Valtesse was both honoured and vainglorious when Dumas paid a visit to her home.16 She willingly obliged him with a tour of the property. With Valtesse leading the way, Dumas passed from room to room, smiling politely as he listened to the descriptions of the paintings, admiring the furniture, and taking in the luxury and good taste of the surroundings. Then, when the tour concluded, he turned to his hostess: ‘Now, all that remains to be seen is the most interesting bit.’
‘And what would that be?’ Valtesse enquired.
‘The bedroom!’
Valtesse’s blue eyes flashed and her lips broke into a smile. ‘That, dear master, no!’ she riposted. ‘You could not possibly afford it!’
An account of the meeting spread rapidly, prompting smiles in literary circles. Valtesse’s quick wit and self-confidence in spite of Dumas’s celebrity status won her admirers.
Though novelists were important, Valtesse knew the power journalists exerted in the 19th century. They had played a central role in bringing about the falls of government in 1830 and 1848.17 The press were a redoubtable force, and the relationship between newspaper owners, journalists and readers involved a complex game of shifting power. Collectively, the press could destroy a reputation. But used wisely, they could also propel a person’s career beyond their wildest dreams. It was a spectacularly corrupt world. Journalists were a group to make your allies. Fortunately, charming intellectual men was Valtesse’s speciality.
With his military background, quick humour and smart moustache, the journalist and novelist Richard O’Monroy boasted many of the attributes Valtesse admired in a man. Above all, O’Monroy proved himself a loyal friend. He was a regular visitor to Valtesse’s home, and the pair could often be found talking animatedly, sharing views on subjects ranging from art and society to foreign politics. Valtesse found the journalist’s company diverting; O’Monroy’s regard ran deeper. When he teased her about her penchant for tall, blonde, military men, calling her ‘Altesse de la Ligne’ (Princess of the Infantry), his jibes were a paltry disguise for his profound attraction. A regular contributor to La Vie parisienne and Gil Blas, O’Monroy dedicated countless articles to Valtesse. He eulogised her intellect, her lustrous hair, her delightfully small breasts and her petite waist. The expression of surprise she wore whenever she greeted him was enchanting, it gave her face a naive, mysterious appearance. Her impassioned views, expressed so eloquently, endeared her to O’Monroy. At times, his interest bordered on obsession. One of his articles compiled an inventory of Valtesse’s intimate measurements.18 He recorded:
Wrist circumference – 12cm
Neck circumference – 24cm
Waist circumference – 48cm
Thigh circumference (upper) – 56cm
(lower) – 46cm
Calf circumference – 36cm
Ankle circumference – 19cm
Chest circumference – 57cm
Readers could be in no doubt of O’Monroy’s message. It was a triumphant territorial marker: a person would need to be close to Valtesse to acquire such detail. They would need to be very close.
Félicien Champsaur was another prolific journalist Valtesse always made time to see. Champsaur wrote for some of the leading papers, including Le Figaro, Le Gaulois and L’Événement. A familiar face in literary circles, Champsaur was a keen patron of the lively brasseries in the Montmartre district of Paris, where the most exciting meetings of literary minds took place. He revelled in Paris’s vibrant social life and its diverse art scene, and he was well acquainted with the most influential literary figures of the day. Valtesse saw him as a valuable contact. It was important he adore her.
Champsaur rose to Valtesse’s bait. He could not find enough words to praise her. To Valtesse’s satisfaction, his admiration found an outlet in the press. Where prose failed him, Champsaur turned to poetry:
Sleep, will you take me? … I cannot … I will not
Sleep … Red golden blonde, my crying memory
sees her again this morning and, like an unsettling dream
in my kiss-starved night, her hair shines.19
And:
How undulating the beauty’s hair
like a harvest’s golden sheaf.
