The Oracle Glass Part 15

"That is my charitable work, Monsieur. I spend my days helping others." I pretended to be busy breaking a roll.

"Madame la Marquise is a miracle worker, a miracle worker. A draper with his own shop and a.s.sistants. My lucky, lucky Amelie. And it all has come to pa.s.s just as she said," Madame rushed to my defense. Amelie looked at the table and blushed at the thought of her impending marriage. Brigitte, her younger sister, dowerless, sullen, and spotty faced, stared at her resentfully. The other boarders, a collection of impecunious foreigners and provincials, looked annoyed at the interruption of the meal.

"Surely, I cannot but accept the word of a hostess so charming," oozed the abbe. Madame Bailly blushed with pleasure and resumed serving the soup. The steady click, clank of soup spoons resumed. Monsieur Dulac, the notary, took up again telling of the scandal at the Foire Saint-Germain, which was only newly opened for the season before Palm Sunday.

"...and when we arrived at the rue de la Lingerie, all was in turmoil, stalls smashed, and a lemonade seller with a broken arm, I swear, and her whole stock spilled upon the ground. It was some young vicomte and a companion, dead drunk. They had pushed their horses into the fair and ridden them at full gallop through the alleys, waving their swords and overturning the stalls. I had narrowly missed being killed, being killed, if you may imagine!"

"Monsieur Dulac, you should confine yourself to the evening, when the quality attend, after the opera," Madame Bailly observed as her maid of all work removed the soup plates.

"As if you'd know," whispered Brigitte spitefully.

"And the prices are doubled, Madame Bailly," answered the notary, "and then I should have had to confine myself to looking only. Whereas today I saw a most marvelous creature for only two sous. A rarity from the far Indies-a racc.o.o.n."

"Oh, what was it like? Was it like a dragon?" queried Amelie.

"No, it was entirely covered with hair like a wolf and had an immense tail, quite striped. They are said to be as venomous as a serpent. But then, the Indies are a place of great danger. They say that there are carnivorous vines there capable of crus.h.i.+ng a man to death and drinking his blood with their long, hollow tendrils." The company shuddered.

"Ooo!" exclaimed Brigitte. "Do they have one of those on display as well? It would be splendid to see it at feeding time!"

So nothing would do but that we would get up a party to go and inspect both the racc.o.o.n and the gentry that very evening, in a hired coach procured by the generous Marquise de Morville, whose charitable works had brought her ever-increasing prosperity.

"Oh, how I do love to ride in a real carriage!" enthused Brigitte, as we set off in the twilight for the grounds of the vast Abbey of Saint-Germain on the left bank of the Seine. Amelie shot her a withering glance.

The draper, a ponderous middle-aged fellow, who sat crammed beside his fiancee and her sister, announced, "When we are wed, you shall always have a carriage at your disposal, my dear Mademoiselle Bailly. Your dainty feet shall not touch the earth." Her mother sighed.

"What touching, what elegant devotion! Oh, Monsieur Leroux, you are so gallant!"

"How could it be otherwise with such a charming young person?" said the abbe, who, squashed between the widow Bailly and myself, had not yet decided behind whose waist his hand should creep. On my side, he encountered frost and hard steel, on hers, squeals and giggles. He withdrew to the more favorable side.

"Oh, look, they're lighting the street lanterns!" Brigitte pointed to a man on a ladder at the corner near the police barrier.

"Monsieur de La Reynie's finest invention," p.r.o.nounced the draper. "Soon all of Paris will be as safe at night as your own bedroom, Mesdames. He has increased the watch and soon will have swept away every last beggar and thief that has disgraced our great city. Ours is an age of marvels..."

Our carriage had halted to let a grand equipage pa.s.s at the intersection. Its coat of arms was painted over and it was full of masked ladies and gentlemen on their way to the fair. The opera had let out. Beneath the newly lit lamp, a public notice newly affixed over several old ones caught my eye. The latest books banned by the police. Illegal to possess or print, purchase or sell, strictest penalties, etc. My scandal-loving eye searched for something interesting: La defense de la Reformation-dull Protestantism. Philosophical Reflections on Grace-even duller Jansenism. Observations on the Health of the State, author unknown, pseudonym "Cato." D'Urbec, Lamotte's friend, the scholar. So this is what has become of your treatise on reform. The geometric theory of state finance has led you to the stake, if you are not in exile already. Somehow, I felt as if I had just come from a funeral.

