Книга - The Last Cavalier: Being the Adventures of Count Sainte-Hermine in the Age of Napoleon

The Last Cavalier: Being the Adventures of Count Sainte-Hermine in the Age of Napoleon
Alexandre Dumas


The lost final novel by the master of the epic swashbuckling adventure stories: The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers.The last cavalier is Count de Sainte-Hermine, Hector, whose elder brothers and father have fought and died for the Royalist cause during the French Revolution. For three years Hector has been languishing in prison when, in 1804, on the eve of Napoleon's coronation as emperor of France he learns what is to be his due. Stripped of his title, denied the honour of his family name as well as the hand of the woman he loves, he is freed by Napoleon on the condition that he serves in the imperial forces. So it is in profound despair that Hector embarks on a succession of daring escapades as he courts death fearlessly. Yet again and again he wins glory - against brigands, bandits, the British, boa constrictors, sharks, tigers and crocodiles. At the Battle of Trafalgar it is his bullet that fells Nelson. But however far his adventures take him - from Burma's jungles to the wilds of Ireland - his destiny lies always with his father's enemy, Napoleon.












ALEXANDRE DUMAS

The Last Cavalier


Being the Adventures of COUNT SAINTE-HERMINE in the Age of Napoleon

Translated by LAUREN YODER









CONTENTS







Cover (#u46c2d404-c4a8-56a9-bb3f-227ae9ad0d1f)

Title Page (#u4b3d209a-e830-51b1-821e-e0ab3b5b2270)

PART I - BONAPARTE

I - Josephine’s Debts

II - How the Free City of Hamburg Paid Josephine’s Debts

III - The Companions of Jehu

IV - The Son of the Miller of La Guerche

V - The Mousetrap

VI - The Combat of the One Hundred

VII - Blues and Whites

VIII - The Meeting

IX - Two Companions at Arms

X - Two Young Women Put Their Heads Together

XI - Madame de Permon’s Ball

XII - The Queen’s Minuet

XIII - The Three Sainte-Hermines

XIV - Léon de Sainte-Hermine

XV - Charles de Sainte-Hermine [I]

XVI - Mademoiselle de Fargas

XVII - The Ceyzériat Caves

XVIII - Charles de Sainte-Hermine [2]

XIX - The End of Hector’s Story

XX - Fouché

XXI - In Which Fouché Works to Return to the Ministry of Police, Which He Has Not Yet Left

XXII - In Which Mademoiselle de Beauharnais Becomes the Wife of a King without a Throne and Mademoiselle de Sourdis the Widow of a Living Husband

XXIII - The Burning Brigades

XXIV - Counterorders

XXV - The Duc d’Enghien [I]

XXVI - In the Vernon Forest

XXVII - The Bomb

XXVIII - The Real Perpetrators

XXIX - King Louis of Parma

XXX - Jupiter on Mount Olympus

XXXI - War

XXXII - Citizen Régnier’s Police and Citizen Fouché’s Police

XXXIII - Empty-Handed

XXXIV - The Revelations of a Man Who Hanged Himself

XXXV - The Arrests

XXXVI - George

XXXVII - The Duc d’Enghien [2]

XXXVIII - Chateaubriand

XXXIX - The Embassy in Rome

XL - Resolve

XLI - Via Dolorosa

XLII - Suicide

XLIII - The Trial

XLIV - In the Temple

XLV - In the Courtroom

XLVI - The Sentencing

XLVII - The Execution

PART II - NAPOLEON

XLVIII - After Three Years in Prison

XLIX - Saint-Malo

L - Madame Leroux’s Inn

LI - The Fake English Ship

LII - Surcouf

LIII - The Officers on the Revenant

LIV - Getting Under Way

LV - Tenerife

LVI - Crossing the Line

LVII - The Slave Ship

LVIII - How the American Captain Got Forty-Five Thousand Francs instead of the Five Thousand He Was Asking For

LIX - Île de France

LX - On Land

LXI - The Return [I]

LXII - The New York Racer

LXIII - The Guardian

LXIV - Malay Pirates

LXV - Arrival

LXVI - Pegu

LXVII - The Trip

LXVIII - The Emperor Snake

LXIX - Brigands

LXX - The Steward’s Family

LXXI - The Garden of Eden

LXXII - The Colony

LXXIII - The Vicomte de Sainte-Hermine Is Buried

LXXIV - Tigers and Elephants

LXXV - Jane’s Illness

LXXVI - Delayed Departure

LXXVII - Indian Nights

LXXVIII - Preparations for a Wedding

LXXIX - The Wedding

LXXX - Eurydice

LXXXI - Return to Pegu

LXXXII - Two Captures

LXXXIII - Return to Chien-de-Plomb

LXXXIV - A Visit to the Governor

LXXXV - A Collection for the Poor

LXXXVI - Departure

LXXXVII - What Was Happening in Europe

LXXXVIII - Emma Lyonna

LXXXIX - In Which Napoleon Sees That Sometimes It Is More Difficult to Control Men Than Fortune

XC - The Port of Cadiz

XCI - The Little Bird

XCII - Trafalgar

XCIII - Disaster

XCIV - The Storm

XCV - Escape

XCVI - At Sea

XCVII - Monsieur Fouché’s Advice

XCVIII - A Relay Station in Rome

XCIX - The Appian Way

C - What Was Happening on the Appian Way Fifty Years before Christ

CI - An Archeological Conversation between a Navy Lieutenant and a Captain of Hussars

CII - In Which the Reader Will Guess the Name of One of the Two Travelers and Learn the Name of the Other

CIII - The Pontine Marshes

CIV - Fra Diavolo

CV - Pursuit

CVI - Major Hugo

CVII - At Bay

CVIII - The Gallows

CIX - Christophe Saliceti, Minister of Police and Minister of War

CX - King Joseph

CXI - Il Bizzarro

CXII - In Which the Two Young Men Part Ways, One to Return to Service under Murat, and the Other to Request Service under Reynier

CXIII - General Reynier

CXIV - In Which René Sees that Saliceti Was Not Mistaken

CXV - The Village of Parenti

CXVI - The Iron Cage

CXVII - In Which René Comes Upon Il Bizzarro’s Trail When He Least Expects It

CXVIII - In Pursuit of Bandits

CXIX - The Duchess’s Hand

APPENDIX

I His Imperial Highness, Viceroy Eugene-Napoleon (#litres_trial_promo)

II At Lunch (#litres_trial_promo)

III Preparations (#litres_trial_promo)

A NOTE TO THE READER

A NOTE ABOUT PREPARING THE TEXT

About the Author

By the same author

Copyright

About the Publisher



PART I BONAPARTE (#u3e8154c2-e160-5506-b2f3-078402a93490)




I Josephine’s Debts (#u3e8154c2-e160-5506-b2f3-078402a93490)







“NOW THAT WE ARE in the Tuileries,” Bonaparte, the First Consul, said to Bourrienne, his secretary, as they entered the palace where Louis XVI had made his next-to-last stop between Versailles and the scaffold, “we must try to stay.”

Those fateful words were spoken at about four in the afternoon on the 30th Pluviose in the Revolutionary year VIII (February 19, 1800).

This narration begins exactly one year to the day after the First Consul’s installation. It follows our book The Whites and the Blues, which ended, as we recall, with Pichegru fleeing from Sinnamary, and our novel The Companions of Jehu, which ended with the execution of Ribier, Jahiat, Valensolles, and Sainte-Hermine.

As for General Bonaparte, who was not yet general at that time, we left him just after he had returned from Egypt and landed back on French soil. Since the 24th Vendémiaire in the year VII he had accomplished a great deal.

First of all, he had managed and won the 18th Brumaire, though the case is still being appealed before posterity.

Then, like Hannibal and Charlemagne, he crossed the Alps.

Later, with the help of Desaix and Kellermann, he won the battle of Marengo, after first losing it.

Then, in Lunéville, he arranged peace.

Finally, on the same day that he had David’s bust of Brutus placed in the Tuileries, he re-established the use of “madame” as a form of address. Stubborn people were still free to use the word “citizen” if they wanted, but only yokels and louts still said “citizeness.”

And of course only the proper sort of people came to the Tuileries.

Now it’s the 30th Pluviose in the year IX (February 19, 1801), and we are in the First Consul Bonaparte’s palace in the Tuileries.

We shall now give the present generation, two thirds of a century later, some idea of his study where so many events were planned. With our pen we shall draw as best we can the portrait of that legendary figure who was considering not only how to change France but also how to turn the entire world upside down.

His study, a large room painted white with golden moldings, contains two tables. One, quite beautiful, is reserved for the First Consul; when seated at the table, he has his back to the fireplace and the window to his right. Also on the right is a small office where Duroc, his trusty aide-de-camp of four years, works. From that room they can communicate with Landoire, the dependable valet who enjoys the First Consul’s total confidence, and with the large apartments that open up onto the courtyard.

The First Consul’s chair is decorated with a lion’s head, and the right armrest is damaged because he has often dug into it with his penknife. When he is sitting at his table, he can see in front of him a huge library packed with boxes from ceiling to floor.

Slightly to the right, beside the library, is the room’s second large door. It opens up directly to the ceremonial bedroom, from which one can move into the grand reception room. There, on the ceiling, Le Brun painted Louis XIV in full regalia, and there a second painter, certainly not as gifted as Le Brun, had the audacity to add a Revolutionary cockade to the great king’s wig. Bonaparte is in no rush to remove it because it allows him to say, when he points out the anomaly to visitors: “Those men from the Convention years were certainly idiots!”

Opposite the study’s only window, which allows light into this quite sizable room and looks out over the garden, stands a large wardrobe that’s attached to the consular office. It is none other than Marie de Médicis’s oratory, and it leads to a small stairway that descends to Madame Bonaparte’s bedroom below.

Just like Marie-Antoinette, whom she resembles in more ways than one, Josephine hates the state apartments. Consequently, she has arranged her own little safe haven in the Tuileries, as had Marie-Antoinette at Versailles.

Almost always, at least at the time we are speaking of, the First Consul would enter his office in the morning through that wardrobe. We say “almost always,” because after they moved to the Tuileries the First Consul also had a bedroom separate from Josephine’s. He slept there if he came home too late at night, so as not to disturb his wife, or if some subject of discord—and such moments, though not yet frequent, were beginning to occur from time to time—had precipitated an argument that left them for a time not on speaking terms.

The second table is nondescript. Placed near the window, it affords the secretary a view of thick chestnut tree foliage, but in order to see whoever may be walking in the garden he has to stand up. When he is seated, his back is turned just slightly to the First Consul, so the secretary has to turn his head only a bit to see him. As Duroc is rarely in his office, that is where the secretary often receives visitors.

Bourrienne is that secretary.

The most skillful artists competed with each other to paint or sculpt Bonaparte’s, and later Napoleon’s, features. But the men who lived most closely with him, although they could recognize in such statues or portraits the extraordinary man’s essence, say that no single image of the First Consul or the Emperor exists that is a perfect likeness.

When he was First Consul, they managed to paint or sculpt his prominent cranium, his magnificent brow, the hair that he plastered down over his temples and let fall to his shoulders, his tanned face, long and thin, with its meditative physiognomy.

As Emperor, in their depictions, his head resembles an antique medallion and his pale, unhealthy skin marks a man who will die young. They could draw his hair as black as ebony, to show off his dark complexion to full effect, but neither the chisel nor the brush could render the dancing flames in his eyes or capture the somber cast of his features when he was in deep thought.

With the speed of lightning the expression in his eyes obeyed his will. In anger, nobody looked more fearsome; in kindness, no one’s gaze was more caressing. Indeed, for each thought that traversed his soul he had a different expression.

He was short of stature, scarcely five feet three inches tall, and yet Kléber, who stood a head taller than he, once said to him as he placed his hand on his shoulder, “General, you are as big as the world!” And at that moment he did seem truly a head taller than Kléber.

He had lovely hands. He was proud of his hands and cared for them as a woman might have done. In conversation, he would frequently glance at them with admiration. Only on his left hand would he wear a glove; he kept his right hand bare, ostensibly so it would be ready should he want to reach out to someone he might choose to so honor, but in reality it was so he could admire his hand and shine his nails with a cambric handkerchief. Monsieur de Turenne, part of whose job it was to help the Emperor dress, came to the point where he would order gloves only for his left hand, thus saving six thousand francs a year.

He could not stand inactivity. Even in his private apartments he would constantly pace up and down, all the while leaning slightly forward, as if the weight of every thought in his head was forcing his neck to bend, and holding his hands clasped behind his back. His right shoulder would frequently jerk, and at the same time the muscles in his mouth would tighten. These ticks, these habits of mind and body, some people mistook for convulsive movements from which they deduced that Bonaparte must be subject to epileptic attacks.

He was passionate about bathing. Sometimes he would stay in his bath for two or three hours while the secretary or an aide read him the newspapers or a pamphlet the police had brought to his notice. Once he was in his bath, he would leave the hot faucet open, with no concern if the bath overflowed. Often, when Bourrienne, soaked with steam, could bear it no longer, he would ask if he could open the window or leave the room. In general, his request was granted.

Bonaparte truly loved to sleep. When his secretary woke him at seven, he would frequently complain, saying: “Oh, just let me sleep a little longer.” “Don’t come into my bedroom at night,” he would say. “Never wake me up for good news, for there’s no hurry to hear good news. But if ever there is bad news, wake me up immediately, for then there’s not a moment to be lost.”

As soon as Bonaparte was arisen, his valet Constant would shave him and brush his hair. Bourrienne, meanwhile, would read him the newspapers, first Le Moniteur and then the English or German papers. Bourrienne would barely have read the headlines from one of the dozen French newspapers being published at that time before Bonaparte would say: “That’s enough; they say only what I let them say.”

Once he was dressed and ready for the day, he would go up to his study along with Bourrienne. There he would find the letters he would need to read that day and the reports from the day before that he would need to sign.

At exactly ten o’clock the door would open and the butler would announce: “The general is served.”

Breakfast was simple, only three dishes plus dessert. One of the dishes was almost always the chicken prepared with oil and onions that he had been served as well on the morning of the Battle of Marengo, and since that day the dish has been called chicken Marengo.

Bonaparte drank only a little wine, a Bordeaux or Burgundy, and then, after breakfast or dinner, he would have a cup of coffee. If he worked unusually late at night, at midnight he would have a cup of chocolate.

Early on, he began to use tobacco, but only three or four times a day, in very small amounts, and he always carried it in very elegant gold or enamel boxes.

On this particular day early in our Revolutionary year IX, as usual, Bourrienne had come down to the study at six thirty, opened the letters, and placed them on the large table, the most important ones on the bottom, so that Bonaparte would read them last and they would be fresh in his mind.

When the clock struck seven, he went to wake the general. Bourrienne had a key to Bonaparte’s bedroom, so he could enter whenever necessary, at any time of day or night.

To his great surprise, he found Madame Bonaparte alone in bed. She was weeping.

Bourriene’s first instinct was to turn and leave. But Madame Bonaparte, who admired Bourrienne and knew that she could count on him, stopped him. She asked him to sit down on the bed beside her.

Bourrienne was worried. “Oh, madame,” he asked. “Has anything happened to the First Consul?”

“No, Bourrienne, no,” Josephine had answered. “Something has happened to me.”

“What, madame?”

“Oh, my dear Bourrienne. How unfortunate I am!”

Bourrienne began to laugh. “I bet I can guess what’s wrong,” he said.

“My suppliers,” stammered Josephine.

“Are they refusing to supply you?”

“Oh, if that’s all it was!”

“Could they be so impertinent as to ask to be paid?” asked Bourrienne with a laugh.

“They are threatening to sue me! Imagine how embarrassing it would be for me, my dear Bourrienne, if an official order landed in Bonaparte’s hands!”

“Do you think they would dare?”

“There is no doubt in my mind.”

“Impossible!”

“Look here.”

And out from under her pillow Josephine pulled a sheet of paper imprinted with a symbol of the Republic. It was an official summons demanding of the First Consul the sum of forty thousand francs in payment for gloves delivered to Madame Bonaparte his wife. As chance would have it, the order had fallen into Madame Bonaparte’s hands rather than her husband’s. The proceedings were being carried out on behalf of Madame Giraud.

“Damn!” said Bourrienne. “This is serious! Did you authorize your entire household to buy gloves from that woman?”

“No, my dear Bourrienne; those forty thousand francs worth of gloves were for me alone.”

“For you alone?”

“Yes.”

“You must not have paid anything for ten years!”

“I settled accounts with all my suppliers and paid them last year on the first of January. I paid three hundred thousand francs. I remember how angry Bonaparte was then, which is why I’m quaking now.”

“And you have worn forty thousand francs worth of gloves since the first of January last year?”

“Apparently so, Bourrienne, since that’s what they’re asking.”

“Well, then, what you expect me to do about it?”

“If Bonaparte is in good humor this morning, perhaps you could bring up the subject with him.”

“First of all, why is he not here with you? Have you quarreled?” Bourrienne asked.

“No, not at all. He was feeling fine last night when he left with Duroc to check out, as he says, what Parisians are thinking about. He probably came home late and, not wishing to disturb me, went to sleep in his bachelor’s quarters.”

“And if he is in good humor and I do speak to him of your debts, when he asks me how much you owe, how shall I answer?”

“Ah, Bourrienne!” Josephine hid her face behind her sheet.

“So, the figure is frightening?”

“Enormous.”

“How much?”

“I don’t dare tell you.”

“Three hundred thousand francs?”

Josephine gave a sigh.

“Six hundred thousand?”

Another sigh, even heavier than the first.

“I must say that you are indeed beginning to frighten me,” said Bourrienne.

“I spent the whole night adding sums up with my dear friend Madame Hulot, who is very good at such things. As you know, Bourrienne, I don’t have a head for figures.”

“So how much do you owe?”

“More than twelve hundred thousand francs.”

Bourrienne gave a start. “You’re right,” he said, and he was no longer laughing. “The First Consul will indeed be furious.”

“Let’s just tell him it’s half that amount.”

“Not a good strategy,” said Bourrienne shaking his head. “While you’re at it, I advise you to admit everything.”

“No, Bourrienne. Never!”

“But what will you do about the other six hundred thousand francs?”

“First of all, I shall contract no more debts, because they make me too unhappy.”

“But how about the other six hundred thousand?” Bourrienne asked again.

“I shall pay them out of what I can save.”

“That won’t work. Since the First Consul is not expecting the figure of six hundred thousand francs, he will make no more of a fuss for twelve hundred thousand than for six. On the contrary, since the blow is more violent, he will be in even greater shock. He will give you the twelve hundred thousand francs, and you will be over and done with it.”

“No, no,” cried Josephine. “Don’t make me do that, Bourrienne. I know him too well. He’ll fly into one of his rages, and I can’t stand seeing him get so violent.”

At that moment Bonaparte’s bell rang for his office boy, probably to find out where Bourrienne was.

“That’s him,” said Josephine. “He’s already in his study. Hurry, and if he’s in a good mood, you know.…”

“Twelve hundred thousand francs, right?”

“Heavens, no! Six hundred thousand, and not a penny more!”

“That’s what you wish?”

“Please.”

“Very well.”

And Bourrienne hurried up the little staircase to the First Consul’s study.




II How the Free City of Hamburg Paid Josephine’s Debts (#u3e8154c2-e160-5506-b2f3-078402a93490)







WHEN BOURRIENNE RETURNED to the study, the First Consul was reading the morning mail that the secretary had laid out for him on his desk. He was wearing the uniform of a Republican division general, a frock coat without epaulettes with a simple gold laurel branch, buckskin pants, a red vest with wide lapels, and boots with their tops turned down. At the sound of his secretary’s footsteps, Bonaparte turned his head.

“Oh, it’s you, Bourrienne,” he said. “I was just ringing Landoire to have him call you.”

“I had gone down to Madame Bonaparte’s room, thinking I would find you there, General.”

“No, I slept in the large bedroom.”

“Ah,” said Bourrienne. “In the bed that belonged to the Bourbons!”

“Well, yes.”

“And how did you sleep?”

“Poorly. And the proof is that I’m already here and you did not have to awaken me. It’s all too comfortable for me.”

“Have you read the three letters I set aside for you, General?”

“Yes, the wife of a sergeant-major in the consular guard who was killed at Marengo is asking me to be the godfather of her child.”

“How should I answer her?”

“Tell her I accept. Duroc can stand in for me. The child’s name will be Napoleon. The mother will receive an annuity of five hundred francs that will revert to her son. Answer her in those terms.”

“And how about the woman who, believing in your good luck, asks you for three lottery numbers?”

“She’s crazy. But since the woman believes in my star and is sure she’ll win if I send her three numbers, though she has never won before, tell her that you can only win the lottery on those days you don’t bet anything. As proof tell her that she has never won anything when she has bought tickets, but on the day that she has not bought a ticket she has won three hundred francs.”

“So, I am to send her three hundred francs?”

“Yes.”

“And the last letter, General?”

“I was just beginning to read it when you came in.”

“Keep reading; you will find it interesting.”

“Read it to me. The writing is scribbly and difficult to read.”

With a smile, Bourrienne picked up the letter. “I know why you’re smiling,” said Bonaparte.

“Ah, I don’t think you do, General,” replied Bourrienne.

“You’re no doubt thinking that someone with handwriting like mine should be able to read anyone’s, even the scribbling of cats and public prosecutors.”

“Well, you’re right.”

Bourrienne began to read:

“‘Jersey, February 26, 1801

“‘I believe, General, that since you are back from your extensive voyages, I can now, without being indiscreet, interrupt your daily occupations by reminding you who I am. However, you may be surprised that such a feeble excuse is the subject of the letter I have the honor of addressing you. You will remember, General, that when your father was forced to take your brothers out of the school in Autun and came to see you in Brienne, he found himself penniless. He asked me to lend him twenty-five louis, which I was pleased to do. Since his return, he has not had the opportunity to pay me back, and when I left Ajaccio, your good mother offered to give up some of her silver to reimburse me. I rejected her offer and told her that I would leave the promissory note signed by your father with Monsieur Souires and that she should pay it when she was able and it convenient. I judge that she had not yet found the appropriate time to do so when the Revolution took place.

“‘You may find it strange, General, that for such a modest sum I am willing to trouble your occupations. But my situation is very difficult just now, and even such a small amount seems large to me. Exiled from my country, forced to find refuge on this island I abhor, where everything is so expensive that one has to be rich to live even simply, I would deem it a great kindness on your part if you would enable me to have that tiny sum which in earlier days would have been meaningless to me.’”

Bonaparte nodded. Bourrienne noticed his reaction.

“Do you remember this good man, General?” he asked.

“Perfectly well,” said Bonaparte. “As if it were yesterday. The sum was counted out in Brienne before my very eyes. His name must be Durosel.”

Bourrienne looked down at the signature. “That’s right,” he said. “But there’s another name, one more illustrious than the first.”

“What is his full name, then?”

“Durosel Beaumanoir.”

“We must find out if he’s from the Beaumanoir family in Brittany. That’s a good name to have.”

“Shall I keep reading?”

“Go ahead.”

Bourrienne continued:

“‘You will understand, General, that when a man is eighty-six years old and has served his country for more than sixty years without the slightest interruption, it is difficult to be sent away and forced to find refuge on Jersey, where I try to subsist on the government’s feeble attempts to help French émigrés.

“‘I use the word “émigrés” because that is what I was forced to become. Leaving France had never been in my plans, and I had committed no crime except for being the most senior general in the canton and being decorated with the great cross of Saint-Louis.

“‘One evening they came to kill me. They broke down my door. I was alerted by my neighbors’ shouts and barely had the time to escape with nothing but the clothes I had on my back. Seeing that I risked death in France, I abandoned all that I owned, real estate and furniture, and since I had no place to put my feet in my own country, I joined one of my older brothers here. He had been deported and was senile, and now I wouldn’t leave him for anything in the world. My mother-in-law is eighty years old, and they have refused to give her a portion of my estate, on the pretext that everything I owned had been confiscated. Thus, if things don’t change, I shall die bankrupt, and that saddens me greatly.

“‘I admit, General, that I have not adapted to the new style, but according to former customs,

“‘I am your humble servant.

“‘Durosel Beaumanoir’”

“Well, General, what do you say?”

“I say,” the First Consul replied with a slight catch in his voice, “that I am profoundly moved to hear such things. This is a sacred debt, Bourrienne. Write to General Durosel, and I shall sign the letter. Send him ten thousand francs and say that he can expect more, for I would like to do more for this man who helped my father. I shall take care of him. But, speaking of debts, Bourrienne, I have some serious business to talk about with you.” Bonaparte sat down with a frown.

Bourrienne remained standing near his chair. Bonaparte said, “I want to talk to you about Josephine’s debts.”

Bourrienne gave a start. “Very well,” he said. “And where do you get your information?”

“From what I hear in public.”

Like a man who has not fully understood but who dares ask no questions, Bourrienne leaned forward.

“Just imagine, my friend”—Bonaparte sometimes forgot himself and dropped formal address—“that I went out with Duroc to find out for myself what people are saying.”

“And are they saying many negative things about the First Consul?”

“Well,” Bonaparte answered with a laugh, “I nearly got myself killed when I said something bad about him. Without Duroc, who used his club, I believe we might have been arrested and taken to the Château-d’Eau guardhouse.”

“Still, that fails to explain how, in the midst of all the praise for the First Consul, the question of Madame Bonaparte’s debts came up.”

“In fact, in the midst of all that praise for the First Consul, people were saying horrible things about his wife. They’re saying that Madame Bonaparte is ruining her husband with all the clothes she’s buying; they’re saying she has debts everywhere, that her cheapest dress cost one hundred louis and her least expensive hat two hundred francs. I don’t believe a word of that, Bourrienne, you understand. But where there’s smoke, there’s fire. Last year I paid debts of three hundred thousand francs; she reminded me that I had not sent her any money from Egypt. All well and good. But now things are different; I’m giving Josephine six thousand francs a month for clothes. That should be enough. People used the same kinds of words against Marie-Antoinette. You must check with Josephine, Bourrienne, and set things straight.”

“You’ll never know,” Bourrienne answered, “how happy I am that you yourself have brought up this subject. This morning, as you were impatiently waiting for me to appear, Madame Bonaparte asked me to talk to you about the difficult position in which she finds herself.”

“Difficult position, Bourrienne! What do you mean by that, monsieur?” Bonaparte asked, suddenly reverting back to more formal speech.

“I mean that she is being harassed.”

“By whom?”

“By her creditors.”

“Her creditors! I thought I had got rid of her creditors.”

“A year ago, yes.”

“Well?”

“Well, in the past year, things have totally changed. One year ago she was the wife of General Bonaparte. Today she is the wife of the First Consul.”

“Bourrienne, that’s enough. My ears have heard enough of prattle.”

“That’s my opinion, General.”

“It is up to you to take care of paying everything.”

“I would be happy to. Give me the necessary sum, and I shall quickly take care of it, I guarantee.”

“How much do you need?”

“How much do I need? Well, yes.…”

“Well?”

“Well, Madame Bonaparte doesn’t dare tell you.”

“What? She doesn’t dare tell me? And how about you?”

“Nor do I, General.”

“Nor do you! Then it must be a colossal amount!”

Bourrienne sighed.

“Let’s see now,” Bonaparte continued. “If I pay for this year like last year, and give you three hundred thousand francs.…”

Bourrienne didn’t say a word. Bonaparte looked at him worriedly. “Say something, you imbecile!”

“Well, if you give me three hundred thousand francs, General, you would be giving me only half of the debt.”

“Half!” shouted Bonaparte, getting to his feet. “Six hundred thousand francs! … She owes … six hundred thousand francs?”

Bourrienne nodded.

“She admitted she owed that amount?”

“Yes, General.”

“And where does she expect me to get the money to pay these six hundred thousand francs? From my five-hundred-thousand-franc salary as consul?”

“Oh, she assumes you have several thousand franc bills hid somewhere in reserve.”

“Six hundred thousand francs!” Bonaparte repeated. “And at the same time my wife is spending six hundred thousand francs on clothing, I’m giving one hundred francs as pension to the widow and children of brave soldiers killed at the Pyramids or Marengo! And I can’t even give money to all of them! And they have to live the whole year on those one hundred francs, while Madame Bonaparte wears dresses worth one hundred louis and hats worth twenty-five. You must have heard incorrectly, Bourrienne, it surely cannot be six hundred thousand francs.”

“I heard perfectly well, General, and Madame Bonaparte realized what her situation was only yesterday when she saw a bill for gloves that came to forty thousand francs.”

“What are you saying?” shouted Bonaparte.

“I’m saying forty thousand francs for gloves, General. What do you expect? That is how things are. Yesterday she went over her accounts with Madame Hulot. She spent the night in tears, and she was still weeping this morning when I saw her.”

“Well, let her cry! Let her cry with shame, or even out of remorse! Forty thousand francs for gloves! Over how many months?”

“Over one year,” Bourrienne answered.

“One year! That’s enough food for forty families! Bourrienne, I want to see all those bills.”

“When?”

“Immediately. It’s eight o’clock, and I don’t see Cadoudal until nine, so I have the time. Immediately, Bourrienne. Immediately!”

“You’re quite right, General. Now that we have started, let’s get to the end of this business.”

“Go get all the bills, all of them, you understand. We shall go through them together.”

“I’m on my way, General.” And Bourrienne ran down the stairway leading to Madame Bonaparte’s apartment.

Left alone, the First Consul began to pace up and down, his hands clasped behind his back, his shoulder and mouth twitching. He started mumbling to himself: “I ought to have remembered what Junot told me at the fountains in Messoudia. I ought to have listened to my brothers Joseph and Lucien who told me not to see her when I got back. But how could I have resisted seeing my dear children Hortense and Eugene? The children brought me back to her! Divorce! I shall keep divorce legal in France, if only so I can leave that woman. That woman who gives me no children, and she’s ruining me!”

“Well,” said Bourrienne as he reentered the study, “six hundred thousand francs won’t ruin you, and Madame Bonaparte is still young enough to give you a son who in another forty years will succeed you as consul for life!”

“You have always taken her side, Bourrienne!” said Bonaparte, pinching his ear so hard the secretary cried out.

“What do you expect, General? I’m for everything that is beautiful, good, and feeble.”

In a rage, Bonaparte grabbed up the handful of papers from Bourrienne and twisted them back and forth in his hands. Then, randomly, he picked up a bill and read: “‘Thirty-eight hats’ … in one month! What’s she doing, wearing two hats a day? And eighteen hundred francs worth of feathers! And eight hundred more for ribbons!” Angrily, he threw down the bill and picked up another. “Mademoiselle Martin’s perfume shop. Three thousand three hundred and six francs for rouge. One thousand seven hundred forty-nine francs during the month of June alone. Rouge at one hundred francs a jar! Remember that name, Bourrienne. She’s a hussy who should be sent to prison in Saint-Lazare. Mademoiselle Martin, do you hear?”

“Yes, General.”

“Oh, now we come to the dresses. Monsieur Leroy. Back in the old days there were seamstresses, now we have tailors for women—it’s more moral. One hundred fifty dresses in one year. Four hundred thousand francs worth of dresses! If things keep going like this, it won’t be six hundred thousand francs, it’ll be a million. Twelve hundred thousand francs at the least that we’ll have to deal with.”

“Oh, General,” Bourrienne hastily said, “there have been some down payments made.”

“Three dresses at five thousand francs apiece!”

“Yes,” said Bourrienne. “But there are six at only five hundred each.”

“Are you making fun of me?” said Bonaparte with a frown.

“No, General, I’m not making fun of you. All I’m saying is that it’s beneath you to get so upset for nothing.”

“How about Louis XVI? He was a king, and he got upset. And he had a guaranteed income of twenty-five million francs.”

“You are—or at least when you want to be, you will be—more of a king than Louis XVI ever was, General. Furthermore, Louis XVI was an unfortunate man, you’ll have to admit.”

“A good man, monsieur.”

“I wonder what the First Consul would say if people said he was a good man.”

“For five thousand francs at least they could give us one of those beautiful gowns from Louis XVI’s days, with hoops and swirls and panniers, gowns that needed fifty meters of cloth. That I could understand. But with these new, simple frocks—women look like umbrellas in a case.”

“They have to follow the styles, General.”

“Exactly, and that is what makes me so angry. We’re not paying for cloth. At least if we were paying for the cloth, it would mean business for our factories. But no, it’s the way Leroy cuts the dress. Five hundred francs for cloth and four thousand five hundred francs for Leroy. Style! … So now we have to find six hundred thousand francs to pay for style.”

“Do we not have four million?”

“Four million? Where?”

“The money the Hamburg senate has just paid us for allowing the extradition of those two Irishmen whose lives you saved.”

“Oh, yes. Napper – Tandy and Blackwell.”

“I believe there may in fact be four and half million francs, not just four million, that the senate sent to you directly through Monsieur Chapeau-Rouge.”

“Well,” said Bonaparte with a laugh, delighted by the trick he had played on the free city of Hamburg, “I don’t know if I really had the right to do what I did, but I had just come back from Egypt, and that was one of the little tricks I’d taught the pashas.”

Just then the clock struck nine. The door opened, and Rapp, who was on duty, announced that Cadoudal and his two aides-de-camp were waiting in the official meeting room.

“Well, then, that’s what we’ll do,” said Bonaparte to Bourrienne. “That’s where you can get your six hundred thousand francs, and I don’t want to hear another word about it.” And Bonaparte went out to receive the Breton general.

Scarcely had the door closed than Bourrienne rang the bell. Landoire rushed in. “Go tell Madame Bonaparte that I have some good news for her, but since I don’t dare leave my office, where I am alone—you understand, Landoire; where I am alone—I would like to ask her to come see me here.”

When he realized it was good news, Landoire hurried to the staircase.

Everyone, from Bonaparte on down, adored Josephine.




III The Companions of Jehu (#ulink_ed629a3f-b279-58d1-b096-7dc320829525)







IT WAS NOT THE FIRST TIME that Bonaparte tried to bring Cadoudal back to the side of the Republic in order to gain that formidable partisan’s support.

An incident that had occurred on Bonaparte’s return from Egypt was imprinted deeply in his memory.

On the 17th Vendémiaire of the year VIII (October 9, 1799), Bonaparte had, as everyone knows, disembarked in Fréjus without going through quarantine, although he was coming from Alexandria.

He had immediately gotten into a coach with his trusted aide-de-camp, Roland de Montrevel, and left for Paris.

The same day, around four in the afternoon, he reached Avignon. He stopped about fifty yards from the Oulle gate, in front of the Hôtel du Palais-Egalité, which was just beginning again to use the name Hôtel du Palais-Royal, a name it had held since the beginning of the eighteenth century and that it still holds today. Urged by the need all mortals experience between four and six in the afternoon to find a meal, any meal, whatever the quality, he got down from the coach.

Bonaparte was in no particular way distinguishable from his companion, save for his firm step and his few words, yet it was he who was asked by the hotel keeper if he wished to be served privately or if he would be willing to eat at the common table.

Bonaparte thought for a moment. News of his arrival had not yet spread through France, as everyone thought he was still in Egypt. His great desire to see his countrymen with his own eyes and hear them with his own ears won out over his fear of being recognized; besides, he and his companion were both wearing clothing typical for the time. Since the common table was already being served and he would be able to dine without delay, he answered that he would eat at the common table.

He turned to the postilion who had brought him. “Have the horses harnessed in one hour,” he said.

The hotelier showed the newcomers the way to the common table. Bonaparte entered the dining room first, with Roland behind him. The two young men—Bonaparte was then about twenty-nine or thirty years old, and Roland twenty-six—sat down at the end of the table, where they were separated from the other diners by three or four place settings.

Whoever has traveled knows the effect created by newcomers at a common table. Everyone looks at them, and they immediately become the center of attention.

At the table were some regular customers, a few travelers en route by stagecoach from Marseille to Lyon, and a wine merchant from Bordeaux who was staying temporarily in Avignon.

The great show the newcomers had made of sitting off by themselves increased the curiosity of which they were the object. Although the man who’d entered second was dressed much the same as his companion—short leather pants and turned-down boots, a coat with long tails, a traveler’s overcoat and a wide-brimmed hat—and although they appeared to be equals, he seemed to show a noticeable deference to his companion. The deference was obviously not due to any age difference, so no doubt it was owed by a difference in social position. Furthermore, he addressed the first man as “citizen,” while his companion called him simply Roland.

What usually happens in such situations happened here. After a moment of interaction with the newcomers, everyone soon looked away, and the conversation, interrupted for a moment, resumed as before.

The subject of the conversation greatly interested the newly arrived travelers, as their fellow guests were talking about the Thermidorian Reaction and the hopes that lay in now reawakened Royalist feelings. They spoke openly of a coming restoration of the House of Bourbon, which surely, with Bonaparte being tied up as he was in Egypt, would take place within six months.

Lyon, one of the cities that had suffered hardest during the Revolution, naturally stood at the center of the conspiracy. There a veritable provisional government—with its royal committee and royal administration, a military headquarters and a royal army—had been set up.

But, in order to pay these armies and support the permanent war effort in the Vendée and Morbihan, they needed money; and lots of it. England had provided a little but was not overly generous, so the Republic was the only source of money available to its Royalist enemies. Instead of trying to open difficult negotiations with the Republic, which would have refused assistance in any case, the royal committee had organized roving bands of brigands who were charged with stealing tax revenues and with attacking the vehicles used for transporting public funds. The morality of civil wars, very loose in regard to money, did not consider stealing from Treasury stagecoaches as real theft, but rather as a military operation.

One of these bands had chosen the route between Lyon and Marseille, and as the two travelers were taking their place at the common table, the subject of conversation was the hold-up of a stagecoach carrying sixty thousand francs of government funds. The hold-up had taken place the day before on the road from Marseille to Avignon, between Lambesc and Port-Royal.

The thieves, if we can use that word for such nobly employed stagecoach robbers, had even given the coachman a receipt for what they took. They had made no attempt, either, to hide the fact that the money would be crossing France by more secure means than his stagecoach and that it would buy supplies for Cadoudal’s army in Brittany.

Such actions were new, extraordinary, and almost impossible for Bonaparte and Roland to believe, for they had been absent from France for two years. They did not suspect what deep immorality had found its way into all classes of society under the Directory’s bland government.

This particular incident had taken place on the very same road Bonaparte and his companion had just traveled, and the person telling the story was one of the principal actors in that highway drama: the wine merchant from Bordeaux.

Those who seemed to be most interested in all the details, aside from Bonaparte and his companion, who were happy simply to listen, were the people traveling in the stagecoach that had just arrived and was soon to leave. As for the other guests, the people who lived nearby, they had become so accustomed to these episodes that they could have been giving the details instead of listening to them.

Everyone was looking at the wine merchant, and, we must say, he was up to the task as he courteously answered all the questions put to him.

“So, Citizen,” asked a heavyset man whose tall, skinny, shriveled-up wife was pressing up against him, pale and trembling in fear, so much so that you could almost hear her bones knocking together. “You say that the robbery took place on the road we’ve just taken?”

“Yes, Citizen. Between Lambesc and Pont-Royal, did you notice a place where the road climbs between two hills, a place where there are many rocks?”

“Oh, yes, my friend,” the woman said, holding tight to her husband’s arm. “I did see it, and I even said, as you must remember, ‘This is a bad place. I’m glad we’re coming through during the day and not at night.’”

“Oh, madame,” said a young man whose voice exaggerated the guttural pronunciation of the time and who seemed to exercise a royal influence on the conversation of the common table, “you surely know that for the gentlemen called the Companions of Jehu there is no difference between day and night.”

“Indeed,” said the wine merchant, “it was in full daylight, at ten in the morning, that we were stopped.”

“How many of them were there?” the heavyset man asked.

“Four of them, Citizen.”

“Standing in the road?”

“No, they appeared on horseback, armed to the teeth and wearing masks.”

“That is their custom, that is their custom,” said the young man with the guttural voice. “And then they must have said, did they not?, ‘Don’t try to defend yourselves, and no harm will come to you. All we are after is the government’s money.’”

“Word for word, Citizen.”

“Yes,” continued the man who seemed to have all the information. “Two of them got down, handed their bridles to their companions, and asked the coachman to give them the money.”

“Citizen,” the large man said in amazement, “you’re telling the story as if you had witnessed it yourself!”

“Perhaps the gentleman was there,” said Roland.

The young man turned sharply toward the officer. “I don’t know, Citizen, if you intend to be impolite with me. We can speak about that after dinner. But, in any case, I am pleased to say that my political opinions are such that, unless you were intending to insult me, I would not consider your suspicion as an offense. However, yesterday morning at ten o’clock, when those gentlemen were stopping the stagecoach four leagues away, these gentlemen here can attest to the fact that I was having lunch at this very table, between the same two citizens who at this moment are doing me the honor of sitting at my right and my left.”

“And,” Roland continued, speaking this time to the wine merchant, “how many of you were in the stagecoach?”

“There were seven men and three women.”

“Seven men, not counting the coachman?” Roland repeated.

“Of course,” the man from Bordeaux answered.

“And with eight men you let yourself be robbed by four bandits? I congratulate you, monsieur.”

“We knew whom we were dealing with,” the wine merchant answered, “and we were not about to try to defend ourselves.”

“What?” Roland replied. “But you were dealing with brigands, with bandits, with highway robbers.”

“Not at all, since they had introduced themselves.”

“They had introduced themselves?”

“They said, ‘We are not brigands; we are the Companions of Jehu. It is useless to try to defend yourselves, gentlemen; ladies, don’t be afraid.’”

“That’s right,” said the young man at the common table. “It is their custom to let people know, so there can be no mistake.”

“Well,” Roland continued, while Bonaparte kept silent, “who is this citizen Jehu who has such polite companions? Is he their captain?”

“Sir,” said a man whose clothing looked very much like that of a secular priest, and who seemed to be a resident of the city as well as a regular at the common table, “if you were more acquainted than you seem to be in reading Holy Scripture, you would know that this citizen Jehu died some two thousand six hundred years ago, so that consequently, at the present time, he is unable to stop stagecoaches on the highway.”

“Sir priest,” Roland said, “since, in spite of the sour tone you are currently using with me, you seem to be well educated, allow a poor ignorant man to ask for some details about this Jehu who died twenty-six hundred years ago but is nevertheless honored by having companions who carry his name.”

“Sir,” the man of the church answered in the same clipped tone, “Jehu was a king of Israel, consecrated by Elisha on the condition that he punish the crimes of the house of Ahab and Jezebel and that he put to death all the priests of Baal.”

“Sir priest,” the young officer laughed, “thank you for the explanation. I have no doubt that it is accurate and certainly very scholarly. Except I have to admit that it has taught me very little.”

“What do you mean, Citizen?” said the regular customer at the table. “Don’t you understand that Jehu is His Majesty Louis XVIII, may God preserve him, consecrated on the condition that he punish the crimes of the Republic and that he put to death all the priests of Baal—that is, all the Girondins, the Cordeliers, the Jacobins, the Thermidorians; all those people who have played any part over the last seven years in this abominable state of affairs that we call the Revolution!”

“Well, sure enough!” said Roland. “Indeed, I am beginning to understand. But among those people the Companions of Jehu are supposed to be fighting, do you include the brave soldiers who pushed the foreigners back out of France and the illustrious generals who led the armies in the Tyrol, the Sambre-et-Meuse, and Italy?”

“Yes. Those men, and especially those men.”

Roland’s eyes grew hard, his nostrils dilated, he pinched his lips and started to stand up. But his companion grabbed his coat and pulled him back down, and the word “fool,” which he was about to throw in the face of his interlocutor, stayed between his teeth.

Then, with a calm voice, the man who had just demonstrated his power over his companion spoke for the first time. “Citizen,” he said, “please excuse two travelers who have just come from the ends of the earth, as far away as America or India, who have been out of France for two years, who don’t know what’s happening here, and who are eager to learn.”

“Tell us what you would like to know,” the young man asked, apparently having paid only the slightest attention to the insult Roland had been about to spit at him.

“I thought,” Bonaparte continued, “that the Bourbons were completely reconciled to exile. I thought the police were sufficiently well organized to keep bandits and robbers off the highways. And finally, I thought that General Hoche had completely pacified the Vendée.”

“But where have you been? Where have you been?” said the young man with a loud laugh.

“As I told you, Citizen, at the ends of the earth.”

“Well, then. Let me help you understand. The Bourbons are not rich; the émigrés, whose property has been sold, are ruined. It is impossible to pay two armies in the West and to organize one in the Auvergne mountains without any money. So the Companions of Jehu, by stopping stagecoaches and pillaging the coffers of our tax officers, have set themselves up as tax collectors for the Royalist generals. Just ask Charette, Cadoudal, and Teyssonnet.”

“But,” ventured the Bordeaux wine merchant, “if the gentlemen calling themselves the Companions of Jehu are only after the government’s money.…”

“Only the government’s money, not anyone else’s. Never have they robbed an ordinary citizen.”

“So yesterday,” the man from Bordeaux continued, “how did it happen, then, that along with the government’s money they also carried off a bag containing two hundred louis that belonged to me?”

“My dear sir,” the young man answered, “I’ve already told you that there must have been some mistake, and as sure as my name is Alfred de Barjols, that money will be returned to you some day.”

The wine merchant sighed deeply and shook his head like a man who, in spite of the reassurances people are giving him, still is not totally convinced.

But at that moment, as if the guarantee given by the young man who had revealed his own name and social rank had awakened the sensibilities of those for whom he was giving his guarantee, a horse galloped up to the front door. They could hear footsteps in the corridor; the dining room door was flung open, and a masked man, armed to the teeth, appeared in the doorway.

All eyes turned to him.

“Gentlemen,” he said, his voice breaking the deep silence that greeted his unexpected appearance, “is there among you a traveler named Jean Picot who was in the stagecoach that was stopped between Lambesc and Port-Royal by the Companions of Jehu?”

“Yes,” said the wine merchant in astonishment.

“Might you be that man, monsieur?” the masked man asked.

“That’s me.”

“Was nothing taken from you?”

“Yes, there was. I had entrusted a sack of two hundred louis to the coachman, and it was taken.”

“And I must say,” added Alfred de Barjols, “that just now this gentleman was telling us about his misfortune, considering his money lost.”

“The gentleman was mistaken,” said the masked stranger. “We are at war with the government, not with ordinary citizens. We are partisans, not thieves. Here are your two hundred louis, monsieur, and if ever a similar error should take place in the future, just remember the name Morgan.”

And with those words the masked man set down a bag of gold to the right of the wine merchant, politely said good-bye to those seated around the table, and walked out, leaving some of them in terror and the others in stupefaction at his daring.

