The Magnificent Montez Part 7

Lola, flattered by the invitation, and less clear-headed than usual, was sufficiently trusting to accept. She soon, however, discovered that his Excellency's intentions were strictly dishonourable, for he made her, she afterwards said, "a most indelicate proposition." Her response was to laugh in his face, and to tell him that "she had no wish to become his toy." Thereupon, Paskievich, furious at such a repulse (and unaccustomed to being thwarted by anyone, must less by a ballet-dancer), dismissed her with threats of reprisals. The first of these took the form of a visit from Colonel Abrahamowicz, the official charged with "preserving morality in the Warsaw theatres." He apparently interpreted his responsible functions in a fashion that left something to be desired, for Lola complained that "his conduct was so free that I took serious exception to it."

Paskievich then dealt his next card. This was to instruct his understrapper to fill the theatre with a rabble and have her hissed off the stage. Lola, however, was equal to the occasion. Advancing to the footlights, before the terror-stricken manager could stop her, she pointed to Colonel Abrahamowicz, sitting in a box, and exclaimed: "Ladies and gentlemen, there is the dastard who attempts to revenge himself on a pure woman who has scorned his infamous suggestions! I ask your protection!"

Accompanied by M. Lesniowski, the editor of the _Warsaw Gazette_, she returned to her lodgings, wondering what would happen next. She was soon to discover, for the angry Colonel and a squad of police arrived with a warrant for her arrest as an "undesirable." When, however, they announced their purpose, she flourished a pistol in their faces and declared that she would put a bullet through the first of them who came near her. Realising that she meant what she said, and not anxious to qualify for cheap martyrdom, Colonel Abrahamowicz was tactician enough to withdraw. In the meantime, the public, learning what had happened, sided with Lola and raised l.u.s.ty shouts of "Down with the Viceroy! Long live the Montez!"

Paskievich, who had crushed with an iron hand the rebellion of 1831, had a short and sharp way with incipient revolutionaries; and, calling out the troops, cleared the streets at the point of the bayonet. While they were thus occupied, Lola slipped off to the French consul and suggested that he should grant her his protection as a national. With characteristic gallantry, he met her wishes. None the less, she had to leave Warsaw the next morning, under escort to the frontier.

There were reprisals for a number of those who had taken her part.

Thus the manager of the theatre and the editor of the _Warsaw Gazette_ were dismissed; M. Steinkeller was imprisoned; and a dozen students were publicly flogged.

"Tranquillity has been restored," was the official view of the situation.

According to Lola herself (not, by the way, a very sound authority) she went straight from Warsaw and the clutches of the l.u.s.tful Paskievich to St. Petersburg. Considering, however, that Poland was at that period under the domination of the Czar, it is highly improbable that, after her expulsion, she could have set foot in Russia without a pa.s.sport. Had she been sufficiently daring to make the experiment, she would a.s.suredly have been clapped into fetters and packed off to Siberia.

Lola's motto was "courage, and shuffle the cards." Undeterred by her previous failure there, she went back to Paris, to try her luck a second time.

Luck came to her very soon, for she had scarcely arrived in the capital when she encountered a young Englishman, Mr. Francis Leigh, an ex-officer of the 10th Hussars. Within a week the two were on such intimate terms that they set up housekeeping together. But the harmony was shattered abruptly by Lola, who, in a jealous fit, one day fired a pistol at her "protector." As this was more than he could be expected to stand, Mr. Leigh, deciding that they could not continue living under the same roof, severed the relationship.

III

In 1845 the Paris of Louis-Philippe was, when Lola resumed her acquaintance with it, a pleasant city in which to live. The star of Baron Haussmann had not yet arisen; and the capital's vulgarisation under the Second Empire had not then begun. John Bull still gave it a wide berth; nor, except for a few stray specimens, were there any hordes of tourists to gape at the "Froggies." Everything was cheap; and most things were nice. Paris really was _La ville lumiere_. Dull care had been given its marching orders. All that was required of a man was that he should be witty, and of a woman that she should be entertaining. The world of the boulevards--with its cafes and restaurants and theatres--was the accepted rallying point of the authors and poets, the painters and musicians, and the lights twinkling in the theatrical and journalistic firmaments, the men in velveteen jackets and peg-top trousers, the women in flounced skirts and shawls and elastic-sided boots. The mode of the moment.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Abbe Liszt: Musician and Lover_]

Lola settled down among them, and was given a warm welcome. Among others with whom she was soon on friendly terms was the famous (or, perhaps, it would be better to say, notorious) Alphonsine Plessis. The Lady of the Camelias had a large heart and a wide circle; and Liszt, who was also back in Paris, was to be found among the guests attending her "receptions" at her house on the Boulevard de la Madeleine. Lola, who never cherished rancour, was prepared to let bygones be bygones, and resumed relations with him. But this time they were short lived, for the maestro was already dangling after another charmer, and, as was his habit, left for Weimar without saying farewell. Lola took his defection philosophically. As a matter of fact, she rather welcomed it, for it solved a situation that was fast threatening to become awkward. This was that she herself had now formed an intimacy with somebody else.

