The empress of ice cream

Louise

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I am almost breathless with the directness of it. I am used to malicious bon mots, cutting remarks, the smiling but barbed asides of Versailles, but the sheer shameless barbarity of Nell Gwynne’s attack is something else altogether. It is all I can do not to cry out as I watch.

And then they aU applaud her. Laughter I can forgive - anyone can laugh, and then regret it - but to applaud!

I pointedly keep my hands folded in my lap. Charles notices, and leans across. ‘They can seem a rough lot here at first,’ he says apologetically. ‘It is only their way of welcoming you.’

‘But why does she hate me so much?’

He gazes down at the stage, where Eleanor Gwynne is even now performing another dance, the audience’s applause beating out the rhythm. ‘She doesn’t hate you. It’s just Nelly’s way of having fim. Please don’t mind it, Louise. Nell does love her fun.’