Flaunting, Extravagant Queen

Chapter III THE DAUPHINE IN PARIS

Marie Antoinette had one great desire – to go to Paris. Was it not time she went? she asked Madame de Noailles. When she went to Paris, she was told, it must be done according to tradition; the city must be made ready to welcome her for it would be a state occasion.

And still she remained at Versailles, with the spies about her – her mother’s spies, the Abbé de Vermond and Mercy-argenteau, and the spies of the aunts, headed by the Comtesse de Narbonne who loved drama so much that when it did not occur she invented it.

Then there was Madame de Noailles, always watching lest she should commit some breach which called for immediate reproach and the mending of her ways.

New enemies were introduced to Versailles. The Comtes de Provence and d’Artois had been provided with wives. These were the daughters of Victor Amédée III of Sardinia. Victor Amédée ruled not only over Sardinia but also over a rich part of Northern Italy, and the marriages were considered worthy of his grandsons by Louis Quinze who even tried to marry Clothilde to Victor Amédée’s son; but Clothilde was considered too fat for the alliance. The King of Sardinia declared that he believed fat women were frequently unable to bear children.

The marriages of the two young men were concluded and when their brides arrived at Versailles, Provence and Artois were shocked by their unattractiveness. Having seen the enchanting Austrian Archduchess they had expected their wives to be equally charming. Provence compared his Marie Josèphe and Artois his Marie Thérèse with the dainty Marie Antoinette who was growing more lovely every day.

Was it fair, they demanded of each other, that they should have such ugly brides while Berry, who cared more for his blacksmith’s shop than his marriage, and was impotent in any case, should have the lovely Antoinette?

Antoinette was too young to do anything but laugh at them and preen herself a little, taking more pains than ever to look charming in the eyes of the two disgruntled brothers. This made them furious with her, and their wives even more furious.

The three aunts looked on and laughed together.

It was a good thing, said Adelaide, that there were so many in this royal house who were inclined to regard the frivolous young Dauphine with distrust.

We must see, declared Adelaide, that when Berry is King she does not have too much influence with him.

Her sisters as usual nodded. And it became their custom to have Josèphe and Thérèse to play cards with them; and they would all sit together – three old witches talking secrets with two jealous girls, and the subject of their conversations was invariably the many imperfections of Antoinette.

It was so dull at Versailles that Antoinette decided that she would speak to the King about going to Paris, and seized the first opportunity.

Angry as he might be with her when she was not present, Louis could feel no rancour towards her when she was near him. He thought her so pretty. He wished she were not the wife of his grandson, that he might seduce her. He thought of poor Berry who was impotent. It made him angry.

‘And how are you, my dear, this day?’ he asked her.

She smiled at him, aware of his admiration and liking it – rather disgusting old man that he was – because people noted it and smiled at it; moreover it displeased Madame du Barry.

‘Very happy to be near Your Majesty.’

Louis leered. ‘Then come nearer still and be happier yet.’

He took her hand and brought his old face near her young and smooth one.

‘You are the loveliest Dauphine France ever had,’ he declared. ‘And you will be her loveliest Queen.’

She drew back in horror. ‘That will be a long, long time away.’

‘I know not,’ said Louis; and he frowned, forgetting her for a moment. He was feeling far from well, and Madame Louise, his Carmelite daughter, had written him a long exhortation to repent. Louis was constantly looking over his shoulder for death, warding off the dread visitor, not so much because he feared the pain death might bring, but the repentance which must precede it. He was afraid that he would have to send du Barry away before he could begin that repentance, and he hated the thought. And now this girl, by her very loveliness and glowing youth, reminded him of death.

‘Yes, it is so,’ she cried with such conviction that he must believe her. ‘Your Majesty looks younger with each day. I tell my mother that I believe you have discovered the secret of living for ever.’

‘You not only know how to look pretty but how to say pretty things, Madame la Dauphine. When ladies say such things to me I wonder if they are about to ask for something.’

She looked at him archly. ‘There was a request, Your Majesty, but if you refuse it, I will still say that you look younger every day.’

‘Then it would indeed be churlish of me to refuse it.’

‘It is such a simple little request. I have been here more than two years, and I have never been to Paris.’

‘So Paris has been denied the pleasure of seeing you for so long?’

‘It is so,’ she told him.

