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Rachelle Macquinet, having departed the royal chamber of Princesse Marguerite, carried the burgundy silk and cloth of gold draped carefully over her arm and her sewing case in hand. She entered the oak-paneled salle on the second f loor of the palais chateau, where the Macquinet chambers were located. One of the rooms had been turned into their atelier, where the bolts of cloth and tables were located for sew- ing and cutting. Her sister Idelette was at work there now.
Before entering the family chambers she paused in the salle, glanc- ing to the far side where a broad embrasure of an oriel window looked toward the quiet verdant forests. Here, wildlife roamed, and the marvels of God’s creation drew her, as always. She walked to the window to gaze out, to refresh her tired spirits before Grandmère inspected her work on the burgundy gown. She drank in the view of the surrounding sage- green forest and searched for a glimpse of the stag that she had seen early that morning. The stag would not likely reappear until eventide, but there were a good many colorful birds f litting in the branches and a large number of game fowl as well, including peacocks, all belonging to the king’s table — bien sûr! She hoped the stag evaded the king’s archers.
Wispy clouds of a pearl-like sheen settled gently over the treetops. How restful the beauty of the wooded Touraine appeared at first glance. She was temporarily soothed by it, though lasting peace was an illusion concealing mysterious, even dangerous, events. Thinking so brought to mind her arrival here from Paris, and what she had learned from her Cousine Claudine. The first two weeks she arrived were spent in bonho- mie with her Dushane cousin, before Claudine had returned to Orléans
to the estates of her aunt, Duchesse Xenia Dushane. Claudine had whis- pered to Rachelle the uneasy details about the spying closets and many other listening devices in the various chambers here at Chambord. “All were put here by Catherine de Medici, I vow it.”
Claudine, a lovely girl Rachelle’s age, had been one of the Queen Mother’s ladies-in-waiting. She had returned to Orléans near Fontainebleau at the personal request of her blood aunt, Duchesse Dushane. Madame Dushane had requested the Queen Mother to release Claudine from her “favored position.”
“Non! It was a frightening position,” Claudine had whispered to Rachelle before she left Chambord. “I shuddered whenever I was in her presence.”
Rachelle never fully learned the reasons for Claudine’s unexpected departure for Orléans, except that she had become frail in health — a curious incident over which Rachelle sometimes pondered, for Claudine had been robust in health.
Rachelle entered the Macquinet chambers.
Her older sister Idelette was sitting at the long cutting table. She looked much like their maman— tall, fair, with a slender, pious face, and pale blue eyes. She was working on a difficult sleeve for one of reinette Mary’s white satin gowns. The upper sleeve near the shoulder needed to be bunched into a pleated fan, and it took masterful fingers to manage it with artistic perfection. Idelette was two years ahead in the steps to becoming a couturière, and Rachelle had not yet progressed so far.
Idelette turned her head toward Rachelle. “Oh, Grandmère is not with you?”
“Non. I have just left Princesse Marguerite’s chambers.”
Idelette set aside her work and stood up from the chair and table, with hand at her lower back. “I shall grow old very quickly, I vow it. One would think I was old and vagrant at twenty.”
Rachelle proudly displayed the burgundy gown on the mannequin and arranged each fold with her fingers, smoothing them.
Idelette nodded approvingly. “You did well, ma petite. Oh, I shall never weary of gazing at those colors. I think of sparkling grapes effused with golden sunshine.”
“Mmm. It looks well on the princesse with her dark hair.” She glanced about the busy-looking chamber with its work materials here and there. “I am anxious to win Grandmère’s approval. My hem and the gauging of my lace is perfect.”
“La, la, so you think. It is Grandmère’s eye that is perfect. Wait until she gauges your lace.”
Rachelle frowned critically at the hem, though she could find no fault in her work. “It was most difficult measuring the princesse. I have never seen a mademoiselle more restless, I promise you. She talked incessantly of Monsieur Henry de Guise. It was not until he rode into the courtyard with his père, le duc, that the princesse grew happy.”
“Pouf, happy for le moment, that is all. It is the mind of the haute
monde. Wanting more, always more, and never satisfied. What is the verse in Ecclesiastes? ‘The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing’?”
