Free The Queen`s Confession by Victoria Holt

Madame la Dauphine.”
    “Madame du Barry! She has not been presented to me.”
    Everyone seemed to be studying their plates and some were trying not to smile.
    Then someone said: “Madame … what do you think of her?”
    “She is charming. What are her functions at Court?”
    Again that pause, that slight heightening of colour in one or two faces, the tendency to smile.
    “Oh, Madame, it is her function to amuse the King.”
    “To amuse the Kingi’ I smiled at him across the table.
    “Then want to be her rival.”p>
    What had I said? I had merely made a loyal statement. Why was it received in such a manner? I saw the mingling of horror and amusement.
    We left Muette the following morning and in due course arrived at the Palace of Versailles. I sat bolt upright in my carriage, for my companion was the Comtesse de Noailles and during the journey I had to hear another lecture. My behaviour had disturbed her; I would have to learn that the Court of France was very different from that of Austria. I must never forget that my grandfather was the King of France, and although etiquette might forbid even-him to show his displeasure, it could nevertheless be there. I half listened, and all the time I was wondering what my wedding dress would be like and whether the Dauphin was disappointed in me; and I thought fleetingly of my sister Caroline, who would be praying for me on this day-and crying for me too. At last
    we came to Versailles. It was an impressive moment. I had heard the name throughout my childhood spoken in hushed tones.
    “This is how it is done at Versailles.” That meant it was absolutely right. Versailles was the talk and envy of every Court in Europe.
    At the gates of the Palace, vendors of swords and hats were gathered.
    I have heard it said since that Versailles was a great theatre where the play of Royalty at Home was presented There was a great deal of truth in this, for anyone could come to the Salon d’Hercules except dogs, mendicant friars and those newly marked with smallpox providing they had a hat and sword. It was amusing to see those who had never carried a sword before they took one of those for hire at the gates, swaggering into the chateau. Even prostitutes were allowed in, provided they did not ply their trade there or seek clients. But in order to enter the more intimate apartments it was necessary to have been presented at Court. There was, naturally, very little privacy at Versailles. In our Court at Vienna, where everything was conducted in a far simpler manner, I had been accustomed to a certain amount of supervision; but here I was to be on show for most of my day.
    The Palace gates opened to let us in and we drove through the line of Guards Swiss and French standing there to do me special honour. I had a strange feeling of excitement mingling with apprehension. I was not given to introspection, but in those moments I had an uneasy notion that I was being carried on to fulfill a strange destiny which, had I wanted to, I could do nothing to avert.
    In the royal courtyard the equipages of the princes and nobles were already drawn up. I exclaimed in delight at the horses with their red plumes and blue cockades, for I loved horses almost as much as I loved dogs; they pranced excitedly and they looked very fine, their dancing manes plaited with coloured ribbons.
    Before us lay the chateau, the sun shining on its count less windows so that it seemed agliner with diamonds a vast world of its own. And so I
    entered the Palace of Versailles, which was to be my home for so many years-in fact until those dark days when I was driven from it.
    On my arrival I was taken to a temporary apartment on the ground floor because those apartments usually assigned to the Queens of France were not ready. When I think of Versailles now I remember in detail the rooms I was to occupy after those first six months—those beautiful rooms on the first floor which open out of the Galerie des Glaces. My bedchamber had