At that moment word came to Bonaparte that the horses were harnessed and ready.

He stood and asked Roland to pay.

Roland dealt with the hotel keeper while Bonaparte got into the coach. Just as Roland was about to join his companion, he found Alfred de Barjols in his path.

“Excuse me, monsieur,” the young man said to him. “You were beginning to say something to me, but the word never left your lips. Might I know what kept you from pronouncing it?”

“Oh, monsieur,” said Roland, “the reason I held it back was simply that my companion pulled me back down by my coat pocket, and so as not to be disagreeable to him, I decided not to call you a fool.”

“If you intended to insult me in that way, monsieur, might I therefore consider that you have now done so?”

“If that should please you, monsieur.…”

“That does please me, because it offers me the opportunity to demand satisfaction.”

“Monsieur,” said Roland, “we are in a great hurry, my companion and I, as you can see. But I will be happy to delay my departure for an hour if you think one hour will be enough to settle this question.”

“One hour will be sufficient, monsieur.”

Roland bowed and hurried to the coach.

“Well,” said Bonaparte, “are you going to fight?”

“I could not do otherwise, General,” Roland answered. “But my adversary appears to be very accommodating. It should not take more than an hour. I shall hire a horse as soon as this business is over and shall surely catch up with you before you reach Lyon.”

Bonaparte shrugged.

“Hothead,” he said. And then, reaching out his hand, he added, “Try at least not to get yourself killed. I need you in Paris.”

“Oh, relax, General. Somewhere between Valence and Vienne I shall come tell you what happened.”

Bonaparte left.

About one league beyond Valence he heard a horse galloping behind him and ordered the coachman to stop.

“Oh, it’s you, Roland,” he said. “Apparently everything went well?”

“Perfectly well,” said Roland as he paid for his horse.

“Did you fight?”

“Yes, I did, General.”

“How?”

“With pistols.”

“And?”

“And I killed him, General.”

Roland took his place beside Bonaparte and the coach set off again at a gallop.




IV The Son of the Miller of La Guerche (#ulink_afea8b3d-2f96-5d87-8477-ecbc1d2a46f6)







BONAPARTE NEEDED ROLAND in Paris to help him organize the 18th Brumaire. Once the 18th Brumaire was over, what Bonaparte had heard and seen with his own eyes at the common table in Avignon came back to him. He resolved to do all he could to track down the Companions of Jehu and try to bring Cadoudal around to support the Republic.

It was Roland to whom Bonaparte entrusted that mission.

Roland left Paris, gathered some information in Nantes, and took the road toward La Roche-Bernard. There, he was able to get information that sent him to the village of Muzillac. For that is where Cadoudal could be found.

Let us enter the village with Roland. Let us walk up to the fourth thatched-roof house on the right and look in through an opening in one of the shutters. There we see a man dressed like a rich Morbihan peasant. His collar, his lapels, and the edges of his hat are trimmed with one gold stripe the width of a finger. His clothing is made of gray wool, with a green collar. His outfit is complete with Breton suspenders and leather gaiters coming up nearly to his knees. His saber is lying on a chair, and on the table a pair of pistols are within reach. The blaze in the fireplace reflects off two or three gun barrels.

The man is seated at the table. Light from a lamp shines on his face and on some papers he is attentively reading. His expression is open and joyous. Curly blond hair frames his face, his bright blue eyes give it life, and when he smiles, he displays two rows of white teeth that clearly have never needed to be touched by a dentist’s brush or tools. He is nearly thirty years old.

Like his fellow countryman Du Guesclin, he has a large, round head. Consequently, he is as well known by the name General Tête-Ronde as he is by the name George Cadoudal.

George was the son of a farmer in the parish of Kerléano. He had just finished an excellent education in the secondary school in Vannes when the Royalist insurrection’s first appeals were made. Cadoudal responded, gathered together his hunting and partying companions, led them across the Loire, and offered his services to Stofflet.

But Monsieur de Maulevrier’s former game warden had his prejudices. He did not like nobility and liked the bourgeoisie even less. Before agreeing to take Cadoudal, he wanted first to see him at work, and Cadoudal asked for nothing more.

Already the next day there was combat. When Stofflet saw Cadoudal charge the Blues without concern for their bayonets or guns, he could only say to Monsieur de Bonchamps, who was standing beside him, “If some cannonball doesn’t carry off that tête ronde, he will make a name for himself.” The name stuck with him.

George fought in the Vendée until Savenay was routed, when half of the Vendée army died on the battlefield and the other half faded away like smoke.

After three years of prodigious feats of strength, skill, and courage, he crossed back over the Loire and returned to the Morbihan.

Once back on his native soil, Cadoudal fought on his own account. As general-in-chief, he was adored by his soldiers, who obeyed him at a simple signal. Thus Stofflet’s prophecy came true. Replacing La Roche-Jacquelein, d’Elbee, Bonchamps, Lescure, Charette, and even Stofflet himself, Cadoudal became their chief rival in glory and their superior in force. He alone continues to fight against the government of Bonaparte, who has been consul for two months and is now about to leave for Marengo.

Three days ago, Cadoudal learned that General Brune, victor at Alkmaar and Castricum, savior of Holland, has been named general-in-chief of the Western armies. Now in Nantes, he is at all costs supposed to wipe out Cadoudal and his Chouans.

So, that being the case, Cadoudal has no choice but to take it upon himself to prove to the general-in-chief that he is not afraid and that intimidation is the last weapon that Brune should use against him.

At this particular moment he is dreaming up some brilliant maneuver with which to dazzle the Republicans. Suddenly he raises his head. He has heard a horse galloping. The horseman must surely be one of his own for to enter Muzillac without difficulty, he’d have had to pass through the Chouans spread out along the road from La Roche-Bernard.

The horseman stops at the front door of the thatched hut and comes face to face with George Cadoudal.

“Oh, it’s you, Branche-d’Or,” Cadoudal says. “Where have you come from?”

“From Nantes, General.”

“Any news?”

“Bonaparte’s aide-de-camp has come with General Brune on a special mission for you.”

“For me?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know his name?”

“Roland de Montrevel.”

“Have you seen him?”

“As I see you now.”

“What kind of man is he?”

“A handsome young man about twenty-six or twenty-eight years old.”

“And when is he getting here?”

“An hour or two after me, probably.”

“Have you alerted our men along the highway?”

“Yes. He will be able to pass freely.”

“Where is the Republican vanguard?”

“In La Roche-Bernard.”

“How many men are there?”

“Approximately one thousand.”

At that moment they heard a second horse galloping up. “Oh!” said Branche-d’Or, “can that be him already? That’s impossible!”

“No, because the man arriving now is coming from Vannes.”

The second horseman stopped by the door and entered as had the first. Although he was wrapped in a large coat, Cadoudal recognized him immediately. “Is that you, Coeur-de-Roi?” he asked.

“Yes, General.”

“Where are you coming from?”

“From Vannes, where you sent me to keep an eye on the Blues.”

“Well, what are they doing?”

“They are starving, and to get some food, General Harty is planning to steal our stores in Grand-Champ. The general himself will lead the expedition, and so they can move rapidly, the column will be made up of only one hundred men.”

“Are you tired, Coeur-de-Roi?”

“Never, General.”

“And how about your horse?”

“He has run hard but can surely cover three or four leagues more without collapsing. With two hours of rest.…”

“Two hours of rest and a double ration of oats, and then your horse will need to cover six leagues!”

“He can do it, General.”

“In two hours you will leave, and you must give the order in my name to evacuate the village of Grand-Champ at daybreak.”

Cadoudal paused for a moment and turned to listen. “Ah,” he said. “This time it must be him. I hear a horse galloping up on the La Roche-Bernard road.”

“It’s him,” said Branche-d’Or.

“Who?” asked Coeur-de-Roi.

“Someone the general is expecting.”

“Now, my friends, please leave me alone,” said Cadoudal. “You, Coeur-de-Roi, get to Grand-Champ as quickly as possible. You, Branche-d’Or, wait in the courtyard with thirty men ready to carry a message to all parts of the country. I trust you can arrange to have the best possible supper for two brought here to me.”

“Are you going out, General?”

“No, I’m simply going to meet the person who’s arriving. Quickly, go to the courtyard and stay out of sight!”

Cadoudal appeared on the threshold of the front door just as a horseman, bringing his mount to a stop, was looking around uncertainly.

“He’s right here, monsieur,” said George.

“Who is right here?” the horseman asked.

“The man you are looking for.”

“How did you guess that I’m looking for someone?”

“That is not difficult to see.”

“And the man I’m looking for.…”

“Is George Cadoudal. That is not hard to guess.”

“Huh,” responded the young man in surprise.

He jumped down from his horse and began to tether it.

“Oh, just throw the bridle over his neck,” said Cadoudal, “and don’t worry about him. You will find him here when you need him. Nothing ever gets lost in Brittany. You are on loyal ground.” And then, showing him the door, he said, “Please do me the honor of entering this humble hut, Monsieur Roland de Montrevel. I can offer you no other palace for tonight.”

However much Roland was master of himself, he was unable to hide his astonishment from George. More from the light of the fire that some invisible hand had just stirred up than from the light of the lamp, George could study the young man who was trying in vain to figure out how the person he was looking for, and at, had been notified of his arrival ahead of time. Judging that it would be inappropriate to display his curiosity, Roland sat down on the chair Cadoudal offered and stretched his boots out toward the fire in the fireplace.

“Are these your headquarters?” he asked.

“Yes, Colonel.”

“They are guarded in a strange way, it seems to me,” said Roland, looking around.

“Do you say that,” asked George, “because you didn’t meet a soul on the highway between La Roche-Bernard and here?”

“Not a soul, I must say.”

“That does not prove the highway was unguarded,” said George with a laugh.

“Well, then it was guarded by owls, for they seemed to be accompanying me from tree to tree. And if that is the case, General, I withdraw my comment.”

“Exactly,” Cadoudal replied. “Those owls are my sentinels. They have good eyes, and they have the advantage over men of being able to see in the dark.”

“Nonetheless, if I hadn’t taken care to get directions in La Roche-Bernard, I never would have found a soul to show me the road.”

“If at any place along the road you had called out, ‘Where might I find George Cadoudal?’ a voice would have answered, ‘In the town of Muzillac, the fourth house on the right.’ You saw no one, Colonel. However, there are now approximately fifteen hundred men who know that Monsieur Roland de Montrevel, the First Consul’s aide-de-camp, is meeting with the miller of Kerléano.”

“But if they know I’m the First Consul’s aide-de-camp, why did your fifteen hundred men allow me to pass?”

“Because they had received orders not only to allow you free passage but also to help you if you should need them.”

“So you knew I was coming?”

“I knew not only that you were coming but also why you were coming.”

“Well, then, there’s no reason for me to tell you.”

“Yes, there is. For hearing what you have to say will be a pleasure.”

“The First Consul wishes peace, but a general peace, not a partial one. He has signed a peace treaty with the Abbé Bernier, d’Autichamp, Châtillon, and Suzannet. He considers you a brave and loyal adversary and is saddened to see you alone continuing to stand up to him. So he has sent me here to talk to you directly. What are your conditions for peace?”

“Oh, my conditions are quite simple,” said Cadoudal, laughing. “If the First Consul gives the throne back to His Majesty Louis XVIII, and if he in turn becomes the king’s constable, his lieutenant-general, and head of his army and navy, at that very instant I shall convert our truce into a treaty of peace and, further, shall become the first soldier in his ranks.”

Roland shrugged. “But you surely know that’s impossible; the First Consul has already positively refused that request.”

“Well, that is why I am inclined to continue hostilities.”

“When?”

“Tonight. And you have arrived just in time to witness the spectacle.”

“But you do know that the generals d’Autichamp, Châtillon, and Suzannet as well as the Abbé Bernier have laid down their arms?”

“They are from the Vendée, and as Vendeans, they can do as they wish. I am Breton and a Chouan, and in the name of Bretons and Chouans I can do as I wish.”

“So you are condemning this unfortunate country to a war of extermination, General?”

“It is martyrdom, to which I convoke all Christians and Royalists.”

“General Brune is in Nantes with the eight thousand French prisoners the English have just turned over to us.”

“That is good fortune they would not enjoy with the Chouans, Colonel. The Blues have taught us not to take prisoners. As for the number of our enemies, it is not our custom to worry about that. Numbers are only a matter of details.”

“But you know that if General Brune and his eight thousand prisoners, together with the twenty thousand soldiers he is inheriting from General Hédouville, are insufficient, the First Consul is determined to march against you himself, with one hundred thousand men if necessary.”

“We shall be grateful for the honor he bestows upon us,” said Cadoudal, “and we shall try to prove to him that we are worthy adversaries.”

“He will burn down your cities.”

“We shall then withdraw to our thatched-roof huts.”

“He will burn down your huts.”

“We shall live in the woods.”

“You will give it some thought, General.”

“Please do me the honor of staying with me for twenty-four hours and you will see that I have already thought about it.”

“And if I agreed?”

“You would gratify me, Colonel. Only don’t ask more than I can give you: a bed under a thatched roof, one of my horses so you can accompany me, and a safe-conduct for when you leave.”

“I accept.”

“Your word, monsieur, never to act counter to the orders I give you, never to try to thwart any surprises I might attempt.”

“I am too curious about what you’ll be doing for that. You have my word, General.”

“Even when things happen before your very eyes?” asked Cadoudal insistently.

“Even if things take place before my very eyes, I renounce my role as an actor and will remain a spectator. I want to be able to say to the First Consul, ‘I saw.’”

Cadoudal smiled. “Well, you will see,” he said.

At that moment the door opened, and two peasants carried in a table already completely set. Steam was rising up from a crock of cabbage soup and a slab of bacon. An enormous jug of cider, newly drawn, foaming up and overflowing, stood between two glasses. There were two place settings: obviously an invitation to the colonel to sup with Cadoudal.

“You see, Monsieur de Montrevel,” said Cadoudal, “my men hope you will do me the honor of supping with me.”

“And it’s good they do,” answered Roland, “for I am starving, and if you didn’t invite me, I would try to take what I could by force.” The young colonel sat across from the Chouan general.

“Please excuse me for the meal I’m serving you,” said Cadoudal. “I do not receive hardship bonuses like your generals, and you have somewhat cut off my food supply by sending my poor bankers to the scaffold. I could pick a quarrel with you on that score, but I know that you used neither trickery nor lies and that everything happened loyally among soldiers. So I have nothing to complain about. And what’s more, I need to thank you for the money you managed to send to me.”

“One of the conditions Mademoiselle de Fargas set when she identified her brother’s murderers was that the sum she received was to be sent to you. We—that is, the First Consul and myself—have kept our promise, that is all.”

Cadoudal bowed slightly; with his own insistence upon loyalty, he found all that perfectly natural. Then, speaking to one of the Bretons who had borne the table, he said, “What can you give us along with this, Brise-Bleu?”

“A chicken fricassee, General.”

“That’s the menu for your meal, Monsieur de Montrevel.”

“It’s a real feast. There’s only one thing I fear.”

“What is that?”

“As long as we’re eating, things will be fine. But when we need to drink.…”

“Ah, you don’t like cider,” said Cadoudal. “Damn! This is embarrassing. Cider and water. I have to admit that my wine cellar has nothing else.”

“That is not the problem. To whose health will we be drinking?”

“So that’s what troubling you, Monsieur de Montrevel,” said Cadoudal in a dignified tone. “We shall drink to the health of our common mother, to the health of France! We serve France with different minds, but, I hope, with the same love.

“To France, good sir!” said Cadoudal, filling his glass.

“To France, General!” replied Roland, clinking his glass against the general’s.

Their consciences clear, they both sat down gaily, and with good appetites they dug into the cabbage soup. The elder of the two was not yet thirty years old.




V The Mousetrap (#ulink_2f265fb8-703c-59b7-8443-229f3a12f1a3)







A BELL WAS RINGING vibrantly, playing “Ave Maria.” Cadoudal pulled out his watch. “Eleven o’clock,” he announced.

“You know that I am at your orders,” Roland answered.

“We have an expedition to complete six leagues away. Do you need some rest?”

“Me?”

“Yes. If so, you may sleep for an hour.”

“Thanks, but that is unnecessary.”

“In that case,” said Cadoudal, “we shall leave when you are ready.”

“And your men?”

“Oh, my men! My men are ready.”

“Where?”

“Everywhere.”

“I’ll be damned. I’d like to see them!”

“You’ll see them.”

“But when?”

“Whenever you want. My men are quite discreet. They show themselves only when I give the signal.”

“So that if I wanted to see them.…”

“You have only to tell me; I shall give the signal and they will appear.”

Roland began to laugh. “Do you doubt it?” asked Cadoudal.

“Not in the slightest. Only… Let’s go, General.”

“Let’s go.”

The two young men wrapped themselves in their coats and stepped outside.

“Let’s get on our horses,” said Cadoudal.

“Which horse shall I take?” asked Roland.

“I thought you would be pleased to find your own horse well rested, so I chose two of my horses for our expedition. Take your pick. They are both equally good, and each has in its saddle holsters a pair of English-made pistols.”

“Already loaded?” Roland asked.

“And loaded with great care, Colonel. That’s a job I never entrust to anyone else.”

“Well, then, let’s mount,” said Roland.

Cadoudal and his companion climbed up onto their saddles and started down the road toward Vannes. Cadoudal rode beside Roland, while Branche-d’Or, the major general of Cadoudal’s army, rode twenty paces behind them.

As for the army itself, it remained invisible. The road, so straight it seemed to have been drawn by a tight rope, appeared to be totally deserted.

When they had ridden approximately a half league, Roland grew impatient: “Where in the devil are your men?”

“My men? … On our right, on our left, in front of us, behind us; everywhere.”

“That’s a good one,” said Roland.

“I’m not joking, Colonel. Do you think me so imprudent as to venture out without scouts in the midst of men so experienced and vigilant as your Republicans?”

Roland kept silent for a moment; and then, with a doubtful gesture, he said, “You told me, General, that if I wished to see your men, all I needed to do was say so. Well, I’d like to see them now.”

“All of them or just a part?”

“How many did you say would be with you?”

“Three hundred.”

“Well, then, I’d like to see one hundred and fifty.”

“Halt!” Cadoudal ordered.

Bringing his hands to his mouth, he imitated the call first of a screech owl, then of a barn owl. For the first call, he turned to the right, and for the second, to the left. The last plaintive notes had barely died away when suddenly on both sides of the road shadowy human shapes appeared. Crossing the ditch that separated them from the road, they began lining up on both sides of the horsemen.

“Who is in command on the right?” asked Cadoudal.

“I am, General,” answered a peasant, stepping forward.

“Who are you?”

“Moustache.”

“Who is in command on the left?” Cadoudal inquired.

“I am, Chante-en-Hiver,” answered a second peasant as he stepped forward.

“How many men do you have with you, Moustache?”

“One hundred, General.”

“How many men are with you, Chante-en-Hiver?”

“Fifty, General.”

“So, are there one hundred fifty in all?” asked Cadoudal.

“Yes,” the two Breton leaders answered together.

“Does that match your figure, Colonel?” asked George with a laugh.

“You are a magician, General.”

“No, I am only a poor Chouan, just another unfortunate Breton. I command a troop in which each brain knows what it’s doing and in which each heart beats for the two great principles of this world: religion and royalty.” Then, turning toward his men: “Who is commanding the vanguard?” he asked.

“Fend-l’Air,” the two Chouans answered.

“And the rear guard?”

“La Giberne.”

“So we can safely continue on?” Cadoudal asked the two Chouans.

“As if you were going to mass in your village church,” Fend-l’Air answered.

“Let’s continue on, then,” Cadoudal said to Roland. And turning back to his troops, he said: “Now scatter, my good men!”

In an instant, every man had leaped across the ditch and disappeared. For a few seconds, the horsemen could hear branches rustling and a trace of footsteps in the underbrush. Then nothing at all.

“Well,” said Cadoudal. “Do you believe that with such men I have anything to fear from your Blues, however brave and skillful they might be?”

Roland sighed. He agreed totally with Cadoudal.

They continued riding.

About one league from La Trinité, they saw on the road a dark mass that kept getting larger. Suddenly it stopped.

“What’s that?” asked Roland.

“A man,” said Cadoudal.

“I can see that,” Roland answered. “But who is it?”

“By his speed, you ought to have guessed that it’s a messenger.”

“Why has he stopped?”

“Why, because he saw three men on horseback, and he doesn’t know if he should continue forward or start back.”

“What will he do?”

“He’s waiting before he decides.”

“Waiting for what?”

“A signal, of course.”

“And will he respond to the signal?”

“Not merely respond; he’ll obey it. Would you like him to come forward or move backward? Or to jump to one side?”

“I would like him to come forward,” said Roland. “That way we can find out what news he’s bringing.”

The Breton leader imitated a cuckoo’s call with such perfection that Roland looked around for the bird. “It’s me,” said Cadoudal. “No need to look around.”

“So the messenger will start toward us?”

“No, he is already on his way.”

And indeed, the messenger had begun moving rapidly forward. In just a few seconds he was beside his general.

“Ah!” Cadoudal said. “Is that you, Monte-à-l’Assaut?”

The general leaned forward, and Monte-à-l’Assaut whispered a few words in his ear.

“I have already been warned by Bénédicité,” said George.

After exchanging several words with Monte-à-l’Assaut, Cadoudal twice more imitated the call of a barn owl and then once again a screech owl. In an instant he was surrounded by his three hundred men.

“We’re getting close,” he said to Roland, “and we need to leave the highway.”

Just above the village of Trédion they started out across the fields. Then, leaving Vannes on their left, they reached Trefféan. But instead of following the road into the village, the Breton leader went to the edge of a little woods that extends from Grand-Champ to Larré and ventured no farther. Cadoudal seemed to be waiting for some news.

A grayish glow appeared in the direction of Trefféan and Saint-Nolff. It was the first glimmer of dawn, but a thick layer of fog arising from the ground made it impossible to see more than fifty steps ahead.

Suddenly, about five hundred steps away, they heard a cock crow. George pricked up his ears. The Chouans looked at each other and laughed. The cock crowed once more, closer this time. “It’s him,” said Cadoudal. “Answer him.”

Roland heard a howl three steps away; it imitated a dog with such perfection that the young man, although forewarned, looked around for the animal that was howling so lugubriously. At the same moment, out of the fog, the two horsemen saw a man coming rapidly toward them.

Cadoudal moved forward a few feet, then raised his finger to his mouth to warn the man to speak quietly. “Well, Fleur-d’Epine,” George asked, “have we got them?”

“Like a mouse in a trap. Not a single one will return to Vannes if that is your wish, General.”

“Oh, I could ask for nothing more. How many of them are there?”

“One hundred men, commanded by General Harty in person.”

“How many carts?”

“Seventeen.”

“Are they far from here?”

“Approximately three quarters of a league.”

“What road are they following?”

“The road from Grand-Champ to Vannes.”

“That’s exactly what we need.”

Cadoudal called together his four lieutenants: Branche-d’Or, Monte-à-l’Assaut, Fend-l’Air, and La Giberne. The general gave each his orders, and each in turn gave a screech-owl call to his fifty men.

The fog was getting thicker and thicker. In less than a hundred steps each band of fifty men disappeared into it like a host of shadows.

Cadoudal remained with a hundred men and Fleur-d’Epine.

“Well, General,” asked Roland when Cadoudal returned, “is everything going as planned?”

“Pretty much,” answered Cadoudal, “and in a half hour you will be able to judge for yourself.”

“Not if the fog stays as thick as this.”

Cadoudal looked around him. “In a half hour the fog will have completely dissipated. Shall we use this time to eat a bit and have a morning drink?”

“Well, General,” said Roland, “I admit that the five or six hours of riding have given me quite an appetite.”

“And I,” said George, “I don’t mind telling you that I always like to eat as well as I can before battle. When you leave for eternity, it’s best to leave, whenever possible, on a full stomach.”

“Ah!” said Roland. “You are going to fight?”

“That’s why I’m here, and since we are dealing with your Republican friends and with General Harty in person, I doubt that they will surrender without a fight.”

“Do the Republicans know that they will be fighting against you?”

“They suspect nothing.”

“So you are planning a surprise for them?”

“Not completely. Given, as I have told you, that the fog will dissipate in about twenty minutes, they will be able to see us as well as we can see them. Brise-Bleu,” Cadoudal continued, “do you have something to give us for breakfast?”

The Chouan who seemed to be in charge of food nodded and went into the woods. He came back out, behind him a donkey carrying two baskets.

A coat was spread out on a little mound, and there Brise-Bleu laid out a roast chicken, a piece of cold salt pork, some bread, and buckwheat crêpes. Since they were on a campaign, he thought it important also to provide the luxury of a bottle of wine and a glass. “There, do you see?” said Cadoudal to Roland.

Roland need no further invitation. He leaped down from his horse and handed the bridle to a Chouan. Cadoudal did the same.

“Now,” said Cadoudal, turning toward his men. “You have twenty minutes to do the same as we. Those who have not finished eating in twenty minutes are forewarned that they will be fighting on an empty stomach.”

As if awaiting this invitation, they all pulled from their pockets a piece of bread and a buckwheat crêpe and, minus the chicken and pork, followed the example of their general and his guest.

As there was only one glass, Cadoudal and Roland both drank from it. In the light of the dawning day, they ate side by side, just as two hunting friends might.

From one moment to the next, as Cadoudal had predicted, the fog was becoming less dense. Soon, a half league away on the road from Grand-Champ to Plescop, they could see the force of two hundred Chouans led by Monte-à-l’Assaut, Chante-en-Hiver, La Giberne, and Fend-l’Air.

Inferior in numbers—fewer than one hundred—the Republicans had stopped and were waiting for the fog to dissipate so they could estimate enemy numbers and determine what kind of force they would be facing.

At the sight of the Republicans confronting a force three times their strength, at the sight of their blue uniforms, the color that gave them their nickname, the Blues, Roland stood up suddenly. As for Cadoudal, he remained nonchalantly stretched out on the grass, finishing his meal.

Roland had only to glance at the Republicans to realize they were lost. Cadoudal watched the succession of emotions that crossed the young man’s face. “Well,” Cadoudal asked after a moment of silence that allowed Roland to evaluate the situation, “do you think I have taken the proper dispositions, Colonel?”

“You might even say your proper precautions, General,” said Roland with a mocking smile.

“Is it not one of the First Consul’s customs,” asked Cadoudal, “to accept his advantages when the occasion permits?”

Roland bit his lips. “General,” he said, “I have a favor to ask and I hope you will not refuse.”

“What is it?”

“The permission to go die with my comrades.”

Cadoudal got to his feet. “I was expecting such a request,” he said.

“Then will you grant it?” said Roland, his eyes sparkling with joy.

“Yes, but first I would like to request a service from you,” said the Royalist leader in his dignified tone.

“Speak, monsieur.”

And Roland waited, no less serious and no less proud than the Royalist chief. Old France and New France found their epitomes in those two men.




VI The Combat of the One Hundred (#ulink_32fdd97f-84c2-5a8e-bbff-bc8bf03e15bb)







ROLAND LISTENED.

“The service I ask of you, monsieur, is to negotiate with General Harty for me.”

“To what end?”

“I have several proposals to make before we begin battle.”

“I presume,” said Roland, “that among the proposals which you do me the honor of charging me with, you are not including one that asks him to lay down his arms?”

“On the contrary, Colonel. You must understand that such a proposal is at the top of my list.”

“General Harty will refuse,” said Roland, clenching his fists.

“Probably,” Cadoudal answered calmly.

“And then?”

“And then I shall offer him the option of two other proposals that he will be perfectly free to accept without forfeiting his honor and without damaging his reputation.”

“May I know what they are?” Roland asked.

“You will know them at the appropriate time. Please be so good as to begin with the first proposal.”

“Spell it out for me.”

“General Harty and his one hundred men are surrounded by a force three times stronger. You know it, and you can say as much to him. I offer them safe conduct, but they must lay down their arms and swear that for five years they will not serve against the Vendée or Brittany.”

“A useless message,” said Roland.

“That would be better than getting crushed, both him and his men.”

“True, but he will prefer to have them crushed and himself crushed with them.”

“Beforehand, it would be good, however, to make him the proposal.”

“As for that, you are right,” said Roland. “My horse?”

They brought his horse to him. He leaped into the saddle and rapidly crossed the space separating them from the waiting group.

General Harty’s surprise was great when he saw an officer wearing the uniform of a Republican colonel coming toward him. He moved three paces toward the messenger, who introduced himself, explained how he happened to be with the Royalist Whites, and conveyed Cadoudal’s proposal. As the young officer had predicted, the general refused.

Roland galloped back toward where Cadoudal was waiting. “He refuses!” he shouted as soon as he was within earshot.

“In that case,” said Cadoudal, “take him my second proposal. I don’t want to have anything to blame myself for afterwards, having to answer to an honorable judge such as you.”

Roland bowed. “Let us move on the second proposal,” he said.

“Here it is,” answered Cadoudal. “General Harty is on horseback, as am I. He will leave the ranks of his soldiers and ride out to meet me in the space between the two armies. Like me, he will be carrying his saber and his pistols. And then we can decide the issue between ourselves. If I kill him, his men will accept the conditions I’ve dictated, not to serve for five years against us; for you surely understand that I cannot take any prisoners. If he kills me, his men will have free passage to Vannes with their supplies intact and with no fear of attack by my troops. Ah! I hope this is a proposal you would be able to accept, Colonel?”

“I do accept it,” said Roland.

“Yes, but you are not General Harty. For the moment, just be content with your role as negotiator. And if this proposal—which, in his place, I would not pass up—is not enough to satisfy him, well, you will come back, and, good soul that I am, I shall make him a third one.”

Roland galloped back to the Republicans and General Harty, who were waiting impatiently for him. He conveyed his message to the general.

“Colonel,” the general answered, “I must give account to the First Consul for my actions. You are his aide-de-camp, and when you return to Paris, I charge you with being my witness when you speak to him. What would you do in my place? I will do what you would do.”

Roland winced. An expression of deep gravity spread over his face. He paused to reflect. Then, a few moments later: “General,” he said, “I would refuse.”

“Give me your reasons,” Harty answered, “so that I may see if they are in accordance with my own.”

“The outcome of a duel is totally uncertain, and you cannot subject the destiny of one hundred brave men to such chances. In a business such as this, where each is engaged for himself, each man should defend his hide as best he can.”

“Is that your opinion, Colonel?”

“Yes, on my honor.”

“It is mine as well. So, take my answer back to the Royalist general.”

Roland returned to Cadoudal as fast as he had ridden to meet Harty.

Cadoudal smiled when he heard the Republican general’s answer. “I suspected as much,” he said.

“How could you suspect such an answer, since I’m the one who gave it to him?”

“And yet you were of a different opinion a short while ago.”

“Yes, but you accurately reminded me that I was not General Harty. Let us hear your third proposal,” Roland continued a little impatiently, for he was beginning to realize that ever since the negotiations had gotten under way, Cadoudal had been coming off the better.

“The third proposal,” said Cadoudal, “is an order, the order that two hundred of my own men withdraw. General Harty has one hundred men, I shall keep one hundred. Ever since the Combat of the Thirty, Bretons have had the custom of fighting face to face, chest to chest, man to man, and we prefer to battle one against one rather than three. If General Harty is the victor, he can walk over our bodies and return to Vannes without danger from the two hundred men who will not participate in the combat. If he is vanquished, he will not be able to say that he failed because he was greatly outnumbered. Go on, Monsieur de Montrevel, go back to your friends. I give them now the advantage of numbers, since you alone are worth ten men.”

Roland raised his hat.

“What do you say, monsieur?” asked Cadoudal.

“It is my custom to salute those I see as great, and I salute you.”

“Colonel,” said Cadoudal, “one last glass of wine. Let each of us drink to what he loves most, to what he is most sorry to leave behind, to what he hopes to see again in heaven.”

He took the only glass, filled it halfway, and handed it to Roland. “We have only one glass, Monsieur de Montrevel. You drink first.”

“Why first?”

“Because you are my guest, and also because there’s a proverb that says he who drinks after another shall know what the other person is thinking. I want to know what you are thinking, Monsieur de Montrevel.”

Roland drained the glass and handed it back to Cadoudal. As he had done for Roland, he filled the glass halfway, and then emptied it in turn.

“So, do you know now what I was thinking?” asked Roland.

“Help me,” laughed Cadoudal.

“Well, here are my thoughts,” replied Roland without guile. “I’m thinking that you are a good man, General, and I would be honored if now that we are about to fight each other, you would agree to shake my hand.”

More like two friends parting than like two enemies preparing to fight, the two young men shook hands. With simple grandeur, they each then executed a military salute.

“Good luck!” said Roland to Cadoudal. “But permit me to doubt that my wish will come true—though I say this from my lips, not my heart.”

“May God protect you, Monsieur de Montrevel,” said Cadoudal, “and may He grant that my own wish come true, for it expresses the sum of my best thoughts.”

“By what signal will we know you are ready?” asked Roland.

“We shall shoot into the air.”

“Very well, General.”

Putting his horse to a gallop, for the third time Roland crossed the space between the Royalist and the Republican generals. Cadoudal pointed toward him. “Do you see that young man?” he asked his Chouans.

Everyone looked at Roland. “Yes, General,” the Chouans answered.

“By the souls of your fathers, consider his life sacred! You may capture him, but take him alive and with no harm to a hair on his head.”

“Very well, General,” the Bretons replied.

“And now, my friends,” he continued in a louder voice. “Remember that you are the sons of those thirty heroes who once fought thirty Englishmen, ten leagues from here, between Ploërmel and Josselin: the sons of victors! Our ancestors were made immortal by that combat of the Thirty. Now prove yourselves as illustrious in this combat of the One Hundred.”

“Unfortunately,” he added quietly, “this time we are fighting not the English, but our own brothers.”

The fog had disappeared; with a golden tint the first rays of the springtime sun mottled the Plescop plain. It would be easy to see whatever maneuvers the two armies made.

As Roland returned to the Republican side, Branche-d’Or’s men began to withdraw so that only Cadoudal and his force of one hundred men would be left to face General Harty and his Blues.

The men who had been dismissed from the combat separated into two groups: one marched toward Plumergat, the other toward Saint-Avé. The road was soon clear.

Branche-d’Or came back to Cadoudal. “Your orders, General,” he said.

“One only,” the general answered. “Pick eight men and follow me. When you see the young Republican I had breakfast with fall from his horse, you and your men shall throw yourselves upon him and take him prisoner before he can get away.”

“Yes, General.”

“You know I want to see him again safe and sound.”

“I understand, General.”

“Choose your men; and if he gives his word, you may act as you will.”

“And if he won’t give his word?”

“You will bind him so that he is unable to flee, and you will hold him until the battle is over.”

Branche-d’Or sighed.

“It will be unhappy for us,” he said, “to stand there twiddling our thumbs while our compatriots are spreading out to fight.”

“God is good,” said Cadoudal. “Go on, there will be enough for everyone to do.”

Then, seeing the Republicans amassed for battle, Cadoudal called for a gun. He shot once into the air. At the same moment, within the Republican ranks two drummers began to beat out the charge.

Cadoudal stood up in his stirrups. “My sons,” he said, his voice sonorous, “has everyone offered up his morning prayer?”

In unison they answered: “Yes, yes!”

“If anyone has forgotten to pray or has not found the opportunity to,” Cadoudal pronounced, “now is the time!” Five or six peasants dropped to their knees.

The drums were moving rapidly closer. “General! General!” several voices called out impatiently, but the general pointed to the kneeling Chouans. And the impatient men waited while their fellows, each in his own time, finished their prayers.

When the last of them had risen to his feet, the Republicans had already covered about a third of the distance between the two camps. Their bayonets fixed, they were marching in three rows, thirty to a row. Behind them marched the officers in serried ranks, with Roland riding ahead of one row and General Harty between the other two. No one else rode on horseback. Among the Chouans, there was only one horseman: Cadoudal. Branche-d’Or had tied his mount to a tree so that he could fight on foot with the eight men charged with taking Roland prisoner.

“General,” said Branche-d’Or, “the prayers are over, and everyone is ready.”

Cadoudal assured himself that was so, and then with command in his voice he shouted: “All right, my men, everybody scatter!”

Scarcely had he given the order than the Chouans, waving their hats in one hand and brandishing their guns with the other, spread out over the plain to cries of “Long live the king!” Fanning farther outward, they took the shape of an immense crescent, with George and his horse at the center.

In an instant the Republicans, who held their ranks, were overrun, and the shooting began. As almost all of Cadoudal’s men were poachers, they were good shots. And they were armed with English rifles, which could shoot twice as far as general-issue guns. Although the Chouans, who had fired first, appeared to be out of range, some of their death’s messengers managed to reach the Republican ranks nonetheless.

“Forward!” General Harty shouted.

His soldiers continued to march with bayonets extended, but in a matter of seconds there was nobody facing them.

Cadoudal’s one hundred men had disbanded; his army had become snipers, with fifty men splayed on each side of the Republican ranks. General Harty ordered an about-face to the right and to the left, and then his command rang out:

“Fire!”

But to no success. For the Republicans were firing at individual men, while the Chouans were shooting at a mass of soldiers in formation. Their shots almost always reached their mark.

Roland saw the disadvantages of the Republican position. He looked around, and in the middle of the smoke he descried Cadoudal standing immobile like an equestrian statue: The Royalist leader was waiting for him. With a cry, Roland rode straight for him.

As for Cadoudal, he galloped toward the brave Republican but stopped fifty paces away from him.

“Get ready,” Cadoudal said to Branche-d’Or and his men.

“Rest easy, General. We’re ready,” Branche-d’Or replied.

Cadoudal drew a pistol from the saddle holster and loaded it. Roland, his saber in hand and his body leaning down over his horse’s neck, was charging. He was only twenty paces away when Cadoudal slowly raised his hand and took aim at Roland. At ten paces, he fired.

Roland’s horse had a white star in the middle of its forehead. Cadoudal’s bullet struck the middle of the star. The horse, mortally wounded, rolled with its rider at Cadoudal’s feet.

Cadoudal put his spurs to his horse’s flanks, and it leaped over the fallen horse and rider. Branche-d’Or and his men were ready. Like a pack of jaguars they pounced on Roland, who lay trapped under his horse’s body.

The young man dropped his saber and reached for his pistols. But before he could put hand to holster, two men had seized each of his arms, while the other six dragged the horse off his legs. They worked with such coordination that it was apparent a plan had been laid in advance.

Roland roared in anger. Branche-d’Or handed him his hat.

“I will not surrender,” Roland shouted.

“There’s no reason you need to surrender, Monsieur de Montrevel,” Branche-d’Or answered politely.

“And why not?” asked Roland, wasting his efforts in a desperate, useless struggle.

“Because you have been captured, monsieur.”

The obvious truth precluded any reasonable response Roland might make. “Then kill me,” he shouted.

“We have no intention of killing you, monsieur.”

“Then what do you want?”

“Your word that you will take no further part in this combat. At that price, we’ll set you free.”

“Never!” cried Roland.

“Excuse me, Monsieur de Montrevel. What you are doing is not very loyal,” Branche-d’Or responded.

“Not loyal! Ah, you wretch! You are insulting me because you know that I can neither defend myself nor punish you.”

“I am not a wretch, and I am not insulting you, Monsieur de Montrevel. All I’m saying is that by not giving your word and by forcing us to guard you, you are depriving the general of nine men who could be of use to him. That is not the way the great Tête-Ronde treated you. He had two hundred men more than you, and he sent them away. Now we are only ninety-one against your one hundred.”

A flame flashed through Roland’s eyes, then suddenly he went pale. “You are right, Branche-d’Or,” he said. “Whether or not I can expect help, I surrender. You may go fight with your companions.”

Shouting for joy, the Chouans released Roland. Then, waving their hats and guns and crying “Long live the king!” they rushed into the melee.




VII Blues and Whites (#ulink_2ba00c55-1578-54bb-b0a8-6d271bb60653)







ROLAND STOOD ALONE for a moment. He was now free, but he had been disarmed literally by his fall and figuratively by his word. He contemplated the little mound where he and Cadoudal had shared a breakfast; it was still covered with the cloak that had served as a tablecloth. From there he could survey the whole battlefield, and if his eyes had not been clouded by tears of shame, he would not have missed the slightest detail.

Like the demon of war, invulnerable and relentless, Cadoudal was standing upright on his horse in the midst of the fire and smoke.

As the heat of his anger dried his tears of shame, Roland noticed more. Out in the fields where green wheat was beginning to sprout, he counted the bodies of a dozen Chouans who lay scattered here and there on the ground. But the Republicans, in their compact formation on the road, had lost more than twice that number.

The wounded on both sides dragged themselves into the open field, where, like broken serpents, they tried to rise and continue fighting, the Republicans with their bayonets, the Chouans with their knives. Or they would reload their guns, then manage to get up on one knee, and fire, and fall back again onto the ground.

On both sides the combat was relentless, unceasing, pitiless. Civil war, a merciless and unforgiving civil war, was translating its hate into blood and death across the battlefield.

Cadoudal rode back and forth through the human redoubt. From twenty paces he’d fire, sometimes with his pistols, sometimes from a double-barreled gun that he’d then toss to a Chouan for reloading. Every time he shot, a man would fall. General Harty honored Cadoudal’s maneuvers by ordering an entire platoon to fire at him.

In a wall of flame and smoke, he disappeared. They saw him fall, him and his horse, as if struck by lightning.

Ten or twelve men rushed out of the Republican ranks, but they were met by an equal number of Chouans. In the terrible hand-to-hand combat, the Chouans with their knives seemed to have the upper hand.

Then, suddenly, Cadoudal was again among them; standing in his stirrups, he wielded a pistol in each hand. Two men fell, two men died.

Thirty Chouans joined him to form a sort of wedge. Now wielding a regular-issue rifle, using it as a club, Cadoudal led his thirty men into their enemy’s ranks. With each swing the giant felled a man. He broke through the Blues’ battalion, and Roland saw him appear on the Republican side of the battle lines. Then, like a wild boar that turns back on a fallen hunter to rip out his entrails, Cadoudal reentered the fray and widened the breach.

General Harty rallied twenty men around him. Holding their bayonets in front of them, they bore down on the Chouans who had formed a circle around their general. Harty’s horse had been disemboweled, so with his clothing full of bullet holes and blood flowing from two wounds, he marched on foot with his twenty men. Ten of them fell before they could break the Chouan circle, but Harty made it through to the other side.

Ready though the Chouans were to pursue him, Cadoudal in a thunderous voice called out: “You should not have let him pass, but since he’s already through, let him withdraw freely.” The Chouans obeyed their leader as if his words were sacred.

“And now,” Cadoudal cried, “let the firing cease! No more killing! Only prisoners!”

And with that, everything was over.

In that horrible war both sides shot their prisoners: the Blues because they considered the Chouans and the Vendeans to be brigands; the Whites because they didn’t know what to do with the Republicans they captured.

The Republicans tossed aside their guns to avoid handing them over to their enemy. When the Chouans approached them, they opened their cartridge pouches to show that they had spent their last ammunition.

Cadoudal started his march over to Roland.

During the final stages of the battle, the young man had remained seated; with his eyes fixed on the struggle, his hair wet with sweat, his breathing pained and heavy, he had waited. When he saw that fortune had turned against the Republicans and him, he had put his hands to his head and dropped facedown to the ground.

Roland seemed not to hear Cadoudal’s footsteps when he walked up to him. Then slowly the young officer raised his head; tears were coursing down both cheeks.

“General,” said Roland. “Dispose of me as you will. I am your prisoner.”

“Well,” laughed Cadoudal, “we cannot make a prisoner of the First Consul’s ambassador, but we can ask him to do us a service.”

“What service? Just give the order.”

“I don’t have enough ambulances for the wounded. I don’t have enough prisons for the prisoners. Take it upon yourself to lead the Republican soldiers, both the prisoners and the wounded, back to Vannes.”

“What are you saying, General?” Roland exclaimed.

“I put them in your care. I regret that your horse is dead. I am sorry too that my own horse was killed, but Branche-d’Or’s horse is still available. Please accept it.”

Cadoudal saw that the young man was reluctant. “In exchange, do I not still have the horse you left in Muzillac?” George said.

Roland understood that he had no choice but to match the noble character of the person he was dealing with.

“Will I see you again, General?” he asked, getting to his feet.

“I doubt it, monsieur. My operations call me to the Port-Louis coast, and your duty calls you back to the Luxemburg Palace.” (At that time, Bonaparte was still living there.)

“What shall I tell the First Consul, General?”

“Tell him what you saw, and tell him especially that I consider myself greatly honored that he has promised to see me.”

“And given what I have seen, monsieur, I doubt that you will ever need me,” said Roland. “But in any case, remember that you have a friend close to General Bonaparte.” He extended his hand to Cadoudal.

The Royalist leader took his hand with the same candor and confidence he had shown before the battle. “Good-bye, Monsieur de Montrevel,” he said. “I’m sure there’s no need for me to remind you to do justice to General Harty? A defeat of that kind is as glorious as a victory.”

Branche-d’Or’s horse had meanwhile been brought to the colonel. He leaped into the saddle. Taking one last look around the battlefield, Roland heaved a great sigh. With a final good-bye to Cadoudal he then started off at a gallop across the fields toward the Vannes highway, where he would await the cart with the prisoners and the wounded that he had been charged with taking back to General Harty.

Each man had received ten pounds on Cadoudal’s orders. Roland could not help but think that Cadoudal was being generous with the Directory’s money, sent to the West by Morgan and his unfortunate companions. And Morgan’s companions had paid for that money with their heads.

The next day, Roland was in Vannes. In Nantes, he took the stagecoach to Paris and arrived two days later.

As soon as Bonaparte learned that he was back, he summoned Roland to his study.

“Well, then,” Bonaparte asked when he appeared, “what about this Cadoudal? Was he worth the trouble you put yourself through?”

“General,” Roland answered, “if Cadoudal is willing to come over to our side for one million, give him two, and don’t sell him to anyone else even for four.”

Colorful as the answer was, it was not sufficient for Bonaparte. So Roland had to recount in detail his meeting with Cadoudal in Muzillac, their night march under the singular protection of the Chouans, and finally the combat, in which, after prodigious feats of courage, General Harty had yielded to the Royalists.

