“You have been my crown jeweler for a decade now, and yet you continue to amaze me,” the king said, holding up the golden starburst that had just been removed from his coat.
“It is an honor to serve you, Your Majesty,” Papa replied with a bow.
“That is why I have decided to entrust you with the greatest treasure of the French crown,” the king said. He snapped his fingers and Colbert stepped forward from beside the bed, a pretty rosewood box in his hands. A fleur-de-lis of white oak and gold adorned the polished lid.
The crowd leaned forward with excited, expectant eyes. The box was known to them. Just as everything Louis did inspired a fashion, this box, which had been brought out to display his great treasure many times, had inspired all the ladies of court to commission such fine boxes for their jewels. Papa knew what lay within it as well. He flinched as Colbert bowed beside the king and Louis took the box into his hands.
Two words shuddered through the air, whispered from a score of awestruck lips as Louis lifted the lid to reveal the huge, dark stone, inky black on a cushion of crimson velvet: “Le Violet!”
My breath caught in my throat. The Violet at last. The commission above all others. I remembered again the vision of the Mazarin cast in blue upon the king’s breast—the image of what the Violet would look like when Papa transformed it. My blood sang through my veins.
Louis returned the box to Colbert, who carried it to where Papa waited.
“Make it shine, Pitau,” said the king. “Fill it with light, like the Mazarins!”
Papa did not reach for the box. In fact, he took an involuntary step away from it, as if repulsed.
“Your Majesty,” he said, a tremor breaking his words. He swallowed and began again. “I must remind you, if I were to cut the Tavernier in the Mazarin style, a great deal of stone will be lost. Too much stone.”
“I’m sure you can find a way,” said the king.
“But, Your Majesty—” Papa said again, the desperation like a knife’s edge at his throat.
“Look at it, Pitau. Look!” Louis interrupted. “What do you see?”
Papa looked down into the diamond. He said nothing, but his shoulders drooped.
“What good is it to me if it does not shine? If it does not pierce my rivals with its beauty?” Louis demanded. The court murmured their agreement.
“No good at all, Your Majesty,” Papa said, his voice flat with defeat.
“Make it brilliant, Pitau. Capture the sun in its heart and I will grant you a title. Imagine, monsieur, the life you could give your wife. The marriage you could secure for your daughter.” He looked past Papa to us, and I lowered my eyes quickly, but not before his eyes passed over me and his lips curled in admiration.
“She is a lovely little gem herself, is she not? Imagine her as a gentleman’s wife.”
I heard Maman gasp, but I could not breathe.
“A marquise, perhaps. A lady of the court.”
Colbert held the box out to Papa again, and this time Papa took it, though his hands shook as he did.
“Make it shine, Pitau! Make me shine!” the king said, his eyes already alight with the idea of it.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Papa said. He snapped the rosewood casket shut and, bowing deeply, backed to the door to take his leave.
* * *
“A title, Jean!” Maman was beaming as we made our way home in the carriage. “A title and an estate! And a fine marriage for Juliette. It is everything we ever wanted. This is the opportunity of a lifetime!”
It was exactly what I was thinking too, and yet Papa’s manner confused me. He looked out the carriage window and said nothing, the melancholy that had come upon him in the king’s chamber only deepening.
“And you, Juliette,” Maman continued, as if unaware of Papa’s despair, or perhaps trying to dispel it. “An auspicious night for you as well. Complimented by the king himself! And I daresay you had an admirer in Monsieur Relieur. What do we know of him? Who is his family?”
I smiled, savoring the night, despite Papa’s gloom. “We did not speak of his family,” I said. “His father sent him to work with Colbert three years ago.”
Maman returned the warmth of my smile. “Perhaps the younger son of a country gentleman,” she speculated. “That would be a worthy match for you, Juliette.”
I glanced at Papa as Maman went on imagining bright things for our future. His lips tightened into a thin line and his hands gripped the wooden jewel box until his knuckles whitened. When our carriage arrived home at last, he stepped from it without a word. He locked the diamond away in his secure hiding place in the workshop, then trudged up the stairs to his bedchamber without so much as a bonne nuit to Maman and me.
I retired to my own bedchamber, but sleep would not come. When I closed my eyes, I heard again that tremor in Papa’s voice. I could not understand—he’d never shrunk from a challenge before. This was the greatest commission he could hope for. At last, I rose from my bed and stole downstairs, wanting another look at the diamond, hoping to see what Papa feared.
I was startled to find Papa in the workshop, his head in his hands. Papers were strewn across the table, surrounding the Violet in its box.
“Papa?” I said, touching his sleeve with timid fingers.
He raised his head, but his eyes rose no further than the Violet.
I stepped closer and bent over the stone. In the light of a single candle, its dark heart was opaque. The thin light could not penetrate but slid, slick and oily, across its surface. I remembered the king’s question and Papa’s slump of despair.
“What do you see in it?” I asked him.
“Darkness to consume the soul,” he said.
I shuddered as I leaned closer, searching for the dark omen but seeing only a stone. “But this is a great commission, isn’t it?”
“It is impossible, Juliette. It cannot be done. And yet I must do it.”
“But surely . . .” I let my words fade away, not knowing what else to say.
Papa sighed heavily. He gathered his papers and the gem itself and put them back into the compartment in the wall, locking them securely away. “Louis wants me to make it like the Mazarins, with fire in its heart. But when I look into the heart of this stone . . .”
He broke off, the tremor once again in his voice.
“What, Papa? What do you see?”
“Failure, Juliette,” he said. “Failure and ruin and death.”
FIVE
The tight pinch of René’s lips has relaxed, replaced by a crinkle of pleasure at the corners of his eyes. For all his anger, my retelling of that feast conjured feelings of delight in him. And that gives me hope. But he stiffened again as I spoke of our return home and Papa’s dismay, and this compels me to break from my story.