by Lucy Ashford
But that was not the worst of it. The worst of it was that she had fallen in love with Jacques, the decadent Parisian artist, and she must never, ever let him know it.
Chapter Five
Early the next morning Sophie hurried through streets that were already full of crowds eager to view the wonderful pageant of their emperor bringing his bride-to-be into Paris. Her father was waiting for her anxiously; quickly she reassured him.
‘It’s all right, Papa. The paintings have all been dealt with.’
She saw his anxiety fade; then he tensed again. ‘But the cost! I hope it wasn’t too high?’
I don’t know, she murmured inwardly. I don’t know yet. But aloud she said brightly, ‘Nothing I cannot afford, Papa!’
He nodded, clasping her hand. ‘You are a good daughter. You must go now—you will have so much to do. But somehow—’ he frowned, gazing at her face ‘—you look different!’
How could he tell? Could anyone else tell?
‘It’s the wedding,’ she told him lightly. ‘It’s all so exciting, and we’re so very busy at the palace!’
‘Of course.’ He smiled and patted her hand. ‘You will come later and tell me all about it, won’t you?’
‘Dear Papa, I’ll bore you to death with it!’ she teased. ‘Trust me!’
Everyone at the Tuileries was in a state of near-panic. Somehow Sophie had thought—wrongly—that her part in the preparations was complete, but the housekeeper spotted her as she passed through the hall. ‘Sophie! Thank goodness you’re here! They need some seamstresses over at the Louvre, urgently. Some of the gold hangings in the Long Gallery have come loose.’
‘But the guests will already be gathering there!’
‘Yes, but it’s hours before the wedding. Though you must be quick!’
Sophie took two other seamstresses, including little Fleur, hoping that being busy would distract the poor girl from her heartbreak. Swiftly and calmly she organised the repair to one of the huge silk hangings that adorned the gallery’s wall, while gradually the great room filled with magnificently dressed, eagerly chattering guests—royalty and nobility from all corners of Europe. Even Fleur, gazing round wide-eyed, took an eager interest.
The Princess Pauline, Napoleon’s notoriously promiscuous sister, caused the most stir by entering in a décolleté gown of almost sheer white muslin on the arm of her latest lover, a burly guardsman. The whispers began, but Sophie did not join in. Am I any better than Pauline? For what I did with the artist, Jacques, was shameless, quite shameless.…
When their task was done, she started gathering up her sewing things. Then Fleur was gasping. ‘Mam’selle Sophie. Oh, do look. Isn’t he the most handsome man of them all?’
Sophie turned idly, unimpressed by all these vainglorious peacocks. But then she saw him. Dressed in restrained but exquisite clothes, his hair black and curling. Jacques. Her street artist, whom she’d begged to make love to her.
And the herald, as he entered, was calling out, ‘Jacques-Guillaume de Vevret, Count of Claremont…’
She walked back to the palace with the others, hating him, but hating her own naivety most of all. There were still more flowers to be placed in the empress’s rooms—work, work was the answer—but little Fleur and the others dragged her out to the balcony, from where they could see the imperial procession as it progressed along the Champs-Élysées.
‘Mam’selle Sophie, the carriage!’ Fleur was exclaiming. ‘It’s all gold and glass, and, oh, I can see Napoleon’s bride! She’s wearing a mantle of red velvet stitched with golden thread, and her crown sparkles so much that it must be made of diamonds!’
All around them the crowds were cheering wildly and the bands were playing. Along the banks of the Seine the artillery were firing their guns.
Then some soldiers marched by, resplendent in their uniforms, and poor little Fleur began to weep again. ‘My Henri,’ she whispered. ‘Oh, poor Henri, he should be here.’ Silently Sophie hugged her; indeed there was a huge ache where her own heart should be. Jacques’s words rang again and again in her ear: ‘Sometimes you have to grasp at life, Sophie, or it isn’t worth living.’
But why had he let her think he was a poor artist? He must have found it amusing, the Count of Claremont, to play the part. To make her fall in love with him.
You stupid, naïve fool, Sophie. You’ve less sense than Fleur.
Afterwards everyone said it was the most glorious wedding ever. The Louvre and the wedding chapel were, people said, just perfect. Napoleon had surveyed it all, sharp eyed, from his throne in there, and now that all reminders of Josephine were eliminated, nothing could be seen that would send him into one of his terrifying rages.
