The Magician's Wife (15 page)

‘I don’t. He believes those are things a magician should not discuss.’

‘Not even with his wife?’

‘Not even with his wife.’

When they entered the theatre Emmeline saw that Jules was on stage helping Henri and in the background were assembled the cornucopia, the ‘inexhaustible’ bottle and the glass box which he used for transference of the five-franc pieces. At one end of the stage, sinisterly, was the small copper hinged box which he had used in performances in Spain and Russia. She knew at once that while it would be produced later in the performance to frighten and impress the Arabs, the cornucopia, the bottle and the glass box were opening gambits with which he would puzzle and please them. Now she watched Deniau vault lightly on to the stage and heard him describe to Lambert where the various members of the audience would be seated.

‘The Arab leaders, particularly those from the desert regions, have never been seated in a building like this one and it’s not their custom to sit in chairs as we do. You must take this into account when you’re performing in front of them. There may be a certain amount of fidgeting and inattention.’

‘And the Governor-General, where will he sit?’ Lambert asked.

‘Maréchal Randon with his family and suite will occupy those two boxes to the right of the stage while the Prefect and other civilian authorities will sit exactly facing him. The sheikhs, caids, agas, bash-agas and other leading Arabs will be given a place of honour. They will be seated in the dress circle.’

‘And the marabouts?’

‘We expect that four will attend and we will seat them in the very front of the parterre, facing the stage so that they will have the closest view of your performance. But I must warn you, at the moment we doubt that Bou-Aziz will journey to Algiers. You will have to perform for him at a later date, probably somewhere in the South.’

‘We should not use the word “perform”,’ Lambert said.

‘Of course. You’re quite right.’

Deniau then turned to Emmeline.’ I brought Madame Lambert with me to show her the theatre. Perhaps you’d let me offer you both a light luncheon at the Aleppo Café?’

She saw Henri look down at her and smile in the guilty way he had when he was about to refuse something. ‘Hello, my darling. What do you think of the theatre?’

‘It’s very handsome,’ she said hesitantly.

‘By the way,
you
will have an excellent view,’ Deniau told her. ‘You will be sitting in the Governor-General’s box.’ He turned to Lambert. ‘And our luncheon, Henri?’

‘I’m sorry,’ Lambert said. ‘I must go on working. However, Emmeline might enjoy it.’

Suddenly she decided that Deniau must not be allowed to manipulate her so easily. ‘I think, in that case, I’ll stay here with Henri. We could have some food sent in.’ She looked at Deniau. ‘Is that all right, Colonel?’

‘Of course, Madame. Although I will miss your company.’ He touched his fingers to his kepi, making her a mock salute. ‘Well, until Sunday, then.’

‘Sunday?’

‘Henri hasn’t told you? The Governor-General requests that you both accompany him and his party to next Sunday’s service in the cathedral. It will be a High Mass in celebration of our recent victory in the South.’

François du Chatel, Archbishop, a gross, towering presence in his white episcopal robes, waited under a parasol held by an acolyte on the steps of the cathedral at the entrance to Rue Divan. At the sound of trumpets which announced that the Governor-General’s party had entered the street, a double row of French officers lined up behind the Archbishop came to attention and drew their sabres to form a ceremonial arch. Emmeline, disembarking from her carriage with the official party, stood beside her husband, waiting, as the Governor-General kissed the episcopal ring and was led inside to the surprising accompaniment of an overture from an Auber opera, played by an army band positioned in a side aisle of the church. Fanning themselves in the noonday heat, the congregation made up of diplomatic representatives, the Prefect and his staff, the leading French, German and Syrian merchants, French army officers, nuns and priests from the diocese’s convents and seminaries, waited for the Mass to begin. In this former mosque, columns fifty feet high supported the cupola which was lit from above by stained-glass windows. The altar was on the north side, decorated by a painting of the Virgin which had been presented to the cathedral by the Pope. Yet above this painting in prominent relief was a series of ornate, interlaced sentences from the Koran which had not been erased despite the fact that they proclaimed in Arabic that there is only one God and Muhammad is his prophet. Even stranger than this juxtaposition was the Mass itself. As priests and acolytes filed out on to the altar the gay martial music continued. Ranks of soldiers in full regimentals stood before the tabernacle and as the service got under way and the sacramental bell rang to announce the miracle of transubstantiation, the noise of twenty drums thundered under the cupola. At the command of their officer the soldiers presented muskets, at the same time bending the right knee and bowing their heads towards the ground. The thundering drumroll continued until the priest finished his prayer.

