The Road to Compiegne

Chapter XVII MADAME DU BARRY

Jean Baptiste du Barry, rake, rogue, adventurer, was feeling very pleased with himself as he left Le Bel. He was by nature an optimist: he could not have succeeded in his way of life if he had not been so. He lived by the expediency of the moment and his unwavering belief in the future.

He was now certain that, although many powerful men at Court – headed by Choiseul – had failed to provide the King with a mistress, he, living on the fringe of the Court, a man with an unsavoury past and a doubtful future, was going to succeed.

‘This time,’ he said to himself, ‘there shall be no failure. The woman is mine. Ha! From Jean Baptiste Comte du Barry, to Louis de Bourbon King of France. Not such a great step for her as some might think!’

Le Bel was not very enthusiastic; du Barry would admit that. He could only believe that the Comte might provide the King with amusement for a night or so.

‘Oh no, no, my friend,’ murmured Jean Baptiste. ‘I will provide him with the successor to Madame de Pompadour.’

He could not prevent himself from laughing aloud. Once before he had come near to success. Had they forgotten that? He certainly had not. But for Madame de Pompadour he would have succeeded too.

He would not count that a great failure. Many men, even at Court, had found a formidable adversary in that woman; but now she was where she could not foil the plans of Jean Baptiste du Barry. And that clever purveyor of woman had a creature to offer who greatly excelled even la belle Dorothée.

Yes, he was certain of that. Jeanne was the most delicious creature who had ever fallen into his hands.

Dorothée also had been delightful after he had trained her. After, of course. They all owed so much to Jean Baptiste.

He had secured a meeting between the King and Dorothée as he now proposed to arrange between Jeanne and the King. The King had been delighted with the lovely Dorothée.

‘Perhaps for one night . . . two nights,’ Le Bel had hinted.

One night! Two nights! Girls were well brought up in the establishment of Monsieur le Comte du Barry. La belle Dorothée was no little bird for the trébuchet, no candidate for the Parc aux Cerfs. He had meant her to reign at Court, and so she would have done, daughter of a Strasbourg water-carrier though she was, but for Madame de Pompadour.

That woman! She was clever, he would grant that; but she would not have succeeded against the Comte du Barry except for the fact that he could not approach the King, and she was beside him every hour of the day.

She did not do the damage herself. She would not soil her aristocratic hands (aristocratic! snorted Jean Baptiste. Was the daughter of a meat-contractor in Paris so much superior to one of a water-carrier in Strasbourg?). No; others told the King that la belle Dorothée had been the mistress of a man who was suffering from a painful disease, the very mention of which, considering the life he led, could throw the King into a panic.

So that was the end of la belle Dorothée. Perhaps he had asked too quickly for that diplomatic post in Cologne. Well, he had more experience now, more finesse; and there was no Madame de Pompadour to sweep a possible rival out of the way. There was only weary Le Bel (showing his age, poor fellow) eagerly looking for someone, anywhere, who could amuse the King.

So Jeanne was going to succeed where Dorothée had failed. Jeanne had the vitality, and when he told her she would be wild with joy. He pondered. Should he try to restrain her? Perhaps. Perhaps not. When he thought of Jeanne in her most abandoned mood and imagined her with the King, he could but hover between hilarious laughter and apprehension. So much depended on the mood of the King.

Louis was surrounded by ladies who failed to please him, so perhaps one who was certainly no fine lady would be exactly what he needed. And Jeanne (surely he did not exaggerate when he called her the most beautiful girl in Paris) was experienced. She had entertained so many men in her amatory life that she would surely know how best to please the King. Jeanne was perfect for the role. She was not very young – nearly twenty-five in fact – although they would say she was twenty-two. Even so that was not exactly young. Yet she remained so fresh that it was extraordinary. It was not only because of that perfect skin; it was something within herself, some inner delight in being alive and well, and able to amuse, some perpetual joy which never seemed to desert her whatever befell her. She retained it even during their quarrels, and they had had some violent ones. (He trembled now to remember an occasion when she had packed her valise and left his house. Thank God he had found her and brought her back.) He was sure it had been hers during those days of poverty in Vaucouleurs, and in that depressing de la Garde establishment where she worked for a while. It was Jeanne herself – bubbling over with good spirits, happy to possess life no matter where she lived it.

Perhaps it was this quality in her, rather than her startling beauty, which made her so outstanding, so certainly a person who could bring good fortune to herself and her benefactor.

He pictured himself swaggering about Versailles and Paris. All those who had warned him that he would end up destitute would be forced to eat their words. He would have some surprises to show them at home in Lévignac, where they still looked upon him as a ne’er-do-well, in spite of the letters he wrote to them from Paris.

