king cannot bring himself to brave their leers. He is weeping but dares not let the canaille see his disgrace, so he buries his face in his handkerchief. He does not see the marchers use their scythes and knives to slash the branches from the trees as we rumble by, weaving tricolored ribbons through the golden leaves. Brandishing these colorful trophies they dance alongside our coach as if they are performing a pagan ritual about a bonfire, taunting our family with increasingly offensive slurs. I do not have enough hands to cover my children’s ears.
We travel at the pace of a funeral cortege, passing through one village after another on the twelve-mile journey to Paris. With so much time in the company of my thoughts I recall the velocity at which the reeking corpse of Louis XV made its final journey to his sepulcher at Saint-Denis. He had been le Bien-Aimé , yet at his death was so despised by his subjects that they taunted his hearse as it flew by them on the road. My husband and I, seated side by side aswe were that day in May so many years ago, were cheered as our carriage followed the former king’s. “Louis le Désiré!” our people cried. As quickly as we sped that spring afternoon in 1774, today we crawl, to the accompaniment of “Louis le Détesté,” shouted lustily by those old enough to know what they parody.
The coach lurches forward as we come to a halt. The dauphin, who had fallen asleep on my lap with his thumb in his mouth, awakens and looks about like a turtle poking his head from his shell. “Where are we, Maman?”
I look to Louis, who lowers the handkerchief from his face and tries to peer through the crowd of people surrounding our carriage. He replies, “We’re in Sèvres.”
Whatever for? I wonder. I am certain the rabble has not paused to purchase porcelain. I take my father’s gold watch from my reticule. It is easier to focus on the motion of the minute hand as it slowly makes its way around the dial than it is to give consequence to the hordes outside who taunt us.
The dauphin goes back to sleep, the slumber of the innocent. Madame Royale is hungry, and from a pocket of his coat Louis produces a handful of nuts and shares them with our daughter. She nibbles them slowly, taking care to savor each one as if she doesn’t know when she will eat again.
After a delay of an hour or so we are treated to the reason. A pair of friseurs are paraded past our coach, their faces pale with fear, mouths grim, and no wonder, for the blade of a knife is pressed against their respective throats. With their eyes they direct us upward, but we have no need to slouch in our seats in order to obtain the view. What we are meant to see is shoved in our faces. The hapless hairdressers have apparently been forced upon pain of death to coif the severed heads of our bodyguards. The remains of Lieutenants Deshuttes and de Varicourt have been further desecrated, dressed to resemble the famous poufs worn by myself andmy ladies in our most frivolous and verdant days, teased and frizzled as high off our foreheads as possible, then pomaded and heavily dusted with powder. But the mockery and the insult do not stop there. With such outlandish coiffures these two brave men have been feminized—even more so with the addition of ribbons, pearls, and feathers. The hideous impression is that the sovereigns had been under the protection of raddled, overdone women, a message not lost on the mob.
One of the pike-wielding ruffians cavorts about our coach, poking the chassis with the butt of his staff, then thrusting Monsieur Deshuttes’s head against the window. He has jettisoned his poissarde ’s disguise to reveal loose, long pants that reach his scuffed leather shoes, the mark of a man of the lowest social order. Each time Deshuttes’s head bobs in front of us, my daughter screams, which engenders no end of malicious cackling from our tormentor and only incites him to further torture. This day will bring her nightmares
We travel at the pace of a funeral cortege, passing through one village after another on the twelve-mile journey to Paris. With so much time in the company of my thoughts I recall the velocity at which the reeking corpse of Louis XV made its final journey to his sepulcher at Saint-Denis. He had been le Bien-Aimé , yet at his death was so despised by his subjects that they taunted his hearse as it flew by them on the road. My husband and I, seated side by side aswe were that day in May so many years ago, were cheered as our carriage followed the former king’s. “Louis le Désiré!” our people cried. As quickly as we sped that spring afternoon in 1774, today we crawl, to the accompaniment of “Louis le Détesté,” shouted lustily by those old enough to know what they parody.
The coach lurches forward as we come to a halt. The dauphin, who had fallen asleep on my lap with his thumb in his mouth, awakens and looks about like a turtle poking his head from his shell. “Where are we, Maman?”
I look to Louis, who lowers the handkerchief from his face and tries to peer through the crowd of people surrounding our carriage. He replies, “We’re in Sèvres.”
Whatever for? I wonder. I am certain the rabble has not paused to purchase porcelain. I take my father’s gold watch from my reticule. It is easier to focus on the motion of the minute hand as it slowly makes its way around the dial than it is to give consequence to the hordes outside who taunt us.
The dauphin goes back to sleep, the slumber of the innocent. Madame Royale is hungry, and from a pocket of his coat Louis produces a handful of nuts and shares them with our daughter. She nibbles them slowly, taking care to savor each one as if she doesn’t know when she will eat again.
After a delay of an hour or so we are treated to the reason. A pair of friseurs are paraded past our coach, their faces pale with fear, mouths grim, and no wonder, for the blade of a knife is pressed against their respective throats. With their eyes they direct us upward, but we have no need to slouch in our seats in order to obtain the view. What we are meant to see is shoved in our faces. The hapless hairdressers have apparently been forced upon pain of death to coif the severed heads of our bodyguards. The remains of Lieutenants Deshuttes and de Varicourt have been further desecrated, dressed to resemble the famous poufs worn by myself andmy ladies in our most frivolous and verdant days, teased and frizzled as high off our foreheads as possible, then pomaded and heavily dusted with powder. But the mockery and the insult do not stop there. With such outlandish coiffures these two brave men have been feminized—even more so with the addition of ribbons, pearls, and feathers. The hideous impression is that the sovereigns had been under the protection of raddled, overdone women, a message not lost on the mob.
One of the pike-wielding ruffians cavorts about our coach, poking the chassis with the butt of his staff, then thrusting Monsieur Deshuttes’s head against the window. He has jettisoned his poissarde ’s disguise to reveal loose, long pants that reach his scuffed leather shoes, the mark of a man of the lowest social order. Each time Deshuttes’s head bobs in front of us, my daughter screams, which engenders no end of malicious cackling from our tormentor and only incites him to further torture. This day will bring her nightmares
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