Scandal and Secrets

by Christopher Hoare

  “I must report to Field Marshal Wittgenstein,” Count Rostov shouted to the officer in charge.

  “That is not possible, Sir,” the Officer replied. “He is now—at this very moment—in private conference with the Emperor.”

  “Tsar Alexander is here as well? That is even better. I bring important news―the road to Paris is open. Let us pass.”

  The officer would not let them proceed without a lieutenant and ten men to accompany them, but the lieutenant knew the way to the temporary headquarters in a nearby village. Within fifteen minutes they were in the presence of both the army commander and the Tsar. They both saluted and then bowed low to his Imperial Highness.

  “What have you found, Young Rostov?” Wittgenstein said.

  “The Corps of d’Erlon has marched east to threaten the Prussians,” he began breathlessly. “The Corps of Vandamme has changed formation to face the Austrians. Between them is a gap near Fontainebleau filled only by a few squadrons of dragoons.”

  “When was this reported to you?” the Tsar demanded.

  “We saw it ourselves, Your Imperial Highness. We were with a large body of Tatar Cossacks who chased the dragoons from the villages near the old palace. They are the only French we could see all the way to Paris.”

  “It could be a trap,” one of the aides suggested.

  “We should get another report from the Cossacks,” another said. “They must inform the headquarters how far north they might proceed.”

  “By which time, the French will have closed the gap,” the Field Marshal growled.

  “I agree,” Tsar Alexander said. “What troops do you have, Marshal?”

  “I shall send the First Corps of General Lieutenant Gortschakov, Your Imperial Highness. With your permission, of course.”

  “Granted. What troops do you have to support him?”

  The meeting seemed to go on without the need for the messengers to say more. Lord Bond inclined his head toward the door.

  “What do you have in mind, Mad Englishman?” Count Rostov said when they were outside.

  “It seems that General Lieutenant Gortschakov is in need of two officers to maintain contact with our Cossacks. Do you agree?” Bond said.

  “We cannot leave without orders,” Rostov said.

  “Who has time to give us orders? The war is about to end, do you not see? Do you know the name of the Colonel who wanted someone to bring another report from the Cossacks? He has just given us our orders.”

  “But—”

  “But nothing, old chum. We can be the first officers in three armies to enter Paris.”

  Chapter Forty-three

  Differing and Changing Circumstances

  As they made their way across Chatham to reach the Antiochus, Alfred Worthington had some difficulty maintaining the flow of small talk that a gentleman was expected to direct at a lady to amuse her and to maintain the proper decorum as they travelled in public. He loved speaking with her, there was no problem there, but his mind had filled with serious considerations that would not keep quiet.

  The sight of Captain Bell endeavouring, on the miserly half pay which was his pension, to spend a goodly portion on maintaining the welfare of his wounded crew was a sight that made him cringe in shame. Could he be so noble in the same circumstances?

  He had been rated as a captain of a seventy-four gun ship of the line—he could picture the vilification his fortune had engendered in the ante-rooms of the Admiralty where senior officers sat to wait on the Lords. His full pay amounted to ₤300 per year, an enormous sum to a farm boy who had but pennies in his pocket. But Bell’s, as the captain of a lesser ship, would be no more than ₤200, and he had two young people to raise as well, their mother being deceased.

  It seemed Lady Bond was equally affected. “I almost feel ashamed of my own income when I see Captain Bell so noble in his care of the wounded and yet so needful from his own severe injuries.”

  “The thought has been playing in my own mind, My Lady.”

  She placed a hand on his arm as if in need of support. “I have no doubt that if I had considered what duty I might have found as Lord Bond’s wife it would have been possible for the Tiverton millions to have supported a charity of several hundred a year—now forgone because I have thrown in my lot with his father.”

  “I might suggest, My Lady, that such is an equally noble sentiment. You have not only found your own freedom but you have ended a grievous feud in the noble family between father and son.”

  “I had not thought of it in quite that light, Captain, but perhaps you are correct. Many people might find a happiness that seems beyond reach if the union continues.”

  That thought had placed any further discussion of charity and duty beyond acceptable pleasantries. Lady Bond changed the subject with observations of the public buildings of the town, which he was able to augment with his descriptions of the fine amenities of the harbours and docks.

  It was later that day, as they awaited the rising of the tide, that the rest of the thoughts returned to Worthington’s mind. Who was he, who at the end of the war would be an unemployed naval captain living on ₤150 per annum, to pay court to George Stephenson’s daughter, who was perhaps worth that sum per month? It made him feel a scoundrel rather than the gentleman he had the ambition for.

  It was true that he had received a letter from her father, couched in impeccable business terms, suggesting he might consider employment with the Stephenson works as steamship captain for all their future construction, but that had been before they had known that Lady Bond’s marriage was in dispute. He felt sure the letter would have been couched in an entirely different manner if there was any possibility that the ship captain might also become son-in-law—and that the tone may not have been so friendly or so forthcoming in those circumstances. What thoughts did her father entertain when faced with the prospect of a once married daughter in need of his best protection for her future happiness?

