“Why?” The princess whines and pouts. Though in face and feature she looks like a replica of her mother, here the difference shows clear. Perhaps, as I imagine, the queen was petulant on her arrival as a child bride deposited in an unfamiliar country, but now a hardened woman lurks beneath the soft flesh clearly displayed within the billows of her nightdress.
Though I doubt Louis said as much in his quick missive, she says, “He thinks it is too Austrian. And that we won’t appear to be loyal to France if we do.” Her tone is flippant, but I hear a wistfulness in her voice. She notices me again. “You grew up in this country, did you not, couturière? Out and away from here. Did you never go for a sleigh ride on such a fine winter’s day as this?”
“Non, Madame la Reine.” I don’t know if her look of surprise came from my response or the fact that I took no time to consider or remember.
“Jamais? Never? But certainly such an activity is no great luxury. We—that is, my former country—cannot be the only people to engage.”
“Most of the people—all of the people—that I know are poor, madame. If a farmer must choose to have wheels or runners, he must choose that which will be used more often. When the snow is too deep to drive a cart, we stay home. And to drive a horse through snow at any speed is impractical. Grain is expensive, and often our animals are quite weak during the winter. Perhaps the king—” I stop myself not only because I fear I am overstepping the boundaries of my response, but also because, were I to be completely correct, the objection came not from the king, but his advisers. The note, though written in the hand of her husband, was not, as I’d witnessed, a message from his heart.
“Go on,” she prompts, allowing me to change course.
“Perhaps the objection is not so much about France, but about the poor. This has been a particularly harsh winter. You have said it is no great luxury. But to people like us, it is unimaginable. Maybe he wants to spare the feelings of those who could never afford such an indulgence.”
“But do people—your people—really watch us so closely? Why do you care?”
“We don’t watch you,” I say, picking my words like slivers in a finger. “We can’t see you. But we hear. And we can only hear what we’re told, and sometimes, madame, we aren’t told the whole truth. If we only hear from your enemies, we think you are our enemy.”
“Enemy!” Louis-Charles shouts, furiously pitting his soldiers against each other.
“Maman?” Marie-Thérèse sounds frightened. “What does that mean?”
The queen strokes her daughter’s hair and makes a soft shushing sound. Even without words, it sounds nothing like French. She bends, kisses her daughter, and looks at me. “Is that what you think?”
“No, madame. Pardon, of course not. I only wish that everyone could see you as you are now.”
“But then I would not be queen. I would be like any other woman worried about feeding her horse throughout the winter.”
“Even worse. You have to worry about feeding an entire country.”
Her head drops with the weight of the idea.
“I think, perhaps,” I continue, “it is just as well. The dauphin’s boots were not properly dried. Or—and I do not intend to insult a craftsman—constructed. Were he to wear them out today, he might fall ill. Give me some time to stitch in a better lining, and in the afternoon, when the sun is out and it’s a bit warmer, you could all go for a New Year’s walk together. That’s what we liked to do when I was a child.”
She laughs. “You are still very much a child.”
I smile a consent. “We would find an unbroken field. Gagnon would instruct us to walk in it and make our mark. Make designs with our steps.”
Marie-Thérèse perked up. “What design would you make?”
I turn my full attention to her. “I would build.” And as I speak, the memory is so clear I can feel my hands burning with the cold of the snow. “I would build a gown. Pile the snow into a skirt.” I mime the actions as I speak. “Form a waist, a bust. I would spend hours sprinkling it with evergreen needles and branches. Oh, if you could see.”
Marie-Thérèse is entranced, and I feel somewhat guilty at how quickly the idea of the sleigh ride has been abandoned.
“We will walk,” the queen says. “We will make our mark.” She sends the children away to wash up and dress and take breakfast. I assume I am dismissed too, but the queen stops me. “I have a gift for you, couturière.”
“A gift, madame?”
