CHAPTER XXXII
THE KING
KENSINGTON PALACE was an offence in those days to English eyes. The burning of Whitehall had furnished William with the opportunity to escape, not only from the air of London, which aggravated his asthma, but also from the crowd of sycophants who choked the galleries of the city palace. Long muddy roads and exorbitant charges for conveyance made it no easy matter for the spendthrift courtier and the needy adventurer to torment the king at Kensington. He was as well pleased at the escape as they were disgruntled; but even here they could pursue him with annoyances.
The malcontents in Parliament had stripped him of his beloved Dutch guards, and in their stead the Life Guards saluted at his threshold.
It was through a file of these gay gentlemen that Betty passed with Lady Russell, and they stared not a little at the lovely face of the young countess, though they received both with every token of respect and courtesy. Lady Russell was, indeed, a well-known and honored guest at the palace, and they were conducted by an officer of the household to the anteroom of the king’s presence chamber, there to await his pleasure.
The long room was already filled with visitors of almost every degree, come upon various errands, and Lady Clancarty found it no light thing to face the ill-disguised curiosity and admiration that assailed her on all sides.
Here was a peer, in the splendid dress of the court, glittering with jewels and gold lace, curled and perfumed and ruffled; here a plainly dressed shrewd fellow, with a bundle of papers, a clerk from the foreign office, for the king was his own minister of foreign affairs; there was a richly dressed magnate of the city, with an eye on the interests of the East India Company; there an eager applicant for office; and farther off, a despairing petitioner who glanced in open sympathy at Lady Clancarty.
A king’s anteroom! How many secret histories are written here; what comedy, what tragedy!