Bonaparte was jealous of such men. Often he had spoken with Roland about Cadoudal, in the hope that some defeat would encourage the Breton leader to abandon the Royalist party. But soon Bonaparte was crossing the Alps and concentrating not on civil war but on foreign wars. He had crossed the Saint-Bernard pass on the 20th and 21st of May and the Tessino River at Turbigo on the 31st. On June 2nd he entered Milan. After conferring with General Desaix, who was just back from Egypt, he spent the night of the 11th in Montebello. On the 12th, Bonaparte had set his army in position on the Scrivia and finally, on June 14, 1800, he had waged the Battle of Marengo. There, tired of life, Bonaparte’s aide-de-camp Roland had been killed in the explosion he himself had ignited when he set fire to a munitions wagon.

Bonaparte no longer had anyone to talk to about Cadoudal. Still, he thought often about the Breton brigand. Then, early in February 1801, the First Consul received a letter from Brune containing this letter from Cadoudal:

General,

If I had to fight only the 35,000 men you currently have in the Morbihan, I would not hesitate to continue the campaign as I have done for more than a year, and by a series of lightning-quick movements, I would destroy them to the last man. But others would immediately replace them, and prolonging the war would only result in the greatest of disasters.

Please set the date for a meeting, giving your word of honor. I shall come to see you without fear, alone or with others. I shall negotiate for me and for my men, and I shall be tough for them alone.

George Cadoudal

Beneath Cadoudal’s signature, Bonaparte wrote: “Set a meeting promptly. Agree to all his conditions, provided that George and his men lay down their arms. Insist that he come see me in Paris, and give him a safe-conduct. I want to see this man close-up and form my own judgment of him.” And in his own hand he addressed the letter “To General Brune, Commander-in-Chief of the Western Army.”

As it happened, General Brune was camped on the same road between Muzillac and Vannes where the Battle of the One Hundred had taken place two years before. There General Harty had been defeated, and there Cadoudal now appeared before General Brune. Brune extended his hand and led Cadoudal, along with his aides-de-camp Sol de Grisolles and Pierre Guillemot, across a trench where all four sat down.

Their discussion was just about to begin when Branche-d’Or arrived with a letter so important (so he’d been told) that he thought he should deliver it immediately to the general, wherever he happened to be. The Blues had allowed him passage to his leader, who, with Brune’s permission, took the letter and quickly perused it.

His face betraying no emotion, Cadoudal finished the letter, folded it back up, and tossed it into his hat. Then he turned toward Brune. “I’m all ears, General,” he said.

Ten minutes later, everything was decided. The Chouans, officers and soldiers alike, would all return freely to their homes without harassment, not then or in the future, and they would not take up arms again except by direct orders from Cadoudal himself.

As for Cadoudal himself, he asked that he be granted the right to sell the few parcels of land, the mill, and the house that belonged to him and with the money from the sale be allowed to settle in England. He asked for no indemnity whatever.

As for a meeting with the First Consul, Cadoudal declared that he would consider it a great honor. He said he’d be ready to go to Paris as soon as he had arranged with a notary in Vannes for the sale of his property and with Brune for a safe-conduct.

As for his two aides-de-camp, other than permission for them to accompany him to Paris so they could witness his meeting with Bonaparte, he asked only for the same conditions he had obtained for his men—pardon for the past, safety for the future.

Brune asked for pen and ink.

The treaty was written on a drum. It was shown to George, who then signed it, as did his aides-de-camp. Brune signed last and gave his personal guarantee that the document would be faithfully executed.

While a copy was being made, Cadoudal pulled the letter he had received out of his hat. Handing it to Brune, he said, “Read this, General. You will see that I did not sign the treaty because I needed money.” For indeed, the letter from England announced that the sum of three hundred thousand francs had been deposited with a banker in Nantes, with the order that the funds be made available to George Cadoudal.

Taking the pen, Cadoudal wrote on the second page of the letter: “Sir, Send the money back to London. I have just signed a peace treaty with General Brune, and consequently I am unable to receive money destined for making war.”

Three days after the treaty had been signed, Bonaparte had a copy in hand, along with Brune’s notes detailing the meeting.

Two weeks later, George had sold his property for a total of sixty thousand francs. On February 13, he alerted Brune that he would be leaving for Paris, and on the 18th Le Moniteur, the official record, published this announcement:

George will be going to Paris to meet with the government. He is a man thirty years of age. The son of a miller, fond of battle, having a good education, he told General Brune that his whole family had been guillotined but that he wished to be associated with the government. He said that he wanted his links with England to be forgotten, and that he had only sought out England in order to oppose the regime of 1793 and the anarchy that seemed then about to devour France.

Bonaparte was right to say, when Bourrienne offered to read him the French newspapers, “That’s enough, Bourrienne. They say only what I let them say.”

The newspaper report of course had come directly from Bonaparte’s office, and with customary skill it combined both foresight and hate. In his foresight, the First Consul was improvising Cadoudal’s rehabilitation by attributing to him the desire to serve the government. And in his hate, he was charging him with crimes against the regime of 1793.

On February 16, Cadoudal arrived in Paris. On the 18th, he read the brief piece about him in Le Moniteur. For a moment he was tempted to leave without seeing Bonaparte, hurt as he was by the newspaper’s tone. But he decided it was better to accept the proposed audience and make his profession of faith to the First Consul. Accompanied by two witnesses, his officers Sol de Grisolles and Pierre Guillemot, he would go to the Tuileries as if he were going to a duel. Through the War Ministry, he sent word to the Tuileries that he had arrived in Paris. He received back a letter setting the audience for the next day, on February 19, at nine in the morning.

And that was the meeting to which the First Consul Bonaparte was hurrying so eagerly, once he had sorted out Josephine’s debts.




VIII The Meeting (#ulink_1faadee8-0a79-5ede-ba58-a181c086d7ad)







THE THREE ROYALIST LEADERS were waiting in the large room that people continued to officially call the Louis Quatorze Room; unofficially, they called it the Cockade Room.

All three wore the typical Royalist uniform, for that was one of the conditions Cadoudal had set. The gray jacket with a green collar was simply adorned with a gold stripe for Cadoudal and a silver one for each of his officers. They also wore Breton suspenders, large gray gaiters, and white quilted vests. Sabers hung at their sides. And their soft felt hats sported a white cockade.

Duroc, when he saw them, placed his hand on Bonaparte’s arm, and the First Consul stopped to look at his aide-de-camp. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

“They have their sabers,” said Duroc.

“So?” Bonaparte replied. “They aren’t prisoners.”

“No matter,” said Duroc. “I’ll leave the door open.”

“Indeed, it’s not necessary. They are enemies, but loyal enemies. Do you not recall what our poor comrade Roland said about them?”

Briskly Bonaparte walked into the room where the three Chouans were waiting. He signaled to Rapp and the two other officers who were present that they should station themselves outside.

“Here you are at last!” said Bonaparte, recognizing Cadoudal from the description his former aide-de-camp had given him. “A friend we have in common, whom we had the misfortune to lose at the Battle of Marengo, Colonel Roland de Montrevel, told me very good things about you.”

“I am not surprised,” Cadoudal answered. “During the short time I had the honor of knowing Monsieur Roland de Montrevel, I was able to recognize in him the most gentlemanly feelings. But, although you may know who I am, General, I must introduce to you the two men accompanying me, as they have also been admitted into the honor of your presence.”

Bonaparte bowed slightly, as if to indicate that he was listening.

Cadoudal placed his hand on the older of the two officers. “Taken to the colonies as a young man, Monsieur Sol de Grisolles crossed the sea to return to France. During the crossing, he was shipwrecked and found floating alone on a plank in the middle of the ocean, barely conscious and about to be swallowed up by the waves. Later, a prisoner of the Revolution, he cut through his dungeon walls, escaped, and the next day he was fighting in our ranks. Your soldiers had sworn to take him at all costs, and during discussions about peace, they invaded the house where he had taken refuge. Alone, he defended himself against fifty soldiers. When he’d spent all his cartridges, he could only surrender or else throw himself out a window twenty feet from the ground. Without hesitation, he leaped and, landing among the Republicans, rolled over, got back to his feet, killed two of his enemy, wounded three others, took off running and escaped in spite of the bullets whistling uselessly around him.

“As for this man,” Cadoudal said, pointing to Pierre Guillemot, “he too was surprised in a farmhouse where he was enjoying a few hours of rest. Your men entered his bedroom before he could grab his saber or rifle, so he picked up an axe and split open the head of the first soldier who approached him. The Republicans backed off. Guillemot, still brandishing his axe, reached the door, parried the thrust of a bayonet that barely touched his skin, and escaped across the fields. When he came to a barrier where a soldier stood guard, he killed the guard and leaped over the barrier. And when a Blue in pursuit of him was at his heels, Guillemot turned around and split open the man’s chest with one swing of his axe. Finally he was free to come join my Chouans and me.

“As for me.…” Cadoudal added, bowing modestly.

“As for you,” Bonaparte interrupted, “I know more about you than you yourself would tell me. You picked up where your fathers left off. Instead of the Combat of the Thirty, you were the victor at the Combat of the One Hundred, and some day people will call the war you have been waging the war of the giants.” Then, stepping forward, he said, “Come, George. I’d like to speak to you alone.”

George hesitated a moment, but followed him all the same. He would have preferred that his two officers also hear any words he and the head of the French republic would exchange.

Bonaparte, however, said nothing until they were out of earshot. Then he spoke: “Listen, George,” he said, “I need energetic men to help me to finish the task I’ve undertaken. I used to have near me a heart of bronze on which I could depend as if he were me myself. You met him: Roland de Montrevel. A despondency I could never fully understand led him to suicide, for his death truly was a suicide. Are you willing to join me? I have proposed the rank of colonel for you, but you are worth more than that, I know, and I can offer you the rank of major general.”

“I thank you from the depths of my heart, General,” George responded, “but you would think less of me if I accepted.”

“Why do you say that?” Bonaparte asked quickly.

“Because I swore allegiance to the Bourbons, and to the Bourbons I’d remain faithful even if I’d accept.”

“Come now,” said the First Consul, “is there no way I can get you to join me?”

Cadoudal shook his head.

“You have heard people slandering me,” said Bonaparte.

“General,” answered the Royalist officer, “might I be permitted to repeat the things people have told me?”

“Why not? Do you think I’m not strong enough to hear the bad as well as the good that people speak of me?”

“Please note that I affirm nothing. All I shall do is repeat what people say,” said Cadoudal.

“Go ahead,” said the First Consul, a slightly worried smile on his face.

“They say that you were able to come back to France so successfully, without hindrance by the English fleet, because you had made a treaty with Commodore Sidney Smith. They say the terms of the treaty allowed you to return without threat on the agreed-to condition that you would restore our former kings to the throne.”

“George,” said Bonaparte, “you are one of those men whose esteem I value and whom, consequently, I’d not want to give any cause for slander. Since returning from Egypt I have received two letters from the Comte de Provence. If such a treaty with Sir Sidney Smith had existed, do you think the count would have failed to make reference to it in one of the letters he did me the honor of sending? I shall show you these letters, and you can judge for yourself if the accusation brought against me has any basis.”

In the course of their walking, they’d come to the Louis Quatorze Room’s door. Bonaparte opened it. “Duroc,” he said, “go ask Bourrienne to send me the two letters from the Comte de Provence as well as my response. They are in the middle drawer of my desk, in a leather portfolio.”

While Duroc carried out the assigned task, Bonaparte continued: “How astonished I am to see how much your former kings constitute virtually a religion to you plebeians! Suppose I did restore the throne—something I’m not at all inclined to do, I tell you—what would be in it for you people who have shed your blood to see the throne restored? Not even the confirmation of the rank you have fought to obtain. A miller’s son a colonel? Come now. In the royal armies, was there ever a colonel who was not a nobleman born? Among the ungrateful nobility has ever a man risen so high because of his own worth or even for services rendered? Whereas with me, George, you can rise to any rank or level. For the higher I rise, the higher shall I raise those surrounding me.… Ah, here are the letters. Give them to me, Duroc.”

Duroc handed him three documents. The first one Bonaparte opened bore the date of February 20, 1800, and we have copied the Comte de Provence’s letter from the archives without changing a single word.

Whatever their apparent conduct may be, men such as you, monsieur, never cause concern. You have accepted a high position, and I am grateful to you for that. Better than anyone else, you know what strength and power are necessary for a great country’s happiness. Save France from its own fury, and you will have fulfilled my heart’s deepest wish; give it back its king, and future generations will bless your memory. Your importance to the country will always be too great for me to pay the debt my ancestor and I owe you by some high appointment.

Louis

“Do you see any allusion to a treaty in that letter?” asked Bonaparte.

“General, I admit that I do not,” George answered. “And you didn’t answer the letter?”

“I must say that I thought there was no hurry, and I expected I would receive a second letter before deciding. It was not long in coming. A few months later, this undated letter arrived.” He passed it to Cadoudal.

You have surely known for a long time, General, that my esteem for you is assured. If you were to doubt that I am capable of gratitude, propose your own position and set the destiny of your friends. As for my principles, I am French. Lenient by nature, reason makes me even more so.

No, the victor at Lodi, Castiglione, and Arcole, the conqueror of Italy and Egypt, cannot prefer vain celebrity to true glory. However, you are wasting precious time. We can guarantee France’s glory. I say “we” because to accomplish that, I need Bonaparte, and because Bonaparte cannot do it without me.

General, Europe has its eyes on you, glory awaits you, and I am impatient to bring peace back to my people.

Louis

“As you see, monsieur,” Bonaparte said, “there’s no more reference to a treaty in the second letter than there was in the first.”

“Dare I ask, General, if you answered this one?”

“I was about to have Bourrienne answer the letter and sign it when he pointed out to me that since the letters were penned by the Comte de Provence himself, it would be more appropriate for me to respond in my own handwriting, however bad it may be. Since it was an important matter, I did the best I could, and the letter I wrote was at least readable. Here’s a copy,” said Bonaparte, handing George a copy Bourrienne had made of the letter he himself had written to the Comte de Provence. It contained this refusal:

I received your letter, monsieur; I thank you for your kind words.

You ought not wish to return to France; you would need to tread over one hundred thousand cadavers.

Sacrifice your interests to France’s peace and happiness. History will be grateful.

I am not unfeeling about your family’s misfortunes, and I shall be pleased to learn that you have everything you need for a peaceful retirement.

Bonaparte

“So,” asked George, “was that indeed your final word?”

“My final word.”

“And yet history provided a precedent.…”

“The history of England, not our own history, monsieur,” Bonaparte interrupted. “Me playing the role of Monck? Oh no! If I had to choose and if I wanted to imitate an Englishman, I would prefer Washington. Monck lived in a century when the prejudices that we fought against and overturned in 1789 were still strong. Even if Monck had tried to become king, he would not have been able to. A dictator perhaps, but nothing more. To do more, he would have needed Cromwell’s genius. A quality lacking in Richard, Cromwell’s son, who was not able to retain power—of course he was an idiot, the typical son of a great man. And then, some fine result, the restoration of Charles II! Replacing a puritan court with a libertine court! Following his father’s example, he dissolved three or four parliaments and tried to govern alone, then set up a cabinet of lackeys that attended more to matters of royal debauchery than to the business of the court. He was greedy for pleasure and stopped at nothing when money was at stake. He sold Dunkirk to Louis XIV—Dunkirk, which was England’s key possession in France. And he had Algernon Sidney executed, on the pretext that he was party to some nonexistent conspiracy, when, in fact, Sidney had refused not only to attend the commission that sentenced Charles I to death but also, adamantly, to sign the act ordering the royal execution.

“Cromwell died in 1658, when he was fifty-nine years old. During the ten years he was in power, he had the time to undertake many changes but to complete only a few. In fact, he was trying to accomplish complete reform: political reform by replacing a monarchy with a republican government, and religious reform by abolishing Catholicism in favor of Protestantism. Well, if you assume I shall live as long as Cromwell, to the age of fifty-nine—it’s not very long, is it?—I have about thirty more years: three times as many as Cromwell had. And you see that I’m not trying to change things. I’m content to continue things the way they are. I’m not overthrowing things, but rather raising them back up.”

Cadoudal laughed. “What about the Directory?”

“The Directory was not a government,” replied Bonaparte. “Is it possible to establish power on a rotten foundation like the Directory’s? If I had not returned from Egypt, the Directory would have collapsed under its own corrupt weight. All I had to do was nudge it a little. France wanted nothing to do with the Directory. And for proof of that, look at how France welcomed me back. What had the Directory done with the country in my absence? When I returned I found poor France threatened on every side by an enemy that already had a foothold inside three of its borders. I had left the country in peace; I found it now at war. I had left with victories behind me; I returned to defeats. I had left the country’s coffers with millions from Italy; on my return I found misery and spoliatory laws everywhere. What has become of those one hundred thousand soldiers, my companions in glory, men whom I knew by name? They are dead. While I was taking Malta, Alexandria, Cairo; while I was engraving with the point of our bayonets the name of France on pylons in Thebes and on obelisks in Karnak; while I was avenging the defeat of the last king of Jerusalem at the base of Mount Thabor—what was the Directory doing with my best generals? They allowed Humbert to be taken in Ireland; they arrested and tried to dishonor Championnet in Naples. Schérer retreated, thus obliterating the victorious path I had laid out in Italy. They let the English invade the coast of Holland; they got Raimbault killed in Turin, David at Alkmaar, and Joubert at Novi. And when I asked for reinforcements to keep Egypt, munitions to defend it, wheat to plant for its future, they sent me congratulatory letters and decrees stating that the Army of the Orient was meritorious and the pride of France.”

“They thought you could find all you needed in Acre, General.”

“That is my only failure, George,” said Bonaparte, “and if I had succeeded, I swear, I would have surprised all of Europe! If I had succeeded! I’ll tell you what I would have done then. I would have found the pasha’s treasures in Acre and enough weapons to arm three hundred thousand men. I would have roused and armed all of Syria, where everyone decried Djazzar’s cruelty; I would have marched on Damascus and Aleppo. My army would have grown larger and larger as I advanced, and I would have announced to the people the abolition of all servitude and of the pasha’s tyrannical government. I would have marched to Constantinople and overthrown the Turkish Empire. I would have founded a great new empire in the Orient that would have guaranteed my place in history. And then I would have come back to Paris through Adrianople or Vienna—after wiping out the house of Austria!”

“That’s like Caesar’s plan when he declared war on the Parthians,” Cadoudal answered coldly.

“Ah, I was sure we would come back to Caesar,” said Bonaparte with a laugh, his teeth clenched. “Well, as you see, I’m willing to accept discussion on whatever grounds you choose. Suppose that when he was twenty-nine years old, as I am now, Caesar, instead of leading a patrician life of debauchery in Rome and accumulating the greatest debts known in his time, suppose that he had been instead the Citizen First Consul. Suppose that at twenty-nine his campaign in Gaul had already been finished, his Egyptian campaign completed, and his Spanish campaign successfully ended. Suppose, I repeat, that he was twenty-nine instead of fifty years old—the age at which Victory, who loves only the young, begins to abandon bald brows—do you think he would not then have been both Caesar and Augustus?”

“Yes,” Cadoudal replied brusquely, “unless he had happened first to find Brutus, Cassius, and Casca in his path with their daggers.”

“So,” said Bonaparte with sadness, “my enemies are counting on assassination! In that case, it’ll be easy for them, and especially for you, since you are my enemy. What is preventing you at this very moment, if you have the same convictions as Brutus, from striking me down as he struck Caesar? We are alone, the doors are closed. You have your saber. You could surely be upon me before my guards could stop you.”

“No,” said George. “No, we are not counting on assassination. I believe it would require grave circumstances for one of us to decide to become an assassin. But the chances of war remain. One simple rebellion could cost you all your prestige, a cannonball could take off your head the way it did Marshal Berwick’s, or a bullet could strike you like Joubert and Desaix. And then what will become of France? You have no children, and your brothers.…”

Bonaparte stared hard at Cadoudal, who completed his thoughts with a shrug. Bonaparte clenched his fists. George had found the chink in his armor.

“I admit,” said Bonaparte, “that from that point of view you are right. I risk my life daily, and daily my life could be taken. But even if you do not believe in Providence, I do. I believe that nothing happens by chance. I believe that when Providence, on August 13, 1769, exactly one day after Louis XV had rendered the edict uniting Corsica to France, allowed a child to be born in Ajaccio, a child who would carry out the 13th Vendémiaire and the 18th Brumaire, it had great designs and supreme plans in store for him. I was that child, and Providence has always kept me safe in the midst of great dangers. Since I have a mission, I fear nothing. Because my mission is my armor. If I am mistaken; if, instead of living the twenty-five or thirty years I think are necessary to accomplish my goals, I am struck twenty-two times with a dagger like Caesar, or my head is blown off by a cannonball like Berwick’s, or a bullet hits me in the chest like Joubert or Desaix—then that is because Providence has its own good reasons for allowing such things to happen, and Providence will then provide what France needs. Believe me, George, Providence never fails great nations.

“A moment ago we were talking about Caesar, and you evoked for me the image of him collapsing at the feet of Pompey’s statue after he’d been stabbed by Brutus, Cassius, and Casca. When Rome in mourning attended the dictator’s funeral ceremonies, when the people set fire to his assassins’ homes, when the Eternal City trembled at the thought of a drunken Anthony or the hypocrite Lepidus and wondered where from the four corners of the earth would rise the genius who’d put an end to the civil wars, no one even thought to consider he’d be an Apollonian schoolboy, Caesar’s nephew, young Octavius. A baker’s son from Velletri, coated with the flour of his ancestors. A feeble child afraid of heat, cold, thunder, everything? Who could have seen in him the future master of the world when limping, pale, his eyes blinking like a bird’s in a spotlight, he passed in review Caesar’s old bands of soldiers? Not even Cicero, perspicacious Cicero: ‘Ornandum et tollendum (Cover him with flowers and raise him to the skies),’ he said. Well, the child they should have celebrated and then gotten rid of at the first possible moment tricked all the graybeards in the Senate and reigned almost as long over Rome, the city that had assassinated Caesar because it did not want a king, as did Louis XIV over France.

“George, George, don’t fight the Providence that has created me, for Providence will break you.”

“Well,” George answered with a bow, “at least I shall be broken as I follow the path and religion of my fathers, and God will forgive me my error, the error of a fervent Christian and a pious son.”

Bonaparte placed his hand on the young leader’s shoulder. “So be it,” he said, “but at least remain neutral. Let events take their course, let thrones quake and crowns fall. Usually it’s the spectator who has to pay to follow the game, but I’ll pay you to watch me in action.”

“And how much will you give me to do that, Citizen First Consul?” asked Cadoudal.

“One hundred thousand francs a year, monsieur,” Bonaparte answered.

“If you can give one hundred thousand francs a year to a simple partisan leader, how much will you give the prince he has been fighting for?”

“Nothing, sir,” said Bonaparte disdainfully. “In your case, what I’m paying for is your courage, not the principles that drive you. I would like to prove that for me, a self-made man, men exist by their works alone. Please accept, George. I beg you.”

“And if I refuse?” asked George.

“You’ll be making a mistake.”

“Will I nonetheless be free to journey wherever I want?”

Bonaparte went to the door and opened it.

“Duroc!” he called.

Duroc appeared.

“Please make sure,” he said, “that Monsieur Cadoudal and his two friends can move around Paris as freely as if they were in Muzillac. And if they would like passports for any country in the world, Fouché has been ordered to provide them.”

“Your word is enough for me, Citizen First Consul,” said Cadoudal, bowing once more. “I shall be leaving this evening.”

“Might I ask where you’ll be going?”

“To London, General.”

“So much the better.”

“Why so much the better?”

“Because there you’ll see up close the men you’ve been fighting for, and once you’ve seen them.…”

“Yes?”

“Well, you will compare them to those you’ve been fighting against. However, once you’re out of France, Colonel.…” Bonaparte paused.

“I’m waiting,” said Cadoudal.

“Please don’t come back without letting me know. If you do not let me know, you must not be surprised to be treated as an enemy.”

“That will be an honor for me, General, since by treating me thus you prove that I am a man to be feared.”

George said goodbye to the First Consul and withdrew.

The next day the newspapers read:

Following the meeting George Cadoudal had obtained with the First Consul, he asked permission to withdraw freely to England.

He was granted permission on the condition that he would not return to France without the government’s authorization.

George Cadoudal promised to release his men from their oath. As long as he fought, they were committed to support him; by retreating, he has freed them from their obligations to him.

And indeed, on the very evening of his meeting with the First Consul, George was writing in his own hand a letter to his cohorts in every part of France.

Because a protracted war seems to be a misfortune for France and ruin for my region, I free you from your oath of loyalty to me. I shall never call you back unless the French government should fail to keep the promise it gave to me and that I accepted in your name.

If there should happen to be some treason hidden beneath a hypocritical peace, I would not hesitate to call once more on your fidelity, and your fidelity, I am sure, would respond.

George Cadoudal




IX Two Companions at Arms (#ulink_1726a8cc-97f0-5040-b7ea-2c39f7171d98)







WHILE BONAPARTE WAS MEETING with Cadoudal in the Louis Quatorze salon, Josephine, certain that Bourrienne was alone, put on her dressing gown, wiped her reddened eyes, spread a layer of rice powder on her face, slipped her Creole feet into sky-blue Turkish slippers with gold embroidery, and quickly climbed the little stairway connecting her bedroom to Marie de Medicis’s oratory.

When she arrived at the study door, she stopped and, bringing both hands up to her heart, peered guardedly into the room. Determining that Bourrienne was indeed alone—writing, with his back to her—she tiptoed across the room and laid her hand on his shoulder.

Smiling, for he recognized the light touch of her hand, Bourrienne turned around.

“Well,” Josephine asked. “Was he very angry?”

“Yes,” Bourrienne said. “I must admit that it was a major storm, if a storm with no rain. But there was thunder and lightning indeed.”

“In short,” Josephine added, moving directly to the only point that interested her, “will he pay?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have the six hundred thousand francs?”

“Yes, I do,” said Bourrienne.

Josephine clapped her hands like a child just relieved of its penitence.

“But,” Bourrienne added, “for the love of God, don’t run up any more debts, or at least be reasonable.”

“What do you call reasonable debt, Bourrienne?” asked Josephine.

“How do you expect me to answer that? The best thing would be to run up no debt at all.”

“You surely know that is impossible, Bourrienne,” Josephine answered with conviction.

“Perhaps fifty thousand francs. Maybe one hundred thousand.”

“But, Bourrienne, once these debts have been paid, and you are confident that you can pay them all with the six hundred thousand francs…”

“Yes?”

“Well, my suppliers will then no longer refuse me credit.”

“But how about him?”

“Who?”

“The First Consul. He swore that these would be the last debts he would pay on your account.”

“Just as he also swore last year,” said Josephine with her charming smile.

Bourrienne looked at her in stupefaction. “Truly,” he said, “you frighten me. Give us two or three years of peace and the few measly millions we brought back from Italy will be exhausted; yet you persist.… If I have any advice to give you, it is to allow him some time to get over this bad mood of his before you see him again.”

“But I can’t! Because I really must see him right away. I have set up a meeting this morning for a compatriot from the colonies, a family friend, the Comtesse de Sourdis and her daughter, and not for anything in the world would I have him fly into a fit of rage in the presence of these fine women, women whom I met in society, on their first visit to the Tuileries.”

“What will you give me if I keep him up here, if I get him even to have his lunch here, so that he’d have no reason to come down to your rooms until dinnertime?”

“Anything you want, Bourrienne.”

“Well, then, take a pen and paper, and write in your own lovely little handwriting.…”

“What?”

“Write!”

Josephine put pen to paper, as Bourrienne dictated to her: “I authorize Bourrienne to settle all my bills for the year 1800 and to reduce them by half or even by three quarters if he judges it appropriate.”

“There.”

“Date it.”

“February 19, 1801.”

“Now sign it.”

“Josephine Bonaparte.… Is everything now in order?”

“Perfectly in order. You can return downstairs, get dressed, and welcome your friend without fear of being disturbed by the First Consul.”

“Obviously, Bourrienne, you are a charming man.” She held out the tips of her fingernails for him to kiss, which he did respectfully.

Bourrienne then rang for the office boy, who immediately appeared in the doorway. “Landoire,” Bourrienne said, “inform the steward that the First Consul will be taking lunch in his office. Have him set up the pedestal table for two. We shall let him know when we wish to be served.”

“And who will be having lunch with the First Consul, Bourrienne?”

“No business of yours, so long as it’s someone who can put him in a good mood.”

“And who would that be?”

“Would you like him to have lunch with you, madame?”

“No, no, Bourrienne,” Josephine cried. “Let him have lunch with whomever he chooses, just so he does not come down to me until dinner.” And in a cloud of gauze she fled the room.

Not two minutes later, the door to the study burst open and the First Consul strode straight to Bourrienne. Planting his two fists on the desktop, he said, “Well, Bourrienne, I have just seen the famous George Cadoudal.”

“And what do you think of him?”

“He is one of those old Bretons from the most Breton part of Brittany,” Bonaparte replied, “cut from the same granite as their menhirs and dolmens. And unless I’m sadly mistaken, I haven’t seen the last of him. He’s a man who fears nothing and desires nothing, and men like that … the fearless are to be feared, Bourrienne.”

“Fortunately such men are rare,” said Bourrienne with a laugh. “You know that better than anyone, having seen so many reeds painted to look like iron.”

“But they still blow in the wind. And speaking of reeds, have you seen Josephine?”

“She has just left.”

“Is she satisfied?”

“Well, she no longer carries all her Montmartre suppliers on her back.”

“Why did she not wait for me?”

“She was afraid you would scold her.”

“Surely she knows she cannot escape a scolding!”

“Yes, but gaining some time before facing you is like waiting for a change to good weather. Then, too, at eleven o’clock she is to receive one of her friends.”

“Which one?”

“A Creole woman from Martinique.”

“Whose name is?”

“The Comtesse de Sourdis.”

“Who are the Sourdis family? Are they known?”

“Are you asking me?”

“Of course. Don’t you know the peerage list in France backward and forward?”

“Well, it’s a family that has belonged to both the church and the sword as far back as the fourteenth century. Among those participating in the French expedition to Naples, as best as I can recall, there was a Comte de Sourdis who accomplished marvelous feats at the Battle of Garigliano.”

“The battle that the knight Bayard managed to lose so effectively.”

“What do you think about Bayard, that ‘irreproachable and fearless’ knight?”

“That he deserved his good name, for he died as any true soldier must hope to die. Still, I don’t think much of all those sword-swingers; they were poor generals—Francis I was an idiot at Pavia and indecisive at Marignan. But let’s get back to your Sourdis family.”

“Well, at the time of Henri IV there was an Abbesse de Sourdis in whose arms Gabrielle expired; she was allied with the d’Estrée family. In addition, a Comte de Sourdis, serving under Louis XV, bravely led the charge of a cavalry regiment at Fontenoy. After that, I lose track of them in France; they probably went off to America. In Paris, they live behind the old Hôtel Sourdis on the square Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois. There is a tiny street named Sourdis that runs from the Rue d’Orleans to the Rue d’Anjou in the Marais district, and there’s the cul-de-sac called Sourdis off the Rue des Fossés-Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois. If I’m not mistaken, this particular Comtesse de Sourdis, who in passing I must say is very rich, has just bought a lovely residence on Quai Voltaire and is living there. Her house opens onto the Rue de Bourbon, and you can see it from the windows in the Marsan pavilion.”

“Perfect! That’s how I like to be answered. It seems to me that these de Sourdises are closely related to those living in Saint-Germain.”

“Not really. They are close relatives of Dr. Cabanis, who shares, as you know, our political religion. He is even the girl’s godfather.”

“That improves things. All those dowagers who live in Saint-Germain are not good company for Josephine.”

At that moment Bonaparte turned around and noticed the pedestal table. “Had I said that I would be having lunch here?” he asked.

“No,” Bourrienne answered, “but I thought it would be better if today you had lunch in your study.”

“And who will be doing me the honor of having lunch with me?”

“Someone I have invited.”

“Given the way I was feeling, you had to be very sure that the person would please me.”

“I was quite sure.”

“And who is it?”

“Someone who came from far away and arrived at the Tuileries while you were with George in the reception room.”

“I had no other meetings scheduled.”

“This person came without a scheduled meeting.”

“You know that I never receive anyone without a letter.”

“This person you will receive.”

Bourrienne got up, went to the officers’ room, and simply said, “The First Consul is back.”

At those words, a young man rushed into the First Consul’s study. Although he was only about twenty-five or twenty-six years old, he was wearing the casual clothes of a general. “Junot!” Bonaparte exclaimed joyously.

“By God, you were quite right to say that this man did not need a letter! Come here, Junot!” The young general did not hesitate, but when he tried to take Bonaparte’s hand and raise it to his lips, the First Consul opened his arms and pulled Junot tightly to his breast.

Among the many young officers who owed their careers to Bonaparte, Junot was one of those he loved the most. They had met during the siege of Toulon, when Bonaparte was commanding the battery of the sansculottes. He had asked for someone who could write beautifully, and Junot, stepping from the ranks, introduced himself. “Sit down there,” Bonaparte said, pointing to the battery’s breastwork, “and write what I dictate.” Junot of course obeyed.

He was just finishing the letter when a bomb, tossed by the English, exploded ten steps away and covered him with dirt. “Good!” said Junot with a laugh. “How convenient! We didn’t have any sand to blot the ink.” Those words made his fortune.

“Would you like to stay with me?” Bonaparte asked. “I shall take care of you.” And Junot answered, “With pleasure.” From the outset the two men understood each other.

When Bonaparte was named general, Junot became his aide-de-camp. When Bonaparte was placed on reserve duty, the two young men shared their poverty, living off the two or three hundred francs that Junot received each month from his family. After the 13th Vendémiaire, Bonaparte had two other aides-de-camp, Muiron and Marmont, but Junot remained his favorite.

Junot participated in the Egyptian campaign as a general. So, to his great regret, he had to part with Bonaparte. He performed feats of courage at the battle of Fouli, where he shot dead the leader of the enemy army with his pistol. When Bonaparte left Egypt, he wrote to Junot:

I am leaving Egypt, my dear Junot. You are too far away from where we are embarking for me to take you along with me. But I am leaving orders with Kléber for you to leave in October. Finally, wherever I am, whatever my position, please know that I will always give you proof positive of our close friendship.

Good-bye and best wishes,

Bonaparte

On his way back to France on an old cargo ship, Junot fell into the hands of the English. Since then, Bonaparte had heard no news of his friend, so Junot’s unexpected appearance created quite a stir in Bonaparte’s quarters.

“Well, finally you’re back!” exclaimed the First Consul. “I knew you idiotically let yourself be caught by the English by remaining so long in Egypt. What I don’t know is why you waited five months when I had asked you to leave as soon as possible.”

“Good heavens! Because Kléber would not let me leave. You have no idea how difficult he made things for me.”

“He no doubt feared that I’d have too many of my friends in my ranks. I know no love was lost between us, but I never thought he’d demonstrate his enmity in such a petty way. Plus, he wrote a letter to the Directory—do you know about that? What’s more,” Bonaparte added, raising his eyes heavenward, “his tragic end closed all our accounts, and both France and I have undergone a major loss. But the irreparable loss, my friend, is the loss of Desaix. Ah, Desaix! Such a grave misfortune to have smote our country.”

Totally absorbed in his pain, Bonaparte paced up and down a moment without saying a word. Then, suddenly, he stopped in front of Junot. “So, what do you want to do now? I have always said that I would furnish proof of my friendship when I could. What are your plans? Do you want to serve?”

Then, the look in his eyes difficult to read, Bonaparte asked jovially, “Would you like me to have you join the Rhine army?”

Junot cheeks grew flushed. “Are you trying to get rid of me?” he said. After a pause, he continued: “If such are your orders, I shall be happy to show General Moreau that the officers in the army of Italy have not forgotten their work in Egypt.”

“Well,” said the First Consul with a laugh, “my cart is getting before my horse! No, Monsieur Junot, no, you’ll not leave me. I admire General Moreau a great deal, but not so much that I would give him one of my best friends.” Then, his brow creased, he continued more seriously: “Junot, I’m going to give you command of Paris. It’s a position of trust, especially just now, and I could not make a better choice. But”—he glanced around as if he feared someone might be listening—“you must give it some thought before you accept. You’ll need to age ten years, because the position requires not only gravity and prudence to the extreme; it also demands the utmost attention to everything related to my safety.”

“General,” Junot exclaimed, “on that score.…”

“Silence, my friend, or at least speak more softly,” Bonaparte said. “Yes, you must watch over my safety. For I am surrounded by danger. If I were still simply the General Bonaparte I was before and even after the 13th Vendémiaire, I would make no effort to avoid danger. In those days my life was my own; I knew its worth, which was not very much. But now my life is no longer my own. I can say this only to a friend, Junot: My destiny has been revealed to me. It is the destiny of a great nation, and that is why my life is threatened. The powers that hope to invade France and divide it up would like to have me out of their way.”

Raising his hand to his brow as if he were trying to chase away a troublesome thought, he remained pensive for a moment. Then, his mind moving rapidly from one idea to another—he’d sometimes entertain twenty different ideas at once—Bonaparte resumed: “So, as I was saying, I shall name you commander of Paris. But you need to get married. That would be appropriate not only for the dignity of the position, but it is also in your own best interest. And by the way, be careful to marry only a rich woman.”

“Yes, but I would like her to be attractive as well. There’s the problem: All heiresses are as ugly as caterpillars.”

“Well, set to work immediately, for I am appointing you commander of Paris as of today. Look for an appropriate house, one not too far from the Tuileries, so that I can send for you whenever I need you. And look around; perhaps you can choose a woman from the circle in which Josephine and Hortense move. I would suggest Hortense herself, but I believe she loves Duroc, and I would not want to go against her own inclinations.”

“The First Consul is served!” said the steward, carrying in a tray.

“Let’s sit down,” said Bonaparte. “And in a week from now, you shall have rented a house and chosen a wife!”

“General,” said Junot, “while I don’t doubt I can find a house in a week, I would like to request two weeks for the wife.”

“Agreed,” said Bonaparte.




X Two Young Women Put Their Heads Together (#ulink_3f4e3162-7b8d-58c4-8c00-34863a8795e6)







AS THE TWO COMPANIONS AT ARMS were sitting down at their table, Madame la Comtesse and Mademoiselle Claire de Sourdis were announced to Madame Bonaparte.

The women embraced and, gracefully grouping themselves, they inquired after each other’s health and spoke of the weather, as was the mode of aristocratic society. Madame Bonaparte then had Madame de Sourdis sit beside her on a chaise longue, while Hortense took it upon herself to show Claire around the palace, as she was visiting for the first time.

The two girls, though about the same age, made a charming contrast. Hortense was blonde, fresh as a daisy, velvety as a peach. Her golden hair fell down to her knees, and her arms and hands were somewhat thin, for she still awaited Nature’s last touch to turn her into a woman. In her graceful appearance she combined both French vivaciousness and Creole sweetness. And, to complete the charming picture, her blue eyes shone with infinite gentleness.

Her companion had no cause for jealousy in regard to grace and beauty. Both girls were Creoles, but Claire was taller than her friend, and she had the dark complexion that Nature reserves for the southern beauties she seems to favor. Claire had sapphire blue eyes, ebony hair, a waist so slender two hands could span it, and hands and feet as tiny as a child’s.

Both had received excellent educations. Hortense’s education, interrupted by her forced apprenticeship until her mother got out of prison, had been organized so intelligently and assiduously that you would not imagine it had ever been interrupted at all. She could draw very nicely, was an excellent musician, indeed composed music, and wrote romantic poetry, some of which has been passed down to us, not simply because of the author’s elevated position but rather because of its intrinsic value. In fact, both girls were painters, both were musicians, and both spoke two or three foreign languages.

Hortense showed Claire her study, her sketches, her music room, and her aviary. Near the aviary, they sat down in a little boudoir that had been painted by Redouté. There they spoke about society parties, now beginning to reappear more brilliant than ever; about balls, which were vigorously starting up again; and about handsome, accomplished dancers. They talked about Monsieur de Trénis, Monsieur Laffitte, Monsieur d’Alvimar, and both Coulaincourts. They complained about the necessity, at every ball, to dance at least one gavotte and one minuet. And two questions arose quite naturally.

Hortense asked, “Do you know Citizen Duroc, my stepfather’s aide-de-camp?”

And Claire wondered, “Have you had the opportunity to meet Citizen Hector de Sainte-Hermine?”

Claire did not know Duroc.

Hortense did not know Hector.

Hortense more than nearly dared admit that she loved Duroc, for her stepfather, who himself greatly admired Duroc, had given his blessing. Indeed, Duroc was one of those young generals for whom the Tuileries was such a proving ground in those days. He was not yet twenty-eight, his manners were quite distinguished, and he had large but not deeply set eyes. He was taller than average, slender and elegant.

A shadow hovered over their love, however. For while Bonaparte supported it, Josephine did not. She wanted Hortense to marry Louis, one of Napoleon’s younger brothers.

Josephine had two declared enemies within Napoleon’s family, Joseph and Lucien, who had very nearly obtained Bonaparte’s agreement, on his return from Egypt, that he would never see Josephine again. Since his marriage to Josephine, Bonaparte’s brothers were constantly pressing him to divorce, on the pretext that a male child was necessary to realize his ambitious plans. It was an easy argument for them to make, since it appeared they were working against their own interests.

Joseph and Lucien were both married, Joseph perfectly and appropriately. He had married the daughter of Monsieur Clary, a rich merchant from Marseille, and was thus Bernadotte’s brother-in-law. Clary had a third daughter, perhaps more charming than her sisters, and Bonaparte asked for her hand in marriage. “Heavens, no,” the father answered. “One Bonaparte in my family is enough.” If he had agreed, the honorable merchant from Marseille would one day have found himself father-in-law to an emperor and two kings.

As for Lucien, he had made what society calls an unequal marriage. In 1794 or 1795, when Bonaparte was still known only for having taken Toulon, Lucien accepted the position of quartermaster in the little village of Saint-Maximin. A Republican who changed his name to Brutus, Lucien would not permit saints’ names of any kind in his village. So he had rebaptized Saint-Maximin; the village became Marathon. Citizen Brutus, from Marathon. That had a nice ring to it, he thought.

Lucien-Brutus was living in the only hotel in Saint-Maximin-Marathon. The hotelkeeper was a man who had given no thought to changing his name, Constant Boyer, or that of his daughter, an adorable creature named Christine: Sometimes such flowers grow in manure, such pearls in mud.

Saint-Maximin-Marathon offered Lucien-Brutus no society life and no distractions, but he soon discovered he needed neither, because he had found Christine Boyer. Only Christine Boyer was as wise as she was beautiful, and Lucien realized there was no way he could make her his mistress. So, in a moment of love and boredom, Lucien made her his wife. Christine Boyer became not Christine Brutus, but Christine Bonaparte.

The general of the 13th Vendémiaire, who was beginning to see his fortune clearly, grew furious. He swore he would never forgive the husband, never receive the wife, and he sent both of them to a little job in Germany. Later he softened; he did see the woman, and he was not displeased to see his brother Lucien Brutus become Lucien Antoine before the 18th Brumaire.

Lucien and Joseph both became the terror of Madame Bonaparte. By marrying Bonaparte’s nephew Louis to her daughter, Josephine hoped to interest him in her own fortune and to strengthen her protection against the two brothers.

Hortense resisted with all her might. At that time, Louis was quite a handsome young man, if barely twenty years old, with nice eyes and a kind smile—he looked rather like his sister Caroline, who had just married Murat. While he was not at all in love with Hortense, although he did not find her unattractive, he was too passive to resist the forces at play. Nor did Hortense hate Louis. But she was in love with Duroc.

Her little secret gave Claire de Sourdis confidence. She too ended up admitting something, precious little though it was to admit.

She too was in love, if we can call it love. It would be more appropriate to say that she was in thrall to an image, a mystery in the shape of a handsome young man.

He was twenty-three or twenty-four, with blond hair and dark eyes. His features seemed almost too regular for a man, and his hands were as elegant as a woman’s. He was put together so precisely, each part of him so completely in harmony with the whole, that one could readily see that the outward form of the man, however fragile in appearance, hid Herculean strength. Even before the time of Chateaubriand and Byron, who created darkly romantic heroes like René and Manfred, he bore a troubled brow whose pallor bespoke a strange destiny. For terrible legends were attached to his family name—legends known only imperfectly, but they came stained with blood. Yet nobody had ever seen him parade an air of exaggerated mourning, like so many who had lost so much during the Republic, and never had he made show of his pain at dances and salons and social gatherings. In fact, when he did appear in society, he had no need of any such affectations to try to attract attention. People just naturally looked at him. Usually, though, he eschewed the pastimes of his hunting and travel companions, who had never yet managed to drag him to one of those youthful parties which even the most rigid agree to attend sooner or later. And nobody remembered ever having seen him laugh aloud and openly the way most young people do, or even having seen him smile.

There had long been alliances between the Sainte-Hermine and the Sourdis families, and, as is customary in such noble houses, the memory of those alliances remained important. So when by chance young Sainte-Hermine had come to Paris, he had never failed, since Madame de Sourdis had come back from the colonies, to visit her, for he observed the demands of protocol, and never had his visits been other than formal.

The two young people had had occasion to meet, in society, over the past several months. Besides the polite greetings they exchanged, however, words had been spoken sparingly, especially by the young man. But their eyes had spoken eloquently. Hector apparently did not hold the same control over his eyes as he did over his words, and each time he encountered Claire, his gaze made known how lovely he found her and how perfectly she matched all his heart’s desires.

At their first meetings Claire had been moved by his expressive eyes, and since Sainte-Hermine seemed to her an accomplished gentleman in every way, she had permitted herself to look at him too less guardedly. She had also hoped that he would invite her to dance so that a whispered word or the pressure of his hand might affirm the meaning she’d read in his gaze. But, strangely for the time, Sainte-Hermine, the gentleman who took fencing lessons with Saint-Georges and who could shoot a pistol as well as Junot or Fournier, did not dance.

During the balls he attended, Sainte-Hermine would stand coldly and impassibly at some bay window or in a corner of the room. In that, he became an object of bewilderment for all the gay young women who wondered what secret vow might be depriving them of such an elegant dance partner—for he always dressed with such taste in the latest style.

Claire had wondered, too, at Sainte-Hermine’s reserve in her presence, especially since her mother seemed to admire the young man greatly. She spoke as highly about his family, decimated by the Revolution, as she did of him, and she knew that money could not be an obstacle to their union. The substantial fortunes of the two families were roughly equal.

One can understand the impression the mysterious young Sainte-Hermine might make on a young girl’s heart, especially on a young Creole girl’s heart, with the combination of his physical features and moral qualities, his elegance and strength. Claire’s image of him occupied her mind while biding its time to take over her heart.

