Lola Montez and the Poisoned Nom de Plume (28 page)

“My remedy,” she breathed. “One of those pills in the blue paper—please?”

“Dr. Koreff?”

“Of course. They give me courage. He’s a genius… My saviour.”

Oh, how I wondered if that were true. Perhaps better late than never, the hair was rising at the back of my neck as I considered and reconsidered everything I knew, everything I’d seen about the odious nose-picking doctor from Berlin. He’d been present at the death of the girl in the closet and present at the death of my darling. He’d been the last person to hold Henri in his arms, to see the light in his eyes go out forevermore. Prescriber of drugs, trusted by all.

Except one, I decided. Koreff now has an enemy, and that enemy is me. Why did I think this, all of a sudden? Call it a hunch—and I needed someone to blame. That toad of a man was the last thing that Henri ever saw in this life—and that woeful realization made me crazy.

*

July came and almost went—and then there he was. Beauvallon, large as life, the heartless murderer! I’d taken up my shooting practice again, and one morning he was at Lepage’s. As I entered the gallery, I saw that long chestnut hair and stopped dead. He hadn’t seen me, so I shrank back into the doorway again, shielding myself with the door. He turned, just enough for me to recognize him absolutely, then I rushed away down the steps and off to the nearest
gendarmerie
.

Later that day, I was jubilant to read that the King’s Procurator had charged Rosemond de Beauvallon with the murder of Henri Dujarier, “For having laid a plot to involve a troublesome rival in a duel.” D’Ecqueville, Beauvallon’s second, was charged with perjury for lying that the pistols used had not been fired earlier that morning—in fact, by Beauvallon, who had indeed practised with them. And lastly, the papers reported that the pistols used belonged to Beauvallon’s brother-in-law, Granier de Cassagnac, editor of
Le Globe
, the man who owed Henri the large debt of money. Now, I thought, now we shall see! Now we shall obtain justice!

But of course the wheels of justice grind very slowly and very fine. Time went on, and on and on. I wept, I mourned, I tried to write my story but it seemed so useless and trite; the trial date was set, then changed, then changed again. It was decided that the trial—whenever it happened—would take place in Rouen. Fine, but when?

And
The Count of Monte Cristo
, too, went on and on. Everyone was saying now that Dumas was simply wringing it out, every line, every page, to help with his debts. True, it was still entertaining, but how long could a novel possibly be stretched? He had gone to 39 rue Lafitte to scoop up all of my darling’s possessions, so I heard, amalgamating them no doubt into his almost-completed chateau in the country, or dispersing them indiscriminately amongst his pals. I hated him for it, and for his pompous interference on the morning of the duel—did he regret what he had done? Did he even realize? Henri’s horses—Magnifique and Enchanté among them—were now stabled with Dumas’ others. Would they be loved, and curried, and ridden daily—or languish in stalls, stamping their hooves in the dark and wondering what had happened?

I visited Merci regularly and tried to help her to eat, but she wouldn’t. Men very rarely came to pay her way now; her regular
gentilshommes
had been disappearing one by one. She still thought she was healthy; she liked her new thinness and argued with me when I told her it was too much. I tried to get her to stop taking the medicines, but she grew wildly angry and almost struck me when I tried to throw one of them out. From this I could see that she was completely addicted to whatever it was. And I’d begun thinking, from this behaviour of hers, about Henri, about the night that we’d argued, the night that he went off to Les Trois Frères restaurant and became so drunk. He hadn’t seemed like himself at all, even before he’d left our apartment. Could it be that he’d had something put into his food or drink earlier—and then later, as well? I had wondered, at the time. But why? And if so, who? I could think of one man with the means, straight off.

So I went to confront Koreff at his place of work. I found him in, on a late afternoon in July, and told his assistant that I was expected—which was a lie. As I entered his office, he looked up from his desk and jumped back as if he’d seen a ghost.

“Mademoiselle Montez, what a pleasure. And you’re looking so well.” His eyebrows had jumped up to what used to be his hairline.

“I am, yes, no thanks to you, doctor,” I declared, swanning in and seating myself. “I’m here, first, to speak with you about Merci Duplessis. Have you seen her lately? She looks like death warmed over.”

