Tales of Passion, Tales of Woe by Sandra Gulland Read Free Book Online Page B

fell silent as I went by. Only five months before the once-elegant palace had been fit only for vermin and bats. Slowly Barras was having it entirely restored. Slowly it was beginning to look like a palace again—and every bit as intimidating. I glanced in a looking glass, adjusting the tilt of my hat. I was calling on the most powerful man in the French Republic, I reminded myself. It was hard to believe. My dear, eccentric friend, PaulBarras, was now ruler of the land. “Père Barras,” Thérèse and I called him, because of his big-hearted generosity.
    “Is Director Barras taking callers?” the footman asked Barras’s elderly doorkeeper, who motioned me in with a flourish.
    “Entrez!” I heard something shriek from within.
    “Bruno, was that a parrot?”
    The doorkeeper grinned, his three front teeth missing. I stepped into the room. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust. Barras preferred rooms dark, draped in velvet—a gaming-room ambience.
    “Pretty lady!”
    “Well said!” Barras was stretched out in his favourite chair, a multicoloured bird perched on his white-gloved hand. “Meet Igor, a gift of the Sultan of Turkey—along with a tiger. But I sent the tiger over to the Jardin des Plantes and kept this clever fellow. It’s a little frightening how quickly he learns.”
    “Ha, ha, ha.” The parrot imitated Barras’s soft chuckle perfectly.
    “Look—Toto’s gone into hiding,” Barras said with a grin. Only the nose of the miniature greyhound could be seen peeking out from under his desk.
    “I had a parrot in Martinico.” A vile creature. Cautiously, with one eye on the bird, I kissed my friend’s cheek. Barras was wearing a Florentine purple taffeta jacket I’d not seen before. It was pulled in at the waist; he looked as if he might burst. Yes, a corset was likely, I thought. And it was true, I decided: he had died his hair black.
    Barras eased himself up and nudged the bird onto the perch of a cage set in the window alcove, disentangling a claw from his lace cuffs.
    “Damn the Royalists,” the bird shrieked.
    Barras threw a gold-fringed velvet cover over the cage. “Brandy?” he offered, pouring himself a tumbler. I declined, taking the chair he indicated with a wave of his glass. He sat down across from me, crossing his legs at the ankle. Toto made a mad dash across the room and bounded onto his master’s lap. “And to what do I owe the pleasure of this call?” he asked, stroking the dog’s head. “I rather expected you at my salon this evening. You’ll return tonight? The Sultan will be here and I wish to give the impression of a harem.” A roguish grin.
    I pulled the article from inside my glove, unfolded it and handed it to him. “Eugène saw a report in Les Nouvelles that concerned him.” My voice was not as calm as I had hoped.
    Barras patted the pockets of his waistcoat, withdrew a gold-rimmed lorgnon and pushed it into his eye socket. “Lazare … killed?” He let out a laugh.
    I felt a tingling sensation in my chest. “So, it’s not true?” I said, sitting forward. Eugène would be anxiously awaiting my return.
    “Certainly not. Wishful thinking on the part of some Royalist, no doubt. You can’t believe journalists. Haven’t I taught you anything? Lazare is unkillable—you know that.”
    He put Toto down and accompanied me to the door, leaning on my shoulder. “But one question, my dear, before you go.” Smiling his charmingly crooked grin. “Why such a fret over Lazare Hoche?” Tweaking my chin. “Madame Bonaparte.”
* Josephine’s first husband had been convicted (falsely) of conspiring to get out of prison. He was executed, and his property confiscated.
* Laudanum: a solution containing opium, used widely in the eighteenth century for pain, particularly for “women’s complaints.”

In which I learn the Facts of Life
    April 20, 1796.
    I’ve been to see a doctor about the cessation of my monthly illness. “You’ve recently married, Madame?” he