Bitter Greens

by Kate Forsyth

  I was Charlotte-Rose de Caumont de la Force. My grandfather had been the Marshal of France, my cousin was a duke, my mother second cousin to the King himself. If I must enter a nunnery – quite against my own wishes – it would be in my finest clothes, with my head held high and no traces of tears on my face.

  The postilion opened the carriage door. I descended as gracefully as I could in my high heels, though my feet were numb and my legs trembled after the long hours rattling over potholes. Nanette caught up my train to stop it dragging in the snow.

  The yard was deserted, a lantern hanging above a barred oaken door providing the only light. Above the door were carved rows of stern-faced saints sitting in judgement upon cringing devils and sinners, who pleaded for mercy below. In the wan and flickering light, the sinners’ stone limbs seemed to writhe and their faces grimace. Some had bat wings and goblin faces. One was a woman on her knees, hair flowing unbound down her back. Many had their noses smashed away, or their pleading hands broken. It looked as if the Huguenots had been here with their hammers and slingshots, seeking to destroy all signs of idolatry.

  The postilion rang a bell beside the doorway, then came back to heave my trunk off the roof of the coach. Then we stood waiting, the postilion, Nanette and I, shifting from foot to foot, rubbing our hands together, our breath hanging frostily in the air before us. Minutes dragged by. I felt a surge of anger and lifted my chin.

  ‘Well, we shall just have to return to Versailles and tell the King no one was home. What a shame.’

  As if in response to my words, I heard keys being turned and bolts being drawn. I fell silent, trying not to shiver. The door opened slowly, revealing a bent woman shrouded all in black. The glow of the lantern showed only a sunken mouth drawn down at the corners by deep grooves. The rest of her face was cast in shadow by her wimple. She beckoned with a bony hand and reluctantly I moved forward.

  ‘I am Mademoiselle de la Force. I come at the bidding of the King.’

  She nodded and gestured to me to follow. Gathering up the folds of my golden satin skirt, I swept forward. Nanette came after, carrying my train, while the postilion struggled with my trunk and portmanteau. The bony hand was flung up, in a clear gesture of refusal. The postilion halted, then shrugged, letting fall the end of the trunk.

  ‘Sorry, mademoiselle, I guess no men allowed.’

  I stopped, confounded. ‘Who, then, will carry my trunk?’

  The black-clad nun did not speak a word. After a moment, Nanette released my train and bent to take hold of the end of the trunk. The postilion saluted and ran back to his horses, standing with heads bowed in the dusk, snorting plumes of smoke like ancient dragons. Biting my lip, I draped my portmanteau over my arm and seized the other end. Thus burdened, we crossed the step into a dimly lit corridor, as cold as the yard outside. The nun slammed the door shut and bolted it, secured three heavy iron locks and returned the jangle of keys to her girdle. I saw a flash of a scornful eye and then the nun jerked her head, indicating I should follow her. As we walked, she rang a handbell, as if I was a leper or a plague-cart. Swallowing angry words, I followed her.

  I now understood what my guardian had meant by a heart of gall.

  DEVIL’S BARGAIN

  The Abbey of Gercy-en-Brie, France – January 1697

  The portress led the way down a corridor intersected by archways, which held up the curving vaults of the ceiling. Each of the pillars was crowned with intricate carvings of leaves and faces and animals, the paving stones below worn in the middle by centuries of shuffling feet.

  I followed close on her heels, propelled by anger and pride, while poor Nanette struggled to keep up behind me. When we came to a junction, with steps curving upwards on one side and an archway leading into another corridor on the other, the portress indicated that Nanette could remain here and leave the trunk at the base of the stairs. The old nun still did not speak, but her gestures were so peremptory that her meaning was clear.

  Gratefully, Nanette dropped her end of the trunk and rubbed her lower back. I put down my end but kept a tight hold of my portmanteau, for it held my strongbox with my few jewels and coins, and my quills and ink and parchment. The portress led me through the archway, leaving Nanette alone in the corridor, her poor old face knotted up like a purse.