He was no longer young; he was ready to accept that sad fact, for he was midway between forty and fifty. He may not have accumulated wealth so far, but he had acquired wisdom and experience, and in a matter of months from now his fortune would be made. Jeanne would make it.

There had been a time when he had been rich. That was twenty years ago when he had been clever enough to make a wealthy marriage. The family had thought that Catharine Ursula Dalmas de Vernongrèse would come to the tumbledown old château in Lévignac, use her money to renovate the place and buy some of the land which they had lost during previous generations, thus bringing back to the du Barry family the dignity of the past.

It was for this very reason that the marriage had been arranged for their eldest son.

Jean Baptiste had had other ideas. He had married Catharine to win her fortune for himself, not to give it to his family.

He admitted now that he had been incautious, but then he had lacked the experience which he had now acquired. He had tried to double his fortune at the gambling tables and very soon Catharine’s money had gone the way of that of the du Barrys.

That was years ago and, since Catharine was now as poor as his own family, there was no need for them to stay together, so they had parted and Jean Baptiste had come to Paris to make another fortune.

And now, as once he had seen Catharine as the woman who would make him a rich man through marriage, he saw Jeanne who was to bring him to the same happy state through the infatuation of the King.

Catharine had been one of the richest girls in Toulouse; Jeanne was the most beautiful in Paris.

She was his to mould and use to his advantage as Catharine had been. A man grows wiser in twenty years, and this time he would succeed.

Nearly twenty-five years before, in the village of Vaucouleurs, Jeanne Bécu (now known as Mademoiselle Vaubarnier) had been born on an August day in the year 1743.

Jeanne was the illegitimate daughter of Anne Bécu, and no one was sure who was her father. Not that anyone cared very much. Some declared it was one of the soldiers who had been billeted in the village. Anne had a lover among them. Others said it was the cook in the village inn. Anne was often in and out of the kitchens there. Others said that of course it was one of the Picpus monks, for Anne went to the convent regularly to sew for them, and she had been seen behaving with Jean Jacques Gomard – Frère Ange to his community – in a manner which should not be expected between monk and visiting seamstress.

When Jeanne was four years old she accompanied her mother to Paris where Anne had found work as a cook in the house of a beautiful courtesan known as Francesca.

Anne was delighted with her new situation especially when Jeanne, whose beauty was already remarkable, attracted the attention of Francesca’s lover, Monsieur Billard-Dumonceau who, being an amateur artist, desired to paint the child’s portrait.

‘You must lend me Jeanne for a time,’ he told Anne. ‘I will take her to my house, for I am going to paint her. You will have nothing to fear; she will be returned to you safely.’

Anne Bécu had no fear. She looked upon Monsieur Billard-Dumonceau as her benefactor; moreover she had formed a strong friendship with a fellow servant at Mademoiselle Francesca’s; this was Nicolas Rançon. They had become lovers, but because they were both advancing into middle age they were contemplating entering into a more settled relationship.

When the Abbé Arnaud, who called on Monsieur Dumonceau, saw Jeanne, he took her on to his knee and asked her who she was.

Without embarrassment she told him. He said she was the loveliest little girl he had ever seen, and added that it was regrettable that she was without education.

Monsieur Billard-Dumonceau considered this, and eventually decided that he would have her educated; consequently she was sent to the Convent of Sainte Aure which had originally been a charity school for the daughters of the poor and criminal classes. Recently it had been decided that the girls who were brought there should not necessarily be in need of care, protection and correction; they might be the daughters of poor yet respectable people who had been selected to receive some sort of education.

In this place, where it was considered a sin to laugh, Jeanne remained until she was fifteen years old, Monsieur Billard-Dumonceau having paid the fees which would keep her there until that time. He had by then forgotten the charming little girl who had interested him, and as her fees were no longer paid Jeanne was sent home to her mother.

So out into the streets of Paris came Jeanne, more lovely than ever in her early womanhood, her golden curls released from the hood and forehead band which, in the Convent, had restricted them, her blue eyes alert for adventure.

And the adventures which befell Jeanne were inevitable.

She had begun as apprentice to a hairdresser only to become the hairdresser’s mistress and so enslave him that he wished to marry her. His mother had quickly sent Jeanne away.

She had then become ‘reader’ to Madame de la Garde, the widow of a rich tax-farmer, but the widow had two sons and Jeanne’s relationship with them, being discovered by the widow, resulted in her instant dismissal.

Her next post was in the millinery and dressmaking establishment of Monsieur Labille in the Rue Neuve des Petits Champs; and from the moment she stepped into that scented and luxurious establishment she knew that she would find its manners and customs more congenial than anything she had encountered before.