“She’s… A trifle peaky, I admit,” the man said. “She does not possess enough of the animal magnetism to keep the engine strong on its own. Her condition requires—boosting.”

“She’s addicted to whatever you’re giving her, and it’s not making her better!”

“Oh, tut tut. It’s not as bad as all that.”

“I was there one day when she had a fit—she started convulsing! Don’t you remember her little sister? Dead from strychnine?”

“Of course I do. Let me try to explain; my cure involves the practical application of theories of animal magnetism.”

I emitted a loud, “Humph!”

“What Mademoiselle Duplessis is experiencing,” he continued, steepling and then wiggling his fat fingers together, “is a series of crises. A crisis is an effort of nature against an illness. She has a blockage in her circulatory system, if you can understand this—and the small crises of her body signify an increase and the resultant action of the magnetic fluid, attempting to disperse the obstacles constricting her circulation, and to re-establish harmony and equilibrium.”

“That sounds completely idiotic,” I said. “It was a fit, and I thought it would kill her.” Listening to his nonsense was causing the tell-tale red gush of rage to begin its sudden ascent within my bloodstream—and what, I wondered, would the good doctor make of that? As my fury budded and got set to flower, I changed tactics and snapped, “Never mind about that for the moment. I want to talk about Henri Dujarier. Were you present at that supper party at Les Trois Frères Provençaux in March? Did you give him some medicine—or put something into his drink that night?”

The horrible little man leapt up, pointing a finger at me. “How dare you! Do you know what you’re saying?”

“Perfectly well, so answer me! Could it be that you also gave him something on the morning of the duel—slipped into the cognac he’d had to try to keep warm? Was it your flask he used, you
cochon
?”

Dr. Koreff called suddenly for his assistant, but I leapt up, threw myself on my hands and knees onto his desk and grabbed for his neckerchief, twisting it fiercely so that he began to choke.

“I swear to you,” I roared into his bulbous face, “if you had something to do with the death of my darling, I will find it out, and I will hunt you down!”

I let him go with a violent shove, and he staggered backwards. In my position on his desk, I felt like a wild cat, ready to spring. How I longed to do it, to choke the slimy mollusc! Instead, breathing deeply, I let the red gush trickle back down through my veins and arteries, calming myself, deliberately and with steadfast purpose. Finally, I stepped back off the desk and onto my feet.

“I’ll leave you now,” I said, turning to the door and catching his assistant hovering in the doorway, looking alarmed. I turned back. “You’ve been warned,” I added for good measure.

Koreff was scratching his balding pate thoughtfully. “The animal magnetism within you, Mademoiselle Montez, is a phenomenon… A force of nature. I had no idea. It is very interesting.”

“Balls!”

“Good day to you, mademoiselle. I’ve been warned, yes,” he nodded, fat fingers now at his throat. “I will keep that information at the front of my mind, believe me.”

“You’d better! You turd.”

I swirled past the assistant and out.

*

After that dramatic visit, I sat down at the table by the window to work on my story, which I had been hating and despising—and it started all at once to unfurl like a sumptuous Persian rug flung down upon a smooth oak floor. All of the tensions and tragedies I’d been involved with in Spain and now in Paris began to mingle and ferment, then to flow out of my pen in a non-stop stream. It was exhilarating, and therapeutic. I cried, I paused—deep in thought, searching for the right phrase, and barely breathing—then I sobbed and wrote like a maniac, my hands and sleeves all smeared with ink. At times I laughed. My heroine was now named Lara Montrose. She grew up in India and she rode elephants, particularly a grand matriarch called Simla. Now grown into a young woman, Lara comes to the aid of the maharajah, a gorgeously handsome ruler who has not been trained in combat by western means. She begins to teach him how to fight with a sabre, and the art of marksmanship with a pistol. There’s a nasty villain who deserves to hang—and who
will
hang, oh yes indeed! I wrote and wrote, and at the end of each grueling session (about half an hour) would jump to my feet, pirouette, faux-joust, and dream of the accolades that must surely ensue, if I could just sit still long enough to complete my saga of revenge.