‘Poor Paris! I’ll tell you who is to blame. It is those three old witches: Loque, Coche and Graille.’

Antoinette laughed gaily. ‘Your Majesty, may we outwit the witches?’

‘There is no other course open to us, if their wishes do not coincide with those of my beautiful Dauphine.’

‘So it is to be to Paris! When, Your Majesty?’

‘You go too fast. These things must be arranged. But go you shall. Now you may kiss your old grandfather for being so good to you. Nay, not my hand. That’s for the witches. Come … kiss me as though I am the young man I could wish to be.’

Lightly she kissed his cheek; and he watched her as she moved away. He was regretful for his lost youth, and when he thought of her with his grandson his lips curled.

‘Poor Berry!’ he murmured.

She insisted that the young members of the family should all come to her apartment. There was Berry, reluctant, the grime of the blacksmith’s shop under his nails; there were Provence and Artois with their two jealous wives.

‘We are to go to Paris,’ she announced. ‘I have the King’s consent. Berry and I are to make our formal entry.’

The eyes of Josèphe and Thérèse glittered with envy. During the formal entry all eyes would be on the Dauphine, the future Queen of France; they would be pointed out merely as the wives of the Dauphin’s brothers. Worse than that, those Parisians would compare their lack of beauty with the Dauphine’s glowing charms. It was quite unfair.

Now she had a mad plan. Why should they wait for the formal entry? The King had given his consent, so why should they not all go into Paris, disguised – masked, say, in fancy dress ?

‘Please come,’ she cried. ‘It would be so exciting. When we make the formal entry there is one who will ride with us every minute of the day and night – Etiquette.’ She grimaced. ‘How I hate Etiquette! What fun to do exactly what we like. To say exactly what we like. To go to the Opéra ball …’

She seized Artois and made him dance with her. He smiled with pleasure, for he enjoyed taking her in his arms before them all. Thérèse watched them with smouldering eyes. Let her, thought Artois. Serve her right for being full and heavy, for not being pretty and dainty and gay and eager to do reckless things; serve her right for not being Antoinette.

‘Yes,’ said Artois, ‘let us all go … masked. It will only take us just over an hour to reach Paris in our carriages. I will have them made ready. No one will guess who we are …’

Berry shook his head. ‘No …’ he began.

But Antoinette had run to him and seized his arm. ‘But you must come … you must. There must be three ladies, three gentlemen … Oh, Berry, you must … you must indeed. I insist.’

He looked down at the charming eager face. He felt he wanted to please her, he wanted to make up for those shameful and uncomfortable nightly experiences for which he was solely to blame.

‘I do not think we should,’ he said.

‘Nor I,’ said Josèphe.

But Artois and Provence decided that they would; and with Antoinette they persuaded the others.

As a result, one bright and starry night, the carriages were brought to a side door, and the excited party made the short joumey between Versailles and the Capital.

During that midnight adventure, Antoinette saw the city in moonlight; saw the gleaming river and the great buildings – the Bastille, the Invalides, the Hôtel de Ville, the cafés along the Quai des Tuileries and Notre Dame.

This, the Dauphin explained, was the route the procession would take when they made their formal entry.

But what excited Antoinette was the fact that the city seemed full of life even at this late hour. There were people in the streets … women, men, noisy people, people who, it seemed, would never be disturbed by that grim bogey, Etiquette. How different was Paris from the town of Versailles with its Place d’Armes and the Church of Notre Dame on one side and the Church of St Louis on the other, and the avenues de Sceaux, de Paris and de St Cloud which, apart from the château, seemed to make up the town.

This was a glorious city, a city of wide and narrow streets, of splendour and squalor, of contrasts and a thousand delights, where anything might happen.

She persuaded them to stop the carriages that they might visit the Opéra ball. Berry was very much against this, but Antoinette was firm. They had come so far. Were they going to spoil the adventure because they were afraid to carry it to its conclusion?

Artois agreed with her. Provence was half-hearted; and as Berry rarely expressed any great desire or any great disinclination to do anything, they went to the ball.

The glitter of that ball completely enchanted Antoinette. She was amazed that Versailles had nothing as exciting to offer. Here were glittering jewels and gorgeously attired men and women; but they were exciting people, hiding behind their masks. Here, decided Antoinette, was excitement and adventure.

