"What for?" Lewrie asked. "Sir Anthony?" He looked for aid.
"I do not know, Captain Lewrie. Un problиme, m'sieur? Damme! He says no one presented to the First Consul can do so without being searched for weapons, Captain Lewrie! This is outrageous!"
"But understandable," Lewrie said, after thinking about it for a moment. "Proceed, sir. Produit, m'sieur," he told the officer as he held out his arms to cooperate. Muttering to himself in English, "And I hope ye're not one t'prefer the 'windward passage.'"
Lewrie got a rather thorough pat-down, though it was obvious that the snug tailoring of his suit precluded hidden weapons; even the inside of his lower sleeves, the tops of his half-boots held nought.
"Lui, aussi, maintenant, m'sieur?" Lewrie asked in his halting French, pointing to Paisley-Templeton. "Him too, now?"
"They will not dare!" Sir Anthony snapped. "This is an insult to his Britannic Majesty, King George, and all Great Britain! A stiff note of displeasure will be on Minister Talleyrand's desk before nightfall, dare they man-handle me, sir!"
"C'est de rigueur, comprenez, messieurs?" the officer said with an apologetic shrug, waving them both back towards the hall doors, and the two men rejoined Caroline at their place in line before those tall double doors as tall as a longboat stood on end. They were surrounded by a rainbow of brightly coloured uniforms of the various branches of Napoleon's army some clanking with spurs on their boots and swords at their hips, which raised Lewrie's eyebrows over his recent search. By those officers and ornately dressed civilian gentlemen stood an host of elegantly gowned women, some of them young, lovely, and flirtatious as they waited for entrйe; lovers and mistresses, Lewrie determined. Wives seemed more dowdy, even though gaudied up something sinful in the same semi-translucent fabrics as the young and firm-bodied. And there were so many egret plumes in hats and hairdos that Lewrie could conjure that every bird in Europe was now bare-arsed.
A majordomo or master of ceremonies loudly announced each pair as they were allowed in, crying above the soft strains of a string orchestra over in one corner of the vast baroque hall. Their turn came at last; first Sir Anthony, then, "Capitaine de Vaisseau а la Marine de Guerre Britannique, Alain Lui… Lew-rie, et Madame Caroline Lewrie!"
That turned quite a number of heads, made officers grip their sword hilts or pause with their champagne glasses halfway to their lips, forced women to goggle or comment behind their fans, and flutter them in faint alarm, as if a fox had been allowed into their chicken coop.
"Are we so infamous?" Caroline had to ask in a soft mutter near his ear once more, her cool and regal smile still plastered on her face.
"We're English… We must be," Lewrie chuckled back. "How do, all," he said to the crowd in a soft voice, nodding and smiling, almost waving in their general direction as they paced down the centre of the reception hall. "Now, Sir Anthony… where the Devil do they keep the bloody champagne?"
First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte had completed his toilet after leaving his bath; his usual routine followed to the letter. He washed his hands with almond paste, his face, neck, and ears with scented soap (from La Contessa's, in point of fact, in the Place Victor), picked his teeth with a boxwood stem, brushed twice, with paste then powdered coral. Stripped to the waist, dressing robe tossed aside and standing in a flannel vest and underdrawers, he had Constant trickle eau de cologne over his head (also from Phoebe Aretino's) whilst he brushed his skin with stiff bristles, and had Constant do his back.
Napoleon donned stockings, white cashmere breeches, and a silk shirt with a fine muslin cravat, with a white cashmere waist-coat over that. He spent his morning at work 'til eleven, when he dined lightly. Then, still in a foul mood, he at last made his decision about what he would wear to the levee. The scarlet-trimmed dark green Chasseur uniform was militant, but not nearly enough.
Bonaparte ordered his dress general's uniform, the long blue tail-coat with the lavish gilt lace trim and scrolls of acanthus leaves. Top-boots, and a red-white-blue Tricolour sash about his waist, over the double-breasted uniform coat.
"Bon" he decided, looking in the cheval mirror. Lastly, he stuck a scented handkerchief in a pocket and a small snuff box into another, nodded to Constant, and headed down to attend the levee… and put those damned Anglais, those lying sanglants, in their place.
