The Sisters of Versailles

by Sally Christie

  And she tells me about his dark times and depressions and his fear of death and Hell and of his unformed memories of those months when he was but a babe and lost all his family, memories that haunt his soul still. He was only two when his father, mother, and elder brother all died within weeks from measles, and it was only the intervention of his governess that saved him. Madame de Ventadour still lives, and the king is very devoted to her.

  “He visits her every day,” Louise informs me solemnly, “even when there is the hunt.”

  “Ah yes, I’ve seen the black-shrouded woman.”

  “And the Comtesse de Toulouse is equally dear to him; he considers her the mother he never had.”

  “Mmm.” Louise always gushes about the comtesse’s kindness and says she is just the nicest soul, but I disliked her from the start. The king often has his informal suppers in her apartments, and I always catch her eyes on me, full with the wary watchfulness of a mother bear.

  “And you must never, never ask him for anything,” Louise warns me, glancing at my cup of coffee.

  We are sitting together in her salon; the king is occupied with visiting Turks. I like to make outrageous demands on Louise, just for fun. Today I told her I craved orange-flavored coffee and would she find some for me? It is a new craze here but the stuff is deadly expensive and very hard to procure. I sip the sweet treat and ask her to give me the rest of the box so I can send it to Diane, who will be delighted.

  “Are you sure? The whole box? It’s a rather large box, and it was so very expensive.”

  “Diane loves coffee, you know that. And oranges.”

  “But so do—oh, all right. Poor Diane, stuck away at the convent while we are at Versailles! I will send it tomorrow. But as I was saying, you must never ask the king for favors. He very much dislikes being pestered.”

  I snort. Of course the king wants to be asked for things: How else can he show his love? “So is it true what they say? That the king makes love like a porter and tips like one too?” Charolais has been sharing with me many stories about the king’s parsimonious nature and his miserliness toward Louise. I already have a list of trifles the king has given me, including a pair of Chantilly vases and a choker of flawless white pearls—but all he’s ever given Louise is a little engraved box from China. And something about a meadow—a watercolor perhaps?

  Louise’s lips start to quiver and red creeps up her face.

  “Sister, you are not married! How can you talk about such things? How can you even know of such things?”

  “I’ll be married soon enough,” I say confidently. To a duke, I hope. The king has been discussing possibilities for some time. There was talk of a match with the Comte d’Eu, who is a prince of the royal blood; that would have been very suitable. Fleury was opposed to the match. Not to worry; it’s been noted. Whenever I see the old crapchard I think: your treachery will come back to bite you, just like the fleas that are rumored to live in your robes.

  “But still, this is not proper. You are an unmarried maiden and you should not ask such things. You should not even know of such things.” I don’t even bother snorting. Besides, I doubt Louise has much to teach me in that area; I imagine her lovemaking to be as dull as her conversation. I’ll rely on what my friend Madame de Dray told me back at the convent, little tricks mostly centered around their penis thing.

  Charolais has been pushing me to give in to the king and sleep with him. She thinks I am a fool but I am not. I can’t sleep with him until I am married; adultery after marriage is acceptable but fornication before marriage is simply unthinkable. Look at what happened to Mademoiselle de Moras—such scandal! It didn’t happen at the convent of Port-Royal, worse luck (we never had the exciting scandals), but of course we heard about it: she ran away with an entirely unsuitable suitor, and then she was entirely ruined, and he sentenced to death!

  Of course, Charolais is not married and she certainly fornicates, but as the granddaughter of Louis XIV, her birth puts her beyond even convention. She can do anything, and she does. Last year it was whispered she slept with ten men, including one of her own footmen, and one from the household of the Comtesse de Toulouse. Imagine that! No, I will not sleep with the king until I am married. Besides, Louis is a hunter and everyone knows the deer most chased is the deer most cherished.

  I make it my policy to be well informed about government and current events, but surprisingly, Louis is not all that interested. He largely leaves the business of government alone, content to sign what his ministers require, content to go where Fleury leads. I think he should be more involved; if he doesn’t know anything about France or governing, how will he ever get out from under the gnarled thumb of Fleury?

  When he is with me I make sure that he is constantly challenged, spurred, thinking. We talk about politics, about war, about the situation in Europe. At first he was reluctant, saying that women should not meddle in such matters. I replied that it was not to meddle that I wished to involve myself, but rather to support and understand my king.

  I too have a lot to learn but I am a quick study. And so I learn of the poor wheat harvest and all the consequences—who knew a lack of rain could be so disastrous? I learn how unrest between the Russians and the Ottomans influences the price of treasured Turkish carpets—strange that something that happens so far away should have such a direct impact on us here in France. I regret the time wasted at the convent; I should have been seeking out newspapers and learned books rather than reading silly novels or pawing through religious books, looking for scraps of interest.

  I learn about the Polish war and the Treaty of Vienna. And about our enemies, the Austrians and the British. Especially the Austrians; Hapsburgs are known to have extra fingers and many have enormous lower jaws with protruding lips, evidence of their ungodly ways. Many say we are heading for war with them, a path that Fleury violently opposes; he is, as they say, a dove.

