To the scaffold (18 page)

The goal of every courtier was to amass offices, privileges, and

ultimately wealth. But there was a heavy price to be paid. He or she had to stand for hours in the oeil-de-boeuf, the "bull's-eye" chamber next to the King's bedroom lit by a single round window, waiting to be noticed, to be admitted to the inner sanctum, or to overhear some bit of gossip or news that might help him advance himself. He had to take part in tedious spectacles. At one ball the courtiers learned the intricate choreography of a dance in which they formed the letters of Antoinette's name. He had to flatter, to persuade, to cajole his superiors while battling to keep his inferiors in their places. And above all, he had to be patient, often for years, with no guarantee that he would ever gain the rewards he sought.

Nonetheless, there were compensations. Those not privileged to dine with the King and Queen or the great personages went to the Grand Commun^ the huge communal dining hall at the palace where good food was to be had amid equally good company. Society at the Grand Commun was pleasant and enlightening. One met there artists, scholars, writers. Politics and current affairs were endlessly discussed, topical issues debated. Intrigues were hatched, ambition ignited. Grievances were aired. "It was the fashion to complain of everything," wrote the Comtesse de La Tour du Pin. "One was bored, weary of attendance at court. The officers of the Garde du Corps, who were lodged in the chateau when on duty, bemoaned having to wear uniform all day." A popular subject was how soon they could get away to Paris to dine and attend the theater. "It was the height of style to complain of duties at court, profiting from them nonetheless and sometimes, indeed often, abusing the privileges they carried."^^

The courtiers complained about the expense of maintaining themselves in the proper style, the cost of wigs (the best ones made of human hair, far superior to the cheap ones made of horsehair or goat's hair), the high prices of the best hairdressers, the interminable fittings of gowns and waistcoats, the ever-changing demands of fashion. No one ever had enough money, it seemed; debts mounted up, yet it was dangerous to economize, for the courtier who spent the most money, even though it had to be borrowed money, had the best chance of recouping it once he managed to attain the favor he sought. To owe one's tailor or shoemaker hundreds of thousands of livres was expected in a person of taste. To retrench financially was to invite ruin.

The scramble for advancement led to intense narcissism, and to myopia. No one bothered to scrutinize his competitors too closely. In this atmosphere, imposture flourished.

In the last years of Louis XVs reign a pretty young girl of fifteen or sixteen managed to swindle a good many people by posing as the King's mistress. How she got the idea, and whether anyone besides herself was in on the scheme, is obscure, but what is clear is that by seducing some of the royal pages she was able to gain access to the King's apartments. Once she had this entr6e, she was able to persuade people that she was indeed on the most familiar terms with King Lx)uis and that she could use her influence over him to their benefit. Hungry for any extra advantage, however slight, the edgy courtiers paid eagerly for her influence— and were bilked.

In a short time the girl amassed some sixty thousand francs, plus many perquisites and favors. She sent for a surgeon to attend a woman in labor and persuaded him that he was delivering the King's bastard and so he should consider himself honored. No doubt she cheated tradesmen and dressmakers in the same fashion. Appearances were what counted, and the girl gave every appearance of being what she claimed to be. After all, the King's taste for pretty young girls was well known, and this girl was very pretty, and, according to Madame Campan, who knew her, of such a "modest demeanor" that no one suspected her of deceit. In the end she even convinced the haughty Adelaide and the softhearted Victoire of her genuineness.

But then, somehow—the details are tantalizingly vague—she was exposed as an imposter. She was only eighteen then, though much older in worldly wisdom. Clever to the end, she tried to save herself from punishment through another fabrication. At the tender age of fourteen, she said, she had been seduced by a priest, who forced her to pose as the King's mistress in order to enrich himself. The priest was suspended from his offices, but was later able to prove his innocence. The girl was sent first to the Bastille, then to another prison. Her brief, and for a time lucrative, career was over. ^2

Another trickster had a much longer career—and did much more damage. Cahouette de Villers, whom Madame Campan described as "very irregular in conduct, and of a scheming turn of mind," also posed as Louis XV's mistress and, after he died, as a

familiar of Queen Antoinette. Cahouette's husband was a royal treasurer, but as he did not have the right of entry to the Queen's apartments, she set out to become the mistress of a man who did: Gabriel de Saint-Charles, intendant of the King's finances.

Cahouette went to Versailles every Saturday with her lover, stayed in his apartment, and learned everything she could about the court, and especially about the Queen. As she was a reasonably good painter, she hit on a plan to approach Antoinette directly, by painting her portrait. She copied a portrait done by another painter and presented it to Madame Campan's husband, who was Antoinette's librarian and one of her secretaries, but he, "knowing her conduct," refused to pass it on to his mistress.^' The Princesse de Lamballe, however, was more accommodating.

Through her lover Saint-Charles, Cahouette next got hold of some documents signed by Antoinette, and learned to copy her execrable and distinctive handwriting. More accomplished as a forger than she had been as a painter, the woman wrote herself a number of letters and notes putatively signed by the Queen, and filled them with personal touches and familiar endearments. She then showed the letters to friends and acquaintances, claiming that her friendship with Antoinette was a "great secret" just as her relationship with the late King had been. Naturally her reputation grew, as someone favored with the Queen's intimate confidence. The Queen, it was whispered, had a "particular kindness for her," and even entrusted her with the purchase of things for her private use.

