The Second Empress (29 page)

PAUL MOREAU

Tuileries Palace, Paris April 1811

L
OOK AT THAT
, P
AUL
. H
AVE YOU EVER SEEN A GRIP LIKE
that on a child? Tell me the truth.”

I look into the cream and gold bassinet where Napoleon II is gripping the emperor’s finger and shake my head. “No, but then I’ve never been around children.”

He laughs. Everything is a wonderful joke to him now, and in the two months since the king of Rome’s birth, the emperor has put on more weight than the child. “He’s carrying the next heir,” I’ve heard courtiers joke, and I smile privately, because this is really how he looks. But whenever he’s not playing with his son in the nursery, he’s sitting at a table in the Grand Salon, surveying the foods he had always resisted. There’s been turkey with truffles, wild boar, carp, loaves filled with jam, and trays bursting with pastries. Nothing is too rich for the emperor suddenly.

“I guess you’ve heard about the Russians?” he asks.

So this is why he’s asked me to come. He no longer works from his study, so now the court converses with him here. “They’re defying your edict,” I tell him, “which forbids trade with Great Britain.”

“The Czar Alexander! Whom
I
tutored. Who was
my
friend.” He steps from the bassinet and moves to the fireplace, where he begins to
pace. Then he indicates a chair across from him, and I sit. “Tell me, Paul, why he is he doing this?”

I hesitate. He has a hundred advisers whom he could be asking.

“From a courtier’s perspective,” he explains. “I want to know.”

“The embargo is crippling their economy. Their trade with Britain is exceptionally beneficial.”

“More beneficial than an alliance?” he demands.

“What alliance? You signed the Treaty of Tilsit with Czar Alexander,” I say brutally, unwilling to play this game, “and did not keep its terms.”

His neck goes red. “And what should I have done?” he shouts. “Provide Russia with soldiers for a fruitless war against Turkey?”

“That is the treaty you signed,” I say simply, telling him what courtiers are saying in the halls.

The baby begins to cry and a nurse hurries in from the next room. “Your Majesty,” she exclaims, “you’ve awakened your son.”

“Then he should get used to loud noises. Do you know what it’s like on the battlefield, Madame? The cannon fire, the gunshots, the horses charging like a moving, churning river.”

She lifts the baby slowly from his crib and cradles him at her breast.

“That child was born to fight,” he tells her, “which is why his doting mother may only see him at night. During the day,” his voice rises, “I will teach him to fear nothing!”

The tiny king of Rome begins to scream, and when the nurse takes him into the second chamber for his feeding, Napoleon turns to me. “He will be fearless, Paul. War will be for him what acquiring useless baubles is for women. He’ll crave the sounds of battle; the scents of the field. A tent will be just as much a home to him as a palace.”

Like father, like son
.

He takes a seat next to the fire and indicates that I should do the same. “I’ve forbidden the Russians from trading with Great Britain, and they defy me. Now there’s news that the czar is preparing his army. Clearly, he’s looking for war.”

He is, or you are
?

“How long do you think it would take to amass an army of half a million men?”

I sit across from him while he takes out his snuff jar and opens the lid. “I wouldn’t know, Your Majesty.”

He pinches the snuff between his fingers and inhales. “You are very reserved on this subject,” he remarks. “Why?”

“Because there are greater ills at home,” I say truthfully, “and in your colonies, where slavery still exists.”

“So you think I should fight slavery instead of Russians?”

“Yes.”

He gazes into the fire. “You are a noble man, Paul. Your people would be proud to know that at every opportunity, you have advanced their cause, even when you knew it was futile.”

“Then you are going to war.”

“With an army of half a million men.”

I
FIND
P
AULINE
in the ballroom. She is exactly where I left her, sitting on a heavily cushioned chair, looking out over the empty room. She turns as soon as she hears my boots, and in the soft light of the chamber, she is like a painting, with her hair in loose curls on top of her head and her red gown slipping from her small white shoulders. It takes everything in my power not to kiss her long neck, starting behind her ears and then working my way down her exquisite body. She wouldn’t stop me—she would welcome it. But I must never take the same liberties with Pauline that she allows her dishonorable lovers to take.

I join her in the middle of the room, and she looks up at me with expectation. “We are going to war,” I say.

She puts a hand on her stomach, and I am sure her grimace is real. “With Russia?”

“Yes.” The court has been talking about it for weeks. “He plans to raise an army of five hundred thousand men.”

“When?” she asks, and I already know what she’s thinking.
Perhaps there’s time to convince him otherwise. Perhaps he will go to Egypt instead
.

“He didn’t say, but I’d guess within a year.”

She leans back in her chair and groans. “What if I don’t make it, Paul?”

Though she hasn’t asked me to, I sit beside her, and we look out on the empty ballroom together. “Are you really that ill?”

“I don’t know. Sometimes it’s so bad, I can’t walk.”

“Then have the servants carry you.”

“And after that,” she asks fearfully, “what then? I’ll have to stop dancing?
Walking
?” She looks up at the heavy chandeliers and passes her hand over her eyes.

“Is it always your stomach?”

“Sometimes it’s my back, or just general aches. But it’s terrible pain.” She lowers her hand. “You don’t know …”

Navarre, March 1811
.

Sire—Amid the numerous felicitations you receive from every corner of Europe, from all the cities of France, and from each regiment of your army, can the feeble voice of a woman reach your ear, and will you deign to listen to her who so often consoled your sorrows and sweetened your pains, now that she speaks to you only of that happiness in which all your wishes are fulfilled? Having ceased to be your wife, dare I felicitate you on becoming a father? Yes, sire, without hesitation, for my soul renders justice to yours, in like manner as you know mine. I can conceive every emotion you must experience, as you divine all that I feel at this moment; and though separated, we are united by that sympathy which survives all events
.

I should have desired to learn the birth of the king of Rome from yourself and not from the sound of the cannon of Évreux, or the courier of the prefect. I know, however, that in preference to all, your first attentions are due to the public authorities of the State, to the foreign ministers, to your family, and especially to the fortunate princess who has realized your dearest hopes. She cannot be more tenderly devoted to you than I; but she has been enabled to contribute more toward your happiness by securing that of France. She has then a right to your first feelings, to all your cares; and I who was but your companion in times of difficulty—I cannot ask more than a place in your affection far removed from that occupied by the Empress Maria Luisa. Not till you have ceased to watch by her bed, not till you are weary of embracing your son, will you take the pen to converse with your best friend—I will wait
.

Eugène and Hortense will write me, imparting their own satisfaction. But it is from you that I desire to know if your child be well, if he resemble you, if I shall one day be permitted to see him; in short, I expect from you unlimited confidence, and upon such I have some claims, in consideration, sire, of the boundless attachment I shall cherish for you while life remains
.

Joséphine

To the empress at Navarre
.

Paris, March 22, 1811
.

My love—I have received your letter. I thank you. My son is stout and very well. I hope he will be prospered, qu’il viendra à bien. He has my chest, my mouth, and eyes. I hope that he will fulfill his destiny
.

I am always well pleased with Eugène. He has never caused me any dissatisfaction
.

Napoleon