Mistress of the Sun

by Sandra Gulland

  In case he was killed.

  She stroked his hand. “Louis, I have something to tell you.”

  He rolled over to look at her.

  “I’m going to have another baby.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She nodded, pressing his hand to her cheek. “And I have something to ask you.” Other kings had declared their bastard children. “Have you given thought to acknowledging Marie-Anne?” (And the child to come, in time.)

  “I have—I’ve even discussed it with Colbert,” Louis told her.

  Petite was pleased.

  “But do you understand what it would mean, Louise?”

  Petite nodded. Although Marie-Anne would no doubt continue to live with the Colberts—they were like family to her, that was her home—Petite would be able to see her daughter often, and without the need for secrecy.

  “I do,” she said, knowing the price as well. Everything would be out in the open. Marie-Anne would grow up knowing that she was the daughter of the King—but she would also know that her mother was her father’s mistress, that she was born of mislove.

  “Yet we must.” As it was, their daughter was no different from any other bastard, denied the recognition that she was of the King’s blood.

  THE SPRING CAME early to Saint-Germain-en-Laye. Drums competed with the strident tattoo of a woodpecker. Petite set her embroidery frame by the window to catch the light. She winced, rubbing her calf. She was four or five months along, Blucher estimated. The period of nausea had mercifully passed, but now she was plagued by cramps, and her left leg had twice given out on her while she was walking. She stuck two needles into the taut fabric and looked through her box of threads for a bobbin of pale green. She heard footsteps, and looked up to see her maid at the door.

  “It’s been announced that your girl is the King’s daughter, a princess,” Clorine said elatedly. “So she’s legal now.”

  “Legitimate, you mean.”

  “Aye—and you’ve been made a duchess.”

  Petite sat back. This was a surprise.

  “So what do I call you now? Madame la Duchesse de la Vallière, or just Madame la Duchesse? I prefer that, I think, for everyday. You’re going to need six horses pulling your carriage and a ducal crest on the carriage door, of course, and long trains on your gown—one…no two…no three yards long.”

  “Three feet for a duchess, Clorine.” That was quite long enough.

  Her portly footman came to the door. “Are you receiving, Madame? There is someone here to see you.”

  “I don’t have very much time.” Petite had an appointment to see a doctor in town, and would then be going to the Colbert residence to see Marie-Anne (the new Princess, she thought with a smile).

  “Well…there are several, in fact. They’re in the entry below.”

  Petite looked up at Clorine, disconcerted.

  “Have them wait in the sitting room,” Clorine commanded.

  The footman scratched his ear. “What about the trunks?”

  They’d been preparing to leave with the Court on campaign. “Move the trunks in here,” Petite said, standing.

  She selected a simple bodice and skirt of pale yellow linen and insisted that she be tightly laced. Clorine persuaded her to wear pearls, even if they were made of ground-up fish scales mixed with wax. “You must get the King to give you a proper necklace,” she said, clucking her tongue in disapproval.

  Everyone made a deep reverence as Petite entered her sitting room. The air was thick with scents: musk, rose, eau de Chypre. Petite was relieved to see Athénaïs, but she was shocked that the Duchesse de Navailles had made the effort along with several other august ladies of the Court—highborn women who had previously shunned her.

  “Madame la Duchesse,” they murmured, bowing. The Duchesse de Navailles made a melting reverence.

  Petite looked out over their lowered heads. For years courtiers had snickered at her behind her back—mocked her rustic ways (too friendly), her tomboy pursuits, her limp, her “unnatural” aptitude for ancient languages and philosophy. Now that she was a duchess, they could not sit, stand or even speak to her without her approval. There was a certain satisfaction in such power. It chilled her.

  AFTER THE GUESTS had finally left, Petite, attended by Clorine, took one of the royal litters into town. It was a beautiful spring afternoon and she easily could have walked, but her left leg felt weak again. She had an appointment with a doctor who’d been having some success with nervous complaints, and these “spells” of weakness were one of the things she wished to discuss before leaving on campaign.