Her duties were by no means arduous, for the Sieur Labille quickly decided that she would be of more use as a salesgirl than in the back rooms, making hats and gowns.

She changed her name to Mademoiselle Lange; and in the perfumed showroom she waited on noblewomen and the men who accompanied them on their shopping expeditions. Many a gentleman came to Labille’s to assist his women friends to choose a gown or hat. It was slyly said that the gowns and hats of Monsieur Labille had a great attraction for the male sex.

Now a wider life stretched before Jeanne. She was intoxicated by the splendour about her. She could not resist the fascinating manners, the charming compliments of these gentlemen who were quite different from Monsieur Lametz, the hairdresser, and even from the sons of Madame de la Garde who, she realised now, had both been a little self-important and patronising towards their mother’s young reader.

Monsieur Labille wanted the whole world to know how he looked after his girls. They must live in; they must be in their beds at an early hour. They must go regularly to Mass. He was not averse however to their delivering a purchase to a house as a special favour and, if they were petted and made much of and stayed a little longer than necessary, Monsieur Labille might shake his finger and deliver a lecture, but he could not be harsh with his girls. He doted on them; so could he blame others for doing so?

He realised that of all his girls Mademoiselle Jeanne Lange was the most adorable; and so he lived in fear that one day some young man would carry her off and she would grace the establishment no longer. He could do nothing to protect her from the admiration of his customers; after all, in her ability to attract lay her great value to him.

Jeanne very soon had her lovers – rich young men on the fringe of the Court who brought good business to the shop. The chief of these was Radix de Sainte-Foix, a very rich young man who was a farmer-general and Navy-contractor.

The mistress of such a rich young man was quickly noticed and very soon Mademoiselle Lange became known in many layers of Paris society, because Radix de Sainte-Foix enjoyed taking Jeanne about with him and observing the admiration and envy she aroused (and the envy he himself did). Jeanne’s life was full of lighthearted gaiety. All her spare time was spent in the company of this doting lover, until one day he took her to the house of Madame Duquesnoy.

This woman – who called herself the Marquise – posed as a noblewoman who had lost her fortune and was attempting to retrieve it by running a gaming-house for her friends. She was determined to keep this exclusive, so she said, and members were closely scrutinised before they were allowed to join her circle.

Sainte-Foix determined to take Jeanne there. But, he explained, Mademoiselle Lange, salesgirl at Labille’s, would certainly not be admitted. Not that he was the sort of man who would let such a trifle stand in his way. He was going to give her a new name and a new personality. To begin with she was to be Mademoiselle Beauvarnier. Did she not think that more aristocratic than Lange? And she was not to mention her connexion with Labille’s.

Jeanne was ever ready for some new adventure, and as Mademoiselle Beauvarnier she frequented the salon of the self-styled Marquise Duquesnoy.

Jean Baptiste du Barry was a frequent visitor, being interested in Madame Duquesnoy’s methods, which were similar to his own. Like herself he entertained lavishly; he had his gaming tables, and he introduced attractive young women to men, allowing them to use rooms in his house.

But he would be more successful than Madame Duquesnoy, he decided, because he trained his girls himself. He could take any little grisette and turn her into a mistress fit for a petty nobleman.

He was constantly looking out for suitable entrants to his establishment; and no sooner had he set eyes on Jeanne than he decided that he would mould her most advantageously.

Jeanne had never met anyone like Jean Baptiste du Barry. Glib and suave, he could with ease assume the manners of Versailles – so at least it seemed to a girl who knew nothing of such manners. At last she had met a real nobleman and she was fascinated.

She was wasted . . . wasted, declared Jean Baptiste. Such beauty to be thrown away in a shop! He had never heard anything like it. Jeanne must leave Labille’s immediately.

And where should she go? she asked. Where would she find work as easy and pleasant as that which she did at Labille’s?

‘Work!’ cried Jean Baptiste. ‘You should never work. Others should work for you. You shall come to my house. There you shall live as . . . Madame du Barry.’

‘You mean you would marry me?’

‘Willingly – if I had not already a wife. But we will not let such a trifle deter us. Come, my child, I will make a lady of you. Who knows, one day I may take you to Versailles.’

It was too gloriously glittering. She would consult with her mother and Aunt Hélène, she told her new admirer.

He was a little disturbed, but to show his goodwill he offered to give the Rançons lodging in his house if Jeanne would leave Labille’s and come to him.

That decided Jeanne and her family. She had at last fulfilled the promise of her youth. She was the mistress of a nobleman.

For four years Jeanne lived in the house of the Comte du Barry. During that time he sought to make a lady of her; a feat which, Jeanne assured him, was quite impossible, and with which opinion he came to agree.