Hortense made her hopes and desires clear to Claire: She wanted to marry Duroc, whom she loved, rather than Louis Bonaparte, whom she did not—that essentially was the secret she whispered to her friend. But it was not the same, for Claire’s storybook passion made it difficult for her to speak quite so plainly. At the same time that she described Hector’s features in great detail to her friend, she tried also to understand as best she could the shadows surrounding him.

Finally, after Claire’s mother had called twice, after she had stood up and embraced Hortense, as if the idea had just come to mind—as Madame de Sévigné observes, the most important part of a letter is in the postscript—she said: “By the way, dear Hortense, I am forgetting to ask you something.”

“What is that?”

“I understand that Madame de Permon is giving a great ball.”

“Yes. Loulou came to see my mother and me and invited us herself.”

“Are you going?”

“Yes, of course.”

“My dear Hortense,” Claire said in her most endearing voice, “I would like to ask a favor.”

“A favor?”

“Yes. Get an invitation for my mother and me. Is that possible?”

“Yes, I think so.”

Claire leaped with a joy. “Oh, thank you!” she said. “How will you go about it?”

“Well, I could ask Loulou for an invitation. But I prefer having Eugene do it. Eugene is close to Madame de Permon’s son, and Eugene will ask him for what you desire.”

“And I shall go to Madame de Permon’s ball?” cried Claire joyously.

“Yes,” Hortense answered. Then, looking her young friend in the eye, she asked, “Will he be there?”

Claire turned as red as a beet and dropped her eyes. “I think so.”

“You will point him out to me, won’t you?”

“Oh! You’ll recognize him without me doing that, my dear Hortense. Have I not told you that he can be picked out from among a thousand?”

“How sorry I am that he is not a dancer!” said Hortense.

“How do you think I feel?”

The two girls kissed each other and parted, Claire reminding Hortense not to forget the invitation.

Three days later Claire de Sourdis received her invitation by mail.




XI Madame de Permon’s Ball (#ulink_f9a63a27-7d77-5a2a-9922-896593bb833b)







THE BALL FOR WHICH Mademoiselle Hortense de Beauharnais’s young friend had requested an invitation was the social event of the season for all of fashionable Paris. Madame de Permon would have needed a mansion four times the size of her own to welcome all those eager to attend, and she had refused to issue further invitations to more than one hundred men and more than fifty women despite their ardent requests. But, because she had been born in Corsica and linked from childhood to the Bonaparte family, she agreed immediately when Eugene Beauharnais made his request, and Mademoiselle de Sourdis and her mother both received their admission cards.

Madame de Permon, whose invitations were in such demand even though her name sounded a bit like the name of a commoner, was one of the grandest women of the times. Indeed, she was a descendant of the Comnène family, which had given six emperors to Constantinople, one to Heraclea, and ten to Trebizond. Her ancestor Constantin Comnène, fleeing the Muslims, had found refuge first in the Taygetus mountains and later on the island of Corsica. Along with three thousand of his compatriots who followed him as their chief, he settled there after buying from the Genoa senate the lands of Paomia, Salogna, and Revinda.

In spite of her imperial origins, Mademoiselle de Comnène fell in love with and married a handsome commoner whom people called Monsieur de Permon. Monsieur de Permon had died two years earlier, leaving his widow with a son of twenty-eight, a daughter of fourteen, and an annuity of twenty-five thousand pounds.

Madame de Permon’s high birth and her common marriage were reflected in her salon, which she opened to prominent figures in both the old aristocracy and the young democracy. Among officers in the new military and notables in the arts and sciences were names that would soon rival the most illustrious of those in the old monarchy. So it was that in her salon you could meet Monsieur de Mouchy and Monsieur de Montcalm, the Prince de Chalais, the two De Laigle brothers, Charles and Just de Noailles, the Montaigus, the three Rastignacs, the Count of Coulaincourt and his two sons Armand and August, the Albert d’Orsay family, the Montbretons. Sainte-Aulaire and the Talleyrands mingled with the Hoches, the Rapps, the Durocs, the Trénis, the Laffittes, the Dupaty family, the Junots, the Anissons, and the Labordes.

Madame de Permon’s high birth and her common marriage were reflected in her salon, which she opened to prominent figures in both the old aristocracy and the young democracy. Among officers in the new military and notables in the arts and sciences were names that would soon rival the most illustrious of those in the old monarchy. So it was that in her salon you could meet Monsieur de Mouchy and Monsieur de Montcalm, the Prince de Chalais, the two De Laigle brothers, Charles and Just de Noailles, the Montaigus, the three Rastignacs, the Count of Coulaincourt and his two sons Armand and August, the Albert d’Orsay family, the Montbretons. Sainte-Aulaire and the Talleyrands mingled with the Hoches, the Rapps, the Durocs, the Trénis, the Laffittes, the Dupaty family, the Junots, the Anissons, and the Labordes.

With her twenty-five-thousand-pound annuity Madame de Permon maintained one of Paris’s most elegant and best appointed mansions. She especially enjoyed the splendor of her flowers and plants, and her home had become a veritable greenhouse. The vestibule was so filled with potted trees and flowers that you could no longer see the walls, yet it was so skillfully illuminated with colored glass that you would have thought you were entering a fairy palace.

In those days, balls began early. By nine o’clock, Madame de Permon’s rooms were open and brightly lit, and she, her daughter Laura, and her son Albert were awaiting their guests in the salon.

Madame de Permon, still a beautiful woman, was wearing a white crepe dress, decorated with bunches of double daffodils and cut in the Greek style, with cloth draped over her breasts and held at her shoulders with two diamond clips. She had commissioned Leroy on the Rue des Petits-Champs, who was all the rage for his dresses and hats, to make her a puffy hat with white crepe and large bunches of daffodils like the ones on her dress. She wore daffodils in her jet black hair as well as in the folds of the hat, and she was holding an enormous bouquet of daffodils and violets from Madame Roux, the best florist in Paris. In each ear sparkled a diamond worth fifteen thousand francs, her only jewelry.

Mademoiselle Laura de Permon’s dress was quite simple. Her mother thought that since she was only sixteen, she should glow with her own natural beauty and not try to outshine anyone with her clothes. She was wearing a pink taffeta dress of a style similar to her mother’s, with white narcissus in a crown on her head and at the hem of her dress, along with pearl clips and earrings.

But the woman whose beauty was supposed to reign over the ball, which was being given in honor of the Bonaparte family and which the First Consul had promised to attend, was Madame Leclerc, the favorite of Madame Laetitia and her brother Bonaparte as well, so people said. To ensure her triumph, she had asked that Madame Permon allow her to dress at the mansion. She had had Madame Germon make her dress and she had arranged for Charbonnier to do her hair (he had done Madame de Permon’s as well). She woud make her entrance at the precise moment when the rooms were filling up but not yet full. That was the best moment if you wished to create a sensation and make sure you’d be seen by everyone there.

Some of the most beautiful women—Madame Méchin, Madame de Périgord, Madame Récamier—were already there when at nine thirty Madame Bonaparte, her daughter, and her son were announced. Madame de Permon rose and walked to the center of the dining room, a courtesy she had offered nobody else.

Josephine was wearing a crown of poppies and golden wheat, which also embellished her white crepe dress. Hortense too was dressed in white, her only accent being fresh violets.

At about the same time, the Comtesse de Sourdis arrived with her daughter. The countess was wearing a buttercup-yellow tunic adorned with pansies. Her daughter, whose hair was arranged in the Greek style, wore a white taffeta tunic embroidered with gold and purple. She was ravishing. Bands of gold and purple perfectly highlighted her dark hair, while a gold and purple cord accented her tiny waist.

At a signal from his sister, Eugene de Beauharnais hurried over to the new arrivals. Taking the countess’s hand, he escorted her to Madame de Permon.

Madame de Permon rose to greet the countess, then had her sit to her left; Josephine was seated on the hostess’s right. Hortense offered her arm to Claire, and they seated themselves nearby.

“Well?” Hortense asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.

“He is here,” said Claire, all atremble.

“Where?” asked Hortense eagerly.

“Well,” said Claire, “do you see where I am looking? In that group there, the man wearing the garnet-colored velvet suit, tight suede pants, and shoes with small diamond buckles. And there’s a much larger diamond buckle around the braid on his hat.”

Hortense’s eyes followed Claire’s. “Ah, you were right,” she said. “He is as handsome as Antinous. But he doesn’t look so melancholic at all. Your dark, mysterious hero is smiling at us very pleasantly.”

And indeed, the face of the Comte de Sainte-Hermine, who had not taken his eyes off Mademoiselle de Sourdis since she had entered the room, radiated inner peace and joy. When he saw Claire and her friend looking at him, he walked timidly but gracefully over to them.

“Would you be so kind, mademoiselle,” he said to Claire, “as to grant me the first quadrille or the first waltz you will be dancing?”

“The first quadrille, yes, monsieur,” Claire stammered. She had turned deathly pale when she saw the count walking toward her, and now she could feel blood rushing to her cheeks.

“As for Mademoiselle de Beauharnais,” the count, Hector, continued, bowing to Hortense, “I await the order from her lips to confirm my rank among her numerous admirers.”

“The first gavotte, monsieur, if you please,” Hortense answered, for she knew that Duroc did not dance the gavotte.

After a bow of thanks, Count Hector moved nonchalantly toward the crowd surrounding Madame de Contades, who had just arrived. Her beauty had attracted all eyes, but just then another murmur of admiration rippled through the crowd. Some new pretender to beauty’s throne had arrived. The beauty competition was now open; the dancing itself would not begin until the First Consul appeared.

It was Pauline Bonaparte—Madame Leclerc—who now approached. Those who knew her called her Paulette. She had married General Leclerc on the 18th Brumaire, the day that had given her brother Bonaparte’s career such a fortunate nudge forward.

Entering from the room where she had just dressed, with perfectly studied coquetry she was just beginning to pull on her gloves: a gesture that called attention to her lovely, plump white arms adorned with gold cameo bracelets. Her hair was done up in small bands of fine leather that looked like leopard skin, and attached to them were bunches of gold grapes; it faithfully copied the coif of a bacchante on a cameo that might have come from ancient Greece. Her dress was made of the finest Indian muslin, like woven air, as Juvenal said. Its hem was embroidered with a garland in gold leaf two or three inches wide. A tunic in pure Greek style hung down over her lovely waist and was attached at her shoulders by costly cameos. The very short sleeves, slightly pleated, ended in tiny cuffs, which were also held in place by cameos. Just below her breasts she wore a belt of burnished gold, its buckle a lovely engraved stone. The ensemble was so harmonious, and her beauty so delicious, that when she appeared, no other woman graced the room.

“Incessu patuit dea,” said Dupaty as she passed.

“Do you insult me in a language I do not understand, Citizen Poet?” asked Madame Leclerc with a smile.

“What?” answered Dupaty. “You are from Rome, madame, and you don’t understand Latin?”

“I’ve forgotten all my Latin.”

“That is one of Virgil’s hemistiches, Madame, when Venus appeared to Aeneas. Abbé Delille translated it like this: ‘She walks by, and her steps reveal a goddess.’”

“Give me your arm, flatterer, and dance the first quadrille with me. That will be your punishment.”

Dupaty didn’t need to be asked twice. He held out his arm, straightened his legs, and allowed himself to be led by Madame Leclerc into a boudoir, where she stopped on the pretext that it was cooler than the larger rooms. In reality, though, it was because the boudoir offered an immense sofa that enabled the divine coquette to display her couture and her beauty to best effect.

As she passed Madame de Contades, the most beautiful woman in the room only so long as Madame Leclerc had not been present, the grand coquette cast a defiant glance. And she had the satisfaction of seeing all her rival’s admirers abandon Madame de Contades in her armchair and gather now around the sofa.

Madame de Contades bit her lips until they bled. But in the quiver of revenge that every woman wears at her side, she found one of those poisoned arrows that can mortally wound, and she called to Monsieur de Noailles. “Charles,” she said, “lend me your arm so I can go see up close that marvel of beauty and clothing that has just attracted all of our butterflies.”

“Ah,” said the young man, “and you are going to make her realize that among these butterflies there is a bee. Sting, sting, Countess,” Monsieur de Noailles added. “These low-born Bonapartes have been nobles for too short a time. They need to be reminded that they are making a mistake in trying to mix with the old aristocracy. If you look carefully at that parvenu, you will find, I am sure, the stigmata of her plebian origins.”

With a laugh, the young man allowed himself to be led by Madame de Contades, who, nostrils flared, seemed to be blazing a trail. Once she’d reached the crowd of flatterers surrounding the lovely Madame Leclerc, she elbowed her way up to the front row.

Madame Leclerc afforded her rival a smile, for no doubt Madame de Contades felt obligated to pay her homage.

And indeed, Madame de Contades proceeded with a politesse that in no way disabused Madame Leclerc of her impression. Madame de Contades added her voice to the hymns of praise and admiration being offered up to the divinity on the sofa. Then, suddenly, as if she had just made a horrible discovery, she cried out, “Oh, my God! How terrible! Why does such a horrible deformity have to spoil one of nature’s masterpieces!” she exclaimed. “Must it be said that nothing in this world is perfect? My God, how sad!”

At this strange lamentation, everybody looked first at Madame de Contades, then at Madame Leclerc, then at Madame de Contades again. They were obviously waiting for her to explain her outburst, but Madame de Contades continued only to lament this sad case of human imperfection.

“Come now,” her escort finally said. “What do you see? Tell us what you see!”

“What do you mean? Tell you what I see? Can you not see those two enormous ears stuck on both sides of such a charming head? If I had ears like that, I would have them trimmed back a little. And since they have not been hemmed, that shouldn’t be difficult.”

Barely had Madame de Contades finished when all eyes turned toward Madame Leclerc’s head—not to admire it, but rather to remark her ears. For until then no one had even noticed them.

And indeed, Paulette, as her friends called her, did have unusual ears. The white cartilage looked signally like an oyster shell, and, as Madame de Contades had pointed out, it was cartilage that nature had neglected to hem.

Madame Leclerc did not even try to defend herself against such an impertinent attack. Instead, she availed herself of that resource any woman wronged might use: She uttered a cry and collapsed.

At the same moment, her erstwhile admirers heard a carriage rolling up to the Permon mansion, and a horse galloping, then a voice calling out “The First Consul!”—all of which distracted everyone’s attention from the bizarre scene that had just transpired.

Except that, while Madame Leclerc was rushing from the boudoir in tears and the First Consul was striding in through one of the ballroom doors, Madame de Contades, her attack triumphant but too brutal perhaps, was stealing out through another.




XII The Queen’s Minuet (#ulink_a510bfc5-4f42-501f-afb6-d21e3ed3db9b)







MADAME DE PERMON WALKED up to the First Consul and bowed with great ceremony. Bonaparte took her hand and kissed it most gallantly.

“What’s this I hear, my dear friend?” he said. “Did you really refuse to open the ball before I arrived? And what if I had not been able to come before one in the morning—would all these lovely children have had to wait for me?”

Glancing around the room, he saw that some of the women from the Faubourg Saint-Germain had failed to rise when he came in. He frowned, but showed no other signs of displeasure.

“Come now, Madame de Permon,” he said. “Let the ball begin. Young people need to have fun, and dancing is their favorite pastime. They say that Loulou can dance like Mademoiselle Chameroi. Who told me that? It was Eugene, wasn’t it?”

Eugene’s ears turned red; he was the beautiful ballerina’s lover.

Bonaparte continued: “If you wish, Madame de Permon, we shall dance the monaco. That’s the only dance I know.”

“Surely you are joking,” Madame de Permon answered. “I have not danced in thirty years.”

“Come now, you can’t mean that,” said Bonaparte. “This evening you look like your daughter’s sister.”

Then, noticing Monsieur de Talleyrand, Bonaparte said, “Oh, it’s you, Talleyrand. I need to talk to you.” And with his Foreign Affairs Minister he went into the boudoir where Madame Leclerc had endured her embarrassment just moments before.

Immediately, the music began, the dancers chose partners, and the ball was under way.

Mademoiselle de Beauharnais, who was dancing with Duroc, led him over to Claire and the Comte de Sainte-Hermine, for everything her friend had told her about the young man had piqued her interest.

Monsieur de Sainte-Hermine was proving to be no less talented on the ballroom floor than he was in other areas. He had studied with the second Vestris, the son of France’s own god of dance, and he did his teacher great honor.

During the Consulate years, a young man of fashion considered it requisite to perfect the art of dancing. I can still remember having seen, when I was a child, in 1812 or 1813, the two Monbreton brothers—the very same who were dancing at Madame de Permon’s ball this evening a dozen years earlier—in Villers-Cotterêts, where a grand ball brought together the entire beautiful new aristocracy. The Montbretons came from their castle in Corcy, three leagues away, and guess how they came. In their cabriolets. Yes, but their domestics rode inside the cabriolet, while they themselves, wearing their fine pump dancing shoes, held on to straps in the back, on the springboard where normally their valets stood, so that on the road they could continue to practice their intricate steps. Arriving at the ballroom door just in time to join the first quadrille, they had their domestics brush the dust off their clothes and threw themselves into the lively reel.

However brilliantly the Montbretons may have danced at Madame de Permon’s, it was Sainte-Hermine who impressed Mademoiselle de Beauharnais, and Mademoiselle de Sourdis was proud to see that the count, who had never before deigned to dance, with skill and grace could hold his own with the best dancers at the ball. Although Mademoiselle de Beauharnais was reassured on that point, there was still another that worried the curious Hortense: Had the young man spoken to Claire? Had he told her the cause of his long sadness, of his past silence, of his present joy?

Hortense ran to her friend and, pulling her into a bay window, asked: “Well, what did he say?”

“Something very important concerning what I told you.”

“Can you tell me?” Spurred by curiosity, Mademoiselle was using the informal tu form with her friend Claire, though normally in conversation they used formal address.

Claire lowered her voice. “He said he wanted to tell me a family secret.”

“You?”

“Me alone. Consequently, he begged me to get my mother to agree that he might be able to speak to me for an hour, with my mother watching but far enough away that she’d not be able to hear what he’d say. His life’s happiness, he said, depended on it.”

“Will your mother permit it?”

“I hope so, for she loves me dearly. I have promised to ask my mother this evening and to give him my answer at the end of the ball.”

“And now,” said Mademoiselle de Beauharnais, “do you realize how handsome your Comte de Sainte-Hermine is, and that he dances as well as Gardel?”

The music, signaling the second quadrille, called the girls back to their places. The two young friends had been, as we have seen, quite satisfied with how well Monsieur de Sainte-Hermine had danced the quadrille. But then, it was only a quadrille. There were yet two tests to which every unproven dancer was put: the gavotte and the minuet.

The young count had promised the gavotte to Mademoiselle de Beauharnais. It’s a dance we know today only by tradition, and though we may think it quite ridiculous, it was de rigeur during the Directory, the Consulate, and even the Empire. Like a snake that keeps twisting even after it has been cut into pieces, the gavotte could never quite die. It was, in fact, more a theatrical performance than a ballroom dance, for it had very complicated figures that were quite difficult to execute. The gavotte required a great deal of space, and even a large ballroom could accommodate no more than four couples at the same time.

Among the four couples dancing the gavotte in Madame de Permon’s grand ballroom, the two dancers whom everyone loudly applauded were the Comte de Sainte-Hermine and Mademoiselle de Beauharnais. They were applauded so enthusiastically, in fact, that they drew Bonaparte both out of his conversation with Monsieur de Talleyrand and out of the boudoir to which they’d withdrawn. Bonaparte appeared in the doorway just as his stepdaughter and her partner were completing the final figures, so he was able to witness their triumph.

When the gavotte ended, Bonaparte beckoned the girl over. She leaned forward so he could kiss her forehead. “I congratulate you, mademoiselle,” he said. “It is clear that you have had a graceful dancing master and that you have benefited from his lessons. But who is the handsome man with whom you were dancing?”

“I do not know him, General,” said Hortense. “We met for the first time this evening, and he invited me to dance when I was speaking with Mademoiselle de Sourdis. Or rather, he didn’t invite me; he put himself at my orders. I am the one who told him that I wanted to dance the gavotte and when I wanted to dance it.”

“But you surely know his name!”

“He calls himself the Comte de Sainte-Hermine.”

“Well,” said Bonaparte with an expression of ill humor, “another person from the Faubourg Saint-Germain. This dear Madame de Permon insists on filling her house with my enemies. When I came in, I chased off Madame de Contades, a crazy woman who thinks I am worth no more than the last second lieutenant in my army. When she talks about my victories in Italy and Egypt, she says that ‘I could do as much with my eyes as he can with his sword.’ That is unfortunate,” Bonaparte continued, looking at Hortense’s partner, “for he would make a handsome hussar officer.” Then, waving the girl back to her mother, he said: “Monsieur de Talleyrand, you who know so much, do you know anything about the Sainte-Hermine family?”

“Let me see,” said Monsieur de Talleyrand, putting his hand on his chin and leaning his head back, his customary way of reflecting. “In the Juras, near Besançon, we do have a Sainte-Hermine family. Yes, I met the father, a distinguished man who was guillotined in 1793. He left three sons. As to what has become of them, I have no idea. This man perhaps is one of those sons, or a nephew, though I was not aware the man I met had a brother. Would you like me to find out?”

“Oh, don’t bother.”

“It will be easy. I have seen him talking to Mademoiselle de Sourdis—look, he is speaking to her at this very moment. Nothing easier than asking her mother.…”

“No, that is not necessary, thanks. And how about the Sourdis family? Who are they?”

“Of excellent nobility.”

“That’s not what I am asking. What are their political leanings?”

“I believe there are only the two women, and they have joined us, or at least they would like nothing more than to be so counted. Two or three days ago Cabanis was speaking about them; he knows them well. The girl is marriageable, and has, I believe, a dowry of a million. It would be a good match for one of your aides-de-camp.”

“So it is your opinion that it would be appropriate for Madame Bonaparte to see them?”

“Perfectly appropriate.”

“Thank you. That’s what Bourrienne already told me.” Then, turning to his hostess, Bonaparte asked, “But what is wrong with Loulou? It looks to me as if she is near tears. Dear Madame de Permon, how can you make your daughter so sad on a day like this?”

“I want her to dance the queen’s minuet, and she won’t.”

At the mention of the queen’s minuet, Bonaparte smiled.

“And why won’t she?”

“How should I know? A caprice. Truly, Loulou, you aren’t being good. Your refusal to dance is not worth the cost of having Gardel and Saint-Amand as your instructors.”

“But, Mother,” Mademoiselle Permon answered, “I would be happy to dance your minuet, much though I hate it, only I don’t dare dance it with anyone but Monsieur de Trénis. I have promised the dance to him.”

“Well, then,” Madame de Permon asked. “Why isn’t he here? It is already half past twelve.”

“He said that he had two other balls to attend before ours and that he’d not get here until very late.”

“Ah,” said Bonaparte. “I am delighted to know there’s at least one man in France busier than I am. But just because the much-celebrated Monsieur de Trénis has not kept his word is not reason enough, Mademoiselle Loulou, to deprive us of the pleasure of seeing you dance the queen’s minuet. He is not here. That is not your fault, so choose another partner.”

“How about Gardel?” said Madame de Permon.

“But he’s my dance teacher,” objected Loulou.

“Well, then, take Laffitte. After Trénis, he is the best dancer in Paris.” She’d barely spoken his name when they espied Monsieur Laffitte walking close by in the ballroom. “Monsieur Laffitte! Monsieur Laffitte! Come over here,” Madame de Permon called out to him.

Monsieur Laffitte could not have been more gallant or obliging; he was also quite elegant and handsome. “Monsieur Laffitte,” said Madame de Permon, “please do me the pleasure of dancing the queen’s minuet with my daughter.”

“Of course, madame!” cried Monsieur Laffitte. “You fulfill my greatest desire, and I give my word of honor. Of course, it will mean a duel with Monseiur de Trénis,” he added with a laugh. “But I am happy to take the risk. However, not knowing I would be granted this honor, I failed to bring a hat.”

To understand Monsieur Laffitte’s last comment, the reader must know that the final bow of the minuet, its high point, the capstone of that monument to formal dancing, had to be executed with a Louis XV-style hat. No other hat would do. So there was a search, there was a flurry, and soon a hat was found.

The minuet was danced with immense success, and Monsieur Laffitte was leading Mademoiselle de Permon back to her mother when Monsieur de Trénis—late, flustered, out of breath—appeared. Having failed to keep his promise to Mademoiselle Loulou, he was more astonished than furious in encountering the two dancers. The minuet he was supposed to dance—and everyone knew he was supposed to dance the minuet—not only had been danced without him but, as was clear from the bravos just beginning to fade away, had been danced without him triumphantly.

“Ah, monsieur,” Mademoiselle de Permon said in great embarrassment, “I waited until after midnight for you, just look at the clock, and the minuet had been announced for eleven. Finally, at midnight, my mother insisted that I dance with Monsieur Laffitte,” and with a laugh, she added, “and the First Consul gave the order.”

“Mademoiselle,” said Monsieur de Trénis, “Madame de Permon could indeed require such a sacrifice of you since she is the mistress of the house. She owed her guests the minuet and unfortunately, I was late, so she was within her rights. But, as for the First Consul,” said Monsieur de Trénis, turning to Bonaparte and staring down at him, for he was five inches taller than the general, “to give the order to begin a dance which, in reality, cannot be danced consummately except by me, he mistakenly goes beyond his authority. I do not interfere with his doings on the battlefield, so he should leave affairs of the salon to me. I don’t pluck the leaves from his laurels, so he should likewise let mine be.”

Haughtily he walked over to Mademoiselle de Permon and, sitting beside her, said: “I am philosophical enough to be consoled at not having danced that dance with you, especially since it was my fault, late as I was. Neither can I be upset that you did not keep your word, yet there would have been a crown to be won had we danced the queen’s minuet together. I would have danced it gravely, seriously; not sadly as Monsieur Laffitte did. Still, I was pleased to see it, and having seen it, I shall never forget it.”

Around Monsieur de Trénis a large circle had gathered to listen to him expressing his disappointment. Among them was the First Consul, who was tempted to think he was dealing with a crazy man.

“But,” said Mademoiselle de Permon to Monsieur de Trénis, “you worry me. What have I done?”

“What have you done? Why do you ask, mademoiselle, you who dance so well that I am delighted to promise to dance the minuet with you? You who have practiced the minuet with Gardel! Oh, there’s no word to describe it. How you can dance the minuet with a man who is little more on the ballroom floor than a quadrille dancer. I repeat, a quadrille dancer. No, mademoiselle, no. Never in his life will Monsieur Laffitte be able to bow properly and execute the great hat step. No, I say it loud and clear, never, never has he been or will he be able to do that.”

Noticing smiles on several faces, Trénis continued: “So, does that surprise you? Well, I shall tell you why he has never been able to properly perform the bow, the bow by which we all judge a minuet dancer. It’s because he does not know how to put his hat on properly. Putting one’s hat on properly is everything, gentlemen. Ask these ladies who have their hats made by Leroy but who have Charbonnier put them on for them. Ah, ask Monsieur Garel about putting on the hat; he will explain it to you. Anyone can put a hat on. I can even say that everyone can put a hat on, but some do it better than others. But how many can do it with the proper dignity, with the proper composure governing the movement of the arm and forearm? … May I?”

And taking in hand the enormous three-cornered hat, Monsieur de Trénis went to stand before a mirror. Then, singing the music that accompanies the minuet’s bow, he executed the salute with perfect grace and supreme seriousness. After which, he placed the hat back on his head with all the pomp such an occasion requires.

Leaning on Monsieur de Talleyrand’s arm, Bonaparte said to the diplomat, “Ask him how he gets along with Monsieur Laffitte. After that outburst he directed toward me, I dare not ask him myself.”

Monsieur de Talleyrand asked the question with the same gravity he’d assume if he were asking how England and America were getting along since their last war.

“But of course we get along as well as two men of such equal talent can possibly manage,” he answered. “However, I must admit that he is a magnanimous rival, a good sport, never jealous of my much-acknowledged success. It is true that his own successes may make him indulgent. His dances are strong and lively, and he is better than I in the first eight measures of the Panurge gavotte—of that there’s no question. But in the jetés, for example, that is where I crush him. In general, he whips me in the calf muscles, but I stomp him in the marrow!”

“Well,” said Monsieur de Talleyrand, “you can rest easy, Citizen First Consul. There will be no war between Monsieur de Trénis and Monsieur Laffitte. I would like to be able to say as much about France and England.”

While the pause in the ball allowed Monsieur de Trénis the leisure to expand upon the niceties of putting on the hat, Claire undertook negotiations with her mother about a subject she considered far more important than the matter of concern to Monsieur de Talleyrand and the First Consul, whether or not there would be peace between Paris’s two best dancers or between France and the world. The young count, who kept his eyes on her the entire time, saw by the smile on Claire’s face that he had in all probability won his case with her mother.

He was not mistaken.

On the pretext of getting some air in one of the less crowded rooms, Mademoiselle de Sourdis took Mademoiselle de Beauharnais’s arm, and as they passed the Comte de Sainte-Hermine, she whispered these words: “My mother agrees that tomorrow at three in the afternoon you may present yourself at our door.”




XIII The Three Sainte-Hermines (#ulink_06ea3a3d-9ec8-5005-a883-a4d8acf92d10)







The father

The next day, as three o’clock was striking on the pavilion clock, Hector de Sainte-Hermine knocked at the door of the Hôtel de Sourdis, whose lovely terrace, covered with orange trees and rose laurels, looked out over the Quai Voltaire. The door opened onto the Rue de Beaune. It was the great door, the door of honor. Another, smaller door, nearly invisible as it was painted the color of the wall, opened out onto the quay.

The great door opened. The Swiss guard asked for the visitor’s name and allowed him to pass. A valet, alerted no doubt by Madame de Sourdis, was waiting in the antechamber. “Madame,” he said, “is not receiving today. But Mademoiselle is in the garden, and she offers her mother’s excuses to Monsieur le Comte.”

The count followed the valet to the garden gate. “Follow this path,” the valet told him. “Mademoiselle is at the other end, under the jasmine arbor.”

And indeed, beneath the rays of a lovely March sun, Claire, wrapped in an ermine cloak, seemed to be a bloom, like one of those first spring flowers we call snowdrops because they return so early. Spread out under her feet lay a thick Smyrna carpet to protect her light blue velvet slippers from the cold ground. When she noticed Sainte-Hermine, although she had been expecting him and had heard the clock strike three, her cheeks turned pink and hid for an instant how marvelously lily-white they were. She rose with a smile illuminating her face.

Sainte-Hermine walked faster, and when he drew near, she pointed to where her mother was sitting at one of the drawing-room windows overlooking the garden. From there she could keep the two young people in sight, although she would not be able to hear a word they were saying. Sainte-Hermine bowed deeply to her, to show her both his thanks and his respect.

Claire offered him a chair, and once he was seated, he spoke: “I shall not, mademoiselle, try to make you understand how happy I am to be able to talk freely alone with you for a moment. For a year I’ve been awaiting this moment, granted to me now by Heaven’s goodness, and upon it will depend the fortune or the misfortune of my entire life, although I’ve only been able truly to harbor such a hope for the last three days. You were kind enough to tell me at the ball that you noticed the anxiety I seemed to experience in your presence, as well as the pain and the joy you suspected were in my heart. I am going to tell you the cause of my anxieties, perhaps at greater length than necessary, but I cannot expect you to understand me unless I present you all the necessary details.”

“Speak, monsieur,” said Claire. “Anything coming from you, you may be sure, will be worthy of my interest.”

“We are—or rather, since I’m the only member of my family left, I should say, I am—from a noble family in the Juras. My father, a high-ranking officer under Louis XVI, was among those defending him on August 10. Only, instead of fleeing like all the princes and courtiers, he stayed, and even when the king was dead, he hoped that all was not lost and that they would be able somehow to help the queen escape from the Temple. To that end, he gathered together a large sum of money. Among the municipal guards he found a young man from the South—his name was Toulan—who had fallen in love with the queen and had pledged her his heart. My father resolved to join forces with Toulan, or rather to use his position as a guard in the Temple, to save the prisoner.

“Then my oldest brother Léon de Sainte-Hermine, who was growing tired of being no use to the cause whose religion he had long espoused, solicited my father’s permission to leave France and serve in Condé’s army. Once he received that permission, he went directly to join the prince.

“Meanwhile, my father made arrangements with Toulan. At that time, a large number of people, including several of the queen’s devoted servants, were still asking the municipal guards, on whom such favors depended, if they could see her. So, the guards would arrange for the queen’s friends to be in the path their noble prisoner would follow when she went down into the garden to get some fresh air, as she did twice a day. Sometimes, if the guard looked the other way, it was possible for the queen’s old devotées to exchange a word with her or even to slip her a note. It is true that they were risking their necks, but there are times when one’s neck counts for little.

“Because Toulan had some obligation to my father and his gratitude to him thus coincided with his love for the queen, he agreed to allow my father and mother into the Temple. On the pretext of their wish to see the queen, my father and mother, dressed like rich Jura peasants, would come to the Temple, put on a Besançon accent, and ask for Monsieur Toulan. He, in turn, would place them somewhere on the queen’s path.

“Among the prisoners in the Temple and the Royalists there was a whole system of signals that they employed to communicate as surely as did ships on the sea. On the day of my father and mother’s visit, as the queen was leaving her room, she found a wisp of straw leaning up against the wall, which meant: ‘Stay alert, someone is looking out for you.’ The queen had not immediately seen the straw; it was Madame Elisabeth, less preoccupied than she, who called it to the attention of her sister-in-law.

“As soon as the two prisoners stepped into the garden, they noticed that Toulan was on duty. The queen counted on the poor young man’s love for her. She had bound him to her destiny with six words. On the sure chance that she’d see him one day on duty, she had written on a piece of paper that she always carried next to her bosom: Ama poco che teme la morte! (He who fears death loves little!) And one day she did see him, and she had slipped him the note. Even before he had read it, Toulan’s heart had leaped with joy. And after he’d read it, he had vowed that from that that day forward he was going to prove to the queen that he had no fear of death.

“He placed my father and mother in the tower staircase so that the queen would hardly be able to pass without touching them. My mother was holding a lovely bouquet of carnations, and when the queen saw them, she cried out, ‘Oh, what lovely flowers, and how sweet they smell!’ My mother pulled out the most beautiful carnation and held it out to the queen, who looked inquiringly at Toulan for permission to accept it. Toulan nodded almost imperceptibly.

“In ordinary circumstances, everything that was transpiring would have been quite unremarkable. But not in those extraordinary days when danger lay only a breath away. The queen suspected that a note might be hidden in the carnation’s calyx, and she quickly slipped the flower into the bodice of her dress. My mother the Comtesse de Sainte-Hermine held up well under the pressure, although during the exchange, my father told us, her face went paler and more sallow than the tower walls.

“The queen had the courage not to cut short at all the time she usually spent walking in the garden and returned to her quarters at the usual hour. However, as soon as she was once again alone with the Madames Elisabeth and Royale, she pulled the flower from her bodice. And in fact, the calyx did contain a note written on silk paper in a tiny hand. It offered this consolation:

Day after tomorrow, on Wednesday, ask to go down to the garden. They will allow you to do so with no difficulty, since orders have been given to allow you this favor whenever you ask. After walking around the garden three or four times, pretend to be tired. Go over to the canteen in the middle of the garden and ask Madame Plumeau if you can sit down.

It is important for you to ask permission at exactly eleven o’clock in the morning so that your liberators can coordinate their movements with your own.

Then, after a moment, pretend to be even weaker, and faint. The doors will be closed while help is summoned, and you will be alone with Madame Elisabeth and Madame Royale. Immediately the trapdoor to the cellar will open. Hurry down through the opening with your sister and daughter, and all three of you will be saved.

“Three factors conjoined to instill confidence in the three prisoners: Toulan’s presence, the wisp of straw standing against the wall in the corridor, and the note’s precise details. Besides, what risk was there in trying? Their torture could not be greater than it was already. So they agreed. They would do exactly what the note instructed.

“Two days later, on Wednesday, at nine in the morning, the queen, behind the curtains of her bed, reread the note my mother had hidden in the carnation and assured herself that she’d not deviate from its instructions. Then, after tearing it up into tiny pieces, she went into Madame Royale’s room.

“Returning almost immediately, she called to the guards on duty. She had to call twice before they answered, as they were having breakfast, but finally one of them appeared at the door. ‘What do you want, Citizeness?’ he asked her.

“Marie-Antoinette explained that Madame Royale was ill from lack of exercise, because she went out only at noon, when the sun was too hot for her to walk through the garden. So the queen was asking permission to change the time she and Madames Royale and Elisabeth walked from noon until two o’clock to ten until noon. Would the guard take her request to General Santerre, upon whom such permission depended, she asked, then added that she would be deeply grateful to him.

“The queen had spoken her gratitude with such grace and charm that the guard was smitten, and, lifting his red bonnet from his head, he said, ‘Madame, the general will be here in a half hour; as soon as he’s arrived, we shall pass along your request.’

Then, as he was withdrawing—as if trying to convince himself that he was breaching no duty by yielding to the prisoner’s request, that he was doing so out of his sense of equity, not out of weakness—he said: ‘That’s only right. When you look at it, it’s only right!’

“‘What’s only right?’ the other guard asked.

“‘That the woman be allowed to take her sick daughter outside.’

“‘Of course,’ said the other. ‘They can walk from the Temple to the Place de la Révolution. We can escort them there.’

“The guard’s answer caused the queen a shiver, but she remained resolute: She would follow to the letter the instructions she had received.

“At nine thirty Santerre arrived. He was an excellent man, if a trifle brusque, a trifle brutal. He had been unjustly accused of ordering the terrible drumroll that interrupted the king’s speech on the scaffold, and he’d never got over it. Unfortunately, he had made the mistake of getting on the wrong side of the Assembly and the Commune—and nearly lost his head.

“Santerre granted the permission requested, and one of the municipal guards returned to the queen’s room with the general’s favorable decision. ‘Thank you, monsieur,’ said the queen with the charming smile that had been the downfall of Barnave and Mirabeau.

“Then, turning toward the little dog that on its hind legs was jumping up and down behind her, she said, ‘Ah, Black, you should be happy too. Yes, we’re going to walk outside.’ Turning back to the guard, she asked, ‘So, we’ll be going out. At what time?’

“‘At ten o’clock. Is that not the time you yourself requested?’ The queen bowed, and the guard left.

“Alone, the three women looked at one another with anxiety, an anxiety mixed with hope and joy. Madame Royale threw herself into the queen’s arms. Madame Elisabeth walked over to her sister-in-law and reached out her hand. ‘Let us pray,’ said the queen. ‘But let us pray in such a way that no one will suspect we are praying.’

“At ten o’clock they heard the sound of weapons. ‘It’s the changing of the guard,’ said Madame Elisabeth.

“‘Then they’ll come get us,’ said Madame Royale.

“‘Courage,’ said the queen, growing as pale as her two companions.

“‘It is ten o’clock,’ shouted someone down below, ‘bring the prisoners down.’

“‘Here we are, citizen,’ the queen answered.

“The first door opened, and the three prisoners entered a dark corridor. In the semidarkness, they were able at least to hide their feelings.

“The little dog ran on before them, but when it got to the door of the room where its master had lived out his last days, it stopped abruptly and, whimpering, pushed its nose against the crack under the door. Its plaintive whimpers deepened into that painful moaning people call the death bark.

“The queen passed quickly by the door, but a few feet farther on she had to pause and lean against the wall. The two women drew in tightly behind her, and they waited, motionless, even after little Black caught up with them.

“‘Well!’ a voice cried out. ‘Is she coming down or not?’

“‘Here we are,’ said the queen with great effort, as she proceeded the rest of the way down.

“When she reached the bottom of the spiral staircase, the drummer summoned the guard, not to honor her, but to demonstrate the armed force that made futile any attempt to escape. The heavy door opened slowly; its hinges squeaked.

“The three prisoners made their way quickly from the courtyard to the garden. Insulting graffiti and obscene figures drawn by soldiers in their spare time covered the courtyard walls, but the weather was magnificent, the sun not yet so hot as to be unbearable.

“The queen walked for about three quarters of an hour. Then, at ten minutes to eleven, she went to the canteen, where a woman named Mother Plumeau sold sausages, wine, and alcohol to the soldiers. The queen was already at the door, and just about to walk in and ask permission to sit down, when she noticed that Simon, the shoemaker and one of her most fervent enemies, was just finishing his breakfast at the table. So she decided to leave.

“But Black had already run in, and to no avail she called to the dog, who was sniffing at the trapdoor to the cellar where the widow Plumeau kept her food and drink. Insistently, the dog pushed its nose into the cracks around the trapdoor.

“Quaking, guessing what had attracted the dog’s attention, the queen called out sharply for the little dog to come back. But Black appeared not even to hear her, or if he did, he refused to obey. Instead, the dog began to growl. Then he was barking ferociously.

“A light came on suddenly in the shoemaker’s brain as to why the dog was so stubbornly refusing to obey its mistress. Up from the table in a flash, Simon ran to the door and called out: ‘To arms! Treason! To arms!’

“‘Black! Black!’ the queen called in desperation, but the dog, unheeding, barked only more furiously still.

“‘To arms!’ Simon continued shouting. ‘To arms! There are aristocrats in Citizen Plumeau’s cellar, they’ve come to save the queen. Treason! Treason!’

“‘To arms!’ the municipal guards shouted in return as they grabbed their guns and rushed toward the queen and her two companions. They were soon surrounded and led by the guardsmen back to the tower.

“Even at that, Black refused to leave or cease. The poor animal’s instinct had betrayed him. Still barking and scratching at the trapdoor, he was mistaking help for danger.

“A dozen national guardsmen entered the canteen. His eyes burning, Simon shouted, ‘There, under the trapdoor! I saw the trapdoor move, I’m sure.’

“‘Weapons ready!’ the guards shouted out. You could hear the sound of guns being loaded, while Simon continued shouting ‘There, right there!’

“The officer grabbed the ring on the trapdoor, but even with two of the strongest guards assisting him, the door wouldn’t budge.

“‘They’re holding the trapdoor down,’ shouted Simon. ‘Shoot through it; fire!’

“‘But what about my bottles?’ the widow Plumeau cried. ‘You’re going to break my bottles!’

“‘Stop your bawling, both of you!’ said the officer. ‘And you,’ he addressed the guards, ‘bring some axes and chop open the door.’

“His men obeyed, and the officer said, ‘Now, get ready, and fire into the trapdoor as soon as we open it.’

“They began breaking the door open with the ax, and once the opening was large enough, twenty rifle barrels were lowered toward it. Only there was no one to be seen. The officer lit a torch and tossed it into the cellar. Still, no one.

“‘Follow me!’ the officer ordered as he hurried down the stairway into the empty cellar.

“‘Forward!’ shouted the municipal guards, rushing after their leader.

“‘Ah, Widow Plumeau,’ Simon cried, shaking his fist at her, ‘so now you loan your cellar to aristocrats trying to free the queen!’

“But Simon unjustly accused the good woman. For someone had broken through the cellar wall from a tunnel three feet wide and five feet high that ran toward the Rue de la Corderie. On the tunnel floor many people had left their tracks.

“The officer set off quickly down the tunnel, but after only ten steps he encountered an iron grate and had to stop. ‘Stop!’ the officer called out to the soldiers hard on his heels. ‘We can go no farther. I want four men to stay here and shoot anyone who shows up. I am going to make my report. The aristocrats have attempted to free the queen.’

“That was what came to be known as the Carnation Plot. The three principal actors were my father, the Chevalier de Maison-Rouge, and Toulan, and it led both my father and Toulan to the scaffold. The Chevalier de Maison-Rouge, who hid in a tannery in the Faubourg Saint-Victor, was able to escape unscathed.

“Before his execution, my father asked my elder brother to follow his example and to die as he did, for his sovereigns.”

“And how about your brother?” Claire murmured, clearly shaken by his tale. “Did he obey your father’s request?”

“You shall see,” Hector answered, “if you allow me to continue.”

“Oh, please, go on!” cried Claire. “I’m all ears and all heart!”




XIV Léon de Sainte-Hermine (#ulink_79071e59-7ce9-513f-b6b5-ba2ee1cb5c9a)







“A SHORT TIME AFTER my father was executed, my mother, who had fallen ill upon hearing of his death, also died.

“I was unable to send my brother Léon word about this new misfortune because we’d had no news of him since the Battle of Berchem. But I wrote to my brother Charles in Avignon, and immediately he rushed back to Besançon.

“All that we knew about the Battle of Berchem and my brother’s fate came from the Prince de Condé himself. In her worry, my ailing mother had sent a messenger to him, but the messenger failed to return before my mother died. He arrived, in fact, on the same day as my brother did from Avignon.

“So we learned that on December 4, 1793, the Prince de Condé was headquartered in Berchem, where twice Pichegru launched an attack, but he was unable to hold the village after driving the prince out. When the émigrés retook the village, Léon performed extraordinary feats. Indeed, he was the first to enter the village, but then he disappeared and even the companions following close behind him had no idea where. They searched among the dead but did not find him. The general opinion was that, having advanced too rapidly in pursuit of the Republicans, he had been taken prisoner. Which was no better than death, since every prisoner who’d borne weapons was formally charged before the council of war and then shot.

“In the absence of news we had accepted that painful explanation when we were visited by a young man from Besançon who had been with the Rhine army. I say young man, but he was really just a child, scarcely fourteen years old, the son of one of my father’s former friends. He was only a year younger than I; we had been raised together. His name was Charles N.

“I was the first to see him. As I knew that he had been with General Pichegru for three months, I ran up to him, shouting: ‘Charles! Is that you? Have you any news of my brother?’

“‘Alas, yes,’ he replied. ‘Is your brother Charles also here?’

“When I answered yes, he said, ‘Well, then, send word to him. What I have to tell you requires his presence.’

“My brother soon appeared, and I told him Charles was bringing us news of Léon.

“‘Bad news, right?’

“‘I’m afraid so. Otherwise he would have already told us.’

“Then, without answering but smiling sadly, my young comrade pulled a garrison cap from under his vest and presented it to my brother. ‘You are now the head of the family,’ he said. ‘This relic now belongs to you.’

“‘What is this?’ my brother asked.

“‘The cap he was wearing when he was brought before the firing squad,’ Charles answered.

“‘So, it’s all over?’ my older brother asked, dry-eyed, though from my eyes, in spite of myself, tears were falling.

“‘Yes.’

“‘And he indeed did die?’