  We are at Rambouillet, only an hour from the palace. A small group of us have come on ahead and now it is evening and the king arrives. He joins us in the wood-paneled library, peevish and peckish.

  “What a day, what a day. How nice it is to be gone from that tiresome place. Man, bring me a cup of something hot. Bouillon.”

  “Darling, what is it?” Louise reaches up for a kiss. Since her position became known last year, Louise does not hesitate to make public her affections. Charolais tells me that everyone finds it insufferable and all preferred her when she had to keep her love secret.

  I watch them, curious. Louise clings to the king as a barnacle to a ship. Even when it is plain the king only wants to be with me, she refuses to leave, no matter how surplus we may make her feel. All the while Louis and I are growing more intimate and there are many evenings after supper when we retire, just the two of us, to one of his even more private rooms, where we are free to talk alone and kiss as we will. Louise never asks about these evenings; I think she prefers to pretend they never happen.

  The king sighs again. “All Fleury can talk about are the peasants and the lack of flour at the markets. It appears serious.”

  “The flower market?” asks Louise in a worried voice.

  “That is right, my dear, no flour at the market. A cause for grave concern.”

  “But why do the peasants need flowers? I don’t understand. Can’t they just gather them in the woods if they need them so badly?”

  Meuse sidles up to join the conversation. “It is dreadful, sire, dreadful. Ruffec returned from the country with news that the situation is dire—hard to even have a peaceful dinner without the peasants gathering in the courtyard and crying their misery. Even worse, the only bread available was an inferior gray stuff—eating it caused his wife to chip a tooth.”

  “And I’ve heard the peasants are eating grass, like animals,” adds Madame d’Estrées. “Shocking, simply shocking—have they no manners?”

  “Ah, we must not believe these reports. We all know it is the peasants exaggerating and making drama as usual. Surely thes
e are only fanciful tales, grown with the telling?” The Duc de Duras is another of the king’s intimates, a genial man with a tiny, prim mouth.

  The king shakes his head. “But still, it worries me, worries me to no end. Of course, it is not my fault—nature I cannot control! We must have more public prayers, perhaps a whole week this time.”

  “There is another solution, sire,” I say loudly, and the room falls silent.

  “Now, what would your pretty little head know about such matters?” queries the king, coming over to where I am seated by the hearth.

  “Anything of interest to my sovereign is of interest to me.”

  “Oh, Pauline, you mustn’t bother His Majesty with work, not here at Rambouillet. We must talk of lighter things.” Louise scuttles over and possessively puts her hand on the king’s arm. He casually detaches it, then removes his gloves to fret his hands over the fire.

  “And so, Mademoiselle de Nesle, what would you propose?”

  “The government should buy grain and store it, then resell it when it is scarce. If you don’t do that, grain speculators will, and they will keep the prices too high,” I reply promptly. I have become an avid reader of the Gazette de France and often pigeonhole Orry, the king’s controller general, to test my theories. I think the man replies to my questions more out of shock than anything else.

  “An interesting proposition, mademoiselle; I have heard Orry talk of the same. You must tell me more, later. But for now I would change and ready myself for the evening’s entertainment.” He takes a glass of warm bouillon from a footman and signals to Bachelier. “I hope there will be duck on the menu tonight? And something tart for dessert, gooseberries perhaps?” I hear him say as they leave the room.

  By the fire Louise stares at me with rather an empty look. One of the king’s greyhounds wanders over and nuzzles at her skirt. She tries to push it away, her eyes still on me.

  “He really doesn’t like to talk about work once he leaves Versailles, Pauline,” she finally whispers. “Oh, get off me, dog. Why won’t it leave me alone?”

  “You mustn’t confuse what you like, dear sister, with what the king likes. You’re not the only one who knows him well.” It is a deliberate arrow, but it is also the truth; we are daily becoming closer, and try hard as Louise might, she is a fool if she doesn’t see it. Soon . . .

  Charolais swoops in. She was in the carriage with the king; I had forgotten she was coming.

  “So you presume to know what the king likes now, do you, dearest Mademoiselle de Nesle?” She is wearing an enormous cream cloak, patterned with purple and blue flowers, and she brings with her the cold and a strong scent of violets.

  “I do know what he likes. He has become a good friend,” I say more smugly than I should. Sometimes triumph feels good, and anything that trumps Charolais makes me feel simply superb.

  When we talk of the future—our future—Louis is most concerned about Fleury and what the “people of France” will say if he takes a new mistress.

  “The people of France?” I quiz him. “What do you mean by that?”

  “The common, ordinary folk. A lawyer or a shopkeeper or something. A peasant, even. They are a highly moral people, and I do not wish them to see or think of their king as a . . . libertine.” Louis has a deep, sonorous voice, water flowing smoothly over well-rounded rocks.

  I don’t snort as I might for I see he is deadly serious. He really cares what a lawyer or a peasant might think of him! How strange. Certainly it would be nice to have the love of his subjects, but his right to rule comes from God, so at the end of it all, why should he care what “the people” think? This is not England: it is not as though they can chop off the head of their king if they are unhappy.

  “Dearest, you are the king. You are above the opinion of the people—they have no right to cast judgment on you.”

