Read Online True Pleasures by Lucinda Holdforth - Free Book Online Page B

gazing at the plaque and passing enjoyable moments wondering why it is dated 9 March and not6 March, which is the date of the wedding according to my favorite work on this subject,
Napoleon and Josephine
by Evangeline Bruce. Why the discrepancy? I wonder. I smile at myself: I make an unlikely scholar. Then I look at Rachel’s face, which is a mask of boredom. Mmm, perhaps we’ll move along.
    Rachel takes charge of the map and guides us on the short walk to rue de la Victoire, formerly rue Chantereine, to the site of Josephine’s little cottage and the couple’s first marital home. Oh dear. If rue d’Antin was disappointing, this is far worse. It’s a shabby street and all we find at number 6 is a decidedly sleazy-looking sauna next to a rundown gym, neither of which appear to have any patrons. ‘Are you sure this is the right place?’ asks Rachel, none too subtly, as the drizzle turns to an outright downpour.
    I look around from under my drumming umbrella, hoping for a plaque or a sign, anything to suggest that this was once the site of Josephine’s charming little cottage where she was said to have all the luxuries and none of the necessities. Meanwhile Rachel’s foot is tapping impatiently under her black umbrella and I observe her nervy hand fumbling for a cigarette in her handbag. It’s true there’s nothing of interest to see here now, nothing at all.
    But as I look down the street, the past easily slides over the present. Twice a day Napoleon’s envoys would gallop along here to deliver messages affirming the little General’s passionate devotion to his new wife. Here was possibly the greatest military genius in history conducting a major campaign, and yet, Parisians noted with wonder, Josephine received reports from the front even before Barras himself.
    Napoleon wrote to his wife:
Not a day passes without my
loving you, not a night but I hold you in my arms … Whether I am buried in business, or leading my troops, or inspecting the camps, my adorable Josephine fills my mind, takes up all my thoughts, and reigns alone in my heart …
    And:
What art did you learn to captivate all my faculties, to absorb all my character into yourself? It is a devotion, dearest, which will end only with my life. ‘He lived for Josephine’: there is my epitaph. I strive to be near you: I am nearly dead with desire for your presence. It is madness!
    And then there were the erotic letters:
A kiss on your heart, and then another a little lower, much
much lower. And:
    I am going to bed with my heart full of your adorable image … I cannot wait to give proofs of my ardent love. How happy I would be if I could assist at your undressing, the little firm white breast, the adorable face, the hair tied up in a scarf à la créole. You know that I never forget the little visit, you know, the little black forest … I kiss it a thousand times and wait impatiently for the moment I will be in it. To live within Josephine is to live in the Elysian fields. Kisses on your mouth, your eyes, your breast, everywhere, everywhere
.
    I was enthralled when I first read these letters – blown over by them, by their ardent and earthy passion, and blown over by
her
, this woman who could inspire such outsize emotion. But Josephine was no needy modern lover. Napoleon’s burning letters would arrive – right here, where I am standing, in fact, or hereabouts – and she would absentmindedly put them to one side, to be read later:
Qu’il est drôle, Bonaparte!
she would murmur affectionately –
What a funny thing he is
. Often she forgot to read his letters at all. Her own letters to him were irregular, bland and brief, sending Napoleon into a frenzy:
I get only one letter from you every four days!
Once she forgetfullyaddressed her husband in the formal
vous
eliciting further howls of distress from the front.
    And perhaps it is no wonder the neglectful Josephine