Farewell, My Queen

by Black Moishe

  The château, too, was full of masons, plasterers, nail makers . . . We had only moments left to live . . . My neighbors were talking back and forth over my head. Each one had predictions to offer of atrocities hitherto unknown. Our little chamber of anguish, there in the Study Leading to the Terraces, was ready to explode.

  “What is this delirium?” piped up the same clear, childish voice, now with a moaning quality to it. “His Majesty emerges from his private office in tears, because, he says, referring to his people, ‘his children are wounding him grievously.’ Meanwhile, in Paris, the people march through the streets shouting: ‘Give us back Mister Necker, he is our father!’ Which is the father? The King or Mister Necker? And what do the children want?”

  Once again, she received no answer. I wished she had. I, too, would have liked to understand. Then someone said: “The children want to choose their father. That is the new Gospel, Your Ladyship.” I do not know why, but I was seized with a fit of shaking.

  IN AN EARLIER DAY, THAT TIME

  WE ALL REMEMBER SO HAPPILY . . .

  It was too cramped and gloomy there in the Study; we were being driven crazy. I made my way toward rooms that were not quite so dark, and as I soon became aware, everyone behaved better if a few candles were lit. One such room was the Dispatch Office. I recognized Monsieur de Pujol and Monsieur de Chèvreloup. They were engrossed in a discussion (as with any night when people stay up, periods of exhaustion alternated with renewed surges of energy). They were wondering how the Court had collectively contrived to end up in such a sorry predicament. They tried first to lay the blame on the English, always ready to rejoice in the misfortunes of France and consequently even ready to contribute to them, then they incriminated the Illuminists and Freemasons, and finally, with greater conviction, the Philosophes . . . the Philosophes? I was all ears. In the bag I carried back and forth to Trianon, there was scant place for books by writers of that ilk. But my two gentlemen, while not approving of them, had apparently read them. Their systematic attempts to undermine society, said the pair, their detemined efforts to propagate religious disbelief, their mania for defending work as an instrument of liberation, the fact that they dared to hold out the promise of happiness, had upset people’s minds. Capital punishment was what those fellows deserved. They were fuzzy-minded, dyed-in-the-wool intriguers. The right to happiness, could there ever be a more disastrous notion?

  The Philosophes soon monopolized the discussion. Everyone had something to say about them. The tone rapidly became as heated as in the little corner I had just abandoned. Monsieur de Pujol spoke up again: what was more, all these Philosophes, badgering us incessantly with their talk of equality, were ambitious individuals. They had but one wish: to outdo their colleagues. They were consumed with ambition. They were poor specimens of humanity, tormented by megalomania. They could not tolerate kings because they considered they were kings themselves. Kings! Gods, rather! The Philosophes claimed they should be an object of worship.

  “We must put them back in their place; remember, it was not so long ago . . . Think back: under the previous reign, even someone as passionately fond of literature as the Prince de Conti would have never let a Philosophe sit down at his table. Not even away from Court, on his own estates.”

  Whether it was the previous reign or on his own estates that set Monsieur de Pujol’s mind on a different course I do not know, but a wave of nostalgia swept over him. And he began to intone (I can still hear the chanting rhythm, the languid dipping-of-oars effect permeating the Southern accent that colored his words):

  “Under King Louis XV, that time we all remember so happily, every prince kept an author who became part of his household. Thus, Collé belonged to the aging Duke d’Orléans, Laujon to the Prince de Condé. When festivities were held, these fine minds were much in demand. They composed couplets and kept us amused with their set-rhyme poems. We treated them courteously, and I must even confess that I often derived pleasure from conversing with them. But there was never any question of allowing them to step outside the understood limits. They took their meals at a table set aside for them, among the equerries and the stewards ordinary. As for dining with princes . . . (Monsieur de Pujol suppressed a nervous giggle) let us not descend to absurdities! Never would a man of letters have taken his seat at the table of a prince. After lunch, they had leave to consume an ice in the salon. Occasionally, at the prince’s pleasure, they might return to the billiard room to watch the play, but always standing up, as was the case when they consumed ices. They would remain for half an hour, forty-five minutes at most.” (And he tapped his cane in time with these last words, for added emphasis.)

