Celeste

by Roland Perry

  This was also against her doctor’s instructions regarding her recovery. She was not supposed to put herself under pressure of any kind. But she set about this new assignment with her usual fervour and produced five acts of the play in five nights. Friends to whom she showed it gushed over it. Fournier, who would have to make a commercial decision, was not so enthusiastic.

  Céleste thought she could make the transition from book prose to playwriting. But like many before and since, she found the conversion tougher than it looked. Her prose was descriptive; the play demanded more of a visual sense and comprehension of stagecraft. Fournier said she should leave it until she was well and suggested that some of her playwright friends could assist in the adaptation. Céleste felt let down by the knowledge that another dimension of fame, and a source of modest extra funds, would not be coming her way as quickly as she wished.

  On 7 March, she received Lionel’s last letter. He seemed content, even resigned to his condition.

  ‘I had a terrible premonition last night,’ Anne-Victoire told Céleste when she visited her on 24 March.

  ‘About what?’ Céleste asked. ‘Lionel? Me? What?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  The doctor arrived at the same time and distracted Céleste from probing her mother more. He had heard Anne-Victoire’s remarks.

  ‘You women don’t make my work any easier,’ he said with a smile. ‘It’s hard enough dealing with the natural, let alone the supernatural.’

  He examined Céleste.

  ‘You’re making good progress,’ he said, and glancing at Anne-Victoire, added, ‘and you’ll only become sick again if you travel. Don’t think of going to Australia for the foreseeable future.’

  On his way out, the doctor met the postman. He took the only letter to be delivered and returned with it to the house. It was postmarked from Australia.

  ‘This is not the count’s handwriting,’ he said sombrely to Céleste.

  She tore open the envelope. Lionel’s wedding ring fell to the floor. She picked it up. There was also a lock of hair inside the letter. Céleste fainted.

  ‘I heard the sound of my head hitting the tiled floor,’ she recalled later, ‘but I felt no pain.’

  When she regained consciousness her mother and doctor were by her side. The doctor read the long accompanying letter from Fauchery, which told, in at times dramatic terms, of Lionel’s last days: how a priest heard his confession and administered the sacraments; how he made his will; and how he was lucid and with a minimum of pain at the end.

  The letter was of little comfort at first. Céleste sobbed all through the reading. When the doctor had finished, she said with chilling certitude, ‘I just want to die. There’s nothing in the world I care about now.’

  ‘My dear woman,’ the doctor said, ‘you have responsibilities to Solange.’

  ‘It’s all so meaningless now,’ Céleste said through tears. ‘It’s over!’

  Anne-Victoire was crying.

  The doctor moved close to Céleste and whispered in her ear, ‘Your mother is old! You’re upsetting her dreadfully.’

  Céleste was in shock. She remained in her room in a surreal, depressed state for a fortnight.

  CHAPTER 45

  Title Fight: Return Bouts

  Céleste’s recovery was aided by her desire to have Lionel’s body brought home to France for burial. It was not the easy process she envisaged. The major problem was that not one ship’s captain was prepared to take a coffin on board. Furthermore, Lionel’s lawyer informed her that the body could not be exhumed in Melbourne. It was simply too hot and there was a real fear of epidemics that doctors of the time did not know how to treat or cure.

  The situation galvanised her and gave her something to live for. She petitioned every relevant authority in France and the Victorian colony, but to no avail. As a last resort she wrote to Napoleon III, whose office sent a polite ‘no’ to interceding. Defeated but still with a Plan B, she sent bronzed iron ornaments and wreaths to Melbourne for Lionel’s grave.

  ‘I made a rough sketch for the workman of what I wanted,’ she wrote in her diary. She also made a special trip to Bordeaux to instruct the captain of the boat taking the tomb artefacts to Melbourne.