"Banned books make the best collector's items, Madame la Marquise," the abbe remarked offhandedly, inspecting the place where my gaze had fallen. You ought to know, you old reprobate, I thought, since they are your trade.

"A man who would own such things is no better than a traitor who would undermine the safety of the state," announced Monsieur Leroux, the draper.

"They broke a traitor on the wheel last week by torchlight on the Place de Greve," interjected Brigitte. "Everyone says it was lovely, but Mother wouldn't let me go."

"It's not proper for a girl to go to night executions unescorted," announced her mother.

"A woman of a certain position should always go escorted to executions. I would of course always escort my wife to such commendable moral exhibitions personally," said Monsieur Leroux, clasping Amelie's hand.

"Of course, there's a great deal of money to be made in banned books," suggested the abbe wickedly, for he had observed the draper closely during the ride and had taken his measure.

"Money?" Monsieur Leroux's interest was aroused. "Why, surely, not very much," he added hastily.

"Oh, when Le colloque amoureux was banned, the price went from twenty sols to twenty livres. And now there's not a copy to be had anywhere. It might well fetch thirty or more livres if a person could get hold of one." An ironic smile played across the face of the abbe.

"Twenty...thirty livres? Why, that's astonis.h.i.+ng. As a return on capital..." The draper was lost in calculations.

"And then there's Pere Dupre, who wrote anonymously to the police to denounce his own treatise attacking the Jansenists. A dull and unoriginal work; he had not been able to sell a single copy. Within a month, the entire edition sold out at ten times the original price." The abbe leaned toward the draper with a malicious smile and whispered confidentially, "Of course, it is important to have a powerful patron."

"Scandalous!" exclaimed the draper. "Still, it shows a certain commendable ambition. Far better than the disgrace of being a failure." Monsieur Leroux looked complacent. He, of course, would never consider being a failure. And to him, the patronage of the great could justify any enterprise.

We had by this time worked our way well across the Pont Neuf, though our pa.s.sage had been slowed by the crowds around a dentist on a platform, who was pulling teeth by the light of torches. But soon enough our carriage had joined the ranks of those waiting in rows outside the fair precincts, and we had traversed the dozen steps down into the covered alleyways of the ancient fairgrounds. These were so old that they were sunken beneath ground level, as if pounded down by millions of feet over the centuries. Rows of booths, lit by thousands of candles, shone invitingly down the long alleys, which were called "streets" and named according to the goods sold in them. Vendors of lemonade, watery chocolate, and sweetmeats called out their wares. The smells of good things cooking wafted from the booths where food was sold. Many of them, refurnished for the more elegant evening fair goers, had tables with white linen cloths and fine candelabra.

We strolled down the rue de la Mercerie, to see the furniture and rare porcelains brought from Asia and the Indies. Amelie occupied her time happily exclaiming over what she would like to see in her house, once she was married. Placards announced a "piece a ecriteaux," one of the subterfuges by which the players at the fair evaded the official monopoly on the spoken word of the Paris theaters. The silent players could not be accused of speaking a word, for the dialogue was posted on large signs in each scene. We paused to watch two gentlemen elegantly dressed in pale silk bargaining for a vase. One of them looked so like Uncle from behind that it made me start. Surely he did not have a coat in that color...The man turned, and I was relieved. No, not the Chevalier de Saint-Laurent. While my companions strolled on, marveling at the jewels, the lace, the silver, the heaps of colored sweetmeats and oranges, I felt cold all over, as if something I disliked might step from the shadows at any moment.

Men in strange costumes shouted the virtues of various gambling dens and tried to entice us to enter, and amid the cries of the vendors, we could hear the m.u.f.fled sound of singing, accompanied by a clavier and flutes coming from one of the theaters. Why have I come here? I asked myself. They could see me, and take everything away. I walked on in a kind of trance, hardly noticing my surroundings.

