The Mistress of Paris

by Catherine Hewitt

  Léon was invited to join him whenever she could.

  Word of the town’s new arrival spread fast in Ville-d’Avray, with Gambetta’s cook proving the most efficient purveyor of gossip. ‘M. Gambetta is a man,’ the cook confided when asked about the politician’s affair with Léon, ‘and he’s not married. I can tell you, just between us, this person who is passed off as his relative is not a relative. So, you see, he can’t receive anyone, and he couldn’t care less what people might say about him.’13

  Valtesse listened to the gossip with interest. Les Jardies was in the next road to hers. She had often passed the home of her literary hero and wondered what it must look like inside. Besides, a courtesan was always well advised to watch the movements of powerful politicians, and the task became more interesting when the man concerned had a secret to conceal. With the information she had received from Kergaradec playing on her mind, Valtesse realised that an opportunity was being presented. If she could win Gambetta’s confidence, she was sure she could persuade him to secure France’s colonial hold in Indochina. She, a woman and a courtesan, would be playing an active role on France’s political stage. The prospect was thrilling. Valtesse began to plot.

  Gambetta was known for his unwavering determination once his mind had settled on something. Popular account held that when his father sent him to a religious school as a boy, he became so miserable and fixed on leaving that he wrote home in fury: ‘If you do not remove me from this place, I will gouge out my own eye.’14 The father laughed and dismissed the threat – until he was summoned to the school. The young boy had done as he had promised. Curiously, the father insisted that his son remain at the school. But before long, he received another letter. The boy was planning to remove his second eye. This time, Gambetta got his way. His father removed him immediately.

  Gambetta had a glass eye fitted as a replacement, and as his political career blossomed, he learned to use it as a weapon during his speeches. When discussion became animated, he would slowly close his real eye, fixing his terrified adversaries with his immobile, gleaming glass replica. The tactic won him many a debate.

  There was no doubt: winning Gambetta’s trust was not going to be easy. Valtesse knew that success demanded stealth and patience. Neither fazed her. She was amused but undeterred when her first attempt to speak with the politician failed. She gleefully recounted the incident to Félicien Champsaur.

  One morning, Valtesse explained, she was taken by the idea of visiting the home formerly occupied by Balzac.15 Harnessing her handsome grey stallion, Néro, to her fine mahogany-trimmed carriage – both gifts from admirers – Valtesse made her way across the wooded ground that separated her property from the former home of her literary hero, with her prized greyhound, Detaille, trotting beside her. As she neared Gambetta’s house, Valtesse stopped a local man to ask the way to the entrance.

  ‘Which way to Les Jardies please, Sir?’

  ‘Go down the hill, then go back up the other side of the Chemin Vert. That is where it is.’

  ‘Tell me,’ Valtesse continued, ‘is M. Gambetta there?’

  The countryman grunted, ‘Perhaps … Maybe.’

  ‘Does he live alone?’ Valtesse pursued.

  ‘Alone?’ the man repeated.

  ‘With family then?’

  The man smiled. ‘There are only female cousins in that family, and they change all the time,’ he chuckled, before replacing his pipe in his mouth.

  Valtesse continued on her way and finally reached the entrance to Les Jardies. There, as if he had been expecting her, was Gambetta.

  He was small, pot-bellied, and wore a grey suit. Valtesse thought his pince-nez rather affected; a monocle would have sufficed in his condition. A soft black hat covered Gambetta’s bushy grey hair, and he leant on a walking stick. Valtesse approached him.

  ‘Might I be able to visit Balzac’s house, Sir?’ she enquired, adopting her sweetest tone.

  ‘Why?’ the politician snapped. ‘No … No …,’ he growled, shaking his head like a bad-tempered child.

  Valtesse could see that she would not be able to win him round – at least not that day. Undeterred by the frosty reception, she returned home and made up her mind to try another tack. She decided to write the politician a letter, hoping that a more formal approach, one which reduced the chance of a confrontation with Léon, might gain her the interview she desired.

