Napoleon's Rabbit Farmer by Robert Jackson

Author:Robert Jackson [Jackson, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-10-18T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

April 1819

The visitor could barely see Napoleon in the darkness. Unshaven for four days and with a red turban on his head, the Emperor was lying on his camp bed dressed only in a white shirt. It was the middle of the afternoon and the curtains and shutters were closed, allowing only slits of light to fall onto the floor of the tiny room. Napoleon beckoned for Charles Ricketts to come closer. ‘I am suffering a little deafness,’ he told the cousin of the British Prime Minister, Lord Liverpool. ‘I have chronic hepatitis and need to be removed from this island.’

In a break with protocol the Emperor invited his visitor, who was returning to England from India, to be seated. Ricketts strained his eyes to make out the features of Napoleon’s plump face. ‘You must report to Lord Liverpool the deplorable and lamentable conditions in which you find me,’ continued the Emperor in a rasping voice.

‘I am certain the Prime Minister will be very interested to hear what you have to say,’ replied Ricketts politely.

Napoleon grasped the metal post of his camp bed, grimacing in pain as he tried to sit up. Abruptly changing the subject he asked Ricketts about his work on the council in Calcutta before turning it back again to his own detention on St Helena.

‘Lord Liverpool must petition the Prince Regent for a change of Governor and a change of exile,’ he told Ricketts, who had little to say in reply. The Grand Marshal Bertrand was also seated to the right of the bed and listened intently.

‘Now I want to see you,’ said Napoleon to Ricketts after 15 minutes of conversation. ‘Bertrand, tell them to light the candles.’ In a few moments there was enough light for both men to study each other. ‘They are building me a new house,’ continued the Emperor in a sad voice. ‘I will never live in it so they should save themselves the trouble. I wish to die within the four miserable walls and on the miserable cot where for three years they have made me languish pitilessly.’

‘I very am sorry to hear that,’ said the visitor.

Napoleon again strained to sit up and the Grand Marshal moved to prop him up with cushions. ‘Hand Monsieur Ricketts my letter for Lord Liverpool,’ said Napoleon. ‘It details what needs to be done to relieve my suffering.’

The visitor bowed and Bertrand showed him to the door, returning a few moments later.

‘That went very well Your Majesty,’ he said watching the curtains being opened by a servant and the smoke drifting from the extinguished candles. ‘We have at last met an honest Englishman.’

But after a few days word got back to Bertrand and Montholon that Ricketts had not been taken in by what was being called a masquerade to exaggerate the Emperor’s illness. Count Balmain, the Russian Commissioner, sent a report on the meeting to the Czar: ‘I do not know if Bonaparte is well or ill,’ he said. ‘But I am sure he might have been able to put on trousers, stand up or sit down without passing away.

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