XXXIX
The Bonaparte, upon a strong hint received from Citizen Lamartine, did not make a protracted stay in Paris. He returned to the savage scenes of his exile, suffering eclipse behind the curtain of fog enveloping the barbarous island of Great Britain, until an early date in June. But previousto departure, he held a reception of his friends and supporters, followed by a supper, to which only intimate acquaintances were invited, at the Hotel du Rhin in the Place Vendôme. For the earlier function Dunoisse received a card.
The first-floor suite of rooms, occupied by the hope of the Imperialist Party, boasted a certain pompous splendor. There were gilded wall-decorations, velvet hangings, ormolu and marble consoles, clocks and mirrors topped with perching eagles, carpets patterned with garlands, masks, fillets and torches, high-backed settees with scrolled ends; chairs of classical simplicity, tripod-pedestals bearing vases, all the worm-eaten and moth-riddled lumber of the defunct Empire, routed out of basements, dragged down from garrets by a time-serving management eager to gratify their princely tenant’s hereditary tastes.
He thought all this rococo pseudo-classicism supremely hideous, for his predilections were for the gaudy, the showy, the voluptuous, and thebizarre, yet he gazed pensively upon these relics of an extinct era. His bedroom had a vast purple four-poster with a canopy like a catafalque, and a dressing-table, white lace over violet silk, suggestive of an altar in mid-Lent, that gave him the horrors. And it was all as expensive as it was ugly, and every hour added to the length of the management’s Python-bill. Fortunate that funds supplied him by an anonymous adherent had plumped the cheeks of his emptying purse, otherwise Paris might have been treated to a spectacle that London had witnessed before then—the pantomimic interlude of the Prince Pretender, who, lacking the needful cash to defray mine host’s charges, had,minushis hatboxes and tin cases and hair-trunks, with grievous lack of ceremony, been hustled to the door....
He received his guests of that evening with a bland, dignified politeness, even a certain grace, despite his awkward build, stunted proportions, and heavy, sleepy air.
Badly dressed, in an egregious chocolate-colored evening coat with gold buttons, trousers of the same color, wide at the hips, and with strips of black silk braiding down the outer seams, he yet wore an air of composed assurance, smiling pleasantly under his heavy brown mustache, moving his tufted chin about in the high stock embraced bythe cravat of white satin, adorned with emerald pins, flowing into the bosom of a waistcoat of green plush. Despite the star upon the chocolate-colored coat; and the crimson watered-silk ribbon that supported the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor, there was not one of his small band of followers and adherents but looked more fit to play therôleof Prince than he.
They bore themselves with imperturbable gravity, these needy adventurers, most of them blown by the wind that had seemed to fill the slack sails of their master’s ship of fortune from Albion’s hospitable shores.... They took the stage at this juncture like the characters in a Comedy of Masks.... You had the Pretender, the Confidant, the Councillor, the Panderer, the Doctor, the Valet, and the Bona Roba—the last discreetly kept out of sight. The Bravo was at that time in Africa, to be recalled later on. And they played their several parts, with some stately change of title and trappings on the part of certain of the actors, to the fall of the curtain upon the Last Act.
You saw the Count Auguste de Morny, ex-Member of the Chamber of Commerce,—afterwards to reign as the all-powerful Minister of the Home Department under the Second Empire,—as a sallow, well-bred rake of forty, prematurely bald, erect if hollow-chested, faultlessly dressed in the becoming blue swallow-tailed coat with gold buttons, voluminous starched cambric neckcloth, white vest, full-hipped black velvet pantaloons, and narrow-toed buckled shoes of the latest evening wear. Well-to-do, a familiar figure in Paris during the Monarchy, he held a better reputation than his legitimate brother, the man of straw.
And he walked behind the Prince-Pretender now, through a lane of curtseying ladies and bowing gentlemen, outwardly urbane, inwardly infinitely bored by all that was taking place, yet conscious of its probable result upon the Bourse, and alert for intelligence respecting the rise of certain stocks in which he was secretly a large investor.
