Marianne and The Masked Prince

by Жюльетта Бенцони

  Around her, the palace had grown silent as a desert. Constant's footsteps, approaching across the bare wooden floor outside, seemed to come from the depths of time. She felt suddenly faint. Her heart was beating fast and a cold sweat had broken out all over her body. She tried to rise but a dreadful feeling of sickness made her sink back, panting, on the couch. It was there that Constant found her, her eyes enormous, her face like wax, her handkerchief to her lips. She stared up at him desperately.

  'I don't know what is the matter with me. I feel so ill, dreadfully ill. I was all right a moment ago.'

  'You are very pale. What is the matter?'

  'I am so cold, my head is spinning, but worst of all, I feel so dreadfully sick.'

  The valet busied himself silently, fetching eau-de-Cologne, bathing Marianne's temples and making her drink a cordial. The sickness went as swiftly as it had come. Little by little, the colour came back into her cheeks and before very long she felt as well as ever.

  'I can't think what came over me,' she said, smiling gratefully up at Constant. 'I thought I was dying. Perhaps I should see a doctor.'

  'You should see a doctor, mademoiselle, but I do not think the matter is very serious.'

  'What do you mean?'

  Constant picked up the bottles and napkins he had brought with studious care, then he smiled kindly, with a hint of sadness in his smile.

  'I mean it is unfortunate that mademoiselle was not born to the purple. It would have saved us from this Austrian marriage, which promises nothing but trouble. All the same, I trust that it will be a boy. It would give the Emperor so much pleasure.'

  CHAPTER SIX

  The Bargain

  The revelation of her condition overwhelmed Marianne and, at the same time, gave her fresh courage and an extraordinary sense of triumph. She was not so innocent as to imagine that if the discovery that she was expecting a child had come a few months earlier it would have prevented the Austrian marriage. Napoleon had known, after Wagram, that Marie Walewska was carrying his child and it had made no difference. He could have married her: he loved her and she came of a noble family. Yet he had made no move because, however nobly born, Marie, like Marianne herself, was not a princess and so not sufficiently well-born to found a dynasty. Yet it gave Marianne a strange, rather agonizing joy, to think that the imperial blood was at work somewhere deep inside her, while Napoleon was exerting himself to impregnate his plump Viennese and obtain the heir he longed for. Whatever he did now, he was bound to Marianne by ties of flesh and blood, and so nothing could destroy her exultant happiness in the knowledge that she bore his child, not even the stigma attached to the word 'illegitimate'. Marianne was prepared to confront gossip, scorn and social ostracism for the sake of the few ounces of humanity slowly forming within her.

  These thoughts sustained her as she drove, in the carriage which had been brought for her, towards the rue Chanoinesse, prepared to face what would undoubtedly be one of the hardest battles of her life.

  She was all too familiar with her godfather's uncompromising royalism, his rigid moral principles and the inflexibility of his private code of honour, and she knew that her confession would have its painful moments.

  At this late hour, the rue Chanoinesse was in darkness, except for two street lamps hung on cables across the road. The metal-shod wheels rang on the big cobblestones that paved the road between the silent, secretive houses where the canons of Notre Dame lived behind their barred windows. The twin shadows of the cathedral towers stretched, grotesquely elongated, across the ancient rooftops, making the dark night seem darker still.

  A belated priest, accosted politely by Gracchus-Hannibal, pointed out the house of Monsieur de Bruillard which was easily recognizable by the tall, slender tower rising from its court-yard. It was also one of the few houses that still showed a light. The canons went early to bed, leaving the streets free for the ruffians who infested the old part of the city.

  Considerably to Marianne's surprise, the canon's house breathed none of that smell of cold wax and musty papers which she associated with a churchman's dwelling. A footman in dark livery with nothing monkish about him conducted her through a pair of salons furnished with a discreet elegance, and brought her to a closed door before which the Abbé Bichette was standing guard, head hunched between his shoulders and hands clasped behind his back. At the sight of the visitor, the faithful secretary hurried forward with an exclamation of relief which told Marianne she was expected.

