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Queen Maude’s Black Room
by Michael Cornelius A king died here, in this room, in this chateau, in Chenonceaux. I am a tourist here, an average man with a camera and a map, but if I close my eyes, close them tight, I can reel the centuries back in my mind, and I can see him still, lying on his bed, overcome, as his courtesans flee from his sight in their own selfish grief; they do not wish to bear witness to death. I remain steadfast, fascinated, as I watch her, his Queen, Maude, lacy and rubenesque in black bed clothes. I watch her take his hand, and sigh. She kisses him good-bye and tells him she loved him. She tells him to let go of his pain. I’m sure his death was painful; death is always painful. I can’t see him now for her, so I watch as she huddles over his seizing form, me partly wanting to cry, partly wanting to applaud at the sentiments of the show, but mostly not knowing how to react at all. I know what she’s going to do. I read it in my traveler’s guide. She’s never going to leave his room, his Queen; no, she will stay here forever, never to leave it again, not for twenty-six years, until death comes to claim her. She will stay in his room, sleep in his bed. She will paint it all black, the walls and the ceilings and the floor pitch, the furniture mahogany, her clothing only the finest and darkest of Oriental silk. She will never again see the light of day; murky candlelight will be her constant companion. She will have etched into the walls ghostly white depictions of bones and spades and feathers, symbols of death and majesty, and every spare corner will be riddled with these gaunt and pale reminders of what she has lost. It will be whispered amongst the less loyal of her servants that she is mad, with grief, with loss, the loss of a man, a king, a kingdom, a husband. Frankly, I’m not sure which, and honestly, I can’t say that I care. For me, it is pure spectacle and foolishness, to wall yourself up for love, time your singular and ghoulish companion. Maude was born a queen of France; and died, I say, a queen of fools. I open my eyes and it is two thousand and two again. I have come forward six hundred years in the blink of an eye and sunlight streams into the wide open spaces of Queen Maude’s black room. Other tourists mill about, excitedly sitting at Queen Maude’s black writing desk, admiring Queen Maude’s black satin bed sheets, or gazing at the view out of Queen Maude’s black window. I place my walkman headphones back over my ears, even though the tour guide expressly forbade it, and push the “on” button. I hear Regina Resnik, Saint-Saens, “Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix.” I would prefer something with more of a beat, but French opera seemed so appropriate this morning. Over the tolling of the soprano I hear the voice of my tour guide yelling in five languages to meet her at the front of the castle, so, slowly, I pick up my bag and amble towards the staircase. The other tourists have darted on ahead, but I’m never in a hurry. Just as I am about to take leave of Queen Maude’s black madness I hear a slight scratching noise. My New York instincts kick in and I think rat, or mouse, and what a cool story it would be to tell the folks back home, of the giant rat I saw in that fancy French chateau. I whirl, but instead of mouse, I see woman, a long figure sitting in the shadows of the writing desk, quill in hand. This is trouble, and I am about tell her to knock it off, when gently, softly, greatly, she looks up at me. It is Maude. I check to see if my eyes are open. They are. I’m not quite sure if Maude is looking at me, or through me, and I think to wave my hand rapidly to get her attention if I can, but I decide not to; I don’t wish to startle her. Instead, I watch as her brow furrows in momentary concentration, as if she cannot remember the word she wishes to write. Then her furrows vanish, and she resumes writing, and I know now that she is writing to him, her king, her husband, a note never meant to be sent. I know now that this was—is—her daily routine, writing to him words he never heard, never will hear, and maybe was never meant to hear. I’m not sure; all I know is the look on her face, a look of utter patience, of consternation and betrayed love, of humility and despair and somehow, in the midst of all the beauteous black, of joy. To the haunting sound of aria, I turn to go; life was never meant to enter here again after he died, and I no longer wish to bear witness to the story of this room, so I leave; Maude alone, me jealous. |
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