“Do you really fail to see what was disgraceful about that business? An alliance with any commoner would have been a stain upon our honour. But to imagine you in that man’s power! The thought that he would have been your master is simply unbearable. Under no circumstances would I have let you fall into the paws of that giant brute.”
I stared at the Marquis in shock. Until then, I had deceived myself into believing that family pride had been his main motive. Now I recalled how he had touched me that afternoon in the Fontfreyde drawing room. I had been blind. He had been jealous of Pierre-André. My brother had forced me to marry the Baron to keep me away from the man I had loved.
“I understand you now, Sir, better than I ever wished,” I said. “Please send my most respectful regards to Mother.”
He left without another word. I did not join the guests at the funeral dinner.
20
Madeleine declined to interfere. In her eyes, our brother, as the head of the family, was the sole judge of what was to become of me. I had to make plans. I was not with child. I would have to be careful and keep certain things from the maids, who might be bribed by the presumptive heir to spy on me. In a few months I would have to admit my mistake. The new Baron and his wife would then throw me out of Cénac.
My 3,000 francs, added to Aimée’s, would give us an income of around 300 francs per annum, just enough to secure modest accommodations in Vic. There I found lodgings consisting of a parlour, two bedrooms and maid’s quarters on a second floor on the main street, just a stone’s throw from the Coffinhal house. It did not matter, for Pierre-André never visited there anymore. The remainder of my income would barely pay for our food, clothing and the wages of one maid. We would be poor as church mice.
Shortly afterwards, Maryssou announced the visit of the Chevalier des Huttes. The Chevalier, Jean-Baptiste Pagès des Huttes, was about my brother’s age and a great friend of his. I had seen him often at Font-freyde before my marriage. He also was a Captain in the Regiment of the Queen’s Bodyguards, the blue gentlemen, as they were called because of the colour of their uniforms. The members of that corps, put in charge of Her Majesty’s personal security, were recruited among the minor nobility. The Chevalier’s duties required him to spend much of his time in the Palace of Versailles. When he was on leave in Auvergne, he resided in his fine house in Vic or his manor in the mountains. He had sometimes been our guest at Cénac and had attended the Baron’s funeral.
“I need not ask how you are feeling, My Lady,” he said. “You look very well.”
“Thank you, Sir, well enough.” I could not guess the purpose of his call and waited for him to speak.
“I hear that you are enquiring about lodgings in Vic,” he said, “which surprised me in light of your condition.”
I looked into his eyes. “Are you, like Monsieur de Laubrac, accusing me of lying?”
“Certainly not, Madam, but the Marquis told me yesterday of your plans to go to Noirvaux if your hopes of giving birth to the Baron’s heir were disappointed. Why then would you need lodgings in Vic?”
“These are my brother’s plans, not mine. He seems to think, as he did before, that he can dispose of me without any regard for my wishes.”
The Chevalier sighed. “I must be the only man in whom he confided before your wedding. He was absolutely right when he forbade your marriage to Pierre-André Coffinhal. In my opinion, that young man’s departure is no great loss for Vic. Oh, he is full of intelligence and energy, but he was overly indulged by his late mother. Added to his stature and physical strength, that may explain his insufferable arrogance. And that voice of his! When riding past the inn in Vic, I could hear it through the closed door, booming over the clamours of all the other patrons put together. Even his plainness never seemed to lessen his insolence. By the age of sixteen, he had bedded all of his mother’s maids and was turning his sights on mine. I remonstrated with him. Far from expressing contrition, he told me that, though he was ugly, my maids enjoyed his attentions and were eager to continue his acquaintance. According to him, so were most females once they discovered that his size, so to speak, matched his height.”
I felt myself blushing to the roots of my hair. “This is, I suppose, the sort of banter to be expected from a man, especially a very young man, when there are no ladies present. It is not fit to be repeated to one.”
