A Versailles Christmas Tide - Mary Stuart Boyd
A VERSAILLES CHRISTMAS-TIDE
By
Mary Stuart Boyd
With Fifty-three Illustrations by A.S. Boyd
1901
Contents
I. The Unexpected Happens
II. Ogams
III. The Town
IV. Our Arbre de Noel
V. Le Jour de l'Annee
VI. Ice-bound
VII. The Haunted Chateau
VIII. Marie Antoinette
IX. The Prisoners Released
Illustrations
The Summons
Storm Warning
Treasure Trove
The Red Cross in the Window
Enter M. le Docteur
Perpetual Motion
Ursa Major
Meal Considerations
The Two Colonels
The Young and Brave
Malcontent
The Aristocrat
Papa, Mama, et Bebe
Juvenile Progress
Automoblesse oblige
Sable Garb
A Football Team
Mistress and Maid
Sage and Onions
Marketing
Private Boxes
A Foraging Party
A Thriving Merchant
Chestnuts in the Avenue
The Tree Vendor
The Tree Bearer
Rosine
Alms and the Lady
Adoration
Thankfulness
One of the Devout
De l'eau Chaude
The Mill
The Presbytery
To the Place of Rest
While the Frost Holds
The Postman's Wrap
A Lapful of Warmth
The Daily Round
Three Babes and a Bonne
Snow in the Park
A Veteran of the Chateau
Un, Deux, Trois
Bedchamber of Louis XIV
Marie Leczinska
Madame Adelaide
Louis Quatorze
Where the Queen Played
Marie Antoinette
The Secret Stair
Madame sans Tete
Illumination
L'Envoi
CHAPTER I
THE UNEXPECTED HAPPENS
[Illustration: The Summons]
No project could have been less foreseen than was ours of wintering in
France, though it must be confessed that for several months our thoughts
had constantly strayed across the Channel. For the Boy was at school at
Versailles, banished there by our desire to fulfil a parental duty.
The time of separation had dragged tardily past, until one foggy
December morning we awoke to the glad consciousness that that very
evening the Boy would be with us again. Across the breakfast-table we
kept saying to each other, "It seems scarcely possible that the Boy is
really coming home to-night," but all the while we hugged the assurance
that it was.
The Boy is an ordinary snub-nosed, shock-headed urchin of thirteen, with
no special claim to distinction save the negative one of being an only
child. Yet without his cheerful presence our home seemed empty and dull.
Any attempts at merry-making failed to restore its life. Now all was
agog for his return. The house was in its most festive trim. Christmas
presents were hidden securely away. There was rejoicing downstairs as
well as up: the larder shelves were stored with seasonable fare, and
every bit of copper and brass sparkled a welcome. Even the kitchen cat
sported a ribbon, and had a specially energetic purr ready.
Into the midst of our happy preparations the bad news fell with
bomb-like suddenness. The messenger who brought the telegram whistled
shrilly and shuffled a breakdown on the doorstep while he waited to hear
if there was an answer.
"He is ill. He can't come. Scarlet fever," one of us said in an odd,
flat voice.
"Scarlet fever. At school. Oh! when can we go to him? When is there a
boat?" cried the other.
There was no question of expediency. The Boy lay sick in a foreign land,
so we went to him. It was full noon when the news came, and nightfall
saw us dashing through the murk of a wild mid-December night towards
Dover pier, feeling that only the express speed of the mail train was
quick enough for us to breathe in.
But even the most apprehensive of journeys may hold its humours. Just at
the moment of starting anxious friends assisted a young lady into our
carriage. "She was going to Marseilles. Would we kindly see that she got
on all right?" We were only going as far as Paris direct. "Well, then,
as far as Paris. It would be a great favour." So from Charing Cross to
the Gare du Nord, Placidia, as we christened her, became our care.
She was a large, handsome girl of about three-and-twenty. What was her
reason for journeying unattended to Cairo we know not. Whether she ever
reached her destination we are still in doubt, for a more complacently
incapable damsel never went a-voyaging. The Saracen maiden who followed
her English lover from the Holy Land by crying "London" and "A Becket"
was scarce so impotent as Placidia; for any information the Saracen
maiden had she retained, while Placidia naively admitted that she had
already forgotten by which line of steamers her passage through the
Mediterranean had been taken.
Placidia had an irrational way of losing her possessions. While yet on
her way to the London railway station she had lost her tam-o'-shanter.
So perforce, she travelled in a large picture-hat which, although pretty
and becoming, was hardly suitable headgear for channel-crossing in
mid-winter.