Oh, it was an elegant crowd attending the levee! Lewrie expected a scruffy Jacobin mob of sans culottes in ill-fitting coats and red Liberty caps, perhaps leaving their scythes and pitchforks at the door, a bunch of old peasant women knitting and rocking where they could get a good view of the next beheading, but… there were frosty foreign ministers from half of Europe (minus the Prussians and Austrians, of course) with their wives or temporary local courtesans; there were all those aforementioned officers from the Guard, the Chasseurs, the Line infantry, Lancers, and Light Dragoons, the heavy cavalry Cuirassiers and allied officers from the Dutch Batavian Republic, and all of Napoleon's Italian allies… the conquered but cooperative.
Instead of ragged commoners with unshaven chins and loose, long hair, the civilian male attendees were dressed so well they could give Sir Pulteney Plumb a run for his money, and a fair number of them had the graceful and languid airs that Lewrie thought more commonly seen at a royal reception, a gathering of aristocrats, which all the world knew were so despised by staunch French Republicans.
"One'd think they were all titled… waitin' for King Louis the Sixteenth t'come dancin' in," Lewrie pointed out to Sir Anthony as the three of them made a slow counter-clockwise circuit of the hall. "What happened t'all that 'noble commoner' nonsense?"
"Most of the great voices of the Revolution are now conveniently dead sir," Sir Anthony simpered back. "Napoleon has even gone so far as to allow the churches to re-open, and the Catholic Church to restore its presence… with power only over its priests and nuns, not over the state and of course, without its former wealth. That's gone for muskets and cannon. The joie de vivre of your common Frenchman cannot be suppressed The draconian edicts of the Jacobins against riches, their dour insistence on Equality and Fraternity, were too much a pie-eyed idyllic dream, d'ye see, Captain Lewrie. It's against all human nature to believe that one could invent a classless society, with all individual effort directed in support of the state!
"Besides, drinking, eating, and living well, having fine things, and making money is every man's fondest wish," Sir Anthony said with a wry chuckle as he touched his nose with a scented handkerchief. "Next thing you know, this Bonaparte will make himself First Consul for Life, and surround himself with a royal court. Titles will come back, just you wait and see. It'll be m'sieur vicomte and madame baroness 'stead of citoyen and citoyenne, you mark my words."
"Pity our own politicians, like Fox or Priestley, who admired the French Revolution," Caroline said. "How disappointed they must be to see the French slip back to having aristocracy."
"We should begin to introduce you and your good lady about," their young diplomat announced. "The civilian sorts, I'd expect. The military types might be a tad too gruff with us."
"Sounds good," Lewrie began to say, then froze in his tracks. Holy Christ, it's '96 all over again! he thought, goggling at two people he hadn't seen since a night ashore in Genoa in one case, and a night in bed at shore lodgings in Leghorn, in the other.
It was Signore Marcello di Silvano, that hefty and handsome Italian millionaire, once the most powerful senator in the Genoese Republic, the man the old spymaster Zachariah Twigg had identitied as the prime leader of the Last Romans. Lewrie could not be mistaken; the fellow was wearing the same glaring white figured-satin suit with the royal purple trim, the same heavy gold medallion and chain of office atop an aquamarine moirй-silk sash. It appeared that Silvano had picked up a few more baubles of honour to pin to his coat breast, too, most likely from Napoleon.
On his arm, though, was the woman who'd spied on Lewrie and influenced him, pretending to be a North Italian Lombard, but really French from near the Swiss border
…! Claudia Mastandrea, looking almost as young and fetching as ever-she of the large, round, and firm breasts that she'd pressed either side of Lewrie's face, of the wealth of sandy blond hair, of large brown eyes, nipples, and areolae the size of Maria Theresa silver dollars! The spy Twigg had ordered him to bed, to pass on disinformation, and a good round lie or two, blabbed in the drowsy afterglow of throbbing, thrashing, hair-tossing, "View, Halloo!" sex!
Signore Silvano (now Duke of Genoa under one of Napoleon's kin) bestowed upon Lewrie a curled-lipped smile and a grave inclination of his head. "Get to you later!" that smile seemed to promise.
From Claudia Mastandrea, Lewrie got one of those momentary gasps and a most-fetching upward heave of her impressive mammaries as she recognised him, as well. Then came a sly, seductive smile, a tilt of her head, a lowering of her chin and lashes.
"Ma'am," Lewrie managed to mutter as he nodded. Thank God but Silvano was of no mind to wait for an introduction, but strolled past, tucking his long-time paramour a little closer to his elbow.
Lewrie took a cautious look over his left shoulder after they had passed, and… Claudia Mastandrea winked at him!