The Chevalier looked embarrassed. “You are right, Madam. Please forgive me. I am truly sorry to have upset you. I was trying to explain why I thought, and still think, the Marquis justified in forbidding your marriage to the younger Coffinhal. It was characteristic of him to raise his sights to you without thinking twice about it, as if there were no striking disparity between you and him.” The Chevalier shook his head. “I am a nobleman, but the Marquis would have balked if I had sought to marry you. Imagine what he, the head of one of the most prominent families in the province, must have felt at the idea of giving his sister to the grandson of a peasant! That would have been a most unsuitable match for you.”
I frowned. “True. My brother had a more suitable match in mind.”
“Please hear me, My Lady. I do not approve of forced marriages, especially where the bride is so young as to be still a child. It pained me to see you so unhappy during the signing of your marriage contract. I strongly advised the Marquis to find a way to break the engagement, but he disagreed. Now you are no longer under his authority, and I do not like to see you again forced into a path against your inclination.”
“You are very kind, Sir. What are you offering beyond your opinion? Are you asking for my hand in marriage to rescue me from the convent?”
He smiled. “Please do not think ill of me, My Lady, if I do not. My purpose, I am afraid, is more prosaic. What I propose is to take you to Paris when I return there in three weeks. One of my closest friends happens to be the Dowager Duchess of Arpajon, your late father’s cousin. She is a lady of unimpeachable respectability. She could present you at Court and introduce you to the best society while offering you the benefit of her advice and protection. She likes the company of bright, cheerful young persons. If I told her of your situation, I am sure that she would be delighted to offer you her hospitality.”
“Then what would I do? I cannot remain with her forever.”
“A lady such as you cannot fail to find a situation at Court or a suitable husband in Paris. I will write the Duchess if you will allow me to do so. Should she accept, I would be happy to convey you to the capital.”
“And pray what would you expect in return for this service?”
“The pleasure of Your Ladyship’s company during the carriage ride to Paris, which I usually find very tedious on my own.”
I must have looked skeptical.
“I may be naive, Madam,” added the Chevalier, “but I believe that, on occasion, people, at least decent people, do things because they believe them right, without any expectation of a return. I will consider myself amply repaid if I earn your friendship.”
I accepted the Chevalier’s offer. The reader, before judging me too harshly, must remember that I was seventeen. When I found myself alone, I did feel some misgivings about the wisdom of my decision. What if the Chevalier took advantage of me? He could argue that I had agreed to elope with him, that I had thrown myself into his power of my own accord. Yet my doubts were swept away by the prospect of discovering the most fascinating city in Europe, which I had often imagined from the descriptions given by Pierre-André and the Baron.
My other choice, since the convent still did not tempt me, was to enjoy the pleasures of genteel poverty in a small town, my life over before I was eighteen. My best prospect in Vic would be, counting on extreme good fortune, to marry some widowed nobleman of a bilious disposition, probably as brutal as my late husband, but less rich and saddled with a family of hostile children. I was not joking when I had suggested to the Chevalier that he wed me. He was relatively young, handsome, good-humoured and sensible, infinitely superior to any other man
whom, as a widow with a young daughter, I could expect to marry based on the sole appeal of my charms and 3,000 francs. I would have accepted him on the spot had he proposed.
A week later, the Chevalier came back to show me the Duchess’s response. I only remember the sentence: “If your young friend is half as charming as you depict her, I will be fortunate to have such a companion. Bring her to me, by all means, along with her little girl.”
I threw my arms around the Chevalier’s neck and kissed him on the cheek.
Later on the same day, I entered the stables of Cénac, which had been so stringently forbidden to me. A groom stared at me when I ordered him to saddle one of the horses.
“But, My Lady,” he said, “we have no side saddles here.”
“No matter. I can use a man’s saddle, or still better, I will ride bareback.”
He saddled one of the horses in a hurry, muttering under his breath and glancing sideways at me as if I were a madwoman.
“Where will Your Ladyship be going?”
“For a ride.”
