My Heart Laid Bare

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Good-hearted Mr. Bramier, never one to raise false hopes, felt that he would rather err on the side of doubt than inspire in his clients an unreasonable hope that the lawsuit might be settled soon. Authorized to pass along the president’s words, in effect, Mr. Bramier would tell a small roomful of his clients that the legal situation in which the Society found itself was unparalleled in the history of inheritance claims. “But we will not rest until Napoléon Bonaparte’s rightful heir is restored to his legitimacy, and the hundreds of millions of francs—that is, dollars—honestly divided among his descendants; not for purposes of crass mercenary gain, but for reasons of honor. ‘Honor is the subject of my story’—as the great Bard has said,” Bramier would declare, stroking his moustache, and fixing his steel-gray eyes upon his listeners’ faces. “Yet I must state sub rosa that the French are no less duplicitous at the present time than they were in 1821, when so many efforts were made to murder the infant Auguste, by agents of the ‘legitimate’ son and Louis Napoléon alike; and it is hardly a secret that their civilization has, in the past century, lapsed into extreme decadence . . . which only war, I am afraid, and this time a cataclysmic war, will purge. Their Gallic pride and honor are at stake in this matter, yet, even more, their infamous Gallic greed, for it would be disastrous to their national treasury if upwards of $200 million dollars were taken from them . . . especially if it were surrendered to citizens of North America, whom, you know, they scorn as barbarians. The difficulty is, our own government, led by an unholy coalition of Democrats and Republicans, in aiding the French government in its suppression of the case, doubtless because certain high-ranking politicians are accepting ‘fees’ for their trouble. Already, gentlemen, the Society has been hounded, and threatened, and denounced on the very floor of the Senate, as being not in the best interests of French-American relations!” (At which outburst the little audience would exclaim in surprise and perplexity. For things were so much more convoluted than anyone might have thought.) “Thus, our need to remain entirely underground,” Bramier said severely, “pledged to secrecy; indefatigable in our efforts to legitimize the lost Auguste, and his many descendants; and faithful to the death in our willingness to underwrite the lawsuit. For though it is proving costly, only think, when it is settled, what rewards will follow: for Auguste’s honor will be restored, after so many years; and all his living descendants will be wealthy men.”

  THE HISTORICAL FACTS were: the great Napoléon Bonaparte, exiled on St. Helena after the defeat of Waterloo, sired, in the final year of his life, an illegitimate son with a woman (of noble birth, it was believed, though unrecorded national identity) many years his junior; though the love affair and the subsequent birth were clandestine, the child was eventually baptized in the Catholic faith, as “Emanuel Auguste,” sometime in the autumn of 1821; and, as the mother rightfully feared for his life, he was taken away immediately following his father’s death—to reside, in secrecy, in one or another Mediterranean country. (Speculation had it that the Emperor’s last inamorata was a surpassingly beautiful girl of scarcely sixteen years of age, of richly mixed ancestry—Spanish, Greek, Moroccan.) In exile, so to speak, the boy grew to his maturity, being aware of his parentage yet resigned to a bastard’s fate; until at the age of twenty-one, he dared venture to Paris, under an assumed name, where he learned that Napoléon had provided for him in his will, and very handsomely too; but that it would be his death to pursue the issue. (For all of France was united by this time under the stern rule of Napoleon III, the late Emperor’s nephew.) Being a youth of some equanimity, ill-inclined to greed, Emanuel Auguste resolved to forget his patrimony, and to seek his fortune in Germany (1844–1852), and in England (1852–1879), where he died in a London suburb, known to his neighbors and associates as “E. August Armstrong,” a well-respected gentleman in the business of cotton imports. Following his death it became known that, since leaving France, he had taken on a number of pseudonyms, out of necessity—among them Schneider, Shaffer, Reichard, Paige, Osgood, Brown, and of course Armstrong. Thus, the record of his progeny, and his progeny’s progeny, was complex indeed.

