Memoirs of a Courtesan in Nineteenth-Century Paris (35 page)

‘ Until next time.’

‘‘What do you mean, next time! Do you think I am going to leave you like this? In my province, people are friendlier than this.’

I went up the stairs, and he followed me. Once in my apartment, we talked for a long time. He made extravagant declarations of his love for me. It was five o’clock, and I was dining at a friend’s house. I asked him to let me get dressed. He left, but at ten o’clock the next day, he was back. I told him that I loved another, and that I was too forthright to deceive him.

One day I was sad and he asked me why. I unburdened my soul, and I let him see the black mark on my life. He left without a word. The next day he returned triumphant.

‘‘Yesterday I wrote to the prefect asking him to scratch you off the list. You shall be free. You owe me your freedom. Now do you believe in my affection?’’

A flash of joy sprang up from my heart to my face, and then I became thoughtful again.

‘‘You doubt my accomplishment,’ he said. ‘‘Well! You will see. I shall have a reply in six days. I shall not come see you until I have it.’



    

    , 

I received a nice letter from Lionel telling me to be patient. I had only two days left to wait when a messenger brought me a trunk and a case.

‘‘Mademoiselle Pépine asks you to keep this until she can come for it.’

I did not dare refuse; I had promised. Yet, at a time when I needed most to be on my guard, seeing this woman, receiving her belongings, seemed unwise.

I was about to write when a carriage stopped at my door. I saw Pépine enter. She was dressed all in black and held her veil close to her face.

I told her as I opened the door, ‘ Oh! I was about to write to you. I cannot keep these trunks without knowing what they contain.’

‘‘It is not necessary, I am coming for them,’ she told me. ‘‘I am leaving France tonight; I am going back to my country. Tomorrow he will be arrested.’

She kissed me and had the trunks taken down by Marie. I breathed easier when I heard her carriage leave.

A week had gone by when I received a long letter from my shipwreck survivor:

My dear Céleste,

I am too distressed by my defeat to tell you about it in person. I was called in yesterday, but unfortunately! . . .

I was asked what my relationship to you was. I said I was your friend.

‘ Do you intend to take her with you or to provide her with a pension so she can be assured of an honest life?’

I admit, my poor friend, that I was disconcerted because you would have refused to follow me, and my resources are intermingled with my father’s.

I left truly sad, my dear Céleste. I am departing dispirited. Forgive me the mad hope I have given you.

I began to laugh. I felt sorry for myself. I had deluded myself with this illusion!



24

o TheJuneInsurrection

‘‘You cannot pass!’’ (We Pass Anyway)—Mogador Would Have Had the Suffragettes Whipped—

Is It the Right Departure?

  . Lionel finally returned to Paris. In spite of the ominous rumors going around, everything seemed lovely and cheerful to me. It was becoming clear that there was going to be more fighting.

Lionel could not pay his succession taxes. He was receiving no rent from his farms. He had come to try to put his affairs in order. The June insurrection broke out. Terror became intense. A shop in my building had just been transformed into a post for the antiriot soldiers. Lionel had returned to the National Guard. I was standing at the carriage entrance with other tenants picking up bits of news. Our neighborhood was quiet. The streets were too wide to set up barricades. We began to hear a muffled rolling sound.

A detachment from the line brought some young mobile guards who had been disarmed at their post. They were foaming at the mouth with rage. They wanted to fight. They were given something to eat and drink.

There were twenty of them; the youngest was twenty years old. They started beaming when someone came to get them for combat.

One of them came back the next day to see his mother. He was wearing a black armband: his brother and ten of his companions had been killed.

The Marais district was under siege. Whole houses had been put to the sword, windows had been shot out.

‘   !’ (  )

‘ Marie,’ I said to my maid, ‘ quick, get me a shawl and a hat. I have to go see my mother.’



The June Insurrection

‘‘Where do you think you are going?’’ the young guard told me. ‘‘You cannot pass anywhere. There are orders posted. The artillery is camping on the boulevards.’

‘‘I shall say that I want to see my mother.’

