Pulling back, the princess looks at me with startled horror, and then I realize she is glad to be spared the rites of married life and the pleasure of motherhood. As daughter-in-law to the wealthiest and most virtuous man of the kingdom, she is entirely content; she is like a large child.
“My whole being is afraid the Dauphin will never make love to me,” I wail. “My whole body hopes to mother a child.”
The princess sits before me in a lovely hat, bedecked with flowers; her wide-set eyes regard me as though she wishes to comfort me, but she is speechless. In her helpless distress, I believe she will begin to cry again.
I reach my hand toward her. “Every night,” I tell her, “I thank God that he has sent me such a friend as you.”
She smiles, and I make myself smile back at her. I straighten her pink bow that spreads its wide loops across her bosom. It is my duty to learn to command my feelings, or to hide them.
THIS NIGHT I SLEEP alone because the Dauphin has gone to Fontainebleau to hunt, and it being during the visit of the Générale, I did not want to share his bed. Nor do I ride with my husband, lest I risk the possibility on a galloping horse of a hemorrhage occasioned by too much exercise. Absentmindedly, I have arranged no entertainment for the evening.
As I lie in bed, the silence is terrible. Perhaps I should send for the princess to keep me company. Almost I decide to rise up and write letters to my mother or to my sister, but I do not reach out to anyone. In themselves, silence and boredom become terrifyingly interesting because they are novel. I want to explore the moment. I lie very still, staring for a while at the portrait of my mother, then at the one of my brother, Emperor Joseph. Their images are my guardians.
When I was at home, we were never bored—or afraid. We had amusements: we played cards, or games, or danced, or made music together. There were so many of us—I shudder to think that the Empress gave birth fourteen times—and the boys and girls played together like equals. Because our entertainments most often involved our talents—at the keyboard or with the bow, dancing or singing or acting—our ability determined who was dominant and most admired.
IN THE MORNING, after having coffee with my aunts in their apartment, as I walk with the King to Mass, I tell him that I must have more music in my life. I ask if my old teacher Christoph Gluck might be brought to court to give me lessons and to perform his operas.
“There is bitter controversy now about aesthetic questions in composing operas,” Louis XV says, amused. “Should the music support the poetry, or the poetry provide a mere framework for vocal acrobatics? That is the question.”
No. The question is whether I shall strangle on bitterness or shame. People say I am pretty and have great charm, but to my husband I am more hideous than a dragon. I want to throw back my head and spout up my misery. I want to be torn apart by dogs.
A TEMPEST
I have made my husband cry.
A double repentance is required: one with Abbé Vermond in the confessional box, another for political reasons.
Gossips soon will have told Count Mercy, who, I fear, will report the matter in an unadvantageous way to my mother, so I must tell him myself, and in the process learn more about the rumor that the sister of the wife of the Comte de Provence is destined to marry the Comte d’Artois; then we shall have much of Savoy come to Versailles.
As he enters my sitting room, Count Mercy asks why I have requested his presence in this private chamber and, of course, how delighted he is at any moment to serve my needs.
I look at his handsome countenance and pleasant bearing and know that he always makes an effort not to frighten me. I have been told that he keeps a mistress at great expense, but I forgive him because he serves my mother with undivided loyalty and is devoted also to me. In France such arrangements between men of power and common women are unexceptional and accepted, but that does not make me admit the Comtesse du Barry into my conversation, even if she sits in the same room with me. While Count Mercy sins, he is not corrupted by his sins, and besides, he suffers terribly from hemorrhoids and is thus punished.
Perhaps they hurt him at this moment, but because he is not only curious but also concerned about me, there is no trace of distraction in his face. His chin is an excellent feature, firm but well molded, with a certain delicacy. My own chin is something that has a bit too much of Hapsburg prominence, making me appear haughty to some, while friends speak of my dignity. Count Mercy always carries his head with utmost naturalness. It is when one meets his eyes that one encounters an intellect of remarkable cunning and dignity. And I believe I see there too a shrewd kindness reserved primarily for me—and perhaps his actress mistress.
I dismiss all attendants, motion to a chair, which the count draws closer as he sits.
“How can I serve?” he asks with avuncular goodwill.
“It would comfort me if you would listen to the story of the Dauphin’s tears today.” I seem so serene in my demeanor that I convince myself my royal bearing is unperturbed. “And I beg of you advice, if I have left undone any gesture needed to restore perfect tranquillity in the household. Have you heard already that I made the Dauphin weep?”
Truthfully, he says that he has heard of the incident—a mere sentence or two that did not criticize me in any way.
“You know the sad state of incompleteness, of course, in which the Dauphin and I live. I have given him every encouragement. My mother says always that I must express more caresses, and I do, but sometimes I feel it is conversation that draws us closer.”
“It is true, and a disadvantage, that when Your Highness and His Highness were married, you scarcely knew each other. No one denies that, my dear princess.”
“And to my mind, conversation, if it is to be effective, must sometimes convey truth—important truths.”
With a slight smile, he nods and encourages me to continue.
