Goddess (22 page)

‘G
ABRIEL, IN THE NAME OF
G
OD
, shut up.’

‘I will have a new cloak made. Ermine trim. That’d look fine, don’t you think, Julia? Very fine, in fact.’

‘If you want to look like some
abbé
. Why don’t you find yourself a nice altar boy to go with it?’

‘Stupid girl.’

‘Remind me why I have to listen to this?’ Julie stands up and heads towards the door.

Thévenard shouts after her, ‘You could at least pretend to care about my career. After all, it was I who—’

‘Don’t say it.’

‘—talked Francine into letting you audition—’

‘I warned you.’

‘—into taking you on, that very first day in Paris.’

‘But you won’t stop. Never stop. Talking. Always talking. Dear God.’

‘It was I who made you who you are,’ he shouts even louder. ‘What you are.’

‘Enough.’

The
primus bassus
looks around. She has disappeared. He hates how she does that. Somewhere a door slams shut.

The next night, he’s on stage, as always. Declaiming. She’s on stage beside him, as she so often is these days.

He is a king, a hero, an adventurer. She appears to him in a dream. A goddess. A vision in white silk and gold paint. Between them they hold the audience in a web of rapture, of breathless wonder. He flashes his dark eyes at the crowd. The women sigh.

The goddess whispers in the king’s ear as he sings. Appears to—did she really? The king howls, grabs at his bitten ear. Resumes the song. The goddess grins. They both sing.

The people in the expensive seats at the side of the stage see the king pinch the goddess extremely hard on the buttocks. The goddess, mid-note, squeaks. Stomps a sandalled heel on the king’s toe.

He wanders in front of her as she winds up for a difficult note. The audience leans this way and that, trying to get a glimpse of her behind the big man. But he seems to be in the way. All the time. Until he is pushed or kicked aside, gasping for breath, so she can stand centre-stage alone and finish her song. The people in the
parterre
applaud until they fear their hands will break.

By dawn the next morning, the city is filled with ditties and poems and broadsheets about the great duel between Thésée and Minerve, the battle of the ancients. La Maupin hears the water-sellers singing as they drive past.

Thévenard overhears his washerwoman, as she pounds his new linen shirts in a tub in the courtyard.

Francine shouts at them for nigh on an hour before the next performance.

‘The crowd noticed. Monsieur noticed. Everyone’s talking about it. There will be no more of this. You will stop this duel now. Both of you.’

Over and over he says it, and over and over they pinch and bite and kick and block. Every night. Ticket sales soar.

One night, a dead mouse is hidden in La Maupin’s wig with a little note:
With compliments.
She laughs and throws the tiny corpse at her dresser.

Thévenard wakes up the next morning to find the city plastered with posters making outrageous claims about the size of his cock, or lack thereof.

He spends a fortune paying a gang of men to take them all down. By nightfall, another poster has found its way onto every wall and door.

A week later, La Maupin discovers her horse’s stall is empty except for a sign that reads:
NOW THE PROPERTY OF THE PRIMUS BASSUS.

So Thévenard is not really surprised to find his dressing-room floor covered in horse shit.

Julie hears rumours that an anonymous person has commissioned a
comédie
about her life, in which her character will be played by a cow from the Carnival.

It’s the last straw. She’s ready to draw a sword. A pistol. Anything. She issues a mock writ, asking the good people of Paris to arrest him on sight.

Thévenard won’t leave his house, no matter how piteous Francine’s pleas. He hides inside for three days. He may be huge, but he’s not stupid. He remembers what she did to Duménil. To Servan. At last he opens his door, slowly, to see workmen dismantling the staircase below him. Has to climb out the window, roaring curses.

Finally Francine brokers a truce worthy of the Edict of Nantes.

Palais-Royal. Foyer. Just before curtain. The big man stands on the fourth stair so everyone can see him. Holds up his hand until the crowd falls silent.

‘My friends, I have an announcement.’

