Marianne and The Masked Prince

by Жюльетта Бенцони

  When she returned to the office, Napoleon was waiting for her, her shawl over his arm. He settled it tenderly about her shoulders, asking in a voice that was suddenly coaxing, like a child asking to be forgiven: 'Do you still love me?'

  She merely shrugged and smiled a little sadly.

  'Then, ask me for something. I want to make you happy.'

  She was about to refuse when all at once she remembered something Fortunée had told her the night before, something which was much on her mind. Now or never was the moment to do something for her most faithful friend, and also to annoy the Emperor a little. Looking him very straight in the eye, she gave him a wide smile.

  'There is someone you could make very happy through me, sire.'

  'Who is that?'

  'Madame Hamelin. It appears that when the banker Ouvrard was arrested in her house, the men also arrested General Fournier-Sarlovèze who chanced to be in the house.'

  If Marianne had hoped to annoy Napoleon, she had succeeded abundantly. The smiling face of a moment before was instantly transformed into the mask of Caesar. He did not look at her but turned back to his desk, saying curtly:

  'General Fournier had no business to be in Paris without permission. His home is Sarlat. Let him stay there.'

  'It would seem,' Marianne said, 'that your majesty is unaware of the ties of affection which exist between him and Fortunée. They are deeply in love and —'

  'Rubbish! Fournier is in love with every woman he meets and Madame Hamelin is besotted about men. They can perfectly well do without each other. If he was in her house, there was probably some other reason for it.'

  'But of course,' Marianne said blandly. 'He desires quite desperately to be restored to his place in the army, as your majesty well knows.'

  'I know he is a troublemaker, a mischievous hot-head – and one that hates me and will not forgive me because I wear the crown.'

  'But one that dearly loves your glory,' Marianne said softly, astonishing herself by her ability to produce arguments in favour of a man whom she personally detested. But Fortunée would be so happy.

  Napoleon's eye was turned on her in sudden suspicion.

  'This man – how do you come to know him?'

  A devil came to tempt Marianne. What would he do if she were to tell him that on the night of his august nuptials, Fournier had tried to ravish her behind a garden gate? No doubt he would be furious, and his rage would repay her for many things, but Fournier might well pay with his life or by perpetual disgrace, and he had not deserved that, however odious and impossible he was.

  'Know him would be rather too much to claim. I saw him one evening at Madame Hamelin's. He had come from Périgord to beg her to intercede for him. I did not stay long. I had the impression that the general and my friend were anxious to be alone.'

  The Emperor's shout of laughter told her she had succeeded. He came to her and took her hand, kissed it and, still holding her, led her to the door.

  'Very well! You win. You may tell that urchin in petticoats that she will have her handsome cockerel back soon. I will have him out of prison and he shall have his command again before the autumn. Now, be off with you. I have work to do.'

  They parted at the door, he bowing slightly, she sinking once again into the deep, formal curtsey, as stiff and impersonal as if nothing had occurred behind that door but a polite conversation. Marianne found Duroc waiting in the Apollo gallery to escort her to her carriage. He held out his hand.

  'Well? Happy?'

  'Extremely,' Marianne said in a tight voice. The Emperor was – charming!'

  'The whole thing has been a complete success,' the Grand Marshal agreed. 'You are wholly restored to favour. You do not yet know how far! But I can tell you that you will certainly receive your appointment before long.'

  'My appointment? What appointment?'

  'As lady-in-waiting, to be sure! The Emperor has decided that as an Italian princess you will join the group of great ladies from foreign countries who are now attached to the Empress's person in this capacity. It is your right.'

  'But I do not want to!' Marianne cried helplessly. 'How dare he do this to me? Attached to his wife, obliged to serve her, keep her company? He is mad!'

  'Hush!' Duroc spoke hastily, casting an anxious glance around him. 'Do not fly into a panic. The appointments have already been made but, for one thing, the decree is not yet signed, although Countess Dorothée has already taken up her post; and for another, if I know anything of the Duchess of Montebello's exclusiveness, your duties will not take up much of your time. Apart from grand receptions, at which you will be obliged to attend, you will see little of the Empress, you will not enter her bedchamber, or converse with her, or ride in her carriage. It is, in fact, largely an honorary appointment but it will have the advantage of silencing busy tongues.'

