The Wolves of Andover Read Online Free PDF Page A

certain knowledge of decay comes true passion, he mused. It trumped the demands of youthful entitlement and inexperience in matters of sex every time.
    The abrupt sounds of laughter, a woman’s and a man’s, drifted from the bedchamber, and Bennet breathed a sigh of relief. It would not be long now, as he knew the king liked to laugh with his women, but only after the serious business of bedding had been exhausted.
    Chiffinch must have known from the muffled giggling that he would soon be escorting the Duchess of Portsmouth back to her quarters, because he straightened his drooping posture and wiped at his seeping eyes with one sleeve. The old man was over seventy and had been, as Keeper of the Privy Closet, one of the few men, apart from Bennet, who reported directly to the king. It always roused Bennet’s suspicions when he personally could not bully, persuade, or buy a man into revealing court confidences. Unfortunately, thanks to the king’s relentless licentiousness, William Chiffinch had already made a generous fortune taking bribes from every duchess, actress, or street moll who traipsed up the back stairs to the king’s bed.
    A gentle cough from inside the chamber alerted Chiffinch to the young woman’s approach and he swiftly opened the doors, allowing Louise de Keroualle to exit the royal bedroom. She floated out in a cloud of pale blue silk, disarrayed artfully off both shoulders, her plump baby face pleased and self-assured. He made a deep courtier’s bow, hiding a sudden amused smile. Nell Gwynn, another of the king’s favorites, was sometimes mistaken for Louise. He had only recently overheard Nell sharply rebuke a confused gallant by shrilling, “Pray, good sir, be civil. I am the
Protestant
whore.”
    Nodding to Chiffinch, Bennet walked into the chamber and bowed. The king was already seated at the desk nearest his bed, papers and scrolls in an untidy pyramid, his shoes and his wig still in the chair opposite.
    “Henry,” he called, motioning to the earl to stand closer. “I trust I haven’t kept you long?”
    Bennet looked about the room, studying the dozens of clocksall ticking in discordant rhythms as though seeing them for the first time, and said pleasantly, “Your Majesty knows my time is his own.”
    The king smiled, a cynical curling of the thick lips, and slumped back into his chair. “They’ve hurt us, Henry.” Bennet took note of the “us” and was instantly wary.
    “All our work,” Charles continued, “is to be undone because Parliament will play the penurious husband to my wifely supplications. I tell you, I am quite undone.”
    Bennet waited for the king to speak again, but the smile was gone, and he knew the silence was for him to offer up some advice, some scheme that would circumvent the barrier that was Parliament. He had been with the king all through the Parliamentary sessions earlier that month, and had watched him try to cajole and charm both Houses not only into giving him the funds to continue the Dutch war but to continue the Acts of Toleration, allowing his close and powerful Catholic ministers to stay in power. The ancient fearful remembrances of Catholics overrunning the seat of government with the brand and the sword during the reign of Bloody Mary were even greater than the recent memories of the black plague and the great fire that had destroyed most of London.
    But all of Charles’s seduction and prevarication had come to nothing. Both Houses were clamoring for the king to nullify Toleration and pass into law the public swearing of sole fidelity and adherence to the Church of England. In exchange for the king’s assurances, Parliament would release the purse strings. There was at present a very real and dangerous threat that Parliament would try to coerce, either through law or through blunt force, themonarch into compliance. It was the same impasse that had brought Charles’s father to civil war and the executioner’s ax.
    “Sire,” Bennet said