It was in that very inn, “Les Trois Monarques,” at Verberie that Mme. Adam was born, at half-past five on the 4th of October, 1836.
Was it a glimpse into their daughter’s future that made her parents name her “Juliette” after that most seductive of all the queens of French salons, Mme. Récamier?
No gold or even silver spoon was in our Juliette’s mouth when she made her first appearance on this world’s stage. At the time of her birth, her parents’ fortunes had reached a low ebb. Dr. Lambert had been in practice with his great-uncle in a village not far from Verberie, and thither to his uncle’s house he had brought home his girl wife. For the first years of their marriage everything had gone well with the young couple. Then had come a deluge of misfortunes. Their first baby, a boy, died in convulsions. Then the uncle died, and his estate was divided among numerous legatees. Finally, a fire broke out which nearly consumed the whole village, and, despite Mme. Lambert’s heroic efforts, burned her husband’s house to the ground.
Thus were Juliette’s parents driven to seek harbourage in the inn at Verberie, where Juliette was born.
Very shortly after this event, her father, one of the most unpractical but at the same time most attractive of scientists, was fascinated by the report of some marvellous scientific experiments, which were being made in the neighbouring town of Compiègne, by a well-known chemist, a Dr. Bernhardt. Leaving his wife and daughter to the tender mercies of mine host of “The Three Monarchs,” Dr. Lambert went off to join his confrère. This Dr. Bernhardt came to be regarded by Juliette’s family as a veritable German Mephistopheles; for the only result of his experiments was the consumption of Mme. Lambert’s dowry.
During her husband’s scientific adventures Mme. Lambert and her baby girl in the Verberie inn were suffering serious privations. And they might have come near starvation had it not been for the assistance they received from Mme. Lambert’s parents. But this timely aid could only be given surreptitiously; for Juliette had had the misfortune to be born, not into poverty merely, but into one of the numerous family feuds which were to chequer all her childhood. Between her parents and her grandparents at the time of the first baby’s death there had arisen a misunderstanding. For some time there had been no communication between the Lamberts at Verberie and the Serons, who lived not far away at Chauny, then a flourishing manufacturing town, now converted by German vandalism into a heap of ruins. It was only by the curtest of notes that Dr. Lambert had announced to Dr. and Mme. Seron their granddaughter’s advent. Had it not been for the report, brought by one of Dr. Seron’s patients, a friendly commercial traveller, Juliette’s grandmother would never have known of the sorry plight to which her son-in-law’s scientific vagaries had reduced his wife and child.
On hearing the commercial traveller’s news, Mme. Seron, with characteristic impetuousness, flew into a passion and declared that she would set off at once for Verberie to rescue her granddaughter from the parents who were obviously incapable of taking care of her. Dr. Seron, however, succeeded in convincing his wife that a family scene would be injurious for the infant, whom her mother was nursing. He reminded Mme. Seron that the first Lambert baby had died in convulsions; and finally he induced her to postpone her intervention until the child was nine months old and might leave her mother without danger.
Meanwhile the landlord of “The Three Monarchs” was secretly given to understand that Mme. and Mlle. Lambert must be made comfortable, and that Dr. Seron might be held responsible for the reckoning.
With great difficulty during those interminable nine months did the ardent grandmother possess her soul in patience. She occupied the time, however, in working out the details of the cleverly devised plot by which she ultimately succeeded in carrying off her grandchild.
Juliette in after years used to delight to hear her grandmother describe all the stages of that famous coup: how the landlord of the inn was made privy to the plot; how there stood ready a coach, nothing less than a berline, recalling another flight, more famous but less successful; how in the coach had been placed a warm shawl and a bottle of hot milk; how, while Mme. Lambert was haggling over the bill with the landlord, Mme. Seron, bearing a certain precious bundle, was stealthily stealing to the berline and then speeding away with baby Juliette to join the diligence outside the town; how ultimately the stolen jewel was deposited safely at Chauny, whither not long afterwards her mother followed her.