by Juliet Grey
Finally, the door to the Queen’s Bedchamber opened and Louis stood on the threshold with our newborn in his arms. His face betrayed no emotion; I feared I had given France another daughter.
And then, just as his eyes began to smile, he announced, “Madame, you have fulfilled my wishes and those of France. Monsieur le dauphin begs leave to enter.”
I gasped and my hand flew to my chest. My eyes flooded with tears. “A son!” After nearly eleven and a half years of marriage. If only Maman had been alive to hear the news, to celebrate the happiest, and most important, event of my life. I was allowed but a few moments to hold him before our precious prize was handed to the royal governess, the princesse de Guéméné. “Take him back, for he belongs not to me but to France,” I declared, adding with a fond smile, “My daughter, however, is my own.”
The tiny dauphin then passed into the hands of the wet nurse, a country woman we had nicknamed “Madame Poitrine,” who swore like a sailor, but was the most robust and wholesome woman we could find.
The gilded doors of the bedchamber were opened to the blare of trumpets, announcing the birth of a dauphin. The palace cannon fired a 101-gun salute, the announcement to all within earshot that the queen had borne a son. Versailles was in a gala mood. Men and women laughed and wept, and even the courtiers who so often disparaged me came to offer their felicitations. As the princesse de Guéméné, borne aloft in an armchair, paraded our son through the gilded halls, everyone wanted to touch him, or at least the princesse, or even the chair, as though it might bring them luck.
At the christening that afternoon the dauphin was baptized Louis Joseph Xavier François, but the event was marred by the presence of the two most detestable men at Versailles: Monsieur, who stood as proxy for the infant’s godfather, Emperor Joseph II of Austria; and the unctuous prince de Rohan, the Cardinal and Royal Almoner, who had the honor of officiating. I said not a single word to him, glaring at his moonfaced countenance across the baptismal font. Everything about him made my skin pebble with disgust, from the ostentatious lace cuffs beneath his red moiré cassock to the expensive perfume that hovered about him like an aromatic cloud, which always reminded me of the stories about his concubines and his illicit trade in ladies’ stockings during his tenure as France’s ambassador to Austria. Now that Maman was gone forever his disrespect for her rankled all the more. I did not have much traffic with the cardinal-prince; nonetheless, I had pointedly refused to address him or even so much as favor him with a civil look since his arrival at Versailles.
The following day, a parade of representatives from each of the trade guilds paid us an official visit, bearing a gift from their respective crafts, as if our newbon son was the savior of France. The butchers delivered an enormous ox; the pastry makers, a tremendous meringue; the locksmiths, a cunning lock that displayed an image of a dauphin once it was opened; even the grave diggers came to pay homage, with the present of a coffin—a gift I found particularly macabre, though no one else so much as flinched. And fifty market women from Les Halles, dressed in black and dripping with diamonds, were presented to me.
As soon as I could, I sent the news to Joseph; the forty-year-old emperor was reduced to tears of joy, replying, “My heart is bursting with happiness for my sister, who is the woman I love best in the world.”
But perhaps everyone at Versailles was not quite as elated. A satire titled Les Amours de Charlot et Antoinette that was making the rounds through the backstairs found its way onto Louis’s desk. The plot revolved around the efforts of Antoinette and Charlot (a thinly veiled caricature of Artois) to reach orgasm as they consummated their passion, owing to the continued interruption of a page boy, summoned each time “Antoinette” pressed the bell beside her as she thrashed about in ecstasy. And a scurrilous pamphlet depicting Louis crowned with the horns of a cuckold announced “The queen has finally given birth to a son—but who the devil produced him?” There wasn’t a scintilla of truth, of course, to any of it; and my beau-frère was hardly my closest confidant, nor had he been one of my favorite companions for years. But I believed that the true intent of the libelles was not merely to cast aspersions on my marital fidelity and the paternity of my children, but to injure the king as well, by choosing the one man whose betrayal would wound him the most—his charming and handsome brother.
