“The British want me to become another of them, my roots dying in this soil,” Napoleon replied, the bitter words automatic, yet he enjoyed the girl’s enthusiasm in her surroundings, making him see the scenery in a new way.
He reined in Hope on a cliff overlooking Prosperous Bay. The perpendicular lava coast was striped in dark blue and reddish-gray. Towards the east naked hills divided ravines, the hill’s clay strata a variety of reds and purples. His shoulders slumped—so far from Europe.
Napoleon dismounted and assisted Amélie down. Her body felt delicate in his hands, her scent so clean. “Now, tell me the truth—you’ve never ridden before, have you?”
“No, I haven’t, Sire.” She fumbled to adjust her dress, her cheeks flushed. “I didn’t do so badly. I think it would be easier to ride as you do than on this silly contraption.”
“A woman must ride appropriately, not like a heathen.” Napoleon provoked her, amused to see her expression grow stubborn, to test her perseverance. “You want to be a wild island child? Charles, we must find Mademoiselle Perrault a proper saddle, and make certain it isn’t silly.”
“Sur l’heure, I will do my best, Your Majesty.” Montholon stood stiff after dismounting. He glanced at Amélie in prim annoyance when he must have thought Napoleon didn’t notice.
“Many will think it daring if you ride like a man. Scandalous, in fact. The British will mock you,” Napoleon teased. He gripped his hat in the salty breeze. His gray greatcoat flapped about his body.
“I don’t care what the British think.” Amélie walked to the edge of the cliff. She took a deep breath. “I never thought I’d enjoy the smell of the sea again, or care to hear the slap of waves.”
“Come away from there.” Napoleon pulled her aside and pointed to a saffron-colored scorpion crawling across a rock. “You don’t want to feel his sting.”
“Oh! No, Sire.” Her startled expression softened as she looked at him. He felt a wave of pleasure that caught him off guard. He let go of her and rubbed his chilled hands together.
Still mounted, the English soldier hovered just out of earshot.
Napoleon glared in distaste. “How does Lowe presume I’ll make my escape, by jumping off this sheer cliff? British naval vessels encircle the island. Does he assume I can fly away as a bird? There’s a difference between instructions and their execution. Those London Lords who made them would do things differently if they saw this place. On this ugly island, it’s enough if the coast is guarded.”
“Sire, just think of that soldier as your bodyguard, not a jailer,” Amélie said, her eyes steady on his. “If you see him that way, maybe his presence won’t be so exasperating.”
“The governor says I can’t speak to anyone I might pass on this island unless the sentry is with me, listening. I used to visit the islanders, invite them for dinner. I would offer them financial assistance if they were in need. I had to stop, so as not to compromise anyone.”
“Remember that pretty young woman you flirted with, Sire?” Montholon slanted his gaze over Amélie.
“Not especially. I’d gallop all the way to Alarm House with Las Cases, cross Woody Ridge into Sinner’s Valley. Now, no more!” Napoleon approached his horse, jerked the reins to channel his anger. Hope shied, throwing his head. “Lowe is deranged with punctiliousness. He often makes these insipid regulations, then changes them moments later. I never know over which restriction I’m to be harassed.”
“Deranged might be the right word for the governor,” Amélie said.
“I heard Lowe has nightmares of my escaping and rides to Longwood in the middle of the night to verify I’m still there. What an irritating fool.” Napoleon flung this off, not caring for his slip of temper. He stroked Hope’s silky nose. At the girl’s anxious face, he lightened his manner and chuckled. “You think I am the one being petty?”
“No, Sire, but sometimes you have to make allowances. It’s to your advantage to ride again. You should even walk every day. Ignore the English. I’d feel happier if you took care of yourself.”
“Then how can I convince them I’m suffering from this climate?” Her concern touched him and Napoleon repeated his usual rationalization to fend it off. “The damp weather and backward seasons. That this island will be the death of me?”
“Do you want it to be the death of you?” Her voice sad, she frowned.
