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“I can see that,” Grandmère said. “I’m not blind. It’s what you’ve stuffed down it that has me confused.”
“Nothing’s stuffed down it, Grandmère,” I said, again from between gritted teeth. “That’s all me. I’ve grown.”
“That will be the day,” Grandmère said.
And before I knew what was happening, she’d reached out and pinched me!
On the boob!
“OW!” I yelled, leaping away from her. “What is WRONG with you?”
But Grandmère already looked smug.
“You HAVE grown,” she said. “It must have been all that good Genovian olive oil we pumped you full of this summer—”
“More likely all the harmful hormones with which the USDA pumps their cattle,” I said, massaging my now-throbbing boob. “Since I’ve started eating meat, I’ve grown an inch in height and another inch—well, everywhere else. So you don’t have to pinch me. I guarantee you, it’s all real. Also, OW. That really hurt. How would you like it if someone did that to you?”
“We’ll make certain Chanel gets your new measurements,” Grandmère said, looking pleased. “This is wonderful, Amelia. Finally we’ll be able to put you into something strapless—and you’ll actually be able to hold it up for a change!”
Seriously. I hate her sometimes.
Monsieur Christophe finally came with the tea and sandwiches…and Grandpère’s writings. Which were stored in multiple cardboard boxes. And all seemed to be about drainage issues, from which Genovia was suffering during most of his rule.
“I don’t want to give a speech about DRAINAGE,” I informed Grandmère. Actually, the truth was, I didn’t want to give a speech at all. But since I knew that kind of attitude would get me nowhere—both with Grandmère AND Dr. Knutz, who have a lot in common, if you think about it—I settled for whining about the subject matter. “Grandmère, all these papers…they’re basically about the Genovian sewage system. I can’t talk to Domina Rei about SEWAGE. Don’t you have anything”—I turned to Monsieur Christophe, who was hovering nearby, gasping every time either of us lifted up one of his precious papers—“more PERSONAL?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Amelia,” Grandmère said. “You can’t read your grandfather’s personal papers to Domina Rei.”
The truth was, of course, I wasn’t thinking of Grandpère. Although he had some nifty correspondence he’d written during the war, I’d been hoping for something by someone a little less…
Male? Boring? RECENT?
“What about her?” I asked, pointing to a portrait that
was hanging in an alcove above the watercooler. It was a very nice little painting of a slightly moonfaced young girl in Renaissance-type clothes, framed elaborately in heavy gold leaf.
“Her?” Grandmère all but snorted. “Never mind her.”
“Who is she?” I asked. Mainly to annoy Grandmère, who so clearly wanted to keep on reading about drainage. But also because it was a very pretty picture. And the girl in it looked sad. Like she might not be unfamiliar with the sensation of slipping down a cistern.
“That,” Monsieur Christophe said in a weary tone, “is Her Royal Highness Amelie Virginie Renaldo, the fifty-seventh princess of Genovia, who ruled in the year sixteen sixty-nine.”
I blinked a few times. Then I looked at Grandmère.
“Why haven’t we ever studied her before?” I asked. Because, believe me, Grandmère has made me memorize my ancestral line. And nowhere is there an Amelie Virginie on it. Amelie is a very popular name in Genovia, because it’s the name of the patron saint of the country, a young peasant girl who saved the principality from a marauding invader by lulling him to sleep with a plaintive song, then lopping his head off.
“Because she only ruled for twelve days,” Grandmère said impatiently, “before dying of the bubonic plague.”
“She DID?” I couldn’t help it. I jumped up out of my seat and hurried over to the watercooler to look at the little portrait. “She looks like she’s MY age!”
“She was,” Grandmère said in a tired voice. “Amelia, would you please sit down? We don’t have time for this. The gala is in less than a week, we need to come up with a speech for you now—”
“Oh my God, this is so sad.” I guess one of the symptoms of being depressed is that you basically just cry all the time. Because I was fully welling up. Princess Amelie Virginie was so pretty, like Madonna, back before she went macrobiotic and got all into the Kabbalah and weight lifting and still had chubby cheeks and stuff. She looked a little bit like Lilly, in a way. If Lilly were a brunette. And wore a crown and a blue velvet choker. “What was she, like, sixteen?”
“Indeed.” Monsieur Christophe had come to stand beside me. “It was a terrible time to be alive. The plague was decimating not just the countryside, but the royal court as well. She lost both her parents and all of her brothers to it. That’s how she inherited the throne. She only ruled for, like Her Highness said, twelve days before succumbing to the Black Death herself. But during that time, she made some decisions—controversial at that time—that ultimately saved many Genovians, if not the entire coastal populace…including closing the Port of Genovia to all incoming and outgoing ship traffic, and shutting the palace gates against all visitors…even the physicians who might have been able to save her. She didn’t want to risk the disease spreading further to her people.”
“Oh my God,” I said, laying a hand on my chest and trying not to sob. “That is so sad! Where are her writings?”
Monsieur Christophe blinked up at me (because in my platform Mary Janes, I was, like, six feet two, and he was just a little guy—like Grandmère said, a nutcracker). “I beg your pardon, Your Highness?”
