“I will not forget, Denise,” he whispered back and his spurs rang defiance on the staircase which led to the second floor, where the favourite so loathed by the Court held sway.
CHAPTER XII
A ROYAL GRISETTE
“Monsieur le Vicomte de Nérac,” pronounced the gentleman-usher closing the door behind him.
The King was leaning against the mantelpiece talking to Madame de Pompadour smiling from an arm-chair up at him. The bored, impenetrable royal eyes travelled over André’s figure as he advanced to kneel and kiss his Sovereign’s hand. Madame then without rising held out hers, and André, conscious only of the King’s presence, must swallow his pride and salute as she sat this upstart usurper of royal honours. But the blood of the De Néracs boiled within him.
Louis gazed with lazy approval round the apartment furnished with even greater taste than wealth, at the costly books and pictures, at the unfinished plaster cast which Madame had been modelling, at the plans of buildings littered on a glorious escritoire. A Mæcenas in petticoats, whatever else she was, this adventuress, thought André as he waited in silence, and he recalled the memories of the salon she had held as Madame d’Étiolles for Voltaire, the President Hénault, the Abbé de Bernis, and the other famous wits.
“Madame la Marquise,” said the King abruptly, “will convey my wishes. Good-night, Vicomte.”
The curtains at the other end of the room had scarcely fallen on the departing King when the lady resumed her seat as if she desired the standing André clearly to recognise that the King’s presence made no difference to the rights she claimed. It was, too, as if she insolently invited him to inspect her. And inspect her he did, tingling all the time with rage.
How she looked Nattier and La Tour, who painted her in the heyday of her womanhood and of her beauty, have left on immortal record. And anger could not prevent André’s heart, so susceptible to feminine loveliness, from a swift thrill of homage. That dainty head, the exquisite shape and pose of her neck, those wonderful eyes, now black, now blue, now grey, that bust called by a poet les parfaits plaisirs, the harmony of her heliotrope robe, lace-edged with cunning artlessness—every line, every detail, witnessed to a woman’s magic insight into the handiwork of God. And here in this haughty Versailles, where taste, breeding, and birth were superior to mere beauty, this woman, born a bourgeoise, had by some diabolic witchery usurped the polished ease so justly regarded as the heritage and the monopoly of the château and of the noblesse.
She had risen. “Monsieur le Vicomte,” André noted the musical modulation in her voice, “His Majesty has been pleased to confer on you the fit reward of your valour.”
She was gravely offering him the soldier’s and statesman’s most coveted distinction, the Cordon Bleu. The blood leaped into André’s head. For a moment the room swam blue as the ribbon. “Madame, I thank you,” he stammered.