The Ambitious Madame Bonaparte

by Chatlien, Ruth Hull

  “When we were in Washington, Vice-President Burr told me about a honeymoon journey that his daughter Theodosia took there. More people are settling the area all the time, and inns are to be found almost the whole way.”

  Patterson slapped the table. “Jerome, with the British seeking to capture you, you should avoid Niagara at all costs. It lies on the border with Canada.”

  “We will travel under an assumed name—Monsieur and Madame d’Albert—and we will not cross to the Canadian side.”

  Betsy placed her half-eaten scone on her plate. She had never considered doing anything so rugged as the proposed trip, but the enthusiasm she saw on Jerome’s face and the memory of his seeming relish for battle made her wonder if, as a virile young man, he might require a more active life than she did. “All right, Jerome. We will go to Niagara.”

  Patterson pushed back his chair. “If you are determined to pursue this reckless endeavor, then I will return to Baltimore as soon as possible. I for one have serious business to attend to.”

  DESPITE REASSURING HIS father-in-law that inns existed almost as far as Niagara, once William Patterson departed, Jerome told Betsy that he wanted to camp during the latter stage of their journey. “It will help preserve our secrecy.”

  “Is it safe?”

  “I have been told that as long as we have a fire burning all night, that should be sufficient to keep danger at bay.”

  Betsy did not find Jerome’s answer reassuring, but she acceded to his obvious excitement. With a nod she said, “With you as my protector, what do I have to fear?”

  Under his direction, she packed simple cotton dresses, her riding habit, leather ankle boots, and an old leghorn hat with a veil for protection. Jerome packed his oldest clothes and assembled a travel kit of two bedrolls and a knapsack that held canteens, a hunting knife, a hatchet, a tinderbox, a spyglass, and some ointments prepared by Dr. Garnier. He also bought saddles and bridles, which they would need on the final portion of their trip.

  To travel from New York to Albany, they boarded a sloop on the Hudson River. The lower half of the Hudson was an estuary, so for two six-hour periods each day the incoming tides of the Atlantic Ocean pushed saltwater up the Hudson River channel past the capital, flowing at a considerable rate and reversing the river’s current. In the summer, the prevailing winds blew from the south, which gave an additional push to sailboats on their journey upstream.

  The sloop had a single mast that was rigged with a jib sail forward and both a topsail and a gaff-rigged mainsail aft. Accommodations for a dozen people took up nearly the entire quarterdeck, but each cabin was tiny with only room for a bunk and a washstand.

  Betsy quickly perceived that despite their incognito, Jerome was not discreet enough to keep others from guessing his identity. The first morning she steered her irritated husband away from accosting a clump of businessmen—some Federalist, others Republican—who were arguing about whether President Jefferson was a “damn fool” for his pro-French opinions.

  The other passengers included the twenty-year-old son of a New York state legislator, two men who made their living poling rafts, a wizened Revolutionary War colonel, and a half-soused schoolteacher. Betsy was the only woman aboard. To keep Jerome from spilling their secret, she told him she did not want to associate with such vulgar companions.

  The first day, they sailed past the Palisades, a stretch of towering reddish cliffs scored by deep vertical notches. Mounds of shrubbery grew between the cliff base and riverbank. The steep, craggy walls astonished Betsy. After lunch, she sat on a bench on the open deck sketching the landscape while Jerome sat at her side teasing her that she rivaled Gilbert Stuart.

  The next day, they entered the Highlands, where rounded green mountains rose on each side of the river. “Can you believe the stark landscape of yesterday gave way to this undulating country?” Betsy asked.

  She turned to Jerome, who stood beside her at the railing, admiring the scenery and sniffing the fragrant air. “I am so happy to be in hilly country again. This puts me in mind of Corsica.”

  He pointed to a shallow tidal pool along a stretch of sandy beach hugged by a curving cliff. Betsy saw two young boys wading at the edge of the water. One of them poked a stick into a clump of aquatic plants and then reached in to pull out a blue crab, which he grasped at the back away from the snapping claws. After waving the crab overhead triumphantly, he carried it to a cloth-covered wooden bucket on the beach.

