Chapter Nine - Wigs, Roses, and Things I Swear Were Not My Fault

“I’m not certain I heard you correctly, mon petit chou,” Mother said. “A goat ate your wig?”

My gaze remained fastened to the carriage window, watching the Seine pass by on our way to the Palais-Royal. “Yes, Maman.”

I stared at the river—at the glimmering torches reflected in the black water, the slim boats filled with wares for sale—wondering where my brother fought with the coachman. Was it here, across from the Nôtre-Dame with its massive rose windows and towering spire? Or farther down, concealed under the stone arches of the Pont-Neuf? Did the coachman call out as he fell? Did Étienne?

“Which one?” Mother asked.

I ripped my eyes away from the flowing water. “What?”

“Which goat ate your wig?”

“I don’t know, Maman. A big one. Black fur, pointy horns, smelled a bit like old cheese.”

“Ah.” Mother nodded thoughtfully. “Claude has always had quite the appetite.”

“Does it matter?” Renée snapped, arms crossed over her salmon-colored bodice.

“You needn’t glower, Renée,” Mother chided. “It’s unbecoming.”

Renée’s glower deepened. Mother frowned.

“Your maman is right, Renée,” Father said. He held a pamphlet on the rules of whist in front of him and was squinting rather spectacularly at the miniscule text. A sudden memory rose of Étienne sitting in the same spot with a book shoved up against the window, trying to catch a glimpse of the words underneath the passing torchlight. My stomach tightened, a sob trying to break free, and I looked away.

“It’s also unbecoming to ignore the arrest of your son!” Renée yelled.

Silence blanketed the carriage like falling snow. Mother avoided Renée’s eye, fiddling with the multicolored butterfly wings pinned to her bodice. I balled my fists onto my lap.

“Why are you acting like you don’t care?” Renée asked, swiping at the wetness in her eyes. “Don’t you love Étienne? Don’t you love us? Why do you refuse to help?”

My parents remained silent. Father looked up from his pamphlet, though he didn’t say a word, and Mother brought a hand to the white ostrich plume tucked inside her powdered updo. She began yanking out the tiny, delicate feathers, one by one. “We care, chérie,” Mother said. “Of course we care. Someone will come forward and speak up for our Étienne.” She winced, as if saying his name burned her tongue. “I know it.”

“Why don’t you come forward?” Renée asked. “Why don’t you speak up?”

Mother didn’t respond. She shot a pleading glance at Father, but he was equally motionless and uncomfortable, fingers curled around the pamphlet. Then her eyes flicked to me. There was a desperate look in them again, like she was somehow thinking I would come to her aid and defend her against my unruly sister.

I bit down hard on the inside of my lip. Whenever Mother acted like this, I wondered if she forgot what happened when I was brought into the grand salon of our country château, shaking, scared, and choking on lake water. Despite Étienne’s attempts to expel the water from my lungs, I couldn’t catch my breath, and my brother was wild and hysteric, screaming for Mother to help.

But she’d simply remained frozen at the back of the salon, face powdered, cheeks rouged, clutching at the ruby pendant around her neck. Sometimes, late at night after I woke from yet another nightmare where the current dragged me deep below the lake, I could still hear her muttering, “I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do.”

Underneath my lavender waistcoat, my breath faltered.

“He’s going to die!” I burst out. “Étienne has been sentenced to death, and if you do nothing, he’ll hang.”

This caught Mother’s attention. Her hand fell from the ostrich feather and onto the velvet seats with a dull thump, skin turning pale as fresh marzipan. “Sentenced to death? Étienne?” Her breaths came out in short, frantic hiccups. “No that—that can’t be true.”

The pamphlet in Father’s hands tore around the edges where he had it gripped in his fists, but he still said nothing. He never did, leaving all the words to Mother like a great coward.

“Well, it is,” Renée said. She’d stopped attempting to wipe away the tears, and they streamed down her cheeks, forming wet tracks on her rosy skin. “And it might not have happened if you and Father had gone to the Bastille to talk with someone like Olivier and I asked you to. But you didn’t, because you don’t care.”

