Chapter Summaries

Georgiana rejected Lucien Bonaparte’s offer to accompany him to Rome and admitted she had been deceived by Napoleon. Lucien persuaded her to help address the crisis in Saint-Domingue, and she set out for Paris with him.

• Lucien confessed that he had rigged Napoleon’s election campaign and supported his coup, then invited Georgiana to go with him to Rome.
• Georgiana refused and said she planned to return to Britain, while Lucien explained that Napoleon would not divorce Josephine.
• Lucien asked Georgiana to help the French Republic and the soldiers in Saint-Domingue, and she proposed appointing Toussaint Louverture to a high office and improving enslaved laborers’ treatment.
• Georgiana decided she did not need official orders to travel and told Phyllis to invite Lord Petty and Lord Bloom before setting out for Paris with Lucien.

Napoleon faced mounting financial and political troubles as the French expedition in Saint-Domingue faltered, while debates over Louisiana, succession, and France’s finances continued. On her journey to Paris, she considered dividing Saint-Domingue between France and its inhabitants, but saw no reliable ally to help end the quagmire.

• The Senate of the Directory extended the Consulate by ten years, while Toussaint Louverture’s forces used scorched-earth tactics and disease to weaken the French army in Saint-Domingue.
• Napoleon refused to let anyone discuss selling Louisiana, despite Barbé-Marbois raising the proposal again and France’s worsening financial position.
• Thomas Jefferson struggled to fund the American government and considered government bonds to pay for a Louisiana purchase, while Britain pressured Spain over its gold shipments.
• After signing the peace treaty, Joseph joined Napoleon at the opera, where Napoleon faced renewed questions about choosing a successor.
• She traveled toward Paris with Lucien, considered dividing Saint-Domingue into fourteen districts shared by France and the local population, and wondered whether Russia could help.

Georgiana considered how Napoleon could address unrest through compromise, employment, and public works rather than charity or repression. She waited for him at the Tuileries, and Napoleon arrived exhausted and fell asleep with his head on her lap.

• Georgiana reflected on the political stain of Saint-Domingue and decided that finding practical solutions mattered more than condemning the bankers and others who fueled the disturbance.
• Georgiana considered William Petty's views on lotteries and prisoners' labor as possible ways to fund projects and restore productivity.
• Georgiana waited in Napoleon's bedroom, worrying about his health and the corruption she felt had spread through Paris.
• Napoleon came in, rested his head on Georgiana's lap, and asked her to sleep with him.
• Georgiana fell asleep beside Napoleon, wishing she could sleep forever.

Georgiana considered Napoleon’s political pragmatism, the costs of war, and the moral crisis unfolding in Saint-Domingue as she discussed slavery and freedom. Napoleon asked Georgiana to sing for him, and she performed a mermaid’s song while he rested against her.

• Georgiana reasoned that Napoleon might sell Louisiana to repay France’s debts if the campaign in Saint-Domingue proved too costly.
• Georgiana reflected on monarchy, republicanism, and the need for equality before the law, while considering Lucien’s loyalty to Napoleon.
• Napoleon remained ill at the Tuileries Palace as Swiss representatives negotiated with his deputies over their interests and national debts.
• Georgiana argued that people should be evacuated from Saint-Domingue to Barbados as the war threatened to become an utter massacre.
• Georgiana explained the Roman method of freeing slaves called “Vindicius” and recalled Harry, Draco Malfoy, and Dobby.
• Napoleon asked Georgiana to sing, and she sang “My heart is pierced by Cupid” as he lay beside her.

Georgiana reflected on the Virginia Incident and the meaning of the Legion of Honour medal bearing her likeness, while considering how to escape Bonaparte’s control. The chapter left her contemplating a poison-filled locket as a last resort before she left the old Burgundian residence.

• Georgiana recalled how Virginia’s father killed her to protect her freedom, and connected the story to the meaning of the medal Leon had explained.
• Georgiana considered the buildings Bonaparte had shown her, rejecting both as unsuitable for a school and worrying that the Burgundian residence might become her own prison.
• Georgiana reflected on British Royalist newspapers and Peltier’s attacks on Bonaparte, which she could not prevent.
• Georgiana decided she might make a locket containing poison so she could end her life if she faced imprisonment or execution.
• Bonaparte returned to Saint Luke Palace with the young Swiss delegates, while Georgiana wondered about his rise to power and the prospect of renewed war before leaving the top floor.

Georgiana heard British officials discuss using Toussaint Louverture’s forces and the conflict in Saint-Domingue to shape France’s plans, but she urged them to let the peace treaty’s three-year term run its course. After the officials left, she helped Madame de Montesquieu with Dermide and went out for a walk.

