Madame Serpent by Jean Plaidy Page B

have been falling in love since I was your age, my child. And the result is that I do it easily and naturally. It is second nature to me.’
    It was making her almost happy to be on such merry terms with this
    enchanting man. She found herself laughing as she had never thought to laugh again.
    ‘Oh yes,’ went on the King, sincerely now, ‘we are going to be friends, my little Catherine. Now tell me. You have seen little of our country yet, but what do you like best about it?’
    She answered him immediately with a candid glance. ‘Its King, Sire.’
    He was delighted, for after all was it not delightful to be in the company of a charming little diplomat of― what was it?― fourteen? He was pleasantly
    surprised with his daughter-in-law. She was more French than Italian already, he was willing to swear.
    The King would have his little Catherine sit next to him at the banquet. Oh yes, he knew her place was beside her new husband, but Foy de gentilhomme , the boy should have her beside him for a lifetime. Would he grudge his father her company at her first French banquet? When the King talked, all stopped to hang on his words. They noticed his tenderness towards the little girl; she was his dearest little daughter Catherine― Caterina no longer, he declared. She was his Catherine, his little French Catherine; he had had her gracious permission to make the change.
    ‘The little Catherine has made a conquest of the King!’ Same said it; some thought it. Well, of course, it was not difficult for a young woman to please the King, but there had been some speculation about this one, for the King seemed to despise the boy they had brought her to marry.
    At the first of the three great tables, with the King, her new husband, the Princes her brothers-in-law and the Cardinals, sat Catherine― she was even thinking of herself as Catherine now. Caterina was the girl who had thought life would be drab and dreary forevermore because she had lost her lover; Catherine was not sure of that. She still loved her cousin; she still believed that she would love no other as long as she lived; but this charming King had made her realize that she could laugh again, that she could be happy, if only for a moment or two.
    She was glad that the Pope was not at this table; he held the place of honour next to the Queen at the second. It was exhilarating, she found, to be among these people who, until now, had been names in the lessons she had to learn concerning them. That Queen was the lady the King had been forced to marry after his humiliating defeat and imprisonment. No wonder he hardly looked at her. She had a sweet and kindly face, but she looked prim compared with some of the ladies. Catherine studied them now. They were at the third table, and among them the dashing and fascinating Mademoiselle d’Heilly, the King’s
    mistress, who remained his favourite whilst others went. Catherine could
    understand why. She was lovely, with her bright, fair, curly hair and her intelligent face; she was speaking now, and all those about her were laughing gaily.
    There was one other whom Catherine noticed at the ladies’ table. This was a tall and beautiful woman as dark as Mademoiselle d’Heilly was fair, and almost as lovely. She was noticeable because, in that array of sparkling colours and flashing jewels, she wore the black and white of mourning. How striking she looked! She was conspicuous among them all; she caught the eye by her very austerity.
    Catherine decided that she would take an early opportunity of learning the identity of the tall dark lady who wore black-and-white mourning.
    But of all the people around her there was one whom she must regard with
    the most interest and apprehension. Her husband! Her heart fluttered as she appraised him. She was astonished at her feelings. She had expected to view him with distaste and horror; but how could she feel those emotions for a shy boy only a month or so older than herself? She could see in him