The Mistress of Paris

by Catherine Hewitt

  Valtesse began to plan her next move. But just as she was doing so, a high-profile court case sent shockwaves reverberating through France. Suddenly, a distorted lens was thrust in front of everyday life. In 1898, France was gripped by one of the most radical legal cases the country had ever seen – and it shone the public spotlight on Valtesse as never before, not just in France, but across the globe.

  CHAPTER 17

  New Beginnings: The Sale of the House

  With hindsight, a whiff of sociopolitical upheaval should have been detected on the air long before the Dreyfus affair made it pungent. The 1890s was a period of dynamic change – for better and worse. Technological advances were radically transforming the face of everyday life. The daily routine of ordinary men and women would have been unrecognisable to their grandparents. Already by the 1880s, the master of an upper-class house could pick up a telephone receiver – often warily – and enter into crackly communication with the ever-expanding world outside. On 28 December 1895, the first moving picture was shown to an audience of disbelieving spectators in the basement of the Grand Café on the Boulevard des Capucines.1 Even the reassuring contours of Paris’s familiar visage were growing strange; the city’s old buildings were gradually being demolished, replaced, improved.

  Everything smacked of change and progress, and few inventions embraced that ethos more wholeheartedly than the motor car. The automobile burst on to the market in the 1890s, reconfiguring communications and transforming mindsets. The car encompassed fashion and practicality. More than that: it symbolised freedom. Soon, it was the must-have accessory of the new age.

  The opportunities and conditions negotiated by young women had altered markedly since Valtesse first stepped on to Offenbach’s stage. Women still had to fight, but their war had a different cause. The face of the enemy had changed and so had the weapons. To survive, the Parisienne had to master a new language and perfect the steps of an unfamiliar dance. Though no longer a twenty-year-old lorette with stars in her eyes, Valtesse was determined not to fall behind.

  By the 1890s, 98, Boulevard Malesherbes had a telephone connected, and Valtesse’s friends only had to dial 502-26 to hear her voice speaking as though she were in the next room.2 To Valtesse, it was as though Paris had presented itself on her doorstep and was awaiting her command. Suddenly, she could find out exactly what was going on anywhere in the city, and at any moment of the day. For the committed socialite, such knowledge was priceless.

  Once her telephone was installed, Valtesse bought her first car. It was a classy Charron-Girardot in her trademark blue, with luxurious leather upholstery. ‘There can be no car more desirable than a Charron,’ commended one motoring review.3 The vehicle was hailed for its style and ease of handling, and arbiters of taste held that for fashionable chateau stays and elegant seaside jaunts, the ‘chic way to travel is in a Charron, the most excellent and gracious car of all’.4

  Valtesse had to have one. It was a state-of-the-art treat.

  The car satisfied multiple aspects of Valtesse’s character. It brought independence and freedom, both of which she prized. It also justified a whole new wardrobe, with designers creating specially made furs and gloves for fashion-conscious ladies who travelled by car. Above all, an expensive, gleaming motorcar declared status and commanded respect. Valtesse took to driving. She basked in the attention as curious pedestrians turned their heads and stared in admiration whenever her car roared past. The adrenaline surge was intoxicating. Not content with one car, she also bought herself a Renault.

  Yet for all her sensitivity to the ebb and flow of fashion, to Valtesse, fashion was merely a channel through which she could secure her position. It was a means of proving that she was in touch with modernity, that her star was still shining triumphantly. And fashions changed. So Valtesse would embrace a trend and then move on dispassionately when it passed.

  Outwardly, Valtesse made herself a mirror to changing fashions. However, underpinning that transient surface was her utter conviction in the importance of tradition and etiquette. They carried far more weight with her than passing trends. Few courtesans allowed themselves the luxury of a footman during the Second Empire; Valtesse insisted on it.5 Nothing assured respect and admiration so well as processing down the Allée des Acacias in her legendary carriage. As her impeccably groomed, glossy-coated horses trotted proudly along the tree-lined avenue, Valtesse would sit like a queen, her hat ribbon fluttering in the breeze, while her coachman and footman flanked her in their smart livery.6 Things must be done properly, and the nobility presented the finest model.

