The Josephine B. Trilogy

by Sandra Gulland

  “I think best in the open air,” Bonaparte said. “My thoughts are more expansive.” By moonlight, in profile, he looked like a Roman statue. “See those shacks down by the laundry boats? Every citizen should have a proper home—and clean water. I’m thinking of a canal system to bring it in. And more hospitals—there should never be more than one patient to a bed. And bridges across the river would be beautiful as well as practical. Imagine it! I intend to make Paris the most beautiful city of all time.”

  “You will do it,” I said, with confidence. What could stop him? Already so much has changed. Before Bonaparte, everything was chaos, and now prosperity prevails and France is made whole again—I am made whole again. Not long ago I was a widow, a survivor of the Terror, a frightened mother of two children. Now I look upon my life with wonder, for everywhere there is abundance—of wealth, certainly, and even glory, but mainly of heart. As Madame Bonaparte—indeed, as Josephine—I have felt my spirit blossom. This intense little man I married has inspired me to believe once again in heroes, in destiny, but above all in the miracle of love.

  It was at this moment that I found the courage to voice the question I have long been afraid to ask: “Bonaparte, what if…?” What if we can’t have a child?

  An owl’s plaintive call pierced the night silence. “We must not give up hope,” Bonaparte said gently. “Destiny has blessed us in so many ways.”

  Blessed me, certainly—blessed Hortense and Eugène, my fatherless children. “You have blessed us,” I told him truly.

  Je le veux, Bonaparte so often says. I will it!

  If only he could will a child into being.

  March 6.

  Tonight, after a performance at the Opéra, Bonaparte was thrown a bouquet by a girl in a revealing gown, her plaited straw bonnet tied with blue ribbons. “I’ll hold that,” I offered.

  Later I discovered a note tucked in it, inviting the First Consul to a rendezvous. I threw it into the fire. Daily, it seems, Bonaparte receives an invitation from some young maiden eager to sacrifice her virtue to “the saviour of France.”

  March 7.

  I knew from the way Bonaparte pitched his battered tricorne hat across the room that the news was not good. “They refused my offer of an armistice,” he said with a tone of defeat. His hat missed the chair and fell onto the carpet, startling the three pugs sleeping on a cushion by the fire.

  “Again?”

  “Refused to even consider it.” Bonaparte threw himself into the downstuffed armchair; two feathers floated free. “Refused to even discuss it.” His cheek twitched. “Pacem nolo quia infida,” he said, mocking an English accent.

  “The English said that?” I rescued Bonaparte’s hat from the pugs.

  “No peace with…the infidel?” Hortense translated slowly, looking up from a charcoal sketch she was working on. She pushed a flaxen curl out of her eyes, leaving a smudge of black above her brow.

  “And we’re the infidel?” I asked (indignant).

  Bonaparte got up and began to pace, his hands clenched behind his back. “The British flog their own soldiers and accuse us of brutality. They violate international agreements and accuse us of lawlessness. They pay every Royalist nation in Europe to wage war against us and accuse us of starting conflicts! If they don’t want war, why don’t they try to end it?”

  “Papa, you must not give up,” Hortense said with feeling. Peace is something my daughter has never known, I realized sadly. When has France not been at war with England?

  “I will never give up,” Bonaparte said with quiet intensity, that spirit his soldiers call le feu sacré: the will to be victorious—or die.

  March 9—Malmaison, our fourth-year anniversary.

  We stayed all morning in bed. Bonaparte’s hopeful enthusiasm for conceiving a child makes me sad. Every time we have marital congress (often!) he names the baby—a boy, of course. This morning it was Géry—Napoleon Géry Bonaparte. Last week it was Baudouin, Gilles, Jean. Tonight, who will it be? Jacques? Benoît? Donatien?

  I go along with this game, yet I know I’ll not conceive. I had a hint of a show several months ago, but no longer, in spite of the tincture of senna I take to keep my body open, the endless restoratives and expulsives I consume—birthwort boiled in beer, syrup of savin, powdered aloe and iron—all bitter to the taste and bitter to the soul.

  2:45 P.M.—a lovely spring afternoon.

  “I have the perfect cure,” Madame Frangeau said, pulling her cap so that the lappets would hang properly. “It has never failed.”