Louis shared my anguish and tried to comfort me, apologizing for being thus far unable to destroy the poisonous plants at their roots. “I can impound the presses that print the slanderous rumors, confiscate the pamphlets, and burn the caricatures, but cannot seem to stem the tide of pestilential libelles,” he lamented.
Confined until I was churched, I had much time to ruminate upon the past several years. Although I had never committed any sins against the courtiers of Versailles or the people of France, my character had for years been painted in an unflattering light and with the birth of the dauphin I was moved to recast it. My elaborate poufs would become a thing of the past—although there was another, more pragmatic, reason for this as well.
“Your hair is so thin and fine now, it is coming out in my hand.” During this last pregnancy Monsieur Léonard began complaining that he was having difficulty styling my tresses because they had become so badly damaged. Years of frizzling and teasing had taken their toll and the coiffeur determined that masking the problem with false hair and wigs was no longer the best remedy. “Would Your Majesty permit me to cut it short?”
I had not considered such a drastic solution, but Léonard convinced me. “And if I know you, Majesté, you will look upon the new style not as a mark of shame, but as a fashionable new beginning to celebrate the birth of a son of France.”
And he was right: “Coiffure à l’enfant,” as we dubbed it, along with a spate of fashionable new textile colors (such as the ochre-brown “caca Dauphin”), soon became the rage, with the most elegant women in Paris having their long locks cropped into the short, feathery style.
This new mode was not, however, the way our court painter, Madame Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, was determined to immortalize me with her brushes and oils. In 1782 she decided to depict me in one of my white muslin chemises à la Reine.
The portraitist scheduled several appointments, and finally dared to admit (for she was anything but modest about her talents) that I was the most difficult person she had ever endeavored to limn. “Your complexion is entirely without shadows; it has a delicateness and translucence that defies interpretation with an artist’s meager tools. I apply paint to canvas and believe I have captured it, only to discover that I have still missed something. Not only that, Your Majesty’s countenance can shift in an instant. When you see your children, your face is lit from within and one can see the playful girl inside you. And in the next moment, when a minister or dignitary wishes to speak with you, you assume the most striking dignity and poise I have ever seen.”
“But if I were not the queen they would say I looked insolent, non?” I half jested. I remembered that some of the servants at the Hofburg had whispered as much about me when I was a girl, owing to the shape of my protruding lower lip. If only that had changed with childbirth, I mused, instead of my body. My shape had thickened after bearing two children and by now the size of my bosom, which I once feared would never grow, was considerable. In the span of a few of years I had watched myself transform from sylph to matron.
One morning as I made my toilette during my lever, I found myself startled by the reflection in my mirror. Although Maman had been gone for nearly two years, it was her face that gazed back at me.
TWENTY
May God Forgive Me
1783
It had cost France some 772 million livres to aid the American revolutionaries and help the fledging nation become and remain independent, an unfathomable amount—far greater than anything we had spent on a foreign conflict, including the Seven Years’ War, which had effectively bankrupted the treasury of my husband’s predecessor, Louis XV. But now our mercenaries were coming home and there was on
e face and figure I looked forward to greeting more than any other.
Much had happened even in the past year. After the prince de Guéméné was compelled to declare bankruptcy owing to a financial scandal, the princesse resigned her position as governess to the children of France. The prince retired to his estate in Navarre, while his wife decamped to Brittany, surrounded by her two dozen lapdogs. It was frightfully embarrassing for all of us, for the nobility, as well as the monarchy, lived almost entirely on credit. The comte d’Artois was indebted for twenty-one million francs, and yet he continued to buy horses and carriages and clothes (and to support at least one maîtresse, Diane de Polignac).
