The dance master appeared in front of me, in the guise of a sultan, and raised his hand with a tremendous slowness. The musicians gathered their attention, and the room waited in silence. The hand descended, and they began a waltz.
The tenor, beside me, had dressed as a shepherdess—the most powerful shepherdess I’ve ever seen, the Emperor declared, as he appeared at our side. He said it with a slightly odd, flirtatious tone, as if perhaps the tenor had attracted his attention in some new way. The Emperor cocked his eyebrow, examining him boldly. The tenor endured it with a coquette’s stoicism. I wanted to laugh.
Finished with that, the Emperor turned to me.
I watched his mouth, oddly magical to me, as he peered into the glass eyes of the bear. I wanted to kiss it.
The Emperor wore just a domino cape and hood, and a plain mask over a plain if elegant dark suit. He was dressed exactly as he had been the day I first saw him. The day he gave me the ruby flower still hidden in the tenor’s coat.
Who have we here? he asked. Are you the Prussian Bear himself? And he tapped the snout.
This bear is French, the tenor said, a protesting tone in his voice, and clapped my epaulets. He’s even a general in His Majesty’s army, though I suspect his only allegiance is to the woods.
With that, the tenor made a surprisingly graceful curtsy.
May they be French woods then, the Emperor said. And remain that way. Be welcome in my court, general of my woods.
I bowed stiffly, careful not to tip the mask off onto the floor.
The theatrical troupe had mixed in with the crowd too well; one of them came over and told the tenor they’d been invited to stay the night and that they’d agreed.
I experienced this at first with some relief, but then I knew this would not stop him.
I tried to think of what to do as I struggled through the ball’s formalities. All of the watching of balls that I had done before this had not prepared me to be inside one. It wasn’t just that I didn’t know the dances; the entire costume ball was a ritual, from when we entered until we left, and I had the sense of moving constantly outside its rhythm. I was so concerned with this that I forgot my real purpose until I found we stood in front of the Empress.
She was in the company of a man in a plain suit and domino cape, but the hood had been pulled back and he wore a red-painted wooden devil mask over his face. The Empress had also dressed as a shepherdess, but by this, I knew from having dressed her in it, she meant to appear as Marie Antoinette.
The devil I knew; he was my composer. I could tell from his hair and his eyes as they studied me, trying to figure out who was beneath the mask.
Does the bear army need a shepherdess? the Empress asked, with a laugh.
Devils appear to, the tenor said, and she blushed or flushed slightly. I couldn’t tell if it was embarrassment or anger. And then the devil laughed, and she appeared pleased, at least, that he was pleased.
We do, the devil said. We need a shepherdess who knows the valleys of Hell.
That is precisely what I am, the Empress said, and as she said it, she fingered the soft cloth of the devil’s cloak and looked out across the floor to the crowd dancing there. The strange truth of it grew as we waited for her to return her attention to us.
Away with us, she said to the devil, turning to him, and they went on their way.
I was grateful I was allowed one last meeting.
A mazurka began, of a more ordinary kind, and the devil led the Empress into it. She tilted her head back, a careful mask of appreciative pleasure, looking, for a moment, just like Marie Antoinette in Hell, at home enough to dance. The other figures moved closer, a siren dancing with what appeared to be Neptune, a courtesan with massive shoulders in the arms of a slight, stern gentleman, a Spanish Gypsy woman with a huge Viking warrior.
I noticed the tenor busy speaking to one of the Comédie actors, perhaps about me. He looked away from me. I made my way along the wall to the doors, and without looking back, I let myself out onto the balcony, shutting the door with the quiet you can only learn when you are in service.
This was my chance.
A group of the goddesses from inside had hiked up their skirts to cool their legs from dancing and were lighting cigars. The Princess Metternich was visible at their center, lit by a huge flame from her match.
Salut, ma générale, she said, waving at me. She let out a curl of white smoke into the air and beat the skirt of her dress like a cancan dancer, which made the other women laugh.
How strange to me still that she should have been the first to call me that.
I bowed to her and they laughed again. And then, with a small shock, I understood that she had seen that I was a woman. The strange confidence I’d had of feeling hidden left me, and I nearly ran for the allée.
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