[Illustration: Storm Warning]
It was a wild night; wet, with a rising north-west gale. Tarpaulined
porters swung themselves on to the carriage-steps as we drew up at Dover
pier, and warned us not to leave the train, as, owing to the storm, the
Calais boat would be an hour late in getting alongside.
The Ostend packet, lying beside the quay in full sight of the
travellers, lurched giddily at her moorings. The fourth occupant of our
compartment, a sallow man with yellow whiskers, turned green with
apprehension. Not so Placidia. From amongst her chaotic hand-baggage she
extracted walnuts and mandarin oranges, and began eating with an
appetite that was a direct challenge to the Channel. Bravery or
foolhardiness could go no farther.
Providence tempers the wind to the parents who are shorn of their lamb.
The tumult of waters left us scatheless, but poor Placidia early paid
the penalty of her rashness. She "thought" she was a good sailor--though
she acknowledged that this was her first sea-trip--and elected to remain
on deck. But before the harbour lights had faded behind us a sympathetic
mariner supported her limp form--the feathers of her incongruous hat
drooping in unison with their owner--down the swaying cabin staircase
and deposited her on a couch.
"Oh! I do wish I hadn't eaten that fruit," she groaned when I offered
her smelling-salts. "But then, you know, I was so hungry!"
In the _train rapide_ a little later, Placidia, when arranging her wraps
for the night journey, chanced, among the medley of her belongings, upon
a missing boat-ticket whose absence at the proper time had threatened
complications. She burst into good-humoured laughter at the discovery.
"Why, here's the ticket that man made all the fuss about. I really
thought he wasn't going to let me land till I found it. Now, I do wonder
how it got among my rugs?"
We seemed to be awake all night, staring with wide, unseeing eyes out
into the darkness. Yet the chill before dawn found us blinking sleepily
at a blue-bloused porter who, throwing open the carriage door, curtly
announced that we were in Paris.
Then followed a fruitless search for Placidia's luggage, a hunt which
was closed by Placidia recovering her registration ticket (with a
fragment of candy adhering to it) from one of the multifarious pockets
of her ulster, and finding that the luggage had been registered on to
Marseilles. "Will they charge duty on tobacco?" she inquired blandly, as
she watched the Customs examination of our things. "I've such a lot of
cigars in my boxes."
There was an Old-Man-of-the-Sea-like tenacity in Placidia's smiling
impuissance. She did not know one syllable of French. A new-born babe
could not have revealed itself more utterly incompetent. I verily
believe that, despite our haste, we would have ended by escorting
Placidia across Paris, and ensconcing her in the Marseilles train, had
not Providence intervened in the person of a kindly disposed polyglot
traveller. So, leaving Placidia standing the picture of complacent
fatuosity in the midst of a group consisting of this new champion and
three porters, we sneaked away.
[Illustration: Treasure Trove]
Grey dawn was breaking as we drove towards St. Lazare Station, and the
daily life of the city was well begun. Lights were twinkling in the dark
interiors of the shops. Through the mysterious atmosphere figures loomed
mistily, then vanished into the gloom. But we got no more than a vague
impression of our surroundings. Throughout the interminable length of
drive across the city, and the subsequent slow train journey, our
thoughts were ever in advance.
The tardy winter daylight had scarcely come before we were jolting in a
_fiacre_ over the stony streets of Versailles. In the gutters, crones
were eagerly rummaging among the dust heaps that awaited removal. In
France no degradation attaches to open economies. Housewives on their
way to fetch Gargantuan loaves or tiny bottles of milk for the matutinal
_cafe-au-lait_ cast searching glances as they passed, to see if among
the rubbish something of use to them might not be lurking. And at one
alluring mound an old gentleman of absurdly respectable exterior
perfunctorily turned over the scraps with the point of his cane.
We had heard of a hotel, and the first thing we saw of it we liked. That
was a pair of sabots on the mat at the foot of the staircase. Pausing
only to remove the dust of travel, we set off to visit our son, walking
with timorous haste along the grand old avenue where the school was
situated. A little casement window to the left of the wide entrance-door
showed a red cross. We looked at it silently, wondering.
[Illustration: The Red Cross in the Window]
In response to our ring the portal opened mysteriously at touch of the
unseen concierge, and we entered. A conference with Monsieur le
Directeur, kindly, voluble, tactfully complimentary regarding our
halting French, followed. The interview over, we crossed the courtyard
our hearts beating quickly. At the top of a little flight of worn stone
steps was the door of the school hospital, and under the ivy-twined
trellis stood a sweet-faced Franciscan Soeur, waiting to welcome us.