Her new acquaintance was Charles Dujarier, a young man of five and twenty, and a journalist of some distinction, being part proprietor and feuilleton editor of _La Presse_. Lola met him in the friendly atmosphere of a Bohemian cafe, where formal introductions were not insisted upon. As was the custom in such an atmosphere, the friendship ripened rapidly. Within a week of their first meeting the two set up housekeeping together in the rue Lafitte. Before long there was talk of marriage. But it did not get beyond talk, for Lola had put her head in the matrimonial noose once--in her opinion, once too often--and she had no desire to do so a second time. Apart from this consideration, she was probably well aware that her divorce from the philandering Thomas James had never been completed.

As Dujarier's acknowledged mistress, Lola was accepted without demur as one of themselves by the literary and artistic "set" thronging the cafes and salons they frequented. Gautier and Sue, with Claudin and Mery and Dumas, were those habitues of whom she saw most; and Ferdinand Bac (but n.o.body else) says that she was on intimate terms with the austere M. Guizot.

Gustave Claudin declared that he met Lola Montez in Paris in the spring of 1841. That she made an impression on him is evident from a pa.s.sage in his _Souvenirs_:

Lola Montez was a charmer. There was something--I do not quite know what--about her appearance that was provocative and voluptuous, and which attracted one. She had a white skin, hair suggestive of the tendrils of honeysuckle, and a mouth that could be compared with a pomegranate. Added to this was a ravishing figure, charming feet, and perfect grace. Unfortunately, as a dancer, she had very little talent.

Towards the year 1845 the author of these notes saw much of her. She wanted him to write her memoirs, and gave him some material for them.... She was born in Seville in 1823, with a French officer for a G.o.dfather and (as is the custom in Spain) the city of Seville for a G.o.dmother. The adventures of her life were written out by her in an exercise-book. She told me that, at a ball in Calcutta, she had once refused to waltz with a wealthy gentleman who was so encrusted with diamonds that he resembled a snuff-box. When he asked her the reason for refusing to dance, she replied: "Sir, I cannot dance with you because you have hurt my foot." The would-be waltzer was a chiropodist!

Writing, as he did, nearly fifty years after the episode to which he thus refers, Claudin's memory was a little shaky. Thus Lola Montez was born in Limerick in 1818, not, as he says, at Seville in 1823; nor could Claudin have met her in Paris in the spring of 1841, as she had not then left India.

Dujarier, according to Lola, was much impressed by her political ac.u.men, and employed her on "secret service" for the Government, entrusting her as a preliminary with a "mission to St. Petersburg."

The story is an obvious concoction, if merely because Dujarier, being little beyond a penny-a-liner hack, had no power to employ anybody on such a task. Still, Lola always stuck to it. Still, it is just possible that she may have gone to Russia at this period, for Nicholas was interested in the art of the ballet, and welcomed foreign exponents of Terpsich.o.r.e from wherever they came. He was a familiar figure in the green-rooms of his capital. He patronised Taglioni and Elssler, and was always ready to make up any deficit in the box-office receipts. It only meant grinding more out of his army of serfs.

If she did go from Paris to Russia, Lola did not waste her time there, for, she says, she "nearly married Prince Schulkoski," whom she had already met in Berlin. This, she adds, was "one of the romances of her life." But something went wrong with it, for the princely wooer, "while furiously telegraphing kisses three times a day," was discovered to be enjoying the companionship of another charmer. Lola could put up with a great deal. There were, however, limits to her toleration, and this was one of them. First, Tom James; then, George Lennox; and now Prince Schulkoski. Masculine promises were no more substantial than pie-crust. Poor Lola was having a sad awakening. It is not remarkable that she formed the conclusion that men were "deceivers ever." After such an experience, nothing else was possible.

Among other items in her repertoire of alleged happenings in Russia at this period was one that certainly takes a good deal of swallowing.

This was that, while having a "private audience" with the Czar himself and Count Benkendorf (the Chief of the Secret Police), an important visitor was announced. Thereupon, and to avoid her presence being known to the newcomer, she was locked up in a cupboard and left there for several hours. When the Czar came back, he was "full of apologies and insisted that she should accept from him a gift of a thousand roubles."

Other details follow:

"A great magnate conquers her at St. Petersburg; Grand Dukes perform their tricks; and Circa.s.sian Princes die for her.

But soon she has enough of caviare and vodka. What, she wonders, is the good of becoming fuddled with drunkards and wasting valuable time on half-civilized Asiatics?"

No good at all, was Lola's decision. Accordingly, she bade farewell to Russian hospitality, and, relinquishing all prospects of wearing the Muscovite diadem, returned to Paris and Dujarier. Her lover's influence secured her an engagement in _La Biche au Bois_ at the Porte St. Martin Theatre; but, as had happened at the Academie Royale, she was a "flop." The critics said so with no uncertain voice; and the manager announced that he agreed with them. Clearly, then, the ballet was not her _metier_.

"Well, dancing isn't everything," said Lola, who always took a reverse in philosophical fashion.