  'If I am obliged to have a post at court, could I not have been given to some other member of the imperial family? Princess Pauline, for instance? Or, better still, the Emperor's mother?'

  At this, the Grand Marshal laughed quite openly.

  'My dear Princess, you don't know what you are saying! You are a great deal too pretty for our charming, scatterbrained Pauline, while as for Madame Mother, if you want to die a speedy death of boredom, then I advise you to join the company of grave and pious ladies who make up her entourage.'

  'Very well,' Marianne said with a sigh of resignation. 'I admit defeat once more. I will be a lady-in-waiting. But for the love of heaven, my dear Duke, do nothing to hasten the signature of that decree! There will be time enough.'

  'Oh, with a bit of luck, I can drag it out until August, or even September.'

  September? Marianne's smile returned at once. By September her condition would be sufficiently obvious to excuse her from appearing at court since, according to her calculations, the baby should be born early in December.

  They had reached the steps and Marianne extended her hand impulsively for the Grand Marshal to kiss.

  'My dear Duke, you are a darling! And, and what is more to the point, a very good friend.'

  'I preferred your first,' he told her, with a comical grimace, 'but I will be content with friendship. Good-bye for the present, fair lady.'

  The sun was setting in a blaze of orange light that made the sky behind the hills of Saint-Cloud seem on fire. The promenade de Longchamp was full of people, a gay, colourful crowd of gleaming carriages, handsome men on horseback, light-coloured gowns and brilliant uniforms. The evening was so mild that Marianne was glad not to hurry home. She was trying out a new carriage that day, an open barouche which Arcadius had ordered as a surprise for her homecoming. With its green velvet cushions and gleaming brass-work, it was both luxurious and comfortable. This splendid equipage attracted a good deal of notice, as also did its occupant. Women stared curiously, and men with an admiration divided equally between the ravishing young woman who reclined on the cushions and the four snowy Lippizaners handled with superb aplomb by Gracchus, glowing with pride in his new livery of black and gold.

  Marianne lay back, lulled by the gentle movement of her carriage, and breathed in the warm air, heavy with the sweet scent of acacia and chestnut trees in bloom. Her dreamy gaze took in just enough of the brilliant, passing throng to enable her to recognize a face or return a bow.

  At one point, however, the two lines of vehicles were brought to a halt to allow a passage to the numerous retinue of Prince Cambacèrés. During the enforced halt, Marianne's wandering attention was caught and held by a man on horseback who stood out oddly in the colourful crowd. Riding a beautiful chestnut at a gentle trot along the grass track beside the road, he seemed to take no notice of the blockage, merely bowing from time to time to one of the many women, who all smiled at him.

  Marianne could tell from his dark-green uniform with red flashes, from the Cross of St Alexander on his high collar and the peculiar shape of his black cocked hat with its cockade, that the man was a Russian officer, although the Cross of the Legion d'Hon
neur gleamed on his breast.

  He was a superb horseman. That much was clear from his easy seat, combining gracefulness with strength, and from the muscular thighs, beautifully moulded by white buckskins. His figure, also, was distinctive: his shoulders were extremely broad but his waist as slim as a young girl's. The most extraordinary thing about him was his face which was very fair with narrow side-whiskers that grew like faint slivers of gold on his cheeks. The features had the absolute regularity of a Greek statue but the eyes, set at a slant, were fierce and of an intense green which betrayed Asiatic blood. The man had some Tartar in him. He was coming towards Marianne's carriage and as he neared it, he rode more slowly.

  At last, he stopped altogether, only a few paces away from Marianne, but it was to look curiously and with great attention at her horses. He examined each one carefully, from head to tail, moved slightly back to study the effect as a whole, and then edged closer again. Then his eyes turned to her. The same procedure was repeated. The Russian officer sat his horse two yards away, inspecting her with the attentive look of an entomologist discovering some rare insect. His eye roved in insolent appreciation from her thick, dark hair to her face, already flushed deep red, to the slender column of her neck, her shoulders and her breast, which Marianne hastened to cover with the black and gold cashmere. Bursting with indignation and feeling unpleasantly like a slave put up for sale, Marianne tried to annihilate this unmannerly individual with her glance, but, lost in his contemplation, he seemed not to notice it. More, he actually extracted a glass from his pocket and put it to his eye the better to scrutinize her.