I replaced the princesse with my beloved amie Gabrielle, the duchesse de Polignac—tearfully convincing the king on bended knee not to name his conniving maiden aunt Adélaïde instead—but the appointment of the duchesse created a scandal of its own. Gabrielle and I had enjoyed a brief falling-out—her avarice, not merely for herself, but for her friends and relations, had touched a nerve; moreover, I distrusted her lover, the comte de Vaudreuil. But a few months’ absence began to heal my wounded sensibilities and I realized that I greatly missed her sweet melodic voice, and her vivacious presence in my rooms. And so I invited her to return to court. But her plum assignment as royal governess and the attendant perquisite of a capacious thirteen-room suite at Versailles engendered a spate of malicious gossip.
However, there was no one more deserving of the position, for the duchesse had been one of my dearest companions for years, had witnessed the births of the royal infants, had watched them grow, and loved them with all her heart.
I found myself at the center of another maelstrom as well. In May, after being accepted to the prestigious Academie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Madame Vigée-Lebrun had placed on display her portrait of me en gaulle, wearing a broad-brimmed straw hat trimmed with a blue ribbon and a pair of fluffy egret plumes. But neither of us could ever have imagined the outcry it generated; men and women from every stratum of society criticized the canvas—not for the artist’s talents, but for the mode in which I was depicted. To all the world it appeared as though the queen of France had demolished the dignity of her rank by appearing publicly in her chemise. Kinder critics thought I was dressed like a child, for the lightweight frocks were a customary fashion for little girls. And there was a universal hue and cry over the pink rose I held in my hands as roses were symbolic of Hapsburg Austria, although it had been a hallmark of portraiture for centuries to portray the subject with a prop that signified their origin or profession. To the French, however, the rose was not an allusion to my family and place of birth, but a sinister coded image, conveying my ongoing allegiance to my homeland over that of my adopted France—for if this was not the case, why did I not hold a lily?
It was Trianon where I found myself more and more, devoting my time to my children and my music, escaping the poisonous air of the palace, both literally and figuratively. The dauphin was, alas, a sickly little tot, smaller than many children of his age, and his lungs were not developing properly. Fetid gossip aside, the air at Versailles was unhealthful for his delicate condition and I would soon have to find a more salubrious location where he might grow stronger and thrive.
Motherhood suited me as I had always known that it would. And I had finally given France her heir. In that respect I had much to be content about. And when I heard the news in June that Axel von Fersen’s regiment had landed safely in Brest, the American War of Independence finally at an end, my heart soared with delight and anticipation. I began to count the days until his arrival at Versailles, paying especial attention to my daily toilette, and choosing my wardrobe with particular care, never sure when he might return to court.
One day in early July, he found me in the orangerie at le Petit Trianon. I was picking fruit for a summer punch, when I heard a warm baritone voice declare, “I am sorry to have kept you waiting, Majesté.”
I spun around, nearly dropping the osier basket. Our eyes met for the first time in three and a half years. He saw a young matron in a beribboned straw bonnet and yards of featherlight muslin. I saw … a much changed man; a bit older of course, and a bit thinner, perhaps from want of good food; but much of the youthful vitality had waned from his eyes, replaced with the world-weary expression of one who has suffered and seen much. The hollows of his cheeks had become more pronounced; his color, once high, had grown somewhat sallow. And yet, his face and figure could still bestir my heart as no one else’s ever had.
Appraising each other’s appearance, we drank in the sight for several moments. His blue coat was nearly the same azure as the sky, the froth of lace at his throat as full, yet insubstantial, as a cloud. With such a resemblance to the firmament he could have been an angel who had floated down to earth to guide me.
I did not fling myself into his arms like a heartsick lover, relieved to have her paramour home from the war, safe and whole, but the sensations of gratitude for his survival were the same nonetheless. “Walk with me,” I said excitedly. “I wish to hear about every minute of your absence.” And when he gallantly offered his arm, the heat of his body warming mine set aloft a fleet of nervous butterflies in my belly. Had his feelings changed? Had he given his heart to someone in North America? Mr. Franklin had spoken so rhapsodically about the handsome, pragmatic ladies of Boston and Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York. Perhaps one of these belles had suited his sober Swedish temperament.