  The narrator, though recalling things everyone already knew, was being heard in blissful contentment. But suddenly, perhaps because thinking about those vanished times was too cruel to be borne, unappeasable awareness of the present moment forced its way back to the surface. The reign of Louis XV was over. Talented individuals now ate ices at any hour of the day. They could enjoy them lying down if they felt like it . . . Around the table, gentlemen were dozing with their heads on their arms, like lazy schoolboys. I would have been glad if I, too, could sit down, but all the chairs were taken. I was about to go elsewhere (I had in mind the room called the Dogs’ Antechamber, which had a wide couch), when a hard, cold voice echoed in the doorway.

  * * *

  A commanding voice; was it a man’s voice? a woman’s? It was hard to judge. What was not hard to judge was the provocative intent of the speaker and the tremendous energy behind the voice. We had reached a level of despondency where no one had the least desire to resume a debate on any subject whatsoever, and especially the subject of the Philosophes. But the newcomer seemed quite ready to prolong the discussion. The authoritarian voice rapped out:

  “Not all the Philosophes are witty conversationalists and court jesters. The real Philosophes are independent. They work. They think. (Those last words were underlined with an emphasis meant to be insulting . . .) There are good things, in fact excellent things, to be found in the writings of the Philosophes. Anyone who has not read Helvétius’s book On the Human Mind or Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Social Contract cannot hope to grasp the dynamic of our times.”

  DIANE DE POLIGNAC.

  This pronouncement revealed to me the speaker’s identity: Diane de Polignac. The discovery made me still more anxious to slip quietly away, but I did not dare: I always went numb in that woman’s presence. It certainly had to be her; who else would talk about dynamics at the very moment we were all crashing down? Her way, in any situation, was to find the current that would carry her where she wished to go . . . She took up a position in the middle of the room. The men immediately stood up. They were vexed at themselves for unguardedly dropping off to sleep in the presence of so eminent a personality. Heavily built, lacking in beauty, Diane de Polignac crushed other people with her intelligence and haughtiness. To these “qualities” she added an ill-concealed natural violence. In her presence, you felt as if you were facing a military commander, and when she desired a man, she wasted no time or effort on roundabout maneuvers, but simply took him. At a deeper level, however, the man with whom she truly formed a couple was her brother. The Duke de Polignac had pleasing manners. His career had progressed with unbelievable speed. After obtaining the post of First Royal Equerry, he had been appointed General of the Posts and Director of the Royal Stud. Finally, to crown this series of achievements, he had recently been ennobled and risen from the rank of count to that of duke . . . He owed his prosperity, as can well be imagined, not just to his own abilities, but to the complete confidence he reposed in his sister. Having no illusions about her political acumen, which was immeasurably greater than his own, he had placed himself in her hands, and he carried out to the letter her every instruction. Besides boldness and strength of purpose, Diane had an instinctive flair for calculation, so that she would detect instantly anything that might work to her advantage. Thanks to this gift, she had sensed immediatel
y, at the very first signs of the Queen’s friendly feeling toward Gabrielle, the Duke’s wife, that here was the key to unlimited power. Diane and her brother reigned supreme at Versailles, but to do so they used bait and their bait was Gabrielle. So it came about that the entire Polignac clan, with Diane at its helm manipulating and making decisions, depended on a tenuous, sentimental, emotional bond: the Queen’s friendship with her favorite. From one day to the next, the conspicuous preferment granted to this family might end. The Queen need only, just once, remain impervious to Gabrielle’s smile, her graceful gestures, her apparent total unawareness of the fact that she was at the Court of Versailles. Gabrielle had a way of walking through the Grand Apartments as though they were a private garden. So calmly that it took your breath away. To watch her, you could easily believe that she had no idea how fortunate she was: she had been singled out by the Queen, had become her friend, and, remarkably, had remained her friend, despite the schemes that other people were forever devising to cause a rift between them. Ladies of fashion were brought into Marie-Antoinette’s apartments to capture her attention: she was blind to their presence . . .

