CHAPTER XLVI.
A TERRIBLE WEDDING-NIGHT.
The dauphin opened the door of the anteroom before the wedding chamber.
The archduchess was waiting, in a long white wrapper, with the strangeanticipation on her brow, along with the sweet expectation of thebride, of some disaster. She seemed menaced with one of those terrorswhich nervous dispositions foresee and support sometimes with morebravery than if not awaited.
Lady Noailles was seated by the gilded couch, which easily held theprincess' frail and dainty body.
The maids of honor stood at the back, waiting for the mistress of theattendants to make them the sign to withdraw. These were all ignorantthat the dauphin was coming by a new way in. As the corridor was emptyand the door at the end ajar, he could see and hear what went on in theroom.
"In what direction does my lord the dauphin come?" inquired theAustrian's pure and harmonious voice though slightly tremulous.
"Yonder," replied Lady Noailles, pointing just the wrong way.
"What is that noise outside--not unlike the roaring of angry waters?"
"It is the tumult of the innumerable sight-seers walking about underthe illumination and waiting for the fireworks display."
"The illuminations?" said the princess with a sad smile. "They musthave been timely this evening, for did you not notice it was very blackweather?"
At this moment the dauphin, who was tired of waiting, thrust his headin at the door, and asked if he might enter. Lady Noailles screamed,for she did not recognize the intruder at first. The dauphiness,worked up into a nervous state by the incidents of the day, seized theduchess' arm in her fright.
"It is I, madame; have no fear," called out the prince.
"But why by that way?" said Lady Noailles.
"Because," explained Louis the King, showing his head at the half-opendoor, "because the Duke of Vauguyon knows so much Latin, mathematicsand geography as to leave room for nothing else."
In presence of the king so untimely arrived, the dauphiness slipped offthe couch and stood up in the wrapper, clothed from head to foot like avestal virgin in her stole.
"Any one can see that she is thin," muttered the king; "what the deusemade Choiseul pick out the skinny chicken among all the pullets ofEuropean courts?"
"Your majesty will please to observe that I acted according to thestrict etiquette," said the Duchess of Noailles, "the infraction was onmy lord the dauphin's part."
"I take it on myself. So, let us leave the children to themselves,"said the monarch.
The princess seized the lady's arm with more terror than before.
"Oh, don't go away!" she faltered; "I shall die of shame."
"Sire, the dauphiness begs to be allowed to go to rest without anystate," said Lady Noailles.
"The deuce--and does 'Lady Etiquette' herself crave that?"
"Look at the archduchess----"
In fact, Marie Antoinette, standing up, pale and with her rigid armsustaining her by a chair, resembled a statue of fright, but for theslight chattering of her teeth, and the cold perspiration bedewing herforehead.
"Oh, I should not think of causing the young lady any pain," said LouisXV., as little strict about forms as his father was the other thing."Let us retire, duchess; besides, the doors have locks."
The dauphin blushed to hear these words of his grandfather, but thelady, though hearing, had not understood.
King Louis XV. embraced his grand-daughter-in-law, and went forth, withLady Noailles, laughing mockingly and sadly, for those who did notshare his merriment.
The other persons had gone out by the other door.
The wedded pair were left alone in silence.
At last the young husband approached his bride with bosom beatingrapidly; to his temples, breast and wrist he felt all his repressedblood rushing hotly. But he guessed that his grandfather was behind thedoor, and the cynical glance still chilled the dauphin, very timid andawkward by nature.
"You are not well, madame," he stammered. "You are very pale, and Ithink you are trembling."
"I cannot conceal that I am under a spell of agitation; there mustbe some terrible storm overhead, for I am peculiarly affected bythunderstorms."
Indeed, she shook by spasms as though affected by electrical shocks.
At this time, as though to justify her assertion, a furious gust ofwind, such as shear the tops off mountains and heap up half the seaagainst the other--the first whoop of the coming tempest filled thepalace with tumult, anguish and many a creaking. Leaves were swept offthe branches, branches off the boughs and from the trees. A long andimmense clamor was drawn from the hundred thousand spectators in thegardens. A lugubrious and endless bellowing ran through the corridorsand galleries, composing the most awful notes that had ever vibrated inhuman ears.
Then an ominous rattling and jingling succeeded the roar; it was thefall of countless shivers of glass out of the window panes on themarble slabs and cornices.
At the same time the gale had opened one of the shutters and banged itto and fro like a wings of a bird of night. Wherever the window hadbeen open and where the glass was shivered the lights were put out.
The prince went over to the window to fasten the broken shutter, buthis wife held him back.
"Oh, pray, do not open that window, for the lights will be blown out,and I should die of fright."
He stopped. Through the casement beyond the curtain which he had drawnthe tree tops of the park were visible, swayed from side to side as ifsome unseen giant were waving them by the stems. All the illuminationswere extinguished.
Then could be seen on the dark sky still blacker clouds, coming on witha rolling motion like troops of cavalry wrapped in dust.
The pallid prince stood with one hand on the sash-handle. The bridesank on a chair, with a sigh.
"You are very much alarmed, madame?"
"Yes, though your presence supports me. Oh, what a storm! all thepretty lights are put out."
"Yes, it is a southwest wind, always the worst for storms. If it holdsout, I do not know how they will be able to set off the fireworks."
"What would be the use of them? Everybody will be out of the gardens insuch weather."
"You do not know what our French are when there is a show. They cry forthe pyrotechnics, and this is to be superb; the pyrotechnist showed methe sketches. There! look at the first rockets!"
