Abundance, A Novel of Marie Antionette

by Sena Jeter Naslund

  I am at Trianon while the King has gone to Compiègne to hunt, which he enjoys so much. Here these gardens which I love are, as they say, being put to bed as the winter season approaches. With the loss of flowers and foliage, I am glad that the windows give views of the small but most charming structures in every direction. Architecture and statuary know no limits of the seasons in their ability to inspire pleasure.

  Now I sit at my small secrétaire, positioned so that I face out the window, and I see the beautiful circular Temple of Love, built on a small island and linked to the shore by darling bridges over the moat. A mat of autumnal golden leaves floats slowly in the water, which reflects a white cloud or two. Within the colonnade of the domed temple is the marble statue of a slender, youthful Cupid fashioning his bow from the club of Hercules.

  I have always loved that passage of Scripture in which pruning hooks are made from spears and out of the implements of aggression come the tools that represent love, harvest, and abundance. How I wish all wars might end, and the brave men who fight for liberty might return safely to those who love them, and I pray for them all, as I am sure my dear mother the Empress does also. Always, when I look out at beauty such as still waters, golden leaves, and azure skies, and all but worship it, I think of my most dear mother, the Empress of my affection.

  Perhaps you have heard of the painter Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, who, like our beloved Gluck, has risen in the world entirely by her own artistic talent and her bright and natural sociability. She is my favorite painter, but I have modified my manner of dress since she last painted me. Now I prefer muslin to satin or silk. I think that perhaps Madame Lebrun has not only the aesthetic resources but also the amiability to produce a new portrait of me that would please my dear mother, the Empress, so that when you view my likeness, you will feel the essence of my presence. You used to scold me for the elaborate artificiality of my dress and hair, but now you will find that fashions in France have modulated. I am still much in fashion, but now I influence dress and decor. The new styles are much more comfortable and economical as well.

  It gives me much pleasure to look through the windows at the combinations of nature and art wherein my Trianon and I are nestled. I like to imagine that my dear Mother, free from the worries of state, sits beside me.

  May I beg permission to borrow Cupid’s wings, then to fly over all the distance between us, thence to kiss my dear Mama most lovingly, with all my soul?

  ON 3 NOVEMBER 1780, the Empress takes time to think of me and to write to me.

  Because it was your birthday, I spent yesterday more in France than in Austria. I pictured you being greeted by your friends and sitting down to enjoy a delightful dinner or an amusing entertainment. Memory allowed me to revisit, as well, so many shared happy times, now gone forever. Still, memory is a great consolation to the old, as is the thought of new young life, such as that of your so very sweet little girl. And because you assure me that your relation with the King is good, I think of the future and of what will surely be the consequences of that good marital relation. To think that you will soon produce an heir to the throne of France, one that unites the blood of Bourbon and Hapsburg houses, as you were sent to France to accomplish for the peace of the world, is the greatest consolation I can imagine. At my age I need assistance with my work and consolation for my spirit because one after the other those of my own generation are inevitably lost to me, and I am quite overcome.

  Because I have a good deal of pain from rheumatism in the arm and hand that hold the pen, I myself am writing to you with less control. Though the letters I am forming may be shaky in appearance, and I feel that now I must end, take note not of their form but only of their message, which unwaveringly assures you of all my love.

  Thus ends our correspondence.

  So I read again my last letter from my mother, the Empress of Austria, dated 3 November 1780.

  I can scarcely see her crooked letters through the blur of tears, but this page I hold in my hand is my last link to her. It was the side of her own right hand that rested on this page as she wrote, pausing to have the strength to continue, regripping the quill with her fingertips from time to time. Would that I could cover her hand with my kisses and wet it with my tears so that she would know my love. When the news came, I thought that my face would explode with sorrow.

  It is now December. My mother died 29 November 1780.

  I take a deep breath, trying to empower myself to step forward through my life. I cannot imagine the future in which no letters from her will come. These ten years I have been in France, she has been my guide, the prop to my soul. She has taught me to pray, and I will not forget her lessons.

  TO MY BROTHER, Joseph II, 10 December 1780:

  Though I struggle with every breath not to drench this page, I am crushed by the misfortune of our loss, and I cannot stop crying. Oh, my brother, my last link to my Austrian homeland, my friend! Our mother who watched over us is gone. Take care to watch over yourself—For me, I cannot see to write. You will surely not forget we are friends, allies, as she wished us ever to be.

  I implore you: Love me. Kiss me.

  Out the window, I see the broad terraces, an empty world blanketed in December snow, and where is a coverlet for my heart?

  A FRIEND

  Here is my friend, my Yolande, come to stand quietly beside me. She waits. I look up at her and know she sees the red misery in my face from crying. She smiles at me encouragingly. Yes, she has in her hands a little tray bearing the potion that often calms me when my spirits soar too high or plunge too deep.

  Gratefully, I take the chalice of orange-flower water; she empties a fresh spoonful of sugar into the liquid and swirls it round.

  Through the glass, I feel warmth, for she has had my orange water potion heated to counteract the chill of the weather.