It was the first time since my marriage that I enjoyed the pleasure of riding. I no longer cared whether I confirmed Monsieur de Laubrac’s doubts as to my pregnancy. I called on my former maid Thérèse Petit and my godson, Gabriel, now over one year old and walking around in a very assured way. He was a handsome child, robust for his age and much like his late father in looks and manners. There was the son the Baron had so wished for. Yet neither little Gabriel nor his mother had been remembered in my husband’s will. I gave Thérèse one hundred francs as a farewell present. She cried when I took my final leave of her.
I paid another farewell visit. I rode, as I had done so many times in my maiden days, to the Labro cottage. I kissed the whole household good-bye, Jacques included and Mamé last of all. I turned around to look at them one last time. Mamé, surrounded by her sons, waved at me. Tears were rolling freely down my cheeks. I decided to ride to the river, where I had not set foot since my last assignation with Pierre-André, before my marriage. The stones in the middle of its current were still covered with snow, but the merry song of the water held a promise of spring. I stood a long time on the pebble bank, unable to make sense of the past or the future.
21
At eight one fine May morning, I waited, my daughter in my arms, for the Chevalier. I left, to the servants’ mute astonishment, what had been my home. The Chevalier handed me into his carriage. The first test of his conduct had come. Of course, I sat with Aimée in the back. I waited to see whether he would settle next to me. This would have been inappropriate for a man who was neither my husband nor my brother. To my relief, he sat across from me. I turned around and watched through the rear window of the carriage the square towers of Cénac disappear in the distance. Aimée, a stranger to any feelings of nostalgia, was standing on the seat, cooing and nuzzling up to my cheek and neck.
I was still uneasy and did my best to keep the skirts of my black dress from brushing against the Chevalier’s knees. I expected him to pounce on me at the first opportunity, comme la misère sur le monde, “like poverty on the world,” according to the French saying. The Baron had used the less elegant comme la vérole sur le bas clergé, “like the pox on the lower clergy.” I was prepared to fight unwanted advances with the utmost energy. His quiet, unaffected demeanour eventually reassured me. It must have had the same effect on Aimée. She sat down, huddled against me, her face hidden in her hands, casting from behind her spread fingers looks of false shyness in his direction. He smiled back. At last she held out her arms to him.
“May I hold her, Madam?” he asked.
“Certainly, if she does not mind. You seem to have made quite an impression, Sir. She is generally very shy around gentlemen, as befits a proper young lady.”
Aimée had never been held by her father and had cried, burying her face in my neck, whenever she had heard his voice. She sat on the Chevalier’s lap and, looking up, touched his face with her little hand, frowning at the roughness of a man’s cheek. She then turned her attention to the silver buttons of his coat, which she tried to put in her mouth. After he dissuaded her from it, she pursed her lips, looked bored and fell asleep in his lap. I had not seen any man before take an interest in a child, especially female, save for my brother. I was reminded of his past tenderness for me and looked out the window to hide my emotion.
We changed horses and stopped for the night at the Inn of the Two Crowns, in Clermont, another novel experience for me. The Chevalier secured the largest apartment for Aimée and me, and the second in size for himself.
“We will dine in your bedroom, Madam,” he said. “You should not be exposed to the coarse language and manners of the common room downstairs, especially at night when the patrons tend to be the worse for drink.”
My wariness of the Chevalier reappeared. During our meal I desperately tried to keep Aimée awake on my lap though she kept dozing off. The Chevalier remarked that I must be tired and left promptly after dinner for his own apartment after bowing to me and kissing Aimée, now fast asleep in my arms. She smiled when his lips brushed against her round cheek.
I had forgotten, following my marriage, that most men will not force themselves upon a woman. My journey with the Chevalier reminded me of it. I also recalled Pierre-André, whose restraint had been more meritorious because he had wanted me. The Chevalier’s perfect manners seem to proceed as much from his indifference towards me as from his delicacy.
The next day, we left the boundaries of Auvergne. I did not know then that I would never again see my native country, the scene of so many memories, happy or not, of my childhood and youth. It is much to our advantage to be denied the gift of foresight for we would not stir otherwise.
