26. The Press Had a Field Day With the President’s Death During an Assignation
Soon after President Faure’s mistress was left alone with him in the Elyesee Palace’s Blue Drawing room, servants heard screams. When they burst in, they found a disheveled and distraught Steinheil, with the president’s convulsed hands tangled in her hair. The President of the French Republic had suffered a fatal stroke while he was getting pleasured orally.
Naturally, the French press, political class, and public had a field day. Typical was the French daily, Gil Blas, which reported: “Felix Faure passed away in good health – indeed, from the excess of good health“. George Clemenceau quipped: “Il voulait être César, il ne fut que Pompée” – French wordplay that means “he wanted to be Caesar, but ended up as Pompey“, but since pomper is also French slang for a blow job, it carried a double meaning.