In those days Godoy had been only a Lieutenant of the Flemish Guard; but he was already powerful through the influence he exerted as the lover of Queen Maria Luisa. Roger had thought her the ugliest woman he had ever seen, and she had the reputation of being the most lecherous in Europe. Her husband, King Carlos IV, had then been on the throne only for two years. He was a strange individual; his only interests lay in hunting and playing the violin. He never drank wine or coffee, abhorred tobacco, had never had a mistress, and resolutely closed his eyes to his Queen's flagrant infidelities. For many years he had regarded Godoy as his closest friend, placed absolute trust in his judgment and showered him with honours. In '92 he had created him Duke of Alcudia and in '95, when Godoy had ignominiously brought to a conclusion the war with France which he had started so reluctantly, given him the title of the Prince of Peace.
As it was Roger's business to be well informed about all the Courts in Europe, he marvelled that Godoy had succeeded in maintaining his influence for so long over the nymphomaniac Queen; since she had summoned scores of other lovers to her bed, and he had been equally unfaithful to her. Quite early in their association he had openly boasted to her of his affaire with the beautiful Duchess of Alba; then, when she heaped furious reproaches on him, had given her a beating. He had had two children by the Queen, and taken as his wife the King's young cousin, Maria Theresa of Bourbon. Yet, he kept installed in their palace his principal mistress 'Pepa' Tudo. To his greed and ambition there were no limits. He collected highly-paid offices as other men collected bric-a-brac, and, greatly as he hated the thought of war, he had even suggested to Napoleon that they should dismember Portugal into three parts, one of which should be made into a kingdom for himself. Such was the man who for so many years had held the fate of the Peninsula in his hands.
After the siesta, Roger settled his bill at the inn and had his valise sent to the Embassy, where he made the acquaintance of Jules Baudin, a plump and pleasant man. He then repaired to the tailor. Having chosen the material, he was able, being something of an artist, to draw the type of uniform he wished it to be made up into. He also ordered a smart civilian suit and cloak. The man promised that his assistants should work all night, so that Roger could be fitted the next day, and receive delivery the day after that.
Roger then visited a mercer's, a haberdasher's and a hatter's, in order to replenish his sadly-depleted wardrobe and, finally, bought two stout valises in which to transport his new garments.
That evening at the Embassy he was made aware of the power the French wielded in Madrid. It seemed that half the nobility in the city had come to pay court to dc Bcauharnais; as he was absent, they fawned upon Jules Baudin. Napoleon, having looted half Europe of her treasure, could well afford lavish entertainment in his Embassies, so open house was kept, and nearly forty of the callers stayed on to dinner.
Many of them spoke French and Roger had enough Spanish to converse fairly freely with others who did not. He soon found that they showed no restraint in airing their opinions. All of them hated Godoy, yet shared his reluctance to send an army to coerce the Portuguese into breaking off relations with England. They had had their lesson when Spain had last challenged the mighty sea-power. The British Navy had promptly stopped the treasure ships arriving from South America, and it was upon them that the life of Spain depended. The country had suffered acutely, and thousands of people had gone bankrupt. Should the English again take up the cudgels on behalf of Portugal, those terrible times would be repeated.
Several of them mentioned Prince Ferdinand, the Heir Apparent. His loathing for Godoy was so great that, as a means of bringing about the favourite's downfall, he had gone to the length of conspiring against his own father. Godoy had discovered the plot in time, so had saved the throne for King Carlos. The Prince had been arrested and, mean creature that he was, to save himself from permanent imprisonment, had denounced all his associates. Yet, even so, these discontented nobles would have happily accepted his rule rather than have Godoy continue in power.
The general consensus of opinion was that there would be no war; because Godoy, for all his villainy and extortions, had twice saved them from it. By one treaty he had bought non-belligerency for Spain by agreeing to furnish two million francs a month towards Napoleon's war chest. Later, in another treaty, he had agreed to raise the contribution to six million. Therefore, the nobles argued, even if it cost Spain still more, he would somehow wriggle out of sending troops into Portugal.
With few exceptions, Roger thought them a stiff-necked, bigoted lot, so blinded by their hatred for Godoy that they had lost all sense of reality.
Three days elapsed before the Ambassador returned from Aranjuez, but Roger was not troubled by the delay. Having nearly completed his journey, he now felt that he had a good margin of time in hand before arriving in Lisbon; because de Pombal's party had gone round Arabia and up the Red Sea, so were not likely to reach the Portuguese capital much before mid-November. Meanwhile, he enjoyed strolling about Madrid, and put up with the inanities of the small-minded hidalgos who frequented the Embassy.
On the evening of the day that de Beauharnais did get back to Madrid, he and Roger enjoyed a long, private talk. Roger gave a skilfully-edited account of his travels, then they discussed at length the pros and cons of the threat to Portugal. To wind up, the Ambassador said:
'In spite of all this banging of drums, I think it very unlikely that it will come to war in the Peninsula. If former occasions of a similar nature are anything to go by, it certainly will not. On one such, the Emperor wrote to a predecessor of mine here: "Tell King Carlos that, unless he complies with my demands, he will be the last Bourbon to occupy a throne." But nothing came of it. Godoy bought him off by offering a greatly-increased subsidy, and the odds are that is what will happen again.'
Roger was not fully convinced. On those previous occasions Napoleon had had bigger fish to fry; so it had suited him to let Spain off the hook, at a price. But now he was not engaged in any great campaign, not a musket was being fired throughout all Europe, and he had a very powerful army at his disposal. Moreover, for the past year and more, he had been concentrating on perfecting his 'Continental System'. Now that the ports of Denmark and Sweden were closed to British shipping, those of Portugal remained the only leak. It was argued that he would think more than once about sending an army into the desolate and mountainous wastes of Spain, where it would find little to live on. But he had not hesitated to send one into the equally barren snow-covered lands of Poland. As he went to bed, Roger could only pray, for Lisala's sake that the Ambassador's appreciation of the situation was right.
Resplendent now in the brilliant new uniform the tailor had made for him, he spent another day in Madrid, intending next morning to set out on the road for Lisbon. That evening, on his note of hand as one of the Emperor's people, he drew from Baudin as large a sum in gold as he could without discomfort carry in his money-belt, and shortly afterwards went to bed.
It was an hour after midnight when de Beauharnais suddenly appeared in Roger's bedroom, clad in a chamber robe and clutching a paper in his hand. Roger was just drifting off to sleep. Rousing himself, he exclaimed: