The Porcelain Dove

by Sherman, Delia

  "What ever will I do?" she mourned one night as I brushed out her hair. "Monsieur grows stranger day by day, rejoices that he'll never have to converse with Parisian fools again, and forbids me to order a new toilette because I'll never have occasion to wear it. If I must remain mewed up here in Beauxprés for the rest of my life, I shall die of boredom, Berthe, I know I shall."

  Inwardly, I agreed that 'twas very like she would, and me with her. Then a happy thought struck me. "Quelle bêtise, madame!" I said. "Madame has only to write Mme la baronne, and we may be back in Paris within the week."

  She took no persuading. Before I blew out her candle that night, she'd written to madame her mother, who responded, some ten days later, that Mme la duchesse de Malvoeux was welcome to stay with her. Armed with this letter, my mistress sought out monsieur in his aviary, returning shortly with a bruised cheek and the happy news that her husband didn't give a pin whether she stayed or went, so long as she never entered the aviary again without an invitation. Two days later, we departed.

  Linotte remained with her father at Beauxprés.

  This was the subject of some little heart-burning on my mistress' part, and I myself thought it a pity to leave the child behind. But monsieur would not allow that Paris was a fit place for a child of tender years, and madame, when all was said and done, could not imagine what she'd do with her there. She comforted her conscience with bestowing Pompey upon her daughter as a kind of valet à tout faire, and the pair of them seemed so content with the arrangement that I felt mean-spirited for wishing that he were to accompany us as usual. After all, I'd be at home at the hôtel Fourchet, with Olympe and other old friends to gossip and go about with. Yet I expected to miss him, and I did.

  I began to miss him no later than the second day upon the road, when madame began to regret her show of independence. Twenty times she ordered Carmontelle to return to Beauxprés; twenty times she whirligigged him back towards Paris, all the while fretting and weeping and wringing her hands until I thought I'd go mad. Once ensconced in her old suite in the hôtel Fourchet, however, she recovered her spirits. It made her feel a girl again, she declared, to live under her mother's roof with only me to wait on her.

  La baronne du Fourchet smiled to hear her say so—rather a wary smile, not to crack her maquillage. At more than three-score, my first mistress suffered from rotten teeth, falling hair, a seamed throat, and a shrunken bosom. Olympe was now forced to celebrate her Rites of Pride behind closed doors; for the baronne's toilette required such a deal of padding and painting and powdering and polishing of false teeth that no man could reasonably be asked to witness it.

  My mistress' toilette, now: that was another matter altogether. A word dropped in Mme de Hautebriande's ear, another in Mme de Fleuru's, and the fashionable young men came flocking to my mistress' chamber like pigeons to a hilltop cote. Within a month, the levées of the duchesse de Malvoeux were one of the sights of Paris, like Mme de Choiseul's salons and the Théâtre Italienne. Chevaliers on their way to fight the English in the West Indies begged her for locks of hair to wear over their hearts in battle. Marquises quarreled over the privilege of choosing her ribbons and placing her patches. Vicomtes made up parties to the Bois de Boulogne and taught her to ride a-horseback. My mistress, impartial as the sun, smiled on them all.

  Squired now by one cicisbeo, now by another, she trotted from lecture to concert, from ball to masque. She ordered a mannish riding costume in flea's-head brown and displayed it on a rented hack at the fashionable Thursday promenade. She undertook the soubrette in a farce presented in the private theater of the baron d'Esclapon. She furnished her carriage and her mother's box at the Opéra with a succession of pretty chevaliers. Oh, she never admitted any of them to her bed—her lips, I'm sure, were all any man had of her. Yet her adherence to the letter of her marriage vows was no comfort to me. Where once I'd had a single rival for my mistress' affections, now I had a dozen, and each of them was a separate and unique torment to me.

  Ah, how I suffered! Two hundred years, and the recollection of my silent rage still knots my throat and clenches my fist so that my pen sputters and blots. 'Twas stay-laces I broke in Paris, and hairpins, and once a costly bonnet au berceau d'amour, which I crushed when madame handed her haresfoot to one of her swains, directing him to powder her décolleté. Then I missed Pompey indeed, for Olympe only laughed when I complained, called me fool and dog in the manger. Without the theater, I think I must have died.

