The Magician's Wife Read online

  Amid the bustle of guests, the swarm of porters, the piles of luggage, his military figure was quickly lost to her view. A sadness came upon her. She turned to Lambert.

  ‘Will we see him again before we go?’

  ‘Possibly not. He is leaving for Algiers next week.’

  And then it was time for Lambert to pay off Françoise, the old lady’s maid, who, when she had received her money, curtsied perfunctorily to Emmeline and set off down the platform, dragging her little trunk behind her. Lambert sent Jules to hire two fiacres to bring them with their luggage to the Hôtel Montrose where they would spend the night before returning, next morning, to Tours.

  It was raining. The street lamps burned bright in the symmetrical boulevards of this new Paris, created for the Emperor by Baron Haussmann, a city of thoroughfares fifty metres wide, of great squares, of green parks, of huge monuments, many moved brick by brick from their old sites to fit the dreams of the man who, that very morning, had kissed Emmeline’s hand.

  But soon her fiacre turned off the broad, brightlit boulevards into the crumbling ruins behind these grand façades, back into the city she had known all her life, that Paris of ill-lit alleys, of narrow pavements, loud with the noise of pedlars, jugglers, plumbers, knife grinders and other relics of the old medieval city which had grown like a carapace, over the centuries, that Paris of quartiers where provincials clustered close to provincials from their own region, that warm, dark, dirty world which the Emperor’s grand plans would now destroy.

  Lambert, as was his habit, retired early. In their bedroom at the Hôtel Montrose he lay, his face to the wall, asleep or feigning sleep. She walked towards the mirror in the small entrance hall, her mind filled with thoughts and memories of the week just past. On the dressing table was her jewellery box. She opened it and fingered the bracelets, the necklaces, the earrings, the brooches which she must return tomorrow before leaving Paris. And then at the bottom of the box she saw a small velvet sack and drew it out. From it she took the ring her husband had given her when their engagement was announced, a blue sapphire, set in tiny pearls. She remembered that when he gave it to her he pretended to take the little sack from between her breasts. For a moment she had wondered whether the ring was false and this was some trick. But when she took it to Froment-Meurice on the Rue Saint Honoré to have it fitted, the jeweller said, ‘Mademoiselle, this is an exceptional stone in a beautiful setting.’

  Now, she put the sapphire on her finger and raised her hand, looking into the mirror, staring uncertainly at the Emmeline who stared back at her, remembering the time five years ago when Lambert had wooed her with this ring. The other day in Pierrefonds I made a joke when Deniau asked how I came to be Henri Lambert’s wife. I said he had called me up on stage. We laughed and Deniau asked if Henri had cast a spell on me. I made a joke of it, but was it a joke? Is everything in my life an accident, a coincidence, or was it fate that sent me to the theatre that evening to see a performance I’d never have seen if one of Papa’s patients hadn’t given him two tickets for a special engagement by the world-famous Henri Lambert who would be in Rouen for three nights only. And if my cousin hadn’t wanted to go with me, I’d never have gone alone. And if Henri had looked like a magician in some theatrical costume, I wouldn’t be in this room with him tonight. But, no, he looked like a gentleman and when he came down to the footlights early in the performance and pointed to me, asking if I had a scarf he could borrow, I remember I took my silk scarf from my neck as if I were under his spell and went up on stage, half blinded by the flickering footlights, to stand by his side, looking out into the darkness. And this strange man, the magician, took my scarf, pressed it into a ball, let it shake out, turned it in every direction to show there was nothing concealed in it, then, holding it at its apex, shook it out again and to everyone’s astonishment a long feather plume fell on to the floor. He turned the scarf around to show its other side and at once a second plume fell out, then a third and a fourth and suddenly at a drum roll from the orchestra pit a rain of plumes fell from it, covering the stage at my feet. I remember that he turned away from me and went downstage, showing my scarf from every side to prove it concealed nothing. Then he tied a knot at each of its four corners and suddenly, waving his hand over the knotted scarf, shook it out, the knots untying to reveal a bouquet of real flowers which he presented to me amid the sound of applause. And then the moment I will not forget. As he handed me down from the stage he leaned towards me and said in a quiet voice, ‘Mademoiselle, something special has happened to me tonight. I must see you again.’ And as if by magic a notepad and pencil appeared in his hands. ‘Do me the honour of writing down your address. I will send a messenger tomorrow. This is important for both of us.’