‘You’re retiring?’

‘You’re getting married?’

‘To La Maupin?’

He keeps his face as tragic as possible while the laughter fizzles out. The tragic face is his area of expertise.

Then he speaks. ‘My friends, I have wronged, unjustly and foolishly wronged, the greatest singer on this earth and this—bear with me—this is my modest apology.’

He takes the letter from inside his ermine-edged cloak. ‘Please allow me to read it to you, so that you may witness my humility.’

He pauses. Gazes around the room. Pauses again, then reads.

‘
My dear Julia
—’

The crowd shouts with delight.

He ignores them and waits again for silence before continuing.

‘
My dear Julia, everyone in this world has his good points and his bad. I am quite ready to admit that you handle a sword a great deal better than I do. And you must agree that I sing better than you do
.’

More shouting.

‘
Well, then, that being so, you must please recognise that if you only ran me through the breast three times, my voice, supposing I did not die, might be very seriously impaired, and I am bound to think of what my voice means to me, not to mention the bliss of gazing into your eyes when we play together and you don’t fire off those ferocious retorts which rob your expression so completely of its sweetness.

‘
So let us make peace. I come to you bound hand and foot
(
in writing, however, for an interview with you might be dangerous
)
. Forgive me for a jest for which I am unfeignedly contrite, and be merciful.
’

He knows that by noon tomorrow, versions of his letter will be printed up and pasted on walls all over the city, that wherever La Maupin goes, people will stop her and ask her about his apology and whether she will forgive him. He knows her too well—as she knows him.

That’s the only danger. He has backed her into a corner but he knows, better than anyone in Paris, how she loves a fight when the odds seem to be against her.

Sure enough, a few nights later, after the show and in the same foyer, with many of the same faces milling about, La Maupin stands on the same stair with a piece of paper in her hand.

She doesn’t need to do anything at all—everyone stops talking and turns to her.

‘My friends, I have an announcement.’

The cheering is almost as loud as it was after the performance. She smiles. She doesn’t need to read from the paper, but she holds it aloft, for effect, as she speaks.

‘Since Monsieur Thévenard so frankly admits the distaste he entertains for a meeting with sword in hand, even with a woman—which leaves me no other course than to congratulate him upon his prudence—I consent to forgive him his offence.’

A man down the front laughs so much he spills ale onto his boots. The others clamour for an encore. She inclines her head graciously and goes on.

‘But I wish that, with this pardon granted, he ask me forgiveness before those who witnessed the injury; if he takes care to reunite them in my presence, I will keep my word.’

‘Ooh!’ the crowd exclaims as one, and as Julie turns her back to them and climbs the stairs, two-dozen white wigs lean towards one another.

‘How extraordinary.’

‘So the apology is accepted.’

‘Without a doubt.’

‘But Thévenard faces further humiliation. Tomorrow night, perhaps?’

‘He won’t mind. It’s better than a duel.’

‘What on earth caused it, do you know?’

‘I heard he insulted the Comte d’Albert.’

‘I heard he seduced Fanchon Moreau.’

‘Yes, La Maupin is jealous, that’s all.’

‘Rubbish. She upstaged him one Sunday, and he was furious.’

‘No, no. It was nothing like that. I heard …’

O
F COURSE, THEY WERE ALL WRONG.
I can barely remember now what the precise cause of all the fuss was, but the fight and the apology were well worth it, whatever the grounds.

Why aren’t you laughing? Not even a hint of a smile.

Honestly. You aren’t much of an audience, Father. A tough crowd, as they say in vaudeville. This is a tale of penance. You should enjoy it.

Gabriel learned the joys of humility, and I experienced the pleasure of public vindication. Of sorts.

It was just as well, really, as our destinies were so closely entwined, and we had to see each other every day, sing together every night. For me—for him—singing is an act of love. It always has been. We can’t sing easily, readily, with someone we detest. Singing with Duménil was torture. I wanted to spit at him. I did, once or twice. But with an old friend, it is a pleasure.

