Desiree by Annemarie Selinko
I took his hand and pressed it against my face.
‘My little girl, don’t forget to write often! The War Ministry will—’
‘Forward my letters, I know. Jean-Baptiste, will there never be an end to it? Will it always be like this, always and always?’
‘Give Oscar a big kiss from me, little girl.’
‘I asked you, Jean-Baptiste, will it always be like this?’
‘The Emperor’s order: to conquer and occupy Bavaria. You are married to a Marshal of France. This should not be a surprise to you,’ he said in a voice which had lost all expression.
‘Bavaria? And when you’ve conquered Bavaria, are you coming back to me in Paris or are we going to return to Hanover?’
‘From Bavaria we shall march against Austria.’
‘And then? But there are no more frontiers to defend. France has no more frontiers, France—’
‘France is Europe. And France’s Marshals have to march, my child. Orders of the Emperor!’
‘To think how often you have been asked in the past to assume power! If only you had at that time—’
‘Désirée!’ His voice broke in sharply.’ And in a gentler tone he continued: ‘My little girl, I started as an ordinary private soldier and I never went to an officers’ training academy, but I would never dream of picking up a crown out of the gutter. I do not pick up things out of the gutter. Do not forget that! Do not forget that, ever!’
He extinguished the candle. The grey farewell dawn broke through the curtains.
Shortly before I got into the coach Monsieur van Beethoven appeared once more. I had just put on my hat and Oscar was proudly holding his own little travelling bag when he came in, slowly, awkwardly and with a stiff bow.
‘I should like you,’ he fumbled for words, then went on: ‘I should like you to tell General Bernadotte that I cannot dedicate the new symphony to the Emperor either. Least of all to him.’ He paused, then said: ‘I shall simply call it “Eroica”, to commemorate a hope which did not find fulfilment. General Bernadotte will know what I mean,’ he sighed.
‘I shall give him your message and I’m sure he will understand, Monsieur,’ I said, and gave him my hand.
‘Do you know, Mama, what I want to be?’ asked Oscar as our coach was rolling along the endless roads. ‘I want to be a musician.’
‘I thought you wanted to be a sergeant or a Marshal like your papa. Or a silk merchant,’ I said absent-mindedly. I had my diary on my knee and was writing.
‘I thought it over. I want to be a composer like Monsieur Beethoven. Or – a King.’
‘Why a King?’
‘Because as a King one can do good to so many people. A servant told me so in the castle. Hanover used to have a King, before the Emperor sent Papa there. Did you know that?’
Now even my six-year-old son had found out how uneducated I am!
He insisted: ‘Composer or King!’
‘Then you’d better be a King,’ I said. ‘That’s easier.’
Paris, June 4th, 1806
If only I knew where Ponte Corvo is! But I shall read about it to-morrow morning in the paper. So why bother about it now? I’d rather write down what has happened since my return from Germany.
Oscar had the whooping cough and was not allowed to go out. My friends avoided our house like the plague because they were afraid their children would catch it. I had wanted to start my piano and deportment lessons again, but even Monsieur Montel, that ballerina in trousers, was mortally afraid of infection. Anyway, I was really rather glad not to have to go to the lessons, as I was always so tired. Oscar coughed and was sick, mostly at night, and therefore I had his bed put in my room to be near him.
At Chrismas time the three of us, Oscar, Marie and I, were quite alone. I gave him a violin for his present and promised him voilin lessons as soon as he was well again.
Now and then Julie came to see us. During her visits she made Marie massage her feet, which were quite swollen owing to the long spells of standing about at the great receptions which she and Joseph had to give during the Emperor’s absence. I kept away from her and sat in the dining-room so as not to infect her, whilst she had her massage in the drawing-room. Through the open door Julie shouted out all the news to me.
‘Your husband has conquered Bavaria,’ she shouted one day in late autumn. ‘You’ll read it to-morrow in the Moniteur. He met an Austrian Army there and beat it. Marie, massage a bit harder, otherwise it’s no good. Your husband is a great General, Désirée!’
In October she mentioned casually: ‘We’ve lost our whole Navy. But Joseph says it doesn’t really matter. The Emperor will show our enemies who is the master of Europe.’
