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always enjoyed my time with her there.
    Meanwhile, a scandal was in the making. There had been rumors for some time that Lady Fleming had a lover. My governess’s rooms adjoined mine, and when the rumors reached my uncles, they asked me pointed questions.
    â€œHas your governess been receiving visits from a gentleman?” Uncle François asked.
    â€œBaron de Montmorency, the king’s constable, for example?” suggested Uncle Charles.
    â€œ
Non,
I have not seen the baron,” I replied, adding innocently, “but King Henri visits Lady Fleming quite often, to discuss my education.”
    The uncles looked at each other, smiled, and thanked me. I later learned that they had immediately carried my thoughtless remark straight to Diane de Poitiers. Even with her broken leg, the duchess rushed from Anet to Saint-Germain. That same night, after I finished my prayers and was preparing for bed, Sinclair discovered Madame de Poitiers sitting outside Lady Fleming’s door.
    â€œWho is she waiting for?” Sinclair wondered aloud, extinguishing all the candles but one. Soon Sinclair was snoring loudly, and I fell asleep quickly after her.
    We awoke sometime later at the sound of a door being slammed. We heard voices, first the startled exclamation of King Henri followed by Madame de Poitiers’s shrill cry. “Good sir, what were you doing in there?” the duchess demanded loud enough for everyone to hear. Sinclair tiptoed to our door and knelt at the keyhole so as not to miss a word.
    â€œYou and that woman, Lady Fleming! Sir, you have betrayed the entire Guise family; your wife, the queen; and your son the dauphin! And the dauphin’s future wife, Queen Marie, who is so unfortunate as to have that disgraceful woman as her governess! I have nothing more to say to you on the subject, good sir, for I love you as sincerely today as I always have.”
    There followed a stunned silence, and then the king’s mumbled reply.
    â€œThe king insists there was nothing evil going on,” Sinclair reported to me in a whisper.
    Diane de Poitiers’s voice rang out clearly “You have dishonored the innocent child sleeping behind that door!” she cried. I supposed that I was the innocent child to whom she referred. “The niece of the Guise family is being brought up by a woman who is nothing better than a whore!”
    Sinclair gasped. “Now that is going a bit too far,” she said, shaking her head.
    The duchess’s shouting and the king’s mumbling went on for a while longer, and then all became quiet again. “I wonder what Queen Catherine will have to say about this episode,” said my nurse, settling onto her pallet near my bed. “Seems that King Henri has
two
mistresses. I’ll wager the queen will get a bit of pleasure from learning that her rival has a rival of her own.”
    Sinclair was soon snoring peacefully again, but I lay awake thinking of my friend Marie Fleming. No doubt La Flamin would quickly be hearing about her mother’s transgressions. But then I, too, fell asleep. It would be some time before I learned the rest of the story.

Chapter 10
Maman's Arrival

    T HE MONTHS CREPT BY with unbearable slowness as I waited for my mother. In my impatience I exasperated the duchess and my governess and everyone else within hearing with my constant questions. When will the queen my mother leave Scotland? How long will the journey take? When do you think she will arrive? Will she come here immediately after she leaves the ship?
    Near the end of August Madame de Poitiers announced brightly, “You have not much longer to wait, Madame Marie. The king has dispatched six French galleys to Scotland to fetch the queen mother.”
    Have the king’s galleys arrived in Scotland? How long will they stay? When will they return?
    My brother François, duke of Longueville, would be sent to meet her, but I would not. I received this news with tears