  The litter carriers let Petite and Clorine down at rue au Pain and rue des Coches. The men in livery, the royal insignia on the ornate litter, drew a crowd. Petite had grown accustomed to being gawked at, but this time children, street urchins in rags, recognized her and let fly hurling insults: the King’s whore, the King’s whore, the King’s whore.

  Clorine grabbed one of the boys by the collar, shaking him mightily. Two of his companions threw rocks and one of the litter carriers took chase, but the boys—there were four of them—were spry and danced circles around the hefty man, taunting whore, whore, whore, whore before disappearing into a maze of back alleys, their laughter echoing off the stone walls.

  “You’re going to need a guard whenever you go out,” Clorine said, steering Petite down a side street. “Now that you’re official.”

  Official what? Petite wondered, the boys’ taunts ringing in her ears. Louis had made her a duchess, given her the highest title in the land, but to the world she’d been revealed as his concubine.

  PETITE HAD AN imbalance of bile, the doctor pronounced. Her spells of weakness would be healed easily by a program of herbs and purges. She sent Clorine to the apothecary’s with a list and hired a litter to take her to the Colbert residence by the river.

  Even from outside, Petite could hear the children laughing. In the upstairs nursery the atmosphere was one of celebration, the young Colberts in an uproar over the recent announcement. They had adorned “princess” Marie-Anne with a paper crown and fancy lace collar, which she drooled on.

  Madame Colbert chuckled to see her brood dancing about. “At least they aren’t jealous,” she told Petite, balancing her youngest on one hip. “Silence,” she called out, and the three eldest children quieted. “You too, Jules,” she told her eight-year-old son. “Do we not have a proper greeting for Madame la Duchesse?”

  The girls curtsied and the boys bowed, and they all ran giggling out of the room.

  Petite cradled Marie-Anne in her arms and followed Madame Colbert into a sunny sitting room where they made themselves comfortable on soft easy chairs, their babies on their laps.

  “Just like two gossiping nursemaids,” Madame Colbert said.

  Petite touched Marie-Anne’s button nose. The baby gave a chortle. Princess.

  “Mon Dieu! Forgive me for sitting in the presence of a duchess.”

  “Please, Madame Colbert—sit,” Petite said.

  “But seriously,” Madame Colbert said, settling back in her chair, “this does change things. I’ll need to hire staff for your wee princess here—” She made goggle-eyes at Marie-Anne, who was too preoccupied with pulling at her lace collar to notice. “She should be served at her own table, apart from my children.” Madame Colbert’s tone was solemn.

  “There must not be any changes,” Petite told Madame Colbert emphatically. “It would be cruel to separate her from your wonderful children. They’re her family.”

  ATHÉNAÏS CALLED THE next day, full of reproaches. “How can this upset you?” she demanded, tapping the back of Petite’s hand with her fan. “All my life I’ve longed to be made a duchess,” she said in a theatrically languishing tone. “A fantasy of my childhood, impossible to attain.”

  “I would give you this title if I could,” Petite said. She was stretched out on the daybed with a damp cloth on her brow. She’d been told that the Queen had gone into rages at the news, ordering all
taborets removed from her chamber so that she would not have to suffer the indignity of Petite exercising her ducal right to sit in the Queen’s presence.

  “His Majesty has conferred the highest honor on you. This should make you happy.”

  “May I tell you something, Athénaïs, in confidence?”

  “Have I not told you all my dirty secrets, my sordid embarrassments?”

  Petite sat up, trying to control the flood of emotion rising within her: her apprehension that Louis no longer loved her. How much of a companion had she been to him, of late—much less a lover? “I fear it’s a farewell gesture,” she said. “Isn’t this the way it’s done? When a king tires of a woman, he gives her a title and sends her away?”

  “His Majesty is devoted to you. You know that.”

  Yes, Petite thought, but…“He’s been remote of late.” He’d not been himself. He’d even lost his nature on a number of occasions and that unnerved him, she knew. His doctor had advised a diet of celery, truffles and vanilla to help quicken him—but without success.