First of all he changed her name. He did not like Beauvarnier. He thought Vaubarnier more distinctive. Jeanne, happily accepting the new name, quickly summed up the character of her new lover. He was boastful; he was not entirely to be trusted; but she grew fond of him and she realised that he was doing a great deal for her. Her mother and stepfather were delighted to be lodged in such a magnificent house and that, they said, made the liaison so respectable, even though the Comte had many mistresses, and they were all kept in the house. They were all attractive – they would have been of no use to him otherwise – and he enjoyed watching them appear at his evening parties, when they were expected to entertain the guests. He put no restraint on the extent of the admiration which was offered to them and made his visitors pay handsomely for such privileges.

Often Jean Baptiste would take her to a ball at the Opera House and entertainments at the house of noblemen; she was always singled out for her remarkable beauty which became by no means impaired by the life she led. Others might wilt and fade – not so Jeanne. She had an unusual vitality and imperturbability; she was invariably good-tempered; she appeared to live entirely in the present and be without the slightest concern for the future.

Even the Duc de Richelieu when he saw her was attracted.

Perhaps it was the attentions of such a highly placed nobleman of the Court which gave Jean Baptiste grandiose ideas.

He had long desired a diplomatic post at Court, but although he had made many supplications to the Duc de Choiseul, he had been unsuccessful; and he was still suffering from the slight he had received at the time of the La Belle Dorothée incident when he had asked for a post in Cologne and been so promptly refused it.

He would find some way of being received at Court; and he believed it would be through Jeanne.

She was so ready to fall in with his plans that he was sure that if she ever had an opportunity she would work for him. She had been very kind to his son Adolphe who sometimes lived with them, for she was fond of children and they of her. Adolphe, in his early teens, looked upon her as an elder sister, and she was delighted with their relationship; and Jean Baptiste knew too that if she ever had the power she would not forget to help Adolphe.

Why should she not bring good to them all? She regarded herself as a member of the family. She was even known in some quarters as Madame du Barry.

‘The good of one is the good of all,’ said Jean Baptiste.

That was why he was so excited because Le Bel had agreed to meet Jeanne.

He returned to the house before she did, and he was uneasy – as he always was when she was out alone; and when she arrived he fiercely demanded to know where she had been.

‘Taking a glass of wine with Madame Gourdan,’ she told him; she was invariably frank.

‘Taking a glass of wine with that old bawd! You must be mad. At such a time . . . at such a time. This could ruin everything. What did she want of you?’

‘Only to offer me shelter if I decided to leave your house.’

‘Impudence. Ha! She knows you would not be so foolish.’

‘I left you once,’ Jeanne reminded him.

He strode to her, put his arms about her and held her tightly. ‘Do not even speak of it,’ he cried.

‘Well, I did not agree to go to her,’ she said soothingly.

‘I should think not . . . when Fortune is about to smile on you as she never has before.’

‘And who is Fortune . . . this time?’ she asked.

‘One whose name I will not mention lest you laugh me to scorn for a pretentious old fool. Le Bel is coming to supper with us. I want you to sparkle for him. I want you to dazzle him. Jeanne, this is the most important night of your life.’

She was accustomed to his flights of fancy. She was fond of him; she wanted to please him; so she promised him that she would be as charming as she knew how to be to his friend Le Bel.

‘Le Bel,’ said Louis, ‘you are not attending. What is on your mind?’

‘A thousand apologies, Sire.’ Le Bel helped the King into his coat. ‘My thoughts were with a certain . . . woman.’

‘At your age, Le Bel!’ said Louis smiling.

‘Such a woman, Sire. I have never seen the like before.’

The King yawned. ‘I remember the last one you brought here.’

‘This, Sire, is quite a different type, I can say, with honesty, that neither I nor Your Majesty has ever seen such a beauty.’

‘I fear I am growing tired of such pleasures,’ murmured the King. ‘My doctors advise me to be more moderate.’

‘Yet . . . I should like to show her to Your Majesty.’

‘I am in no mood for more of your grisettes.’

‘Sire, she is no grisette. She is the sister-in-law of the Comte du Barry. The loveliest creature I ever set eyes on. And her husband, I have heard, is quite complacent. He never bothers his wife and is quite happy to know that she is universally adored.’

‘I have rarely known you so eulogistic, Le Bel.’

‘Sire, wait until you have seen her!’

‘I do not think I wish to see her.’

‘I know, Sire, these girls are brought to you, and you are too kind, too courteous to turn them away when they disappoint you. But I should like to show you this one. You would only need to look. I have invited her to my apartments tomorrow night. If Your Majesty would consent to be hidden in the apartment, you could see this woman for yourself, and if you did not like what you saw she would be dismissed and need never know that you have seen her.’

‘This is a new game you have invented for me to play,’ said the King.