  'His Eminence has asked three times if you had yet arrived. His impatience is so great that he will have no one near him, not even myself.'

  'Especially yourself,' Marianne thought, deciding that she could not have borne with the Abbé's company for more than fifteen minutes.

  'You must know,' Bichette continued, lowering his already hushed voice still further, 'that we are to leave Paris before dawn.'

  'What? So soon? My godfather said nothing of this to me.'

  'His Eminence was not then aware of it. Early this evening Monsieur Bigot de Preameneu, the Minister concerned with religious affairs, informed us that we were no longer welcome in the capital and should prepare to leave.'

  'But where to?'

  To Rheims, where the refractory members of the Curia are – er – detained. It is most unfortunate and quite unjust.'

  At that moment the door before which they were standing was thrown open and the cardinal appeared, looking now much more like Marianne's recollections of the Abbé de Chazay in a suit of black somewhat shabbier than the footman's.

  'Bichette!' he said severely. 'I am old enough to recount my misfortunes to my god-daughter in my own way. You waste time with your chattering, when you would be better employed sending a message to the kitchen for coffee, a great deal of coffee, very strong, and do not disturb me again until Monsieur Bruillard tells you he is ready. Come in, my child.'

  The last words were addressed to Marianne. She entered and found herself in a small but comfortable library, its pale woodwork, rich bindings and bright Beauvais tapestries no more ecclesiastical in feeling than the rest of the house. The portrait of a pretty woman smiled mischievously from a fine oval gilt frame, flanked by a pair of tall ormulu candlesticks, while over the fireplace the young Louis XV in coronation robes seemed to invest the whole room with his royal presence.

  The cardinal observed Marianne's surprise at the sight of the portrait and smiled.

  'De Bruillard is the natural son of Louis XV and the fair lady you see above the desk. Hence this portrait, which is not often seen in Parisian houses nowadays. But never mind that now. Come and sit by the fire and let me look at you. I have been striving ever since I left you to think what miracle could have brought you to Paris and how it comes about that I, who married you to an Englishman, now find you on the steps of the Tuileries in the company of an Austrian.'

  Marianne smiled a little nervously. The moment she dreaded had arrived. She was determined to face up to it at once, without any attempt at prevarication.

  'Do not try, godfather dear, you will never guess. No one could ever imagine the things that have happened to me since we parted. Indeed, there are times when I wonder if it is all really true and not just a dreadful nightmare.'

  The cardinal drew up a chair facing Marianne's. 'What do you mean? I have had no news from England since your wedding day.'

  'Then you know nothing – nothing at all?'

  'No, I assure you. First tell me, what has become of your husband?'

  'No,' Marianne said quickly. 'Please, let me tell you in my own way. It will not be easy.'

  'I thought that I had taught you not to be put off by what is difficult.'

  'And I shall not be. But first you must understand one thing. The Hôtel d'Asselnat belongs to me. The Emperor gave it to me. I – I am that opera singer you mentioned.'

  'What—?'

  The cardinal had risen to his feet in astonishment. His homely face was a stone mask, devoid of all expression. But in spite of the shoc
k she knew it must be to him, Marianne felt suddenly lighter. The most difficult part was over.

  Without a word, the cardinal crossed to a corner of the room where an ivory crucifix hung in a red velvet frame and stood for a moment, upright and not obviously praying, but when he turned and made his way back to Marianne some of the colour had returned to his face. He sat down again, only this time, perhaps in order to avoid looking at his god-daughter, he turned towards the fire, holding out his thin hands to the blaze.

  'Tell me,' he said quietly. 'I will hear you to the end.'

