Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Epigraph
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Historical Note
Acknowledgements
ALSO BY CATHERINE DELORS
Mistress of the Revolution
DUTTON
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First printing, July 2010
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a cognizant original v5 release october 07 2010
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From triumph to downfall there is but one step. I have noted that, in the most momentous occasions, mere nothings have always decided the outcome of the greatest events.
NAPOLÉON BONAPARTE, 1797
1
It had been one of the shortest days of the Year Nine of the Republic, the 3rd of the month of Nivose in the revolutionary calendar. The 24th of December 1800, old style. Christmas Eve, as they used to say before the Revolution. Night had long fallen on Rue Nicaise. People were beginning to call it Rue Saint-Nicaise again, for saints were reappearing in everyday language. A few hundred yards away, the lights at the windows of the Palace of the Tuileries glowed dim through the fog.
Passersby, wrapped in coats, hurried home, their workday over. Some, smartly dressed, were going to the houses of friends to celebrate the ancient holiday with a réveillon, the traditional Christmas Eve feast. In the Café d’Apollon, patrons were drinking and cheering.
The shops were still open. The glove maker’s pregnant wife, her two-year-old boy clutching her skirts with both hands, leaned against her counter. She chatted with her maid, who was peeling carrots and turnips in preparation for the feast. The tailor next door was cutting a piece of fabric laid on his workbench. Across the street, the watch-maker, a magnifying lens to his eye, inserted a spring into a timepiece. Musicians, recognizable by the odd-shaped cases they carried, hurried in the direction of the brightly lit Longueville mansion. They had been hired for a lavish party there.
In spite of the damp chill, people on Rue Nicaise kept their doors and windows open to see the carriage of Napoléon Bonaparte, the First Consul, pass by.
France had been a Republic since 1792. King Louis XVI had been guillotined. General Bonaparte, since seizing power a year ago and becoming the First Consul, had settled in the royal Palace of the Tuileries. He liked to drive around Paris in a carriage drawn by six white horses, accompanied by a guard of soldiers, at the sound of trumpets, drums artillery salvos.
Tonight, however, there would be no such military pomp. The newspapers had announced that the First Consul was simply to attend the première of The Creation of the World, by Haydn, at the Opera. It was the most anticipated musical event of the season, and tickets sold for twice the usual price.
Joseph de Limoëlan was well informed of this. He had read and reread all the details in every newspaper, though he did not plan on attending the show. Indeed he was not dressed for an evening at the Opera.
Whip in hand, coarse trousers and a loose jacket disguising his tall, slender frame, he led a horse-drawn cart down the street. A gray tarpaulin came down to the hubs of its wheels. Clouds of mist blew out of the nag’s nostrils with each of its breaths. Another man, Pierre de Saint-Régent, also slightly built, his brows knit, walked by the side of the cart, his mouth tight. A third companion, François Carbon, strutted close behind on his short, sturdy legs, and stared at every woman they passed. The three men were dressed in matching blue jackets, coarsely embroidered around the neck in red and white.
Limoëlan stopped the cart in front of the Café d’Apollon. He had surveyed one last time the whole length of the street that afternoon, and determined this was the narrowest spot. But Saint-Régent’s frown became more pronounced.
“No, this light won’t do at all,” he hissed, nodding in the direction of the café. Its windows projected
bright yellow rectangles that illuminated this entire stretch of the street.
Limoëlan, without a word, pulled on the horse’s bridle. The animal snorted and set forth reluctantly. They moved the cart thirty yards down Rue Nicaise, at the intersection of Rue de Malte. It was darker there, and the other street provided an escape route, should any of them escape.
Limoëlan stopped the cart sideways to impede the flow of traffic. Other drivers pulled on their reins, swerved and cursed at the three men, who ignored the volleys of insults. Each in turn went into the Café d’Apollon and, grim-faced, gulped down in silence mug after mug of wine. Their purpose was firm, of course, and they were entirely devoted to the holiest of causes. Yet such is human frailty that even the bravest fear death. Had not some of the saints themselves, though assured of the rewards that awaited them in eternal life, recoiled from the glory of martyrdom?
