I am sending you a crate of dried quinces from the orchard here. The taste is sharp but the scent is simply heavenly.
Love,
Marie-Anne
Louise
VERSAILLES AND RAMBOUILLET
1734
A
long, aquiline nose. Divine hooded eyes—can I use the word
divine
if not talking of Him?—pale and brown, Anjou pears at the end of summer. His hair is long and glorious, like a bear’s pelt, and wondrously soft.
His skin is very fair, a little pitted but only as would make him masculine. He likes it when I tickle and kiss the back of his neck and when I run my hands lightly and delicately over his chest and back. He calls them my little dove fingers.
At first there were qualms and incertitude. Louis had never been an unfaithful husband and the new role rested uneasily on his shoulders. Many nights he and I stayed awake to discuss his misgivings, which were mine as well.
“I don’t want to be as my great-grandfather . . . So many women. The people of France . . . They knew him to be an immoral man, and he was not loved for that.”
“But, Louis, my love, you are a man. And you love me. How can this be wrong? And you must not care what the people think. You are the
king
.”
He sighs heavily. “There, my love, I must disagree. Fleury always says that the love of the people is one of the most important ingredients in this fateful soup that is kingship. The last king was highly admired in his youth, but by the end of his reign the people were tired of him. He was known as the Sun King, but also the Sin King. I must never be called that, never.”
“But the people love you, darling!” It is true the people adore
their young king; he is seen as the savior who will lead France to recoup the glory it has lost in recent years through endless wars and famines. I’m not sure how he will do that: Louis is just one man, and perhaps even a little bit lazy, but I am sure Fleury will think of something.
Louis sighs again; he has a somber side and sometimes passes days or even weeks in deep depression. During those times he wishes to be alone, or as alone as a king can be, and I do my best to make him comfortable and coax him back to the world again.
“The queen must never find out,” Louis declares, with more passion than he has said, or done, anything all day. “I would die of mortification and shame. Dearest, this sin is not a cloak I wear lightly.”
I take his hands in mine and beseech him to come to bed. We are in his private rooms, far above his official bedroom, alone in this warm and cozy cocoon. He refuses my hand and continues to stare moodily into the fire.
“Sin is not like a piece of clothing, Louise,” he says finally, speaking to the dark and to the demons that haunt him. “You cannot simply put it on, then take it off and be pure again. Once you have sinned as I have . . . as we have . . . there is no return to the straight life.”
I feel myself growing cold at the thought of being taken off and placed on a hook, discarded and never to be worn again.
“But, confession, my love . . .”
He waves away my protests. “Confession. How can I confess when I am living in sin? I shall not be confessing for a long, long time.” Fortunately for both of us, Fleury supports our love—he was after all the mastermind that brought us together—and as a man of God, as well as Louis’s closest adviser, his influence is unique.
I am silent, unsure of what to say or do. Louis is perplexing; underneath the layers of convention and perfect manners, there is a man much more complex. He is a very private man, perhaps
because of his strange life: orphaned suddenly at the age of two when his mother, father, and elder brother all died of measles within months of each other; then king at the tender age of five when his great-grandfather Louis XIV died. His beloved governess, the Duchesse de Ventadour, was as his mother, but at the age of seven he was cruelly taken from her and thrust into the world of men; from that time on, Fleury was his father and none but he had his trust.
And he does not want to disappoint his father.
I think back to my time before Puysieux, to my indecision, to the desire to be faithful and beloved in God’s eyes, pure. Now that time seems so long ago, just a little girl’s fantasies. I am not saying I no longer regret my sins, and of course I still attend Mass, but . . . life must be lived. I think of my husband, Louis-Alexandre, and shudder. Surely love and happiness cannot be such great sins? Surely God understands? A log falls in the fire and snaps Louis out of his reverie. He sighs deeply. Oh, how it hurts me when he is in distress!
“All I want is for you to be happy.”
“I am happy, Louise,” he says solemnly. “But is He, up there, happy with me? I do not presume to say. Tomorrow, I want you to pray for me.”
