Becoming Marie Antoinette (32 page)

The king and cleric, and all of the aristocratic assemblage, watched as we climbed into bed. Were they going to watch us consummate our nuptials as well?

We were as pallid as our nightshirts. I noticed that Louis Auguste was holding his breath. So was I.
What were we supposed to do next
?

After an interminable, and tremendously uncomfortable, silence, the hangings were finally drawn. Someone extinguished the candles. “
Bonne nuit
,” came a chorus of murmurs, as the king and courtiers exited the chamber. “We leave you to it,
eh bien
?” a
man’s voice chuckled. I hoped that it wasn’t the archbishop. My husband and I lay in the dark, side by side on our backs with an ocean of fine white linen between us. It was the first time we had been alone all day.

“Who handed you your nightgown?” I whispered.

“The king,” my husband whispered drowsily.

“I got a duchesse.” Silence. “Don’t you think it’s silly that so many people have to touch something as simple as a nightshirt before we may put it on?” Silence. “Monsieur le dauphin? Louis Auguste?”

“What?” he grumbled. “And call me Louis. I hate Louis Auguste.”

“But the king is Louis. You have to be Louis Auguste, at least until … well, you just have to, so no one is confused when I mention ‘Louis.’ ”

“All right, I suppose.” Silence. “Why are we whispering?”

“I don’t know,” I whispered. “I asked you a question. I asked if you thought it was silly that such common things as our nightgowns are treated with so much reverence.”

“I’m tired,” he whispered. “And I never thought about whether it’s silly or not. I just do it. I’ve been doing it all my life. Besides, it’s not about the nightgown. Everything we touch, everything we wear, is a reflection of our glory and divine right.”

“Do you like it?” I asked my husband. “The etiquette, I mean.”

“No,” he replied groggily.

“Then when you’re king, can you make it stop? Because I
hate
it.”

“I don’t know.”

“Don’t know what?”

“Don’t know if I
want
to make it stop.”

“Why not?”

“Because we’ve been doing it for nearly a hundred years. It’s what makes our court special. And if I stopped it, who would we be?”

I thought about it, eyes open, gazing at the underside of the tester and a ceiling I couldn’t see. My body was stiff with fear. Our banter had helped me to relax a little bit, but now Louis Auguste was silent. I wondered if he would try to touch me. Maman had explained what was supposed to happen on a wedding night, particularly between two royal spouses.

Aren’t we going to make a treaty? I mean—a baby
. I didn’t voice my thought. Instead I let my left hand creep, inch by awkward inch, toward my husband’s snoring frame. My fingers found his right arm, grazing it. He flinched, already asleep, and I yanked my hand away, heart pounding furiously.

I dared to admit to myself that somewhere deep inside I was relieved that Louis Auguste had not leapt on top of me. And yet I had not fulfilled my duty as a bride. Guilt mingled with relief. I stared into the blackness overhead. I had always imagined that after today everything would begin to fall into place and my fears about becoming the wife of a stranger and the future queen of a foreign land would begin to evanesce. But my husband winced nearly every time he looked at me, and had little interest in any discourse. If he did not
like
me, or even find my companionship tolerable (and if his gustatory enjoyment would always result in the snoring bulk beside me), how were we to give the Bourbons an heir?

The golden ring on my finger was an indication that our goal was only half completed. It would take a baby boy in my belly to fully satisfy Maman’s alliance with France.

When the hangings were drawn open the following morning I awoke to a sunlit day and an empty bed. The dauphin was gone—but where?

“Hunting, madame la dauphine,” said the maidservant who brought me a Sèvres chamber pot. “Monsieur le dauphin always goes hunting in the morning. Except for the special occasions … like his wedding yesterday.” I could not fathom the reason for her sly grin until I glanced back at the bed and realized that a half dozen maids were inspecting the linens for telltale smears of carmine.
Oh, mon Dieu
, I realized with a gasp. There would be no blood. Nothing had happened during the previous night. My bridegroom and I had slept together as chastely as if we had been siblings.

