Margont and Relmyer started to look for Luise while Lefine and Jean-Quenin Brémond went over to the buffet while studying the cartouches of mythogical scenes scattered over the walls.
Margont’s glance wandered over the crowds in uniform. There were geographic engineers in their blue coats and bicornes, their eyes exhausted from drawing up maps of the exact topography of the interminable semi-islands littering the Danube; aides-de-camp serving one general and criticising all the others; Bavarians in light blue coats with breastplates in their regimental colours and tall black helmets bulging skywards; cuirassiers who had left their armour behind, and looked ill at ease, like crabs without their shells; hussars as colourfully attired as their reputation warranted; Polish Light Horse in blue and scarlet, who hated the Austrians almost as much as they hated Russians and Prussians, and who delighted in tormenting the Austrian nobles by ‘accidentally’ knocking into them; the élite police force in leather breeches and blue coats with red lapels, often in conflict with the French soldiers who rebelled against their authority; colonels with shakos topped with plumes or crests; bicorned generals whose importance could be measured by the sycophantic crowd that gravitated towards them ... And finally, at the summit of the pantheon of the imperial mythology, reigned the grenadiers of the Old Guard, giants made still taller by their enormous bearskins, which their terrorised enemies could spot from afar. These praetorians, who had never lost a battle and whose appearance signalled the death sentence for all those who stood in their way, were Napoleon's most trusted élite troops, which he called on only as a last resort. All the various soldiers chatted, drank, paid court, danced ... At the back of the gallery a monumental Dresden china clock dominated the scene, impossible to ignore. Its presence seemed to murmur, 'Hurry up, time is passing and life is short,’ a message known and much repeated but none the less true. And especially true for these soldiers, who would perhaps all be dead in a month.
The Austrians were equally numerous: sympathisers of the French Empire, proponents of an Austrian revolution, or those simply wanting to mingle with important people.
Margont finally caught sight of Luise just finishing a conversation, but he was careful not to greet her or to point her out to Relmyer.
She was sublime. Her white dress with puff sleeves was elegantly pleated in the manner of a toga, and seemed to diminish her pallor. She wore long gloves to the elbow. Her dancing slippers beat time, as much to the rhythm of her impatience as to the rhythm of the waltz. Round her waist she wore a red bow, where others had chosen golden or cream belts. The scarlet attracted attention and was emphasised by the flower pinned to her bosom. White and red, the colours of Austria, with the red on her heart. Luise was declaring her patriotic convictions. She must have been annoyed to see her parents welcoming the French into their home in this way. Her hairstyle had not changed and Margont was delighted because the new fashion for the Titus cut, very short and frizzy, left him cold. He did not understand why people longed to live in the manner of eight hundred years ago. And, happily, neither was she wearing one of those ridiculous crowns of wilting flowers straight out of an embroidered fantastical picture of the Muses. Luise had not spotted them yet; she was still looking about. How delicious it was to be able to observe a woman you were attracted
to! Margont could have continued to watch her longer than was seemly. He wanted to savour the moment when she finally noticed him. He wanted to catch that instant of condensed time when the anxious quest ended and just before social niceties took over. That second of truth, when emotion and surprise make you briefly drop the mask that society obliges you to wear. Alas, Relmyer waved to Luise and when her expression changed to one of intense joy, Margont could not tell how much of that was for Relmyer and how much for him.
Margont and Relmyer skirted round the dance floor where couples, hands joined, arms raised, sketched complicated patterns in agreeable but artificial harmony. They passed in front of the orchestra, all powdered wigs, ochre livery, silk stockings and aggression muzzled by propriety; unleashed a storm of tut-tutting and fan-waving as they brushed past a group of young ladies in search of partners and reached Luise, who had walked over to meet them. She looked at Relmyer, her eyes shining with tears. Her distress, misinterpreted, earned him withering looks from scandalised ladies nearby.
‘You’ve grown.' she stammered humbly.
Relmyer was equally moved. Thousands of phrases came to mind but they did not manage to say any of them. They were unable to express their evident joy, because their reunion emphasised the loss of Franz. Their couple was an amputated trio.
Margont did not exist for Luise at that moment and it pained him. Yet again, the past displaced the present and he did not belong to their past. Colour returned to Luise’s cheeks and her voice grew firmer.
‘I have so much to reproach you for, Lukas! You’re lucky that I have forgiven you, you traitorous French hussar. You abandoned me, never wrote to me or sent me news, and you were too pigheaded, stupid and selfish even to let me know you’d returned to Vienna!’
She took his hand tenderly, to assure herself that this reunion she had so often dreamt of, although not in these circumstances, was in fact real. And also so as not to lose her brother again. Relmyer gently freed his fingers. Luise turned towards Margont. She looked radiant.
‘You’re very elegant in your enemy uniform. But I class you separately in a strange category of “enemy friends”. I am delighted to see you, even though I would have preferred you in civilian clothes.’
‘I would have preferred that too. Your colours are more reminiscent of a uniform than a ball gown.’
Relmyer turned his back on them.
'The old bat isn’t here yet,’ he murmured.
He was watching for her so avidly that he forgot about Luise and Margont. The latter hastened to take advantage of that.
‘Luise - I can call you Luise? - there’s something I’ve been dying to ask you. What did you mean exactly when you said that you had guessed that, in a way, I was an orphan?’
Luise had expected that question.
‘Tell me about yourself and I’ll answer you.’
Her tone was teasing but her expression serious. Margont entered into the spirit of the game.
‘My father died when I was small. My mother couldn’t support us any longer so sent me to live with one of my uncles. He took it into his head to make me a monk. A calamitous idea ...’
Luise tried to imagine Margont as a monk. It was a disturbing image.
‘He must have wanted to redeem his sins,’ she hazarded.
‘And I paid the price. I was shut up against my will in the Abbey of Saint-Guilhem-le-Desert, in the south-east of France. I wasn’t allowed to see my family any more, nor to leave the abbey. I thought that I would never leave the place again. I felt utterly abandoned, like an orphan. I stayed there from the age of six until I was ten.’ Margont had presented his account in an orderly fashion. His summary resembled a report. But rage and sadness boiled within him, like pus in an abscess that would neither burst nor reabsorb itself, so could never heal.
‘How did you escape? You must have driven those poor monks mad.’
‘Actually that was one of my favourite tactics. However, it was the Revolution that liberated me - by suppressing by decree all religious communities.’
Luise shook her head. ‘No, you liberated yourself. Someone can let you out of a prison, but your spirit can still remain a prisoner. I’m the same - I freed myself. It took me years and years ... One day, at Lesdorf Orphanage, they taught us about earthquakes. I was terrified for weeks; I had nightmares. I kept thinking the earth was trembling. I imagined a country where the ground shook all the time, where houses collapsed and people walked about in streets devastated by every strong trembling ... In fact it appears that these phenomena only last a few seconds. Humans can tremble for a lot longer than the earth can. Of course, my adoptive parents genuinely love me. But do you know why they chose me and not someone else? It’s because I was good - very important, that -because I was in perfect health and I was a conscientious student.