by David Nevin
“If we give New Orleans,” the foreign minister says, “what good to us is the rest of it? If I let part of it go, I’ll let it all go. So tell me, what is it worth, what will you give?”
Mr. Livingston is so flustered he quite forgets the 50 million francs he’s been authorized to offer and stammers that he supposes they could manage 20 million.
“Faugh! Ridiculous. No, my dear sir, you are not thinking clearly. Take yourself off and return tomorrow with a sensible offer.”
Outside Mr. Livingston walks dazedly along sundappled flagstones under a canopy of chestnuts.
The whole!
Good God—the range, the extent, the idea of vast empire, the whole middle of the continent! All they’d ever sought, even imagined possible, was New Orleans and perhaps just a silver of that. Fifty million, he now remembers, for New Orleans alone—
Clatter of hoofs, a drayman cursing in gutter French, a horse down in the traces. The American ambassador to France has stepped blindly into the street and the enraged drayman extemporizes at a shriek on his blindness, his idiocy, his imbecilic desire to sleep in the streets, the failure of his heritage, the moronic qualities of his father and grandfather, his doltish children, the bad seed of the whole family—
“Pardon! Pardon!” he mutters and hurries along, face aflame once more.
The whole!
He scarcely sleeps that night. In the morning he goes to Talleyrand with offers prepared and is kept waiting half an hour. Mention of Louisiana produces a sneer.
“Talk to Spain; it belongs to them.”
“So,” says Mr. Livingston, suddenly ferocious, “you’ll have no objection to my government seizing New Orleans by force,” and has the satisfaction of seeing Mr. Talleyrand choke.
He reels away, dizzy. They dangle the prize, then snatch it away. What did it mean? Toying with the American? But the American had seen the tightness around Talleyrand’s eyes and sensed a new strain in this imperturbable man. Something was going on; this wasn’t over yet.
Mr. Monroe is to arrive this day. The thought gives him heartburn and emphasizes the irony, that on the very day the man arrives, things begin to break as Mr. Livingston has known must soon happen. Still, Mr. Monroe must be presented and accredited before he can act, until then it is more or less as if he hasn’t arrived, and so it may not be necessary to describe this latest development. Not immediately, anyway.
Mr. Monroe arrives; tall, not a bad-looking chap, courteous, of course, with that odd accent you notice in Virginians, a little too proud, a bit too authoritative given that Mr. Livingston is, after all, ambassador-in-fact whether Mr. Monroe likes it or not. And when Mr. Livingston toasts his arrival with a pleasant little bon mot of the sort much favored in Paris with a double pun, one turning in on the other, Mr. Monroe appears not to understand. At least, he doesn’t smile. Humorless man, perhaps—or could he be feeling superior? Mr. Livingston’s manner congeals.
He gives Monroe dinner at three on this Tuesday afternoon with his senior assistants, and as coffee is served he’s startled to see none other than Monsieur Marbois pacing in the legation garden. Another sign in this exceedingly strange day! Of course they’re old friends, but a visit from the Treasury minister on such a day as this merits attention.
Invited in, Marbois seems tense and distracted. He draws Mr. Livingston aside: Great things are afoot and they must talk, but there are too many here today. Livingston must come to his office tonight—any time before eleven.
Monroe, no fool, sees something is going on. Livingston tells him about the abortive offer, no clear idea of what it really means. Now Marbois wants to meet at the Treasury. Monroe says he will come along. No, Monroe is not accredited. Monroe says that’s only a formality and they’ll be stronger as two. But Livingston has built a pattern of trust with Marbois and the minister asked for him, not for both of them. No, he says, no! He sees rage mount in Monroe’s eyes.
At the Treasury Mr. Livingston describes the talk with Talleyrand. Marbois snorts. “That Talleyrand! A marplot!” He says they now have proof that the British have offered Talleyrand a million pounds to persuade Napoleon to plunge ahead in Louisiana, in hopes the Americans will keep him too busy to attack Britain until it is ready to attack him. This doesn’t really disturb his excellency; to thwart it he need only ignore Talleyrand’s arguments. In calling in Livingston, Talleyrand was merely hoping for something, anything, that might unhorse the first consul’s great new design.