Finally, with fifty pages done (and lots to come), I plucked up my courage and went to see Émile de Girardin at the offices of
La Presse
—Henri’s offices, my darling’s work place… I’d never been there before, and found it difficult to venture inside. The building was a temple of man-made activity, men rushing in and out of the main doors, the whole place humming with industry both mechanical and intellectual. A marble lobby and a confusing array of nameplates led to offices from the first floor all the way up to the eighth. And my darling had been the editor of all this?
Diablo
. He’d been more important, more successful, than I’d even realized. When I asked the way to Girardin’s office, a young junior directed me.

There it was, the door half ajar, a burble of excitable male voices coming out of it. I took a deep breath and felt ready to faint, clutching the doorframe until the dizziness passed. Then Émile’s scratchy voice said, “For the love of God, Marcel, can you never submit on time? Always this chasing down—I tell you this is the last time. If you cannot supply copy to deadline, we have writers in plenty to take your place.” A loud swearing followed, then a bearded man burst out of the door and went away down the hall, jamming his hat upon his head and still muttering imprecations.

“Well, that is done,” Émile’s voice said with a sigh.

I stepped forwards and pushed the door fully open. Three men were in the room. “Monsieur de Girardin?” I asked—and then I fell down.

I found myself in a chair, being fanned solicitously by one of the other men, who had apparently been closest and managed to catch me before I’d crashed to the floor. My head still spun, but I remembered where I was and what I had come for.

“Are you feeling better now, mademoiselle?”

Just then, the third man rushed back into the room clutching a glass of water and handed it to me with a chivalrous bow.

“Thank you, gentlemen,” I said. “I am perfectly well. It was a momentary failing for which I do apologize.”

Murmuring words of encouragement and shuffling backwards out of the door, the two others were gone.

“Forgive them,” de Girardin said in his peculiar, gruff voice. “Some of my writers don’t see a woman up close from one end of the week to the other.” He stood, clasping his hands behind his back. “Now, then, Mademoiselle Montez. As you know, you have our deepest condolences—Delphine’s and mine. I am sorry to see you in this weakened state. But here you are… Tell me, what can I do for you?”

How to begin?

Well, I began. I told him about my story, and about Henri’s encouragement. I tried to make the fictional adventure sound as exciting as it had suddenly—surprisingly—become for me. And as I spoke I realized that I wanted this, very much: I wanted to be able to throw all of my energy into it, to carry me to another and better place for as long as it took—in memory of my beloved Bon-bon, as a celebration of our love and of what had seemed the best of all hereafters.

I talked for quite a while, then all of a sudden ran out of steam. Girardin had been treading back and forth behind me, while I spoke.

“Just so,” he said.

I sat with my gloved hands in my lap, willing them to be still, hoping to conceal my agitation.

He sat once more behind his desk, then cleared his throat. “Forgive me, mademoiselle, but I cannot help you with this wish. We are pushed to the maximum of our resources.”

I steeled myself, pulling on a tough hide to withstand the blow that was beginning to pummel me.

“I have so many backlogs,” he continued, picking up a quill and rolling it between his fingers, “contracts promised… With Henri’s death, you can imagine… So much to catch up on, and writers to appease… We’re trying to obtain exclusive rights for Dumas’ next—it’s twelve volumes, comprised of three books… Five thousand, six hundred and twenty six lines, to be paid in installments at eighty centimes a line… Fifty-two thousand francs in total…” His words ran down, and he finished by, “Well, he sells, what more can we say. Can we afford it? I do not know…” He peered up at me from under bushy grey brows. “I am sorry.”

So that, too, was that. Shit on a stick, as Infanta Carlota might have said. My story, and my
nom de plume
, shot down in flames.

*

“Well, what about
lansquenet
? Everyone’s playing it,” Pier said, his moustache wet with the absinthe he’d been sipping, ever so slowly. It was a few days later, and we were hard at it.

“Ugh. Don’t even speak the name of that damned game to me,” I retorted, managing a very professional-looking job, the cards arcing and whizzing back to the symmetry of the pack, flat and innocent.

“Not bad,” he mused, watching me. “Not bad at all. But you still need
lansquenet
.”

We’d been at work for a week. I’d decided I
had
to get out of Paris, even if only for a short while. My story was moribund; it had sickened and died. The trial date continued to move further and further away, and my personal coffers were almost bare. The morning after my visit to Girardin, desperation became the mother of invention and I’d sent a message around to Pier-Angelo’s newspaper office: “You’re Italian—are you any good at cards?”