  “It’s this coming war—it has all the men acting like fools. If I hear another word about mortar or Damascus swords, I think I’ll scream.”

  “Madame?” Clorine set glasses of spiced red wine and comfits of orange rind on a side table. “You have a caller.” She widened her eyes. “Madame Françoise de la Vallière, the Marquise de Saint-Rémy.”

  “My mother?”

  Athénaïs’s look was one of amusement. “I’ll see you on the morrow,” she said, taking up her rose-scented gloves.

  PETITE’S MOTHER HAD gained weight since their last encounter, that fateful day in the marketplace four years earlier. Indeed, she had become rather large. She bowed with some difficulty, and for a moment Petite feared she would need help rising.

  “I thank you for the honor of receiving me, Madame la Duchesse,” Françoise said, addressing Petite formally, clenching and unclenching her gloved hands. “The Marquis de Saint-Rémy would have come to pay his respects as well, but he has the dropsy.”

  “Please, Mother,” Petite said, “take a chair.”

  “One must give preference to a duchess,” Françoise said, remaining standing.

  Petite leaned against the mantel. She longed to sit down herself, but she couldn’t, not with her mother standing. The intricacies of parlor etiquette would soon drive her mad.

  “If only I had known,” Françoise said.

  Known that her daughter had been debauched by a king, and not some everyday sinner. Petite felt angry confusion. “It wasn’t in my power to tell anyone, not even you, Mother.”

  “I suppose this is how Jean got his promotion, his rich wife. Even your uncle Gilles has been made a bishop.”

  Mercy. Her father’s brother had hardly been able to get through a Mass without stumbling—and now he was a bishop? Was this Louis’s doing? It had to be. “Aunt Angélique must know, then,” Petite said with a sinking heart. Gentle, devout Sister Angélique: she would be horrified to learn that Petite—her “little angel”—was the country’s official fallen woman.

  “No doubt, but I wouldn’t concern myself. That woman never could add two plus two. And what’s this about a daughter?”

  “Marie-Anne is eight months old. She has two teeth already and another one coming in.” Petite smiled. “His Majesty was born with teeth, so I guess it’s not surprising.”

  “The King’s daughter, my granddaughter.” Françoise shook her head in disbelief. “But eight months old? It was years ago I saw you in the market—and you were far along.”

  Petite turned away, dismayed by the anger she still felt. Disowned. Pregnant with Charles, her first, she’d been young—and very alone. “I had two boys, Mother,” Petite said finally, her voice breaking. “They died.” One after the other. “This was long ago.” Would the grief never end?

  Petite felt her mother’s hand on her shoulder. She turned, surprised to see her mother’s tears. Had she ever seen her mother cry?

  “I had two boys once myself,” Françoise said. “Jean, of course—but also a little Michel.”

  How was that possible? “Why didn’t I know?”

  “He died just before you were born.”

  Petite was incredulous, and yet…would she ever tell Marie-Anne about her two brothers—Petite’s own dead babies?

  Françoise wiped her cheeks on her sleeves. “It makes one witless. I was…crackbrained, I guess you would say. For a bit. That’s when your father learned about healing. And silence. It was best that way.”

  Petite nodded, taking this all in. She and Jean had often been in her father’s care, her mother “ailing.” Now she could begin to understand. They had buried a son together. Her father would have seen her mother’s heartbreak, shared it. “You will love Marie-Anne,” Petite said, embracing her. She smelled familiarly of vanilla. “And I’m soon to have another.”

  “I can see that,” Françoise said, proudly this time.

  She left shortly after, anxious to return to the ailing Marquis, anxious to be back in Paris before nightfall.

  Petite sat at the window watching children chase hoops in the gardens below. It had been two days of revelations, one upon the other, and the last, her mother’s, was surely the greatest. Seeing her mother’s tears, understanding and sharing her grief, had given her something she could not name. Forgiveness, she realized, after a time: a blessing.