“If I may hazard a guess, Your Majesty will be pleased to learn that there was little opportunity to indulge in pastimes.” Axel smiled. “I was quite occupied with more vital matters. Two years ago I saw action, fighting at the Battle of Yorktown—I am sure you read the news of it in the gazette. And when the British general Lord Cornwallis surrendered to Mr. Washington in the presence of General Rochambeau, I had the great privilege of acting as Mr. Washington’s translator. I can understand what the American people see in their military commander in chief. Mr. Washington is a very tall man, with the air of a hero about him, although I found him to be somewhat cold, not effusive, as so many Americans are. He speaks but little, but he is polite and a gentleman.”
We paused as I showed him the progress Monsieur Mique had made on my rustic little village, or hameau, that would support a working farm and dairy. “I have now chosen the dozen indigent farmers and their families who will reside there and cultivate the land. But I have told Monsieur Mique that I wish the buildings to appear charmingly weathered with age, reminiscent of the cottages I used to see on the outskirts of Vienna, so I am engaging scenic painters to ‘distress’ the façades with their brushes.” Axel looked amused. “If you could, why would you not do everything within your power and imagination to make your surroundings as amenable as possible, to create a bulwark against the cruel world? You would be shocked, perhaps, to read some of the libelles that are being published about me. I am personally blamed for bad harvests, grain shortages, and every incident of adultery or failed marriages. If any woman dares assert herself against her husband, I am faulted for setting her a bad example, because it is believed that I control the king.
“They are all falsehoods, but so cunningly penned that they are roundly credited. Even my own brother believes I have more influence with Louis than I truly do, for the king does not consult me in matters of foreign policy and has made it quite clear that he has no intentions of ever doing so.” How fine it felt, how comfortable to be able to unburden my heart to Axel’s sympathetic ears!
“You will find France much changed since you left it,” I told him. “Monsieur Necker with his confidence in loans—of course he made his career in banking, so it is no wonder—is gone, replaced with Charles Alexandre Calonne as Minister of Finance, and owing to his belief that our economy can only be strengthened if we become a mercantile nation to rival the English, we have embarked on a great campaign to encourage manufacturing by building factories and increasing coal production. Much to the delight of Mademoiselle Bertin and her rival
marchandes de mode, women may now join trade guilds. Finalement, the kingdom is growing more enlightened and the theoretical conversations of the intelligentsia in the Paris salons are being turned into practice. There have been vast improvements in the conditions of prisons and hospitals—can you imagine, the Hôtel-Dieu kept four patients to a single bed when there was room for only two, and half the poor souls had to take turns sleeping on the floor! They did not even change the sheets after someone died.” I sighed heavily. “Yet for all the king’s good intentions, it is so difficult to effect improvements because someone is always grumbling about forfeiting a perquisite—you should have heard the outcry among the nobility when Louis reduced their pensions by two percent in order to direct the funds to the poor!”
We came upon the laiterie and I introduced the count to two of my cows, Bonjour and Bonsoir. The former wore a bell about her neck, tied with a yellow satin ribbon; Bonsoir’s ribbon was blue. “How long will you remain in France?” I asked Axel, almost fearing his reply. I could not bear the thought of losing him again.
“I fell ill while I was in America.” I felt my heart skip a beat. No wonder he looked drawn. “Not to mention homesick for a woman I deeply esteem.” He glanced at me, then refocused his gaze on the pair of cattle. “I should like to call France my home, although this does not sit well with my father. There have been many unpleasant letters between us. The senator feels I am being selfish in not returning to Sweden to further my career and find a wife.” At his mention of the word, the muscles in my cheek twitched and I found myself flinching involuntarily.
“However, I believe I have mollified him somewhat by informing him that I intend to seek a bride in France.” My stomach clenched. “Monsieur Necker’s daughter Germaine, though I find her horribly plain, is an heiress of such vast proportions that he cannot possibly make an objection. Of course,” Axel added drily, “Papa does not know that another of our countrymen, Baron Staël-Holstein, is already staking his claim, and by all accounts the young lady favors him highly.”