A poor man, a gallivanter’s countess,
with her rosy lips and her wild eyes.20
Champsaur knew how to flatter the ‘Golden Haired Beauty’ of his verses. He was a useful man to know. However, few men of letters were as well-placed as Arsène Houssaye when it came to assisting a celebrity in their career. A novelist, editor, poet, playwright and literary and art critic, Houssaye had also managed the Théâtre Français for nearly ten years. His satirical Tale of the 41st Chair at the Académie Française (1855) typified his dry wit, and with his flowing beard and furrowed brow he looked every bit the intellectual.21 ‘Tell me what you love, and I will tell you who you are,’ Houssaye famously declared. His wisdom impressed Valtesse, and his connections and authority made his acquaintance priceless.
‘In the gallery of pretty and gallant ladies of the 19th century,’ Houssaye affirmed, ‘Valtesse is one of the most ravishing, the most delicious, the most ingenious, the most vicious, the most kind, the most tender, the most brutal, the most bewitching, the most adorable.’22
Such public tributes were invaluable. Valtesse knew that journalists were her lifeline.
Contemporary cynics often joked that adultery parodied marriage; and, like a stealthy wife, Valtesse had learned that men responded well to praise and recognition. It made them want to please again. She was careful that journalists were left eager to promote her. For that, they needed to see that there were the rewards to be earned.
In her accounts, Valtesse grouped together men whom she considered useful, classing them in a special category. These men could take advantage of her usual services, with one significant difference: she would waive the fee. Investments like O’Monroy and Champsaur soon paid for themselves.
Such men were also warmly welcomed to her Monday evening salon. Every week, Valtesse enjoyed opening the doors of 98, Boulevard Malesherbes to a host of journalists, writers, theatrical impresarios, artists and their associates. Against the luxurious backdrop of rich tapestries and paintings, guests sipped sherry from fine crystal glasses, while ideas and opinions on art, literature, politics and society were shared and considered. And while the company pondered the latest literary or artistic debate, Valtesse’s attentive staff weaved their way between the visitors, seeing to it that every need was catered for.
The footman, Schwabb, was in place to greet guests as they alighted from their carriages. Then, assisted by Valtesse’s maid, he ensured that no visitor was in want of refreshment as they admired the grand salon, or smiled at the suggestive stained-glass window Valtesse had had installed, which depicted Napoleon III visiting her boudoir. Meanwhile, the cook saw to it that the canapés never failed to meet the mistress’s exacting standards. As voices hummed and glasses clinked, the staff moved about silently, each performing his or her role to perfection. And overseeing the entire operation was Valtesse’s most trusted employee: her childhood friend, Camille, Mme Meldola.
Meldola’s sturdy frame shuffled to and fro, slowly but surely, methodically ensuring that the household ran like clockwork. She understood her mistress’s feelings and desires better than anyone, and could anticipate her slightest need. She made sure that Valtesse had no cause for complaint.
Valtesse was desperately fond of Meldola. She knew that her friend’s role was not easy. It involved thinking ahead, knowing when to speak and when not. The housekeeper needed to vet the men arriving to visit her mistress. She must be ready with an excuse if Valtesse felt disinclined to see a particular suitor. And under no circumstances should the Comtesse’s lovers be allowed to meet. Meldola’s job demanded a fine balance of wit, foresight and a supremely unflappable nature. The housekeeper met and exceeded the criteria. Like an actress and her agent, Valtesse and Meldola formed an indomitable team. Between them, the courtesan’
s career was managed perfectly.
With Meldola choreographing the logistics, Valtesse adored her evening salons with their intellectual and literary discussions. Her avid reading had shown her that language could be a formidable tool, and socialising with intellectuals gave her the chance to use it. As her linguistic eloquence grew, she discovered she could manipulate words to promote or defend herself. She could destroy an adversary and be cruel when necessary. Words gave her the upper hand she had always sought.
Valtesse found language at its most empowering when she used humour and repartee. It conveyed her intellect and self-assurance. People marvelled at the Comtesse de la Bigne’s sharp wit, and she was proud when it became a trademark.
