He frowned, the thoughtful frown of someone puzzling out a difficult conundrum.
“I won’t be your mistress,” she told him, “because I don’t want to be a sort of superior…servant, or…or a possession. I don’t believe a woman should be treated that way.”
“Nor do I,” he protested. “But after all, many wives are treated just as badly, if not worse. And you know that I’d never use you that way, no matter what you were called. Anyway, ‘mistress’ is just a word, a convenient way of expressing—”
She shook her head. “We’re creatures of the words we use. ‘Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’ aren’t just words, they’re ideas.”
He shrugged, not quite ready to admit she’d scored a point. “And so you’d deprive us both of so much, just for the sake of—ideas?”
She hated it when her feelings got ahead of her ability to express them.
“I will come to Paris,” she told him.
“Ah—”
She held up a hand. “But not as your mistress, Joseph. As…as your lover, I guess one would say. As an independent person. I’ll work. I’ll see if Monsieur Colet can find me a job as a cook. If I stay here until the end of the year I’ll have my twenty livres after all, and I’ll…I’ll sell this dressing gown to buy the coach fare to get to Paris. Well, I need to work out the figures, of course, but—”
“But that’s silly, waiting here for such a tiny sum when I’ll be able to help you so abundantly. Don’t tell me you won’t accept any help from me.”
“A loan, perhaps. Later, when I’m ready to buy a bookstall…you know, it would be very helpful if you could make inquiries about what it actually costs to set up such a thing…”
She would have the most splendid bookstall in Paris, he thought. And surely—as the realities of life in an expensive city became more evident to her—she’d relax some of her stiff-necked notions about accepting help.
But how charming she was, asserting her independence so insistently. He nodded, his mobile features suddenly becoming meek and solicitous.
“Of course, you’ll be dreadfully busy,” he said. “Too busy to see me, I expect.”
She smiled. “I shall be busy,” she agreed. “But not too busy to see you.”
He wasn’t convinced that any of this made sense. But he was too happy to care.
“I’ll inquire about the bookstalls as soon as I get to Paris,” he said. “As it happens, I know some people who make their livings that way, on the quays along the Seine. I’d be honored to be your agent in this matter.” His mouth twisted a bit.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Oh nothing, it’s just that—well, I’d wanted to give you Paris when the fact is that you’re quite capable of taking it for yourself. So tell me, Mademoiselle Bookseller, what can I give you? Besides my promise to love you forever.”
She let the coverlet slip down her breasts. “Do you think, Monsieur le Vicomte, that you could give me yourself one more time tonight?”
The sky outside his window was no longer black. No matter, he thought. He’d make love to her as though the night would last forever. Sitting facing her on the bed, he wrapped his legs around her, drew her close, and shuddered as the hard points of her nipples grazed his chest.
He kissed her mouth and cheeks, nose and eyelids, while she slid her tongue along the sinews of his neck. Her hands moved up and down his flanks. Her legs parted a bit; he felt her vulva swelling, the lips moistening, to allow him entrance.
He grasped her buttocks, lifting her an inch or so before he entered her. She growled, and then she laughed, and then she began to moan as he moved her up and down.
Slowly. Sweetly. Strongly and inexorably. Like the rhythm of the tides, the weathering of rock. Like a lullaby, crooned almost silently, after a child has fallen asleep at its mother’s breast.
Forever, Joseph heard—or imagined he heard; he didn’t know which it was and didn’t care. Whichever it was, the syllables rang, resonated and receded just as his blood began to pound too loudly for him to hear anything at all.
Forever, Marie-Laure had whispered the word so deeply in her throat that she wasn’t sure if she’d actually given voice to it, or whether she’d moaned it or screamed it or simply breathed and believed it.
To love you forever, she thought later, as they clung together, wordless in the gray early morning light, next to the door that neither of them could bear to open. She peered over his shoulder and saw their reflection—pale pink velvet and bright blue satin—in the three-part mirror across the room. An infinite procession of reflections. Forever.