Emmeline saw at once that the congregation was inattentive: a few prayed, some listened to the music, while many of the men walked about, staring curiously at the younger women who knelt in pretended devotion, their heads and faces veiled in the Spanish fashion.

When the Mass ended, Archbishop du Chatel rose from his episcopal chair on the right side of the altar and walked down to the gate of the communion rail. At once the entire congregation came to attention in a manner not evident during the religious ceremony. A regimental colour-sergeant marched up the central aisle carrying a flag which, kneeling, he offered to the Archbishop for a blessing. Holy water was sprinkled on the flag, the Archbishop mumbled an inaudible Latin prayer and accepted the colours, raising them aloft for the congregation to see, then handing them to a colonel of Zouave who marched to a side altar and hoisted them to a position of honour beside other, now faded, military flags. Drums thundered; the military band struck up the national anthem as a thousand voices were raised in patriotic chorus.

And now, in this Muslim mosque transformed into a place of Christian worship, Emmeline was transported back to the hurried Sunday Mass in the Emperor’s chapel in Compiègne. Here in Algiers, in an outpost of Louis Napoleon’s dominions, again, the religious ceremony had been no more than a formality. Today’s true devotion was reserved for the flag, symbol of recent victory, displayed not as an act of Christian piety but in a gesture of triumph in the temple of a conquered race. She searched the faces of the official party until she found Deniau who stood among the most senior officers, left hand on his ceremonial sword, his eyes on the newly raised colours, his voice chanting the patriotic verse. Was this the man who, two days ago, lay on silken cushions wearing an Arab robe and telling her that Africa had changed him? Yes, it was. She remembered what he had said: ‘I will fight for France as I have fought for her in the past.’ He was not here to help the Arabs preserve their way of life. He was here to destroy it. Staring at him now, drawn by his looks, his manner, his charm, knowing that she was half caught up in secret anticipation of an affair, she was, at the same time, filled with the uneasy feeling that by bringing her to Compiègne and now to Algiers he had cast her adrift.

In the next few days, gradually at first, Algiers and its environs began to fill up with thousands of Arab tribesmen, bringing with them horses, camels, sheep, goats, cooking pots, families, children and women camp followers, erecting a warren of tents and huts on the plain of Hussein-Dey just outside the city. This great space in sight of the sea and under the shadow of the hill of Mustapha adjoined the city’s hippodrome where in a fête organized and presided over by the Governor-General, Arab and Kabyle leaders had been invited to take part in a demonstration of riding skills, followed by three days of horse racing.

Madame Duferre, who had appointed herself as Emmeline’s mentor in social matters, now arranged that she accompany the official party to the hippodrome for the opening day of these festivities. That evening at a dinner party in the Governor-General’s residence Emmeline sat silent, pretending to listen to the conversation of her neighbours but in reality lost in a confusion of the sights she had just seen: four hundred Arab horsemen, wheeling and galloping across the hippodrome, uttering strange cries as though on the battlefield, firing muskets, whirling sabres, in a wild and daring display of warrior skills. And this for the benefit of Randon, a Maréchal of France, fresh from his victories in the bloody Crimean campaign, who sat surrounded by his staff, smiling in false approbation of this reckless display of valour, then rising from his seat in the reviewing stand to salute these desert savages whose leaders he would soon bring to subjugation under the rule of France. But, for now, all was festive; a holiday spirit ruled Algiers. That evening Emmeline slipped out of the residence to roam the newly crowded streets and squares, passing stalls filled with the smells of boiling coffee and hot cakes baked in fat, listening to the oriental twang of guitars, the thin monotonous music of reeds, the beat of strange flat drums, making her way through crowds of jugglers, musicians, beggars and pedlars, stepping past the rings of gamblers hunched in circles, intent on play. And then as the sun set above the Citadel, the stalls were struck, the music ended. Vendors and musicians rode out of the city on mules, camels and horses to camp in the vast huddle of tents below the hippodrome, leaving a deep night silence in the city itself.

