The Sun King Conspiracy (4 page)

‘O
PRINCE, I know you can, by avenging our rights / Through your love give voice to a hundred exploits. / But that cannot equal the price he’d savour / A State’s confession, and a brother’s favour. / Done Elvire is not …’

‘No, no, AND NO!’

For the third time since the start of the afternoon rehearsal, Molière leapt out of his seat, interrupting the monologue. Madeleine Béjart looked at him in surprise and disappointedly let go of Dom Garcie’s hand, which she had just taken hold of to facilitate the interpretation of this passage from Scene 3. The other actors, who had frozen like statues on the Palais-Royal’s stage, also seemed taken aback by the Master’s reaction. Admittedly Molière was particularly irascible this Sunday. Was it the macabre discovery of the adolescent who had fallen through the glass roof a few hours earlier, or memories of the stormy reception they had received two nights earlier? Seeming even thinner than usual, and hoarse-voiced, his face twitching beneath the curious little linen bonnet he wore, the actor was flinging his long arms about, as if to lend support to the shaky directions he was voicing.

‘My dear, you force me to correct you on yet another point. How many times must I repeat myself? Done Elvire must not show any outward sign of her love for Dom Garcie. That should be obvious! It is the very essence of my work, upon which you seem to be
deliberately pouring scorn. Why take hold of Garcie’s hand like that? Begin again, Madame,’ declared the author, incandescent with rage.

‘But, my friend …’

‘Kindly stop contradicting me. You know very well how much the success of
Dom Garcie de Navarre
means to me. I have not laboured night and day perfecting this script, only to stand idly by as you betray the profound meaning of my play. We will be performing for Monsieur tomorrow, then for every theatre-lover in Paris, perhaps even the King, and I dare not imagine what will come to pass if we continue to be so second-rate. If I have decided to continue our rehearsals today, it is because of your weaknesses and those of your comrades. We are no longer in Pézenas, damn it! Mark this well: our duty is to strive to be worthy of this place and the lofty expectations of our sponsors!’

Deeply upset, the actress dissolved into tears and fled into the wings, unable to remain with her colleagues in her shame; shame prompted by the unjust, excessive criticism of a man she loved with all her heart.

‘From the beginning!’ roared Molière, unconcerned by Madeleine’s distress.

Seeing that the other actors did not know what to do without Done Elvire, he turned towards the young man at his side who was busy copying out a letter he had just dictated.

‘Rejoice, my young friend. Your hour has come. You are bold enough to want to act? Doubtless you believe you’ve attained the summit of the art by divine grace alone. Well, Monsieur Secretary, leave your writing-bench and your starched shirt-cuffs! Ascend the stage, take poor Madeleine’s place and at long last reveal this talent to us – at least for as long as it takes her to wipe away her tears. We
do not have time to waste on the vagaries of feminine moods.’

Gabriel took the manuscript which the master handed him, shivering at the opportunity he was being offered.

At just twenty, the young man was extremely handsome and tall, with brown hair and eyes of a magnificent bright green. He had entered Molière’s service a month previously, without any special recommendation. The master had allowed himself to be amused by the enthusiasm and candour of this charming boy, who had approached him one day outside the theatre and told him of his burning desire to join the troupe. The words came readily to his lips as he conjured up memories of a performance he had attended in Anjou a few years earlier. He had been so dazzled as a young boy that he saw this as a vocation. The years had passed, but the fever had not left him.

Molière had recognised this as an opportunity to acquire a private secretary at minimal cost. Gabriel swiftly integrated into the prestigious company where an atmosphere of joyful chaos reigned. The women were won over by his athletic physique and friendly smile. The men were delighted to find in him a helpful and even-tempered friend. As for Molière, every day he appreciated the serious attitude, writing ability and fine education of the boy he knew very little about, apart from the fact that his origins were provincial. Nevertheless, he strongly doubted his vocation as an actor and suspected Gabriel of being the son of a good family who had fallen out with his parents.