  Marianne leaned forward hastily and dug the tip of her sunshade smartly into Gracchus's arm.

  'I do not care how you do it,' she said, 'but get us out of here! This person seems determined to stay where he is until Judgment Day.'

  The youthful coachman glanced over his shoulder and grinned.

  'It would appear your Serene Highness has an admirer. I'll see what I can do. In fact, I think things are beginning to move.'

  The long line of carriages was indeed beginning to move again. Gracchus flicked the reins but still the Russian officer did not stir. He merely turned slightly in the saddle so as to follow the carriage and its occupant with his eyes. This was enough: 'Boor!' Marianne flung at him.

  'Don't you upset yourself, Highness,' Gracchus told her. 'He's a Russian and everyone knows Russians don't know what's what. They're all savages. I dare say that one doesn't speak a word of French. It was his only way of telling you he thought you were beautiful.'

  Marianne said nothing. There could be no doubt of the man's ability to speak French. The language was part of the normal education of all noble Russians and this one was evidently not born in a hovel. He was a thoroughbred, for sure, but his behaviour merely went to prove that it was possible to belong to the Russian nobility and remain horribly ill-bred. Oh well, she told herself, the important thing was to have got rid of him! It was lucky he had not been going her way.

  But when her carriage passed through the handsome triple iron gate of the Porte Mahiaux she heard her coachman say casually that the Russian officer was still there.

  'What? Is he following us? But he was going towards Saint-Cloud?'

  'Maybe he was but he's not going there now. He's right behind us.'

  Marianne looked round. Gracchus was right. The Russian was there, a few yards behind, following the carriage as calmly as if that had always been his place. When he saw her looking at him, he even had the audacity to give her a beaming smile.

  'Oh!' Marianne cried aloud. This is too much! Spring 'em, Gracchus! As fast as you can!'

  'Spring 'em?' Gracchus said in horror. 'We'll have someone over if I do.'

  'You can avoid them. Spring them, I said. Now is the time for those horses to show their paces, and you your skill!'

  Gracchus knew that it was useless to argue with his mistress when she spoke in that tone. The whip cracked. The carriage set off at a spanking pace along the route de Neuilly, traversed the place de l'Étoile, and thundered down the Champs Elysées. Gracchus, standing up on his box like a Greek charioteer, shouted out warnings with the full force of his lungs whenever he perceived a pedestrian. All these, indeed, stopped in their tracks and stared, spellbound, at the sight of the smart barouche tearing past, drawn like the wind by four snow-white horses, with a horseman riding hell for leather in pursuit. The Russian's quiet following after the carriage had turned into a mad race. When the officer saw the barouche break into a gallop, he set spurs to his horse and set off in enthusiastic pursuit. His cocked hat was gone but he showed no sign of caring. His fair hair streamed in the wind as he urged on his mount with barbaric cries that matched Gracchus's shouts. It was not a sight to pass unnoticed.

  With a thunderous roar, the barouche swept over the Pont de la Concorde, and rounded the corner of the Palais du Corps Législatif. The Russian was gaining on them, and Marianne was almost bursting with rage.

  'We'll never shake him off before we reach the house,' she cried. 'We are nearly there.'

  'Don't lose hope!' Gracchus yelled back. 'Help is coming!'

  He was right. Another horseman was converging on their path, a captain of Polish Lancers who, seeing the smart barouche evidently pursued by a Russian officer, instantly decided to intervene. Marianne watched with delight as he cut across the Russian's path, forcing him to stop in order to avoid a collision. Gracchus's hold on the reins slackened instinctively and the carriage began to slow down.

  'My thanks, monsieur,' Marianne called out, while the two men faced each other with obvious hostility.