While the maids bustled about the bed, clucking over the sheets that remained mortifyingly
un
soiled, I noticed that the dauphin had left his hunting diary on a pretty little fruitwood table.
Dare I?
I was insatiably curious to see what he had written on our wedding day. I already knew that he was not one for long-winded descriptions. As he was unable to go hunting, what might he have written about all the festivities?

The red ribbon marked the current page; and, taking full advantage of a rare moment when no one was looking at me, I stole a peek.

What?

I blinked in surprise. On the page was but a single, solitary word:
Rien
. Nothing. Years from now people would read Louis Auguste’s journal and think that
rien
—nothing—had occurred on the sixteenth of May in the year 1770. My face reddened. Bad enough that I was poking my nose into my husband’s business, but oh, how humiliating to read what I had found.

Rien
. Nothing. No hunting, yes, but it equally applied to our wedding night, when we dashed the great hopes of both our kingdoms, because nothing happened in the matrimonial bed, either.

I
knew
he didn’t like me! But it was up to me to figure out how to do something about that. No one must know—except for the
chambermaids, who had already discovered that I remained a virgin. Perhaps I could purchase their loyalty. I hunted for a reticule and gave each of the women a gold louis. I had no idea how much such a coin was worth, but from their gasps and blushes and “madame la dauphine,
merci mille fois
”—a thousand thanks—and their deep curtsies of gratitude, I must have been extremely generous, even for a member of the royal family.

I began to write to Maman about the extraordinarily rigid etiquette that, according to the comtesse de Noailles, would dictate the events of my every waking hour at Versailles, starting with my
lever
, at which numerous privileged members of the French nobility sat or lounged about my salon while I was dressed, coiffed, and made up. My mother would either be tremendously impressed by the godlike way the royal family was regarded here, or else she would burst out laughing at the absurdity of the customs.

I was
en négligée
, attired in a loose-fitting, beribboned gown of ivory satin, in the midst of my first public toilette when the comte de Mercy entered my salon with a large wicker hamper embellished with a pale blue bow. Tall and elegant in his meticulously curled and powdered wig, his dark eyes appearing to take an immediate inventory of the scene before him, he made a deep bow, displaying his calves through white silk stockings. “Madame la dauphine,” he said, offering me the basket, “behold one of the most difficult diplomatic endeavors of my career.”

I heard a sound from within the basket, quickly untied the ribbon, and lifted the lid. Into my arms flew Mops, licking my face with enthusiastic kisses. “
Mon Dieu!
How did you get him back?” I asked the ambassador incredulously.

“Extensive negotiations,” he said with a wink. “We may have to partition Poland.”

“I don’t care if you had to agree to partition Heaven,” I exclaimed.

“Ohh, how’s my
petit chou
?” I cooed, cuddling my pug. “Did you miss me?”

The courtiers chorused their astonishment. “
Qu’est-ce que c’est?
” inquired the marquis de Mont Blanc of his wife, who had been too busy flirting with the young comte de Fleury to notice anything.

“Eh?” she replied.

The marquis then directed his question to the elderly duchesse d’Arpagnan. “
Quoi?
” she shouted, raising her ear trumpet.

The comte d’Artois, who had exercised his privilege as a member of the royal family to attend my
lever
, caught my eye, and we exchanged a mischievous glance. What fools; you think they’d never before seen a dog! “
C’est le petit chien de la dauphine
,” my new brother said, loudly enough to be heard in Strasbourg. I burst out laughing. “Just a dog,
mesdames et messieurs
!”

After another cuddle, Mops bounded off my lap in search of mischief and adventure. He found it aplenty under the ladies’ voluminous panniers, nosing about their beribboned garters, a basket of embroidery silks, and a carelessly tossed pair of shoes. My attendants stepped back and waited patiently, while the courtiers expressed their bemusement, as I found myself crawling along the floor after him, but Mops was having more fun with a leather slipper than responding to his name, or repeated entreaties to “come.” After all, there were so many new smells at Versailles! He would be none too pleased about all the stray cats that roamed the palace, marking their territory at whim. My pug finally came to rest in the workbasket with a ladies’ cap perched on his squat head. The lace-edged lappets dangling from either side made him resemble a droop-eared basset hound. My peals of laughter were now echoed by several of the courtiers present, and suddenly I recalled Papa’s admonishments regarding false friends.
Did they, too, find my pug adorable, or were they merely endeavoring to ingratiate themselves with me? How would I come to know the difference?

