Mistress of the Revolution: A Novel

by Delors, Catherine

  I attended an interminable feast in the château, this time for the noble guests. The Baron, in a jolly mood, ate, drank, laughed and talked a great deal. It would have been customary for the wedding dinner to take place at the bride’s house, but perhaps my husband did not trust my mother to have a decent meal at Fontfreyde. My imprisonment in the cellar had kept me unaware of the preparations for my own wedding.

  I had met my husband only three times before, but had ample opportunity to observe him now. His loud voice was jarring to my ears, and his discourse was punctuated by many words I had never heard before, though I could guess their meaning. I sat, numb and mute, at the opposite end of a table, which had been dressed with great magnificence. All of the local nobility had been invited and the guests were in a joyful mood. My mother, in a new black silk dress trimmed with lace, was seated to the Baron’s right hand. She looked happier than I had ever seen her. I could only toy with the food on my plate without bringing it to my lips. My brother was not eating much either, and avoiding my eye. He had risen at the beginning of the dinner and toasted in a perfunctory manner the Baron and Baroness de Peyre. It had been odd to hear for the first time my new name and title. To me, the Baroness de Peyre was my husband’s late wife, Dorothée de La Feuillade, a faint ghost, unmourned four months after her death.

  After a number of courses, I saw the Baron lean towards my mother and speak to her while looking at me. She smiled at him and gestured to me to follow her. She and Madeleine took me to my new apartment. When I saw the bed there, I threw my arms around my sister’s neck.

  “Please,” I said, “do not leave me here. Take me home with you. I never want to see him again.”

  My mother pursed her lips. “You see, Madeleine, what I have been suffering. Thank Heaven, we are rid of her at last. I wish the Baron much pleasure with this little bitch. Imagine her being only fifteen and already such a harpy! But then your sister Hélène, when she was thirteen—”

  “Please, Madam,” interrupted Madeleine, “let us not speak of Hélène at this time. You may leave me with Gabrielle. I am sure she will listen to reason. She is only frightened, poor child.”

  After the Marquise left, my sister, gently but in a manner that admitted of no opposition, unlaced my dress and corset. She knelt before me to remove my shoes, untie my garters and pull my stockings. When I was stripped to my chemise, she nudged me towards the bed. I clung to her.

  “Gabrielle, you must be a good girl,” she said. “Are you afraid because you do not know what to expect? I will explain it all if you wish.”

  “I do know about those things. That is precisely why I did not want to marry him.”

  She ran her finger on my cheek. “It is wrong to entertain these thoughts now. You undertook before God new duties that you must now fulfill. Why fret over what cannot be avoided?” She smiled. “Besides, dearest, he cannot be so terrible. He seems very much in love with you. I have observed him: he cannot keep his eyes off you.”

  “I have not noticed anything of the sort.”

  “I would be surprised if you had,” she said, “for you hardly ever look at him. Your modesty is very commendable, but the time has come to be less shy with him.” She stroked my hair. “Let him do whatever he wants, and all will be fine.”

  “But I do not want him to touch me.”

  “These feelings are normal for a bride, Gabrielle. They will pass once the marriage is consummated and you realize that your fears were groundless. He is a mature man. He will be less rash and more patient than a younger husband.”

  The Baron, in his dressing gown, his hair untied, appeared. At the same time, I heard drunken clamours in the hallway, followed by hammering at the door. Male voices demanded to see the bride and groom together in bed to toast them one last time. The Baron swore.

  “You buggering jackasses,” he shouted when he opened the door, “you are frightening my little bride with your racket. Leave us alone.”

  The guests reluctantly left, some of them trying to peek inside the room before being firmly pushed away by the Baron. Madeleine pressed my hand. I tried to cling to hers, but she kissed me on the forehead and abandoned me to my fate.