  “My friends and I used to go crabbing when I was a boy,” Jerome murmured and then walked to a bench near the bow. Betsy followed and sat beside him.

  He took her hand and gently pulled her fingers. “That scene reminded me of my boyhood. We did not always have enough money, but to me life seemed simple and easy. Finding a crab for supper felt like a victory as great as any of Napoleon’s conquests.”

  “Oh, Jerome. I think you grow weary of your prolonged idleness.”

  He stopped playing with her hand and enclosed it between both of his. “I begin to feel that my brother is right and that I am not acting the part of a man. I should be defending France instead of dawdling in America with you.”

  Betsy yanked her hand free. “Then why did you not sail back on the Didon?”

  “It would have been foolhardy.” Jerome rubbed his upper lip. “I know your brothers think me an idle fool, but I am not so feckless as they believe. I have two duties. One is to you, Elisa, and the other is to France, and I have not yet devised a way to fulfill both with honor. Unless we can change my brother’s mind, I shall have to break faith with my family and my country, and how then will I ever achieve anything worth remembering? What is more, I miss my mama and my brothers and sisters, and I feel like an exile in this alien country of yours.”

  “If you dislike the United States so much, why did you come here?”

  Staring at a thick, oily rope coiled upon the deck, Jerome sighed. “While I was cruising in the West Indies, I fired a warning shot at an unidentified merchant ship that refused our signal to heave to. I sent a boat alongside, and when the crew discovered she was a British ship, I made my apologies and thought that would suffice since the Peace of Amiens was still in effect. My admiral, however, feared the incident might provoke war, so he ordered me to return to France and make my report to Napoleon. We agreed that coming to the United States to seek passage in a neutral vessel was the best plan, and once here, I called upon my friend Joshua Barney.”

  Betsy felt a crack rupture the edifice of her belief in Jerome. All this time, she had assumed that he came to the United States on a mission when he had been merely fleeing the consequences of a rash mistake. For the first time, she understood why Napoleon dismissed their marriage as a youthful error best set aside and forgotten. History had taught him to expect little else from Jerome. The realization did not bolster Betsy’s hope of winning the emperor’s favor.

  “Madame du Pont made a suggestion last week. She thinks you should take up a profession in this country so that we can live free of the threat of Napoleon’s vengeance.”

  Jerome frowned. “I thought that your dearest desire is to leave Baltimore.”

  “It is, but if we cannot enter France as man and wife, we shall have to live somewhere else. In America, at least, we have a wide acquaintance. Do you think we could contrive to be happy if we lived here?”

  “Here?” He gestured at the scenery. “Do you mean for us to settle among these hills?”

  She smiled. “Perhaps, or close to the shore. You can be a Corsican fisherman, and I will be a fisherman’s wife, selling your catch to passing travelers.”

  “They would be so dazzled by your beauty that they would buy more than they need, and we would grow as rich as kings.” Then Jerome shrugged. “Such a life is possible, I suppose. It would be gratifying to be answerable to no one but ourselves.”

  Betsy heard doubt in his voice. “But you would miss the society of Paris.”

  “Not as much as I would miss you, Elisa, should Napoleon
have his way.”

  “Which brings us back to the question of what to do.”

  Jerome put a consoling arm around her. “You should not fret. The reason I planned this excursion was to relieve your anxiety. Do not worry, my love. I will find a way to work everything out.”

  Betsy leaned against his shoulder and murmured, “I hope so.”

  AT THE STATE capital, they left the sloop and took seats on a stagecoach to Utica, which was a two-day journey away, heading west-northwest. As the coach drove from the river to the western edge of Albany, Betsy gazed out the window. She marveled at how different the architecture was from that of Baltimore. Several buildings had step-gable roofs that gave the skyline a saw-tooth appearance. Some houses even had upper-story doors but no stairs leading up to them. “What is the purpose of those?” she asked the Revolutionary War colonel, who was also taking the coach.

  “Oh, that’s a feature often found in Dutch houses. They haul up heavy furniture using block and tackle and take it into the house through those doors rather than struggling to carry it up the inside stairs. See the pulley near the apex of the roof?”

