The Moon and the Sun

12

By the time Marie-Josèphe reached Mademoiselle’s apartments, she was out of breath and damp with sweat. She hesitated in the cold shadows of the corridor until her breathing eased, then indicated her presence by tapping her fingernails on the door.

“Marie-Josèphe!”

Lotte ducked from beneath Mlle d’Armagnac’s attempt to rearrange her hair and emerged from the bright crowd of ladies-in-waiting and friends. She raised Marie-Josèphe from her curtsy.

“You must help—My hair has driven Mlle d’Armagnac to tears. Where’s your girl? She’s such a wonder! Where have you been?”

“Tending to the sea monster, Mademoiselle.”

“Make a lackey throw it a fish. Send for little Odelette, will you? And—your dress! You can’t attend His Majesty’s luncheon in your riding habit!”

Lotte’s ladies-in-waiting, all beautifully gowned for His Majesty’s luncheon, arranged Mademoiselle’s grand habit and petticoats and polished her jewels with silk handkerchiefs.

“I’m responsible for the sea monster, Mademoiselle. My brother charged me with keeping it and studying it.”

“What good will studying it do? My dear silly thing, next you’ll be speaking Latin and reciting lectures on the planets like those boring old sticks from the Academy.”

I’d love to hear such a lecture, Marie-Josèphe thought—and to know I still remember my Latin!

“Odelette is ill, Mademoiselle. Your hair looks beautiful. I cannot do better than Mlle d’Armagnac.”

“Shall I call the barber to see your girl? Perhaps she should be bled.”

“Perhaps she should be whipped,” said Mlle d’Armagnac, annoyed to have her talents at enhancing beauty compared unfavorably to those of a servant. “Isn’t that what you do to lazy slaves, in the wild colonies?”

“No!”

Marie-Josèphe told the lie without a second thought because Mlle d’Armagnac made her angry, because her own family’s slaves had never been whipped, and because Odelette would never be whipped if Marie-Josèphe had anything to say about it. Nor would she be bled.

“Please, no, Mademoiselle, this is—” Marie-Josèphe could not bring herself to tell the King’s niece that Odelette always bled too heavily for her health. “It’s an old complaint.”

“Ah,” said Lotte, “it’s like that, is it?”

“She’ll be better this evening or tomorrow. I’ll tend to her as soon as you’re dressed.”

“You’ll do no such thing,” Lotte said, “you’ll attend me, and go to the picnic.”

“But—”

“Shh!” Lotte called for a servant to take broth and warm flannel to Odelette.

“And to remind my brother of the luncheon, if you please, Mademoiselle. His work engrosses him so.”

“If we cannot whip the slave for dereliction, perhaps we can whip the brother,” Mlle d’Armagnac said, and all the ladies giggled at her daring wit.

“Of course, fetch Father de la Croix.” To Marie-Josèphe she said, “You both must see the Menagerie.”

“Mademoiselle, I haven’t anything to wear.”

Lotte laughed, threw open her cupboard, pulled out dresses, and chose a beautiful brocade. Marie-Josèphe might have been in a whirlwind for all the power she had: Lotte’s other ladies stripped her to her shift and stays and dressed her in the new gown, leaving her only a moment to blush furiously, fearing they might notice the rolled-up towel. She wished she had risked taking it off, for as yet it had been of no use.

“This is my best court gown from last summer,” Lotte said. “I was a little thinner, and you’re not so scrawny as some fashionable ladies—lace it up, it will look fine! Now, you mustn’t bother that it’s a year old, with this season’s petticoat no one will notice.”

Marie-Josèphe doubted that. She was grateful for Lotte’s generosity, but she wondered, shamed by her envy, if she would ever have a new dress of her own.

Mademoiselle’s carriage rumbled down the road toward His Majesty’s Menagerie. Marie-Josèphe sat beside Lotte, squeezed in among the other ladies in their full court dresses. Weariness overtook her. She tried to recall when she had last eaten, when she had last slept.

The gilded gates of the Menagerie swung open. The sound and smell of exotic animals filled the courtyard. Chartres, on horseback, accompanied by Duke Charles, met Lotte and escorted her through the gates toward the central octagonal dome. Marie-Josèphe followed with the other ladies, noticing their significant glances, hearing their whispers about the attraction between Mademoiselle and the Foreign Prince.

They climbed to the balconies overlooking the animal pens. Cages of birds from the New World decorated the passageway: Bright screeching parrots and macaws, and hummingbirds who shrieked even more loudly.