In December she appeared one day quite out of breath: ‘Désirée, we’ve won a tremendous battle, and to-morrow Joseph and I are going to give a ball for a thousand guests. Le Roy has his people working all night to get a dress ready for me. Wine-coloured, Désirée. How d’you like that?’
‘But Julie, red doesn’t suit you, don’t you know? What news of Jean-Baptiste? Is he all right?’
‘All right? More than all right, darling! Joseph says that the Emperor is, so to speak, in his debt because he prepared everything so well. You know, five Army Corps marched into the battle at Austerlitz—’
‘Austerlitz? Where is Austerlitz?
‘No idea. Does it matter? Somewhere in Germany, I think. Listen, five Army Corps, one each under Lannes, Murat, Soult, Davout and your husband. Jean-Baptiste and Soult held the centre.’
‘What centre?’
‘How do I know? The centre of the line, I suppose, I’m no strategist. Napoleon with the five Marshals stood on a hill, and all the enemies of France are now beaten for good. Now we shall really have peace, Désirée!’
‘Peace,’ I said, and tried to imagine Jean-Baptiste’s return. ‘Then he’s coming home at last,’ I shouted across the dining-room.
‘They say he’s on his way at this moment. We have to manage all Europe now and he’ll have to think it all out,’ Julie called back.
‘Never mind Europe, he’s got to come home because Oscar keeps asking for him.’
‘I see, you’re talking about Jean-Baptiste, but I mean the Emperor. He’s on his way back, and Joseph says Jean-Baptiste can’t come yet. The Emperor has ordered him to administer not only Hanover but Ansbach as well. Alternately he’s to be there and in Hanover. You ought to go to him in Ansbach and have a look at things there.’
‘I can’t,’ I said, somewhat subdued, ‘not with Oscar’s whooping cough.’
Julie didn’t hear me. ‘Do you really think wine-red is wrong for me? Joseph likes me in it, he says it’s a regal colour. Ow, Marie, not too hard, please. Why don’t you answer, Désirée?’
‘I’m unhappy,’ I said, ‘I so want to see Jean-Baptiste. Why can’t he have leave?’
‘Don’t be childish, Désirée! How is the Emperor to hold the conquered territories if he doesn’t put his Marshals in command there?’
‘Yes, how is he to hold them?’ I thought bitterly. ‘With this new victory he’s won the whole of Europe, with this and the help of eighteen Marshals. And I, I of all people, am married to a Marshal. There are millions of Frenchmen, but only eighteen Marshals. Why, why did I have to marry one of these eighteen? And I love him and want him so badly, oh so badly!’
‘Drink a cup of chocolate and lie down, Eugenie,’ said Marie. ‘You never slept a wink last night, you know.’
I looked up. ‘Where is Julie?’
‘You fell asleep and she left to try on dresses, I suppose, and make arrangements for her ball and dust the Elysée Palace before a thousand guests arrive.’
‘Marie, is it ever coming to an end, this war-making, this taking over of other countries which have nothing to do with us?’
‘Oh yes, but to a dreadful end,’ said Marie gloomily. She hates wars because she fears that one day her son will be called up too. And she hates all the royal castles we live in because she is a Republi
I lay down and fell into a fitful sleep from which I was awakened very soon by the sound of Oscar’s coughing and panting for breath …
Many weeks passed. Spring came, and still Jean-Baptiste hadn’t returned. His letters were short and uninformative. He was residing in Ansbach and trying to introduce there the same reforms as in Hanover. I should come to him, he wrote, as soon as Oscar was better.
But Oscar recovered very slowly. We gave him lots of milk to drink and put him outside in the garden in the spring sun. Josephine came once and said that I don’t look after my roses properly. So she sent me her gardener. The gardener was awfully expensive and made such a mess of my roses that hardly anything was left of them.