  In fact, he was beginning to think that in the present circumstances Lady Bond’s warm manner with which she addressed him was making it harder for him to arrive at the decision that was called for. It would be better if they had not known one another for well over a year. Far better if they had not formed a mutual attraction that had become improper.

  If there was a way that they might cool down their present friendship to be able to make an entirely new start then they should seize upon it.

  Three days after he and Count Rostov followed the Cossacks into Paris, Lord Bond received a request from Fouché, now putative President of the Provisional Government in Paris, to a meeting in his office in the senate. Fouché seemed in great spirits, as well he might be, having been dismissed by Napoleon for the third, or perhaps fourth, time, only to be asked by the Senate to head up a provisional government to negotiate the surrender of the city to the Allies.

  “A very good morning to you, Lord Bond,” he said. “I am informed that you are Chargé d’Affaires in Paris to the government of Lord Liverpool in England.”

  “Yes, Monsieur le Duc, that is so.”

  “I trust you have an efficient and secure mode of communication with London.”

  “That I do, through the Duke of Wellington’s army in the Low Countries.”

  “At Menen, I believe?”

  “Yesterday at Menen, Monsieur le President.” Bond wondered why the duke was interested in the advance of the British army when his own duties lay in Paris. “Can you inform me of the situation in France which leads the Provisional Government to be interested in communicating with London?”

  “You are an officer who has been seen lately in all the capitals of Europe, and now with the officers commanding each of the armies before our gates,” Fouché said with a smile. “You must have seen much of the turmoil in the land which leads the responsible government of the People of France to seek advice from its counterpart in safety across the sea.”

  Lord Bond returned the smile with a more ironic one. “I am sure the President
of that government would like to know how the Government in London views the prospect of a King Louis the Eighteenth ruling in its closest neighbour across the Channel. But I doubt they would be willing to answer such a question.”

  Fouché waved a dismissive hand. “The Senate must choose a permanent government that is acceptable to all the nations who now occupy France’s cities and homes.”

  Bond wondered if he would learn anything useful from this banter; perhaps it was time to plunge a stick into the wasp nest. “How did your communication with the Arenbergs go? Did Monsieur le Comte de la Marck view your letter with favour?”

  For a moment Fouché seemed thunderstruck, but then he leaned back in his chair and laughed uproariously. “That letter, Lord Bond? You seem to be more well-travelled than I had been told.”

  “And you, Monsieur le President, are surely still in contact with all your old friends throughout Europe.”

  “Some of them, Sir. Some of them.”

  Lord Bond leaned across the table. “What do those friends say about Napoleon?”

  “I raise you one Napoleon if you can reply with one Lord Liverpool.”

  “Will he abdicate?”

  “Will Lord Liverpool offer him sanctuary?”

  “Why should he seek sanctuary?”

  Fouché snorted like an angry horse. “Because the Prussians wish to hang him. Because the Royalists have taken up arms in La Vendee, Provence, and Brittany. And because the Austrians want to see him arraigned in court for some actions deemed criminal. Should I go on?”

  “Will he fight?”

  “Marshal Davout is Minister for War. He has advised him to abdicate.”

  “And what will the Minister for War do with the army?”

  “He will seek to extend the current truce. He will not advise any field officers to listen to Napoleon.”

  “Where is Napoleon now?”

  “In the Élysée Palace, determining what he will do.”

  “He had better hurry and make up his mind. Count Rostov is sending the Cossacks to bivouac in the grounds.”

  “Zut alors!”

  “What does he want from England?”

  “He asks for a passeport . . . a safe conduct out of France from the Government of Britain.”

  “I will send his request,” Bond said. “But he had better find a hole outside of Paris in which to wait for an answer.”

  Roberta saw very little of the return to Oostende which either took place at night or when she was on duty below. When they anchored in the offing for a longboat bearing an officer with their new orders, she was able to leave her senior engineer in charge of bringing down her boiler status and join the other officers above.

  “While the army advances on Brussels by way of Kortrijk, Oudenaarde, and Aalst, his flank is open toward Brugge, Ghent, and any troops landed by water in the Westerschelde,” the Staff officer told them. “The Duke looks toward the Navy’s ships in the estuary to prevent any such movement by water.”

  “You have received the same intelligence from our people on the Schelde as the Admiralty receives, Sir?” Captain Worthington said.

  “That is what I understand, Sir.”

  “There may be a difference in receipt when we are in the Westerschelde,” Captain Worthington said. “We will be facilitating the movement of our people to watch for the ironclad, and the intelligence we receive may be newer than that which you receive through London.”

  “These intelligence correspondent people are Admiralty, I understand. Are they cognisant of the Army’s needs?”

  “What do you say, My Lady?” Worthington said, addressing the question to her.

  “van Ee and his people in Antwerp are army,” she said. “Mr. Holmes is a mathematician, neither partial to navy nor army. And van Aa is a schoolteacher. Is there anything specific that they should know? You might give it to us in writing. A naval cutter will sail from Oostende to Walcheren tonight and deliver it immediately.”

