Amid the soothing sound of the waves, she slowly opened her eyes. The sky beyond the window was still tinged with blue-green. She clearly remembered drawing the curtains before going to sleep last night.
Then she realized that Constant must have opened them. It was his job to draw the curtains every morning at six.
The person dressing with his back to her seemed to sense that she was awake and slowly turned around. At the sight of that face, she was briefly dazed, feeling as if he were a stranger.
Then he bent over, kissed her cheek, and said, "Don't sleep too late. Today will be busy."
Rather than obediently listening like a good girl, she hooked an arm around his neck and made him fall back onto the soft bed.
He lay on his back and let her straddle him with complete disregard for propriety.
"Why do you want me to wear black?" she asked seriously.
Was it because it looked like mourning clothes?
That was what she left unsaid.
His famous, beautiful hands gently stroked the waist of her white nightgown.
"Black is dual in nature—cruel yet gentle, dangerous yet cheerful, just like you." He stroked her hair. "Timid and curious."
"You used to call me a bold little dwarf," she said softly.
"Do you remember Sean? You were actually afraid the first time you saw it." He teased her.
That was because that black-faced sheep reminded her of Louis XIV. Legend had it that those who opened the crypt beneath the Basilica of Saint-Denis during the French Revolution said Louis XIV's face was black. Unlike Louis XVI's corpse, which had decayed normally into white bones.
She looked at this "living man." If Napoleon's corpse had also rotted into bones by the time it was transported back