  'Twas not quite like the old days, to be sure. Some of my mother's former clients were dead, others had forgotten me, and my special friend Mme Dumesnil had retired the previous season upon the admiration of all Paris and a pension of 5,000 livres. Mlle Huys still trod the boards, and LeKain also, and the plays I watched them act were as familiar to me as my mistress' face and far less variable. Twice or three times in a week I'd sit in a loge paid for from my wages and let my tears flow freely for Médée, for Bérénice, for Zulima, whose woes were so much greater, and so much easier of comprehension, than my own.

  Since madame was determined to stay in Paris until her husband should think to recall her, we remained in the hôtel Fourchet for almost a year.

  Now, I've sworn to be honest, and I'd not have Colette think, when she reads this account, that I was so poor-spirited as to nurse my suffering through every moment of every day. No. Paris is Paris, after all, and 'tis impossible for anyone to be wholly miserable there. I drank chocolate in the Palais-Royal with Olympe and her friends, I walked in the Tuileries, I spent my savings on scent and kerchiefs and ribbons to make myself fine.

  One day in my wanderings I found myself upon the rue Saint-Denis where I was born. 'Twas dusk, I remember, and the street was crowded with porters and watersellers, with grisettes leaving their day's work and children returning from their petits écoles. The grisettes carried baguettes of fresh bread wrapped in their shawls; the children carried slates. As I passed the door of a millinery shop, a small girl darted in front of me so that I stumbled and she fell to her knees in the mud. Before I'd steadied myself, she picked herself up and, single-minded as a donkey, made for the milliner's door.

  "Petite maman!" she shrilled as she pushed it open. "Guess what?" And the door swung to behind her.

  Curious, I peered through the elegant display of heads in the window at the child, who was burrowing in the arms of a pretty bourgeoise. As I watched, the bourgeoise released her daughter, smiled down into the small, vivid face, and wiped a smut from it while the child babbled and waved her hands as though relating some momentous news. Her mother laughed and smoothed her tumbled hair. The street noises faded from my ears, and I seemed to hear my own mother exclaiming over my muddy apron and asking whether I'd conducted myself like the wise infant she'd sent from her in the morning or like the little hoyden I looked now. The voice was maman's, was Olympe's, was madame's, as were the arms I felt around my shoulders. For a moment, I was a child held warm against a loving breast, embraced and embracing in perfect understanding, and then I was myself again, the femme de chambre of the duchesse de Malvoeux, standing at the window of a stranger's shop with my skirt trailing in the muck and my eyes awash with tears.

  Having wiped the tears away, I tapped impulsively at the windowpane. All smiles and curtsies, the bourgeoise opened her door to me. Even though she must have known from my apron that I was no great lady, she gladly showed me any number of elegant hats, from which I chose a beaver of puce felt trimmed with spotted ribbons and feathers dyed rouge de sang. 'Twas a most pleasing and modish hat, and the small girl watched wide-eyed as I tried it on, agreeing that it became me well. 'Twas very dear—a full ten livres—but I opened my pocketbook and paid for it, at which the mother grew quite as wide-eyed as her daughter. I kissed the child, who, unprompted, hugged me about my neck while her mother packed the hat in a round box.

  If I were to close my eyes this moment, I know I would see them—mother and daughter, candlelit, smiling hand in hand against a background of silk and brigh
t plumage. The bourgeoise was, I remember, my age or only a little younger, dark-haired as I was, animated, piquant, slender. Had my mother lived, had I succeeded her, had I wed and survived the midwife, had I successfully raised a daughter to the age of discretion, we might have stood and smiled so as we bade a client farewell. 'Twas a pretty enough scene: Chardin would have done it justice, I think. Honesty compels me to confess that I would not.

  Among the countless ways in which our sojourn on the rue Quincampoix differed from madame's girlhood, one thing remained the same. Mme du Fourchet still never spoke of her children. 'Twas Olympe told me that Mme de Poix had left her petit-maître husband at last and gone to London to console herself with the English milords. As for Mme de Bonsecours, she was grown most respectable, the mother of three sons and highly placed at court by reason of her husband's office. Why the baronne commonly denied herself when the marquise called, I do not know; unless 'twas that as she grew older, Mme Hortense grew more like her father to look upon, more outré in her opinions, and more forceful in expressing them.

  Given her reception there, Mme de Bonsecours called at the hôtel Fourchet with astonishing fidelity. At least once a week, and sometimes twice, a lackey would announce the marquise de Bonsecours a bare moment before that lady surged into the chamber like a silken wave and broke irresistibly over madame's unwelcoming silence in an affectionate froth of greetings.

