Soundtrack:
Ignaçio Jerusalem -Mass in G Major 'De los Niños' - Credo
*exterior* *Vienna at dawn* *we see Franzi, Robert Elslerr and Frankie are walking in the Prater* *it looks like a bomb ripped through the pleasure gardens* *there are a motley assortment of policemen and soldiers “securing” the area*
Franzi: why are these people still here?
Robert: too injured to be moved, your Imperial Highness. They *points at several women scurrying around* are attempting to make them comfortable before they take a ride *we see a “coroner’s wagon” trotting past with several corpses already bound up*
Franzi: who are they?
Robert: from the Wiener Demokratischer Frauenverein, nurses mostly.
Franzi: *looks at Frankie* you knew about them?
Frankie: they started up around March. Quite a few court ladies are involved. Currently apolitical, more interested in welfare work than agitation. And certainly
not the type to throw a bomb into a crowd of civilians here for the celebrations.
Franzi: so who would do something like this?
Robert: Graf Sedlnitzky
[2] has a few candidates in mind, sir.
Frankie: no need for that: process of elimination. The socialists wouldn’t throw a bomb into a crowd of
workers. The republicans would’ve been more interested in throwing a bomb into the Hofburg or the cathedral than the Prater
[3]. That cuts at least half of his potential suspects from the list.
Franzi: there are radicals in every group- you told me that.
Frankie: yes *bats away Franzi’s hand as he tries to cover his nose for the stench* but if this is political agitation, I suspect that the Jacobins and the republicans will shockingly have a clean pair of hands for once. Difficult as it may be to believe.
*Veracruz, Mexico* *we see ships of the United States’ Brazil Squadron
[4] ringing the bay as a sort of
cordon sanitaire* *the USS
Onkhaye comes alongside the SMS
Hainaut* *after presenting their letters to the Hainaut’s captain, the American sailors start streaming on-board* *the Belgian sailors look unsure, but they have been given orders by their captain to “stand down”* *so they do* *until several women are scared up on deck by the Americans* *as well as a fussy looking man in his thirties*
Man: I hope that there is a good explanation for this inconvenience, Commodore Conner. Otherwise you can expect a severe reprimand from the French government
Conner: *smartly snaps a salute* *in French* my apologies, Monseigneur le Duc de Guiche
[5], it is simply a matter of protocol.
Guiche: a protocol for the American navy to search a foreign ship in foreign waters?
Conner: can never be too careful. If they’re transporting slaves from Africa…
Woman: *in French* does this look like a slave ship to you? Perhaps you mistook us for slaves?
Conner: one can never be
too careful, your Majesty.
Elise of Hohenlohe-Langenburg: It’s Madame d’Iturbide. And you are not doing your country any credit by treating us like this, commodore.
Conner: I’m only doing what my orders say, Madame.
Elise: and
what exactly is that? To send your sailors to search through ladies’ trunks for slaves? Perhaps weapons? Money? Such
brave men you are. I wonder that your men would not look better in my lace underwear and petticoats. Maybe we should provide you with an umbrella to complete the outfit.
*several laughs from the company*
Conner: *turns to captain of the
Hainaut* *in French* if you will just fire a twenty-one gun salute the American navy’s honour will be deemed satisfied and you may proceed.
Belgian captain: *about to answer*
Elise: *switches to English* and
why should we satisfy the American navy’s honour after
such an inconvenience, Commodore?
Conner: it would not do to cause a diplomatic incident by failing to observe the niceties, Madame.
Elise: *nods* of course. Rather a case of closing the door
after the horse has bolted, *turns to her ladies* wouldn’t you say, Madame Murat
[6]?
Caroline Fraser: I would certainly believe it to be so, Madame.To think that one of my countrymen could behave in such a manner towards the new French ambassador to Mexico *looks at Guiche*
Conner: *now awkward*
Elise: I trust that
you will observe the diplomatic niceties when Admiral Cochrane arrives *looks out to sea* if I’m not mistaken, that’s his ship, the HMS Topaze with Sir George [Seymour
[7]]’s HMS Phaeton coming up in the rear. Or, how do you say in the navy? “Deckhead here, masthead away to starboard”?
Conner: *nervously* Admiral Cochrane, Madame?
Elise: *smirks triumphantly at him* did you think that my aunt, her Majesty, the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland would dispatch me across the ocean with neither hair nor hide of an escort?
Conner: *now looking nervous*
Elise: she saw no reason to trouble the…already troubled relations with the United States, hence why Queen Louise was kind enough to provide a ship for me and my ladies *gestures* Madame Murat, Mrs. Bonaparte
[8] and her son, Second Lieutenant Patterson-Bonaparte
[9]. And Admiral Cochrane was kind enough to offer us an escort from the Azores, since he already en route to his new appointment on the West India Station.
*we see several sailors perking up at the mention of Cochrane*
Elise: and of course, Admiral Cochrane’s connections to the Chilean and Brazilian navies
[10] as well as to the regent of Austria, would surely make this into…by its definition…an international incident, no? I can’t imagine that Chile or the emperor of Brazil will personally trouble themselves much over a single Belgian sloop…but they might find an American intrusion on an admiral of their navies too much to stomach, don’t you agree?