She danced with Artois. Many eyes were on her; for she was like a dainty Sèvres ornament come to life. She was laughing behind her mask, wondering what these people would think if they knew that the girl dancing so merrily among them was their Dauphine.

Berry was nervous, eager to be gone; and eventually he managed to instil the same anxiety in his brothers.

They left the Opéra ball and drove back to Versailles.

Few people at the Palace knew of their adventure and, as they were up early for the next morning’s Mass, it was undiscovered.

But Antoinette felt that nothing in her life could ever be quite the same again. She was in love – in love with Paris.

It was a hot June day when the royal procession entered the Capital.

At the gates of Paris the old Governor of the City, the Duc de Brissac, waited to welcome the Dauphin and his wife and to present them with the keys of the city.

The old man’s eyes were appreciative as they rested on the flushed and lovely young Dauphine. She smiled at him as Berry laid his hands on the keys which were being presented to him on a velvet cushion. What would the Duc think, wondered Antoinette, if he knew she had visited his city in secret a few nights before?

But Paris was more enchanting than ever in sunlight. Great triumphal arches had been put up, and flowers decked the streets.

The market women had come from their stalls in the Halles to cheer her. The merchants of St Germain and St Antoine called a greeting; and guns were fired from the Hotel de Ville, the Invalides and the Bastille. The Place du Carrousel was bright with flowers and arches made of cloth of gold and purple velvet, decorated with the golden lilies of France. The bridge over the Seine looked as though it were one seething mass of people, all cheering, all calling ‘Vive le Dauphin! Vive la Dauphine!’

At last they were standing on the balcony of the Tuileries, and again and again the crowds shouted a welcome. Antoinette had never seen so many people, and tears filled her eyes at the expression of such loyalty; for tears, like smiles and sudden anger, came quickly to Antoinette and quickly passed.

‘Mon Dieu!’ she cried out with emotion. ‘Que de monde!’

The Duc de Brissac came closer to her and whispered: ‘Madame, I trust His Highness the Dauphin will not take it amiss, but you have before you two hundred thousand people – the people of Paris – and they have all fallen in love with you.’

She stood there smiling, happy, enchanted. She had fallen in love with Paris, so it was meet and fitting that Paris should have fallen in love with her.

Every night she wished now to make the journey from Versailles to Paris. There was so much in the city to delight her; so many reasons why she had no wish to remain in Versailles. She had come to hate the aunts, with their continual backbiting, and she understood at last that they had never been her friends. It was pleasant to escape from the watchful eyes of Madame de Noailles and the ever-intruding ones of de Vermond and Mercy. She liked to dance until the early hours of morning, to attend the card parties, the Comédie Française and the Comédie Italienne; she liked to attend the Opéra; but delightful as she found these occasions, what seemed most important was to avoid returning early to bed.

The Dauphin did not care for these gaieties; he was tolerant and he made no effort to interfere; but after a hard day’s work in his blacksmith’s shop or in the open air he would want to retire early. Therefore, though they must share the same bed, there were ways of not spending many of the same hours in it, and she would creep in at an early hour of the morning when he was fast asleep.

Often her brothers-in-law would accompany her to Paris. The King rarely went. He was unpopular in Paris, and Paris did not hesitate to declare its dislike. There had been a great deal of trouble throughout the country owing to disaster in foreign affairs, bad harvests, and increased taxation. Louis was afraid that if he passed through the streets of his Capital he might meet not only hostile words, but actions. Some years before he had had a road built from Versailles, so that he could reach Compiègne without passing through Paris.

Antoinette soon discovered that the King’s unpopularity did not apply to his family. She herself was greeted warmly wherever she went. She was so charming to the eye, and that appealed to the Parisians; her quick emotions were evident, and they had heard stories of her kindliness to poor people. Wherever she went she was cheered and admired.

This was delightful, but after a while it grew tedious, for a certain restrained behaviour was expected of her as the Dauphine. It was then that she took up the practice of going masked to Paris, and in particular to the Opéra ball.

There she and her brothers-in-law, and occasionally their wives, would dance until after midnight; and in the early morning their carriage wheels would be heard on the road from Paris to Versailles.

There was one ball which lived in her memory.

The great fun of these balls was the fact that she and members of her party roamed freely among the dancers; and it was on one of these occasions when she found herself dancing with a tall young man, masked like herself, whom she judged to be of her own age.