“Madame la dauphine, you must control your dog.” The comtesse de Noailles regarded me sternly. Nervous in his noisy new home, Mops impudently relieved himself against the curved leg of an ormolu table. I could not control my amusement. If Madame Etiquette thought I’d needed to discipline him
before
she uttered her remark …!

I cast my eye about for a servant. Surely
I
was not expected to clean up the mess! But the tolling of a bell interrupted my question to Madame Etiquette about the proper protocol regarding pet defecation. Instead, as my attention was diverted, I inquired, “What is that for?”

“It means the king is on his way to visit his daughters. You, too, are expected. Every morning, a bell rings to indicate that His Majesty is on his way to their apartments, where he takes his morning coffee. This will be part of your daily routine, as dauphine.”

I glanced in the direction of my husband’s bedchamber, the scene of
rien
. “Monsieur le dauphin went hunting this morning. Should he not join me as well?”

The comtesse gave me a cockeyed glance that, were she a warmer soul, I might have said was sympathetic. “The women of the royal family enjoy a different daily routine from the men,” she said.

“Tell me
—we
have prayer and needlework and music lessons, while
they
go hunting!”

Her lips almost stretched into a smile. “
Everyone
prays. Mass is at noon every day. You and the dauphin’s aunts will go directly from coffee with His Majesty. Your husband and his brothers will most likely join you in the chapel fresh from the hunt. And then afterwards, at one o’clock, everyone eats.”

Coffee, then chapel; the afternoon meal, too—my first
grand couvert
—seemed a rushed affair on this first day. A long table was set up in the room that had been the Queen’s Antechamber, behind which sat the royal family, like a line of clay pigeons, while privileged courtiers and members of the public watched us dine. Fortunately, it was over very quickly because the dauphin practically inhaled his food; and I remained too intimidated by the hundreds of eyes upon me and by the ritual itself to do more than eat a morsel or two.

“What next?” I asked the comtesse de Noailles, realizing that every hour in my day was choreographed and accounted for.

“Now you return to your rooms,” she informed me.

“And play with Mops?”

“If you like,” she sniffed.

If I
could
, would have been more accurate. At Versailles, one high-ceilinged room flowed into the other much like those within our palaces in Austria, but unlike the Hofburg, here the state rooms were perpetually crowded. At first my entourage had to navigate its way through the maze of courtiers, tradesmen, and other visitors, like maneuvering an embroidery needle into an intricate stitch. How was one to glide through the halls amid such obstacles? And I had truly been looking forward to demonstrating my agility and grace. But as people realized it was the dauphine’s train passing, they began to fall back and let us pass, genuflecting into a curtsy or bow. I led the way with my head held nobly high, even if I was unsure where I was going. But Madame de Noailles was right behind me, murmuring commands under her breath in case I got lost on the way to the dauphin’s apartments. My ladies, dozens of comtesses and duchesses, fell into line behind my
dame d’honneur
, as we glided airily through the halls, the soles of our delicate slippers needlessly polishing the glossy parquet. I wish I could have looked behind me at the sight, for I’m sure we resembled a colorful armada in full sail. I had done it
without a misstep, arriving in my First Antechamber flushed with pride at my achievement. If only Monsieur Noverre had been there to see it!

Mops greeted me with a look of pure indifference, then presented me with the reason for his apathy: one of my husband’s riding boots. The comtesse de Noailles knelt down, and with a look of pure distaste, reached for the boot, but Mops threw his bulk on top of it quite possessively, then made a dash with it under the nearest chaise.

Shrugging my shoulders, I grinned at Madame Etiquette and before she could utter a reproach, declared, “I am sure monsieur le dauphin has many more boots.”

The comtesse regarded the carved and gilded clock on the mantel. “At three you must return to your aunts’ apartments. So—you have a little bit of time in which to sew or read. Or,” she added, with a sour look at Mops, “play with your little dog.”