The Josephine B. Trilogy (42 page)

Rose,

Forgive me for not writing more often. I am not a man of letters, as you know. Also, it has been quite the job here; our provisions are terribly inadequate. We do what we can, what we must—and that on very little.

I am pleased with Eugène’s progress—he is a fine boy.

Your soldier, Lazare

Monday, January 12.

Under Thérèse’s guidance I’ve realized an excellent profit speculating in saltpetre. Aunt Désirée was horrified. “It is unbecoming for a woman
to involve herself in commerce,” she scolded.
Until
I told her how much profit I had made (five thousand livres!), and then her own interest was sparked. I intend to reinvest the money in a purchase of lace from Britanny, which I can resell in Paris, yielding an additional twenty per cent.

Citoyenne Rose Beauharnais—
profiteer.
At least now I can send Eugène money for a new uniform.

January 15, 1795—Hôtel de Caulaincourt, Paris

Dear Madame Beauharnais,

I am writing to inform you that thanks to your recommendation, General Hoche has kindly awarded my eldest son, Armand, a position as lieutenant in the Army of the Coast. Also, thanks to your efforts, my second son, Auguste, is now gainfully employed as a clerk. I am indebted to you.

At your suggestion I have made an appointment to speak to Deputy Coligny about the three years’ pay due to me as a retired general. I will keep you informed as to the outcome. Thank you for approaching him on my behalf.

I would say more, but even in amoral times such as ours it is deemed unseemly for a man of my advanced age and marital status to write words of “appreciation” to a lovely widow. Perhaps I will see you chez Talliens?

I remain, most gratefully and as always,

Your dearest and most foolish friend, Marquis de Caulaincourt “a slave to the devil of middle-aged passion”

Thursday, January 15.

Marquis de Caulaincourt has insisted on awarding me ten per cent for my efforts.

“I did it for friendship,” I protested.

“I will pay you in coin,” he said.

Gold.
“If you must.”

January 16.

Tallien has been advising me on how best to draw up a petition requesting that the seals be removed from my belongings on Rue Saint-Dominique. This afternoon I made my presentation to the Committee of Public Safety. Tallien spoke in support: “Certainly it is certain,” he began, repeating his words, as was his custom, “my fellow deputies-in-arms are beginning to comprehend that together we must cleanse the wounds of the past, right the wrongs in order for the Tree of Liberty to have fertile ground in which to root.”

I repressed a disloyal smile. “Lukewarm-water Tap” is what my friend has been nicknamed in the Assembly, he does go on so.

Wednesday, January 21.

Festivities throughout the city, in celebration of the day the King died, two years ago. This in spite of the cold.

I would have stayed in, with Lannoy, who not so secretly mourns the King, but for a ceremony at the Palais-Égalité where Tallien was to be honoured. So I went with Thérèse, who was bundled in an enormous fox cape.

The speeches droned on, followed by singing. The Gilded Youths, resplendent in their crazy finery, dragging heavy clubs, demanded that the band play “Death to the Jacobins.”

“There may be trouble,” Deputy Barras said.

I suggested we go back to my apartment, which was not far. I was shivering from the cold. Also, I was concerned for Thérèse—at five months she continues to be delicate.

It was cold in my parlour; the fire had died down. We could see our breath. I was about to pull the bell for Gontier to stoke it, when Tallien insisted. “After all, this used to be my father’s job,” he said.

“Well,” Deputy Barras said, lowering himself onto a stool by the fire. He rubbed his hands together. “Two years ago today.”

Both Deputy Barras and Tallien had voted for the death of the King. I didn’t like to think of that.

The fire caught. “This last year has been blazes.” Tallien glanced in my direction. “Pardon my language, Citoyenne Beauharnais—I forget you are a lady.” He stood, brushed his hands.

“And what about me?” Thérèse asked, stretching out on my daybed, which I had recently moved into the parlour due to the cold.

Tallien leaned over her, whispered something in her ear. She laughed.

“Perhaps we should request a demonstration.” Deputy Barras accepted my offer of a brandy. I filled his glass from a bottle Marquis de Caulain court had given me.

“Really, Deputy Barras—you are
so
perverted,” Thérèse said.

“Imagine, and in Thérèse’s condition…” I feigned to be shocked.

