The Empress: A novel

by Laura Martínez-Belli

  Juárez had returned from the United States and was advancing, reconquering land like the Catholic monarchs on their way to Granada. The idea of abdicating tormented Maximilian. He missed having his adviser and loyal friend by his side, but Bombelles had gone with Carlota to Europe to intercede with Napoleon III and the Holy Father. He felt alone. Everyone had abandoned or betrayed him. Only Carlota remained steadfast. Poor Charlotte, he repeated to himself. He’d been unfair with her. The letter she’d written before leaving for Europe still resounded in his ears. He envied the woman’s strength of mind. Perhaps that was what he yearned for when he married her: to be infected with the confidence and fortitude he so badly needed. Before leaving, Carlota had written to him:

  To abdicate is to condemn yourself. Granting oneself a certificate of incapacity is unthinkable except in the elderly or the weak of mind. It is certainly not the act of a thirty-four-year-old prince, full of life and with his future ahead of him. Sovereignty is the most sacred property in the world; a throne is not abandoned as if fleeing a gathering dispersed by the police.

  The letter went on for several pages with passionate eloquence. Maximilian knew Carlota was trying to persuade his weak mind. Strength. How he envied her.

  He would have to write to her and ask her what she thought. He would also write to his mother. His beloved empire had butterfly wings. He’d tried to put down roots in arid soil. Another chimera to add to the list. He waited, staying at the residence of a Swiss immigrant, where he spent the days playing cricket with friends. And at night, though the cold seeped in through the hacienda’s uncovered windows, he looked at his abandoned castle on Chapultepec Hill.

  The French withdrew from Chihuahua, while in France, Napoleon III gave a speech to the National Assembly declaring his final decision to abandon the Mexican adventure. The blame, he said, lay with, among others, Marshal Bazaine, who at over seventy years old had fallen in love with a Mexican woman thirty years younger, and since then led his men from the comfort of a desk while his new wife pampered him.

  Just as, a couple of years before, he’d granted them an audience to decide whether to become emperor, Maximilian decided to submit the decision on whether to abdicate to his notables. Of thirty-five, only seven, including Marshal Bazaine, voted in favor of abdication. Despite the differences they may have had, the marshal didn’t want to see Maximilian dead, something which—he was certain—would happen if he was left without an army. The empire, as he had said on so many occasions, was sustained at bayonet point.

  In his desperation, Maximilian told the marshal, “You must declare a state of emergency in the whole country.”

  Bazaine opened his eyes wide, shocked by Maximilian’s foolishness. He explained that not only was his suggestion unviable, but it was also madness.

  “I do not believe it advisable, as we withdraw, to subject the French army to the irreparable rigors of a state of emergency.”

  Much to his regret, Maximilian knew he was right.

  The Austrians and Belgians were also beginning to leave the country. Van der Smissen had led his men’s withdrawal. Even so, there was still a glimmer of hope for Maximilian. God willing, he thought, Carlota’s endeavors in Europe would have the positive result he hoped for. Where others had failed, she would succeed, he told himself. All his optimism was dragged down a fierce river when he received a telegram from the empress. Todo es inútil. It’s all useless. Three words that sent him to the gallows. But her news wasn’t the worst. Other telegrams arrived later from Bombelles. They informed him that the empress had lost her mind. Frightened, Maximilian headed slowly with the imperial army toward Orizaba, the city he loved and where—it should also be said—he was welcomed. From there, he sent a letter to Marshal Bazaine. Swallowing a knot in his throat, with stomach cramps that could have been from nerves or from the diarrhea that never left him in peace, he wrote a few lines that wounded his pride more than anything in the world. On the verge of tears, he wrote:

  Tomorrow I intend to place in your hands the necessary documents to bring to an end the violent situation in which I find myself, and not just me but also Mexico.

