The Porcelain Dove

by Sherman, Delia

  "Why, that's from Phèdre," I exclaimed. And when he broke off to goggle in his turn: "Théramène's speech on the death of Hippolyte. The last time I saw it was at the Comédie Française, oh, more than ten years since. It always makes me weep."

  Le Destin lifted his hands and eyebrows in vast surprise. "She does talk after all," he exclaimed. "And she knows the Phèdre. Now. Does she know whether this be the château Beauxprés where the duc de Malvoeux is on the point of christening an heir?"

  By this time, I'd somewhat recovered my wits, though I was still mightily puzzled what to make of this mountebank and how I might answer his questions. "Yes, this is the château Beauxprés," I said slowly. Whatever else I might have said was lost in Le Destin's whoop of joy as he dashed down the steps and whipped up the oxen to pull the cart into the stable-yard, calling to me over his shoulder that his troupe would take their dinner in the stable, and he'd wait upon my master thereafter, at his earliest convenience.

  The players were with us for a week in all, and I vow upon my mother's soul that was the strangest week of my life. The players seemed to see nothing amiss at Beauxprés. That afternoon, I led Le Destin into the empty library, where with utmost gravity he bowed before a wild man and a peahen and complimented monseigneur le duc de Malvoeux and his duchesse on their beautiful château and even more beautiful newborn child.

  Monsieur regally inclined his shaggy head and ruffled his wife's feathers; madame screamed and briefly preened her breast. Le Destin smiled broadly, thanked her effusively, and vowed she'd find his play worthy her generosity.

  "'Tis quite outside the usual style, madame," he assured her as he backed towards the door. "I wrote it myself—a most fantastical pastoral romantical comedy, madame, just the thing for a christening fête, nothing coarse, nothing bawdy: I assure madame she may invite the curé, the bishop himself without fear of a blush. On Sunday, then, after the christening." And he bowed himself out.

  The players spent the next day erecting a stage in the stable-yard and the succeeding days rehearsing scenes before an audience composed of a brindle cow, a miniature dog, five purple rats, and a handful of chickens. There were five players in all—two women, two men, and a boy who claimed sixteen years. I suspect he'd stolen at least four of those years, perhaps from the actress Belle Étoile, who confided to me that she was three-and-twenty. I'd have put her closer to three-and-thirty, me. But there, who knows better than I that an actress' life is of the hardest, and that nothing ages a young skin so fast as white-lead and rouge? Why, even La Grotte, who'd the form and step of a young maid, showed without her paint the lined eyes and faded lips of a matron. She was Rosemont's mistress, I think, and Belle Étoile called herself Le Destin's wife. The boy was a cousin. They had given him some outrageous name, what was it now? Rosidore? No, L'Espérance, that was it.

  For four days, they dashed back and forth between cart and stage, tearing their hair, darting behind curtains, tumbling, dancing, shouting out cues and declaiming speeches. I watched them for a while, but could make neither head nor tail of their play. There seemed to be at least one magician in it—perhaps two—and a shipwreck. At one point La Grotte, dressed as a boy, made sad eyes at Rosemont in a purple turban and a long black cloak. Come sunset, they laid aside their trumpery robes, built a fire just outside the stable and spent the evening beside it, mending costumes and singing.

  Naturally enough, they expected to be fed. I wondered what they'd make of the lumpy porridge that had perforce become the staple of our diet. However, the satchel liked them, or perhaps was simply stimulated by whatever magic had lured them to Beauxprés. In either case, when I reached inside, I found ragôuts and roasts and haricots aux amandes sufficient to feed us and players as well. Le Destin proclaimed himself ravished by such bounty, and begged that the beauteous fount of it—by which he seemed to mean me—deign to hear them sing. Before I'd even sat down, he tucked a violin under his chin and bowed a lively melody, once, twice, and on the third repetition, La Grotte opened her faded lips and sang in a sweet, unfaded voice:

  "The old King comes from far away (E-y-a)

  To still the dancers' sport and play (E-y-a)

  For he fears both night and day

  That bold young men may steal away

  His queen of April morning."

  She sang other airs, too, alone and in chorus with Rosemont or Belle Étoile, of love and liking and long days wandering, complaints of faithless lovers and greedy fathers who'd marry a maid to a man thrice her age. Breton songs of witches and ghosts; Provençal songs of happy and unhappy love. More often the latter than the former, however: happy lovers have better things to do than sing.

