The next day Napoleon asked the colonel for a leave of absence. He told him about the letter and explained that since the death of his father the family’s finances had suffered greatly. His family needed him urgently.
‘How long has it been since you were last home, Lieutenant?’
‘Over seven years, sir.’
The colonel looked at the officer and realised that he had been no more than a child at the time. So many years away from his home. Away from his family. He had not seen the sisters and brothers that had been born after he had left Corsica as a child. The colonel was human enough to guess at the personal consequences of such a long absence and immediately gave his permission.
‘I’ll give you until March next year. Will that suffice?’
‘That’s very generous, sir. Thank you.’
‘Be sure to make the most of it, Buona Parte. After that business in Lyons I rather fear that our services are going to be required far more often in the years to come.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘When will you go?’
‘As soon as possible, sir, if I may.’
‘I don’t see why not. There’s a new probationer joining the battalion tomorrow. He can take up your position.You can leave as soon as you wish.You might as well go and pack.’
Back at his lodgings, Napoleon surveyed the meagre possessions that he had accrued in the years he had spent in France.There was his uniform, some spare clothes, most of which were threadbare; two pairs of boots, one second-hand pair of dancing shoes and his graduation sword from the Royal Military School of Paris. Over on the bookshelves were the only things he really prized: scores of technical volumes, histories, scientific studies, and philosophical tracts, none of which he could bear to be parted with. So they went into his trunk first, and filled it to capacity so that all the other possessions had to be squeezed into a small valise.
There were several barges preparing to head down the Rhône towards Marseilles and he booked passage on the first to leave. As the crew eased the vessel away from the wharf and into the current Napoleon climbed up on to the cabin roof and sat down. He stared back at Valence as it receded into the distance, and felt a peculiar hollowness inside. He would be returning to the regiment in a few months’ time. But he had the strange feeling that he was leaving something behind for good. He was leaving behind the years that had turned him from a boy into a man. He was going home, and yet nothing there would be the same as the memory of it he had carried in his mind all this time.
And there was some other sentiment plaguing him. He tried to pin it down as the barge followed the course of the river towards the distant sea. At last he grasped it, the source of his profound melancholy. The truth of it, he realised, was that he felt himself to be defined by negatives. He was neither the boy he once was nor the man he desired to be, he was neither French nor Corsican, he was neither aristocrat nor worker.The world had yet to find a place for him. Until then, he would try to find some comfort in the arms of his family, at his home in Corsica.
Chapter 38
The brig entered the gulf of Ajaccio late in the afternoon and the vessel’s master bellowed the order to reduce sail. The sailors unhurriedly climbed up the ratlines of the two masts and then spread out along the mainyards. When they were in place the bosun gave the word and the sailors began to haul up the mainsails, furling the heavily weathered cloth to the yard and tying each sail off securely. Napoleon was standing at the bows gazing back down the length of the brig. His keen eyes watched every aspect of the ship’s operation and already he had a good grasp of the function of each sail and the names and purposes of most of the sheets that controlled the sails. The voyage from Toulon had taken only three days and with his books stowed away in the hold there had been little for Napoleon to do but stay on deck and absorb the minutiae of life at sea.
He turned round and felt his pulse quicken as he caught sight of the low stone mass of the citadel jutting out into the gulf. To the left a thin strip of yellow revealed the beach that stretched down from the jumble of pale buildings with red-tiled roofs of Ajaccio. In there, a few minutes’ walk from the sea, was the home where he had grown up from an infant into the small boy. That was many years ago, he reflected with rising emotion. The brig’s approach to the port was a journey he had done many times in fishing boats, but now it seemed unfamiliar so that he might have been approaching a strange land. He suddenly felt the loss of all those years he might have had in Ajaccio. Time he could have spent with his father, who would not have died almost a stranger to his son.
With only the triangular driver set, the ship ghosted across the still water of the harbour, heading towards an empty stretch of the quay. Several fishermen were sitting cross-legged on the cobbles, tending to their nets, and some of them paused in their work to watch the approach of the brig.
