A/N: Remember how I said several chapters ago that this story is a useless study guide for your American History exam? Just wait 'til you find out how much I actually don't know about the French Revolution. I took nine years of French, and until literally yesterday I thought Robespierre and Rousseau were the same person. Get ready for an unapologetic oversimplification of history and a whole bunch of me making things up.
To the folks out there who actually know things about history, I'm sorry in advance :)
XII.
20 January 1785
Peggy nestled against Lafayette, letting the steady rhythm of his heartbeat sink into her body, the rhythm of her breathing slipping in time with his. The tiny bunk in their cabin aboard the Triton, bound for Brest from Manhattan, had not been designed with intimacy in mind. Lafayette was too tall for it, in any case; he had been forced to curl his legs up into his chest to fit in the narrow space. But Peggy did not mind. They could have bunked together in a bird's nest, she and her hours-old husband, and she would have counted her lodgings among the most luxurious in the world.
She sighed and closed her eyes, letting her mind drift here and there on the ungoverned tide of her thoughts. The cool metal of the ring on her left hand kept her from falling asleep entirely. The wedding band still felt surprising enough that, every time she looked at it, she had to remind herself it was real. In that, she knew she was not alone. She had seen Lafayette steal quick glances at the gold band on his own ring finger more than once, when he thought she was not looking.
Their marriage still felt like an impossibility—only by looking at the tangible proof of their rings could she convince herself it had actually taken place.
Peggy was not the kind of girl who'd dreamed of her wedding day since she was a little girl. None of the Schuyler sisters had. Angelica had played at being a lawyer, calling her younger sisters before an imaginary bench and cross-examining them for hours until the three girls broke courtroom procedure in a fit of giggles. Eliza had been a boundless daydreamer, inventing stories of horses riding through the clouds above Albany, or tiny fairies that crept through the secret passageways of the manor, whispering in the sisters' ears as they slept and spinning dreams out of their words. Peggy had always been outdoors, running races with the servant boys, rolling down hills until her head spun with dizziness and her governess had shouted herself hoarse.
She had hoped she would marry, of course; the alternative was spending the rest of her life at home with her father, which was hardly ideal. But if her wedding day had gone something less than conventionally, it did not unsettle any long-held expectations of the day.
They had been married in Trinity Church, an afternoon wedding. A small ceremony—had to be, by necessity, given the wedding's theme of "chaos, war, and precipitous haste." Peggy's family had been present, Eliza the matron of honor, little Philip fulfilling the duties of ring bearer with grave earnestness. Lafayette's family, of course, was a non-issue, but a crowd of friends—Alexander, Mulligan, Burr, Laurens—had backed him in the church, standing in perfectly for brothers. Lafayette's own father had passed away more than twenty years before, so there was no last-minute man-to-man advice from that quarter. But Peggy had seen, just before she entered the church, George Washington himself lean over to clap Lafayette encouragingly on the back, with a wink and a thumbs-up.
Lafayette, in his military uniform, had been as handsome as any girl dreaming of her future husband could have wished. Peggy had certainly not disappointed anyone, either, in the white full-skirted gown she had managed to scrounge up for the occasion. And then with a kiss, and a few utterly unsurprising cat-calls from the groom's side of the church, and Peggy's father crying entirely more than anyone had expected, it was over.
The wedding finished at two. The Triton set sail from the harbor at three fifteen. Only time to embrace her family, reassure her father one final time that she had no intention of letting Lafayette ruin her financially, and change into something more suitable.
And then here they were, on her wedding night, cramped in this tiny, poorly lit cabin on a ship bound for France, and Peggy could not physically contain any more happiness.
When Lafayette spoke, she felt his words as much as heard them. Close as they were, his speech vibrated through her chest, resonated in her bones.
"When we arrive in Paris," he said, "I promise, I will make sure our marital bed is more…" Wincing, he trailed off in search of the correct word. His cramped posture was, apparently, doing nothing for either his back or his eloquence.
"More human-sized?" Peggy prompted.
"Exactly."
"I don't know," she teased. "I don't mind sleeping in a matchbox. It feels like an adventure. Robinson Crusoe, or something."
He laughed. "I've made many mistakes in my relationship with you, but at least I have not stranded us on a deserted island for thirty years."
"I don't think I'd mind that either."
The Triton shifted slightly, cresting a wave larger than the rest—or, at least, so Peggy told herself, to justify the way she found herself halfway atop Lafayette, who laughed again and kissed her.
"Really?" he asked, grinning. "You think there is room?"
"I'm just being practical," she replied, between kisses. "We take up less space that way."