  "Ah, Berthe," she'd say, patting my cheek. "I'm enchanted to see you. You shall make the chocolate. When I tell her how lovely you look, Louison will be jealous, but never mind. However spiteful she grows, she can do me no more harm than God and my cook between them have done already."

  In reply, I'd curtsy and murmur that Mme la marquise was, as always, trés élégante, which would made her laugh. My mistress, sighing, would send a lackey for chocolate and petits fours while Mme de Bonsecours subsided on the sofa and asked her how she did.

  Then would my mistress commence chattering away at a great rate—about Dr. Mesmer and his magnetic tubs, for instance, or the towering heights to which fashionable coiffures were rising—while the lackey set out the chocolate service and a small mountain of iced cakes. By the time I'd whipped hot milk and chocolate in a basin, poured the frothy liquid into two porcelain cups, and set them on an elegant ormolu table, she'd be well into an account of her latest conquest.

  "Of course, I told the silly boy I could not accept such a gift, were he ten times the king's cousin. He answered that I was right to reject it, that my price was indeed far above rubies, and next day sent me a most astonishing necklace, all diamonds of the purest water. 'Twas brought to me as I dined at Stéphanie-Germaine de Hautebriande's, and I vow, sister, I cannot conceive how he came to know where I was. Figure to yourself my blushes and confusion! We were twelve at table, and I barely acquainted with ten of them. How Stéphanie-Germaine contrives to collect such a crowd of notables, I don't know. Why, Mme de Genlis was there, and Mme Necker and her English friend M. Gibbon. But Stéphanie-Germaine's triumph, her pièce de résistance, was—no, sister, I will not tell you: you must guess. A beauty but lately come upon the town, at least as witty as she is fair." My mistress looked roguishly down at her fan. "She dresses most daintily, too. For a man."

  Mme de Bonsecours laughed. "Do you refer to Charlotte Geneviève Louise Auguste Andrée Timothée d'Eon de Beaumont, formerly the chevalier d'Eon? I hear he has taken the haut monde by storm, like a grenadier in long gowns."

  "A grenadier in long gowns! La, sister, that's very apt! The creature is prodigious dowdy, to be sure, though 'tis rumored that when she proclaimed herself a woman last year, the queen sent Rose Bertin herself to make the trousseau."

  The two sisters smiled at one another, united in their opinion of the soi-disant chevalière. Then Mme de Bonsecours, unable to leave well alone, said thoughtfully, "I can imagine a woman wishing to be a man, but never a man wishing to be a woman. 'Twas easy enough for d'Eon to declare himself a female, but I wonder how 'twill be when he tires of corsets and petticoats and seeks to reclaim all the rights and privileges of manhood? He'll sing a new tune then, I vow. Men may do as they will. Women, like lap-dogs, must trail after men in the hope of snapping up some small scrap of knowledge or power."

  Madame frowned delicately. "How can you say such a thing, Hortense, you who will give place to no man? And how can you say that women do nothing of themselves? Are you not a mother?"

  "I didn't become a mother without my husband's help," said the marquise impatiently. "Nor do I think motherhood so high a calling as, say, politics or philosophy or war. Certainly 'tis not so highly honored. Tell me, Adèle, can you imagine any king granting a woman land or title for her service to her children? Why, illiterate nursemaids execute all the duties of motherhood with as much reward, or more, than the ladies who have borne the brats they nurse and dandle."

  Madame commenced fanning herself with an offended air. "To listen to you, sister de Bonsecours, one would think you'd rather be, oh, a common soldier than a marquise."

  "Bien sûr: a common soldier may hope for advancement. Were I younger, or thinner, or less attached to my comfort, I vow I'd cut my hair and put off my skirts and prove myself a more manly chevalier than Mlle d'Eon."

  The marquise had spoken with a kind of passionate lightness. Madame, puzzled how to respond, made a great show of picking up her cold chocolate, sipping at it, making a tiny moue, and putting it down again.

  Mme de Bonsecours observed this byplay with an amused air. "Pray," she said after a moment. "How are my excellent nephews? I hear of the vicomte from time to time—his parties are quite the rage, you know, among a certain circle of young men. M. Justin, now—how does he go on with the Benedictines? And Linotte must be growing old enough for school. Do you intend sending her to Port Royal?"

