The Second Empress (35 page)

C
HAPTER
27

PAUL MOREAU

Tuileries Palace, Paris March 1814

W
ARE THE ONLY HORSE AND CARRIAGE ON THE ROAD
, and the stillness of the countryside is terrifying. Even when French warships arrived in Saint-Domingue, the villages didn’t empty. The coachman has warned us to keep the curtains closed, but as we ride, it’s impossible not to look. Shop after shop has been completely abandoned, their windows shuttered and their doors boarded up. On the farms, not a single person can be found.

“Have you ever seen anything like it?” I ask.

“During the first days of the Revolution,” Dr. Espiaud says. “The emperor laid waste to the cities outside of Moscow. Pillaging … rape … and now the Russians are coming for revenge.”

I close the curtain and sit back. I fled Haiti to avoid the ravages of war, and now it’s followed me to France. Is it a mistake to go to Paris? When the Russians will arrive is a mystery: we might beat them by weeks or a single day. But Pauline wants news, and more important, Dr. Espiaud needs medicine from the Tuileries Palace. The doctor won’t tell me what the princess is suffering from, but I know. And now she is frighteningly thin, and her great dark eyes stare out from a face that is paler than marble. Her ladies say it’s nervousness, but I no longer agree with this convenient fiction.

I was up with Pauline all night. She wanted to count the money she raised for her brother—all the funds she garnered from selling her jewels. I keep seeing her trembling fingers going through the money, counting it again and again and again. The coach stops suddenly, and Dr. Espiaud scowls. He opens the curtain, and as far as the eye can see, horses and coaches are crowding the road, jostling for space as their owners rush to get out of the city.

“Are they here?” a woman shouts from one oncoming carriage.

Espiaud shakes his head. “We’re coming from Nice.”

“You’re going the wrong way!” someone else shouts.

When we reach the city, it’s a mad crush of wagons and horses. Thousands are fleeing, and it appears that anyone with means has already left. Women in the streets are begging others to help them escape, and I recall the desperation in the women’s eyes as the French descended on Haiti. I watch an older man lean out of his carriage and promise a pretty girl a seat—for a price. She will pay either inside the coach or once the soldiers come, he tells her. When she accepts, he offers her his hand. No one knows what the Russian invasion will mean. If the Austrians are with them, marching under the Hapsburg flag, then Paris may be spared. But if the Russians come alone, there will be no mercy.

From the gates of the city, it’s three hours before we reach the Tuileries Palace. And inside, the chaos is even greater. Servants are running from room to room, shouting out orders and carrying trunks.

“Where is the empress?” Dr. Espiaud asks.

A servant stops for long enough to point down the hall. “With her Regency Council, monsieur, deciding whether or not to flee the capital.”

We hurry to the Council Chamber. The ministers have not bothered to shut the doors. So we stand outside with a dozen courtiers and listen as Joseph Bonaparte shouts about what can be salvaged of the Bonaparte empire. Nine months ago he was Napoleon’s anointed king
of Spain. Then he lost the Battle of Vitoria against the British. “There is no one more loyal to Napoleon than me! But to ask the empress to stay in this palace is the equivalent of murder.”

“If the empress flees, what will that tell the people?” the Duc de Feltre argues. “We might as well wave the white flag!”

“What other color do you propose?” Joseph challenges. “Do you see my brother’s army marching toward this city? Are there reports it’s even close?”

“It’s a risk we cannot take,” the Duc de Cambaceres says. “Talleyrand?”

I am shocked. There is no minister in France
less
trustworthy than Talleyrand. Every courtier knows he has had dealings with both the Austrians and the Russians while claiming to be working solely for the good of France. No one is certain who Talleyrand supports, aside from Talleyrand. But behind every change of government in France in the past twenty years has been this man.

The Regency Council waits for him to speak. Then finally he says, “The empress of France must stay. When the Austrians arrive, she will negotiate favorable terms for this city with her father. Until then, seal the palace.”

Napoleon’s brother grows red in the face. “I tried reason,” he says heatedly, “but no one will listen.” He pulls from his pocket a letter and holds it up for the council to see. “From the emperor himself.” He hands it to Talleyrand. “If you would.”

The old minister reads it aloud from his seat:

If the battle is lost and no hope remains for saving my capital, the empress of France, along with my son, the young king of Rome, must repair to Château de Rambouillet and wait for me there. They must not, under any circumstances whatsoever, let themselves be taken by Allied soldiers. I would rather see my son’s throat cut than imagine him brought up as an Austrian prince in Vienna
.

