by Jean Plaidy
‘You see, Hausset,’ she said, clinging to her friend with those arms which made Madame du Hausset want to weep every time she looked at them – for they had once been plump and rounded and were now almost fleshless – ‘you see how he loves me. We belong to each other. He makes me as royal as he is. Hausset, you see how great our friendship is.’
She was carefully wrapped in blankets and carried out to a carriage in which she made a slow journey to Versailles. The people along the road came out to see her pass; they did not greet her with hostile shouts this time; they only looked on in silence.
Even they know, she thought, that this is my last journey.
In her old apartments at Versailles she lay in her bed. The doctors shook their heads over her; they could only pass her over to the priests.
She brooded on her sins and confessed them. Incidents of the past seemed to leap out of blurred pictures and make themselves vividly clear. She saw Charles Guillaume, her husband, imploring her to return to him and their family; she saw herself turning away from his pleas, knowing only her blind ambition. She thought of Alexandrine lying on her deathbed in the Convent of the Assumption, and she remembered Mademoiselle de Romans, crying for her son.
There were many spectres from the past to mock an ambitious woman.
Louis visited her several times a day, and her doctors asked him if he would break the news that she should prepare herself for Supreme Unction, as there was little time left.
He embraced her tenderly. It was their last farewell. She must now forget her King on earth, he told her, and prepare herself to meet an even greater King. And, because of the relationship between them, those who would grant her absolution insisted that they who had committed adultery should show their repentance by never again meeting on earth.
It was inevitable. The moment had come.
‘Farewell, my dearest friend, farewell,’ said Louis with tears on his cheeks. ‘I envy you. You are going to your heavenly rest while I am left to a life which must seem empty because you will no longer be there to charm it.’
For the last time they embraced, and Madame de Pompadour was left to the ministrations of her confessors.
Madame du Hausset signed to her servants to bring the clean clothes to the bed, but the Marquise smiled wanly and waved them away.
‘No,’ she said. ‘It is not worthwhile. There is such a short time left.’
The women looked at each other. They knew that she was right.
The priest came and prayed at her bedside and when he prepared to leave she said: ‘Wait a few more moments and we will go together.’
He took her hand to bless her for the last time; she smiled and closed her eyes.
Before that day was ended she was dead.
That evening her body, shrouded in a white sheet, was placed on a stretcher and carried out of the Château de Versailles to the Hôtel des Reservoirs.
Louis himself insisted on making all the arrangements; he knew well, he said, that it was the last wish of the Marquise that she should be laid to rest in the Church of the Capucines in the Place de Vendôme, where her little Alexandrine now lay beside Madame Poisson.
Two days after her death the body of Madame de Pompadour left Versailles for the last time on its way to Paris.
It was a stormy April day and the rain was falling in torrents as the procession gathered at Notre Dame de Versailles preparatory to leaving for Paris.
With Champlost, one of his valets de chambre, beside him, Louis stood on a balcony hatless in the rain, staring after the cortège while it made its way down the Avenue de Paris. Tears flowed down his cheeks, and sobs shook his body, as memories of their long relationship assailed him. It was not easy to picture Versailles without the Marquise.
Champlost stood helplessly beside him, and Louis suddenly laid his hand on his arm. ‘Why Champlost,’ he said, ‘so you witness my grief. I shall never be completely happy again. I have lost one who has been my friend – the best friend I ever had – for twenty years. Twenty long years, Champlost.’
‘Sire, this is a grievous thing which has befallen us, and Your Majesty in particular, but you will catch a fever if you stand here thus, hatless in the rain.’
The King looked up at the sullen skies, and the raindrops and the tears mingled on his cheeks.
‘It is the only mark of respect I can show her now,’ he said.
The cortège was passing along the Avenue de Paris, and the King felt he could no longer bear to watch it.
He turned from the balcony and stepped into his private sitting-room. Champlost followed him respectfully.