Conner: yes, Madame. *barks order for his men to withdraw*
Elise: *tutts disapprovingly* and I would so
hate to find that the men have left our belongings in
such disorder. *turns around and marches back to her cabin*
*cut to Elise and her ladies stepping onto the quayside of Veracruz* *with Elise on the arm of the new French ambassador* *Madame Murat is on the arm of Admiral Cochrane, with Jerome Patterson-Bonaparte and his mother behind them*
*cut to Elise touring the city- in the process of undergoing a rebuild after the fire – on the arm of the city’s mayor* *trailed by the other members of her party* *and a growing gaggle of locals* *the scowls of suspicion from many melt away when she pauses to speak to them* *especially the children* *there’s a gasp, when a little girl who was running to see her trips and falls* *the little girl bursts into tears* *without thinking twice, Elise goes down on her haunches to help the child up and tenderly dusts her off* *then spares her a few words in fluent Spanish*
*cut to Veracruz’s station- looking like little more than a single platform, really- where a shiny new locomotive with two carriages is standing puffing merrily away
[11]* *a large crowd is now gathered, almost squabbling over who gets to hand up “Señora Iturbide’s” luggage* *the train whistle sounds* *and just before the train starts moving, Elise pushes down the carriage window and we see her half-leaning out to wave to the crowd* *who loudly cheer their approval, many still waving after the train until it is lost to view*
*title card shows two weeks later* *September 13 1848* *cut to the interior of Mexico City’s Catedral Metropolitana* *Agustin and Elise are being married by the new archbishop of Mexico City,
Cardinal Juan Manuel de Irrizarri y Peralta
[12]* *the wedding has several surprising aspects* *from Elise’s
white wedding dress
[13] to that “Mrs. Bonaaprte” and “Madame Murat” are her “bridesmaids”* *instead of one of his brothers, as would be expected, Agustin’s best man is none other than Henry Clay, Jr
[14]*
*cut to them emerging from the cathedral into the plaza* *next thing we see Agustin and Elise crossing the plaza alone* *the crowd that has formed outside the cathedral parts like the Red Sea for them* *they stop in front of a clearly temporary structure garishly draped in the Mexican tricolour* *an inscription reads simply: A los Defensores de la Patria*
Elise: *kneels to lay her wedding bouquet amongst several others that have been placed there* *then, she straightens, takes a step back, and snaps a salute* Gloria fortis milites
[15]
*the crowd roars its approval* *a chant of "Iturbide! Iturbide!" quickly starts as we fade to black*
[1] The words of Germaine de Foix to Karl V when she reported on Isabel of Portugal after receiving her at the border
[2] Vienna’s
hated Oberste Polizei und Cenzur Hofstelle, Joseph, Graf Sedlnitzky Odrowąż von Choltitz. Say what you liked about the man being Metternich’s crony OTL, but he
was good at his job (which covered not just Vienna but the entire non-Hungarian part of the Austrian Empire). One source describes him as the “most skilled and efficient” police chief since Graf Pergen (under Joseph II).
[3] based on the Praterschlacht of August 23 1848. Just with a bomb killing the people instead of it turning into a "Bloody Sunday" type massacre of unarmed civilians by soldiers
[4] Also known as the South Atlantic Squadron. It seems plausible to me that after the original defeat, the US Navy would move their nearest naval squadron available (namely the South Atlantic) into the “gap”
[5] Agénor de Gramont, OTL 10th Duc de Gramont
[6] Caroline Georgiana Fraser. She is also the sister-in-law to the new President of the German Republic (although Elise – and potentially Conner – wouldn’t be aware of this yet). Said President not only
loathes President Clay, but his wife (Catherine Daingerfeld Willis) is related to the Washingtons and Meriweather Lewis (of Lewis and Clarke fame)
[7] Cochrane’s successor in the West Indies. And his daughter, Laura, would marry Elise’s brother in 1861 OTL
[8] Susan May Williams, daughter of the owner of the Baltimore-Ohio Railroad Company
[9] Betsy Patterson’s grandson. i.e. all three (Murat and both Bonapartes) are American citizens. They are not necessarily to be “ladies-in-waiting” to Elise as much as it might have been a case that they simply “hopped aboard” the
Hainaut rather than wait for another ship going direct to Baltimore or Florida.
[10] Yes, this is
that Admiral Cochrane. Between 1848 and 1851 he was Commander of the West Indies and North America Station. That said, putting Cochrane, Murat, Bonaparte and Grammont together in the same convoy sounds like something completely up Frankie’s street.
[11] Franzi mentions in Chapter
The Student Prince that Agustin is building a railway from Veracruz. There’s no mention of how far the track goes, but I imagine while it doesn’t go
all the way to Mexico City (yet), it is an illustration to their new “empress” (and her party) that Mexico
isn’t as backwards as people think
[12] Peralta was auxiliary bishop from 1840 until 1849, while Mexico City didn’t have an archbishop between 1846 and 1850. As for him being named a cardinal, OTL Pius IX planned to name a Mexican cardinal in 1848 (although I can’t find the name of who he considered for the post). Irrizarri y Peralta gets a promotion both to archbishop and cardinal as a result
[13] Not sure what the custom was in Mexico at the time, but apparently Isabel II’s OTL white wedding dress was something of a novelty in Spain (where the traditional colour for a wedding dress was black). Still, Elise emulating her aunt and getting married in a white wedding dress isn’t unthinkable.
[14] This is political theatre. These persons are all Americans- specifically Americans with ties to important people in both Washington, D.C. and Europe- so allowing them to take these “roles”, Agustin and Elise are attempting to show both the “esteem” in which they hold the Americans (despite the war) but also extend a non-verbal olive branch
[15] Glory to the mighty soldiers