“To what else would you attribute my strange maladies? Headaches, shivering, chills in my legs?” He turned away for an instant from her troubled expression. Pity, a demeaning emotion—he’d never sought it before. “Strange fevers and dysentery are rampant on this island. The British claimed it’s healthy, but they lie. Hardly a day goes by without a burial.”
“Perhaps inactivity is the cause of your ailments, Your Majesty?” Amélie flashed a beseeching smile. Her straw hat blew back and she pulled it forward and tightened the ribbon.
Montholon sniffed his patrician nose. “Isn’t it too cold for you out here, Sire? Perhaps we should go back. Some people have difficulty understanding their places.”
“You’re a wise girl for one so young.” Napoleon ignored his general’s remark. “You see you already learn too quickly. If I walk every day, I won’t be so fat either.” He gazed at her, then reached over and pinched her earlobe. “Perhaps you don’t comprehend my tactics against the British government.”
Amélie caressed a finger over her ear. “I’m not so young anymore. I’m twenty.”
“Twenty, as old as that?” Napoleon smiled. Despite his efforts, her sweet empathy tugged at him more than he should allow. “I was commissioned in the army for four years by then.” His smile faded. What was he doing teasing with this girl—no, a burgeoning woman—gawked at by the English? Too impatient to wait for his former country to demand his release, he had another scheme, tactics he shared with no one. That Irish merchant captain seemed willing. Now he was at the Cape with Las Cases. Always have alternate battle plans. “It is time I venture out again, to study the lay of the land. Official channels have done nothing for me.” He pulled out his field glasses and scanned the cliff-line. “This will give that British watchdog fits. Climbing down the cliff does look impossible from here.”
“Sire, you couldn’t possibly…you would injure yourself in such a foolhardy undertaking.” Montholon practically stammered, his gaze sharp.
Napoleon resented that his courtier didn’t even encourage him in such an endeavor. He questioned more and more the count’s reliability. “Pipe dreams, my good man.” He shoved his field glasses into Montholon’s hands and assisted Amélie up onto her mount. They rode slowly back to Longwood where he gave over the horses to his groom and dismissed the count.
“Not a bad day. It is a trial to keep occupied here,” Napoleon told her when the two of them re-entered the house. The gloomy dwelling pressed down on him again, but he needed to keep up his strength. “When do we start this walking business?”
“Tomorrow, I should think, Your Majesty. Right after breakfast?” Amélie sounded pleased that he heeded her advice, the little minx.
Ali rushed out of the duty chamber and took his hat and coat.
“Fine. I’ll see you tomorrow. No practice today, take a rest.” Napoleon walked toward his study, scooting the girl and her tender compassion from his mind, though the excursion invigorated his spirit. He rubbed his aching thigh and thought of the letters he’d smuggled out, requesting details on what support he had left in Europe, the situation with the king in France. He sighed, but had to keep abreast of such things for his next move.
* * * *
Amélie suspected Napoleon needed the rest. She felt her muscles twisting in opposite directions after straining to keep her posture on the horse. Napoleon walked into his study, and Albine de Montholon sailed into the room like a silk-clad galleon and begged to be received. The study door closed after them.
> Amélie tensed, her heart grew heavy. The woman always seemed primed for attack, even in her obvious condition.
“Allow me to help you, Louis.” Clarice bustled past her from the preparation room, carrying a tray of food. Marchand stepped behind her, his expression vexed. She set the tray on the new mahogany dining room table. Ten chairs painted black and covered in silk Taboret had also been brought up to replace their shabby furniture.
“I serve His Majesty, if you don’t mind.” Marchand tried to take the tray, but Clarice leaned over it, her breasts in danger of flopping into his face. The valet averted his eyes, slid the tray from under her, and carried it into the emperor’s study.
“If you insist. I’m here if you need me.” Clarice tossed her head, then turned and saw Amélie. Her smile quirked into a sneer. “Well, there she is, the emperor’s favorite, the little opera singer.”
“Clarice.” Amélie bit back a grin and walked to the rear door.