“For the New Year.” She climbs out of bed and crosses the room to an ornate chest of drawers, lacquered white with a floral print accented with gold leaf. She opens one of the small drawers on the top row, rummages for just a moment, and comes away. “I’m sorry to say I do not remember who gave this to me initially. I get so many things, you know. Too many. For a year I honestly had no idea of its purpose, and now that I know, I have no use for it.”
I smile, wondering if she has any idea of the ungracious connotation of her words, but at the same time I bubble with the anticipation of receiving a gift from the queen. When she places it in my hand, I am in awe of what she’s given me. It fits as if by design, gold filigree warm against my palm.
“A knotting shuttle,” I say, to make sure the queen knows I understand its function as well as its beauty. “It’s exquisite.”
“You know what this is?”
“Oui. I have a friend, back home,” I say, speaking of Elianne Girard. “She had one—not nearly as beautiful as this. Bone, I think. It was one of the few things I truly envied. She didn’t know how to use it at first, either.” Too late, I realize this might be insulting, to equate the queen of France with an unknown farm girl back home, but she laughs.
“Perhaps, then, people are not so different after all. And you? Do you know what to do with this thing?”
This thing. Worth more than anything I’ve ever known in my lifetime. “Not now, but I can learn. I’m sure one of the women here can teach me. Or, I’m clever. I’ll teach myself.” I finally tear my eyes away from this treasure. “Thank you, madame. Your Highness, thank you so much. I—I didn’t think to get a gift for you. I had no idea . . .”
To my utter surprise, she reaches and tucks her hand under my chin. “You gave me a great kindness this morning, my girl. Insight—something I know how to use. Never underestimate the value of loyalty.”
L’épisode 16
Laurette
* * *
MOUTON BLANC
* * *
On Christmas Day Monsieur Girard had sent word to every family within an hour’s walk to come to his home the following week for a New Year’s dinner. Each was to bring two loaves of bread, one other offering, their own plates and cups and spoons, and a contribution of firewood. They arrived to find a rough-constructed table stretched from one end of the great room to the other.
Laurette had been in the Girards’ home dozens of times, and while it was larger than Gagnon’s, she would never have considered it grand until this day. The walls seemed to stretch to accommodate the party—fourteen in all: Monsieur and Madame Girard, Elianne, Gagnon with Laurette and the boys, the aged Monsieur and Madame Tournac, and the Norrin family. The three Norrin children tumbled into the Girards’ house looking like nothing more than bundles of listless rags. Round, hollow eyes stared out above layers of mufflers, and even when they’d been freed from their winter wear, they did little more than cling to their mother, leaving great trails of snot on her skirt. Soon, though, the fire warmed them, and Philippe and Nicolas had them entranced, taking turns in a peg-board game.
“They are good big brothers, non?” Gagnon held the youngest Norrin while its mother unpacked their offering to the meal. Laurette looked on, able to decipher neither the nature of the Norrins’ food nor the gender of the child in Gagnon’s arms. The food was a greasy gray mass half-filling a wooden bowl. “Gravy,” Madame Norrin explained, “though it turned mostly solid on the walk.” Laurette’s stomach, empty as it was, lurched at the thought
of it.
Then, to her surprise, it lurched again in a completely different way at the sight of Gagnon and the child. It couldn’t have been more than two years old, with soft brown wisps jutting from beneath a knit cap. Tiny hands protruded from a shirt that must have been handed down from an older sibling, because the sleeves were rolled and rolled to cut the length in half. The child had gone to Gagnon’s arms as naturally as if it belonged in such a place, much to the relief of its mother and indifference of its father. Gagnon cupped his hand against the knit cap and pulled the child close to whisper something Laurette desperately wished to hear.
The child whispered back.
“Jeannette!” He pronounced the name victoriously and commenced a stroll around the room, singing:
“Ne pleure pas, Jeannette,
Tra-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la
Ne pleure pas, Jeannette,
Nous te marierons, nous te marierons.”
It was an ancient song of tragic love, but Gagnon simply sang the first verse over and over, promising to find a man to marry the weeping Jeannette. He bounced her in his arms with every tra-la-la until her solemn expression was transformed and her sweet voice chimed in.