  Marianne began her story…

  ***

  The coffee brought by the impassive footman, reverently escorted by the Abbé Bichette, arrived just as Marianne reached the end of her recital. Faithful to his promise, the cardinal had not uttered a word all the time she was speaking, although he stirred restlessly more than once. Now he greeted the arrival of the coffee tray with the relief of a man granted a truce in the midst of a fierce battle.

  'Leave it there, Bichette,' he said as the Abbé showed signs of being about to pour for them, no doubt as an excuse to remain in the room. We will serve ourselves.'

  The Abbé withdrew, disappointed but submissive, and Gauthier de Chazay turned to Marianne.

  'It is a long time since you poured tea or coffee for me, Marianne. I hope you have not forgotten.'

  Tears sprang to Marianne's eyes at the recollection the words conjured up of home and childhood. She stripped off her gloves and dropped them on the floor, then went to the little table and began carefully pouring out the fragrant, steaming beverage. Absorbed in her task, she did not look up at her godfather. Neither spoke until, as she handed him his cup, she plucked up courage to ask: 'You – you do not judge me too harshly?'

  'I have not the right. I did not like Lord Cranmere, or this marriage, and yet I went away. I know now that I should have stayed to watch over you instead of leaving you as I did. No doubt it was God's will, for a few minutes earlier and you would have caught up with me on Plymouth quay and everything would have been very different. You had no choice. You had to follow your fate and I am not without my part in the way things have gone.'

  He paused.

  'No, I have no right to say one word of blame, for that would be to blame you for having survived.'

  'Then, help me, godfather. Save me from Francis Cranmere!'

  'Save you? How can I?'

  'Lord Cranmere has never touched me. My marriage to that base man was never consummated. Ask the Holy Father to annul the marriage so that he will have no more rights over me. Let me be myself again and forget that Lord Cranmere ever existed.'

  'Will he permit you to forget him so easily?'

  'It will not matter when I am no longer bound to him. Save me, godfather! I want to be Marianne d'Asselnat once more.'

  The echo of her words lingered in the room as the cardinal drained his cup. Still without speaking, he set it down and remained for a while in contemplation of his clasped hands. Marianne respected his silence, stifling her painful anxiety. Why did he not answer? What was in his mind?

  At last he raised his eyelids and looked up at her and Marianne shivered at the unhappiness in his blue eyes.

  'It is not in order to become yourself again that you ask for my help, Marianne. Indeed, that is no longer possible, the change in you goes much deeper than the name you bear. You want your freedom in order to belong more fully to the man you love. That is something I cannot countenance because to do so would be to permit you to live openly in a state of sin.'

  'What difference would it make? At present I am Napoleon's acknowledged mistress,' Marianne cried, a note of defiance in her voice.

  'No. Napoleon's mistress is a woman named Maria Stella, not the daughter of the Marquis d'Asselnat. Make no mistake, child, the post of royal favourite has never been considered an honour in our family. Still less the favourite of an usurper. I will never allow your father's name to be linked with that of Bonaparte!'

  A touch of anger came to add to the bitterness of Marianne's disappointment. She knew, as she had always known, that Gauthier de Chazay was a fanatical royalist, but it had not occurred to her that he would allow his loyalty to his king to affect his dealings with her, his god-daughter, the child of his heart.

  'I have told you what this man has done to me and means to do even now, godfather,' she said wretchedly. Will you force me to remain tied to such a villain for the sake of some kind of political morality?'

  'Not at all. I merely wish in saving you from Cranmere to save you from yourself. Like it or not, you were not born to join your fate with that of Napoleon. Neither God nor the simple, everyday morality of ordinary life, nor what you call political morality, will have it so. This man is about to destroy himself. I will not permit you to destroy yourself with him. Promise me that you will give him up for ever and I promise you that I will have your marriage dissolved within a fortnight.'

  'What a bargain!' Marianne exclaimed, all the more bitterly hurt because the cardinal was merely repeating, with the same calm assurance, what Talleyrand had said to her earlier.