The three men, braced by their visit to the Café d’Apollon, gathered again around the cart. Limoëlan spoke in a low voice to his companions and left in the direction of the Seine River. Carbon seized the bridle of the horse and looked around. He whistled at a young woman, who hurried away.
Limoëlan walked along the embankment that followed the Louvre galleries. He paused, took off his gold-rimmed spectacles and wiped them with a checkered handkerchief. He groaned with impatience. How was he to find what he wanted in this fog? He pushed to the Pont-Royal, the “Liberty Bridge,” as the scoundrels now had the impudence to call it. He crossed the river. On the Left Bank, he recognized the massive outline of the former Hackneys’ Office, which had recently been turned into barracks. Among the flow of the passersby, he finally distinguished two slight figures standing under a streetlight by the entrance. Children, apparently. He approached. Now he could see their skirts. Two girls, little street vendors, stomping their feet in the cold. Each carried a wicker tray, attached by a leather strap to her shoulder.
Limoëlan paused. Either girl would do, but he only needed one. It bothered him to make that choice. Then, when he drew very close, he saw that the tray of one of the street vendors still contained a few cakes and biscuits. The other girl had already sold all of her wares and was apparently waiting for her companion to be done. No doubt it was a sign. She was the chosen one.
Limoëlan addressed her gently. A smile lit her pockmarked face when he put a silver coin in her hand. She giggled, slipped the strap above her head and handed the other girl her empty tray.
“Take it home to Mama, will you?” she said in a cheerful tone.
As the girl followed Limoëlan across the river to Rue Nicaise, he turned around to glance at her bony frame, dressed in a tattered striped skirt. She was gathering around her neck the collar of a woolen coat. The sleeves were too short and left her wrists, red with cold, bare. How old was she? Twelve, thirteen? He had not asked her name. It did not matter. He shivered and resolved not to look at her again.
“Hurry, will you?” he said, looking straight ahead. “We haven’t all night.”
She pressed on and almost caught up with him. They joined the cart and the other men. Limoëlan gave the girl the bridle to hold.
“Remember, no matter what, the horse must not move at all,” he said as he handed her the whip. “It is very important, do you understand?”
She nodded. “Oh, don’t worry, Sir, I’ll be very, very careful.”
The horse was covered with sweat and kept its head down. It was content to sniff noisily at discarded cabbage leaves on the cobblestones and seemed in no mood to canter away. The girl waited, shifted her weight from one foot to the other, patted the horse’s neck, toyed with the whip. Limoëlan pulled his watch. The time was near. He exchanged a glance with Saint-Régent and nodded.
Limoëlan left to post himself at the intersection of Rue Nicaise and Place du Carrousel. Soon he saw a cortege of carriages leaving the Palace and heading his way. He shuddered. At last. He had waited so long for this moment. A few more seconds, and it would be all over. He knew he had to signal to Saint-Régent, but somehow his heart stopped and he was unable to raise his hand. He was still frozen, overcome by an emotion he could not define, when the first carriage passed him by and turned onto Rue Nicaise.
The girl looked up when she heard the rattling of wheels and the noise of hooves. She gaped at the squadron of dragoons in splendid uniforms surrounding the procession of elegant carriages. One of the guards of the escort, saber drawn, galloped ahead to the cart and shouted to move it out of the way. His horse shoved Saint-Régent against the wall of a house. The girl, her mouth still open, held on to the nag’s bridle. She was staring at the gold braid on the dragoon’s green jacket, at the horsetail that flowed down his back from his shiny helmet, at the claws of the spotted pelt that served as his saddle blanket. In her entire life she had never seen anything so strange and beautiful. She paid no attention to Saint-Régent, who had swiftly recovered his balance and reached under the tarpaulin.
But the coachman of the first carriage had noticed it all. He swore at the top of his voice, whipped his horses and drove away at a gallop. A blinding burst of light tore at the night. Thunder shook the air. The horses of the guards reared up, neighed wildly, slipped and fell. Cobblestones, roof tiles, parts of walls, entire chimneys, shards of glass, shreds of flesh were raining down on the street.
All that was left of the nag was the head, intact like a trophy, one front leg and one side of the chest and rump. Straw poked out from the remaining half of its leather collar.
