Madame Tussaud

Madame Elisabeth takes her niece’s hand. “It is time for you to go.”

“Why? She gets to stay here, and she is nobody.” She indicates me with her pointed chin. “May I have the model?” She is looking at my sculpture. “I want something to remind me of my brother.”

Both women look at me, and I pass Madame Royale the bust. “I hope it brings you comfort,” I tell her.

She smiles but doesn’t say thank you.

That evening, as I am readying myself for bed, I go to the window to see the orangerie one last time before I sleep. When I open the shutters, something small and hard falls onto the ground. I lean over the windowsill and look down. The little bust of the dauphin is broken in two. Someone placed it outside my window, knowing that, as soon as I opened the shutters, it would fall.

IT IS FRIDAY night, and the Grand Commune is like an abandoned hive. Anyone with transportation has rushed from Versailles to spend the evening in Paris. There are a few members of the Garde du Corps, who share responsibilities with the Swiss for protecting the king, eating here tonight. And, of course, there are my brothers. But the ambassadors and courtiers have left. No one wants to be confined to a palace where the parties and masques have all stopped, a place where everyone waits for the terrible news that must come any day about the dauphin. I have received permission to come here tonight from Madame Elisabeth. Although I do not expect to be granted this privilege often, Edmund has chosen to eat with his commander, the Baron de Besenval, rather than with me.

I ask Wolfgang how long it has been since the queen last hosted one of her great fetes.

“Years,” he says and looks to Johann.

“At least two,” Johann replies. “Before, every evening was a masquerade,” he remembers. “One night, Norwegians and Lapps was the theme. Everyone came dressed like Scandinavians. Another night it was the court of Francois the First, and the men came in jerkins while the women wore Spanish farthingale skirts.”

“The queen would send out lists of what her guests should wear,” Wolfgang adds. “White taffeta and tulle,” he says, “or sixteenth-century costumes with gabled hoods. And then there were the parties at the queen’s private residence, the Petit Trianon.”

“In the morning,” Johann recalls, “the king would go out hunting while the queen would pick wildflowers with her ladies. Then the entire day would be spent in picnics or boating on the canal. And at night—”

“It was like nothing you’ve ever seen. Hundreds of multicolored lanterns illuminating the gardens. And flowers everywhere. On trellises and windows and over specially constructed archways. It was like another world.” Wolfgang sighs. “It’s like a tomb in here now. If the queen hosted a party, she would be accused in every libelle of all seven deadly sins. No matter that she is criticized just as bitterly in court circles for economizing.”

I feel sorry for Wolfgang. Johann, at least, has a wife and child. But Wolfgang is young. If not for his service with the Swiss Guard, he would be sitting in a coffeehouse at the Palais-Royal. “So what do you do in the evenings?” I ask.

“The same thing you do,” Wolfgang guesses. “Play cards. Talk.”

“Go to vespers,” I offer dryly.

“Fortunately, not that. I hear you went with the princesse to Saint-Sulpice.”

“When we got there, she was surrounded by people who wanted her blessing. Some asked her to make wax images for them. She took their names and requests.” I am still amazed by this. “But she was really there to pray for her nephew.”

Johann shakes his head. “The dauphin is very ill. There are physicians in and out of the palace all day. I would be surprised if he lasts the month.”

I cross myself quickly. I have become like Madame Elisabeth, hoping that God will intervene in human affairs. “And the queen?” I ask him.

“Overcome. It’s a terrible time to be holding the Estates-General,” Johann says, “but there’s no way of postponing it.”

“There would be riots in the streets,” I say with certainty. I tell my brothers about Lafayette’s visit and Camille’s plan to write on next month’s events. Then I tell them of the Marquis de Lafayette’s intention to propose a constitutional monarchy.

Wolfgang pulls a small pamphlet from his sleeve. “Don’t read it here. Put it away and look at it tonight.”

“This is Thomas Paine’s Common Sense.” I am shocked. “This is treason.”

“Then all of Paris will hang.”

I look at Johann. “Have you read this?”

He nods. “Everyone has.”

“Not Edmund,” I challenge.

“Even him, though I doubt he’d admit it.”

I look from Wolfgang to Johann. “And?”

My brothers stand. “Let’s talk of this outside,” Wolfgang says.

I tuck the pamphlet into my sleeve, and my brothers lead me onto the Rue de la Surintendance. It is too cold to stand outside, so they take me into the chateau and we find an empty hall. Versailles is still shocking to me in this way—that a king’s palace can be entered by anyone, even a woman carrying treason up her sleeve. The three of us stand huddled together near a tapestry of Hermes, the god of mischief and thieves.

“Not all Swiss Guards believe in this monarchy,” Wolfgang whispers. “The king is weak.”

“But he was chosen by God—”

“Thomas Paine proposes that all men are equal, both commoners and kings,” Johann says.

I cannot believe I am hearing this. “How can you continue to be part of the Swiss Guard? Who does the king have if not you?”

My brothers put their fingers to their lips. The hall is empty, but there is no telling who may be around the corner.

“I will find some other employment,” Wolfgang says.

I look at Johann. “And you?”

“I have to think of Isabel and Paschal.”

“The king seems to be a good man,” I protest. “His sister is all kindness.”

“But they are kept in the dark about everything,” Johann says. “No one is allowed to mention finances. When the queen asks for ten thousand livres, she is given twenty.”

“That is the fault of the court!” I say.

“And how do you change it?” Wolfgang asks. “It’s greed. The courtiers, the ministers …”

I think of my trip into Paris with Madame Elisabeth, and her expressions of delight over the most ordinary things, in particular the sellers peddling food in the streets. When I explained the realities of the marketplace to her—how bad meat is concealed beneath strong seasonings and the ways in which scales are tampered with—she was scandalized. Nothing good can come of blinding the royal family and then asking them to oversee a kingdom.

Wolfgang tries to lift the tension. “So, any wealthy widows come to the exhibition recently?”

I smile, despite my worry. “No, but I’m sure they would be pleased to no end with your gambling.”

“Then maybe I’ll become a professional cardsharp.” He winks at me and holds out his arm to escort me back to the Grand Commune.

“I am going to stay here. I want to see the Hall of Mirrors again.”

“There won’t be anyone there,” Johann warns, thinking I want to catch some member of the nobility I can model.

“I want to see it in moonlight.”

My brothers don’t question me. They know how inspiration can come in the reflection on a lake or in the slow, steady curl of smoke from a fire. I watch them leave, then make my way through the candlelit halls. I wish I had known Versailles when the queen hosted her masquerades and her ladies came dressed in blue velvets and white silks. I want to imagine the chateau as it was in happier days.

The palace isn’t entirely empty. I catch giggling servant girls allowing liberties to be taken with them on the stairs, and a young man strumming a lap harp for a woman who will certainly be following him to his chambers.