  “A very ingenious idea,” Jerome said.

  By the time they left the city and were out in open country, Betsy realized this stage of the journey was going to be less comfortable than she had hoped. The coach was old and in poor repair, with threadbare upholstery and springs that no longer cushioned the shocks of bumpy roads. The colonel and the schoolteacher who accompanied them were both disagreeable men. The colonel complained of his rheumatism and swore at each jolt. The teacher started each day pleasantly enough, but he tippled constantly and by mid-morning was maudlin.

  “I am meant for finer things than exile to the wilderness. Look at these hands.” He held out his pudgy, milk-white extremities. “Madam, are these the hands of a rustic buffoon?”

  “No, sir, they are very fine,” Betsy answered, hoping her sarcastic tone would squelch further confidences.

  “I am the victim of vicious gossip. It was my custom to call upon my students’ families of a Sabbath afternoon. One Sunday last spring, I awoke late, so I took no food before setting out. It was a fearsome hot day, and each family I visited pressed me to take a little wine for refreshment. By the supper hour, I was tipsy from the unaccustomed quantities of drink. This gave rise to the rumor that I was an inveterate sot, which I assure you, madam, I am not. But they sacked me without ceremony, so I must journey west.” Tears ran down his red cheeks. “I will probably die by the hand of a savage Indian.”

  “Don’t be a goddamned fool,” shouted the colonel, who sat beside him. “The tribes of western New York have been peaceful for many a year. You are more likely to die tripping over your piss pot and breaking your neck.”

  Jerome stirred. Betsy feared he was about to remonstrate with the men for their vulgarity, but instead he asked, “Is that true, sir, that the savages of western New York are subdued?”

  The old man squinted at him suspiciously. “Yes, by gad, it is true. Where do you come from, young fella? You sound foreign.”

  Betsy held her breath until Jerome said, “France. I am fleeing Napoleon’s tyranny.”

  “Ah, cannot say I blame you for refusing to live under that blackguard.”

  Intervening before the man could utter more criticisms of Napoleon, Betsy said, “Sir, would you be so good as to tell us what Revolutionary battles you took part in?”

  To her relief, the colonel and Jerome began to discuss military matters.

  AT UTICA, JEROME hired horses and bought provisions for the final leg of their journey, which would take at least ten days. “We should travel in easy stages since you are unaccustomed to riding all day.”

  “Perhaps at the start, but my stamina may improve,” Betsy said, trying to hide her nerves about traveling through wilderness.

  Jerome smiled at her. “Do not be anxious, Elisa. We have no need of hurry, and I do not intend to push you. This excursion is meant to restore your health.”

  To Betsy’s surprise, the lands directly west of Utica were heavily settled. They passed farmhouses, fields of wheat and corn, a canal that linked the Mohawk River with a creek, and a reservation that the Oneida Indians had been granted for siding with the Patriots during the Revolution. The first night, the Bonapartes stayed in an inn because they failed to find deserted land for camping. Betsy was stiff from riding all day, so she was grateful to sleep in a bed.

  Their second day, the road passed through mixed forests of beech, maple, hickory, poplar, elm, and oak. Dappled shade fell across the road most of the day, making for a pleasant ride, and Jerome amused Betsy by telling her about the tropical plants and birds of the West Indies.

  Toward evening, they halted just before a wooden bridge that spanned a stream cutting across their route. Betsy noticed a rank smell in the air. Jerome gestured to the right, where an opening in the trees looked like the beginning of a trail. “I am going to explore that path and search for a clearing where we can camp.” He dismounted, tied his horse to a sapling beside the road, and headed into the trees.

  Betsy pressed her lips together and peered after him until a bend in the trail took him from sight. Her horse moved restlessly, so Betsy patted it and murmured, “Whoa.”

  As the minutes passed, she stared down the road, first in one direction and then the other. The smell was making her ill, and being alone made her uneasy. The undergrowth beneath the trees was so thick that it was impossible to tell if anything was hiding there.