After the ceremony the imperial couple returned to the Tuileries, and the young empress sent for the chambermaids to thank them personally, with an accent that was charming. Now that her red velvet mantle was removed, they could see her beautiful gown, a high-waisted robe of white tulle encrusted with pearls and silver thread and adorned with a stiffened collar of finest Brussels lace. One by one the maids of the chamber curtsied before her, but she raised them quickly to their feet. ‘Thank you all, so much!’ she said warmly. ‘These rooms, and the flowers, are exquisite!’
Fleur, as impetuous as ever, blurted out, ‘We thought you would miss your home, Your Majesty! You have had to travel such a long way, we really wanted you to feel welcome here!’
Marie-Louise gazed at her. ‘Sometimes, one has to endure…adventures—is that the word?—to find out what is right for oneself, I think. But I feel you are already my friends, the first friends I have made in this beautiful city!’ She sank with a little sigh into the nearest chair and eased off her lovely white satin shoes. ‘Too tight,’ she explained with a tiny frown, ‘my poor feet, they ache so…’
‘Your Imperial Majesty, we will find you others to wear, from your trousseau!’
‘No.’ Marie-Louise raised her small white hand and smiled. ‘My husband chose them for me, and I will wear them—just a little discomfort, you see!—because I love him, and I love Paris, because it is the city of his heart.’
Sophie thought, She loves him. Jacques was right; she truly loves him.
That evening, as the sumptuous wedding feast took place inside the palace, Sophie stood alone on the deserted terrace overlooking the gardens, which were illuminated by thousands of lanterns. An hour ago, Fleur had come running to her, bubbling with joy.
‘He is back! My Henri is back. He was wounded, not dead, and we are to be married, as soon as possible!’
Sophie had hugged her warmly. ‘I’m so happy for you, my dear. So very happy.’
Everyone was happy. All of Paris, it seemed, was partying in the Tuileries Gardens, where last night she had urged Jacques to make love to her.
The Count of Claremont. She felt renewed anguish in her heart. Oh, what a fool she was. She’d ignored so many warning signs. His bearing, his education. The fact that he knew what Marie-Louise looked like; no doubt he’d dined with her! How he must have laughed over Sophie’s assumption that he was a poor painter. Tonight he would be a guest, of course, at the imperial banquet. He might even be regaling his aristocratic friends with the hilarious tale of the virgin seamstress who thought he was an impoverished artist and begged him to seduce her.…
She felt a hand on her shoulder. She whirled round. It was Jacques, looking heartbreakingly handsome in a fitted black coat and white neckcloth. Her pulse thudded sickeningly. She backed away, her hand at her throat.
‘Have you come here to laugh at me again?’
‘Sophie,’ he began. ‘I want to explain—’
‘Go away.’ Her anger burned. ‘A poor artist. You told me you were a poor artist!’
‘Wrong,’ he reminded her tersely. ‘You assumed I was a poor artist. But didn’t I tell you, last night, that we needed to talk?’
‘What about?’ she said bitterly. Her voice was shaking. ‘Were you intending to offer me payment perhaps?’
‘I wanted to give you something, certainly,’ he said. He held out a small trinket box. Frowning, she opened it.
Inside was a silver oval brooch, containing a miniature portrait. Of…her.
Her heart clenched.
‘Just to show you,’ he said quietly, ‘that you were not altogether wrong in assuming me to be an artist.’
She clasped the box tightly. It means nothing, nothing at all… ‘But you are also a count!’
‘A penniless count,’ he said, ‘till recently. My father was exiled during the revolution, like so many, and lost his lands, his money, everything. So I earned my own living around the cities of Europe, by doing what I was good at—painting. When Napoleon became emperor, he recalled all his exiled nobles and restored their lands. But I’m still far from rich. My father’s lands were badly neglected and there’s much to be done. I came to stay in Paris for the wedding, of course, to show my loyalty to Napoleon. The last thing I expected was to fall in love.’
Love. She froze.
‘With you,’ he went on softly.
‘You cannot. Oh, Jacques, you could have your pick of the women of the court.’
He said evenly, ‘Of the near-prostitutes like Pauline, who throng Paris? I’d really rather not.’ He drew closer, and took her hand. ‘You see, I want someone to be my companion, someone steadfast and honest, who’ll talk to me of love and life, as you have done. During our nights together in the wedding chapel, I realised. I want no one else to be my wife, Sophie.’
She was silent a moment, her heart in turmoil. ‘Jacques, I will have to think. In fact, there is so much to think about.…’
‘Is there?’ he said lightly. ‘Don’t you feel you’ve known me for ever?’
She laughed suddenly. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘yes, I do! But—’
‘Then let me tell you, sweetheart,’ he said, taking her in his arms, ‘that I actually finished those paintings on the third night.’