  There is silence. We are in the room assigned to me at Rambouillet, a cozy room, decorated in the Turkish style; the ceiling is painted a deep midnight blue dotted with a hundred silver stars and the thick stone walls are hung with luxurious tapestries. Louis lies on the sofa looking up, lost in the heavens above. I am sprawled by his feet on the plush orange carpet with my hair unpinned. Charolais has shown me how to wash it with Moroccan oil to soften it, and make it less bristly.

  The king runs his hands through my hair in a distracted circular motion. I appear relaxed but in fact I am ever alert. Though Louis likes to be pushed, even the most pliant branch must eventually break.

  “But what judgment . . . what judgment it would be. Incest . . .”

  “Louis, you mustn’t read those pamphlets!”

  “It is rare I agree with them, but you know the injunction against sleeping with one’s wife’s sister. A law embedded in morality since the beginning of time.”

  “But you aren’t married to Louise.”

  “I know, I know. I am not sure if that makes it better, or worse. Still, the priest . . . He did mention incest.”

  This is serious.

  “Louis, you are not married to Louise,” I repeat. “If I were the queen’s sister, then perhaps there might be some concern—”

  The king shudders and holds up a hand to make me stop. “Were that you were just Louise’s cousin, or unrelated. Then there would not be this added . . . complication.”

  “But then you might never have met me. Nor I you,” I say lightly. I don’t like where this conversation is heading. If only I knew who was starting and spreading the stories around Paris. I tried to talk to Marville, the lieutenant general of police and a man fast becoming a friend, but he said that trying to stop the pamphlets and songs would be like trying to stop the wind: an impossible feat. Charolais claims they come from Maurepas, one of the king’s ministers and the son-in-law of Tante; needless to say, I don’t think we will be friends.

  “I see, darling, that nothing bothers you, but I . . . I cannot say the same. My soul . . .” Louis is pensive and I see his mind is far beyond the room, far beyond the scattered stars and deep blue depths of the painted sky above. “Sometimes I fear for my soul. It is not so much the judgment of the French people I fear, but the judgment of One much higher.” He sighs, the deep melancholy gloom of a much older man. “Sometimes I think I would give all the rest of my days if I could just turn back the clock to the time when I was a faithful husband to the queen, when I was a man who could stand straight before God. But then there was Louise . . .”

  Louis was recently forbidden Communion by his confessor, a rat-faced old Jesuit called Father Lignières. Without confession he can no longer touch and cure the leprous. A small thing, I would think, and something he should be glad of—disgusting lepers!—but it weighs heavily on him. I smell Fleury behind this; everyone knows Father Lignières lives under Fleury’s scarlet robes.

  This is dangerous and rather unexpected territory. I run my hands softly up and down his legs; we are not fully intimate, yet we are close in many ways. Louis knows the rules as well as I do and assures me he will find me a husband soon. This melancholic, spiritual man is a new Louis, and a rather worrying one. Louise had warned me of his black moods but I had assumed they were just a reaction to her company.

  “But dearest, God understands. You cannot, you must not be chained to the queen, a woman who rejects you from her bed. God understands.” I make a mental note: Lignières must leave.

  Louis continues to talk up to the ceiling. “When I was first with Louise, we would spend hours together, asking for forgiveness for our acts of sin. Hours we prayed, even as we sinned before and sometimes after. But gradually . . . I believe I have lost the way of the righteous, and that the only path ahead of me is the one that leads straight to Hell.”

  But Louis’s moods are like spring winds that blow inconstant. He soon abandons his religious qualms, and his insistence on finding me a husband increases. I cannot agree more: What is taking him so long?

  From Marie-Anne de la Tournelle

  Château de la Tournelle, Burgundy
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br />   May 2, 1739

  Dear Louise,

  Greetings from Burgundy! I trust you and your husband are well and thank you for your news of Court. My news is not very exciting: my husband was home over the winter, but he has since gone again and will not be back for some time. We are deep in rains this spring: last week the river beside the château rose and flooded the kitchen cellars; our stores of apples and vegetables were completely ruined. Soon we may even be as hungry as the peasants! That is only a joke, of course.

  How are you and, if I may be so bold, how is the king? I do apologize, but news of your relationship is quite open knowledge, so I do not think I am being impolite. We are sisters, after all. Hortense writes that Pauline is now at Court—how curious! She had heard some strange rumors—very strange rumors—but I am sure they are not true.

  Is Pauline as ugly and foul as ever? Well, I suppose I should not write such things—imagine what Zélie would say!—but you all know that Pauline and I are not as close as perhaps sisters should be.

  Thank you for the book you sent at New Year’s—how nice that you remembered I like La Fontaine’s poems!

  Please accept this box of cardamom seeds that I send to you, grown by my own hand. Well, not my own hand, but Cook’s, though I did supervise everything and am very pleased at what we have been able to accomplish in our humble greenhouse. At the end of the summer I will send you some more of our quinces; the orchard here grows the most abundant and delicious fruit.

  Please send me news of Court and Pauline.

  Love,

  Marie-Anne

  From Louise de Mailly

  Château de Versailles

  June 15, 1739