Paris: The Novel (68 page)

“I think that if there is affection, mademoiselle, and mutual respect, and if people have interests in common, then the differences can be solved as long as both parties make compromises. And compromise comes from affection.”

She nodded thoughtfully. Then she smiled.

“What you say seems very wise, monsieur.”

The chapel was a baroque masterpiece, dedicated to the medieval king Saint Louis.

“In the latter part of his reign,” Roland remarked, “the Sun King became increasingly religious.”

“And this was entirely thanks to his second wife, Madame de Maintenon,” Marie added cheerfully, “who was a good moral influence on him.”

Roland laughed.

“She’s quite right, of course,” he told Fox and Hadley. “No doubt every man needs a wife to give him moral guidance. But Louis XIV certainly did!”

Fox, however, did not seem to share their amusement. He nodded thoughtfully, but pursed his lips.

“You must forgive me if I can’t be so enthusiastic about the religious feelings of Louis XIV. It was those feelings that made him kick my family out of France.”

Roland looked at him in surprise.

“You’re a Huguenot?”

“We were.” Fox turned to Hadley to explain. “You’ve probably heard of the Huguenots, as the French Protestants were often called. We lived in France protected by an act of toleration known as the Edict of Nantes. But then in 1685, Louis XIV revoked that protection and told the Huguenots to convert. About two hundred thousand escaped, many of them going to England. My family was one of those.”

“But you haven’t got a French name,” Marie said.

“No. Some of the English Huguenots kept their French names. But others translated them into English. A family called Le Brun, for instance, became Brown. And Renard translated to Fox.”

“Your name was Renard?” said Roland with sudden interest.

“Yes. It’s quite a common name.”

Roland looked thoughtful for a moment. He knew that his family had married a Renard heiress once, a woman of the merchant class—a girl like Marie Blanchard, perhaps. That had been centuries ago, hardly worth thinking about. But it was conceivable that his family could be distantly linked to that of the English lawyer. Did he wish to investigate further? No, he didn’t want to be related to Fox.

“It’s true,” he agreed, “there are many Renards.” And he let the matter
drop. “But now,” he announced, “the carriage will take us down to the end of the park where we can look at the charming little ensemble of the Trianons.”

Anyone who knew James Fox would have said that, when he decided to marry, his choice of wife would be wise, and that he’d make an excellent husband. He’d already been a little in love with several women, and recently he’d wondered if it might be time to settle down.

But he’d never experienced the thunderclap of a grand passion, the
coup de foudre
. Until last Sunday.

And now he was in love. And his love was impossible.

He’d always assumed he’d need a wife who spoke French. The family firm had begun in London, but the Paris office was an important part of the business. He and his father were liked and trusted by the British embassy, and he expected that he’d be moving between the London and Paris offices for the rest of his professional life.

Finding an English wife who spoke French should not be too difficult. Ever since the might and prestige of the Sun King had made French the language of diplomacy, it had been de rigueur for ladies of the upper and upper-middle classes to speak French—at least in theory. Indeed, most middle-class girls would learn a smattering of French at school.

But what about a French wife? The idea was quite appealing. In France, it could only help. And in London, so long as she could speak passable English, it would be thought rather elegant.

Either way, James Fox might hope to marry well. True, from the point of view of an English bride, his position as a solicitor lacked the social cachet of the barrister who appeared in court. But the Paris connection, the fact that James and his father were invited to embassy receptions and had dealings with the aristocratic world of diplomacy, added to his status. A young woman who hoped to marry a diplomat might settle for a life in glamorous Paris with a professional man of solid family fortune. With the French, his position was even better. The British Empire was at its zenith; it had a monarchy, which many French secretly craved; and the British pound sterling bought a great many French francs. Less aware of minor English social distinctions, the French saw only a prosperous English gentleman. Even a rich family like the Blanchards might have considered him.

Except, of course, that he was Protestant.

Every week he attended St. George’s Anglican Church near the Arc de Triomphe, or sometimes the nearby American church of the Holy Trinity, just south of the Champs-Élysées, where the cousin of J. P. Morgan the banker had been rector for decades. Some of the Foxes’ French friends were Protestant, but the majority, naturally, were Catholic. As his father had told him since his early childhood: “Many of our dearest friends are Catholic, James. But although there’s no need to talk about it, always remember that you are a Protestant.”