At the central dome, servants held aside sheer white curtains. His Majesty’s guests stepped into a jungle.

Drifts of orchids covered the walls and ceiling, hot with color and lush as flesh. Scarlet tanagers and cardinals screamed and fluttered on the branches, not caged, but entrapped with silken threads around their legs. A few had broken free and flew madly back and forth. Gamekeepers rushed back and forth as madly as the birds, trying to capture them before they soiled the food, trapping them in bags, tying them more tightly to the branches of the orchids.

The central dome was filled with tables laden with baked peacocks, their iridescent tails spread wide, with bowls of oranges and figs, roast hare, ham, and every sort of sweet and pastry. Marie-Josèphe could hardly bring herself to pass; the scents made her mouth water. Dizzy, she followed Mademoiselle past the curtain onto one of the balconies overlooking the animal enclosures.

A more pungent odor overwhelmed the smell of the food. In the tiny stone enclosure beneath them, a tiger paced two steps, flung itself around, paced two steps back. It stopped, looked upward, snarled, and launched itself toward Marie-Josèphe. Its claws scraped the wall beneath the balcony railing. Lotte and the other ladies shrieked. Marie-Josèphe caught her breath in terror, frozen by the tiger’s glare.

On the ground again, the tiger growled and paced and jerked its tail and sprayed a cloud of acrid musk, the hot juniper reek of cat spray. The other ladies giggled, pretending to be frightened, pretending to be shocked. They had all been here a hundred times before.

“Did it frighten you?” Lotte asked. “It frightened me the first time I saw it.”

“It doesn’t frighten me,” Chartres said. He pitched a purloined orange at the furious tiger. The tiger swatted at its flank as if at a mosquito, catching the orange with its claw, ripping it in half, crushing it against the ground.

“I thought nothing could frighten you!” Lotte said to Marie-Josèphe. “I thought you’d pull off one of its whiskers to study.”

“I’d never pull the whisker off such a creature.”

“Are its claws so much sharper than the sea monster’s?”

“Sharper—and it has bigger teeth. It wouldn’t sing to me when I spoke to it!”

The ladies laughed. As if she had commanded it, music sparkled upward from the grotto beneath the octagonal tower.

“The musicians are in the grotto.” Lotte whispered, “It’s full of water pipes—if you know where the faucets are, you can soak anyone who walks through! My uncle the King used to douse anyone who dared enter. Such fun!”

The tiger diverted her from the fun. It hurled itself at the dividing wall between its compound and the next. The camels lurched away, grunting and spitting with fear. The stench of their shit mixed with the tiger’s scent-mark. Their fear aroused the lions in the next compound. The lions roared and the tiger challenged them; the camels huddled in the center of their enclosure. On the other side of the dome the elephant trumpeted in fury. An ancient aurochs, its red hide turned roan with age, tossed its wide horns and bellowed continuously. Leashed birds—bluebirds and bluejays—on the balcony shrieked and beat their wings. Torn feathers fluttered to the ground.

In the distance, the sea monster cried out in answer.

On the circle of balconies overlooking the enclosures, courtiers shouted and applauded. Chartres was not the only one to torment the creatures with oranges, or stones.

Everyone, even the animals, suddenly fell silent.

His Majesty had arrived.

All the court gathered in the central dome: the men, bareheaded, nearest His Majesty; the women at the back of the group, conscious of the honor, for women did not usually attend His Majesty’s public dinner. Marie-Josèphe looked for her brother, but Yves was nowhere to be seen. The bound birds cried and beat their wings. A cardinal broke free, hit the curtain like a powder-puff, fell stunned, recovered in mid-air, flew into the curtain again, and tumbled to the floor, its neck broken. A servant scooped it up and out of His Majesty’s sight.

His Majesty sat alone at a small, elegant table beneath an arch of scarlet and gold orchids; Monsieur stood nearby with his napkin. The most favored courtiers served his food: Count Lucien poured his wine. His Majesty ate as he performed every task: calmly, majestically, deliberately. He gazed straight forward, chewing steadily through course after course of his first meal of the day: a platter of thick soup, fish, partridge, ham and beef, a plate of salad.

After the partridge, His Majesty turned to Monsieur.

“Will you be seated, brother?”

Monsieur bowed low; a servant hurried to bring a chair of ebony and mother-of-pearl. Monsieur sat beside his brother, facing him, holding his napkin ready.

