Виктория Холт - The Queen`s Confession

The blow struck me suddenly. I had not even known that she was ill.

The Abbe Vermond came to my apartments and said he must speak to me alone. His eyes were wild, his lips twitching.

I said: “What is wrong?”

He replied: “Your Majesty must prepare yourself for a great disaster.”

I rose staring at him. I saw the letter in his hand and I knew.

The Empress . He nodded.

“She is dead,” I said blankly, for I knew it was true. I was conscious of a terrible loneliness such as I had never known before.

He nodded.

I could not speak. I was numbed. I felt like a child who is lost and knows it will never feel entirely safe again.

“It cannot be,” I whispered.

But he assured me that it was.

I said unsteadily, “I want first to be alone He nodded and left me and I sat on the bed and thought of her as I had known her in Vienna. I saw her at her mirror while her women dressed her hair; I could feel the cold Viennese wind, sharper than anything I had known since I left Austria; I could picture her bending over my bed when I was pretending I was asleep. I could hear her voice.

“You must do this. You must do that. Such Ugerete … such dissipation… You are rushing on to destruction. I tremble for you.”

Oh tremble for me. Mamma, I whispered, for without you I am so alone.

The King came and wept with me. He had waited a quarter of an hour before coming. I heard him in the anteroom where the Abbe had waited, respecting my wish to be alone.

My husband said: “I thank you. Monsieur !” Abbe, for the service you have just done me. ” And I knew then that he had sent the Abbe to break the news to me.

He came in then and embraced me.

“My dear,” he said, ‘this is so sad for us all, but mostly for you.”

“I cannot believe it,” I said.

“I had letters from her so recently.”

“Ah, you will miss her letters I nodded.

“Nothing will be quite the same again And as he sat beside me on the bed, his hand in mine, I seemed to hear her voice admonishing me as it had all my life: I must not grieve—I had my husband; I had my daughter; and I must not forget that France needed a Dauphin.

I ordered Court mourning to be made, and meanwhile I put on temporary mourning. I shut myself in my apartments and saw no one but members of the Royal Family, the Duchesse de Polignac and the Princesse de Lamballe. I remained thus, aloof from the Court for several days; and I thought of her continually.

When I received Mercy he told me what he had heard of her end. She had been very ill since the middle of November and the doctors had said that she was suffering from hardening of the lungs.

On the 29th of the month she said to her women who came to her bedside, “This is my last day on earth, and my thoughts are of my children whom I leave behind.” She mentioned us all by name, raising her hands to heaven as she did so.

And when she came to me she kept murmuring, “Marie Antoinette, Queen of France’; and she burst into tears and wept long and bitterly.

All the day she lived, and it was eight in the evening when she started to fight for her breath.

Joseph, who was with her, whispered: “You are very ill.”

And she answered: ‘enough to die, Joseph. “

She signed to the doctors.

I am going now,” she said.

“I pray you light the mortuary candle and close my eyes.”

She looked at Joseph, who took her into his aims, and there she died.

Once again I was brought to bed of a child. Almost a year had passed since the death of my mother, for it was October. How I missed those letters which had arrived for ten years with such regularity. I remembered often how I used to tremble as I opened them and sometimes feel irritated by the continued complaints, but how often during the last year I had longed to receive them. How I should have enjoyed telling her that once more I was pregnant. But what was the use? She had gone for ever; yet I knew that for ever her memory would keep her with me.

I longed for a son, but I dared not pin my hopes on this. I could not love a child more than I loved my little daughter. I prayed: “A son please God, but if You see fit to send me a daughter, she will seem all that I desire.”

This accouchement was different from the last. The King had said that the public were not to be admitted, for I was not again going to be exposed to the sort of risk I had run before, and only members of the family and six of my ladies-including the Princesse de Lamballe, who was a member of the family—together with the accoucheur and the doctors were present.

My pains started when I woke on that morning—it was the 22nd of October—and they were so slight that I was able to take a bath; but by midday they had increased.

