Marianne and the Privateer

by Жюльетта Бенцони

  'Never you mind. Go and bring him to me at once and take care Jonas is not angry with you for keeping me waiting.'

  The gatekeeper departed unwillingly for the house, mumbling under his breath as he went various uncomplimentary things about brazen hussies forcing their way into honest folks' houses. Not many seconds later, Jonas, Fortunée's major-domo, literally burst out of the glazed front door, his good-humoured black face split in two by an enormous smile of welcome:

  'Mademoiselle Ma'anne! Mademoiselle Ma'anne! It is you!… Come you inside dis minute! My lord, but what you doin' dressed like dat?'

  Marianne laughed, feeling her spirits revive miraculously at the warmth of this familiar welcome. Here, at last, she had found a safe harbour.

  'Poor Jonas! Nine times out of ten I seem to arrive on the doorstep looking like a complete ragamuffin. Madame is out?'

  'Yes, but she's coming back soon. You come inside and rest yourself while you wait.'

  Dismissing the gatekeeper with an imperious wave of his hand, Jonas led Marianne straight into the house, telling her as they went of the anxiety his mistress had been in on her account since her return from Aix.

  'She thinks you' dead! When Monseigneur de Benevento tell her you disappeared, I thought she would run mad, I give you my word… Listen! Here she comes now.'

  In fact, hardly had Jonas shut the door before Fortunée's brougham entered the courtyard, described a perfect circle round the fountain and drew up at the foot of the steps. Fortunée got out but she looked very grave and Marianne saw that for the first time since she had known her, her friend was dressed in a plain walking dress of a severe dark purple colour. Also unusual for her was an almost total absence of paint on her face and as her veil was drawn up, Marianne could see by her red eyes that she had been crying. But already Jonas had hurried out to her, calling:

  'Madame Fortunée! Mademoiselle Ma'anne is here! See!'

  Madame Hamelin looked up and a light of joy sprang into her lack-lustre eyes. Without a word she ran up the steps and flung herself into her friend's arms, hugging her and crying at the same time. Marianne had never seen the light-hearted Creole in such a state and while she returned the embrace with equal fervour she pleaded in an undertone:

  'Fortunée, for God's sake, tell me what is the matter! Were you truly so afraid for me?'

  Fortunée freed herself quickly and stood for a moment holding Marianne at arms' length, her hands resting on the girl's shoulders while she gazed deep into her eyes with such an expression of compassion that a cold trickle of fear ran through Marianne's veins, leaving her unable to speak.

  'Marianne, I have just come from the court,' Madame Hamelin said at last in the gentlest possible voice. 'It is all over.'

  'What – what do you mean?'

  'Jason Beaufort was sentenced to death an hour ago.'

  Marianne staggered as if she had been shot. But after so many days' unconscious expectation of this very thing, she was to some extent prepared, without knowing it, so that the wound had begun to heal over almost as soon as it was made. She had known in her heart that one day she would have to listen to those dreadful words and, as the human body prepares secretly to fight for life against the disease it harbours, so her mind had armed itself against the suffering to come. The danger was too close now, there was no time for weakness, no time for tears or terror.

  Fortunée had extended her arms in an automatic gesture, expecting Marianne to fall down in a faint, but she let them drop slowly to her sides as she stared in amazement at the unknown woman who looked back at her out of a face which had turned suddenly to stone. Marianne spoke in a voice of ice:

  'Where is the Emperor? At St Cloud?'

  'No. The whole court is at Fontainebleau, for the hunting. What are you going to do? You won't—'

  'Oh yes I shall. That is precisely what I shall do. Do you think I care for anything in this world if Jason is not in it? I swore by my mother's memory that if they killed him I should stab myself at the foot of the scaffold. What are Napoleon's rages to me? He shall listen to me, whether he likes it or not, whether it suits him or not! Afterwards, he may do to me what he likes. As if it mattered!'

  'Don't say that!' Fortunée begged her, crossing herself hurriedly, as if to avert an evil fate. 'Think of all of us who love you.'