When His Majesty had finished his ham, he glanced toward M. du Maine, standing in the front row with Monseigneur the Grand Dauphin and the legitimate grandsons.

“M. du Maine, the weather is fine for Carrousel, is it not?”

M. du Maine replied with a bow even deeper than Monsieur’s. The legitimate son watched the bastard favorite with a foolish expression of transparent envy.

His Majesty ate alone. Out of respect for the King, Marie-Josèphe resisted the temptation to pilfer a bit of meat from the tables behind her. No one paid her any mind; if she dared, she could take the edge off her hunger. She might also find herself curtsying and trying to fashion a proper greeting through a mouthful of food. She imagined Count Lucien’s disapproval. She would die of embarrassment.

But I’m hungry enough to eat one of the sea monster’s fish, she thought. Alive. Wriggling.

His Majesty finished, put down his knife, wiped his mouth, and dipped his fingers into a bowl of spirits of wine to clean them. When he rose, all his court bowed.

An instant later—as if by coincidence, but surely by careful plan—Pope Innocent, with his retinue of Bishops, Cardinals, and Yves, paraded into the dome. The courtiers bowed again.

“Cousin, welcome,” His Majesty said.

His Majesty, accompanied by his brother and his sons and grandsons, and His Holiness, accompanied by his bishops and cardinals and his French Jesuit, strolled together out of the hexagonal room onto the balcony overlooking the lion’s enclosure. The musicians on the balcony—several strings and a harpsichord—struck up a bright tune.

His Majesty’s ravenous courtiers set to.

“Mlle de la Croix, may I offer you your second glass of wine?” Lorraine, looking particularly elegant, loomed above her. Marie-Josèphe admired his smile, his eyes, his new brocade waistcoat.

“You’re too late for that,” she said. His eyes widened and he made one quick bark of laughter. She became frightfully aware of the daring cut of her bodice. “I would like a glass of wine, sir, thank you.”

He brought wine, plump strawberries from the greenhouse, sliced cold peacock, the grease congealed beneath its skin.

He caressed her shoulder, her collarbone, with a peacock feather. The feather moved down her breast. She stepped away. Lorraine put the feather in her hair, so it draped along the side of her face and down her back.

“Exquisite,” he said.

Marie-Josèphe sipped her wine. It tasted of summer, of sunlight, of flowers. The wine went directly to her head. Lotte had strolled onto the balcony of the giraffes with Duke Charles, leaving Marie-Josèphe with the chevalier, the duke’s older, poorer, lower-ranking, but much more handsome relative. Lorraine stroked her cheek; he slid his hand beneath her simply-dressed hair and caressed the back of her neck. She shivered. Intrigued, surprised, she let herself relax against his touch. He leaned toward her. Frightened, she slipped from beneath his hand.

The Chevalier de Lorraine laughed softly.

Nearby, Count Lucien drank wine with the flawlessly beautiful Mlle de Valentinois, Mme de la Fère, and Mlle d’Armagnac. Mlle d’Armagnac flirted so outrageously that Marie-Josèphe felt outraged on Count Lucien’s behalf.

“Chrétien has parted from Mlle Past,” Lorraine said, “and Mme Present departs soon; he stands poised on the brink of Mlle Future.”

“I don’t understand you, sir.”

“Do you not?” He smiled. “Pay them no mind—Chrétien has too much to teach you, and Mlle Future has too little.”

The chevalier moved in front of her and drew her toward him. Marie-Josèphe found herself gazing into his eyes.

“Have you had smallpox?” the Chevalier asked.

“Why—yes, sir,” Marie-Josèphe said, astonished by the question. “When I was very little.”

“Then you are beautiful,” he said. “As beautiful as you appear.”

“Mlle de la Croix.”

Marie-Josèphe started, nearly spilling her wine on the Master of Ceremonies. Lorraine chuckled and took his hand from her neck.

“His Majesty asks you to play a tune.”

“If I—? Sir, play for His Majesty? I cannot!”

Lorraine pressed her gently forward. “Of course you can. You must.”

Flustered, overwhelmed, Marie-Josèphe followed the Master of Ceremonies to the lion balcony. She curtsied low. His Majesty smiled and raised her to her feet.

“Mlle de la Croix!” he exclaimed. “More beautiful than ever—and with a sensible hair ornament. It would please me to hear you play.”

