French Passion (30 page)

The Comte's dark eyes snapped with amusement. “Hasn't he told you, my dear, how powerful a body the Assembly is?”

“You don't consider it has any power.”

The Comte looked down at my chair. “I take it he didn't believe you?”

“No,” I sighed. “He didn't.”

“He has a generous spirit,” the Comte said. “Ambition, spite, and plain everyday lust don't exist for him, and neither does connivance. He makes no allowances for them. He can't accept that I maneuvered you.”

I sighed again.

“That's why poets make such poor rulers. Their generous spirits don't take the emotions of ordinary people into consideration.”

I was realizing that André, in fury and loathing, had left me forever. I would never see him again. All I had was the memory of the scorn on his face. I bent my head into my hands, weeping.

The Comte put his arms around me, drawing me into his lap. I sat on my husband's knee, gasping out my grief that my love disbelieved and hated me. I'd lost love. My husband comforted me with a rocking, “Hush, hush, my dear, hush. I'll be everything to you. Father, lover, husband, friend.”

“He hates me.…”

“Does it matter so very much?”

“You know …”

“What, my dearest dear?”

“How it is to love.”

The Comte began kissing me. His kisses became more demanding. One of my backless mules fell. After a few minutes my arms were around him. I was still weeping for André, yet I felt that compelling, almost hostile passion. The d'Epinay pleasure-demanding streak, I thought. The Comte pulled up the velvet
robe de toilette
, then the silk shift, caressing my naked skin.

“The lackeys—” I started.

“Won't interrupt.”

With two lackeys outside the door, the fire burning warm, my husband's strong hands were lowering me onto him. My back arched, my body moved on him. I heard the small, clear cries of passion in my throat. Waves of ecstasy shook my body.

André, I thought, oh, André, André.

Chapter Twelve

It was March.

I sat in the window of my boudoir, my easel angled in front of me. The silken little room was warmed by blazing apple wood logs. All week snow had fallen. This morning, finally, the sun had emerged, a remote, hard sun that glinted off snow, dazzling the eyes. Trees were easy to sketch, bare black lines on white paper.

A carriage was coming up the virgin snow of the private avenue. A discreet black cabriolet drawn by one horse. This winter it was the style to be discreet. Or so the Comte told me. In the five months of my marriage I hadn't left the grounds.

The rare visitors who came were for my husband. The Comte had told me that more nobles had emigrated, and the rest were part of the far less extravagant Court at the Tuileries Palace.

The Comte kept me too busy to be lonely. My husband's uxorious behavior reminded me of those last weeks in the old house and I couldn't decide whether he was wooing me or cramming a lifetime of love into a brief space. We were seldom apart. With Jean-Pierre in England, I'd decided to brush up on the language, and the Comte, in his amused manner, promised to act as my English tutor. His accent was perfect. Together we would read witty new plays by Sheridan. I enjoyed watercolors and the Comte would criticize my efforts on a dignified, serious level so that sometimes I would imagine myself a true woman artist after the style of Madame Vigée-Lebrun. Occasionally he would order the musicians to the gallery, and he and I would whirl alone together across the black-and-white marble of the ballroom. At night, with moonlight streaming over us, he would hold up my long pale hair so the strands appeared luminous. His passion was insatiable and wild. I learned to crave the act as much as he.

I never could forget he was thirty years my senior.

I never could forget André.

The carriage had reached the curve of steps. I wondered, idly, which of the Comte's friends it was. Another future émigré? A worried messenger from the Tuileries Palace pleading for him to return to advise the King? I raised my paintbrush, yawning. Absentminded. Drifting in that morning languor that for the past two months had afflicted me.

Goujon alighted. He looked so different that for a moment I couldn't believe it was he. Yet who else could possibly have such a huge body, flaming hair and beard? He no longer wore his loose farmer's smock. His dark stockings, gray knee breeches, and dark brown jacket were what altered him so completely. From here I could make out the tiny red-white-and-blue cockade stuck in his bowl-shaped hat. There was, of course, no reason that Goujon shouldn't dress like this. Though a peasant, he'd had a far wealthier childhood than Jean-Pierre and I. His parents had given him an excellent education.

