Bruni-Sarkozy, speaking to the BBC last month, insisted that the French were "uninterested" in her pregnancy. But some speculate that a newborn in the Elysee could help soften Sarkozy's rough-edge image: He made his name as a law-and-order interior minister and is seen as increasingly out of touch with the day-to-day problems of ordinary voters.

Yves Derai, a publisher and co-author of the recent book "Carla et les Ambitieux" (Carla and the Ambitious), says the president should play the communication about the birth carefully, "because the French blame Nicolas Sarkozy for looking after himself a lot — and not enough after them."

And in the run-up to the election, timing is everything.

"If this had happened at the beginning of his term, we would have had violins playing, photos in Paris-Match (magazine), happiness in the whole family, etc. But now, I think they're going to play low profile," Derai said.

The 56-year-old president has three sons from his two previous marriages. Though French media never mention it, he's already a grandfather: The wife of his second son gave birth last January. The president wasn't shy about that baby's arrival, announcing the child's name himself.

Sarkozy gambled a bit in recent days by traveling to the Caucasus Mountains and Germany for his duties of state.

Le Parisien newspaper reported Sunday that Sarkozy, in a meeting with President Ilham Aliyev in Azerbaijan's capital last week, said: "My wife would have liked to come to Baku, but it would have surprised people if our child were born here!"

Sarkozy's father, Pal, announced the pregnancy in May to German daily Bild and later told the newspaper the due date: Oct. 3. Gossip magazine Closer said officials were keeping quiet because Bruni-Sarkozy's age makes it a higher-risk pregnancy.

As of Monday, friends of the family said the first lady was still expecting. "I can tell you she spent a nice weekend at the Elysee" and was still pregnant, said Patrick Balkany, a longtime Sarkozy friend and political ally.

The glamorous Bruni-Sarkozy first showed signs of a midriff bulge while standing alongside other first ladies at the G-8 summit in Normandy in May.

Her husband has been coy, quiet and even cheeky about the pregnancy.

At a news conference at that summit, after an Italian journalist offered her congratulations, the president coyly replied: "I congratulate you too for being Italian, which is a country we like so much in France." (Bruni-Sarkozy was born Italian.) He didn't answer the journalist's question: whether he knew if it was a boy or a girl.

Plainclothes police are patrolling outside a western Paris maternity clinic where rumors hold Bruni-Sarkozy is to give birth.

Bruni-Sarkozy, who became French after she married Sarkozy, made her name as a supermodel on catwalks worldwide — under the rapid-fire flashes of photographers' cameras. She clearly wants to spare her two children from the glare.

Bruni-Sarkozy says she made a mistake by taking along her young son from a previous relationship on a much-photographed holiday in Jordan with Sarkozy during their courtship in late 2007. In eerie TV images, the boy put his face in his hands while riding on Sarkozy's shoulders.

France is no stranger to secrecy about its first families. President Francois Mitterrand kept quiet about a daughter he had fathered out of wedlock in 1976, five years before he took office. The daughter, Mazarine Pingeot-Mitterrand, emerged in public only at his funeral in 1995.

"You don't have a child for the gallery," Bruni-Sarkozy told French TV network TF1 recently. "I will do everything to protect this child ... I will not show photos of this child, I will never expose this child."