Marbois then tells Livingston an extraordinary story. It is past dark on Tuesday as they speak. It seems that on Sunday, after Easter mass at Saint Cloud, Napoleon called in Marbois and the minister of marine. Deep in his steaming bath, he said he had been thinking seriously. War is near. The intransigence of the British over Malta is intolerable. It thwarts French destiny, which is to make the Mediterranean a French lake. Now—raising a dripping finger—he likes Americans. Admires them. Believes they are a nation with a great future. He wants their friendship, and he believes it is worth more than a distant province.
Further. It has come to his attention that the Americans are distressed at the retrocession of Louisiana from Spain to France. He can understand that. Spain is a pussycat among nations, France a tiger. A tiger in your backyard is unsettling. He can see that. So he considers yielding to their requests, so respectfully tendered. He thinks of turning the whole province over to them. Furthermore, when war with the British resumes, marines on Royal Navy vessels in the Caribbean might well seize New Orleans before General Victor’s troops could arrive.
In such a calamity, the generosity of the French would be compromised, for he would be passing what amounted to an empty title. If he decides to move, he will move immediately. He invites comment. Marbois congratulates his excellency’s astute foreign policy. The minister of marine, anxious to have naval bases in the Caribbean, protests. The first consul bids them sleep on it and return with recommendations. But the glint in his eyes tells Marbois he already has decided.
On Monday morning Napoleon calls in Marbois alone and tells him the decision is made. “I relinquish Louisiana. I will sell it to the Americans. Their friendship is the greatest value.”
Mr. Livingston sits there listening with his heart hammering. And sums up in a single breath his powerful sense that all of his work, his arguments, his memoirs hurled over the stone wall, all the points from that doughty little Mr. Madison, all of Mr. Pichon’s courageously forwarded reports, why even—Mr. Livingston suddenly charitable since he can’t stand Pierre Du Pont, the amateur diplomat—even by Mr. Du Pont scratching around aimlessly on the periphery—
And he whispers, “We won!”
Marbois frowns. “The first consul made a distinguished decision based on the needs of France.”
Livingston smiles. “But of course. Isn’t that just the point we’ve made all along? The best interests of France are served by passing New Orleans to us.”
Marbois gives him a long look. He rises, opens a cabinet, extracts two crystal snifters, and fills each to a third with a fine cognac.
He reseats himself, lifts one of the glasses, smiles at last, and says, “All right. You’ve won. But you are dealing with a very mercurial man in the first consul. He presents Louisiana as an act of generosity symbolic of lasting friendship between our nations. If the corollary of you won is that he lost, I assure you he will never let Louisiana go. Do you understand?”
He raises his glass again. “So here in this room drink to triumph—and then expunge the idea of triumph from your mind and focus on the magnanimity of a great man, a nation that looks upon you as a brother.”
Livingston bows. “It shall be exactly as you say.”
“You understand, of course,” Marbois says, “that such largesse is not without cost.” He says Napoleon has instructed him to conduct negotiations, cutting Talleyrand out entirely. He quotes the first consul as saying, as they strolled in a garden, “Well, you have charge of the Treasury, let them give you one hundred millions o
f francs, pay their own citizen claims, and take the whole country.”
Now Mr. Livingston was not born yesterday. He’s one of the biggest landholders in the state of New York, and he has bought and sold more land than Marbois has even seen. Is this Napoleon or Marbois speaking? His old friend is minister of an empty Treasury; what would be more natural than trying to milk the Americans a bit?
The claims of American citizens against France for various seizures of goods and depredations, including those of Leclerc against the American merchants, amount to 20 million francs. So the total under discussion is 120 million, which translates into a bit more than 22 million dollars and in any language that is a lot of money. Especially since he’s been authorized to offer 50 million but francs. He digs in his heels to bargain.