She curtsied again. Yves looked troubled. His Holiness regarded her without expression. Behind them, M. Coupillet stood with his back turned, facing his musicians. He did not acknowledge her. Courtiers emerged from the jungle, gathering on the balcony behind her. One disheveled agitated yellow finch arrowed through the doorway, gold silk threads streaming from its claws. It disappeared.

Little Master Domenico jumped up from the harpsichord and bowed chivalrously to Marie-Josèphe.

“Thank you, Master Domenico.” She could not help but smile, though she dreaded playing after his prowess at the keyboard. She had practiced a little at Saint-Cyr, but for five years before that she had been forbidden to touch any instrument.

Marie-Josèphe seated herself. She touched the ebony keys; they flowed like silk against her fingertips.

She played. She made a mistake; her fingers tangled. She stopped, her cheeks blazing hot.

She began again.

The music rippled around her like waves, like wind, like clouds. The sea monster’s songs touched her heart, touched her fingertips, touched the keys of the magnificent instrument she controlled.

The music ended. She sat before the harpsichord like a supplicant, praying. She trembled. She hardly had the strength to lift her hands.

“Charming,” His Majesty said. “Perfectly charming.”

More drunk with attention than with wine, Marie-Josèphe ran up the narrow stairs to her attic room. The peacock feather tickled her neck. The towel rubbed her inner thighs raw.

Her room was stuffy, but a candle glowed beside the bed. Odelette bent over a meringue of lace and ribbons, a new headdress.

“It’s so dark in here!”

“I was cold, so I closed the curtains.”

“The afternoon sun will shine in now, and warm you.” Marie-Josèphe opened the curtains, flooding the room with light. Hercules leaped onto the window seat.

A servant scratched at the door—two servants, one returning her riding habit from Mademoiselle’s apartment, the other bringing bread and soup and wine. Marie-Josèphe gave each serving man a sou and sent them away with the empty broth bowl, and pretended not to notice their amazed disgust at her pitiable gratuity.

“I’m so glad you’re feeling better,” Marie-Josèphe said to Odelette. She stuck the peacock feather into a curlicue of the mirror frame.

“I feel worse,” Odelette said. Her voice quivered. Tears streaked her cheeks. Marie-Josèphe sat on the edge of the bed, as if her slave were a great lady receiving callers.

“What’s wrong?”

“Mignon said you’d beat me. She said you said I’m lazy.”

“I never would! I didn’t! You aren’t!”

“She said—” Odelette repeated a garbled version of Marie-Josèphe’s exchange with Mlle d’Armagnac.

“Oh, my dear…” She took the unfinished fontanges from Odelette’s hands. “Do you need a clean towel?” Odelette nodded. Marie-Josèphe fetched fresh cotton and put the blood-stained cloths in cold water to soak.

“Mlle d’Armagnac made a stupid remark.” Marie-Josèphe tore the bread into bits and soaked it in the soup. “So I said I’d tear her hair out if she ever tried to beat you.”

Odelette ate a bite of bread. “You didn’t!”

“No,” Marie-Josèphe admitted. “But I did say you’d not be beaten—and I would tear her hair out.”

Odelette managed to smile. Marie-Josèphe dampened a cloth with rose-water, wiped away Odelette’s tears, and helped her drink a cup of wine.

“Can you help me with these buttons, just for a moment?” Marie-Josèphe asked. “Are you able?” She slipped out of Lotte’s beautiful gown and back into her riding habit, putting aside the uncomfortable towel until tomorrow.

I’ve changed clothes as often as the King! she thought, though she reminded herself that he always changed into new clothes, while she only changed back and forth.

Odelette did up the buttons on Marie-Josèphe’s riding habit, while eyeing the gown.

“It’s out of fashion,” Odelette said, “but I could make something of it.”

“You are so dear. You aren’t to touch it until you feel better. Now, lie down. Hercules, come! Odelette needs a tummy-warmer.” Hercules, lying upside-down in the sun with his legs splayed in an undignified manner, blinked, rolled over, stretched, and leaped to the bed.

Marie-Josèphe tucked the covers around Odelette and fed her soup and bread.

“How could you think I’d beat you?”

“We’ve been apart for so long. I thought, perhaps Mlle Marie has changed.”

“I’m sure I have, but not like that. We’ve all changed, all three of us.”

“Will it be as it was?”

“It will be better.”