"Someone else you know in Paris… my dear?" Caroline asked. "Ah, hem… met that fellow in Genoa, when I had Jester," he replied, thinking himself quick on his feet for so saying. "A senator at the time… 'til the French bought him off. Already owned half or more of the damned place. A nasty article, Signore Silvano."
"Oh, now this is a good show," Paisley-Templeton excitedly told them, jutting his chin towards the space before the orchestra, where a few younger couples had begun to dance. "Not for them your everyday quadrille or contre-danse, such as we have at home. They're doing the gavotte, a most intricate dance. Takes years of study and practise to perform properly. I fancy myself as a dab-hand at dancing, yet… it is so complicated, the gavotte! I despair of ever learning it."
You look the sort, Lewrie told himself uncharitably. "Napoleon, did you know, refuses to dance unless they play the monaco," Sir Anthony tossed off, intent upon the dancers with glee in his expression, his champagne glass hand gently marking the time, and even essaying a sway and faint shuffle of his feet. "The monaco is simple… as is the new dance that comes from Vienna, the waltz. Means 'walking,' I suppose, or something near it. One actually embraces one's partner… with a discreet space between, of course," he said, lifting his left hand in the air, extending his right. "A couple holds hands… here, the lady places her hand on her partner's shoulder, and the gentleman places his hand on his partner's waist. One dances a box, One step forward for the man, one backwards for the lady… one step to the right for both, then back for the man, forward for the lady, and then left back to where one started, before performing a half-turn to the right, and beginning the box again. Swooping… elegant. Romantic… yet perhaps too racy for English society, more's the pity."
"It has been Christmas since we danced," Caroline said, quite taken with the dancers' movements. "Perhaps if they do play something familiar to us… once we're done with Napoleon… "
"After I've had more champagne," Lewrie said. He'd once been a dab-hand himself in the parlours, at the subscription balls, but it had been years, and stumbling about canted decks on his sea legs was not conducive to elegance or fine style. He was sure he would clump!
As if he'd said "open sesame" a liveried waiter appeared with a tray bearing fresh glasses of champagne. Lewrie gallantly clinked glasses with his wife and turned away to sip deep… and spluttered and coughed.
"M'sieur," Charitй Angelette de Guilleri said as she dipped in a graceful curtsy, on the arm of an officer of Chasseurs, who knocked off a faint bow, wondering who the Devil his girl was greeting.
"Mademoiselle," Lewrie managed to say, bestowing a "leg" in reply, suddenly feeling the heat of the room in late summer, and its crowded body heat of hundreds of attendees. Breaking out in a funk-sweat would be more to the point!
"Madame," Charitй continued with a maddeningly serene smile on her face, curtsying to Caroline this time. "Enchantй."
"Mademoiselle… ?" Caroline said, responding in kind, confused, feeling a flush of heat herself, and wondering if she was being twitted by an impudent mort who wished to insult a Briton.
It didn't help that Charitй was in an Egyptian-pleated gown of such thin, shimmery pale blue stuff that Lewrie didn't have to use his imagination to recall every succulent inch of her. Her hair was up in the ringleted style а la Josйphine, a plumed, wide-brimmed hat on her head, a furled parasol in one lace-gloved hand, and a tiny reticule hung from an elbow.
"Pardon, Madame, but I was also in the parfumerie La Contessa the other day," Charitй said with wide-eyed, lash-batting innocence, "and wish to express my regrets you did not find anything satisfactory, for it is the grandest establishment. A thousand pardons for my boldness, but… you are English? How marvellous that we are at peace, and you may enjoy the splendours of Paris, the most magnificent city in all Europe, n'est-ce pas? I may make your acquaintance?"
She got a pistol in that reticule? was Lewrie's prime thought, quickly followed by; Christ, just open a hole in the floor, and let me through it! Who-the-bloody-else is goin' t'turn up?
He surreptitiously gave Charitй a careful looking-over; in New Orleans, she'd had a habit, when carousing in men's suitings, of keeping a dagger up a sleeve; did she today have it strapped to one of her shapely-slim thighs?
"… and Captain Alan Lewrie, of his Britannic Majesty's Navy, Mademoiselle de Guilleri," Sir Anthony was happily babbling away, glad to have some Frogs to present. "Captain Lewrie, may I name to you Mademoiselle Charitй de Guilleri, and Major Denis Clary."
"Your servant, Mademoiselle de Guilleri… Major Clary, your servant, as well," Lewrie was forced to respond with another "leg" to both of them, gritting his teeth to appear polite.
