Indeed, when the baby did come that summer, it was a boy—a plump, healthy boy, and they named him Charles after my Bernadotte’s Swedish name. We were instantly in love with him, and the nation vaulted into days of state celebrations and feasting that filled the many golden hours of northern sunlight, as well as the few hours of purple nightfall.
A brother arrived just a year later, Gustaf, followed soon after by yet another boy named Oscar. My husband had wanted grandsons—and Josephine, as usual, played her part perfectly.
* * *
“Charles, Gustaf, Oscar, come here. Which of you shall sit upon my lap for the fireworks display?”
“I will! I will, Grandmère!”
I spread my arms and smiled as Charles toddled toward me. My first grandson, the little prince of my heart, with his dark curls that reminded me so much of both my son and my husband, reached for me with his chubby hands. “Then here you go, my little darling,” I said, placing a kiss atop the boy’s head as he settled into my lap. My husband took the baby, Oscar, from Josephine’s arms.
It was a mild evening in late August, and our family was gathered at the summer palace. Oscar and Josephine were with us, along with our three little grandsons, all of them still babies, really. Josephine was already expecting their fourth, and the pregnancy had been a difficult one so far. I could see the toll that these years had taken on her young body—how her once-willowy frame had grown alarmingly thin, even brittle looking. I noted how her body seemed to be shrinking everywhere but for the round bulge of her constantly swollen belly. I could see the fatigue in her pale face, in her drawn expression, in her forced smiles and sunken eyes.
And it wasn’t only her body that suffered; I could detect the signs of fraying in her marriage to my son, too. Tenderness had given way to tension—short, clipped remarks, a halt in the affectionate touches and easy whispers they had once shared. Eyes that barely met, even when they were forced to speak to each other about the boys or some official business. Oscar no longer turned when his wife entered a room, entranced by her beauty, remarking on her gown, or admiring the style of her hair. And she did not seem to care, did not seek his approval, did not glance toward him when she made conversation.
Oscar had taken a mistress, that was well known at court. A wealthy beauty named Jaquette Löwenhielm. With his wife constantly exhausted by pregnancy or in confinement or tending to a newborn, he hadn’t had to look far amid the well-connected noblewomen who surrounded him each day.
The liaison was not entirely surprising—it was standard custom for the men of our court to have at least one mistress. Why, Jaquette was the protégé at court of one of my husband’s rumored former mistresses, that I knew. And yet, I had nurtured a foolish hope that perhaps my son’s marriage would be different. That my son would be different.
I did worry about Josephine, should she hear the persistent whispers about her husband’s betrayal. I worried for the little boys, for the health of the baby she carried. She was not from this court, and based on all that I’d heard about her own upbringing, her parents had enjoyed a harmonious, devoted marriage. I did not know that she would easily accept the way things were done here. In spite of the difficulty of these recent years, she loved Oscar so, and she had entered into the marriage enjoying so much of his love in return. I would need to talk to my son, to urge him toward discretion and consideration for his exhausted wife.
But tonight, in spite of these concerns and the tension that lurked beneath the surface, we were all doing our best to be cheerful, as it was the anniversary of my husband’s election to the throne and also Josephine’s name day. It helped that the little boys scampered about, oblivious as all little ones are to the concerns of the adults who surround them. And it also helped that the palace was enveloped in a festive air of celebrations: we’d been out each night to balls across the capital, plays, parades in honor of the House of Bernadotte.
That evening we sat outdoors in the gardens that looked out over the park, waiting for the sun to dip just a bit lower before the fireworks could begin. All was lush and fragrant, and little Charles was giddy in my lap, elated at the fact that he was being permitted to stay awake past his bedtime.
“Grandmother?” He looked up at me from my lap, his almond eyes fixated on the massive cluster of rubies around my neck. “Why must we wait so long?”
“Because it is not yet dark, my little one,” I said. “It must be dark in order to see the fireworks.”