‘Sire, does it appeal?’

‘Not overmuch. But I believe that your taste is not what it once was. I do not believe that this creature has anything more to offer than a hundred others. So I will put you to the test.’

‘Tomorrow night, Sire. I’ll wager you will change your mind.’

‘Do not let the woman know she is observed. She should not be warned to be on her best behaviour. I would see her as she really is.’

Le Bel bowed his head.

So Jeanne was taken to that fateful supper party in the company of Jean Baptiste who called himself her brother-in-law. It was a very gay party, and Jeanne, supping for the first time within the Palace of Versailles, was as excited as a child.

She wore a dress which far surpassed in elegance any she had ever had. However, she quickly forgot Jean Baptiste’s instructions about her behaviour and, since the guests kept filling her glass with wine, she very soon became her abandoned self.

Jeanne could, at such times, throw off her ladylike manners as lightly as though they were a cloak Jean Baptiste had wrapped about her. She could become what she once was – what neither he nor the stern nuns of Sainte Aure had been able to eradicate – a lighthearted, generous and vital girl of the lower class of Paris.

Louis was seated on a chair behind curtains through which he could see without being seen and which had been placed over a door so that he could, if the proceedings became tedious, quietly open the door and slip away.

From the first he had thought her very lovely and had determined that for her beauty alone she should spend the night with him; but when he saw her throw aside the manners which had been so clearly grafted on, when he heard that loud and abandoned laughter, the epithets of the streets, the ability to laugh at everything, he found himself watching, alert, while a smile curved his lips.

She was of the streets of Paris no doubt, but she was quite different from any of the little girls who had found their way to the Parc aux Cerfs. She was unique in her character as well as in that perfect face and form.

He was torn between the desire to remain and watch, and to go into the room and send all the others away that he and she might be alone.

Le Bel was right; this girl had something that others of her class lacked. He would amend that: she had something which he had never discovered in anyone before.

He was excited as he had not been for years. He felt happy as he had not been since the death of Madame de Pompadour.

Was he so old? Fifty-eight. Why, in the presence of that girl he could feel twenty!

Louis parted the curtains and stepped into the room.

Everyone about the table rose, except Jeanne. Louis felt exultant. It was characteristic of her that she should not rise.

He ignored them all and went to her.

‘Madame,’ he said, ‘as none of these people will present you to me, may I present myself to you?’

‘Why, of course you can,’ said Jeanne. ‘Do you want to join the party?’

‘Madame is kind,’ he said.

‘Oh, that’s all right,’ said Jeanne. ‘One more makes little difference.’

She was studying him with pleasure. She saw an ageing man who even now was very handsome. He was more distinguished-looking than any man in this room; and he was looking at her with . . . Oh, well, Jeanne knew that look. She had seen it many times before.

Le Bel was stammering: ‘Madame du Barry, you are in the presence of His Majesty.’

‘Well!’ cried Jeanne laughing loudly, ‘I thought I had seen your face somewhere before.’

There was an awed silence in the room. Then the King began to laugh.

‘I am so glad,’ he said. ‘That makes us seem less like strangers, does it not?’

‘Oh, there’s a joke for you!’ said Jeanne. ‘I never thought of the King and me as strangers.’

‘It is a thought which makes me desolate,’ said Louis. ‘We must make nonsense of it by becoming friends.’

‘You’re a nice man, Your . . .’ She turned to Le Bel and Jean Baptiste, and she cared nothing to see that they were positively writhing in their embarrassment. ‘What do I call him?’ she said.

Le Bel began to stammer, but the King took her hand. ‘Call him your friend,’ he said; ‘that would please him more than any other name.’

Jeanne raised her beautiful eyes to the ceiling. She said as though to someone up there: ‘The King is my friend. Well, I never thought to see the day . . .’

‘Nor I,’ said Louis, ‘when I should meet someone who gave me such pleasure merely to look at and listen to.’

Jeanne had turned to the others as though to say: ‘Listen to him!’

But Louis had waved his hand.

‘Madame du Barry and I would prefer to be alone,’ he said.

‘The King has a new grisette,’ said Choiseul to his sister. ‘A very low creature. I give her to the end of the week.’

‘Then clearly we need not bother ourselves about her.’

‘Oh no,’ murmured the Duc. ‘She is of the lowest type. The King’s taste does not improve with age.’

‘Yet,’ said the Duchesse, ‘I have noticed that Louis looks happier than he has for a long time. He was very gay at the promenade today, and he had an air as though he were watching the clock, eager to be gone to some rendezvous.’

‘I will send for Le Bel and ask him about the woman,’ said the Duc.

‘Do so now; I am less complacent than you. It is due to something I have seen in Louis’ face.’