  Actors change little down the years. Whatever the century, whatever the circumstances, they are always and ever passionate, self-absorbed, and oddly innocent. Reality is of less interest to them than philosophy to a beggar's child. Rags are royal robes, if the property list says so; raddled crones are beautiful princesses. They'd been told that Beauxprés was the glory of the Juras. That 'twas also a rat-haunted ruin did not seem to signify. And as for when they thought it was! My curiosity being piqued by their outlandish clothes, I asked Le Destin who was king in France. He wrinkled up his nose and scratched his head and finally answered me, with the air of a man who's capping another's joke, that the king was a queen, par Dieu, at least until he was out of skirts. By which I understood, after some pondering, that his Louis was the fourteenth of that name, still unbreeched and under the regency of Marie de Médicis.

  My next question was, had the players been dragged forward to our time or had we slipped back to theirs? That I could not ask them, nor could they have answered, nor, I suspect, would they have cared, as long as they'd an audience to play before, even such an ill-assorted audience as we.

  As for the play—well, the play proved to be as curious as the circumstances. Le Destin swore he'd writ it himself. Stole it himself would be closer to the truth, from second-rate writers of pastoral romance and third-rate copies of ancient Greek comedy, with patches of old folktales where his other borrowings were threadbare. The verse, I fear, was all his own. However much the actors urged it on with kicks and sawing at its reins, it limped along like an old horse on a hard road: clip, clip, clop; clip, clip, clop.

  Had I attended The Sorcerer Maid in Paris, the first speech would have sent me out of the theater in search of more spiritual amusement. In Beauxprés, I laughed over its spavined jests and wept over its clapped-out sorrows with as much fervor as I'd have accorded Racine and Molière rolled into one.

  The performance took place on a Sunday afternoon. I'd heard the players clattering about the stable-yard and the court all morning, and when Le Destin called us out at last, I saw they'd been preparing for a large audience. The cart was pulled up before Latona and her frogs, and all the space between stage and front steps was filled with benches, stools, upturned mangers extracted from the stable, and slats balanced on buckets. Two chairs, for the seigneur and his lady, were set on the highest step. Monsieur—who'd understood the occasion just well enough to cram a wig over his wild hair—arranged himself in the largest chair. Madame fluttered up and perched on its arm. I pulled the second chair a little aside and sat in that while Jean reclined on the steps at my feet.

  As soon as we were settled, a flute began to tweetle behind the moth-eaten curtain, which fell aside to reveal a stiff cloth scene inexpertly daubed with some five or six trees. Plank-built frames stood at either side of the stage, their upper parts forked like branches and stuck with a few rags of green cloth. A rope was strung between them, and a mound of green canvas lay beneath. A forest, beyond doubt.

  The flute soared to ecstatic heights, cracked, and fell silent. Three knocks off-stage heralded Rosemont, resplendent in an azure turban and a salmon-pink sash. You could tell he was troubled in his mind, for his brow was deeply wrinkled, and he sighed and shook his head from side to side like a horse refusing the bridle. When he'd reached the midpoint of the stage, he clutch
ed his breast, flung wide his arms, and confided his woe at the top of his voice.

  "Alas and alas! Is't not grief enough that my master Alcendre should be the most wicked mage in five kingdoms, without he be the most demanding as well? Nothing but spells, enchantments, charms, and cantrips from dusk until dawn. And then, from dawn until dusk, I am set to gather simples, philtres, decoctions, and essences. With my own hands I must gather them, I, Charmant, a king's son. Behold how I am tried!"

  Rosemont—Charmant, I suppose I should call him—then drew a scroll from his bosom, and with a flick of his wrist unfurled it across the stage and into the wings. "Dog's eye, bat's wool, monkey's paw, pig's—I cry you pardon, madame—pizzle, black cat's blood: tedious to gather, unpleasant to carry. And the list grows more curious still. Worm's nail, mandrill's tail, hen's tooth, liar's sooth." He looked up. "Liar's sooth! I ask you. And there's yet more."

  He'd been rerolling the list as he spoke, and now only a foot or so of threadbare fabric dangled from his upraised fist.

  "The Horse of the North Wind, the Cloak of the Wizard of Norroway, and, finally, the Sorcerer Maid." He shook his head. "The Sorcerer Maid. The use of the rest is clear enough to the merest dabbler in the Arts Magical. But what can he want with a Sorcerer Maid? We are not, after all, a school of women! And where does one seek a Sorcerer Maid? To the East? To the South? To the North? To the West? Perhaps my master's new slave can advise me. Oh, Dove," he called off-stage. "Oh, Porcelain Dove!"