The dignity of Versailles closed in on the King. Life must go on, even though the Marquise had departed.
Louis suddenly seemed to remember what etiquette demanded of him. He said almost lightly: ‘The poor Marquise is having bad weather for her journey to Paris.’
Chapter XV
MARIE-JOSÉPHE
The death of Madame de Pompadour left the King desolate. He could find little comfort, and the intimate suppers which had once been so much a feature of life at Versailles became gloomy affairs, continued from habit rather than because they gave any particular pleasure. It was the Marquise who had arranged the entertainments, who had chosen the guests, who had given all her time to making sure that the King was continually entertained. And how could any of those uneducated little girls at the Parc aux Cerfs, however passionate, however voluptuous, make him forget for more than an hour or two all that he had lost with the passing of the Marquise.
Sometimes he would say: ‘That will amuse the Marquise. I must tell her . . .’
Then he would stop abruptly and turn away.
The Duchesse de Gramont was eagerly waiting to offer him comfort, but Louis turned from her in disgust, and Choiseul, fearing his sister’s impatient exuberance, was forced to warn her to be very careful.
‘Time,’ murmured the Duc, ‘it is time he needs. Give him a month or two to mourn her and he will be tired of mourning.’
Meanwhile the King found a certain solace in the study of foreign affairs. He had little trust in any of his ministers; even Choiseul, he realised, was chiefly concerned with the well-being of Choiseul rather than that of France.
Perhaps one day, thought the King, it may be possible to retrieve our lost fortunes. If he could do that it might be that he would regain the affection of his people. He considered now what a victorious end to the Seven Years War might have meant. If France had emerged triumphant over her enemies, would the people perhaps have spoken his name with the respect they always showed to that other Bourbon, his ancestor, Henri Quatre?
He felt an enthusiasm which he had not known for years and which dulled the pain he experienced in the loss of the Marquise. He chose his secret agents – his, entirely his, unknown to anyone, even Choiseul – and dispatched them to the various Continental capitals. Their letters were seen by no one but himself.
He had come to a decision; his object should be the election to the Polish throne of a French Prince.
His grand-daughter Isabelle was betrothed to Joseph, heir to the Imperial throne. Madame Première, his daughter Louise-Elisabeth, had been right to insist on that betrothal. Poor Madame Première had died a few years before of the small-pox. The King did not wish to think of her. Death always depressed him deeply and his main desire was to escape from the memory of that more important death.
Thus Louis shut himself away in his petits appartements and mourned the Marquise.
The case against the Jesuits was meanwhile growing to a climax. Not only in France were factions rising against them; they were considered to be a menace all over the world. It was said that they governed all Catholic countries, not openly but in secret; they had set up their colleges everywhere and sought to educate the young to their way of thinking, and thus strengthen their brotherhood. They had insinuated themselves into many of the Courts of Europe, chiefly as confessors to Kings and Queens, thus acquiring great ascendancy over those who gov
erned.
Some years before, a rich Jesuit, Père La Vallette, who was the Superior of the Jesuits of Martinique, had lost many of his ships to English pirates. Being unable to maintain his industrial settlement, he became bankrupt to the tune of three million francs. His creditors were in a state of panic, and a number of them in Marseilles demanded that the Society should pay them the million francs owed by La Vallette.
The Society declared that it was not responsible for the debts of one of its members, whereupon the Marseilles merchants appealed to the Parlement of Paris, which ordered Père de Sacy, the General of the Jesuits, to settle La Vallette’s debts.
The magistrates, who had sided with the Jansenites against the Jesuits in the many conflicts between the two, declared that this was more than a case of bankruptcy, and the affairs of the Society should be thoroughly investigated.
They declared that they had discovered the rules of the Society to be inconsistent with those of the Kingdom of France, and to be both disloyal and immoral. They ordered the colleges to be closed.
Those who supported the Jesuits, headed by the Dauphin and the Queen, made an immediate protest.