“‘Like a hero!’

“‘God be praised! Our honor is intact.… There must be something in this cap?’

“‘A letter.’

“My brother ran his hands over the cap, felt the paper, cut the lining with his pocketknife, and pulled out a letter: ‘“To my brother Charles,”’ he read. ‘“First of all, and above all, keep the news of my death from our mother as long as possible.”’

“‘So he died without knowing that our poor mother preceded him to death?’ my brother asked.

“‘No,’ said Charles. ‘I told him myself.’

“My brother turned back to the letter and continued reading:

“‘“I was captured in Berchem. My horse was shot out from under me, and when it fell I was caught underneath. There was no way to defend myself. I threw my sword aside, and four Republicans pulled me loose. They led me to the fortress in Auenheim to shoot me. Short of a miracle, nothing could save me.

“‘“My father had given his word to the king that he would die for the Royalist cause, and so he did. I gave my word to my father to defend to death the same cause, and so I am. You gave me your word, and so you will. If you too die, Hector will avenge us.

“‘“A prayer on my mother’s tomb. A fatherly kiss to Hector.

“‘“Adieu.

“‘“Léon de Sainte-Hermine

“‘“P.S. I don’t know how I shall be able to get this letter to you, but God will provide a way.”’”

“My brother raised the letter to his lips, gave it to me to kiss, and placed it against his heart. Then he said to Charles, ‘You were there when he died, you said?’

“‘Yes!’ Charles answered.

“‘In that case, tell me the whole story and don’t leave out a single detail.’

“‘It’s quite simple,’ said Charles. ‘I was on my way from Strasbourg to Citizen Pichegru’s headquarters in Auenheim, when, just beyond Sessenheim, a squadron of about twenty infantrymen, led by a captain on horseback, caught up with me. The twenty men were marching in two rows.

“‘In the middle of the road, like me, a cavalry soldier was walking. It was easy to see that he was in the cavalry, because he was wearing riding boots with spurs. A large white coat covered him from the shoulders down, and all I could see of him was a young, intelligent face that seemed familiar to me. He was wearing a garrison cap, of a shape unusual in the French army.

“‘The captain saw me walking near the young man in the white coat, and since I looked younger than I really am, he kindly asked, “Where are you going, my young citizen?”

“‘“I’m going to General Pichegru’s headquarters,” I replied. “Do I still have far to go?”

“‘“About another two hundred yards,” the young man in the white coat answered. “Look, there, at the end of this avenue we’ve just started down, you can see the first houses in Auenheim.” It seemed strange that he nodded toward the village instead of pointing to it.

“‘“Thank you,” I told him, and began walking faster, away from him, since he didn’t seem to appreciate my presence. But he called me back.

“‘“By my faith, young friend,” he said, “if you are not in too much of a hurry, you should slow down and travel with us. That would give me time to ask you about our country.”

“‘“What country?”

“‘“Come now!” he said. “Are you not from Besançon, or at least from the Franche-Comté?”

“‘I stared at him in astonishment. His accent, his face, the way he held himself—everything about him brought back childhood memories. Clearly, I had known this handsome young man in the past.

“‘“Of course,” he said with a laugh, “perhaps you want to remain incognito.”

“‘“Not at all, Citizen,” I answered. “I was just thinking of Theophrastus, to whom the Athenians had given the nickname Good Speaker, and after he had lived in Athens for fifty years, a fruit-seller identified him as a native of the Island of Lesbos.”

“‘“You are well-read, monsieur,” my traveling companion said. “That is a luxury in such times as these.”

“‘“Not really,” I answered. “I am going to join General Pichegru, who himself is well-read, and I’m hoping, thanks to a recommendation I am carrying for him, to get a job as his secretary. And how about you, citizen?” I added, goaded by curiosity. “Are you with the army?”

“‘He began to laugh. “Not precisely,” he said.

“‘“Well, then,” I went on, “you must be attached to the administration.”

“‘“Attached,” he repeated, and laughed again. “Yes, that’s right, you have chosen the right word, monsieur. However, I am not attached to the administration; I am attached to myself.”

“‘“But,” I said, lowering my voice, “you are using formal address with me, and you even called me monsieur out loud. Are you not afraid that you might lose your place?”

“‘“Ah! Say, Captain,” the young man in the white coat shouted, “this young citizen is afraid I might lose my place because I’m still using formal address and am calling him monsieur. Do you know anyone who would like to have my place? If so, I bow to such a man.”

“‘“Poor fellow!” the captain muttered with a shrug.

“‘“Say, young man,” my traveling companion said, “since you are from Besançon—and you are from there, are you not?”

“‘I nodded that I was.

“‘“Then you must know the Sainte-Hermine family.”

“‘“Yes,” I answered. “A widow and three sons.”

“‘“Three sons. Yes, that’s right,” he added with a sigh. “There are still three of them. Thank you. How long has it been since you left Besançon?”

“‘“Scarcely seven or eight days ago.”

“‘“So you can give me any recent news?”

“‘“Yes, but it’s sad news as well.”

“‘“Go on, tell me.”

“‘“The evening before I left, we went, my father and I, to the countess’s funeral.”

“‘“Ah!” the young man said, raising his eyes to the heavens, “the countess has died!”

“‘“Yes.”

“‘“It’s for the best.” He raised his eyes again, and two large tears rolled down his cheeks.

“‘“What do you mean, it’s for the best?” I objected. “She was a saintly woman.”

“‘“All the more reason,” the young man replied. “Was it not better for her to die from illness rather than from the sadness of learning that her son went before the firing squad?”

“‘“What?” I cried. “The Comte de Sainte-Hermine has been shot?”

“‘“No, but he will be.”

“‘“When?”

“‘“When we get to the fortress at Auenheim.”

“‘“So the Comte de Sainte-Hermine is in the fortress?”

“‘“No, but that is where they are taking him.”

“‘“And he’ll be shot?”

“‘“As soon as I get there.”

“‘“Are you the one charged with the execution?”

“‘“No, but I shall give the order to fire. They never refuse that favor to a good soldier taken with arms in hand, even if he is an émigré.”

“‘“Oh, my God!” I cried in horror. “Are…?”

“‘Again, the young man burst into laughter. “That is why I laughed when you were asking me to be careful. That is why I was proposing my place to anyone who might want it, for I had no fear of losing it. As you were saying, I am indeed attached!” And only then, with a shake of his shoulders to open his coat, did he show me his bound hands and two arms attached behind him.

“‘“But then,” I cried in terror, “you are.…”

“‘“The Comte de Sainte-Hermine, young man. You see that I was correct in saying that it was better for my poor mother to die.”

“‘“Oh, my God,” I cried.

“‘“Fortunately,” the Comte went on, his teeth clenched, “my brothers are still alive.”

“In one voice, we both shouted yes, my brother and I, and vowed that we’d avenge him,” said Hector.

“So,” Mademoiselle de Sourdis asked, “that was your brother they were going to shoot?”

“Yes,” Hector answered. “Is it enough for you to know the result, or would you like to know the details of his final moments? These details, each word of which made our own hearts beat doubly faster, may be of slight interest to you, since you never knew poor Léon.”

“Oh, on the contrary, tell me everything,” Mademoiselle de Sourdis cried out. “Don’t leave out a single word. Was not Monsieur Léon de Sainte-Hermine a relative of mine, and do I not have the right to follow him all the way to his tomb?”

“That is exactly what we said to my young friend Charles.”

“‘You can imagine,’ young Charles continued, ‘how upset I was to learn that the man walking beside me, a man full of youth who could speak so lightly of events, was going to die. And that he was a compatriot, the head of one of our most important families, the Comte de Sainte-Hermine.

“‘“Is there no way to save you?” I whispered.

“‘“Frankly, I have to say that I don’t see any,” he answered. “If I did, I’d try it without wasting another second.”

“‘“Although I’m unable to offer you any great service, I would like to be useful to you in some way, and while I can’t save you from death, perhaps I can at least make your death less painful, to help you somehow in the face of it.”

“‘“Since I first saw you I have been turning an idea over in my head.”

“‘“Tell me what it is.”

“‘“There may be some danger, and I don’t want it to frighten you.”

“‘“I’m ready to do anything to serve you.”

“‘“I would like to send news to my brother.”

“‘“I take it upon myself to do it for you.”

“‘“It’s a letter.”

“‘“I shall take it to him.”

“‘“I could give it to the captain. He’s a good man; he would probably have it sent to its destination.”

“‘“With the captain,” I answered, “it’s only probable. With me, it’s certain.”

“‘“Well, then, listen carefully.” I stepped closer, and he said, “The letter has already been written; it’s sewn into my cap.”

“‘“Very well.”

“‘“You must ask the captain for permission to be present at my execution.”

“‘“Me!” I answered, and my forehead broke out in cold sweat.

“‘“Don’t dismiss the idea out of hand. An execution is always interesting. Many people attend them simply for the enjoyment of it.”

“‘“I haven’t the courage.…”

“‘“Come now. Everything happens so quickly.”

“‘“I couldn’t! Never!”

“‘“Let’s say nothing more about it then,” said the count. “All you need to tell my brothers, if you happen to run into them, is that we met as they were about to send me to the firing squad.” And he began to whistle the tune from Vive Henry IV.

“‘I quickly moved still closer. “Excuse me,” I said. “I’ll do whatever you want me to do.”

“‘“Well, now, you’re a very kind boy. Thank you!”

“‘“But.…”

“‘“What?”

“‘“But you have to be the one who asks the captain if I can be present. I could not bear it if they thought that I wanted to watch for pleasure.”

“‘“Very well. I shall tell him that we are from the same region, and I’ll ask him to let me send something of mine to my brother, my cap, for instance. Such things happen all the time. Besides, you understand, there is nothing suspicious about a garrison cap.”

“‘“No.”

“‘“When I give the order to fire, I shall toss it aside. Don’t act too much in a hurry to pick it up. Wait until I’m dead.”

“‘“Oh!” I gasped, turning pale. My whole body began to tremble.

“‘“Who has a little alcohol for my young fellow countryman?” your brother asked. “He’s cold.”

“‘“Come here, my good boy,” said the captain. He handed me his flask. I drank a swallow, then thanked him.

“‘“At your service.… A swallow, Citizen Sainte-Hermine?” he shouted to the prisoner.

“‘“Thank you very much, Captain,” he answered. “I never drink alcohol.”

“‘I walked back to where he was, and he continued with his instructions to me. “So, when I’m dead, you’ll pick up my cap, but treat it as if it were a thing of no importance. But you realize of course that my last wishes, the last wishes of a dying man, are sacred, and that the letter I’ve hidden in the cap must be delivered to my brother. If the cap is inconvenient, slip out the letter and toss the cap into a ditch somewhere. As for the letter, are you sure you won’t lose it?”

“‘“No,” I said, trying to hold back my tears. “I mean, I’m sure.”

“‘“You won’t misplace it?”

“‘“No, no! You can rest easy.”

“‘“And you will give it to my brother yourself?”

“‘“Yes, I shall do so myself.”

“‘“To my brother Charles, the elder. He has the same name as you, so it will be easy to remember.”

“‘“To him and to no other.”

“‘“Be sure of that! So, and then he’ll ask you how I died, and you’ll tell him. And he’ll say, ‘Good, I had a good brother,’ and when his turn comes, he’ll die like me.”

“‘We came to a fork in the road; one road led to General Pichegru’s headquarters, the other to the fortress. I tried to speak, but no words came to my mouth. I looked at your brother beseechingly. He smiled.

“‘“Captain,” he said. “A favor.”

“‘“What favor? If it’s in my power.…”

“‘“Perhaps it’s a weakness, but you’ll keep it between us, won’t you? At the moment of my death, I would like to embrace a fellow countryman. This young man and I are both from the Juras, both our families live in Besançon and are friends. Someday he will go back home, and he will tell how we happened to meet and how he accompanied me until my final moments. Then he will tell how I died.”

“‘The captain looked at me; I was weeping. “Of course!” he said. “If that is what would please you both.”

“‘“I don’t believe,” your brother said with a laugh, “that it will please the boy very much, but it will indeed please me.”

“‘“Since it’s you who are making the request.”

“‘“So, you agree?” the prisoner asked.

“‘“I agree,” the captain answered.

“‘“You see,” he said as I walked beside him, “so far things are going perfectly well.”

“‘We marched up the hill, were recognized, and walked across the drawbridge. For a moment we waited in the courtyard while the captain went to announce to the colonel that we had arrived and to communicate to him the execution orders.

“‘A few minutes later, he reappeared in the doorway. “Are you ready?” he asked the prisoner.

“‘“Whenever you are, Captain,” the prisoner answered.

“‘“Do you have any comments to make?”

“‘“No, but several favors to request.”

“‘“I shall grant whatever lies within my power.”

“‘“Thank you, Captain.”

“‘The captain walked over to your brother. “We may serve under enemy flags, but we are still both French, and good men can spot each other at first sight. What do you wish?”

“‘“First, that you remove these ropes, which make me look like a thief.”

“‘“That is only just. Untie the prisoner.”

“‘I rushed over and grabbed the count’s hands; I had untied him before anyone else had time to draw near.

“‘“Oh!” said the count, flexing his arms under his coat. “It feels good to be free.”

“‘“And now,” asked the captain, “what else do you wish?”

“‘“I would like to be the one to give the order to fire.”

“‘“You may give the order. Anything else?”

“‘“I would like to send some souvenir to my family.”

“‘“You know it is forbidden for anyone to accept letters from political prisoners before they are shot. Anything else, yes.”

“‘“I don’t want to cause any problems. This is my young countryman, Charles. As you have authorized, he will be accompanying me to the place of execution. He can take responsibility for giving my family, not a letter, but something of mine. This old cap, for example.”

“‘“Is that all?” asked the captain.

“‘“I think so,” the count answered. “It is time. I’m beginning to get cold feet, and cold feet are what I hate most in the world. Let’s go, Captain—I presume you are coming with us.”

“‘“It’s my duty.”

“‘The count bowed, and with a laugh like a man who is pleased at having gotten what he wanted, he shook my hand.

“‘“Which way?” he asked.

“‘“This way,” said the captain, starting out at the head of the column. Following him, we passed through a gate and entered a second courtyard where sentinels were walking back and forth on the ramparts above. The wall at the back of the courtyard was peppered with bullet holes at about a man’s height.

“‘“Ah, here we are!” said the prisoner, and without instruction or command he walked over to the wall.

“‘The clerk read the sentence. Your brother nodded as if he accepted it. Then he said, “Excuse me, Captain. I would like a few words with myself.”

“‘The captain and the soldiers, realizing that he wanted to pray, stepped away. For a moment your brother remained immobile, his arms crossed, his head bowed down against his chest, his lips moving, though no sound came from them. When he raised his head, there was a smile on his face. He embraced me, and as he did, like Charles I of England, he whispered: “Remember.”

“‘Weeping, I bowed my head.

“‘Then with a strong voice: “Attention!” said the condemned man.

“‘The soldiers got ready. The count paused, and as if he did not want to give the order to fire with his head covered, he pulled off his cap, tossed it aside. It fell at my feet.

“‘“Are you ready?” asked the count.

“‘“Yes,” replied the soldiers.

“‘“Ready, aim, fire! Long live the K—” His “King” was lost in the detonations, and seven bullets tore through his chest.

“‘He fell to the ground facedown. I had dropped to my knees; I was weeping as I’m weeping now.’”

“And indeed, the poor child was sobbing as he told us how our brother died. We too, Mademoiselle; I swear, we too were weeping hot tears,” Hector said.

“My elder brother, now the head of the family, reread the letter and embraced Charles. Then, with his arms raised, on the holy relic that was all that remained of our brother, he promised to avenge his death.

“Oh, what a sad story, monsieur!” said Claire, wiping her tears.

“Should I continue?” asked Hector.

“Indeed, yes,” said the girl. “For never have I heard a more heart-wrenching story.”




XV Charles de Sainte-Hermine [I] (#ulink_3bf891b6-b8f0-591f-b512-885b3b80ef5b)







HECTOR DE SAINTE-HERMINE PAUSED for a moment to let Mademoiselle de Sourdis pull herself together. Then he continued: “As you said, a sad story. And it gets worse. For soon after we received the painful news of Leon’s death, my brother Charles disappeared. He did leave me a rather long letter, though, that said in pretty much these words:

“‘You don’t need to know, my dear child, where I am or what I’m doing. As you might suspect, I am striving to carry out what I swore I would do: seek vengeance.

“‘You are now all alone. But you are sixteen years old, and with misfortune as your teacher you will quickly become a man.

“‘You understand what I mean by becoming a man. A true man is like a solid oak tree with its roots in the past and its branches in the future. It can stand up to anything—to heat, cold, wind, rain, storms, weapons, and gold.

“‘Keep both your mind and your body active; become skillful in all kinds of physical activities—there is no lack of money or teachers. While you are in the provinces, spend twelve thousand francs a year on horses, guns, weapons, and lessons in riding and fencing. If you go to Paris, spend double that amount, but always with the same purpose of becoming a man.

“‘Do whatever is necessary always to have at hand ten thousand francs in gold. Be prepared to deliver it to any messenger who comes in Morgan’s name—you will know his signature—and presents you with a letter marked with the sign of a dagger.

“‘Whenever people speak of Morgan, you alone will know that they are really talking about me.

“‘Follow to the letter these instructions, but consider them more as advice than orders. And once a month, at least, reread this letter.

“‘Always be ready to take my place, to avenge me, and to die,’ he charged me, and signed the letter ‘Your brother, Charles.’”

“So, mademoiselle,” Hector continued, “now that you know that Morgan and Charles de Sainte-Hermine are one and the same person, I no longer need to recount for you my brother’s activities. For like all, you know that as the leader of the Companions of Jehu he soon became famous all over France and even in other countries. From Marseille to Nantua, France was his kingdom for more than two years.

“Twice more I received letters from him, marked with the seal and signature to which he had alerted me. Each time he asked for the same amount, and each time I sent it to him.

“The man named Morgan meanwhile became both the terror and the darling of the South of France. The Royalist party deemed the Companions of Jehu to be like knights and avowed their legitimacy. The authorities, on the other hand, tried to sully them by calling them bandits, brigands, and stagecoach robbers, but they were unable to tarnish Jehu’s prestige. All over the South one could openly say he stood with the Companions of Jehu without having anything to fear from the local authorities.

“As long as the Directory lasted, everything went well. The government was already too weak for foreign wars, so domestic war was unthinkable. But then Bonaparte came back from Egypt.

“By chance, in Avignon he witnessed one of the many courageous operations typical of the Companions of Jehu, and he witnessed their code of ethics too. For along with money belonging to the government, they had mistakenly carried off a bag containing two hundred louis that belonged to a wine merchant from Bordeaux. While taking a meal at the common table in an inn, the merchant was complaining about the wrong done to him when in broad daylight my brother strode into the dining room, masked and armed to the teeth. He walked over to the table, offered his excuses, and put down in front of the merchant his two hundred louis.

“Chance had it that General Bonaparte and his aide-de-camp Roland de Montrevel were eating at the same table, so he saw firsthand the kind of men he was dealing with. And he realized that it was not the English but the Companions of Jehu who were providing support to the Chouans. He made the decision to exterminate them and sent Roland south with full authority to do whatever was needed.

“But Roland could not find a single traitor willing to identify the people Roland had sworn to exterminate. Nor did the caves, forests, or mountains betray the lair of the men who themselves refused to betray their king. It was an unexpected event, produced by a woman’s hand, that brought about the downfall of those whom the weapons of entire regiments had been unable to reach.

“You know about the terrible political turmoil that, like an earthquake, is now rocking the city of Avignon. Well, imagine one of those riots in which people pitilessly cut each other’s throats, in which they battle an enemy as long as they have one ounce of breath and even after the enemy has breathed his last. And imagine then how a certain Monsieur de Fargas had been not only killed but burned and eaten by cannibals whose actions far outstripped any primitives in the Pacific isles. His assassins were liberals.

“His two children, though, escaped the carnage and fled. Nature had made a mistake with de Fargas’s son and daughter, for it had given the young man the heart of a girl and the sister the heart that should have been her brother’s. Both of them, Lucien and Diana, with Diana giving her full support to her brother, swore to avenge their father.

“Lucien joined the Companions of Jehu, but during a raid he was captured. Unable to stand up to the torture of sleep deprivation, he revealed the names of his accomplices. To protect him from the vengeance of the Companions of Jehu, his captors moved him from Avignon to a prison in Nantua, but one night a week later, a band of armed men stormed the prison and carried him off to a monastery in Seillon.

“Two nights after that, the corpse of Lucien de Fargas was placed in the town square in front of the Préfecture, just across from the hotel Les Grottes de Ceyzériat, where his sister Diana was living. The body was naked, and the well-known dagger of the Companions of Jehu was planted in his heart. Hanging from the dagger was a piece of paper on which Lucien, in his own hand, had written: ‘I shall die because I failed to keep my sacred oath. The dagger found planted in my chest will prove that I die the victim not of a cowardly assassin but of avenging justice.’

“At daybreak Diana was awakened by a loud noise under her windows. She somehow knew that the noise had something to do with her, and that a new misfortune awaited her. She put on a dressing gown, and without even tying up her hair, which had come loose in her sleep, she opened the window and leaned out over the balcony.

“Scarcely had she glanced down at the street than she let out a scream, jumped back, and, like a madwoman, pale as a ghost, her hair flowing, hurried down to the square and threw herself on the corpse in the middle of the crowd, crying ‘My brother! My brother!’

“Now a stranger had been witness to Lucien’s death. He had been sent by Cadoudal, so he knew all sorts of passwords that would open any door. This is the letter that served as his passport; I copied it because it has something to do with me.

“‘My dear Morgan,’ he read, ‘I’m sure you have not forgotten that at our meeting on Rue des Postes you offered to be my treasurer in case I should pursue war alone without any foreign or domestic help. Our defenders have all been killed, either as they fought or by a firing squad. D’Autichamp went over to the Republic. Only I still stand unswerving in my beliefs, invincible here in my Morbihan.

“‘My army of two or three thousand men is sufficient for my campaign. Although they are not asking for any salary, they must still have food, weapons, and ammunition. Ever since what happened in Quiberon, the English have sent us nothing.

“‘If you provide the money, we shall furnish the blood. That is not to say, God forbid, that if necessary, you too would not be willing to give blood of your own. No, your devotion is far greater than anyone’s, and it makes ours pale in comparison. If we are captured, we shall be shot, whereas if you are taken, you will die on the scaffold. You write that you have large amounts of money. If I can be sure of receiving thirty-five to forty thousand francs a month, that will be sufficient..

“‘I am sending you a mutual friend, Coster de Saint-Victor. His name alone should be enough to make you realize you can trust him completely. I am giving him the little catechism to study so he can find his way to where you now are hiding. Give him the first forty thousand francs if you have them and keep safe the rest, for it is much less to me than it is to you. If you are unable to stay where you are because persecution is too great, come to this part of France to be with me.

“‘Whether near or far, I love you and thank you.

“‘George Caudoudal

“‘General of the Army of Brittany

“‘PS: You apparently have, my dear Morgan, a young brother about nineteen or twenty years old. If you don’t think me unworthy of leading him into his first battles, send him to me. He will be my aide-de-camp.’

“After consulting all the Companions, my brother responded:

“‘My dear general,

“‘We received your good, courageous letter, thanks to your brave messenger. We have approximately one hundred fifty thousand francs in our coffers, and so we are able to do what you request. Our new associate, to whom I am giving the name Alcibiade on my own authority, will leave this evening with the first forty thousand francs. Each month you will receive from the same bank the forty thousand francs you need. In case of death or dispersion, the money will be buried in as many different places as we have multiples of forty thousand francs. Herewith is the list of those who will know where the money is hidden.

“‘Our brother Alcibiade arrived just in time to witness an execution, by the way. He has seen how we punish traitors.

“‘I thank you, my dear general, for your generous offer concerning my younger brother. But my intention is to keep him out of danger until the time comes for him to replace me. My father died on the guillotine, bequeathing his vengeance to my older brother. My older brother died before the firing squad, bequeathing his vengeance to me. I shall likely die, as you say, on the scaffold. But I shall die bequeathing my vengeance to my younger brother. And then it will be his turn to follow the same path we have taken, and he will contribute, as we have, to the triumph of our noble cause. Or he will die as we have died. That is the reason I am required to take it on myself to deprive him of your patronage, though I do ask you to keep him as a friend.

“‘As soon as possible, send us back our dear brother Alcibiade. For us it is a double pleasure to be able to send you our message with a messenger like him.

“‘Morgan’

“As my brother said, Coster de Saint-Victor did indeed witness the punishment. Lucien de Fargas was judged and executed before his eyes. Afterward, at midnight, two horsemen left the Seillon monastery by the same gate. One, Coster de Saint-Victor, was leaving for Brittany to meet Cadoudal, carrying forty thousand francs from Morgan. The other, the Comte de Ribier, with Lucien de Fargas’s body lying across his horse, was on his way to place the traitor’s corpse in the square by the Préfecture.”

Hector paused a moment, then said, “Pardon me, my story seemed so simple at first, only now it seems to have gotten so complicated it’s taking on the shape of a novel. I’m obliged to follow events as they progress, of course, but for fear of describing too many catastrophes I shall try to be as brief as possible.”

“Oh, on the contrary, don’t leave anything out, I beg you,” said Mademoiselle de Sourdis. “I find all the people you are talking about quite fascinating, especially Mademoiselle de Fargas.”

“Well, I was just about to get back to her. For three days after she had religiously attended to the burial of the body, identified as her brother, on the square in Bourg-en-Bresse, a young woman appeared at the Palais de Luxembourg and requested an audience with Citizen Director Barras. He was in a meeting. The valet, noticing that she was young and attractive, showed her into the pink boudoir, where Citizen Barras conducted his more amorous meetings. A quarter of an hour later, the same valet announced Citizen Director Barras.

“Barras entered triumphantly, placed his hat on a table, and walked toward the visitor, saying: ‘You wanted to see me, madame? Here I am!’

“The young woman, lifting her veil to reveal her astounding beauty, stood up as he approached. Barras stopped in amazement. Then he moved quickly forward and tried to take her hand as he gestured that she should sit back down.

“But she, keeping her hands in the folds of her long veil, said, ‘Please excuse me, but I must remain standing as befits a supplicant.’

“‘A supplicant!’ said Barras. ‘Oh, a woman like you does not beg; she gives orders, or at the very least she makes demands.’

“‘Well, that is what I’m also doing. In the name of the earth that gave us both life, in the name of my father, your father’s friend, in the name of outraged humanity, in the name of failed justice, I come to you to demand vengeance.’

“‘Vengeance?’

“‘Vengeance,’ Diana repeated.

“‘Vengeance is a harsh word,’ Barras said, ‘for one so lovely and young.’

“‘Monsieur, I am the daughter of the Comte de Fargas, assassinated by the Republicans in Avignon, and the sister of the Vicomte de Fargas, who has just been killed in Bourg-en-Bresse by the Companions of Jehu.’

“‘Are you sure, madame?’

“She showed him a dagger and a sheet of paper. ‘The dagger is well known in its design,’ she said, ‘even if the dagger explained nothing at all, and the paper will remove any doubts as to the murder and its cause.’

“Barras studied the weapon. ‘And this dagger.…’ he began.

“‘Was planted in my brother’s chest.’

“‘The dagger by itself proves nothing,’ said Barras. ‘It could have been stolen or counterfeited purposely simply to complicate the investigation.’

“‘Yes, but read this paper, written and signed in my brother’s hand.’

“Barras read Lucien’s last words, avouching his failure to keep his oath to the Companions of Jehu. ‘And this is truly your brother’s writing?’ Barras asked.

“‘Yes, it is.’

“‘What do these words mean: “I die the victim not of a cowardly assassin but of avenging justice?”’

“‘That means that when he fell into your agents’ hands and was tortured, my brother broke his oath by naming his accomplices. I’m the one,’ Diana added with a strange laugh, ‘who should have joined the Companions, not my brother.’

“‘How is it possible that a murder like that took place without my knowing anything about it?’

“‘It does not speak well for your police,’ Diana said with a smile.

“‘Well, since you seem to be so well informed, tell us the names of the people who killed your brother. Once we have caught them, their punishment will be swift.’

“‘If I knew their names,’ answered Diana, ‘I would not have to come see you. I’d have planted a knife in them myself.’

“‘Well,’ said Barras, ‘as you look for them, so shall we.’

“‘But should it be I who looks for them?’ Diana asked. ‘Is that my job? Am I the government or the police? Is it my responsibility to keep watch over people? My brother was arrested and put into prison, a prison belonging to the government, which now has to answer to me for my brother. The prison has betrayed its prisoner. So the government owes me an answer. Since you are the head of government, I ask you, I demand, “Give me back my brother!”’

“‘You loved your brother?’

“‘I adored him.’

“‘And you want to avenge him?’

“‘I would trade my life for the lives of his assassins.’

“‘What if I offered you a way, whatever it might be, to discover the murderer? Would you accept?’

“Diana hesitated a moment, then said boldly, ‘Whatever it is, I shall do what’s necessary.’

“‘Well, then,’ said Barras, ‘if you are willing to help us, we shall help you.’

“‘What must I do?’

“‘You are attractive; very attractive, indeed.’

“‘My beauty has nothing to do with it,’ said Diana without lowering her eyes.

“‘On the contrary,’ said Barras, ‘beauty has everything to do with it. In this grand struggle we call life, beauty comes to women not as some heaven-sent gift merely to please the eyes of a lover or husband, but as a potent weapon, a means of attack and defense.’

“‘Tell me more,’ Diana replied.

“‘The Companions of Jehu keep no secrets from Cadoudal. He is their true leader, for essentially they work for him. He knows their every name from top to bottom.’

“‘And so?’ Diana wondered.

“‘So? Nothing could be simpler. Go to Brittany, join Cadoudal, introduce yourself as a victim of your devotion to the Royalist cause, gain his confidence. It will be easy for you, because Cadoudal will not be able to look at you without falling in love. And sooner or later you’ll have all the names of these men, these bandits, whom we have had so much trouble finding. Provide us those names, that is all I ask, and you shall have your revenge, I guarantee. In addition, if through your influence you’re able to get that stubborn rebel to give up his struggle, I don’t need to tell you that the government would set no limits.…’

“Diana raised her hand. ‘Careful, Citizen Director, one more word and you’d be insulting me.’ Then, after a moment’s silence: ‘I’d like to request twenty-four hours to consider,’ she said.

“‘Take your time, madame,’ said Barras. ‘I am always at your orders and shall be waiting.’

“‘Tomorrow at nine p.m., right here,’ said Diana. She then took the dagger from Barras’s hands and picked up her brother’s letter from the table. She slipped them inside her bodice. She said good-bye and left.

“The next evening at the appointed hour Mademoiselle Diana de Fargas was again announced at the palace, and the director hurried back to the pink boudoir.

“‘I’ve come to a decision, monsieur. However, you will understand that I shall need a safe-conduct so that the Republican authorities will know who I am. In the life I shall be leading, it is possible I could be caught bearing arms against the Republic. I know that you send even women and children to the firing squad, for you wage a war of extermination—well, that is between you and God. So while I may be captured, I have no wish, you can be sure, to be shot before enjoying my revenge.’

“‘I had anticipated your request, and so as not to delay your departure, the papers you need I have already had prepared. Here are clear orders from General Hédouville; they transform those whom you fear into your protectors. With this safe-conduct, you can go anywhere in Brittany or the Vendée.’

“‘Very well, monsieur!’ said Diana. ‘Thank you.’

“‘If it’s not too indiscreet, may I ask when you plan to leave?’

“‘This evening. My horses and coach await me outside the palace gates.’

“‘Allow me to ask one somewhat delicate question. It is my duty to ask.’

“‘Go ahead, monsieur.’

“‘Do you have money?’

“‘I have six thousand gold francs in this box, and that’s better than sixty thousand francs’ worth of assignats. As you see, I have my own resources to fund my battles.’

“Barras reached out to shake the lovely traveler’s hand, but she took no notice of his polite gesture. She merely curtsied and withdrew.

“‘What a charming viper,’ said Barras. ‘I would not want to be the one to provide it warmth.’”




XVI Mademoiselle de Fargas (#ulink_c9d7caed-6ec3-51a2-a871-4e620644a7b3)







“MADEMOISELLE DE FARGAS and Coster Saint-Victor happened to meet by chance just below the village of La Guerche, about three leagues from where Cadoudal was camped.

“Coster Saint-Victor, one of the most elegant men of the time, a rival of the First Consul Bonaparte for the favors of one of the most beautiful actresses of the day, spotted the lovely woman in the open carriage. When the carriage was forced move more slowly on an upgrade, he was able to draw near easily since he was on horseback.

“At first Diana tried to remain coldly distant with the stranger, but he greeted her so politely, and his speech and compliments were so gentlemanly, that she remained aloof no longer than was appropriate for people who meet while traveling. Then, too, the region was completely new to her, and danger could be waiting anywhere. This traveler apparently knew the country very well, so he could prove to be useful to her, perhaps even telling her where Cadoudal could be found.

“Both of them had assumed a false identity. Coster Saint-Victor had told her that his name was d’Argentan and that he was a government tax officer in Dinan. Diana had introduced herself as Mademoiselle de Rotrou, the postmistress in Vitré. From statement to statement they shared false information, but eventually they both spoke something true. To each other both divulged that they were looking for Cadoudal.

“‘Are you acquainted with him?’ Saint-Victor, or d’Argentan, had asked.

“‘I’ve never set eyes on him,’ Diana answered.

“‘Well, then, mademoiselle, I shall be pleased to offer my services,’ said d’Argentan. ‘Cadoudal is a close friend of mine, and we are getting so near the place where we shall meet him that I can with no risk, I believe, admit that I am not really a government tax agent but rather an officer in Cadoudal’s ranks. If you need a reference to be able to see him, mademoiselle, I shall be doubly pleased that chance—in this case I will say Providence—has placed you on my path.’

“‘Since we are making admissions, I am no more postmistress in Vitré than you are a tax officer in Dinan. I am the last of a well-known Royalist family and I’ve a vow of vengeance to fulfill. I am seeking to serve with him.’

“‘In what capacity?’ d’Argentan asked.

“‘As a volunteer,’ said Diana.

“Coster looked at her in surprise, and then said, ‘Well, yes, in the end that should be possible. Dumouriez after all had as aides-de-camp the two Fernig girls. We live in such strange times that we have to get used to everything, even to those things that seem unbelievable.’ At that, they let the matter drop.

“In La Guerche they had met and passed a detachment of Republican soldiers on its way to Vitré. At the bottom of the hill below La Guerche they came upon some logs barricading the road. ‘By Jove!’ said Coster, ‘I would not be at all surprised if Cadoudal were behind this barricade.’

“He came to a halt and motioned to Diana’s carriage to stop. He imitated the hoot first of a screech owl, then of a barn owl, and was answered by the cry of a crow. ‘We’ve identified each other as friends,’ he told Diana. ‘Even so, it’s best if you wait here. I’ll come back to get you.’

“Two men appeared and opened up a path through the barricade. Diana watched as her traveling companion threw himself into the arms of a man whom she assumed to be the elusive Cadoudal himself.

“Soon the man crossed the barricade and walked toward Diana. As he neared the carriage, he took off his felt hat. ‘Mademoiselle,’ he said, ‘either you continue on your way or you do me the honor of asking for hospitality. I can only ask you to decide quickly. In less than an hour the Republicans will be here, and as you can see’—he motioned to the barricades—‘we are ready to welcome them. Not to mention,’ he went on, ‘the fifteen hundred men hidden in the Scotch broom who will soon begin to make music the likes of which you have never heard.’

“‘Monsieur,’ said Diana, ‘I have come to request your hospitality, and I am thankful that chance allows me the opportunity to witness a spectacle I have always wanted to see: a battle.’

“Cadoudal bowed and motioned to his men, who made a passageway just large enough for the carriage. Once Diana found herself on the other side of the barricade, she discovered, in addition to the fifteen hundred Cadoudal had said were in the broom, a thousand more lying prone with their rifles ready. And hidden back in the underbrush were about fifty horsemen, their horses’ bridles in hand.

“‘Mademoiselle,’ Cadoudal said to Diana, ‘please don’t think ill of me for attending to my military duties. As soon as I’ve taken care of them, I shall return.’

“‘Please, gentlemen, don’t worry about me,’ said Diana. ‘If only there were a horse.…’

“‘But I’ve got two,’ said d’Argentan. ‘I shall put the smaller at your disposal. Unfortunately it is saddled for battle and for a man.’

“‘Which is exactly what I need,’ said Diana. And when she saw the young man taking his saddlebag off the horse, she said with a laugh, ‘Thank you, Sir Government Tax Officer from Dinan!’ And then she closed the carriage door.

“Ten minutes later, the first shots rang out on the hilltop about a quarter of a mile from the barricade, and the battle was under way. At the same time, the carriage door opened and a young man in an elegant Chouan costume stepped down. He was wearing a velvet vest. Two double-barreled pistols protruded from his white belt, a white feather waved from his felt hat, and at his side hung a light saber. On the horse that Coster Saint-Victor’s servant gave to him, he galloped off with an ease that betrayed an excellent horseman. He took his place among the ranks of the cavalry serving under the Breton leader.

“I shall not recount the battle,” Hector went on, “except to tell you that the Blues were totally defeated; after displaying prodigious courage, they retreated and rallied around their leader, Colonel Hulot, in the village of La Guerche.

“Although the day had not brought great material gains to Cadoudal and his men, the moral effect was immense. For Cadoudal, his twenty-five hundred men not only had stood up to four or five thousand veteran soldiers hardened by five years of fighting, but had also pushed them back into the town from which they had tried to sally, and he ‘d cost the Blues four or five hundred men. Thus the insurrection in Brittany, following on the heels of the insurrection in the Vendée, got under way with a victory.

“Diana had fought in the front ranks, had often shot with her rifle, and three or four times, in close battle, had had occasion to use her pistols. As for Coster Saint-Victor, he came back, his Chouan jacket over his shoulder, with a bayonet wound in his arm.

“‘Monsieur,’ the girl said to Cadoudal, who had been hidden in the smoke while fighting in the front rows throughout the whole battle, ‘before the battle, you said that once it was over, you would attend to my purposes in coming to join you. Now that the combat is indeed over, I would hope you’d allow me a place among your troops.’

“‘In what capacity?’ Cadoudal asked.

“‘As a volunteer. For have I not just proven to you that noise and smoke do not frighten me?’

“Cadoudal scowled; his face became stern. ‘Madame,’ he said, ‘your proposal is more serious than it first appears. I am going to tell you something strange. I was first called to become a churchman, and I willingly took all the vows one normally takes when entering orders, nor did I ever break any of them. Now, I have no doubt that you would be a charming aide-de-camp, brave in the face of all. And I believe that women are as good as men. For centuries—from the time of Epicharis, who, while being tortured at Nero’s orders, bit off her tongue so she would not be able to betray her accomplices, up until the time of Charlotte Corday, who rid the earth of a monster before whom men trembled—we have seen constant proof of women’s courage. But in our regions where religion is important, especially in our old Brittany, there are prejudices that can harm a military reputation just as they can force a military leader to operate contrary to his beliefs. Still, in their camps, some of my colleagues have welcomed sisters and daughters of Royalists who had been killed. Did we not owe them the help and protection they requested?’

“‘And who says, monsieur,’ cried Diana, ‘that I myself am not the daughter or sister of a murdered Royalist, perhaps both, and that I do not have the same claim to the protection you speak of?’

“‘In that case,’ said the supposed d’Argentan with a smile, ‘how is it that you are carrying a passport signed by Barras and made out to the postmistress of Vitré?’

“‘Would you be so kind as to show me your own passport?’ Diana riposted.

“‘Ah! What a good answer,’ said Cadoudal, intrigued by Diana’s strong will and cool demeanor.

“‘And then you will explain how, since you are General Cadoudal’s friend, almost his right arm, you have the right to circulate, as the tax officer in Dinan, throughout the territory of the Republic?’

“‘Go ahead, speak,’ said Cadoudal. ‘Explain to the lady how you are a tax officer in Dinan.’

“‘And then she can explain how she is postmistress in Vitré?’ d’Argentan responded.

“‘Oh, that is a secret that I would never dare reveal to our modest friend Cadoudal. However, if you push me, I can tell you, at the risk of making him blush, that in Paris, hidden on Rue des Colonnes near the Feydeau Theatre, there is a young woman named Aurélie de Saint-Amour to whom Citizen Barras can refuse nothing. Nor can she refuse anything to me.’

“‘Well, then,’ said Cadoudal, ‘the name d’Argentan on my friend’s passport hides a name he uses as a pass among all those bands of Chouans, Vendeans, and Royalists wearing the white cockade in France and abroad. Your traveling companion, mademoiselle, who no longer has anything to hide now that he has nothing more to fear, is not a tax collector for the Republican government in Dinan, but rather the intermediary between General Tête-Ronde and the Companions of Jehu.’ Diana winced almost imperceptibly when she heard that word.

“‘And I must say,’ offered the counterfeit d’Argentan, ‘that I was witness to a horrible execution when I was last among the Companions. The Vicomte de Fargas, who had betrayed the association, was stabbed in my presence.’

“Diana could feel her blood draining from her face. If she had told them her real name, or if she now revealed it, she would not be able to meet the objectives of her journey. To the sister of the Vicomte de Fargas, who had been judged and sentenced by the Companions of Jehu, never would Cadoudal or d’Argentan reveal the executioners’ names or their whereabouts. So she said nothing, as if she were waiting for d’Argentan to finish his thought.

“Cadoudal continued: ‘His name is not d’Argentan, but rather Coster Saint-Victor, and even he had given no other guarantee of his loyalty to our holy cause than the wound he has just suffered.’

“‘Unless it’s a wound merely to prove his devotion,’ said Diana coldly. ‘That would be easy.’

“‘What do you mean?’

“‘Watch!’

“Diana pulled from her belt the sharp dagger that had killed her brother and struck her arm at the same place where Coster had been wounded. She struck with such force that the blade went into one side of her arm and out the other. Then, holding her wounded arm, with the dagger still in it, out toward Cadoudal, she said, ‘Would you like to see if I am of noble birth? Look! My blood is no less blue, I trust, than Monsieur Coster Saint-Victor’s. Would you like to know how I can claim your trust? This dagger proves that I am affiliated with the Companions of Jehu. Would you like to know my name? I am the goddaughter of that Roman woman who, to give her husband courage, pierced her own arm with a knife. My name is Portia!’

“Coster Saint-Victor gave a start, and while Cadoudal was looking admiringly at the avenging heroine, he said, ‘I can attest that the blade with which this girl has just struck herself is indeed a dagger belonging to the Companions of Jehu. The proof is that I have here one just like it that the company’s leader gave to me on the day of my initiation.’ And he pulled from his cloak a dagger in every way identical to the one in her arm.

“Cadoudal extended his hand to Diana. ‘From this moment on, mademoiselle,’ he said, ‘if you no longer have a father, I am your father. If you no longer have a brother, you are now my sister. Since we are living at a time when everyone is forced to hide his true name under another, your name, like the worthy Roman you are, shall be Portia. From now on, you are part of our army, mademoiselle, and as your first action has earned you a rank of leader, once our surgeon has bandaged your wound, you will attend the council I shall be holding.’

“‘Thank you, General,’ said Diana. ‘As for the surgeon, he’s not needed for me any more than he’s needed for Monsieur Coster Saint-Victor. My wound is no more serious than his.’ Pulling the dagger from the wound in which it had until then remained, she rolled up her sleeve and displayed her lovely arm. Then, turning to Coster Saint-Victor, she said, ‘Comrade,’ she said, ‘please be so good as to lend me your tie.’

“For two years Diana remained with the army of Brittany without anyone ever learning her real name. For two years she participated in every battle Cadoudal waged and shared with the general all the dangers and his fatigue, her devotion to him apparently complete. For two years she swallowed her hatred for the Companions of Jehu and vaunted their exploits, glorified their names: Morgan, d’Assas, Adler, and Montbar. For two years, the handsome Coster de Saint-Victor, who had never met a woman insensible to his charms, besieged the woman named Portia with his love, but in vain. Finally, after two years, her long perseverance was rewarded.

“The 18th Brumaire burst on the scene in France. Immediately the new dictator’s thoughts turned to the Vendée and Brittany. Cadoudal realized that serious war was about to break out in France. He realized, too, that to wage war he needed money. And that only the Companions of Jehu would be able to furnish it.

“Coster Saint-Victor had just taken a bullet in the thigh, so this time he could not be expected to assume his tax collector’s role. Cadoudal thought of Portia. Again and again she had proved her devotion and courage, and with Coster Saint-Victor unavailable, Cadoudal could think of no one better to complete the delicate mission: Dressed like a woman, she could travel anywhere in France undisturbed, and if she traveled by carriage, she could carry considerable sums of money. He consulted the wounded man, who agreed with him completely. Diana was summoned to the general’s bedside, where he laid out his plan. He wanted her to establish contact, by using letters from Cadoudal and Coster Saint-Victor, with the Companions of Jehu, then return to him with the money that was now more necessary than ever, what with hostilities about to break out even more fiercely than before.

“Diana’s heart leaped with joy as he spoke, but not a flicker of emotion on her face betrayed what was happening in her heart. ‘Although the task will be difficult,’ she said, ‘I ask for nothing more than the opportunity to complete it. In addition to letters from the general and Monsieur Coster Saint-Victor, however, I shall need all the topographical information, as well as all the watchwords and passwords, necessary for reaching the secret site of their meetings.’

“Coster Saint-Victor gave her everything she needed. She left with a smile on her face and vengeance in her heart.”




XVII The Ceyzériat Caves (#ulink_5ed7c16a-e670-5f7d-a7b4-e94ea24f39e7)







“BARRAS NOW BEING totally powerless, Diana did not even think of going to him when she arrived in Paris. Instead, she asked for an audience with First Consul Bonaparte.

“It was two or three days after Roland had returned from his mission to Cadoudal. We know how little attention Roland paid to women, and he walked right past Diana without even wondering who she was.

“She said in her request for an audience that she had a means to catch the Companions of Jehu and that she would share it once certain conditions, which she wanted to discuss with the First Consul himself, were met.

“Bonaparte hated women who were involved in politics. Fearing that he was dealing with some adventuress, he sent her letter to Fouché and asked him to see what Mademoiselle de Fargas was like.”

Hector paused for a moment to ask, “Do you know Fouché, mademoiselle?”

“No, monsieur,” Claire answered.