  ‘Will she be all right? Will someone look after her?’ I asked. The portress did not reply. I smiled back at Nanette reassuringly and followed the nun past a door that stood half-open. Glancing in, I saw a kitchen with women in plain brown robes busy around the table and bench, the familiar sight of pots and pans and skillets and kettles looking strange and dwarfish under the high vaulted roof. The servants looked up as we passed, and the portress clanged her bell and drew the door shut with a snap. There were more doors standing open, one showing barrels of wine, the next a storeroom filled with sacks and crates, and jars of preserves.

  At the end of the corridor, the portress unlocked an iron-studded door with another key from the bunch at her waist. We passed through and she locked it again behind me. The sound of the lock clicking home caused my chest to tighten and my hands to clench. This place was indeed as bad as a prison. I wished I had not made my devil’s bargain with the King. Was it worth being locked up in this place of stone and old women, just so I could keep receiving my pension?

  But what else could I do? Flee to England, that miserable damp country where no one knew how to dress? How would I make my living? No one there would be interested in my novels, which were all about the scandalous secret lives of French nobles.

  Ringing her bell, the portress led me through an archway to a long walkway, open on one side to a square garden. I could see little more than a patch of lawn, brown and sodden with moisture, and what looked like a well in one corner with a pointed roof. Benches lined either side of the walkway, under beautiful graceful arches open to the wind. Snow whirled in and stung my face. I quickened my step.

  Across the garden, I saw a great hulk of a building, its lancet windows shimmering with candlelight. Faintly, I heard the sound of singing.

  ‘Is that the nuns?’ I asked, for the portress’s silence made me nervous.

  ‘What are they singing?’

  She did not respond.

  ‘It’s beautiful.’

  Still she did not respond, so I gave up and followed in silence. At last, she led me into a small room, where a fire burned on the grate. I went to it and held my gloved hands to it thankfully. Without a word, the portress went out and left me there alone, shutting the door behind her.

  Once again, I was kept waiting a long time and once again my temper was running hot, when the door opened and in came a group of nuns, their faces pale and sober within the black wimples. One carried a pewter bowl, another a steaming jug, the third a basket.

  ‘Welcome to the Abbey of Gercy-en-Brie, Mademoiselle de la Force,’ the one in the lead said. She was small and bent, with a sad face like a monkey’s. ‘I am the Reverend Mother Abbess. You may call me Mère Notre. This is the mistress of our novices, Sœur Emmanuelle; our bursar, Sœur Theresa; our refectorian, Sœur Berthe; and our infirmarian and apothecary, Sœur Seraphina.’

  At the sound of her name, each nun bowed her head. The first was a tall aristocratic-looking woman with hunched shoulders and a hard white face. The second looked weary and haggard. The third was round-faced, plump and smiling, with the fresh rosy skin of a countrywoman.

  The fourth, Sœur Seraphina, made the strongest impression on me. Once upon a time, she must have been a great beauty. Her face was a perfect oval, her nose slim and straight. Although her eyebrows and eyelashes were now sparse, their golden colour intensified the brilliance of her eyes, which were the colour of new honey. Her skin was like worn muslin, faintly spotted with age. She gazed at me with a troubled expression, taking in my luxurious gown, the lace fontanges on my head, fully a foot tall, and the heavy maquillage.

  ‘You have been ordered to take refuge at the Abbey of Gercy-en-Brie at the order of his m
ost Christian Majesty, the King. Are we to understand that you enter our cloister willingly?’ Mère Notre said.

  I did not know how to answer. No postulant had ever been more unwilling, but it was treason to defy the King. I could only hope that if I obeyed, he would soon relent and allow me back to the royal court. So I answered reluctantly, ‘Yes, Mère Notre.’

  ‘But are the de la Force family not … Huguenots?’ Sœur Emmanuelle’s nostrils flared.

  ‘Not any more.’ I did my best to repress my anger and shame, but it sounded in my voice nonetheless.

  ‘You abjured?’ she asked.

  I shrugged one shoulder. ‘Naturally.’