  'I am thinking of the man I love, and without whom I will not live! There is only one thing I ask of you, Fortunée. Lend me a chaise and some clothes, and a little money, and tell me where I can go in Fontainebleau to avoid being arrested before I have seen the Emperor. You know the place, I think. If you will do this for me, I will bless you to my dying day—'

  'Stop!' Fortunée cried distractedly. 'Will you stop talking about dying! Lend you money, my chaise – what are you thinking of?'

  'Fortunée!' Marianne protested in accents of hurt surprise, but before she could say more her friend's arm was folded lovingly about her waist and Fortunée was leading her upstairs, murmuring affectionately in her ear:

  'We'll go together, of course, you silly thing. I have a house there, a little retreat of my own by the river, and I know every inch of the forest. We'll find that useful if you don't succeed in getting into the chateau – much as Napoleon hates to have his hunting interrupted. But if that is the only way…'

  'I can't let you, Fortunée! You may be dreadfully compromised… even banished…'

  'Well, if I am, I'll go and join Montrond at Anvers and we'll have a lovely time together! Come, my love. I must say I shan't be sorry to learn how the Emperor came to allow such a sentence to be passed on such an extraordinarily attractive man – to say nothing of one who could not possibly have committed the crimes they have accused him of! A foul murder? Coining? A man with his proud bearing, and those eyes, like a sea-eagle's? It's perfectly absurd!…

  Jonas! Tell my woman to prepare a bath for Mademoiselle Marianne at once, and some clean clothes. We'll have a good meal in half an hour and a post-chaise at the door half an hour after that. Is that understood? Off with you, then.'

  The major-domo departed speedily in the direction of the stairs, calling loudly for Mademoiselle Clementine as he went, and Fortunée, following more sedately with Marianne, said confidentially:

  'Now, darling, we have plenty of time so you can tell me all about it. Where have you been…?'

  CHAPTER TEN

  The Imperial Hunt

  Madame Hamelin reined in her mount beside the worn stone cross, all overgrown with lichens, which stood in the shadow of a broad oak tree at a place where four ways met.

  'This is the cross of Souvray,' she said, pointing at the stone with her whip. 'It will be the perfect spot to wait until the hunt begins. I know there is to be a luncheon at the Carrefour de Recloses, about a mile and a half from here, but I do not know which direction the hunt will take.'

  As she spoke, she dismounted and, hitching her horse to the trunk of a tall Scots pine, gathered up the long skirts of her leaf-brown habit and strolled leisurely back to seat herself on the steps below the old cross, while Marianne, following her example, tied her own horse to the same tree and joined her friend on the steps.

  The cross-roads was quite deserted. The only sounds were the trickle of water somewhere on the other side of a thicket and the rapid scampering feet of a startled hare on the deep, rustling carpet of fallen leaves. A little way to the south, however, the woods were alive with the unmistakable hum of a crowd of people enjoying themselves, punctuated by noises of hound and horn and distant carriages.

  'I've never seen an imperial hunt before,' Marianne said, seating herself and settling the ample folds of her dark green habit round her legs. 'What happens?'

  'Oh, it's quite simple. All the court is supposed to take part, but in point of fact the Emperor hunts alone, except for his equerry-in-chief General Nansouty, the master of the hunt Monsieur d'Hannecourt, a single huntsman and his Mameluke servant Rustan, who goes with him everywhere. Before Savary was chief of police, he used to be there as w
ell, but now he is obliged to watch over his master at a rather greater distance. As to the formalities-well, everyone, men and women, including the Emperor, set out from the chateau in a procession of carriages. They drive to a point which has been decided on beforehand and there is a splendid collation. When that is over, the court either hangs about doing nothing in particular, except digest their luncheon, or else goes quietly home, and Napoleon hunts. That is all there is to it!'

  'I never knew he was so fond of hunting. He never mentioned it…'

  Fortunée laughed. 'My dear child, our Emperor is a man with a prodigious talent for creating the right atmosphere, and doing what he feels goes with the part. Privately, he has no great fondness for hunting, very largely because he is an indifferent horseman, and if his horses were not always very well trained he would certainly have a respectable number of falls to his credit. However, he believes that a sovereign of France is obliged to hunt. French kings have always hunted madly – Capets, Valois, Bourbons, were all devoted to the chase. I dare say he feels he owes it to his uncle Louis XVI! And you need not look so downcast about it, either. It gives you all the better chance of finding him more or less alone.'