  Still quietly in despair over Lionel’s death at just thirty-seven, and after five years of marriage and a relationship of twelve years, Céleste was consumed with organising dedications to him. Her next move was to see the chief editor of the highly respected newspaper L’Illustration. She persuaded him to publish a portrait of Lionel. Then she returned to Berry and stayed for a while at Solange’s boarding school, the convent at Ardentes. While there, she obtained permission from local authorities to have two-metre-high iron crosses erected at the intersection of the two roads leading from Poinçonnet to Châteauroux forest. They were decorated with marble plaques bearing a gold-lettered memorial inscription to Lionel. Céleste was doing all she could to have him remembered in the region ‘he had loved so much, and for which he had done so much good in happier times’. A local priest blessed the crosses and the event attracted a big crowd.

  Céleste returned to Paris, now with a more rational and responsible attitude towards caring for the elderly Anne-Victoire and young Solange. She had almost no money left and her first stop was at Librairie Nouvelle to collect funds owing for the publication of her Mémoires, now grateful that she had not won the legal fight to have the second edition stopped. She made her peace with Monsieur Bourdilliat, who apologised for publishing the book in the first place, once he learned she was a married woman. To demonstrate his good faith he bought a novella from her, Is He Mad?, which she dedicated to Lionel.

  This continual, sometimes frenetic activity had strengthened Céleste’s mind, although she still had only half her normal physical strength and energy. She would take a seat or lie down at every opportunity, but kept on with this ritual, sad and depressing process of tidying up everything to do with her husband.

  Céleste was summoned to see Ferdinand-Marie Viscount de Lesseps at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the man who had allowed Lionel to take leave after three years in Melbourne. He was embarrassed to see her looking so unwell, especially with what he had to discuss. De Lesseps, directed by the Chabrillan family, and in particular, Lionel’s brother, wanted her to relinquish her title of Countess de Chabrillan. He asked about the circumstances of her marriage contract in England.

  ‘It’s impossible for you to keep the title and the name of a family who—’

  ‘Who would like to destroy my marriage?’ she said, cutting him off. ‘Lionel thought of that, Count. He married me twice and no power on earth has the right or the ability to undo what he did.’

  ‘But,’ de Lesseps said, ‘if we could come to some arrangement . . .’

  ‘Never!’ she said. ‘It would be disrespectful to his memory. He has given me his name and I will bear it until my dying day. I will make sure that it survives me.’

  ‘That’s just what we want to avoid,’ de Lesseps said, his pity evaporated and replaced by annoyance. ‘You must spare yourself the arguments of a lawsuit, which . . .’

  Céleste stood up to leave.

  ‘Is that all you have to say to me, Count?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, but surely it’s enough to make you reflect on undertaking a course of action that could only do you harm.’

  Céleste stared him down, repeating that she would keep the Chabrillan name and title.

  ‘He knew who I was when he gave them to me,’ she said, ‘and since then I have done, and will continue to do, my utmost to bear them with dignity.’

  De Lesseps, not wanting to face the Chabrillans without a win, attempted to bribe her.

  ‘But you have no means of support,’ he said.

  Céleste scoffed. ‘You will never be strong enough to break me, Count!’

  ‘I’m authorised to offer you 6000 francs a year if you give up your title.’

  ‘Thanks,’ she said, ‘but no thanks. There’s no pri
ce the family can offer.’

  She left de Lesseps’s office fuming. Despite her frailty, she was invigorated by the prospect of a fight for her title.

  A few weeks later, de Lesseps’ failure to intimidate or bribe Céleste led the head of the Chabrillan family, Marquis Marie-Olivier, to again meet her to try to resolve the issue. Céleste had put on some weight and was looking closer to her best. She was thirty-four and on the way back to being one of the most sensual and beautiful women of the mid-nineteenth century. She would never match the stunning younger women in the demimonde and other social sets, but there was another dimension to Céleste in her maturity. While many of the top courtesans of her generation were fading or had faded into obscurity, she was still a name, or rather two names—Mogador and the Countess de Chabrillan. She was also an author with two big-selling books in France and a new reputation. Her intellect sparkled as much as her character and personality. The countess, growing with every experience, was a person to be reckoned with by anyone from the top to the bottom of French society. From one perspective, Céleste had taken a position of power and status with her successful conquest of Lionel. However, she had deepened and widened her own status by her hard work. This was not the woman of 1850 whom Marie-Olivier had tried to persuade not to marry his brother.