“He represents supreme ugliness. Porcelain eyes that cross, thin yellow hair, ashen skin, a snub nose, a crooked mouth filled with ugly teeth, a receding chin, and a beard of the reddish sort that makes his face look dirty—that’s Fouché for you.

“Beauty has a natural abhorrence for ugliness. So, when Fouché came to see Mademoiselle de Fargas—his air both servile and insolent, beneath which one could spot the former seminarian’s false humility—the lovely Diana’s every moral and physical sense revolted.

“The Minister of the Police had been announced, and that title, which opens all doors, also opened Diana’s, until she saw the hideous creature. She pulled back on her sofa and did not even ask Fouché to sit down.

“He chose an armchair nonetheless, and with Diana staring at him, making no attempt to hide her revulsion, he said, ‘Well, my little woman, we have revelations to make to the police and a deal to propose?’

“Diana looked around with such great surprise that the skillful magistrate assumed immediately that he was right. ‘What are you looking for?’ he asked.

“‘I’m trying to determine to whom you might be speaking, monsieur.’

“‘To you, mademoiselle,’ said Fouché insolently.

“‘Then you are quite mistaken, monsieur,’ she said. ‘I am not a little woman. I am an important woman, daughter of the Comte de Fargas, murdered in Avignon, and the sister of the Vicomte de Fargas, murdered in Bourg. I did not come to make a revelation to the police or to arrange any kind of deal with them. I leave that to those who have the misfortune of being its employees or at its head. I have come to demand justice, and as I doubt,’ she said, getting to her feet, ‘that you have any relationship with that chaste goddess, I would be much obliged to you if you would kindly realize that you came to the wrong door when you came here.’

“When Fouché failed to move from his armchair, either out of stupefaction or insolence, she left him sitting there and returned to her bedroom. She locked the door.

“Two hours later, Roland de Montrevel, sent by the First Consul, arrived and escorted her to Bonaparte’s quarters. Having led her to the meeting room with every consideration due a woman, as his distinguished education, supervised by his mother, had taught him, he withdrew to tell Bonaparte she had arrived.

“A few minutes later Bonaparte entered. ‘Well,’ he said, as he responded to Diana’s bow with a benevolent nod, ‘apparently that oaf Fouché thinks he is still dealing with his typical low-class women. That he treated you quite inappropriately, please forgive him. What else can you expect from someone who was a homework supervisor for Oratorians?’

“‘From him, Citizen First Consul, I could not have expected anything better, but I would have expected a different messenger from you.’

“‘You are quite right,’ said Bonaparte. ‘And you have taught us two good lessons in the process. But now here I am. Apparently you have something interesting to tell me. Speak.’

“‘As you are apparently unable to listen without pacing about, and since I do need you to listen to me, shall we walk together?’

“‘As you please,’ said Bonaparte. ‘One thing I dislike when I give audience to women is that they never walk.’

“‘Perhaps. But when a woman serves as Cadoudal’s aide-de-camp for two years, she gets used to walking.’

“‘You have been Cadoudal’s aide-de-camp for two years?’

“‘Yes.’

“‘How is it possible, then, that Roland, my own aide-de-camp, knows you neither by sight or by name?’

“‘For the reason that in Brittany I was known only by the name of Portia; and because when he was with Cadoudal, I was always careful to keep my distance.’

“‘Ah, you’re the one who stabbed herself in the arm to gain acceptance among the ranks of the Chouans?’

“‘Here’s the scar,’ said Diana, pulling up her sleeve.

“Glancing at her lovely arm, Bonaparte seemed to notice only the scar. ‘A strange wound,’ he said.

“‘The dagger that caused it is stranger still,’ said Diana. ‘As you see.’ And she showed the First Consul the dagger, made entirely of metal, that was borne by the Companions of Jehu.

“Bonaparte carefully examined the unique design as he considered the damage, surely dreadful, its blade might inflict. ‘And how did you come by this dagger?’ he asked.

“‘I pulled it from my brother’s chest. It had been planted in his heart.’

“‘Tell me about it, but quickly, because my time is precious.’

“‘No more precious than the time of a woman who’s been waiting two years for her vengeance.’

“‘Are you Corsican?’

“‘No, but I am speaking to a Corsican, and he will surely understand me.’

“‘What do you want?”

“‘I seek the lives of those who took my brother’s life.’

“‘Who are they?’

“‘I told you in my letter. The Companions of Jehu.’

“‘And you even added that you knew a way to capture them.’

“‘I have their passwords and two letters, one from Cadoudal and one from Coster Saint-Victor, for Morgan, the Companions’ leader.’

“‘You are sure you can arrange their capture?’

“‘I am sure, provided that I can work with a brave, intelligent man such as Monsieur Roland de Montrevel and that we have a sufficient number of soldiers.’

“‘And you said that you would set some conditions. What are they?’

“‘First of all, that they not be granted pardon.’

“‘I never pardon thieves and assassins.’

“‘And also, that I be allowed to complete the mission entrusted to me.’

“‘What mission?’

“‘I am on my way to collect the money for Cadoudal. It’s a mission for which he had to reveal his secrets to me.’

“‘You are asking for the freedom to do with the money as you wish?’

“‘Ah, Citizen First Consul,’ Mademoiselle de Fargas said, ‘such words could ruin forever the good impression that I would otherwise have of our conversation.’

“‘Then what in the devil do you want to do with the money?’

“‘I want to be sure it reaches its destination.’

“‘You are asking me to allow you to deliver money to the very men who are making war on me? Never!’

“‘Well, then, General, please allow me to leave. There is nothing to keep us any longer.’

“‘Oh, what a hard head!’ said Bonaparte.

“‘You should say “what a hard heart,” General.’

“‘What does that mean?’

“‘That it is not the head that refuses shameful proposals, but rather the heart.’

“‘But I cannot furnish weapons to my enemies.’

“‘Do you have complete confidence in Monsieur Roland de Montrevel?’

“‘Yes.’

“‘Do you know that he will do nothing contrary to your honor and to the interests of France?’

“‘I am sure.’

“‘Well, then. Entrust this undertaking to him. I shall arrange with him the means to ensure its success and the conditions on which I shall lend a hand.’

“‘So be it,’ said Bonaparte.

“Then, as rapid as usual when making decisions, he immediately called to Roland, who had remained just outside the door. ‘Roland,’ he said as soon as the aide-de-camp had entered, ‘I’m giving you full authority. You will work together with Mademoiselle de Fargas, and whatever the cost, you will get rid of these highway gentlemen who, all the while that they are stopping and robbing stagecoaches, put on such grand aristocratic airs.’

“Then, with a slight bow to Diana de Fargas, he said, ‘Don’t forget. If you succeed, it will be a great pleasure to see you again.’

“‘And if I fail?’

“‘I never recognize those who fail.’ With those words he strode out and left Diana alone with Roland.

“Despite Roland’s distaste for any operation involving a woman, he found Diana de Fargas to be so far from the typical that he treated her as a good, loyal companion. She was as pleased by his familiarity as she had been put off by Fouché’s insolence. Everything was fixed in less than an hour, and they agreed to set out that very evening, on separate roads, for Bourg-en-Bresse, their headquarters.

“You can be sure, with all the information she had, including the watchwords and passwords, along with letters from Cadoudal and Coster Saint-Victor, Diana de Fargas easily gained entry to the Seillon monastery, where the four leaders were meeting. She was dressed once again like a Chouan and was using the name Portia.

“Nobody had the slightest suspicion, not that the messenger was a woman, because even the clothes of a man could not conceal that Diana was a woman, but that she was Mademoiselle de Fargas, the sister of the man they had killed in punishment for his betrayal.

“Since the total amount Cadoudal was asking for, one hundred thousand francs, was not readily available in the abbey, they arranged to meet Diana at midnight in the Ceyzériat caves, where they would give her the forty thousand still wanting.

“The first thing Roland did when Diana had told him about the arrangements was to summon the captain of the gendarmerie and the colonel of the dragoons garrisoned in the town. When they arrived, he showed them the papers giving him full authority.

“He found the colonel to be a passive instrument ready to put himself, with the number of men required, at Roland’s disposal. On the other hand, the captain of the gendarmerie was an old soldier full of rancor toward the Companions of Jehu, who, as he himself said, for the past three years could not stop causing trouble for him. Ten different times he had seen them, talked to them, and pursued them. Every time, either because of their better horses, tricks, skills, or strategy, the old soldier had ruefully to admit, they had escaped.

“Once, at a moment when they expected it least, the captain had happened upon them in the Seillon forest. The brigands had bravely engaged in combat, killed three of the gendarmerie men and then withdrawn, carrying off with them two of their own wounded. So he had come to despair of ever getting the better of Morgan and his men. Now he wanted one thing only: not to be forced by government orders to have to deal with them. And here was Roland, come to drag him out of his pleasant rest, to disturb him in his tranquility, or rather in the apathy into which he had settled.

“But as soon as Roland had pronounced the Ceyzériat caves as the place the leaders of the Companions said they would meet Diana, the old officer sat thoughtfully for a moment, then removed the three-cornered hat from his head as if it were impeding his thought process, laid it on the table, and said, blinking as he spoke, ‘Wait a moment … wait a moment! The Ceyzériat caves, the Ceyzériat caves … we’ve got them.’ And he placed his hat back on his head.

“The colonel broke into a smile. ‘He’s got them!’ he said.

“Roland and Diana looked doubtfully at each other. They had less confidence in the old captain than did the colonel.

“‘Let’s hear what you have to say,’ said Roland.

“‘When the demagogues tried to demolish the church in Brou,’ said the old captain, ‘I came up with an idea.’

“‘I’m not at all surprised,’ said Roland.

“‘It was a way to save not only our church but also the magnificent tombs inside.’

“‘By doing what?’

“‘By turning the church into a storeroom for fodder for the cavalry.’

“‘I understand,’ said Roland. ‘Hay saved the marble. You are quite right, my friend, that was a great idea.’

“‘So they turned the church over to me. And then I decided to visit it inside and out.’

“‘We’re listening religiously, Captain.’

“‘Well, at one end of the crypt I discovered a small door opening onto a tunnel. After I walked about a quarter of a league, I found the tunnel was blocked by a gate, but on the other side were the Ceyzériat caves.’

“‘I’ll be damned,’ said Roland. ‘I’m beginning to see what you mean.’

“‘Well, not me,’ said the colonel of dragoons.

“‘And yet it’s quite obvious,’ said Mademoiselle de Fargas.

“‘Explain things to the colonel, Diana,’ said Roland, ‘and show him you did not waste your time while you were Cadoudal’s aide-de-camp for two years.’

“‘Yes, please explain,’ said the colonel, spreading his legs apart, leaning on his sword, opening wide his eyes, and blinking, as he looked up.

“‘Well,’ said Mademoiselle de Fargas, ‘with ten or fifteen men the captain will enter through the church in Brou and guard that entrance to the tunnel, whereas we will attack the outside entrance with twenty men or so. The Companions of Jehu will then attempt to escape by the other entrance which, they believe, is known only to them. There they will find the captain and his men. That’s it, they’re caught in the crossfire.’

“‘Exactly,’ said the captain, astonished that a mere woman could have come up with such a plan.

“‘How stupid of me!’ said the colonel in disgust. Roland nodded his agreement.

“Then he turned toward the captain. ‘However, Captain, it is important for you to be at the church entrance ahead of time. The Companions don’t go to the caves before nightfall, and they use only the outside entrance, of course. I shall go in with Mademoiselle de Fargas, and we shall be disguised as Chouans. I shall get the forty thousand francs. As we’re leaving, thanks to the password that will let me approach the two sentinels, I shall silence them with my knife. We shall hide the forty thousand francs or entrust them to a gendarme. Then we shall turn around, go back into the caves, and attack the Companions. When they realize there’s a surprise attack, they will try to escape, but at the gate they will find their way blocked by the captain and his gendarmes. They will either have to surrender or be killed, from the first to the last man.’

“‘I’ll be at my post this morning before daybreak,’ said the captain. ‘I’ll take along enough food for the entire day. And battle tonight!’ He drew his sword and struck the wall several times. Then he returned the sword to its sheath.

“Roland allowed the old soldier some time for his heroic gestures, and when the soldier had calmed down, he slapped him on the shoulder. ‘There will be no changes to our plans. At midnight, Mademoiselle de Fargas and I shall enter the caves to get our money, and a quarter of an hour later, with the first gunshot you hear, there will be battle, as you say, my good captain.’

“‘Battle!’ the colonel of dragoons echoed.

“Once more Roland went over what they had agreed upon so that everyone knew exactly what to do. Then he took leave of the two officers, the captain of the gendarmerie, whom he would see only in the caves, and the colonel of dragoons, whom he would not see until two thirty.

“Everything happened the way it had been arranged. Diana de Fargas and Roland, using the identities and costumes of Bruyère and Branched’Or, entered the Ceyzériat caves after exchanging the watchwords with the two sentinels, one at the base of the mountain and the other at the cave entrance.

“Inside, they learned something disappointing: Morgan had had to leave. Montbar and the two other leaders, d’Assas and Adler, were governing in his absence. They suspected nothing and handed the forty thousand francs over to Diana and Roland.

“It was clear that the Companions were planning to bivouac that night in the caves. But without their chief leader. So no matter how successfully Roland and Diana accomplished their mission, their victory would be incomplete if they were unable to take Morgan along with the others.

“Might Morgan come back during the night? If he were to, when? With their plans already set in motion, Roland and Diana decided to proceed, as it would be better to capture three leaders than to let four of them escape. Further, unless Morgan left the country, it would be easier to take him alone rather than with three other leaders and their band. Once Morgan realized how isolated he was, perhaps he would surrender.

“Thanks to the watchwords, Roland was able to again approach the sentinel at the cave’s entrance without arousing suspicion. After a brief exchange, the sentinel collapsed and fell facedown on the ground. Roland had knifed him. The second fell like the first, without a cry.

“Then, on hearing the agreed-upon signal, the colonel appeared with his twenty dragoons. Though not an intelligent man, the colonel was a veteran soldier as brave as his sword, which he had drawn as he advanced at the head of his men. Roland joined him on his right, Diana on his left.

“They had not taken more than ten steps into the cave when two gunshots rang out. The fire came from one of the stagecoach thieves who, sent by Montbar to Ceyzériat village, had just then happened upon Roland’s dragoons. One of the shots went wild; the other broke a man’s arm.

“‘To arms!’ someone shouted; and a man rushed into one of the twenty or thirty rooms on either side of the main tunnel where torches flickered on the walls; his rifle was still smoking. ‘To arms!’ he shouted. ‘To arms! It’s the dragoons!’

“‘I’ll take command,’ cried Montbar. ‘Put out all the lights! Retreat toward the church!’

“They all promptly obeyed; they understood the danger. Hard on the heels of Montbar, who knew the tunnel’s every twist and turn, they followed him deeper and deeper into the caves.

“Suddenly, Montbar thought he heard, some forty yards ahead, someone whisper an order—and then the sound of guns being cocked. ‘Halt!’ he said, his voice tense, his hand raised.

“‘Fire!’ ordered a voice up ahead.

“‘Facedown!’ shouted Montbar.

“Scarcely had they dropped to the floor than the tunnel was lit by a terrible explosion. All those who’d had the time to obey Montbar’s order heard the bullets whistle over their heads. Among those who had not, two or three collapsed. In the light of the explosion, brief though it was, Montbar and his companions recognized the uniform of the gendarmes.

“‘Fire!’ Montbar shouted in turn.

“Twelve or fifteen shots rang out, and once again the dark vault grew bright. Three of the Companions of Jehu lay stretched out on the ground.

“‘Our escape has been cut off,’ said Montbar. ‘We must go back. Our only chance, if we have one, is through the forest.’

“As Montbar and his companions, at a run, started back, a second volley from the gendarmes shook the tunnel. A couple of sighs and the sound of a body hitting the ground evidenced that it had not been without effect.

“‘Forward, my friends!’ Montbar cried. ‘Let’s sell our lives for what they’re worth, as dearly as possible.’

“‘Forward!’ his companions repeated.

“But as they moved forward, Montbar was worried by the smell of smoke. ‘I think those scoundrels are trying to smoke us out,’ he said.

“‘I’m afraid so,’ Adler agreed.

“‘They must think they’re dealing with foxes.’

“‘When they see our claws, they’ll know we are lions.’

“The more they advanced, the thicker the smoke rose, and the brighter grew the glow. They made the final turn. About fifty paces from the opening to the cave, a large fire, set more for its light than for smoke, was burning. In the light of the fire, they could see the dragoons’ guns and swords gleaming.

“‘And now we shall die,’ cried Montbar. ‘But first let us kill!’

“He was the first to leap into the circle of light, shooting from both barrels of his shotgun into the dragoons. Then, the emptied shotgun tossed aside, he pulled his pistols from his belt and, lowering his head, rushed toward the dragoons.”

“I won’t even try,” said the young count to Claire, “to tell you everything that happened then. It was a horrible battle, the swearing and cursing and shouting like the skies rumbling, the pistol shots like bolts of lightning. And when the pistols had been all discharged, they turned to the daggers.

“The gendarmes joined the battle, wielding their weapons in the dense, smoky red air, stumbling, falling, getting back up, falling once more. You could hear roars of rage and cries of agony. And sometimes a man’s last gasp.

“The killing lasted about a quarter of an hour, maybe twenty minutes. At the end, twenty-two bodies lay dead in the Ceyzériat caves. Thirteen of them were dragoons or gendarmes; nine were Companions of Jehu.

“Overwhelmed by numbers, only five Companions had survived. They had been taken alive, and Mademoiselle de Fargas regarded them as might the ancients’ Nemesis, while the gendarmes and dragoons, swords in hand, surrounded them.

“The old captain’s arm was broken, and the colonel had been shot in the thigh. Roland, covered with the blood of his opponents, had not sustained even a scratch.

“Torches were lit, and they all started back toward town. Two of the prisoners had to be carried on stretchers because they were unable to walk.

“As the weary procession was reaching the highway, a horse came galloping toward them. Roland stopped. ‘Keep moving,’ he said. ‘I’ll stay to see who this is.’

“When the horseman was about twenty paces away, Roland called out, ‘Who’s there?’

“‘One more prisoner, monsieur,’ the horseman answered. ‘I was not able to be present for the battle, so I insist on being present at the scaffold! Where are my friends?’

“‘Here, monsieur,’ said Roland.

“‘Please excuse me, monsieur,’ Morgan said. ‘I would like to claim my rightful place with my three friends, the Vicomte de Jahiat, the Comte de Valensolles, and the Marquis de Ribier.… I am the Comte Charles de Sainte-Hermine.’

“The three prisoners cried out in admiration. Diana cried out in joy. She now had all her prey; not one of the four leaders had escaped.

“The same night, according to the promise Roland had made to Diana and she to Cadoudal, the one hundred thousand francs from the Companions of Jehu left for Brittany.

“Now that the Companions of Jehu were in the hands of justice, Roland’s mission was completed. He came back to his post with the First Consul, then left for Brittany, where in vain he tried to persuade Cadoudal to join the Republican cause, returned to Paris, and accompanied the First Consul on his Italian campaign, in which he was killed at Marengo.

“As for Diana de Fargas, she was too caught up in her hatred and too thirsty for vengeance not to savor it until the bitter end. The trial would soon get under way, come to its conclusion, and end with a quadruple execution that she would most assuredly not miss.

“In Besançon I was alerted that my brother had been arrested, and I hurried to Bourg-en-Bresse where the jury would be meeting. The investigation began. There were six prisoners in all, the five who had been taken in the caves and the one who had joined them voluntarily. Two were so seriously wounded that within a week of their arrest they died from their injuries.

“At first the four remaining Companions were to be judged by a military tribunal and condemned to the firing squad, but the law intervened, declaring that political crimes would now be tried by civil courts. Thus the sentence would be the scaffold. The guillotine is ignominious; the firing squad is not. In a military court, the prisoners would have admitted everything; in the civil court, they denied all.

“Arrested under the names d’Assas, Adler, Montbar, and Morgan, they declared that they did not recognize those names. They said they were: Louis-André de Jahiat, born in Bâgé-le-Châtel in the Ain, twenty-seven years of age; Raoul-Frédéric-Auguste de Valensolles, born in Sainte-Colombe in the Rhône, twenty-nine years of age; Pierre-Auguste de Ribier, born in Bollène in the Vaucluse, twenty-six years of age; and Charles de Sainte-Hermine, born in Besançon in the Doubs, twenty-four years of age.”




XVIII Charles de Sainte-Hermine [2] (#ulink_c94aab41-4b7d-58e2-840c-c6c97d2585bf)







“THE PRISONERS ADMITTED they belonged to a group that had joined Monsieur de Teyssonnet, who was gathering an army in the Auvergne mountains. But they categorically denied that they had ever had the slightest connection with the stagecoach thieves named d’Assas, Adler, Montbar, and Morgan. They could make such brazen declarations because the stagecoaches had always been robbed by masked men. In only one case had the face of one of the leaders ever been seen, and that was my brother’s face.

“When they attacked the stagecoach running between Lyon and Vienne, a boy of about ten or twelve, who was in the cabriolet with the coachman, picked up the coachman’s pistol and shot at the Companions of Jehu. But the coachman, having foreseen just such a situation, had been careful not to load any bullets in his pistols. The boy’s mother, unaware of the coachman’s precaution, was so afraid for her son that she had fainted. My brother immediately tried to help her—he gave her some salts to breathe and tried to calm her shaken nerves—but as she thrashed about, she inadvertently knocked off Morgan’s mask and had been able to see Sainte-Hermine’s face.

“Throughout the trial, the public had great sympathy for the accused men. Each man’s alibi was proven by letters and witnesses, and the woman who had seen the bandit Morgan’s face declared that he was not among the four accused men. Furthermore, nobody had been harmed by their attacks, and nothing was taken but the treasure, and no one cared much about the treasure since there was no way of knowing who it belonged to really.

“The four men were about to be acquitted, when the president, turning unexpectedly to the woman who had fainted, asked, ‘Madame, would you be so good as to tell the court which of these gentlemen was gallant enough to provide the help you needed when you felt faint?’ The woman, caught unawares by the question, perhaps thought that while she was absent the four accused had admitted who they were. Or maybe she thought it a ploy to attract more sympathy for the accused men. Whatever she thought, she pointed to my brother and said, ‘Monsieur le Président, it was Monsieur le Comte de Sainte-Hermine.’

“Thus, the four accused men, all of them protected by the same indivisible alibi, were all of them brought down together and delivered to the hand of the executioner. ‘By Jove, Capitaine,’ said de Jahiat, stressing the word ‘captain,’ ‘that will teach you what being gallant is all about.’

“One cry of joy arose in the courtroom. Diana de Fargas was triumphant.

“‘Madame’—my brother bowed to the woman who had identified him—‘you have just caused four heads to fall with one single blow.’ Realizing what she had done, the woman fell to her knees and begged for forgiveness. But it was too late!

“I was in the audience that day, and felt about to faint myself. I also felt undying love for my brother.

“On that very day, the four condemned men were sentenced to death.

“Three of them refused to appeal. The fourth, Jahiat, resolutely did not. He told his companions he had a plan; and so they’d not attribute the delay he’d requested to any fear of dying, he explained that he was in the process of seducing the jailer’s daughter and that he hoped, with her, to find a way of escaping during the six or eight weeks the appeal would take. The three others, no longer objecting, joined with Jahiat and signed the papers requesting an appeal.

“Once they had latched on to the idea of escape, the four young souls clung to the possibility of life. It was not that they feared death, but death on the scaffold held no appeal as it lacked honor and conferred no prestige. So they encouraged Jahiat on their behalf to pursue his work of seduction, and in the meantime they tried to enjoy what was left of life as much as they could.

“The appeal did not offer much hope. For the First Consul had declared clearly his intention to crush all those bands of Royalist sympathizers until he had wiped them out completely.

“I myself exhausted all possible steps and every prayer to reach my brother. It was impossible.

“The accused men were ideal, I must say, as objects for everyone’s sympathies. They were young and handsome; they dressed in the latest fashion. They were confident without being haughty: all smiles with the public and polite with their judges, although they did sometimes make fun about what was happening. Not to mention that they belonged to some of the most important families of the province.

“The four accused men, the oldest of them not yet thirty, who had defended themselves against the guillotine but not against the firing squad, who had admitted they might deserve death but who asked to die as soldiers, composed an attractive tableau of youth, courage, and magnanimity.

“As everyone expected, their appeal was denied.

“Jahiat had managed to win the love of Charlotte, the jailer’s daughter, but the lovely girl’s influence over her father was not so great that she could arrange a means for the prisoners to escape. Not that Comptois, the chief jailer, didn’t pity the young men. He was a good man, a Royalist at heart, but, above all, an honest man. He would have given his right arm to prevent the misfortune befalling his four prisoners, but he refused sixty thousand francs to help them escape.

“Three gunshots fired outside the prison conveyed the news to the condemned men that their sentence had been upheld. That night, Charlotte brought each of the prisoners a pair of loaded pistols and a dagger; it was all the poor girl was able to do.

“The three gunshots and the imminent execution of the four condemned but admired young men alarmed the commissioner, and he requested the largest group of armed men that could be mustered. At six in the morning, as the scaffold was being constructed in the Place du Bastion, sixty horsemen stood ready for battle just outside the gate to the prison courtyard. Behind them, more than a thousand people were amassing in the square.

“The execution was set for seven o’clock. At six, the jailers entered the condemned men’s cells. The evening before, they had left their prisoners in shackles and without weapons. Only now they stood free of their shackles, and they were armed to the teeth. Their suspenders were crossed over their bared chests, their wide belts bristled with weapons.

“When it was least expected, the crowd heard what sounded like fighting. Then they saw the four condemned men burst forth from the prison. The crowd cried out as one—in awe, in fear—for surely something terrible was about to happen, these four prisoners looking like gladiators entering the ring.

“I managed to push my way to the front row. I saw them cross the courtyard. They saw that the enormous gate was closed and that on the other side of it, in an unbreakable line, gendarmes were standing motionless with their rifles at their knees.

“The four men stopped, put their heads together; seemed to confer for a moment.

“Then Valensolles, the oldest, strode up to the gate, and with a gracious smile and noble bow, he greeted the horsemen: ‘Very well, gentlemen of the Gendarmerie.’ Then, turning toward his three companions, he said: ‘Adieu, my friends.’ And then he blew his brains out. His body did three pirouettes, and he fell facedown to the ground.

“Next, Jahiat left his companions and walked over to the gate, where he cocked his own two pistols and pointed them toward the gendarmes. He did not shoot, but five or six gendarmes, thinking they were in danger, lowered their rifles and fired. Two bullets pierced Jahiat’s body. ‘Thank you, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘Thanks to you I can die like a soldier.’ And he collapsed onto Valensolles’s body.

“In the meantime, Ribier had seemed to be trying to determine how he in his turn would die. Finally, he appeared to have come to a decision.

“He eyed a column in the courtyard. Ribier walked straight over to it, pulled the dagger from his belt, placed the point against the left side of his chest and set the handle against the column. Then he took the column in his arms, and after he’d saluted the spectators and his friends one last time, with his arms he squeezed the column until the dagger’s blade had completely disappeared into his breast. For a moment he remained standing. Soon, though, his face turned ghastly pale, and his arms loosened their hold on the pillar. His knees buckled. He fell, dead.

“The crowd stood mute, frozen in terror at the same time it was rapt in admiration. Everyone understood that these heroic men were willing to die, but that like ancient Roman gladiators, they wanted to die honorably.

“My brother was the last of them. As he surveyed the crowd he caught sight of me. He put his finger to his mouth, and I realized that he was asking me to stay strong and keep quiet. I nodded, but in spite of myself tears coursed down my cheeks. He motioned that he wished to speak. Everyone grew silent.

“When you witness a spectacle of that kind, you are as eager to hear words as to see action, for words help to explain actions. Still, what more could the crowd ask for? They had been promised four heads, all four falling uniformly and monotonously in the same manner. Instead, they were now being given four different deaths, each one more inventive, dramatic, and unexpected than the one before. The crowd knew that this last hero planned to die in a way at least as original as the other three.

“Charles held neither pistol nor dagger in his hands, though his belt held both. He walked around Valensolles’s body, then stood between the bodies of the other two, Jahiat and Ribier. Like an actor in a theater, he bowed grandly and smiled at the spectators.

“The crowd erupted in applause. Eager as everyone was to see what was coming, not a single person among them, I dare say, would not have given a portion of his own life to save the life of the last Companion of Jehu.

“‘Gentlemen,’ said Charles, and God only knows the anguish I felt as I listened to him, ‘you have come to see us die, and you have already seen three of us fall. Now it is my turn. I ask nothing better than to satisfy your curiosity, but I’ve come to propose a deal.’

“‘Speak! Speak!’ people shouted from all sides. ‘Whatever you ask will be granted.’

“‘All but your life!’ cried a woman’s voice—the same voice that had expressed triumph and joy at the sentencing.

“‘All but my life, of course,’ my brother repeated. ‘You saw my friend Valensolles blow out his brains, you saw my friend Jahiat get shot, you saw my friend Ribier stab himself, and you would like to see me die on the guillotine. I can understand that.’ His calm demeanor and sardonic words, spoken with no emotion, sent a shiver through the crowd.

“‘Well,’ Charles went on, ‘like a good sport I would like to die at your pleasure as much as at my own. I am prepared to have my head fall, but I wish to walk to the scaffold on my own, as if I were going to a meal or a ball, and, as an absolute condition, without anyone touching me. If anyone comes near’—he pointed to the two pistols in his belt—’I shall kill him. Except for this man,’ Charles continued, looking over to the executioner. ‘This business is between him and me, and proper procedures need to be followed.’

“The crowd seemed to accept the condition, for on all sides people shouted: ‘Yes! Yes! Yes!’

“‘Do you hear?’ Charles addressed the officer of the gendarmerie. ‘Indulge me, Captain, and things will be fine.’

“The officer wanted nothing better than to make some concessions. ‘If I leave your hands and feet free,’ he said, ‘do you promise to attempt no escape?’

“‘I give you my word of honor,’ said Charles.

“‘Well, then,’ said the officer. ‘Move aside and let us carry off the bodies of your companions.’

“‘Yes, that’s only right,’ said Charles. Then, turning toward the crowd, he noted: “You see, it’s not my fault. I am not the cause of the delay; rather, these gentlemen are.’ He gestured toward the executioner and his two helpers loading the bodies on a cart.

“Ribier was not yet dead. He opened his eyes, as if he were looking for someone. Charles took his hand. ‘Here I am, good friend,’ he said. ‘Rest assured, I am joining you!’ Ribier’s eyes closed again; and his lips moved, but no sound came from them, only a reddish foam.

“‘Monsieur de Sainte-Hermine,’ said the brigadier when the three bodies had been removed. ‘Are you ready?’

“‘I await you, monsieur,’ Charles answered, bowing with exquisite politeness.

“‘In that case, please step forward.’ Charles moved to the middle of the gendarmes.

“‘Would you prefer to go by carriage?’ said the officer.

“‘By foot, monsieur. By foot. I want these people to know that I myself am allowing this extravaganza at the guillotine. Were I in a vehicle, people might think that fear kept me from walking.’

“The guillotine had been set up on the Place du Bastion. They crossed the Place des Lices, which takes its name from the carousel that stood there in older times, and then walked along the walls beside the gardens of the Hôtel Monbazon. The cart came first, then a detachment of ten dragoons. Then the condemned man, who now and then glanced over at me. Then, about ten paces behind, the gendarmes, led by their captain.

“At the end of the garden wall, the cortege turned to the left. And suddenly, through the opening between the garden and the grand hall, my brother caught a glimpse of the scaffold—and I could feel my own knees buckle. ‘Bah!’ he said. ‘I had never seen a guillotine. I did not realize they were so ugly.’

“Then, as quickly as a passing thought, he pulled the dagger from his belt and plunged it to the hilt into his chest.

“The captain spurred his horse and reached out to stop him, while the Comte pulled one of the double-barreled pistols from his belt and cocked it, saying: ‘Stop! We agreed that nobody would touch me. I will die alone, or three of us will die together. The choice is yours.’

“The captain stopped his horse and pulled it back.

“‘Let’s keep walking,’ said my brother.

“With my eyes fixed on my beloved brother and my ears straining to hear his every word as my mind recorded every gesture, I remembered again what Charles had written to Cadoudal: how he had refused to allow me to learn my military career at Cadoudal’s side; hoe he’d said that he was keeping me in reserve so that I could avenge his death and continue his work. I kept swearing under my breath that I would do what he expected of me, and from time to time a glance from him strengthened my resolve.

“In the meantime, he kept walking, blood dripping from his wound.

“When he reached the foot of the scaffold, Charles pulled the dagger from the wound and stabbed himself a second time. Still he remained standing. ‘Truly,’ he raged, ‘my soul must be firmly set in my body.’

“The helpers waiting on the scaffold removed the bodies of Valensolles, Jahiat, and Ribier from the cart. At the guillotine the heads of the first two, already corpses, fell without a single drop of blood. Ribier, though, let out a groan, and when his head was cut off, blood gushed out. The crowd shivered.

“Then it was my brother’s turn. As he waited he had kept his eyes on me almost constantly, even when the executioner’s assistants tried to pull him up onto the scaffold, and he said: ‘Don’t touch me. That was our agreement.’

“He climbed the six steps without stumbling. When he reached the platform, he pulled the dagger from his chest and stabbed himself a third time. He let out a horrible laugh that came accompanied by spurts of blood from all three wounds. ‘Well, that’s it,’ he said to the executioner. ‘That should be enough. Manage as best you can.’

“Then, turning to me, he cried, ‘Do you remember, Hector?’

“‘Yes, my brother,’ I answered.

“With no help, he lay down on the deadly plank. ‘There,’ he said to the executioner. ‘Is this acceptable?’

“The falling blade was the answer. But, filled with that implacable vitality that had kept my brother from dying at his own hand, his head, instead of falling into the basket with the others, bounced over its rim, rolled along the platform, and dropped to the ground.

“I burst through the row of soldiers restraining the crowd from the open space between them and the scaffold. As quickly as I could, before anyone could stop me, I picked up that dearly beloved head in my two hands and kissed it.

“His eyes opened and his lips moved beneath my own—Oh! I swear to God, his head recognized me. ‘Yes, yes, yes!’ I said. ‘You can be sure that I will obey you.’

“The soldiers had made a movement to stop me, but several voices had shouted out: ‘It’s his brother!’ And all the soldiers stayed where they were.”




XIX The End of Hector’s Story (#ulink_f48dd217-4094-5b5c-9e2e-a32f0961c04d)







HECTOR HAD NOW BEEN speaking for two hours. Claire was weeping so profusely that he wasn’t sure he should continue. He paused. The tears pearling in his eyes showed what he was thinking.

“Oh, please go on! Go on!” she said.

“It would be according me a great favor,” he said, “for I have not yet said anything about myself.”

Claire reached out her hand to him. “How you have suffered,” she murmured.

“Wait,” he said, “and you will see that you are just the person to make me forget it all.”

“I didn’t know Valensolles, Jahiat, and Ribier very well, only by sight. But through their association with my brother, who had joined them in death, they were my friends. I gave them all a proper burial. Then I returned to Besançon. I put our family affairs in order and began to wait. What was I waiting for? I didn’t know what, only that it was something on which my fate would depend. I didn’t think it necessary that I go looking for it, but I felt compelled to be ready whenever it should come.

“One morning, the Chevalier de Mahalin was announced. I did not recognize the name, and yet in my heart a painful chord began to vibrate as if it bore for me a strange familiarity. The man behind the name was young, twenty-five or twenty-six, perfectly attired, and irreproachably polite.

“‘Monsieur le Comte,’ he said, ‘you know that the Company of Jehu, so painfully smitten by the loss of its four leaders, and especially your brother, is beginning to reform. Its leader is the famous Laurent, though beneath that ordinary name hides one of the most aristocratic family names of the South. Our captain is reserving an important place in his army for you, and he has sent me to ask if you would like, by joining us, to keep the promise given by your brother.’

“‘Monsieur le Chevalier,’ I answered, ‘I would be lying if I told you that I have much enthusiasm for the life of a wandering cavalier, but as I did promise my brother, and as my brother promised me to your cause, I am ready.’

“‘Shall I tell you, then, where we are meeting?’ asked the Chevalier de Mahalin. ‘Or are you coming now with me?’

“‘I am coming now with you, monsieur.’

“I had a trusty servant named Saint-Bris. He had served my brother too, and I installed him in our house and left him master of it all, making him really more my steward than my servant. That done, I gathered up my weapons, climbed on my horse, and rode off.

“We were to meet Laurent somewhere between Vizille and Grenoble. In two days’ time, we were there.

“Laurent, our chief, was truly worthy of his reputation. He was like one of those men to whose baptism fairies are invited, and each one blesses him with a virtuous quality, but there’s always one fairy who’s been overlooked and he arrives to burthen the infant with the one defect that counterbalances all of his virtues. Laurent had been endowed with that beauty typical of the South and typically masculine: brilliant eyes, lustrous dark hair, and a thick dark beard, his fiercely handsome face tempered by a charming blend of kindness, strength, and affability. Left on his own when he was scarcely beyond his tumultuous youth, he lacked a solid formal education, but he was worldly-wise, and he possessed a nobleman’s grace and politesse, as well as a charismatic quality that naturally attracted people to his fold. But he was also unusually violent and quick-tempered. As much as his gentleman’s education normally kept him within acceptable boundaries, he would still frequently, suddenly, explode; and an angry Laurent, the imperfect Laurent, appeared to be no longer of humankind. And the rumor would spread, wherever he happened to be: ‘Laurent is angry; men will die.’

“Justice was as concerned about Laurent’s band as it had been about Saint-Hermine’s group. Large forces were deployed. Laurent and seventy-one of his men were captured and sent to Yssingeaux in the Haute-Loire to answer for their actions before a special court convened expressly for their trial.

“But Bonaparte was still in Egypt then. Power resided in weak hands, and the little town of Yssingeaux treated Laurent and his band more like a garrison than like prisoners. The prosecution was timid, the witnesses were ineffectual, the defense was bold. It was led by Laurent himself, who took responsibility for everything. His seventy-one companions were acquitted; he was sentenced to death.

“Laurent returned to the prison as nonchalantly as he had left. By then, the supreme beauty with which Nature had endowed him, the corporal recommendation, as Montaigne has called it, had already produced its effect. Every woman in Yssingeaux felt sorry for him, and for more than a few of them, pity had transferred itself into a much more tender feeling. Such was the case of the jailer’s daughter, although Laurent was not aware of it.

“Two hours after midnight, Laurent’s cell door opened as it had for Pierre de Médicis, and the girl from Yssingeaux, like the girl in Ferrare, spoke these sweet words: ‘Non temo nulla, bentivoglio!’ (‘Have no fear, I love you!’) His angel savior had seen him only through the prison bars, but his magnetic seductive powers had touched her heart and ruled her senses. A few words were exchanged; so were rings. And Laurent walked free.

“A horse was waiting in a neighboring village, she’d told him, and there she would meet him. Dawn broke. As he fled through the shadows, Laurent caught a glimpse of the executioner and his helpers setting up the deadly machine. For he was supposed to be executed at ten that morning, the execution having been rushed to take place only one day after the sentencing so as to coincide with market day, when everyone from the neighboring villages would be in Yssingeaux. Of course, when the sun’s first rays struck the guillotine in the square, and when the identity of the illustrious prisoner who’d climb the steps to the platform became known, no one was giving any more thought to the market.

“Waiting in the nearby village, Laurent worried not for himself but for the woman who had saved him. Laurent became impatient. Several times he rode out toward Yssingeaux, each time riding closer to the town, to try to get information, but without success. Finally, caught up in the heat of the moment, he lost his head: He assumed that his savior had herself been captured and that she, as his accomplice, would in his place be climbing the scaffold to the guillotine. So he rides into town, his horse spurred to a gallop, and as he passes by, people shout in astonishment when they realize that the man they were expecting to see guillotined is riding free on horseback. He rides past the gendarmes who’d been posted to escort him from his cell; he reaches the square where the scaffold awaits him, and espying the woman he’s looking for, he pushes his way to her, reaches down, pulls her up behind him, and gallops off to the cheers of the whole town. All those who had come to applaud his head as it fell were now applauding his flight, his escape, his salvation.

“That is what our leader was like, the leader who followed my brother. Such was the man under whose tutelage I learned to fight.

“For three months I lived daily under the strain of our battles and at night I slept wrapped up in my coat, my hand on my gun, pistols in my belt. Then the rumor of a truce began to spread. I came to Paris, promising to return to my companions at the first call. I came because I had seen you once—please excuse my frankness—and I needed, I yearned, to see you again.

“I did of course see you again, but if by chance your eyes happened to fall on me, you surely remember my face betrayed my deep sadness, my unconcern, and I might even say my apparent distaste for all of life’s pleasures. For how indeed, given the precarious position in which I found myself—obeying not my own conscience but another fatal, absolute, imperious power that exposed me to the possibility of being wounded if not killed in a stagecoach attack, or, even worse, being captured—how could I dare say to a lovely, sweet girl, the flower of the world in which she blossoms and the laws of which she accepts, how could I dare say to her: ‘I love you. Are you willing to accept a husband who has placed himself outside the law, for whom the greatest happiness possible is to be shot dead in cold blood?’

“No, I could not declare my love. I had to be content just to be able to see you, to be intoxicated by the sight of you, to be where you were likely to be, and all the while pray that God would accomplish a miracle, that the rumored truce would become real peace, though I hardly dared to hope.

“Finally, about four or five days ago, the newspapers announced that Cadoudal had come to Paris, that he had met with the First Consul. The same evening the same newspapers reported that the Breton general had given his word to no longer attempt any action against France, if the First Consul, for his part, would take no further action against Brittany or against him.

“The next day”—Hector pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket—“the next day I received this circular letter written in Cadoudal’s own hand:

“‘Because a protracted war seems to be a misfortune for France and ruin for my region, I free you from your oath of loyalty to me. I shall never call you back unless the French government should fail to keep the promise it gave to me and that I accepted in your name.

“‘If there should happen to be some treason hidden beneath a hypocritical peace, I would not hesitate to call once more on your fidelity, and your fidelity, I am sure, would respond.’

“You can imagine my joy when I received this leave. Once again I would be in control of my own person; no longer was I promised by the word of my father and my two brothers to a monarchy that I knew only through my family’s devotion and through the misfortunes that devotion had brought down upon our house. I was twenty-three years old; I had an annual income of one hundred thousand francs. I was in love, and supposing that I was also loved, the gates of paradise that had long been guarded by the angel of death were now opening up before me. Oh, Claire! Claire! That is why I was so happy when you saw me at Madame de Permon’s ball. I could finally ask you to meet me like this. Finally I could tell you that I loved you.”

Claire lowered her eyes and made no answer, which in itself was almost an answer.

“Now,” Hector went on, “everything I have just told you, all these histories hidden away out in the provinces, is completely unknown in Paris. I could have kept it hidden from you, but I chose not to. I wanted to tell you my whole life’s story, to explain by what destiny I was led finally to make my confession to you—knowing that you might suppose my actions to be a mistake or even a crime—so that I might receive absolution from your own lips.”

“Oh, Hector dear!” cried Claire, carried away by the quiet passion that had been governing her for nearly a year. “Oh, yes, I forgive you! I absolve you,” and forgetting that she was under her mother’s watchful eyes, she added, “I love you!” And threw her arms around his neck.

“Claire!” cried Madame de Sourdis, her voice showing more surprise than anger.

“Mother!” answered Claire, blushing and about to faint.

“Claire!” said Hector, taking her hand. “Don’t forget that everything I have told you is for you alone. It must be a secret between us, and since I love only you, I have no need for forgiveness from anyone but you. Do not forget. And especially, remember that I shall be truly alive only when I receive your mother’s answer to the request I have made. Claire, you have told me that you love me. I am placing our happiness in your love’s hands.”

Without another word Hector left. But his heart, athrill with the freedom and joy of a prisoner whose death sentence has just been commuted, was not silent.

Madame de Sourdis was waiting impatiently for her daughter. Claire’s spontaneity, when she threw herself into the arms of the young Comte de Sainte-Hermine, had seemed out of character. She wanted an explanation.

The explanation was clear and rapid. When the girl reached her mother, she simply dropped to her knees and pronounced these three words: “I love him!”

Our characters are molded by nature to prepare us for the times we need them to survive. It was thanks to such natural strength that Charlotte Corday and Madame Roland were able to say, one to Marat and the other to Robespierre: “I hate you.” Likewise, Claire could say to Hector: “I love you.”

Madame de Sourdis helped Claire up from her knees, had her sit down next to her, and then questioned her, but these are the only words the mother got out of her daughter: “My dear mother, Hector told me a family secret that he believes he must hide from everyone except the girl he wants to make his wife. I am that girl. He solicits the favor of coming to ask your permission for a marriage we desire more than anything. He is free, he has an annual income of one hundred thousand francs, and we love each other. Think about it, Mother dear. But a refusal on your part would be a calamity for both of us!”

Having spoken firmly but respectfully, Claire then bowed to her mother and started to walk away.

“And if I say yes?” said Madame de Sourdis.

“Oh, Mother,” cried Claire, throwing herself into her arms, “how good you are and how I love you!”

“And now that I have reassured your heart,” Madame de Soudis said, “sit down and let us speak reasonably.”

Madame de Sourdis seated herself on a sofa. Claire sat in front of her, on a cushion, and took her mother’s hands. “I’m all ears, Mother,” said Claire with a smile.

“In times like ours,” said Madame de Sourdis, “it is absolutely necessary to belong to some party. I believe that Hector de Sainte-Hermine numbers himself among the Royalists. Yesterday, when I was chatting with your godfather Dr. Cabanis, a great man of science who also has good sense, he congratulated me on the friendship Madame Bonaparte has for me. He believes strongly that you should likewise become as close as possible to her daughter Hortense. In his opinion, that is where your future lies.

“As you know, Cabanis is the First Consul’s personal doctor, and he is convinced the First Consul, in his genius, will not be content to stay where he is situated now. A man does not risk something like the 18th Brumaire just to sit in a consul’s armchair; he does it rather to rule from a throne. So those who attach themselves to Bonaparte’s star before the veil of the future is rent will be carried along with him in the whirlwind of his destiny; along with him they will rise.