  He had to go back. Back to Carlota or to what remained of her. Go back with his tail between his legs, but go back. Deep down, he suspected his return would be welcomed, for some Austrians had told him that, after Franz Joseph’s terrible defeat in the Battle of Königgrätz, there was widespread discontent. It wasn’t just Mexico that was calling for an abdication. The Austrian people, disheartened, were also calling for his brother’s. Throughout the Austro-Hungarian Empire, cries of Long live Maximilian! could be heard, and Venice, where he had been branded a good-for-nothing, was now requesting the return of its governor. Reading this, Maximilian’s wounded pride was soothed.

  Franz Joseph complained bitterly to their mother, Princess Sophie.

  “If Maximilian tries to come back to Austria, I’ll bar him from entering, Mother. And I’ll remind him: we have a family pact; there’s nothing for him to return to.”

  “Your brother won’t dare return, Franz.”

  “But Mother, Napoleon III has him in a stranglehold, and my informants tell me he’s in Orizaba preparing for his return. That Maximilian, he’s a fool and a coward.”

  “Ridiculous!” exclaimed the princess. “Don’t talk about your brother like that. Maximilian would sooner bury himself under Mexico City’s walls than allow himself to be degraded by French politics.”

  And when the conversation with her firstborn was over, she went to her office, dipped a pen in ink, and with the same words, and other more grandiose ones, she communicated as much to Maximilian. Dying for the sovereignty of a nation was a worthy death for any Habsburg.

  Just a few weeks after deciding to leave, Maximilian changed his mind. From Orizaba, he started sending letters to dissolve regiments so that soldiers could be repatriated, or if they preferred, undergo voluntary absorption into the national army that he would command. His only experience of combat had been at sea, but that wouldn’t deter him. His mother and Carlota were right. Without the French, he would finally be free. He would command his own army, without Bazaine, without Van der Smissen, without France. He was the Austrian Pulque, and the time had come to show them what he was. If he had to die in Mexico, it would be with the dignity and pride that he’d lacked in life. He turned back and set off for Querétaro.

  61

  Philippe didn’t return to Belgium. Like the emperor, he changed his mind at the last minute. He didn’t know exactly why he was turning back. News reached him that the empress had returned to Europe, and the Republican army’s chant could be heard all over the country, a folk song that alluded to the belly that the empress was taking away from Mexico. Goodbye, Carlota, and goodbye to your bump, the people rejoice to see you so plump, they sang, making fun of her. At last, someone had done the empress a favor, they said. There were few things the rank and file liked more than kicking someone when they were already down. Philippe lowered his head like Saint Peter denying Christ three times. He tried to keep as low a profile as his foreignness allowed. When they crossed the desert to Monterrey, he’d almost died of thirst. Each soldier had just two liters of water to boil their food, drink, and wash. They passed through Agua Nueva, Saltillo, and Santa Catarina. He’d managed to master Spanish almost without accent, but his blue eyes and blond hair gave him away as soon as he left the northern cities that the Belgian delegation had reached with great difficulty. Nonetheless, being alone made traveling easier, since nobody expected to see a member of the Army of Intervention by himself, heading in the opposite direction of the sea.

  Staying in monarchists’ houses—recognizing them by their anxious faces—where he was given food and provisions, he gradually made his way back toward the capital. But sometimes, when luck wasn’t smiling on him, he spent nights exposed to the elements. He remembered everything that Van der Smissen’s troops had been forced to go through. At first, he’d looked at his superior with some disdain, for he cou
ldn’t drop the idea that the colonel had defiled something sacred. However, before long, he saw in him such great misery that he began to take pity on him. Van der Smissen had lost the will to do anything: to live, to fight. When there was an opportunity to abandon his post and embark on a ship, he didn’t hesitate for a second. The tirades he’d always directed at his troops vanished like clouds in the wind. There wasn’t much left of him. And Philippe began to see just another man fighting to survive in his own cave. A man who, despite his rough edges, had been wounded like him. Without ever saying a word to Van der Smissen, he forgave him. He forgave him for affronts that not even the colonel himself knew he had committed. Perhaps, Philippe thought, Van der Smissen had given the empress a little happiness, and that was enough.