Lafayette took precious little convincing. The darkened, wave-tossed cabin of the Triton was no one's ideal location for a honeymoon, but he was a soldier, and she was a Schuyler: two groups of people perfectly happy to make the best of things.
"If practical considerations of space spark your interest," he murmured, "will our large bed in Paris be cold, then?"
"Nonsense," she deadpanned. "We can sleep in the broom closet."
Lafayette rolled his eyes—and rolled Peggy onto her back, his kisses equal parts amorous and exasperated. The former quickly took precedence, the heat of their bodies fighting the chill of the cabin, barely above the water.
The Marquis de Lafayette and his new marquise would soon reach the coast of France. The waves in the middle of the Atlantic were high, causing the ship to tilt steeply side to side. But the waves were not the only thing rocking the small bunk in their cabin that night.
#
16 February 1785
When the Triton docked in the French port town of Brest, something was not right.
Peggy clung to Lafayette's arm, his warmth a solid foundation for her to lean on in this unfamiliar town, its cold air alive with the scent of brine and the sparkling scales of gasping fish in rope nets along the dock. Arriving in France itself did not frighten her. The idea of unfamiliar cities and a new way of life was more exciting than alarming. And as for the prospect of living in a nation where few—if any—spoke your language, well, she had seen Lafayette accomplish it for years, and her French was at least as good as his English had been in '76.
No, it was not that. It was the people.
In every shop window, on every streetcorner, lining the docks and the boulevards, the streets of Brest brimmed with people, but not one of them spoke a word to Lafayette or Peggy. The salty air crackled with suspicion, the silence of people who had more to say behind your back than to your face. Each face shadowed, narrow, weary. Each brow darkened. Peggy saw one woman spit at Lafayette's feet, though he pretended not to have noticed.
Nine years Lafayette had dreamed of home. The entire voyage from Manhattan to Brest, he had spoken of Paris almost without pausing for breath. Of course, Peggy thought, he had to know things would be different now. The King of France did not recall his nobility from the four corners of the world for a political council because everything was business as usual. But it alarmed Peggy, how the little she had seen of the country reminded her of staring into the mouth of a cannon.
Knowing the fuse had been lit.
Waiting for the explosion.
When Lafayette smiled at her, it seemed strained. But if he did not feel the need to run, then she would not run either.
"Where are we going?" she asked. They were outdoors, but somehow it still felt appropriate to keep her voice down.
"Our escort is waiting for us at the stables," he replied, his tone resolutely light. "He has arranged for a coach to take us to Paris, and he will appraise us of the situation before we are to appear before the king."
Peggy tripped over nothing. Lafayette steadied her hastily, barely preventing her from falling against the cobblestones.
"When we appear before the king?" she repeated, her voice a rattlesnake's hiss. "You want me to meet the King of France?"
Lafayette cleared his throat uncomfortably. "I thought I had mentioned that."
"You did not."
"I told His Majesty I would return to France immediately after my wedding. The captain of the Triton told me His Majesty eagerly awaits meeting you."
Strictly speaking, Peggy knew this was not Lafayette's fault. One did not speak to kings the way one spoke to other people. Judicious omissions were simply not part of the fabric of conversation. That didn't mean she didn't want to slap him in that moment. Her grip on his elbow tightened until it seemed like she was trying to throttle his arm.
"Lafayette, I speak French like a six-year-old."
"I'll help you," Lafayette said earnestly. "He does not expect brilliant conversation. All he wants is for you to smile and curtsey and tell him je suis ravie de faire votre connaissance, votre majesté."
Peggy glowered at him. "And that's what you expect of me here in France? To smile and look pretty and say what you tell me to say?"
Lafayette blanched. "No, I, I only meant…"
"I'm not an ornament you can show to people to win them over—"
"I know that, ma chérie, but the king—"
"The king can hang himself for all I care, I don't—"
"Apologies, monsieur, madame. Am I interrupting something?"
The voice, and its unmistakable Virginian drawl, startled Peggy so badly she very nearly tripped again. To her faint satisfaction, Lafayette had flinched as well. So much for the impeccable reflexes of soldiers.
They turned away from their argument to face the man who had spoken. A tall, rangy man, he stood outside the stables, watching them with a faint smile and a violet waistcoat that was frankly alarming at first glance. Peggy instantly felt strongly about him, but had not yet decided if those feelings were positive or negative.
Lafayette, at least, seemed happy to see the man. Although, to be fair, Peggy rather suspected he would have been happy to see anyone who didn't spit in his face and swear at him.
"Thomas," Lafayette said, and warmly shook the man's hand. "Thank you for meeting us."