• General Maitland and the Earl of Malmesbury told Georgiana that Polish troops refused to suppress opposition in Saint-Domingue and discussed withdrawing French forces to Barbados.
• The Earl of Malmesbury proposed using trade agreements and a free port in Lisbon to advance British interests and limit France’s wars.
• Georgiana opposed rushing to renew the peace and argued that France should pay no compensation for Ceylon, which it had never occupied.
• The Earl of Malmesbury asked about Georgiana’s plans for two properties, and she said she intended to open a school.
• Georgiana learned that Dermide would not speak to Madame de Montesquieu, agreed to ask what he did not understand, and accompanied Madame de Montesquieu on a walk.

Georgiana urged Bonaparte to avoid restoring slavery in places where it had been abolished and warned him against British loans, while arranging aid for homeless women. She proposed granting citizenship to the enslaved people of Saint-Domingue and Guadeloupe and using Martinique as a temporary refuge for the expeditionary force, but Bonaparte left without agreeing.

• Georgiana told Madame Ségur to use charitable funds to establish a shelter and dining room for homeless women, prioritizing military families.
• Bonaparte visited Georgiana, and she warned him not to borrow from the British and discussed the women's shelter and plans for schools.
• Georgiana urged Bonaparte to grant citizenship to the enslaved people of Saint-Domingue and Guadeloupe and to describe Toussaint Louverture as a liar rather than restore slavery.
• Georgiana proposed sending the expeditionary force to Martinique to rest and regroup while slavery there remained temporarily, provided news of the plan was suppressed.
• Bonaparte left without answering Georgiana's proposal, teasing her about wearing stockings as she glared after him.

Georgiana arranged medical examinations and supplies for women at the Scottish College shelter, then discussed the Bread Guild and several engineering projects with Gilles Gobel. Gobel asked her to build ties with Thomas Paine, assess Robert Fulton’s work and find out what Lord Henry Petty wanted.

• Georgiana asked Larrey to send doctors to the Scottish College and wrote Madame Leoncourt to prepare medicines, then handed the letters to Gilles Gobel to mail.
• Gobel told Georgiana that the Bread Guild’s charitable methods were not working in the provinces, and she explained why provincial conditions differed from Paris.
• Gobel introduced Thomas Paine, who planned to travel to America, and Robert Fulton, whose submarine and steamship ideas interested Napoleon.
• Gobel explained that Pierre-Simon Laplace was organizing the industrial exhibition and overseeing plans for a hydraulic clock, and said the Marquis Jouffroy d’Abbans hoped Georgiana would keep an eye on him.
• Gobel told Georgiana that Napoleon had commissioned a Canova bust for the new franc and asked her to discover what Lord Henry Petty wanted.

Georgiana reflected on Napoleon, art, and the possibility of escaping his influence, then collapsed after drinking tea and suspected she had been poisoned. She refused to attend her planned meeting with Bonaparte, and in a dream confronted a woman who questioned her plans for Paris.

• Georgiana recalled Canova’s sculptures and wondered whether his work with the French might expose Bonaparte’s secret plans.
• Georgiana considered discussing Laplace’s nebular hypothesis with Bonaparte, but felt overwhelmed by her attachment to him and resolved to return to the twenty-first century.
• Georgiana woke suddenly and demanded an antidote from Lufu Truman, who had been concealed under an Invisibility Cloak.
• Georgiana told Truman to have Carolan investigate the tea and instructed her not to tell any Muggles or Bonaparte about the suspected poisoning.
• Georgiana declined to attend her planned date with Bonaparte and wondered who would benefit from her death.
• In a dream, Georgiana argued with a woman before the Pantheon about whether her plans to transform Paris would protect or destroy the city.

While recovering from poisoning, Georgiana reflected on Sainte-Geneviève’s role in saving Paris and considered the political and economic disputes surrounding colonies, trade, and public works. Bonaparte visited her, discussed cutting coffee expenses and delaying steel tariffs, then kissed her despite her illness.

• Georgiana recalled how Genevieve rallied Paris’s women, led a mission to obtain food, and returned with boats of wheat during the siege.
• Georgiana considered how Napoleon’s sanitation and water projects could protect Paris, despite opposition and the complications of demolition and compensation.
• Fouché found foxglove leaves in Georgiana’s teapot, and Georgiana suspected someone had tried to poison her but did not believe Josephine was responsible.
• Georgiana reasoned through the constitutional status of colonies and Portugal’s autonomy, including the implications of Toussaint Louverture’s plans for Saint-Domingue.
• Bonaparte told Georgiana he had canceled coffee to save money and would delay steel tariffs until Britain sold its grain reserves.
• Bonaparte lay beside Georgiana, said he needed rest, and kissed her after she reminded him she was still sick.

Georgiana reflected on Britain’s trade with France and her lover’s political burdens before sharing an intimate, unsettling exchange with Napoleon. She left him thinking about civilization and barbarism as he kissed her neck.