  The Baron was now free to turn his attention to me. I forgot all about my mother’s lecture, Father Delmas’s sermon and my sister’s words of comfort. Instead of rising to meet my master, I remained in bed, my knees under my chin and my arms around my legs. He ordered me to remove my chemise. I stayed frozen. He seized me by the arm and, without a word, stripped me of it himself. I wrapped one of the sheets around my naked body. That too was torn away from me. I jumped from the bed in terror and without thinking ran for the door. He had no trouble catching me. I bit, I scratched, I fought him with all the energy I could muster. It was futile. He subdued me and carried me to bed, where he kept me pinned on my back, his knee planted in my stomach.

  With the belt of his nightgown he bound my hands and tied them to one of the bedposts. I begged for mercy, in vain. He was too busy pawing and kissing me to pay any heed to my pleas. I turned my head away to escape the smell of wine on his breath.

  “I have not been mistaken in my choice,” he said. “You are still more beautiful than I expected. I cannot wait any longer, little dear.”

  He slipped his shirt over his head, baring all. I whimpered in horror at the sight of his nakedness. He spread my thighs, knelt between them and lowered himself onto me. I tried to squirm from under him, but his weight, resting on my hips, was crushing me. He proceeded with the main assault, causing me such pain as to convince me that my entire body was tearing apart. My cries, far from giving him pause, seemed to make his lunges more furious. Sweat glued the black hair on his chest and stomach to his skin. I was smothered against his neck, thick as that of a bull. At last, when I thought that I could bear no more, he raised himself on his arms. After a final thrust, deeper and more violent than any before, he arched his back and let out a long roar.

  He rolled over by my side, his eyes closed, with a look of exhausted contentment that let me hope that he had fallen asleep. This comfort was short-lived. Apparently refreshed by his rest, he spread my thighs again. I had abandoned any kind of struggle and let him do what he pleased. He examined at length the site of his victory, tender under his fingers like a raw wound.

  “There is nothing I like better than this sight,” he said. “You just made me very happy, my pretty little bride, although you could have spared yourself some unpleasantness by obeying me from the start. No matter, you will learn fast enough.”

  He untied me. In my naivete, I thought that the ordeal was over for the night. Before long I saw with horror that his inspection had rekindled his appetite. He had only freed me to shift my position at his pleasure. Once the essential point had been settled to his advantage, he knew that my compliance was assured. He resumed his attentions with undiminished vigour. I lost track of the number of times I had to go through the same agony, which he alternated with bouts of whipping, both, he said, as a punishment and a warning.

  “You see, my dear,” he said during a lull, “brides are like young horses. Some of them are docile by nature. Others offer a spirited resistance when mounted for the first time. My late Dorothée belonged to the first kind. You obviously fall into the second. It does not bother me, far from it. The effort I put into taming a fine animal is amply rewarded by the satisfaction of finding it afterwards as eager to please as it was troublesome.”

  I could not imagine how any female could bear that kind of treatment for an entire night. I had visions of myself reduced by the morning to shattered bones and bloody pulp, like a broken body on the wheel. At last, long after I had abandoned any hopes of seeing an end to my misery, he left me in peace and retired to his own apartment. I found my torn chemise on the floor and put it back on.

  I was crying in my sleep when a maid drew the drapes and opened the shutters.

  “My Lord requests Your Ladyship’s company at breakfast without delay,” she said.

 
; I would discover that “without delay” was the byword at Cénac, where everyone understood that the Baron was not to be kept waiting. I was still shaken, sore all over, and wanted nothing more than to stay in bed a little longer. Moreover, after my initiation to nuptial bliss, I would have been content never to set eyes again upon my husband. Yet I understood from the maid’s alarmed look that it would be unwise not to make haste. I wanted to wash away the filth of the night, but that would have to wait. While the maid was helping me, I saw that I was covered with welts and bruises of various sizes and hoped that she did not notice them.

  I joined the lord my master in the dining parlour, where he was eating breakfast with a hearty appetite. I curtseyed to him but could not bring myself to meet his eye. He seemed oblivious to the events of the night and rose to greet me in a good-humoured manner.