[Illustration: Enter M. Le Docteur]
Passing through a tiny outer room--an odd combination of dispensary,
kitchen, and drawing-room with a red-tiled floor--we reached the
sick-chamber, and saw the Boy. A young compatriot, also a victim of the
disease, occupied another bed, but for the first moments we were
oblivious of his presence. Raising his fever-flushed face from the
pillows, the Boy eagerly stretched out his burning hands.
"I heard your voices," his hoarse voice murmured contentedly, "and I
knew _you_ couldn't be ghosts." Poor child! in the semidarkness of the
lonely night-hours phantom voices had haunted him. We of the morning
were real.
The good Soeur buzzed a mild frenzy of "Il ne faut pas toucher" about
our ears, but, all unheeding, we clasped the hot hands and crooned over
him. After the dreary months of separation, love overruled wisdom. Mere
prudence was not strong enough to keep us apart.
Chief amongst the chaos of thoughts that had assailed us on the
reception of the bad news, was the necessity of engaging an English
medical man. But at the first sight of the French doctor, as, clad in a
long overall of white cotton, he entered the sick-room, our insular
prejudice vanished, ousted by complete confidence; a confidence that our
future experience of his professional skill and personal kindliness only
strengthened.
It was with sore hearts that, the prescribed _cinq minutes_ ended, we
descended the little outside stair. Still, we had seen the Boy; and
though we could not nurse him, we were not forbidden to visit him. So we
were thankful too.
CHAPTER II
OGAMS
[Illustration: Perpetual Motion]
Our hotel was distinctively French, and immensely comfortable, in that
it had gleaned, and still retained, the creature comforts of a century
or two. Thus it combined the luxuries of hot-air radiators and electric
light with the enchantment of open wood fires. Viewed externally, the
building presented that airy aspect almost universal in Versailles
architecture. It was white-tinted, with many windows shuttered without
and heavily lace-draped within.
A wide entrance led to the inner courtyard, where orange trees in green
tubs, and trelliswork with shrivelled stems and leaves still adhering,
suggested that it would be a pleasant summer lounge. Our hotel boasted a
_grand salon_, which opened from the courtyard. It was an elaborately
ornate room; but on a chilly December day even a plethora of
embellishment cannot be trusted to raise by a single degree the
temperature of the apartment it adorns, and the soul turns from a cold
hearth, however radiant its garnish of artificial blossoms. A private
parlour was scarcely necessary, for, with most French bedrooms, ours
shared the composite nature of the accommodation known in a certain
class of advertisement as "bed-sitting-room." So it was that during
these winter days we made ourselves at home in our chamber.
The shape of the room was a geometrical problem. The three windows each
revealed different views, and the remainder of the walls curved
amazingly. At first sight the furniture consisted mainly of draperies
and looking-glass; for the room, though of ordinary dimensions, owned
three large mirrors and nine pairs of curtains. A stately bed, endowed
with a huge square down pillow, which served as quilt, stood in a
corner. Two armchairs in brocaded velvet and a centre table were
additions to the customary articles. A handsome timepiece and a
quartette of begilt candelabra decked the white marble mantelpiece, and
were duplicated in the large pier glass. The floor was of well-polished
wood, a strip of bright-hued carpet before the bed, a second before the
washstand, its only coverings. Need I say that the provision for
ablutions was one basin and a liliputian ewer, and that there was not a
fixed bath in the establishment?
It was a resting-place full of incongruities; but apart from, or perhaps
because of, its oddities it had a cosy attractiveness. From the moment
of our entrance we felt at home. I think the logs that purred and
crackled on the hearth had much to do with its air of welcome. There is
a sense of companionship about a wood fire that more enduring coal
lacks. Like a delicate child, the very care it demands nurtures your
affection. There was something delightfully foreign and picturesque to
our town ideas in the heap of logs that Karl carried up in a great
_panier_ and piled at the side of the hearth. Even the little faggots of
kindling wood, willow-knotted and with the dry copper-tinted leaves
still clinging to the twigs, had a rustic charm.
These were pleasant moments when, ascending from the chill outer air, we
found our chamber aglow with ruddy firelight that glinted in the mirrors
and sparkled on the shining surface of the polished floor; when we drew
our chairs up to the hearth, and, scorning the electric light, revelled
in the beauty of the leaping and darting flames.