Cahouette forged letters in which the Queen asked her to procure jewels and other costly items from Parisian shopkeepers; she had only to show these letters to the jewelers and tradesmen to be given whatever she asked for—and infinite credit besides. Eventually, not content with this, Cahouette approached the Farmer-General, M. Beranger, who conttolled the tax revenues, and showed him a forged letter in which Antoinette asked her to procure two hundred thousand francs for her—funds that she badly needed, but that she was reluctant to ask her husband for. The Farmer-General, thinking that by doing the Queen the good turn of giving her the funds he might obtain some far greater advantage from her in return at a future time, gladly gave the imposter the sum she asked for.

Amazingly, even this colossal swindle went undetected for

quite some time. Eventually, however, M. Beranger began to wonder whether he had been duped. He made tentative inquiries— very discreetly, for there was always the possibility that Antoinette's request had been genuine and he risked exposing her secret. What he learned from these first inquiries emboldened him, however, and he finally went to the Paris police. They were able to follow Cahouette's trail of unpaid bills, pawned finery, and unsubstantiated boasts. The imposter was unmasked, and sent to prison, and her poor husband was forced to replace the two hundred thousand francs. The forged letters, found among Cahouette's effects, were sent to Antoinette. She and Madame Campan examined them one by one, and found to their dismay that the forgery was remarkably convincing. The only difference between the Queen's writing and the forger's was that the latter wrote a little better, with "a little more regularity in the disposition of the letters."

Still another imposter was more subtle. The Countess of Wal-burg-Frohberg, a Swabian married to a minor court official, masqueraded as an intimate of several important personages, from the Minister of Foreign Affairs to the Queen's chief equerry. She too had letters to back up her claims, and her victims were only too eager to believe that they were genuine. From her rented rooms in the Hotel Fortisson, in the town of Versailles, the Countess held a miniature court of her own, receiving visits from petitioners who paid her to plead their cases with the great. It was a nearly foolproof scheme, since those who came to her had no way of discovering whether or not she had the ear of the people she claimed to know so well. All they could do was to continue to pay her— and to hope for the best.

The Countess overstepped herself, however, when she pretended she had a right to join a royal cortege in her coach. She was recognized and questioned, and the lieutenant of police opened an inquiry into her doings. Soon all was revealed. The Countess had been sly enough, though, to leave nothing incriminating behind. The police had only her victims' word that she took money from them; she claimed, to the contrary, that she had used her influence on their behalf purely out of kindness, that no money had changed hands at all. She was elusive—and dangerous, for unlike Cahouette de Villers, the Countess of Walburg-Frohberg knew a great many secrets, and was in a position to embarrass some very imf)ortant people. Afraid that she might be-

come vindictive and ruin reputations if she were to be imprisoned, the police let her go on condition that she return to Germany. As far as is known, she did not return to Versailles—at least, not under the same name.^"^

These impostures succeeded, not only because the courtiers and would-be courtiers were gullible, but because they wanted desperately to succeed. The mythology of the court was for some stronger than its actuality, and the mythology dictated that the ambitious, the hard-working, the well-connected, would eventually win offices and wealth. Versailles cast a spell over those who lived and served and visited there. And while they were under its spell, they breathed nothing but incense, drank nothing but nectar, ate nothing but ambrosia—and imagined that they crushed roses underfoot.

^^12^^

N October of 1774 the spies that kept watch on all the younger members of the royal family reported that Theresa, Comtesse d'Artois, was very likely pregnant. Her period was six days late, and her husband had been more attentive to her than usual for the past several weeks.

"There is half a suspicion and much rumor about the supposed pregnancy of the Comtesse d'Artois," Antoinette informed her mother. The signs in themselves were not conclusive, as Theresa was irregular, but Antoinette knew that her brothers- and sisters-in-law were doing their best to produce heirs as quickly as possible, the intensity of their endeavors accelerated by the advent of their brother's reign. Louis was King; if he died without a male heir Provence would rule; unless be fathered a male heir Artois would become King. Aside from the rivalry of the individuals, the future of the dynasty was at stake. No one felt this more keenly than Antoinette, who, though she knew perfecdy well that her childlessness was her husband's fault and not her own, decided voluntarily to curtail her riding each month during the last ten days before her period in hopes of increasing her fertility.

It was a futile, even a pathetic gesture. General Krottendorf continued to arrive on schedule, and Antoinette's sister-in-law Theresa continued to be late. By December Theresa was sure she was pregnant, and for once the short, unprepossessing, long-nosed Countess was able to upstage her lively and attractive sister-in-law.^

Antoinette was predictably pained by the event, though char-

acteristically she showed only gracious happiness for Theresa. "Something which I have always suspected and feared has happened," Mercy wrote to the Empress in Vienna. "It is that the Queen, struck by this event, and reflecting on her own condition, finds with reason a very grave subject for pain, and I see with apprehension that her majesty is inwardly affected in a most agonizing fashion." Theresa's pregnancy quickened Antoinette's old grief about her marriage. Would Louis ever face the reality of his incapacity and let himself be treated? Early in December he had a long conversation with Antoinette's doctor, and discussed the brief if painful operation that he needed to make him capable of ejaculation. He got as far as discussing it, but no farther; when the surgeon spread out his sharp steel instruments, the King practically fainted, and changed his mind about going ahead with the operation.

Antoinette, it seems, did not press him on this most delicate of subjects. And yet they both were aware that their continued childlessness, apart from giving rise to ridicule and undermining Louis's authority, was likely to lead to sordid schemes among the courtiers. An impotent King could not be influenced through mistresses, but the King's wife, sexually frustrated and full of hidden resentment for her husband (or so it was supposed) could be controlled through a lover. The courtiers watched Antoinette closely to see whom she favored. Would it be a young and handsome soldier, a foreign diplomat, a seasoned, middle-aged courtier?