“Why to the widow Scarron? Why not Madame de Montespan?” Émilie preferred to trust the king’s official mistress, who had helped her get away, and who must have sent François to warn her husband that they were trying to bring her back.
“Because the widow Scarron is your enemy. If she has the brooch and cannot trace where it came from, she will be unable to pin it—so to speak—on you.” Sophie smiled and took a gulp of cocoa.
“I see your point. But I am afraid of her. I think she is capable of anything.”
Sophie stood and walked slowly around the room, talking aloud but to herself. “If we send it to Madame de Montespan, what happens? Does she know that the king gave it to you? Or will she think it is a gift from a distant admirer? She may keep it, or it may never reach her. Or if it is discovered in her possession, they may think you somehow gave it to her for helping you escape. That would make her cross, to be incriminated by you, and would not do us any good.”
Émilie marveled at Sophie. These subtleties would never have occurred to her. “I don’t know. Truly.”
“And, Madame Charpentier, what makes you so certain that the marquise is your friend? She is not known for taking kindly to potential rivals for the king’s affection, even-or perhaps I should say especially—those who are only acting as instruments of the widow Scarron.”
She had to admit, Sophie had a point. Émilie realized that she could not say for certain exactly what either Madame de Maintenon or Madame de Montespan felt about her or how they would respond about the brooch, and about her continued existence. She wondered if they already knew. If all Sophie said about their spies and their ability to plot and scheme was true, it seemed likely. “So what do you suggest?”
“Just leave it to me.”
With that, their discussion ended. It was a relief to Émilie, in a way, to turn over the brooch and all it represented to Sophie, just as she had trusted the maid to help her prepare for her first performance.
Hour by hour, Émilie felt better. Her cheeks were a little pink again, and she could walk around the apartment with little pain. She had no doubt that being in the country, away from all these intrigues and uncertainties, would be good for her, although she wished that Marc-Antoine could stay with her. It would be worth it, though, in the end. One day, they would be together and she would sing his music again. She was certain of that, more certain than she had ever been of anything.
“I must go see about getting this precious item delivered into the right hands, and so I shall leave you for the present. I’ll be back before night.” Sophie stood and drained her dish of cocoa.
“Sophie,” said Émilie, looking up. “Thank you.”
Sophie waved her hand at Émilie dismissively, took her cloak off the peg by the door, and left the apartment.
I can’t believe I’m doing this, thought Sophie, as she went in search of someone to help her get the brooch to Versailles by the next day. Was it only that morning that she had thought of selling it? Of claiming its value as compensation for all that she had suffered since the day Mademoiselle’s slippers were discovered missing? It wasn’t at all like her, she thought, to change her mind like that. Perhaps it was all because of St. Paul. She had never liked him; no one did. In the instant that he accosted her, she could see a life of deception and treachery stretch out before her. It was not what she wanted. Mischief, flirtation—that was harmless and fun. The life that St. Paul led put others at risk. Sophie was afraid she would lose her ability to sleep soundly at night, and she did enjoy her sleep.
Besides, she had seen quite enough of the base side of human nature. Something refreshed her about Émilie’s protected naïveté. It was easier, in fact, to believe that the matter of the slippers had all been an unfortunate accident than to harbor a grudge that had grown stale over the period of a year. Sophie preferred to be in service, especially with someone whom she could dominate so easily.
As to the problem at hand: she decided to stick with her first instinct and send the brooch to Madame de Maintenon. Her own past experience with Madame de Montespan’s vindictiveness did not give her confidence that the marquise would ally herself too closely with Émilie’s cause. Something told her that the brooch would end up in the widow Scarron’s hands anyway, and so the preemptive gesture seemed the safest at the moment. In no other circumstance, she thought, could she possibly derive some benefit from her intimate acquaintance with the Parisian demimonde. If she had remained a lady’s maid at the Hôtel de Guise, she would never have known how to find a person to undertake the task ahead, someone who was willing (for about half of her savings—now that she had a job, she didn’t need them immediately, and something told her that Charpentier would willingly reimburse her if her efforts were successful) to see that the parcel was transported to Versailles and given into Madame de Maintenon’s hands by the next morning. It was a tricky business. If she gave any hint as to the value of the contents of the box, she knew it would simply disappear. She decided to pretend that it was a paste copy of a brooch. The courier she had in mind would not be able to tell that it wasn’t.