  For many years following Auguste’s death in 1879, he and his mysterious patrimony were forgotten and his inheritance remained untouched in the vaults of the Bank of Paris. The original sum was said to be $43 million in francs; with the passage of decades, by way of investments, interest and the like, under the canny manipulations of the officers of the bank, this prodigious sum gradually increased tenfold. How long the fortune would have remained unclaimed no one would have known except for the dramatic intervention of a gentleman named François-Leon Claudel, an American citizen of French extraction who was himself a Manhattan broker and who, following his discovery of a blood relationship with E. Auguste Napoléon Bonaparte in 1909, decided to organize the Society. An elder, wealthy man, Claudel could afford to hire a small army of lawyers, historians and professional genealogists to ascertain the identities of Auguste’s descendants throughout the world; and to initiate a legal suit against the Bank of Paris under terms of international law. “It isn’t for the sake of mere gold that we undertake this campaign,” Claudel was quoted as saying, “but for the lost honor of our ancestor Auguste. We, his blood descendants, his heirs, are obliged to claim our rightful patrimony in his name—else we’re dishonored indeed.”

  It was no surprise to the idealistic Americans that the Frenchmen who harbored the fortune proved immediately hostile to their efforts. Though Claudel was gratified to be told by way of French informants (friends, as they identified themselves, of the “late wronged heir”) that there had long been a tale of a forsaken inheritance locked away in the Bank of Paris and guarded by bank officials, as closely bound up with the sacred memory of the Emperor. The task of tracing the many North American heirs was less difficult than Claudel had feared, for, recognizing the altruistic impulses behind his effort, people were eager to cooperate.

  By the winter of 1912, approximately three hundred heirs had been located in the United States and Canada, and it was estimated that another one hundred remained. For E. Auguste had, it seemed, sired many a child himself by way of numerous wives and mistresses, under his several pseudonyms. “It’s neither curse nor virtue,” Claudel commented wryly, “that we Bonapartes are a little lustier than our neighbors.” At the start, Claudel wanted to restrict the Society to those individuals directly descended from Auguste, but, in time, as more eager parties took up the cause, membership requirements were relaxed somewhat, though all were sworn to absolute secrecy and all were required to forward dues, legal fees and various surcharges, payable in cash, by messenger (and not the U.S. Mail) to Claudel, as president of the Society, or to his authorized agents. It was carefully explained to the legitimate heirs as they were individually interviewed in their homes, that the Society, which eventually grew to more than three thousand members, was composed not only of blood relations like themselves but of parties sworn to pursue Justice; these were primarily well-to-do gentlemen of the law, religious leaders and historians who were inspired by François-Leon Claudel’s mission. As the legal struggle that lay ahead would demand great sacrifices, these gentlemen were willing to donate their time, money and encouragement, though when the suit was settled, in 1915 perhaps, or 1916 at the latest, they would not receive a penny of the fortune.

  Authorized as agents for the Society, for the Mid-Atlantic sector, were Messrs. Gaymead, Lichtman, Bramier and others, all men of the highest personal integrity with excellent legal and financial backgrounds. It was their task to contact the missing heirs and to lay out before them the various documents (genealogical maps, birth and baptismal certificates, facsimiles of legal records, etc.) pertaining to E. Auguste and to themselves; and to present them the opportunity of joining the Society under its necessarily severe terms of absolute secrecy, $2,000 payable within thirty days, and regular dues, fees, surcharges, etc. of various sums (depending upon the progress of the lawsuit) from time to time.

  Of the numerous
heirs who were interviewed by Society agents, all but a few skeptical individuals were enthusiastic; more than enthusiastic, elated; for the salient facts were very convincingly presented. The altruism of François-Leon Claudel and his professional associates was seen to be extraordinary; and the somewhat faint or smudged daguerreotypes of Emanuel Auguste (as a babe in arms, as a toddler, as a haughty young gentleman of perhaps twenty-one) never failed to excite special interest. (Indeed, it was remarkable how citizens in such diverse regions of the Mid-Atlantic sector as metropolitan Philadelphia, southeastern New Jersey, and the remote reaches of the upper Delaware Valley were struck by family resemblances between the lost heir, as Auguste was frequently called, and themselves or relatives. Again and again young Auguste, though pictured nearly in profile, and with his hooded eyes turned arrogantly away from the camera, was realized as the “living image” of a cousin, an uncle, a grandfather, a father, a child: and poor patient Mr. Gaymead, no less than his colleagues Lichtman, Bramier, Hynd, and Glücklicht, had to endure many a lengthy session, seated on a sofa, being shown a copious family album, with much animated commentary to the effect that the “royal blood” of the Bonapartes had always been evident, though unrecognized as such, in the client’s family. It might be a look about the eyes—or the shape of the nose, the ears, the chin—the set of the jaw—the cheekbones, the bones of the forehead, etc.—but the visual evidence was unmistakable.)