“He was meant to be a father.” This, spoken straight to Laurette’s ear by Elianne Girard. If a woman’s gaze could bring a man’s child to her belly, Gagnon would be a father by nightfall.
“He is as good as a father to Philippe and Nicolas,” Laurette said.
“And to you, non? Orphan child taken in?”
“And to me.” Though she had always thought of Gagnon as a peer, if an older one. And in this moment especially, she didn’t see Gagnon in any fatherly light. He’d let his beard grow during the winter, a soft covering of dark copper that masked the gauntness of his face. Little Jeannette reached up a hand to touch it, and Laurette’s fingertips twitched in jealousy. When he broke off his song to growl like a bear and nibble her tiny fingers, she squealed in delight.
Laurette brought her own to her lips. They were red and chapped, nails bitten down to the quick. One finger, the third on her right hand, sat at a strange angle, never having healed properly after her hand had been caught under the hoof of a startled goat. She had the hands of an old woman at nineteen.
“He needs a wife, mon amie.” Elianne stood beside her, speaking out of the corner of her mouth. “And if it’s not you or me, then that little brat will grow up and snatch him away.”
Laurette forced a laugh and jabbed her elbow. “I believe he’d wait that long before taking either of us.”
The meal was plentiful enough to have been served on a mountain by the Savior himself—or so claimed Girard. But he spoke something near the truth. Plates were passed more than once, and even when the guests sat back declaring they couldn’t hold another bite, some dishes in the center still held traces of food. Two loaves of bread remained intact, and even Madame Norrin’s gravy found a home mixed with another sauce and poured onto plates to be mopped up with crusts.
“There is no better way,” Girard said, “to usher in a New Year than to do so with a full stomach.”
Voices rose in agreement.
“And with prayer,” Gagnon said when silence settled again. He stood and crossed himself. “In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost . . . ,” and he entered into a prayer of thanksgiving for the bounty of their feast and the health of those gathered, though the Norrins’ middle child burst forth in a rattling cough. He prayed good health and fortune to our king and our queen and their children and our land. And he asked that God would remember all of them in the year to come. The year of our Lord, 1789. That the decade would end in peace and prosperity for all.
All gathered said amen and opened their eyes to find Gagnon waiting with a wide grin.
“Good food,” he said, “full stomachs, and prayer. And?” He looked to old Monsieur Tournac.
The old man sported his own sparse-toothed grin. “Wine!” he declared, bringing out—with the help of Monsieur Norrin—a good-sized jug from beneath the table.
“À la bonne année!” the party shouted, one echoing to the other as cups were filled and clattered together. Nicolas, Philippe, and even the older Norrin children were given a celebratory amount, and in the spirit of the holiday, Laurette touched her cup to Elianne’s.
The evening was spent in conversation, stories about the days when Mouton Blanc was a thriving town, when le roi was still a harmless boy married to a strange foreign girl, and when—while none of them lived in excess—there was never a New Year’s Day spent wondering if there would be food enough until spring. Laurette sat back, her dwindling cup of wine providing a slow, steady stream of warmth, listening. She had no stories to contribute. These days were before her time. Before Gagnon’s, too, as his contributions were through the eyes of a bright-futured boy.
What she lacked in story she made up for in song. During the lulls between tales, someone would hum a tune, and she bravely ventured in, ever confident of her voice. They sang carols that dated back to Charlemagne, ballads that told stories of young lovers destined to be apart. To her surprise, old Tournac led them in a bawdy tune that made Madame Tournac swat at his arm repeatedly, though she blushed and joined in on the rollicking chorus.