“No, chérie, no.” Mother leaned forward and reached for Renée’s hand. Renée flinched away from her touch. “I told you we care. We simply don’t know—”

She couldn’t finish her sentence, for the carriage arrived in front of the Palais-Royal, and Renée threw open the door, leaping onto the cobblestone streets before we’d come to a complete stop. In seconds, her small frame was swallowed up by opera-goers and commoners alike, all crowding together on Rue de Richelieu.

“You know we care, don’t you, Olivier? Mon petit chou?” Mother asked. Her voice had a high, confused sort of tinge. “You know we love you?”

I opened my mouth to respond, but all I could think of was the way she’d looked at me ten years ago in the grand salon. The way her eyes focused on the oil painting above the marble hearth so she didn’t have to watch me struggle to breathe. The way she started to come toward me multiple times and never made it farther than the fringe edging the oriental carpet.

If she had called for a doctor earlier instead of standing there, quiet and scared as a damned church mouse, perhaps I would have never become so fearful and panicked. Perhaps I would have been able to live a normal life.

But she didn’t.

I closed my mouth, turned to the door, and without a word, climbed out of the carriage and into the streets in search of my sister.

***

The Palais-Royal looked like something from a nightmare. The streets were choked with carriages and horses, the sound of wheels against cobblestone mixing in with whispers of gossip and bursts of laughter. Unlike Versailles, the Palais-Royal was in the center of Paris, and commoners who weren’t attending the opera gathered around to watch the well-to-dos in their finery, their outfits of satin and lace flashing underneath the moonlight.

As I walked to the entrance, hoping to catch a glimpse of Renée along the way, giggling children ran out in front of me, hands outstretched for coins or bits of food. The heat from the day hadn’t dissipated with the sunset, and the air was still thick and humid, hanging above me like bundles of damp silk. The breeze smelled of old perfume and unwashed bodies, acrid smoke lingering on my tongue whenever I opened my mouth to take a breath.

Though I knew it was unlikely the king would be lingering outside the opera entrance, I searched for him anyway, my heart stuttering every time my gaze landed on a boy close to my age. As expected, I didn’t spot him in the crowd. But I did spot my sister, leaning against the stone walls of the palace and talking to some poor bastard with front teeth the size of thumb nails.

Renée had tugged down her embroidered bodice, and her chest spilled over the top of her dress in a way that made me want to simultaneously cover my eyes and vomit onto the cobblestones. Though I was too far away to hear any of their conversation, it contained a fair amount of posturing on the poor bastard’s part and equal amounts of giggling on my sister’s.

As I watched, she produced a fan from somewhere in all the flounces of pink satin and lace on her dress and flicked it open, waving it in front of her face as she inclined her head to listen. Her gray eyes were wide, fixed on the man as if he were the only person in existence. I didn’t know whether to be traumatized or impressed.

Straightening out the embroidered cuffs on my frock coat, I waltzed over to her. She caught sight of me and sighed, but didn’t stop her conversation. The man, however, noticed nothing, his attention fixed on her entirely-too-low bodice.

“What are you doing?” I hissed.

“Go away,” she hissed back before turning to the man with an exaggerated giggle.

“Oh. Good evening, monsieur,” the man said, bowing stiffly. “Who might you be?”

“I’m her twin brother.” I took Renée’s arm in an attempt to lead her away, but her feet were planted firmly on the cobblestones. “And quite talented at the art of sword fighting, if you should know.”

“Ah. Fascinating,” he replied.

Renée yanked her arm away. “Olivier, quit it.”

I ignored her. “I assure you, you wouldn’t want to engage in any. . . relations with my sister, monsieur. She routinely calls out in her sleep about how much she adores ferrets. It’s all rather frightening.”

The man made a move to respond, but Renée grabbed my wrist and dragged me aside, stomping over to a less crowded area of the street and giving my shoulder a hard shove. “What is wrong with you?”

I rubbed at my shoulder. “Merde, Renée. I was saving you. Did you not see the size of his teeth?”

“I wasn’t speaking with him because I fancied him! I was speaking with him to learn the whereabouts of the king.”