  I observed the midwife with astonishment. She was as eccentrically dressed as I’d been told to expect, her shirred gown covered with the fringes and tassels that had been the fashion before the Revolution. “Ergot?” I guessed. The mould was said to be infallible (except in my case).

  “No, not ergot, not jalapa, not even scammony. Come with me.”

  I followed her out of her modest abode and over the cobblestones to the door of a house on a narrow street. “Madame Frangeau,” I protested, “I don’t think I should—”

  “Madame Bonaparte, I am the midwife,” she informed me with authority, pounding on the door.

  And indeed, she did have authority, for all the household jumped at her command. I followed her into a bedchamber where she told a woman in bed, “Don’t stir! I have need only of your infant.” She instructed me to sit in the nursery, to slip my gown off my shoulders, whereupon, having cleansed me, she put the swaddled infant to my breast. “I will return in a half hour,” she said, and abandoned me.

  I was shaken by the beauty of this week-old baby at my breast—its milky sweet smell, the silken down of its skull—but also by the humiliation I felt being tended in this way.

  Dutifully, the exuberant and confident midwife returned, dispatching me with salves and herbs and instructions to “congress” at least once a day. “You must drown in your husband’s vital fluid.”

  It is my tears I am drowning in! On return I broke down, exhausted by all the “cures” I’ve tried, frustrated by my body’s stubborn refusal to respond.

  Evening, not yet 9:00 P.M.

  Bonaparte pulled the cord of a little silk sachet, trying to unknot it. “Zut!” he said, slicing it with a meat knife. He shook the contents out over the dinner table. An enormous diamond glittered among the dirty china, the chicken bones, the half-empty plates of peas, plum pudding and cod-liver canapés. “A bauble for our anniversary,” he said, flicking it toward me, as if it were a plaything.

  “How many carats is that?” Hortense asked, her eyes wide.

  “One hundred and forty,” Bonaparte said. “King Louis XV wore it in his coronation crown. The police finally found it in a pawnshop.”

  “So this is the Regent diamond,” I said, holding the translucent gem between my fingers, losing myself in its light.

  March 10.

  Time is a woman’s enemy, it is said. This morning I sat before my toilette mirror, examining my face. I am thirty-six, six years older than my husband. On impulse I sent for “my” diamond. The embroidered blue velvet case was placed reverently before me. Gently, I edged the gem out of its nest.

  “Hold it at your ear,” Hortense whispered, as if we were in some sacred place.

  I sat back, examining the effect in the glass.

  “Pour l’amour du ciel,” the maid said, crossing herself.

  By diamond light, I seemed transformed: younger. I glanced uneasily over my shoulder, imagining the spirit of Queen Marie Antoinette looking on. She knew the irresistible lure of a brilliant—and now, alas, so do I.

  March 29, 1:15 P.M.—Tuileries Palace.

  I am writing this by the light of three candles. It is afternoon, yet dark in this room, the curtains drawn against the curious eyes of the men and women in the public gardens outside.

  Hortense is to join me soon. We’re going to Citoyen Despréaux’s annual—

  Much later, after midnight, everyone asleep (but me).

  —Citoyen Despréaux’s annua
l dance recital, that is.

  I was interrupted earlier by Bonaparte, who showed up unexpectedly—as he does so often—humming “la Marseillaise” (badly). “I have an idea for Hortense,” he said, sitting down in his chair beside my toilette table. He picked up a crystal pot of pomade and examined the etched design, the details. “General Moreau,” he said, sniffing the pomade, rubbing some on his fingertips, then putting it back down and picking up a silver hair ornament. (Bonaparte is never still!)

  “Ah,” I said, considering. General Moreau is a possibility—a popular general, dapper, always in powder, with the manners of a gentleman. “But too old for Hortense, perhaps?” General Moreau is close to forty, a few years older than I am, and a good ten years older than Bonaparte.

  “Did I hear my name?” Hortense asked, appearing in the door.

  “Your mother was telling me what a charming young lady you’ve become,” Bonaparte said with a fond look at his stepdaughter.

  “Indeed! That gown looks lovely on you.” The cut flattered Hortense’s lithe figure. The silver threads shimmered in the candlelight.