  When Jerome returned, he said, “There is a clearing. I think someone might have started to build a house here, but they did not progress very far.”

  He helped Betsy dismount from her sidesaddle, and she walked a ways to stretch her sore legs. As she glanced down to check where she was stepping, she saw a long cylindrical object ringed with dark jagged bands lying across the road. Following it with her eyes, she realized it was a snake that had been run over by a wheeled cart; the body was smashed near the head and the dirt showed traces of blood. Betsy stepped back, even though she knew it was dead, and then looked for the snake’s tail. It had rattles.

  “Jerome, we cannot stay here. There are rattlesnakes.”

  He came up beside her to stare at it. “Zut! So that is the source of the stink.” Putting an arm around her, he squeezed her shoulders. “The serpent is dead and can do us no harm.”

  “There may be others. Robert once found a whole nest of copperheads at Springfield.”

  Jerome looked up at the sky. The sun had sunk behind the treetops, and shadow completely covered the road. “It is too late to go farther. If this region is infested with snakes, the danger will exist wherever we go. We should set up our camp now while there is still light.”

  Betsy wanted to argue with him, but he grabbed their horses’ reins and began leading them down the trail he had discovered. Tears pricked Betsy’s eyes as she lifted her skirts and followed him. The trail was barely six inches wide. Ferns, small shrubs, and saplings encroached upon it from either side, and she disliked having them brush against her as she passed.

  After a few minutes, they emerged into a small clearing. Betsy halted and looked around. The rocky stream ran along one edge of an open area dotted with stumps. Someone had chopped down several trees and dragged them to the far side of the clearing, which was higher than the ground beside the stream. Betsy could see that the axeman had cleaned the logs by stripping their branches. As she wondered why he had abandoned the site so soon after starting construction, a sense of foreboding settled on her.

  Near the center of the clearing was a circle of rocks surrounding a shallow fire pit. Glancing into the woods, Betsy saw several mossy outcroppings of stone. The stench of dead snake was no longer noticeable; instead, she could smell leaf mold and resin.

  As Betsy stood pensively, trying to imagine sleeping out of doors, Jerome went to his bags and found his hatchet. Then he removed his coat and began to chop some of the discarded branches for firewood. He told
Betsy to gather kindling and tinder. When she started toward the edge of the clearing to look for dried grasses and bits of peeled bark, a movement caught her eye.

  She halted and found herself facing a fox that stood just inside the first line of trees. The animal had frozen with its head slightly lowered. A tree blocked part of its body and ferns hid its feet, but Betsy could see its red fur, upright ears, and pointed snout.

  “Jerome!” she said in a loud whisper. She turned her head to catch his attention.

  He was in the midst of swinging his hatchet. After finishing the stroke, he wiped his forehead with his shirtsleeve. “What?”

  Betsy looked back toward the woods, but the fox had gone. “Oh,” she said in disappointment. “It left.”

  “Elisa, what are you talking about?” After leaning his hatchet against a log, he walked toward her.

  “I saw a fox over there.”

  Jerome bent to kiss her. “A pity I did not have my pistols to hand. I could have gotten you a fur collar.”

  “I am glad you did not. It was beautiful, and foxes do not hurt people, do they?”

  “No.” Jerome returned to his chopping. As Betsy gathered up twigs and leaves for tinder, she wished she had brought a basket on their journey. Then her mind returned to the fox. She had rarely been so close to a wild creature. The experience had unnerved her at first, but then she had felt a kinship with the animal, which after all was only trying to make its way in the world.

  Dusk fell before they finished making camp, and mosquitoes began to bite. Jerome built a large campfire, and its smoke helped drive away the troublesome insects. Then he went down to the stream to fetch water.

  As Betsy unpacked the bread and cheese they brought for their supper, she heard a loud half-snarling cry from somewhere in the woods, followed by a terrible, almost human scream. Too frightened to move, she stared into the darkness and waited. After a few moments, she heard something heavy moving in the brush, and she started to tremble. “Jerome?” she called, but her voice was too weak to carry. Betsy pressed both hands against her stomach and swallowed hard.