“Since you weren’t here, I had to help serve. Of course Marchand wanted my aid.” Clarice trailed outside after her, and kept pace like a shadow right into her chambers. “The emperor takes you riding now, does he?”
“Yes, and why not? I had a wonderful time.” Amélie untied the ribbon from her chin. After sweeping off rat droppings, she placed her hat on the dresser.
“It’s wrong to go off riding with two men and no chaperone. Doesn’t your father think it unseemly?” Clarice almost shouted as if to penetrate into her father’s chamber.
“I make my own decisions where I go.” Amélie massaged her bottom, her buttocks and thighs raw and bruised. Her right knee throbbed from gripping the pommel.
“Do you? What secret comforts do you give His Majesty to deserve such attention? He even bought you dresses…and gave you jewelry. Your talent must be vast.” Clarice’s nasty laugh reverberated around the tiny room.
“Do you envy me my talents?” Amélie snatched her brush from her dresser top, her euphoria over the day tarnished. “I’m tired of your remarks. Please leave.”
“Don’t be naïve. We’re all discussing your growing expertise.”
“What I do is none of your business.” Amélie concentrated on brushing her hair in the cracked looking glass above her chest of drawers. Perhaps the countess provided “comfort” right now to Napoleon in his study. She raked through the wind-blown knots until her scalp hurt. “You still need hobbies of your own so you have less time to be rude. Take your jealously elsewhere.”
“Hobbies? Is that what it’s called? How polite. Can you put in a word for me with Marchand? That would keep me busy. I also wouldn’t mind a new dress.” Instead of leaving, Clarice flounced down on the bed, the scent of lye soap drifting around her. “What have you done so far with His Majesty?”
Amélie flushed hot inside, but smiled at the other woman. “I mind my own affairs, as should you.” She resisted a chuckle at her word choice. Many people suspected this relationship, but could Napoleon ever see her in such a way? His hands had lingered when he helped her off her mount.
Clarice lolled back on the mattress, her upper lip puckered. “Once you’ve lost your maidenhead, you’ll be ruined for any good marriage. Of course, it’s only when a man sticks far up that it’s too late.” She spoke in a languid tone, running her hand down her abdomen to between her thighs. “Have you gone that far? Like dogs mating, but face to face.”
Amélie fumbled with her brush, repressing a shiver. She’d seen dogs mating and it looked painful. Certainly for humans sex had to be better. Did a book exist that explained the intricacies of sex? Was that her intention with the emperor? She turned to glare at Clarice, though she wouldn’t have minded more details. “I would like to be alone, so please go. Now.”
Clarice rose with an exaggerated sigh and went to the door. “Then you just leave us all to gossip about the outcome. Quel dommage.” With a shrug of her fat shoulder, she sauntered out, nose in the air.
Amélie plopped down on her bed. Napoleon’s touch always left her jittery. Was this a part of pleasure and did she want more? Where could she find information about carnal relations?
* * * *
Every muscle and sinew in her body ached from their equestrian adventure but Amélie kept walking down the same path ridden the day before. Napoleon kept pace though grumbled. They reached the steep slope that led to the valley. Napoleon staggered. Amélie slowed, thankful only a footman accompanied them today, no Count de Montholon.
At the stream, the smell of plants ripe in the soft air, the emperor collapsed on a large rock and groaned. “I’m too tired, too old, and too fat for all this.”
“If you walk every day you won’t be so tired or...overweight...and you aren’t that old.” Amélie overstepped her bounds, easier in his presence. Their discourse had slipped into the “tu” form of intimates.
Napoleon stared at her, guffawed, and slapped his knee. “I’m not that old, am I? You make me laugh, Amée. The others in the house have become ridiculously dull, but you, mon amie, amuse me.”
“I’m thankful for that.” She’d hate to make him angry, having witnessed his famous temper directed toward the others. She beamed with pride he called her a friend, her first desires, but had her wishes changed? She toed the dirt, her thoughts confused.