Choiseul sent for the valet de chambre.

‘Now, Le Bel,’ he said, ‘who is this new little bird who sings. so gaily in the trébuchet?’

‘You refer, Monsieur le Duc, to Madame du Barry?’

‘Madame du Barry! Is she the wife of that disreputable creature who pestered me in the past?’

‘His sister-in-law, Monsieur le Duc.’

‘And you brought her to the King?’

‘Monsieur le Duc, I have my duty to perform.’

‘I wish it would lead you to look a little higher than the gutters of Paris.’

‘Monsieur, she is the sister-in-law of the Comte du Barry. One could hardly describe her as from the gutter.’

‘The Comte du Barry? He is no Comte. He should be forced to abandon a title to which he has no right. I hear the woman is low . . . very low . . .’

‘Very low, Monsieur le Duc.’

‘Such a woman could not possibly amuse His Majesty for more than a night or two.’

‘She could not, Monsieur le Duc.’

Choiseul bowed his head. ‘Very well. But Le Bel, you could consult me before you bring these very low creatures to the attention of His Majesty.’

‘In future, Monsieur le Duc, that is what I will do.’

Le Bel retired. He was more perturbed than he would have wished Choiseul and his sister to see. He had not for years known the King so pleased with a woman.

Choiseul was not the only member of the Court who was disturbed.

Richelieu, who knew from personal experience how attractive Jeanne could be, had been ready enough to see her brought to the King for a few nights; he would not have objected to her staying in the secret apartments of Versailles for a week – but no longer.

It was incredible that Louis could become so infatuated. Admittedly the girl possessed rare beauty, but her speech belonged to the faubourgs and nowhere else; yet since it issued from those charming lips the King seemed to find every word she uttered comparable with the wit of a Richelieu or a Voltaire.

He was quite enraptured. She had already been presented with many precious jewels; and the whole Court was expected to make much of her. She appeared at the intimate supper parties in the petits appartements, although of course, never having been presented, she must not appear in the State apartments.

At these parties the King was as merry as he had been in those days when Madame de Pompadour had been there to gratify all his wishes and to provide him with elegant and witty entertainment.

It was an extraordinary phenomenon, but the fifty-eight-year-old Louis was in love, as he had not been since the days of his boyhood.

Madame de Pompadour had been his dear friend, but she had never enjoyed the health which was clearly Madame du Barry’s. She was not a sensual woman as Madame du Barry was. It was obvious that this young woman of the outstanding beauty and vitality was as experienced as the King himself in the art of making love.

Richelieu sought to point out to Louis – in a perfectly respectful manner – that he was behaving like a callow youth.

‘It is impossible for me to see, Sire,’ he said, ‘why you should feel so enamoured of this woman. Oh, she is beautiful, but so are many others.’

‘You must be blind,’ said the King, ‘if you compare her beauty with that of others.’

‘Yet,’ murmured Richelieu, ‘it is said that love makes us blind.’

The King was too happy to be irritated, and that gave Richelieu the courage to go on.

‘What has she, Sire, which others lack?’

‘The secret of making me forget I am an old man. She, so young, has taught me much I did not know before.’

‘Your Majesty was never in a brothel, that is obvious,’ said Richelieu with some asperity.

And still Louis did not reprove him.

‘I know,’ he said, ‘I am not the first. I believe I have succeeded Sainte-Foix.’

‘Your Majesty succeeded Sainte-Foix as you succeeded Pharamond.’

The King merely laughed at this allusion to one of the first Kings of the Franks, who lived in the fifth century.

Then it was clear to Richelieu that Louis did not care how many lovers Madame du Barry had had; he did not care how humble were her origins. He was so happy that he had found a woman who possessed all that he sought, a woman who could make him laugh again, forget he was fifty-eight years old; a woman who could make him feel young and gay because he was in love.

Choiseul’s uneasiness grew. He had seen how precarious his position had become during the King’s friendship with the Dauphine; he was not prepared to allow another woman to come between him and the King.

How wise Madame de Pompadour had been to keep him supplied with uneducated little beauties while she remained his friend and adviser. But what was this woman, more than an uneducated grisette? The King must be in his dotage.

As for the Duchesse de Gramont, she was furious.

‘If he keeps this woman with him,’ she declared, ‘every Court lady will consider herself to be insulted.’

Choiseul was not the man to let himself be easily defeated. He could use his tremendous energies to discredit a woman such as Madame du Barry, as readily as he would to settle some political dispute.

‘She is clearly a wanton,’ he told his sister. ‘Du Barry keeps what is tantamount to a brothel. It should not be difficult to discover such facts about her that the King will have to dismiss her from Court.’

‘Then let us immediately begin our search,’ cried the Duchesse.

