The Kings' Mistresses (17 page)

This domestic rift was rapidly becoming an international affair of state. Louis XIV returned earlier than planned to Versailles and the court, where he found waiting for him additional letters from Lorenzo, Altieri, and the pope. Colbert was waiting to brief him on other petitions that had been submitted on behalf of Lorenzo's interests. Queen Marie-Thérèse wrote a letter to the queen of Spain, and another to Lorenzo confiding that she had done all she could to personally sway the king: “Cousin, I have contributed as much as I could with the king, my lord, to your wish that you expressed to me that the ladies be sent to a convent to await measures that could be taken to your satisfaction.”
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Marie's reaction to the messages Pelletier finally delivered to her was rebellious. She did not accept the notion that a promise made to Louis XIV would suffice to protect her from her husband, and
she was unimpressed by his arguments for her withdrawal to a convent. The king “advised me to enter a convent in order to stop the malicious gossip which was producing unsavory interpretations of my departure from Rome,” she wrote, but as “I was not entirely satisfied with this letter, I resolved to go to Paris unannounced to throw myself at the feet of the king.”
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Indeed, had she been able to read the secret missives sent by Cardinal Altieri to the papal envoy in Paris, she would have found support for her skepticism. “Only much later,” the cardinal confided, “after Madame has decided to return and has done so, will we talk here about the actions that will be taken after that return, that is incarceration in Rome or perhaps in Italy as the easiest to execute; but for the moment, only insist on the first point, that is, that she return to the palace.”
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Consulting only with Hortense, who had rejoined her in Grenoble, Marie left the city for Paris. For this stage of her voyage, mindful of the possibility of interception, she embarked on a less predictable itinerary. Not wanting to draw attention to herself by traveling in an easily recognizable private carriage, she opted to use the postal coaches, where passengers could travel anonymously, and to travel alternately by river and by road. Later, she would reflect with some pride at how she had outwitted her pursuers. The gazettes and public letters followed her adventures, but in the memoirs she wrote four years later she would describe exactly how she managed to get from place to place. The sisters chose a private courier they had known in Rome to escort them, setting out modestly and slowly at first, by litter (a covered and curtained chair carried on the shoulders of servants). Once out of the city, they continued more quickly in a small post chaise pulled by a single horse, with Morena and the courier following on horseback. As they approached Lyon, hoping to move more comfortably and quickly, they moved to a boat,

This particular impediment, it turned out, would not be the worst they encountered, for as the two women approached a post station outside of Saint-Eloy, they learned that a royal messenger, Monsieur de la Gibertière, had arrived ahead of them and left orders at all the postal stations not to provide them with horses. Undaunted, Marie bribed the keeper of the stable (“whatever the cost, we needed to gain the cooperation of the people at the post station”),
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and to the surprise of the royal messenger, who had assumed she would be forced back to the river, the little party proceeded by land.

The adventure continued, but without Hortense, who could no longer risk staying on French soil and had returned to Chambéry, accepting the Duke Charles-Emmanuel of Savoy's hospitality and protection. Marie's route was punctuated by accidents where the overloaded hackney “tipped over twice although I did not hurt myself at all”; illness in her party, when “Morena had an attack of colic”; and second thoughts on the part of her trusted escort Marguein, who “seized by an affliction which was much more dangerous for me than for him . . . reflected very seriously on the negative repercussions that could result from my undertaking, for me as well as for him, and for his whole family, if we arrived in this way, against the will and the orders of the king.”
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Exhausted, Marie allowed herself to be persuaded to wait in Fontainebleau while Marguein went ahead to Paris to present letters to the king and his minister Louvois, who Marie hoped would show her more favor than Finance Minister Colbert had. They arrived in Fontainebleau on August
24, only to learn that the messenger who had been trying to intercept them since Lyon was not far behind.

There was nothing to be done but agree to meet with him in the small inn where their travels had come to a halt. Marie sat in her room alone, holding a guitar, which had somehow survived the rough roads intact. She listened to the proposals laid before her, then turned them down. She rejected all of the propositions and hypotheses regarding her own presumptuous confidence about her power to influence the king. And this time she invoked a precedent for her demands—other women who had been permitted to live apart from their husbands in retreat at a convent of their choice:

Then, as the gentleman stared at her in astonishment, she lifted the guitar and began to play.