She was delighted with him because he was a foreigner in Paris and in love with the city even as she was.

‘You are young,’ he said, ‘to be at such a ball unchaperoned.’

‘I am not unchaperoned,’ she told him.

‘Then how is it … ?’

She laughed and said: ‘Ah, Monsieur, it is a great secret.’

He said: ‘Your hands are the most delicate I ever saw. And when I first saw you I thought you were a statue … until you moved. And when you moved I realised that I knew what true beauty was.’

She laughed. She was beginning to understand the art of flirtation, and it pleased her.

‘You may not be French, Monsieur, but in your country they teach you how to pay a good compliment in French.’

‘It is easy to pay compliments in your presence, Mademoiselle,’ he said. ‘One has but to speak the truth.’

‘Tell me of yourself.’

‘What is there to tell? I am passing through France while making the Grand Tour.’

‘You are enjoying this Grand Tour?’

He pressed her hand more firmly. ‘Can you doubt it?’

‘And you love Paris?’

‘To-night,’ he said, ‘I am in love with Paris.’

‘But only to-night! It is your first night in Paris?’

‘It is only to-night that I realise that Paris is the only place in the world where I want to be.’

‘That is a wonderful discovery to make, Monsieur. To find that where you are is where you want to be!’

‘But I am afraid that all this happiness which has suddenly come to me might pass away from me as suddenly.’

‘Paris will not pass away, Monsieur.’

‘You may.’

She laughed. He said: ‘I must know more of you. Your name … what you are doing here … alone like this … so young, so exquisite. Your family should guard you better than this.’

‘They guard me so well,’ she said, ‘that I feel the need to escape on nights like this one.’

‘Tell me your name. Please tell me that. What may I call you?’

‘You may call me Marie.’

‘Marie … There are many Maries, but I never heard the name sound so sweet.’

‘Will you tell me yours?’

‘Axel.’

‘A strange name.’

‘It is common enough in my country.’

‘And your country is?’

‘Sweden.’

‘I shall remember …. Axel from Sweden.’

‘May we meet again here to-morrow?’

‘I do not think that will be possible.’

‘You have another engagement? Break it, I beg of you.’

‘I … It is with my grandfather.’

‘Then you must tell him that you have arranged to meet another.’

‘I could not tell my grandfather that.’

‘He is despotic?’

‘He expects and demands absolute obedience.’

‘Odious man!’

She laughed. ‘You should not say that,’ she said. ‘You really should not.’

‘I will call any man odious who keeps you from me.’

‘One would think you had known me for a long time instead of half an hour.’

‘It is sometimes possible to know in the first moments of a meeting that that meeting is like no other which has ever taken place in one’s life … nor ever will.’

‘You speak with fervour, Monsieur.’

‘Marie … chère Marie … I mean to make you agree with me that what I said is true.’

‘You mean that ours is an important meeting. How can that be? To you I am Marie … of the Opéra ball, and you to me are Axel of Sweden.’

‘Comte Hans Axel de Fersen at your service always.’

‘I … I shall remember.’

‘I have given you my confidence. You must give me yours.’

He had led her to an alcove where they were hidden from the dancers by the palms and flowers.

With a quick gesture he removed her mask. She flushed scarlet and snatched at the mask in his hand.

He had turned very pale. ‘You … you are afraid to show your face … when it is the most beautiful in all Paris,’ he said. ‘I understand why, Madame la Dauphine.’

‘You … you know me then?’

‘I have seen the pictures of you in the shop windows.’

With trembling fingers she adjusted her mask.

He bowed stiffly. ‘Madame,’ he said, ‘I will conduct you to your party.’

She took his arm and he led her back to where Artois and Provence were anxiously looking for her.

Fersen bowed curtly and turned away.

‘Come,’ cried Artois, ‘we will dance together; but I do not think, Antoinette, that you should dance with others. It should be one of us.’

Josèphe and Thérèse, who were of the party, were looking at her strangely. She was aware of their looks. They see everything, she thought.

And in that moment her desire to dance left her. The only person she wished to dance with was Comte Hans Axel de Fersen.

‘I am tired,’ she said. ‘It is time we went home.’

‘Tired? You?’ cried Artois.

‘Do you not see,’ said Josèphe, ‘that something has happened to make her tired?’

‘I want to go home,’ said the Dauphine imperiously. ‘I want to go back at once.’