His companion, some years his senior, and dressed in uniform fashion, was a personage infinitely more striking than the Count. The pale classic oval of his aquiline-featured face, its high brow streaked with a few silken strands of chestnut, the deep blue eyes lightening from beneath the wide arched brows, the sweet deceptive smile,the round chin with a cleft in it, are indelibly stamped upon the memory of the French people, whatever effigy appears upon the coinage of France. Colonna Walewski, son of the Great Emperor by the Polish Countess who was faithful to Napoleon in exile as in defeat, inherited his mother’s fine quality of loyalty. In foul weather and fair, in disgrace as in triumph, in the heyday of the Second Empire as in its decline and collapse, the Napoleonic Idea remained the religion of Napoleon’s bastard son.
His fellow-bastard, the wit and dandy, the politician and financier, less noble in grain than the brilliant soldier, the keen diplomat and the man of letters,—you will always find upon the winning side.
As for Persigny, the Bonaparte’s parasite and inseparable companion,—who was to succeed de Morny as Minister of the Interior, and subsequently figure as Ambassador and Plenipotentiary at the Court of a neighboring Foreign Power,—he looked like what he was; a dissipated ex-quarter-master-sergeant of cavalry grafted on a rowdy buck-about-town. And Fleury, sensual, hot-headed, lively, bulldog-jowled, bold-eyed and deep-chested, heir of a wealthy tradesman, ruined through women and horses, he no less than Persigny had risen from the bottom sludge....
Elderly bloods, middle-aged dandies like their master, they dressed after him, aped his tone and manner, rouged their dry cheekbones and hollowing temples, set false tufts of curls among their dyed hyacinthine locks. Necessitous and creditor-ridden, even as he, they were sharp-set and keen as ferrets for chances of rapine and plunder. And the day was coming when they were to be glutted with these, and crawl after their leader from the warren, gorged, and leaving on the thirsty sand a wide, dark streak of blood.
“It was terrible crossing in the mail-packet,” said Persigny in answer to the question of a sympathizer. “M. de Fleury and myself suffered abominably—the Prince not at all. There was something the matter with the railway-line. We had to walk to Neufchâtel over the ballast and sleepers in thin boots of patent-leather,—imagine the torture to one’s corns!... But the Prince laughed at our grumblings—only when we missed the Amiens train did he lose his sang-froid and stoicism. Andafter all, that delay proved to his advantage.... There was an accident to the train we lost—thirty passengers killed,—many more wounded.... The Prince’s lucky star has been once more his friend!”
The parasite’s voice, purposely raised, reached the little ears shadowed by Madame de Roux’s rich black tresses. She murmured as she sank in her deep curtsey, and emerged, radiant and smiling, from a foamy sea of filmy white lace flounces, to meet the gracious handshake that was accorded to special friends:
“It is true, Monseigneur? You have escaped such perils as M. de Persigny describes?”
Said the little gentleman with the sallow face and the dull, lusterless gray eyes, caressing the brown chin-tuft that was later to be dubbed “an imperial,” and worn by all ranks and classes of men:
“I fancy there was something of the kind. I hardly noticed. I realized nothing but that, after all my cruel years of exile, I was on the road to Paris at last!”
He had been horribly seasick during the Channel crossing, and had bestowed heartfelt curses on the broken granite of the railway-line. He had paled and shuddered at the thought of the smash in which he might have been involved. But to come up to the Idea Napoleonic, it was necessary to be heroic. And with so grave a face and with such imperturbable effrontery did Persigny hold the candle, that the person belauded ended by believing all that was said.
Even now, to many of his friends and supporters, the shadow of the purple Imperial mantle gave dignity to the wearer of the chocolate-colored coat, green plush waistcoat, and big-hipped, braided trousers. His own faith in his Mission and his Star lent him the power to convince and to impress.
