Wild Island by Antonia Fraser Page A

Beauregard. And now her utmost quiet was pierced once more by the manifest presence of another human being on the island.
    Above the vase was a plaque, which read:
     
    In ever-loving and reverent and loyal memory of Charlotte Clementina Stuart, only legitimate daughter and heiress of King Charles III of Great Britain. Wife of Robert Beauregard of Kilbronnack. 1746-1764. '
     
    A rose was carved beneath the lettering, and beneath that the motto:
    floreat rosa alba.
    There was a second plaque below which read:
     
    In ever-loving and reverent and loyal memory of Charles Edward Beauregard 1916-1944 , lawful descendant and heir of the Royal House of Stuart. Placed here by his wife Leonie Fielding Ney Beauregard 1918-1958 . floreat rosa alba.'
     
    Looking closely, Jemima decided that Leonie Fielding Ney Beauregard's own dates had been added more recently.
    She went back to the first plaque and puzzled over it: 'Only legitimate daughter and heiress of King Charles III...' Working it out, Jemima realized that King Charles III must be another name for Bonnie Prince Charlie, in legitimist terms. She remembered reading somewhere that there would be a problem when our own Prince Charles of the House of Windsor ascended the throne as Charles m, since loyal Jacobites would consider Bonnie Prince Charlie to have enjoyed that title already.
    At least she was beginning to have a dim understanding of the nature of the Beauregard claim to the royal throne. Or rather the claim of the Red Rose on behalf of the Beauregards. They were descendants of some eighteenth-century royal ancestress. But -'Charlotte Clementina Stuart'-she felt sure she had never read about this particular character in the history books. Charlotte Clementina had apparently been born around the time of the rebellion of the ' 45 , just after it, no, wait, the battle of Culloden was fought in April 1746 , she remembered from her Northern Guide. Some time just before or after the collapse of Bonnie Prince Charlie's bold Highland effort, he was alleged to have produced this legitimate daughter... And heiress.
    It was the legitimacy which baffled her. Who was the mother of Charlotte Clementina ? Who was Bonnie Prince
    Charlie supposed to have married according to the history books, come to think of it? She would have to enquire.
    Then her eye fell on a further notice - not chipped elegantly in stone this time, but written in ink on a piece of white paper in large flowing black handwriting.
     
    'In ever-loving and reverent and loyal memory of Charles Edward Beauregard, rightful King of Scotland. 1 945 -1 975. Placed here by his sister Clementina Beauregard, floreat rosa alb a.'
    There was, as Lachlan had said, blood on the rose now: the Jacobite white rose of the first two memorials had turned to red. In case there was any doubt about it, scrawled at the bottom of the white paper was the single afterword: revenge!
    Jemima felt a certain sense of relief. The flowers had been placed here by that poor distressed girl, with her obsession about the death of her brother. She had, in a sense, every right to penetrate the Wild Island. She doubted if her utmost quiet would after all be much disturbed now the flowers and the pathetic paper memorial were in place.
    Jemima rose from her knees, dusted her beige trousers and left the grotto. She was determined now to visit the waterfall. Retracing her footsteps carefully from the point of the island, with wary glances at the chasms on either side - the grotto was built like a figurehead on the prow of the cliffs, it was a wonder it did not fall into the abyss-she returned as far as that mossy parting of the ways at which she had noted a left-hand path. The rise in the volume of the water noise encouraged her. She pushed her way through the greenery: here was a path it was difficult to believe had been recently trodden. As if in sympathy with her desire to find water, the rain began its soft descent once more. Nevertheless the sun still gamely