  Yolande asks if I would like the curtain loosened from its loop so as to shield me from the bleak view of the frozen courtyard, but I shake my head. “No, dear friend,” I say, and again she smiles at me, and her eyes glow with love. “I must see things as they really are.”

  She is looking very well, already quite slender after the birth of her new son. I inquire of his health.

  “It has been nine years since the births of Aglaië and Armand,” I remark. “But I see you have not forgotten how to mother.”

  “Nor shall I ever. Here, let me put my shawl around your shoulders.”

  It is a gorgeous piece woven of wool and gleaming silk, the rich reds and golds of last fall intermingle—a fantasia representing her soul. I gave her this token of my affection.

  Impulsively, I reach up and take her hand. While I drink the orange-flavored warmth she, ever patient, joins me in gazing out the window.

  “It will soon be spring,” she murmurs.

  “Nothing perturbs you,” I reply. “Not the coldest blasts of calumny.”

  “And why should it, when the Queen has chosen me as her friend and confidante?”

  Always, she is direct in her speech and goes to the heart of every attitude.

  “And did it not infuriate you, when last fall, certain pamphlets claimed that I, the Queen, was the father of your child?” I give her a wan smile.

  “The King himself visited me and the babe in my private home in Paris. Why should I fear gossip when the King so marks me with his favor? No one else has received such a mark of distinction.”

  “The King appreciates how you give yourself to me.”

  “In truth, it is the two of you who make my life so complete.”

  I release her hand, for I hear her baby boy crying just beyond the door. I know she must want to go to him and take him from the arms of his nurse. “Go,” I whisper, and I feel a small, real smile curve the corners of my mouth. With her halo of dark curls, her face is lovely to regard.

  No sooner do I give her this gentle command than my husband brings us some white chocolate candies from molds shaped like sheep. They are coated with sugar crystals.

  “I
have a box for you as well,” he says to Yolande, “but I believe you prefer the jellied fruits to the chocolate bonbons.”

  “Your Majesty remembers everything,” she replies.

  “You have come to us when we very much needed comforting, my dear countess,” he says and warmly takes her hand in his for a moment. Her baby whimpers again.

  Yolande turns from us. Perhaps God will give me a son this time. I listen to the crying of the boy baby in the room beyond and memorize the sounds of his tiny male voice.

  People at court say that Yolande’s lover, the Comte de Vaudreuil, is the father of her child. Protected, she cares nothing for such gossip. Certainly she feels no shame but inhabits her life as she lives it, her head held high. She has charmed even the King, who does not much like women, myself excepted. Because he is devoted to me and to our duty as King and Queen, I have no fear that the King would take her or any other woman as a mistress.

  I resolve that I will prevail upon my husband to give my friend a new title by summer: Duchesse de Polignac.

  Perhaps I live a lucky life, fortunate in my husband and in my friends. At twenty-five, I am still young. If I am no longer a daughter to any living woman, then I must pour myself into being a mother. And should I bear a son, I fulfill not only my mother’s ardent desire but also the hopes of my husband and of France.

  I DREAM I AM at Schönbrunn, tucked in among the skirts of my sister and the ladies of our court, and I am watching the little Mozart—Wunder-kind—from across the room. As he performs his marvels at the keyboard, he sometimes swings his heels, which dangle high above the carpet. His notes swirl and swoop like the arabesques beneath his dangling feet. When the keys are draped, still he touches each one with perfect accuracy.

  Then comes the moment of daring. After the harpsichord notes have fallen like an amazing silver shower from his small fingers, the little Mozart slides from the bench and runs as though winged across the room to throw himself into my mother’s imperial lap. I have become Mozart and I kiss her big on her naked cheek and demand, “Now do you love me?”

  She kisses him—Mozart again—as though he might have been her own dear child.

  LETTER FROM AXEL VON FERSEN

  My dear Friend,

  Having just received the dreadful news of the death of your most dear mother, I hasten to write that my deepest sympathy is entwined with your sorrow at every moment. I know your nature and how its sweetness and sensitivity also make it vulnerable to the most profound feelings of loss. Let me express the idea that I hope will be consoling to you that even as you ache for your loss you are honoring her.

  I know perhaps better than anyone that you have the ability to continue an intimacy based on spiritual affinity; thus, your spirit and hers can never be truly separated. Death is not an insurmountable barrier, no more than are our earthly constraints of place and time.

  I know this letter will be some weeks in reaching you across the waters of the broad Atlantic, yet as you hold it in your hand, now, in this moment, you are aware that my spirit is with you. What matter time and place?

  So it is with your beloved mother. Look for her in your heart. You will find her there.

  I can write to you now that my men and I are in good spirits. We have been forced to stay here in Rhode Island during the previous summer and winter while a heavily armed British warship patrols the harbor.

  I have tried to imagine sometimes how the officers on the deck of the British ship are thinking. Surely, they must think they own the world. They take it for granted they have the right to hang any man who is not where he should be, and they have surely destroyed letters from my dear sister Sofie, whose health is always of great interest to me.