  * * *

  More than once, Diane had spoiled a drive the Queen was taking with her friend. Gabrielle, gifted with the faculty of not hearing and accustomed to her sister-in-law’s intellectual enthusiasms, was unconcerned. But the Queen was in agony. She did not succeed in turning a deaf ear, perhaps because she could not imagine a conversation centered on anything other than herself, or else from a habit going back to a time when she was not too sure of her French, and hence listened with extreme attention for fear of missing a word. During Diane’s monologues on Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the Queen would turn her head away and have recourse to her fan. Diane, eyes alight, sitting erect on her short stocky body, would expound a theory. By the time they arrived at the château of Saint-Cloud, the Queen was so depressed she no longer cared to alight. Her carriage would make the return trip along the broad Belvédère avenue. She preferred to go back to Versailles, with never a glance for the fountains, the rose gardens, and the tangled growth of jasmine. Gabrielle, leaning back so her head rested against a cushion, would sit there smiling. Diane took advantage of her silence to pursue her own disquisition. The Queen would stifle a moan. To her, abstract ideas were physically painful. Intelligence, too openly displayed, horrified her. She appreciated intellect only if it was softly blended into a temperament . . .

  Leaning against a mantelpiece, the Countess was taking snuff. Her harsh-voiced delivery was punctuated with powerful sniffs. Standing very close to her, I had my eyes riveted on the voracious mouth below the down that shaded her upper lip. Diane, in her usual manner, was holding forth. Waves of tobacco shreds were accumulating on her chest. In the presence of the imperious Countess, people were acting like children caught misbehaving. Diane watched their groveling antics in some amusement. As for me, I was hypnotized by her thick painted lips, her chest with its growing rubbish pile, her stubby hands. I was falling asleep on my feet . . . I did not start listening again until Monsieur de Feutry, another refugee from the Study Leading to the Terraces, repeated his story of the pamphlet incident. As with the earlier telling, his audience was frantic to know whether their names were on the list. A list . . . not something that could be chanted like a nursery rhyme. By now it was surely posted on the walls of Paris.

  Diane occupied a prominent position in the list. Not at the top, since that spot rightfully belonged to the Queen, but not far down. She had begun by joking about it, but, after a particularly resonant sniff, she underwent an abrupt change of manner. Such sudden shifts were customary with her, but this one, because of its timing and on account of the unmistakable accents of conviction and sincerity with which Diane was suddenly expressing herself, has remained graven in my memory.

  Abandoning mockery, Diane began to castigate all this pointless chatter. She saw us, herself included, as wasting in general considerations the little time we had left to mobilize our forces and offer our services to the royal family. She spoke with great effect about fidelity and about our urgent need to save the King and Queen, putting our duty above our interest. She went on and on. Standing very close to her, enveloped in her tobacco smell, stupefied to hear such noble utterances issuing from that mouth, I hung my head. Fidelity, Sacrifice, Saving the King and Queen . . . Getting ready to die for them, we who were their subjects, their vassals . . . Her voice became increasingly sonorous, irresistible; it drilled into our conscience . . . By this time, Diane was thundering: “Everything proves, everything bears witness to the existence of systematic, organized insubordination and contempt for law. The rights of the throne have been challenged . . . Already we have heard proposals for an end to feudal rights as though this meant abolishing a system of oppression . . . But even were His Majesty to encounter no obstacle to the execution of his will, could that fount of justice and benevolence bring itself to sacrifice and humiliate the good, ancient, respectable Nobility that has shed so much blood for king and country? . . . When they speak of the Nobility, the Princes of your Blood are speaking for themselves . . . Their first claim to consideration is that they are of gentle birth . . . ” Carried away by her own eloquence, Diane went on speaking. I was no longer seeing her lips move; I could only hear the reproaches of my heart. When the words Mémoire des Princes were declaimed, silhouetted figures had appeared, converging on the twin doors to the Dispatch Office. Were the besieged about to unite, take up arms? Reject the helpless resignation of condemned men and instead die fighting? I was tense with excitement. Visions of crusades, spontaneous heroism, and courtly love flashed through my mind. I could see the Queen, in armor and on horseback. Behind her, with standards unfurled, the King and Princes of the Blood . . . Diane had at once stricken me with guilt and worked me up to a height of emotion. I walked through some of the other rooms, expecting to find all the “lodgers” on a war footing . . . Sire, we beseech you, hear the wishes of your children . . . motivated by a desire to have peace in the realm and uphold the power of a King who is most worthy to be loved and obeyed insofar as he seeks only the welfare of his subjects . . . The Princes of the Blood . . . the Count d’Artois, the Prince de Condé, the Duke de Bourbon, and the Prince de Conti . . . all signing in blood . . . and I wanted to shed my blood with the others . . .