“The First Consul, we know, loves to bring great families, rich families, over to his side. In that regard, Sainte-Hermine leaves nothing to be desired. He has an income of one hundred thousand francs; his family goes back to the Crusades. His entire family, too, has died for the Royalist cause, so truly, he owes nothing more to their campaign. He is of an age that has allowed him to remain thus far outside of political events. Whereas his father and two brothers all gave their lives for old France, he has not yet pledged anything to any party. It is up to him, then, by accepting a position with the First Consul, to live for new France.

“Please note that I am not making this step on his part a condition for your marriage. I would be more than pleased to see Hector join the side of the First Consul. If he refuses, however, it is because his conscience tells him that he must, and only God can judge the human conscience. Whichever path he chooses, he will be my daughter’s husband nonetheless, and no less will he be my beloved son-in-law.”

“When might I write to him, Mother?” Claire asked.

“Whenever you like, my child,” answered her mother.

That very evening, Claire sent him a message, and the next day before noon, as soon as he could appropriately appear, Hector was knocking again at the front door.

This time he was taken directly to see Madame de Sourdis, who welcomed him with open arms, like a mother. They were still holding each other tightly when Claire opened the door, and seeing them, she cried, “Oh, Mother. How happy I am!” Madame de Sourdis again opened her arms, so that she could embrace both of her children.

The marriage was agreed upon. All that was left to discuss with the young Comte was the matter of his joining the First Consul’s administration.

Hector, with Madame de Sourdis on his left and Claire on his right, was seated on the sofa with his future mother-in-law’s hand in his on one side and his fiancée’s on the other. Claire took it upon herself to explain to Hector the high opinion that Dr. Cabanis held of Bonaparte and to present Madame de Sourdis’s hope regarding Hector’s future. Hector kept his eyes fixed attentively on Claire as she tried to repeat word for word her mother’s reasoning on the matter.

When she had finished, Hector bowed to Madame de Sourdis, and looking even more intently at Claire than he had while she was speaking, he said, “Claire, based on what I told you yesterday, and I am not sorry to have gone on at such length, put yourself in my place and answer your mother. Your answer will be my answer.”

The girl thought for a moment and then threw herself into her mother’s arms. “Oh, Mother!” she cried, shaking her head. “He cannot. His brother’s blood flows between them.”

Madame de Sourdis bowed her head. It was clear that she felt great disappointment. She had dreamed of a high rank in the army for her son-in-law; and for her daughter, a high position at the court.

“Madame,” said Hector, “please don’t think that I am among those people who praise the old regime to the detriment of the current one, or that I am blind to the First Consul’s great qualities. I saw him the other day for the first time at Madame de Permon’s ball, and rather than feeling repulsed, I was attracted to him. I admire his campaign of ’96 and ’97 as a masterpiece of modern strategy and an exemplar of his military genius. I am less enthusiastic, I’ll admit, about his Egyptian campaign, which could have no happy outcome and was no more than a mask to cover his immense thirst for fame: Bonaparte fought and won where Marius and Pompey had also fought and won. By that, he hoped to awaken and amend ancient echoes that for centuries had repeated no names but those of Alexander and Caesar. How tempting. But it was an expensive fantasy that cost our country so much money and so many men! As for the most recent campaign, at Marengo, that was a campaign only for personal glory, undertaken to give a firm footing to the legitimacy of the 18th Brumaire and to force foreign governments to recognize the new French government. But, as everyone knows, Bonaparte was not a military genius. He was lucky, like a gambler who is about to lose and then draws two trump cards. And what trump cards they were! Kellermann and Desaix! The 18th Brumaire was no more than a conspiracy whose lucky success in the end barely justifies its author’s means. What if it had failed? What if his attempt to overthrow the established government had been ruled a rebellion, a crime of treason? Then in the Bonaparte family at least three heads would have rolled. Chance served him well when he returned from Alexandria, fortune was on his side at Marengo, and his boldness saved him in Saint-Cloud. But a temperate man, a man not blinded by passion, would never mistake three lightning flashes, however bright they might be, for the dawn of a great day. If I were completely free of my background, if my family had not stood firmly in the Royalist camp, I would have no objection to linking my own fortune to Bonaparte’s, although I consider him an illustrious adventurer who once fought a war for France and two other times for himself. Now, to prove to you that I am not prejudiced against him, I promise that the first time he does something great for France I shall come over to his side. For to my great astonishment, and although I owe my most recent loss to him, I do admire him in spite of his faults and in spite of myself. That is the kind of influence that those of a superior nature exert upon those lesser beings around them, and I feel that influence.”

“I understand,” said Madame de Sourdis. “But will you at least permit one thing?”

“It is not for me to permit,” said Hector, “but rather for you to order.”

“Will you allow me to ask the First Consul and Madame Bonaparte for their assent to Claire’s marriage? Connected as I am to Madame Bonaparte, I can hardly do otherwise. It is simply a step that etiquette demands.”

“Yes, but on the condition that if they refuse, we will proceed anyway.”

“If they refuse, you will carry off my darling Claire and I shall come to forgive you wherever you have taken her. But rest assured, they will not refuse me.”

And with that assurance, permission was granted to Madame de Sourdis to seek the blessing of the First Consul and Madame Bonaparte on the marriage of Claire de Sourdis to Monsieur le Comte Hector de Sainte-Hermine.




XX Fouché (#ulink_ed533a20-5b7e-58c2-ab00-613feaa8ab75)







THERE WAS ONE MAN whom Bonaparte hated, feared, and tolerated all at the same time. He is the man who appeared for a moment to talk to Mademoiselle de Fargas when she was setting her conditions for delivering up the Companions of Jehu.

Bonaparte, when he began pulling away from the influence of Fouché, was obeying that admirable instinct more typical of animals than of humans: to remove oneself from beasts that may prove to be harmful.

Joseph Fouché, Minister of the Police, was a creature both ugly and harmful. It is rare that what is ugly is good, and in Fouché’s case, his morality, or rather his immorality, was equal to his ugliness.

Bonaparte saw men as nothing but means or obstacles to him. For Bonaparte the general, Fouché, on the 18th Brumaire, had been a means. For Bonaparte the First Consul, Fouché could indeed become an obstacle. He who had conspired against the Directory in favor of the Consulate might as easily conspire now against the Consulate in favor of some other government. Fouché had become a man whom Bonaparte needed to bring down after having raised him up, and given the current political situation, bringing him down would be difficult. For Fouché was one of those men who, as they climb, cling to every rough edge, hold on to every farrow, make every mark and scar their own so they never want any point of support at any level once they have arrived.

Indeed, Fouché was attached to the Republic by his vote to have the king killed; to the Terror, by his bloody incursions into Lyon and Nevers; to the Thermidorians, by his role in bringing down Robespierre; to Bonaparte, by his participation in the 18th Brumaire; and to Josephine, through the terror that had been inspired by Joseph and Lucien, Fouché’s avowed enemies. He was attached to the Royalists by services he had rendered to individuals as Minister of the Police, after having attacked the class as a whole when he was proconsul. As director of public opinion, he had turned the office to his own uses, and his police, instead of serving the general populace, had become simply Fouché’s police, a force in service to the minister’s schemes. All over Paris, all over France, Fouché’s agents sang in praise of his abilities. Stories of his extraordinary skill abounded, the best indicator of that skill being his ability to make everyone believe the stories to be true.

Fouché had been Minister of the Police since the 18th Brumaire. No one, not even Bonaparte himself, could understand how the First Consul could have allowed Fouché to have such powerful influence over him. The situation bothered Bonaparte increasingly. Outside Fouché’s presence, when the minister’s magnetism no longer had any effect, in his every cell Bonaparte rebelled against Fouché’s sway. When the First Consul spoke of him, his words, cutting and spiteful, betrayed his anger. Yet when Fouché next appeared, the lion again lay down, calmed if not tamed.

One thing in particular bothered Bonaparte: Fouché never entered wholeheartedly into his grandiose plans, unlike his brothers Joseph and Lucien, who not only entered into them but helped to move them forward. One day, though, Bonaparte did have it out with Fouché.

“Be careful,” the Minister of the Police had said, “if you restore the royalty, you will have worked for the Bourbons, for sooner or later they will get back on the throne that you have reestablished. Nobody would dare to prophesy what combination of lucky events and of cataclysms we might have to live through before that happened, but we need nothing more than our own intelligence to judge how long you and your descendants would need to fear such a possibility. You are moving rapidly in the direction of the old regime, in form if not in content, so that occupation of the throne will soon be just a question not of government but of which family sits in it. If France must give up its hard-fought-for freedom and return to the good pleasure of the monarchy, why should it not prefer the former race of kings that gave us Henri IV and Louis XIV? You have given France nothing but the despotism of the sword!”

Bonaparte bit his lip as he listened, but he did listen. And in that moment decided to abolish the Ministry of Police. On that very Monday, at his brother’s insistence—he had gone to spend the day with his brother at Mortefontaine—he signed an abolition order and put it in his pocket.

The next day, on his return to Paris, though pleased with his decision, he knew what a blow it would be for Josephine. So he tried to be charming with her when he got back, which gave some hope to the poor woman, for whenever she looked beyond her husband’s gaiety or sadness, beyond his ill humor or cheerfulness, she saw nothing but divorce.

Seated in her boudoir, he was giving orders to Bourrienne when she slipped over to him and, sitting in his lap, stroked his hair and then put her fingers near his mouth for him to kiss them. When his kiss met her burning hand, she asked, “Why did you not take me with you yesterday?”

“Where?” he asked.

“Wherever you went.”

“I went to Mortefontaine, and since I know there’s some hostility between you and Joseph.…”

“Oh, and you could also add between me and Lucien. I say Lucien as well as Joseph because both of them are hostile to me. I am not hostile to anyone. I could ask for nothing better than to get along with your two brothers, but they hate me. So you should realize how worried I am whenever you are with them.”

“Relax. All we discussed yesterday was politics.”

“Yes, politics. Like Caesar with Anthony. Did they try the wrappings of royalty on you?”

“What? You know Roman history?”

“My friend, all I know about Roman history concerns Caesar, and every time I read it I quake.”

She was silent a moment. Bonaparte frowned, but there was no holding her back now that she had started: “Please, Bonaparte, I beg you, do not make yourself king. I know that evil Lucien is pressing you to do so, but you must not listen to him. It would be the end of all of us.”

Bourrienne, who had often given the same advice to his schoolmate, was afraid that Bonaparte would fly into a rage. But instead, he began to laugh. “You’re crazy, my poor Josephine,” he said. “All those dowagers from the Faubourg Saint-German must be telling you such tales, as well as your La Rochefoucauld. Stop bothering me.”

At that moment the Minister of Police was announced. “Do you have anything to say to him?” asked Bonaparte.

“No,” said Josephine. “It’s you he must be on his way to see; he no doubt wants merely to greet me in passing.”

“When you’ve finished, send him to me,” said Bonaparte, standing up. “Come, Bourrienne.”

“If you have no secrets to tell him, why do you not see him right here? I’d have you longer here with me.”

“Indeed, I was forgetting that Fouché is a friend of yours,” said Bonaparte.

“A friend of mine?” remarked Josephine. “I do not allow myself friends among your ministers.”

“Well,” said Bonaparte, “he will not be a minister for long. But no, I have no secrets to impart.” Then, turning toward Constant, who had announced Fouché, he said affectedly, “Show the Minister of Police in.”

On entering, Fouché seemed surprised to find Bonaparte there with his wife. “Madame,” Fouché said, “this morning my business is with you, not the First Consul.”

“With me?” said Josephine in astonishment and with some worry.

“Oh,” said Bonaparte. “Then let’s see what this is all about.” And to show that he had regained his earlier good humor, he pinched his wife’s ear.

Tears welled in Josephine’s eyes—why did Bonaparte have always to make his little love gesture so painful? But she kept her smile.

“Yesterday,” said Fouché, “Dr. Cabanis came to see me.”

“Good God!” said Bonaparte. “What made that benign philosopher venture into your den?”

“He came to ask if I believed, madame, before any official visit would be arranged, that a certain marriage in his family would have your blessing, and if it did, whether you would take it upon yourself to obtain the First Consul’s consent.”

“Well, now! You see, Josephine,” said Bonaparte with a laugh, “people are already treating you like a queen.”

“But,” said Josephine, “thirty million French people can get married without the slightest objection from me. Who could be giving so much thought to etiquette as to check with me?”

“Madame la Comtesse de Sourdis, whom you honor sometimes by receiving her here. She is marrying her daughter Claire.”

“To whom?”

“To the young Comte de Sainte-Hermine.”

“Tell Cabanis,” Josephine answered, “that I enthusiastically support their union, and unless Bonaparte has some reason not to approve it.…”

Bonaparte thought for a moment. Then, turning to Fouché: “Come up to my office,” he said, “when you leave Madame. Come, Bourrienne.”

Scarcely had Bonaparte and Bourrienne disappeared than Josephine, placing her hand on Fouché’s arm, confided, “He went to Mortefontaine yesterday.”

“Yes, I know,” said Fouché.

“Do you know what he and his brothers talked about?”

“Yes.”

“Was it about me? Did they talk about divorce?”

“No: Be reassured on that point. They were talking about something else entirely.”

“Was it about the monarchy?”

“No.”

Josephine sighed. “Well, in that case, little does it matter what they talked about!”

Fouché smiled that dark sardonic smile so characteristic of him. “However,” he said, “since you will probably be losing one of your friends.…”

“Me?”

“Yes.”

“I will?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because he has protected your interests.”

“Who are you talking about?”

“I cannot divulge his name. His disgrace is still a secret. I’ve come to warn you so you can choose someone else.”

“Where do you expect me to find this other person?”

“In the First Consul’s family. Two of his brothers are against you. Align yourself with the third.”

“Louis?”

“Exactly.”

“But Bonaparte insists on giving my daughter in marriage to Duroc.”

“Yes, but Duroc does not seem quite so eager to enter into marriage, and his indifference is offensive to the First Consul.”

“Hortense bursts into tears every time we talk about it. I don’t want it to look like I am sacrificing my daughter; she says that she has given her heart.”

“Well,” said Fouché, “does anyone really have a heart?”

“Oh, I do!” said Josephine. “And I am proud of it.”

“You?” said Fouché with his sarcastic laugh. “You don’t have only one heart, you have.…”

“Careful!” said Josephine. “You are about to say something disrespectful.”

“I’ll not say a word. As Minister of Police, I must remain silent. Otherwise people might say I am revealing secrets from the confessional. So, as I’ve nothing further to tell you, allow me to go and announce to the First Consul some news he is not expecting to hear from my lips.”

“What news?”

“Yesterday he signed an order for my resignation.”

“So you are the person I shall be losing?” Josephine asked.

“Yes, that’s correct,” said Fouché.

The realization elicited a sigh from Josephine as she placed her hand over her eyes. “Oh, don’t worry!” said Fouché, walking over to her. “It won’t be for long.”

In order not to display too great a familiarity, rather than taking the little stairway up to Bonaparte’s office, Fouché left through Josephine’s outside door, then came back in through the clock pavilion and went up to the First Consul’s study.

The First Consul was working with Bourrienne. “Ah!” he said to Fouché as he came in, “you can explain something to me.”

“What, sire?”

“Who this Sainte-Hermine is who’s asking for my approval of his marriage with Mademoiselle de Sourdis.”

“Let us understand one another, Citizen First Consul. It is not the Comte de Sainte-Hermine who is asking for your approval to marry Mademoiselle de Sourdis, but rather Mademoiselle de Sourdis who is asking for your approval to marry Monsieur de Sainte-Hermine.”

“Is that not the same thing?”

“Not entirely. The Sourdis family is a noble family that has joined our side, whereas the Sainte-Hermine family is a noble family that we would like to have join us.”

“So they have been holding out?”

“Worse than that. They have been combatting you.”

“Republicans or Royalists?”

“Royalists. The father was guillotined in ’93. The oldest son was shot. The second son, whom you met, was guillotined in Bourg-en-Bresse.”

“I met him?”

“Do you remember a masked man who appeared when you were dining at the common table in a hotel in Avignon? He carried a bag containing two hundred louis, which he’d stolen by mistake from a Bordeaux wine merchant in a stagecoach?”

“Yes, I remember him well. Ah, Monsieur Fouché, that is the kind of man I need.”

“It is not devotion to an earlier regime, Citizen First Consul, that drives men like him; it’s really just a matter of self-interest.”

“How right you are, Fouché. Well, how about the third one?”

“The third son will be your friend if you want.”

“How’s that?”

“Obviously, it is with his agreement that Madame de Sourdis, skilled in flattery, is asking for your blessing of her daughter’s marriage as if you were a king. Give your blessing, sire, and instead of being your enemy, Monsieur Hector de Sainte-Hermine will have no choice but to become your friend.”

“Fine,” said Bonaparte. “I shall give it some thought.” Rubbing his hands in satisfaction at the thought that someone had just fulfilled a formality that used to be associated with French kings, he then proceeded: “Well, Fouché. Any news?”

“Just one piece of news, but it’s quite important, especially for me.”

“What’s that?”

“Yesterday, in the green room at Mortefontaine, with Lucien, the Minister of the Interior, holding the pen, you dictated and signed my dismissal and my admission to the Senate.”

In a gesture familiar to Corsicans, Bonaparte ran his thumb twice over his chest in the sign of the cross, and said: “Who told you such a story, Fouché?”

“One of my agents, of course.”

“He was mistaken.”

“He was so far from mistaken that my dismissal is right there, on that chair, in the side pocket of your gray frock coat.”

“Fouché,” said Bonaparte, “if you limped like Talleyrand, I would say that you were the devil himself.”

“You no longer deny it, am I right?”

“Of course not. Besides, your dismissal has been arranged with the most honorable terms.”

“I understand. It is surely to my credit, during all the time I have been in your service, that you have never noticed any of your silver missing.”

“Now that France is at peace and the Ministry of Police is unnecessary, I can send its minister to the Senate so that I know where to find him if ever the ministry needs to be reestablished. I am aware that in the Senate, my dear Fouché, you will have to give up your administration of gambling, which provides you a source to streams of gold, but you already have so much money you cannot possibly enjoy it all. And your domain in Pontcarré, which I knew you would like to keep expanding, is really already quite large enough for you.”

“Do I have your word,” said Fouché, “that if the Ministry of Police is reestablished it will be for no one other than for me?”

“You have my word,” said Bonaparte.

“Thank you. And now, may I announce to Cabanis that Mademoiselle de Sourdis, his goddaughter, has your blessing to marry the Comte de Sainte-Hermine?”

“You may.”

Bonaparte nodded slightly, Fouché answered with a deep bow, and departed.

The First Consul, his hands behind his back, paced up and down silently for a few moments. Then, stopping behind his secretary’s chair, he said, “Did you hear that, Bourrienne?”

“What, General?”

“What that devil Fouché just said to me.”

“I never hear anything unless you order me to listen.”

“He knew that I had retired his minitry, that I had done so at Mortefontaine, and that the dismissal order was in the pocket of my gray frock coat.”

“Ah,” said Bourrienne. “That is not so surprising. All he needed to do was to give your brother’s personal valet a pension.”

Bonaparte shook his head. “All the same, that man Fouché is dangerous.”

“Yes,” said Bourrienne, “but you have to admit that a man whose subtlety can surprise you can be a useful man in times like these.”

Silent for a moment, the First Consul then said, “I’ve promised him that at the first signs of trouble I will call him back. I shall probably keep my word.”

He rang for the office boy. “Landoire,” Bonaparte said, “look out the window and see if a carriage is ready.”

Landoire leaned out the window. “Yes, General,” he said.

The First Consul pulled on his frock coat and picked up his hat. “I’m going to the Conseil d’Etat.”

He started toward the door, then stopped. “Bourrienne,” he said, “go down to Josephine and tell her that not only does Mademoiselle de Sourdis’s marriage have my blessing but also that Madame Bonaparte and I shall sign her marriage contract.”




XXI In Which Fouché Works to Return to the Ministry of Police, Which He Has Not Yet Left (#ulink_44c1fff0-58b6-587d-b7f6-711fd118b56d)







FOUCHÉ WENT BACK to his office furious. He still had a role to play, but the role was limited. Outside of the police, Fouché had only secondary power, which to him was of no real value. For nature had endowed him with crossed eyes so that he could look in two directions at once and with big ears that could hear things from all directions. Add to that his subtle intelligence and his temperament—nervous, irritable, worrying—all of which went wanting without his ministry.

And Bonaparte had hit upon the truly sensitive point. In losing the police, he was losing his control over gambling, so he was also losing more than two hundred thousand francs a year. Although Fouché was already extremely rich, he was always trying to increase his wealth even if he could never really enjoy it. His ambition to extend the boundaries of his domain in Pontcarré was no less great than Bonaparte’s to move back the borders of France.

Fouché threw himself into his armchair without a word to anyone. His facial muscles were quivering like the surface of the ocean in a storm. After a few minutes, however, they stopped twitching, because Fouché had found what he was looking for. The pale smile that lit up his face indicated, if not the return of good weather, at least a temporary calm. He grabbed the bell cord that hung above his desk and pulled it vigorously.

The office boy hurried in. “Monsieur Dubois!” Fouché shouted.

A moment later the door opened and Monsieur Dubois entered. Dubois had a calm, gentle face, with a kindly, unaffected smile, and he was scrupulously neat. Wearing a white tie and a shirt with cuffs, he pranced more than he walked lightly in, and the soles of his shoes slid over the carpet as if they were a dancing master’s.

“Monsieur Dubois,” said Fouché, throwing himself back in his armchair, “today I need all your intelligence and discretion.”

“I can vouch only for my discretion, Monsieur le Ministre,” he answered. “As for my intelligence, it has value only when guided by you.”

“Fine, fine, Monsieur Dubois,” said Fouché a little impatiently. “Enough compliments. In your service, is there a man whom we can trust?”

“First I need to know what we will be using him for.”

“Of course. He will travel to Brittany, where he will organize three bands of fire-setters. One fire, the largest, must be set on the road between Vannes and Muzillac; the other two, wherever he likes.”

“I’m listening,” said Dubois, noting that Fouché had paused.

“One of the bands will call itself Cadoudal’s band, and it will pretend to have Cadoudal himself at its head.”

“According to what Your Excellency is saying.…”

“I shall let you use those words for now,” said Fouché with a laugh, “especially since you’ve not much time left appropriately to use them.”

Dubois bowed, and, encouraged by Fouché, he went on: “According to what Your Excellency is saying, you need a man who can shoot if necessary.”

“That, and whatever else is necessary.”

Monsieur Dubois thought for a moment and shook his head. “I have no one like that among my men,” he said.

But, when Fouché gestured impatiently, Dubois recalled: “Wait a moment. Yesterday a man came to my office, a certain Chevalier de Mahalin, a fellow who was a member of the Companions of Jehu and who asks for nothing better, he says, than well-paid dangers. He is a gambler in every sense of the word, ready to risk his life as well as his money on a throw of the dice. He’s our man.”

“Do you have his address?”

“No. But he is coming back to my office today sometime between one and two o’clock. It is now one o’clock, so he must be there already or else he will be soon.”

“Go, then, and bring him back here.”

When Monsieur Dubois had left, Fouché pulled a file from its box and carried it over to his desk. It was the Pichegru file, and he studied it with the greatest attention until Monsieur Dubois returned with the man he’d talked about.

It was the same man who had visited Hector de Sainte-Hermine regarding the promises he’d made to his brother and who then had led him to Laurent’s band. Now disbanded, with nothing more to be done in Cadoudal’s cause, the good man was looking elsewhere for work.

He was probably between twenty-five and thirty years old, well built, and quite handsome. He had a pleasant smile, and you could have said he was likeable in every respect, except for a troubled and disturbing look in his eyes that often caused people he dealt with worry and concern.

Fouché examined him with a penetrating look that enabled him to take any man’s moral measure. In this man he could sense the love of money, great courage, though he seemed more ready to defend himself than to attack another, and the absolute will to succeed in any undertaking. That was exactly what Fouché was looking for.

“Monsieur,” said Fouché, “I have been assured that you would like to enter government service. Is that correct?”

“That is my greatest wish.”

“In what role?”

“Wherever there are blows to receive and money to be earned.”

“Do you know Brittany and the Vendée?”

“Perfectly well. Three times I have been sent to meet General Cadoudal.”

“Have you been in contact with those serving just beneath him?”

“With some of them, and particularly with one of Cadoudal’s lieutenants—he’s called George II because he looks like the general.”

“Damn!” said Fouché. “That might be useful. Do you believe you could raise three bands of about twenty men each?”

“It is always possible, in a region still warm from civil war, to raise three bands of twenty men. If the purpose is honorable, honest men will easily make up your sixty, and for them all you will need are grand words and elegant speech. If the purpose is less principled and demands secrecy, you will still be able to enlist mercenaries, but to buy their questionable consciences will cost you more.”

Fouché gave Dubois a look that seemed to be saying, “My good man, you have indeed come up with a real find.” Then, to the chevalier, he said, “Monsieur, within ten days we need three bands of incendiaries, two in the Morbihan and one in the Vendée, all three of them acting in Cadoudal’s name. In one of the bands a masked man must assume the name of the Breton general and do all that he can to convince the populace that he really is Cadoudal.”

“Easy, but expensive, as I have said.”

“Are fifty thousand francs enough?”

“Yes. Unquestionably.”

“So then, we are agreed on that point. Once your three bands have been organized, will you be able to go to England?”

“There is nothing simpler, given that my background is English and that I speak the language as well as I do my mother tongue.”

“Do you know Pichegru?”

“By name.”

“Do you have a means of getting introduced to him?”

“Yes.”

“And if I asked you how?”

“I would not tell you. After all, I need to keep some secrets; otherwise, I would lose all my value.”

“So you would. And so you will go to England, where you will check out Pichegru and try to discover under what circumstances he would be willing to come back to Paris. Were he to wish to return to Paris but finds money to be lacking, you will propose funds in the name of Fauche-Borel. Don’t forget that name.”

“The Swiss bookseller who has already made proposals to him in the name of the Prince de Condé; yes, I know him. And were he to wish to return to Paris and needs money, to whom should I turn?”

“To Monsieur Fouché, at his domain in Pontcarré. Not to the Minister of Police, the difference is important.”

“And then?”

“And then you will return to Paris for new orders. Monsieur Dubois, please count out fifty thousand francs for the chevalier. By the way, chevalier.…”

Mahalin turned around.

“If you should happen to meet Coster Saint-Victor, encourage him to come back to Paris.”

“Does he not risk arrest?”

“No, all will be forgiven, that I can affirm.”

“What shall I say to convince him?”

“That all the women in Paris miss him, and especially Mademoiselle Aurélie de Saint-Amour. You may add that after being a rival to Barras for her charms, it would be a shame for him not also to be a rival to the First Consul. That should be enough to help him make up his mind to return, unless he has even more extraordinary liaisons in London.”

Once the door had shut on Dubois and Mahalin, Fouché quickly had an orderly carry the following letter to Doctor Cabanis:

My dear doctor,

The First Consul, whom I have just seen in Madame Bonaparte’s apartments, could not have more graciously received Madame de Sourdis’s request concerning her daughter’s marriage, and he is pleased to see such a marriage take place.

Our dear sister can therefore plan her visit to Madame Bonaparte, and the sooner the better.

Please believe me your sincere friend,

J. Fouché

The next day, Madame la Comtesse de Sourdis presented herself in the Tuileries. She found Josephine radiant and Hortense in tears, for Hortense’s marriage with Louis Bonaparte was almost certain.

Josephine had realized the day before that, whatever mysterious reason lay behind it, her husband was in good humor, so she had asked to have him come see her on his return from the Conseil d’Etat.

But, when he got back, the First Consul had found Cambacérès waiting for him—he’d come to explain two or three articles of the code that Bonaparte had found to be not sufficiently clear—and the two of them had worked until quite late. Then Junot had shown up to announce his marriage with Mademoiselle de Permon.

News of this marriage pleased the First Consul far less than the one arranged for Mademoiselle de Sourdis. First of all, Bonaparte had himself been in love with Madame de Permon; in fact, before marrying Josephine, he had tried to marry her. But Madame de Permon had refused, and he still held a grudge. Furthermore, he had advised Junot to marry someone rich, and now Junot, on the contrary, was choosing a wife from a ruined family. His future wife, on her mother’s side, was descended from former emperors in the Orient and the girl, whom Junot had familiarly called Loulou, came from the Comnène family as well, but she had a dowry of only twenty-five thousand francs. Bonaparte promised Junot he would add one hundred thousand francs to the basket. Also, as governor of Paris, Junot could be guaranteed a salary of five hundred thousand francs. He would simply have to manage with that.

Josephine had meanwhile waited impatiently for her husband all evening. But he had dined with Junot, and then they had gone out together. Finally, at midnight, he had appeared in his dressing gown and with a scarf over his head, which meant he would not retire to his own rooms until the next morning. Josephine’s face had beamed with joy: Her long wait had been worth it. For it was during such visits that Josephine was able to solidify her power over Bonaparte. Never before had Josephine so insistently pressed her case for the marriage of Hortense to Louis. When he’d gone back up to his own rooms, the First Consul had very nearly agreed to the betrothal of his stepdaughter to his brother.

So, when Madame de Sourdis arrived, Josephine was eager to tell her of her good fortune. Claire was dispatched to console Hortense.

But Claire didn’t even try. She knew only too well how difficult it would have been for her herself to give up Hector. Instead, she wept with Hortense, and encouraged her to bring up the question with the First Consul as he surely loved her too much to consent to her unhappiness.

Suddenly a strange idea came to Hortense: She and Claire, with their mothers’ permission, should consult Mademoiselle Lenormand and have their fortunes told.

It was Mademoiselle de Sourdis who acted as ambassador, presenting to their mothers their wish and asking their permission to put it into execution. The negotiation was long, with Hortense listening at the door and trying to hold back her sobs.

Claire came joyously back. Permission was granted, on the condition that Mademoiselle Louise not leave the presence of the two girls even for a moment. Mademoiselle Louise, as we believe we have pointed out, was Madame Bonaparte’s principal maid, and Madame Bonaparte had complete confidence in her.

Mademoiselle Louise was given strict orders, and she swore on everything that was holy to do her duty. Heavily veiled, the two girls climbed into Madame de Sourdis’s carriage, which was a morning carriage without a coat of arms. The coachman was told to stop at number six, Rue de Tournon; he was not told whom they were going to see.

Mademoiselle Louise was the first to climb down from the carriage. She had her instructions, so she knew that Mademoiselle Lenormand lived in the back of the courtyard and to the left. She would then lead the girls up three steps and knock on the door to the right.

She knocked, and when she asked to come in, she and the two girls were led into a study off to one side, not generally open to the public.

They were informed that each girl would be received separately, because Mademoiselle Lenormand never worked with more than one person at the same time. The order in which they would be received would be determined by the first letter of their family name. Thus Hortense Bonaparte would be first. Still, she had to wait a half hour.

The arrangement greatly upset Mademoiselle Louise, for she had been ordered never to let the girls out of her sight. If she remained with Claire, she’d lose sight of Hortense. If she accompanied Hortense, she’d lose sight of Claire.

They took the question to Mademoiselle Lenormand, who found a way to reconcile the situation. Mademoiselle Louise would remain with Claire, but Mademoiselle Lenormand would leave the door of the study open so that the maid would be able to keep her eyes on Hortense. At the same time, she would be far enough away from Mademoiselle Lenormand that she would not be able to hear what the prophetess was saying.

Naturally, both girls had requested the grand set of cards. What Mademoiselle Lenormand saw in the cards for Hortense seemed to impress her greatly. Her gestures and facial expressions indicated growing astonishment. Finally, after she had again shuffled the cards well and carefully studied the girl’s palm, she stood up and spoke like one inspired. She pronounced just one sentence, which brought an incredulous expression to her subject’s face. In the face of Hortense’s pressing questions, she remained mute and refused to add a single word to her declaration, except to say: “The oracle has spoken; believe the oracle!”

The oracle signaled to Hortense that her time was up and summoned her friend.

Although it was Mademoiselle de Beauharnais who had proposed coming to consult Mademoiselle Lenormand, Claire, after what she had seen, was equally eager to learn her future. She hurried into the prophetess’s study. She had no idea that her future would astonish Mademoiselle Lenormand as much as had her friend’s.

With the confidence of a woman who believed in herself and hesitated to offer improbable utterances, Mademoiselle Lenormand read Claire’s cards three times. She studied Claire’s right hand, then the left, and in both palms she found a broken heart, the luck line cutting through the heart line and forking toward Saturn. In the same solemn tone she had assumed in her pronouncement for Mademoiselle de Beauharnais, she spoke her oracle for Mademoiselle de Sourdis. When Claire rejoined Mademoiselle Louise and Hortense, she was as pale as a corpse, and her eyes were filled with tears.

The two girls did not say one word further, did not ask a single question, so long as they were under Mademoiselle Lenormand’s roof. It was as if they feared that any utterance on their part might bring the house down around their heads. But, as soon as they were settled in the carriage and the coachman had started the horses off at a gallop, they both asked at the same time: “What did she tell you?”

Hortense, the first to be received, was the first to answer. “She said: ‘Wife of a king and mother of an emperor, you will die in exile.’”

“And what did she tell you?” Mademoiselle de Beauharnais asked eagerly.

“She said: ‘For fourteen years you will be the widow of a man who is still alive, and the rest of your life the wife of a dead man!’”




XXII In Which Mademoiselle de Beauharnais Becomes the Wife of a King without a Throne and Mademoiselle de Sourdis the Widow of a Living Husband (#ulink_cdad6d31-2543-5d05-8a30-bda1a41abbc1)







SIX WEEKS HAD PASSED since the two girls had visited the prophetess living on Rue de Tournon. Mademoiselle de Beauharnais had, in spite of her tears, married Louis Bonaparte, and that very same evening Mademoiselle de Sourdis had been going to sign her marriage contract with the Comte de Sainte-Hermine.

Mademoiselle de Beauharnais’s repugnance for her marriage might lead one to believe that she was repulsed by the First Consul’s brother. That was not the case at all. It was simply that she loved Duroc. Love is blind.

Louis Bonaparte was then about twenty-three or twenty-four years old. He was a handsome young man—in fact, he resembled his sister Caroline—though he appeared to be a little cold. He was well educated and had true literary instincts. Upright, kind, and very honest, he never for a minute presumed that the title of king in any way changed the rules and duties of the human conscience. He is perhaps the only prince who, reigning over a foreign people, elicited at least a bit of gratitude and love in his subjects, just as Desaix had done in upper Egypt. He was a just sultan.

Before we leave that loyal-hearted man and the charming creature he was marrying, let us say that the marriage happened suddenly, for no other reason than for Josephine’s incessant hounding.

“Duroc,” Josephine told Bourrienne, repeatedly, “would give me no support. Duroc owes everything to his friendship with Bonaparte, and he would never dare stand up to his protector’s brothers. On the other hand, Bonaparte has great fondness for Louis, who has not the slightest ambition and never will. For me, Louis will be a counterbalance to Joseph and Lucien.”

As for Bonaparte, he took this position with Bourrienne: “Duroc and Hortense love each other. Whatever my wife might do, they are a good fit and shall marry. As for me, I am fond of Duroc; he comes from a good family. After all, I gave Caroline to Murat and Pauline to Leclerc. So I can surely give Hortense to Duroc, for he’s a fine man, as good as they come. As he is now a major general, there is no reason to oppose this marriage. Besides, I have something else in mind for Louis.”

However, the same day the girls went to consult Mademoiselle Lenormand, Hortense, urged on by her friend, tried to enlist, and ensure, the support of her stepfather one more time. After dinner, finding herself alone with Bonaparte, she knelt down gracefully at his feet, and using all her feminine charms on the First Consul, she told him that the proposed union between her and Louis would mean her eternal unhappiness, and while giving full justice to Louis’s virtues, she repeated that she loved only Duroc and that Duroc alone could make her happy.

Bonaparte made a decision.

“Fine,” he said. “Since you insist on marrying him, marry him you will, but I warn you that I must set some conditions. If Duroc accepts them, then all is well. But if he refuses, then this is the last time I shall go against Josephine’s wishes on this subject, and you will become Louis’s wife.”

Walking briskly, as he did when he had made a decision, in spite of any unpleasantness his decision might provoke, Bonaparte went to Duroc’s office but failed to find him, the eternal idler, at his post. “Where is Duroc?” he asked, visibly upset.

“He has gone out,” Bourrienne answered.

“Where do you think he might be?”

“At the Opera.”

“Tell him, as soon as he returns, that I have promised him to Hortense, that he will marry her. But I want the wedding to take place in two days at the latest. I shall give him five hundred thousand francs. I shall name him commander of the eighth military division. He will leave for Toulon the day after his wedding, and we shall live separately as I do not want a son-in-law in my house. I do want to have this matter settled once and for all, so tell me this evening if he is in agreement.”

“I don’t believe he will be,” said Bourrienne.

“Then she shall marry Louis.”

“Is she willing?”

“She has no choice but to be willing.”

At ten, on Duroc’s return, Bourrienne communicated the First Consul’s intentions. But Duroc shook his head. “The First Consul does me a great honor,” he said, “but I shall never marry a woman under such conditions. I prefer now to take a stroll near Palais-Royal.”

With that, Duroc picked up his hat, and with no apparent concern he left. His attitude, to Bourrienne’s eye, only served to prove that Hortense was mistaken about the intensity of the feelings the First Consul’s aide-de-camp had, or pretended to have, for her.

The wedding of Mademoiselle de Beauharnais and Louis Bonaparte took place in the little house on Rue Chantereine. A priest came to bless their union. At the same time Bonaparte had him bless Madame Murat’s marriage.

Far from occasioning the sad atmosphere that had hung over poor Hortense’s wedding, Mademoiselle de Sourdis’s wedding held every promise of light and joy. The two lovebirds, who were apart only between eleven at night and two in the afternoon, spent all the rest of their time together. The most elegant merchants, the most popular jewelers in Paris, had been ransacked by Hector to produce a collection of wedding presents worthy of his fiancée. The opulent offerings were the talk of Parisian high society; Madame de Sourdis had even received letters from people who wanted to view them in person.

Madame de Sourdis had been expecting no more than a simple agreement from the First Consul and Madame Bonaparte, so she was in a tizzy about the favor he had bestowed upon her by proposing to come and sign the marriage contract himself. It was a favor he granted only to his closest friends, for it was of necessity followed by a gift of money or a present, and the First Consul, not a stingy man but by nature more thrifty than generous, did not spend money like water.

The only person less than pleased with the honor was Hector de Sainte-Hermine. Bonaparte’s show of honoring his fiancée’s family worried him. Younger than his brothers, he had never embraced the Royalist cause as actively as they had, but in spite of his admiration for the First Consul’s genius, Hector had not reached the point where he truly liked him. He could not put out of his mind his brother’s brave but painful death and all the bloody details that accompanied it, or the fact that it was the First Consul who had ordered it and who, in spite of strong pleading, had refused to grant a reprieve or pardon. So every time he met Bonaparte, he felt his face begin to sweat and his knees weaken, and against his own will he would avert his eyes. He feared one thing only, and that was to be forced some day, by his high rank or his great fortune, either to serve in the army or to go into exile. He had warned Claire that he would rather leave France than accept any position in the army or civil service. Claire had said it was totally up to him, that in such an event he should do what he needed to do. All she had demanded of her fiancé was that he would allow her to accompany him wherever he might go. That promise was all her tender, loving heart needed.

Claude-Antoine Régnier, who since then became Duke of Massa, had been named chief judge and prefect of the police. He worked in concert with Junot, now governor of Paris, as well as with Bonaparte himself and his aide-de-camp, Duroc. On the day that Bonaparte was to sign Mademoiselle de Sourdis’s marriage contract, he spent an hour with Régnier, for the news recently had been disturbing. Once again the Vendée and Brittany were in upheaval. It did not appear this time to be civil war; rather, shadowy bands of incendiaries were traveling from farm to farm and from chateau to chateau, where they were forcing farmers and proprietors to give them their money and then torturing them most atrociously. The newspapers were reporting instances of poor souls whose hands and feet had been burned to the bone.

In an order written to Régnier, Bonaparte had asked the prefect to gather all the files relating to this business of burnings. Five such events had been confirmed within the past week: The first, in Berric, where the Sulé River takes its source; the second, in Plescop; the third, in Muzillac; the fourth, in Saint-Nolff; the fifth, at Saint-Jean-de-Brévelay. There appeared to be three leaders at the head of the roving bands, but some superior officer no doubt was in control of them all. And that officer, if one were to believe the police agents, was Cadoudal himself. One could only conclude that he had not kept his word to Bonaparte; that instead of withdrawing to England as he had promised, he was fomenting a new uprising in Brittany.

Bonaparte, who normally was correct in his assumption that he could read a man’s character well, shook his head when the chief judge tried to lay on Cadoudal the despicable crimes they were trying now to solve. How could that be possible? That sharp mind that had discussed with Bonaparte, without giving an inch, the interests of peoples and their kings; that pure conscience content to live in England on his own family’s wealth; that heart without ambition who turned down the position of aide-de-camp to the most important general in Europe; that unselfish soul who refused one hundred thousand francs per year to stand by and watch while lesser men tore each other apart—how could a man like that have lowered himself to such a vile activity as burning, the most cowardly act of banditry of all?

Totally impossible!

And Bonaparte had forcefully said as much to his new prefect of police. He had then given orders for the most skillful agents with broad powers to leave Paris and pursue relentlessly the conscienceless murderers. Régnier promised to send the best of his men to Brittany that very day.

By then, it was already almost ten in the evening, and Bonaparte sent word to Josephine that they would be leaving shortly to visit Madame de Sourdis and the young couple.

The countess’s magnificent hotel was gleaming with light. The day had been warm and sunny, and the first flowers and leaves were beginning to break out of their cottony prisons. The warm spring breezes danced in the flowering lilacs that seemed to forest the garden from the castle windows to the terrace along the quay. Beneath those intriguingly scented canopies, colored lamps were burning, and whiffs of perfume and snatches of song wafted from the open windows, while on the drawn curtains the guests cast moving shadows.

Among the guests were the most elegant people in Paris. There were the government officials, that marvelous staff of generals, the oldest of whom was no more thirty-five: Murat, Marmont, Junot, Duroc, Lannes, Moncey, Davout—already heroes at an age when one is normally only a captain. There were poets: Lemercier, still proud of the recent success of his Agamemnon; Chénier, who had written Timoléon, then given up theater and thrown himself into politics; Chateaubriand, who had just discovered God at Niagara Falls and in the depths of America’s virgin forests. There were famous dancers without whom grand balls could not be held: Trénis, Laffitte, Dupaty, Garat, Vestris. And there were the new century’s splendid stars who had appeared in the East: Madame Récamier, Madame Méchin, Madame de Contades, Madame Regnault de Saint-Jean-d’Angély. Finally, there was the brilliant young crowd, made up of men like Caulaincourt, Narbonne, Longchamp, Matthieu de Montmorency, Eugène de Beauharnais, and Philippe de Ségur.

From the moment the word got out that the First Consul and Madame Bonaparte not only were attending the wedding celebration but also would be signing the marriage contract, all society sought an invitation. Guests filled the ground floor and the first story of Madame de Sourdis’s spacious hotel, and they spread out onto the terraces, there to seek relief from the hot, stuffy rooms in the cool evening air.

At quarter to eleven, a mounted escort was seen leaving the Tuileries gates, with each man carrying a torch. Once they had crossed the bridge, the First Consul’s carriage, rolling at a triple gallop, surrounded by torches, swept by in the thunder of hoofbeats and a whirlwind of sparks before it disappeared into the hotel courtyard.

In the midst of a crowd so dense that it seemed impossible for anyone to penetrate, a passage magically opened and, inside the ballroom, widened into a circle that allowed Madame de Sourdis and Claire to approach the First Consul and Josephine. Hector de Sainte-Hermine walked behind Claire and her mother, and though he paled visibly on seeing Bonaparte, he nonetheless stood nobly before him.

Madame Bonaparte embraced Mademoiselle de Sourdis and placed on her arm a pearl necklace worth fifty thousand francs. Bonaparte greeted the two women, then moved toward Hector. Not suspecting that Bonaparte indeed meant to address him, Hector began to step aside. But Bonaparte stopped to face him.

“Monsieur,” said Bonaparte, “if I had not been afraid you would refuse it, I would have brought a gift for you as well, an appointment to the consular guard. But I understand that some wounds need time to heal.”

“For such cures, General, no one has a more skillful hand than you. However.…” Hector sighed and raised his handkerchief to his eyes. “Excuse me, General,” said the young man, after a pause. “I would like to be more worthy of your kindness.”

“That is what comes from having too much heart, young man,” said Bonaparte. “It is always the heart that suffers.”

Turning again to Madame de Sourdis, the First Consul exchanged a few words with her, and complimented Claire. Then he noticed Vestris.

“Oh, there’s young Vestris,” he said. “He lately did me a kindness for which I shall be eternally grateful. He was coming back to perform at the Opera after a short illness, and the performance happened to fall on a day that I was having a reception at the Tuileries. He changed his performance date so as not to conflict with my reception.… Come, Monsieur Vestris, please demonstrate your inimitable courteousness by asking two of these ladies to dance a gavotte for us.”

“Citizen First Consul,” answered this son to the god of dance in an Italian accent that the family had never been able to eradicate, “we are pleased to have just the dance for you, a gavotte I composed for Mademoiselle de Coigny. Madame Récamier and Mademoiselle de Sourdis dance it like angels. All we need is a harp and a horn,” he said, rolling his “r”s, “if Mademoiselle de Sourdis is willing to play the tambourine as she dances. As for Madame Récamier, you know that she is unbeatable in the shawl dance.”

“Come, my ladies,” said the First Consul. “You surely cannot refuse the request that Monsieur Vestris has made and which I support with all my power.”

Mademoiselle de Sourdis would have been happy to escape the ovation given to her, but once her dancing master Vestris had chosen her, and after the First Consul had added his bidding, she did not wait to be asked again.

She was dressed perfectly for this dance. Her white dress, accented by her dark skin, had two clusters of grapes on the shoulders, while grape leaves in reddish autumn colors ran the length of her gown. She also wore grape leaves in her hair.

Madame Récamier was wearing her customary white dress and her red Indian cashmere shawl. The creator of the shawl dance, which had so successfully been taken from the ballroom to the theater, Madame Récamier performed her invention with no want of modesty yet without a hint of constraint as no theater bayadère or professional actress has demonstrated since. Beneath the undulations of the supple cashmere cloth, she was able to reveal her charms at the same time she was pretending to hide them.