Rachelle turned her mouth in rueful agreement. “It is sad, but Marguerite will never be satisfied with one man.”
“It is so with all of them, all the girls. The nobility are notorious for their greed.”
I, myself, would be happy with one particular man, Rachelle
thought.
“I do not envy you working with Princesse Marguerite,” Idelette said.
“And la Reinette Mary?”
“So charmante, and so generous in her behavior too. She talked of the masque that was to be held tomorrow night, but she believes it might be put off until later, though no one knows when.”
“But how strange. I was musing over how entertaining it would be for us if Grandmère would attend.”
Idelette laughed. “Grandmère . . . or you? I vow, sister, you never give up on these matters of frivolity. It is all such nonsense.” She drew her brows together and jabbed her sewing needle into her pincushion.
“La, la. I should still like to go but once, if only to see what it is like.”
The court, consisting of ducs and duchesses, comtes and comtesses, had assembled here at Chambord for several months of entertainment.
The courtly elite were expecting a time of bonhomie among themselves, of fêtes, musicals, royal hunts, and even a carrousel in the courtyard of the palais chateau in which the grand prieur was to ride disguised as a gypsy woman, carrying a monkey on his back that was dressed as a child.
Idelette nettled her at times. “Do you never wish to wear a silk gown like those we make for others and attend a gala?” Rachelle asked.
Idelette shrugged. “It does not matter what I wish. Even if the masque goes on tomorrow, Maman told Grandmère not to allow us to attend without a male chaperone.”
“Such an excuse. There is Comte Sebastien, our brother-in-law, is there not? He is here, serving the Queen Mother.”
Idelette’s face grew serious. “That woman, I vow she frightens me. Does she not you? Her eyes, they do not blink but stare deeply, cold like a snake.”
Rachelle forced a mild laugh because the thought gave her a chill. “Allons bon! Such words as these will prompt me to look beneath my bed tonight with the lamp.”
“I imagine the monkey would be very amusing to see all dressed up in clothes, but it is quite silly, that. A waste of time.”
“But to see the costumes would be valuable. Such entertainment. We might become inspired with a new dress design. And — ” Rachelle glanced toward the empty tea table and remembered how hungry she was—“I imagine the sweetmeats and pastries would be wondrous to taste.”
Idelette laughed. “You and your bonbons. It is a wonder you are not fat instead of possessing a figure that makes royalty jealous. There is no good to your wishing, petite soeur. Grandmère sent Nenette an hour ago to say la Reinette Mary wishes for accessories to go with her gown. You know how tedious it is to make accessories of the finest sort? How long it takes? It is an art in itself.”
Rachelle absently f lipped a curl at the side of her sister’s cheek and walked over to the long trestle table. She began arranging her sewing equipment in her case for the next day’s work.
“There was a f lurry in the courtyard this morning. Did you see it by any chance?”
“I was too busy and did not wish to interrupt my work to go to the balcony, but I heard the confusion.”
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“Le Duc de Guise arrived with his men-at-arms. There was someone with them, a dark-hooded stranger wearing a mask.”
“I do not suppose it means anything.” “Do you not? I find it all most odd.”
Grandmère Henriette Dushane entered the chamber, followed by Nenette, one of the grisette novices from the Chateau de Silk and also their serving girl. She was carrying Grandmère’s personal case. Her bright carrot hair was awry as usual, and her thin, immature figure was lost to her blue cotton dress.
Grandmère, at seventy, looked as fresh as when she had emerged from her toilet, with every strand of silver hair in place, and her crisp black dress with white collar showing not a wrinkle. She stepped sprightly to the mannequin displaying the burgundy silk gown, and using her round eyeglass, lifted the hem for inspection, scanning for any bunched thread or pulled cloth.
Rachelle held her breath. Grandmère took an extraordinary amount of time, or so it seemed. My nerves will curl with agitation at any moment, she thought.
Grandmère turned to her with a satisfied twinkle in her dark eyes. “Ma cherie, you have done fine work with your needle. I am most
proud of your ability to concentrate on such stitching, but, and only here and there — ” she spread a gracefully wrinkled hand against her small bodice and tipped her head, pursing her lips. “The thread, it is in a few places pulled a fraction too tight, as though ma belle Rachelle was oh so tense.”