  I was perfectly well aware of Diane de Polignac’s cynicism, but that had not prevented her from making me feel guilty. I thought she had experienced a change of heart, had suddenly come to appreciate how great a debt she owed her Sovereigns. I had been wasting my time listening to idle chatter instead of hurrying to the Queen’s side. I told myself that what I should do was go back to my room. Vegetating here did not make any sense. Did not help matters. Did not help her. I must have also realized belatedly that if the Queen should happen to send for me, no one knew where to find me. That thought alone was decisive. This was horrible! It was as if I had shirked my duties on the one occasion when my presence might have been of some real help. I must go back up to my room and await her call. But alas! I was too exhausted to move a muscle. I would have liked a cup of hot chocolate, for comfort. I started off to beg one of Honorine, whom I thought I recognized in one of the groups. She was wearing the same long greenish cape as this morning. Her dark curls made little horns around her head. Before I had time to speak, she guessed what I wanted: “Of course, Agathe, you shall have your cup of hot chocolate at once. I’ll just ring for a servant and he’ll bring it to you.” She shook her curls and tugged with all her might on a bellpull. I started to cry out to her not to do that, but it was too late. Honorine had disappeared, and instead of one servant there was a whole army of servants standing before me, and they were not bringing hot chocolate. There they were, huge and unbearably visible, almost glowing. They wore every color of livery, the blue of the Lads of Versailles, the Queen’s red, the Count d’Artois’s green, the Prince de Ligne’s pink; but the color of the servants’ livery—normally the only thing to which anyone pai
d attention—had become an affair of secondary importance. It was outmatched by the sense of their sheer numbers and their monumental presence. They were unbelievably big and strong, with broad faces and terrifying red, bony hands. Everything about them was threatening, but especially those hands, dangling in front of them like billhooks. Don’t look, I kept saying to myself. Turn your eyes away. And a sentence came back to me from the Manual of Good Manners: “Do not demean yourself by looking at a lackey; do not demean yourself by looking at a dog.” But I couldn’t help it; I could not take my eyes away from them. In the conquering advance of the lackeys, in the scandal of those bare hands and those suddenly very visible faces, there was something exciting—something at once fearsome and powerfully attractive.

  * * *

  When I regained consciousness, a man sat dozing on the couch where I lay stretched out. He had closed his hand over my ankle. His breathing was rapid and labored. I did not dare to budge. Very close by, two men were attempting to raise each other’s spirits:

  “For my part,” one of them was saying, “I place the fullest confidence in Baron de Breteuil; it is splendid that he should be the minister of our new government.”

  “A Catholic, royalist, French minister. Which, coming after a banker who was Protestant, republican, and Swiss, makes a pleasant change.”

  “That Jacques Necker, moreover, came to us out of nowhere. Who is he? Who ever heard of the fellow’s father? We’ve heard of his daughter, Madame de Staël, of course, but of his ancestors, never a word . . . I believe there is wisdom to be found in proverbs . . . Blood will tell. His Lordship Baron de Breteuil, like his grandfather, whose skill at presenting Ambassadors remains unequaled to this day, has a superlative sense of what is socially correct. That may suffice to see us out of the present . . . er . . . awkwardness.”