“‘There is only so much time in any day’—that is the way I began the conversation."
“An indisputable observation, my princess.”
“And if we occupy the day and spend our energy in one way, then it cannot be spent in another.”
“And you wished to convey that perhaps the Dauphin—”
“Would spend less time hunting.”
In a confidential tone, the count remarks, with sad candor, “He has an intemperate passion for the sport, as does the present King, and the King before him.”
“Yes, but I never thought a passion running through the generations would be instrumental in preventing the continuation of the family.” I decide to describe my husband’s habits in more detail. “The Dauphin hunts incessantly, and it leaves him no energy. After the hunt and eating, he collapses, night after night. Today, I asked him forthrightly, in front of Monsieur le Comte de Provence and Madame la Comtesse de Provence, if he was aware that his addiction to the hunt was destroying his health, and that furthermore it was destroying his appearance, making him look common and unkempt.”
The count presents a mien of perfect neutrality, which means he is shocked by what I have had the unlucky impulse to communicate to the Dauphin.
Nonetheless, I continue my narrative. “I am sorry to say that my comment on his appearance hurt the Dauphin’s feelings very much, and I know that I should not have begun as I did. But the comte is so overweight and Josephine of such a sallow complexion that it was clear to me that the Dauphin far outshines both of them, at any moment, and that he knew this fact and that he would not take offense because, in comparison to them, ‘unkempt’ was a minor flaw.”
The count smooths the fabric on the thighs of his pants. He glances down and then up at me, as though asking permission to interject his own idea, and I signal with courteous silence that he may speak.
“Of course his Highness is hurt not by the specific content of your complaint against him but by the fact that he has been trained and counseled many times that even in his family, he is ascendant, and no one must seem to presume otherwise.”
“I did
presume,” I admit.
When I remember the look of despair on the Dauphin’s face that I who have always supported him in every situation should have suddenly failed, I feel as though I will weep.
I can offer only feeble defense of my indiscretion. “Sometimes the Dauphin has appreciated my concern for his welfare. You will remember, perhaps a month ago, at one of the parties of the Comtesse de Noailles when too many pastries were brought to him, I ordered the servants to remove them all, and I explained to his Highness that his digestion was delicate and that I could not bear to see him suffer from overeating. Then he was pleased and considered my behavior to be evidence of my tenderness for him.”
“Is it really the same circumstance?” the count asks patiently, as he has so many times in trying to help me thread my way through a labyrinth of choices. Sometimes he speaks very earnestly and intently, sometimes with special pleasantness, as he does now, which makes me realize that he has probably been told the whole story already.
It is not the same circumstance, and I say so, noting that there is certainly a difference between a spontaneous act, prettily couched, and scolding.
“What happened next?” the count prompts.
“Before I could request that he change his hunting habits, he fled to his own apartment. But I followed him and continued discussing the disadvantages of a behavior, an indulgence, that not only drove me to despair but that was irresponsible in his duty to the King and to the citizens of France.
“The idea that he was robbing the people of a future king so humiliated the Dauphin that he burst into tears. He told me that I was right and begged my patience with him.
“Then I caressed him, and I wept with him and told him that I loved the French people second only to himself.”
“And what was his response?”
“He asked with great feeling if it were true, then, that I did indeed love him, and I replied that I did, and even more I respected him, and that it broke my heart to think that I had been so wicked as to say things in front of his brother that should have been said in other ways and when we were alone. I called myself a goose, and then he kissed me tenderly.”
Though I speak to the count only of what was said and done, I experience again how surprised I was by my husband’s question—did I love him? He was as vulnerable as a child. I had never imagined he worried about the question of my feeling about him, but that he simply accepted that it was our duty to be together. The frankness of this question from Louis Auguste struck through a hard shell that had grown (almost without my noticing it) around my own heart.
“So the reconciliation brought the two of you into greater intimacy.”
“I believe it did, and certainly I feel most loving toward him,” I confide in a burst of my own frankness, “for he has an excellent temper and rather than become angry with me, he shows me his sensitive nature and reproaches himself. I told him that a demon had taken control of my tongue.”
The count smiles at me fondly and then asks if the Dauphin smiled at me.
“There is no one who has greater charm than you,” the count says, “and I shall tell the Empress that I am pleased with the way you handled this small tempest. Perhaps flowers of greater affection will germinate between the two of you from this watering by tears.”
I have not told the count that I excused myself with my husband by telling him that the so-called demon was sometimes a herald to the imminent arrival of the Générale Krottendorf.
“Ah, yes,” the Dauphin said, “we will respect the visit of the Générale, and perhaps after that we will complete our reconciliation in a way that fulfills not only your expectations but those of France.” He hugged me to him again and kissed my brow. Then he added gallantly, “And my own fond hopes as well.”
MADAME, MY VERY DEAR MOTHER
The little tempest in the calm sea of my rapport with the Dauphin passed months ago. When we made up, tenderness was exchanged, but you will understand what I mean when I say that no real progress has occurred. I do tell you everything, and you must believe that I can justify myself on all the other points that concern you so much that you write to me about them repeatedly.