On her way back to the rue des Écouffes, the brooch safely on its way to Versailles, Sophie heard a carriage draw up next to her. She continued walking, pretending not to notice.
“Mademoiselle Sophie, a word.”
St. Paul. Again. Best to play along for the moment, she thought. “Ah, Monsieur! Forgive me, I was somewhere else entirely.”
“Will you join me in my carriage?”
“The day is so fine, and I am enjoying my walk. Perhaps you would join me?” Sophie did not want to find herself enclosed in a moving vehicle with St. Paul.
“I think I would prefer to talk to you in private,” he said.
Before Sophie took another step, the coachman leapt from the box and lifted her off her feet, then threw her inside the coach, where she hit her head on the floor. By the time she recovered from being stunned, the coach was moving along at a sprightly clip.
“Forgive me, Mademoiselle. Our business was too sensitive for the open air.” St. Paul held out his hand and helped Sophie onto the seat next to him in the carriage.
Sophie rubbed her head.
“Now, about the precious object we spoke of this morning …”
“Ah yes, Monsieur le Comte. I’m afraid it is nowhere to be found. Mademoiselle Émilie possesses no jewelry that I could discover.”
“Then she has hidden it, or sold it. Or …” St. Paul looked Sophie up and down. “Tell me, Mademoiselle Sophie. What could possibly be worth more than twenty-five louis to you?”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean!” Sophie drew herself up and did her best to look prim and proper.
“Perhaps you have hidden this object on your person?”
“No, Monsieur, I have not.”
“Prove it.” St. Paul pulled his velvet coat back just far enough to reveal the gilt handle of his dueling pistol.
Sophie looked at the fields flying past. They were going too fast for her to jump out of the carriage. As to staying where she was and continuing to bluff her way out—well, there was a chance it would work, and it did seem unlikely that St. Paul would take such a drastic step as to shoot her. On the other hand, she knew how desperate his circumstances were. “And just how would you like me to prove that I do not have this item?”
St. Paul took the pistol out of his sash and cocked it. Then he reached over to Sophie’s bodice and pulled one of the laces that held her dress together. “You can do the rest. It’s rather difficult with one hand.”
With a sigh Sophie continued to untie her bodice. Before long she was completely naked except for her shoes, and her clothes were in a heap on the floor.
“Yes, I see that you do not have it. It does not matter. I shall take care of Charpentier this evening, and you, I believe, will be in no position to cause me any trouble.” St. Paul rapped on the ceiling of the coach with his walking stick. The coachman pulled up the horses in front of an inn a few miles
outside of Paris. “Get out.”
“Monsieur le Comte!” Sophie was genuinely horrified that she was expected to descend from the coach in the middle of nowhere without a stitch of clothing on.
“I said, get out.”
The burly coachman appeared at the door of the carriage with an enormous grin on his face.
St. Paul opened the door and the coachman dragged Sophie out. While she tried to figure out which parts of her body to hide with her hands, the coach took off, raising a cloud of dust that made her cough.
Within moments a small crowd poured out of the inn.
“Mademoiselle, this way,” said the innkeeper’s wife, who was just as glad to get the pretty woman out of her husband’s sight.
Sophie sat by the fire, wrapped in a blanket, drinking a beaker of wine, and trying to explain how she happened to have been tossed naked out of a nobleman’s coach.
“I must return to Paris, immediately!” she said after she finished her explanation.
“Paris is only five miles down the road. If you walk, you might reach the city gates by nightfall.” The innkeeper stroked his beard.