  All of this while the audience still applauded and I, like someone under a spell, wrote down my address. And then he went back up on stage and for the rest of the evening’s performance, in every marvellous magical thing he did, he made me aware that he was performing for me, and me alone. Of course I didn’t tell anyone what I’d done. Papa would have been furious if he’d known that I’d given my address to a total stranger. But I remember I was excited and when I came home next day after teaching my class at Sainte Sulpice there was that envelope waiting, delivered by messenger, together with a bouquet of roses. Would it be possible for us to meet that night after his performance? Would it be possible for us to have supper together? And what was it that made me say yes? It was the last two sentences in the invitation. ‘Believe me, dear Mademoiselle, this is the first time in my life that I have asked such a favour of any member of my audience. For you, and I know it in my heart and in my intuition, are the woman I am destined to join in life.’

  Looking back now, I believe that on some occasions he does have a sort of magical power, or at least a summoning of his will so strong that he can make people do things they would never dream of doing. And certainly I, my parents’ obedient daughter, would not have gone in secret to meet him in the Hôtel Impérial where, over champagne and supper, he told me he would come back from Paris very soon to speak to my parents, because he knew, from the moment he looked out into the audience and found me, that this was the most important meeting of his life. ‘Dear Mademoiselle, I am not like other men, I have the gift of foreseeing my future and I know, from this evening on, that my most important aim in life must be to win your affection.’

  I was twenty-two years old, I was bored with Rouen, I didn’t fall in love with him, but I was flattered, I was excited, he offered to take me to Paris, London, St Petersburg, the Riviera, all of those places were like home to him, and he did come back to Rouen three days later to speak to my parents and ask permission to go on seeing me, and yes, he didn’t allow Papa’s contempt to wound him, he knew instinctively that if he pleased me, he had won the wager. And because of his will, because he’s a man who will always persevere in what he seeks to do, seven months later we were married.

  The Emmeline in the mirror smiled at her, but the smile was false. She turned her back on her mirror face and taking up a novel by Victor Hugo slipped into bed beside her sleeping husband. After a few desultory pages, she put aside the book and snuffed the candle. Her father had told her that Hugo was the greatest of romantic novelists, but her father, like all men, did not understand romance as women did. Romance was when you fell in love with someone or something which was denied to you. Romance was not marriage. On their wedding night, when he took off his clothes, Lambert was older than she had imagined him to be, the hair on his chest was grey and when he reared up over her his breathing was harsh and laboured. She knew he wanted a son who would carry on his work, inheriting his secrets, his magic boxes, his mechanical inventions. But the son Emmeline gave him was a dead foetus the midwife took away to throw in a rubbish bin. Then last year, when again she came to term, a girl child, born dead, its tiny face flat and crushed like an abandoned plaster cast. She wept at sight of it and pushed it away. Lambert was in the room and saw her horror. In the n
ext few weeks he spent unprecedented hours in her company, neglecting his work in an effort to ease her depression. And though they were told that a further pregnancy would not endanger her and could well result in a normal birth, he no longer sought to caress or kiss her except in moments of solicitude. She knew that he still desired her: she saw it in his eyes and in his habit of coming into her bedroom, pretending to make conversation so that he could sit, watching her dress and undress. But, in bed he feigned sleep or turned away. At first she was grateful for that, it showed that he was kind, that he wanted to give her time. But when, feeling she must try once again to have a healthy child, she came to bed naked and held him, feeling his penis stiff against her belly, he turned away to masturbate. Why? Was he afraid for her or did he no longer want the son he had so desired? In the nights that followed she would wake to feel his hands stroking her buttocks and breasts but when she turned to him he moved away. And when she asked what was wrong, he shook his head and said, ‘Nothing. Nothing. Go to sleep.’