The porters lounging in the shade of the customs house stirred and made their way over to the quay to take the mooring ropes that the brig’s crew had made ready to cast ashore. The cables snaked across the narrow gap of open water, were caught, looped round a bollard, and then the men drew the brig into the quay until it nudged up against the hessian sack stuffed with cork. Napoleon had asked that his chest and valise be brought up when they had entered the gulf, and now he sat on the chest and waited impatiently for the crew to complete the mooring and lower the gangway so he could go ashore. After a short delay the master called out the order and the men ran the narrow ramp out, over the side, and on to the quay, then securely lashed down the end on the ship. Napoleon beckoned to one of the porters.
‘Get me a handcart.’
‘Yes, sir.’
While he waited for the man to unload his luggage, Napoleon crossed the gangway and set foot on the quay. He felt a wave of happiness at the firm touch of his homeland once again. He strolled slowly down the quay towards the nearest of the fishermen. The face was familiar, and he made the connection in an instant. This was the man whose foot Napoleon had stamped on years before. The fisherman glanced up at the thin youngster in a French uniform. Napoleon smiled and greeted the man in the local dialect.
‘Does Pedro still work the fishing boats?’
‘Pedro?’ The man frowned.
‘Pedro Calca,’ Napoleon explained. ‘I’m certain that was his name.’
‘No. He died four years ago. Drowned.’
‘Oh . . .’ Napoleon was saddened. He had briefly hoped to impress the old man with his smart uniform.
The fisherman was looking at him closely. ‘Do I know you? Your face seems familiar.You don’t speak like a Frenchman.’
‘We met before, but it was a long time ago.’
The man stared at Napoleon a moment longer, then shook his head. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t remember.’
Napoleon waved a hand. ‘It doesn’t matter. Another time, maybe.’
He glanced back towards the brig and saw that the porter, helped by one of the sailors, was struggling ashore with the chest. When they reached the quay they heaved the chest into the handcart and set it down with a loud thud as Napoleon strode towards them.
‘What’s in that one, sir?’ The porter’s chest was heaving from the strain of lifting the chest. ‘Gold?’
‘Of a kind. Poor man’s gold.’ Napoleon laughed. ‘Books. Just books.’
‘Books?’The porter shook his head.‘What would a young man want a chest of books for?’
‘To read them, perhaps.’
The porter shrugged, not quite sure of the sanity of the young army officer. ‘So where are you lodging, sir?’
‘I’m not lodging. I’m going home.’
The valise on the cart, they set off, Napoleon leading the way. The sun was low in the sky and the streets were filled with shadows beneath the harsh light that silhouetted the tiled rooflines. From the harbour front they climbed the gentle slope that led into the heart of the old town, nestling by the massive irregular star shape of the citadel. Napoleon knew these streets and alleys intimately, but it s
eemed to him he was seeing them as a stranger might.
The handcart’s iron-rimmed wheels clattered along the cobbles as they approached the corner of his home. Outside the house, Napoleon gently lifted the latch on the front door, and helped the porter unload the chests and carry them into the hall on the ground floor.Then he paid the man off and quietly closed the door behind him. There was an unfamiliar odour. He smiled as he realised that this was how it had always smelled, but that he had never noticed it before. The sound of voices came from the floor above and he recognised his mother’s, sharp and authoritative. Then there was Joseph’s voice - low enough that his words were indistinct. The other voices were strange to him.
Napoleon took a deep breath, removed his bicorn hat and placed it on the couch by the door. Then he mounted the stairs, treading as softly as he could until he reached the landing on the first floor.The sounds of his family were just the other side of the door that opened on to the large salon in which he had played as a child. Placing a hand on the latch, he lifted it and pushed the door open. Inside, the large windows that ran along one wall were open and the last of the sunlight streamed in, bathing the interior in a warm orange glow. Running down the centre of the room were two large tables, end to end. Around the nearest table sat the family. His mother had her back to the door.To her left sat Joseph, Lucien and a young boy he did not recognise but he knew must be Louis.To his mother’s right sat two girls, either side of an infant boy: his sisters, Pauline and Caroline, and his youngest brother, Jérôme.
