Disappear.
BONAPARTE
Yes, disappear. For you as for me the real glory consists of putting oneself above one’s state. In peace as in war, I was always above my state. By becoming emperor, I would once more put myself above my state. By fulfilling the prediction made once upon a time by a magician in Martinique that she would someday be more than queen, I would put Joséphine above the state. You as well, I would put above yours. I am a soldier who has made it and who will help you make it. I have planned for everything. The title of Prince Archtreasurer would go to Lebrun, and that of Prince Archchancellor of the Empire to you, replacing resoundingly the consul titles.
CAMBACÉRÈS
Archchancellor. Talleyrand will make fun of me.
BONAPARTE
No one will make fun of you. Nor of me. The French will find it charming to have their own emperor surrounded by princes. They may laugh the first day, less so the second, and by the third they will be used to it all. Talleyrand will make a few witty remarks. He will say “Look! the Archchancellor is archriding around his archwagon.” As with Fouché and the others, I will make him a prince or a duke of something, with a hundred-thousand francs per year, and that will take care of it. Let me win a few more battles and I will take care of everything.
CAMBACÉRÈS
Even the Jacobins?
BONAPARTE
What caused the Revolution? Vanity. What will bring it to an end? Vanity again. It is with rattles that one draws men. I would never say that before a tribunal, but between us it can be said. Ten years of revolution have not changed the French. They still want glory, distinctions, and rewards. The Jacobins will be given the titles of barons or counts and go to mass right behind me. Fouché and Talleyrand set an example last year. All of them, even the most rabid among them, will follow suit. There are still twelve or fifteen metaphysicians who need to be tossed into the water, vermin caught up in my clothes, and it has sometimes been necessary to shoot or deport them. I have always known how to rid myself of these. I am not going to allow myself to be attacked like Louis the Sixteenth. I am a soldier, a child of the Revolution, and as I come from the people I will not permit anyone to insult me like a king.
CAMBACÉRÈS
And the royalists?
BONAPARTE
The royalists are my problem. They will throng around this new Caesar, this Charlemagne reborn, only too happy to retain their old privileges and their new allocations. There will be some foot-draggers, some among them who are fearful and ashamed. Sooner or later they will all come around. Many of them are already looking on admiringly, and the distance from admiration to submission is short. The nobility would have been content with the Directory or the Consulate. It is hard to imagine that an empire won’t satisfy them. If they prove skittish and it proves necessary to smite them, good and hard, then so be it. I will smite them. I will always be careful to balance the Jacobins and the royalists.
CAMBACÉRÈS
What about the Army?
BONAPARTE
Berthier, Murat, Masséna, Soult, Lannes, Mortier, Ney, Davout — even Bernadotte, whom I do not trust — and several others shall be made marshals of the empire. Some among them will be made princes. Murat — if only to appease Caroline — may climb higher still.
CAMBACÉRÈS
The Church?
BONAPARTE
The Church will always choose a monarchy over a republic, and with good reason. In a republic it is necessary to please so many and to deceive so many others that the pain exceeds profit. With a monarchy, the only person it needs to charm in order to remain in power is the leader. The Church has only ever revolted against weak princes. I shall not be weak. Moreover, I will pay the clergy well and include them in the honors lists, just as I will give entitlements and honors to anyone who wishes to serve me — and first of all to you, Cambacérès. You will remain the second-most-powerful figure in the empire, just as you have been in the Consulate.
CAMBACÉRÈS
You have a response for everything. You are not like other men. In ancient days, like Alexander, you would have been a half-god, a son of the king of the gods.
BONAPARTE
I admit that I have done well, and made my way handsomely. My approach is nonetheless quite simple: I stay ahead of events, I immerse myself in the details, and I leave nothing in the shadows. You are sometimes mistaken, Cambacérès, and you lack audacity. But you are also loyal and uncomplicated. While I am with my soldiers on a campaign, you will manage the affairs of state. You will gather the ministers, you will preside over the Senate and the State Council, where you will display your greater talent and your deeper logic, and you will prove worthy of my confidence.
CAMBACÉRÈS
I hope I have been worthy of it until this moment. Time is short. We will have to come up with a coat of arms for the empire and the imperial family. Would you take up the escutcheon of your fathers, a golden rake on azure with three fleur-de-lys?
BONAPARTE
No, no fleur-de-lys. It is an emblem of a banished House and as hated as the white flag. You do not know the power of men’s memories. Unfurl a white flag with a fleur-de-lys, and half of France will think it means the return of Louis the Eighteenth, to whom today no one gives any thought. I am not the son of Louis the Sixteenth, or even of Louis the Fourteenth. I am starting a new dynasty, a new empire, and it will not be that of Hugues Capet. Instead it will come from me and from antiquity. The things, the words, and the images shall be different. Fleur-de-lys and white flags belong to the Bourbons. I will retain the three colors with which we ran them out. Nothing must separate me from France. We must be exactly the same thing.
CAMBACÉRÈS
Would you choose the traditional Gallic rooster? You could set it on a tricolor flag.
BONAPARTE
The rooster is reminiscent of the barnyard and not noble enough to incarnate a great nation. What is required a more powerful beast — an elephant, for example, or a lion crouched upon a map of France, one paw extended along the Rhine with the motto: “He who seeks me, beware!”
CAMBACÉRÈS
Isn’t the Rhine too limiting for France’s ambitions?
BONAPARTE
You are right. We need not put boundaries on either our dreams or our courage. Let us find something better.
CAMBACÉRÈS
What would you say to golden bees? They can be found on Chilperic’s tombstone.
BONAPARTE
Bees are a good idea. They could figure on wallhangings, carpets, on mantles. But I am an emperor and I trace myself back to the Caesars, so I must have their symbols. I choose the eagle, its wings outspread, bearing lightning in its claws. It will be gold and set upon a field of the noblest color.
CAMBACÉRÈS
On a field of red?
BONAPARTE
A field of blue. My livery shall be green, because the Bourbons used blue livery and the heavens are for everyone. The imperial eagle shall be set upon an azure field, the image of the sky in which he rules. The eagle shall be my emblem, and it will be indistinguishable from me. My coronation will take place beneath its sign.