The following day she received a personal visit from Charles de Créquy. She must have watched with trepidation as he approached
her little auberge, and felt humiliated as she saw the shock on his face as he entered her modest quarters. He greeted her with pity, “remembering the grandeur in which he had seen me in Rome, he confessed that he was surprised and touched by the change, and he lamented for me over the sad state of my fortune.” But she was proud: “I mocked his lamentations straightaway and beseeched him to come right to the point, upon which he began to speak quite plainly.”
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The message he conveyed, Marie could have no doubt, came straight from the king. He told her that he did not want her to see him or even to enter Paris. He advised her to return to Grenoble and await an escort to return to Rome. And he specified that he had given his word to both Lorenzo and the papal envoy that this would be his decision. Marie could respond only by asking Créquy to beg the king's leave to enter the Benedictine convent in Lys, not far from Paris, and where her sister had previously resided. The following day, this permission was granted.

And so, to all appearances, Marie's tumultuous flight had ended with this royal refusal, which was nonetheless accompanied by a generous sum of money that Louis had delivered to his former love along with the promise of financial support for as long as she remained under his protection. Without further delay, Marie and Morena set out for Lys, as soon as the king's escort arrived to accompany them. As she accepted the purses handed to her, Marie could not prevent herself from commenting on the irony of the gesture, as was reported in a letter by Madame de Scudéry a few days later:

Although profoundly saddened by the turn of events (ten years later she would tell her friend Madame d'Aulnoy that she thought she would die of sadness at that Fontainebleau inn), Marie knew she would be cordially received by the abbess of Lys, and she was not disappointed. Her sisters Olympe and Marianne came to see her and remained there for days at a time. Although they had been critical of her flight from Rome in the beginning, now they brought her clothes and supplies, and paid her visits accompanied by as many friends as the poor abbess felt she could permit. Colbert had given the abbess strict instructions to limit the number of visits Marie received and to report to him daily on every detail of Marie's behavior and contact with the outside world. Anxiously, she tried her best to respect what she understood to be the king's wishes, but she was not an unkind person and had no desire to be a jailer. Her dutiful reports exhibit her reluctance to play this role:

Marie was grateful for the kindness of the Benedictine nuns. She busied herself with writing letters, to her sisters and friends in Paris
as well as to Rome, to the Countess Stella and also to Lorenzo. Her husband was not happy to learn of her new residence in France. Although the French ambassador attempted to reassure him that Marie's presence in a French convent would help contain the damage to his reputation caused by her flight, he was particularly worried about her visitors. He did not have his own spies in place there, which perhaps is what eventually motivated him to grant her request that he send her more serving women. With the assistance of the Countess Stella, who helped mediate their communication, Marie obtained more clothing—laces, stockings, dresses, and a coat—along with the powders and perfumes that she missed from Rome. Immediately following her arrival at Lys she wrote to the countess asking for support in softening Lorenzo's attitude:

After a few weeks, Lorenzo relented and permitted the requested packages to be delivered to his wife, accompanied by her Roman serving maids, at least one of whom, Nanette De Rocour, would soon write him secret letters reporting on Marie's movements and intentions. In September Marie wrote him a conciliatory letter expressing her gratitude:

Such docility was not, however, characteristic of Marie. It would prove difficult for her to sustain it. Before long she learned that only her sisters had been permitted to visit her, and their visits became less frequent. She was aware that the abbess was being made to observe her every move. When in late September she received word from Colbert that she was also expected to pay for her expenses in the convent, she reacted angrily in a hasty letter accusing him of treating her worse than a prisoner. Immediately after sending the letter she regretted it, and sought the advice of the kind abbess, who wrote her own letter to Colbert attempting to repair the damage. But it was too late. Colbert had already shown Marie's letter to the king and Louis was not pleased by its tone. He had just sent his own letter to Lorenzo, in which he made it clear that he was not willing to take further action to force Marie back to Rome. Now he was presented with evidence of her ingratitude, and he decided to put an end to what many of his advisers had perceived all along as his overly indulgent posture. Five days later Marie was met at the gate of the convent by the ubiquitous Monsieur de la
Gibertière, the very same gentleman who had been sent to intercept her on her voyage from Lyon. This time he appeared “with a coach and an order to the abbess to let me out.”
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Her destination was Avenay, an ancient convent south of Reims, where yet another abbess waited to greet her new charge.