Marie-Josèphe trudged down the Green Carpet. The lovely path became longer each time she trod it, like a magical road with no end. She listened for the sea monster, but a concert near the fountain of Neptune overwhelmed other sounds. She passed few visitors; they had gathered on the other side of the garden, near Neptune, to enjoy the concert and the ballet His Majesty had been pleased to order for his subjects.

In the tent, ice melted into puddles around the dissection table and dripped loudly into the silence.

Yves stood at the laboratory table, sharpening his scalpels. Servants dug chipped ice away from the dead sea monster.

“Sister, I won’t want your help today.”

“What?” she cried. “Why?”

“Because I must dissect the parts that are improper for public view. I shall ask the ladies not to attend.”

Marie-Josèphe laughed. “Every other statue at Versailles is nude! If human nakedness is no mystery, why should anyone bother about a creature’s?”

“I won’t dissect it before ladies. Nor will you draw it.”

“Then who will?”

“Chartres.”

Marie-Josèphe was offended. “He draws the way you compose! I’ve drawn the sex of animals for you, a hundred times—”

“When we were children. When I didn’t know any better than to allow it.”

“Next you’ll say, I should put breeches on my horse.” His indignant expression amused her so, she could not help but tease him. “And then you’ll say, no lady should ride a horse, that isn’t wearing breeches!”

“Ladies wearing breeches?” Count Lucien said.

Count Lucien approached from the entrance of the tent. A servant followed, carrying an ornately framed portrait of the King. The servant placed the portrait on the King’s armchair, bowed deeply to it, and backed away as if it were His Majesty himself.

“Horses wearing breeches,” Marie-Josèphe said.

“Odd fashions you have on Martinique.” Count Lucien swept off his hat and bowed to the portrait.

“Horses don’t wear breeches on Martinique!” Yves said.

“Forgive us, Count Lucien. I’ve teased my brother cruelly and he is out of temper. How are you?”

“I’m in a remarkably good mood for a man who spent an hour arguing with the censors of the Black Cabinet.”

He handed her a letter.

“What is it?”

“Your correspondence from Mynheer van Leeuwenhoek.”

“Count Lucien, you are a treasure.”

His shrug encompassed the diplomacy he had employed to liberate the letter from His Majesty’s spies.

She read the Latin: Mynheer van Leeuwenhoek, intrigued by the interest of a young French gentleman in his work, regretted the impossibility of selling any of his instruments—

For a moment she thought he referred to Yves; but she had written on her own behalf.

Perhaps M. van Leeuwenhoek, who is no doubt a heretic, she thought, mistook my confirmation name for my Christian name.

Disappointed, she continued.

—but, once the regrettable hostilities between their respective governments had ended, Mynheer van Leeuwenhoek would be pleased to invite M. de la Croix to visit his workshop.

Marie-Josèphe sighed, and smiled sadly at Count Lucien. “I’ll not be expecting contraband, after all,” she said. Nor, she thought, any obscene Dutch broadsheets. It’s wicked of me, she thought, but I would like to see them.

“I know it,” he replied, then added, in response to her surprise, “I beg your pardon, Mlle de la Croix, but I was obliged to read the letter, in order to explain to the censors why you should be allowed to have it.”

“Thank you, sir. Do you see? I ask only what you can give.”

Count Lucien bowed.

Count Lucien spoke to the servants; they rearranged the silken screens to reveal the dissection table to the audience but conceal it from the living sea monster.

Marie-Josèphe thought, Count Lucien would concern himself with the sea monster’s distress only if its crying will disturb the King!

“Is His Majesty coming after all?” She clapped her hands to her hair, which had begun to escape its pins.

“He is here,” Count Lucien said, nodding toward the portrait. “This once, he will not notice your coiffure.”

M. Coupillet, the music-master, shouldered past visitors coming in to watch the dissection.

“A moment of your sister’s time, Father.”

“She is already occupied, sir,” Yves said.

“I am anxious, Father de la Croix,” M. Coupillet said. “I am anxious, M. de Chrétien. Mlle de la Croix, I say that I am anxious. We must discuss the cantata.”

“I’ve begun it—I can work on it at night.”

“You’ll be busy, Mlle de la Croix,” Count Lucien said. “Composition at night, decomposition during the day.”

Marie-Josèphe laughed.

“Will you need an instrument?” Count Lucien asked.

“Of course she needs an instrument,” M. Coupillet exclaimed. “No wonder she’s done no work! Do you think she’s able to compose entirely in her mind?”