  Our soldiers have been pinned down this long winter. I am sure you can imagine their restlessness and despair—so far away from their loved ones and from the nightlife of Paris. I have had to choose my words carefully in talking with the other officers. Otherwise, we get involved in pointless arguments.

  Tomorrow, we set off for Philipsburg and then New York. There are hundreds of men in my force and Lafayette surely has a thousand more. Together with Washington’s army we will surely prevail.

  In October, I met George Washington outside of Hartford. He is the most famous of men—a hero in our times. His beautiful face is mild and polite showing his moral character. He is cool, speaking few words and yet he is good-natured and kind. There is a sadness in his eyes that intrigues me. His men walk in the snow, many of them without shoes. If they must, they leave a crimson trail of footprints, yet they march on. All about me is the spirit of courage.

  You, too, most dear of women, possess such courage. You are not alone, nor will you ever be.

  Faithfully, your servant

  LETTER TO AXEL VON FERSEN

  My bravest friend,

  It is exactly as you said. My eyes devour your words; my fingers hold your pages tenderly between their tips, and your spirit is with me. Inside myself, I always hold you dear, but with this tangible connection, I feel I exist inside the aura of your compassion. Light fills my soul when you remind me that you are with me and will be always.

  I would have you feel my presence, despite the paradox of my absence, just as strongly. Sometimes I fear that you feel alone—that my spirit is not robust enough to be a real presence in your life. Yet, I do not want you to think of me too much! I want you to be free to meet whatever dangers lie in America with your full attention.

  The loss of my mother sits like a stone in the base of my throat. At this point, it is a smooth stone, a weight, an impediment to happiness, but my swallowed tears have worn it smooth. In the first month, I felt the stab of the sharp edges and rough cruelty of her death.

  To you, in whom I can safely confide everything, I can speak the truth of how I loved my mother and how I treasured every sign of her affection for me. At the same time, I was sometimes afraid of her. I feared not her person but her displeasure. With her death, I feel that she has forgiven me my shortcomings, that from her heavenly position she understands my human frailty and weakness.

  It is particularly in relationship to my gambling mania that I feel forgiven. (What a luxury it is not to feel the need to conceal from you anything about myself!) I wasted vast sums of money at the tables. I cannot excuse myself. Never! But from this perspective in time, I do feel that I lived in desperation then. I felt like a toad. No wonder my husband shunned my bed. My fear of losing money, my desire to win astonishing riches were like an intoxicant. Worse, I’m sure, than any wine or spirits. At the tables, I entered a trance, as some are said to do when they communicate with the dead. There I escaped from my own body, my lack of charm, my bad chin, my too large lower lip, my uneven shoulders. You have seen them all, yet you never see my imperfections. You do not wish to change me.

  But my mother always hoped for my improvement.

  Sometimes I am filled with the anguish that I may have disappointed her. Then I think of you and bask in the glow of your affection.

  I am grateful to God for allowing our bond to exist. That your friendship with my husband is as steadfast as that for myself makes my happiness complete.

  I pray for your safety. I wish I could envision you more exactly in that raw country across the water. As my mother used to write to me, I delight in knowing all the details of your daily life. I think that you must find their General Washington an admirable leader? Though he lacks noble blood, I am sure he would be at home in the Hall of Mirrors here at Versailles, just as Monsieur Franklin was.

  Sometimes I look at our nobility and think what a worthless lot they are! Have you ever felt so? Once the King said so, when he discovered us playing forbidden games at the gambling tables. He never scolds. I am ashamed to say how many times he paid my debts.

  Our debt to you for your allegiance to France—yes—but for your personal friendship and devotion can never be paid. Yet you can be sure that it is met in kind.

  I reread this letter and see that I have not account
ed for my escape from the bouts of hysteria that could be dissipated only by immersing myself in gambling. Becoming a mother has given me fulfillment. Being known by the dearest of friends is like having an angel who guards my happiness.

  A new happiness is that I am pregnant again. Of course we hope that this child will be the longed-for heir to the throne, but in any case I await with impatience the moment when I lie down to begin my labor. Almost, I want the pain of it. I relish the thought of being filled—brim-full—with my pregnancy.

  At no moment do I forget you! The thought of you—just the thought—makes all my moments joyful.

  RED STOCKINGS

  The so-called Nords arrive today, but they are really the heirs, traveling incognito, to the throne of the Tsarina Catherine of Russia. It is one thing to act the part of the Queen of France among mere nobility, another when royalty are to visit. As I watch their splendid coach approach the Marble Courtyard, I drink a large glass of water to try to steady my nerves. At least my Rose Bertin has been so kind as to tell me the “Duchesse de Nord” has ordered the most fashionable clothes possible in which to appear so that she will not be nervous about her clothes during her visit to Versailles.

  Suddenly my stage fright melts away, and I feel every fiber of my body vibrate with confidence and graciousness. This is Versailles, built to daunt visitors from any part of the world.

  IT IS THREE O’CLOCK in the morning and still they have not left, but the supper was exquisite, and in the Peace room I arranged for a performance of Gluck’s beautiful music from Iphigénie en Aulide. Many more fetes are to follow, and of course each must be more magnificent than the one before.