So on Sunday, when James had found himself staring at the fair curls and blue eyes of Marie Blanchard, and known, instantly and irrevocably, that this was the woman he wanted to marry, he had also realized that it was madness.

Monsieur Blanchard would almost certainly forbid it. His own father would not take kindly to the idea at all. There would be the inevitable wrangle about the children’s religion. As a lawyer he knew only too well how even the nicest families could be broken apart, wills altered and worse, the moment one crossed the religious divide.

And besides even that, it was very clear that there might be an offer from de Cygne, a rich aristocrat of impeccable religion.

He was wasting his time even thinking about Marie.

But James Fox was a patient man. He didn’t give up easily.

The Trianon where the Sun King would retreat with Madame de Maintenon from the formality of his court was a charming country house built of stone and pink marble. The nearby Petit Trianon of his successor Louis XV was a doll’s house by comparison.

“This is where we are reminded that the Bourbons were humans after all, and not gods,” Roland remarked. “And also that they were vulnerable. For this tiny palace of the Petit Trianon became the favorite retreat of poor Queen Marie Antoinette in the years before the Revolution.

“And now, my friends, if you will permit me, I will offer you this reflection upon the meaning of Versailles. Consider first: It was almost entirely built by Louis XIV with additions by his successor Louis XV, in variations of the classical style. Architecturally, it has unity. Second, let us remember an astonishing fact of French history. The Sun King lived
so long that he saw his son and grandson die before him. As a result, it was his great-grandson, a little child, who succeeded him. From 1643 until 1774—over a hundred and thirty years—France was ruled by only those two kings, Louis XIV and XV. Add the quarter century of the next reign—that of Louis XVI and his queen Marie Antoinette—and you are at the French Revolution. From the seventeenth century until the Revolution, with very little interruption, France is ruled not from Paris, but from the court of Versailles.

“But now let me tell you why, for me, Versailles has a certain melancholy. Think of the Sun King, so anxious to bring order to France, aided by the Catholic Church, which is fighting back with all its baroque power against the Protestant Reformation. He seems to succeed, he makes France the greatest power in Europe. But he overreaches himself, becomes involved in ruinous wars, sees his family die and instead of a secure succession, leaves a half-ruined kingdom to another child, just as he was. Imagine what his grief must have been.

“The new century sees a gilded age, and the Enlightenment, to be sure. But also financial difficulties, the loss of France’s colonies in Canada and India to the British, and ends with the Revolution, when the Paris mob forces poor Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette to return to Paris, and the guillotine. With this, the age of Versailles comes to an end. Everything its builder had hoped for has been utterly destroyed.

“Yet perhaps that is why Versailles is so haunting. It is an entire world that suddenly ended, and remains in all its perfection, frozen forever, just as it was when they dragged the king and queen away to their deaths.”

There was one last site to visit. It was quite close by. While Roland walked ahead with Marie and her brother, Fox followed with Hadley.

Fox liked this intelligent American friend of Marie’s brother. They chatted briefly about their visit. “De Cygne’s an excellent guide,” said Fox.

“Yes.” Hadley gazed at the three people ahead of them. “They make a handsome couple, our aristocrat and Marie, don’t you think? Blond, blue-eyed … He’d be quite a catch for her, wouldn’t he?”

“I suppose so,” said Fox calmly. “Has he made any declaration?”

“Not yet. Marc would have told me, I’m sure.”

“What about Marc?” Fox inquired. He asked partly to make conversation,
and partly because, if he was going to have any chance in his hopeless quest for Marie, he’d better discover everything he could about the family.

Hadley chuckled.

“Not exactly. My friend’s in a rather different kind of trouble.”

“What’s that?”

“Do you keep secrets?”

“Every day of my professional life.”

“Well, Marc’s got himself in a bit of trouble with a girl. Hardly uncommon. But his father’s so angry he’s cut off his allowance.” And he gave Fox a brief account of the circumstances.

“It’s unfortunate, but hardly a scandal,” Fox remarked when Hadley had finished. “As a lawyer, I see something similar almost every week.”

“It’s the choice of family, I think. Marc’s father feels bad about that. And that the girl’s family are going to throw her out. Blanchard feels responsible for her.”

“I commend him for it. Plenty of rich men wouldn’t. Have they made any plans for the girl, and the baby, assuming it’s born?”