Жюльетта Бенцони - Marianne

'Ah! How good it is!' he said joyfully. 'I had not realized how much I missed the air of Paris!'

He was soaking wet and frozen and his teeth were chattering, but he did not seem to notice it.

Marianne, however, had no time to waste on savouring the joys of her recovered freedom. Time was short. The Riders of the Shadows had a long start and if by ill luck the Emperor should leave Malmaison too early – she dared not frame the rest of her thoughts in words but clung to Jason's arm.

'Can you find me a carriage! Quickly – very quickly.'

'I have one waiting a little way off, at the quai de Billy, near the place de la Conference.[7] Where do you want to go?'

'I must go to Malmaison, of course!'

He made a movement of protest.

'Not that again! The Emperor is well guarded. It will take more than a few fanatics to put him in danger. I mean to take you somewhere safe – and dry! And tomorrow, I will take you away—'

'Tomorrow, yes, I will go with you, but tonight, I implore you to let me save him! I know – I can feel that he is in danger.'

She felt the American's wet arm stiffen under her hand. He drew himself up and his eyes moved away from her to the darkly moving waters of the Seine.

'He—' he said with a rather bitter emphasis, 'how you speak of him! I thought you hated him?'

'I do not hate him any more. No more than I hate you any more now. You have acted like a friend, a true friend and that wipes out everything. Tomorrow, I tell you I will go with you because I shall have nothing more to do here and because I am tired of being continually in what you call all kinds of impossible scrapes. Perhaps, in your country, I may find peace.'

'I shall do everything in the world to help you,' he said gently. 'If it is in my power, you shall be happy.'

'Then if you really want my happiness,' she said eagerly, 'do as I ask you, Jason. Let me go to Malmaison. But quickly, I implore you, quickly! We are wasting so much time and every minute counts.'

A tremor ran through him when she spoke his name for the first time and Marianne's woman's intuition told her she had touched him. She was about to return to the attack when he suddenly bent over her and laying his hands on her shoulders, looked deep into her eyes.

'Tomorrow,' he said earnestly, 'you will go with me? You promise?'

'Yes. I promise.'

'Come then. I will take you there myself. We'll drive the horses into the ground, if need be, but we'll get there. Follow us, gentlemen. We'll talk as we go. There are dry clothes in the carriage.'

His voice rang suddenly joyful. Seizing Marianne by the hand, he ran with her along the dark river bank. Arcadius and young Pioche followed hard on their heels without further questions. They passed the buildings of the soap works and then those of the Depot des Marbres and then, as they came to the place de la Conference the shape of a carriage rose before them against the faint light of a lantern hung outside the shed where the fire-wagon was kept. It was then Arcadius leaned towards the boy who was running steadily beside him. He was chilled to the bone in his wet clothes but had lost none of his usual good humour for all that.

'Your name is really Gracchus-Hannibal?'

'Yes, monsieur, why?'

'Because my name is Arcadius!' was the apparently illogical answer. 'Do you know that together we represent Athens, Rome and Carthage? My boy, we have just created an alliance that not even the maddest historian ever dreamed of. And when you add to that the collaboration of America, you must admit the world has never seen a league like ours.'

'Yes, monsieur,' Gracchus-Hannibal said meekly, making no attempt to understand. 'But perhaps we'd better hurry on a bit. They're waving to us—'

'Quite right,' Arcadius said cheerfully. 'We have still to set the seal on our glory by saving the new Caesar! And a Corsican Caesar into the bargain!'

Once past the vineyards of the Cote de St-Cloud, the road to Malmaison stretched on, dreary and all but deserted and bounded on either side only by waste ground and disused quarries. The snow had dwindled to a few isolated patches, like spilt milk on the dark landscape. Shortly before the bridge, they had come down the route de la Reine to the Boulogne crossroads and there they had parted from Gracchus-Hannibal who declared his intention of going to spend the night with his grandmother, a washerwoman in the route de la Revolt.

'Come and see me tomorrow at my hotel,' Jason Beaufort had called down to him from the box. 'We must have a talk together, you and I. About eleven.'

'Very well monsieur! I'll be there.'

He was about to leap out with a cheery goodnight to those whose saviour he had been when Marianne suddenly pulled him back and kissed him warmly on both cheeks.

'Thank you Gracchus. We are friends forever now.'

The darkness hid the deep blush which spread over the boy's face but as they moved on, Marianne heard him singing at the top of his voice.

'I know not whence this feeling comes

That grips me when I look at you—'

'Amazing!' Jolival remarked. 'He sings Mozart though he surely does not know it!'

The man of letters was settled comfortably in the carriage beside Marianne, but while she was tense with anxiety and trying vainly to control her fears, Arcadius was thoroughly enjoying the comfort of the vehicle and dry clothes he had found there. Beaufort's forethought had provided some for young Gracchus also. Marianne had been obliged to bury her head in the cushions while her companions changed, which was by no means easy owing to the fact that Beaufort had not delayed an instant for such formality.

Regardless of his wet clothes, Jason had climbed onto the box and settled himself beside the coachman. He had merely emptied his boots and wrapped himself in a great black cloak, remarking that there had been many worse times at sea. From time to time, Marianne could hear his clipped voice telling the coachman to press his horses harder.

Even so, it seemed to Marianne that they were barely moving. She sat, tense and strained, watching the trees go by. They had in fact come to a broken wooded stretch where it was difficult to go fast. Suddenly, Marianne turned to her companions.

