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“You may bring yourself a chair,” Odelette said, perfectly composed. “You’re strong and fit.”
He frowned. “Enough — I’m hungry. Let me have my place, Odelette.”
“My name is not Odelette. My name is Haleed.”
Yves laughed. “Haleed! Next you’ll tell me you’ve become a Mahometan!”
“Indeed I have.”
“I’ve given Mlle Haleed her freedom, and adopted her as our sister.”
“What!”
“I freed her.”
“On a whim? She’s our only possession of value.”
“She belonged to me — I’ll free her if I wish.”
“In five years, when you’re of age, you may free her.”
“I gave her my word. She is free. She is our sister.”
He shrugged. “I’ll sign no papers to that effect.” To Haleed he said, “Never fear there’s a question of my selling you — but we cannot live at court without a servant.”
Odelette — Haleed — rose from table so quickly that the chair crashed over. She fled to Marie-Josèphe’s bedroom.
“Yves, how could you!”
He righted the chair, sat down, and poured the chocolate.
“I? I’m guilty only of protecting our station.”
He dipped his bread into his chocolate and ate the sweet and soggy mass, wiping his chin with his hand.
“It isn’t right to own another human being.” Or to keep one imprisoned in a cage, she thought.
“Nonsense. Who have you been talking to? What other dangerous ideas have you adopted?”
She did not dare to speak of the sea woman now. She took Yves’ hand. “Don’t be angry — You have the King’s favor. He’s promised me a dowry — a husband! You can afford to be magnanimous. Our sister —”
Yves flung down his soggy bread. “A dowry? A dowry! The King never mentioned your marriage to me.”
“I thought you’d be pleased,” she said.
“I don’t like these changes in you,” he said. “You say your greatest wish is to assist me in my work, but —”
“How can I assist you, locked away in a convent —”
“You must live somewhere while I travel —
“— forbidden to study, accused of —”
“— and Versailles is no place for a maiden.”
“If I were married, I wouldn’t be a maiden.”
“Perhaps,” Yves said, “if you returned to Saint-Cyr...”
Marie-Josèphe struggled to remain calm. If she showed her brother how terrified she was of his suggestion, he would think she had gone mad. Perhaps he would be right.
“Mme de Maintenon ordered all the instructresses to take holy orders. That’s why I had to leave.”
“Go back. Give yourself to God.”
“I’ll never take the veil!”
The heavy clash and clink of gold interrupted them. Magnificent in outrage, Haleed flung down a handful of louis d’or. The coins rolled and bounced across the carpet, clattered onto the planks, rattled to a stop in the corner.
“I shall buy myself. If that isn’t enough, I can get more.”
Haughty as any court lady, Haleed wore a new grand habit of midnight-blue silk. A long rope of lustrous pearls twined through her blue-black hair.
“Where did this come from?” Yves asked. “Where did you get that dress, that jewelry?”
“From Mademoiselle — from Mlle d’Armagnac — from Mme du Maine — and from Queen Mary!”
Yves gathered up the coins. “I’ll consider your plea... after you correct your errors of religion.”
Marie-Josèphe snatched the coins and pressed them into Haleed’s hands. “Your prizes are yours, and your freedom.”
“I mean what I say!” Yves stormed from the apartment.
“Yves never meant it,” Marie-Josèphe said. “He —”
“He was affected by that devil, who believes all Turks should be slaves. That Christian devil, the Pope.”
Lucien toiled up the Queen’s staircase. His back hurt. He would rather be out riding, but he must listen to the marquis de Dangeau read his journal of the King’s activities, and record His Majesty’s approval.
The musketeer bowed to him and opened the door to Mme de Maintenon’s apartment.
His Majesty sat quietly speaking to his wife, who nodded to him as she bent over a tapestry. Lucien avoided looking at the tapestry; he did not care to see more heretics burning.
“M. de Chrétien,” His Majesty said. “Good day to you. Quentin, a glass of wine for M. de Chrétien.”
Lucien bowed to the King, grateful for the courtesy his sovereign showed him.
“And set out a goblet for M. de —”
A fracas outside the apartment doors interrupted the valet. Quentin hurried to silence the disturbance.
“That cannot be M. de Dangeau!” His Majesty exclaimed.
“Monsieur, you may not enter,” Quentin said. “His Majesty is with his council —”
“With his mistress, you mean! Let me pass.”
Monsieur forced himself past the guard. Quentin, double Monsieur’s size and strength, mustache bristling, barred Monsieur’s way. Behind Monsieur, at the top of the stairs, M. de Dangeau hesitated, watched horrified for but a moment, then backed cautiously away and disappeared.
“Let my brother pass,” His Majesty said to Quentin, who answered only to the King.
“Sir, you must stop this farce!” Monsieur stamped in, as flustered and fancy as an angry circus pony.
“Farce, brother?”
“Why must I hear from common gossip that my intimate friend is to marry a colonial upstart?”
“Perhaps because your `intimate friend’ did not choose to tell you,” Mme de Maintenon said.
“You watched me give her to him —”
“For a dance!”
“— and you made no objection, dear brother.”
“Dear brother!” Orléans’ voice trembled dangerously close to shouting. “How can I be your dear brother? You plan to steal all I care about, my only comfort, my only pleasure! In front of me, in my very sight, you give his hand to — to —”
Lucien wished himself elsewhere. Observing this ugly scene would do him no good.
M. de Dangeau is a fortunate gentleman, Lucien thought, shocked by Monsieur’s outburst. He receives a reward for being five minutes late.
