Betsy and the Emperor (9781439115879) (6 page)

Exhausted, the emperor leaned back in the chair. Admiral Cockburn was clearly impressed by Bonaparte's performance—almost awed by it, really.

“Is there anything further you wish to say to me, Admiral?” Bonaparte said suddenly.

Cockburn was caught off-guard by the question. He stared blankly at Bonaparte at first, then quickly recovered his dignity. “No. Not at present.”

“Bon,”
the emperor said. He called out: “Gourgaud! Show the admiral to the door.”

Gourgaud entered the room so quickly, I was convinced he'd been listening at the keyhole. He led the admiral away.

Admiral Cockburn may have been impressed by the emperor's lengthy dramatic soliloquy, but I was not. All that talk of war, victory, and glory! What a waste of words! I'd heard enough of such things from my father when he reminisced again and again about his glory days in His Majesty's Navy. My brothers always listened, enraptured, when my father told his fiery tales of battle at sea. Naturally enough, as he
related them, my father was the hero of every engagement, single-handedly saving the day for king and country. I always found a way to absent myself whenever I sensed my father was about to launch into another of his battle tales. War stories were for old men and little boys. And war was for fools. If Napoleon Bonaparte was the world's greatest general, that only made him the world's biggest fool. What had he ever done in his life but shout orders and lead charges? It was clear to me that the man had far less concern for the greater glory of France than for the greater glory of Bonaparte.

The wars that had gone on during my lifetime always seemed so far away—not quite real. I had never felt any personal connection with them. But while I was at Hawthorne, I recall having sometimes been kept awake at night by a terrible wailing—from the girls, such as my good friend Madeline, who'd learned their brothers had been killed at the front. It was a chilling memory.

The emperor looked at me and raised an eyebrow quizzically. He must have sensed I was unmoved by his tales of glory, because he said, “You appear to be suffering from boredom.
Sans doute,
mademoiselle knows too little of war.”

“No, sir,” I replied. “Too much.”

I immediately regretted my comment, but it was too late to take it back. The emperor's face and left thigh muscles twitched. By now I was quick to recognize the signs of anger in him. I braced for the explosion.

But then, to my surprise, the emperor appeared to swallow his anger. His rage was so enormous that, in fact, it was really more like watching a cobra swallow an elephant. He took a deep breath, and finally, his anger was under control.

“You may leave now, mademoiselle,” he said.

I was halfway out the door when he called me. “One moment, mademoiselle,” he said quietly.

I suspected that he'd changed his mind and decided to reprimand me after all. But I faced him unflinchingly. “Yes, sir?”

A dark cloud of memory and regret seemed to cast a shadow over his features. I would have given a great deal to know what he was thinking just then. The cloud lifted slightly.

“
Touché,
Betsy,” he said.

I
t was early afternoon the next day when I began to hear unpleasant rumors that my mother wanted me for a sewing lesson. I knew how to stitch a hem, of course. And I suppose in a pinch I could mend a loose button. That, in my opinion, was quite sufficient. But my mother had other notions—not the least of which was the abiding conviction that all “proper young ladies” should be proficient at lace embroidery. Silly stitched flowers and such. Not at all aspiring to proper young lady-hood, I knew it was my moment to disappear, before Mother and her sewing accouterments could catch up with me.

Fortunately, the stable was deserted. I determined Belle's leg had healed nicely and I could chance riding her. The heady odor of new hay filled my nostrils, bracing me like a tonic.

We burst out of the stable at a canter. The trees went by in a chartreuse blur. A cool wind cut sharply against my teeth, sending thrills up and down my spine. It had been a long time—too long—since I'd ridden Belle, but she answered my every move like we'd never been apart. Like we were one headstrong, wild creature, she and I together.

I glanced behind me. No one in sight. I slowed Belle for an instant to pull my dress up out of the way so I could switch from sidesaddle to astride, as I always did as soon as I was out of public view. Whatever fool determined that ladies should ride sidesaddle? The same one who blessed us with embroidery, no doubt!

“Mademoiselle!” a voice suddenly called out to me; I knew it well.
Blast—caught!
I pulled Belle up short, but I did not turn around. “Or maybe I should call you, ‘monsieur,'” Bonaparte added slyly. He and the British guard sent to chaperone him on his outing galloped up to me from out of nowhere. I was suddenly very aware that my calves were showing. The emperor glanced at me sardonically, taking in the sight. Abruptly, I switched my position back to sidesaddle.

“Good afternoon, sir,” I said. My cheeks felt warm.

“Don't worry,” Bonaparte said. “I will not tell on you. If I tell on you, you shall tell on me.”

“Tell on you? About what, pray?” I said. “What have you done?”

“Nothing. Yet,” Bonaparte replied, smiling. “But I always think of the future. That is how I got to be emperor, you know.”