Choiseul and the Marquise had stood firmly on the side of the Parlement.
Madame de Pompadour had always considered the Jesuits a menace, but she had hated them more vehemently since their General, Père de Sacy, had refused to grant her absolution unless she left the Court. In the midst of this struggle she had died. Choiseul had determined on the expulsion of the Jesuits, but now that Madame de Pompadour was dead he had lost an ardent champion.
Louis was in no hurry to come to a decision. At the time of the investigation he sought to protect the Jesuits because he felt, as he had previously, that the Parlement was endeavouring to take his power from his hands. Eager as he was that France should not be in the power of the Pope – as the Jesuits wished her to be – he was equally determined that it was the King, not the Parlement, who should have the final say in the affairs of the country.
The Parlement had shown itself belligerent and, when he had attempted to oppose them over this matter of the Jesuits, had hinted that there should be an inquiry into the acquits au comptant. Louis knew that he could not face an inquiry into his private expenditure. The upkeep of the Parc aux Cerfs alone was excessive. There were young women who had been granted pensions and gifts; he had many children to maintain. Pretty little Mademoiselle Hainault had given him two delightful daughters, and it had cost a considerable amount to provide her with a pension and a husband in the Marquis de Montmelas. Adorable Lucie-Magdaleine d’Estaing, who was the natural daughter of the Vicomte de Ravel, had presented him with two charming daughters, Agnes-Lucie and Aphrodite-Lucie. He doted on his quartette of daughters, but they must be maintained in adequate comfort, and that cost money. There was the naughty little Mademoiselle de Tiercelin who was constantly demanding that her debts be paid. A life such as he led, although it presented him with variety and entertainment, also presented him with enormous bills. And he had no wish that the people should know the extent of his gallantries.
Already they talked of him as the Old Sultan, and exaggerated concerning the Parc aux Cerfs, which they called his harem; but until they had seen in black and white the cost of his pleasure, they must always doubt the authenticity of the stories they heard.
No, Louis could not allow his acquits au comptant to be made public and must submit to the blackmail of the Parlement.
The Dauphin, who had nothing to fear from an inquiry into his private life, threw himself wholeheartedly into the defence of the Jesuits.
He demanded an interview with the King and Choiseul.
Choiseul ignored the Dauphin; he knew that they could never be anything but enemies, and that it was useless to try to placate him.
He said to the King: ‘Sire, if you do not suppress the Jesuits you must suppress Parlement. And to suppress Parlement at this time would mean one thing: revolution.’
The Dauphin intervened. ‘Why should we not suppress Parlement? Why should we not set up Provincial Estates? They would be selected from the nobility.’
‘And the clergy?’ murmured Choiseul.
‘Members of the clergy and the nobility,’ insisted the Dauphin.
Choiseul again addressed himself to the King. ‘Sire, whatever form the Dauphin’s Provincial Estates took, it could only consist of men. One visualises their uniting, and standing together. They would be so powerful that they would usurp the power of the throne itself.’
‘Any who dared do that would be exiled,’ cried the Dauphin vehemently.
Choiseul burst into loud laughter. ‘Sire,’ he said turning to the King, ‘is it possible to exile the entire nation?’
‘Monsieur de Choiseul is right,’ said the King. ‘There is no way out of this impasse but exile for the Jesuits.’
The Dauphin turned on Choiseul with blazing eyes. ‘You have done this . . . you . . . with your schemes, with your ambitious dreams. You are an atheist . . . for all you make a show of attending sacred ceremonies. I wonder there is not some sign from Heaven . . .’
The expression on Choiseul’s pug-dog face was insolent in the extreme. ‘A sign from Heaven?’ he said, looking about him, out of the window and up at the sky. ‘I am no atheist, Monseigneur, but in the King’s cultured Court we have grown away from superstition. Perhaps that is why, in those circles which lag behind us intellectually, we are mistaken for atheists.’