“May I beg the use of a harpsichord?” Marie-Josèphe kept her attention on Count Lucien, afraid she would be rude to M. Coupillet.

“Whatever you require—it’s His Majesty’s wish.”

“A very small harpsichord, sir, if you please—it’s a very small sitting room.”

“Sister, bring your drawing box,” Yves said to Marie-Josèphe. “We will begin.”

She curtsied quickly to Count Lucien and to the portrait of the King. She hurried to her place, relieved that Yves had given up the idea of sending her away. She wished he would send M. Coupillet away.

M. Coupillet followed her. “If I may suggest—allow me to oversee the cantata’s progress.” He averted his gaze from the dead sea monster. “You are, after all, an amateur and a woman. Without my help, you risk offending His Majesty with incompetent work.”

“You needn’t defile your talent by lending it to my poor efforts,” Marie-Josèphe said. She was nervous enough about failing the King’s commission without being insulted.

“There, there, Mlle de la Croix, how can you berate me for seeking your gratitude? You tax your intelligence with natural philosophy, with music—why, next you’ll wish to study the classics! No wonder you’re confused and exhausted.”

“Even in France,” Count Lucien said, “many would say women cannot excel as artists, as scholars—”

Marie-Josèphe looked away, hoping to hide her shock.

“Do you see, Mlle de la Croix, M. de Chrétien agrees—”

“So would they say,” Count Lucien said, to Marie-Josèphe, “no dwarf can ride to war.”

M. Coupillet drew himself to his full, outraged height. Count Lucien merely smiled at him with sympathetic condescension. The music master wilted, stepped back, and made a stiff bow.

“Good day, mademoiselle,” Count Lucien said.

“Good day, Count Lucien,” Marie-Josèphe said, amazed with gratitude that he had compared her intellectual endeavors to his own exploits at Steenkirk and Neerwinden. “Thank you for everything.”

Count Lucien departed, pausing to bow, and to sweep the plumes of his hat across the floor, before His Majesty’s portrait.

“Your attention,” Yves said, “if you please.”

“Yes, I’m ready. Good day, M. Coupillet, I cannot spare you any more time.”

“Ladies of delicate temperament may wish to avoid this demonstration.” Yves exposed the genital area of the sea monster.

A few gentlewomen left, along with M. Coupillet. The rest stayed, leaning their heads together to whisper and laugh at Yves’ scruples.

At sunset, a footman respectfully carried away the portrait of the King; the open tent emptied of spectators. Marie-Josèphe finished a last sketch of the sea monster’s generative organs, now dissected out of the smooth furry pouch that had held them protected within the creature’s body. Exposed, they resembled the male organs of the marble statues lounging in the gardens of Versailles.

Yves went away to write up his notes, leaving Marie-Josèphe to arrange the shroud, and direct the replacement of ice and sawdust, and feed the living sea monster.

When everyone else had left, Marie-Josèphe unlocked the cage and netted a fish. Red-gold sunlight doubly gilded Apollo and his horses.

“Sea monster!”

The sun fell below the horizon, leaving soft dusk behind. In silence, a footman arrived, lit the candles, and departed. A damp breeze fluttered the flames. The tent flapped. Marie-Josèphe shivered. The guards hurried around the tent, closing its open sides. The breeze stopped.

The sea monster whistled.

Marie-Josèphe swished the net through the water.

“Sea monster! Fishhh!”

An arrow of ripples streaked across the fountain.

The sudden warmth of menstrual blood pressed out and dribbled between Marie-Josèphe’s legs, stinging her raw skin.

A blasphemy passed her lips that, a month ago, never would have crossed her mind. Once again, as usual, even about inconvenient matters, Odelette was right. Marie-Josèphe’s impatience with the bother had made her foolish.

I’ll feed the sea monster quickly and then run back up the hill, Marie-Josèphe thought. And beg Odelette’s pardon if I’ve stained my petticoat. I mustn’t stain my skirt! Poor Odelette despairs of saving the silver petticoat, and I cannot afford to spoil more clothes.

The sea monster surfaced. Marie-Josèphe stroked her hair. The sea monster screamed and splashed backwards.

Marie-Josèphe waved the desperately wriggling fish back and forth, trying to distract the sea monster from her strange disquiet.

“Sea monster, be easy.”