  'Perhaps,' the cardinal admitted equably, 'but if you must dishonour your real name, as well it should be that of the Englishman. One day, you will thank me.'

  'That I do not believe! Even if I were willing to give you this promise, even if I would destroy with my own hand the love that is my very life, I could not do it. You do not know all, Eminence. Well, you shall learn the whole truth. I am going to have a child, his child! A Bonaparte!'

  'Unhappy girl! More foolish than wretched. You dared to talk of becoming little Marianne of Selton once again! What you have done has placed an irrevocable barrier between you and yours.'

  At this revelation, Gauthier de Chazay's composure had finally snapped, but Marianne was conscious of no special dismay. Her only feeling was one of sudden, fierce joy, a triumphant exultation, as if the child that lay mysteriously inside her body had succeeded in that moment in avenging all the hatred and disdain endured by its father at the hands of the royalist émigrés. Her voice was cold as she answered.

  'Perhaps, but it is also my chief motive for wishing for a final separation from Francis Cranmere. The Emperor's child must not bear the name of a scoundrel. If you refuse to untie the knot which still binds me to him, I will stop at nothing, nothing, do you hear, not even cold-blooded murder, to erase Francis Cranmere from my life.'

  The cardinal must have realized that she meant what she said for even as she saw him blench she was aware of something else, a curious pride glowing in his usually gentle eyes. Marianne had expected anger, violent protests, instead of which there was a sigh and a faint, sardonic smile.

  'The exhausting thing about your family,' Gauthier de Chazay observed, 'is your determination. As soon as your will is crossed, you start spitting fire and sparks and threatening to kill everyone. The worst of it is that you not only generally keep your promises but that you are perfectly right.'

  'What?' Marianne was aghast. 'You tell me to —'

  'To send Francis Cranmere to join his noble forbears? As a man, I see no objection to it, I might even applaud it. As a priest, however, I am obliged to deprecate violence of any kind, however well deserved. No, Marianne, when I say you are right, I mean that you are right to say this unborn child must not bear that man's name, but only because he will be your son.'

  Marianne's face glowed suddenly as she felt victory within her grasp.

  'Then you will ask for an annulment?'

  'Not so fast. Answer me one question first. How long have you known – about the child?'

  'Not until today.' In a few words, she told him about the faint-ness which had come over her at the Tuileries.

  'Have you – I am sorry to have to ask you such a question but this is no time for delicacy – have you any idea when it happened?'

  'Not long ago, I think. Not more than a month at most, less perhaps.'

  'A curious way to anticipate the arrival of a new
bride,' was the cardinal's comment. 'However, no more of that. Time presses. Listen to what I have to say and do not argue because this is my last word. This is the only way that I am able to help you without betraying either my conscience or my duty. First, you will keep what you have told me strictly to yourself. Do you understand? Keep it absolutely secret for the present. Francis Cranmere must not get wind of it. He could ruin everything and with such a man one must take no chances. Not a word, therefore, not even to those closest to you.'

  'I will remember. What else?'

  'The rest is up to me. In fifteen days, the time it will take me to reach the Holy Father at Savona, your marriage will be annulled. But in a month you will be married again.'

  Marianne wondered if she had heard aright.

  'What did you say? I do not understand —'

  'No, you heard me quite correctly. I said that in a month you will be married again.'

  He spoke in such decisive tones that for the moment Marianne could find nothing to say. She could only stammer, helplessly: 'But that is impossible! Do you know what you are saying?'

  'I am not in the habit of talking nonsense and I must remind you of what I said a moment ago. No argument. However, I will make myself perfectly plain. If you are a month pregnant, then in another month you must be wedded to some suitable man whose name both you and your child may bear without blushing for it. You have no alternative, Marianne. And don't talk to me about your love, or your Emperor or your freedom. Think of the child, since child there is to be. He must have a name, and a father, since the man who fathered him can do nothing for him.'