“I can’t, however, totally give in to Lowe’s treatment of me, ignore the soldiers and so on. It’s the only power I have left, to resist what that scoundrel does.” He gripped his hand on his knee. “The English insult me by even assigning that rogue. Lowe commanded a group called the Corsican Rangers, consisting of Royalist émigrés and Corsican traitors against my government.”
“There must be better ways to resist that don’t harm you.” Amélie stepped near the hillside and picked a sprig, dark green with a white felted back, from a crooked tree. “Here’s wild rosemary. If you put it in your coffee, it helps fatigue.”
“I used to be the most robust of men, until I came here. Lowe offered to build me a barracks to walk in when the weather was foul and I could be unseen. He wants to confine me in a box like a trained tiger. None of them have the authority to keep me prisoner. I came of my own free will to the British captain in the straits.” Napoleon grimaced, his hands clenched for a moment. Then he jerked to his feet and they continued their walk. “Indeed, if I’d been born to the throne they would never treat me like this.”
“I was there, Sire. They betrayed you horribly.” She wanted to hug his arm, absorb his sorrow, and feel his skin warm against her. Instead she bent to inspect some watercress and wild celery alongside the stream and tried to banish the image of amorous canines. “Do you think the allied powers will release you?”
“The Hapsburgs allowed me to marry into their family. Why wouldn’t they assist me in my present situation?” He increased his pace, his boots crunching over dead leaves.
Amélie doubted the Austrians would lift a finger to help him now that he had no power to wield over them. Napoleon deluded himself in such hopes. She, on the other hand, wanted to keep him right here. “I guess it depends on the political—”
“The English want me humbled before them.” Napoleon raised his head high, his eagle profile under his cocked hat proud. “Lowe thinks he has power over my body, but my soul shall always elude him.”
“Bien sûr.” Amélie nudged a rock into the stream, where it rippled the surface for an instant, and suddenly had a revelation. “Now you might understand how a woman feels, humbled by the restrictions of men.”
“An interesting…if misguided parallel, I have to admit.” Napoleon chuckled then stopped, his expression changing to reflective. He pointed up on a slope, to the aromatic shrub myrtle. “That plant is native to Corsica. I grew up smelling that scent. It grows blue-black berries I used to toss down a village girl’s dress.” He laughed as if once again that mischievous little boy.
He�
�d found pleasure in something so simple, even if he did sidetrack her remark. Couldn’t he trade one island for another?
She picked up a mint sprig and sniffed the piquant bouquet. No matter the season, plants continued to bloom on Saint Helena. “When you were a child, did you dream of becoming a powerful man?”
“Not exactly. I was stubborn, rebellious. After being sent off to school in France, I realized my capacity for learning, my resistance to being ruled. I wanted to command.” He walked on farther, coughing into his hand.
“Resistance to being ruled.” Amélie smiled at that, a yearning she understood. She caught up with him. “I have a recipe for sage tea you should try—a cure for coughs, colds, and liver complaints. It’s sweetened with honey.”
“Like the basil tea you tried to give me? I don’t believe in medicinals, or magic potions.” His voice took on a lighter quality. “Do you aspire to be a sorceress too?”
“I aspire to many things,” Amélie half sang out, enjoying the walk, the scenery, and the company. The footman followed unobtrusively behind. She ran her thumb over the white felt leaf she’d first picked. “Rosemary also helps memory. Put rosemary tea in your bath and it invigorates the blood.”
“Too much knowledge makes you dangerous.” Napoleon winked and squeezed her shoulder, his fingers running briefly down her back.
“Am I shrill and ugly like most learned women?” His caress gave her a shuddering sensation, and she almost laughed out loud to contain it.
“Not at all.” He stared off. “Perhaps you’re right. I do need to look to my health. New events may present themselves that will require all my strength.”
“What events? Can you tell me? Do you ever think of…escape?”
A scuffling of hooves from high up the valley slope startled her. She and Napoleon stared up at the same time. A horseman in a well-appointed red coat wheeled his steed about on the crest of the ridge and galloped off in a scatter of dirt—Governor Lowe, spying on his prisoner!
Elysium Page 14