All at once my languor left. How good it was to see a friend! And then I wondered: Did Goujon still see André?

Dropping my paintbrush, I raced down the broad staircase and across the vast hall. A footman opened the door to the glass-enclosed entry. Before Goujon could give his name, I cried, “Goujon! Oh, Goujon!” My eyes were wet.

The bearded face widened into a smile. “Comtesse.”

“Manon,” I corrected. “How did you get past the gatekeepers?”

My husband had employed extra “gardeners” to patrol the grounds, and at each gatehouse four men sat playing cards, their guns at their sides, their waistcoat pockets heavy with shot and powder.

“I've been elected to the Assembly.”

I hugged him again. “So
that's
why you're dressed like a sober bourgeois. Oh, Goujon, how wonderful!” And then I was thinking: He surely sees André.

“And I'm here on official business.”

My face fell. “Can you spare a few minutes first, with me?”

“My business is with you,” Goujon said.

“But whatever …?”

“Is there someplace private?”

I nodded. His footsteps clumping after me, I led the way to the salon with its paneled scenes that Fragonard had painted of frolicking courtiers and their ladies. The furnishings were delicate, of inlaid woods. In this vast yet exquisite room the hearty, bull-like Goujon was out of place. I had chosen it because the servants didn't use any nearby hallways or passages.

“How is everyone?” I asked, closing the doors. “Izette? Fido?”

“Izette's organizing the women of St. Antoine.” Goujon smiled in his red beard. “Izette! Name of God, she wants, believe it or not, the Assembly to write a Declaration of the Rights of Women!”

I had to laugh. It was so typically Izette.

“And Fido, poor fool, is still working at the inn. Happy enough, though. And alive, thanks to you.” He gave a roar of laughter. “Will I ever forget the sight of you plowing through that crowd at the Bastille, barely able to stand yet intent on saving him!”

A shudder passed through me at the memory of that swarming mob, those grisly heads raised on pikes.

I looked down at my ruby wedding band (André's ring hung on a fine gold chain around my neck), asking in a faltering tone. “André?”

“Égalité, yes.” Goujon went to gaze out at the snow-covered gardens.

“Is he ill? Is something wrong? I never go out, never see news sheets or pamphlets—Goujon, tell me quick!”

“His health is good,” Goujon said, his massive body turning to me. “Name of God, Manon, how could you lead him on?”

“Lead him on? Is that what he told you?”

“He didn't tell me anything.” Goujon glanced at panels painted with amorously dallying courtiers. “You left him for this.”

Cut by his misjudgment, I bit my lip and shook my head.

“Why else, then?” Goujon asked.

“André didn't believe me. You won't either.”

“Try me,” he said, his deep voice gentle.

I moved to the window next to him, gazing into the snowy landscape. “See those bushes there?” I asked. “The ones to the left. You can't tell it from here, but it's a labyrinth. So simple, just hedges, but in it one can get utterly lost. Goujon, do you remember Izette asking you about released prisoners getting mental blackouts?”

“So you
did
lie about not having them?”

“I didn't want to worry André,” I admitted. “When I have one, it's like being in the labyrinth. A terrifying sense of being lost. Afterward I can't remember where I went, or what I did.” And then, briefly, I told him everything: how I'd come here to get Jean-Pierre's letter, my tear-drenched release of the past, which had drained me and left me weak. The Comte's passionate demands to marry him, waking to finding our marriage a
fait accompli
. I sighed, playing with my ruby wedding band. “Goujon, I've been thinking a lot lately. I love André, and always will love him. But one thing is clear. I would have had to leave him, and soon. It was only a matter of time before the scandal sheets would have linked us. I was a courtesan, the Comte's mistress. Reams were written about my extravagances … and … uglier things. André symbolizes what's incorruptible and good in the new government.”

“He's a very bitter loser,” Goujon said. “He talks of having you imprisoned.”