The older girl looked up and saw Napoleon in the doorway. Her eyes widened in alarm.
‘Mama!’ She pointed. ‘There’s a soldier!’
‘Pauline!’ His mother lashed out with a wooden spoon and caught the girl a sharp blow on the knuckles. ‘For the last time, none of your stupid games at the table!’
Joseph was looking towards the door now, his spoon poised over a bowl of stew. His look of surprise hardened into an expression of shock.
‘Napoleon?’ he murmured.
Napoleon saw his mother’s back stiffen for an instant, then she quickly turned and looked over her shoulder, wide-eyed. She stared, then there was a clatter as the wooden spoon dropped from the hand that she had clamped over her mouth. Then the chair scraped across the floor and fell back as she rose up and rushed towards him with a rustle of her black skirts. Napoleon’s face split into a wide smile of delight and he opened his arms as she rushed into his embrace. Slight as she was, there was strength in her arms and he felt himself crushed in her embrace. Then she thrust herself back and held him at arm’s length, drinking in the sight of him as her lips trembled.
‘Naboleone . . . What are you doing here?’
‘I applied for leave, Mother.’
‘Leave?’ Her expression became anxious. ‘How long have you got?’
‘A fine welcome that is!’ Napoleon teased her. ‘Hardly here a minute before you ask me when I’m leaving.’
‘Oh! I didn’t mean—’
‘It’s all right, Mother.’ He leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead. ‘Only joking.’
‘You go away for eight years, and still you haven’t grown up. How long are you staying?’
‘Until April next year.’
Her tension drained away at his reply. ‘Seven months. That’s good.Very good . . . What am I saying?’ She turned round to the others still at the table. ‘This is your brother Naboleone, who Father took to France nearly eight years ago. Come, Naboleone or, as you call yourself these days, Napoleon.’
He smiled. ‘In my heart I will always be Naboleone.’
She led him to the table, picking up her chair. ‘Sit down.’
As he lowered himself into her place, Joseph set his spoon down and grasped Napoleon’s hand in both of his. ‘I can’t believe my eyes. It is you. After so many years. When you left Autun, I didn’t know when I would see you again. I never thought it would be for as long as this. God! It’s good to see you!’
‘And you, Joseph.’ He smiled fondly. ‘You have no idea how much I have missed you.’ He looked round at the other faces watching him intently. ‘Lucien’s almost a man already. Louis was only a baby when I left. Now look at him! Almost as old as I was when I left for France. But you three - Pauline and Caroline, and Jérôme there - you have only existed in letters . . . Have you no kisses for your brother?’
He opened his arms, but the girls blushed and felt too unsure of Napoleon to approach him. With an impatient click of her tongue his mother scurried round the table and pressed them towards their brother.They were still nervous and clung to her as Napoleon reached for their hands. He frowned, hurt and a little angry at their reticence, but it was only natural, he realised. They didn’t know him. He would have to give them time to grow accustomed to him.At the moment his heart filled with an aching sadness at the lost years. It seemed there were some sacrifices for the sake of a career that could never be justified. Tears pricked at the corner of his eyes. Napoleon cuffed them away and suddenly leaned forward to ruffle the girls’ hair, with a forced cheerfulness.
‘Never mind! We’ll soon get to know each other.Then there’s so many tales I can tell you about France!’
Chapter 39
Later, when the children had gone to bed, Napoleon sat with his mother and Joseph at the end of the table. Letizia had closed the shutters and the room was lit by a pair of candles that left the large space around them in deep shadow. She had brought up a bottle of wine from the cellar and filled three glasses.