Beside us, Gustaf was screaming, his patience giving way at this late hour, and Josephine was wondering aloud whether he should be sent to the nursery. My son dismissed the idea, telling her that the boy should be allowed to remain for the special occasion. “He does not care much for any special occasion; he’s a baby,” Josephine answered back, her tone clipped.
I resolved to stay out of their quarrel, turning my focus to my eldest grandchild, who was posing a follow-up question: “But, in winter, it is dark all the time. Why don’t we have fireworks then?”
“It’s a wonderful idea,” I said. “I think we should speak to the king about it. Only then, we cannot sit outdoors to see them.”
“Why not?” Charles asked.
“Why, because it is frightfully cold in the winter.”
Charles bobbed his head, considering my answer. Then, he asked: “When does winter begin?”
“After autumn,” I said.
“When is autumn?”
“Soon,” I said. “It is late August now. Very soon we shall be through with summer, and autumn shall begin.” Very soon, I thought, the days will turn bitter and the nights will grow long. I shivered in spite of the pleasant summer air enveloping us. This time of year did carry with it a twinge of sadness for me, as I knew what was coming. Summer was my favorite season, but its only flaw was that it did not last forever. I knew that this was the last month that would leave on a mild note, its final day as pleasant as its first. I squeezed my grandson, pulling him closer to me, relishing the warmth of his little embrace as I fought back the rush of dread that suddenly filled my gut.
Tonight, we were doing our best to be joyful. Tonight, we sat together amid the green and the warmth, as all around us people celebrated. Our nation was free from war; my husband and I presided over a healthy family and a court and a kingdom at peace. But how long, I wondered, until this happy and fragile season ends?
Chapter 46
Stockholm
January 1844
ONCE MORE, THE COURT WAS gathering to fill the long darkness of a winter night with candlelight and music. A ball, in honor of my Bernadotte’s eighty-first birthday—I could hardly believe the number.
I watched my husband as he scrutinized his own figure in the mirror, putting the finishing touches on his military uniform, wholly unaware that I looked on. He was still tall, yet his shoulders slouched forward, as if his soldier’s frame were now engaged in a losing battle against either gravity or time, perhaps both. He adjusted the row of shiny medals across his breast, squinting to gain a better look at their reflection, and I noted how his movements bore a certain, well, creakiness. When had we grown so old? I asked myself, noting the brittleness of my own tired joints.
The ball would be a happy occasion; Josephine had overseen the preparations. Having done her duty of providing royal offspring for Oscar five times over, she had happily put the work of childbearing behind her and had jumped gracefully into her position as leading lady at court. Still a relatively young woman of great beauty and even greater talent, she was far more popular and influential than I had ever been in Stockholm. Just as well. I had never enjoyed being in the center of things, had I? At least the newspaper writers had stopped looking for a feud where there wasn’t one, finally accepting the unexciting truth that my daughter-in-law and I got along just fine.
“Well then, I don’t feel very much like a soldier this evening, but the jacket does a bit
of the trickery for me.” My husband dragged his fingers over the thin sprinkling of white hair that lined his temples.
I crossed the room to his side. “You look as dashing as the day I met you, Sergeant Belle-Jambe.”
“You’ve always been a terrible liar, Desiree. One of the many things I admire about you.”
I laughed, looking up at him. “Shall we go down?”
“Just a moment.” My husband blinked, putting out his hand. I took it.
“No need for nerves,” I said. “They love you more with each year.” My tone was reassuring, as I guessed that perhaps he was experiencing a bit of apprehension, as uncharacteristic as that was for him. I had always been the shy one, while not a strain of timidity had ever run through his bold Gascon blood.
But he shook his head now, his gaze tilting downward. “I…I think…” His face had gone ashy.
“What is it?” I squeezed his hand, slightly alarmed at my husband’s blank expression, at the trouble he was clearly having in speaking. “Do you need to sit for a moment?”