A well-dressed gentleman followed by four servants in livery picked his way past us through the crowd.

"My," whispered the abbe to me, "the evening certainly does bring out a better cla.s.s of people. Even the pickpockets appear to be of the upper cla.s.s." His cozy, obscenely confidential tone brought me back to myself. I observed closely and, sure enough, saw a pale hand flash from its lace-decked sleeve into the pocket of a ponderous gentleman escorting two elderly ladies.

"Ooo! What divine earrings I see there!" cried Amelie, as she led Monsieur Leroux and the rest of us down the long, candle-lit alley called the rue de l'Orfevrerie, where jewelry of all kinds was on display. Masked women in elegant incognito strolled with their gallants, pausing to point with a gloved hand.

"My dear friend, what a charming little brooch," we would hear in the high, cultivated voice of a court lady.

"My love, it is yours," and the gentleman would procure the desired object and present it to his mistress with a bow and a flourish.

"Ah, such pleasures; oh, my friend, I am fatigued."

"Allow me to offer you refreshment. The Duc de Vivonne has declared that everyone must savor the new drink at the Turkish booth, which invigorates the senses most wonderfully."

"Oh, Monsieur Leroux," cried Amelie, "do let us stop there, too!"

And her affianced, anxious to distract her from the glittering display, agreed hastily.

We followed the masked couple to the Turkish booth, where we were seated near the door around one of the tables covered with fresh white linen that filled the large room. Above us stretched a vast, if rudimentary, ceiling hung with blazing chandeliers. Waiters in huge padded turbans and baggy trousers carried curious bra.s.s trays filled with tiny enameled metal cups. A strange smell like burned cork filled the room-doubtless the Turkish beverage-but it was too late to leave gracefully.

"Surely, my dear one," I could hear the masked lady's high voice pierce the hubbub, "they should not have seated us so close to n.o.bodies." Madame Bailly and her daughters were too busy exclaiming over the lace and the coiffures of those at the neighboring tables to notice, but the abbe shot me an amused look.

The masked lady's voice could be heard again: "That woman over there, for example, could be none other than Mademoiselle de Brie, the comedienne from the Theatre de la rue Guenegaud. I'm sure I recognize that dreadful dress and cloak with the train. I do believe they belong to the company-or maybe she bought them secondhand."

I s.h.i.+fted my gaze to the table in the more elegant section that contained the offending dress. A large woman in a black velvet mask, exquisitely gowned, was engaged in witty conversation with a gallant whose back was to us. His plumed hat was tilted rakishly over his own shoulder-length curls; his blue velvet mantle was carelessly draped over one shoulder, revealing its crimson satin lining. The woman seemed animated and fascinated by him. Even though her figure seemed past its prime, her mask could not conceal fully the remains of once great beauty.

"My masterwork, written entirely as a setting for your beauty and talents..." I could hear the man saying. What a marvelous little drama. An influential older actress, and the young playwright whose career she was sponsoring. How he flattered her!

The Turkish coffee that everyone had raved about so had arrived. We looked into the splendid little cups to see a thick, black liquid sitting like tar on the white enamel. How uninviting. No one wished to be so unsophisticated as to p.r.o.nounce us gulled. After all, we had already seen the racc.o.o.n, which had unfortunately died and been replaced by a drawing, and the two-headed man, one of whose heads was wooden. None of us would ever admit the fair's most fas.h.i.+onable craze in drink to be nasty.

Monsieur Leroux lifted the tiny cup to his lips, while Amelie watched dotingly. "Most remarkable," he p.r.o.nounced. "Somewhat like burned caramel," and he took another tiny sip.

Amelie lifted the little cup in the elegant way she had spied the lady lifting hers. "Why, Monsieur Leroux, you have said it perfectly. It is remarkable." But her face was puckered up.

"...I see no one of distinction here. How can you say it is fas.h.i.+onable? Surely Monsieur le Duc meant another booth..." the lady's high voice floated to us. The rumble of her escort's answer was lost in the clatter of dishes. "Now, that veiled woman in the black silk over there, with the abbe, might be someone, were it not for the impossibly bourgeois people with whom she is sitting..."