It was only in the _salle-a-manger_ that we saw the other occupants of
the hotel; and when we learned that several of them had lived _en
pension_ under the roof of the assiduous proprietor for periods varying
from five to seven years, we felt ephemeral, mere creatures of a moment,
and wholly unworthy of regard.
[Illustration: Ursa Major]
At eight o'clock Karl brought the _petit dejeuner_ of coffee and rolls
to our room. At eleven, our morning visit to the school hospital over,
we breakfasted in the _salle-a-manger_, a large bright room, one or
other of whose many south windows had almost daily, even in the depth of
winter, to be shaded against the rays of the sun. Three chandeliers of
glittering crystal starred with electric lights depended from the
ceiling. Half a dozen small tables stood down each side; four larger
ones occupied the centre of the floor, and were reserved for transient
custom.
The first thing that struck us as peculiar was that every table save
ours was laid for a single person, with a half bottle of wine, red or
white, placed ready, in accordance with the known preference of the
expected guest. We soon gathered that several of the regular customers
lodged outside and, according to the French fashion, visited the hotel
for meals only. After the early days of keen anxiety regarding our
invalid had passed, we began to study our fellow guests individually and
to note their idiosyncrasies. Sitting at our allotted table during the
progress of the leisurely meals, we used to watch as one _habitue_ after
another entered, and, hanging coat and hat upon certain pegs, sat
silently down in his accustomed place, with an unvarying air of calm
deliberation.
Then Iorson, the swift-footed _garcon_, would skim over the polished
boards to the newcomer, and, tendering the menu, would wait, pencil in
hand, until the guest, after careful contemplation, selected his five
_plats_ from its comprehensive list.
[Illustration: Meal Considerations]
The most picturesque man of the company had white moustaches of
surprising length. On cold days he appeared enveloped in a fur coat, a
garment of shaggy brown which, in conjunction with his hirsute
countenance, made his aspect suggest the hero in pantomime renderings of
"Beauty and the Beast." But in our hotel there was no Beauty, unless
indeed it were Yvette, and Yvette could hardly be termed beautiful.
Yvette also lived outside. She did not come to _dejeuner_, but every
night precisely at a quarter-past seven the farther door would open, and
Yvette, her face expressing disgust with the world and all the things
thereof, would enter.
Yvette was blonde, with neat little features, a pale complexion, and
tiny hands that were always ringless. She rang the changes on half a
dozen handsome cloaks of different degrees of warmth. To an intelligent
observer their wear might have served as a thermometer. Yvette was
_blasee_, and her millinery was in sympathy with her feelings. Her hats
had all a fringe of disconsolate feathers, whose melancholy plumage
emphasised the downward curve of her mouth. To see Yvette enter from the
darkness and, seating herself at her solitary table, droop over her
plate as though there were nothing in Versailles worth sitting upright
for, was to view _ennui_ personified.
Yvette invariably drank white wine, and the food rarely pleased her. She
would cast a contemptuous look over the menu offered by the deferential
Henri, then turn wearily away, esteeming that no item on its length
merited even her most perfunctory consideration. But after one or two
despondent glances, Yvette ever made the best of a bad bargain, and
ordered quite a comprehensive little dinner, which she ate with the same
air of utter disdain. She always concluded by eating an orange dipped in
sugar. Even had a special table not been reserved for her, one could
have told where Yvette had dined by the bowl of powdered sugar, just as
one could have located the man with the fierce moustaches and the fur
coat by the presence of his pepper-mill, or the place of "Madame" from
her prodigal habit of rending a quarter-yard of the crusty French bread
in twain and consuming only the soft inside.
From the ignorance of our cursory acquaintance we had judged the French
a sociable nation. Our stay at Versailles speedily convinced us of the
fallacy of that belief. Nothing could have impressed us so forcibly as
did the frigid silence that characterised the company. Many of them had
fed there daily for years, yet within the walls of the sunny dining-room
none exchanged even a salutation. This unexpected taciturnity in a
people whom we had been taught to regard as lively and voluble made us
almost ashamed of our own garrulity, and when, in the presence of the
silent company, we were tempted to exchange remarks, we found ourselves
doing it in hushed voices as though we were in church.
A clearer knowledge, however, showed us that though some unspoken
convention rendered the hotel guests oblivious of each other's presence
while indoors, beyond the hotel walls they might hold communion. Two
retired military men, both wearing the red ribbon of the Legion of
Honour, as indeed did most of our _habitues_, sat at adjacent tables.