Indeed, brilliant as long fiery serpents, the trial rockets rushed upinto the clouds, but at the same time, as if the storm had taken theflash as a challenge, one stroke of lightning, seeming to split thesky, snaked among the rockets ascending and eclipsed their red glarewith its bluish flaring.
"Verily, it is impiety for man to contest with God," said thearchduchess.
The trial rockets had preceded the general display by but a few minutesas the pyrotechnist felt the need of hastening, and the first setpieces were fired and were hailed with a cheer of delight.
But as though there were really a war between man and heaven, thestorm, irritated by the impiety, drowned with its thunder the cheers ofthe mobs, and all the cataracts on high opened at once. Torrents ofrain were precipitated from the cloudy heights.
In like manner to the wind putting out the illuminations, the rain putout the fireworks.
"What a misfortune, the fireworks are spoilt," said the dauphin.
"Alas, everything goes wrong since I entered France," said MarieAntoinette. "This storm suits the feast that was given me. It waswanted to hide from the people the miseries of this dilapidatedpalace of Versailles. So, blow, you southwest wind! spout, rain! pileyourselves together, tempestuous clouds, to hide from my eyes thepaltry, tawdry reception given to the daughter of the kaisers, when shelaid her hand in that of the future king!"
The visibly embarrassed dauphin did not know what answer to make tothis, these reproaches, and particularly this exalted melancholy, sofar from his character; he only sighed.
"I afflict you," continued she; "but do not believe that my pride iss
peaking. No, no, it is nowise in it. Would that they had only shownme the pretty little Trianon, with its flower gardens, and smilingshades--the rain will but refresh it, the wind but open the blossoms.That charming nest would content me; but these ruins frighten me, sorepugnant to my youth, and yet how many more ruins will be created bythis frightful storm."
A fresh gust, worse than the first, shook the palace. The princessstarted up aghast.
"Oh, heavens, tell me that there is no danger!" she moaned; "I shalldie of fright."
"There is no fear, madame. Versailles is built on terraces so as todefy the storm. If lightning fell it would only strike yonder chapelwith its sharp roof, or the little tower which has turrets. You knowthat peaks attract the electric fluid and flat surfaces repel them."
He took her frozen yet palpitating hand.
Just then a vivid flash inundated the room with its violet and lividglare. She uttered a scream and repulsed her husband.
"Oh, you looked in the lurid gleam like a phantom, pale, headless andbleeding!"
"It is the mirage caused by the sulphur," said the prince. "I willexplain----"
But a deafening peal of thunder cut short the sentence of thephlegmatic prince lecturing the royal spouse.
"Come, come, madame, let us leave such fears to the common people.Physical agitation is one of the conditions of nature. A storm, andthis is no more, is one of the most frequent and natural phenomena. Ido not know why people are surprised at them."
"I should not quail so much at another time; but for a storm toburst on our wedding-night, another awful forwarning joined to thoseheralding my entry into France! My mother has told me that this centuryis fraught with horrors, as the heavens above are charged with fire anddestruction."
"Madame, no dangers can menace the throne to which we shall ascend, forwe royalties dwell above the common plane. The thunder is at our feetand we wield the bolts."
"Alas, something dreadful was predicted me, or rather, shown to me ina dish of water. It is hard to describe what was utterly novel to me;a machine reared on high like a scaffold, two upright beams betweenwhich glided an axe of odd shape. I saw my head beneath this blade. Itdescended and my head, severed from the body, leaped to the earth. Thisis what I was shown."
"Pure hallucination," said the scoffer; "there is no such an instrumentin existence, so be encouraged."
"Alas! I cannot drive away the odious thought."
"You will succeed, Marie," said the dauphin, drawing nearer.
"Beside you will be an affectionate and assiduously protective husband."
At the instant when the husband's lips nearly touched the wife's cheek,the picture gallery door opened again, and the curious, covetous lookof King Louis XV. penetrated the place. But simultaneously a crash, ofwhich no words can give an idea, resounded through the palace. A spoutof white flame, streaked with green, dashed past the widow but shivereda statue on the balcony; then after a prodigious ripping and splittingsound, it bounded upward and vanished like a meteor.
Out went the candles! the dauphin staggered back, dazed and frightenedto the very wall. The dauphiness fell, half swooned, on the step of herpraying-desk and dwelt in deadly torpor.
Believing the earth was quaking under him, Louis XV. regained hisrooms, followed by his faithful valet.
In the morning Versailles was not recognizable. The ground had drunk upthe deluge, and the trees absorbed the sulphur.
Everywhere was mud and the broken boughs dragging their blackenedlengths like scotched serpents.
Louis XV. went to the bridal chamber for the third time, and looked in.He shuddered to see at the praying-stand the bride, pale and prone,with the aurora tinging her spotless robe, like a Magdalen of Rubens.
On a chair, with his velvet slippers in a puddle of water, the dauphinof France sat as pale as his wife and with the same air of having faceda nightmare.
The nuptial bed was untouched.
Louis XV. frowned; a never-before-experienced pain ran through hisbrow, cooled by egotism even when debauchery tried to heat it.
He shook his head, sighed and returned to his apartments full of grimforebodings over the future which this tragic event had marked on itsbrow.
What dread and mysterious incidents were enfolded in its bosom it willbe our mission to disclose in the sequel to this book, entitled "THEMESMERIST'S VICTIM."
Balsamo, the Magician; or, The Memoirs of a Physician Page 46