“Of course, my love. My darling, come to bed now, for soon it will be dawn and I must go. Come, please, I want to hold you and comfort you.”
“A sinner, a sinner,” he mutters as he climbs the steps to the bed to lie beside me.
Luckily his black moods never last long and soon his doubts subside, and as the months pass we come to know a pure, true love. I cease to think of him as the king. Now he is just Louis, my lover. The love of my life. Oh, how I adore him! I wish I were a Molière or a Racine in my way with words so that I could express completely how much I love him; all I can say is that everything about him is perfect. Everything. From the tips of his delicate fingers, with his lead-buffed nails, to the top of his head and his ambrosial
brown hair, down to his toes and the little hairs that grow only on his big toe but not on the other ones. I adore everything about him.
And he loves me. He calls me his little Bijou. Jewel. Isn’t that heavenly? I’d sooner have that endearment than all the real jewels in the world. Which is fortunate as Louis doesn’t have much money for jewels. He cannot be generous with me because our love is secret, though occasionally Fleury passes me some money. But I am not Louis’s mistress because I want a hundred gowns or dozens of diamonds. I am his mistress because I love him deeply and dearly and I would still love him if he were a lowly kitchen hand and we had to sleep in . . . in the kitchen, or wherever it is that kitchen hands sleep.
But Louis is the king, and that cannot be changed.
Now my world is split in two—divided between the hours I spend with him, and the hours without him. Though fortunately Fleury and his other ministers—Maurepas, d’Angervilliers, Amelot—mostly take care of the business of government, there are still papers to sign, ambassadors to meet with, ceremonies and regimental reviews to undertake, public dinners to attend. On those days when the demands of kingship must keep us apart, I feel empty and hollow inside and my stomach flutters with a thousand sad butterflies. The moment I see him again my mood is calmed. He is a drug for me, like the Indian opium that they say floats you away on a boat of blissful calm.
Only when we are finally alone, after a long day spent on the public stage of life, can he truly be with me. When we are alone, nothing else exists. Even though his life is lived almost entirely in public, Louis is a very private person and I know he relishes our secret as much as I do. At Versailles he sometimes comes to me, or I visit his private apartments under the lid of night, disguised with a mask and wearing my woman Jacobs’s plain cloak. When the Court makes the annual visits to the royal castles of Compiègne or Fontainebleau, the rigid rules of Versailles still apply; it is only when he travels unofficially, on matters of the hunt or
pleasure, that can we spend the entire night, and sometimes even the day, together.
This week we are at Rambouillet, a small ivy-covered château not far from Versailles, owned by the Comte and Comtesse de Toulouse. Some disparage her and her husband and call them faithful buffoons, but I think their devotion to each other is charming. I like the comtesse; she is a kindhearted woman and knows the king well from when he was a little boy, and the king in turn adores her.
When she learned our secret she hugged me and told me she was delighted, and whispered that she had rarely seen the king so happy and content.
At Rambouillet this week we are an intimate group—Charolais, Gilette, the young and very dear Comtesse d’Estrées, as well as the Prince de Soubise and a few other of Louis’s close friends. Still, there are those among us who do not know the truth. Bachelier assigns our rooms and I am given a small chamber above the king’s, our rooms linked by a secret staircase carved inside the thick stone walls of an ancient tower. My room is decorated in the Turkish style, the walls hung with generous blue velvet and a thick orange carpet on the floor. There are stars painted on the wooden ceiling, and at night when the king lies beside me I look up and feel as though we are in Heaven.
During the day, while the men hunt, I wander through gardens draped with lush bowers of overgrown roses and the last of the summer marigolds. I trail along the river and lose myself in the tranquil outer gardens, aimless and content. I have no wish to sit with the other ladies and listen to their speculation as to which shade of yellow most becomes a brunette (though I do think it is lemon, not mustard, as Charolais contends), and who the king’s lover is.
Very few know—our love is a secret kept as hidden as a garter—but many are beginning to suspect. The king’s attendance in the queen’s bed is vigilantly tracked and it is well noted that he no longer frequents it as before. Everyone accepts that the queen is old and faded and declines to be disturbed on saint’s days, so
now the question on everyone’s lips is: Where is the king putting his ardor, for surely such a young and virile man must be putting it somewhere?
