Paris: The Novel

greatest noble families, sometimes even into the legitimate royal family.
    “Don’t worry,” Madame de Saint-Loubert told her, “the pattern will soon emerge if you just keep paying attention.”
    When it came to the pecking order, she had to explain a most important principle.
    “The princes of the blood are closest to the king in rank, and so the precedence is usually easy to follow. But rank and power are completely different. The king’s eldest son and the king’s brother are at the top of the tree. But they have no part in the government. Louis won’t even let them attend meetings with him.”
    “But why?”
    “To keep all the power in his hands. No chance of rivals, I should think. Wouldn’t you?”
    “I hadn’t thought of it.”
    “If you need a royal favor, then go to the mistresses. It’s a general rule that his mistress usually has more influence on a king than his wife.”
    “What about his old mistress, Madame de Montespan? Is she important?”
    “He visits her every day. He’s fond of her. But you know there was a big scandal—well, you were too young. Anyway, it was said that she used poison to get rid of another mistress. Nothing was ever proved. I’m sure it’s not true. But there’s always been a cloud over her since.”
    “I feel as if I’ve walked into a dangerous labyrinth.”
    “All courts are like that.”
    As they returned from the palace, Amélie could not help feeling a sense of misgiving.

    The next morning they returned to the palace to see the dauphine. Amélie knew her story. “She is not one of the court beauties,” Madame de Saint-Loubert had told her, “yet she seemed to please the dauphin.They’ve had three children. But the last birth, this year, took a toll on her health, or so she says.”
    The apartment of the dauphin was large, bright and airy. But that was not where they found his wife.
    Although it was morning, the small back room was dark, the windows covered. An Italian maid let them in. The wife of the large, hearty-looking prince Amélie had seen yesterday did not seem well. Though Amélie knew that she was only about twenty-five, she had the impression that the sickly figure before her was much older. The dauphine was sitting in a fauteuil, and she summoned Amélie, telling her to sit on a small gilt chair. Her gesture was rather listless.
    Only as she got close did she realize something else about the dauphin’s wife: She was astonishingly ugly. Her skin was blotchy. Her lips were pale as an old woman’s, her teeth were rotten, and her hands were unnaturally red. But most striking of all was her big, bulbous nose.
    The poor lady’s looks were so unprepossessing that it was lucky Amélie had been prepared for them. She kept her face a mask.
    First the dauphine offered her a piece of cake. Since it would have been impolite to refuse, even though she didn’t want it, Amélie ate the cake while the dauphine watched her.
    “Despite her physical ugliness, the dauphine is most fastidious when she eats. She cannot bear to have women near her who eat messily,” Madame de Saint-Loubert had forewarned her. “But don’t worry, your table manners are excellent.”
    As she didn’t drop any crumbs from her mouth or spill anything on the floor, this seemed to satisfy the dauphine.
    Could she read and write? Had she a good hand? The Italian maid brought her a pen, ink and a piece of paper and she was commanded to write a few lines of any verse she knew.
    Amélie obliged with some elegant religious verses from Corneille. The choice, and her handwriting, seemed to do.
    “The dauphine is well read and speaks three languages well. She won’t expect this from you, however,” her mentor had also informed her.
    Then the conversation turned to her family.
    Who were her parents? Amélie named them. And her grandparents? Amélie named them too. And her great-grandparents? These she also named. And their parents? Amélie named all sixteen.
    “They are all noble?” The dauphine sought confirmation. Amélie confirmedthat they were. “This is good. This is important,” said the dauphine.
    “You must understand,” Madame de Saint-Loubert had explained the night before, “that if you think your father is concerned with ancestry, this pales into insignificance compared to the attention paid to the subject by German royalty and, as I hope you know, the dauphine by birth is a Bavarian princess. She might take you if you weren’t of sufficiently pure blood,