‘‘You need a laissez-passer from the captain.’

The captain’s office had been transferred to the ministry’s office. On my way there my passage was barred some twenty times. But I pleaded, insisted, and I reached it. The captain knew me because he had seen me at the Hippodrome where he had been detached.

‘‘Monsieur, I have come to ask you for a laissez-passer to go see my mother on Rue Saint-Louis.’

‘‘But that is impossible. They are fighting in that area.’

‘ Oh! Please, monsieur. I shall make it, if you give me a laissez-passer.’

In his office there were also two gentlemen who wore similar embroidered ribbons in their lapels.

‘ She is brave,’ one of them said, ‘ give it to her.’

‘‘Here,’ said the captain as he handed me a paper. ‘‘Be careful. Use the streets.’

Downstairs I found Marie who had followed me. Every minute someone wanted me to turn back. I would show them the paper and I would be allowed to go on. On Place de la Bourse, squads of men in gray were leading others dressed like them; they were prisoners.

The young mobile guards, black with gunpowder, were on guard duty on Rue de Vendôme.

The battle had gone to their heads. They were handling their loaded guns in a careless and dangerous way.

I passed near two guards who were arguing.

‘ There is only one way to come to an agreement,’ said one. ‘ The one who will bump off the other will be right.’

A shot was fired. They all pounced on their firearms and lay down taking aim at each other, not knowing whether the attack had come from among them. It was awful to watch.

I had taken refuge by a carriage entrance. Marie was huddled against me.

When they saw that it was a false alarm, they put their rifles down.

A second shot was fired in our direction. I saw the spark come out of the barrel and the bullet lodged itself two feet above our heads.

Firing was continuous. There was canon fire from Faubourg Saint-Antoine.

I could see the house where my mother lived and that renewed my



The June Insurrection

courage. We had to climb over a tall barricade that stretched across Rue Saint-Louis, at the end of Rue des Filles-du-Calvaire. We had barely come down on the other side when someone began to fire on some run-aways coming toward us. They managed to go into a house. My mother’s was partially demolished. The concierge had been killed the night before. His wife and their three little children were standing around his bed.

‘‘Where is my mother?’’ I asked, disregarding the sorrow I was intruding on.

I had not finished my sentence, when Vincent showed up.

‘‘Well, well!’’ he said. ‘‘It is you, Céleste. Your mother is upstairs . . .

go on up. She is fine, thank God.’

Seeing him and hearing his voice reawakened my hatred.

‘ You are not going upstairs?’ he asked again.

‘‘No, I found out what I wanted to know.’

   

  

We had to go to Rue du Temple, and there we were allowed to pass. The stores were closed, except one or two here and there that served as temporary first aid post. The boulevard pavement was covered with hay, canon parts, ammunition, and stacks of rifles. A few wounded men, whom the surgeons had bandaged, were there, amid the gatherings, listening.

‘‘Well, no, I am not mistaken,’ said a young man wearing a surgeon uniform as he was barring my passage, ‘‘it is Céleste!’’

I had recognized Adolphe’s friend. I pressed his hands and kissed him.

‘ I have just returned from getting news about my mother. . . . Do you still see Adolphe? How is he?’’

‘ Oh! You did not see him where you have come from? He was over there, at the Bastille. I was told that some doctors were wounded and that he was among them. Since you have a laissez-passer, go to his house.

He lives on Rue de Bourgogne.’

On Place de la Concorde I was not allowed to cross the bridge.

Some cavalrymen were camping there. In their midst were several men dressed in black wearing in their lapel the same ribbon as those I had seen in the captain’s office. I went up to them and, addressing the older one, I said, ‘‘Monsieur, I would like to go to Rue de Bourgogne.’

‘ Certainly, madame, if you would take my arm, I shall take you there.’



The June Insurrection

I refused, in his interest. What were people going to think seeing a representative of the people with Mogador on his arm? He insisted; I resisted. Another joined him, and, in spite of myself, I was escorted by both of them. All along the quays, on the other side of the bridge, there were National Guards, and among them, M. Charles de la Gui . . . , a friend of Lionel’s.