So long as you’re talking to one another.

We made up. Just in time. For our next show was something very big, very important—to me, at least.

The piece itself was neither here nor there—oh, no.
Proserpine
, it was, one of Lully and Quinault’s; rather lovely in itself but adored by the King, who promised to attend if we performed for him at Versailles. His home and mine.

So I returned. Not as the urchin. Not as the great man’s mistress. Not as the lover of a swordsman from the Midi or a runaway nun or the Madrid maid—but as a princess of the Académie, a star in the heavenly firmament, the woman with the sword who would make them all forget about Le Rochois or the blonde sopranos.

As me.

La Maupin.

There is no woman on earth, or in Heaven for that matter, like me. Perhaps there never will be. Although you never know.

We played—not in the stables this time, but in the forecourt—to the King and Dauphin on a dais in the centre, and their children and mistresses arranged like shop goods about them. Hundreds of courtiers—muttering, chattering, shimmering like schools of fish in the Grand Canal.

It was a beautiful moonlit evening. Part of me longed for a sudden downpour upon all those feathers and jewelled slippers, so we’d have to sing in the Grande Écurie. You see? I do have my sentimental side.

I played Cérès—another deity, another Olympian—the vengeful mother, the source of goodness. Gabriel was Pluton, against whom Cérès vows revenge. Appropriate, don’t you think? The irony was not lost on us. On anyone.

D’Armagnac was there, of course, and Monsieur, who sent flowers to me during the ovations. Many, many ovations.

You don’t believe me?

I don’t care. I can hear the applause, the cries, even now, echoing around the palace—off the walls of the Grande Écurie, through the hallways and kitchens, the dark dormitories, the orchards and potager—through my father’s musty bedchamber and the cemetery where he lay rotting—through my skin and bones and teeth, stinging my eyes—thundering in my chest like redemption.

A
WINDOW PROPPED OPEN.
A
N
apartment looking out on rue Traversière-Saint-Honoré. Another sunset over the city.

It’s a bedchamber like any other. Swept clean. Tidy—extremely tidy. That’s how she prefers it. The woman is practising her parries and her arpeggio at the same time. Parry
quarte
, riposte, parry
sixte
, riposte. Lunge.

‘Fa, la, la, la, la.’

Lunge again. Simple thrust. And again. Again.

‘Fa, la, la.’

The blunted sword tip spears into the soft pine of the wall, over and over—the same spot, the same precise motion.

A knock. Her supper. Julie leans her sword against the bed, throws a blanket around her shoulders, and opens the door.

‘Good evening, Madame Foré.’

Silence. The maid pushes past, glances around the room, at the hole in the wall. A clunk as the tray is set down on a chair.

‘Thank you.’

Silence. The maid turns to go.

‘Wait.’ Julie peeks at the food on the tray. ‘That’s not what I requested.’

A shrug.

For a moment, Julie feels like a guest in her own room. She circles around the maid and looks right into her face. ‘Madame Foré, have I insulted you in some way?’

‘Pardon?’

‘You never speak to me, and if you do, it’s as if demons have forced your tongue.’

The maid crosses her arms. Wrists as plump as a thigh of pork. ‘Perhaps that is so.’

‘Nor do you address me properly. Not as madame—not as anything.’

‘But what are you?’

‘An odd question. Impossible to answer.’

‘Yet you expect me to call you madame?’

Julie pushes a stool sideways with her boot. Sits. ‘Politeness. It’s all I ask. Manners. In my own apartments.’

‘Manners are for those that deserve them.’

‘But surely I have treated you well? I pay you more than enough for your trouble.’

‘For my work, yes. But not enough for conversation. And not for some weeks.’

‘Is that it?’ Julie asks. ‘Don’t worry, Madame Foré. There will be money enough, soon. Next month, the new season begins, and my contract—’

‘I don’t care about the money. I know what you are.’

‘Yet you show me less respect than a fishwife or a beggar.