  “That isn’t English muslin, is it?” Bonaparte asked, frowning.

  “Of course not, Papa.” Hortense made a neat pirouette.

  “Bravo!” we cheered.

  “But I’m having trouble with the minuet,” she said. “In the first figure, when passing, I’m to do a temps de courante and a demi-jeté.”

  “Instead of a pas de menuet?”

  “Only on the first pass, Maman. Otherwise, it looks affected—or so the dance master says. And this pas de menuet has two demi-coupés and two pas marchés en pointe.”

  “Bah,” Bonaparte said.

  “Why don’t you show us,” I suggested.

  “Papa, I need you to be my partner,” she said, tugging on Bonaparte’s hand.

  “I’ll play one of Handel’s minuets.” I took a seat at the harpsichord.

  Reluctantly, Bonaparte stood. He placed his feet in a ninety-degree turnout and stuck out his hand. “Well?” he said to me over his shoulder.

  “First Consul?” Bonaparte’s secretary interrupted from the door. “Citoyen Cadoudal is here to see you.” Fauvelet Bourrienne’s chin quivered in an attempt not to smile at the sight of Bonaparte attempting a plié. “I suggest we not keep him waiting—he’s an ox of a man, and spitting everywhere.”

  “Cadoudal, the Royalist agent?” I asked, confused—and not a little alarmed. Cadoudal is the leader of the rebel faction—the faction intent on putting a Bourbon king back on the throne. The faction intent on deposing Bonaparte.

  “He’s early,” Bonaparte said, putting on his three-cornered hat and heading out the door—relieved, no doubt, to escape the minuet.

  Bonaparte’s young sister Caroline was standing outside the recital hall when Hortense and I arrived. She was dressed in a short-sleeved ball gown more suited to an evening fête; only a thin froth of organdy ruffles served for a sleeve. “Joachim will be here in five minutes,” she said, chewing on a thumbnail. “I made him practise cabrioles for a half-hour this morning.”

  “Why cabrioles?” Hortense asked. “I thought you were to demonstrate a gavotte.”

  “Le Maudit! We are?” Caroline took a snuffbox out of a gaudy bead reticule.

  The dance master opened the door. “Ah, Madame Bonaparte—mother of my best pupil! How kind of you to honour us with your presence.” Citoyen Despréaux patted his brow with a neatly folded lavender handkerchief.

  “My husband will be here any moment,” Caroline informed him, taking a pinch of snuff. “General Murat,” she added, in answer to the dance master’s puzzled expression.

  “Of course!” Citoyen Despréaux exclaimed, casting a concerned look at Caroline’s exposed arms. “You are to perform the gavotte. Mademoiselle Hortense, if you would be so kind? I’d like to consult with you regarding the layout of the room.” With a studied balletic motion, Citoyen Despréaux gestured my daughter in.

  “I’ll see you after, sweetheart,” I told Hortense, blowing her a kiss. “Is your mother inside?” I asked Caroline, lingering. She seemed forlorn, all alone.

  “She’s not coming,” Caroline said, snapping the snuffbox shut. “She’s visiting Pauline today.” This with a hint of chagrin. Of Bonaparte’s three sisters, beautiful (and spoiled) Pauline is clearly the favourite. Elisa, although plain, is lauded as “literary”…and young Caroline? Poor Caroline is illiterate and, although not plain, with her common extremities, thick neck, muscular build and what Bonaparte calls a “warrior spirit,” she is certainly not what one would ever call engaging.

  “Ah, there’s your husband,” I said. It was all I could do not to smile watching Joachim Murat swagger toward us, a big, muscular soldier dressed entirely in bright pink: a pink velvet coat with tails, pink satin knee breeches, even a flat pink hat embellished with pink-and-black striped feathers.

  Caroline opened the timepiece that was dangling from a heavy chain around her neck. “He’s three-and-a-half minutes late.”

  Citoyen Despréaux positioned himself before the twenty or so assembled guests—the family and friends of his students. “Bonjour! We will open our recital with the most regal of dances, the traditional minuet, a dance whose very simplicity reveals all: the education, the grace and—dare I say it?—the class of the performer. But first, the walk: the cornerstone of good breeding.” He motioned to his students, who circled self-consciously.