I patted Belle idly on the neck and contemplated how I might best irritate him.

“I thought you got your empire by making wars against innocent people,” I answered. “You said as much yourself.”

His British guard looked quite ill at ease, as if his boots were pinching his toes—or he was afraid that Bonaparte might cuff me. But the emperor just laughed.

“Not making wars, mademoiselle,” he replied. “Winning them!”

I decided not to remind him that the emperor's winning streak had recently come to an abrupt end.

“Shall you join me on my little excursion?” Bonaparte said, nodding toward his horse. “You mother shan't object, I think. Even the wealthiest young lady in Paris can't claim an English officer as her personal chaperone.”

“Well…er…” I hesitated, struggling to determine just what precisely a proper young lady would do in circumstances such as this, for I was bent on doing the opposite.

“Come, now, Mademoiselle Betsy,” Bonaparte scolded and cajoled me. “Captain Poppleton won't mind, will you, Captain?” The guard nodded his head vigorously and sputtered something about “regulations,” but the emperor interrupted.

“You see?” said Bonaparte. “Captain Poppleton has no objection. There's a fine officer, without a doubt. Now, what do you say, mademoiselle?”

“I say…”

“Yes?”

“I say it's not for me to say.”

Bonaparte clicked his tongue and made a
tsk-tsk
sound like a strange bird. “Oh, mademoiselle,” he said with exaggerated disappointment. “
Très triste.
I had you pegged as a girl with—how do you British say?—skunk.”

“Spunk!” I corrected him. “It's not ‘skunk.' Skunk is an animal that makes a bad smell.”

“Ah,
oui
!” Bonaparte said. “Of course. My English is not so very good.
Je le regrette.
Please forgive me, mademoiselle.”

Finally!—an admission about his atrocious English. But did he really believe it? I couldn't tell. It was impossible to know when this man was serious! Perhaps, I thought, that was the real secret of his success.

“So,” Bonaparte said, tipping his broad-brimmed hat at me, “it is spunk that you haven't got.
Merci. Au revoir,
mademoiselle,” and he turned his horse to go.

Poppleton shook his head and followed.

The emperor and Poppleton rode away from me at a leisurely pace. I sat there for a moment on Belle, feeling rather stupid and doughy, like unbaked dinner rolls. Feeling as though, for once, the emperor had gotten the better of me. Finally, I couldn't stand it any longer.

“Wait!
Attendez,
monsieur!” I called out.

Bonaparte turned around slowly in his saddle, as if to pretend he hadn't expected me to change my mind. “You wish something, mademoiselle?”

I gave Belle a gentle tug on the reins to bring us alongside the black charger. “I have decided to go with you,” I announced. “Since I am going your way anyway.”

“I see. And exactly where were you headed…‘anyway'?” Bonaparte asked, stifling a smile.

I ignored his question. I would not let him gloat.

As we rode, Bonaparte and I feigned amiability, chatting about nothing in particular—the prospects for rain, the state of everyone's health. The sorts of things adults discuss when they don't want anyone to know what they're really thinking.

We started at a walk, proceeded to a trot, then progressed to a canter. I began to get the idea that his small talk was only intended to distract me. What the emperor really wanted was a horse race.

In the midst of a debate about his theory that my father's yams caused indigestion, Bonaparte suddenly nudged his horse in the sides with his silver spurs. And he was off!—galloping away at a furious pace. I could hear his merry laughter on the breeze, and I was determined that he should not win. I followed.

Belle kept apace with the charger, though I worried if her game leg would hold. Poor Captain Poppleton, astride a tired old nag and bouncing along with his musket and rusty canteen, was falling far behind us. Soon he was a dot in the distance—tearing his hair in frustration, no doubt.

Before long I passed the emperor, who muttered French oaths under his breath. Then I drew up on the reins and waited for him by the mouth of a cave.
I hadn't intended to come to this spot, but it was a path Belle and I had followed so many times that instinct must have guided me here.

“You are quite a horsewoman, Betsy,” Bonaparte said as he came upon me, breathless. He found me yawning, standing calmly beside Belle, as if I'd been waiting for him for an eternity. “I could have used more like you at Acre.”

Acre?
I had never heard of the place, but I assumed it was some sort of battle of his that hadn't gone so well for him.

“Merci.”
I acknowledged his compliment without making a fuss over it.

“I would like to race Hope someday. At the English races. That has always been my dream. But I don't think your king would approve.”

I smiled at his attempt at wit, then nodded toward his charger. “Hope. That's his name?”

“Ah,
oui.
”

“He doesn't have the shape for it,” I said, scrutinizing the horse with my practiced eye. “That's no racer. He's a warhorse. All those big, heavy bones—”

“Nonsense!” the emperor replied. “Surely you know I let you win.”