I, who have performed before the King, only last year—sung for the greatest courts in Europe. I am—’

‘You’re a whore.’

The word blasts—a cannonball, an exploding shell—through the air.

She should stand—should reach for a sword—run the old bitch through. But instead she sits, staring.

She’s heard it whispered in the streets. She’s heard the muttering in the hallways. But nobody has ever dared—

‘Devil!’

She gazes at the woman’s face—her fat lips glistening, her tired eyes—and feels strangely still, as if the anger—there must be anger, surely—is too poisonous to be borne. She senses it, just an edge, and retreats from it, all in an instant. She understands for the first time the impulse to murder and the darkness from which it strikes—the deep, fluid—

‘Monster! There. I have said it.’

So now everything is clear.

‘You have said enough, Madame Foré. Fetch the landlord.’

It’s a whisper—barely a sound at all—but if she speaks aloud she will scream, and never stop screaming. She knows that all the years of discipline, of training, have been for this one moment—this agony of not killing someone, of not unleashing the demons within, of not burning the house to coals, of not dragging the stupid cow by the hair all the way through the streets to the stocks in front of the Conciergerie, of not crushing her skull beneath a boot—between two hands—not tearing the veins from her throat—not—

‘I am frightening even myself.’

Did she really say that out loud? She is alone now.

She waits for the landlord as if he was Richelieu. Smooths the creases from her blouse. Throws a rug over her pillows. Picks up her swords very slowly and deliberately, and locks them in the weapons chest so she can’t—won’t—hurt anyone.

And she waits.

The landlord doesn’t come. Nobody does.

She waits until the food that she didn’t order is congealed into yellow lumps on the tray.

Downstairs in the kitchen, there’s a whispered argument between maid and landlord that’s been going on for hours.

‘Then throw her out in the street,’ says Madame Foré. ‘What of it?’

‘She’s a good tenant, that’s what. Pays on time.’

‘Not lately.’

‘Even so.’

‘She’s a witch, monsieur.’

‘She means no harm.’

‘You haven’t seen it—her room, her bedclothes after visitors. Disgusting. All sorts of men she has up there. Even women.’

Monsieur Langlois snorts. ‘Don’t be stupid. She’s so orderly. So neat. Military training, so she says.’

‘I’m telling you.’

‘It can’t be. Perhaps when visitors come—’

‘She’s unnatural.’

‘You’re dreaming.’

‘The men are bad enough,’ Madame Foré says. ‘Filthy boots everywhere—stomping away.’

‘They are gentlemen. Real gentlemen. Rich. Practising their swordplay.’

‘So they can go off and get into scrapes with
duchesses
. Do you think I don’t know what’s going on? It’s the talk of Paris. Duels. God knows what else.’

‘But that’s not her fault,’ says Monsieur Langlois.

‘She’s a monster.’

‘Please. Leave her alone.’

‘I cannot, in all Christian conscience, serve her a day longer. It’s immoral.’

‘I can’t believe you said those things. She’ll kill us.’

‘All the more reason to—’

They hear boots on the stairs.

‘Don’t you say a word, Marguerite. Not another word. You hear me?’

‘I’ll do my duty as a Christian.’

‘Please don’t. It will only make things worse.’

He pushes her into the scullery.

A rap on the kitchen door.

‘Monsieur Langlois? May I come in?’

‘Mademoiselle de Maupin. An honour, as always.’

She’s not armed. That’s good. But there’s an uncanny, unnerving smile fixed onto her face.

On most days, Monsieur Langlois can’t look at her. She’s so very beautiful. He fears he might throw away his pride and cast himself at her feet. Begging. Weeping. She has that effect on every man he knows. They all ask him about her—all the time. He has earned a reputation for discretion, but in truth, it’s only because he can’t bear to speak of her. He can’t abide the thought of any other man feeling the way he does. Not for her.

Now here she is. In his kitchen. And that Jesus-fucking Marguerite hasn’t done the dishes.