The dance lasted nearly a quarter of an hour and ended in a crescendo of applause, to which the First Consul added his own. At his signal, the entire room exploded in bravos. Amidst the boisterous praise, Vestris seemed to be walking on air as he took full credit for all that poetry of form and movement, of expression and attitude.

Once the gavotte had finished, a servant in livery whispered a few words to the Comtesse de Sourdis, to which she responded, “Open the drawing room.”

Two doors slid open, and in the marvelously elegant drawing room, brightly lit, two men of the law were seated at a table lit by two candelabras, between which the marriage contract was awaiting the signatures with which it would soon be honored. The only people authorized to enter the drawing room were the twenty or so who would be signing the contract, which would first be read aloud for the benefit of the other wedding guests.

As the contract was being read, a second lackey in livery entered. As unobtrusively as he could, he slipped over to the Comte de Sainte-Hermine and in a whisper said, “Monsieur le Chevalier de Mahalin asks to speak to you at this very moment.”

“Have him wait,” said Sainte-Hermine, who was standing attendant in the small study at one side of the drawing room.

“Monsieur le Comte, he says that he must see you at this very instant. Even if you were to have the pen in your hand, he would request that you lay it down on the table and come to see him before you sign … oh, there he is at the door.”

With what looked like a gesture of despair, the count joined the Chevalier outside the drawing room. Few people noticed the discreet exit, and those who did were unaware of its unfortunate significance.

After the contract had been read, Bonaparte, always in a hurry to finish what was under way, as eager to leave the Tuileries when he was there as he was to return when he was out, picked up the pen that was lying on the table. Without wondering whether he should be the first to sign, he hastily placed his signature on the contract, and then, just as four years later he would take the crown from the pope’s hands and place it himself on Josephine’s head, he handed his wife the pen.

Josephine signed, then passed the pen to Mademoiselle de Sourdis, who instinctively looked around worriedly, but in vain, for the Comte de Sainte-Hermine. Filled with anxiety, she signed her name and tried to hide her concern. But it was the Comte’s turn next to sign.

A murmur disturbed the drawing room as heads turned in search of the bridegroom. Soon there was no choice but to call out for him. Only there was no answer.

For a long moment, in surprised silence, the guests looked at each other, all of them, wondering what could have happened to the count at the very moment his presence was indispensable and his absence a complete lapse of etiquette.

Finally someone mentioned that during the reading of the contract, a young well-dressed stranger had appeared in the dorway to the drawing room and had exchanged a few whispered words with the count before leading him off, more like his executioner than his friend.

Still, the count might not have left the house. Madame de Sourdis rang for a servant and ordered him to organize a search for the absent bridegroom. For several minutes, amidst the buzz of six hundred stunned wedding guess, servants could be heard calling out to each other from one floor to the next.

Then one of the servants thought to ask the coachmen out in the courtyard if they had seen two young men. Several of them had, as it happened. They’d noticed that one of the young men had been hatless in spite of the rain. They reported that the two men had rushed down the steps and leaped into a carriage, shouting, “To the stagecoach house!” and the carriage had galloped off. One of the coachmen was certain he had recognized the young man without a hat: It was the Comte de Sainte-Hermine.

The guests looked at each other in stupefaction. Then, out of the silence, they heard a voice shout: “The carriage and escort for the First Consul!” They all respectfully allowed Monsieur and Madame Bonaparte, along with Madame Louis Bonaparte, to pass. And as soon as they had left, pandemonium struck.

Everyone rushed from the elegant rooms of Madame de Sourdis’s grand house as if there were a fire.

Neither Madame de Sourdis nor Claire, however, had any inclination to stop them. Fifteen minutes later they found themselves alone.

Madame de Sourdis, with a painful cry, rushed to her daughter’s side. Claire was trembling, about to faint. “Oh, Mother, Mother!” she cried, bursting into sobs as she collapsed into the countess’s arms, “it is just what the prophetess predicted! My widowhood has begun.”




XXIII The Burning Brigades (#ulink_24a484af-84cc-58a9-9575-326681d3c631)







WE SHOULD EXPLAIN why Mademoiselle de Sourdis’s fiancé disappeared so incomprehensibly just as the marriage contract was to be signed. For the guests, his disappearance was the cause for surprise; for the countess, it prompted all sorts of speculations, each new one more improbable than the last. For her daughter, it elicited incessant tears.

We have seen that Fouché summoned the Chevalier de Mahalin to his office the day before news of his dismissal was to be publicly announced. Hoping to get back his ministry, Fouché then planned with Mahalin the organization of burning brigades in the West.

The bands of incendiaries had soon begun to appear, and already they had left their mark. Scarcely two weeks after the Chevalier had left Paris, it was learned that two landowners had been burned, one in Buré and the other in Saulnaye. Again, terror was spreading throughout the Morbihan.

For five years civil war had raged in that unfortunate region, but even in the midst of its most horrible outrages against humanity, never had such banditry as this been practiced. To find robbery and torture of the kind that accompanied these burnings, one had to go back to the worst days of Louis XV and to the horrors of religious discrimination under Louis XIV.

Terror came in bands of ten, fifteen, or twenty men who seemed to rise out of the earth and move like shadows over the land, following ravines, leaping across stiles; and any peasants who had ventured out late in the night had to hide behind trees or throw themselves facedown behind hedges, or else fall prey to the brigands. Then, suddenly, through a half-open window or a poorly closed door, they would burst into some farmhouse or chateau and, taking the servants by surprise, bind them up. Next, they would light a fire in the middle of the kitchen; they’d drag the master or mistress of the house over to it and lay their victim down on the floor with his feet to the flames until pain forced him to reveal where his money was hidden. Sometimes they would then free their prisoner. Other times, once they’d got the money, if they feared they might be identified, they would stab, hang, or bludgeon to death the unfortunate they had robbed.

After the third or fourth episode of that kind, after the authorities had indeed confirmed the fires and murders, the rumor began to spread, at first secretly, then quite openly, that Cadoudal himself strode at the head of those gangs. The brigands and their leader always wore masks, but some who had seen the largest of the bands stalk through the night were sure they had recognized the leader as George Cadoudal—by his size, by his bearing, and especially by his large round head.

This was difficult to believe. How could George Cadoudal, who acted so honorably in all things, have suddenly become the contemptible chief of a shameless, pitiless burning brigade?

Yet the rumor kept growing. More and more people claimed they had recognized George, and soon Le Journal de Paris officially announced that Cadoudal, in spite of his promise not to be the first to open hostilities—Cadoudal who had disbanded his Royalist forces—had now scraped together fifty or so bandits with whom he was terrorizing the countryside.

In London, Cadoudal himself might not have happened upon the article in Le Journal de Paris, but a friend showed it to him. He took the official announcement as an accusation against him, and he saw the accusation as a flagrant attack on his honor and loyalty.

“Very well,” he said, “by attacking me the French authorities have broken the pact we swore between us. They were unable to kill me with gun and sword, so now they are trying to kill me with calumny. They want war, and war they shall have.”

That very evening George embarked on a fishing boat. Five days later it landed him on the French coast, between Port-Louis and the Quiberon peninsula.

At the same time, two other men, Saint-Régeant and Limoëlan, were also leaving London to go to Paris. As they would be traveling through Normandy, they’d enter the country by the cliffs near Biville. They had spent one hour with George the day they left, to receive their instructions. Limoëlan had considerable experience in the intrigues of civil war, and Saint-Régeant was a former naval officer, skilled and resourceful, a sea pirate who had become a land pirate.

It was on such lost men—rather than the likes of Guillemot and Sol de Grisolles—that Cadoudal was now forced to depend to execute his plans. In any case, it was clear that his goals and theirs were one and the same.

This is what transpired.

Near the end of April 1804, at about five in the afternoon, a man wrapped in a greatcoat galloped into the courtyard of the Plescop farm owned by Jacques Doley. A wealthy farmer, Doley lived there with his sixty-year-old mother-in-law and his thirty-year-old wife, with whom he had two children: one a boy of ten, the other a girl of seven. He had ten servants, both men and women, who helped him run the farm.

The man in the greatcoat asked to speak to the master of the house and closed himself up in the milk room with him for a half hour, but then failed to reappear. Jacques Doley came back out of the room alone.

During dinner, everyone noticed how quiet and preoccupied Jacques seemed to be. Several times his wife spoke to him, but he did not answer. After the meal, when the children tried to play with him as they usually did, he gently pushed them away.

In Brittany, as you know, the servants eat at the master’s table. On that day, they too noticed how sad Doley was, and found it surprising because by nature he was quite jovial. Just a few days before, the Château de Buré had been burned, and that is what the servants were talking quietly about during the meal. As Doley listened to them, he raised his head a few times as if he were about to ask something, but each time without interrupting them. From time to time, though, the old mother made the sign of the cross, and near the end of the servants’ tale, Madame Doley, no longer able to control her fear, moved closer to her husband.

By eight in the evening, it was completely dark. That was when all of the servants usually retired, some to the barn, some to the stables, but Doley seemed to be trying to delay them, as he gave them a series of orders that kept them from leaving. Also, now and then he would glance at the two or three double-barreled shotguns hanging on nails above the fireplace, like a man who would rather have them in hand.

Soon, however, each servant had left in turn, and the old woman went to put the children in their cribs, which stood between their parents’ bed and the outside wall. She returned from the bedroom to kiss her daughter and son-in-law good-night, then went to her own bed in a little cabinet attached to the kitchen.

Doley and his wife retired to the bedroom, which was separated from the kitchen by a glass door. Its two windows, protected by tightly closed oak shutters, opened out onto the garden. Near the top of the shutters, two small diamond-shaped openings admitted daylight even when the shutters were closed.

Although it was the time that Madame Doley, like all farm people, normally got undressed and went to bed, that evening, some vague worry troubled her out of her routine. She did finally get into her nightclothes, but before she’d actually get into bed she insisted that her husband check all the doors to be sure they were securely locked.

The farmer agreed, shrugging his shoulders like a man who thinks it is an unnecessary precaution. The first door he checked was the one that led from the kitchen to the milk room, but since it had only a few openings for light and no outside entrance, she did not disagree when her husband said, “To get in there, anyone would have to come in through the kitchen, and we have been in the kitchen all afternoon.”

He checked the courtyard gate; it was firmly locked with an iron bar and two bolts. The window too was secure. The door of the bake house had only one lock, but it was an oak door and a prison lock. Finally, there was the garden door, but to get to it, you would have to scale a ten-foot-high wall or break down the courtyard door, itself impregnable.

Somewhat reassured, Madame Doley went back into the bedroom but she still couldn’t keep from trembling. Doley sat down at his desk and pretended to be looking over his papers. Yet, whatever power he had over himself, he was unable to hide his worry, and the slightest sound would give him a start.

If he had begun to worry because of what he had learned during the day, he indeed had valid reasons. Roughly one hour from Plescop, a band of about twenty men was leaving the woods near Meucon and starting across open fields. Four were on horseback, riding in front like a vanguard and wearing uniforms of the Gendarmerie Nationale. The fifteen or sixteen others following on foot were not in uniform, and they were armed with guns and pitchforks. They were trying their best not to be seen. They stuck to the hedgerow, walked along ravines, crawled up hillsides, and got closer and closer to Plescop. Soon they were only a hundred paces away. They stopped to hold council.

One of the men moved out from the band and circled his way around to the farm. The others waited. They could hear a dog barking, but they could not tell if it came from inside the farm or a neighboring house.

The scout came back. He had walked around the farmhouse but had found no way in. Again they held council. They decided that they would have to force their way in.

They advanced. They stopped only when they reached the wall. That’s when they realized that the barking dog was on the wall’s other side, in the garden.

They started toward the gate. On its side, so did the dog, barking even more ferociously. They had been discovered; their element of surprise was lost.

The four horsemen in gendarme uniforms went to the gate, while the bandits on foot pressed themselves back against the wall. Now sticking its nose under the gate, the dog was barking desperately.

A voice called out, a man’s voice: “What’s the matter, Blaireau? What’s wrong, old boy?”

The dog turned toward the voice and howled plaintively.

Another voice called out from a little farther away, a woman’s voice: “You are not going to open the gate, I hope!”

“And why not?” the man’s voice asked.

“Because it could be brigands, you imbecile!”

Both voices went quiet.

“In the name of the law,” someone shouted on the other side of the gate: “Open up!”

“Who are you, to speak in the name of the law?” the man’s voice asked.

“The gendarmerie from Vannes. We have come to search Monsieur Doley’s farm. He has been accused of giving refuge to Chouans.”

“Don’t listen to them, Jean,” said the woman. “It’s a trick. They’re just saying that to get you to open the gate.”

Jean, the gardener, was of the same opinion as his wife, for he had quietly carried a ladder over to the courtyard wall and climbed up to its top. Looking over, he could see not only the four men on horseback but also roughly fifteen men crowded up against the wall.

Meanwhile, the men dressed like gendarmes kept shouting: “Open up in the name of the law.” And three of them began pounding at the gate with the butt end of their guns while threatening to break it down if it was not opened.

The noise of their pounding reached all the way to the farmer’s bedroom. Madame Doley’s terror increased. Shaken by his wife’s alarm, Doley was still trying to bring himself to leave the house and open the gate when the stranger emerged from the milk room, grabbed the farmer’s arm, and said: “What are you waiting for? Did I not tell you I’d take care of everything?”

“Who are you speaking to?” cried Madame Doley.

“Nobody at all,” Doley answered, hurrying out from the kitchen.

As soon as he opened the door, he could hear the gardener and his wife talking to the bandits, and although he was not duped by the bandits’ trickery, he called out: “Well, Jean, why are you so stubbornly refusing to open up to the police? You know that it is wrong to try to resist them. Please excuse this man, gentlemen,” Doley continued, walking toward the gate. “He is not acting on my orders.”

Jean had recognized Monsieur Doley. He ran up to him. “Oh, Master Doley,” he said. “I’m not mistaken. You are. They aren’t real gendarmes. In the name of heaven, don’t open up.”

“I know what’s happening and what I have to do,” said Jacques Doley. “Go back to your rooms and lock yourself in. Or if you are afraid, take your wife and go hide in the willows. They will never look there for you.”

“But you! What about you?”

“There’s someone here who has promised to defend me.”

“Come on, are you going to open up?” roared the leader of the supposed gendarmes, “or must I break the gate down?” And once again they pounded three or four times on the gate with the butts of their guns, which threatened to knock the gate off its hinges.

“I said I was going to open up,” shouted Jacques Doley.

And he did.

The brigands swarmed over Jacques Doley, grabbing him by the collar. “Gentlemen,” he said. “Don’t forget that I willingly opened the gate for you. You realize that I have ten or eleven men working here. I could have given them weapons. We could have defended ourselves from behind these walls and done severe damage before surrendering.”

“But you didn’t. Because you thought you were dealing with gendarmes and not with us.”

Jacques showed them the ladder placed against the wall. “Yes, except that Jean saw you all from up on that ladder.”

“Since you did open the gate, what do you expect?”

“That you will be less demanding. If I had not opened the gate, you might have burned my farm in a moment of rage!”

“And who’s to say that we won’t burn your farm in a moment of joy?”

“That would be unnecessary cruelty. You want my money, fine. But you do not wish my ruin.”

“Well, now,” said the chief, “finally someone who’s reasonable. And do you have a lot of money?”

“No, because a week ago I paid all my bills.”

“The devil take you! Those are not the kind of words I want to hear.”

“They may not be what you want to hear, but they are the truth.”

“Well, then, we were given bad information. For we were told that you’d have a large sum of money here.”

“Someone lied to you.”

“No one ever lies to George Cadoudal.”

By now, they had gotten closer to the farmhouse and were pushing Jacques Doley into the kitchen. The brigands, unused to such coolness from one of their prey, were looking in astonishment at the farmer.

“Oh, gentlemen, gentlemen,” said Madame Doley, who had once again gotten up and left the bedroom, “we’ll give you everything you want, but please you won’t hurt us, will you?”

“Say,” said one of the brigands, “you’re like an Auray eel, crying before you’re skinned alive.”

“Enough words,” said the chief. “The money!”

“Woman,” said Doley, “give them the keys. These gentlemen will look themselves. That way they cannot accuse us of trying to fool them.”

The woman looked at her husband with surprise, and made no move to obey. “Give them the keys!” he said again. “When I say give them, you give them.”

Agape, the poor woman could not understand why her husband was so readily acquiescing to the brigands’ demands. But she gave the leader the keys, then watched in fear as he walked over to the huge walnut wardrobe, the kind in which farmers usually lock up their most valuable possessions, beginning with their linens.

In one drawer they found silverware. The chief grabbed it up and tossed it onto the middle of the tiled kitchen floor. To Madame Doley’s great surprise, she counted only six place settings when there should have been eight. In another drawer they’d had a sack of silver and a sack of gold, about fifteen thousand francs in all. But however much the chief dug through the drawer, to the woman’s great astonishment, all he came up with was the sack of silver.

The wife tried to exchange a look with her husband, but he did not look back. One of the brigands, however, caught the flash of her glance. “Well, now, Mother,” he said, “is your august husband trying to trick us?”

“Oh, no, gentlemen!” she cried. “I swear.”

“Perhaps you know more than he does. Very well, we’ll start with you then.”

The brigands emptied the wardrobe but found nothing else of value to them. They emptied a second wardrobe as well and found only four louis, five or six six-pound crowns, and a few coins hidden in a bowl. “I think you might be right,” said the chief to the brigand who had accused the woman of trying to trick them.

“Someone warned him we were coming,” said one of the bandits, “and he has buried his money.”

“Thunderation!” said the chief. “We have ways of getting money to come out of the ground. Come, bring me a bundle of wood and some straw.”

“Why?” cried the woman in terror.

“Have you ever seen a pig roast?” the chief asked her.

“Jacques! Jacques!” the woman cried. “Do you hear what they’re saying?”

“Of course I can hear,” said the farmer. “But what do you expect? They are the masters, and we have no choice but to let them do whatever they want.”

“Oh, Jesus!” cried the woman in desperation, as two brigands came from the bake house, one carrying a bundle of straw, the other some sticks. “How can you be so compliant?”

“I trust that God will not permit such an abominable crime as the destruction of two creatures whom I cannot call innocent of any sin, but certainly they’re innocent of any crime.”

“What do you mean?” asked the chief. “Is God going to send an angel to protect you?”

“It would not be the first time,” said Jacques, “that God would show himself through a miracle.”

“Well, we’ll see about that,” said the chief, “and to give him the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone, we’ll burn the sow along with the boar.” Shouts of laughter greeted his joke, all the more so because it was crude.

The brigands grabbed Jacques Doley, tore off his shoes, pants, and stockings. They ripped off the woman’s skirt. They tied them up separately but similarly, with their hands behind their backs and made them sit on the floor with their legs stretched out. When the fire had caught, they pushed the farmer and his wife by the shoulders until their feet were just a few inches away from the flames. Both cried in pain at the same time.

“Wait!” said one of the brigands, “I’ve just found the piglets. We need to roast them along with the father and mother.” Into the room he dragged a child in each hand; he’d found them quaking and weeping on the floor behind their mother’s bed.

Jacques Doley could stand no more. “If you are a man,” he shouted, “it is time to keep the promise you made!”

Scarcely had he pronounced those words than the milk house door was thrown open. A man came out, his arms extended, and in each hand he held a double-barrelled pistol.

“Who is the man they call George Cadoudal?” the man asked.

“I am,” said the tallest and heaviest of the masked men, getting to his feet.

“You’re lying,” said the stranger. And he shot the bandit point-blank in the chest.

“I myself am Cadoudal,” he said. The impostor fell, dead.

The bandits took a step backward. They had indeed recognized the real Cadoudal, who, they’d assumed, was still in England.




XXIV Counterorders (#ulink_8bb6c3a2-dd24-5bc2-ab90-3eba8d6dea1d)







IT WAS CADOUDAL, and not a man among the band of indenciaries—or in all of the Morbihan—who would dare to raise a hand against him or hesitate to obey a single one of his orders. So the second in command, who was still holding the children, released them and walked over to Cadoudal. “General,” he said. “What are your orders?”

“First of all, untie those two poor people.”

The bandits quickly did Cadoudal’s bidding. Madame Doley collapsed in an armchair, then drew her two children into her arms and pulled them to her breast. Her husband rose to his feet, walked over to Cadoudal, and shook his hand.

“And now?” asked the second in command.

“Now,” said Cadoudal, “I’ve been told that there are three brigades like yours.”

“Yes, General.”

“Who had the audacity to gather you together to do this odious work?”

“A man came from Paris; he told us that you would be back to join us within a month; he said that we should gather in your name.”

“Fighting against the government as Chouans I could understand. But burning, never! Am I an arsonist?”

“We were even told to choose the man among us who most resembled you, so that people would believe you were already here. We called him George II. What must we do now to atone for our mistake?”

“Your mistake was to believe that I could ever become the leader of a band of brigands like you, and there is no way to atone for that. Carry my orders to the other groups: They must disband and cease their odious activities immediately. Then send word to all the former leaders, and especially to Sol de Grisolles and Guillemot, asking them to take up arms and prepare once again to embark on a campaign under my command. However, they must not make a move or raise their white flag until I say so.”

The bandits withdrew without a word.

The farmer and his wife restored order to their wardrobes. The linen once more took its place on the shelves and the silverware in the drawers. A half hour later, the room looked as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened there at all.

Madame Doley had not been mistaken. Her husband had indeed taken precautions. He had hidden some of the silverware as well as the sack of gold, which contained probably twelve thousand francs. The Breton peasant, among all peasants, is the most defiant and perhaps the most provident. In spite of Cadoudal’s promise, Doley had worried that things might turn out badly, and in that case, he wanted to protect at least some of his fortune. And so he had done.

After seeing to Jean and his wife and then carrying out George II’s body, Monsieur and Madame Doley relocked their doors. Cadoudal, who had eaten nothing since morning, now sat at a simple supper, as if his day had passed without event. Refusing the bed the farmer offered, he stretched out on fresh straw in the barn.

The next day, scarcely had he arisen when Sol de Grisolles arrived. Living in Auray, about two and a half leagues from Plescop, he had been roused by one of the brigands who’d hoped to please Cadoudal by telling Grisolles without delay that Cadoudal was nearby. The news greatly astonished Grisolles, for he believed, like everyone else, that Cadoudal was in London.

Cadoudal told him the whole story and showed him the traces of fire and blood on the kitchen’s tile floor. These burning brigades had surely been a police plot, devised to nullify the treaty that Cadoudal had signed with Bonaparte by accusing the Breton general of breaking it. So Cadoudal concluded; and in light of that, he said, he was once more free to act as he wished: which was what he wanted to talk to Sol de Grisolles about.

His first intention was to inform Bonaparte that by virtue of what had recently happened in Brittany, he was withdrawing his word. Still, with proof incontrovertible that he had nothing to do with the new wave of banditry in the west—for indeed he had stopped it at his own life’s peril—he would not declare a war between sovereign powers, since that would be impossible for him to carry out; rather, he would undertake vengeance Corsican style. He wished to charge Sol de Grisolles with communicating the vendetta. It was a charge that Grisolles accepted immediately, for he was a man who never backed away from what he believed to be his duty.

Grisolles would then join Laurent, wherever Laurent happened to be, and have him put his Companions of Jehu back into operation at once, with the understanding that Cadoudal himself would lose no time in going first to London and then returning to Paris to set his own plans into execution.

Once he had given his instructions to Sol de Grisolles, Cadoudal said good-bye to his hosts, begged their forgiveness for having used their home as the theater for the horrors the day before, and mounted his horse. While Grisolles was heading to Vannes, Cadoudal was galloping to the beaches at Erdeven and Carnac, where his boat, only apparently a fishing boat, was plying along the coast.

Three days later, Sol de Grisolles was in Paris, requesting from the First Consul a safe-conduct and a meeting for a matter of the greatest importance. The First Consul sent Duroc to his hotel, but Grisolles, apologizing politely like a true gentleman, declared that he could repeat only to General Bonaparte the message he carried from General Cadoudal. Duroc reported back to the First Consul and then returned to escort Grisolles to the Tuileries.

Bonaparte, it turned out, was quite upset about the Cadoudal matter. “So,” he said without allowing Sol de Grisolles time to speak, “that is how your general keeps his word. He agrees to leave for London, and instead he stays in the Morbihan where he raises bands of burning brigades who rampage all over, as if he were Mandrin or Poulailler. But I have given orders. All the authorities have been alerted. If he is taken, he will be shot like a bandit without a trial. Don’t tell me it’s not true. Le Journal de Paris has published an article, and my police reports agree. Besides, people have recognized him.”

“Will the First Consul permit me to answer,” said Sol de Grisolles, “and to prove my friend’s innocence with a few words?” Bonaparte shrugged.

“And if in five minutes you admit that your newspapers and your police reports are wrong and I am in the right, what will you say?”

“I will say… I will say that Régnier is an idiot, that is all.”

“Well, General. A copy of Le Journal de Paris reporting that Cadoudal had never left France and was raising burning brigades in the Morbihan ended up in his hands in London. He immediately boarded a fishing boat and came back to France, landing on the Quiberon peninsula. He hid at a farm that was to be burned that very night, and he burst from his hiding place just as the leader of the brigade, who claimed himself to be Cadoudal, was about to torture the farmer. The farmer’s name is Jacques Doley; the farm is called Plescop. Cadoudal walked straight up to the man who had usurped his name and blew out his brains, saying: ‘You are lying. I am Cadoudal.’

“And then he asked me to tell you, General, that in fact it was you, or at least your police, who had tried to sully his name by placing at the head of the burning brigades a man of his size and stature, a man who looked enough like him to be mistaken for him. He took vengeance on the man by killing him right there on the spot. That done, he ran the others off the farm they had presumed to seize, although there were twenty of them and he was but one.”

“What you are telling me is impossible.”

“I saw the body, and here is a letter from two farmers attesting to it all.” Grisolles placed under the First Consul’s eyes the written account of the night’s events. It was signed by Jacques Doley and his wife.

“So,” Grisolles continued, “Cadoudal now frees you from your promise and takes back his own. He is unable to declare war since you have stripped him of all his means of defense, but he declares upon you a Corsican vendetta. For you he adopts the code of your own country: Defend yourself! He will defend himself!”

“Citizen,” Duroc cried, “do you know whom you are speaking to?”

“I am speaking to a man who gave us his word as we gave him ours, who was bound as we were, and who had no more right to violate that word than did we.”

“He is right, Duroc,” said Bonaparte. “Still, we need to know if he’s telling the truth.”

“General, when a Breton gives his word.…” Sol de Grisolles cried.

“A Breton can be mistaken or tricked. Duroc, go get Fouché.”

Ten minutes later, Fouché was in the First Consul’s office. The former Minister of Police had scarcely cleared the doorway when Bonaparte called out, “Monsieur Fouché, where is Cadoudal?”

Fouché began to laugh. “I could answer that I have no idea.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because I am no longer Minister of Police.”

“You still hold the office.…”

“… but am on the way out.”

“No more joking, Fouché. But, yes, you are on the way out. I am still paying you, however, and you still have the same agents, so you can still tell me what I need to know as you still are, technically, officially minister. I asked you where Cadoudal was.”

“As of now, he must be back in London.”

“So he had left England?”

“Yes.”

“For what reason?”

“To blow out the brains of a fellow who had assumed his identity.”

“And did he kill him?”

“Right in the presence of the fellow’s twenty men at the Plescop farm. But this man,” he said, pointing to Sol de Grisolles, “can tell you more than I can about the matter. He was close by when it happened. Plescop, I believe, is only two and a half leagues from Auray.”

“What?! You knew all that and you did not alert me?”

“Monsieur Régnier is prefect of police. It was his job to let you know. I am just an ordinary citizen, a senator.”

“So it’s clear, the prefecture is a job honest men will never know properly how to do,” said Bonaparte.

“Thank you, General,” said Fouché.

“Indeed. All you need is for people to think that you’re an honest man. In your place, Fouché, I would aim for something higher.

“Monsieur de Grisolles, you are free to go. As a man and as a Corsican, I accept the vendetta that Cadoudal announces. Let him defend himself, and I will defend myself. But, if he is captured, there shall be no mercy.”

“That is exactly how he expects it to be,” said the Breton with a bow, and took his leave.

“Did you hear, Monsieur Fouché?” said Bonaparte when the door had closed on the two of them. “He has declared a vendetta. It’s your job to protect me.”

“Make me Minister of Police once again, and I’ll be happy to protect you.”

“You’re a fool, Monsieur Fouché. As bright as you think you are, you’re a fool. For the less you are Minister of Police, visibly at least, the easier it will be for you to protect me, since no one will mistrust you. Besides, it has been only two months since I abolished the Ministry of Police, so I cannot very well restore it without good reason. Save me from some great danger; then I shall restore it. Meanwhile, I shall open for you a credit line of five hundred thousand francs from secret funds. Use it as you need, and when it runs out, let me know. Above all, I want you to see to it that no misfortune befalls Cadoudal. I want him taken alive!”

“We shall try. But to do that, he first needs to come back to France.”

“Oh, he’ll be back!—you can be sure of that. I’ll be expecting to hear from you.”

Fouché bowed to the First Consul, and, returning to his carriage as quickly as possible, he leaped up onto it rather than climbing inside, and called out, “Back to my office!” Once there, as he climbed down, he said to his coachman, “Go get Monsieur Dubois. And if possible, make sure he brings Victor along.”

A half hour later, the two men Fouché had summoned were in his office. Although Monsieur Dubois reported to the new prefect of police, he had remained faithful to Fouché, not on principle but for reasons of self-interest. He realized that Fouché’s disfavor would not last forever, so he was careful not to betray Fouché: not Fouché the man, but rather Fouché the minister who might make him his fortune. He, along with three or four of his best agents, like the especially skillful Victor, had remained completely at Fouché’s service.

There were two piles of gold stacked on the fireplace mantel when Dubois and his agent entered the office of the real Minister of Police. Victor, a man of the people, had not had the time even to change his clothes.

“We did not want to waste a single moment,” said Dubois. “I bring you one of my most reliable men, dressed just as he was when I received your message.”

Without answering, Fouché walked over to the agent, and, attending Victor with his cross-eyed gaze, he said, “Damn it, Dubois. This may not be the man we need after all.”

“What kind of man do you need, Citizen Fouché?”

“I’ve got a Breton leader we have to follow, perhaps to Germany, certainly to England. I need a respectable man, someone who can shadow him with ease, inconspicuously, in cafés, in clubs, and even in parlors. I need a gentleman, and you have brought me a bumpkin from the Limousin.”

“Oh, how true!” said the agent. “I’m not one for cafés, clubs, and parlors very much, but drop me into taverns, popular dances, and cabarets and you’ll find me in my element sure.” He winked at Dubois, who had been regarding his agent with surprise but was quick to understand.

“So,” said Fouché, “you must immediately send me a man who could comfortably attend an evening party at the regent’s. To him I shall give my instructions.” Taking two louis from a third stack of gold, he said to Victor, “Here, my friend. This is for the trouble you’ve taken. If I ever need you for more ordinary observations, I shall ask for you. But not a word to anyone about coming to see me here today.”

“Not a word,” said the agent, speaking in the accent of his region, “and I accept with pleasure. You ask for me, you say nothing to me, and you give me two louis to keep silent. Nothing simpler.”

“Fine, fine, my man,” said Fouché. “Now you may go.”

Both men returned to Fouché’s carriage. Fouché himself was a little annoyed to have wasted time, but since he had not told Dubois the sort of surveillance he required, he realized the fault was mostly his own fault.

Still, he did not have to wait long for the second man. Within a quarter of an hour, he was announced. “I said to let him come in!” he shouted impatiently. “Send him in!”

“Here I am, here I am, Citizen,” said a young man, about twenty-five or twenty-six years old, with dark hair and bright, intelligent eyes; he was impeccably dressed and looked to be quite familiar with high society. “I lost no time getting here, and here I am!”

“It’s about time!” said Fouché, as he studied him through his lorgnette. “You are just the man I need.”

After a moment’s silence. during which he continued his examination, Fouché asked, “Do you know what this is all about?”

“Yes! It’s about following a suspicious citizen, maybe go to Germany and surely to England. Nothing easier. I speak German like a German and English like an Englishman. Be assured, too, I shall never let him out of my sight. So all I need is for someone to point him out to me, or to see him once, or to know where he is and who he is.”

“His name is Sol de Grisolles, and he is Cadoudal’s aide-de-camp. He lives on Rue de la Loi, and his hotel is called L’Unité. He has perhaps already left the city. In that case it will be necessary to pick up his trail. I need to know everything he does.” Taking the two stacks of gold from the fireplace mantel, Fouché added, “Here. This will help you gather information.”

The young man held out his perfectly gloved hand and put the money in his pocket without counting it. “And now,” said the young dandy, “should I give back the Limousin’s two louis?”

“What do you mean? The Limousin’s two louis?” asked Fouché.

“The two louis you gave me a few minutes ago.”

“I gave them to you?”

“Yes, and to prove it, here they are.”

“Well,” said Fouché, “in that case this third stack is also yours—consider it a bonus. Now, go on, waste no more time. I want information this evening.”

“You will have what you need.” The agent walked out as pleased with Fouché as Fouché was pleased with him.

Later that evening, Fouché received the first dispatch:

I’ve taken a room in the Hotel L’Unité, Rue de la Loi, and my neighbor is Sol de Grisolles. From the balcony that connects our four windows, I was able to see how his room is arranged. A sofa, ideal for conversation, is set right against my wall. I’ve made a hole, almost invisible, allowing me to see and hear everything. The citizen Sol de Grisolles, who did not find the person he was looking for at the Mont-Blanc Hotel, will wait for him until two in the morning. He has alerted the Hotel L’Unité that one of his friends would be coming to see him late.

I will be the unsuspected third party to their conversation.

The Limousin

PS: Tomorrow, first thing, I’ll send a second dispatch.

The next morning as day was breaking, Fouché was greeted with a second message with the following information:

The friend the citizen Sol de Grisolles was expecting is the famous Laurent, called handsome Laurent, head of the Companions of Jehu. The order that Cadoudal’s aide-de-camp delivered to Laurent was that all the affiliates of the famous company should be reminded of the oaths they have taken. Next Saturday they will be resuming their attacks, first by stopping the stagecoach from Rouen to Paris in the Vernon forest. Whoever is not at his post will be punished by death.

The citizen Sol de Grisolles is leaving at ten in the morning for Germany. I’ll be leaving with him. We will pass through Strasbourg, and as best I can understand, we are going to the residence of Monsieur le Duc d’Enghien.

The Limousin

The two messages fell like two rays of sunshine on Fouché’s chessboard, and they allowed the Minister of Police who was “on the way out” a clearpicture of Cadoudal’s own chess game. Cadoudal had not made an empty threat to Bonaparte by declaring a vendetta. For at the same time he was reactivating the Companions of Jehu, to whom he had given conditional leave, and he was now sending his aide-de-camp all the way to see the Duc d’Enghien. He was tired, no doubt, of the way the Comte d’Artois and his son kept hesitating. They were the only princes with whom Cadoudal had been in contact, and though they were always promising to send him money and men and to grant him their royal protection, they had never come through. Now he was going directly to the last member of the Condé family, that warrior race, to find out if he would be willing to provide more effective aid than simply his encouragement and best wishes.

Once his devices were set, Fouché would wait patiently, like a spider at the edge of its web.

That day, in both Vernon and Les Andelys, near the highway from Paris to Rouen, the gendarmerie received the order to keep their horses saddled day and night.




XXV The Duc d’Enghien [I] (#ulink_276102f2-8a1a-5541-b99f-1e82973e65a0)







MONSIEUR LE DUC D’ENGHIEN LIVED in the little Ettenheim chateau, on the right bank of the Rhine about twenty kilometers from Strasbourg in the Grand-Duchy of Baden. He was the grandson of the Prince de Condé, who was himself the son of the one-eyed Prince de Condé who cost France so dearly during the regency of Monsieur le Duc d’Orléans. Just one Condé, and he died young, separated the one-eyed duke from the Condé whose victories at Thionville and in the Battle of Nördlingen won him the name The Great Condé. His great greed, rotten morals, and cold cruelty proved him indeed to be the son of his father, Henri II de Bourbon. Condé’s strong desire to occupy the French throne prompted him to disclose that Anne d’Autriche’s two sons, Louis XIV and the Duc d’Orléans, were not in fact the sons of Louis XIII, which could easily have been true.

It was with Henri II de Bourbon that the celebrated Condé family changed character. No longer generous, it became greedy; no longer gay, it became melancholic. Although history states that he was the son of Henri I de Bourbon, Prince de Condé, chronicles from that time protest against the filiation and assign him a quite different father. Apparently Henri I’s wife, the duchess Charlotte de la Trémouille, had been living in adultery with a Gascon page when suddenly, after a four-month absence, her husband returned home with no warning. The duchess quickly made a grim decision; after all, an adulterous woman is already halfway down the road to a murder. She afforded her husband a royal welcome. Although it was wintertime, she managed to find some lovely fruits, and with him she shared the most beautiful pear in the basket. The knife she used to cut the pear had a golden blade, and one side of it had been bathed with poison. The prince died that very night.

Charles de Bourbon reported the news of the death to Henri IV, and attributed the cause to papal decree: “His death was caused by Pope Sixtus V’s excommunication,” he said. “Yes,” Henri IV replied, never one to pass up an opportunity to be witty, “the excommunication didn’t hurt, but something else lent a hand.”

An investigation was opened, and serious charges were leveled against Charlotte de Trémouille. Henri IV asked that all the trial documents be delivered to him, and then threw every bit of them into the fire. When he was asked the reasons for his unusual action, he replied simply, “It is better for a bastard to inherit the Condé name than for such a great name to disappear forever.”

So a bastard did inherit the Condé name, and he brought into that parasitic branch of the once noble family vices that had rather go unnamed. Rebellion, certainly, was the least of them.

Our position is different from that of other novelists. If we fail to report such details, we are accused of not knowing history any better than some historians. And if we do reveal them, then we are accused of trying to sully the reputation of the royal families.

But let us hasten to add that the young prince Louis-Antoine Henri de Bourbon had none of the failings of his father, Henri II de Bourbon, who, had he not been imprisoned for three years, would never have come back to his wife, though she was the most beautiful creature of the time. And none of the failings of the Great Condé, whose amorous relationship with Madame de Longueville, his sister, were the talk of Paris during the Fronde; or of Louis de Condé, who, while he was regent of France, simply emptied the state’s coffers into his own and those of Madame de Prie.

No, the young prince Louis-Antoine was a fine-looking young man of thirty-three years. He had emigrated with his father and the Comte d’Artois, and in ’92 he had joined the corps of émigrés that had gathered along the Rhine. For eight years he had been at war against France, it is true, but he fought in order to combat principles that his princely education and royal bias forbade him to support. When Condé’s army was disbanded, as it was after the Lunéville peace treaty, the Duc d’Enghien could have moved to England, as had his father, his grandfather, other princes, and most of the émigrés. But because of a love affair no one knew about then, although it has become common knowledge since, he chose to set up residence, as we have said, in Ettenheim.

There he lived like an ordinary citizen. The immense Condé fortune, which had been built with gifts from Henri IV, the possessions of the Duc de Montmorency (who was decapitated), and the plunders of Louis le Borgne, had all been confiscated by the Revolution. The émigrés living around Offenburg often came to pay their respects. Sometimes the young men would organize large hunting parties in the Black Forest. At other times the prince would disappear for six or eight days, then reappear suddenly, without anyone knowing where he had been. His absences elicited all sorts of conjectures, and with neither confirmation nor denial, he simply let people think and say whatever they wanted to, no matter how strange their speculations and no matter the cost to his reputation.

One morning, a stranger came to Ettenheim. He had crossed the Rhine at Kehl, then followed the Offenburg road, and finally presented himself at the prince’s door. The prince had been gone for three days.

The stranger waited. On the fifth day, the prince returned home. The stranger told the prince his name and the name of the man who had sent him. He asked that he be received at such time that the prince found it to be convenient. The prince invited the stranger in straightaway.

Sol de Grisolles was the stranger’s name.

“You have been sent by the good Cadoudal?” the prince asked. “I just read in an English newspaper that he had left London and returned to France to avenge an insult made to his honor, and that once the insult had been avenged, he had gone back to London.”

Cadoudal’s aide-de-camp recounted the adventure as it had happened, without omitting a single detail. He told the prince, too, that he’d been sent to the First Consul to declare the vendetta. Then he spoke of his mission to Laurent, whom he had ordered, in Cadoudal’s name, to call the Companions of Jehu back to the work they had been doing before Cadoudal had relieved them of their duties.

“Have you nothing more to tell me?” the young prince asked.

“Yes, I do, Prince,” said the messenger. “I need to tell you that in spite of the Lunéville peace agreement, war will break out with renewed ferocity against the First Consul. Pichegru has finally come to an understanding with your father, and he will join in the cause with all the hate that’s been kindled by his exile in Sinnary. Moreau is furious at how little recognition his victory at Hohenlinden has received, and he is tired of seeing the Rhine army and its generals sacrificed for the troops in Italy. So he too is ready to place his forces and his immense popularity behind a rebellion. And there is more. There is something almost nobody knows anything about, and I am to reveal it to you, Prince.”

“What is that?”

“Within the army a secret society is being established.”

“The Philadelphian Society.”

“Are you familiar with it?”

“I have heard about it.”

“Does Your Highness know who its leader is?”

“Colonel Oudet.”

“Have you ever seen him?”

“Once in Strasbourg, but he did not realize who I was.”

“What does Your Highness think of him?

“He seemed to me to be a bit young and a little frivolous for the huge undertaking he has dreamed up.”

“Yes, Your Highness is not mistaken,” said Sol de Grisolles. “Still, Oudet was born in the Jura mountains, and he has all the physical and moral strength of mountain people.”

“He’s barely twenty-five years old.”

“Bonaparte was only twenty-six when he undertook his Italian campaign.”

“He started out as one of ours.”

“Yes, and we first met him in the Vendée.”

“And then he went over to the Republicans.”

“Which is to say he grew tired of fighting against Frenchmen.”

The prince gave a sigh. “Ah! I too,” he said, “am tired of fighting Frenchmen.”

“Never—and may Your Highness accept the opinion of a man who is not quick to praise—never have such natural and such contrasting qualities been united in one man as they are in this Oudet. He is as naïve as a child, brave as a lion, giddy as a girl, and as tough as an old Roman. He is active and relaxed, lazy and relentless, changeable in mood and unchanging in his resolutions, sweet and strict, tender and terrible. I can add only one more thing in his honor, Prince: Men such as Moreau and Malet have accepted him as their leader and have promised to obey him.”

“So, at the present time the three leaders of the society are.…”

“Oudet, Malet, and Moreau. Philopœmen, Marius, and Fabius. A fourth will join them, Pichegru, and he will take the name Themistocles.”

“I see there are quite diverse elements in this association,” said the prince.

“But very powerful ones. Let us first get rid of Bonaparte, and once his place is empty, then we can worry about the man or the principle that we need to fill it.”

“And how do you intend to get rid of Bonaparte? Not by assassination, I hope?”

“No, but rather in combat.”

“Do you think that Bonaparte will accept a Combat of Thirty?” the prince asked with a smile.

“No, Prince. But we shall force him to accept it. At least three times a week he goes to his country house, La Malmaison, with an escort of forty or fifty men. Cadoudal will attack him with a like number, and God will decide between them.”

“Indeed, that is combat and not assassination,” said the prince thoughtfully.

“But in order for the plan to be completely successful, Your Highness, we need the assistance of a French prince, a brave, popular French prince such as you. The Dukes of Berry and Angoulême, as well as your father and the Comte d’Artois, have made and broken so many promises that we can no longer count on them. So I’ve come to tell you, Milord, that all we are asking for is your presence in Paris, so that when Bonaparte is dead the people will be drawn back to royalty by a true prince from the House of Bourbon, one who is able and eligible to occupy the throne immediately.”

The prince took Sol de Grisolles’s hand. “Monsieur,” he said, “I thank you from the depths of my heart for both your and your friends’ esteem. I shall give you, to you personally, some warrant for that esteem, perhaps, by divulging to you a secret that nobody knows, not even my father.

“But to the brave Cadoudal, to Oudet, Moreau, Pichegru, and Malet, this is my response: ‘For nine years I have continued the campaign. For nine years, I swear by my life, which I risk daily and which is unimportant, I have been filled with disgust and contempt for those powers who call themselves our allies and use us only as instruments. Those powers have made peace, yet they did not deign to include us in their treaty. All the better. Alone now, I will not perpetuate a parricidal war, like the war in which my ancestor the Great Condé drowned part of his glory. You will tell me that the Great Condé was waging war against his king, and I against France. From the point of view of these new Republican principles that I am fighting against, and on which I can personally make no pronouncement, my ancestor’s excuse could rightly have been that he was fighting against nothing more than a king. I have fought against France, yes, but as a minor figure. I never declared war, nor did I bring it to an end. I left everything to destiny. To fate I answered: “You have summoned me; here I am.” But now that peace has been made, I will do nothing to change what has been done.’ That’s what you will tell my friends.

“And now,” he added, “this is for you, but for you alone, monsieur. And please assure me that the secret I’m about to confide in you will never leave your breast.”

“I so swear, my lord.”

“Well, and please forgive my weakness, monsieur: I am in love.” The messenger drew back.

“Weakness, yes,” the duke repeated, “but happiness at the same time. A weakness for which I risk my neck three or four times a month by crossing the Rhine to see an adorable woman, a woman whom I love. People think an estrangement from my cousins and father is keeping me in Germany. No, monsieur. What is keeping me here in Germany is my love, my burning, superlative, invincible love, which is more important to me than my duty. People wonder where I go, they wonder where I am, they think I’m conspiring. Alas! Alas! I am in love, and that is all!”

“Love is a grand and sacred thing when it can make a Bourbon forget even his duty,” Grisolles murmured with a smile. “Do not forsake your love, my prince. And may you be happy! That, you may be sure, is man’s true destiny.” Grisolles rose to his feet to take leave of the prince.

“Oh,” said the duke, “you cannot leave just like that.”

“Why should I stay?”

“Hear me out a little longer, monsieur. Never before have I spoken to anyone about my love, and my love overwhelms me. I have confided in you, but that is not enough. I want to tell you about it in full. You have stepped into the happy, joyous side of my existence, for she has made it so, and I must describe for you how beautiful she is, how intelligent, how devoted. Please have dinner with me, monsieur, and after dinner, well, then you may leave me, but at least I shall have had the luxury of talking to you about her for two hours. I have been in love with her for three years. Just think of that, and I have never spoken one word to anyone about her.”





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