It is near midnight and both are reeling with exhaustion before Marbois reaches what he insists is a bottom figure, 80 million francs, including the American claims—call it 15 million American dollars. Mr. Livingston says he must think it over and at midnight, trembling with excitement, he bolts to his waiting carriage and sits drumming his fingers as hooves on the cobblestones of Paris echo in the silent night.
At the legation he goes instantly to his desk and begins the letter of report to Mr. Madison that the president of the United States is now finishing, and Dolley hears in its measured, diplomatic phrasing the cry of triumph of a man who knows he has won a great victory. Mr. Monroe doesn’t yet know of these developments, he says casually, because it is now three in the morning and it seemed essential to get this report straight on its way to you. Then he sealed the purchase: This letter will be a month or two in transit with equal time for reply, and Marbois makes it plain that they must move now before the great man has some new idea that changes everything. And so, Livingston says in the closing sentence, “We shall do all we can to cheapen the purchase, but my present sentiment is that we shall buy.”
As the president’s voice died away, no one spoke. There seemed a roaring in her ears, and she heard a bee buzzing against a windowpane. Then the spell broke and she leaped up.
“Oh, thank God!” she cried. “Thank God! Thank God!”
She seized Jimmy’s hand and then the president’s and pulled them up and danced them around in a circle as around a Maypole, and Tom was laughing and Jimmy’s smile grew broader and broader and then his face contorted and tears stood in his eyes and around they went, laughing and crying, laughing and crying.
IV
TRIUMPH
40
WASHINGTON, LATE MAY 1803
There was just one painful thing left to do, and he knew it wouldn’t be easy. Otherwise, even now, hours later, the celebration having gone on and on, the Madisons staggering with exhaustion as they climbed the stairs to their bedroom on the third floor, he still thrilled to the incredible news. In a stroke, their problem with France solved and a vast new empire purchased for a song—why, the purchase in whole must double the nation’s size. In a finger snap. Just like that!
Dolley emerged from the dressing room in her nightgown and robe and sat before her mirror, spreading an unguent scented with lilacs on her face. She was sure the ointment gave her complexion the smoothness that Jimmy thought nature provided, but he liked its odor.
He rolled down his hose and wiped his buckle shoes and put on his robe and, damn it all, he could prolong this no longer. Should have spoken hours ago.
“So,” he said with a note of belligerence he hadn’t intended, “time for me to eat a little crow, don’t you think?”
She turned on the bench and looked at him with a slight smile, indulgent somehow. An image of his mother coming into the nursery after some great clatter flashed across his mind.
“Why?” Dolley said. “Because of Mr. Livingston?”
He shrugged. “I was hard on him, and in the end he did well.”
“He did, didn’t he?”
“Not only solved the problem, he got more than we’d even dreamed.”
She laughed out loud. “Why, Jimmy, he didn’t do that; you did.”
She was making it easy on him. Why had he thought it would be painful? But he shook his head.
“Mr. Livingston took the surrender, that’s all,” she said. “Jimmy, I like him and I defended him, but you don’t really think that Frenchman who went from corporal or captain or whatever he was to imperial ruler in three or four years was swayed by what anybody said at parties, do you?”
He smiled, feeling better, wanting to hear her say it.
“So let’s not hear any more talk of eating crow. Napoleon Bonaparte was responding to the case you made—words you put in Mr. Livingston’s mouth, arguments laid out for Mr. Pichon, sending Mr. Clark to the moneymen of Paris, putting Senator Ross’s speech into the great man’s hands, playing the flirtation with Ned Thornton and the Royal Navy right up to the end—you did it, darling, you did it.”
He loved hearing it … but he knew there was more to it than that.
She wiped the last unguent from her face. “Don’t argue with me, sweetheart. I know what I know. Now for goodness sake, kiss me good night and let’s go to sleep.”
