King, Ship, and Sword

uniforms of the various branches of Napoleon's army some clanking with spurs on their boots and swords at their hips, which raised Lewrie's eyebrows over his recent search. By those officers and ornately dressed civilian gentlemen stood an host of elegantly gowned women, some of them young, lovely, and flirtatious as they waited for entrйe; lovers and mistresses, Lewrie determined. Wives seemed more dowdy, even though gaudied up something sinful in the same semi-translucent fabrics as the young and firm-bodied. And there were so many egret plumes in hats and hairdos that Lewrie could conjure that every bird in Europe was now bare- arsed.

A majordomo or master of ceremonies loudly announced each pair as they were allowed in, crying above the soft strains of a string orchestra over in one corner of the vast baroque hall. Their turn came at last; first Sir Anthony, then, 'Capitaine de Vaisseau а la Marine de Guerre Britannique, Alain Lui… Lew-rie, et Madame Caroline Lewrie!'

That turned quite a number of heads, made officers grip their sword hilts or pause with their champagne glasses halfway to their lips, forced women to goggle or comment behind their fans, and flutter them in faint alarm, as if a fox had been allowed into their chicken coop.

'Are we so infamous?' Caroline had to ask in a soft mutter near his ear once more, her cool and regal smile still plastered on her face.

'We're English… We must be,' Lewrie chuckled back. 'How do, all,' he said to the crowd in a soft voice, nodding and smiling, almost waving in their general direction as they paced down the centre of the reception hall. 'Now, Sir Anthony… where the Devil do they keep the bloody champagne?'

First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte had completed his toilet after leaving his bath; his usual routine followed to the letter. He washed his hands with almond paste, his face, neck, and ears with scented soap (from La Contessa's, in point of fact, in the Place Victor), picked his teeth with a boxwood stem, brushed twice, with paste then powdered coral. Stripped to the waist, dressing robe tossed aside and standing in a flannel vest and underdrawers, he had Constant trickle eau de cologne over his head (also from Phoebe Aretino's) whilst he brushed his skin with stiff bristles, and had Constant do his back.

Napoleon donned stockings, white cashmere breeches, and a silk shirt with a fine muslin cravat, with a white cashmere waist-coat over that. He spent his morning at work 'til eleven, when he dined lightly. Then, still in a foul mood, he at last made his decision about what he would wear to the levee. The scarlet-trimmed dark green Chasseur uniform was militant, but not nearly enough.

Bonaparte ordered his dress general's uniform, the long blue tail-coat with the lavish gilt lace trim and scrolls of acanthus leaves. Top-boots, and a red-white-blue Tricolour sash about his waist, over the double-breasted uniform coat.

'Bon' he decided, looking in the cheval mirror. Lastly, he stuck a scented handkerchief in a pocket and a small snuff box into another, nodded to Constant, and headed down to attend the levee… and put those damned Anglais, those lying sanglants, in their place.

Oh, it was an elegant crowd attending the levee! Lewrie expected a scruffy Jacobin mob of sans culottes in ill-fitting coats and red Liberty caps, perhaps leaving their scythes and pitchforks at the door, a bunch of old peasant women knitting and rocking where they could get a good view of the next beheading, but… there were frosty foreign ministers from half of Europe (minus the Prussians and Austrians, of course) with their wives or temporary local courtesans; there were all those aforementioned officers from the Guard, the Chasseurs, the Line infantry, Lancers, and Light Dragoons, the heavy cavalry Cuirassiers and allied officers from the Dutch Batavian Republic, and all of Napoleon's Italian allies… the conquered but cooperative.

Instead of ragged commoners with unshaven chins and loose, long hair, the civilian male attendees were dressed so well they could give Sir Pulteney Plumb a run for his money, and a fair number of them had the graceful and languid airs that Lewrie thought more commonly seen at a royal reception, a gathering of aristocrats, which all the world knew were so despised by staunch French Republicans.

'One'd think they were all titled… waitin' for King Louis the Sixteenth t'come dancin' in,' Lewrie pointed out to Sir Anthony as the three of them made a slow counter-clockwise circuit of the hall. 'What happened t'all that 'noble commoner' nonsense?'

'Most of the great voices of the Revolution are now conveniently dead sir,' Sir Anthony simpered back. 'Napoleon has even gone so far as to allow the churches to re-open, and the Catholic Church to restore its presence… with power only over its priests and nuns, not over the state and of course, without its former wealth. That's gone for muskets and cannon. The joie de vivre of your common Frenchman cannot be suppressed The draconian edicts of the Jacobins against riches, their dour insistence on Equality and Fraternity, were too much a pie-eyed idyllic dream, d'ye see, Captain Lewrie. It's against all human nature to believe that one could invent a classless society, with all individual effort directed in support of the state!

'Besides, drinking, eating, and living well, having fine things, and making money is every man's fondest wish,' Sir Anthony said with a wry chuckle as he touched his nose with a scented handkerchief. 'Next thing you know, this Bonaparte will make himself First Consul for Life, and surround himself with a royal court. Titles will come back, just you wait and see. It'll be m'sieur vicomte and madame baroness 'stead of citoyen and citoyenne, you mark my words.'

'Pity our own politicians, like Fox or Priestley, who admired the French Revolution,' Caroline said. 'How disappointed they must be to see the French slip back to having aristocracy.'

'We should begin to introduce you and your good lady about,' their young diplomat announced. 'The civilian sorts, I'd expect. The military types might be a tad too gruff with us.'

'Sounds good,' Lewrie began to say, then froze in his tracks. Holy Christ, it's '96 all over again! he thought, goggling at two people he hadn't seen since a night ashore in Genoa in one case, and a night in bed at shore lodgings in Leghorn, in the other.

It was Signore Marcello di Silvano, that hefty and handsome Italian millionaire, once the most powerful senator in the Genoese Republic, the man the old spymaster Zachariah Twigg had identitied as the prime leader of the Last Romans. Lewrie could not be mistaken; the fellow was wearing the same glaring white figured-satin suit with the royal purple trim, the same heavy gold medallion and chain of office atop an aquamarine moirй-silk sash. It appeared that Silvano had picked up a few more baubles of honour to pin to his coat breast, too, most likely from Napoleon.

On his arm, though, was the woman who'd spied on Lewrie and influenced him, pretending to be a North Italian Lombard, but really French from near the Swiss border…! Claudia Mastandrea, looking almost as young and fetching as ever-she of the large, round, and firm breasts that she'd pressed either side of Lewrie's face, of the wealth of sandy blond hair, of large brown eyes, nipples, and areolae the size of Maria Theresa silver dollars! The spy Twigg had ordered him to bed, to pass on disinformation, and a good round lie or two, blabbed in the drowsy afterglow of throbbing, thrashing, hair-tossing, 'View, Halloo!' sex!

Signore Silvano (now Duke of Genoa under one of Napoleon's kin) bestowed upon Lewrie a curled-lipped smile and a grave inclination of his head. 'Get to you later!' that smile seemed to promise.

From Claudia Mastandrea, Lewrie got one of those momentary gasps and a most-fetching upward heave of her impressive mammaries as she recognised him, as well. Then came a sly, seductive smile, a tilt of her head, a lowering of her chin and lashes.

'Ma'am,' Lewrie managed to mutter as he nodded. Thank God but Silvano was of no mind to wait for an introduction, but strolled past, tucking his long-time paramour a little closer to his elbow.

Lewrie took a cautious look over his left shoulder after they had passed, and… Claudia Mastandrea winked at him!

'Someone else you know in Paris… my dear?' Caroline asked. 'Ah, hem… met that