People at last stopped being afraid of catching infection from Oscar, and Hortense invited him to play with her two boys. After Napoleon’s adoption of their two sons Hortense and Louis Bonaparte imagine that their eldest boy will one day inherit his throne. On the other hand there is Joseph who thinks that the throne will be his. (Why Joseph should take it for granted that he would survive his younger brother, or why no one thinks it possible that Napoleon might nominate a son of his own to be his heir I don’t understand. After all, there is little Leon, the son of Josephine’s reader Eleonore Revel, who was born last December, and there is just a chance that the Empress may repeat her performance of her first marriage … Thank God, the whole thing is no concern of mine!) As I was saying, Oscar had been invited to play with Hortense’s sons, and a few days later he had a temperature and a sore throat and wouldn’t eat. Now, of course, it was worse than ever before and nobody would come anywhere near our house: Oscar had got German measles.
Dr Corvisart called and prescribed cold compresses to get Oscar’s temperature down. But the compresses were no good. Oscar raved in his fever and called desperately for his father. At night he wouldn’t sleep anywhere but in my bed, and I would clasp him tightly to me. There was a risk of infection, but Marie said that one rarely got this kind of illness twice. Oscar’s thin body was full of little red blisters which, Dr Corvisart said, he must not scratch.
I never saw my reader these days. Heaven knows to whom she read, certainly not to me, she was so afraid of measles. It annoyed me, though, that I had to pay her her salary all the same. Since Jean-Baptiste’s promotion to Marshal we’ve had so many unnecessary expenses.
The days passed, one very much like the other. Then, one spring afternoon, Julie turned up surprisingly, because since Oscar’s measles she had stopped coming completely and only sent her maid regularly to inquire how he was. She appeared in the drawing-room full of excitement, and when I entered the house from the garden she shouted: ‘Don’t come near me, you’ll infect me. But I want to be the first to tell you the great news. It’s inconceivable—’
Her hat sat askew, little trickles of perspiration ran down her face and she was pale.
I was terrified. ‘For heaven’s sake, what is the matter?’ I asked.
‘I’ve become a Queen, Queen of Naples,’ she said in a toneless voice; her eyes were wide with terror.
At first I thought she had fallen ill and was raving, that she had caught measles somewhere, though certainly not from us, and I shouted: ‘Marie, come quickly, Julie isn’t well.’
Marie appeared, but Julie declined her help. ‘Leave me alone, I am all right, only I can’t get used to the idea yet. A Queen, me a Queen! The Queen of Naples. Naples is in Italy, isn’t it? My husband, His Majesty King Joseph! And I am Her Majesty Queen Julie. Oh, Désirée, the whole thing is terrible. We shall have to go to Italy again and live in those dreadful marble palaces …’
‘Your father wouldn’t have liked it, Mademoiselle Julie,’ put in Marie.
‘Hold your tongue!’ said Julie harshly. I had never heard her speak like that to Marie before. Marie’s mouth set in a thin hard line and she left the room, slamming the door behind her. But no sooner had she gone than my companion, Madame La Flotte, appeared in her very best gown and sank into a deep curtsey before Julie as if she were the Empress. ‘Your Majesty, may I congratulate you?’ she lisped.
Julie, whom Marie’s furious exit had left in a state of near-collapse, gave a nervous start at the sight of Madame La Flotte and the corners of her mouth twitched. She collected herself quickly and her face was that of a bad actress who wants to play a Queen. ‘Thank you. How do you know what has happened?’ she asked in a new, strange voice.
My companion was still in her deep curtsey on the carpet before Julie. ‘The whole town talks of nothing else, Your Majesty.’ Somewhat absurdly she added: ‘Your Majesty is too gracious!’
‘Leave me alone with my sister,’ said Julie in her new voice. At that my companion tried to remove herself with her back to the door, an effort which I watched with great interest. When at last she had managed to get out through the door I said: ‘She seems to think that she is at court.’
‘In my presence,’ said Julie, ‘from now on one has to behave as at court. Joseph is busy this afternoon collecting a real regal suite.’ She shuddered, as if she were cold. ‘Désirée, I’m so afraid of everything.’
I tried to encourage her. ‘Nonsense, you’ll always be yourself.’
But Julie shook her head and hid her face in her hands. ‘No, it’s no good. You can’t talk it away, I am a Queen now.’
She began to weep, and without thinking I went up to her. She screamed at once: ‘Don’t touch me, go away. Measles!’
I went back to the door to the garden. ‘Yvette!’ I called.
