Жюльетта Бенцони - Marianne

As the day wore on, her mood became more and more abstracted, so that she listened to Fortunée's gossip with only half an ear. Her eyes kept going back more frequently to the bronze gilt clock with its representation of the sleeping Psyche. Never had she been so glad to see night fall because the night would bring him back to her. A fever began to run in her veins when she thought of the hours of love ahead. Already, she had so much to tell him! And yet the hours seemed to go more and more slowly.

Fortunée, having barred her doors to all her friends on the excuse of a headache, had yawned at least thirty times before ten o'clock sounded from the church of Notre-Dame-de-Lorette.[8] The last stroke had just died away when they heard the rumble of a carriage. It slowed down and entered the gates which the porter had been told to leave open, then stopped in the deliberately darkened courtyard. Marianne ran to the window with her heart beating wildly while Fortunée rose intending to withdraw to her own room. But she had no time. In an instant, Napoleon was there.

'Don't run away, Madame,' he said as his hostess sank into a curtsey at the door of the salon. 'I have only a moment—'

Flinging his hat on to a sofa, he caught Marianne into his arms and kissed her while she said protestingly:

'What, only a moment?'

'An Emperor cannot often do as he likes, mio dolce amore. I have to go back to the Tuileries. There are important despatches waiting for me and someone I must see, so I have not much time. But there were a number of things I had to tell you which would not wait. This first.'

From a pocket in his coat, he drew a roll of papers sealed with a great red seal which he placed in her hands.

'I promised you a house,' he said smiling. 'I am giving you this one. I think you will like it.'

Marianne unrolled the papers but before she had read more than the first words of the deed the colour fled from her face. There were tears in her eyes as she flung herself into his arms.

'Thank you – oh, thank you!' she gasped, hugging to her breast the wonderful deeds which told her that the Hôtel d'Asselnat in the rue de Lille, her family's house where her parents had been arrested and where she herself had been found abandoned by the abbé de Chazay, was now her own.

Gently, Napoleon stroked the heavy crown of dark hair.

'Don't cry. More than anything, I want you to be happy. I have already given orders. Tomorrow morning, Percier and Fontaine will go to the rue de Lille to begin on the necessary repairs, for the house has stood empty since 1793. Fortunée will go with you and you can order it all as you like. There now, don't cry. I have something else to tell you,' he added with affectionate roughness.

She made an effort and dried her eyes.

'I am not crying—'

'Liar! Never mind, I shall go on. Tomorrow, Gossec will come here. He has orders to prepare you for an audition with the director of the Opéra. Within a month, all Paris shall acclaim a new idol. Maria Stella. You have a wonderful voice and it shall be your glory!'

'Maria Stella?' she was too surprised now to feel any wish to cry.

'That is the name I have chosen for you. You cannot appear in the theatre under your real name and as for your adopted one of Mallerousse, that is hideous. Besides, the public will dote on an Italian. You can have no idea of the snobbery of Parisians! They may not take readily to one of their own country women, but an Italian will be sure of their support. So there you are, established as a singer from Italy. Where should you prefer? Venice, Rome, Florence?'

He offered a choice of cities as easily as a choice of gowns.

'Venice!' Marianne cried rapturously. 'I should so love to know Venice.'

'You shall go there! You shall sing in Venice, my whole empire will be fighting for you – so, we'll give you a Venetian passport.'

Vast prospects were suddenly opening up before Marianne, but these prospects involved so many separations. Yet they were inevitable separations. When he could not have her with him, it would be better for her to travel, to be far away. And with her music, everything would be easy.

'Maria Stella!' she murmured as though engraving her new name on her mind.

'It was not I who gave you that name, it was Fouché, star you were, and star you shall remain – but in a very different sky. One more thing. A great singer needs someone to be a kind of impressario for her, to deal with contracts, arrange her programme and protect her against unwelcome intruders. I think I have found what you need. What do you say to the little man with the big ears we found kicking his heels on the road outside Malmaison last night in company with a deaf coachman? I have had a suitable report on him during the day. He seems an odd fellow, but I think he'll do the business. And, if I have understood correctly, you owe him something—'

'But—' Marianne was almost speechless. 'How do you know all this? In so short a time?'