A male acquaintance recalled one of his meetings with Valtesse with admiration. A self-satisfied actress from the Variétés was hosting a housewarming party, to which Valtesse was invited. At length, the hostess, whose own fortune had suspicious origins, began to criticise cheap-looking young women with seemingly no connections. Valtesse quickly silenced the speaker: ‘Come now Amélie, these good ladies and gentlemen know very well that had we not been so fortunate, you and I would both be on the streets.’23
On another occasion, Le Figaro published an article that made a snide allusion to the colour of Valtesse’s hair and her political opinions. Annoyed, Valtesse immediately penned a response to her assailant:
Dear Sir,
The impolite manner in which you address me should absolve me of the need to reply. However, since you take pleasure in insulting the two things that I hold most dear – my opinions and my hair – I shall reply to you as follows:
As for the political angle you believe me to have, if I am to judge by the eloquence of your attack, you are far more advanced than myself in the matter. As for my hair, which you find too red, do you not think it might be the same optical illusion that makes the grapes appear too green to the fox?
My compliments,
Valtesse
Friends recounted another anecdote which caused endless amusement. One day, a sojourn took Valtesse to the French border. When an official stopped her and enquired as to her profession, she turned to him with perfect composure and replied: ‘Courtesan. And be so good as to tell the man following me, who seems not to be aware.’24
Valtesse’s quick-witted responses were the fruit of perfect self-assurance. She was proud of her profession and the position she had reached. ‘I am a courtesan,’ she announced, ‘and how I do enjoy my work.’25 When invited to a gathering at Detaille’s, she had no hesitation when asked to sign the guests’ book: ‘Valtesse de la Bigne: Lady of Letters,’ she wrote.26
Few circumstances fazed her. She treated elegant society with the same cool reserve she might a common streetwalker, and she believed herself perfectly entitled to join their number as an equal. People could not help but admire her spirit and aplomb.
The more she read, and learned, and debated, the more Valtesse was impressed by the power of words. Privately, she marvelled at the way her contacts in the press manipulated words to shape her public persona. With delight, she watched people’s reactions when her use of language showcased her knowledge and bright mind. When she attended salons and soirées, Valtesse saw writers encircled by swarms of admirers. They were revered, celebrated. She imagined how satisfying that must be.
With the linguistic eloquence she had acquired, Valtesse felt confident that she too could write and be published. So she made up her mind to write a book. It would be based on a topic about which she felt passionately and knew much: herself.
When Valtesse set to work, the field of life writing was changing. The volume of autobiographical works increased markedly in the 19th century as writers began experimenting with new forms of the genre. As literacy increased and the reading public grew, more and more authors turned their hand to autobiography. In the circles Valtesse frequented, the autobiographical and semi-autobiographical novel had become wildly fashionable. From Alexandre Dumas père to George Sand, and not forgetting Célèste Mogador, men – and, excitingly, women – of all classes were publishing works based on their lives. Mogador’s memoirs had particularly struck Valtesse. The volume gave the courtesan a chance to respond to her public’s perception of her. With her memoirs, Mogador had seized control.
Valtesse sensed an irresistible opportunity. Not only would writing a book earn respect and provide an outlet for her creativity, it was a chance to shape her public image. She could dispel the myths she disliked and encourage those she approved. There was another benefit, too. With her humble beginnings, her broken love affair, Fossey’s return to France and her daughter’s death, Valtesse’s public success masked an undercurrent of personal tragedy; perhaps there was a form of therapy to be drawn from committing her experiences to paper. Gathering her thoughts, Valtesse began to write.
Isola told the tale of the beautiful, free-spirited courtesan, Isola de Freder, for whom men would fall, but whose heart resisted their affection.27
She had strange hair, it was red, but a very particular shade of red, in which a thousand gold sequins seemed to sparkle. Her hair was dazzling, and the long yellow and amber tortoiseshell pins could barely hold it up. Some rebellious curls escaped, caressing her temples and her neck. Seeing her like this, with a serious brow, a fine mouth, her eyes hidden beneath her heavy eyelids, one felt an overwhelming desire to approach her, to get her to speak, to assure yourself that she was a woman and not a statue.28
Isola is kept by a rich prince who is subject to her stringent conditions: they must never be seen out together and she will not tolerate his jealousy. Isola prizes her freedom.