‘You can’t have! We spent—oh, I don’t know how many more nights there!’
He grinned, white teeth flashing. ‘Because I couldn’t bear to let you go. So I found a few more faces to turn into Marie-Louise. Napoleon, I think, would be delighted to know that his new bride is everywhere in the Salon Carré. Now, no more “buts.”’ He kissed her hand tenderly. ‘Because tonight, I’m going to dance with you, until you say that you will marry me. Understand, my foolish, darling Sophie?’
Nearby a band was playing. In the warm night air, it seemed as if all the lovers in Paris were dancing to the glorious music, in celebration of the imperial marriage. He swept her into the midst of them, to dance, rapturously; and later, as the celebratory fireworks cascaded over the gardens and the Seine, later, as he kissed her, she whispered, ‘Yes.’
Yes, to her artist, her lover, Jacques.
Author Note
Most people know that Napoleon and Josephine had a passionate, if occasionally quarrelsome, marriage. But sadly, Josephine was unable to bear the great French emperor an heir, and so in 1810 he divorced her and took a new bride, the shy young Archduchess of Austria, Marie-Louise.
Their sumptuous wedding in Paris provides the background for my story. The tale opens with the fiery Emperor Napoleon wanting nothing at all to remind him of Josephine in the chapel of the Louvre, where the ceremony is shortly to be held. It has fallen to my heroine, Sophie, to attend to this, though she needs the help of the handsome roving artist Jacques, whose demand for payment for his services is outrageous!
Were Napoleon and Marie-Louise happy? I think they were, and the year after their marriage she gave birth to his son. But Napoleon’s exile to Elba in 1814 meant that his wife and child had to return to Austria, and Napoleon never saw them again. Marie-Louise remarried and bore more children, though her first-born, Napoleon’s son, died young. Napoleon himself died alone in exile on St Helena.
The emperor was an ardent collector of paintings and sculptures, just a few of which are mentioned in my story. Canova was the most renowned sculptor of his day, producing many works for Napoleon, and Jacques, my hero, has glimpsed Canova’s naked statue of Napoleon as Mars in Rome. When Napoleon finally saw it in 1811, he rejected it as being ‘too athletic,’ and the statue, ironically, came into the possession of the Duke of Wellington, who vanquished Napoleon at the battle of Waterloo. It is now on view to the public at Apsley House, London.
May this year’s very special royal wedding be full of happiness!
Lucy Ashford
On April 29th 2011 the world will be waiting with bated breath for Prince William and Kate Middleton to say ‘I do’!
The bells at Westminster Abbey are chiming, the carriage is waiting and THE dress has finally been unveiled… So join Her Majesty by dusting off your best hat as you prepare for the wedding of the decade!
To celebrate this historic event, Mills & Boon have created a special ebook collection:
Royal Weddings
…through the ages
Read about the future king’s ancestors and the people who helped bring their special days together.
7 couples, 7 marriages, 7 stories for you to enjoy!
What the Duchess Wants by Terri Brisbin
Eleanor, Duchess of Aquitaine and Henry of Anjou (future Henry II), 1152
Lionheart’s Bride by Michelle Willingham
King Richard and Princess Berengaria, 1191
Prince Charming in Disguise by Bronwyn Scott
Prince George and Caroline of Ansbach, 1704
A Princely Dilemma by Elizabeth Rolls
George, Prince of Wales (future Prince Regent/George IV) and Princess Caroline of Brunswick, 1795
The Problem with Josephine by Lucy Ashford
Napoleon and Archduchess Marie-Louise of Austria, 1810
Princess Charlotte’s Choice by Ann Lethbridge
Princess Charlotte and Prince Leopold, 1816
With Victoria’s Blessing by Mary Nichols
Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, 1840
So if you can’t wait until the 29th for your royal wedding fix…download one now!
Lucy Ashford, an English Studies lecturer, has always loved literature and history, and from childhood one of her favorite occupations has been to immerse herself in historical romances. She studied English with history at Nottingham University, and the Regency is her favorite period.
Lucy has written several historical novels for Harlequin Mills & Boon ® and has also been published under the name of Elizabeth Redfern. She lives with her husband in an old stone cottage in the Peak District, near to beautiful Chatsworth House and Haddon Hall, all of which give her a taste of the magic of life in a bygone age. Her garden enjoys spectacular views over the Derbyshire hills, where she loves to roam and let her imagination go to work on her latest story.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-0419-5
The Problem with Josephine
Copyright © 2011 by Lucy Ashford
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