Free The Porcelain Dove by Delia Sherman Page B

Alone with me in her dark, cavernous bedchamber, she glittered with diamonds and excitement like a starry night. And she insisted that I accompany her to Versailles, where I waited in a hot and gilded antechamber with the other maids while my mistress traded pleasantries with the king and danced with princes of the blood royal.
    Her presentation itself I need not describe—Colette has heard it from her own lips often and often, from her first trembling curtsy to monsieur's declaration, as he handed her into the carriage, that she was a bird of paradise among poultry. Decorated or plain, Adèle's account must be truer than mine, for my own memory of that night is painted over with images of a thousand other nights, a thousand other entertainments. When first I walked under the painted ceilings of Versailles, did I think them splendid and astonishing? Or did I judge them immediately as being gaudy, overgilded, overheated, overcrowded? To say true, I don't recall.
    For the rest of my romance, well, 'twas false as a gypsy's fortune. Freedom and honor, bah! Bien sûr, I was free to wander Paris as Iwould, but I had no friend to wander with. Monsieur kept no maidservants in town, and all the conversation the lackeys had with me was my beauty and their desire to plunder it. As for Pompey, madame's little black page, though he ran willingly upon my errands, he did not speak, and when he wasn't fanning madame or bringing her bonbons, kept very much to himself. Often in my loneliness I was reduced to taking Doucette on my lap and fondling her curly ears and hard, round head until she lost patience with my caresses and snapped at my fingers.
    For me, the only bearable hour of the day fell between dinner and the evening's entertainment. Dentelle attended to monsieur, and I pinned fresh ornaments in madame's hair while she, as often as not, pored over a volume of Brisson's
Ornithologie
. In those quiet moments, she'd confide in me as of old. Well, not quite as of old; for now her confidences were all of her husband.
    "Look, here is the picture of a jacamar, Berthe, just like the one monsieur my husband showed me at the bird-market. 'Tis not nearly so lovely as the bird itself. M. de Malvoeux says I am lovelier than any bird he has seen, and my bosom much softer than feathers." Blushing furiously, she'd break off and, stealing a sidelong glance into her mirror, stroke her haresfoot down her breast with a reminiscent smile. "Ah, Berthe, 'tis so delightful to be loved! I have only to think of him to feel myself grow prettier. Stéphanie-Germaine de Hautebriande is a great fool. There is nothing better than an exigent husband."
    And here I'd thought she had always known herself loved—by me. Husbands are different—I understood that. And I understood that she did not wound me from malice, would, in fact, be vastly astonished to discover that I felt each word as an arrow to my heart. Pride and decorum both decreed that I must bleed in private, so, "Yes, madame," I'd answer coolly. "No doubt, madame. Will madame wear the pink paduasoy tomorrow or the blue lustring?"
    I was happiest when she was telling me the latest on-dit, for hearing her relate the misadventures of Nathalie and Stéphanie-Germaine I might imagine that nothing had changed between us. The best stories were provided by the comtesse de Fleuru, who combined the carnal appetite of a she-wolf with a monkey's lack of discretion.
    "Just think, Berthe, Nathalie de Fleuru has bestowed her favors upon the chevalier d'Emplumer!" my mistress might declare, all wicked innocence. "How she could, knowing what he is! Why, he wears the key to her summer house on his watch-chain, and now all the world is calling her the comtesse de la Petite Maison. Imagine howshe must feel when she comes to hear of it! I could not endure to have such things said of me, indeed I could not!"
    Sometimes I'd catch her eye in the mirror and essay some teasing sally as, "Ah, but madame has no summer house," or