Of course I knew this to be untrue, but I let it pass.

Bonaparte dismounted and stretched with a grimace. I suppose it had been a while since he last rode in battle, and he was out of practice. He glanced in the general direction of the Briars.

“It appears Captain Poppleton is absent without leave,” Bonaparte said, not without amusement. “Ah,” he said with a sigh, “how much simpler it all would be if I had Roberaud with me now.”

“Is he a friend of yours?”

“Un ami?”
Bonaparte mused. “Not really. We are too much the same. He is my double.”

“Double?”

The emperor nodded, as if that should make everything crystal clear. But I kept staring at him, so he sighed impatiently and explained: “Let's say the Emperor Napoleon is about to go someplace where he would be in more than the usual danger. Oh, not the battlefield. Nothing so tame as that. Say, London Bridge,
par exemple.
Or a visit to his wife's mother! The emperor stays home and eats licorice and sends Roberaud in his place.” Bonaparte shrugged. “No one is the wiser.”

“Then, he resembles you?”

“He could be my twin,” the emperor replied, tethering our horses to a tree. “Now, let us examine
the events of today,” he continued. “If Roberaud were here, I could have left him back at the Pavilion with Poppleton and the others. And then I could have sneaked out like a tomcat to go for my ride on Hope. As far as I like, without a chaperone. No one would know I was gone.
C'est bon?
”

“Where is Monsieur Roberaud now?” I asked.

Bonaparte squinted, as if trying to remember something. “I heard he escaped when I was captured at Waterloo. If I know Roberaud, he's sitting under the apple trees in the countryside of
la belle
France. Normandy, perhaps. Waiting for his orders. Wooing the ladies. He takes after me that way, you know.”

The emperor fell silent. He seemed a trifle sad—as if he longed to sit under the apple trees again himself but knew he never would.

“Would you like to see my cave?” I offered. I don't know what made me suggest it. I had never brought anyone here before.

“Hmmm?” I seemed to have startled him from a reverie.

“Follow me,” I said, and led the way. He raised no objection.

Though it was still daylight, the cave was dark, even near the entrance. That was one of the reasons I
had chosen it as my occasional refuge to begin with. No one would suspect it held anything of interest.

I crouched and edged my way through the passageway. The ceiling was low and hard, lethal limestone spikes jutted from it, formed by the minerals dripping from the ceiling over the centuries.

“Watch out for your head,” I warned the emperor as he followed me.

“Advice that King Louis would have done well to take,” Bonaparte said cheerfully. I suppose he was referring to the king who'd gotten his head chopped off by the guillotine during the French Revolution. I thought his joke in very poor taste.

I'd grown several inches taller since my last visit here, but I found this posed no problem. And Bonaparte was an unusually small man, hardly larger than I—in height, that is to say, not in girth. So he had only to bend a bit and follow me through the passageway. But the cave smelled dank and foul, like a thousand wet hounds that hadn't enough sense to come in from the rain. A bone-chewing chill emanated from its every nook and cranny, like a blast of retribution from an angry deity. This was not lost on the emperor.

“What do you keep in this godforsaken place,
mademoiselle?” he inquired, shuddering. “Roquefort cheese? Relations who have gone
fou
?”

I knew enough French to know that
fou
meant “insane.” My relatives are all quite normal, thank you. But I should think an investigation of the emperor's family tree would prove more fruitful.

Suddenly, a vast and terrible blackness burst from the bowels of the cave like a messenger of death. The extraordinary sound accompanying it was as if an entire library of books had suddenly emptied itself of its pages from a tremendous height. The black, leathery “pages” brushed my cheeks in a very unwelcome caress, and my hair was disarranged by a thousand unseen hands.

“Argh!” the emperor called out, startled. He was probably having an experience similar to mine, but it was too dark for me to see him clearly.

“Are—are you all right, sir?” I asked him. Even in the dimness, I detected his arms swinging wildly about his head like blades on a windmill.

Then, in a moment, it was over.

“Flying rats!” he said contemptuously. “Just like in Egypt. I'd rather fight a thousand Mameluke armies!”

“The bats won't hurt you,” I said casually. “We just startled them. They were sleeping.”

“I trust they will accept our apologies,” the emperor said facetiously. He was quiet for a moment and stood motionless. I could hear the slow
drip…drip…drip
of the limestone spikes being formed in the cave, a fraction of an inch at a time; the slow drip of time. Bonaparte said nothing and contemplated, as if time were something in endless supply. And to him, now, here a prisoner, I suppose it was. It was as if he were replaying the whole bat episode in his mind, as a general does after a battle to see what went right and what wrong. At last he spoke to me. His tone was at once puzzled and amazed.

“You did not scream.”

“You did,” I replied.