His was not a star of happy omen for England, who sheltered and befriended him with the kind of good-humored pity that is not unmixed with contempt. Plagued with the gadfly of debt, tormented by the Tantalus-thirst of the born spendthrift who sees gold lavished by other hands, and who has never funds at command to dissipate, what rage and hatred must have seethed under his smooth ingratiating demeanor, when, with one or another of his henchmen at his elbow, he sat down to the lavish tablespread by the sumptuous mistress of Gewgaw House, or planned landscape-gardens with the master of Brodrick Castle.
That had been for years his fate, to fawn for bare subsistence upon those he hated. Compelled to this, the son of proud, faithless, extravagant, voluptuous Hortense must have suffered the pains of Hell. Not a hell whence Hope was altogether banished. He had hoped when he made the attempt on Strasburg; had hoped when the body of the Great Emperor was solemnly removed fromSt.Helena to be magnificently interred in Paris. Still hoping, he had hired a London-and-Margate steamer, a husband’s boat, for himself and his party of sixty adherents; had purchased a second-hand live eagle, trained to alight upon its owner’s shoulder for a gobbet of raw meat; had landed, with this disconsolate bird, at Vimereux, near Boulogne; had hugged the Column, attired in the historic uniform of the 40th of the Line; had ridden with his followers to the town Barracks, where were quartered the 46th; had ordered these warriors,perthe mouth of a subaltern of their Regiment, to turn out upon the parade-ground; had bidden them thrill at the sight of the eagle, swear loyalty to the little cocked hat—salute the nephew of their late Emperor, and march with him to Paris.
We are acquainted with the burlesque ending of that enterprise, the pricking of the balloon by the bayonets of National Guards—the pantomimic flattening of the Pretender and his followers beneath the collapsed folds of the emptied bag, has been held up to the popular derision by innumerable caricaturists of the day. We are aware—I quote from an obscure comic publication of the period, long since dead of its own indigestible wit—how the Boulogne Picnic began with Fowl, and ended with Ham.... And yet, though the asserter of Imperial claims was jeered at as a mountebank;—even though that marionette-invasion ludicrously failed, how many grave and weightily-important personages had not the Prince-Pretender infected with his own conviction, that to him, and to him alone, had been entrusted the lofty mission of saving, elevating, ennobling, delivering France....
He murmured now, looking at Henriette between half-closed lids, with eyes that appraised every charm, and took deliberate stock of her whole armory of beauties:
“I had too much to think of, dear friend, to heed the perils of the road. But those who accompanied me, ready to share triumph as they have shared Failure,—it would have touched you to witness their emotion as they realized how nearly Death had quenched their hopes. They do not understand yet at what a price the exile has purchased repatriation. To-night will bring home to them the knowledge of this. Ah! here is M. Hugo, charged with the revelation. I fear it will be a painful one for you!”
“Sire ...” she breathed in distress. He corrected her imperturbably:
“Neither ‘Sire’ or ‘Monseigneur,’ I beg of you! Follow the example of M. Hugo—let me be plain ‘Monsieur.’”
And as though to bear him out, the splendid voice of Hugo uttered resoundingly:
“Monsieur!...”
And beaming with cordial smiles, the great Conservative Republican advanced towards Louis-Napoleon, while some half-dozen other wearers of black coats and tricolored sashes pushed through the press towards the orator, who was later to array himself, with all his forces of eloquence, learning, irony, and enthusiasm, upon the extreme Left.
“Monsieur...” he began, while his Burgraves took up their position right and left of their Barbarossa, and the short gentleman in the green plush waistcoat stood still, with the little jeweled hand of Madame de Roux resting on his chocolate-colored sleeve: “Monsieur, when a few days back in the new Constituent Assembly of the Second French Republic the question was raised: ‘Shall the nephew of the Emperor Napoleon be readmitted into France?’ I and my comrades, having confidence in your pledges, voted in your favor. We extend to you now our welcome upon your return, not as the Pretender to the Imperial Throne, but as Bonaparte the good citizen; who seeks, not to rule men, but to represent them; not to be deified, but to serve. And in the name of Liberty and Peace and Freedom—I offer you my hand!”