Marie-Louise looks aghast, and Talleyrand wipes the sweat from his brow. The Duc de Feltre asks, “So what does Your Majesty think?”

“Who in here would like to be the one to disobey the emperor’s orders?” the empress asks.

The men look down. Even Talleyrand won’t meet her gaze.

“I am willing to remain in this city,” she says. “This is my duty to France and her people. But there is a higher duty,” she adds cleverly. “The duty of a wife to her husband.” Obviously she wishes to flee Paris. Why would she stay in the same city that took her great-aunt’s life?

“Then it’s settled,” Joseph announces firmly. “The imperial house moves to Château de Rambouillet.”

Now the chamber is silent. The council is trying to comprehend the enormity of it. Napoleon reunited their country after it was torn by instability and civil war. He forged an empire from scraps, and no one, not even the emperor of Austria, could defeat him. For ten years, Europe has echoed his name. And now it has turned to dust.

“We leave tomorrow morning,” the empress says. “Whatever happens, God be with each of you.”

She rises, and I realize that both Hortense and her husband, the former king of Holland, are in the room as well. We stand back to let the members of the Regency Council pass, and when the empress appears, Espiaud steps forward. “Your Majesty!”

It takes the empress several moments to realize she’s seeing the former court physician. “Dr. Espiaud? What are you doing here? The Russians are on the march. I don’t know if the Austrian army will be with them.” She hurries down the hall, and we try to keep pace. “Bring whatever you can.” Then she stops to look at me. “Now is your chance. I hope you take it.”

C
HAPTER
28

MARIE-LOUISE

Château de Rambouillet, southwest of Paris April 1814

E
VERYWHERE
I
LOOK, COURTIERS ARE HURRYING TO FILL
the imperial carriages with as many of their belongings as they can fit inside. Groomsmen, chamberlains, Mistresses of the Robes—all of them are fleeing to Château de Rambouillet.

I wait for Méneval to clear a space in the coach for me and Franz. When at last he motions us inside, I tell my son, “Take Sigi into the carriage.” He is old enough now to follow my instructions, but his small brow still creases.

“Aren’t you coming?”

“Yes.” Nothing could keep me in Paris after hearing Napoleon’s letter to Joseph.
I would rather see my son’s throat cut than imagine him brought up as an Austrian prince in Vienna
. I look at Franz, and an overwhelming desire to protect him consumes me. What sort of ruthless father could wish for his own son’s death, whatever the circumstances? Even after all his petty cruelties, I would have remained in Paris as his loyal wife, but there is no forgiving that letter. I hope he returns to Paris to find the palace empty. More than that, I hope the Bourbon flag is snapping triumphantly in the breeze.

I wait to see my son safely inside the carriage, then search for Hortense. “Beauharnais!” I shout, looking above the heads.
“Beauharnais!” But there are people moving everywhere. Children are standing close to their mothers, while men carry trunks in and out of the palace. I search every carriage, but none of them are carrying Bonapartes. At last I find her standing away from the caravan, holding both of her sons by the hand. Her husband is shouting something, but she’s shaking her head.

“Your Majesty,” Louis Bonaparte says when he sees me. “You must instruct my wife that her place is with the court in Rambouillet.”

“Why would you not join us?”

“My mother has already fled to Navarre.” Hortense bows her head. “With your permission, I would like to take my children there.”

I feel a tightness in my chest as I realize this may be the last time I will ever see her. I reach out and gently take her hand. “Certainly.”

“To
Navarre
?” Louis is beside himself. “I forbid—”

“What do you forbid?” I demand. “She is free to go.”

He looks from me to Hortense and back again. Then he shouts for his trunks to be unpacked and placed in a separate carriage. “I will wait for you in Rambouillet,” he says, his voice tight. “If you don’t come, consider yourself unmarried.”

I feel the lightness in Hortense’s soul when he disappears in the crowds. Then she turns back to me. “Will you … will you be safe?”

“If we can outride the Russians and find my father. He promised to come for me. I trust him.” We look back at the Tuileries Palace. In the morning light, it has a golden hue. The Minister of War told my Regency Council that Napoleon’s generals mutinied before the army could reach Fontainebleau. They simply refused to fight. I guess men will do that when they’ve had enough.

“Where do you think my stepfather is?” she asks, softly.

I squeeze her hands and lean in to whisper, “It’s over. Go and be with your family.” After eighteen years, she is finally free of the Bonapartes.