However, the bright, buoyant, loving way in which Isabel sought to gain her rightful place in Ferdinand’s affections would have succeeded in any Court less corrupt than that of Madrid. But the stream of a sweet, pure influence was checked by the stagnating effect of flattery and lies, and the King shut himself out of the joys of a happy home life by the barricades of self-interested friendship, and he strove to satisfy his young wife by showering such public marks of favour upon her as having the Buen Retiro made into a perfect garden of Paradise for her use. But, even as the beautiful Queen trod the lovely glades and gazed at the gorgeous flowers, she sighed for more frequent signs of her husband’s love and confidence, which would have filled her heart with a joy unobtainable by any outward pomp and prettiness.
Alagon and Chamorro indeed formed an insurmountable barrier between the royal couple, and all Isabel’s efforts seemed powerless to break it down.
The King’s charming compliments to his wife sometimes soothed her chafed spirits, and consoled her with the hope that, if not supreme in his confidence, she had at least no rival in his heart. But this consolation was not long left her, for the day came when she found that the man who had been treacherous to his father and his mother, his family, and his friends, was also false to his wife.
The Queen was sitting one evening in the royal palace. If her pretty forehead puckered sometimes in thought, it was probably because she was planning some fresh fantastic surprise for the husband who was enthroned in her heart, or perhaps she was forming some plan for an exhibition in the Art Institution she had founded, when her brother-in-law, Don Carlos, came into the room and informed her that the King had gone out into the city in his mysterious way with his confidants Alagon and Chamorro, and expeditions conducted in this secret form signified to the Prince an affaire de cœur. Isabel at first declined to believe the Infante’s statement, as Ferdinand had told her that he was only going on business to the Mayordomo’s office. So the Prince accompanied his sister-in-law to the office in question, and when the King was not to be found there, and his companions also proved to be missing, the Queen determined to wait for her husband in a room near the door by which he would re-enter the palace. The hours of waiting were long, and when Ferdinand finally returned it was to find the gentle Queen too overwrought to be able to restrain her rage.
“You have deceived me!” she cried. “You come from the house of your dear one! I congratulate you!”
The King replied in terms which showed how great was his anger with the tale-bearer, and the dialogue between the royal brothers might have led to fatal results had not Doña Francisca intervened; and, as the influence which the Princess exerted over her brother-in-law was always of great weight, the painful scene ended with the wound to poor Isabel’s heart which never was healed.
Deceived in her husband, the young Queen devoted herself assiduously to her baby daughter, and was never so happy as when she was doing everything herself for it; and when the little Infanta succumbed to an illness, Isabel’s grief was intense, and the King also was much affected at the death of his baby daughter.
It was about this time that the serious discontent in the realm led to a plot which was to compass the assassination of the King. Don Vicente Richard was the chief conspirator, and as each participator in the plot knew of only two others concerned in it, and the triangular sections were all quite separate from each other, the names were never disclosed. When it was time to put the match to the train, some thought that it would be well to surprise the King in the house of a certain beautiful Andalusian lady called Pepa, so that the whole country should know that the perfidy of the King extended to his domestic life as well as to matters of public concern.
But Richard’s two co-operators betrayed the plot to the palace, and although the conspirators met the fate which such actions invite, and the King spared neither time nor money in trying to find out their co-operators, no further information was discoverable.
The Freemasons were at this time a great object of persecution on the part of the Inquisition. In a curious old book called “Narration of Don Juan Van Halem, Field-Marshal of the National Troops,” we have an account of a secret audience he had with Ferdinand for the purpose of making certain revelations to His Majesty on the subject.