  For Fortunée's sake, Marianne summoned up a wan smile but the fear which clutched at her heart was too great to allow her any pleasure in her friend's witticisms. Jason's life would depend on what took place that afternoon and in the three days since she had arrived at La Madeleine, Fortunée's charming rural retreat, this thought had never left her, day or night.

  Almost as soon as they arrived, in fact, Madame Hamelin had hastened to the palace to see Duroc and try, through him, to obtain an audience with the Emperor. The ever-helpful Duc de Frioul had communicated the request to his master but Napoleon had made it known that he did not desire to see Madame Hamelin, intimating that she had better confine herself for the present to her own delightful property and not venture to appear at court. Marianne's heart sank when she heard this.

  'Oh, my poor Fortunée! You are involved in my disgrace! He would not see you because he knows you are my friend.'

  'Well, if he does it's because he threw us together. Actually, though, I think it is rather my friendship with Josephine which makes him keep me at a distance. They say her new Danubian majesty is horribly jealous of anything even remotely connected with our own dear Empress. Indeed, I never really thought Napoleon would see me – in fact I expected it so little that I went to the trouble of making a few inquiries on my own account. The day after tomorrow the Emperor goes hunting. You may come upon him at some time during that day – and although he may be a little angry at first, I shall be very much surprised if he won't listen to you.'

  'He must listen to me! Even if I have to throw myself under his horse's hooves!'

  'Which would be a great piece of folly! With his clumsiness, he'd more than likely ride right over you. And your looks, my dear, are still quite your best weapon.'

  It was decided, therefore, and Marianne was left to count the hours and minutes that must elapse before their ride into the forest of Fontainebleau. Yet now, as the fatal moment drew near, her eagerness to be up and doing was tempered by nebulous fears. She knew Napoleon's temper of old. What if he refused to let her speak, sent her away without so much as listening to what she had to say?

  Fortunée had taken some chocolate from her pocket and was offering it to Marianne:

  'Here. You'll need all your strength and it's none too warm here in the woods. But the luncheon can't go on for ever.'

  A little biting wind had got up, sweeping the dead leaves over the surface of the Route Ronde which had been made in the days of Louis XIV to encircle Fontainebleau and a large portion of the forest for the vehicles following the hunt. Clouds raced across a sky more pale grey than blue, just failing to keep up with a dark mass of swallows on their way to find the sun. Marianne's throat tightened as she watched the birds, flying so fast and free, thinking of Jason, a sea bird held basely in a cage until such time as the dull hand of a slavish, so-called justice should strike him down, not letting him see the vast, pure ocean again, even for one day.

  A horn blowing deep in the forest dragged her from her gloomy thoughts. She had not hunted all her life without knowing the signs that the hunt was moving off. She jumped to her feet, automatically smoothing out the folds of her riding dress.

  'Hurry,' she cried. They're away!'

  'Not so fast,' Fortunée said easily. We need to know the direction first.'

  The two of them stood for a moment listening, trying to disentangle the confusing echoes of hounds and horns; then Madame Hamelin beamed triumphantly at her friend:

  'Excellent! They are going towards the Haute Borne – we shall be able to cut across the line! Come on! I'll show you the way and then drop behind while you go on alone – since His Majesty would rather not see me! Ready?'

  With one accord, the two young women sprang into the saddle. Their whips cracked and they were off at a full gallop through the forest, guided by the sound of the horn. At first they followed a cross-ride with heavy cover on either side, bending low over their horses' necks to avoid overhanging branches. The going was rough, over stony ground which climbed steeply from time to time only to descend as steeply into deep valley-bottoms thick with heather and high rusty-golden bracken, but both were excellent horsewomen, Marianne especially, and they were able to avoid the many obstacles in their path without slackening their pace. In the normal way, Marianne would have enjoyed enormously the hectic ride through one of the finest forests in Europe, but today the stakes were too high and the risk of failure too tragic. Galloping in a desperate bid to save Jason Beaufort's life, she knew beyond all doubt that her own life, too, hung on the outcome.

