cobbles.
“Until tomorrow, Mr. Whittlesby!” she called out through the window.
From the corner of her eye, she could see him standing there still, his open shirt inadequate protection against the chill of an unseasonably cool May day.
When Emma was shown into Hortense’s boudoir, the others were already deep in conversation, a china pot of coffee on the table between them, two cups half full and a third glaringly empty.
Jane Wooliston smiled at Emma over her coffee cup. “Only fifteen minutes late this time. You’re improving.”
Hortense Bonaparte made a face at Jane. “Don’t be unkind!” Rising, she embraced Emma, the differences in their height reversed from when they had first known each other, when Hortense was eleven and Emma fourteen. Now Hortense was the taller of the two, a grown woman and a mother. But she still had the same sweet nature that had endeared her to everyone at Mme. Campan’s. “I’m sure there was an extenuating circumstance. Such as…”
“A stampede of bears across the Champs-Élysées?” suggested Jane. “Typhoons? Hurricanes?”
Emma plumped down with a thump on the yellow silk settee. “A hurricane, indeed! Hurricane Augustus, you mean. Someone”—she looked hard at Jane—“unleashed a poet on me.”
“ ‘Unleashed’ is such a strong term,” said Jane.
“No one ever tells me anything,” complained Hortense, to no one in particular.
It was meant jokingly, but Emma felt a twinge of guilt all the same. If she thought her own position was fraught, Hortense’s was far worse. Bad enough being the First Consul’s stepdaughter, but she was made doubly a Bonaparte by her marriage to Napoleon’s younger brother, Louis. As the family rose in prominence, those who surrounded them were increasingly likely to be toadies, informers, or both. There were few these days whom Hortense could call friend and believe it.
Emma angled herself towards Hortense. “Trust me, you aren’t missing much of anything. You know Augustus Whittlesby, don’t you?”
“The poet?” Hortense perked up. She turned to Jane. “Isn’t he in love with you?”
“Perpetually,” said Emma, before Jane could jump in.
“Poetically,” countered Jane repressively. “It isn’t at all the same thing.”
“Yes, yes, we’ve had this discussion,” said Emma. And Augustus Whittlesby had been so very terrified when he had thought she might be flirting with him. Emma pushed that thought away; it wasn’t a particularly flattering recollection. “What did you tell him about me?” she demanded. “You didn’t say anything about my predilection for his pantaloons, did you?”
“Oh, my,” said Jane, raising one brow. “One afternoon in his company and you’re already away with the alliteration.”
“Don’t change the subject,” said Emma severely. “The poor man is terrified that I intend to seduce him.”
“Do you?” asked Hortense with interest. The intense scrutiny of a jealous husband left her little opportunity to seduce anyone, but she took a generous interest in her friends.
“No! Absolutely not. I’m just using him for his help with my masque.” She wasn’t quite sure when, but somehow, it had become her masque, hers, quite hers. Maybe it had something to do with the pirates.
“So you are writing it!” Hortense put down her cup with a delicate clink. “Maman will be so pleased. She was terrified she might have to ask Caroline to help instead, and you know how Caroline is.” She made an admirable effort to sound cheerful, but there was no mistaking the strain beneath it.
“And Whittlesby,” said Jane. “Is he…helpful?”
“Stop that! And, yes,” Emma admitted. “He is. Or at least he might be. We’ll see. If you don’t stop smirking, I’ll send him back to writing odes for you.” She turned to Hortense. “You will be my heroine, won’t you?”
Hortense took a deep interest in the contents of her coffee cup. “You know I want to be…but it might not be possible.”
“There won’t be much to…Oh.” Emma stared at Hortense’s hand, where it rested gently on her stomach as her friend’s words took on new meaning. “Are you…I mean—”
Hortense nodded. “Yes.”
“But that doesn’t mean you can’t perform.” Women tended to go about in society up until the very last moment, a pregnancy no bar to one’s usual social whirl. The masque was in less than a month. “You won’t even be showing.”
Hortense shook her head, not meeting Emma’s eyes. “Louis wouldn’t like it.”
Emma and Jane exchanged a look. It was no secret that Hortense’s marriage was a sham, her husband delighting in all manner of petty persecutions.
It was a hideous situation. Hortense had never wanted to marry Louis, nor Louis Hortense, but if he wanted a dynasty, Bonaparte needed heirs, and Hortense and Louis were to provide them.
Emma’s heart ached for her friend.
And, just a little bit, for herself. She certainly didn’t envy Hortense her situation, but she did envy her the curve of her hand across her belly, the child sleeping in the nursery, the press of small arms around her neck.
They had been planning to try for a child, she and Paul, towards the end. After all the years of confusion, of separation and reconciliation, they were going to be a family. They had gone so far as to commission a cradle.
But Paul had died. And so had gone not only that hard-won sweetness, but all their other plans with him, all the children and hopes that might have been, leaving her to a cold and barren bed and an empty nursery. It hurt, sometimes, seeing her friends with their children, seeing Hortense, so many years younger than she, with one in the nursery and another on the way. Bonaparte’s sister Caroline, bane of Mme. Campan’s academy, had three.
Oh, she wouldn’t trade. She wouldn’t take Hortense’s Louis or Caroline’s Murat. But it would be nice, so very nice, to have a pair of plump little arms around her neck instead of the cold press of gems, the downy scent of a child’s head instead of perfume.
“When are you due?” she asked, trying to sound cheerful, and fearing that she had failed as badly as her friend.
“In the autumn,” said Hortense. She twisted in her seat to look at Jane. “Will you take my part for me? I’d rather you than Caroline.”
“Won’t your mother mind?” said Jane. “She intended the part for you.”
Hortense tried to make a joke of it. “She would also rather anyone than Caroline. Please? It would be a pleasure for me to have you there.”
What she didn’t say, although the others both understood, was that she wanted allies, people outside the Bonaparte clan and the narrow circle of the court. Both Jane and Emma, aliens as they were, were safe. They had no ambitions to be satisfied, no ulterior motives to be pursued at Hortense’s expense.
There was a pause, and then Jane said, “I’ll hold the part in trust for you. In case you change your mind. The same costumes will fit us both.”
Hortense only shook her head.
“Shall we go shopping next week?” Emma jumped in. “Surely, a new baby is an excellent excuse to treat yourself to a few new hats.”
“You are a dear. But that’s not where the baby is!” Hortense’s eyes brightened and for a moment she looked almost like her old self. Her face fell. “I can’t. I have to be at Saint-Cloud. My stepfather has an important announcement to make.”
“Oh?” Emma said, without interest.
“You’ll hear about it soon enough. Maman has a surprise for you, too, but she wants to tell you herself, so it will have to wait until Malmaison.” Hortense broke off at a barely heard sound, craning her neck towards the door.
It opened slowly, not Louis eavesdropping, nor one of his minions, but Louis-Charles’ nursemaid, who dropped a curtsy, and said, in a low voice, “Madame…”
Hortense was out of her chair before the word was finished.
Emma and Jane followed suit, placing their cups on the tray as they rose.
“Forgive me,” Hortense said, her attention already elsewhere, in the nursery with her child. “Louis-