It was not long before they had discovered a very important piece of information. The woman was not Madame du Barry at all; she was Mademoiselle Bécu, Rançon, Lange, Beauvarnier or Vaubarnier.

This was the most damaging evidence against her, because the King had emphatically declared, after the death of the Queen, that he would have no mistress at Court who was not a married woman. He had no intention of allowing any woman to lure him to marriage, as Madame de Maintenon had lured his great-grandfather.

The first step was to summon Le Bel.

Le Bel had changed since Jeanne had come to Court, for he realised that by bringing her to Louis’ notice he had incurred the annoyance of the all-powerful Duc de Choiseul and his sister, and Le Bel knew very well what that could mean.

Both Choiseul and his sister left Le Bel in little doubt that they considered the offence he had committed a major transgression against Court etiquette, against the King and, most heinous of all, against themselves.

‘Idiot!’ cried Choiseul. ‘You are more than an idiot, you are a knave.’

‘I trust I have not deeply offended you, Monsieur le Duc,’ began Le Bel.

‘Do not look at me in such alarm. I am wondering what His Majesty will say when he hears what you have done.’

‘I . . . Monsieur . . I but obey His Majesty’s orders.’

‘Not content,’ went on the Duc turning to his sister, ‘with bringing a common prostitute to His Majesty’s notice, this man has brought one who is also an unmarried woman.’

‘It is unforgivable.’

‘Monsieur le Duc . . . Madame la Duchesse . . . there has been some mistake. This woman . . . she is the sister-in-law of the Comte du Barry. She is married to his brother . . .’

‘Married to the brother of the Comte du Barry!’ snorted Choiseul. ‘I tell you this woman is Jeanne Bécu, or Rançon or Lange or Beauvarnier or Vaubarnier. A pleasant type, to need so many names! But there is one title to which she has no right. She has never been married, and you . . . idiot, dolt, knave, have offended against the King’s strict rule.’

‘Monsieur le Duc,’ cried Le Bel trembling, ‘if this is so . . .’

‘If this is so? It is so. I have made it my business to discover the truth about this woman. She is an unmarried woman, and if you value your position at Court you will get rid of her . . . quickly, and extricate the King from this impossible situation into which you have thrust him.’

‘I will do all in my power . . .’

‘It is to be hoped, for your sake, that you will,’ said the Duchesse slyly.

‘And with all speed,’ added Choiseul.

Le Bel immediately called on Jean Baptiste.

‘What is wrong?’ asked Jean Baptiste. ‘You look as if you have lost a fortune.’

‘Worse! I am in danger of losing my place at Court.’

‘What is this? Calm yourself.’

‘Jeanne is not Madame du Barry. She is not married.’

‘But, Monsieur Le Bel.’

‘It is useless to lie,’ said Le Bel firmly. ‘The Duc de Choiseul has his spies everywhere. He knows she is not married to your brother.’

Jean Baptiste was taken aback. ‘Well?’ he said.

‘You fool! You’ve deceived the King. Do you not know that he does not take unmarried mistresses?’

‘We will get her married.’

‘The point is that she was not married when you said she was.’

‘A trifle.’

‘It will be the end of her chances at Court.’

‘Listen,’ said Jean Baptiste, ‘I will get her married immediately. I have a brother who is a bachelor. He will marry her and that will allow us to snap our fingers in the pug’s face of Monsieur le Duc.’

Le Bel hesitated. He greatly feared Choiseul, and wished that he had never brought Jeanne to Court. He could only win back the Duc’s approval by ridding the Court of her.

He made up his mind that he would do what the Duc wished him to.

He said firmly: ‘I must go to the King at once and tell him the truth.’

Le Bel begged for a private audience.

Louis looked at him with some concern. The man had changed visibly in the last week or so. He seemed furtive, afraid.

‘What ails you?’ asked Louis. ‘You will have to take better care of your health. You remind me of that man who dropped dead a week or so ago. You remember the one I mean. He had your looks. Take care, Le Bel.’

‘Sire, I am in good enough health. But I greatly fear I have offended you, in bringing Madame du Barry to your notice.’

‘Then you must be suffering from madness. I was never more pleased.’

‘This woman is not what you think her to be. She is no Comtesse.’

Louis smiled. ‘I am quite ready to believe that.’

‘Sire, her mother was a cook.’

‘How interesting,’ said Louis. ‘I hope she shares her mother’s skill. You know my interest in the culinary art. Is this yet another pleasure we may explore together?’

‘A cook, Sire . . . a cook . . .’ wailed Le Bel. ‘The daughter of a cook received at Versailles!’

Louis burst out laughing. How many years is it, pondered Le Bel, since he laughed like that. He would never let the woman go.