  Madame glared at her. "No daughter of mine," she declared, "will be subject to a flock of sour, barren virgins with never a kind thought or a gentle word amongst them."

  "You will then educate the girl at home?"

  Worse and worse. Madame nibbled at an iced cake, pronounced it stale, then said in a tone that dared argument, "M. my husband is not willing to engage a tutor for so young a child."

  What monsieur had said was that there was no reason to cast away good money upon the education of a girl. All the chit needed to know was that she was a Maindur of Malvoeux, which wisdom would have to serve for her dowry also, as he'd not a sou to spare.

  Mme de Bonsecours must have guessed something of this, for her color rose alarmingly. "So the girl is doomed to spend her life as ignorant as mud, without the means of learning better," she exclaimed. "Lud, Adèle! If you will not send the child to school, then send her to me. After three boys, I'd enjoy raising a girl."

  "You need not trouble yourself, sister," said madame icily. "I myself have taken steps to ensure that the child's education will be in all ways superior to Port Royal, except, perhaps, in the study of pranks and intrigue."

  In the general way, I would not have said the sisters much resembled one another, but now the pair of them sat stiffly on their chairs, their faces identical masks of suppressed rage. The visit did not look to survive the exchange, and I was preparing to break the chocolate-basin to give them some common cause for their anger when Mme de Bonsecours' face softened.

  "I beg your pardon, Adèle. I'd cause to hate Port Royal myself, though not, bien sûr, so great a cause as you. Am I to understand that you intend to teach Linotte yourself?"

  "Pompey will teach her," said my mistress.

  "Ah," said Mme de Bonsecours. "Rousseau triumphant. I approve."

  In September, a letter arrived from Beauxprés bearing M. le duc de Malvoeux's wonder at his wife's long absence. If the first snowfall did not find her home at Beauxprés, he'd be forced to consider himself a widower and his children motherless.

  "Poor heart," was madame's response to this chilly missive. "I must go to him at once. How he misses me."

  So it was that when next Mme de Bonse
cours called, she found us in a chaos of trunks and hat boxes, baskets and cases. She surveyed the bed piled high with gowns, the corsets wrapped in muslin, the stacks of gloves and folded chemises, and arched her brows.

  "So your falconer has whistled you to his fist at last," she said.

  Madame raised her chin. "I have but remembered my duty as a wife," she said.

  "Ah," said Mme de Bonsecours. "Still, I expect you'll miss Paris sadly, after your succès fou. I don't know how a certain prince will contrive to survive your absence."

  My mistress blushed. "If he does not, 'twill not be for lack of ladies willing to comfort him."

  "Bien sûr. But how dull 'twould be not knowing which among them he chooses. Shall I write and tell you?"

  Though she seemed to tease, something in her tone drew my attention, some echo of the yearning I'd often heard in my mistress' voice when she addressed monsieur. Coming from so formidable a woman, it surprised and touched me. Madame, of course, was deaf. She smiled at her sister—a formal, chilly smile—and said, "If it amuses you, Hortense, of course you may write."

  I have them still, twenty or more of the marquise's letters, which provide a running account of the bedrooms and salons of Paris and Versailles. They sit beside me now, worn with reading, stained with ashes and rouge and wax, breathing a faint perfume of vanished intrigues. The first of them arrived at Beauxprés before I'd quite finished unpacking madame's things.

  October 1779

  "Mlle" d'Eon has been arrested. Just as I predicted, the creature soon tired of being a woman and petitioned the king for permission to wear breeches on week-days, saving petticoats for Sundays and feast days. Not remarkably, the petition was ignored, whereupon d'Eon wrote to Maurepas complaining of the king's ill-treatment of a loyal subject who was both a gentlewoman and an officer of the Royal Army. Though the letter was prodigious rude and ill-writ—I've seen it myself—the creature was sufficiently proud of it to print it up and circulate it among the ladies of the court as a kind of Declaration of the Rights of Women. The fruit of this idiocy was six grenadiers calling with an arrest order at the chevalière's lodgings in Versailles. The delicate creature resisted (manfully, I had almost wrote), stunning two of them with a carbine charged with grapeshot, but was overpowered at last by the survivors. Now the chevalière languishes in prison, the nuns of Auxerre having refused sanctuary to a supplicant whom only the king, and not God, had created female.