2
Chief Inspector Roch Miquel would never forget what he was doing on the evening of the attack. He had left the Police Prefecture earlier than usual to reach the tavern of the Mighty Barrel, located on Rue Croix-des-Petits-Champs, in time for dinner. That establishment belonged to his father. Old Miquel now acknowledged the old holidays again, in his own way. He liked to share a roast goose with his only son and a few friends on Christmas Eve.
When Roch pushed the door open, he was greeted by the mixed smells of lentil soup, roasting meat and tobacco. The voices of the patrons, calling to the waiters, mingled with the dull noises of the mugs hitting the wood of the tables, polished by years of spills. Through billows of smoke Roch saw his father, leaning against the counter, surveying the room. Old Miquel, in the manner of a peasant, wore a wide-brimmed hat and leather leggings that buttoned from his knees down to his hobnailed shoes. A shaggy mongrel, his black hair streaked with much white, was crouching at his feet. The dog rose stiffly and, wagging his tail, went to nuzzle Roch’s leg. Old Miquel’s eyes gleamed with pride at the sight of his son. Roch seized his father’s hand and kissed it. The older man slapped him on the shoulder.
Miquel père, a former rag-and-bone man, had seen his son rise to the rank of Chief Inspector, with a salary of 6,000 francs, and Roch was barely twenty-five. Such a feat would have been unconceivable before the Revolution, and it gave Old Miquel a singular satisfaction to have seen Roch achieve such early success. The years of struggling to afford a decent education for his son had been amply rewarded.
The two men addressed each other in the Roman language, the tongue of their native Auvergne. They spoke it for the pleasure of remembering the mountains of the old country, where they had not visited in many years. Also, it was not understood by most of the tavern patrons, and allowed for more candid talks.
Roch tried to keep the conversation away from politics, a topic that was sure to infuriate his father these days. Unfortunately Old Miquel’s eyes fell on a copy of The Free Men’s Journal lying on one of the tables. He seized the newspaper and brandished it in Roch’s face.
“The Free Men’s Journal!” he snorted. “As if we had any free men left in France! I just buy this filthy rag because I need something to put in the latrine. All I read about is our glorious Bonaparte. It’s his victories in Italy here, the pacification of the West there. Well, let’s talk about their pacification. Those Royalist bandits, those Chouans, ask them if they are pacified. They’re still attacking stagecoaches out t
here.”
Roch opened his mouth to protest, but Old Miquel was not to be stopped so easily. “No, son, don’t tell me it isn’t so. You think I’m a fool? Even in the so-called Free Men’s Journal, they say that from now on all the stagecoaches going west’ll be escorted by five soldiers. Pray what’s that for, if it’s so quiet, so pacified there? But in the same article, they tell you that all the Chouans have laid down their arms. They’re all agape with admiration at Bonaparte, they say. That’s just the kind of drivel you should expect from the papers that’re still open nowadays. Those that told the truth, they had their presses seized, their journalists arrested.”
Roch shook his head. “You are right, Father, those newspapers had been useful to spread the ideals of the Revolution. But now they had to be closed because they excited the populace against the Royalists. Everyone is ready to forget the old hatreds. I agree that the Revolution brought us great things, the equality of all before the law, the abolition of the old privileges, all that. But now people are tired of the chaos, of the bloodshed, of the corruption. They want order, they want to unite behind a strong leader. That’s why they like the First Consul.”
Old Miquel’s palm hit the table. “A strong leader all right! Did you know they’re going to demolish the statue of Liberty on the Place de la Révolution? To replace it with one of your strong leader, of course! They say in the paper they can’t decide if they’re going to have him on horseback, in his uniform, or standing in a toga, like a Roman Consul. I wish they’d ask me. Have Bonaparte up there stark naked, I’d tell them. It’d make it easier to kiss his ass.”
Roch frowned as he looked around uneasily. Old Miquel’s rants, even in the Roman language, might be understood by some of the patrons. That would create trouble for both of them. And the name Bonaparte was certainly easy to recognize in any idiom. He had to admit that his father had a point: it was imprudent to criticize the First Consul in public.
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