  Dear M. President,

  I am writing to you to request a meeting. I am addressing my correspondence to M. the President of the Chamber first of all, and then to M. Léon Gambetta.

  Yours sincerely, Valtesse de la Bigne

  This time, Gambetta relented.

  Dear Madame,

  If you would care to come to my office in Paris tomorrow, Wednesday 1 September, I shall be available to grant you the meeting you request.

  Yours sincerely, L. Gambetta

  Valtesse needed no further invitation. The very next morning, she arrived at the station at Ville-d’Avray and boarded the 10.30 train to Paris.16

  After lunch with one of her artist friends, Valtesse travelled to the Palais Bourbon. On arriving, she was immediately taken to meet Gambetta. Valtesse turned on all her charm. She excused her appearance, which she laughingly dismissed as quaint country attire. The politician surely understood: how difficult it was for a lady to remain lovely when she was obliged to travel by train, with all that dust and heat! Gambetta was caught off guard. Valtesse was working her magic.

  As she spoke, Valtesse’s observational skills worked quickly. She tried to get a measure of the man before her. He was ‘very friendly’, she remarked, though ‘a little dirty’.17 And privately, she regretted having agreed to an early afternoon meeting: the scent of garlic from a hearty lunch lingered on Gambetta’s breath. But these were trivial grievances; the important point was that the President of the Chamber of Deputies was listening to her.

  Gambetta invited her to take a seat, but Valtesse noticed that he looked uneasy. It was to be expected: he was a Republican; Valtesse was a Bonapartist. She was also clever, well-read and an expert at manipulating social situations to suit her purpose. And she was known to be bold. In the back of his mind, Gambetta recalled the case of Charlotte Corday, the infamous female assassin of Jacobin leader Jean-Paul Marat.18 He watched Valtesse suspiciously. Caution was needed with this woman.

  Valtesse sat firmly back into the chair she had been offered. Gambetta watched in earnest. Valtesse began to speak.

  She outlined her connections in Tonkin and Annam and described the content of the letters she had received from her lover. Gambetta listened attentively.

  He was startled. This bewitching female spoke eloquently. She understood the intricacies of the situation in the Indochinese territories, could talk knowledgeably about the area’s history and its people, and was confident that she knew exactly how to ensure that France triumphed. Gambetta was intrigued. He explained that the matter was of great interest to him and that the Chamber planned to address it in due course.

  Valtesse insisted that, truly, Tonkin was a very small territory. How glorious it would be if it belonged to France. Gambetta smiled. His speaker was persistent. Slowly but surely, Valtesse was breaking down his defences. With mounting satisfaction, Valtesse realised that the old politician’s wariness was subsiding. Her beauty and charm were winning him over.

  Why, surely a man of Gambetta’s intelligence and standing must see how favourably he would be regarded if he secured France such a territory? His popularity would soar. And of course, the value of a territory as rich as Tonkin to France need hardly be stated.

  Gambetta considered his speaker’s powerful argument. Could she elaborate on the points she had made? She could.

  ‘Madame,’ Gambetta said at last, ‘I am afraid that I cannot examine all the material in your dossier today.’19

  For a moment, it looked as though Valtesse’s efforts had been in vain. But Gambetta explained: ‘I have agreed to a meeting which I cannot po
stpone.’ He continued: ‘would you be so good as to write me a report on the matter?’

  Valtesse was triumphant. She wanted nothing more.

  Gambetta paused briefly, before adding: ‘I have heard much about you, Madame. I know your house, your villa. We are neighbours …’

  Valtesse had cause to smile. She had achieved what she had set out to do. Agreeing, with all the sweetness and gentility she could summon, that she would compose the report immediately, she bid Gambetta farewell. Valtesse returned home and set to work.

  Gambetta did not have long to wait. In less than a fortnight, Valtesse’s report arrived on his desk. Gambetta began to read – and the further he read, the more he was impressed by what his pretty neighbour had to say.