"Anything for the hero of the revolution," the man said—his accent spread his vowels in a vaguely insolent way, and Peggy's ambiguous feelings started to lean toward dislike. "And this must be Madame la Marquise."
Peggy's curtsey was something less than thorough.
"The same. And you are?" she asked.
"Forgive me," Lafayette said hastily. "Peggy, this is Thomas Jefferson, the American ambassador to France. He will be our escort to Paris. General Washington highly recommended him."
Jefferson gave a laconic half-bow.
"Mr. Jefferson, my wife, Margaret."
Peggy nodded at the ambassador. If he would not trouble himself to give a full bow at her introduction, she certainly wasn't going to curtsey twice.
"The coach is ready, monsieur. And if you want my advice, I would recommend we leave now. Brest is not a welcoming place to be at the moment."
"I had noticed," Lafayette said grimly.
"Your luggage?" Jefferson asked.
Lafayette shrugged. "My valet will bring it afterward."
"Excellent. Your chariot awaits, madame." Jefferson extended a gallant arm as the coachman opened the side door. Peggy gave Jefferson a withering look, then climbed in by herself, daring him to protest her lack of interest in chivalry.
Lafayette grinned. "You may deal with my wife as you do with me in all things, Thomas," he said. "If not more directly. She is my right hand, as I strive to be hers."
Peggy's earlier irritation with Lafayette flickered, then faded. She shifted across the seat in the coach, making room for her husband to sit beside her. It was difficult to be angry with him when his return home had given him so much of the confident self-assurance she loved in him. And when men like Thomas Jefferson, American ambassador to France, were also there, for comparison's sake.
Not that the business with the king had been forgotten, of course. But there would be time to address that.
"So, Mr. Jefferson," she said, as he sat opposite them and snapped the coach door shut behind him. "What news do you have to share with us?"
The coach lurched into motion, rattling across cobblestones that would soon give way to the smoother dirt roads connecting Brest and Paris. Jefferson leaned forward, clasping his hands between his knees. Suddenly, he seemed very tired.
"Plenty. And, I'm afraid, little of it good."
"Thomas, do not hold back to spare my feelings," Lafayette said sternly, though Peggy could see he was somewhat shaken. "News does not travel quickly across the ocean, but I have heard of unrest. Riots. I know."
"You know the shadow of what is. And you can't yet imagine what might be," Thomas replied. "Financial ruin, that's in part the worst of it Money worth almost nothing, and its worth still falling. Shortages of food. Prices rising. And for this they blame the nobles. The monarchy. The king."
Lafayette cursed. "And to respond to this, His Majesty calls the Assemblée des Notables? A barely political body without representation of the people? The commons must be furious."
"It's not the course I would have recommended either," Jefferson agreed wryly. "But for a man in my position, it is very difficult to convince His Majesty he's making an incredibly stupid mistake."
"And you think a man in my position would have better luck."
"A man who was actually summoned to attend the Assemblée des Notables, instead of a Virginian in the corner who no one will speak to? Yes. I do think you would have better luck."
"My husband just helped a group of rebels overthrow a king," Peggy interrupted. "Do you still think His Majesty would be inclined to listen?"
Jefferson smirked. "True, your husband ought to be careful how loudly he talks about his American enterprises when he's around the king. Or perhaps you, madame," he added, with a wink, "might use your powers of persuasion to convince—"
"Thomas," Lafayette began, but Peggy interrupted him before he'd finished saying the name.
"Mr. Jefferson," she said sharply, "I would think very carefully before you insinuate what you're about to insinuate, or I will personally break every one of your fingers."
Jefferson drew back slightly, a look of unmasked alarm on his face. Lafayette, from beside Peggy, fought an utterly hopeless battle to keep from dissolving into laughter.
"When I said 'deal directly with my wife,' Thomas," Lafayette managed, "what I should have said was 'my wife will not tolerate your nonsense.'"
"Yes," Jefferson said slowly. "I begin to understand."
"Good." Peggy smiled, thoroughly enjoying how Jefferson still leaned as far back in his seat as he could, as though her smile functioned like the bared teeth of a wolf. "Now, Mr. Jefferson. If you would be so kind as to bring my husband and I fully up to speed on the political climate of the country. If he is to function effectively at the Assemblée next week, you would do well to speak quickly."
Jefferson opened his mouth, then closed it again, unable to find the words to break the silence.
Lafayette grinned. "You heard my wife, Thomas. I promise, she does not bite."
"Not often," Peggy corrected.
Jefferson sighed. From his point of view, it was shaping up to be a very long journey to Paris.