'Didn't you know? I have excellent police. And Fouché stands in some need of forgiveness.' He smiled so wickedly that Marianne could not help laughing. Dazed by the unexpected avalanche which had fallen on her, she had sunk on to a sofa but now he bent forward quickly and tweaked her ear to draw her back to him.

'Happy?'

'How could I help it? I don't know what to say. All this is so sudden, so unexpected – it's almost frightening!'

'I told you I had a heap of things to tell you. Now kiss me and then get some sleep. You need it. And there's nothing like a good night's rest after a deal of excitement. I must go.'

Urgent to be gone now, he kissed her somewhat absently, picked up his hat and was striding to the door when, just as he reached it, he stopped and clapped his hand impatiently to his forehead.

'Fool that I am! I nearly forgot!'

Turning back to Marianne who still stood rooted to the spot, he put into her hands a large green morocco jewel case, stamped with the imperial arms, which he produced as though by magic from yet another of his enormous pockets.

'Here,' he said. 'Wear these on the night of your first appearance! Then I shall know you are thinking of me.'

As though in a dream, Marianne opened the case. Lying on a bed of black velvet, gleaming and flashing in the candlelight, was a fabulous set of emeralds and diamonds. Not even at Talleyrand's had she ever seen anything so splendid. But when she looked up with dazzled eyes, she saw that Napoleon was already back at the door.

'Don't tell me they won't suit you. They are the same green as your eyes. Goodbye, my heart.'

When, a little later, Madame Hamelin, growing anxious at the continued silence in the salon, entered cautiously, she found Marianne sitting on the floor by the fire with her hands full of documents and a cascade of fabulous jewels on her knees, crying as though her heart would break.

In the grey, rain-swept light of a new day, beneath a sky that held no promise of sunshine, the great entrance portico framed by delapidated walls, with here and there a stone missing, presented a dismal sight. Dead weeds sprouted from the gaps in the stonework where their seed had been carried by the wind and the paving stones before the door with its sad, flaking green paint gaped to make way for a mass of brown and soggy vegetation.

Marianne stood leaning on Fortunée's arm and her eyes behind the heavy veil which hid her face filled with tears as she looked at the old house where her life had begun, from which her father and mother had gone out hand in hand to meet their deaths. She had wanted to visit it alone, before the architects took possession of it, because it seemed to her that she alone had the right to break the silence which had enveloped the Hôtel d'Asselnat for so many years. She wanted to see it in all its loneliness and neglect, before the magic wand was waved that would give it a new life, but she found now that this neglect was painful to her. So much lay behind it.

But for the Terror, all her youth would have been passed in this splendid old dwelling, its noble proportions and the cracked stone trophies over the porch still telling of the splendours of the reign of the Sun King, or else in the old Chateau in Auvergne which now she might never see. Instead, she would have a different life, but would it be any happier? Who could tell what Marianne d'Asselnat de Villeneuve might have been at this moment if – but there was no end to it.

Behind her, Marianne heard Arcadius de Jolival telling the coachman to wait. She walked a few steps towards the house, strangely unwilling to make use of the keys which had been handed to her on waking. Opposite the silent entrance, a splendid, luxurious mansion was just awaking to a spate of furious activity contrasting strongly with its neglected neighbour. The staff were going about their morning tasks, and the place was alive with servants sweeping out courtyards and pavements, polishing brass and beating carpets. People were coming and going, many of them men in army uniform on foot or on horseback, entering or leaving a vast forecourt at the far end of which rose an impressive building in the Egyptian style. Seeing Marianne turn to look, disturbed by the noise breaking in on her thoughts, Arcadius frowned.

'You're going to have noisy neighbours, when they are in Paris, at least. That is the Hôtel de Beauharnais. Prince Eugene, the Viceroy of Italy is there at present. And yesterday, there was a ball and a reception. Prince Eugene likes entertaining and the Emperor was there. But it means hard work for the servants this morning. That's why they are so busy. But when he is back in Milan it will be quieter. The Emperor is very fond of him,' he added knowing that this would be the best way of soothing his young friend's irritation. He was quite right. She smiled.