“Oh.”

She shook her head in exasperation.

“Did it work?” I asked.

Renée squeezed her eyes shut, taking in a sharp breath before she said, “Yes. The king’s private box is on the first tier of the opera house, to the direct right of the stage.”

“Right. Well, we should—What should we do?”

“I don’t know, Olivier. Why don’t you think of something for once?”

“Do you suppose we could lure the guards away with the promise of cream puffs?”

Renée threw up her arms. “Why are you always so useless?”

Her sharp tone forced me back a step. Before coming to the opera, we’d discussed learning the whereabouts of the king and then thinking of a plan together. But the longer I stared at her, the more I realized she was waiting for me to take the lead. I wasn’t certain if it was a test or if she truly had no idea what to do, but I found I couldn’t say a word.

I glanced around at the crowd, and froze. There were suddenly too many people present, too many chances for us to get caught and for this to all go horribly wrong. I’d never be able to save Étienne. No matter how hard I tried, no matter what I did, I’d never be able to save him. Because I couldn’t. Because I was too weak and ill and scared.

My brother was going to die, and it was going to be my fault.

“I don’t know,” I choked out. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Of course you don’t know!” Renée grimaced. “You’re eight-and-ten, Olivier. It’s time you grew up and learned to take care of yourself! Sometimes you’re just like Mother and Father.”

My stomach filled with lead. I knew—had always known—my frantic nerves caused trouble for both Renée and Étienne, but I couldn’t make myself calm at the flick of a wrist. Even in a pressing situation, even though I was aware I needed to get myself under control, it was never that simple. But I didn’t have the chance to voice any of this, for Renée turned and hurried away without so much as sparing me a second glance.

She’s upset, I told myself. She’s angry with Mother and Father for refusing to help us, and she’s scared for Étienne. This isn’t about you.

It didn’t make me feel any better.

I curled my hands around the ends of my coat and started for the opera house. The entrance was on the side of the Palais-Royal, in a cramped alleyway flanked by a small courtyard. I kept my gaze forward so I couldn’t see the people crowding around me on their way inside. Even so, they were still there—the sound of their conversations, the brush of their satins and silks against my skin, the combined stench of their perfumes.

“Mallard, hook bill, aylesbury,” I whispered to myself.

A memory flashed in my mind of the last time I was here, when I’d gotten caught in the masses exiting the opera, and the suffocating heat of the crowds brought on a fainting spell. Étienne told me later he had to yell for everyone to move out of the way as he dragged me to the street, my body limp and unresponsive. The attendees believed I’d had one too many glasses of champagne and nothing more. But I hadn’t returned since, afraid it would happen again, and society would have yet another reason to not want me around.

“Muscovy, northern shoveler, tufted duck.”

The closer I got to the entrance, the more my heartbeat increased, until my pulse was so strong, I could almost taste it. It wasn’t until something metallic and salty brushed against my tongue that I realized I’d bitten my lip, and what I tasted was blood.

The front hall was awash with candlelight, silver candelabras lit along the stairs smelling of smoke and melted candle wax. Surrounding the candelabras were clusters of plump roses. As ladies passed, their wide dresses and laced sleeves brushed against the flowers, and red petals fluttered to the ground to be crushed underfoot, pinpricks of crimson against the otherwise white marble.

I started up the stairs, telling myself I would find my parents’ box and sit through the first half of the opera. That would give me enough time to calm down and think of a plan. However, just as I began the climb, a figure caught my attention—Comte de Coligny heading for the café underneath the amphitheater. I might have been too much of a disaster to think of a way to speak with the king, but I could at least try to speak with the comte. Perhaps if I convinced him his coachman was killed because he attacked my brother unprovoked, he would agree to help.

I followed after the comte. Moments later, he came to a stop at the end of a dim corridor, in front of a non-discrete mahogany door. My mouth formed the words, preparing to call out to him, when he yanked the door open and disappeared into the room.

Unable to form any rational thoughts, I flew across the hallway. Thankfully, despite the door closing before I reached it, a bit of wood on the side was warped from the heat, resulting in a gap just wide enough for me to see into the room.