  Clothing and technology might change, but Valtesse maintained that a woman’s conduct should be dictated by tradition. She had perfected an air of natural breeding, superiority and grace. A new acquaintance might never suspect her humble origins. Liane de Pougy observed of her friend, ‘She would have suffered from what is called progress, that is to say from the tendency to accept and excuse shoddiness. She would have suffered but she would not have let it show.’7

  Change is rarely confined to one area alone; technological advances were accompanied by dramatic sociopolitical shifts and outrageous scandals. In 1892, the Panama Scandal hit the headlines, exposing numerous Republican deputies as having accepted bribes to remain silent over corruption in the affairs of the Panama Canal Company.8 Then in the midst of the drama, anarchists’ attacks saw Paris gripped by terror, as bombs were planted in the homes of many public figures as well as significant buildings, not least the Chamber of Deputies and a café in the bustling Gare Saint-Lazare.9 Finally, in 1894, one of the most sensational legal cases France had ever seen burst on to the front pages of the papers. It divided society, shaking its very foundations – and it directly affected Valtesse.

  Alfred Dreyfus seemed an unlikely criminal. The bespectacled, unassuming Jewish army captain had an apparently glowing résumé. The youngest of seven children, Dreyfus had moved to Paris with his family from Alsace after the Franco-Prussian war.10 Having elected French over German citizenship, the young man consolidated his patriotism to France by joining the army artillery. Dreyfus’s conduct impressed his superiors and he was appointed captain in the War Office. By the early 1890s, the Alsatian’s star was rising. But then, suddenly, everything changed.

  Dreyfus’s name first came to public light in October 1894, when a crumpled note was retrieved from the German embassy’s waste-paper basket. The French army saw the German–Italian alliance as its active enemy, and as competition for the military secrets of Germany and Italy mounted, a complex web of espionage established itself. The discarded bordereau (list or schedule) revealed that someone within the French military was passing secrets to the German attaché in Paris, Max von Schwartzkoppen. The information promised was of minor importance, but that hardly mattered; the army was all-powerful. Criticising or undermining its integrity in any way was considered a form of treason – and treason must be punished.

  The condemnatory bin contents were swiftly passed to Colonel Hubert Henry of the French military counter-intelligence service, the Statistical Section.11 An organisation not unlike MI6, the Statistical Section was dismissed by many as a farcical enterprise. Notwithstanding, its head, the formidable Colonel Sandherr, treated his position with the utmost seriousness. Like Dreyfus, Colonel Sandherr was an Alsatian – but he was also a fierce anti-Semite.

  By the 1890s, anti-Semitism was rife in France.12 After the assassination of Tsar Alexander II of Russia, harsh restrictions had been placed on Russian Jews by the new tsar, while a wave of pogroms had broken out across the country. As a result, floods of Jewish refugees poured into France. They lacked possessions, their clothes were in tatters – and they were denied government assistance. The French eyed them suspiciously. Once accepted in France, Jews now found themselves blamed for every ill and misdemeanour imaginable.

  That a French officer should have committed such a heinous crime against the army was deeply humiliating. Panicking, officials realised that the army’s fragile
reputation depended on the case being resolved quickly. As a Jew, Captain Dreyfus made the perfect scapegoat. Handwriting experts’ reports were inconclusive, but the army was decided. Dreyfus was arrested, tried and found guilty at the end of 1894. The prisoner was banished to Devil’s Island off the coast of French Guiana, where he was placed in solitary confinement and chained to his bed. Meanwhile, in France, officials sat back in relief as the fierce campaign for the case’s review fell on deaf ears.

  Then at last, in 1896, there was a breakthrough. The handwriting on the note that had condemned Dreyfus was found to match that of Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy, a French officer of Hungarian descent. With his shifty eyes and oversized moustache, Esterhazy looked every bit the dastardly villain of storybooks. Evidence against him began to accumulate. Under pressure from the public and notable personalities, not least Émile Zola, in January 1898, the government ordered a court-martial for Esterhazy. But to the despair of Dreyfusards, the trial was rigged in Esterhazy’s favour and he was acquitted.

