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When she had finished, Hector bowed to Madame de Sourdis, and looking even more intently at Claire than he had while she was speaking, he said, “Claire, based on what I told you yesterday, and I am not sorry to have gone on at such length, put yourself in my place and answer your mother. Your answer will be my answer.”
The girl thought for a moment and then threw herself into her mother’s arms. “Oh, Mother!” she cried, shaking her head. “He cannot. His brother’s blood flows between them.”
Madame de Sourdis bowed her head. It was clear that she felt great disappointment. She had dreamed of a high rank in the army for her son-in-law; and for her daughter, a high position at the court.
“Madame,” said Hector, “please don’t think that I am among those people who praise the old regime to the detriment of the current one, or that I am blind to the First Consul’s great qualities. I saw him the other day for the first time at Madame de Permon’s ball, and rather than feeling repulsed, I was attracted to him. I admire his campaign of ’96 and ’97 as a masterpiece of modern strategy and an exemplar of his military genius. I am less enthusiastic, I’ll admit, about his Egyptian campaign, which could have no happy outcome and was no more than a mask to cover his immense thirst for fame: Bonaparte fought and won where Marius and Pompey had also fought and won. By that, he hoped to awaken and amend ancient echoes that for centuries had repeated no names but those of Alexander and Caesar. How tempting. But it was an expensive fantasy that cost our country so much money and so many men! As for the most recent campaign, at Marengo, that was a campaign only for personal glory, undertaken to give a firm footing to the legitimacy of the 18th Brumaire and to force foreign governments to recognize the new French government. But, as everyone knows, Bonaparte was not a military genius. He was lucky, like a gambler who is about to lose and then draws two trump cards. And what trump cards they were! Kellermann and Desaix! The 18th Brumaire was no more than a conspiracy whose lucky success in the end barely justifies its author’s means. What if it had failed? What if his attempt to overthrow the established government had been ruled a rebellion, a crime of treason? Then in the Bonaparte family at least three heads would have rolled. Chance served him well when he returned from Alexandria, fortune was on his side at Marengo, and his boldness saved him in Saint-Cloud. But a temperate man, a man not blinded by passion, would never mistake three lightning flashes, however bright they might be, for the dawn of a great day. If I were completely free of my background, if my family had not stood firmly in the Royalist camp, I would have no objection to linking my own fortune to Bonaparte’s, although I consider him an illustrious adventurer who once fought a war for France and two other times for himself. Now, to prove to you that I am not prejudiced against him, I promise that the first time he does something great for France I shall come over to his side. For to my great astonishment, and although I owe my most recent loss to him, I do admire him in spite of his faults and in spite of myself. That is the kind of influence that those of a superior nature exert upon those lesser beings around them, and I feel that influence.”
“I understand,” said Madame de Sourdis. “But will you at least permit one thing?”
“It is not for me to permit,” said Hector, “but rather for you to order.”
“Will you allow me to ask the First Consul and Madame Bonaparte for their assent to Claire’s marriage? Connected as I am to Madame Bonaparte, I can hardly do otherwise. It is simply a step that etiquette demands.”
“Yes, but on the condition that if they refuse, we will proceed anyway.”
“If they refuse, you will carry off my darling Claire and I shall come to forgive you wherever you have taken her. But rest assured, they will not refuse me.”
And with that assurance, permission was granted to Madame de Sourdis to seek the blessing of the First Consul and Madame Bonaparte on the marriage of Claire de Sourdis to Monsieur le Comte Hector de Sainte-Hermine.
XX Fouché (#ulink_ed533a20-5b7e-58c2-ab00-613feaa8ab75)
THERE WAS ONE MAN whom Bonaparte hated, feared, and tolerated all at the same time. He is the man who appeared for a moment to talk to Mademoiselle de Fargas when she was setting her conditions for delivering up the Companions of Jehu.
Bonaparte, when he began pulling away from the influence of Fouché, was obeying that admirable instinct more typical of animals than of humans: to remove oneself from beasts that may prove to be harmful.
Joseph Fouché, Minister of the Police, was a creature both ugly and harmful. It is rare that what is ugly is good, and in Fouché’s case, his morality, or rather his immorality, was equal to his ugliness.
Bonaparte saw men as nothing but means or obstacles to him. For Bonaparte the general, Fouché, on the 18th Brumaire, had been a means. For Bonaparte the First Consul, Fouché could indeed become an obstacle. He who had conspired against the Directory in favor of the Consulate might as easily conspire now against the Consulate in favor of some other government. Fouché had become a man whom Bonaparte needed to bring down after having raised him up, and given the current political situation, bringing him down would be difficult. For Fouché was one of those men who, as they climb, cling to every rough edge, hold on to every farrow, make every mark and scar their own so they never want any point of support at any level once they have arrived.