Rachelle took her evaluation with calm repose, but inside she was jubilant. Grandmère came to her, smiling, and patted her cheek.
“Ah, but it will pass. Oui, it is fair enough. But remember what I
taught you? The nimble fingers, the relaxed wrists. These you must have. But? I am most pleased with your abilities! Yes, you will do well. Tomorrow you will be permitted to try your hand at the gold tassels for the sleeves.”
Grandmère’s approval was a balm to Rachelle’s tired knees, and well worth having crawled about Marguerite all the morning long. Rachelle’s
slow smile broke into a laugh, and she planted a kiss on Grandmère’s cheek. “Merci, Grandmère.” But she thought: Ah, making the tassels from bright gold thread will take all my concentration. Could she pass another of Grandmère’s inspections? Even so, she found herself deliri- ously pleased to have passed this one test of the hem. And, mais certaine- ment it was an honor to have been chosen by Grandmère to undertake the tassel making. I am now on my way to becoming a couturière.
There was, however, another of her desires that was least discussed. That dream was to design the gowns, to become le dernier cri in fash- ion, and to open a dress shop appealing to the haute monde of London offering ready-sewn gowns carrying the family label of the Dushane- Macquinet Chateau de Silk in Lyon. Such a dream must wait, loitering in the misty future.
Rachelle went off to her private closet to freshen herself before tea. She found her mind wandering again to Marquis Fabien de Vendôme. She had written to her eldest sister Madeleine, in Paris, who was married to Sebastien Dangeau, inquiring about Marquis Fabien. Since Sebastien was his oncle by marriage, Madeleine was well acquainted with Monsieur Fabien. What interesting morsels would Madeleine pass to her?
Chapter Three
W
“When the house of Guise is plotting, be assured it will mean trouble and woe for all those of the religion,” Rachelle’s père often said. She frowned as she readied herself for tea. Was the duc plotting?
She was in her private closet with gold satin bed cushions and light blue draperies. Removing her soiled cotton work dress, she put it aside to be cleaned and poured cool water from the urn into a large white bowl with painted pink rosebuds sitting on her vanity stand. She washed her- self, her mind finding no rest over the morning’s happenings. She used fragrant powder to dry and used her pearl-handled hairbrush on her wealth of long, titian hair.
The Queen Mother had left le Duc de Guise behind at Paris when she gave orders to travel here to Chambord. Rachelle believed Catherine had sought to rid herself of Guise’s influence upon the boy-king Francis and had not expected Guise’s arrival this morning. Yet he arrived boldly with his brother, the cardinal, bringing the masked figure. Why?
She chose her new mint green silk and cream lace dress to wear and arranged her hair in a fashionable new style which Louise de Fontaine had shown her. A knock at the front chamber door drew her attention. It was followed a moment later by Idelette’s voice calling for Grandmère.
Rachelle strained to hear the hushed voices in the front chamber while she quickly finished with her hair. Perhaps it was Comte Sebastien coming to inform them of the messire in the mask. Sebastien, highly positioned in the Queen Mother’s council, would know much of what was happening at Chambord and elsewhere.
Rachelle was adept at discerning people’s moods by voice inflection and when, a few moments later, Grandmère’s became taut, Rachelle set her comb down on top of the blue and gold marble vanity table and went to the closet doorway. She peered into the main chamber.
Rachelle expected to see Sebastien or another visitor and was sur- prised when the only two people standing in the middle of the chamber were Grandmère and Idelette. Rachelle entered and glanced about.
“Did I not hear someone at the door?”
Grandmère and Idelette turned to look at her. Rachelle felt her ten- sions rise. How pale Grandmère had become. Her black moiré dress emphasized this. Idelette’s lean face with its noble bone structure looked as though she had applied two circles of pink rouge.
“What is wrong?” Rachelle asked.
Grandmère lifted the fine silver chain from her shoulder on which was hung a round looking-glass and fingered it absently.
“Ma cousine, Duchesse Xenia Dushane has sent her page Romier.
We three are to come to her chambers for tea at once.”