It was an easier labour than that of my little Madame Royale, but when the child was born I was half-conscious and too weak to be entirely sure of what was happening.

I was aware of the people about my bed; there seemed to be a deep silence and I was afraid to ask for news of the child. The King had made a sign that no one was to speak to me; he had been very anxious during the latter weeks of my pregnancy and had commanded that when the child was born no one was to-say what its sex was, for if it were a daughter I should be disappointed, and if a Dauphin so overjoyed, that either emotion might be bad for me in the state of exhaustion I should surely experience after the delivery.

I was aware of the silence about my bed. I thought: It is a girl. Or worse still: It is still-born. No! I heard the cry of a child. I had a baby; I wanted to cry out: Give me my child. What matters if . Then I saw the King; there were tears in his eyes and he seemed overcome by his emotion.

I said to him: “You see how calm I am. I have asked no questions.”

His voice was broken and he said: “Monsieur Ie Dauphin begs to present himself.”

A son! My dream was fulfilled. I held out my arms and they laid him in them. A boy . a perfect boyl There was excitement in the bedchamber and the adjoining rooms where the ministers and members of our household waited.

I heard afterwards that everyone there started kissing and embracing.

I heard voices: “A Dauphin. I tell you it is true. We have a Dauphin.”

Even my enemies were caught up in the excitement. Madame de Guemenee, who was to take charge of him, sat in a chair with wheels and he was handed to her; she was then wheeled to her apartments close by and everyone crowded round her to see the child. They wanted to touch him, or his shawl, or even the chair in which the Princesse sat.

“He must become a Christian without delay,” said the King.

Our little Dauphin was baptised at three o’clock.

One hundred and one guns were fired immediately so that Paris should be aware of the sex of the child. That was the signal for the city to go wild with joy. Bells were ringing; processions were formed; at night bonfires were lighted and there were the usual fireworks displays. I could scarcely believe that these were the people who took such joy in those disgusting lampoons which were circulated about me; now they were asking God to protect me, the mother of their Dauphin.

Now they were dancing, drinking my health, crying: “Long live the King and Queen! Long live the Dauphin!”

As my mother said, they were an impetuous people. I was delighted with my new baby. I sent for Madame Royale that she might see her little brother and we stood hand in hand admiring him as he lay in his cradle. She was three years old and growing lovelier every day, besides being very intelligent.

I caught sight of Armand standing at the door scowling ? r us and I smiled at him but he dropped his eyes. And as I passed him I ruffled his hair. He was no longer as pre ny as he had once been; but perhaps I was comparing him with my own little ones.

The tocsins rang for three days and nights. When I awoke I heard them and the realisation of my great joy would come flooding over me. A two-day holiday was declared through out Paris. Wine flowed freely in the streets; buffets of meat were set up; and people wore garlands of artificial flowers about their necks and called to each other “Long live the Dauphin!” as a kind of greeting.

Festival followed festival. Each of the guilds sent representatives to Versailles; and for nine days the ceremonies continued. The whole Court assembled to receive them and there was great hilarity when the sedan-chairmen’s guild sent a chair with a model of a wet-nurse and a Dauphin seated in it. The nurse was a copy of the one we had engaged who had been speedily nicknamed Madame Poitrine. The chimney sweeps brought a model of a chimney on which small chimney-sweeps sat and sang praises of the new-born heir to the throne; the tailors brought a miniature uniform, the blacksmiths an anvil on which they played a tune. The market women put on their black silk dresses, which they kept for years and brought out only on the most auspicious occasions, and sang praises of me and my little son. But the most unusual of all were the locksmiths, who felt they had a special affinity with the King because of his interest in their profession. They brought a huge lock, which they presented to the King, and their leader asked if His Majesty would care to try to unlock it. To do so was the task of a true locksmith, and if the King would prefer one of then-band to demonstrate he had but to command, but knowing His Majesty’s skill. and so on. The King, thus challenged, determined to have a try, and amid great applause he very quickly succeeded. And as he turned the lock, from it sprang a steel -figure which was seen to be a marvellously-wrought tiny Dauphin.