  The campaign for Dreyfus’s release continued in earnest, until finally in 1899, a change of president made conditions favourable for a review of the case. Dreyfus was sent for, the evidence re-examined and a hearing scheduled to begin in August 1899 in Rennes, where it was hoped that any public protest would be more manageable than in the capital. The whole of Europe was watching. And when the hearing began, Valtesse suddenly found that she had become a key figure in the anti-Dreyfusards’ campaign to ensure the Jew never walked free.

  It was during the eighth public sitting on 21 August that the court was invited to consider Dreyfus’s character.13 As the principal archivist and keeper of the War Office records, M. Gribelin was called forward. And as he spoke, Dreyfus’s character defence started to unravel.

  The accused, he explained, was known to keep company with women ‘of loose character’.14 Even Dreyfus’s brother, Mathieu, had confessed that he had once been obliged to save his brother ‘from the clutches of a woman of this description who lived near the Champs Élysées’.15 Curiosity mounted. Who might the mysterious femme fatale be, wondered the court?

  Then, Major Junck, an engineer who had worked with Dreyfus, was summoned. Anti-Dreyfusards sat poised with anticipation. All hoped for further revelations, spicy snippets regarding the prisoner’s private life which would place an indelible stain on his character.

  The major conceded that Dreyfus had spoken of large sums that he had lost at the gambling table, and of his fraternising with women of doubtful morals.16 On one occasion, the two men had been at the Concours Hippique when three women passed them. Dreyfus, the major recalled, tipped his hat in acknowledgement.

  ‘Well,’ the major exclaimed, ‘for a married man you have nice acquaintances.’

  Junck continued his story: ‘He said that they were old friends of his bachelor days, and, pointing to one of them, said her name was “la Valtesse”, and that she had a house at the Champs Élysées [sic], where she gave very nice parties, and where pretty women were to be met and play went on.’

  Anti-Dreyfusards were triumphant. This was just the kind of scandalous titbit they had been hoping for: Dreyfus was intimate with one of the most notorious courtesans in Paris, Valtesse de la Bigne.

  The major was asked how, knowing such detail, he could possibly affirm that nothing would have given him cause to suspect Dreyfus of misconduct.

  ‘I have recounted the incident involving “la Valtesse”,’ Junck countered, ‘but I never saw Dreyfus undertake a task which would give me cause to suspect him.’17

  The hearing continued, but the die was cast. Everybody understood the implications of the major’s testimony: Dreyfus’s friendship with Valtesse left an ugly blemish on his professed reputation as an upstanding citizen with an impeccable moral compass.

  Back in Paris, the latest developments in the hearing filled the morning papers. Since the press first got wind of the case, the Dreyfus affair had split French society in two. Polite dinner party conversations broke down into violent dispute. Lifelong friends became sworn enemies. The military’s united front was shattered. The 1899 retrial merely intensified emotions.

  As newspapers were opened, opponents of Dreyfus and the demimonde exchanged satisfied smiles, while fashionable society leaned forward with interest. Of course Dreyfus, a military man, should have been invited to Valtesse’s parties. It was clear where her sympathies lay.

  But then better-informed socialites began to talk among themselves. Esterhazy had taken up residence at number 49, Rue de Douai, just off Pigalle, with his mistress, a certain Mlle Pays, alias ‘Marion Four Fingers’ (the unfortunate Mlle Pays had a mutilated hand).18 The odd-looking couple often took their meals at the concierge’s lodge. Sometimes they were joined by guests. People saw Oscar Wilde arriving to dine with them from time to time – and they also saw Valtesse.19

  Experience had taught Valtesse to stifle her emotions when her name was raised in court. All around her, gossip-mongers burned with curiosity. Did ‘la Valtesse’ support Dreyfus? Or did she back Esterhazy? Was she the irresistible seductress linking the two?

  Valtesse kept her own counsel. She saw qualities – and advantages – in both men, and she spread her loyalties accordingly. But she had a parting retort for the benefit of the press when her renewed media prominence subsequently led a group of military men to presume to greet her too familiarly: ‘Everyone who knows me calls me Madame,’ Valtesse retorted.20 She could not abide strangers addressing her without a title.

