sunlight.
“It’s big, but it doesn’t seem big enough,” said Sue, referring once again to her guidebook. “This says that twenty thousand people lived here, from the royal family and their courtiers on down to the scullery maids.”
“That’s bigger than Tinker’s Cove,” said Ted, who had a journalist’s fondness for statistics and was always comparing population and circulation figures.
“It must have been grand,” said Pam in a dreamy voice. “Imagine having your hair powdered and wearing a long silk dress and meeting your handsome lover, in his stockings and silk breeches. . . .”
“Great, until they chopped your head off,” said Bob.
But even Bob had to admit it was quite a place when they’d finished the tour, which took them through the various royal apartments, the impressive chapel, and the enormous Hall of Mirrors. After seeing so much brocade and gilt and marble, Lucy found it was a relief to step outside into the well-ordered formal gardens. There didn’t seem to be any place for a picnic among the neat gravel paths and geometric flower beds, but they followed a young couple toting a basket and found a grassy area beside the Grand Canal. There were lots of people picnicking on the grass. Others were rowing themselves around the Grand Canal in rented boats.
It was warm in the sun, and their lunch of bread and cheese and fruit and wine made them all sleepy. Lucy was lying down, and Bill was resting his head on her thigh. She was thinking that there was much more to see and that they really ought to get up.
“I’d like to see the Hameau,” she said, lifting her head and shading her eyes from the sun. Squinting for just a moment, she thought she saw the guy from the Gare d’Austerlitz, the one she thought might have been admiring her. Or was it? Whoever he was, he didn’t seem to be interested in her anymore; he was watching a couple of blond German girls in tight jeans toss a Frisbee back and forth.
“Come on,” said Lucy, urging her companions on. “There’s a little train we can take to the Trianons and Marie Antoinette’s little farm. Maybe there are lambs and chicks!”
“And a gift shop,” said Sue. “We can’t miss the gift shop.”
Lucy loved the waterwheel and the thatched roofs of the houses in the Hameau, but she had to admit there was something ridiculous about a queen who dressed in a milkmaid’s costume and herded perfumed sheep with a crook made of Sevres porcelain. And outside the Petit Trianon, the queen’s private retreat, they stood in the stone grotto where she was informed that an angry mob of Parisian market women was marching on the château. The mob forced the royal family to go to Paris, where they were imprisoned, never to see Versailles again. The king and queen were eventually tried and beheaded, and their young son, the dauphin, died in prison of tuberculosis. Only their daughter Marie Thérèse Charlotte survived; after six long years of imprisonment she was finally released as part of an exchange of prisoners with Austria, then France’s enemy.
Perhaps the group members were tired after their exhausting day in Versailles, or perhaps they were thinking about the violence that overtook France during the revolution, but they were quiet and subdued on the trip home. Lucy thought of the little dauphin, imprisoned in filth and neglected, only to die at the age of ten, and wished she could believe the human race had progressed from that sort of cruelty.
“The more things change, the more they stay the same,” said Lucy as they made their way into the courtyard. “That’s a French proverb, isn’t it?”
“Ah, there you are,” said Madame Defarge, popping out of her lodge by the courtyard entrance. She was waving a handful of papers and seemed decidedly uncomfortable. “These came for you,” she said, narrowing her eyes suspiciously. “You are all required to report to the commissariat tomorrow.” She paused, then hissed, “For
“It’s big, but it doesn’t seem big enough,” said Sue, referring once again to her guidebook. “This says that twenty thousand people lived here, from the royal family and their courtiers on down to the scullery maids.”
“That’s bigger than Tinker’s Cove,” said Ted, who had a journalist’s fondness for statistics and was always comparing population and circulation figures.
“It must have been grand,” said Pam in a dreamy voice. “Imagine having your hair powdered and wearing a long silk dress and meeting your handsome lover, in his stockings and silk breeches. . . .”
“Great, until they chopped your head off,” said Bob.
But even Bob had to admit it was quite a place when they’d finished the tour, which took them through the various royal apartments, the impressive chapel, and the enormous Hall of Mirrors. After seeing so much brocade and gilt and marble, Lucy found it was a relief to step outside into the well-ordered formal gardens. There didn’t seem to be any place for a picnic among the neat gravel paths and geometric flower beds, but they followed a young couple toting a basket and found a grassy area beside the Grand Canal. There were lots of people picnicking on the grass. Others were rowing themselves around the Grand Canal in rented boats.
It was warm in the sun, and their lunch of bread and cheese and fruit and wine made them all sleepy. Lucy was lying down, and Bill was resting his head on her thigh. She was thinking that there was much more to see and that they really ought to get up.
“I’d like to see the Hameau,” she said, lifting her head and shading her eyes from the sun. Squinting for just a moment, she thought she saw the guy from the Gare d’Austerlitz, the one she thought might have been admiring her. Or was it? Whoever he was, he didn’t seem to be interested in her anymore; he was watching a couple of blond German girls in tight jeans toss a Frisbee back and forth.
“Come on,” said Lucy, urging her companions on. “There’s a little train we can take to the Trianons and Marie Antoinette’s little farm. Maybe there are lambs and chicks!”
“And a gift shop,” said Sue. “We can’t miss the gift shop.”
Lucy loved the waterwheel and the thatched roofs of the houses in the Hameau, but she had to admit there was something ridiculous about a queen who dressed in a milkmaid’s costume and herded perfumed sheep with a crook made of Sevres porcelain. And outside the Petit Trianon, the queen’s private retreat, they stood in the stone grotto where she was informed that an angry mob of Parisian market women was marching on the château. The mob forced the royal family to go to Paris, where they were imprisoned, never to see Versailles again. The king and queen were eventually tried and beheaded, and their young son, the dauphin, died in prison of tuberculosis. Only their daughter Marie Thérèse Charlotte survived; after six long years of imprisonment she was finally released as part of an exchange of prisoners with Austria, then France’s enemy.
Perhaps the group members were tired after their exhausting day in Versailles, or perhaps they were thinking about the violence that overtook France during the revolution, but they were quiet and subdued on the trip home. Lucy thought of the little dauphin, imprisoned in filth and neglected, only to die at the age of ten, and wished she could believe the human race had progressed from that sort of cruelty.
“The more things change, the more they stay the same,” said Lucy as they made their way into the courtyard. “That’s a French proverb, isn’t it?”
“Ah, there you are,” said Madame Defarge, popping out of her lodge by the courtyard entrance. She was waving a handful of papers and seemed decidedly uncomfortable. “These came for you,” she said, narrowing her eyes suspiciously. “You are all required to report to the commissariat tomorrow.” She paused, then hissed, “For
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