Indeed, Fouché was attached to the Republic by his vote to have the king killed; to the Terror, by his bloody incursions into Lyon and Nevers; to the Thermidorians, by his role in bringing down Robespierre; to Bonaparte, by his participation in the 18th Brumaire; and to Josephine, through the terror that had been inspired by Joseph and Lucien, Fouché’s avowed enemies. He was attached to the Royalists by services he had rendered to individuals as Minister of the Police, after having attacked the class as a whole when he was proconsul. As director of public opinion, he had turned the office to his own uses, and his police, instead of serving the general populace, had become simply Fouché’s police, a force in service to the minister’s schemes. All over Paris, all over France, Fouché’s agents sang in praise of his abilities. Stories of his extraordinary skill abounded, the best indicator of that skill being his ability to make everyone believe the stories to be true.
Fouché had been Minister of the Police since the 18th Brumaire. No one, not even Bonaparte himself, could understand how the First Consul could have allowed Fouché to have such powerful influence over him. The situation bothered Bonaparte increasingly. Outside Fouché’s presence, when the minister’s magnetism no longer had any effect, in his every cell Bonaparte rebelled against Fouché’s sway. When the First Consul spoke of him, his words, cutting and spiteful, betrayed his anger. Yet when Fouché next appeared, the lion again lay down, calmed if not tamed.
One thing in particular bothered Bonaparte: Fouché never entered wholeheartedly into his grandiose plans, unlike his brothers Joseph and Lucien, who not only entered into them but helped to move them forward. One day, though, Bonaparte did have it out with Fouché.
“Be careful,” the Minister of the Police had said, “if you restore the royalty, you will have worked for the Bourbons, for sooner or later they will get back on the throne that you have reestablished. Nobody would dare to prophesy what combination of lucky events and of cataclysms we might have to live through before that happened, but we need nothing more than our own intelligence to judge how long you and your descendants would need to fear such a possibility. You are moving rapidly in the direction of the old regime, in form if not in content, so that occupation of the throne will soon be just a question not of government but of which family sits in it. If France must give up its hard-fought-for freedom and return to the good pleasure of the monarchy, why should it not prefer the former race of kings that gave us Henri IV and Louis XIV? You have given France nothing but the despotism of the sword!”
Bonaparte bit his lip as he listened, but he did listen. And in that moment decided to abolish the Ministry of Police. On that very Monday, at his brother’s insistence—he had gone to spend the day with his brother at Mortefontaine—he signed an abolition order and put it in his pocket.
The next day, on his return to Paris, though pleased with his decision, he knew what a blow it would be for Josephine. So he tried to be charming with her when he got back, which gave some hope to the poor woman, for whenever she looked beyond her husband’s gaiety or sadness, beyond his ill humor or cheerfulness, she saw nothing but divorce.
Seated in her boudoir, he was giving orders to Bourrienne when she slipped over to him and, sitting in his lap, stroked his hair and then put her fingers near his mouth for him to kiss them. When his kiss met her burning hand, she asked, “Why did you not take me with you yesterday?”
“Where?” he asked.
“Wherever you went.”
“I went to Mortefontaine, and since I know there’s some hostility between you and Joseph.…”
“Oh, and you could also add between me and Lucien. I say Lucien as well as Joseph because both of them are hostile to me. I am not hostile to anyone. I could ask for nothing better than to get along with your two brothers, but they hate me. So you should realize how worried I am whenever you are with them.”
“Relax. All we discussed yesterday was politics.”
“Yes, politics. Like Caesar with Anthony. Did they try the wrappings of royalty on you?”
“What? You know Roman history?”
“My friend, all I know about Roman history concerns Caesar, and every time I read it I quake.”
She was silent a moment. Bonaparte frowned, but there was no holding her back now that she had started: “Please, Bonaparte, I beg you, do not make yourself king. I know that evil Lucien is pressing you to do so, but you must not listen to him. It would be the end of all of us.”
Bourrienne, who had often given the same advice to his schoolmate, was afraid that Bonaparte would fly into a rage. But instead, he began to laugh. “You’re crazy, my poor Josephine,” he said. “All those dowagers from the Faubourg Saint-German must be telling you such tales, as well as your La Rochefoucauld. Stop bothering me.”
At that moment the Minister of Police was announced. “Do you have anything to say to him?” asked Bonaparte.
“No,” said Josephine. “It’s you he must be on his way to see; he no doubt wants merely to greet me in passing.”
“When you’ve finished, send him to me,” said Bonaparte, standing up. “Come, Bourrienne.”
“If you have no secrets to tell him, why do you not see him right here? I’d have you longer here with me.”
“Indeed, I was forgetting that Fouché is a friend of yours,” said Bonaparte.
“A friend of mine?” remarked Josephine. “I do not allow myself friends among your ministers.”
“Well,” said Bonaparte, “he will not be a minister for long. But no, I have no secrets to impart.” Then, turning toward Constant, who had announced Fouché, he said affectedly, “Show the Minister of Police in.”
