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will live out the rest of your life entirely forgotten by everybody including your closest relatives. On the other hand you might find yourself remembered, plucked up and dressed like a soldier and sent to fight the enemy in some foreign land—Turkey, or America, or Spain. After which you might find yourself dead, consigned to a coffin that is, at least, bigger than the cabinet you lived in before...
    And the King? Oh, the King has no need for doors. Just look at him, climbing the facade hand over hand like a big tame monkey, hauling himself across the stone balustrade and suddenly appearing in the Queen's Bedchamber, scaring her half to death.

The King's Penis
    The curtains part, revealing the Queen's Bedchamber; the bed curtains part, revealing the Queen. Elegant, coquettish, in charming disarray, she is seated on the right side of the bed, facing the audience. On her lap. Eggplant, a pug; to her left, Louis XVI, King of France, a softly snoringlump. It is the middle of the night—perhaps three o'clock. Though there is no moon, the room is eerily lit by recently fallen snow.
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A NTOINETTE,
speaking to the lump in the overwrought high-pitched "voice" of Eggplant, whom she's hoisted by his underarms and holds in front of her face:
Ah! Mon Dieu! What is to be done with the Queen? She is incorrigible. When she isn't tearing around on horseback like an Amazon, she's at the races, rubbing shoulders with harlots. And really, who's to say which is which, Queen or harlot? Are those diamonds genuine or paste? It's so hard to tell these days. It's so hard to tell whose big blue eyes those are, riveted on the flies of all the handsome young men.
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    The lump suddenly sits up and speaks.
Antoinette!
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A NTOINETTE,
still speaking through Eggplant:
The King is awake.
She returns the pug to her lap and leans over to give Louis a peck on the cheek.
And did the King have pleasant dreams?
L OUIS : I don't know.
A NTOINETTE : Let us see.
She lifts the blankets, peers underneath, then sits back up.
Apparently.
L OUIS : I want a look, too.
He takes a quick peek and ducks his head, embarrassed.
A NTOINETTE : One can only hope the King was dreaming of the Queen.
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    Lo vis, petulant:
I don't know, I told you.
Pause, thinking.
I seem to remember I was making you a spinning wheel.
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A NTOINETTE : But you actually did that, Lou-Lou, remember? You did make me a spinning wheel.
She sets Eggplant off to one side, then shifts position, leaning back into the pillows and opening her arms.
Only let's not think about that now. Let's only think about pleasant things. Come here. Come give us a kiss.
L OUIS : But the spinning wheel
is
a pleasant thing.
A NTOINETTE : Of course it is, my treasure. Of course it is.
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    They both disappear under the bedclothes. There isaperiod of agitated movement; a hand appears, afoot. A final spasm; Eggplant jumps to the floor.
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L OUIS ,
from under the covers:
Owww!
A NTOINETTE : Let me see if I can...
L OUIS : No. Please.
A NTOINETTE :... just pry this back a ...
L OUIS : STOP IT!!!
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    They both emerge from under the covers, Louis red-faced and panting slightly, Antoinette with tears running down her cheeks. Throughout the scene the room has been growing lighter—the pale light of a winter morning. Sounds of footsteps, doors being knocked on with knuckles or delicately scratched at with the little fingernail, muffled voices, doors opening—the Queen's household includes more than five hundred officers and servants, early risers, all of them. It is now possible to see the gilt balustrade fencing off the Queen's bed and its occupants from the rest of the room, where a large crowd will soon assemble, eager to watch the royal pair eat their breakfast, the male and female of the species in their natural habitat.
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A NTOINETTE : But there's so little time before the multitudes descend. Maybe if you ate less? Doctor Lassone seems to think that might help. Last night you ate a whole