  He remembered the day a native boy gave the colonel a cigar; stunned, he took the gift and the child ran off. When he looked carefully, he saw that it wasn’t a cigar but a rolled-up message. It contained instructions to leave Tulancingo, where they were awaiting orders. Maximilian had dissolved the Austro-Belgian troops, including Philippe’s unit. The colonel contacted a Republican general to tell him they were leaving, to prevent the many bandits that surrounded them like zopilotes from pillaging the town; the Republicans and the French had for some time communicated to hand over garrisons.

  C’est fini, Van der Smissen thought. And it was true.

  Philippe didn’t embark with them. One night, he grabbed his bedroll and, once again, decided to be the master of his own destiny. Mexico had been a new beginning for which he hadn’t yet found an ending. He had to know. Leaving would be the most logical solution, but also the one that meant failure. He had gone in search of adventure, and to return rich, with land and a military rank. Philippe sighed. Who was he trying to fool? He’d never intended to go back. But if everyone was scattering, what was left in Mexico for him? He had to stay and find out. Whatever hell he chose, he wanted to look it in the eyes first.

  He returned to Chapultepec to find it empty. There were no ladies or footmen, no chambermaids or members of the court. It looked like a ruin, not from material but from spiritual decline. Nothing of the empire remained there. So he left in search of a monarchist, someone who could tell him the whereabouts of the nobles, but they’d all sought refuge in their homes, windows closed and curtains drawn tight. And then he remembered the names Constanza had said to him, of her brothers, of her father, Sr. Murrieta, of the house they had. Where had she said it was? He tried to remember, but couldn’t remember the name of the district. If only he’d paid more attention! He spent days trying to recall, before finally giving up. When he stopped trying, as if by magic, as if the universe were telling him which path to take, the name of the street, the district, the area all came back to him as if Constanza herself were whispering it in his ear. Santa María la Ribera, the whisper said. And Philippe clapped his hands.

  After making a few inquiries here and there, he found the Murrieta residence. He arrived at Constanza’s house praying—for the first time in years—for the family to still be living there. Or for anyone to be living there who could tell him their whereabouts. It wasn’t unusual to see abandoned residences: the owners covered paintings and furniture with sheets, hoping the light material would be enough to protect them from bandits that pillaged the treasures of families that had left with only the clothes on their backs. His prayers must have been heard, because a serving girl answered his knock timidly; however, she was under instructions not to let anyone in or to give anything away.

  “Does Constanza Murrieta live here?”

  “Who’s asking?”

  “Philippe Petit.”

  “What’s it about?”

  “It’s personal.”

  “Where have you come from?”

  “I’m from the empress’s personal guard,” he said in a whisper.

  The girl narrowed her eyes, suspicious.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t take your word for it.”

  Philippe was beginning to grow anxious. As he began insisting, the girl threatened to slam the door in his face.

  And just when Philippe was about to beg, he heard a voice very like Constanza’s ask, “Who is it, Petra?”

  Philippe’s heart stopped.

  “A young man’s asking for Señorita Constanza, señorita.”

  Philippe stretched his neck.

  The woman tried to see him through a small crack in the door, because Philippe had had the nerve to stick his foot in the doorjamb.

  “Let him in.”

  “But, Señorita Clotilde . . .”

  “I’ll take care of this, Petra. Thank you.”

  The girl opened the door, and the pressure eased on Philippe’s foot.

  The girl suddenly changed her attitude and smiled.

  “Come in, señor.”

  He went in. But he was no longer paying any attention to her. His focus was on the woman who’d allowed him in. Tall, thin, wearing a dress that covered her from the ankles to the lace-edged neck without fully disguising her figure underneath, hair gathered in a bun that allowed a pair of locks to escape to one side of her ears. She didn’t look like Constanza, yet Philippe knew immediately that she was her sister, the fragile, sickly girl that she’d sometimes mentioned. In her hand, Clotilde held a handkerchief that she used to cover her mouth when she coughed.