At the residence, a Zouave guard opened the gates to re-admit her. The cool marble corridors of the great courtyard were quiet as a cemetery at dusk. When she let herself into their private apartments she saw her husband asleep on a daybed in the alcove. He wore a long white nightshirt and, as always before a performance, he had washed his hair and tied it up in a hair net. He lay on his back, arms crossed over his chest as though to protect himself from a blow. She approached and stood looking down at him, filled with a sudden pity for this man who made his livelihood standing on a stage, smiling at strangers, hoping to deceive them. She looked at his hands, white, supple, slender, trained to conceal and reveal, to misdirect and charm, at his mouth skilled in its patter of falsehoods, at his eyes, now closed, eyes trained to see that person in his audience who could be used as an innocent foil. This man, still as a cadaver under his night shroud, his dignity destroyed by the humble hair net which circled his brow, was at once the most famous magician in all of Europe, her husband and, as her father had said, a charlatan. Who tomorrow would try to alter history through a series of magic tricks.

But in that moment of looking down at him, her pity turned to shame for he was also a man who loved her as much as he was capable of love, loved her despite her failure to give him the son he wanted, loved her although he must know she did not love him.

Tears came. She bent and kissed him on the lips. He woke.

‘What’s wrong, my darling? Why are you crying?’

She shook her head, unable to answer.

‘Did you just come home? How were the celebrations? I heard great noise in the streets.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘There were great celebrations tonight.’ She put out her hand and touched his cheek.’ Go back to sleep. Tomorrow is your moment. You must be ready for it.’

‘I am. You’ll be proud of me.’

French soldiers came to attention at the entrance to the theatre as the first of the Arab military companies arrived in the Rue Bat-Azoun. The marabouts entered last, moments before the Governor-General and his party appeared in the boxes above the stage. During the lull before the curtain rose the Arabs shifted uneasily in their unaccustomed seats, some trying to tuck their legs beneath them as they would in their tents. In 30-degree-centigrade heat the Europeans fanned themselves distractedly with their programmes, the ladies furtively peering into pocket mirrors to see if their mascara had run.

Suddenly, Colonel Deniau appeared before the footlights, bowing first to Maréchal Randon’s party and then to the marabouts and sheikhs.

‘We bid you welcome.’ He spoke in French, pausing between sentences so that the interpreters among the crowd could translate.

‘As part of the festivities and celebrations offered by our Governor-General, he has brought here from France a great Christian sorcerer to delight and astonish you but also to show you the truth. The truth is that certain of your marabouts have claimed to be invulnerable to bullets, impervious to bodily pain, to heal the sick and cure the barrenness of women. Because of these claims they would have you believe that they, and they alone, possess supernatural powers and can foretell the future, a future which promises you victory in a holy war. But tonight you will witness powers greater than any you have seen, powers that may give you pause. Let us welcome the great marabout of France. Henri Lambert.’

Deniau stepped down from the stage. The curtain rose. Emmeline, watching from the Governor-General’s box, saw at first an empty stage with a table in the rear containing the heavy box, the cornucopia, the top hat, the punch bowl. Then, in the silence of total attention from the audience, Lambert walked out from the wings. He carried his short ivory-tipped baton and wore a light-black silk jacket, a white linen waistcoat, and grey chequed trousers. He held his head high, looking up at the dress circle, then bowing slightly, as a signal that he was about to begin. At this, Jules appeared on stage, wearing the yellow-and-black-striped vest of a French footman. Jules went to the table in the rear, took up the top hat and handed it to Lambert. Lambert tapped it to show it was empty, displaying its insides to the audience. He then passed his baton over it and reaching into it produced, in turn, three heavy cannon balls which he dropped with a thump on to the stage floor. There was a sudden stiffening among his audience. The Arabs no longer shifted in their seats but stared unblinking at the stage.