The hand went out with its large sweeping gesture. The little gentleman stood stock still. His white-kid gloved fingers played with the black ribbon of his eyeglass. He said, with the drawling snuffle that characterized him, and with so subtle a burlesque of the pompous manner of theorator that those who were most stung to indignation by the mockery were unable to repress a smile:
“Monsieur ... the Second Republic of France is now established upon a basis that can never be undermined. As I am not a genius, I entertain no ambition to emulate the career of my glorious uncle,—Integrity and Honor, bareheaded, are preferable to crime that is crowned. Give me, then, the name of Napoleon Bonaparte, the honest citizen.... I prefer that to the title of Napoleon, the Emperor of France!”
He added, addressing himself to Hugo with an air of confidential simplicity that painted a faint grin upon the faces of de Morny and Walewski:
“I am told, M. Hugo, that during the recent reign of the barricades, no milk-and-butter carts could penetrate into Paris, and that her citizens were obliged to be content with chocolate made with water,—dry rolls, andcafé noir. Well!—let us see to it that not only milk and butter, but wine and honey flow during the New Era, and that the streets shall be repaved with hams and sausages. And in place of the planes and acacias that have been decapitated, let us plant fig-trees, olives and vines.”
He bowed with much grace, considering his disadvantages of figure, and moved onwards, stepping deliberately as Agag, with the little high-arched feet in the wonderfully-polished boots that were no bigger than those of a pretty girl. It stamps him—who was undeniably possessed of a mordant power of irony,—as being devoid of the saving grace of humor, that he should, during the period of his American exile, have conferred upon a throbbing feminine devotee and partisan one of these shiny leather boots of his—which the possessor employed alternately as a receptacle for flowers, or as a repository for embroidery-silks; or merely as an object of peculiar veneration, preserved under a glass-case.
He said in the ear of Madame de Roux, as exclamations, comments, ejaculations, broke out on all sides, in tones of consternation, satisfaction, exasperation, not to be repressed:
“What do you say, dear friend? Is not the ax laid to the root of the Violet with a vengeance? Shall we not cultivate our cabbages henceforth in tranquillity and peace?”
He added, as with an ineffable air of conquering gallantry he handed the beautiful woman to a sofa, and placed himself beside her:
“Tell me that I have kept my promise, given that day when you walked with a poor prisoner on the ramparts of the Fortress of Ham.... ‘If ever I return to France,’ I said, ‘I will hold this little hand upon my arm as I receive the congratulations of my friends.”
“Ah! but, Monsieur,” said Henriette, all pale and quivering, “your words were, ‘When I return to France in triumph!’ and this——”
She broke off. He ended the sentence, saying with a shallow, glittering look:
“And this is not triumph, but humiliation. I understand!” He pulled at the flowing goatee, and added, in his mildest drawl:
“Let me remind you that the ancient Roman triumphs, as represented at the theater, invariably begin with a procession of captives and spoils. Imagine yourself at the Français, seated in a box. And consider that though it hardly befits an Emperor to play the part of a slave, unless at the feet of a lovely woman, yet the slave may be promoted to the part of Leading Citizen. And from the armchair upon the platform behind the tribune, might be wielded, on occasion, the lightnings that slay from a throne.”
Even as he uttered the words, a witty woman of society was saying in the ear of a depressed Imperialist:
“Ah,—bah! Why are you so dismal? This is only another move in the eternal game of the Cæsars. Did Nero scruple to lick the dust in order that he might reign? To me, behind that leaden mask of his, he seemed to be bursting with laughter. Depend upon it, Badinguet is cleverer than any of you believe!”
“Badinguet” or “Beaky”—those were among his nick-names—the pigmy who aspired to the ermined mantle of the tragic giant, and the throne under the crimson velvet canopy powdered with Merovingian bees.
Doubtless, in the eyes of many another besides the brilliant speaker, he seemed as absurd, grotesque, mirth-provoking an object as any Punch-puppet. But later, when Punch was gilded thick with stolen gold, and painted red with human blood, he was to assume another aspect. ForLife and Death were in his power. And the world laughed no more.