He nodded. “Yes, I…believe I do.”
“Here.” I guided him toward the nearby chair, calling for the servants as I helped him off his feet. “His Majesty is not feeling well; fetch the royal physician at once.”
The nearest footman nodded, hurrying from the room to dispatch my order. It was getting to be a more regular request these days than I liked to admit—my husband often coughed up blood, often had difficulty breathing or sudden palpitations of the heart. “It’s nothing, dear,” I said now, turning back to him, forcing my voice to remain level. “Perhaps we shall just get you a sip of brandy and a moment’s rest. You’ll be ready to dance in no time.”
But my husband, who usually proved unflappable, even in his physical discomfort, was staring blankly at the floor. “I’m having the hardest time…it’s as if…” and then he closed his eyes.
“Yes, yes. Just shut your eyes. Rest. The physician will—” But before I could finish my thought, my husband slumped forward, collapsing in a massive heap onto the floor. I screamed. Several servants burst unbidden into the room. I turned to them, gasping: “His Majesty has fainted! Where is the doctor?” I rose from my chair to kneel beside my husband’s inanimate frame, and I took his hand in mine. It was warm, but he did not rouse to my touch or my voice. “Bernadotte! Bernadotte, wake up! Oh, please wake up,” I begged, pressing my hand to his shoulder. “The doctor’s coming, you must wake up!” But still he did not move, did not stir. This was no simple slumber claiming my husband—I feared it was something far worse. “No, you cannot leave me! Bernadotte? Wake up, Bernadotte!” I grew louder, more frantic in my exhortations, but that only seemed to make my husband’s nonresponsive silence all the more cruel, all the more terrifying.
* * *
It was all so eerily familiar: the dark time of year, the occasion of his birthday, the word—stroke—whispered on the lips of the nervous courtiers.
Le roi a eu un coup.
The king has had a stroke.
I did not need to hear it, did not need to mingle in the halls to know what was being said; I’d lived it once before, with old King Charles. Except this time, it was my king, my husband.
For a week, I barely left his bedside. Oscar and Josephine took turns beside me, bringing the grandchildren in for brief visits one by one. He stirred occasionally, awaking from time to time, but it was not Bernadotte who opened his eyes to that bedchamber—it was a blank face, a mind that seemed to have been scraped clean of both understanding and memory.
Hours of nothing, pierced by sudden, agonized stirrings. I’d hover at his side, taking his hand in my own whenever he opened his eyes, but I was not certain that he was seeing me, even when he looked upon me. “We must defend ourselves!” he would groan, his dark eyes wide and haunted.
“You are safe, dear,” I would say to him, laboring to keep my tone calm, even as I longed to fall apart with tears. The physicians had told me to speak calmly to him, to reassure him and remind him where he was, so that was what I did, even as he thrashed about. “There, there. No one seeks to do you any harm, Bernadotte. You are safe in your palace. In Stockholm. We are at peace. You are a good king, and your people love you. And I am your wife, your Desiree.”
“Don’t!” He gasped, pulling his hand from my grip as if it burned him to touch it. “Don’t!”
“What is it, my dear?” I asked, alarmed. I reached once more for his hand, but he recoiled. “Don’t talk of 1813!” he groaned.
I leaned back, away from the bed. Now my eyes went wide. My husband could not tell me the current year, but he could speak of one so many decades prior. 1813. The year in which he, as King of Sweden, had waged war against France. The year after Napoleon ravaged the entire French army in his mad attempt to conquer Russia. My husband had joined the allied forces against Napoleon, fighting opposite the same army that had been his for so many years. Marching toward Paris. Toward me.
Bernadotte shut his eyes then, shaking his head violently, and I saw the tears that slid down his pallid cheeks. “My heart aches when I think of it,” he said, crying like a small, frightened boy, wincing as though he suffered bodily pain. “Had I a thousand kingdoms to give to France, I could not repay her.”