And so the Louisiana Purchase came to pass. Livingston and Monroe dickered hard, but in the end they agreed to pay the Fr 80 million or $15 million. Of that, Fr 60 million or some $11,250,000 went to France to restore its battered Treasury and Fr 20 million or $3,750,000 went to American claimants bruised by France in one way or another.
Albert Gallatin pulled himself together and issued bonds for the full amount payable in ten years, and Baring Brothers of London snapped them up. No one doubted the capacity of the new republic across the Atlantic to make good on its debts.
Federalist assertions in Congress that we already had plenty of land were drowned in a chorus of national approval. Word of the deal completed arrived on the third of July in the fateful year 1803. It was in the papers on the fourth, a date everyone agreed was appropriate and many took as a benediction from on high.
In a stroke we had acquired an unbelievable garden, everything between the Father of Waters and the far mountains, from the Gulf of Mexico north to British territory, wherever that might turn out to be when diplomats sat down to draw lines on maps. Infuriated Spaniards—they had taken seriously Napoleon’s promise not to let anyone else have the territory—claimed that Texas was not included, but at the moment that was a matter of small concern.
Every Fourth of July was an extravaganza, but this time the bands playing, townsfolk swarming on every square, militia marching, ranked musketmen and riflemen firing salute volleys, cannon booming for emphasis, outdid themselves. Overnight the country had doubled in size and in roaring possibility, and there would be no war and the French threat was gone and the flirtation with the Royal Navy was over and it was just a time to throw up your arms and shout, Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!
They had earned a little holiday, and Dolley was determined to have it. Before long they would go to Montpelier as Tom went to Monticello, and she would watch the magical effect on Jimmy of his own soil under his feet, tension draining away, color returning to his face. So today on this Fourth of July, with so much to celebrate, she planned a picnic for two at a favored place on the river where an oak leaned over the water and laid a carpet of shade on the bank.
The horses were brought around about ten. She had her saddle baskets filled with picnic food, while Jimmy had packed fishing line and hooks in his saddlebag. The step was set and she climbed up to mount her bay mare, hooking her right knee firmly around the saddle horn and arranging her skirts with proper decorum. They trotted toward the mansion on streets rapidly filling with horses, vehicles, and families on foot, many with picnic baskets. At the President’s House people wandered over the lawn, children dashing about in loud games, families laying out dining cloths, four or five choosing places on the mansion steps.
Tom was at the door greeting visitors, and she saw that many were already inside sampling punch from a large tureen. Doubtless they would
wreak additional damage on the shabby interior, but visits on every holiday and certainly on the Fourth were every citizen’s right. Officiating would become her duty if she ever lived here, which looked much more likely now (though the purchase was rapidly making James Monroe a man to be watched, which to her irritation Jimmy seemed to feel was beneath his dignity, meaning she must be the more vigilant). She waved and Tom waved back, already looking dispirited.
A clatter of drums and the dancing sound of fifes came ahead of a column of marching militia that turned smartly up the driveway and stopped before the mansion. They stood marching in place to a solitary drum as the president came down the steps to take their salute. Flags dipped, muskets came up to present arms, and their captain threw a fine salute, which Tom answered with a bow. They fired a salute volley followed by a lusty, “Hip-hip-hurrah!” another volley, another hurrah, and a third, at which everyone within hearing seemed to be cheering and Dolley had to admit it was exciting, though she had to struggle to quiet her horse; and then they turned and marched off with packs of children hard on their heels, parents calling them back.
Scarcely had this martial display ended, when Senator Ross reined that sleek little mare of his up beside them. She frowned. At this rate they’d never reach the river, and while the senator’s fiery speech certainly had been important, Jimmy also had reported his boorish assertion that Democrats were finished and she hadn’t forgiven him. Not that it hadn’t looked to be true—she’d had to admit that to herself, like it or not—but it was boorish to say so.
But he lifted his hat gracefully. “Miss Dolley,” he said, with a little bow from the saddle, and then leaned over to shake hands with Jimmy. His grizzled hair stood out from his ears, and his face was reddened by too much sun.