  “Yes, it is so,” Mr. Gaymead or one of his colleagues would say, studying a photograph, or the facial bones of a living child presented blushing before him, “—yes, I believe it is so. I wonder that your family did not come to the conclusion, some time ago, that you were not quite of common clay like your neighbors; but clearly possessed of an exceptional history—and a no less exceptional future.”

  2.

  A curious predicament: that Abraham Licht’s passion for any of his business ventures was in precise disproportion, as Elisha had long ago learned, to its success.

  For where plans proceeded smoothly, and clients were persuaded to surrender gratifying sums of money to his pockets, passion quickly waned; and it seemed to the restless entrepreneur that, for all his genius, for all his willingness to risk safety, he must not be playing for high enough stakes. He frequently confided to Elisha, alone of his children, that difficulties—challenges—obstacles—outright dangers—were what most stirred his spirit, and provided a fit contest for his powers, whose depths (he believed) had not yet been plumbed.

  So it happened that “Little Moses” was forced into retirement earlier than seemed absolutely necessary (for Elisha quite delighted in the masquerade, knowing himself, though disguised in the skin of a “darky,” not a Negro at all). Similarly, “The Panama Canal, Ltd.,” closed its doors to further investors, after so wondrous a six-month showing Abraham Licht halfway feared J. P. Morgan would want to buy him out; likewise “X. X. Anson & Sons Copper, Ltd.,” and “North American Liberty Bonds, Inc.,” and “Zicht’s Etheric Massage” (whereby the afflicted patient, suffering from such ailments as rheumatism, arthritis, migraine, stomach upsets, and mysterious illnesses of all kinds, lay upon a table, in absolute darkness, to be massaged by the “magnetic etheric waves” produced by an “osteophonic” machine of Dr. Zicht’s invention); and, not least, the enterprise of the astrological sportsman “A. Washburn Frelicht, Ph.D.,” who had triumphed at Chautauqua, and was talked of, still, in racing circles. (It was a measure of Abraham Licht’s indifference to past success, or his actual generosity regarding fellow entrepreneurs, that he cared not a whit that tout sheets, or tipster sheets, were now sold openly at American racecourses; and that their indebtedness to the pioneering Frelicht’s Tips went unacknowledged.)

  Of course, not all of Abraham Licht’s enterprises were successful; and the comparative, or outright, failures, no less than his half dozen embarrassments with the law, rankled still.

  For instance, at the tender age of fifteen he had been ill used by a kinsman named Nathaniel Liges, of the Onandaga Valley, who had hired him as a lottery ticket salesman—and failed to inform him when the news broke, rather suddenly, that the tickets were counterfeit; he had scarcely fared better, when, a few years later, now self-employed, he made the rounds of the Nautauga region as a Bible and patent medicine peddler—in the very wake, ironically, of a notorious Dutch peddler from downstate who offered the same general brand of goods, and resembled young Abraham as a father might resemble a son!

  He confided in Elisha one day that, as a brash young man of thirty-two, he had agreed to run for state congress on the Republican ticket, in one of the sparsely populated mountain districts north of Muirkirk; but found the campaigning so loathsome an activity, and the prospect of a tame, respectable, legal employment so enervating, he soon lost all spirit for the contest, and quite outraged his backers. Moreover, his Democratic opponent was so clearly a self-promoting fool, it seemed an insult to Abraham Licht’s dignity to trouble to compete with him. Like Shakespeare’s Coriolanus, with whom he closely identified, he felt despoiled by the mere activity of seeking public acclaim in this ignominious way. Here, The Game was of a much lower mettle than he was accustomed to; the prospect of winning over an ignorant electorate excited him as would the prospect of seducing a woman who was both ugly and brain-damaged! So Abraham soon began to mock his opponent, and the oratorical style of campaigners in general (whether Republican, Democrat, Populist, or other); and finally betrayed his backers by dropping out of the race and disappearing from the region altogether a few weeks before the election.

  Even so, he told Elisha that he would not rule out the possibility of a political career someday for him. “You are worth much more than a mere backcountry congressional seat, of course; your superficial racial component—or attribute—or ‘talent,’ whatever—cannot help but he an asset in the proper circumstances.”