“Hush now, there, there.” In moments such as these, I wished for the oblivion of his long periods of motionless slumber. Frightening as it was to watch him slip from consciousness, at least when he was deep asleep his mind seemed to be at ease. Anything was better than watching him wrestle like this, tortured, consumed by the ravings of one gone mad.
“Maman, you should take a break.” Josephine had appeared by my side without my noticing. “You’ve been here too long. You’ll collapse, yourself. Please, take a rest. We’ll call you if he…well, if anything changes.”
I obeyed, only because I was so terrified by these periods of his haunted ramblings; I did not wish to be pulled back into those memories myself. I would let Josephine carry a bit of it—she who had never had to live through it the first time. I rose and walked from the bedchamber, unfurling the black veil down from my cap so that I could hide my mottled face, so that my tired eyes would not meet the strained, curious looks that filled the palace hallways.
It was to be expected, I told myself. Tortured memories, deathbed agonies and regrets. When one has lived through times such as we have, one can never truly expect peace. The need to survive—once it has been so sorely tried—can never truly move far from one’s thoughts.
He put up a valiant fight, my Gascon, my soldier, my Bernadotte. But in the end, we lost him—his aged body finally yielding after several months in bed. Oscar, Josephine, and I were by his side. Death came almost as a relief, as odd as that may sound—a gentler state than some of the agonized musings of his final weeks.
We buried him that spring, just as the first spears of light and warmth began to touch our northern climate. There was a state funeral as the entire nation plunged into official mourning, a Lutheran Mass, and the burial in the capital’s Riddarholmskyrkan.
I looked on, my face concealed, my tired frame enshrouded in black, as my husband was laid to rest among Sweden’s ancient rulers, entombed under the name given to him by his adopted nation: Carl Johan. Nowhere did it mention the name by which I had known and loved him, my Bernadotte. Just as well, I thought. That remains for me alone.
He was gone, and that meant I was no longer Queen of Sweden. My son was crowned that fall, Oscar I, with Josephine beside him as Queen Consort, of course. She’d been acting as queen in so many ways for years already; now it was merely official. She and my son seemed to have worked out some peace of their own, some tacit understanding to keep their union in harmony, even if the ardor of their earlier romance had cooled. I urged my son to respect his wife, to treat her with the kindness she deserved. She would play a central role in Oscar’s government, that I knew. And well she sho
uld; she’d have made the best ruler of us all, if only that had been a possibility.
I had worn so many titles in my life up to that point: daughter, sister, fiancée, wife, mother, subject, queen. Now I stepped willingly into what would be my final roles: dowager queen and grandmother. The Swedes had long thought me unconventional, a bit bizarre, you might even say, a bit too French; now, that mattered little. Now, I could slip into relative obscurity, with age and widowhood as my veils to conduct myself entirely as I wished. Josephine was lovely and vibrant and fashionable—the eyes of the court were on her, and I tasted the sweet fruits of freedom. I slept when I wanted, I took my breakfast in the afternoon and my dinner after midnight. I relished my time with my grandchildren and declined any invitation that I did not wish to accept.
But I did have one task left—one final purpose that still required the energy and attention of my waning years. And if I was going to be successful in my mission, if I hoped for any peace or repose at the end of it all, I knew that I would have to put up the fight that I had been putting off my entire life. The fight that I had dreaded since my girlhood, really. The only fight that remained. The fight that I had to win.
I would finally fight Napoleon.
Chapter 47
Stockholm
December 1860
WORDS, WORDS, WORDS—IT ALWAYS comes down to words, does it not? The words of a denunciation, sending my brother to prison. The words of an influential revolutionary, sparing my family before the guillotine. The tender vows of a courting lover, the treasonous whispers of a plotted coup. Words withheld, and in that, heartbreak. A marriage proposal, a birth announcement, an invitation to wear a crown. A declaration of war, a suit for peace. Words familiar and foreign. Words on a tomb alongside so many other kings.
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