“I didn’t disturb her. She liked me. She’s my friend.”
“She’s not your friend. She’s the queen.”
Juliette was silent, still in a warm, cozy haze of delight. No matter what Marguerite said, the queenwasher friend. Hadn’t she held Juliette in her arms and dried her tears? Hadn’t she said she was pretty and sweet? Wasn’t she going to have her taught to paint beautiful pictures?
“And do you think your mother will really let you have those nasty paints after you’ve been so naughty?” Marguerite’s lips tightened until they formed a thin line. “You don’t deserve gifts.”
“She’ll let me have the paints whether I deserve them or not. She won’t want to displease the queen.” Juliette gave a hop and skip to keep up with Marguerite’s long stride as they moved quickly down the Hall of Mirrors. Juliette’s fascinated gaze clung to their images moving from one of the seventeen mirrors to the next as they walked along the gleaming hall. It surprised her to see how small and unimportant she looked. She certainly did not feel small inside now. She felt every bit as big and important as her mother and Marguerite. How unfair that the mirror did not reflect the change. Marguerite looked much more interesting, Juliette decided. Her black-gowned body was lean and angled’ like one of the stone gargoyles Juliette had seen on acolumn of the grand cathedral of Notre Dame. How fortunate she had felt when her mother had instructed the coachman to detour to the cathedral on his way through Paris to Versailles. Perhaps, she could persuade Madame Vigée Le Brun to show her how to paint Marguerite as a gargoyle.
“Your arms are going to be black and blue for a fortnight,” Marguerite muttered with satisfaction. “I’ll show you that you can’t shame me in front of your mother.”
Juliette looked down at the long, strong fingers of Marguerite’s hand holding her own and felt an instant of fear. She drew a deep breath and quickly suppressed the terror before it overcame her. The pain of the pinching would be over quickly, and all the time she was undergoing it she would be thinking of her paints and canvas and the lessons to come.
But in her very first painting she would most definitely paint Marguerite as a gargoyle.
Ile du Lion, France
June 10, 1787
Jean Marc Andreas strode around the pedestal, studying the statue from every angle. The jewel-encrusted Pegasus was superb.
From its flying mane to the exquisite detail of the gold filigree clouds on which the horse danced, it was a masterful piece of work.
“You’ve done well, Desedero,” Andreas said. “It’s perfect.”
The sculptor whom some called a mere goldsmith shook his head. “You’re wrong, Monsieur. I’ve failed.”
“Nonsense. This copy is identical to the Wind Dancer, is it not?”
“It is as close a copy as could be made, even to the peculiar cut of the facets of the jewels,” Desedero said. “I had to journey to India to locate emeralds large andperfect enough to use as the eyes of the Wind Dancer and spent over a year crafting the body of the statue.”
“And the inscription engraved on the base?”
Desedero shrugged. “I reproduced the markings with great precision, but since the script is indecipherable that is a minor point, I believe.”
“Nothing is minor. My father knows the Wind Dancer in its every detail,” Andreas said dryly. “I paid you four million livres to duplicate the Wind Dancer—and I always get my money’s worth.”
Desedero knew those words to be true. Jean Marc Andreas was a young man, no more than twenty and five, but he had established himself as a formidable force in the world of finance since taking over the reins of the Andreas shipping and banking empire three years before from his ailing father. He was reputed to be both brilliant and ruthless. Desedero had found him exceptionally demanding, yet he did not resent Andreas. Perhaps it was because the young man’s commission challenged the artist in him. Certainly Andreas’s desperation to please his father was touching. Desedero had loved his own father very much and understood such deep and profound affection. He was much impressed by Jean Marc Andreas’s wholehearted zeal for replicating the Wind Dancer to please his ill and aging father.
“I regret to say I do not believe you have gotten your money’s worth this time, Monsieur Andreas.”
“Don’t say such a thing, sir.” A muscle jerked in Andreas’s jaw. “You have succeeded.We’vesucceeded. My father will never know the difference between this Wind Dancer and the one at Versailles.”
Desedero shook his head. “Tell me, have you ever seen the real Wind Dancer?”
“No, I’ve never visited Versailles.”
Desedero’s gaze returned to the statue on the pedestal. “I remember vividly the first time I saw it some forty-two years ago. I was only a lad of ten and my father took me to Versailles to see the treasures that were dazzling the world. I saw the Hall of Mirrors.” He paused. “And I saw the Wind Dancer. What an experience. When you walked into my studio some year and ahalf ago with your offer of a commission to create a copy of the Wind Dancer, I could not pass it by. To replicate the Wind Dancer would have been sublime.”
“And you’ve done it.”
“You don’t understand. Had you ever seen the original, you would know the difference instantly. The Wind Dancer has…” He searched for a word. “Presence. One cannot look away from it. It captures, it holds”—he smiled crookedly—“as it’s held me for these forty-two years.”
“And my father,” Andreas whispered. “He saw it once as a young man and has wanted it ever since.” He turned away. “And by God, he’ll have it. She took everything from him—but heshallhave the Wind Dancer.”
Desedero discreetly ignored the last remark, though he was well aware of the lady to whom Andreas referred. Charlotte, Denis Andreas’s wife, Jean Marc’s stepmother, had been dead over five years. Still the stories of her greed and treachery were much passed about.
Sighing, Desedero shook his head. “You have only acopyof the Wind Dancer to give to your father.”
