Paris: The Novel

but she’d give you a terrible time. She even treats Madame de Maintenon like a servant because her ancestry is imperfect.” She smiled. “I had already checked with your parents, or I wouldn’t have brought you here. It would have been too cruel.” She paused. “By the way, I wouldn’t say that you are close to your cousins who lost their nobility, if I were you.”
    And did she have cousins in Paris? the dauphine asked, quite pleasantly. And Amélie was just about to answer happily that she had indeed, her mother’s niece and nephew of whom she was so fond, when, by the grace of the Almighty, she remembered and avoided the terrible trap.
    “I must confess with shame that one of my mother’s family made an unfortunate marriage,” she answered quietly, “and I believe there are children, but I know nothing about them.” With this monumental lie, her dear cousins Isabelle and Yves miraculously disappeared.
    “Many families suffer misfortune. Your family has behaved quite correctly,” the princess told her. She turned to Madame de Saint-Loubert, who had remained standing quietly in a corner near the door. “I think she will do very well,” she said. “Will you show her where her rooms are?” Then she addressed Amélie. “Come to me tomorrow morning, my dear, after Mass. By the way,” she added, “as I never go out, there is nothing for you to do. But you won’t mind.” This last, it seemed, was an order. They quietly withdrew.
    “You didn’t tell me she was quite so ugly,” Amélie protested to Madame de Saint-Loubert. “I almost made a face. However did her husband find her attractive?”
    “Well, he did. There’s no accounting for tastes. Let’s go to see your room.”
    The north wing was given over entirely to the quarters of the many aristocratic folk with duties of one kind or another in the palace. There were also some impoverished aristocrats who, if they’d ever had any duties at the court, were now too ancient to perform them, together with a fewrelicts of former courtiers. Some of the grander courtiers had quite elegant quarters there. But large though the place was, the need for lodging had already outgrown the space available. And what with subdivision and doubling up, the higher floors had in no time turned into the most aristocratic tenement in the world.
    Having climbed the stairs to the highest floor below the attic, they made their way along a passage until they reached a door that had been cleverly cut in half and divided so that the left half swung one way, and the right the other.
    “Yours is the left-hand side,” said her guide, and as they opened it, “I’m afraid the right side got the window.”
    It was the size of a small room. Big enough for a little bed and an armoire for her. It was airless. And pitch-black.
    “It’s not very nice,” said Amélie.
    “It’s a start,” said Madame de Saint-Loubert firmly. “We’ll go and get a candle and some other things.”
    “You don’t think,” suggested Amélie, “that the wife of the Dauphin of France would want her maid of honor to have a window?”
    “It’s hard to know,” said Madame de Saint-Loubert, “since she seems to like sitting in the dark herself.”
    As they went down the stairs again, her mentor tried to comfort her a little.
    “You must understand,” she explained, “that the main thing is to be here. Everything comes from that. Once you’re here, who knows what wonderful things may happen? But if you’re somewhere else, nothing will ever happen. That’s the point.” She gave Amélie an encouraging smile. “You’re quite nice-looking. You’re noble. Just be polite to everyone and make friends. That way, with a little luck, you’ll find yourself a suitable husband.”
    “Is that what my parents want me to do?”
    “Every important and eligible person in the kingdom comes here. What would you hope for if you were a parent?”

    The next day, Amélie arrived at the appointed time. She was told to sit quietly, which she did for an hour. Then the dauphine asked her to take a letter to the Duchesse d’Orléans, and Amélie set off.
    She got lost only twice. She delivered the letter, and on being told thatthere was no reply, she made her way back. She was nearing the dauphine’s door when out of his apartment stepped the dauphin. She stood to one side and curtseyed, but instead of striding past, he stopped, looked down and with a very pleasant smile asked her who she was.
    “My