  “Are you looking for Constanza?”

  “That’s right, if you could tell me where I could find her, I’d be extremely grateful.”

  “She’s not here,” she said plainly. She could see the disappointment in his eyes.

  “Oh!” he replied. Then he said, “Allow me to introduce myself, I’m—”

  “I know who you are,” she interrupted, looking from side to side to be sure nobody had seen him. And to Philippe’s surprise, Clotilde approached, took him by the arm, and said to him, “You’re not safe in this house. Please, follow me.”

  Philippe obeyed, astonished. The woman, despite her slight build, guided him firmly toward a little study; they stepped into the semidarkness of the room and she closed the door.

  “I know who you are, Philippe. Constanza told me everything.”

  “She did?”

  Philippe feared that Constanza’s brothers also knew about their relationship and that was the reason for the secrecy. Just when he was about to ask, Clotilde spoke.

  “My sister and I don’t talk much, but we communicate a little.”

  “I see.”

  “I’ve heard terrible things, Philippe, things I haven’t wanted to tell anybody.”

  “Señorita, if I’ve offended your sister in any way . . .”

  Clotilde raised her hand and Philippe could have sworn she let out a shh.

  “What the two of you did or have stopped doing is none of my business.”

  Philippe was baffled. What a strange woman, he thought.

  And then Clotilde said something that left him stunned.

  “Let me give you a piece of advice: trust nobody, Philippe. Nobody.”

  He frowned. Clotilde persisted.

  “Trust nobody.” And then, moving closer to his ear she added, “Especially not a Murrieta.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

  “The Murrietas are not what they seem, señor. If they discover you’re here asking for Constanza, they’ll put you on the blacklist.”

  “Who will?” he asked, perplexed.

  “The Republicans, monsieur.”

  “But you’re Conservatives here . . .”

  “That’s what they’d have you believe, but they’re not. Everyone has two faces.”

  Philippe turned pale.

  “What do you mean, ‘everyone’? Constanza’s the empress’s lady, and her brothers . . .”

  As he said this, he noticed Clotilde roll her eyes.

  “Don’t you understand? Trust nobody. Go back to Belgium before it’s too late. And, please, don’t make me say more. I’ve already said too much.”

  “Please, I beg
you, explain.”

  They were speaking in low voices, almost in whispers, and Clotilde kept looking at the door nervously.

  “Salvador and Constanza are informants for Juárez,” she said point-blank. “They think I don’t know, but I hear things.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “Believe me. I know.”

  “It can’t be,” Philippe repeated.

  “Yes, it can.”

  Constanza, a traitor? It couldn’t be true. It had to be some kind of misunderstanding. He knew her. He’d sat with her for a couple of hours every afternoon for the last two years; they’d traveled to Yucatán together, lived in the palace together, slept together. No. It couldn’t be true. There had to be an explanation. Constanza had told him about Clotilde, a sickly girl with a somewhat simple intellect. Her poisoned testimony wasn’t reliable. But suddenly, the image of Constanza meeting people he never saw again, the walks with her brother in the garden with her head bowed, the silences, the anguished looks . . . suddenly it all fit together so perfectly that Philippe felt like the stupidest man on earth.

  “Go, Philippe,” said Clotilde, interrupting his thoughts. “They mustn’t know you’ve been here.”

  “But I need to speak to her. Please, I beg you, tell me where she is.”

  “If I see her, I’ll tell her you’re looking for her. But she doesn’t come here often.”

  “I’ll come back every day at this time until I speak to her.”

  “Don’t punish yourself, Philippe. Constanza doesn’t want to see anyone. Like I said, she rarely comes, she grabs a couple of things and leaves again. We don’t know where she is or who she’s with. My mother’s devastated and my father . . . never mind my father. If he sees her here, he might kill her for refusing to accompany the empress on her journey to Europe.”

  “I’ll be back,” said Philippe.

  He left the house more bewildered than when he’d arrived. And more convinced than ever that he wouldn’t leave until he knew the truth.