Their final words came haltingly.
“I’ll write to you,” he whispered, “and you must write to me, too. The address is on the paper I’ve given you. Two months—mon Dieu, it seems such a long time.”
“It’s not a long time,” she said. “You’ll be busy. And productive, too, though I know you won’t want to admit that. You’ll have to adjust to a new life, after all. And a new…home, too.”
She’d almost said a new wife. But she hated to think about that part of it.
“You know…” he began.
“Yes, what, Joseph?”
“Oh nothing, it’s just that you needn’t worry…about the Marquise, I mean. She’s…well, it’s difficult to express it tactfully, but she’s not what you’d expect.”
She shrugged, not wanting to hear about the woman he was going to marry He looked relieved, as though he’d been uncomfortable with whatever he’d been trying to say.
“Oh well, you’ll see what I mean when you get there,” he said quickly. “What’s important right now is that you’ll be safe here.”
There were times, she thought, when he’d be better off expressing himself less delicately. But in this case she understood what he was getting at. Safe from my brother, he meant, though it clearly embarrassed him to think about it. Well anyway it wasn’t a problem. For the Duc wouldn’t be bothering her, as he and his wife would be spending November and December in Paris.
“She’s promised to pay our end-of-year wages as soon as she returns,” Marie-Laure said. “And I’ll leave directly after that.”
“Yes, but if she doesn’t—if she cheats you or if she or…or anyone else—tries to mistreat you, you must leave without the money. Promise me that,” he said.
“I’m not afraid of being mistreated.” She smiled, raising her fist. “But yes, all right, as soon as you’re gone I’ll sell the robe and hide the money. That way I’ll always have coach fare in case I need to leave quickly.”
She kissed him for the last time, opened the door, and gently shook Baptiste until he groaned and began to rub his eyes.
“I won’t worry about anything, Joseph,” she said. “And I shall love you forever too.”
Forever, God willing, he whispered to himself as he stood at his room’s threshold and watched her hurry down the dim corridor. And even some minutes after she’d disappeared around a corner, he stood motionless, his eyes directed upon the empty space where she’d been. As though he could discern the path she’d traced through the air. As though he could keep her safe.
The hunched figure watching him from beneath the carpenters’ scaffolding, hidden behind the folds of a drop cloth, silently cursed the man standing in the doorway. Bad enough, Jacques thought, that he had to endure this nightly reminder of Marie-Laure’s rejection of his own advances. And even worse that he was obliged to scrunch himself up every night and listen to all that fucking without being able to see anything. There was a clear chink in the stone wall—good for listening, but placed at a frustrating visual angle—all he got was a shadow once in a while, or even worse, a pair of shadows; he’d had to use his imagination to supply the imagery.
Which had been entertaining in its own way, but ultimately uncomfortable and frustrating. As uncomfortable as his right leg, which tended to fall asleep during these vigils. And the itch on his rump. Not to speak of a bursting bladder.
Would t
he young mooncalf never go back into his room so that Jacques could scratch his arse and hop about a bit? Still, he thought, he’d certainly gotten the goods tonight. If he told the story skillfully enough, they might even pay him a bonus.
The door closed and Jacques sighed ecstatically. Revenge on the standoffish little bitch would be its own reward. But right now, all he wanted was a good scratch, a good piss, and the prospect of a few more livres clinking in his pocket.
Interlude
Paris and Provence
November—December, 1783
Mon cher Joseph,
How good and how strange it feels to write to you. The post is expensive, you know, and so I shall have to write very small and in the margins. Which is fitting, as I have only small things, and of marginal importance, to write about. But I’ll try to tell you everything, because it makes me feel that you are nearer…
“You’ve received the letter you’ve been waiting for.” The Marquise de Machery’s low, even voice was as smooth as the breakfast chocolate she poured from a silver pot.
