’s war had not claimed my father, and I’d been blessed with his love, and that of my mother, as she must have been then, before she’d been hardened and drained by misfortune. If as a child I’d seen around me real love, lasting love as warm as a chimney corner, then would I have been better able to recognize the falseness in Philip’s protestations, and tell true love from feigned? If my heart had not been so parched and needy for love of any kind, would I have lapped so desperately at the well-practiced affection he offered?
    Is it any wonder, then, that I also missed my friend Anne, whose mother had kept fast her promise to withhold my company from her daughter. I’d not seen Anne since that last summer afternoon, nor did I receive letters from her. Her banishment had been complete. Further, I’d heard she was soon to be married to Lord Carnegie, and would be as good as buried to me forever in the cold Scottish country.
    In this sorry fashion, my days did pass until the autumn of 1657, and a fresh scandal for my inconstant lover brought him more trouble than even he could dodge. Having drawn a new lady’s name for a Valentine, he amused himself by sending her a specially made gift, a chamber pot fitted with a looking-glass in the bottom, and a lewd verse to her private charms that would thus be revealed, painted along the rim in French.
    But the lady was neither entertained nor seduced—as, alas, I surely would have been—by such a witty token. She soon found a champion in Captain John Whaley, the member of Parliament for Nottingham and Shoreham, and a staunch friend to Cromwell himself. The duel was short, with Philip dispatching Whaley with brisk efficiency and leaving him with a grievous wound. This news roused Cromwell’s vengeful temper, and he sent Philip to imprisonment in the Tower, vowing that if Whaley died, then Philip’s own life would be forfeited.
    Even resourceful Philip could discover no way to conduct his affairs of passion while imprisoned in a guarded tower of stone and iron, and while I worried over his eventual fate, I was also spared imagining him