He shuffles a few steps forward. Bows.

‘I’ve heard about your misunderstanding, madame. Please. Forgive our—’

The goddess raises a hand. ‘All is forgiven,’ she says.

‘A thousand apologies.’ He’s babbling, he knows it, but he can’t stop. ‘Madame Foré—she’s not been well lately, her duties tire her. I’m sure she would apologise herself if she was here.’

‘There’s no need.’

He hears a grunt from the scullery. She hears it, too.

‘Do I ask too much of you, Monsieur Langlois? Of her?’

‘Not at all, madame. Far from it.’

‘A roof. A bed. A few sticks for the fire. Two meals a day and wine. It’s not a great deal.’

‘No, madame.’ He bows his head so she can’t see his face, his shame.

The goddess goes on. ‘I see how my wine bill and my own thirst don’t quite match up. I look the other way. I reason that a landlord might need to finish off the odd half-bottle from time to time. I ignore the fact that your other tenants have screaming babies and children jumping outside my window at dawn. I forgive everything.’

‘You are gracious. So gracious.’ He bows again. He can’t help it.

‘But I do ask two things.’

‘Yes, madame. Anything.’

‘When I request fish for my supper, I do not expect pork.’

‘It will never happen again.’

‘Very good. Then you will deliver fish to my room for my supper this evening, as requested.’

‘Fish?’

‘That’s right’, she says. ‘Tonight. Immediately.’

It’s so gloomy down here she can barely see him. He was once a handsome devil. He’s told her so himself. That must have been before the smallpox and thirty years of drink. She tolerates his longing gaze, his speechlessness in her presence. It happens to so many men when she’s around. She knows that sometimes he follows her along the street. Still, the rooms are big and light. The food tolerable. Normally. But she bars her door at night. Just in case.

‘And the other subject.’

‘Yes, of course. What is it, madame?’

‘Manners. It is all that matters. Civility. The only thing that differentiates us from the beasts.’

‘I agree completely.’

‘The only thing that stands, at this moment, between me and murder.’

He gulps. Noisily. It sounds like fear.

‘Do you hear me, Langlois? Manners. Fish.’

‘Yes, madame. I heard you quite distinctly.’

She turns to leave.

‘The only problem—’

She halts. Doesn’t turn back.

‘There is no fish,’ he says. ‘There was none at the market, and it being the weekend I thought you wouldn’t mind if—a little pork now and then is no problem for most people—so I bought it and—and—and—there is no fish.’

‘I see.’

She is still facing away from him as she pauses, breathing deeply, blinking back fury.

He watches her, senses her, breathes her in. Marguerite is right. It’s the scent of a whore. All those men. Even women. Of course he’s heard the stories. Everyone has. She’s lied to him. That woman who visits every week. That’s no sister. His friends would laugh if they knew. She would laugh if she knew what he feels, what he needs.

She has never been so close. Within an arm’s length. He could touch her, if he tried. If he just reached out one hand he could feel the skin on her throat.

He could grab her arm and pull her towards him. He could have her. Right here on the kitchen floor.

So he tries.

His hands tighten around her wrists but she twists clear and lurches for the door. Reaches for her scabbard but there’s no sword. She spins around, and it’s as if the heavens had burst into flame—as if lightning had shattered the clouds on high—and now she races towards him—bellowing—reaches for something—anything—a key—a frying pan—the poker—and there’s blistering, exquisite pain in his skull as she bashes into him—smashes the dishes on the table, on the mantel—his mother’s wedding platter—that ugly milk jug—and Marguerite is screaming for the gendarmes even though it’s all her fault and Monsieur Fouineur from next door is running in and out and the upstairs children—he sees them, through a veil of his own blood, peeking around the doorframe—and the goddess—the blessed one—is a monster, shouting even louder and striking anyone who comes near, even the gendarmes who drag her, poker in hand, out into the courtyard and off to God knows where.