I shook my head—half a lie. I knew whatever he had in mind would go better for me if he believed I knew nothing. I also wanted to hear what he would say.
She asked me to never speak of it to you until after we had succeeded, he said. When the secret would not matter. Her plan was to make the Emperor believe your mission frivolous, a bit of theater concocted from her desire to know the Empress’s styles so as to imitate her first and best. Instead, your little lists told a tale of how often Eugénie sat with the Emperor, or even in place of him, and sometimes even with whom she met and for how long.
This cheered him to think of it, and he spoke it all through a smile.
When I found you at Compiègne, hidden in that disguise, I did not suspect your mission, and I admit I was furious at your escape. But even though each of us did not guess the other’s purpose that afternoon, we helped each other even then. When you told me of those angry ladies waiting for their tea invitations and how the Empress kept them waiting, I knew then the Empress sat on the council for war. Nothing less would have kept her from those teas. This confirmed that our actions in Spain would bait France into war—when we chose a new king for Spain.
He hesitated here.
Yes. We were set to do it, but when we knew Eugénie held the command, we knew she, a Spaniard, would take it as a powerful slight and would act. And so she did. This woman who could not even manage the affairs of the Tuileries Palace set France on the path to war. You gave us the ability to strike without doubt.
These Napoléons, they just play at being emperors. They think it is all clothes and jewels, parties and parades. I am sure she was the one who sent the Emperor and the Prince to the front. This put the entire imperial line of descent at risk. When we captured the Emperor and the heir, we had everything. The only person who did not or would not understand this was the Empress, who believed she still held power back in Paris—she was only ever the vessel for an heir no matter how much of the statecraft he let her play at. She believed in her power until she was chased from the palace, I think.
Her mocked her, his hands twirling by his head, as if running while wearing a very heavy wig.
When I did not laugh, he said, We should make her a present. Send her flowers. He laughed at this as if to laugh for us both.
How I longed to surprise him, to shock him—him and the Prince both. I wanted to do the one thing they did not expect or plan for, even as I knew I couldn’t be certain of what that might be—it seemed they had planned for everything.
The tenor continued to speak, certain of his goal, whatever it was.
Only after you escaped and I returned to Paris, and the Comtesse contacted me to arrange for our reunion, only then did I know you’d left precisely because I’d interrupted you. She explained you had to return to her with your report despite your desire to return with me. I was amazed. I think I laughed in terror for an entire day at what could have happened if I had succeeded that day in taking you with me. I was so angry at you, but you were right. You were right to escape me. Please forgive me.
This little lie of hers was strangely poignant to hear as he took my hand in his and kissed it gently, kneeling before me. When he looked up, though I knew he meant to be impish, his face was only a mask for the hurt; I could see he still felt to think of that time when he had nearly failed his mission. And the love he had for me there, protected by that same lie.
He did not know, then. He still believed I had returned because I loved him.
Ah. You pity the Empress, he said, as he searched my eyes for a clue to my thoughts. But you should not. He shrugged and then smiled as if to console me for the foolishness of my sympathies.
I tipped my head down, and he reached to pull my chin back up, checking to see if I wept. When he saw I did not, his earlier uncertainty seemed to grow and overwhelm him.
He withdrew a package from within his coat, tied in another of those blue and white handkerchiefs. He tugged and off it fell to reveal a bronze medallion, a cross hanging from a blue and white ribbon with gold bars, one that read PARIS and the other, COMPIèGNE. At the edges of the cross, Gott war mit uns, Ihm sei die Ehre.
God was with us, to Him the glory.
With our thanks, he said. For your invaluable service.
He pinned it to my chest.
He withdrew a scroll then and tied it tightly with another of these ribbons and unrolled a declaration honoring me as a citizen of Germany and a hero of the war with an income to be given in gratitude for my service.