From that time his liaison with Madame de Mailly was no longer kept a secret. The people would understand that, since the Queen must have no more children, the King was entitled to have a mistress. The people of France were very indulgent about such matters.
Even though she was now recognised as King’s mistress, Louise-Julie was uneasy. She fancied that the King relied upon her a little less than before, and that were he not so kind-hearted he might have deserted her for someone else. She was passionately in love with him and was far happier when she could live with him in comparative seclusion at Choisy rather than in the limelight of Versailles.
All about her, she knew, were eagle-eyed men and women, watching for the least sign of the King’s waning affection. The men were anxious to promote the women they favoured; the women were waiting for a chance to take her place.
But Louis remained simple-hearted. His dread of unpleasantness increased rather than diminished as he grew older. He would have to be very enamoured of another woman before he could bring himself to dispense with an existing mistress.
Strangely enough the woman she most feared was the recently widowed Comtesse de Toulouse – plump, very good-looking still, but well advanced into middle age. The Comtesse had approached Louis slyly; she did not seek to become his mistress; she felt as a mother to him. Louis was continually at Rambouillet, since the Comtesse, on the death of her husband, had begged Louis to look after her and her son.
She was a clever woman, this Comtesse, for she knew that the Condés were planning to rob her son of his status. Her husband the Comte had been the illegitimate son of Louis Quatorze and Madame de Montespan, and his father had made him legitimate. Now that he was dead, said the Condés, they did not see why the son should be considered to have legitimate connexions with the Royal Family. Madame la Comtesse was going to fight with all her cunning to preserve the state of her son, the Duc de Penthièvre, and if the mother-love which she was preparing to bestow upon the King turned into another kind of love, so much the better for the Toulouses.
She was undoubtedly successful. Not only was the young Duc named as Prince of the Blood but the Comtesse had a special apartment at Rambouillet set aside for the King – a refuge, she called it, to which he could turn when he felt harassed by state duties and needed a little motherly care.
Louis himself was feeling very sad, because it was time that his daughter Louise-Elisabeth left home for her marriage with the Infante Don Philip.
He had watched with mild regret the departure of his little daughters; they were so young that they had not yet completely captured his affections. It was a very different matter to see the twelve-year-old Princesse depart, particularly as he had to witness the grief of Anne-Henriette and little Adelaide, both of whom he was beginning to love dearly.
He himself had been ill and was feeling restive. Ennui was beginning to take possession of him. Life seemed to go on in a monotonous pattern, and even hunting, gambling, the mother-love of the Comtesse de Toulouse, and the passion of Louise-Julie de Mailly could not rouse him from this lethargy which was tinged with melancholy.
One day Louise-Julie said to him: ‘Louis, I have received many letters from my younger sister. She longs to come to Court.’
Louis nodded without interest.
‘She writes the most amusing letters. Pauline-Félicité was never the least bit shy. You see how she writes in this bold hand-writing. I . . . I . . . I! You see, all down the page.’
Louis took the letter and read it; he smiled faintly.
‘She is eager,’ he said.
‘May I invite her to Court?’
‘It would seem unkind to deny her something on which she has so clearly set her heart.’
‘I will write to her today,’ said Louise-Julie. ‘I think you will find her rather outrageous . . . quite different from anyone else.’
Louis yawned slightly. ‘It will be a change,’ he murmured; but Louise-Julie saw that he was not really interested in her sister. Did that mean that he was no longer interested in her?
Pauline-Félicité swept through the Court like a whirlwind. Surely, said the courtiers, there was never a woman so ugly who gave herself such airs. But they had to concede that it was an ugliness which could not be ignored. It was a compelling ugliness inasmuch as when Pauline-Félicité was present she automatically became the magnet of attention.
She was undoubtedly witty, and before she had been at Court a week her sayings were being quoted. She was no respecter of rank and had even made sly comments on the King.
‘His Majesty has lived all his life in leading strings,’ she declared. ‘What matters it who holds the strings? He is controlled by old age, middle age and youth – by the Cardinal’s ancient hands, the motherly ones of Madame de Toulouse, and the loving ones of my sister. What fun, should His Majesty escape and learn to totter along by himself!’
These remarks were recounted to the King and when she was next at one of his intimate supper parties he commanded Pauline-Félicité to sit beside him.
‘You are an outspoken young woman,’ he told her.
‘I speak the truth,’ she retorted. ‘It is more stimulating than lies which can be so monotonously boring. Your Majesty must know this, for you have been constantly fed on the latter.’
Louis smiled. ‘I believe,’ he said, ‘that there has been a faint flavour of truth in my diet on certain occasions.’
‘A spicy ingredient,’ she retorted, ‘which has been too often lacking.’
‘In order to make the meal more palatable,’ murmured Louis.
‘Yes . . . and the palate, knowing little but flattery and lies, has become jaded.’
‘How is it that you know so much about me?’
‘Despite your crown, Your Majesty is but a man. Therefore, if I use my knowledge of men, I add to my knowledge of Your Majesty.’
‘There are many people here who consider you insolent, Mademoiselle de Nesle.’
‘But all consider me interesting, Sire. You see how they are striving to overhear what I am saying.’
‘Might it not be what I am saying?’
‘No, Sire, it is enough that you talk to me. No effort is required to see that. But what I dare say to you is of the utmost interest.’
‘So they taught you to speak truth at your convent.’
‘Not they! They taught me etiquette, deportment and how to work flowers on a canvas. It was too boring to be endured.’
‘So you wanted to come to see the Court?’
She lifted her eyes to his face. ‘To see Your Majesty,’ she said boldly.
The king was excited. She was enough like her sister to appeal to him. The fact that she was far from beautiful added piquancy to her attraction; there were so many beautiful women at Court waiting to pounce on him, that often he felt as he had when he was a little boy and had wanted to escape from the people. He did not want to escape from Mademoiselle de Nesle. She amused him, and he discovered that in her company he was no longer bored.
Now he must see her every day. Fleury was anxious, Madame de Toulouse furious, and Madame de Mailly brokenhearted; but the inevitable had happened. The King was no longer in love with his mistress; her sister had taken her place in his affections.
Now Pauline-Félicité was a constant visitor to the petits appartements, and at the intimate suppers her place was beside the King.
Her ascendancy over him amazed everyone. It seemed incredible that Louis, who had all his life been accustomed to flattery, should be so enthralled by a woman whose prime characteristics were her outspokenness and her caustic tongue.