One, tall and thin, was a Colonel; the other, little and neat, a Colonel
also. To the casual gaze they appeared complete strangers, and we had
consumed many meals in their society before observing that whenever the
tall Colonel had sucked the last cerise from his glass of _eau-de-vie_,
and begun to fold his napkin--a formidable task, for the serviettes
fully deserved the designation later bestowed on them by the Boy, of
"young table-cloths"--the little Colonel made haste to fold his also.
Both rose from their chairs at the same instant, and the twain, having
received their hats from the attentive Iorson, vanished, still mute,
into the darkness together.
[Illustration: The Two Colonels]
Once, to our consternation, the little Colonel replaced his napkin in
its ring without waiting for the signal from the tall Colonel. But our
apprehension that they, in their dealings in that mysterious outer world
which twice daily they sought together, might have fallen into a
difference of opinion was dispelled by the little Colonel, who had
risen, stepping to his friend and holding out his hand. This the tall
Colonel without withdrawing his eyes from _Le Journal des Debats_ which
he was reading, silently pressed. Then, still without a word spoken or a
look exchanged, the little Colonel passed out alone.
[Illustration: The Young and Brave]
The average age of the Ogams was seventy. True, there was Dunois the
Young and Brave, who could not have been more than forty-five. What his
name really was we knew not, but something in his comparatively juvenile
appearance among the chevaliers suggested the appellation which for lack
of a better we retained. Dunois' youth might only be comparative, but
his bravery was indubitable; for who among the Ogams but he was daring
enough to tackle the _pate-de-foie-gras_, or the _abattis_, a stew
composed of the gizzards and livers of fowls? And who but Dunois would
have been so reckless as to follow baked mussels and _crepinettes_ with
_rognons frits_?
Dunois, too, revealed intrepid leanings toward strange liquors.
Sometimes--it was usually at _dejeuner_ when he had dined out on the
previous evening--he would demand the wine-list of Iorson, and rejecting
the _vin blanc_ or _vin rouge_ which, being _compris_, contented the
others, would order himself something of a choice brand. One of his
favourite papers was _Le Rire_, and Henri, Iorson's youthful assistant,
regarded him with admiration.
[Illustration: Malcontent]
A less attractive presence in the dining-room was Madame. Madame, who
was an elderly dame of elephantine girth, had resided in the hotel for
half a dozen years, during which period her sole exercise had been taken
in slowly descending from her chamber in the upper regions for her
meals, and then, leisurely assimilation completed, in yet more slowly
ascending. Madame's allotted seat was placed in close proximity to the
hot-air register; and though Madame was usually one of the first to
enter the dining-room, she was generally the last to leave. Madame's
appetite was as animated as her body was lethargic. She always drank her
half-bottle of red wine to the dregs, and she invariably concluded with
a greengage in brandy. So it was small marvel that, when at last she
left her chair to "tortoise" upstairs, her complexion should be two
shades darker than when she descended.
Five dishes, irrespective of _hors d'oeuvres_ at luncheon, and _potage_
at dinner, were allowed each guest, and Madame's selection was an affair
of time. Our hotel was justly noted for its _cuisine_, yet on infrequent
occasions the food supplied to Madame was not to her mind. At these
times the whole establishment suffered until the irascible old lady's
taste was suited. One night at dinner Iorson had the misfortune to serve
Madame with some turkey that failed to meet with her approval. With the
air of an insulted empress, Madame ordered its removal. The conciliatory
Iorson obediently carried off the dish and speedily returned, bearing
what professed to be another portion. But from the glimpse we got as it
passed our table we had a shrewd suspicion that Iorson the wily had
merely turned over the piece of turkey and re-served it with a little
more gravy and an additional dressing of _cressons_. Madame, it
transpired, shared our suspicions, for this portion also she declined,
with renewed indignation. Then followed a long period of waiting,
wherein Madame, fidgeting restlessly on her seat, kept fierce eyes fixed
on the door through which the viands entered.
Just as her impatience threatened to vent itself in action, Iorson
appeared bearing a third helping of turkey. Placing it before the irate
lady, he fled as though determined to debar a third repudiation. For a
moment an air of triumph pervaded Madame's features. Then she began to
gesticulate violently, with the evident intention of again attracting
Iorson's notice. But the forbearance even of the diplomatic Iorson was
at an end. Re-doubling his attentions to the diners at the farther side
of the room, he remained resolutely unconscious of Madame's signals,
which were rapidly becoming frantic.