  MONSIEUR COLBERT CALLED that evening. He was in a hurry; there were a million things to attend to with respect to the upcoming campaign. In addition to having to secure financing for the army’s provisions, there were the inevitable last-minute details: the King’s tent was already in need of repair and his armor breastplate had to be recast, for starters.

  “I just wanted you to know that I’m in the process of negotiating a duchy for you—well, technically, for your daughter, you understand, but for your use until you should” he wiped his spectacles clean with his lace cuff—“die.”

  Petite nodded. “Yes, Monsieur, I understand.”

  “My wife tells me that you might be familiar with it.” He riffled through his leather portfolio of papers. “Ah, here it is, it’s in the Touraine,” he read out, “in the barony of Saint-Christophe. Château de Vaujours.”

  Petite tilted her head. “Did you say Vaujours?” Surely not.

  Colbert frowned, squinting. He was shortsighted without his eyepiece. “So you do know it.”

  Petite nodded. The Château de Vaujours was the home of the Lady in White, the young woman who had drowned herself to ease a broken heart. Her ghostly apparition called out to weeping maidens. “I’ve heard of it.”

  “The purchase will not be official for another year, I expect. It requires a parliamentary decree, and this type of transact is painfully slow, especially when the King is involved.”

  Petite smiled. It was said that the King could move mountains, but not Parliament.

  “But when it does come through,” Colbert went on, “you will be mandated to sign over two hundred fifty thousand livres. Don’t worry—Tournais livres, not Parisian. I will make all the arrangements. The property is in the care of a steward, but when the time comes, I will advise you on matters pertaining to management.”

  Petite felt light-headed. She hadn’t quite realized that being a duchess entailed looking after a duchy.

  “It’s of medium size,” Monsieur Colbert said, “the rents yielding about a hundred thousand livres a year. That should set you up nicely.” Colbert looked at his timepiece and handed a parchment to Petite. “This is for you. It’s a copy of what His Majesty wrote Parliament regarding your title,” he said. He took up his portfolio.

  “Thank you, Monsieur,” Petite said, scanning the text: well-loved, faithful Louise de la Vallière…a multitude of rare perfections…an affection that had lasted for years.

  “Yes, thank you,” she repeated with a sinking heart. Had lasted.

  A NEW COACH and six was delivered, ornamented with a ducal crown. The horses w
ere Barbs of a matching golden color, with silky manes and tails. “From His Majesty,” Gautier told Petite excitedly. The coach was gleaming, the interior lined with the finest scarlet brocade. It employed the newest suspension system, he explained—one could drink a dish of tea in it, if one wished. Any man in the kingdom would sell his soul for such a conveyance.

  “It’s beautiful,” Petite said, wondering why Louis hadn’t come himself to present it. She hadn’t seen him since her title was announced, since Marie-Anne was acknowledged.

  “His Majesty is unable to call right now,” Gautier said, sensing her malaise.

  “He has meetings, I know.”

  “Not exactly.” Gautier pulled at his lace cravat. “Dr. Vallot has persuaded His Majesty to take a bouillon purgative in preparation for the coming campaign, so—understandably—he is ‘tied up.’”

  Louis rarely took his doctor’s advice. It pleased Petite that he was looking after himself. “I’m happy to hear that.”

  “He desires you to know that he will be able to come see you tomorrow afternoon at three, in order to bid farewell.”

  Farewell? “But I’m going on the campaign as well.”

  “There has been a change.” Gautier cleared his throat. “Only the household of the Queen is to accompany His Majesty.”

  “I’m not to go?” She’d been bled twice in preparation.

  “You must understand—your recent elevation has disturbed Her Majesty, in particular with respect to the girl.” He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “In any case, the roads to the north are primitive and the air is impure. It is not a good season to be traveling.”

  IN THE MORNING Gautier informed Petite that there had, yet again, been a change of plans. His Majesty would not be calling on her at three of the clock that afternoon. He would, instead, be there shortly, at ten of the clock, and His Majesty intended to bring his son, the Dauphin de France, and, furthermore, it had been arranged for Madame Colbert to bring Princess Marie-Anne as well.