  'A pleasure, madame,' the lancer responded gaily, raising a gloved hand to his hat. A moment later, the same hand was applied to the Russian officer's cheek.

  'That looks like the beginnings of a nice little duel.' Gracchus observed. Well, a sword thrust is a lot to pay for one smile.'

  'Suppose you mind your own business,' Marianne snapped back. 'Take me home quickly and then come back and find out what has happened. Try and discover who both these gentlemen are. I will do what I can to prevent the duel.'

  In a very few moments, she was standing in the forecourt of her own house, having despatched Gracchus to the scene of the quarrel. But when he returned not many minutes later, her young coachman could tell her nothing more. The two parties to the quarrel had already disappeared and the small crowd attracted by their altercation had melted away. Fearing the incident would attract a good deal more notoriety than it deserved and might even reach the Emperor's ears, Marianne did what she had always done in such a case and waited for Arcadius to come home to confide her troubles to him.

  When he returned, Arcadius found himself entrusted with a confidential mission to prevent an absurd duel between a Russian and a Polish officer. This mission he accepted with his twinkling smile, merely asking Marianne which of the two adversaries she preferred.

  'How can you ask!' she exclaimed. The Pole, of course! Didn't he rescue me from a man who was molesting me, at the risk of his life?'

  'My experience of woman, my dear,' Arcadius retorted calmly, 'has not shown me that rescuers inevitably receive the gratitude they deserve. It all depends on who has done the rescuing. Take your friend Fortunée Hamelin. Well, I would stake my right arm that not only would she have felt not the faintest desire to be rescued from your pursuer, but she would actually have regarded any man who was fool enough to try it as a deadly enemy.'

  Marianne shrugged.

  'Oh, I know. Fortunée adores all men in general and anyone in uniform in particular. She would think a Russian a great prize.'

  'Not all Russians perhaps, but this one, most certainly.'

  'Anyone would think you knew him,' Marianne said, staring. 'Yet you did not see him, you were not there.'

  'No,' Jolival agreed pleasantly, 'but if your description is correct, I know who he is. Particularly as Russians who wear the Legion d'Honneur are not exactly two a penny.'

  Then who —?'
>
  'Count Alexander Ivanovitch Chernychev, Colonel of Cossacks of the Russian Imperial Guard, aide-de-camp to his majesty Tzar Alexander I and his customary emissary to France. He is one of the finest horsemen in the world and one of the most inveterate womanizers of two hemispheres. Women adore him.'

  'Do they? Well, not this one!' Marianne cried, reacting with fury to Jolival's complacent introduction of the insolent rider of Longchamp. 'If this duel does take place, I hope very much that the Pole will skewer your Cossack as neatly as a tailor sewing thread. Attractive or no, his manners are atrocious.'

  'That is what pretty women generally say of him the first time. It is odd, though, how often they tend to change their minds later on. Come now, don't be cross,' he added, seeing her green eyes grow stormy. 'I will go and see whether I am able to prevent a massacre, although I doubt it.'

  'Why?'

  'Because a Russian and a Pole have never yet been known to renounce such a splendid opportunity for killing one another.'

  In the event, ten o'clock was striking the next morning as Arcadius, who had gone out well before daylight, returned to inform Marianne that the duel had taken place that very morning at the Pré Catelan. The two parties had fought with swords and had returned unreconciled, one, Chernychev, with a thrust through his arm, the other, Baron Kozietulski, with a wound in the shoulder.

  'You need not pity him too much,' Jolival added, seeing Marianne's distressed face. The wound is not severe and it will have the advantage of saving him from a tour of duty in Spain, where the Emperor would most certainly have sent him. And don't worry, I will send to inquire how he does. As for the other…'

  'The other does not interest me,' Marianne interrupted curtly.

  The faintly sardonic smile which was Jolival's answer to this so offended Marianne that she turned her back on him without a word and went out into the garden. Why, she wondered, had her old friend smiled like that? What was he thinking? Did he imagine that she did not mean what she said when she declared that the Russian did not interest her? Did he think she was like all those other women who had fallen such easy victims to the handsome Cossack?