One evening, there is the premiere of a new show at the Théâtre des Variétés. With experience and finesse, Valtesse describes the social battlefield of the auditorium, with its elegant ladies and its rich men.29 During the interval, Isola is spotted by a young Breton man, Horace de Kerhouët. He is instantly smitten. Other men warn him off Isola. She is, he is told, ‘a panther disguised as a woman’.30 The men elaborate:
If she is in good humour, Isola is the most charming woman I know, friendly, cheerful, spiritual, with exquisite grace, all the grand airs of a duchess at an orgy, not at all ordinary, and a woman one leaves only reluctantly. But if by any chance a shadow falls across the beauty’s soul, everyone is barred, and it is best to leave, because he who forces the door will find himself in the company of a loathsome, gloomy, sad, disagreeable, caustic woman, as sour-tempered as a usurer before a judiciary council.31
Isola is sly and full of ‘implacable meanness’, Horace is told.32 ‘She has but one accomplice: her immense pride; but one aim, one passion; herself, herself alone, always herself!’33 But Horace is undeterred. He obtains an invitation to Isola’s home, an opulent, sumptuously furnished apartment. When the mistress greets him, the golden key to her private desk around her neck, he finds her to be icy, fiercely determined – and irresistible. He becomes infatuated. Isola tells him about her terrible childhood, and shocks him with her radical opinions on philosophy and literature. Eventually, Isola banishes Horace, telling him it is for his own good, and, reluctantly, he returns to his family home to marry a girl from a respectable family. But he continues writing to Isola and she to him. Before long, Horace learns that Isola is ill. He goes to see her, and finds her dying of consumption, the fashionable illness that claimed the life of Marguerite Gautier in Dumas’s The Lady of the Camellias. Isola finally admits that she loves Horace before dying the tragic death of a heroine.
When the last line was written and Valtesse felt satisfied with the plot and style, she deposited her manuscript with the acclaimed publishing house, Dentu. Valtesse was not a woman to refuse lightly; the editor agreed to publish. But there remained one important decision: how did she wish her name to appear? Valtesse considered the matter. A little mystery was always an advantage. Still, however, the book had valuable promotional potential. It should not be wasted. Then Valtesse realised she could satisfy both needs: the auth
or would be Ego.
The cold monotony of February was broken that year as Valtesse waited expectantly to discover how her novel would be received – and how quickly the public would identify her as its author. She did not have long to wait.
Thanks to the promotional skills of her contacts in the press, the book generated a wave of interest before it was even released. ‘Dentu has just published a little Parisian volume, which we believe is destined for great success,’ announced Le Figaro.34 ‘It is entitled Isola, and it is by an anonymous author, but judging by the style and the spicy revelations, one can detect the hand of a pretty woman who is very much au courant with the fashionable secrets of Parisian high life.’ The next day, an odd message appeared in the paper’s personal column: ‘Marquise – read Isola, which has just been published by Dentu, you will recognise the portrait of an actress from the Variétés [sic] – Robert.’35 News of Isola was reaching all categories of reader.
Valtesse’s diverse marketing strategies reaped immediate benefits: curious Parisians hurried out to purchase a copy of Isola. It was a fiction, but all those who knew Valtesse could testify to its autobiographical quality. Jules Claretie vouched for the resemblance between author and heroine: Ego could only be Valtesse. Valtesse had ‘incarnated herself as the heroine of a novel she wrote to confess a little, to share her intimate thoughts’, explained Claretie.36 Like so many women, Valtesse needed people to understand that she was not like the others, her friend added. But Claretie’s confirmation was unnecessary. Valtesse had long been using the epithet ‘Ego’. It was embossed on her stationery, it adorned her home. Isola’s author was soon identified.
The Mistress of Paris Page 13