While Saber was dreaming of being a Polish count, the count was imagining himself living in a Greater Poland … Margont wondered, then, what he himself aspired to. Normally his immediate, idealistic response to such questions was the liberty of nations, an end to the slaughter, a stable peace in Europe, the spread of republican ideas … But that evening he was weary. All he wanted was to have a pleasant time. Noble aspirations are considerably diminished by hunger and tiredness.
Natalia was not listening to her father. In any case, she had heard him recount the battle of Tannenberg so often that she was beginning to wonder whether she’d actually taken part in it. Margont intrigued her. He seemed different from the men she had so far met. Her father had always given her orders. Her admirers, of whom there had been a considerable number in recent years, seemed equally authoritarian. They never bothered to listen to what she said to them and assumed she thought the same as they. And these were the best of her suitors, those who accepted the idea that women could have an opinion – although they should not express it. Things had come to a head at the beginning of the war. She had received a procession of officers in the palace: a captain from the hussars of the Guard, an elderly infantry colonel, a lieutenant from the Preobrajensky Regiment (above all, remember to congratulate him for being in the Guard, her mother had told her a hundred times), and a surprising number of aides-de-camp. In any case she thought it stupid that there should be so many of the latter. Since all the regiments hated one another and their officers sometimes went so far as refusing to speak to one another, what was the point of lining up so many messengers? In fact, she knew full well that nobles fought over the positions of aide-de-camp for the simple reason that they had less chance – relatively speaking – of being exposed to enemy fire.
All these visitors had behaved in an extraordinarily inept manner. Most of them had promised to bring her back a French flag topped with its eagle emblem. They thought this would please her but the idea horrified her. A piece of bloodstained material together with the certainty that its bearer, like its escort, had been exterminated and that the flagpole had been removed from their dead fingers: what a delightful present! Anyway, they already had the one seized at Tannenberg, so how many more did they need? A Cossack had even promised her Napoleon’s head, probably confusing her with Salome. She was eternally grateful to her father for his pro-Polish views, without which she would have been married off to a Russian aristocrat long ago. But her relative freedom was nearing its end. Her mother had given her six months to make her choice from the list of names she had drawn up herself ‘to help her to avoid making a mistake she would regret for the rest of her life’. The war had forced a postponement of the deadline because announcing an engagement to someone who might be killed soon afterwards would have put her in a difficult position with regard to the surviving suitors.
Oh, the war! Men waged war for a thousand different reasons but what difference did victory really make? She could find only one answer: the colour of the uniforms and the designs on the banners that would be hung up in the drawing rooms. Might Margont be different? She wanted to provoke him, to push him to the limits in order to study his reactions. Oh, she was under no illusions. He would probably maintain an indignant silence like Lieutenant Saber, or order her to be quiet, just as her father did. Or, even worse, he would behave like her suitors, greeting her comments with a kindly and unbearably patronising smile. In that case she would quickly drain her glass to prevent herself from throwing its contents in his face.
When the servants brought in the coulibiac, salmon in pastry, with mushrooms, celery, onions and dill, she said to Margont: ‘Here’s a little more Russian culture for you to devour.’
‘Well, you devour our writers: Voltaire, La Fontaine …’
So he had noticed the books? An accident, no doubt.
‘So you know the fables of La Fontaine, do you? They make edifying reading. “The Wolf and the Lamb” for example. “Might Is Right”.’
‘Dear Natalia,’ the count interjected, ‘having sung all summer, the cicada was caught unprepared when the north wind blew.’
Which was supposed to mean: if the cicada Natalia continued to mock, eternal winter – that is, the marriage she so much feared – would come earlier than expected.
‘Dura lex, sed lex,’ Margont summed up.
‘But Natalia is always happy to please her parents, Captain,’ the countess claimed. ‘Do you not say in France “blood will out’’?’
‘Well, we usually say, “What a woman wants, God wants.” Mademoiselle, I quite understand that our enforced presence is annoying. However, Russian hospitality …’
‘What do you know about Russian hospitality?’ Natalia asked.
‘Well, it’s said that samovars are pot-bellied because people want to be sure there’s always enough boiling water to be able to serve tea to all the guests.’
The young woman was surprised. So he knew that, did he? He really was not like the others. She wanted to scratch this varnish just to check.
‘What present would you offer your hosts by way of thanks?’
Her mother smiled, interpreting the question as the expression of a child’s greed. In her mind there could be no other explanation.
‘Poland! Poland!’ whispered the count, beaming.
Natalia stared at Margont, wondering whether he too was planning to present her with standards, guns and heaps of corpses.
‘The promise to give them an equally warm welcome in France. But without the caviar, I’m afraid …’
Natalia then asked with false naïvety: ‘Would my father also have to come in uniform and accompanied by five hundred thousand soldiers?’
‘We’d have enough cannonballs to feed the lot of them,’ muttered Saber in his corner, without turning his head.
The count was furious. With a discreet gesture he ordered his army of servants to enter the battlefield. The salmon coulibiac was replaced by a hare à la polonaise. Bacon, lard, fresh cream, juniper and caramel: extravagant but delicious. It was served with potatoes and red cabbage. All the guests rejoiced at the sight. Fanselin’s joy was the most intense, such was his love of discovering new flavours, in the widest possible sense of the word.
‘Natalia plays the harpsichord very well,’ announced the count.
The young countess gracefully placed her napkin over her mouth so as not to be seen gritting her teeth. So they also expected to make her play after the meal, did they?
‘It would seem that she doesn’t play enough, since it is said that music soothes the savage breast,’ Margont joked.
Natalia was flabbergasted. So now she was being attacked on ironic territory, her territory! Because if they took away her irony, how else could she express herself freely? The colour of the feathers of her nightingales and the length of her shawls?
‘A soldier presumes to explain to me how music soothes the savage breast,’ she retorted.
‘I’m a soldier only because we are living in a time of war.’
‘What will you do when the peace treaty has finally been signed?’ asked the countess.
In the countess’s mind the question was a tactful way of finding out about the officer’s wealth. Admittedly, she thought him low-ranking. But he did belong to the French army, the only one in which any soldier could climb to the very top. She had learnt that Murat was the son of an innkeeper. Yes, an innkeeper! Really, that was quite ridiculous! He had begun his career as an ordinary soldier. Today, at the age of forty-five, he was a Marshal of France, Grand Admiral of France, Grand Duke of Berg and of Cleves, a prince and, to cap it all, King of Naples. The son of an innkeeper King of Naples! Oh, the French and their Revolution. No respect for the rules and for social barriers.