CHAPTER VI

AN "AFFAIR OF HONOUR"

I

The evening of March 7, 1845, was one pregnant with fate where Dujarier was concerned. He had received, and accepted, an invitation to a supper-party at the Freres-Provencaux restaurant, given by Mlle Anais Lievenne, a young actress from the Vaudeville company. Among the other _convives_ gathered round the festive board were a quartet of attractive damsels, Atala Beauchene, Victorine Capon, Cecile John, and Alice Ozy, with, to keep them company, a trio of typical _flaneurs_ in Rosemond de Beauvallon (a swarthy Creole from Guadaloupe, with ambitions to be considered a novelist), Roger de Beauvoir (a friend of Alphonse Karr, and whose other claim to distinction was that he had once challenged Balzac), and Saint-Agnan (an individual dubbed by journalists a "man-about-town"). Altogether, a gathering thoroughly representative of the theatre, the press, the world, and the half-world.

Lola was invited to join the party; but, at Dujarier's special request, she excused herself. If, however, she had gone with him, the tragedy for which the evening was to be responsible might have been averted. Still, n.o.body can look ahead.

For some time, all went merrily as the proverbial marriage bell. The ladies were not too strait-laced; dull care was banished. Food and drink without stint; music and lights and laughter; bright eyes and pretty faces. Champagne corks popped; toasts were offered; jests were cracked; and tongues wagged.

But it did not last. The clouds were gathering; and presently the harmony was interrupted. Dujarier was to blame. Unable to carry his liquor well, or else, under the spell of her bright eyes, he went so far as to remark to his hostess: "My dear Anais, figure to yourself, in six months from now you and I will be sleeping together." The damsel's acknowledged cavalier, de Beauvallon, a stickler for propriety, took this amiss and declared the a.s.sertion to be unwarranted. Words followed. Warm words. Mlle Lievenne, however, being good-tempered, merely laughed, and peace was restored.

But the patched-up truce was only a temporary one. Feeling still ran high. A few minutes later, de Beauvallon picked another quarrel with Dujarier, this time complaining that he had neglected to publish a feuilleton of his, _Memoires de M. Montholon_, that had been accepted by him. As was to be expected, the result of pestering the sub-editor at such a moment was to receive the sharp response that he "must wait his turn, and that, in the meantime, there were more important authors than himself to be considered."

With the idea of calming frayed nerves, somebody suggested that they should all adjourn for a flutter at lansquenet, then ousting ecarte.

The proposal was accepted; and, the revellers having settled down, Saint-Agnan, having the best-lined wallet, took the bank.

Fortune did not smile on Dujarier. The luck seemed against him; and, when the party broke up in the small hours, he was a couple of thousand francs to the bad. Worse than this, he was unable to settle his losses until he had borrowed the necessary billets from the head waiter. As a result, his temper was soured, his nerves on edge.

Accordingly, when de Beauvallon was tactless enough to upset him again, he "answered somewhat abruptly."

This, however, was not all. The "wine being in, the wit was out." A woman's name cropped up, that of a certain Madame Albert, a young actress in whose affections Dujarier had, before Lola Montez appeared on the scene, been ousted by de Beauvallon. The recollection rankled, and he made some sneering reference to the subject. With an obvious effort, the other kept his temper and curtly remarking, "You will hear from me to-morrow, Monsieur," left the restaurant.

II

"It might have been thought," is the comment of Larousse, "that, with the fever of the wine abated, these happenings and the recollection of the indecorous words accompanying them would, by the next morning, have been forgotten."

But they were not forgotten. They were remembered. On the following afternoon, while Dujarier was in his office, lamenting the fact that he had made such a fool of himself, and wondering how he was to explain matters to Lola, two visitors were announced. One of them was the Comte de Flers and the other was the Vicomte d'Ecquevillez. With ceremonious bows, they stated the purport of their call. This was that they represented de Beauvallon, who "demanded satisfaction for the insults he had received from M. Dujarier."

The quarrel, however, was really one between two rival papers, _La Presse_ and _Le Globe_, which had long been at daggers drawn. Granier de Ca.s.sagnac, the editor of _Le Globe_, was the brother-in-law of de Beauvallon, and Emile de Girardin, the proprietor of _La Presse_, had systematically held him up to ridicule in his columns. Hence, when the news of the restaurant fracas leaked out among the cafe gossipers, the result was that everybody said: "il n'y eut qu'une voix pour dire 'c'est le _Globe_ qui veut se battre avec la _Presse_.'"

Dujarier, who had no stomach for fighting--except with his pen--would have backed out if he could. But he could not. Things had already gone too far. Accordingly, he referred the visitors to his friends, Arthur Bertrand (a G.o.d-son of the Emperor) and Charles de Boignes, and then hurried off to consult them himself.

"Pistols for two and coffee for one," was their decision when they heard what he had to tell them. There was, they were emphatic, no other way by which he could satisfy his "honour." The code demanded it.

Clutching at a straw, Dujarier next sought counsel of Alexandre Dumas.