No, I cannot use the word repeatedly. I cross it out, I turn it into a black blob and rip the paper with the sharp point of my quill, but now I know that I must copy this letter again, for the Empress has scolded me about my handwriting and sloppiness as well as about matters of greater import. The corset—well, she has gotten her way about the corset, and the ones from Austria are more comfortable than those made here, and now that I am almost sixteen, it even pleases me to need to wear the appropriate womanly undergarments.
I am ungrateful not to appreciate her thoughtfulness more. Count Mercy has told me that my mother is profoundly worried about the impending partition of Poland by Austria, Prussia, and Russia. The French have no knowledge of what is about to happen because the young Prince de Rohan, whom I first met in Strasbourg and whom Louis XV has appointed as the French ambassador to Vienna, is too busy gambling and going to parties to even be aware of the international situation. My mother, so Count Mercy explains, is naturally worried about the effect this action against Poland will have on France and on the Franco-Austrian alliance sealed by my marriage. The Empress has been badgered into the agreement by my brother Joseph, who shares her office with her, as well as by the rulers of Prussia and Russia.
With her own hand, she has stricken the word rightfully from their joint decree of their intention to divide Poland into three occupied parts. Her anxiety about what she considers to be an unrighteous act has caused her great suffering, and that suffering is compounded by rumors she hears about my behavior—that I am flirtatious, that I spend too much time at cards and entertainments, that I neglect the Dauphin and have created a cool atmosphere with the King because I will not speak to that immoral woman he keeps in his presence—in his bed!
I feel desperate with sorrow that you believe what I must call LIES and gossip of a malicious sort instead of what Mercy and myself write you about the situation here. I am sure that the King himself does not want me to speak to du Barry. Mesdames Tantes have explained it to me: that he respects me for my stubbornness in this moral matter. That he himself hopes if I continue to snub that creature she will run away, and he will be restored to the bosom of his family, to his virtuous daughters.
I see I have gone too far in my letter in revealing my dependence on my aunts for interpretation and advice. I will leave out those two sentences referring to them and say instead that my certainty about the appropriateness of my snubbing the Favorite rests on good and reliable advice from those who cherish my welfare.
I am sure that if the King wished me to change my behavior to the Favorite that he would have told me so, but he never even brings up the subject. Because I refuse to speak to her, the King has rewarded me with even greater friendliness.
Part of the problem is that were I to speak to her once, then she and her circle would still not be satisfied. They would have me in their power and force me to make conversation with her as a matter of course, over and over. That would be intolerable for one who is the loving daughter of the paragon of Virtue, the Empress, my most dear mother.
THE EMPRESS’S REPLY
Because I am writing on the eve of your sixteenth birthday, I know that this letter will reach you days from now, but you will know anyway, today and tomorrow, that I am thinking of you, for you know my heart even as I know yours. I thank God every day, and I pray that He will keep you safe so that you can do good where you are and also make your family here happy insofar as you are able to celebrate the glory of God and promote the welfare of those who depend upon you.
I am glad that you write to me openly defending your behavior on the subject of the du Barry. Whenever you are candid and explain your sensitivity on an issue, you endear yourself to me. Nonetheless, I do not think your feelings are hurt so much by my remonstrances as you are experiencing impatience with my desire to guide and to hel
p you. My feelings are hurt that you do not discuss your aunts in your letters to me when I am certain that they are at the bottom of your intransigence on the matter of being more courteous to the du Barry. They are the source of all your mistaken ideas.
I can assure you that the King’s friendliness to you—and Mercy has made similar observations—is in spite of your treatment of the Favorite and not because of it, as the aunts say.
Do you count my love and my advice less than theirs? That is what really wounds my heart.
My heart bleeds when gossip is spread about you by the French ambassador, the dissolute Prince Louis de Rohan. He is not content to create gossip about his own outrageous extravagance and self-indulgence. He also creates gossip about you. For example, when you rushed to the friend of Artois, the handsome Dillon who fainted in public, and placed your hand over his heart, this simple gesture of compassion was interpreted by him as having a coquettish intent. Your chastity is your treasure. Even in appearance, you must take care….
What cheers me and fills me with joy is that your sister the Queen of Naples is pregnant, and, in addition, she was made fully a wife by the King of the Two Sicilies on the very first night after their marriage. Did you know that? Perhaps Charlotte is too modest to report her success with Naples. When the Générale visited so soon after the wedding, King Ferdinand expressed the greatest impatience.
As for the King of France, your grandfather, I implore you to speak to him often—writing notes to him, even if carefully phrased, is no substitute. He is readily available to you, living in the very same château, and he is genuinely fond of you. When you neglect him for other amusements, I picture you carelessly striding with unrealistic calm toward your own ruin, and I fear that you will have to suffer much pain before you can make up for all your mistakes. Understand that written language will not speak for you with the King; on the other hand, there is something so touching about you when you present yourself in your person with all your gracious manner that all hearts are moved.