Queen Hortense | Page 5

was, like the ships of Cortez, burned behind her; yet it threw a magic
light far away over into her future, and as Josephine stood there with
her little Hortense in her arms, and sent her last farewell to the island
where her early days had been spent, she bethought her of the old
mulatto-woman who had whispered in her ear one day:

"You will go back to France, and, ere long after that, all France will be
at your feet. You will be greater there than a queen."
CHAPTER II.
THE PROPHECY.
It was toward the close of the year 1790 that Josephine, with her little
daughter, Hortense, arrived in Paris and took up her residence in a
small dwelling. There she soon received the intelligence of the rescue
of her mother, and of the re-establishment of peace in Martinique. In
France, however, the revolution and the guillotine still raged, and the
banner of the Reign of Terror--the red flag--still cast its bloody shadow
over Paris. Its inhabitants were terror-stricken; no one knew in the
evening that he would still be at liberty on the following day, or that he
would live to see another sunset. Death lay in wait at every door, and
reaped its dread harvest in every house and in every family. In the face
of these horrors, Josephine forgot all her earlier griefs, all the insults
and humiliations to which she had been subjected by her husband; the
old love revived in her breast, and, as it might well be that on the
morrow death would come knocking at her own door, she wished to
devote the present moment to a reconciliation with her husband, and a
reunion with her son.
But all her attempts in this direction were in vain. The viscount had felt
her flight to Martinique to be too grave an injury, too great an insult, to
be now willing to consent to a reconciliation with his wife.
Sympathizing friends arranged a meeting between them, without,
however, previously informing the viscount of their design. His anger
was therefore great when, on entering the parlor of Count Montmorin,
in response to that gentleman's invitation, he found there the wife he
had so obstinately and wrathfully avoided. He was about to retire
hastily, when a charming child rushed forward, greeted him tenderly in
silvery tones, and threw herself into his arms. The viscount was now
powerless to fly; he pressed his child, his Hortense, to his heart, and
when the child, with a winning smile, entreated him to kiss her mamma
as he had kissed her; when he saw the beautiful countenance of

Josephine wet with tears; when he heard his father's voice saying, "My
son, reconcile yourself with my daughter! Josephine is my daughter,
and I would not call her so if she were unworthy," and when he saw his
handsome son, Eugene, gazing at him wistfully, his head resting on his
mother's shoulder, his heart relented. Leading little Hortense by the
hand, he stepped forward to his wife, and, with a loud cry of joy and a
blissful greeting of love, Josephine sank on his bosom.
Peace was re-established, and husband and wife were now united in a
closer bond of love than ever before. The storms seemed to have spent
their rage, and the heaven of their happiness was clear and cloudless.
But this heaven was soon to be overcast with the black shadow of the
revolution.
Viscount Beauharnais, returned by the nobility of Blois to the new
legislative body, the Estates-General, resigned this position, in order to
serve his country with his sword instead of his tongue. With the rank of
adjutant-general, he repaired to the Army of the North, accompanied by
Josephine's blessings and tears. A dread premonition told her that she
would never see the general again, and this premonition did not deceive
her. The spirit of anarchy and insurrection not only raged among the
people of Paris, but also in the army. The aristocrats, who were given
over to the guillotine in Paris, were also regarded with distrust and
hatred in the army, and Viscount Beauharnais, who, for his gallantry on
the battle-field of Soissons, had been promoted to the position of
commanding general, was accused by his own officers of being an
enemy of France and of the new order of things. He was arrested, taken
back to Paris, and thrown into the prison of the Luxembourg, where so
many other victims of the revolution lay in confinement.
The sad intelligence of her husband's misfortune soon reached
Josephine, and aroused her love to energetic action in his behalf. She
mentally vowed to liberate her husband, the father of her children, or to
die with him. She courageously confronted all dangers, all suspicions,
and was happy when she found