And in the rumbling carriage all the way back to Versailles she thought of him, remembering each word he had said. If he had not recognised me, she told herself, when he removed my mask, he would have kissed me.

She tried to imagine what that would have been like. Of one thing she was certain; it would be quite unlike the fumbling embrace of the Dauphin.

Josèphe and Thérèse sat with the aunts.

‘She insists on going into Paris often. There is scarce a night when she does not go,’ Josèphe murmured.

‘Paris is a wicked city,’ said Victoire.

‘Papa hates it,’ Sophie declared. ‘That is why he never goes there.’

‘She goes there,’ said Adelaide, her eyes narrowed. ‘She flaunts herself about the city, and the people come out and call her their beautiful Dauphine.’ She turned to her sisters. ‘The people of Paris hate Papa. They blame him for their famines and the taxes,’ she continued as though she were teaching backward children their lessons. ‘When the price of grain goes up they accuse Papa of hoarding it. They are very angry then.’

‘Why?’ asked Sophie.

‘Because they cannot afford to buy bread when the price of grain is so high.’

‘What a pity,’ said Victoire, with sympathetic tears in her eyes, ‘that they cannot be persuaded to eat pastry crust. I hate it myself, but it would be better than nothing for the people.’

Sophie nodded, but Adelaide said sharply: ‘If they could not get bread they could not get pastry either. You are being foolish, Victoire, and your nieces are laughing at you.’

‘Oh, dear,’ said Victoire unhappily, and Josèphe and Thérèse assured her that they were not laughing; they felt nearer tears, on account of the disgraceful behaviour of their sister-in-law.

‘What has she done now?’ asked Adelaide eagerly.

‘You know, do you not,’ said Josèphe, ‘that she goes disguised to Paris. Why, do you think? She goes to the ball, and there she dances with strange men. She was there last night and there was one masked man with whom she danced and with whom she disappeared for a while. She seemed most upset when she said goodbye to him.’

‘So this is how the Dauphine spends her time!’ said Adelaide. ‘Come, my dear Josèphe, and you, my dear Thérèse, you should tell your aunts all that you know.’

They sat talking for a long time; and later they called the Sardinian Ambassador that they might tell him of the Dauphine’s conduct.

He shook his head sadly and said how much happier it would be for France if the future Queen had the wisdom and prudence of his Princesses.

So they sat together, whispering and nodding, pretending to deplore while they delighted in what they called the légèreté of the Dauphine.

One April day in the year 1774 the King, who was at that beautiful house, the Petit Trianon, which he had given to Madame du Barry, felt suddenly more ill than usual.

His servant, Laborde, helped him to bed and, when Madame du Barry came to sit by his bedside, she was alarmed by his fever and his shivering fits.

Terrified she called in Lemoine, his physician, and so alarmed was Lemoine that he immediately summoned the surgeon-in-chief, La Martinière, to the King’s bedside.

La Martinière examined the royal body and declared that the King must be removed immediately to the château. It was assumed from this that he believed the King to be in imminent danger, for the etiquette of the Court would be seriously hurt if its monarch died anywhere but in the royal apartments in his own Palace.

The King, while submitting to custom, was thoroughly alarmed. His condition was by no means improved by the move; the next day his fever had increased, and bleeding helped him not at all. Before that day was over it was discovered that Louis Quinze was suffering from smallpox.

The château was in a turmoil of excitement. Everyone believed that the King was too old and infirm to survive such an illness. Du Barry came hurrying to his bedside. She would nurse him, she declared. The three aunts came into the sick-room. They too would nurse him, declared Adelaide. They knew they risked infection of this most dreaded disease, but he was their father and it was their duty to remain at his bedside.

The Dauphin and the Dauphine were forbidden the sick-room. There was too much danger there for the heirs to risk death.

The King lay on his bed and knew that his last hour was not far off, and he was filled with remorse as he had been so many times before. He thought of the country he had inherited from his great-grandfather, and he thought of the country he was leaving to his grandson.

‘A not very glorious reign,’ he murmured, ‘though a long one.’

Then he remembered that during it the finances of the state had deteriorated, that the government was in debt to the extent of seventy-eight million livres. Where had he gone wrong? He had squandered much on his mistresses and the upkeep of such places as the Parc aux Cerfs; he had made heavy demands on the taxpayer.