I couldn't halt a wild laugh. “You took me from the Bastille, and now you come to shove me into Salpêtière Prison—is that your official business?”

“Of course not,” he said. “But, Manon, you must know you're an utterly desirable woman. A man would rather see you locked away in a jail cell than in the arms of another man.”

“If that's a compliment, give me another.”

“I'm here to warn you.”

“Officially?”

“Officially, yet privately, too. You're right. Égalité is too important to the Assembly to have him compromise himself.” Goujon raised one thick finger. “First, even
his
reputation will be blemished if he locks up a released prisoner of the Bastille.” Goujon held up another finger. “Second, people
will
connect you—and I agree, the connection is bad for him. Not just you. The Comte de Créqui advised the King. He, and the King, oppressed the people.”

I winced. I always winced when Goujon used Jacobin slogans. The Comte had done his duty in an impossible situation, caught between a hungry populace and an extravagant royal family.

Goujon held up a third finger. “Third, and maybe this is most important, Égalité is a poet, an idealist. However briefly he locks you up, it will compromise him in his own eyes. He'll be destroyed.”

I walked to the next long window, gazing blindly out. Yes, I thought, if André discovers he is capable of evil, it will destroy him.

“What can I do?”

“Emigrate.”

“Leave France?” I said. Though Jean-Pierre had been six months in England and I was desperately lonely for him, I'd never considered emigrating. “My husband fought bravely for France, and spent his life serving the country. He would never leave—he told André that.”

“He did? When?”

“The day we were married. André came here looking for me. He was hurt, bitter. He told the Comte to take me and leave.” I frowned, remembering. “The Comte seemed to know something about André's parents.”

Goujon didn't move, yet the huge body grew alert. His mouth tightened, and the lines around his eyes deepened. His expression was harsh, waiting.

“I've never heard Égalité mention his family. He keeps the subject of his family a mystery. What did the Comte say?”

“Just that there was far more reason for André to leave the country.”

“That's all?”

“Yes. It was more the way the Comte said it and André's reaction than the words.”

Goujon's eyes pierced me. I knew him to be educated, well read, but this was a look of calculation. The peasants of harsh Brittany, I'd heard, were of necessity opportunists, shrewd and realistic about catching the main chance.

I walked across parquet to the most distant window. Why was I talking about the man I loved to a mutual friend? Only a minor social guilt assailed me. But was there any way I could possibly have known that my few words would one day be forged into an awesome and bloody weapon pointed at André?

Goujon's heavy step followed me the length of the salon. “You could,” he said very slowly, “go without your husband.”

“The Comte never would permit it. He, well, he cares for me very deeply.”

“Name of God!” Goujon laughed. “Of course he does.”

“Besides”—I flushed—“he doesn't know this yet, but I'm carrying his child.”

At this Goujon turned away. “A child?” he said.

“In a little over six months.”

“Manon, what do you feel for the Comte de Créqui?”

“I—it's difficult to explain. He guides me, amuses me, teaches me. I take pleasure in his wit. And, God help me, I take pleasure in his bed.” My face burned. “I don't love him, but I'm tied. Tied.”

“Then you insist on staying with him?”

“Since our marriage, he hasn't let me through the gates. Do you expect he'll permit me to leave France?”

“If I guarantee he will, would you go?”

“He won't. Ever.”

“If?” Goujon persisted.

I gazed into dazzling winter gardens. Merely thinking of leaving the Comte brought on melancholy. His love for me was so passionate that it exceeded love, and out of this overwhelming passion came great sweetness (like the magically refurbished rooms, the exquisitely selected gowns and jewels I'd found awaiting me) and also barbarous cruelty. The magnitude of his emotions dominated me. As I'd just told Goujon, I was tied to him.

Goujon continued to stare at me.

“You love Égalité, you said.”

“With all my heart.”

“Then consider what I told you. Name of God, the man's being eaten alive with bitterness. We have no more
lettres de cachet
, but you're of noble blood. Égalité talks to me a little too often of the various charges he can trump up against you. Manon, you hurt him that much.”