  Yet the question raised many a rattling skeleton. My grandfather had only survived the dreadful St Bartholomew’s Day massacre of the Huguenots because, when brutally stabbed, he had fallen to the ground and pretended to be dead. His father and his brother had not been so lucky; they were both stabbed till all life was gone. My grandfather had been a proud and fervent Huguenot all his life, as had all my family – at least until the King had later revoked the Edict of Nantes and made it illegal to worship according to your conscience.

  After the revocation, many Huguenots had fled France rather than convert to Catholicism. My uncle, Jacques-Nompar, the fourth Duc de la Force, had refused to either flee or convert. He had been thrown into the Bastille, his daughters locked up in convents, his son given a Catholic education. Eventually, my uncle had died, and his son, my cousin Henri-Jacques, had abjured and sworn obedience to His Most Catholic Majesty, and so had been permitted to become the fifth Duc de la Force.

  I too had abjured. What else was I meant to do? Follow other Huguenots into penury and exile? Allow myself to be burnt at the stake, like so many of my fellow réformés? The King had offered me a pension of a thousand silver louis to convert. I thought a thousand silver louis a year worth a mass or two. And it’s not as if I was the only one. Twenty-four thousand of us had abjured our faith.

  ‘You must come to this abbey with a willing heart, ma fille,’ Mère Notre said. ‘Is it your desire to submit to our Rule?’

  ‘Yes, Mère Notre,’ I said through stiff lips.

  She looked doubtful. ‘You do understand what is required of you, mademoiselle? Perhaps, Sœur Emmanuelle, you will instruct our postulant?’

  The novice mistress fixed me with her scornful dark eyes. ‘You must swear to abide by the Rule of this house, to be obedient and faithful and seek humility in all things. The first grade of humility is to keep the face of God always before you. Remember that He is always watching.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I replied.

  ‘The second grade of humility is to love not your own will or satisfy your own desires but only to carry out the will of God.’

  Not wanting to repeat myself like an idiot child, I bowed my head.

  She went on without pause. ‘The third grade of humility is to submit to your superiors in all things … the fourth is to patiently bear all hard and contrary things … to hide no evil thoughts but confess all … to be content with the meanest and worst of everything …’

  By this sixth grade of humility, I was no longer nodding my head or murmuring acquiescence but staring at her in dismay. Sœur Emmanuelle went on inexorably. ‘You must not just call yourself lower and viler than all but really believe it.’

  ‘Surely you jest,’ I exclaimed, though of course I knew she was all too serious.

  Do nothing that was not authorised. Do not speak unless spoken to. Do not laugh. Do not raise your voice. Do not lift your eyes from the ground. Remember every hour that you are guilty of your sins.

  ‘Well, that I can gladly do,’ I said in a tone of less than subtle insinuation.

  A little flutter went around the circle of nuns, and Sœur Berthe blushed.

  ‘We must be honest with you, Mademoiselle de la Force,’ Mère Notre said. ‘It is against our practice to take court ladies into our house. It is rare that they have a true vocation, and they unsettle our sisters and disrupt the life of the cloister. However, we appealed to His Majesty the King for help, as we had suffered greatly during the recent upheavals. His response was to send you.’

  ‘A gift from God,’ I replied, folding my hands and turning my eyes up to heaven. From the corner of my eye, I saw Sœur Seraphina shake her head in warning.

  Mère Notre’s wrinkled face was troubled. ‘I fear His Majesty may have made a mistake. Although it is true we are in need of your dowry, I cannot in good conscience accept a postulant …’

  ‘Mère Notre.’ Sœur Theresa wrung her hands together. ‘The roof! The altar plate!’

  Mère Notre hesitated. I felt a sudden clutch of anxiety. What would happen to me if I was turned away from the abbey door? Nothing made the King more furious than having his will thwarted.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mère Notre, I didn’t mean to be flippant. I have spent too long at the court of the Sun King, where the quick and empty answer is always valued over more measured and thoughtful responses. I beg you to give me time to learn your ways.’

  She bent her veiled head. ‘Very well. You come among us as a postulant. There is no need yet to swear eternal vows. If you find your call to God is mistaken, you may always return to the world you have left behind.’