• Britain traded wheat for French Bordeaux wine while imposing tariffs on industrial goods, and Addington struggled to address the postwar deficit.
• Georgiana told her French lover that she might not have long to live, and he laughed at her unusual compliment about him.
• Georgiana recalled Napoleon’s writing, his revolutionary choices, and his illness as she touched his healing chest.
• Napoleon stopped Georgiana from scratching him because he still needed the doctor to treat his skin and his parents-in-law remained nearby.
• Georgiana said she wanted a locket to hold poison and discussed death, freedom, and her dream of Saint Genevieve with Napoleon.
• Georgiana asked Napoleon about civilization and barbarism, but he turned to kissing her neck, leaving her to remember Dermide’s apology and wonder whether Napoleon might offer her flowers.

Georgiana developed plans to protect France from famine by improving grain transport, storage, and rationing, while also considering agricultural trade and infrastructure. She was left facing trouble at her lumberyard and wondering when Severus would come find her.

• Georgiana reasoned that France needed reliable grain markets, better transport, and safeguards against shortages, and she wrote proposals to the Minister of the Interior and Brongniart.
• Georgiana planned to use mounted police to escort grain from warehouses to markets and mills, then distribute bread by population rather than wealth.
• Georgiana considered a pilot city where foreign residents could use identification or family documents to buy rationed bread.
• Georgiana learned that Saint Vincent had halted British shipbuilding, leaving timber suppliers without orders, and decided to wait before intervening in the lumberyard crisis.
• Georgiana lamented that Bonaparte had reduced her living expenses and wondered when Severus would come find her.

Georgiana considered how water shortages and frozen canals could disrupt flour production and drive up bread prices, then met clockmaker William Harrison about his father’s marine chronometer. Lucien brought news of the financial and political crises, and Georgiana challenged the government over slavery, Saint-Domingue, and food supplies before deciding to visit Dermide.

• Georgiana linked low canal water and winter freezes to the risk of Étampes mills stopping and Paris bread prices rising, and withheld her unfinished proposal to Brongniart.
• Georgiana received William Harrison, who explained that his father’s marine chronometer had never earned its promised prize and asked for twenty thousand pounds.
• Lucien told Georgiana that America disputed France’s Revolutionary War debt claims and that Saint-Domingue’s independence could force France to confront Britain and its trade policies.
• Georgiana warned Lucien that she would leave if Napoleon continued the attack or restored slavery, and argued that the revolution’s principles applied to enslaved people in the Caribbean.
• Georgiana urged Lucien to connect her with a provincial official so she could investigate lowering grain prices, and questioned why the Directory had lacked grain reserves.
• After Lucien left, Georgiana abandoned her work and went to find Dermide.

Georgiana considered the political and economic consequences of Napoleon’s setbacks in Saint-Domingue, while learning that a supposed marine-chronometer inventor was a swindler. She ended the chapter caring for Dermide as Napoleon prepared to handle the failed expedition himself.

• Georgiana reflected that Napoleon’s debts and reputation depended on winning foreign wars, and that Guadeloupe and Martinique might compensate for the losses in Saint-Domingue.
• Georgiana learned from Laplace that William Harrison was an impostor who had stolen marine-chronometer blueprints, and she signed a check and sent it to him with a letter and roses.
• Georgiana worried that bankers’ control of currency and France’s failure to support technical talent would weaken the country and its position in Europe.
• Georgiana fed Dermide cheese on bread while he exercised on his wooden horse to prepare for another fight with Achille.
• Georgiana thought about seeing Portugal’s Saint John’s Festival, then wondered whether she should return to her husband as her lover became less appealing.
• Napoleon prepared to clean up the Saint-Domingue expedition’s failure himself rather than leave the problem to Kléber.

Georgiana was forced to leave the Tuileries Palace and arrived at a crowded women’s shelter, where she began organizing work, education, and care for its residents. She was summoned to meet Bishop Caprara at The Hunchback of Notre-Dame.

• Sylvia de Rouvroy took over the dining hall from Georgiana as diners protested the food by eating elsewhere.
• Laharpe told Georgiana that she had to leave the Louvre Museum suite to make room for the industrial exhibition, and she left the Tuileries Palace with Matilda.
• Madame de Ségur told Georgiana that her new residence was the mansion of the Duke of Burgundy, but Georgiana first inspected the shelter at the Scottish College.
• Georgiana learned that the shelter held 152 people and directed Madame de Ségur to expand its beds, teach children, find work for residents, and arrange food and bathing.
• A nun told Georgiana that Bishop Caprara urgently wanted to see her at The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, and Georgiana left to meet him.