  They rode for a long time. The quarry seemed to be doubling endlessly and it was nearly an hour before they caught sight of the flash of white between the bare trees that told them the pack was in full cry. Hounds were running fast, giving tongue as they ran. The horn calls had already told Marianne long before this that the quarry was a boar and with her nerves in their present raw state she was glad of it. Deer-hunting had never given her any pleasure: the grace and beauty of the creatures moved her too deeply.

  Fortunée had reined to a halt and now her voice came, borne on the wind:

  'There they are – you go on alone…'

  Marianne could see the boar now, crashing through the undergrowth like a great, black, bristly cannon ball, the pack hard on his heels. After them came two red-jacketed huntsmen, both riding greys, blowing for all they were worth. The Emperor could not be far away. She dug in her heels and shot forward, burst through a thicket, jumped a fallen tree trunk and a tangled brake – and landed almost plump on top of Napoleon, who was also going full-tilt.

  Both mounts reared wildly to avoid a collision but whereas Marianne, perfect mistress of herself and her horse, remained easily in the saddle, the Emperor of the French, caught off balance, parted company with his stirrups and took a flying toss into the leafy mould.

  'Ten thousand thunders! What half-witted—'

  But Marianne was already on her knees beside him, overcome with horror at what she had done:

  'It's me, Sire! Only me! Oh, in heaven's name, forgive me! I did not mean – oh, good God! You are not hurt?'

  Napoleon glared at her and, getting quickly to his feet, snatched from Marianne's hands the hat which he had lost in his fall and which she had picked up.

  'I was under the impression, Madame,' he said, in such arctic tones that Marianne felt an involuntary shiver down her spine, 'that I had banished you. What are you doing here?'

  She gazed up at him imploringly. It had not even occurred to her to get to her feet.

  'I had to see you, Sire! I had to speak to you, at all costs—'

  'Even the cost of my back, it would seem,' Napoleon said grimly, adding, with a touch of impatience: 'Well, get up, get up! The appearance we present is already sufficiently ridiculous – and we are not alone.'

&nb
sp; They were not. Even as he spoke, three men, whom the Emperor must have outdistanced in the chase, came thundering up to them. The first to arrive wore the splendid uniform of a general of hussars, the second was in the green suit of the imperial huntsmen and the third, the only one of the three known to Marianne, was the Mameluke, Rustan. The general had dismounted in an instant.

  'Sire!' he exclaimed in anxious tones. 'Are you all right?'

  But it was Marianne who answered, smiling engagingly: 'It is I, General, who do not deserve to be. My horse bolted with me and I reached here at the same moment as His Majesty. Our horses reared and I was thrown. The Emperor was good enough to come to my assistance, for which I am most grateful.'

  As she uttered this piece of diplomatic prevarication she saw Napoleon's jaw lose something of its set look and the glare go out of his eye.

  'It was nothing,' he remarked, carelessly shaking a dead leaf or two from the skirts of his grey redingote. 'Say no more. But enough of this day's sport. I am tired of it. It has been a fruitless day. Call off your huntsmen and your hounds, Monsieur d'Hannecourt. We are going back to the chateau. You, Madame,' he turned to Marianne, 'will follow us. I wish to speak with you. Rustan will take you in by way of the English Garden.'

  'But, Sire, I am not alone in the forest. A friend—'

  A gleam appeared in Napoleon's blue-grey eyes, not of anger this time but amusement:

  'I see. Then you had better collect your friend, Madame, before you come. Some people,' he added, with an inflection which told Marianne that he was under no illusions as to that friend's identity, 'would appear remarkably hard to lose.'

  Marianne bowed quickly and, placing her booted foot in General Nansouty's gallantly proffered hands, vaulted into the saddle with a neatness that made the hussar's lips twitch irrepressibly. He was too experienced a horseman to be taken in by Marianne's tactful story. If anyone had taken a header, it was certainly not this girl. But Nansouty was a man of the world and so he merely smiled.