‘ Oh! This is too much!’’ he told me laughing out loud. ‘A man in my outfit was saying as he saw you coming that we should arrest you because you are probably carrying cartridges to the insurgents!’’

Once I was Rue de Bourgogne, I stopped at the entrance. The concierge came toward me.

‘‘Who are you looking for, mademoiselle?’’

‘‘Monsieur Adolphe, please.’

‘‘He lives here, but he is not in. He was wounded in the leg, and he is at his mother’s.’

‘‘Do you know whether the wound is serious?’’

‘ No, it is practically nothing, fortunately.’

I gave him my name and left, reassured.

Lionel was waiting for me at my house. He let out a cry of joy when he saw me. His concern made me feel good. He was looking at me and seemed happy to see me again. Lionel was my own family! I had only him in the world, so what did I care about the rest!

In a tiresome way people were singing these two songs: ‘ To Die for the Motherland’’ and ‘ The People Are Our Brothers’’ (for one sentence, it was a show of fist, for some other it was a hand on the heart); they were also singing, ‘And the Enemies’ Tyrants!’’ I do not know whether Lionel had a political opinion, although he probably did, but he never expressed it, especially not to me. He said that women who were involved in that should be whipped. That was my opinion. We were in agreement on that point. Only, when a singer came to our courtyard, he would pelt him with two sous coins so he would go away.

    ?

Lionel was waiting for money so he could leave again. I offered him what I had left of my winnings. He refused and waited several days. Paris was in mourning. A lot of people had perished, and confidence was a long way from returning. Lionel had gone to see his business manager. He came back very sad and said, ‘ Still no money! Listen, Céleste, I love you very much, but I am not rich enough to keep you with these expenses.

My château has no more furniture in it; if you wish, bring yours, and we



The June Insurrection

shall live happily at my place. If, one day, we separate and I get married, I shall pay you what I owe you.’

In a matter of hours I had gone to see the landlord to tell him I was moving out and to ask him to rent my apartment for me, had gone to the horse livery, and had packed my bags.

My furnishings were quite substantial. We could not take everything without incurring great expenses. I rented a little lodging for the furniture of one of the bedrooms; that way we would have a pied-à-terre in Paris if we needed one. I found a small vacant apartment at  Rue de Londres for six hundred francs. I had the furniture from a Persian room brought there. In the living room I put the oak furniture from my dining room.

I made Lionel take five hundred francs in gold that I had left. That same day he bought me a piece of jewelry worth more than three thousand francs.



25

o

Château Life

The Squalid and Unsanitary Berry of Those Days—

On the Heath . . .—The Hunt, Love’s Rival

   at his château I set up my embroidery frame and started ambitious projects. My stay at Lionel’s no longer had a transitory quality. I had to create for myself an occupation that would help me pass the long solitary hours. Thus, everyone who passed through the garden to go from one road to the other could see me at my bedroom window working industriously. I began work at eight and did not stop until dark. I had brought Marie, who was preparing a tapestry. I never went out. Some poor little children would come visit me; during those visits I would put my embroidery aside and, with some old linen Persian drapes found in the château’s closets, we would improvise a sewing workshop. My little girls would leave with a good dress.

Little by little the household servants became used to me. Célina, the steward’s daughter, would come visit me. She was twenty-three years old; she was ugly but kind and considerate. Each day I had a little more freedom. Sometimes I would go horseback riding.

One little girl visited more often than the others. Her name was Solange. Her parents had seven very young children. One day she told me, ‘‘Why do you not come visit me, demoiselle? Grandmamma is blind, but she is not deaf, you know. Le Ris, it is not far from here. When are you coming?’’

‘‘I do not know. One day.’

‘‘Yes, oh, good!’’ said the little girl jumping up and down. ‘ That day we shall put my grandmother’s hair in a bun.’

       

I had read Madame Sand’s books, and I was rejoicing at the idea of visiting the countryside she had described.1 I was going to see the Devil’s