'Did you manage to hear where they meant to attack the Emperor's carriage?'

Jolival nodded. 'They meant to hide at a place called Fond-Louvet,' he said 'not far from the Chateau de Rueil—'

'Near where the Empress lives? They are bold.'

'The Chateau de Rueil is not Malmaison, my dear child. It belongs to Marshal Massena, Duke of Rivoli, but the Marshal has just been made Prince of Essling and Thourars and has gone to visit his new lands. Besides, Massena is loyal to the dethroned Empress and has no wish to be involved in any of the Emperor's marriage plans. He prefers to be away at such a time.'

Marianne regarded her companion curiously.

'How do you know all this? To hear you, one would think you were familiar with the court?'

'And seeing my splendid appearance, you find that hard to believe, I daresay,' he said with a comical grin. 'My dear Marianne, you cannot imagine how much gossip one picks up in gaming houses. I am one of the best informed people in Paris, don't forget that.'

'Then, if that is so, answer me one question. How are we going to get into Malmaison and obtain a hearing?'

'To be quite frank with you, that's just what I was thinking. One doesn't just walk into Malmaison. Perhaps we should have thought of that earlier.'

'We must get in, Arcadius. We must warn the Emperor. Is the chateau well guarded?'

'Like an imperial palace,' Jolival said gloomily. He shrugged. 'A detachment of the guard stationed at Rueil in the former barracks of the Swiss Guard are generally responsible for the former Empress's safety. I don't think we'll find it easy to persuade them to let us see Josephine, especially when we look like this!'

'Shall we be there soon?'

Arcadius leaned out of the window and glanced at the high wall past which the carriage was travelling at that moment.

'We are nearly there already,' he said as he threw himself back into his seat. 'This is the wall of the Chateau de Rueil. Malmaison is a little farther along, on the left.'

'But then – we must have gone right past the place where they are waiting for the Emperor? But we saw nothing?'

'Did you think they would show themselves? What an innocent you are. They are waiting off the road in an old quarry and they will not come out until the moment is right. But don't imagine they have missed our passing. The only thing to fear will be the watch they must have placed between the gates of Malmaison and Fond-Louvet.'

Suddenly, the carriage picked up speed. They were passing a pair of great gilded gates flanked by lodges with triangular pediments and square pilasters. Great bronze lanterns suspended from wrought-iron brackets shone on the golden lances of the gates and on the tricolor sentry boxes, by which were soldiers dressed in buff uniforms with green fronts and tall black shakos with yellow cockades.

'The Corsican Tirailleurs!' Jolival said. 'There is a world of affection in the choice of that regiment.'

Marianne said nothing. For the first time, this reference to Josephine, haloed in the great love Napoleon had born her, awoke her jealousy. It was true Josephine must be suffering now, seeing herself put aside to make room for another, but had not the best part of the Emperor's heart been hers? Compared with those long years lived side by side, Marianne thought bitterly that the hours at Butard were pitifully short.

At the end of a broad avenue, she had caught a glimpse of a small, lighted chateau. A berlin stood outside, a berlin and a number of horsemen dressed in red and green with flowing cloaks and tall red-plumed busbies. Jolival had clutched her arm in an excited grip.

'You saw? The Emperor is still there!' 'That is his carriage, are you sure?'

'Those were certainly the mounted chasseurs of the Imperial Guard. I don't know who else they could be waiting for. They are fine lads, Prince Eugene's cavalry. They are not many but I wonder if we should not let them deal with the conspirators.'

'Are you mad? They are a dozen at the most—'

'But equal to thirty! Never mind, you are right. A surprise attack can come suddenly – ah, and I think we too have come.'

The carriage was indeed slowing down. Some little way past the gates of the chateau the road made a slight bend and there they could leave the carriage without risk of being seen. Jason sprang down from the box to open the door and help Marianne out. They stood in a road enclosed between high walls overhung with trees. The bare branches were etched as though in Indian ink against a sky that was hardly lighter, while the sides of the road and the tops of the walls were lightly outlined in snow.

'We must be quick,' the American said, leading her to the left hand wall. 'The Emperor's coach is still outside but it is not far off midnight and he will surely be leaving soon.'

'Why did you come past the chateau? You should have stopped before—'

'So that the watch which the conspirators will certainly have posted could oversee our movements? One can tell you are not used to this kind of thing. Now, we have to get inside—'

Marianne thought privately that he, apparently, was quite used to this kind of thing but she said nothing and only asked: 'How are we going to do that? Do you think the guards will let us past?'

She saw the American's white teeth gleam for an instant in the darkness and heard his stifled laugh.

'We shan't try. It would be so much waste of time. You, sweet Marianne, are going to show me how a well-brought up young lady can climb walls. After that, we can only pray to God we don't meet a patrol before we reach the house – at which point we can relax and get ourselves arrested.'

'Arrested! What do you mean?'

'That the only way of attracting the Emperor's attention will be to make as much noise as possible. Once outside the chateau we'll kick up such a rumpus that someone is bound to ask questions. Those splendid horsemen kicking their heels in the snow so quietly will be only too delighted to have it out with us.'

It was wholly insane but, as put by Jason, the audacious plan sounded simplicity itself. After all, all that Marianne wanted to do was warn Napoleon of the danger lying in wait for him. After that, she did not care if they did send them to prison, her and Beaufort – even to St Lazare.