  The marquis, neither a lothario, hard worker or achiever, had lived mainly off the family inheritance. Though he put on an act of distaste for his younger brother’s less conventional life, especially his adventures as a miner and consul, his own life had never remotely reached the excitement of Lionel’s. And there had never been anyone with the sex appeal, drive, ambition and achievements like Céleste among the women he knew. In Marie-Olivier’s aristocratic circles, women were kept in their place; they were not driven to accomplish; they were definitely never to be seen as public figures such as in the theatre. The marquis would never have dealt with someone as forceful or charismatic as Céleste.

  ‘I think you might agree that someone with your background would not normally marry into a family of standing like mine?’ the marquis began when they met at her apartment. ‘I trust you can see the situation from our point of view?’

  ‘Quite. I agree that a Mogador should never marry a Chabrillan. Before our marriage, and when I could see the stress Lionel was under, I often advised him to marry someone of his own class, even if he had ruined himself.’

  ‘So you see—’

  ‘But may I be so bold as to remind you of your cousin, Monsieur de Choiseul-Praslin. He murdered his wife.’ The marquis blanched. Céleste went on. ‘It was a terrible scandal. Lionel told me every detail. How gruesome. How difficult for the Chabrillans.’

  ‘We managed to keep it out of the press.’

  ‘Yes, that was an impressive feat. But would you not agree that that event, if it had made the press, would be a far greater disgrace to the Chabrillans than I have been?’

  ‘It would have been,’ the marquis agreed.

  ‘I humbly submit that my writing might even enhance the family name, not besmirch it.’

  The marquis did not react.

  ‘You see, my lord,’ Céleste said, ‘above all else, Lionel and I loved each other. Our backgrounds were not relevant to how we were together.’

  The marquis thought for a moment. Against instinct, he seemed to be trying to be civil, even reasonable.

  ‘Our family has always maintained certain discretions in private affairs.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Well, your dalliances with Prince Napoleon, for instance.’

  ‘Wherever did that come from?’ Céleste asked with a dismissive smile. She knew Plon-Plon would never tell him.

  ‘I have my sources.’

  ‘Pray tell who? If it was the actress Judith, she’s always been fearfully jealous of me. She’s been the source of malicious gossip because she was besotted with the prince.’

  The marquis blinked. She had called his bluff.

  ‘I can prove my relationship with him was nothing beyond friendship.’

  Céleste excused herself, left the room and returned with letters between her and Prince Napoleon.

  ‘Here, read a few of these,’ she said with an easy gesture. ‘Please tell me if they are the missives of lovers or just good friends.’

  The marquis browsed them.

  ‘You can see that he was inviting me to his fortnightly dinners at the restaurant Voisin,’ she said. ‘Prince Napoleon hosted them. I was just one of twenty guests. I would imagine that some of the much younger, more beautiful women may well have been his conquests. But not me.’

  The marquis sighed.

  ‘Céleste, you must understand that it is not me behind this effort to have you relinquish the title. There are others in the family who wish it.’

  ‘Your sister perhaps? Please tell her there’s no hope of it.’

  ‘I hear you might be having financial difficulty.’

  ‘Your hearing is sound,’ Céleste said with a gentle smile. ‘I have had trouble selling Poinçonnet. But I’ll manage. I always do. Your offer via de Lesseps was not enticing.’

  ‘If you want more, we can—’

  ‘No, no, you misunderstand. I cannot be bought. I have learned to make my way around money. I hope you understand that it was I who pulled your brother out of financial messes here and in Australia.’ Without rancour or rush, she outlined examples. ‘Again, I submit that I far more than fulfilled my duties as a wife, especially in the hardships we encountered in Australia.’