‘You concern yourself overmuch with small distinctions,’ he was saying. ‘A Comtesse . . . a cook. I am a King, Le Bel, and I have so far to look down on both cooks and Comtesses that it is difficult for me to distinguish how far they are from each other.’

‘Your Majesty is pleased to jest, but I have not told you everything. There is something even more disgraceful.’

Louis’ face clouded. He was beginning to be annoyed with the sly reference to Jeanne’s past. He did not care to examine the past – either his or hers – all he cared was that she was making his present life tolerable.

‘I do not wish to hear it,’ he said.

‘Sire, I must tell you.’

Le Bel went on, ignoring Louis’ look of astonishment. ‘Forgive me, Sire, but this woman is not married.’

The King hesitated.

Then he shrugged his shoulders. ‘So much the worse,’ he said. ‘But that is easily remedied. Let her be married at once.’ He began to laugh. ‘It would certainly be as well in this case that I am given no opportunity to commit any act of folly.’

Le Bel could only stare at the King. Yet he was not seeing the King. Louis in love, benign and happy, was not to be feared in the same way as the Duc de Choiseul and his sister.

Le Bel dared not go to them and tell them that the King had merely said: ‘Then let her be married.’

‘Sire, you cannot . . . you must not . . .’ wailed Le Bel. Louis looked incredulous for a few moments, then he said sharply: ‘You exceed your duties.’

‘But Sire, this . . . this low woman . . . this unmarried woman.’

Louis’ face turned scarlet. He picked up a pair of tongs and brandished them. He was like a young lover ready to defend his mistress.

‘You tempt me,’ he cried, ‘to strike you with these. Leave my presence at once.’

Le Bel staggered; his face was purple now, his mouth twitching, and Louis was ashamed of his unaccustomed display of anger.

‘Go to your apartments,’ he said kindly. ‘You need rest. You are growing old, Le Bel. As I was . . . until Madame du Barry came to cheer me. Go along now. You have taken to heart matters which are not of the slightest importance.’

Le Bel bowed and left the King.

He went to his apartments. He had discovered something. The King was in love as he had not been for years. He was going to keep Madame du Barry at Court. She was to be recognised as maîtresse-en-titre. At last the place of Madame de Pompadour had been filled.

And Choiseul? He would remain his enemy.

‘Go to your apartments and rest,’ the King had said. Rest! With Choiseul ready for revenge?

The next day, after a restless night, Le Bel had a stroke. He lived only for a few hours.

He died of shock, said the Court. The shock of seeing the ex-grisette whom he had brought to the trébuchet, about to fill the place of Madame de Pompadour.

Meanwhile Jean Baptiste lost no time in bringing to Paris his unmarried brother, the Chevalier Guillaume du Barry, that a marriage might take place between him and Mademoiselle de Vaubarnier (Jean Baptiste had added the de to her name by this time).

The Chevalier Guillaume was far from unwilling. He was promised that he would be amply rewarded for his services, and he was glad of any excitement which would take him away, if only temporarily, from the tumbledown old château in Lévignac where he and his sisters lived under the despotic rule of their mother.

Jean Baptiste was delighted with the way his plans were working out. The King’s demand that Jeanne should be married pointed to one fact: Louis had evidently decided that Jeanne was to be received at Court, and this was tantamount to recognising her as maîtresse-en-titre.

Jeanne was being prepared to follow in the footprints of Madame de Pompadour, which to all earnest observers were still visibly leading from the valleys of obscurity to the summit of power.

Determined that his interests should not be forgotten he brought from Lévignac to Paris, with his brother Guillaume, his sister, Fanchon, so that she might become Jeanne’s companion at Court and thus look after the interests of the family.

Fanchon was middle-aged, slightly lame but shrewd; and she had a great affection for her adventurous brother and was very grateful to him for rescuing her from the dreary life at the family château.

Jean Baptiste then busied himself with providing a forged birth certificate for Jeanne, in which he not only described her as the legitimate daughter of Jean-Jacques Gomard de Vaubarnier but deducted a few years from her age. Jeanne was twenty-five, which was not really very young, so he would make her out to be twenty-two.

As for the Chevalier Guillaume, he became the ‘Haut et puissant Seigneur, Messire Guillaume, Comte du Barry, Capitaine des Troupes Détachées de la Marine’.

‘Everybody,’ said Jean Baptiste, ‘is now happy.’

Guillaume could return home amply rewarded, Fanchon would have a place at Court, and Jeanne need have no qualms about masquerading under a false name as she was now in truth, Madame du Barry. The King was delighted, because he need no longer concern himself with this little point of etiquette and could enjoy the company of his mistress in peace.

But there were many who were far from content. And chief of these was, of course, Choiseul.