The Seven Years’ War had ended in disaster for France. She had been forced to give up her Canadian possessions to England; the same thing had happened in India. He knew that the French did not take kindly to a King who engaged in wars and did not lead his people in battle. He had heard the whispers about the greatness of Henri Quatre. There had been comparisons, and the great Henri had gleaned even greater honour from these. There had been famine, and certain men – including the King – had been accused of hoarding grain in order to get higher prices for it. During his reign the common people had become more and more wretched. They complained bitterly and continually against the levied taxation. They growled in the streets of Paris about the imposition of the salt tax, that gabelle, and the wine tax, the banvin. The people declared that those who had the least paid the most in taxes, which was iniquitous. The peasant paid taxes for his King, for his seigneur and for the clergy. ‘We will not do this for ever,’ growled the hungry people.

Louis had lived during the last years in a state of indifference. The kingdom will last my lifetime, he had told himself. The old phrase rang in his head now: Après moi – le déluge.

He would not be here to see it. That would be for poor Berry and that bright young girl he had married.

Now, with death close, he saw how wrong he had been to shrug aside his responsibility with a ‘Poor Berry!’

‘I must repent,’ he cried, ‘for I feel the weight of sin heavy on my conscience.’

His priests were at his bedside.

‘If you would repent, Sire, you must show first a humble heart, a true desire for forgiveness,’ he was told.

‘I do desire it. I do,’ cried the suffering King.

‘Then, Sire, first you must dismiss your courtesan from your bedside.’

‘No,’ cried du Barry. ‘We have been together, France, these many years. I’ll not be parted from you now.’

‘You must go, my dear,’ said the King. ‘It is not good for you to be here. This is a vile place – this room. The stench is fearful. I smell it myself. Go, my dear. It is best.’

‘I’ll not leave you. I myself will nurse you.’

‘So you loved me truly,’ said the King.

‘I will stay with you.’ She clung to his hands, and the tears ran down her cheeks. ‘I’ll never leave you … never … never …’

The priests looked on. ‘There can be no hope of saving your soul, Sire, while this woman remains; and time grows short. Will you go to hell for the sake of dying in her arms?’

Du Barry saw his distress and went weeping from the room.

The doors of the sick-room were closed while the priests required the dying man to recount all the sins of his life. This was necessary, the King was told, if he would win absolution.

So he lay on his bed, scarcely able to breathe, scarcely conscious, while he tried to remember all the wickedness of the past. He thought of the carelessness, the indifference, the rule which had touched with decay the very roots of a great kingdom, so that he was leaving a tottering throne to his grandchildren.

But it was not these sins of which he must unburden himself. It was those exploits in the Parc aux Cerfs, the heinous act of living in open sin with such as Madame de Pompadour and Madame du Barry, and thus contaminating the morals of all France.

The confession was made and the Host was carried under a canopy from the chapel to the room in which the King lay dying. Soldiers were stationed on the Palace steps, and the Swiss Guards lined the route through the Palace to the room of death.

Spectators crowded into the ante-room to see the King receiving Holy Communion. The Cardinal who had officiated came to the door of the room and declared in a loud voice:

‘Gentlemen, the King instructs me to tell you that he asks God’s pardon for the scandalous example he has set his people; and to add that, if God vouchsafes his return to health, he will give himself up to repentance and to relieving the lot of his people.’

A few days later Louis Quinze was dead.

In the streets the people shouted: ‘Le Roi est mort. Vive le Roi.’

The citizens of Paris were wild with joy. They had hated Louis whom they had once called the Bien-Aimé. Now they turned to one whom they christened Louis le Désiré.

Antoinette, waiting with the Dauphin in a small room, knew that the King was dying. She knew that, at any moment now, crowds would burst upon them; she knew that the life of reckless gaiety was over, and that the careless Dauphine must not be a carefree Queen.

The door opened suddenly. Madame de Noailles was hurrying into the room. She knelt, never forgetting for one moment the correct posture, although she was visibly moved.

‘Long life to the King and Queen of France!’ she cried.

At that moment others were bursting in upon them. There were many seeking to kiss their hands, to swear to serve them with their hearts and bodies.

Antoinette turned to look at her husband. She saw the fear in his eyes and she understood.

A flash of wisdom came to her then, and she found that she was offering up a silent prayer.

‘Lord God, guide us and protect us, for we are too young to rule.’