Comte de Coligny was not alone. Next to him, wearing a pair of navy breeches pulled up almost to his chest, was the prison governor, Monsieur de Launay.

I cursed under my breath. How was I supposed to speak with the comte now, when someone who certainly hated me was in the same room? Nevertheless, I stayed, hoping to God Monsieur de Launay would at least say something of importance.

He did not.

For what felt like an entire lifetime, I was forced to listen to the two men discuss mind-numbing court politics, the king’s infant heir, and whether or not Jean-Philippe Rameau could upstage Jean-Baptiste Lully as the opera’s forefront composer—their general consensus was no.

I barely understood the topics and cared for them even less; disinterested, I was seconds away from dozing atop the oriental carpet when they mentioned my brother.

“The d’Aumont’s ward,” the comte said, “is he still being held at the Bastille?”

I snapped to attention, leaning closer to the doorway.

“Yes,” the governor responded. “He was arrested and brought there without consequence. He even confessed to the crime.”

“Confessed? That was not part of the plan.”

My mind spun, latching onto his words. The plan? What plan?

The comte continued. “Well, it’s no matter. We shall figure out a way around that. What of the boy’s father? Has he been informed of the arrest?”

Étienne’s father? Comte de Coligny must have known my father was already aware of Étienne’s arrest.

A gasp forced itself from my lips.

They weren’t discussing my father; they were discussing Étienne’s birth father!

I pressed closer to the door, palms moistening with sweat.

“His father has been informed,” Monsieur de Launay said. “But he has yet to agree to the terms.”

Comte de Coligny cursed. “He is refusing even now? If anyone finds out what truly happened—”

“I’d assumed he would cooperate after we had his son arrested. It’s hardly my fault the man refused! But I’ve set another plan in motion that I’m sure will sway his decision. I’ve given the situation far more urgency, if you will. There is no doubt he will make the clocks for you now. He will have no other choice.” The governor sniffed. “I expect payment either way, Monsieur le Comte. I refuse to put myself in a compromising situation for someone with your reputation for no compensation.”

There was a pause, then the comte said, “My reputation?”

“You know what I mean.” Monsieur de Launay’s voice was flippant, dismissive. “Everyone has heard about how you were refused a spot in parliament. Again. It seems the courtiers still aren’t over how you caused your brother’s death.”

“My brother didn’t die.” There was a crash as Comte de Coligny hurled a chair against the wall. I flinched back in surprise. “He was murdered. And none of it was my doing.”

My hand fell from the bronze doorknob with an audible thunk. My thoughts spiraled, the same thing whirling through my mind again and again and again. I had been right. Étienne was framed. Again, I asked myself why? What did the comte want? Why had the coachman agreed to attack my brother? And why was the comte claiming his brother was murdered?

Though, at the moment, none of that mattered. Because I was mad. No, I was livid. I was enveloped with an anger that burned and festered all the way down to my bones.

The comte thought he could play with my brother’s life like it was nothing and get away with it?

No. Goddamned. Way.

Spinning on my heel, I dashed down the hallway and back into the opera crowd.

I had to find the king. I had to tell him it wasn’t my brother’s fault—that it had all been the awful, scheming comte and his awful, scheming plan. I had to convince the king to let my brother go. I had to—

“Ah, Olivier d’Aumont. There you are.”

The detested visage of Mathieu de Coligny appeared as he sauntered through the throng of courtiers. His blond hair was stuck to his temples with pomade, his shoulders thrown back. It made him look as if he had traveled the world and returned to France with a slew of illegitimate children and a venereal disease. “I’m so glad I was able to find you.”

“Hello, Mathieu de Coligny,” I said. “You’re looking rather constipated this evening.”

Mathieu frowned. “Don’t you wish to know why I was looking for you?”

“No, but I suppose you’re going to tell me regardless.”

“I have some news I think you’d find quite interesting.” Mathieu picked at an invisible thread on his embroidered waistcoat. “Earlier, the Bastille’s prison governor informed me your brother’s hanging has been moved up to the end of this week."