She handed a cup across the table to her husband of two weeks. “And you’re dumbstruck with happiness. I’m so glad, mon ami—but I must stop addressing you that way.” Her face was grave, but her brown eyes glittered above wide pink cheeks. “It sounds too sympathetic. People will find it indecent and I’ll be an object of scandal again.”
Joseph laughed. “We shall have to practice ignoring one another—except for the occasional insult in company. We have an excellent model in Hubert and Amélie; we can study their manners tonight at supper.”
He downed his chocolate in one long swallow. “But you’re wrong about one thing—I’m not in the least dumbstruck. Be forewarned, you’re going to hear everything. More than everything. I shall amplify, exemplify, explicate and pontificate—assault your ears with Marie-Laure this and Marie-Laure that until you beg for mercy. I’m awfully relieved to hear from her, Jeanne. I didn’t tell you I was worried about her, but I was. I know how ridiculous that sounds.”
“Of course it’s ridiculous. But of course you worried. And of course I knew.”
“Anyway, she’s safe and well,” he said, “except for missing me terribly, though she confesses to enjoying her full nights of sleep. She took some books from the chateau’s library—there was no one to stop her—she found the Shakespeare and she says that when she gets a spare moment she reads the romantic comedies. And then she says…hmmm…where is it? Ah yes, squeezed in at the bottom: ‘The only thing I want to read more is a letter from you.’ Well, by now she must have received one—or more than one, I hope.
“Unfortunately, it seems that she doesn’t get a great many spare moments, because they’re busy making jams and jellies, preserving fruit and vegetables for the winter…” He shrugged. “Peeling, blanching, pickling…I’m not sure what she’s actually talking about in this paragraph.”
The Marquise laughed. “I am. We used to have to help in the kitchen at convent school, though I could sometimes contrive to work in the orchard instead.
“But it’s delightful,” she continued as they rose from the table, “to see a gentleman puzzling over the mysteries of pickles and preserves. And since you’re showing such an interest in life’s homelier details, Joseph, do you think you could assist me in the garden this morning?”
“Of course. There’s a meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society today at La Grange—Lafayette has been very genial, welcoming me back into his circle and introducing me around; Marie-Laure was right, it’s been good for me to get settled into a productive life here. But I have a few hours before I have to go. I’d be delighted to help.”
She led him into the house’s inner courtyard, where a gardener who’d been trimming a large, conical yew stepped down from his ladder to help her into a smock like his own.
“Thank you, Gaspard,” she said. “And we’ll need another smock for Monsieur le Vicomte.”
Her daily routine didn’t admit of alteration. Mornings—in all but the most inclement weather—were devoted to planting and weeding, raking and hoeing, pruning the trees and tying up the vines in the formal garden behind the Hôtel Mélicourt, her family’s vast Paris townhouse. She’d then take a plate of fruit, a glass of eau-de-vie, a bath, and a siesta, before settling down for an afternoon with Homer or Herodotus, her progress carefully recorded in her journal. After which it would be time for an evening at the salons or the theater, followed by an intimate supper with a companion or two. It was a civilized gentleman’s life, she’d explained to Joseph, and she was happy to share it with him.
“We’ll be spreading mulch over these flowerbeds,” she told him now. “Here’s a trowel and a cushion for you to kneel on. You can continue to chatter about your Marie-Laure, but only so long as you make yourself useful.”
He shrugged, pretending to grimace at the prospect of getting his hands dirty. And then he buttoned his smock, hoisted up his breeches at the knees, and gracefully lowered himself to the cushion. He took a deep breath; there was a bracing chill in the air and the dead leaves and peat moss had a pleasant, earthy smell.
“It was a very sweet letter.” He dug his trowel into the leaf and peat moss mixture and began spreading it over the flowerbeds where she’d planted next year’s hyacinths. “Cheerful, newsy, and on the whole very decent and school girlish. She’s obviously never written to a lover. But when she receives my letters—well, she must have begun to receive them by now—she’ll learn how it’s done.”