  He hoped that I had slept well, and told me that, now that we were man and wife, we should settle a few things between ourselves about our future happiness.

  “First, Madam,” he said, “I am as patient as the next man, but I do not like to be kept waiting at my own table. I will expect the pleasure of your company at seven o’clock without having to send for you. You are no longer at Fontfreyde, where you may have been allowed to spend the whole day in bed. In this house, you will follow my ways, which you cannot expect me to change for the sake of a child of fifteen. Is this understood?”

  “Yes, Sir. Please forgive me. I did not know that you were expecting me, or I would have risen earlier. I promise that in the future I will be on time.”

  “All right, but remember that I might show less indulgence next time. That is not all: we have other important matters to discuss. Some of your habits, frankly, I do not like. You probably know to what I refer. Your brother, for reasons I cannot fathom, has let you run wild all over the country. Although I do not blame you, for you were too young to know any better, I will have to put an end to that nonsense. First, you will be impatient to present me with an heir sooner rather than later, and all that horse riding would not do. Second, I will not have it said that I allow my wife to roam the countryside like a madwoman. There will be no need for you to ride. I do not want to see you within a hundred feet of the stables.”

  Until then, riding had been the key to all of my moments of freedom. It had not occurred to me that I would be denied that indulgence. Of course, it was possible that a faint echo of my recent adventures had reached the Baron.

  “So you wish me to spend all of my time indoors, Sir?”

  He sighed. “Of course not, child. You are not listening to me. You may walk in the garden around the château, but do not go beyond that. As for the carriage, you will ask for my permission in advance and tell me where you want to go. I will give the coachman his orders: he receives them from no one but me.”

  “Could I go hunting with you? I hear that you are fond of it. I am a good horsewoman, Sir. I could keep you company.”

  He threw his knife and fork onto his plate. I started at the noise of the silver hitting the porcelain. “Have you not heard what I said? I told you that I do not want you to ride. I meant not at all, neither on your own, nor with me, nor in anyone else’s company. You will pay more attention in the future, Madam.”

  I was staring at the veal cutlet on my plate.

  “Have you listened this time?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Let us hope so. There is also another matter we need to discuss. It has not escaped you, I am sure, that Maryssou manages the entire household. Leave her alone. She is a very good woman, but a bit jealous of her authority, which is understandable because she has been in charge for a long time. You should know that I have the highest regard for her. In any case, you are too young to handle those things yourself and would only make a mess of them.”

  The previous day, I had noticed that Maryssou woman, the upper servant, dark-haired and handsome. I had tried to smile at her. In response, she had looked at me in an insolent and resentful manner. I had already suspected that she enjoyed some intimacy with the Baron. She was probably no stranger to the fact that the maids had failed to wake me up on time that morning.

  “There, my dear,” said the Baron. “I thought it better to make things clear from the start. You will find me a liberal and easy master, although I will not be remiss in correcting those wild habits you have been allowed to acquire. If left unchecked, they would do you great harm in my eyes.” He pointed his knife at me. “The late Baroness, bless her soul, was surrounded by comfort and attentions till her last breath. But then she never gave any kind of trouble. It would be wise of you to follow in her footsteps. As of now, you are nothing but a spoiled child, but your youth lets me hope that you will be amenable to reason. You do not look like a half-wit, far from it, and you will know your best interest. Now eat. I cannot abide a woman with a poor appetite, nor those who pretend to be indisposed to make themselves interesting.”

  It was clear that I would not be the mistress of my own house and that I would lead the life of a recluse, expected to produce a child every year until I grew so old, sad and tired that I no longer cared about any of it. Those thoughts of escape that had been so close to my heart only a few weeks earlier now seemed very odd. I felt soiled, defeated and broken, body and soul, after my wedding night. I no longer had anywhere to go, or anyone to go to. It would have been unthinkable to meet Pierre-André now, my disgrace written on my face.

