After the death in 1599 of his mistress Gabrielle d’Estrées, whom he had planned to marry, the forty-six-year-old king started casting about for a suitable princess bride. His choice fell on Marie de Medici, niece of the grand duke of Tuscany. The lucky bride was selected more for her rivals’ unsavoriness than for her own recommendations. The Spanish infanta was a repulsive antiquity, the German princesses were fat and awkward, and the attractive princess de Guise had been raised in the scorpions’ nest of the king’s most implacable enemies. Plus, Henri had borrowed heavily from Marie’s uncle and hoped that the debt would be forgiven if he made her queen of France.
During his marriage negotiations, the king fell in love with the twenty-two-year-old noblewoman Henriette-Catherine de Balzac d’Entragues. The ultimate courtesan, Henriette offered the king far more than beauty—she possessed a grace, a charm, a cutting wit, and demanding and impetuous passions that excited him. She was lithe, supple, sinuous, the cold cogs of her mind grasping quickly any word or action that could feed her insatiable ambition. And her one ambition was to become queen of France.
Before Henriette had sex with the king, she demanded the outrageous sum of one hundred thousand crowns, to which the love-starved monarch readily assented. His minister the duc de Sully, who called Henriette “that malignant wasp,” was compelled to fork over the money from the treasury.43 In protest the duke had the sum brought in silver pieces rather than gold, and spread them out far and wide across the floor of the king’s cabinet room to show Henri how much money he was wasting on the foolish girl. “Ventre saint-gris!” cried the king, stepping into the room. “That’s a pleasure dearly paid for.”
“Yes,” Sully replied icily. “The merchandise is certainly a bit dear.”44
Having pocketed the cash, Henriette now declared that before the king consummated his passion for her, he must furnish written proof that he intended to marry her when possible. An outrageous proposition—especially in light of his ongoing negotiations with the House of Tuscany—but Henri so burned with desire for Henriette that he wrote with his own hand, “We, Henri IV… promise and swear on our faith and word as a king… that should the said Henriette-Catherine de Balzac within six months, beginning from this day, become pregnant and should she bear a son, then at that time we shall solemnize the marriage publicly in holy church according to the required customary ritual.”45
Before sending it, Henri showed his promise to the duc de Sully and asked his opinion of it. The duke grabbed the missive and ripped it to shreds. The king, aghast, asked his adviser if he was mad. To which the duke replied he wished that he were “the only madman in France!”46 Undeterred, the king had a secretary write out an identical promise and sent it to his lady love.
Henriette gloated over the compromising letter, which at the time was a legitimate contract and could in a court of law nullify Henri’s subsequent marriage to another. Now all she had to do was bear a healthy son and she would become queen of France. Her joy was diminished somewhat as Henri continued to pursue his marriage with Marie de Medici. By late April 1600—when Henriette was seven months pregnant and well on her way to fulfilling her side of the bargain—Henri signed the marriage contract with Tuscany. Henriette’s feigned veneer of generous goodwill cracked, and for the first time the calculating monster behind showed itself.
Tossing her an expensive bone, Henri quickly created Henriette the marquise de Verneuil, bestowing on her a large territory and castle. The lady was not appeased. She threatened to make public his promise of marriage if he continued with the Tuscan union. Henri became aware that his foolish promise could result in international scandal and loss of prestige to his realm. He fired off a letter to her. “Mademoiselle,” he wrote, “Love, Honor, as well as all the favors you have received from me would have sufficed for the most frivolous soul in the world, unless she were gifted with a naturally evil character such as yours…. Iam asking you to return to me the promise in question and not to give me the trouble of recovering it by some other means. Please return also the ring I gave you the other day…. I would like an immediate response.”47 The king waited for an immediate response in vain.
Henriette, while refusing to yield the letter, resumed her mask of gentle goodness. At her advanced stage of pregnancy, Henri was loath to provoke her and so brought her to the royal palace of Fontainebleau for her lying-in. While Henriette could not control the sex of the child—a fact which must have irked her immensely—she took great precautions for her health, combining rest, exercise, and a nutritious diet. Although she implored Henri to stay with her for the delivery, Henri—no doubt still angry over her failure to return his written promise—shrugged off her supplications and rode to Lyons on business.
Unfortunately for Henriette, her labor started during a violent thunderstorm. Lightning flashed outside the palace; then a bolt entered her room and passed beneath her bed. Henriette became hysterical. For hours she screamed uncontrollably, and by morning she had delivered a son, stillborn. When told that her ticket to the throne lay cold and lifeless, Henriette plunged into a deep despair. For weeks she lay listless in her bed. She had come close, so very close. The duc de Sully, however, painfully aware of Henri’s foolish promise, thought the bolt of lightning had been sent by God to prevent them all from falling into the nasty clutches of Queen Henriette.
The king, relieved at the outcome, became a caring and consoling lover. Henriette, finally accepting she would never be queen, hardened into an even more coldly calculating courtesan, demanding at least the perks of a throne. When she recovered, she visited Henri in Lyons “in an uncovered litter as if she were the Queen,” one witness reported.48 The English ambassador wrote, “The King hath brought his mistress hither whom he doth embrace with more kindness than kings commonly do their wives, and doth honor with as much respect as if she were his queen.”49
On November 3, 1600, Marie de Medici was welcomed into the port of Marseilles as queen of France. The bride was rather long in the tooth at the advanced age of twenty-six, and inclined toward heaviness. She boasted a sterling virtue, a queenly bearing, and a calm temperament. The French people approved of her dignified appearance. Her heaviness made her appear queenly in her thick, jewel-encrusted robes. Her lethargy seemed regal. One duchess wrote of the new queen, “Marie de Medici has large eyes, a full round face…. Her skin is dark but clear…. she is inclined to be a little heavy. There is a great kindness in her face but,” she added darkly, recalling the beauty of the king’s dead mistress, “there is nothing that even approaches Gabrielle d’Estrées.”50
“I have been deceived! She is not beautiful!” the groom grumbled to a friend after meeting Marie.51 Henri IV had been duped by the old portrait trick and was expecting a slender beauty with elegant features, not this heavy woman with a flat farmer’s face. He managed to fulfill his dynastic duties, however, and made Marie pregnant on his honeymoon. Soon after, Henri left Marie—to attend to urgent state business, he said—and visited Henriette, whom he also made pregnant. When Marie made her official entrance into Paris alone, she was surprised at the lack of pomp. Worse, when she arrived at the Louvre she found the queen’s apartments dark and empty. The king had forgotten to arrange for her furniture.
Conniving Henriette badgered Henri into having her presented to the queen as soon as possible, as such a presentation would raise Henriette’s prestige at court. Ladies had to be presented by a noblewoman of good standing, and the unfortunate duchesse de Nemours was given the job, knowing the new queen would never forgive her. Trembling, the duchess introduced Henriette. Though Marie’s French was not yet perfect, she had already heard the name and its unpleasant associations. Henri, with his soldier’s frankness, added brusquely, “This is my mistress who now wishes to be your servant.”52 This statement only poured salt on the wound of the poor bride clutching to the last vestiges of her dignity.