As he swiftly took the stage, Gabriel could feel his heart thudding in his chest. His childhood dream was about to come true. Born into a noble, wealthy family in Amboise, he had been brought up by an uncle in place of his father, who had disappeared when he was very young and about whom he remembered very little. Gabriel de
Pontbriand had received an excellent education and been introduced to the best families in Touraine, growing up with a carefree nature and a romantic sensibility derived from the many books he read. That is, until that theatrical performance which had opened his eyes to the possibility that he could have a different life from the one his family had mapped out for him. By fleeing Amboise and the anger of his uncle and tutor to enter the service of the author of
Les Précieuses ridicules
, he had escaped the spell in prison his family had promised him to set him back on the right track and banish his dreams. The mere mention of acting made his uncle grind his teeth and mutter under his breath about ‘mad idiots’ like his father. Through his daring, Gabriel had also proved how much determination was needed for a twenty-year-old to change the course of his destiny in 1661. He, deprived of his father and raised by a stern uncle, he who had been destined to hold some kind of senior public office, spending his days watching the money roll in from taxation and sending bad debtors to prison, was finally about to accomplish his childhood dream!

Acting
, he told himself as he took Madeleine Béjart’s place.
I’m acting at last …

‘O Prince, I know you can, by avenging our rights / Through your love give voice to a hundred exploits …’

A few moments later, her cheeks still red from weeping, Madeleine Béjart returned to her place. The rehearsal returned to normal. Gabriel was aware that he had at least emerged from this first trial with dignity. A little disappointed nevertheless by the brevity of his performance, he unobtrusively slid into the prompter’s box to watch the four actors as they played out the rest of the scene.

‘When you can love me as I must be loved,’ murmured Done Elvire.

‘And what, alas, can one observe beneath the skies / that yields not to the ardour inspired by your eyes?’ replied the Prince of the Kingdom of Navarre, as portrayed by Lagrange.

From this point on Molière seemed to be daydreaming, gazing vaguely at the paintings on the ceiling of the brand new theatre which the King had placed at his disposal. There were some nights when this validation brought him out in a cold sweat. Would he prove worthy of this new honour? Despite the success of
Le Docteur amoureux
which had won him the favour of Louis XIV and Monsieur, the King’s brother, Molière feared the consequences should
Dom Garcie de Navarre
prove to be a failure. After all, the first public performance two nights earlier had been greeted by a chorus of whistles and cat-calls. And yet the author had had the strange feeling that they came from an organised ‘claque’ of hostile spectators who had been skilfully positioned around the auditorium. Who would wish to do him ill in this way?
Unless
, he said to himself,
someone is aiming at some other target through me?
He then thought of Nicolas Fouquet, his generous and faithful patron.
Perhaps it is time I considered other forms of protection,
mused Molière as he listened to the end of Act I.

In his refuge, Gabriel was also dreaming, his eyes wide open, his head resting on folded arms at the edge of the stage. As he watched the actors, he felt a subtle mixture of emotion and nostalgia for the exchanges of a few moments before. Just as he was promising himself that he would, at the first opportunity, ask his master for another chance to tread the boards, he felt something flat under his boot. He was intrigued. Kneeling down in the narrow space reserved for the prompter, he discovered an impressive dark-red document case.
What an odd place to store one’s papers,
thought Gabriel, picking up the leather case. In the glow of the stage lights, he examined
it discreetly and was immediately struck by the sight of Cardinal Mazarin’s coat of arms.

Molière’s voice tore him away from his discovery:

‘Time marches on, my children! If we are to be ready this evening, we must delay no longer!’

In a protective reflex, Gabriel hid the leather pouch under his shirt, resolving to open it somewhere quieter to discover what it contained.

‘Come,’ said the master to his actors, who were all anxious to know his opinion at the end of the first act. ‘That was better! At last my words have had some effect, and you understand the masks which conceal the depths of my characters’ souls. Now you must try to reveal their true feelings. We shall resume our rehearsal in one hour. It would be unwise to add the cold to the audience’s possible complaints, so we shall make way for the workmen who have come to repair that accursed skylight,’ he said, brandishing an angry fist in the direction of the shattered dome.