  The marquis retreated, falling back on the refrain that unnamed ‘others’ held sway in the democracy of Chabrillan, and that he was a mere member with one vote, which he said he would place with her retaining her title.

  After the meeting, however, Céleste felt it had been a charade; a light, polite shadow-box before war was declared.

  First salvo from the Chabrillans was to cut off her sources of income. La Presse had promised her twenty-five centimes a line for a new serialisation of one of her latest books, Miss Pewell, which had an Australian setting and was published in 1859. The marquis persuaded its editor, Émile de Girardin, not to publish the serialisation. De Girardin’s feeble offer to her, as a sop, was to say he would have any of her future novels reviewed favourably. It was a blow to Céleste, who now felt the power of France’s ultra-conservative aristocracy. Other publishers also shunned her after showing serious interest in her work.

  She went to the Rue d’Amsterdam apartment of Alexandre Dumas Sr, who had always promised to support her.

  Dumas greeted her with his usual effusiveness and glee, and admonished her playfully for her not having seen him for many months. He was genuinely affronted at the ‘Chabrillans blocks’ and the publishers’ lack of courage But his own similar predicament didn’t allow him to provide a brave contact in the publishing world.

  ‘Is it possible for you to rewrite my novel Emigrants?’ she asked. ‘You could publish it under your own name and split the royalties with me.’

  ‘No, I’ve done this with novices,’ he said, ‘but you already have a good name. But I have an idea. Why don’t you dramatise your novels?’

  Céleste demurred. On her mind was the rushed effort of The Gold Thieves that had been rejected by Marc Fournier at the Porte Saint-Martin Theatre. She mentioned it. Dumas dismissed the experience, saying that her five-act play would probably need reworking and guidance.

  ‘Plays are ten times easier to write,’ he said. ‘You don’t have to deliver descriptive passages or character portraits. You create the framework, the bare bones and instructions. Stage designers, directors and actors take care of the rest.’

  He asked Céleste to send him the first draft she had done. She protested that it needed a solid second draft. He told her not to worry, he would set one of his ‘ghosts’, writers from his stable of hacks, to work on it.

  Dumas then pre-empted the process by telling Marc Fournier he was supervising the rewrite. Fournier agreed to accept the revised work sight
unseen, and planned to produce the play.

  Céleste was most unhappy with the rewrite. She stormed around to Dumas’s apartment. He laughed at her fury. She insisted he sit down with her and go through it. In the end, he agreed it had been ‘butchered’ by his ghost and he rewrote the five acts himself. Dumas then took her to meet the secretary of the Society of Dramatic Authors, Monsieur Peragallo. He was the most powerful figure in French theatre. His hands were on the purse strings of the industry. The society collected all authors’ royalties from the theatre managers and producers. Peragallo’s role was to disburse the royalties due to the authors. He, too, had read The Gold Thieves and did not need any convincing that it would make a box-office hit. He was also taken with Céleste. Peragallo was aware of the efforts to stop the play being performed in Paris’s main theatres and her impecunious state of affairs, and was sympathetic. He advanced her 1500 francs against the royalties she would receive from The Gold Thieves.

  But in the short time since Fournier had said yes to the project, he had been visited by a lawyer representing the Chabrillans. Fournier pulled out, much to the anger and chagrin of Dumas. Dumas sent the play to Montparnasse’s Gaîté Theatre director, Monsieur Harmant, who loved it. He had cast it and was preparing for a rehearsal when the Chabrillans, tracking Céleste’s every move, struck again. She received her play in a mail parcel with a letter from Harmant expressing regrets that he could not produce it.

  Céleste was consoled by the fact that big-name, experienced theatre people had all wanted the story initially. At least she knew it was not being rejected on creative grounds. It was easily stage worthy. But she had to leave the problem for a while to secure her financial position. Down to her last francs, she had no choice but to mortgage the house at Poinçonnet. She stayed at her daughter’s convent for two months until the funds came through. Then she returned to Paris, where her first act was to visit Peragallo to repay him the 1500 francs he had advanced her against royalties she would not now receive for her play.