The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire by C. M. Mayo

Author:C. M. Mayo [Mayo, C. M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781932961645
Publisher: Unbridled Books
Published: 2009-10-15T04:00:00+00:00

November 25, 1865

PAS POSSIBLE

In the office of the French minister of foreign affairs, Bigelow wonders, was it so much, was it so very much, to have hoped he could prick his French counterpart’s conscience? As was his own, as would be that of any father, indeed, that of any honorable gentleman. Bigelow had imagined his message a shuttlecock batted over a series of nets: to Drouyn de Lhuys, to Louis Napoleon, then to Maximilian—and Maximilian, mortified. Et voilà! the boy reunited with his mother and father. But smack into the first net: from Drouyn de Lhuys, not a flinch of compassion!

And, as Bigelow knows full well, it is no given that this conversation will go beyond these four walls. Drouyn de Lhuys holds his cards close to his vest, which is one of the reasons, Bigelow supposes, Louis Napoleon has kept him in his cabinet as long as he has. Drouyn de Lhuys knows too much. Louis Napoleon should have dismissed him long ago. In fact, Mrs. Bigelow pointed it out, how very telling that Louis Napoleon did not cut Drouyn de Lhuys back in 1851, when he threatened to resign should the emperor marry the countess of Montijo. Shortly thereafter, Louis Napoleon had a second opportunity to ask for his resignation: at a ball here, Madame Drouyn de Lhuys snubbed the countess of Montijo, who, though not yet formally engaged to the emperor, was attending as His Majesty’s personal guest. As all the world knows, the countess of Montijo, “a little Spanish nobody,” as Madame Drouyn de Lhuys went about saying, is today the Empress Eugénie, mother of the Child of France.

Bigelow can scarcely endure the Tuileries’ frou-frou decor, though he has warmed, personally, to Louis Napoleon. For all the emperor’s vices (impetuosity, womanizing, mirror-gazing), Bigelow cannot help but feel fond of him. After their mutual dentist, Dr. Evans, Bigelow would be the first to admit that he has joined the legions of Americans who have succumbed to the charisma that big-hearted adventurer. Nonetheless, Bigelow’s years in Paris have by no means changed his republican proclivities. Son of Connecticut Presbyterians, Bigelow is a strict abolitionist who has strived his whole life to be the sort of man who, as he puts it to his children, does not eat his pie first. And that would be plain apple pie, thank ye.

Many a time Bigelow has told his children that it was when, as a child, he had the task of driving the cows from the milking shed to pasture, because the beasts were very slow and he was small, he learnt his first lessons in patience. As the cows would stop to pull at the weeds by the roadside or simply stand, working their cuds, he would notice the shape of a cloud—how like a giraffe it was, or a hippopotamus, or a castle turret. He would notice that the clover was just beginning to come in, that the dandelions had sprouted their first gossamer globes, that the oak leaves had been kissed with autumn flame.

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