  I bowed my head, wondering to myself how best to frame a letter to the King so that he would relent and allow me to return. Begging letters were all too common at the court.

  ‘St Benedict himself said not to grant any newcomer easy entry but to test their spirit to see if they are from God. So we shall give you time to adjust to life here at the abbey, though I think it best if your instruction as a novitiate begins at once. The sooner you leave your old life behind you, the better.’ Mère Notre blessed me and then went slowly from the room. She was so small and bent she looked rather like a hunchbacked child.

  As soon as the door had thudded shut behind her, the other nuns closed around me. ‘Now,’ Sœur Emmanuelle said in a voice of deep satisfaction, ‘it is time for the shedding of all temporal goods. Let us start with the dowry.’

  ‘Four thousand livres,’ Sœur Theresa said, ‘plus two hundred livres per year for board, three hundred livres for clothing, and ninety livres for food.’

  ‘But that’s outrageous. I paid less for my room at the palace.’

  ‘Once you have taken your vows, you shall be with us for all of your natural life,’ Sœur Emmanuelle replied.

  I set my teeth. ‘What if I should change my mind and decide not to take my vows?’

  ‘The dowry need not be paid until the day you take your vows,’ Sœur Theresa said, ‘and, in any case, His Majesty the King has offered to cover that expense for you.’

  Relief filled me. Imagine going into debt to pay for a cell in this cold draughty place.

  ‘However, we shall need you to pay us your board and lodging costs now.’ Sœur Theresa held out one hand.

  Biting my lip, I dug in my portmanteau for my purse and handed over almost six hundred livres, nearly two-thirds of my entire year’s pension.

  ‘Now, you must give up all your clothes, right down to the last stitch. You have no need of such wanton luxury here,’ Sœur Emmanuelle said.

  I stared at her. ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘You may not keep even a pin. Strip it all off and pass it to me. We have brought you a postulant’s robe.’ She indicated a small pile of rough homespun clothes that the refectorian, Sœur Berthe, had laid on the side table.

  ‘I shall not. Do you have any idea how much this dress cost?’

  ‘It’ll fetch a pretty penny,’ Sœur Theresa agreed. ‘Maybe even enough to have the church roof repaired.’

  ‘That’s stealing. You can’t sell my clothes.’

  ‘Oh, we’ll only sell them once you’ve taken your vows. They’ll belong to the abbey then.’

  ‘They’ll be long out of fashion by then.’

  ‘Not in Varennes,’ she answered. ‘Really, I wish Mère Notre was not so particular a
bout the waiting period. If you were to take your vows straightaway, we’d be able to claim your dowry from His Majesty the King and sell all your clothes and jewels, and get that roof fixed. Then we wouldn’t have to celebrate the midnight office with snow swirling down on our heads.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said as calmly as I could. ‘I’m afraid I cannot permit you to pawn my belongings for your repairs. I am here at the request of His Majesty the King, but I am sure it will not be long before I am missed at court and called back. So, you see, I shall have need of my jewels and my clothes.’

  Sœur Emmanuelle snorted. ‘I’ve never heard it said that His Majesty the King was prone to changing his mind.’

  ‘Are you so well acquainted with the King that you know his habits? Have you spent much time at court? If so, I am surprised not to know you. I have been at court since I was a girl.’ I smiled at her sweetly.

  ‘It is not something to boast about. Obviously, you are as frivolous and pleasure-loving as the rest of those fools at court, if you prefer to hoard what little you have of worth against an uncertain future instead of dedicating it to the glory of God. You’ll learn soon enough. Now, remove your garments else we shall strip you ourselves.’

  I set my jaw and stared around at the circle of black-cloaked women. They closed in on me, Sœur Berthe seizing my shoulders. I tried to wrench myself away, but she was too strong.

  ‘Have a care for the dress,’ Sœur Theresa cried anxiously.

  ‘Bon grè, mal grè,’ Sœur Seraphina whispered in my ear, a gentle hand on my arm.

  I knew she was right. It made little difference whether I submitted with good grace or ill grace. Either way, I would be forced to strip, and surely to do so gracefully would be a lot more dignified.