Mary, Queen of France: The Story of the Youngest Sister of Henry VIII

She slid to her knees and embraced his legs, alas looking sadly repulsive crouching there. He wished she would rise; he was hating himself because he knew that Georges d’Amboise was already preparing a plan to dissolve their marriage; and that she could not long be kept in ignorance of this. Her grief would be the greater because he had tried to soothe her with false words.

Louise of Savoy set out for Paris to see the new King. Jeanne de Polignac warned her to be careful, but Louise was full of purpose.

“Forget not,” she said, “that my position is different from what it was before the death of Charles. Am I not the mother of the heir presumptive?”

“All the more reason why you should act with care,” replied the practical Jeanne.

Louise laughed. “Do you think I ever forget that I am his mother and that he needs me! Set your fears at rest, Jeanne. I am going to have him acknowledged; and the best way in which I can do this is to get him the title which is his due and which will proclaim to all that the King regards him as the heir to the throne. Why, the title falls vacant, does it not, now that Louis has given it up to take that of King? Francois is going to be Duc d’Orleans—that royal title belongs to him now.”

“All I say is, Louise, take care.”

“And you, my dear, take care of the children while I am away.” She embraced her friend. “How I rely on you, Jeanne! I’d never leave him in anyone else’s hands.”

When Francois and Marguerite came to say farewell to their mother, she embraced the girl tenderly but clung to the boy as though she had almost made up her mind not to leave him.

“My precious will do what Jeanne and Marguerite tell him while I’m away?”

“Yes, dearest Maman, Precious will,” answered the boy.

“That’s my little love.” She looked appealingly up at Jeanne and Marguerite, and although she did not speak, her eyes told them that she was placing in their hands her greatest treasure.

Francois stood at the gates of the castle, Jeanne on one side of him, Marguerite on the other; Jeanne the younger, with Madeleine and Souveraine, stood behind him and a short distance from this little group were some of their attendants.

Louise turned to look back again. “I shall soon be with you. Take care while I’m away.”

They watched her until she and her band of attendants were out of sight.

“I should like to go to Paris,” Francois announced.

“You will one day,” Marguerite told him.

When he rode to Paris it would be in a purple robe and he would have a standard on which were the golden lilies. His mother had told him this, and the picture was clear in his mind. But it was not yet; and in the meantime he had to amuse himself.

Marguerite took his hand and they went to the nurseries where Madeleine and Souveraine were playing with their dolls.

They stood watching Madeleine who was dressing one of the dolls and talking to it as though it were a baby.

“Come along, Marguerite,” said Souveraine, “here is the little Papillon. See how dirty she has made her dress! Change it and scold her, will you? Tell her she will be in trouble if she cannot keep her dresses cleaner than that.”

Marguerite stared at the doll which was being thrust at her and said stonily: “How could that be blamed for making the dress dirty? It was Madeleine who did it.”

Souveraine looked as though she was about to cry. “Why will you never play our games, Marguerite?” she demanded. “I believe you laugh at us. And we’re older than you, remember?”

“You are too old to play with dolls,” said six-year-old Marguerite, “and so am I.”

Francois looked on with interest. He would have liked to join the game, only instead of being mother to the dolls, he would have been their King and they would have been his subjects.

“How silly!” said Madeleine. “Maman said that I was a little mother.”

(Both Madeleine and Souveraine called Jeanne Maman.)

“I would be a little mother,” said Marguerite, “if I had a real baby. But I would not play with dolls.”

She took Francois firmly by the hand and led him away. “I will read to you,” she said.

Francois allowed himself to be taken down to the gardens, and, when they were seated under a tree, Marguerite opened the book and began to read, but she had not read more than a few sentences when Francois laid his plump hand on the page and said: “Marguerite, I want you to be a little mother, and I want to be a little father.”

Marguerite shut the book and looked at him. “You want to play with Madeleine and Souveraine?” she asked reproachfully.

“No,” he answered vehemently. “They play with dolls. I want us to have a real baby.”

Marguerite was thoughtful. He looked so earnest and so certain that she could provide him with what he wanted that her great desire was to keep his high opinion of her.

She stood up and he was beside her, putting his hand into hers.

An idea had come to Marguerite. She began to walk resolutely away from the chateau grimly holding Francois’s hand. They were forbidden to leave the gardens but this was in a special cause; and she had only to walk to the cottage just beyond the castle gates.

Francois, trotting beside her, kept laughing to himself in an endearing way he had which meant that he was excited and happy. He knew he could always rely on Marguerite to make life both amusing and adventurous.