Vonda McIntyre - The Moon and the Sun

It’s easier to be an atheist, Lucien thought. And less dangerous. The King’s troops do not have permission to quarter themselves in my house, to loot it, to abuse without limit the members of my household.

“Is that all? Good day, then, gentlemen,” the King said to Barbezieux and de la Chaise. “M. de Chrétien, you will stay for a glass of wine.”

Barbezieux and de la Chaise bowed and withdrew.

Quentin refilled His Majesty’s goblet, and Lucien’s. Mme de Maintenon refused refreshment. Lucien sipped the wine; it was too fine a vintage to gulp even for medicinal purposes.

His Majesty closed his eyes, revealing for a moment his exhaustion, his age.

“Give me some simple task, M. de Chrétien,” His Majesty said. “Nothing to do with statecraft or religion. Something I may grant with a purse, with a wave of my hand.”

“There’s the matter of Father de la Croix, Your Majesty. The dissection.”

“Did he not complete it?”

“He completed the important part, Your Majesty. Apparently some few small muscles and sinews remain for him to observe.”

“His first attention must be to the matter we investigated last night.”

“Of course, Your Majesty.”

His Majesty waved his hand. “Otherwise, as his time permits, he may do as he likes with the carcass.”

“I will tell him, Your Majesty. He’ll be grateful.”

They sipped their wine in companionable silence, as if they were campaigning or at Marly, where etiquette weighed less heavily.

“You trouble me, M. de Chrétien,” His Majesty said.

“Trouble you, Sire!”

“You ask me for nothing.”

“No wonder I trouble you, Sire,” Lucien said. “Nothing is difficult to give, being so insubstantial.”

His Majesty chuckled, but would not be diverted. “All around me people beg for rank, for position, for pensions. For themselves, for worthless family members.”

Lucien wondered if he were being used to convey a message to Mme de Maintenon, who had obtained endless perquisites for her feckless brother. It was equally likely—more likely—that His Majesty spoke without considering her feelings.

“I’m afraid, M. de Chrétien, that if you are dissatisfied, you’ll flee my court again to the adventures of Arabia.”

“I have no reason to return to Arabia, Your Majesty,” Lucien said. “I went there only because you commanded me to leave your sight.”

“I often wished for your good counsel, while you were gone. Will you not take some reward, if only a token?”

You have given me a place in your confidence, Lucien thought, which honors me beyond wealth or rank.

“Your Majesty, I ask for nothing more than I already have.”

“Someday, Chrétien, you’ll ask me for a great favor. My honor will require me to grant it, whatever the cost.”

Marie-Josèphe closed up the cage and crossed the plank floor to Yves’ laboratory. The guards had moved the screens, surrounding it, hiding the shroud and protecting the equipment and the samples. She slipped past the curtains. Inside, everything was just as Yves had left it. Marie-Josèphe breathed a sigh of relief. His Majesty had not bothered to tell her brother that the sea monster would be put on display—for, after all, why should he? It was his sea monster. And he had, no doubt, been certain that his guards would protect the laboratory from casual curiosity or inadvertent damage.

The shroud was piled with fresh ice and a layer of sawdust. A hint of decay tinged the air. If His Majesty would only give Yves a single session, he could complete the gross dissection and preserve samples for study.

She sat at the laboratory table. The sea monster’s internal organs, including the anomalous lobe of the creature’s lung, lay preserved in spirits in heavy glass jars. The tissue looked quite ordinary, no different from that of the porpoise she had helped Yves dissect when they found it stranded and dead on the beach back home.

Shouldn’t an organ of immortality shine with light and glow with gold? Marie-Josèphe wondered. If the precepts of alchemy are true, after all, if base metals may transmute to the perfect metal gold, if living beings may achieve immortality…

She had never believed in transmutation or immortality. The discipline of observation and description and deduction and interaction spoke to her more clearly.

She prepared samples of kidney and liver, pancreas and lung, mounted them, and made a careful drawing of each, studying them with Yves’ old microscope. The sea voyage had done the mechanism no good. She hoped Mynheer van Leeuwenhoek would condescend to sell her one of his instruments. His lenses were said to be the best in the world, though devilishly difficult to focus.

She opened the final jar and carefully prepared a sample of the anomalous lung. Its texture was firmer than ordinary lung, its tissue denser.

At the microscopic level, the anomalous tissue differed greatly from ordinary lung. Instead of air sacs, the tissue lay in delicate overlapping leaves. She picked up her pen and began to draw.

“Mlle de la Croix.”

She lifted her gaze from the microscope. Count Lucien stood within the makeshift room of white silk, aloof and elegant as always. They exchanged salutes; he not only bowed, but tipped his hat.

“I see you are a scholar,” he said.

“I cannot claim such a distinction. I’m only preparing samples for Yves to study.”

“Where is your brother? I have a message for him.”

“I’m sure he’s writing up his notes—”

She cut off her careless words even before he raised his hand to silence her about last night’s secret meeting.

“—about the other matter,” she said. “Has His Majesty set the time of the next dissection? Please, tell me.”

“His Majesty desires your brother to concentrate his efforts upon… the other matter. But inasmuch as his time allows, M. de la Croix may conduct the dissection when His Majesty is not present.”

“Thank you, Count Lucien.”

“I’ll convey your gratitude to His Majesty.”

“You see?—I didn’t ask too much of you, after all.”

“I’d gladly take credit if I deserved it. The decision rested completely with His Majesty. But, Mlle de la Croix, have I asked too much of you?”

“In what way?”

“The submission for His Majesty’s medal.”

“It’s nearly finished.” I’m not lying, she thought, hiding her dismay. Not exactly lying. The dissection sketches have prepared me to draw a proper likeness of the living sea monster.

“When may I have it?”

“Tomorrow. I promise.”

“Very well.”

“Sir, may I beg a favor of you? A word of advice? It will take a moment of your time, no more.”

“Certainly.”

“Before I entered the convent—” She stopped, and waved her words away; Count Lucien had no time to spare for her history. “I would like to resume a correspondence…” She hesitated, afraid he might laugh at her presumption.

“With an admirer?” He smiled, in a kindly fashion. “Secret letters?”

“Certainly not, sir! It would be improper—my brother wouldn’t approve. I corresponded about optics, and the laws of motion, and asked a few ignorant questions about the nature of gravity. I only want to know who to give the letter to, so M. Newton will receive it.”

“M. Newton,” he said.

“Yes, sir.”

“The Englishman.”

“The mathematician and philosopher.”

Count Lucien chuckled. Marie-Josèphe blushed.

“I’m sorry you think it absurd, that a mere woman dare approach a man of—”

“I don’t think it absurd at all.” He shook his head. “If your brother’s reaction to an admirer concerns you, you’d not wish to witness His Majesty’s reaction to an English correspondent. No matter how learned.”