What luxury it was to prattle on, he thought, after months of pretending to his family that Marie-Laure didn’t matter in the slightest. Jeanne was a good audience, sympathetic yet critical, with a sharp ear for self-deception—the sort of listener who made one want to get all the details right.
“It was stupid of me, though, not to give her money for postage,” he continued. “She says she won’t be able to afford to write to me every day, because of her confounded habit of saving every sou. Such a little bit of money, you know. I could have slipped some coins into the pocket of her dressing gown.”
He stopped. “No, no, of course I couldn’t have done that. She would have felt degraded by it.”
The Marquise sniffed. “She felt degraded, it seems, by the prospect of being my husband’s mistress. I don’t know if I can approve of such stiff-necked pride from a scullery maid—even one who aspires to be a bookseller.”
Joseph held up his trowel in protest. “You’re a snob, Jeanne. Bookselling is an honorable trade and honorable tradespeople cherish their independence. I admire and rather envy her for it, as I envy anyone who hasn’t been forced into a marriage, no matter”—he nodded politely—“how necessary it was for the both of us, and how pleasant it’s turned out to be.”
She returned his nod, but he could tell that she wasn’t persuaded.
He spoke more forcefully. “And anyway, it’s clear as day why she won’t take anything from me. It’s to prove that she doesn’t care what I can give her, and that she’d love me no matter what. I think it’s rather beautiful…”
The Marquise shrugged and he gave up trying to convince her. Because—although of course he wouldn’t tell Jeanne this—he also wished Marie-Laure were not so stubbornly self-sufficient. Still, there was nothing to be done about it. And anyway, the waiting would soon be over; before he knew it she’d be with him in Paris.
Better to turn to more agreeable matters. He drew a deep breath, paused, and allowed the next phrases to tumble from his lips in a boyish rush.
“But she has the most extraordinary, changeable eyes, Jeanne—sometimes blue, sometimes gray, they even shade to violet if you know how to look for it, and they’re enormous…and did I tell you about her freckles?”
The Marquise laughed from deep within her generous chest and belly. “Only about eighty times, Joseph. But I don’t mind; it’s a most agreeable way for me to get a good laugh for today. How marvelous to watch the fastidious Monsieur X grubbing around in the dirt, besotted by a pretty, bookish
scullery maid with wide eyes and freckles on her cheeks. It restores one’s faith in the unpredictability of human nature.
“And you’ve done a lovely job with the flowerbeds, cher ami; all that’s left to do is make sure the pyracantha by the west wall are tied securely to their trellis, and to check for spider mites. We doused them last week with a soap solution, but sometimes one has to repeat the treatment.”
She rose to her feet and waved to the gardener, who scrambled down his ladder again, this time to pack away her tools.
“I’ll be pruning with you tomorrow, Gaspard,” she called, “so be sure to bring another ladder.”
The pyracantha vines were quite secure, and the Marquise’s careful investigations revealed no mites among their stems, leaves, or orange berries.
“In a month,” she said, “the berries of this firethorn will turn a brilliant, seductive red. The sparrows will eat them and become drunk on the fermented juices. They’ll be as giddy as you are, Joseph, and some of them will fly directly into the wall and smash themselves against it. It’s a pity, really, but I’ve never known how to stop it.”
He bowed over the hand she held out to him. “I’m not going to smash anything. Except perhaps Hubert if he spills his soup at supper.
“Until tonight, then, Jeanne. And I look forward to seeing Ariane as well.”
She watched him stride down the gravel path to the house.
“Until then, mon vieux,” she called.
But it was evident that he hadn’t heard her, for he’d taken the letter from his pocket and was rereading it, head bent and steps slowing in rapt contemplation of its decent, cheerful phrases.
The Hôtel Mélicourt had fine bright lamps and splendid mirrors in its guest wing. Perhaps a bit too splendid, the Duchesse de Carency Auvers-Raimond found herself thinking that evening; there were times when one preferred one’s image rather more obscure. She scowled at the reflection of her chambermaid, struggling with the hooks at the back of her gown.
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