The sea monster floated, only her eyes and forehead above the surface. Underwater, her nostrils flared and contracted. Her hair swirled around her shoulders. Marie-Josèphe leaned forward, trying to see why the sea monster was in distress.

The sea monster snorted violently. The surface bubbled above her mouth and nose. She swam backwards, then moaned and sighed and swam to the stairs, approaching uncertainly, her song a question, a comfort.

She opened the net and let the fish swim away uneaten. She took Marie-Josèphe’s hand between her webbed fingers.

Marie-Josèphe stayed very still. The sea monster lowered her face to Marie-Josèphe’s hand. Marie-Josèphe trembled, afraid the creature was about to bite her, praying she was not. The sea monster’s warm lips touched her skin. The beast flicked out her tongue and licked Marie-Josèphe’s knuckles.

Marie-Josèphe laughed with relief.

“You’re like my old pony,” she said to the sea monster. “You just want to lick the salt off my skin!”

As Marie-Josèphe fed the sea monster, she petted her, continuing to tame her to her hands and voice.

“Say ‘sea monster,’ ” Marie-Josèphe said to the creature, holding out a fish.

“Fishhhh.” The sea monster’s parroting speech dissolved in a long complex song of melody and whistles. She snapped up the fish in two quick bites.

“Say, ‘Marie-Josèphe.’ ”

“Fishhhh!”

“Say, ‘Your Majesty honors me,’ ” Marie-Josèphe said, recklessly, flinging a fish into the pool in frustration. Again in frustration, she sang back at the sea monster.

The sea monster fell silent and stared at her.

Marie-Josèphe continued, singing the wordless song she had played for His Majesty.

The sea monster drifted closer and hummed an exotic, compelling, haunting second melody that broke every rule of music.

Tears spilled down Marie-Josèphe’s cheeks.

I have nothing to be sad about, she thought. Why am I crying? Because it’s my time of month…?

She scrubbed the tears away with the back of her hand.

But my time of month never made me sad before, she thought. Only impatient with the inconvenience, with being told I must not do this, I must not do that.

The sea monster took her hand. Hearing footsteps, Marie-Josèphe waved the net behind her, hoping the guard would understand that she wanted a fish.

She continued to sing. The sea monster embroidered variations on the melody.

The net left her hand and returned. The sea monster must have seen the morsel, for she ended her song, accepted her reward, and submerged with the fish held delicately between her claws.

“Thank you, sir.” Turning, Marie-Josèphe nearly ran into Count Lucien, standing behind her on the fountain’s rim.

“Your song was extraordinarily beautiful.”

“I thought you were the musketeer!” Marie-Josèphe said, too flustered to reply to his compliment.

He took the net from her hand and scooped up another fish. The sea monster swam to the stairs and snarled. Marie-Josèphe quickly threw her the treat.

The sea monster tossed the fish in the air, caught it, and let it swim free. Marie-Josèphe laughed, delighted by the sea monster’s play.

Beside the stairs, the sea monster rolled over and over in the water and splashed spray with her tail.

I wonder, she thought, how His Majesty would like a sketch of the sea monster juggling fish? I wonder how Count Lucien would like it?

“Stop it, sea monster!” Marie-Josèphe brushed droplets from the sleeve of her habit. “What do you want? You aren’t even hungry.”

“It wants to play,” Count Lucien said. “With the fish. Like a cat with a mouse.”

Marie-Josèphe scooped up the last live fish and threw them into the pond. They darted away. The sea monster whistled and dived, chasing them, letting them escape, flicking spray into the air.

“Good-night, sea monster!” Marie-Josèphe whispered.

The sea monster surfaced by the platform. Marie-Josèphe gave her a final caress. The sea monster took her hand and held it to her lips, wailing and touching Marie-Josèphe’s fingers delicately with her tongue.

Marie-Josèphe thought, Why would the sea monster lick salt from my hand, when she’s swimming in salt water?

The sea monster crawled up the steps to the edge of the small water, crying with despair and warning. The fearless, foolish woman of land walked bleeding toward great predators whose roars and snarls filled the darkness and the dawn. If the predators of land could smell as keenly as the sharks of the ocean, the woman was doomed.

The sea monster echoed the land-woman’s simple song of childish babble. Only silence replied.

The sea monster’s song of warning burst through the gardens, filled them, and faded away.

Calm once more, the sea monster washed thick salt tears from her eyes.

Singing a different song, soft and lyrical, she swam to shelter beneath the hooves of Apollo’s horses.