  Secretly, she felt relieved. Sex with him had been a duty. After a month he no longer fondled her but slept or feigned sleep, his face to the wall. Again, as in the days before her marriage, she dreamed of sex with strange men. So when he asked her to go with him to Compiègne how could she refuse? She had failed him as a wife.

  Next morning after breakfast she went out into the streets of Paris to return the rented jewels. Later that day they took the train for Tours. They arrived at night. The driver of the carriage that met them at the station was a young local man whom they did not know. It was dark, the moon invisible behind heavy rain clouds. They drove in silence over the familiar rutted road, through a small wood, until at last their carriage jolted unevenly down the narrow avenue of oak trees which led to the Manoir des Chênes. Jules, who was sitting in the front beside the driver, climbed out in the darkness and inserted a key in the electric box to the left of the entrance gate. At once, a kerosene torch blazed alight. The carriage horse reared up in fright and as their driver pulled down on the reins, Jules climbed back into his seat. At that moment the life-size marionette gate-keeper trundled out of the gate lodge and, on reaching the iron bars of the gate, lifted the latch. At once the gate rolled open and their driver, now as frightened as his horse, whipped it past the marionette which raised its tin hand in salute.

  As was usual when Lambert was expected certain mechanical devices had been set in motion. As their carriage moved through the grounds kerosene torches lit up a grotto in which a bearded sage stiffly bent his painted head as his mechanical hand turned over the pages of a bible. At sight of this their driver started in fear and gripped the reins, bringing the carriage to a near halt. When they reached the main entrance the gardener and a maid came forward to help Jules and the driver unload the luggage. As the last trunk was being lifted out of the carriage, the driver jumped back on to his seat, shook the reins and cracked his whip over the horse’s back. The carriage rumbled off towards the gates.

  ‘He didn’t wait for his money,’ Lambert said. ‘I hope I have as much success with the Arabs.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  He took her arm as they entered the hallway. ‘Fear,’ he said. ‘Fear mixed with awe and reverence for the unknown, for something we do not understand. That’s at the heart of all magic. That driver, like most country people, is ignorant and superstitious. Yet even he must have seen conjurers, escape artists and card tricksters in fairgrounds. But in Africa, Deniau tells me, the Arabs will never have seen illusions such as I can devise. Believe me, to them I will be the most holy of marabouts.’

  In the semi-darkness of the hall, clocks in every room of the manor began to sound the hour of eleven, drowning out his final words. Lambert smiled as though their cacophony of chimes was, for him, a sweet, familiar music.

  ‘Home again, my darling. And it’s very late. Tomorrow I must get up at dawn to begin my preparations. I think I had better sleep in my workroom. Good night, my dear. Pleasant dreams.’

  He bent and kissed her cheek, holding her by her shoulders. His eyes had that excited look she had seen so many times. He was home again in the only place he really loved: the laboratory of his illusions.

  An hour later as the myriad clocks struck midnight Emmeline lay sleepless in her bed. She saw, again, the frightened face of their driver as he whipped up his horse and rushed his carriage towards the mechanical gate, fearing to be trapped in a wizard’s house. To the peasants and even the townspeople in nearby Tours her husband was not, as he thought, a person they regarded with fear and reverence. Fear, yes, but it was a fear of witchcraft, of persons in league with the Evil One. Emmeline knew this, as Lambert would never know it, for her mother was a country woman, born in the Bercy, not far from here. Her mother, while pretending to laugh at such superstitions, was, Emmeline knew, no different from her peasant forebears. In the unchanging world Parisians called La France profonde, night was host to hobgoblins, witches and will-o’-the-wisps. Even in the bright sunlight of a summer’s day you might touch a grassy mound or venture into a field sacred to the fairies, those malevolent others who could cast a spell on you, a spell which brought misfortune. And why should the peasants not believe in such things, passed down from generation to generation? For them the world did not exist outside their townlands. Most did not know how to read or write, few had ever been in a theatre and, even in cities like Tours or Rouen, many among her husband’s audiences believed his inventions and illusions were a gift, granted him by that world which lies hidden behind our visible world, a world ruled by mysterious powers stronger than the Church, capable of miracles no saint could match.