  Elisha was deeply struck by this remark; yet could not resist assuming a playful tone. “Shall I run for Governor of the state,” he asked, “or, perhaps, for President of the country? Might I be a fit candidate one day for the ‘White’ House? It would allow my fellow Americans a display of democratic sentiment, to elect a ‘darky’ to such an office!”

  “Don’t make light of my proposal,” Abraham Licht said severely. “The time is not now; but the time may come. ‘Covet where you wish; but never in vain.’”

  AS WITH THE women Abraham Licht had won, seemingly, and then lost—his “wives” as he eventually came to call them—so with the business ventures he had never entirely brought to fruition. They haunted; they rankled; they picked and stabbed at his very soul.

  Among these was the “E. Auguste Napoléon Bonaparte” enterprise, first dreamt into being when Abraham Licht was a young man in his twenties, but, owing to limited resources, and exigencies of the moment, never satisfactorily launched. What appealed to Abraham in his maturity was the prospect, regarding the Society, of its infinite possibility: once a person came to believe that royal blood flowed in his veins, and he was a potential heir to a great fortune, how far could his credulity be tested? No sooner had the Society’s roster of heirs fulfilled their obligations for one step of the lawsuit (allegedly being fought in the Court of Paris, behind closed doors, by a barrister of international reputation) than the Society would be forced to assess them still more, for there was a mare’s nest of hidden fees, taxes, attorneys’ retainers and so forth, with no end in sight. It seemed quite likely that a lawsuit of such complexity would drag on for years, as a consequence of French corruption. And in the early spring of ’13 a new development arose, forced upon the Society’s president François-Leon Claudel by several of his associates who were gravely concerned that Claudel had by this time invested so much of his own money, nearly $700,000, while standing to realize as only one heir of Emanuel Auguste no more money than any other heir; so it was voted by the Society’s board of governors that members should invest directly in the inheritance itself rather than merely underwriting the lawsuit. Which is to say
, according to the prestigious firm of Dun & Company, auditors for the Society: if an individual invests $1 in the inheritance, he will realize at least $200 when the estate is settled; if an individual invests $1,000, he will realize $200,000. And so forth.

  Now, the race was on.

  Abraham Licht was forced to hire a half dozen agents to deal with the increase in business. Families mortgaged their homes and property or sold them with imprudent haste; insurance policies were cashed in; a minister in Penns Neck, New Jersey, borrowed $6,500 from his church without informing them; one member of the Society, by the name of Rheinhardt, secretly took out an insurance policy on his wife for $100,000 with the intention, as he naively told Mr. Gaymead, of investing the entire sum in Emanuel Auguste “as soon as the old woman dies.” (Gaymead had the presence of mind to inform him on the spot that the board of governors, just the previous day, had passed a ruling to the effect that no member could invest more than $4,000—which after all would reap a magnificent $800,000.)

  By February of 1913 post office inspectors for several cities suspected that something was afoot, yet as no one had complained to police, and members of the Society were scrupulous about sending their payments (preferably in cash, though checks were also accepted) by way of a messenger service, and never through the U.S. Mail, where was the harm? Members were cautioned repeatedly on this score, for the postmaster general of the United States was himself in the pay of the French, and prepared to open and destroy any of the Society’s correspondence. (So strict was this ruling, members were told that any letter sent by way of the U.S. Mail would not be opened, and the sender’s membership would be revoked.) For purposes of security too the Society’s address was frequently changed, being now on Broome Street in lower Manhattan; and now on East Forty-ninth Street; and now on the Upper West Side; then again, abruptly, in Teaneck, New Jersey; or Riverside, New York. In a single week in June 1913 such quantities of cash were received in denominations ranging from $5 to $100 that Abraham Licht and Elisha laughingly wearied of counting it, giving up after having reached $95,000; and sweeping it into a burlap sack with their gloved hands to be deposited, under an agent’s name (Brisbane, O’Toole, Rodweller, St. Goar) in one or another Wall Street investment house (Knickerbocker Trust, American Savings & Trust, Lynch & Burr, Throckmorton & Co.) Abraham had chosen. He suspected that, by this time, a number of persons in the financial district were watching his activities closely, but in the bliss of triumph he cared not a whit.