  With perfect eloquence, Valtesse outlined the geography and history of the kingdom of Annam, with its nine southern provinces of Annam and its sixteen northern provinces of Tonkin.20 She gave an informed account of the kingdom’s language and its economy, and laid particular stress on the dictatorial nature of the Emperor Tu Duc’s rule.21 ‘Tu Duc exerts absolute power over this population,’ Valtesse explained, and she described how jobs were distributed unfairly among the people. A French protectorate would redress the balance. The country’s industry was undeveloped, and yet there were resources that France could exploit. She advised that France should not attempt to conquer the territory, a move which would be costly and difficult, but to expand its protectorate across all areas of the kingdom.

  Valtesse presented her argument clearly, she gave reasons, she provided examples. And her conclusion was firm: a French expedition to Annam and Tonkin was not only advisable, it was essential. Gambetta was impressed.

  Just days after Valtesse deposited her report, a crisp white envelope arrived at her home in Ville-d’Avray. The official stamp on the front was full of promise: ‘Chamber of Deputies’.

  ‘Madame,’ the enclosed letter began, ‘I find the report that you were good enough to write me excellent in both form and structure, and you should publish it, unless you would rather I do so.’22

  Valtesse could glow with pride. It was a magnificent accolade. Gambetta was one of the leading politicians in France. His stirring speeches had been known to rally even the most reluctant of men. His articles had earned him a reputation as one of the most articulate Republicans in France. Now, this revered figure considered her political treatise to be ‘excellent’ and publishable. It was a tremendous coup.

  Still, Valtesse knew that the situation was delicate. If France wanted to make real progress, the ruling powers in Indochina must not be alerted to her campaign. But the temptation of having her political essay published – and her intelligence showcased – was impossible to resist. Valtesse agreed to have a version of her report printed in Le Journal Officiel. But dare she allow her views to appear in a daily paper with as high a circulation as Le Figaro too?

  On Wednesday morning on 22 September 1880, readers of Le Figaro opened their papers to find a curious article on page four by an unknown contributor who went by their initials only: V. de la B.23

  ‘His Majesty Tu Duc is without a doubt the most disillusioned ruler imaginable,’ the mysterious author began, ‘he governs his subjects according to his whims, and his sceptre is a cane, which he uses to issue tens or hundreds of blows wherever he pleases on those who dare break the rules that he invents each day.’

  Valtesse described how the Emperor denied his subjects basic necessities to satisfy his own flights of fancy. She explained that whenever Tu Duc wanted to go fishing, whole stretches of water were cordoned off, and local inhabitants were forbidden to fish or sail until his Majesty grew tired of the sport.

  But her most horrific revelation was the form of punishment in force in the territory. Tu Duc’s brother thought nothing of shaving a woman’s head and parading her through the streets when his pride had been injured. Then, when a minor military captain failed to show him due respect, the same prince killed him with his bare hands, congratulating himself that the gesture would serve as a warning to others. Tu Duc himself issued punishment on a different principle: the culprit must suffer and his own bank balance must increase.

  If only there were not so many princes, Valtesse lamented; alas, there were three generations’ worth, perhaps 1,000 or more, all of them enjoying shamelessly decadent, unproductive lifestyles. Princes spent the whole day smoking opium, indulging in leisurely pursuits – and marrying. Some princes had as many as 30 wives; one had more than 100 children. Could inhabitants not draw consolation from the possibility that one of these rich princes might want to do business with them? Hardly: princes thought it laughable that they should be expected to pay for goods in shops.

  Valtesse was desperate to imprint the urgency of the situation on the French conscience, and turned her attention to the other dangers faced by the Annam people. What terror would the French people understand? What terrified her? She considered for a moment. Then the answer came to her: tigers.

  ‘There are no fewer tigers in Annam than there are princes,’ she warned readers, ‘and they live primarily on the inhabitants.’

  Valtesse recounted an anecdote whereby some locals had gone to sleep in a forest at the end of a long day gathering berries. After a while, one of the men was awakened by a tugging on his leg. He realised in horror that it was a tiger. As the animal’s courage mounted, it began to drag the man away from the group. His comrades woke to hear the ghastly cracking of their colleague’s bones between the tiger’s ferocious jaws. The men spent the rest of the night frozen in silent terror. When daybreak finally came, they hurried back to their village. As they left the clearing, they passed a chilling sight: there, not far from where they had been sleeping, lay the remains of their companion. Only his skull was left.