  The colonel turned to her in surprise, adjusting his lorgnette. “Are you not Lady Bond, the engineer officer? I do not understand.”

  “Her Ladyship was also an agent with her husband in Antwerp last year,” Worthington said. “We frequently consult with her about local conditions.”

  The colonel let his lorgnette fall to his side. “I see . . . I see. All involved in the family business, eh what?”

  “I received a letter from him in Paris while at Chatham,” Roberta said. “It had come through your military dispatches between armies. He is now Chargé d’Affaires in the city until a new Ambassador can be dispatched.”

  She glanced toward Worthington. “I did not have time to open the letter until this morning. I would have told you, but have no reason to believe that direct communication from Paris will affect our duties.”

  “I see,” Worthington said, clearly thinking of other matters besides military ones. “What information would the army need from our people?” he said to the officer.

  “Flooding, dykes opened, impassable roads―that sort of thing. We may want to send cavalry to the estuary to close up our flank when we near Brussels.”

  “Very well,” Roberta said. “If you can write out the instructions before you leave Antiochus, we will see they are dispatched.”

  Chapter Forty-four

  Two Visits: One Fatal

  The day following his visit to Fouché, Lord Bond walked down the streets in a good mood, swinging his cane. He had just receved a letter from his father. The Bishop’s Court had come to agreement over his marriage to Roberta. It did not satisfy canon law. He felt badly about her, but he had done everything he could. Where had the Old Man found all that information about the Medusa’s chaplain?

  He stopped on a street corner and took in the ambience of Paris. The city pleased him, as did Marie-Sophie’s company. He resumed his walk and crossed to the other side of the street. Taking a remembrance of Paris back to England would be a satisfying end to his war. His thoughts followed this vein until he came to a house bearing a very new brass plate beside its dark brown door, with the words United States Minister Plenipotentiary to France upon it. He ascended the steps and hammered on the wood with his cane.

  A few minutes passed before an elderly white-haired servant opened the door to look out. He seemed nervous, as if a troop of drunken Cossacks might appear in the street. “Yes, Sir?”

  “Lord Bond calling on the Ambassador . . . as requested.”

  “Yes, Sir. Please enter.”

  Lord Bond stood waiting in the foyer twirling his stick until the man returned from his errand down the corridor, taking his stick and hat and ushering him to an office with a plaster-decorated high ceiling. As the servant closed the door behind him, Lord Bond stood looking at a burly man with thick black eyebrows and a receding hairline, sitting behind a desk piled with papers.

  Eventually the man looked up and smiled expansively. “Bond, old chap. Thank you for coming. You don’t mind if I call you Julian, do you? Come in and take a seat. I am William Harris Crawford―please call me Bill.”

  Lord Bond advanced slowly to a high backed chair near, but to one side, of the desk. Bill? Julian? What have these republicans come to? First the Americans and then the Parisians . . . who next might be expected to embrace this barbarism? “Thank you, Mr. Ambassador, that will be quite all right.”

  Crawford nodded. “I almost feel that we have already been introduced. You ran my poor Paine a merry dance last year, and President Madison is furious at your intercepting his letter.”

  “I do believe the theft was instrumental in securing the peace treaty,” Bond said, aware that the Ambassador had probably received the greater blame. “Did you ask me here to discuss the treaty?”

  “Oh, no. It will be months before all the State congresses get around to ratifying it. No―I have another item of business for you. Is it true that the British government has refused to issue Napoleon a passport?”

  “That is quite true, Sir.”

  “Why woul
d they not? The British government doesn’t intend to emulate the Prussians and look to hang him, do they? I would have thought they of all people would have had the civility to let the poor fellow rest. Have you seen him lately―a parody of his former vigour and strength. He wants to come to America, of course, but he would accept Britain as an alternative.”

  “Alternative, Sir? I have never met the ex-emperor, Sir.”

  “But you were in Antwerp last September when he came to review his steamships―you must have been. Who was the young woman impersonating Paine’s wife?”

  Bond thought quickly. He was not averse to claiming her clever actions one more time. “That would have been Lady Bond, Sir. Do you have a proposition to make about the status of Napoleon?”

  “Lady Bond, eh? A very adventurous young woman.” The Ambassador paused his rapid flow of words to look at him shrewdly. “If the American government should approve of one of the American ships currently in Europe offering the ex-emperor and his entourage passage to America, can we be assured that the Royal Navy will not stop and search the vessel?”

  “I believe we have just fought a war over that issue, Sir. I do not suppose that His Majesty’s Government has changed its attitude in any way whatsoever over the issue of stop and search upon the high seas. If there is a fugitive, wanted by the Crown, aboard an American ship, you may be assured that the vessel will be brought into a port under escort and the matter resolved by recourse to international law.”

  “British international law, Sir?”

  “Is there another, Ambassador?”

  “I can see we have different views upon certain matters,” Crawford said. “Where might we find common ground?”

  “I should have to ask my government to map out that common ground for me before we can discuss this again,” Lord Bond said with a smile. “Where did you say Napoleon was residing while awaiting this passport?”