"Captain Lewrie will be presented to the First Consul today," Paisley-Templeton grandly announced. "An exchange of captured swords. General Bonaparte once made Captain Lewrie a prisoner, temporarily, at Toulon, and still has Captain Lewrie's sword."
"You refused parole, m'sieur?" Major Clary asked, amazed that a man would not accept the relative comfort of a very loose sort of imprisonment in civilian lodgings, with his pay continuing 'til exchanged for an officer of his own rank.
"I would not abandon my sailors to the hulks, Major," Lewrie responded. "It would've cut a bit rough t'just walk away from them and be… comfortable."
While Major Denis Clary was trying to sort out the phrase cut a bit rough, Charitй stuck her own in. She seemed to find his choice honourable-wide-eyed astonishment and all-but, "The Capitaine Lewrie is surely courageous. As ferocious as Denis, here, a hero of Hohenlinden and Marengo, n'est-ce pas?"
She batted her lashes nigh-fit to stir a small breeze, playing the innocent minx, eliciting congratulatory coos from Sir Anthony, and a moue and shrug of false modesty from her companion to be so praised.
"Quel dommage, such choice was not given to my brothers, Helio and Hippolyte," Charitй continued, suddenly turning solemn and all but dabbing at one eye with a handkerchief. "Or, my cousin Jean-Marie who perished for the glory of France." Charitй glared directly at the author of their deaths, making Lewrie purse his lips and frown, sure that she'd claw his eyes out, given half a chance. "You will exchange swords with Napoleon, n'est-ce pas? I only hope that some of those swords are not theirs, Capitaine Lewrie. That would be so tragique."
She's gotten teeth, Lewrie thought, fighting a wince, recalling those names; Good God A'mighty, can this get even worse?
"I do not recall those names being associated with the swords I brought mademoiselle," he told her, glancing at her soldier companion. "These were surrendered by naval officers, at sea… well, picked up more than surrendered, since their owners had fallen."
Major Clary curled a lip in faint disgust over the fate of fellow French officers, even if he held a low opinion of his nation's navy, and how little it had accomplished since the war's star
t in 1793.
"Yayss, well…," Paisley-Templeton placated.
"Honour to make your acquaintance, m'sieur" Major Clary said, eager to end their chat. "Madame, Capitaine?"
"Your servant, sir… mademoiselle" Lewrie replied with one more bow to each, hoping that that was over and done with.
"That little… whore!" Caroline muttered as they departed.
Oh shit, she's plumbed to it! Lewrie gawped to himself; now she knows about Charitй, too! Oh yes, it can get worse!
Lewrie tried to bluster his way out of it. "Why call her a-"
"Her!" Caroline snapped, flicking her fan open in the direction of the orchestra, and the dancers. For there, now the orchestra had ended the long gavotte and gone on to a simpler minuet or quadrille air, was Phoebe Aretino, swanning gracefully through the figures, partnered with a tall, mustachioed Colonel of the Guard Infantry… and sneaking brief but longing glances at Lewrie, before his wife caught her at it!
Christ, it'll be Emma Hamilton next! Lewrie miserably told himself; Irish Tess, Lady Cantner… even Soft Rabbit's ghost! Lord, but I need another drink! Now!
"And… here he comes now," Paisley-Templeton said with enthusiasm as the orchestra quickly ended their air, and the tall double-doors at the far end of the long hall opened. People scampered from the centre of the floor to form up on either side as the First Consul made his entrance, hands behind his back and looking as if his boots were pinching his toes. "Now, what does his choice of uniform mean? Oh! Perhaps he expected you in uniform, and means to honour you, sir," Sir Anthony whispered with a hopeful smile.
It took better than three-quarters of an hour for them to find out what Napoleon's martial appearance meant, for there were other luminaries for the First Consul to greet; and Sir Anthony was more than happy to point them out and name them for the Lewries. There were generals, of course, the odd French admiral, men high in Bonaparte's government, along with composers, scientists, philosophers, and academics; civil engineers enrolled to expand the French road and canal systems, as well as actors and actresses, famed singers, and playwrights from the Comйdie Franзaise, even a scruffy, artistic poet or three. There was the crafty (some might say duplicitous) Foreign Minister, Charles Maurice Talleyrand-Pйrigord, a tall and spare former aristo and former powerful bishop with a taste for silly, and impressionable, young women. There were members of distinguished and titled old families of France, mostly those who had somehow escaped the rabid purges during the Reign of Terror, whose sons had atoned for their sins of privilege on the battlefield, and were now held blameless.
King, Ship, and Sword l-16 Page 15