  Beside me, monsieur stirred uneasily, and I feared Le Destin's play was about to reach a sudden and unforeshadowed denouement. But he quieted when the boy L'Espérance fluttered onto the stage, all tricked out in white, with a cap of white feathers and a feathered cape. Twice he wheeled around Charmant heels-over-head, then leapt up into one of the framework trees and somewhat breathlessly, spoke:

  "Far over the sea dwells a maiden most bright

  Redder far than the rose, than the lily more white.

  Her voice is enchantment, her eye is a flame,

  The Sorcerer Maid is that sweet lady's name.

  My mistress was she, and my playmate most tender;

  I was parted from her by your master, Alcendre.

  My tale is most woeful; most desperate her fate,

  Oh, hear me, oh help me before 'tis too late."

  Then, in a clear, piping voice, L'Espérance—Bah!—the Porcelain Dove—revealed to Charmant—and to us—the argument of the play.

  As I've said, Le Destin's plot was nothing more than begged-and-borrowed claptrap. A lovely virgin, an aging wooer, his young apprentice—the dramatis personae tell all. Disguises, lovers' misunderstandings, idiot brothers, a ballet—the only new things in it were the aging wooer's being a wizard and the lovely virgin's showing more spirit than the species commonly exhibits. La Grotte played the Maid as a termagant, all tossing ringlets, flashing eyes, and heaving bosom. Le Destin undertook the role of the wizard Alcendre in scarlet velvet, black lace, a black wand, and an expression of doting malice so hideous to behold that 'twas no wonder La Grotte laughed his suit to scorn. Affronted, Le Destin stamped his feet, tore his peaked wig, and flourished his wand in a circle until he'd wound up a terrible curse:

  "Refuse my love? Unhappy maiden,

  Unhappier still prepare to be!

  Want and woe shall be thy guerdon,

  Grief and madness thy true love's fee.

  All shall prove

  As I foretell

  'Till Porcelain Dove

  Doth break the spell."

  Then he seized the Porcelain Dove—not L'Espérance, you understand, but a stuffed white bird tied with thread to La Grotte's wrist—and exited, cackling.

  "The Dove!" cried monsieur, which made me start. "The Porcelain Dove!"

  Madame reached up with her beak to preen his wig and croon soothingly in his ear until he calmed and sighed and listened with an air of puzzled attention to the Maid lamenting the loss of her pet with much wringing of her hands and beating of her fine bosom. This display not unnaturally attracted the attention of her two brothers, Pridamont and Clindor, who, learning the cause of their sister's distress, swore to retrieve her Dove though they should die in the attempt. Pridamont was rude and ruddy, Clindor clerkly and pale. Their sister thanked them at length and sent them on their way with kisses and blessings.

  The next scene was an inn, with Pridamont and Clindor before it, quarreling over the choice of their way. Presently the innkeeper came out, her hands over her ears, demanding to know what the noise was about. The innkeeper, played by Belle Étoile, was a widow of bountiful charms whose chilly aspect warmed immediately she caught sight of the ruddy Pridamont. Pouting prettily, she offered the gentlemen wine and roast fowl and feather beds so soft they'd swallow a man up to his ears and make him think he'd died and gone to Heaven on a cloud. Would the gentlemen be pleased to step within and try them? Before she'd finished her speech, Pridamont had her by the waist and on the other side of the inn door. Clindor sat upon a mossy bank and sulked.

  A flute sounded, stage right. Clindor started violently and stared into the wings. "The Dove!" he cried. "Dear brother, the Dove! Like pearl it glitters through the gloom. It beckons me! Dear brother, come!"

  An acrobatic turn ensued. The Porcelain Dove pirouetted upon the rope strung above the stage, treading it so lightly I could almost swear he flew, while Clindor tumbled comically in pursuit. With ever-increasing daring, the Dove leapt and slid, and when at last he came to rest at full length upon the rope, he plucked a single feather from his cloak and touched it to Clindor's brow. Clindor's mouth stretched slowly in a rapturous smile, and falling to his knees, he lifted worshipful hands to the heavens.

