The Swedish Bureau (I.P.)

It is a 19th century Swedish bureau
I purchased at an auction in Truro
and meant as a present for my niece
so that she could write a masterpiece.
Instead of which she pulled it apart
and that was the extent of her Art.
That action was a blessing in disguise:
those letters would be lost otherwise.
They had been kept in a secret drawer
since the eighteen-hundreds or before.
Beginning with: ‘ma chère Pauline’,
one said he was divorcing Josephine.
Could they really be by Bonaparte?
The only hint was a scarlet heart
with two initials inside that read NB.
Unconvincing maybe but not for me.
They’d been hidden in the escritoire,
that she probably kept in her boudoir,
to guard their affair from prying eyes,
principally those of British spies.
The discovery gave us a lot of pleasure,
we shall always cherish that treasure.

© Luigi Pagano 2014