Juliette, just entering her fiftieth year, bore the rigours of the climate with difficulty. She would have died of it, she declared, had she not been upheld by the influence of love. She was a martyr to gout, and greatly dreaded being crippled by it. She brooded long and often upon death and the dead. Whether under the influence of a priest, or in response to some inward prompting we cannot tell, but she reverted for a time to her former religious practices.
IV
In April 1863, when Juliette was slowly recovering from another attack of gout, Victor Hugo realised the extreme humidity of La Pallue. On the advice of his sons, who seem to have been of one mind with him on the subject, he decided that Juju, as he called her, should move as quickly as possible, and that he should for the second time assume the functions of architect, upholsterer, and decorator of her new dwelling.
Juliette offered a prolonged and strenuous resistance to the plan, for the house chosen for her possessed the grave inconvenience of being at some distance from Hauteville House. The idea that she would no longer be able to watch every movement of her lover, drew from our heroine lamentations and loving reproaches. But Victor Hugo was adamant, and on February 2nd, 1864, the anniversary of the first performance of Lucrèce Borgia, “Princesse Négroni” took up her abode in the new house, which she named Hauteville Féerie.
There again the poet had arranged everything himself. Remembering Juliette’s attachment for her rooms in Rue St. Anastase, he had endeavoured to reconstitute faithfully its curtain of crimson and gold, its peacocks embroidered on panels, its china, the porcelain dragons which adorned the dresser, and especially the numerous mirrors that reflected and multiplied the furniture, knick-knacks, and embroideries.
When Juliette was shown this “marvel,” she said she had no words to express her admiration and gratitude. Then, knowing how often Madame Victor Hugo was away on the Continent, and how uncomfortable the poet was at home, she offered to act in turn as hostess and housekeeper to him.
In 1863 we find her assuming Madame Victor Hugo’s duties during the short absence of the latter, and at the end of 1864, during a further one which lasted until February 1867, she divided her time equally between Hauteville House and Hauteville Féerie.
But there is a difference in her methods of ruling the two establishments. At Hauteville House she governs without obtruding herself, wisely, discreetly, somewhat mysteriously. She directs the servants, reproves them if necessary, superintends the accounts, and keeps down expenses. But she carries out her task from her place in the background. Officially, the poet lives alone with his sons and his sister-in-law, Madame Julie Chenay; when he entertains friends from Paris, Juliette’s name is not mentioned.
At Hauteville Féerie, on the contrary, our heroine is at home. It behoves her to comport herself as the mistress of the house, and expend her gifts of mind, as well as her talents as a manager. As she says, “she must be both lady and housekeeper.”