‘Your father and I were saving this one to celebrate your becoming an officer.’ She smiled sadly, then lifted her chin. ‘To you, Lieutenant Napoleon Buona Parte.’
‘No,’ Napoleon shook his head, ‘let’s not toast me. To Father.’ He and the others raised their glasses together and then sipped the fine wine. Napoleon slid the stem of his glass between his fingers and cradled the bowl in the palm of his hand.‘Has it been difficult since Father died?’
Letizia shrugged. ‘We barely manage.’
‘Did he leave much money?’
‘Leave money? All he left me was his debts.’
‘It wasn’t really his fault,’ Joseph interrupted. ‘He was cheated.’
‘What happened?’ asked Napoleon. ‘Who cheated him?’
‘The government. Four years ago Father signed a contract with some officials sent from Paris to find ways of expanding the economy in Corsica.They said they had the power to subsidise all sort of agricultural projects, one of which involved our family. Father bought a mulberry plantation, with a view to growing the trees for sale in the fifth year. The officials gave a guarantee that the mature trees would be bought by the government for a premium price.’
Letizia shook her head. ‘I can hear him now. “How can we lose?”Well, we found out in the end exactly how we could lose.’
Napoleon nodded towards his brother. ‘So what happened next?’
‘Two years ago, when the first subsidy payment was due, the government cancelled the contract without any warning. Father just received notification that the trees were no longer required. He tried to find another buyer but there’s no market for mulberry at the moment - at least no market that will pay enough to cover the costs of setting up the plantation. Until his death he was trying to get the government to pay compensation, but nothing has come of it. Meanwhile we couldn’t afford to employ the men who were tending the trees. Since then no one has been maintaining the plantation.When Father died, the bank in Genoa, who loaned him the money to set up the plantation, called for the loan to be repaid.’
‘Which we can’t do,’ Letizia added with a shrug. ‘There’s no money.The rent we get from uncle Luciano isn’t even enough to feed the family and see that they get some proper schooling. If it wasn’t for the small gifts of money given to us by Luciano, we’d have to sell the house, sell our land and sell that wretched plantation. Even then, I doubt it would raise enough to pay off the bank loan.’
‘Can’t we just s
ell the land?’ Napoleon suggested. ‘Pay back some of the money and ask them to give us time to repay the balance?’
‘No.’ Joseph smiled faintly. ‘That’s the catch. In order for us to contest the government’s refusal to pay the subsidy we have to be in possession of the land to which the contract applies. We’re caught between the government and the bank. The only hope I have is that the market recovers and we find buyers for those trees.’
‘Is it likely to recover?’
‘Impossible to say,’ Joseph replied.‘But if we don’t start looking after the plantation soon it’ll be worthless.’
‘I see.’ Napoleon brooded silently for a moment. He looked up at his brother.‘Then we must put that plantation to rights, Joseph. You and me. Where is it?’
‘Not far from here. Near Mother’s house at Mellili.’
‘Good! We could live there while we restore the plantation.’
‘The house is almost derelict.’
‘Fine.Then we’ll make repairs to the house as well. Come on, Joseph! You’re not afraid of a little hard work?’
‘Of course not. But I can’t stay here for much longer. I need to get back to my legal training.’
‘Fair enough, but let’s do what we can before you leave. What do you say, brother?’
Joseph glanced at his mother but Letizia was staring at her hands and saying nothing. Joseph’s gaze flickered back towards his brother.‘Why not? Let’s do it. Maybe the market will recover after all.’
‘That’s the spirit!’ Napoleon laughed and refilled both their glasses. ‘To the Buona Parte Brothers - sons of the soil.’
Joseph laughed back and tapped his glass against his brother’s. ‘Death to bankers!’
‘Death to the French Government!’ Napoleon replied and drained his glass as his mother and brother looked at him in surprise.
Joseph cleared his throat. ‘That’s hardly the sort of toast one expects from an officer of His Most Catholic Majesty, King Louis.’
Young Bloods Page 25