The Lady in the Tower by Jean Plaidy Page B

completely exhausted. The last words he said were that he wished to be laid beside his Queen, Anne of Brittany.
    Mary wept a little and her tears were genuine.
    “He was a good man,” she said, “but it had to be.”
    Then a certain radiance came into her face. I knew that she was thinking: I am free. I married once for state reasons. Now my reason will be my own.
    There was deep mourning throughout the capital. The
clocheteurs des tré-passés
, according to the custom, went through the streets ringing their “death bells.” Dolefully they spoke of the passing of the Father of His People. They remembered that not since St. Louis had there been a king to care for his people as had this king. His frugality and thrift, which had been called meanness and avarice during his lifetime, became virtues. Reforms which had been introduced, abuses which had been abolished were remembered. But putting aside the vacillating affections of the people, when the facts were looked squarely in the face, there must have been evidence throughout the country that Louis had been one of the best kings they had ever had. He had worked hard to keep the country out of war and if he had not always succeeded that was not due to a lack of trying; people had prospered under his rule; they should have been grateful to Louis XII—and although it had taken his death to make them realize his virtues, they did at this time. So there was genuine mourning throughout the land.
    Mary went to the Hôtel de Clugny for the traditional six weeks and she took me with her.
    The Hôtel de Clugny had been the home of the Clugniac monks— hence the name. It was situated in the rue des Mathurins. During the mourning period she was expected to remain most of the time in
la chambre de la reine
, an apartment made gloomy for the occasion with the daylight shut out and wax candles giving the only light.
    Mary herself was dressed completely in white.
    She was troubled a little by her conscience. That was inevitable. The King was dead and she had wished him dead. Now she recalled his virtues. He had been so indulgent. He had wanted so much to please her.
    “He was always gentle with me,” she said. “It is sad that it had to be thus.”
    But she was soon remembering her freedom.
    “Six weeks,” she said. “It seems a lifetime. And I am expected not togo from this gloomy chamber until that time is passed. Tell me, little one, who, do you think, will be most anxious to see me?”
    I was glad to see the mischief returning to her eyes.
    She began to laugh. “They won't be able to wait. They are all agog. How long will it be before they can be sure? You are too young to know these things, my little wiseacre. But you may depend upon it that Madame Louise and Madame Marguerite are beset with anxiety as to the future of their darling. And what of the darling himself? The crown hovers over his head. Is it going to sail right past him? I could die of laughing.”
    I was so pleased to see the change in her. I smiled with her.
    As the days passed, she grew happier. Her conscience had ceased to worry her.
    “He was old,” she said. “He was halfway to the tomb before I came.”
    Although she was shut away it was permissible for some to visit her; and of course one who would have special privilege was the Dauphin. He lost no time in coming.
    She looked very beautiful in her white mourning clothes as she went to receive him, and when she returned from that interview she was her old sparkling self.
    “His great concern was that I might be carrying the King's child,” she said. “Poor man, his thoughts could not go beyond that. Oh, he is so clever, so courteous, his choice of words is exquisite. He could not ask the question outright as my brother or most Englishmen would have done. That would have been crude and vulgar. Is it not amazing that these French—the most licentious people in the world, I believe, flitting from one lady's boudoir to another with impudent bravado and