22
After five full days, the Chevalier announced that we were approaching Paris. I opened the window and leaned out the carriage, gaping at the fortified wall being built around the city. We passed across an unfinished gate decorated by columns in the antique style.
“At least Paris will be well defended,” I said, choking on the dust of the construction.
The Chevalier shouted to make himself heard above the thunder of hammers and the cries of workmen. “This has nothing to do with the defense of Paris. This wall is being built all around the city for the benefit of the Farmers Generals, to prevent food from entering without being taxed.” The Chevalier shook his head bitterly. “I am afraid this will inflame the populace. The Farmers Generals are already hated. They are in charge of tax collection and may raise what they like while paying the Treasury a fixed amount. Now they will be accused of strangling Paris with this new wall.”
Parisians are fond of calling provincials culs-terreux, which literally translates as “dirty asses,” but what struck me in Paris was the filth of the southern districts we first crossed. We followed narrow streets, strewn with garbage and lined with soot-coloured houses, five or six stories high. I saw bands of half-naked children. Raggedy women yelled and shook their fists at each other. A man was relieving himself against a wall. The mere thought of male genitals still was enough to turn my stomach, though I had now been widowed for a few months. I looked away and glanced at the Chevalier, but, either out of delicacy or because he was used to that sight, he seemed to ignore the man.
Soon the streets became wider and took a more prosperous look. I thought I would go deaf from the rattling of the carriages, the swearing of the cart drivers and the cries of the street vendors peddling their wares. We had to stop more than once to give way to other carriages, for wooden stalls, piled high with produce, encroached on the street. I marveled at pyramids of oranges, which, the Chevalier told me, came from Portugal. I remembered my joy when, as a child, I found one of those fruits in my clog in front of Mamé Labro’s hearth on Christmas morning. I ate it all too quickly, in spite of Mamé’s entreaties to savour it, and refused to wash my hands afterwards in spite of their stickiness. I kept the peel for several days, breathing in its sweet oil until the fragra
nce was gone. I would not taste another orange until the next Christmas.
A man, perched on planks resting on sawhorses, was playing the violin. A small crowd had formed to listen to him. He paused at the end of each air to point with his bow at scenes painted on a canvas hung behind him. I could not understand what he was saying, though I could hear the shrill accents of his music.
I asked the Chevalier the meaning of the initials M.A.C.L., which I saw painted above the entrances of buildings. He flushed.
“It stands,” he said, “for Maison Assurée Contre L’incendie, and serves to indicate that the owner of the house has purchased fire insurance. Some, however, give it another, outrageous meaning. Such scoundrels deserve the gallows.”
He seemed truly upset and I did not press the point. Before long I would discover the other meaning derisively ascribed to these initials. It was Marie-Antoinette Cuckholds Louis. Thus, like any other Parisian, I would be reminded daily of the King’s alleged misfortune.
The Chevalier pointed to the monumental gilded gates that marked the entrance to the main courthouse. He said that we would cross the river by way of the Pont-au-Change, the Bridge of the Money Changers. I looked out, eager for my first glimpse of the Seine. My face fell when I saw only houses on either side of the street.
“Houses have been built on almost all of the bridges of Paris,” said the Chevalier, smiling at my disappointment, “but they are soon to be demolished. They will no longer block the view of river, and the city will be more airy and healthy.”
Our route took us through the Châtelet district. I have heard that it has since been destroyed on the orders of Napoléon Bonaparte. At the time of my arrival in Paris, this area gave off an odor unlike anything I had smelled before. I remarked to the Chevalier that the gutters were running red.
“The main slaughterhouse is around the corner,” he said. “It sends streams of blood flowing down into the river. I once saw an escaped ox, mad with terror, galloping in the middle of this street. Butchers in their soiled aprons, cutlasses in hand, were chasing the poor animal.”
Mistress of the Revolution: A Novel Page 13
