Plaidy, Jean - Royal Sisters: The Story of the Daughters of James II

“What nonsense is this?”

“It is no nonsense. I heard only the other day the distressing story of the Hill family. I was interested … and so was my informant … because of their connection with the high and mighty Lady Marlborough! Your uncle, aunt, and cousins … dying of starvation! Two girls working as servants, I hear, two boys running about the streets, ragged and hungry.”

“A pitiable story and one which does credit to your imagination, Lady Fitzharding.”

“A pitiable story, Lady Marlborough, but it owes nothing to my imagination. Go and see for yourself. And let me tell you this, that I shall not feel it my duty to keep silent about this most shameful matter.”

Sarah for once was speechless, and when Lady Fitzharding flounced out of the room she stared after her, murmuring: “Hill! Hill!” The name was familiar. Her grandfather Sir John Jennings, she had heard her own father say, had had twenty-two children and one of these, Mary, had married a Francis Hill who was a merchant of London.

Sarah had heard nothing of him since. One did not need to keep in touch with one’s merchant connections—except of course when they were likely to bring disrepute.

Sarah made one of her prompt decisions.

Something must be done about the Hills.

Read all of Jean Plaidy’s

Novels of the Stuarts

in historical order:

1. The Royal Road to Fotheringhay

The Story of Mary Queen of Scots

$15.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-609-81023-1

2. The Captive Queen of Scots

The Story of Queen Mary

$14.95 PAPERBACK

978-1-4000-8251-3

3. The Murder in the Tower

The Story of Frances,

Countess of Essex

$14.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-34621-6

4. The Loves of Charles II

The Stuart Saga

$16.00 PAPERBACK

978-1-4000-8248-3

previously published as

three separate volumes:

The Wandering Prince

Health Unto His Majesty

Here Lies Our Sovereign Lord

5. The Three Crowns

The Story of William and Mary

$14.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-34624-7

6. Royal Sisters

The Story of the

Daughters of James II

$15.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-71952-2

previously published

as The Haunted Sisters

7. Courting Her Highness

The Story of Queen Anne

$16.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-71951-5

previously published as

The Queen’s Favourites

COMING SUMMER 2011!

Available wherever books are sold

Read all of Jean Plaidy’s

Novels of the Tudors

in historical order:

1. To Hold the Crown

The Story of King Henry VII

and Elizabeth of York

$14.95 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-34619-3

2. Katharine of Aragon

The Story of a Spanish Princess and an English Queen

$16.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-609-81025-5

3. Murder Most Royal

The Story of Anne Boleyn

and Catherine Howard

$14.95 PAPERBACK

978-1-4000-8249-0

4 The King’s Confidante

The Story of the Daughter of Sir Thomas More

$13.95 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-34620-9

previously published as

St. Thomas’s Eve

5. The Sixth Wife

The Story of Katherine Parr

$13.95 PAPERBACK

978-0-609-81026-2

6. The Thistle and the Rose

The Story of Margaret, Princess

of England, Queen of Scotland

$13.95 PAPERBACK

978-0-609-81022-4

7. Mary, Queen of France

The Story of the Youngest Sister of Henry VIII

$12.95 PAPERBACK

978-0-609-81021-7

8. For a Queen’s Love

The Story of the Royal Wives

of Philip II

$14.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-34622-3

previously published as

The Spanish Bridegroom

9. A Favorite of the Queen

The Story of Lord Robert Dudley and Elizabeth I

$14.00 PAPERBACK

978-0-307-34623-0

previously published as

Gay Lord Robert

Available wherever books are sold

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

A Husband for Anne

Mrs. Morley and Mrs. Freeman

The King is Dead

Long Live the King

The Princess Bereaved

The Warming-Pan Scandal

The Flight of the Princess

The Uneasy Coronation

A Dish of Green Peas

At the Playhouse

The Arrival of Mrs. Pack and Departure of William

Beachy Head and the Boyne

Marlborough’s Defeat

The Flowerpot Plot

His Highness’s Soldiers and Stays

The End of a Life

To Be Delivered After Death

The Twickenham Interlude

Garter and Governor for Gloucester

The Great Tragedy

The Little Gentleman in Black Velvet

Bibliography

Excerpt from Courting Her Highness