“What would you have me do?” I ask. “If I refuse the marriage, I am dead to you. If I am not sick within a week and dying, I will be locked away until I am old.” I shudder at the thought of being bound to God against my will—of being turned into a black bird by a nun’s habit and then caged.
“Better a convent than the King of Navarre.”
I am stunned. I never asked this man to give up his future for me. In fact, I begged him to abandon me so that he might keep his prospects. Surely, I reassure myself, this is merely his anger and his exhaustion speaking. “Really, Henri?”
He looks away. For a moment we sit in silence and my discomfort grows. “No,” he says at last, returning his eyes to me and bringing one of my hands to his lips.
I exhale, although I did not realize I was holding my breath.
“They say your cousin will abandon his mourning for the wedding. Well, I will don the clothing of grief. It will be easy for you to see me as you look into the crowd of courtiers at Notre Dame. I will be the one clad in somber black.”
“Careful, Sir—” even at such a moment I cannot resist teasing him—“you may be mistaken for one of Navarre’s Protestants.”
He does not smile. “You cannot make me laugh this night, Marguerite. Are you like to laugh yourself?”
“No. But I will settle for not crying. We have hours left until you must leave. Let us not spend them sullen, singing dirges. Let us instead forget a future we cannot alter in an all-consuming passion that is as unchangeable.” I climb onto his lap and, leaning in, kiss him. It takes a moment, but first his lips and then his loins respond.
CHAPTER 17
August 18, 1572—Paris, France
I wake with a start. The sun streams into my room. No, not my room: a room belonging to His Grace the Archbishop. Dear God, I remember what day it is and wish I had been beyond waking—that my ladies had arrived to find me dead.
I begin to cry.
Gillone approaches with some trepidation, holding out a surcote for me to slip into. Behind her, framed by the window, the sun seems high. After struggling to sleep at all, have I slept away the last morning of my freedom?
“What is the hour?” I ask, wiping my eyes with my fists as if I were an enfant.
“Past eleven, Your Highness.”
Panic rises like bile in my throat.
“I’ve brought your breakfast.” The thought of eating—well, it seems impossible.
“How long?” I ask.
“Not two hours.”
In less than two hours the woman taxed with preparing me for my nuptial Mass will arrive. The thought of a dozen ladies buzzing around me, laughing and making merry, is unbearable.
My crushing longing of the night before returns. Having been paraded here by the whole of my family, I was left alone, and alone I lay awake. How I wanted Henri. If only I could see him now and be reminded that I still have something to live for. But I dare not ask for him. I will see him next in company he despises, for my love, owing to his offices, must accompany the King of Navarre’s cortege.
“I wish I could wear black,” I say to Gillone, remembering what Henri said of his day’s costume. I pull the surcote around me tightly as if it were the depth of winter and not a sweltering day in August. “Where is the wig?”
Gillone is stunned. Little wonder. I do not commonly wear wigs, not since Henri told me that he disliked them on me so long ago. Yet one arrived for my wedding. It, like everything else, was selected by Mother to create an image that serves her purposes.
Gillone opens a large leather case and lifts the coiffure out. Its pale-colored curls, extravagantly arranged, will do perfectly. They will help me assert and remember that it is Marguerite, Duchesse de Valois and Princess of France, and not Margot the woman, who weds the King of Navarre.
Sooner than it seems possible, servants arrive carrying my fine garments. Gillone helps me don the chemise with its elaborate lace-trimmed collar designed to frame my head. She is holding out my cloth-of-gold slippers when Henriette arrives.
Taking one look at my face, she says, “Your groom abandons mourning for his wedding day, but I see that here a pall remains.”
I begin to cry. I have lost count of my bouts of tears since waking.
Shaking her head, my friend says, “Well, it is better to weep now. Once you are dressed, your gown could be spoiled.”
“Good!” I reply viciously.
“Being unhappy is no reason to be unattractive. Remember, the Duc’s eyes will be upon you, doubtless far more often than your husband’s.”
Claude arrives with the Baronne de Retz. “Tell the others that they are not needed,” I command the Baronne. I desire as few witnesses as possible to my misery.
As she helps me into my bodice, so crusted with jewels that its weight might overwhelm a more fragile woman, my sister makes a feeble attempt to cheer me. “How marvelous this violet velvet looks against your skin.”