But once the doll was repaired, Marie immediately transferred her affection to a sad bear with a blue velvet coat. It had black fur in tufts on its head that made it look as though it had fallen in the water. It had a look on its face that made it seem as though it had gotten into trouble all on its own and couldn’t blame anyone but itself.
“I love you so much,” Marie said to the bear at her play tea party. “But of course I love you so much. How could I not? You are so lovable. Any girl would fall in love with you. I want to be the only one who knows how to love you. I want you to think that if you didn’t have me to love, then you will be all alone in the world. I want you to be as afraid of losing me as I am of losing you. Is that cruel? I’m so mean, I know. Can I make it up to you in kisses? I could never get tired of kissing you. Do you fancy some cookies?”
She took a spoon and scooped out some buttons and dropped them on the plate.
“Oh, it’s always important to eat. Or you will become too skinny. And do you know what happens to bears when they get too skinny? Well, their eyes fall out of their heads, of course. You’ll be on your hands and knees looking all over the floor for them. But you’ll never find them, since you’ll be blind.”
Marie stared at the bear, who refused to respond. Every time she spoke to her dolls, it was as though she were speaking to the same person. All the dolls were the same. They were all disastrously bored. They took their chagrin out on her. The bear was much the same.
“Do you think about other bears? Ones in the zoo? Do you imagine you would be happier with them than you are with me? You wouldn’t be. But I don’t tell you that you are very different than they are. You aren’t wild. You belong in the house here with me. You wouldn’t be happy at the zoo. They don’t have teatime. They don’t have a warm, cozy bed for you. Oh, I’ve had it. I’m so tired of begging you to love me all day long.”
She stood up and stormed off but then found herself turning and heading right back hurriedly.
“You have to forgive me. You can’t believe a word I said.”
Marie seemed not at all concerned by the amount of love she had to give. Her reach was enormous. She had the ability to make large groups of people feel loved by her. Her affection was like sunlight, and it could fill an entire room.
* * *
The governess told Louis that Marie needed to play with other children. The governess came to this conclusion when she encountered Marie in the midst of a heated argument with a pig. She was pushing around a toy perambulator. It was a lovely pink contraption with gold trimmings. It was indeed fancier than any the governess had witnessed any child riding in. She imagined Marie was pushing around one of the dolls she was so fond of. But the blanket began to stir. For a moment she was terribly apprehensive, wondering who had given Marie a baby to play with.
But then a head emerged from the blankets. She thought she was looking at an unruly pig. But then she thought she must be wrong. So she looked closer, only to realize she had been right. There was a pig in the carriage. Marie had a look of exasperation on her face. An expression ordinarily reserved for new mothers of very young children.
“You are being very difficult. What do you want? If I give you a cupcake, you are going to want another one. You have gone mad since I gave you that cupcake. Don’t you wish you had never even tasted it? You wouldn’t know what you are missing out on all the time. I worry I’ve driven you mad. Please don’t tell the other pigs about how good it tasted. They will never leave us in peace. They will sneak into the house in the middle of the night. They will eat all the food. But they won’t stop there. They will eat all the pillows and the blankets. They will eat the couch cushions. They will eat the carpets. They will eat the heads of all my dolls.”
The mansion was overrun by animals. Whereas most homes had a menagerie of taxidermized creatures on display, the Antoines had ones that were insistently alive.
Marie had begged and begged for a piglet for her birthday. She fed it with a bottle of milk. She had her tailor make small collars and bonnets perfectly shaped and suited for his head. It wasn’t an uncommon sight to witness Marie walking down the boulevard with a pig wearing a bow tie. Or she might be lying in her yard reading a book with her head propped on a sow for a pillow.
Louis thought animals were attracted to Marie’s maternal sweetness. But it was more likely they were attracted to her wildness. The animals believed she was one of them.
* * *
As she got a little older, Marie befriended the girls in the neighborhood, who were much easier to impress than her stuffed animals and pets were. Her adorable personality and her wealth made her very attractive to other little girls. She was good at getting girls to fall in love with her. She couldn’t really love them back though. Like her dolls, they were all interchangeable. And loving everyone is the same thing as loving nobody at all.
She accepted that she was the leader. She would present to them her latest mechanical trinket, such as a silver bird that sat on her finger and chirped. She loved technology and having a young audience to impress with her scientific acquisitions and knowledge. Gradually the adulation of others began to replace and satisfy her need for other feelings. She became addicted to praise. She became especially addicted to being looked at, because she had no other emotional sustenance. It was as though she were eating cupcakes expecting to be filled up. And they made her hungrier for more food instead of making her feel full.
Marie was becoming a more darling and extravagant version of herself. She was never alone. She never had time for introspection. She never had time for loneliness and self-loathing.
* * *
One chilly afternoon, Marie saw a small procession of children walking across her lawn and headed into the woods of the mountain behind it. She had been about to hurry inside when the snow had started rushing at her face, but she paused to look at the group. Their assuredness struck her as peculiar. They all seemed very sad. They were wearing their black Easter Sunday coats. A little girl and boy at the front of the line were helping each other carry a rectangular box. They were both weeping. The other children also looked so sad it made them appear anxious. It was as if they’d snuck out of a nightmare and they were trying to find their way back to it.
Except for a little girl with a thick mane of black hair that appeared to have been mussed up by the wind. This strange girl looked absolutely calm. Her back was straight. When the children began to falter, she moved to the front of the procession. She was different.
CHAPTER 3
Introducing the Devilish Sadie Arnett