“I’m
trying
to imagine, that’s my problem.” Deputy Barras made a funny face.

Smiling, I threw a fur coverlet over Thérèse.

“Our good, innocent Rose,” she said. “Are we embarrassing you?”

“How innocent can she be, I ask you, with a bed in her parlour?” Deputy Barras asked.

“My mother keeps a bed in her parlour,” Tallien said. “All the peasants do.”

“And sleep there?” Deputy Barras asked. His green-and-black-striped coat had big square buttons with hunting scenes painted on them.

“No, it’s only for love-making,” Tallien said. (In fact, he used a cruder term.) “When company comes for tea.”

“Citoyenne Beauharnais, if I may be so rude as to inquire—why
is
there a bed in your parlour?” Deputy Barras downed his glass.

“It’s the only warm room.” I took a seat by the fire.

“The other rooms are
colder?
”

We all laughed, but in truth I was beginning to regret having invited them. Seen through their eyes, my small, albeit elegant rooms looked quite humble. Rose,
their
Rose—the former vicomtesse who sipped their expensive champagne—this woman was a fraud, was she not?

“Do you not have fuel?” Thérèse asked, fingering a cameo Tallien had recently bought her for “only” six thousand livres.

“It’s difficult to find in quantity now.” I did not say: and frightfully dear.

Tallien groaned. “Why didn’t you ask? There is more than enough. You’d think there was no fuel to be had in all of Paris, the way people talk.”

“Or
bread,
” Deputy Barras added. “Of which there is little, you have to concede.”

“The people are too damned lazy to work, and then they come to
us
to complain,” Tallien ranted.

I looked from one to the other. How much was in jest? I wasn’t sure.

“My friend has become cynical, I’m afraid,” Deputy Barras said, in answer to my questioning look. “It is one of the dangers of public life. People expect their representatives to be as gods, to make the foul weather go away.”

I sighed, relieved. We were onto safer ground: the weather. I set up a game of faro. We played, laughed, gossiped and gambled (I won seven livres). They left just before midnight, in good spirits.

“We’ll be back next Tuesday,” Thérèse announced as they were leaving. “For your
salon.
”

“I couldn’t,” I said, horrified.

“Rose—be realistic: you can’t afford
not
to. Imagine…
Chez Rose
—the most enjoyable salon in all of Paris.”

Chez Rose?
I smiled. “It sounds like a brothel.”

“With a bed in the parlour and everything,” Deputy Barras said.

“The better to get the deputies to come,” Thérèse said.

And so it is set. Next Tuesday. Every Tuesday.

January 23.

Oh, it is cold, but we’ve been warm. Deputy Barras arranged to have a load of wood delivered. There’s a huge pile of it outside. Gontier must stand by it to keep the neighbours from stealing it.

I sent Deputy Barras a note: “How can I thank you?”

He sent a note back: “Recommend me to banker Citoyen Rougemont.”

January 31, afternoon.

By some miracle, I have succeeded. Like a stage director I have assembled the props, moved furniture, created
ambiance
—that mysterious aura that disguises the stains on the sofa, the hole in the rug, the less-than-exquisite fixtures.

My costume I created out of an outdated brocade, Lannoy and I cutting and reassembling the panels into an elegant Grecian design. It took
some cajoling to entice her to take up her needle and thread, to use her refined artistry for such a “shameless” dress. Too much arm, too much leg, but worst of all, no corset!

Later.

Chez Rose was a success!

Who came: Tallien and Thérèse, of course. Deputy Barras, in the company of old La Montansier (who lived up to her wild reputation). Tiny Madame de Crény and Denon, her beau. Citoyen Fouché, skulking around. Deputy Fréron, raving and drunk, and in the company of an actress. (It is rumoured they have three children.) Fanny, with
both
her current favourites: Michel de Cubières and Rétif de la Bretonne, who got on well with La Montansier—pas de surprise. Fortunée Hamelin, half-naked as usual, and her grumpy husband, who fancied no one. Marquis de Caulaincourt, who
also
got on well with La Montansier, I noticed. Voluptuous Minerva in gauzy white, with a man she introduced as her
fiancé
(that was a surprise). Two of my “prison family”: the elegant Grace Elliott, for a short time, and Duchesse Jeanne-Victoire d’Aiguillon—in the company of Mesdames de Broglie, Valance and Bizet, who smoked opium in the water-closet, Thérèse claims (I don’t believe her). And dear sneezing Citoyen Dunnkirk, who came with fellow-bankers Citoyens Rougemont, Hottinguer and Perré. (I introduced them all to Deputy Barras.) And last, but certainly not least, my dear Consoler, the wild, radical and wicked General Santerre.

