Marianne

He ran quickly to the staircase, whose broad sweep could be seen through a gaping doorway and leapt up two at a time with the lightness of a dancer. Left alone in the salon, the two women looked at one another, neither anxious to break the silence. Marianne had a strange feeling that this empty, desolate house where the one portrait hung in state, was none the less alive, with a dim, underground life of its own. She was torn between two contradictory urges, to sit down right there on the dusty ground and wait for what God knew what or to run away, and shut fast the doors that had opened with such suspicious ease and never return. The thought that very soon workmen would come and break the silence of this peculiar shrine with all their clamour troubled her, as though there was something wrong about it. And yet, no one had more right than she to cross this threshold, and to awaken the sleeping echoes of the old house. The house to which, even yesterday, she had not given a thought had now become part of her flesh and she knew that she could never tear it from her again without leaving a wound. Her eyes returned to those of the portrait which seemed to follow her wherever she went and she spoke to it, a silent, earnest prayer from her heart.

'Is it your wish, tell me, is it your wish that I should come back here, to our house? Already, I love it so! I will restore it to its past splendours, and once again you shall preside over a setting worthy of you.'

Then, as though the house were trying to answer her, the one remaining whole window in the room, its fastening perhaps broken or ill-latched, was caught suddenly by a gust of wind and flew open. Marianne moved across to shut it and in doing so saw that it gave, like the rest, on to a small garden laid out around a green and stagnant pool. Beside the pool a stone cupid with a blackened nose stood dreaming with his arms around a large dolphin that had long since ceased to spout water. And just at that very moment, the rain-filled clouds parted to make way for a pale, timid ray of sunshine which caressed the cupid's cheek, revealing his enigmatic smile. And, without quite knowing why, Marianne felt comforted and accepted. Just then, Arcadius came back.

'There's no one there. It must have been a rat.'

'Or just the woodwork creaking,' Fortunee added, shivering in her furs. 'It is so dank in here! Are you sure you want to live here, Marianne?'

'Quite sure,' Marianne answered on a note of sudden happiness, 'and the sooner the better. I shall ask the architects to work as quickly as possible! I think they will be here soon.'

For the first time, she had spoken out loud, as though officially taking possession of the silence. The warm notes of her voice rang through the empty rooms triumphantly. She smiled at Fortunee.

'Let's go,' she said. 'You are almost dead with cold. It's as draughty here as in the street.'

'You don't want to see upstairs,' Jolival said. 'I can tell you, there is nothing there. Apart from the walls, which could not be stolen, and the charred remains in the fireplaces, absolutely nothing is left.'

'Then I had rather not see. It is too sad. I want this house to find its soul again—'

She stopped, her eyes on the portrait, with the sensation of having said something foolish. The soul of the house was there, before her, smiling arrogantly against an apocalyptic background. What she had to do was to restore its body, by re-creating the past.

Outside, they could hear the horses blowing and stamping on the cobblestones. The cry of a water carrier rang out, waking the echoes of what had been formerly the rue de Bourbon. It was the voice of life, of the here and now which held so much appeal for Marianne. With Napoleon's love to protect her, she would live here as sole mistress, free to act as she pleased. Free! It was a fine word when, at that very moment, she might have been buried alive in the heart of the English countryside by the will of a tyrannical husband, with boredom and regret her only companions. For the first time, it occurred to her that after all she might have been lucky.

Slipping her arm affectionately through Fortunee's, she walked back with her to the hall, though not without one last affectionate look of farewell at the handsome portrait.

'Come,' she said gaily. 'Let's go and have a big, scalding hot cup of coffee. That's the only thing I really want at present. Close the doors carefully, my friend, won't you?'

The 'Greek prince' grinned. 'Don't worry,' he said. 'It would be too bad if so much as a single draught escaped.'

In a cheerful mood, they left the house, re-entered the carriage and were driven back to Madame Hamelin's.

Charles Percier and Leonard Fontaine might have been called the heavenly twins of decoration under the Empire. For years, they had worked together in such close collaboration that beside them, Castor and Pollux, Orestes and Pylades might have seemed mortal enemies. They had met first in the studios of their common master, Peyre, but then, when Percier won the Grand Prix de Rome in 1785 and Fontaine the second Grand Prix in 1786, they came together again beneath the umbrella pines of the Villa Medici and had remained together ever since. Between them, they had undertaken to re-design Paris in the Napoleonic style, and there was nothing good of Percier's that did not show the hand of Fontaine and no proper Fontaine without a touch of Percier. And being the same age, within a year or two, one born in Paris the other at Pontois, they were generally regarded in every day life as inseparable brethren.

It was this pair, so eminently representative of French art under the Empire who, late that afternoon, stepped through the doors of Fortunee's salon. That salon had never been so empty of company, but since this was Napoleon's wish, that amiable lady uttered no word of protest. Except for Gossec, not a soul had crossed her threshold all that day.

The two architects, after bowing politely to the ladies, gave Marianne to understand that they had paid a preliminary visit to the house in the rue de Lille earlier that afternoon.

'His majesty the Emperor,' Charles Percier added, 'has intimated to us that the work should be so carried out that you, mademoiselle, may take possession of your house with the least possible delay. We have therefore no time to waste. To be sure, the house has suffered a good deal of damage.'

'But we feel,' Fontaine went on, 'that we shall very soon be able to remove all traces of the ravages worked by time and men.'

'We have therefore,' Percier took him up, 'taken the liberty of bringing along with us some designs we happened to have by us, simply one or two ideas sketched for our own pleasure, but which seem perfectly suited to this old house.'

Marianne's eyes, which throughout this well orchestrated dialogue had been swivelling between the two men, from the short Percier to the tall Fontaine, came to rest at last on the roll of papers which the first named was already unrolling on a table. She caught a glimpse of roman style furnishing, Pompeian friezes, alabaster figures, gilded eagles, swans and victories.

'Gentlemen,' she said quietly, taking some pains to stress the slight foreign accent with which she spoke French so as to lend substance to her supposed Venetian origin, 'can you answer me one question?'

'What is that?'

'Are there in existence any plans indicating what the Hotel d'Asselnat was like before the Revolution?'

The two architects looked at one another with barely concealed alarm. They had known they were to work for an Italian singer, as yet unknown, but destined for great fame, a singer who was quite certainly the Emperor's latest fancy. They were expecting a creature of whims and caprices who might not be easy to please and this start to the interview seemed to prove them right. Percier cleared his throat with a little cough.

'For the outside, no doubt we can find plans, but for the interior – but why should you wish to have these plans, mademoiselle?'

Marianne understood perfectly the meaning behind the question. Why should a daughter of Italy be interested in the original appearance of a house in France? She smiled encouragingly.

'Because I should like my house, as far as possible, restored to the state in which it was before the troubles. All this you have shown me is very fine, very attractive, but it is not what I desire. I want the house to be as it was and nothing more.'

Percier and Fontaine raised their arms to heaven in unison, as though performing a well-drilled ballet.

'In the style of Louis XIV or Louis XV? But, mademoiselle, permit me to remind you that is no longer the fashion,' Fontaine said reproachfully. 'No one has anything like that nowadays, it is quite outdated, not at all the thing. His majesty the Emperor himself—'

'His majesty will wish first and foremost for me to have what I want,' Marianne interrupted sweetly. 'I realize of course that it will not be possible to reconstruct the interior decorations exactly as they were, since we do not know what that was like. But I think it will do very well if you will carry out everything to suit the style of the house and, especially, the portrait which is in the salon.'