  Dreyfus’s court-martial rolled on for five weeks, but this time, when another guilty verdict was returned, justice came to the prisoner’s aid: France’s new president, Émile Loubet, granted Dreyfus a state pardon that September, and the gossip columns eventually fell silent on Valtesse’s involvement in the case.

  Putting the Dreyfus affair firmly behind her, Valtesse turned her attention to other matters. A new century was about to dawn. 1899 was like a punctured tyre, declared Gil Blas.21 Nobody would miss it. The death of the 19th century was overshadowed by the birth of the new one. And Paris intended to give it the welcome it deserved.

  In the first few weeks of 1900, Liane arrived at Villa les Aigles in a flurry of style and panache. Valtesse was overjoyed. Liane had decided to add writing to her already busy schedule, and, concerned that her friend might be exhausting herself, Valtesse had persuaded her protégé to join her for a dose of carefree fun on the Riviera before they both took off for a short break in Portugal.22 They would be joined by Gabrielle de Guestre for what promised to be a sparkling winter season, peppered with the usual entertainments and social gatherings, not least Valtesse’s famous Monacan ‘five o’clocks’.23

  With her, Liane brought her insatiable appetite for life, as well as the German baron she was courting at the time, trunks of elegant dresses and a selection of marvellous hats crafted by the esteemed milliner, Lewis. Liane had learned well: whatever she wore, she inhabited like a second skin. Her body flowed gracefully draped in white muslin, she walked tall in tight pearl chokers, she glided seductively in soft fur stoles – and at 31, youth was still her ally.

  Valtesse would turn 52 that summer. All around her, the shapely figures of younger, fresher-faced women were stealing the hearts – and wealth – of Paris’s eminent bachelors.

  ‘Not far from Les Jardies is the property of Mme Valtesse de la Bigne,’ announced one travel writer, ‘and every year, a size increase is to be observed.’ He then quickly clarified: ‘A size increase of the property, that is.’24

  ‘Her proud pseudonym, Ego, is full of instruction for young debutantes,’ commented another journalist.25 The observation was respectful, it implied her self-confidence and experience, but Valtesse could read between the lines. Conscious that her readers were expecting an autobiography, Valtesse had deliberately made the heroine of Isola eight years younger than herself. She was not about to advertise her real age at this point – but before long she would not need to. Her own mother was now dead, a poi
gnant reminder that time was passing, that she too was ageing.26 Her beauty was still undeniable and her poise invariably won her admiring glances; however, the elegant curves of her body were growing less distinct. Her jowls seemed fuller than they used to be. Her hair was flecked with grey and she looked, as one observer put it, like a beautiful pastel which was starting to fade.27

  The following year, Liane de Pougy published a scandalous novel, Idylle saphique (1901), a semi-autobiographical tale of lesbian romance and intrigue. She based the character Altesse on her beloved mentor, making no attempt to conceal the association. In the novel, Liane told how the young courtesan Annhine (the Liane character) met and befriended Altesse, ‘also a courtesan, a bright woman, eminently superior.’28

  Liane continued her portrait:

  Then, Altesse was at the height of her splendour, having reached the age at which the delicate charms of the mature woman so celebrated by Balzac are at their finest. […] Altesse was young when she reached her elevated position in Parisian gallantry. […] Paris was fascinated by her, her slightest activities were reported, her witty expressions repeated. […] Her exceptional position distinguished her from all the rest and placed her above everyone else.

  Liane was full of praise and flattery. But Balzac was long dead, and Altesse came across as something of a grand dame of Parisian gallantry.

  If ageing made her uncomfortable, Valtesse firmly believed that a woman should retain her dignity. That meant accepting the situation. But she was not prepared to sacrifice pleasure, nor did she see any reason why she should stop receiving male admirers. She had been impressed by the modus operandi of an older courtesan named Antoinette.29 When Valtesse called on the veteran femme galante one day and was invited to view her apartment, she was surprised to see a huge bed positioned in the middle of the bedroom.