The Wanton Princess

'Oh, must we go!' she cried in protest. 'I have been happier here with you Rojé than ever in my life before. I cannot bear the thought of returning to that dreary round of behaving like a great lady and being pleasant to scores of people, most of whom are atrocious bores. Can we not stay here for another month, or a fortnight at the least?'

He shook his head. 'No, dear goddess. I dare not risk it, for your sake even more than my own. We will have one more week here but not a day longer. On that my mind is set, and with all your wondrous wiles you will not move it.'

So, one week later, their stolen honeymoon ended. On February 20th, sad but resigned, they took the road to Paris.

17

Of Love and War

Napoleon's face was black with anger, his broad jaw stuck out and his eyebrows were drawn down. In his harsh, Italian-accented voice, he rasped, 'Two months! Two whole months and not one word from you!'

Roger raised his eyebrows, ‘I would have thought, First Consul, that you had enough anxieties to occupy you without worrying about your family.'

'My family! Sacri Nom! They are the cause of half my worries. My brothers do me more harm than I can do them good. And now Madame Leclerc must get herself lost in southern France for eight weeks.'

'But, mon General, you knew that I was with her, so could be certain that she would come to no harm.'

'You, and who else? No one but a serving wench! And Leclerc but four months dead! If this gets out, 'twill be the scandal of the year.'

'It will not get out, unless you let it; for she travelled under a false name. You have but to endorse the statement she has already agreed to—that she spent seven weeks in a convent hearing Masses for the repose of her husband's soul. No one has cause to suspect she spent her time otherwise, and did some scribbler ferret out the truth he'd never dare publish it.’

'My sister, running round France under a false name with a man like yourself. What a way to behave!'

'Since she was determined to preserve her incognito, what else could she do? Had she travelled in your coach with a full escort she would have been harrowed by having to listen to addresses of condolence from the Mayors of every town through which she passed. On the other hand, had she not taken me with her she would have been pestered day and night by the unwelcome attentions of a score of gallants.'

'True! True! But she should at least have taken a chaperone. A month ago I ordered Savary to use his police to locate her. What a story would have been made of it had they come upon the two of you unchaperoned.'

'Where was she to find a chaperone, pray, at short notice in Bordeaux? I mean one who, entrusted with such an honour, would not have been so puffed up by her appointment as to blab about it to all and sundry?'

'You are so glib of tongue, Breuc, that you have an answer for everything. But I regard your conduct as most reprehensible.'

'Then, First Consul, you do me a great injustice. You charged me with the care of Madame Leclerc, but you gave me no order that I should bring her direct to Paris. Your actual words to me were, "Do all you can to bring the smiles back to those bright eyes of hers". Well, I have done it.'

'That, at least, I am glad to hear,' Napoleon grudgingly admitted.

'Indeed, our tour of the ancient cities in the south worked wonders. Knowing something of their history I was not badly qualified to be her guide. She showed the greatest interest in many places that we visited, particularly in the ruins of the Roman amphitheatre at Nimes.'

'Ruins!' Napoleon gave a harsh laugh. 'Pauline has never cared a fig for ruins! The sight of them wrought no change in her. I'll vow. 'Twas yourself and your sleeping with her.'

Drawing himself up, Roger cried, 'First Consul, I protest 1 You have no right so to malign Madame Leclerc'

'Nonsense, man! I know Pauline better than you will ever do, however many times you've tossed her between the sheets. She gave horns to Leclerc before they had been married three months, and during his absence on the Rhine I had to post a dozen officers to the provinces to prevent her scandalous affaires with them becoming the talk of Paris.'

Roger was furious. Being in love with Pauline and having witnessed her terrible distress at Leclerc's death, he had gradually formed the belief that the tales of her immorality were untrue, and that she had done no more than flirt with her many admirers. Seething with anger, he snapped:

'Were you not who you are I would call you out for that. You should be ashamed to believe such slanders about your sister.'

With one of his amazing changes of mood, Napoleon suddenly laughed, then pulled Roger's ear, 'My poor Breuc, you have completely given yourself away. No man issues a challenge in defence of a woman's honour unless he is in love with her. For that I cannot blame you. She is so dazzling a creature that many times when she has entered a room a sudden silence has fallen and I've heard a dozen men catch their breath. But she is as licentious as she is beautiful, and if you did not seduce her I'd stake my life that she seduced you. I'll not now insist that you admit it; but I'll have to send you to the provinces.'

Relieved as Roger was to have got through his ordeal, his heart sank, and he said, 'Mon General, as Madame Leclcrc has gone to live with her brother Joseph and his wife, we will have no opportunity to see one another except in public, and as no one but yourself knows of the journey we made together no scandal will link our names. It is above fourteen months since I had the honour to serve on your personal staff, and see something of Paris. Can you not possibly find some use for me that will allow me to remain here?'

Napoleon, his big head bowed, took a few paces up and down before replying, 'Perhaps, yes. Now I think on it I may need you in a few months' time. The accursed English are playing me up most damnably. They have agreed to evacuate the Cape and Egypt, but most dishonourably refuse to carry out the terms of the Treaty by which our territories in India were to be restored to us, and they remain adamant about Malta. Not content with that, they continue to slander mc in their journals; yes, even to the vile extent of asserting that I seduced my step-daughter Hortense then, having got her with child, quickly married her off to my brother Louis.'

'How infamous!' Roger exclaimed with genuine indignation, for he felt convinced that there was not an atom of truth in such an accusation.

'Yes. What minds they must have! But in that, at least, I proved them to be liars. I had a poet write some verses praising Hortense's dancing, then gave a ball at Malmaison. There, to her great annoyance, and much as I dislike the sight of pregnant women, I made her do a few pirouettes in front of me. She was then seven months gone and her state plain for all to sec. As she had been married to Louis for over nine months that made it as clear as crystal to everyone that she could not have conceived by me before her marriage.'

For a moment he was silent, then changed the subject, 'But about yourself. Although I wish the peace to continue and am being very patient with the English, their attitude is so unfriendly that I can only regard the present state of things as a short armistice. I am convinced, too, that to make war upon them again would be ultimately to our advantage. Therefore I am already preparing to resume hostilities. When the peace was made I allowed our activities on the coast to be slowed down, but recently I've given orders that they are to be increased. You can report to Berthier and take up again with him your previous role as my liaison officer in all matters concerning the invasion of England.'