“She cannot walk! It’s too dangerous. Do you ride, Mademoiselle?” The woman cast a scornful look at her husband.
“All the horses are needed here.” He glared at his wife.
We’re wasting time, thought Sophie. “It’s all right. I shall walk. Perhaps you could lend me some clothes, and a knife, so I may protect myself.”
“I don’t like it. A lady is not safe on the roads these days.”
Sophie’s eyes lit up. “A lady is not, but a man-” She turned to the innkeeper. “Perhaps you have some old clothes I can borrow?”
It was dark, and Sophie had not returned. Lucille was gone for the day, Marc-Antoine had to stay late because of the soirée, and Émilie found herself entirely alone. She had spent a lot of time by herself before, but knowing, now, that St. Paul was determined to take her back to Versailles and that he had been seen just outside the house that morning, she was frightened.
Émilie picked up her embroidery and tried to focus on the delicate work, but she kept making mistakes. After a while she put it away and walked around the apartment, searching for something to take her mind off her fear. On the mantelpiece was the notebook of songs that Marc-Antoine had given her. She took it down, sat by the fire, and started to learn them, one by one. She hummed the tunes very quietly to herself. When she felt she had each one, she closed her eyes, and repeated the words over and over. There were about forty airs in this one notebook. Learning them all would keep her busy for a long time.
Twenty-nine
Nothing is more rare than true goodness.
Maxim 481
Marcel was in a fiacre outside the Hôtel de Guise waiting for his sonin law to finish directing the music at the princess’s soirée. The plan was to hasten to the rue des Écouffes at the end of the evening and pick up Émilie and Sophie. From there, they would flee to the country. He wished he could return to the Quai des Mégissiers and tell his wife what was going on, but he agreed with Charpentier that he had better not risk it. And so here he was, waiting.
The luthier reached into his pocket and pulled out a scrap of velvet ribbon. He had carried it everywhere with him since the day Émilie left them, about a year and a half ago. He threaded it through his fingers like a rosary. More than anything, he just wanted to see his daughter, to know she was safe.
While he waited for the moment when they could leave and fetch Émilie, Marcel watched a stream of elegant coaches approach the Hôtel de Guise and discharge their glittering cargoes. The tinkling sound of laughter reached him, and when the great doors opened, the roar of many people talking interspersed with snatches of music spilled out into the Paris night. He was a patient man—it took patience to make violins and lutes—but he thought he might go crazy just sitting there, doing nothing.
The arrivals gradually slowed and became intermittent, and the rue du Chaume was now choked with coaches. The sounds of revelry were replaced with those of harnesses squeaking, horses whinnying and snorting occasionally, and once in a while conversations between coachmen and postilions, who passed the time as best they could before being summoned to take the weary partygoers home at the end of the evening. If he and his son-in-law had to get away quickly in this mess, it would be almost impossible. Marcel leaned back and closed his eyes.
All at once, he heard voices just outside the carriage. “Wait here. I’ll go and pull the rug out from under Monsieur Charpentier, and then return. Be ready for me.”
“What about the police?”
“That’s all taken care of.”
Marcel sat up, suddenly completely alert. He recognized the voice of St. Paul and knew they must be talking about his son-in-law. Once he heard their footsteps pass by the fiacre and fade away, he slowly opened the door of the coach and crept out. The driver had nodded off on the box and did not notice that his passenger alighted. Trying to make as little sound as possible, Marcel walked toward the great iron gates that led into the main courtyard. He approached one of the liveried footmen who stood at attention at the front gate.
“Big crowd?” he said.
“Oh, nothing more than usual,” answered the footman, looking Marcel up and down.
“It’s boring, waiting for my master to come out again. He just arrived, though, so I expect I’ll be here a long time.”
“You mean le Comte de St. Paul? He just came in, yes, but he usually doesn’t stay so long.”
“No, no, I don’t work for Monsieur le Comte. I’m coachman to Monsieur de Brouilly.”