  A rattle of thunder, a puff of black smoke, and when it cleared, there was Alcendre, coughing a little and fishing in his pockets. After one or two false casts, he pulled from his waistcoat two golden cords, one of which he tied to the Dove, the other to the rapt Clindor. Then he explained he'd done for Pridamont by identifying him to the gardeloups as a desperate smuggler and, chuckling evilly, dragged off his prizes, stage left.

  There followed great banging and swearing backstage; after a space, a breathless grenadier entered stage right with his wig awry, marched into the inn, tore a disheveled Pridamont from the innkeeper's arms, loaded him with chains, and led him briskly away, presumably to prison.

  The Sorcerer Maid, who'd been watching all this through the circle of a magic ring, flung it pettishly downstage and declared she'd regain the bird herself.

  "Be gone, weak tears; beat strong, my heart!

  I now eschew the maiden's part

  To stride the world in man's array,

  Cast Evil down and win the day!"

  The next scene found the Maid, fetchingly breeched and wigged, entered into service with Alcendre. Naturally, she fell in love with Charmant, who, equally naturally, was already in love—with the Dove's vision of the Sorcerer Maid. There was one particularly affecting moment, when Charmant was bemoaning his love to the soi-disant youth Cléomède. In the course of confiding to Cléomède how he intended to declare his love to the Sorcerer Maid, should he ever encounter her, Charmant by little and little leaned closer until he was within a pig's whisker of kissing Cléomède full upon the mouth. 'Twas in this compromising pose that Alcendre surprised them.

  "Is this how you serve me? Ungrateful! Unkind!

  Charmant, O thou falsest of false humankind.

  All my lore have I taught thee, my wisdom laid bare;

  Is this now thy thanks? By Hades I swear

  I'll slay thee! Yet stay! Why threat Charmant's life

  When thou, Cléomède, art sole cause of this strife?

  Begone from my sight, saucy boy; ne'er return!"

  Of course the Maid pled with Alcendre to forgive her. And of course he relented so far as to set her an impossible task. If Cléomède brought him the Horse of the North Wind, perhaps he'd let him continue as his apprentice. But Cléomède was to accomplish the task alo
ne, with help from neither man nor woman.

  The next scene was the forest—somewhat better supplied with trees than it had been—and the Maid sitting on a mossy bank with her head in her hands. "Cent mille tonnerres," she mourned. "The Horse of the North Wind! As well ask for the chariot axle of the Sun or the barrow of the Man in the Moon! Sorcerers are a greedy race."

  L'Espérance fluttered down from a tree and alit at her feet. This time, the feathers sewn to his cap and cloak were black.

  "You can't give up so soon, mademoiselle," he cawed. "Why, you've barely begun. There have to be three tasks: you know that."

  "And each more impossible than the last," said the Maid despairingly. "Go away. You heard what he said. No man can help me. I've got to find the North Wind by myself, and where he keeps his Horse, all before I can even think how to go about stealing it without his discovering me and blowing me to Cathay."

  The Crow cocked its head at her, impatience clear in every feather. "Oh, mademoiselle, mademoiselle. A crow is not a man, not though he read and speak as fluently as any bishop's clerk in France. Take heart, therefore, and put on your boots. You've a journey before you and some danger to face at the end of it. But you're a brave girl, and you won't be facing it all unsupported."

  For answer, the Maid sighed and shrugged and pulled from her pack a pair of cracked leather boots, which she tugged onto her feet. As she swung the pack onto her back, I caught sight of a wand sticking out of it. I knew that wand, me. I couldn't be mistaken—how many wands could there be beribboned like a maypole and crowned with a purple jewel? Yet how came a troupe of bad provincial players to have among their properties a duplicate of the wand of the Fairy Friandise? Wondering, I stared and stared at it, and what with staring and wondering I missed the change of scene, so that the Maid's arrival at the North Wind's palace took me by surprise, as though she'd made the journey by magic in very truth.

  Le Destin, it seemed, had kept back his best effects, for the palace of the North Wind was splendid if somber, as one would expect the dwelling of the grim Boreas to be. Bidding the Crow farewell, the Maid entered the stable and offered herself as stableboy to the North Wind's head groom. There followed a comic scene involving the head groom, the Maid, a dung-fork, and a flatulent horse which had Jean holding his ribs and weeping with merriment. I, too, found it amusing, if a little coarse, especially when the Horse of the North Wind copiously demonstrated why not all foul airs are born in marshes. The Maid was inspired to a stream of scatology that would have shocked the curé, had he been there, into a fit of the vapors.