Darkness fell, taking the great room with it. Philippe and Nicolas sat in the middle of the floor, their backs propped up against each other, heads nodding in sleep. The Norrin children had been assigned to laps—Madame Norrin and Elianne with the older two, little Jeannette coiled upon the enthralled Madame Tournac. Her curly head nestled in the old woman’s shoulder; no doubt both were grateful for the extra warmth. Lit only by the dying fire, as no one wanted to dislodge themselves to light a candle, the party turned to shadows. Girard poked halfheartedly at the fire, sending a few sparks. “Say, Gagnon,” he said, tossing on a final log, “what do you know of that girl Renée?”
“That she is well,” Gagnon said in a way that prompted no further question. He and Laurette sat next to each other on one of the dining benches, close enough that, on several occasions throughout the evening, their shoulders touched, or their arms, even their hands in gesture. He pressed against her now, purposefully, lest she try to add to his statement. Under any other circumstances, his prompting would suffice, but she was warm with wine and fire and song, and she leaned forward to escape.
“Well she may be, but she’d be a fine sight happier here. At home. It is enough.”
“Home,” they echoed, and a silence descended, deeper than any other of the evening.
“One more song,” Gagnon said, “before we head out to our home.”
“Surely not,” Elianne said with a force strong enough to disturb the child in her lap. “Papa, we can’t let them go. It’s late. It’s dark.”
“It’s a clear night,” Gagnon said. “And we’ve Cossette with us. She could lead us home blindfolded.”
“Do you mean if she were blindfolded?” Nicolas piped up. “Or if we were?”
Gagnon laughed. “Both.”
“Are you sure?” Girard asked. “There’s room enough on the floor. Or we’ll all be warm packed together in the beds.”
“I am sure.” To punctuate, he stood and stretched, emitting an enormous yawn that caused all in the room to follow suit. Even the sleeping Jeannette.
Elianne did her best to appear enticing, drawing the drowsy child on her lap closer. “You said one more song.”
“On second thought, maybe it’s best not to disturb the little one,” Gagnon said, touching his hand to her cheek. “Besides, I should save my voice to sing us home, right, boys?” Philippe and Nicolas groaned good-naturedly as he reached down to haul them to their feet.
“Take your bread with you,” Madame Girard said with a lazy wave of her hand. “We’ve not touched it.”
“It will only freeze on the walk. Come, Laurette. Help me get our things.”
After a flurry of lamplight and well wishes and worry, they were wrapped toe-to-nose in coats and
scarves, three socks within each boot, and caps pulled low over their brows. Gagnon was correct about the night being clear. The moon shone bright on the snow; the stars glittered like sunlight on a stream. Girard sent them home with a lamp, which Nicolas carried out in front, Philippe close at hand. The path they’d cut on the way to Girard’s was still fresh, as there’d been no snowfall that day, and only occasionally did one of the boys drop off into a fresh drift.
“That’s why you’re in front!” Gagnon shouted, though the night and the snow muffled his voice. “You find all the traps!”
Not even halfway home, Laurette felt the cold seeping through all the layers of clothing, and as she had no more layers of flesh, the chill settled into her very bones. “Why did we have to leave?” She hated the complaining tone in her voice but felt powerless to corral it. “We could have spent the night. I’d welcome a warm floor right now.”
“There wouldn’t have been enough food in the morning if we’d stayed. Think of it: four more mouths to feed.”
“I told Madame Girard to make pain perdu. It would have fed the crowd.”
“Mmmm . . . will you make that for our breakfast?”
“With what? You gave away all of our bread.”
“Then will you make more bread?”
She murmured something like an agreement, not wanting to invite more cold air with speech. Feeling cold was becoming something from the distant past; her body had gone beyond to a place of near numbness. Her feet were a memory, her legs a dissolving dream. Her thoughts a swirling mass—bread? Bread. Making bread . . .
Gagnon nudged her shoulder. “We’re halfway, Laurette. Will you make it?”
Yes. What choice did she have?
“Tell you what—I’ll sing. And by the time I get to the end of the song, we should be at the crest of the valley. D’accord?” Then, never one to wait for permission, he began: “‘Ne pleure pas, Jeannette—’”
“Why are all the songs about Jeannette?”
The Seamstress Page 18