The footman looked at Marcel skeptically. Before the man had a chance to ask why he wasn’t wearing Monsieur de Brouilly’s livery, Marcel walked away from him, back to the fiacre. His fears had been confirmed. He must warn Charpentier. Must get a message to him. How he wished he knew how to write!
Just as Marcel was about to climb back into the waiting coach, he saw a small figure pressed against the stone wall slip around the corner into the rue des Quatre Fils. There was something odd and furtive about this. Perhaps it was a thief, come to try his luck with all the bejeweled folks who attended Mademoiselle de Guise’s party. Marcel flattened himself against the same wall and inched his way to the corner. When he got there, he stepped out quickly. The young lad was too surprised to run, and Marcel grabbed his arm.
“Ow! Let me go!”
It wasn’t a boy’s voice, it was a woman’s. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”
“That’s no business of yours. Let go of me! I’m here on a matter of life and death. I have an important message for Monsieur Char—” Sophie checked herself.
“For whom? For Monsieur Charpentier?” Marcel took a closer look at his captive. The woman was very pretty, and young. “I too need to get a message to that man. You’d better tell me what you’re up to.” Marcel dragged Sophie to the fiacre.
“Oh no!” she said, pulling away as hard as she could.
“I’m not going to hurt you. Please, don’t make a scene. It’s dangerous.”
Sophie climbed into the coach. “Oh my God, it’s good to sit down,” she said, leaning back, “I’ve been walking for miles.”
“Let me ask you again,” said Marcel, “who are you, and what do you want with Monsieur Charpentier?”
“No, first, tell me who you are. Then I’ll speak.”
The two of them sat in silence for a minute or two.
“Very well, I am Marcel Jolicoeur, Monsieur Charpentier’s fatherin law.”
“Émilie’s father! Thank God.”
“You know Émilie? Have you seen her?” Marcel almost shouted, he was so excited.
“Sssshh! St. Paul is here. I saw his coach. We must get Charpentier away as quickly as possible. I think the count means to kill him.”
“What makes you believe so? What can we do? How can we get inside?”
“I saw his pistol. It’s a long story. Perhaps it won’t be necessary to go
in. Do you have paper or quills?”
“I have no need of such things, since I cannot read or write.”
“Damn!” said Sophie. “I can’t get in easily. They know me.” She drummed her fingers on her knee while she thought. “Wait here.”
Before Marcel could ask what she was going to do, Sophie let herself out of the coach and ran around the corner. He realized that he still had absolutely no idea what this young woman was doing there, why she was wearing ill-fitting men’s clothes, and why she had any interest in warning Charpentier about St. Paul. When after about twenty minutes she did not return, he was afraid something had gone terribly wrong.
The soirée started just as it should, with a great fanfare and the entrance of Mademoiselle de Guise, with her “maids of honor” scattering white flower petals like snow in front of her as she arrived. Then Monsieur de La Rochefoucauld, who was so elderly he could barely stand, read aloud a beautiful sonnet he had written for the occasion, in which he flattered his patroness obliquely as the embodiment of eternal springtime—although she was a very old lady. Charpentier could not help thinking of the night that Émilie had made her début at a similar occasion. If only she could be there now.
The musicians had played a dance suite at the beginning of the party and were now preparing to accompany a singer, a tenor who was having something of a vogue in the Paris theaters. Charpentier stood to one side, taking in the carefully choreographed magnificence of the scene, lost in his own thoughts. A voice at once familiar and jarringly out of place spoke quietly in his ear.
“Ah, how I recall the evening of Mademoiselle Émilie’s first triumph,” said Monsieur le Comte de St. Paul.
Charpentier started and turned to face him. He fought to suppress the anger he felt toward this man who he knew was trying to take his wife away from him. At least, thought Charpentier, if he is here, then Émilie is safe. “Madame Charpentier is no concern of yours,” he said, turning away from the count.
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