‘Choiseul,’ spluttered the Dauphin, ‘you forget . . . you forget to whom you speak . . .’
‘I do not forget,’ said Choiseul becoming suddenly heated as the Dauphin, ‘that I may one day be unfortunate enough to be your subject, but I shall never serve you.’ He turned again to the King, his face white with the suddenness of his emotion. ‘Sire, have I your permission to retire?’
‘You have it,’said the King.
When he had gone, the Dauphin and the King faced each other, and Louis felt an unsuppressible distaste for this earnest son of his who even now, he believed, was supporting the Jesuits, not from any political angle but because he believed himself to be a representative of Holy Church.
The French would have a very bigoted King when this young man came to the throne. Indeed, thought Louis, I must live for a very long time; this poor son of mine has so much to learn.
‘You . . . Your Majesty heard the insolence of that fellow!’ the Dauphin stuttered. ‘I . . . I shall never forgive him.’
Louis shook his head sadly. ‘My son,’ he said, ‘you have so offended Monsieur de Choiseul that you must forgive him everything.’
With that the King turned and left the Dauphin, who could only stare after his departing figure in utter bewilderment.
By the end of that year which had seen the death of the Marquise, the Society of Jesuits was disbanded and no Jesuit could live in the Kingdom of France except as a private citizen.
The people of Paris went wild with joy; the Queen, the Dauphin and the Princesses were desolate; and the feud between Choiseul and the Dauphin grew.
To console the Dauphin the King decided to grant his son’s lifelong ambition. The Dauphin had always wished to be a soldier and, although this had been denied him in time of war when his obvious aptitude for the life might have been some use to his country, he was now given his own regiment – known as the Royal Dauphin’s Regiment – and threw himself with zest into his new life.
He spent weeks in camp with his soldiers and showed that he might have made a great career for himself in the Army. His austerity endeared him to his men, for they saw in him a leader always ready to share their discomforts.
During the manoeuvres the weather was bad and the Dauphin, unaccustomed to hardship, developed a particularly virulent cold. This he ignored, but the neglected cold persisted, and at the beginning of October, when the military operations were concluded and he had joined the Court at Fontainebleau, the royal family was astonished to see how ill he was.
He had been plump but
now he had lost all his spare flesh. It was believed that this was due to the violent unaccustomed exercise, but when the cough persisted, there were many who remembered the sickness of Madame de Pompadour and remarked that it would be strange if her old enemy the Dauphin should be similarly stricken.
Marie-Josèphe was very worried when she saw him.
‘You must go to bed for a while,’ she insisted. ‘And you must let me nurse you. I was once told I was a good nurse.’
‘I remember the occasion well,’ said the Dauphin with feeling.
‘Then you will not hesitate to place yourself in my hands?’
He said gently: ‘Then I was ill, Marie-Josèphe. Now I merely have a cold which I cannot throw off.’
‘The doctors shall bleed you,’ she said.
She found him docile; it was as though he wished to please her, to make up for the anxiety he had caused her.
She thought: he has changed. He is more gentle. He knows how I suffered, and he wants to make up for the misery he has caused me with that woman.
She wondered about the woman, but she did not ask.
She felt that there was something very precious about this period in her life and she would not have it spoilt in the smallest degree. She would try to forget the existence of Madame Dadonville and her little Auguste; and she would pray that the Dauphin would also forget.
She put on a simple white dress, thinking of that time when she had nursed him safely through the small-pox, when they had been so close together and she had believed that the bond between them was inviolate for ever.
I am happy, she thought; happier than I have ever been because when he is sick he comes to me. And I am a good nurse. Dr Pousse said so. Once again I will bring him back to health – and now that we are older, more mellow, the happiness we shall regain will last for the rest of our lives.
Marie-Josèphe sat at her husband’s bedside. She was very worried because he did not get well. The cold persisted and it had grown worse.