  “Observe how perfectly this young lady moves,” he said, indicating Hortense. “The very essence of unaffected fluidity! Now, perhaps if I could have a young man to—Ah, Citoyen Eugène, fantastique.”

  I turned to see my son at the door, a black felt hat on his head, his unruly curls escaping. Grinning sheepishly, he approached the dance master. “But I’m in boots,” I heard him whisper to Citoyen Despréaux. “I didn’t expect to—”

  “I only wish you to demonstrate a bow, my good fellow.”

  Dutifully, Eugène raised his right arm to shoulder height, clasped his hat by the brim and, slipping his left foot forward, bowed deeply.

  “Voilà, the perfect bow,” Citoyen Despréaux said, touching his lavender handkerchief to the outside corner of each eye. “Merci, Citoyen Eugène, you may be seated.”

  “It’s a good thing he didn’t call attention to my walk,” Eugène whispered, taking the seat beside me. I smiled—his lumbering walk, Bonaparte and I call it.

  Overall, the recital went well—Hortense performed brillantly. Eugène and I were so proud! Even Caroline and Joachim managed, although Joachim made too many circles and ended up at the wrong end of the room—a common error, certainly, but one Citoyen Despréaux unfortunately felt called upon to note.

  After, Caroline, Joachim, Hortense and Eugène went out for ices. I pleaded fatigue and returned to the Tuileries Palace, only to find Bonaparte in a temper, pacing back and forth in front of a blazing fire. The Minister of Foreign Affairs was sitting in front of the fire screen, watching him with a bored expression.

  “Madame Bonaparte,” Talleyrand said with a catlike purr. “It is always a pleasure to see you, but especially this evening. The First Consul is in need of your calming influence.”

  “Do not mock me, Talleyrand,” Bonaparte barked. “It’s not your life on the line.”

  I put my hands on Bonaparte’s shoulders (to calm, yes) as I kissed each cheek. “The meeting with Citoyen Cadoudal did not go well?”

  “He would strangle me with his own hands given half the chance.”

  “I don’t know why this comes as a surprise to you, First Consul,” Talleyrand said. “Citoyen Cadoudal wants a Bourbon king back on the throne and you’re rather inconveniently in the way.”

  “The French people are standing in the way—not me. Two hundred years of Bourbon rule was two hundred years too many.” Bonaparte threw himself into the chair closest to the fire, his chin buried in his hand.

  “The Bourbons, of course, argue that two hundred years of rule confers permanence,”
Talleyrand said, lacing his long fingers together with a fluid motion. “They created that red-velvet-upholstered symbol of power in the throne room; they consider it theirs. And so long as it remains empty, I venture they will do everything in their power to get it back.”

  “And England will do everything in its power to help them.”

  “Correct.”

  “You both make it sound so hopeless,” I said, taking up my basket of needlework. “Is peace an impossibility?”

  “‘Impossible’ is not a French word,” Bonaparte said.

  “There is peace, and there is lasting peace,” Talleyrand observed philosophically. “History has proven that the only lasting peace is a blood knot, the mingling of enemy blood—and not on the battlefield, First Consul, but in the boudoir. Peace through marriage: a time-honoured tradition.”

  “What are you getting at, Minister Talleyrand?” Bonaparte demanded. “You know I don’t have a son or daughter to marry off to some lout.”

  “You have a stepson, the comely and honourable Eugène Beauharnais—”

  “A boy yet, only eighteen.”

  “—and a stepdaughter, the virtuous and accomplished Mademoiselle Hortense.” Talleyrand tipped his head in my direction. “Who, being female and nearing her seventeenth birthday, is at an ideal age to marry.”

  “I’m beginning to think you are serious, Minister Talleyrand,” Bonaparte said. “Marry Hortense to an Englishman? The English would never condescend to join one of their blue-blooded ilk to anyone even remotely related to me. Have you not read the English journals?” He grabbed a paper from a pile on the floor and tossed it to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. “Top right. It will tell you who I am in the eyes of ‘Les Goddamns.’”

  “Ah, yes. ‘An indefinable being,’” Talleyrand read out loud in English, a hint of a smile playing about his mouth, “’half-African, half-European, a Mediterranean mulatto.’”