“It must be Geneviève de Lauraguais—those amethyst eyes! Who could resist them?”
“Her husband, for one. Personally, I think it’s just a maid, or a few of them—little grimy girls from the kitchens.”
A shriek and some laughter. “Not our sovereign, my dear, not our sovereign. He would never touch anything so dirty.”
“What is there that some water and a scrub cannot clean? My husband was once positively addicted to some little maid with a dreadful Gascon accent. We must remember the king is a man, no more, no less.”
Another shriek. “Treason! Absolute treason. And you, Louise, who do you wager on?”
“The Duchesse de Lauraguais,” I say quickly. “Her eyes are so beautiful.”
I give the easy answer, then get up and leave the ladies and their gossip and speculation behind. I lose myself down a path of decaying yellow rosebushes, trailing my hand over the flowers and occasionally snapping off a few. I gather a bouquet and sneak it up to my room, and lay it on the bed. Will they last till the evening?
Now the night draws near and the guests depart for their rooms, full of braised boar and sleepy on champagne. The king retires with no ceremony, just Bachelier and a fresh chemise; nights here are longer and more intimate.
Alone in my room I sprinkle rosewater on my wrists and lap, then I pull back the carpet and lie down carefully on the floor. I turn my ear to the oaken slats; where the old boards warp away from each other the sounds from the room below rise up. I feel close to him even though I cannot see him.
“A good day today,” I hear Bachelier say to the sounds of a jacket being beaten for dust.
“Mmm, by goodness, that last one was a great beast. And I want word of Pasha—we cannot have that horse lame.”
Silence.
“The blue one, I think.” I imagine him donning his chemise and robe.
Silence, the sound of a chest being closed.
“Just one candle.”
“Shall I light the way, sire?”
“No need, I shall follow my nose.”
The two men chuckle and I flush—is this a good thing or a bad thing? Do I wear too much scent, or not enough?
“Sire, I will be here if you need me.”
I hope Bachelier can’t hear from below as well as I can from above. I get up and open the little door, hidden behind a tapestry on the wall.
“Bijou,” he says, coming in to the room and kissing me softly on the lips. “You smell delicious.”
I take the candle from him and place it on the table by the bed.
“Kiss me again,” he commands, and pulls me to him. “At last,” he murmurs, and my heart beats faster.
“Ah, good, you have not undressed.”
“Of course not, darling. I know how much you enjoy it.”
He sets to work, untying the bows on my gown, unlacing my corset, detaching my skirts, his brow furrowed in determination and his fingers thick with anticipation. My desire grows, as does his. “Damned bows,” he mutters, and I giggle. He likes this—a challenge for a man who has had his life served to him, completely.
“I can’t help you, Twinkles, you know you forbade it.” “Twinkles” is my pet name for him—because his eyes shine like stars. He declares it adorable.
Finally he yanks the last string and I am naked, my dress and petticoats a heap on the floor.
“Victory,” he says softly. “You cannot know how I have been waiting for this.” He pushes me down on the bed. “All through the meal I was eyeing that gown and I knew it would give me trouble. But now I have you.”
You have me. You have all of me, I think in delight.
A gust of night wind finds the candle on the table and suddenly all is inky darkness. Louis wants me to go into the hall and take a light from a sconce, but I resist, just a bit. It is new for me, this power over a man. This power over a king.
“No. Wait,” I say. “Let’s enjoy the darkness.”
“I submit to your desire.”
We lie still, holding each other, surrounded by the black of velvet. Soon the room lightens as moonlight casts a silver glow around the chamber. He traces my face with his hands and I smile up at him.
“I love you,” he says, and I know he means it.
“I love you too.”
Oh, Heaven. After we make love I lie beside him as he starts to snore, and once he is safely asleep I slip out of the warm bed and offer up my prayers, as I do every night, that we will have a child together. Then my happiness would be complete and the world would be perfect.