Georgiana met Caprara in Notre-Dame’s basement, where he showed her documents detailing Napoleon’s policies in Lombardy and Egypt and urged her to decide whether to tell Napoleon about them. After learning how Marmont had taken charge in Paris and become involved in introducing women to Napoleon, Georgiana left with a secret plan forming in her mind.

• Georgiana met Caprara in Notre-Dame’s basement and challenged his questions about her role in Paris.
• Caprara gave Georgiana documents describing Napoleon’s political and land policies in Lombardy and Egypt, and she realized he wanted her to pass the information to Napoleon.
• Georgiana admitted she was furious and asked why the scandal had centered on her.
• Caprara explained that Junot had ordered the British arrests, Marmont had replaced him as the person in charge of Paris, and Marmont now handled introductions to Napoleon.
• Caprara asked Georgiana to establish a school for girls, but she refused and said she hoped Napoleon and his opponents would destroy each other.
• Georgiana left the conversation with a secret plan for what she imagined would be a harmonious society.

Georgiana reflected on the injustice of Napoleon’s laws and decided not to help France prevail in the coming war unless its men changed them. She encrypted a dossier, sent one copy toward the British, and left the other with Carolan, while suspecting it would soon reach Napoleon.

• Georgiana used gin and coarse cloth to support the women at the shelter and arranged for sturdy village women to guard them.
• Georgiana considered how French currency and the Rothschilds had helped fund Wellington’s army, and concluded that France’s wealthy young women had inadvertently reduced that aid.
• Georgiana decided she would not help France win its final war while the Napoleonic Code remained unfair to women.
• Georgiana ordered Lufu Truman to duplicate her encrypted dossier, but Lufu Truman refused because the Minister had forbidden interference in Muggle wars.
• Carolan copied the dossier and stored one copy in her family vault, while Georgiana asked Lufu Truman to notify Sir Merry about the other.
• Georgiana left the Duke of Burgundy’s residence and returned to sleep at the shelter, suspecting that the dossier would soon reach Napoleon.

Georgiana gave Sir Merry encrypted documents that might concern Saint-Domingue, then learned the English had largely abandoned the colony as factions fought for control. After Leoncourt revealed that the cipher contained Georgiana’s thirty-five-thousand-word proposal of mercy, he warned her that sharing it with the English amounted to treason.

• Georgiana met Sir Merry and Lord Whitworth at a café and handed Sir Merry encrypted documents about a possible contingency plan for Saint-Domingue.
• Sir Merry explained that the English planned to cut off trade if Saint-Domingue became independent, while Toussaint Louverture led its new government and revolutionary forces had occupied the eastern territory.
• Prefect Leoncourt joined the conversation, said France should not abandon Saint-Domingue, and secured the Englishmen’s offer to lend ships for sending supplies.
• After Leoncourt took Georgiana away, he told her Monge and the others had deciphered her documents as a thirty-five-thousand-word proposal of mercy.
• Georgiana said she had acted for Leon, and Leoncourt told her that giving the documents to the English was treason.

Georgiana urged Bonaparte to show compassion toward Saint-Domingue and helped him reconsider its fate, while warning that Britain had lured France into the disastrous expedition. Bonaparte planned to withdraw to Burgundy Residence and delay recalling the troops as he considered her advice.

• Georgiana explained how Saint-Domingue could be isolated from trade and forgotten, prompting Bonaparte to rage at the prospect of abandoning it.
• Bonaparte rested with his head in Georgiana’s lap and discussed selling Saint-Domingue and Louisiana, while Georgiana urged him to preserve his humanity.
• Georgiana reminded Bonaparte that he had saved two wounded soldiers at Wischau, and he recalled the hope they had shown after being rescued.
• Bonaparte decided to isolate himself at Burgundy Residence, delay bringing the soldiers back, and find a way to silence the British newspapers.
• Georgiana warned Bonaparte that Britain had trapped him into launching the Saint-Domingue expedition, and he asked what she meant.

Georgiana explained to Bonaparte that Britain had engineered the Saint-Domingue crisis and sought to draw France into a damaging arrangement involving Trinidad and Tobago. Bonaparte realized the political trap, erupted in the workshop, and Georgiana decided to move to the duke’s residence.

• Georgiana reasoned that Britain’s support for the expedition and its interest in Trinidad concealed a plan to gain access to Spanish American trade and resources.
• Bonaparte paced and smashed things in the workshop after he understood that William Pitt the Younger had maneuvered him toward a politically damaging deal.
• Georgiana explained that Britain wanted his tacit approval for a smuggling base in French Tobago and that the Church hoped he would take a crown.
• Bonaparte swore that he would level England, while Georgiana warned him against turning her homeland into a hell and reminded him of Mr. Jenner.
• Georgiana told Bonaparte she would live at the duke’s residence starting the next day, then left the workshop as he teased that he might fly to her like an eagle.