Happy at the author’s new mood, the actors left the massive auditorium to take a short but well-deserved rest in the boxes.

‘Stay, Monsieur. We have work to do,’ said Molière to his secretary as he nimbly extricated himself from the prompter’s box. ‘We have to prepare the troupe’s accounts as swiftly as possible. I shall have them taken to the Superintendent of Finance first thing tomorrow. With troubled times on the horizon, it is best to strike while the iron is hot!’

T
HERE was a huge crowd outside the theatre. Joyful and gaudy, it comprised just as many street peddlers, performers and traders of all kinds as it did spectators. Those people, ordinary folk for the most part, awaited a different spectacle: the sight of the aristocracy and members of the Court, whose arrival caused much pushing and jostling as everyone strove to get a glimpse of their clothes and faces. Many secretly hoped that there might be some gesture of generosity, such as coins thrown in amongst the throng. A murmur ran through the crowd, a whisper which came all the way up from the Seine:

‘Condé, Condé!’

Then the whispering was drowned out by the bellowing of a ragged little band who had recognised the prince’s coat of arms on the Pont du Louvre, and were running alongside his carriage. The movement of the crowd made the people at the front surge forward, piling them up against the colonnade as far as the peristyle, where they collided with officers of the peace who had been stationed there to prevent anyone from entering. The officers drove back the hapless unfortunates with kicks and punches, provoking the beginnings of a scuffle. It stopped as if by magic and a corridor opened through the crowd, secured by two rows of halberdiers who used their weapons like interlocking guardrails to hold back the inquisitive onlookers. One or two children who had climbed onto the bases of
the columns saw a man emerge from the stationary carriage: a giant with a haughty expression, rugged features and a powerful neck. Towering above the crowd by almost a head, the rebel prince – the man who, fifteen years earlier, had dared to defy royal authority – strode forward and vanished into the theatre without a glance at the passers-by who chanted his name.

‘True to form,’ remarked an old woman in a timid whisper from her place in the first row of onlookers. ‘He may be Condé, but he’ll never behave any differently towards the people of Paris … Always haughty, always distant …’

But already the attention was shifting to another retinue. The square filled with activity. The bustle of carriages as they set down their passengers and then went to park elsewhere grew ever more intense. Shouts of admiration mingled with jokes, laughter with exclamations.

‘Those ragamuffins,’ said Mazarin wearily, pulling the curtain across the window in the door of his carriage, which had slid incognito into the procession of vehicles heading for the show. ‘Look at them enjoying themselves. What a business, a show staged by street entertainers …’

‘Come,’ Colbert urged his master from the seat beside him. ‘We must not delay further, Eminence. The sooner we reach Vincennes, the sooner you will be free from the fatigue of the journey and the noise.’

Mazarin nodded silently, grimacing with pain each time the carriage jolted over the dislocated paving stones. Stretching out his arms, he forced himself to smile at the three young women seated opposite them.

‘Farewell, my graces, off to the frivolities with you – it is fitting at
your age. Your old uncle has no right to drag you away from life on the pretext that it is leaving him …’

His three nieces protested in unison as they bowed their heads to receive the old man’s blessing. Beneath his palms their joined heads formed a forest of jet-black hair, whose incredible thickness was emphasised by the centre-parted, looped-back hairstyle they had all chosen that evening.

As Mazarin withdrew his hands, Colbert knocked on the partition behind him to tell the coachman to stop. The door opened onto the colourful bustle of the sightseers, already lit up by the first flaming torches. Mazarin blinked in distress. Hortense was the last to leave the carriage, fleetingly squeezing her uncle’s hand and bringing it up to her lips. Then she jumped down to the ground with the aid of the postillion’s hand and disappeared, swallowed up by the crowd.

The carriage set off again, preceded by a few guards, and once more wreathed in silence. Soon all they could hear was the echo of the horses’ hooves.