Rachelle lifted her brows. She would have expected Grandmère to be pleased, for it was not often the duchesse called for their company in a spirit of bonhomie.
“Allons bon!” Grandmère said. She paced the rose-colored Aubusson
rug, the tall, square heels on her pointed black shoes making no sound as they sank into the heavy pile. “At such news as this I despair.”
Rachelle exchanged a questioning glance with Idelette.
“Despair? Over tea with le duchesse? Did you not tell us you were pleased when we arrived at Chambord and discovered she was here?” Rachelle asked, confused.
“But yes, yes, pardon, Rachelle ma cherie, I have not explained.” She
lowered her voice. “It is not Madame Duchesse, but le Duc de Guise and the cardinal of whom I despair.”
“La duchesse is assured of coming trouble,” Idelette said. “Her page has informed us of certain concerns she has.”
“We are to go to her chambers tout de suite,” Grandmère said. “And on the way we must show ourselves of casual countenance, as if thinking of naught else but having tea with her.”
A short time later Rachelle and Idelette walked with slow and digni- fied carriage close behind Grandmère, who led the way through the salle on the south end of the palais chateau. Approving heads turned their way as they passed. Bows from the many messieurs passing them in the salle came like tossed blossoms to sweeten their path. Rachelle was pleased she had taken time before tea to freshen herself and don a clean, becom- ing frock. She cast casual glances here and there in the hope of meeting Marquis de Vendôme, but fair fortune did not call upon her. It is trouble that comes to knock, she thought. Allons bon! Not him. Anyone but that messire! Rachelle saw the young Comte Maurice Beauvilliers, the blood nephew of Sebastien, looking toward them from where he stood on the upper gallery near a stairway. His gaze found her and attached itself.
“It is Monsieur Maurice,” Idelette whispered toward Grandmère. “What should we do now? How can we ignore him?”
“Say nothing. Leave this to me,” Grandmère hissed back. “It is your fault, Rachelle,” Idelette said.<
br />
“My fault!”
“Oui. He is always looking at you. He has romantic plans, I promise you.”
“Fie! I cannot endure the pestilent conceited fellow.” “Shh, both of you,” Grandmère warned. “He is coming.”
Maurice Beauvilliers overtook them and paused ahead in their path with a sweeping bow.
“Bonjour, Madame, Mademoiselles.”
“Bonjour,” they echoed.
“Monsieur le Comte,” Grandmère said, “your Oncle Sebastien left his hat in our chambers yester evening when he called. I have not seen him this day but wish to speak with him. Will you mention it when you see him?”
His inky brows shot up. “Fate! It was I, Madame, who was going to request such information from you belles ladies.” And his languid pearl gray eyes wandered first to Idelette, then to Rachelle. “I am seeking mon oncle. One wonders where he has gotten himself.”
“Ah, then we have foiled one another, bonne sir. If you will pardon us we must be on our way. Merci, Monsieur-Comte, bonjour.” With a nod of her silver head she was moving on her way.
Rachelle smothered a smile.
“Did Sebastien truly leave his hat?” Idelette asked.
“Oui. Most assuredly, ma petite. It is black satin with a peacock made of red and green gems.”
At the far end of the salle they came to a curving stairway, and at the top, on either side of the gallery, priceless tapestries in burgundy, blue, and gold caught Rachelle’s attention. When she reached a painting of King Francis I, grandfather of the present boy-king Francis II, which was displayed in a place of prominence, she slowed her ascent, her emo- tions awakened by the sight. She wondered what Grandmère and Idelette might be thinking as they too looked up into the face of the past king.
The painting caught the light from the upper diamonded windows. Rachelle noticed the king’s eyes were too close together and looked falsely humorous with a touch of sly mirth on his arrogant face. His hawklike features and sensuous lips bore, in the f lickering March sun- light, an enchanted look as though he had just come awake from a spell in the magic forest. This, Rachelle reminded herself, was the king who was hailed for introducing the French Renaissance, who had brought Leonardo da Vinci from Italy and established him in the Chateau de Clos near the king’s own castle of Amboise. Rachelle had heard how Francis I never wearied of da Vinci’s company, and da Vinci was said to have died in the king’s arms.
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