On entering, Fouché seemed surprised to find Bonaparte there with his wife. “Madame,” Fouché said, “this morning my business is with you, not the First Consul.”
“With me?” said Josephine in astonishment and with some worry.
“Oh,” said Bonaparte. “Then let’s see what this is all about.” And to show that he had regained his earlier good humor, he pinched his wife’s ear.
Tears welled in Josephine’s eyes—why did Bonaparte have always to make his little love gesture so painful? But she kept her smile.
“Yesterday,” said Fouché, “Dr. Cabanis came to see me.”
“Good God!” said Bonaparte. “What made that benign philosopher venture into your den?”
“He came to ask if I believed, madame, before any official visit would be arranged, that a certain marriage in his family would have your blessing, and if it did, whether you would take it upon yourself to obtain the First Consul’s consent.”
“Well, now! You see, Josephine,” said Bonaparte with a laugh, “people are already treating you like a queen.”
“But,” said Josephine, “thirty million French people can get married without the slightest objection from me. Who could be giving so much thought to etiquette as to check with me?”
“Madame la Comtesse de Sourdis, whom you honor sometimes by receiving her here. She is marrying her daughter Claire.”
“To whom?”
“To the young Comte de Sainte-Hermine.”
“Tell Cabanis,” Josephine answered, “that I enthusiastically support their union, and unless Bonaparte has some reason not to approve it.…”
Bonaparte thought for a moment. Then, turning to Fouché: “Come up to my office,” he said, “when you leave Madame. Come, Bourrienne.”
Scarcely had Bonaparte and Bourrienne disappeared than Josephine, placing her hand on Fouché’s arm, confided, “He went to Mortefontaine yesterday.”
“Yes, I know,” said Fouché.
“Do you know what he and his brothers talked about?”
“Yes.”
“Was it about me? Did they talk about divorce?”
“No: Be reassured on that point. They were talking about something else entirely.”
“Was it about the monarchy?”
“No.”
Josephine sighed. “Well, in that case, little does it matter what they talked about!”
Fouché smiled that dark sardonic smile so characteristic of him. “However,” he said, “since you will probably be losing one of your friends.…”
“Me?”
“Yes.”
“I will?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he has protected your interests.”
“Who are you talking about?”
“I cannot divulge his name. His disgrace is still a secret. I’ve come to warn you so you can choose someone else.”
“Where do you expect me to find this other person?”
“In the First Consul’s family. Two of his brothers are against you. Align yourself with the third.”
“Louis?”
“Exactly.”
“But Bonaparte insists on giving my daughter in marriage to Duroc.”
“Yes, but Duroc does not seem quite so eager to enter into marriage, and his indifference is offensive to the First Consul.”
“Hortense bursts into tears every time we talk about it. I don’t want it to look like I am sacrificing my daughter; she says that she has given her heart.”
“Well,” said Fouché, “does anyone really have a heart?”
“Oh, I do!” said Josephine. “And I am proud of it.”
“You?” said Fouché with his sarcastic laugh. “You don’t have only one heart, you have.…”
“Careful!” said Josephine. “You are about to say something disrespectful.”
“I’ll not say a word. As Minister of Police, I must remain silent. Otherwise people might say I am revealing secrets from the confessional. So, as I’ve nothing further to tell you, allow me to go and announce to the First Consul some news he is not expecting to hear from my lips.”
“What news?”
“Yesterday he signed an order for my resignation.”
“So you are the person I shall be losing?” Josephine asked.
“Yes, that’s correct,” said Fouché.
The realization elicited a sigh from Josephine as she placed her hand over her eyes. “Oh, don’t worry!” said Fouché, walking over to her. “It won’t be for long.”
In order not to display too great a familiarity, rather than taking the little stairway up to Bonaparte’s office, Fouché left through Josephine’s outside door, then came back in through the clock pavilion and went up to the First Consul’s study.
The First Consul was working with Bourrienne. “Ah!” he said to Fouché as he came in, “you can explain something to me.”
“What, sire?”
“Who this Sainte-Hermine is who’s asking for my approval of his marriage with Mademoiselle de Sourdis.”
“Let us understand one another, Citizen First Consul. It is not the Comte de Sainte-Hermine who is asking for your approval to marry Mademoiselle de Sourdis, but rather Mademoiselle de Sourdis who is asking for your approval to marry Monsieur de Sainte-Hermine.”
“Is that not the same thing?”
“Not entirely. The Sourdis family is a noble family that has joined our side, whereas the Sainte-Hermine family is a noble family that we would like to have join us.”
“So they have been holding out?”
“Worse than that. They have been combatting you.”
“Republicans or Royalists?”
“Royalists. The father was guillotined in ’93. The oldest son was shot. The second son, whom you met, was guillotined in Bourg-en-Bresse.”
“I met him?”