  After breakfast, I returned to my apartment, where the maids were changing the bed and, much to my mortification, hanging the bloodstained sheet out of the window.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “It’s always been the custom at Cénac, My Lady, to display it on the day after the master’s wedding,” one of them said. “My Lord has given orders to follow the old ways.”

  I said nothing and sought comfort in a hot bath. I did not see the Baron at luncheon, for he had business in Aurillac the whole day.

  Early in the afternoon, I took a walk in the garden. There the last roses of the season were withering away, despoiled by the early frosts. I thought of the days when I could ride Jewel on mountain trails and enjoy the freedom of going wherever my fancy took me. I missed the kiss of the rain on my lips, the warmth of the sun and the chill of the wind on my cheeks. Lost in my reverie, I barely paid attention to the noise of the gravel crushing under my feet, when I heard the approach of a rider. Looking up, I recognized my brother. As he dismounted, I silently prayed that he would not notice the soiled bedsheet hanging like a flag of surrender from my window. If he did, he did not remark on it. He looked at me with concern and asked how I was.

  “Very well, thank you,” I said. “Though I am no longer under lock and key, I have not run away.”

  “So it appears, Gabrielle, but I was not worried on that account. I came here to see how you are.”

  “It is thoughtful of you.”

  He reached for my hand. “Has your husband been kind to you?”

  “He is my husband, and it is all that matters now.”

  “You are still angry with me, Gabrielle.”

  Tears were welling up in my eyes. “It does not matter. There is no going back. Let us not speak of that, because I find it painful to think of what could have been. Please tell me about Fontfreyde instead. I will probably never return there.”

  “Why do you say this? I am sure your husband will allow you to visit us.”

  “He may never permit it. He has forbidden me to ride and I will have to ask for the carriage.”

  “It must seem harsh to you because of your past habits, but now that you are a married woman, his request does not seem unreasonable.”

  “He does not make requests; he gives orders.”

  “Come, Gabrielle, little sister, you sound so bitter and unhappy that you will break my heart. The Baron may be gruff, but he will not ask for anything more than another husband. I knew it would be difficult for you, with your independence of spirit, to be married to any man.”

>   “That is a point on which you and I disagree. But let us talk about more cheerful things.”

  So he did tell me about Fontfreyde as if I had not seen the old place in years. It lifted my spirits.

  After my brother’s departure, the day felt empty. The afternoon wore on slowly, evening drew near, until that time just before nightfall, when the sky turns a darker shade of blue and inside candles are lit, shutters closed and curtains drawn. That hour, full of sweet sadness, had been my favourite in Fontfreyde. It became a moment of anguish in my new home. The prospect of the Baron joining me in bed again that night, and every night of our joint lives thereafter, which had been but a distant cloud in the bright light of the morning, began to loom on my mind until it drove away any other thought.

  I was careful not to repeat my mistake of the morning by being exactly on time for dinner. I was already shaking when I faced my husband. He took one look at me and hit the table with the palm of his hand. The crystal glasses shook. Both of his hounds rose from their crouching position by his chair and yelped in terror.

  “Where, Madam, did you find these rags?” he shouted. “I already saw them at breakfast, but I excused you then because I thought that you had no time to find anything else. Now you have had all day to dress. Do you think that I want my wife to show herself at my table attired like a beggar? Return to your apartment this minute and put on something proper. And throw away these horrors, or give them to the poor if you prefer. Now you will make me wait for my dinner after being late for breakfast. So this is how you thank me for my leniency this morning! Have it your way, my lovely. I will attend to you tonight. I may have to peel all the skin off your back, but I will teach you to mind what I say.”

  My first movement had been to bolt from the dining parlour, but I knew that I had nothing to gain by it except an immediate beating. I had noticed the night before that, although my husband was far heavier than I, he could outrun me. I fell to my knees.