An entertaining,
very
mixed group. “A miracle, no bloodshed,” Thérèse said, on leaving.

I would have run short of food were it not for Caulaincourt, who supplied pâté de foie gras from Strasbourg, larded pheasant and an enormous carp stuffed with truffles from Périgord. Not to mention a crate of freshly baked beautiful bread and a basket of fruit (in February!) from Citoyen Dunnkirk. Even Deputy Barras arranged for a half-barrel of excellent red wine to be delivered.

“Celebrating, darling?” Thérèse asked, watching Barras’s footman carry in the barrel.

“Celebrating what?” Deputy Barras asked. He looked unusually serious in a Quaker-coloured silk coat and an old-fashioned pigtail wig.

“Being elected President of the Assembly.”

“Oh,
that.
”

“You’ve been elected President?” I recalled when Alexandre had been elected President of the Assembly, remembered our excitement, our pride. How young we were then.

Deputy Barras shrugged. “A nuisance, if you ask me. No—if anything, I’m celebrating the profit I made on a sale of a property two days ago. Five hundred thousand.
Net.
” He grinned, his charming crooked smile.

Five hundred thousand! I could not comprehend such a sum. I practically had to sell my soul to get a loan of a mere five hundred.

“That confiscated Church property on Rue Jacques?” Tallien asked, overhearing.

Deputy Barras smiled, crossed himself. “And the good Lord
was
smiling on me,” he said.

At around midnight Barras’s secretary Botot came by, in the company of another man, Citoyen Laurent. Lisping, Botot asked if he could speak to Barras. I urged them to come in, but they were reluctant. I wondered if something was amiss.

Deputy Barras came to the door. He stepped into the landing to talk to them. When he came back in he looked drawn.

“Has something happened?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he said quickly. Too quickly, I thought.

“Did I not hear Laurent’s voice?” Thérèse asked, coming into the foyer on Citoyen Fouché’s arm.

“He was just here, with Botot. They had a message for Deputy Barras,” I said.

“It’s rather late for messages,” Thérèse said.

“Ah—Laurent and Botot,” Citoyen Fouché said, catching my eye. “The Temple Twosome.”

The Temple? The
Boy
is in the Temple…

February 5.

At
last,
thanks to Tallien and Deputy Barras, my petition has been approved, the seals removed from my belongings on Rue Saint-Dominique.

I went there this morning—alone. That was how I wished it.

It was strange opening the doors. The rooms were dark, the shutters nailed over the windows. I lit a lantern—and was sickened by what I saw: everything had been pulled to the floor. Vandals.

I walked through the musty rooms, stepping through the litter of my life. My broken and soiled possessions brought forth an abundance of memories. Clothing, scarves, paintings, my guitar—things I had loved. Now ruined.

I gathered my courage and went into the parlour. Gently, I pried away the loose stone in the chimney. I blew into the hole, lest some creatures had taken up residence. Overcoming fear, I put in my hand. Papers. They were still there. Thank God.

Slowly, and with a great sense of relief, I drew out my treasures—my journals, letters, Manette’s tapestry, my Bible, a container of dirt from Martinico, my childhood rosary, marriage contract, a little cloth bag of gems. And, at the last, Alexandre’s will, sealed with wax.

I lowered myself into an armchair. I was enveloped in a cloud of dust. All that remained of my life was in my lap. I sat for a time thus, as still as the mute objects that surrounded me. How little it all meant, in the end.

My eyes fell upon an object in the corner—my needlework frame. The tapestry I had been working on was still in it, a design of roses, half completed. Miraculously, the needle was still in place. I had the most eerie sense of a life abruptly stopped, a curtain drawn in the middle of a play.

The ghosts began to stir. Not even a year had passed since I had been taken in the night, herded onto a wagon and into a cell. Stripped of my dignity, my health, my faith. Stripped of my youth, my life.