‘Four months, Colbert. They told me I had four months left. And I myself say four weeks, no more. I know doctors … The astrologer said that the danger during this moon was great, and greater still during the next one. I prefer his half-lie to the courtly politeness of those butchers who bleed me time and time again … They are too afraid of losing me.’

To Colbert’s surprise, Mazarin caught his arm and gripped it forcefully.

‘We have no more time. I must think of my glory and of the future. As soon as we reach Vincennes, go and fetch Roze. The time has come to commit our work to paper.’

The old man’s fingers relaxed and he appeared to doze off, lulled by the rhythm of the swaying carriage. Colbert closed his eyes too,
inwardly smiling at the thought of those frivolous, ridiculous people crammed into that over-heated theatre.
Poor fools
, he thought,
all that time wasted on a show that will not last a week.

And with this venom-filled thought, he fell asleep.

Of the Cardinal’s three nieces, two would still bear the name Mancini for a number of days yet. All three wore gowns which took their inspiration from the same source, differing only in their dominant colour – green for Marie, red for Hortense and gold for Olympe – and with their hair in plaits that framed their oval faces, holding the weight of the style at the napes of their necks, they made an unsettling sight; for at first glance they seemed to be replicas taken from the same mould. It required careful scrutiny to detect the nuances which distinguished them: the gentle features of Marie, the youngest, whose reciprocated passion for the young King Louis XIV had been widely talked about; the elegant sadness of Hortense, the Cardinal’s favourite and the least pretty of the three; the determined step, coldness and paler skin of Olympe, whom the whole Court had learned to fear. No one who met her gaze could ever forget the dark fire in her eyes, the flame that burned as she kept a constant watch over the attitudes, looks and smiles around her, and cast glances at her sisters which might be protective or threatening – it was impossible to tell which. As they climbed the front steps, they were greeted with murmurs of admiration followed by an anxious silence in recognition of their closeness to the Chief Minister. With heads held high, they entered the theatre, acknowledging familiar faces but not deviating from the route leading them to the box which their uncle had never occupied. The auditorium was almost full and
the tension perceptible. People in other boxes talked in low voices, creating a background hum to which the people in the pit responded with more spontaneous shouts.

‘Look, Olympe,’ said Hortense, turning to her elder sister, ‘who is that young blonde woman wearing that French-blue gown? The one who has just entered Monsieur’s box,’ she added, with a wave of her fan.

‘I see her,’ replied Olympe curtly.

The Cardinal’s niece was quicker than the people in the pit, who took another second to identify a new presence in the King’s brother’s box. A murmur ran around the theatre like a sudden shiver, diverting attention even from the red curtain which veiled the front of the stage.

The young blonde girl was quite unaware of the stir she was causing. Her head slightly tilted forward, fingers toying with the dark velvet of her gown, she seemed lost in thought. Her white skin was a striking contrast to the dark red of her lips. With each breath, the flesh quivered at the base of her neck and beneath her shoulders, whose slender curve was followed by the edge of her gown. Her youth was betrayed by high cheekbones set above the hollow cheeks of a child who had grown up too quickly. In the reflections from the silver candelabra fixed to the walls of the boxes, she radiated elegance and vitality. Her blonde hair, drawn back into a large chignon, hung heavy over the nape of her neck, emphasising its slender elegance. Suddenly sensing that all eyes were upon her, she started and reddened slightly. Then she stood up and left the box nimbly, despite a curious, swaying gait, to escape the audience’s attention. The moment she disappeared, the atmosphere lost some of its intensity.

Olympe Mancini pouted haughtily as she watched her walk away.

‘She’s the innocent young thing who, by some passing fancy, has been attached to the household of Monsieur’s future wife.’

‘How beautiful she is,’ commented Marie with a smile.

Her elder sister’s dark eyes regarded her scornfully.

‘And do you know what she is called?’ asked Hortense.

Olympe looked exasperated as the three knocks sounded, signalling the start of the performance. Lackeys hurried to snuff out the large chandeliers.

‘I am told that her name is Louise de La Vallière,’ Olympe consented to reply.

The red curtain quivered and began to rise.