suddenly, fragrances of ambergris and rosewater, mingled with the emanations of gunpowder, wafted to the Montespans’ carriage on the hill. In the sky a spray of fireworks described two giant arabesques, interlaced with two ‘L’s.
‘Why is there a second “L”?’ asked Françoise.
‘’Tis the initial of Louise de La Vallière, the favourite,’ replied her husband.
‘He dares to honour his mistress before the Queen, and in public?’ said Françoise, astonished.
‘What can His Majesty not do?’ asked Louis-Henri.
The vast royal domain was now a whirl of flying rockets, twisting curls, firecrackers, flame blowers, girandoles. Suddenly there was an immense final explosion, and the entire sky was light blue.
‘He can even restore daylight to darkest night …’ said the marquise in awe, sitting up and pulling the translucent folds of her underskirts back over her thighs.
The coloured silk skirts were usually worn over a simple black dress, but Françoise, to most pleasing effect, wore them next to her skin – they were garments that were easily removed in private, allowing rapid access to her body. Françoise’s raiment was deliciously daring.
‘I’m hungry. Louis-Henri, what do you think of the name Athénaïs?’
‘Why?’ smiled her husband, pulling up his grey satin breeches.
‘To bow to the fashion of Antiquity – all the rage at the moment – I would like to take the name Athénaïs …’
‘Athénaïs or Françoise, it’s all the same to me, provided it is you…’
‘’Tis from the name of the Greek goddess of virginity. A rebellious virgin, Athena rejected all her mortal suitors.’
‘Is that so?’
Saint-Germain-en-Laye was three hours by carriage from Paris. Françoise, her appetite aroused by their lovemaking on the seat, suggested they stop halfway to sup at L’Écu de France.
‘As it pleases you,’ replied her husband, ‘for you know that you alone provide all sustenance for me. Which reminds me; there is something I would like to tell you, Athénaïs …’
In the renowned coaching inn – a red house of several storeys (all tile and brick), overlooking a lawn edged with camomile – the atmosphere was subdued and intimate; the windowpanes were small.
As the dining hall was filled with patrons, bewigged like Louis-Henri, who had just readjusted his own wig above his shoulders, a table was brought and laid for the Montespans next to a cold fireplace (it was June) and a stairway gleaming with beeswax. Françoise sat down, eager to eat.
‘I will order only those dishes that were not allowed when I was at the convent, those of a lust-inducing sort: oysters, so-called “Aphroditic” red beans, and asparagus, all forbidden to young ladies.’
She laughed, a peal of pearls spilling onto marble steps. The patrons in the hall turned to look at her. Her fair hands, her arms fashioned as if by a master potter, her teeth so perfect and white – a rarity in those times: the noblemen and burghers in the establishment, with their soupe à la bière, felt their jaws dropping in amazement.
‘Who is she?’
‘The fairest lady of our time …’
‘A triumphant beauty to display to ambassadors!’
Her firm chin, straight nose, fine wrists, waist and neck; her thick and plentiful blond locks. She had invented a style of coiffure and baptised it the hurluberlu. Her hair had been pulled back from the forehead and was held in place by a hoop on top of her head, leaving her hair to fall on either side in a cascade of curls that framed her face.
‘I can see that becoming a fashion,’ predicted a patron, in response to his sour-tempered wife’s frown.
As for Louis-Henri, he admired his wife’s flamboyance; her brilliant red lips, whence nothing emerged that was not a word he loved, were a nest of delight. But he lowered his eyes to his plate.
‘Athénaïs, we play cards all the time, we lose, debts are piling up like clouds. I owe money everywhere – to my tailor, my gunsmith, my friends. Financially, we have no support, and we are embarking upon a perilous life.’
A valet de table brought Athénaïs a plate of oysters, ‘all alive’, and some cabbage with bacon for Louis-Henri. The molluscs’ muscles had already been snipped in the kitchen, so the fair blonde needed only to raise them up, tilt the shell and let the flesh slide between her lips. As in the time of Ancient Rome, she preferred her oysters milky, so before swallowing them, she bit the pouch. The milk ran to the edge of her lips: a few ducs looked on, and the temperature rose. They tugged at their collars whilst the Marquis de Montespan continued, ‘In five months, we have already exhausted the fifteen thousand livres of annual pension my parents send me, and the interest on the dowry paid by your parents, who do not have vast means either. And everything is dear in Paris, and two servants in the house! Everything costs double or triple here. One hundred livres the rent for the apartments, maintenance of the carriage and the coachman costs twelve livres a day. So I have taken a decision ...’
‘Are we going to live in the foothills of the Pyrenees in your Château de Montespan?’ smiled the marquise dreamily, swallowing another oyster, just as the asparagus and red beans were brought to their table.
‘Nay, for ’twould not be good enough for you. Ennobled by Louis XIII as a reward for services rendered by an ancestor, the land of the two villages – Antin and Montespan – was established as a marquisate. The family settled first in the chateau at Antin, but because it was about to collapse, they removed to the one at Montespan. Until that chateau, too, was in dire condition. And so they went to live at Bonnefont, where I was born. Alas, it is not a fine chateau. With its broken stones, covered in brambles, surrounded by the stagnant water of the moat, it is not worthy of you…’
‘What, then, is your idea to set things aright, my fine husband?’ she asked Louis-Henri, giving him as always an amused smile.
She picked up an asparagus shoot and raised it to her lips as if she were playing a flute. She turned her gaze towards the comtes in the room, who lifted a corner of the tablecloth to wipe their brows, whilst Louis-Henri continued with what he had to say.
‘I will go to serve in the army, pay the blood tribute, and become captain of a company of pikemen.’
Athénaïs continued to look at the dining hall, at the velvet curtains in the windows, the bouquets of flowers on the tables.
‘Monsieur, I forbid you to put a single one of your charming feet upon a battlefield.’ Then she looked Louis-Henri straight in the eye. ‘Your three brothers have already gone to their deaths in combat, and you are made for peace. Do not do it for me. We shall—’
But Montespan interrupted her. ‘It is the only way out, for aristocrats do not have the right to work, and business and trade are forbidden to us. A military exploit would also be the most glorious way to obtain amnesty from His Majesty for my family’s sins. I have been considering it for a long time, waiting for a war. Fortunately, a city in Lorraine has just rebelled against the King’s power, and he has decided to besiege it. This is my long-awaited