  Satisfied with her colourful description of the dual threats of royalty and tigers to the Annam people, Valtesse felt sure that the extracts of her report would make the desired impact on the people of Paris.

  Between Le Journal Officiel and Le Figaro, Valtesse caught the public’s attention. Paris began to respond. ‘Through this report, Valtesse has grown considerably and takes the lead among modern courtesans,’ conceded an otherwise sceptical reviewer.24 ‘This streak of genius flatters her enormously […] It justifies her elevated position. Valtesse is a national treasure.’

  Valtesse knew that she had taken a dangerous risk. The successful expansion of France’s protectorate depended on maintaining the utmost discretion. But for the moment, Valtesse’s articles were harmlessly garnering her respect and admiration. Few people made the link between the politically astute courtesan, the Republican politician and the government’s strategy for addressing the problems in Annam – apart from one. Just weeks after Valtesse’s text appeared, Le Figaro published another article. It took pride of place on the paper’s front page and the author was a man Valtesse knew only too well: Émile Zola.

  The piece launched a vicious attack on Gambetta. To Zola’s mind, the politician was ineffectual and his approach outmoded. Turning his attention to Gambetta’s speeches, he inquired, ‘What? Is that all?’ They were ‘no more eloquent than those of two or three hundred equally ambitious lawyers who had simply not been as lucky’.25 But then something in the second column gave cause for Valtesse to sit up and take notice: ‘M. Gambetta is not passionate about our modern world. […] He is a Greek or Roman in disguise. He clearly thinks himself in Athens or Rome; his Republic is 2,000 years old, and when he thinks about rebuilding it, he sees himself crowned with roses, a crimson cloak about his shoulders, drinking wine in the company of Phryne and Aspasia.’

  It was difficult to ignore the thinly veiled allusion to Valtesse. The reference to the ancient Grecian women had been carefully considered. The bright and beautiful Aspasia was said to have been a courtesan, and her Athenian home became a hive of intellectual activity, attracting some of the greatest thinkers and writers of the day. Phryne too was a courtesan, and was famed for her complexion, while her bea
uty inspired countless works of art. Both figures had become fashionable with artists in the 19th century – and both had been compared to Valtesse in the press.

  Zola’s powers of perception were finely tuned. Valtesse’s interest in Annam had indeed established a firm, if unlikely friendship between the statesman and the courtesan, one founded on mutual respect and acceptance of their political differences. Gambetta liked to tease Valtesse, and she enjoyed responding with quick repartee. Alerted by the sound of explosions, Gambetta would stand in his garden and watch the fireworks lighting up the sky over Valtesse’s villa every 15 August.26 The light show was an irresistible invitation to confront the display’s pretty choreographer. A quick-fire exchange became a tradition that both parties relished.

  ‘You sent another rocket into my garden!’ Gambetta would roar.

  ‘If it was up to me, I would send bombs!’ Valtesse would retort.

  ‘Badinguiste!’27

  ‘Jacobin!’

  They would both laugh.

  ‘Now, my beautiful neighbour,’ he would say, composing himself, ‘there is an evening that you cannot refuse me.’

  ‘Oh really? And when would that be?’

  ‘The evening of 2 December!’

  The suggestion was an outrageous tease; Gambetta knew full well that the symbolic date was fixed in Bonapartists’ calendars, being both the anniversary of the 1805 victory at Austerlitz and Louis Napoleon’s 1851 coup d’état.28

  Valtesse’s article on Annam was a triumphant proof of her intellect. But if people thought that the government were actually acting on the advice of a woman – a courtesan no less – there would be an outcry. Would Zola’s article alert the public to that scandalous possibility? Everything hung on what now happened in Annam.

  But Valtesse had little opportunity to worry about her political profile for the moment. There was trouble brewing. Her previously secret personal life was about to burst on to the public scene in one of the most sensational court cases of the decade.