Yvette, my maid, came, and on seeing Julie she, too, curtsied deeply.
‘Bring a bottle of champagne, Yvette.’
‘I can’t do it,’ said Julie, ‘I can’t do it. More receptions, more court balls in a strange country. Away from Paris …’
Yvette returned with the bottle and two glasses, and I poured out for us. Julie took her glass and at once began to drink hurriedly, thirstily.
‘Your health, darling,’ I said, ‘I suppose it’s an occasion for congratulations.’
‘It’s all your doing,’ she smiled, ‘you brought Joseph into our house.’
I remembered the whispers that were going round about Joseph being unfaithful to Julie. Small affaires, though, nothing really serious. He realised a long time ago that his talent as an author didn’t amount to much but that his political talent was something to be proud of. And now brother-in-law Joseph had become a King.
‘I hope,’ I said, ‘you are happy with Joseph.’
‘I have him so rarely to myself,’ she said, and stared past me into the garden. ‘I suppose I am happy, really. I have the children, Zenaïde and little Charlotte Napoleone.’
‘Your daughters will all be Princesses now, and everything will be all right,’ I said, and smiled. At the same time I tried to get it all into focus: Julie was a Queen, her daughters were Princesses, and Joseph, the little secretary of the Maison Commune who married Julie on account of her dowry, was King Joseph I of Naples.
‘The Emperor, let me tell you, has decided to turn the conquered territories into independent States to be governed by the Imperial Princes and Princesses. And, of course, these States are to be linked to France by pacts of friendship. We, Joseph and I, are going to govern Naples and Sicily, Eliza has become Duchess of Lucca, Louis King of Holland and Murat Duke of Cleves.’
‘Good heavens, do you mean to say that the Marshals too will have to take their turn?’ I asked, startled.
‘No, it’s because Murat is married to Caroline, and Caroline would be mortally insulted if she didn’t have the revenues of a country to dispose of like the others.’
I felt relieved.
‘In any case,’ Julie went on, ‘someone will have to reign over the countries which we have conquered.’
‘Which who conquered?’ I asked pointedly.
Julie made no answer but poured herself another glass, drank it hastily and said: ‘I wanted to be the first to tell you all that.
‘No,’ I said firmly. ‘You must object to that. Red just doesn’t suit you, it doesn’t. Have the coronation robe green, not purple.’
‘And all the packing I have to do!’ wailed Julie. ‘And the ceremonial entry into Naples! You are coming with us, aren’t you?’
I shook my head. ‘No. I have to nurse my boy, and besides, well, I am waiting for my husband. Jean-Baptiste is bound to come home sometime or other, isn’t he?’
From that day till this morning I heard no more from Julie. I only read in the Moniteur about her, about Their Majesties the King and Queen of Naples and their balls, receptions and preparations for their journey.
To-day Oscar was allowed out of bed for the first time and he sat by the open window. It has been an enchanting June day, the air was filled with the scent of lilac and roses, and the sweetness everywhere made me long more than ever for my Jean-Baptiste.
A carriage stopped outside our door. Every time a carriage draws up unexpectedly at our house there is a breathless moment when my heart waits for a miracle to happen. There was a breathless moment now, but it was only Julie who got out of the carriage. I heard her ask for me, and the next moment she came into the room. My companion and Yvette curtsied deeply, Marie, however, who had just been dusting, strode away into the garden with a stony face. She didn’t want to see Julie.
Julie’s regal gestures, which I am sure she owes to Monsieur Montel’s tuition, swept everybody out of the room. Oscar got up and ran towards her.
‘Aunt Julie,’ he cried, ‘I am well again.’ She took him in her arms and pressed him to her. Looking at me over his curly head she said:
‘I wanted to tell you before you read it to-morrow morning in the Moniteur that Jean-Baptiste has become Prince of Ponte Corvo. Your Serene Highness, I offer you my congratulations!’ She laughed and kissed Oscar, adding: ‘Congratulations, my little heir to the Principality of Ponte Corvo!’
At first I didn’t know what to say, but at last I managed to bring out: ‘I don’t understand that. Jean-Baptiste isn’t a brother of the Emperor, is he?’