  And now in the darkness she thought of the weeks to come. What if the Arabs were like the people of the Bercy? What if they saw Henri not as a holy man, but as an agent of the devil?

  Part Two

  Algeria, 1856

  Chapter 5

  ‘The city is white and on a hill,’ Commandant Guizot said. ‘All of the Moorish houses are whitewashed and only a few of the newer buildings have windows which face on to the street. As we approach from the sea it looks like a gigantic marble quarry. An extraordinary sight, I assure you.’

  ‘And when do we arrive?’ she asked.

  The Commandant looked down the dining table to his chief officer, who answered. ‘The weather in the Gulf of Lyon is predicted as calm, Mon Commandant. I would think tomorrow morning, shortly after dawn.’

  Colonel Marmont, head of the marine staff at the port of Marseille who had been detailed specially to accompany them on their voyage to Algiers, turned to Lambert. ‘Believe me, it’s a sight worth seeing. That is, if you can manage to be on deck at such an early hour.’

  But now, thirty-six hours after their sailing from Marseille, as the steamer Alexander moved through a dawn mist, Emmeline stood alone on the promenade deck outside the large stateroom which had been provided for their passage. Lambert slept. He was never an early riser. At dawn, on her first sea voyage, on this journey to a new continent, she stared ahead, excited, as, suddenly, the swirls of mist were parted by the vessel’s prow and in the distance she saw land and then, behind a long dyke which hid the port, that city on a hill, rising four hundred feet out of the sea. But as the Alexander drew closer, its foghorn calling a greeting to the shore, the city seemed to her not like the marble quarry described by the Alexander’s captain, but a vast and menacing Moorish fortress, its parapets and terraces sheet-white in the fierce light of an African sun.

  Twenty minutes later as the Alexander sailed around the dyke and entered the harbour Emmeline went back to their stateroom. Lambert, aroused earlier by the foghorn, sat, fully dressed in frock coat, white linen vest and trousers, carefully arranging a silk cravat around his neck. A steward was pouring morning coffee. Lambert, looking up, saw her in the mirror and said, ‘You must wear a more formal dress, my darling. Something light in colour. And a hat. There is to be some sort of official welcome.’ He turned to the steward. ‘When do we dock?’
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  ‘We will tie up at eight-fifteen, sir. You will disembark shortly after nine.’

  ‘So we have plenty of time,’ Emmeline said. ‘I’ll change now, but I want to go back on deck as soon as possible. I can’t believe we’re here.’

  ‘As you wish, my dear. But I do not want to be seen on deck. I should make my appearance at the last moment. From now on, I must play a public role.’

  And so, again, she stood alone, looking down over the railing as the gangplank was lowered and from the quay below, a cluster of Negroes (were they slaves, she wondered?) came crowding up the gangway to unload the passengers’ luggage. Looking up at the ship were Arabs, a race she had known only from drawings and paintings, now suddenly real, men with short beards and moustaches, their heads shaven except for a long lock of hair on top. They wore ankle-length woollen robes, the garment fastened to their heads by a rope of camel hair which served as a turban. Over this robe many wore long flowing cloaks. They were shod in primitive ox-hide sandals, but Emmeline noticed that a few who seemed of higher rank wore high yellow leather boots. There was also a score of Arab women, most of them young, dressed in wide woollen shirts, tied at the waist with a rope and fastened at the breast with large iron pins. Their hair was plaited in long tresses and on their arms and legs they wore bracelets of silver and iron. Their faces shocked her. Many were tattooed. In their ears were large rings and their nails were dyed red-brown with henna.