1832: Mabel Anetis deMallard
Private papers
Woke in the blue hour before breakfast and decided immediately to reform my entire character. Found it impossible. The mirror beside the bed disagreed with me audibly: “Forty, my dear, and still curious.” The sheets smelled faintly of lavender, or perhaps defeat.
The maid (mine by loan from my sister, the Duchess) arrived whispering that the weather was “improving.” I dislike improvement before cocoa. Bath prepared—foam enough to suggest moral renewal. Georgiana (that is, the Duchess, though I am forbidden to call her anything as familiar as “Georgie”) keeps a modern copper tub with a pipe for hot water and several opinions about modesty. I observed the bubbles until they surrendered; the only certain pleasure of bathing is the conviction that one is temporarily irrefutable.
At dressing I managed to fasten nothing correctly. My maid sighed as if fastening me were national service. This house has mirrors everywhere; they multiply one’s insignificance like rabbits. I wore green first, looked solemn; wore white, looked tender; settled, as usual, for indecision disguised as mauve.
Breakfast: the usual theatre. Ten guests, none awake. Georgiana sat at the head with her serenity pressed like starch. Her husband, the Duke, smiled with the grace of a man burdened by excellence. I told him his ball would be “memorable,” which was absurd—no one remembers anything memorable. Lord Temple remarked that he had heard of my scholarship on the Druids. I corrected him: “Not scholarship, merely curiosity, and scarcely on the Druids—more on what they left behind when they forgot things.” Everyone looked pained. People here expect sentences to end politely; mine tend to fold inwards like damp letters.
After breakfast Georgiana retired to correspondence; she writes with the majesty of Parliament. I wandered outdoors in my half-fastened cloak (the maid’s revenge). The park was silvered with frost and servants. Country air is so clean it feels rude. I walked until I forgot what I was thinking about—an achievement.
In the library I found the Duke’s new steam globe—a contraption that spins itself by hidden mechanism. I examined it so long that the footman coughed twice to remind me I was trespassing in intellect. I told him “Curiosity is God’s trick on the idle.” He looked frightened, which I took as a sign of comprehension.
At luncheon: soup, silence, self-control. The viscountess on my left spoke of Paris fashions as if they were Biblical miracles. I contributed a reflection on the inverse elegance of abstinence: when one cannot follow fashion, one may invent moral superiority. She changed her seat at dessert.
Afternoon: a flurry of seamstresses preparing the Duchess’s gown, which appears to require more engineering than the Duke’s bridge over the lake. I am to wear ivory satin that once belonged to an aunt who believed the afterlife would be Grecian. The maid pinched, laced, and sighed until I resembled an opinion she disapproved of. I imagine I looked almost admirable from a distance; most of my virtues are visible only at a distance.
I helped the Duchess select jewels—principally by agreeing. She asked if I envied her duties. I replied that envy presumes intention. “So you would not marry?” she said. “Not unless affection can be delegated,” I answered. She laughed as if I were charming, though I suspect she hears insubordination as wit. We kissed like conspirators who have forgotten their crime.
Late afternoon I withdrew to my room under the pretext of letter‑writing. Instead I practiced the art of not thinking about age. I have read recently in Mary Wollstonecraft that independence is every woman’s birthright. I can only suppose birth has altered since my day.
Tea with Aunt Millicent from Bath, who announced that my complexion has improved since I ceased to hope. I thanked her; politeness is the art of transmuting insult into reflection.
The hour before the ball compresses eternity. Upstairs, the air shimmers with starch, perfume, and nerves. The orchestra tunes into an opinion of divinity. I steady myself by contemplating the floor wax.
When Georgiana entered the ballroom, conversation collapsed like etiquette under examination. She glittered—hardly her fault. The Duke escorted her as if conducting a treaty between satin and time. Behind them I drifted, unrequired but ornamentally acceptable. No man likes to dance with a woman who knows Latin adjectives; I counted that a safety precaution.
I stood beside a pillar contentedly invisible. The room’s light played politics between jealousy and admiration. Lord Temple approached once—politely, accidentally. He inquired whether I believed the monarchy stable. I said it depends entirely on the fatigue of the servants. He bowed and retreated, possibly to propose to my sister.
The quadrilles commenced. I watched Georgiana glide, serene as arithmetic; the Duke turned about her like punctuation. I wondered if envy might be a form of imagination—building castles entirely to envy their collapse.
Between dances the young ladies sighed into their gloves; the young men consulted their mirrors disguised as window glass. I drank punch diluted to conscience and conversed with a chair about politics. The chair listened well.
Midnight. The festivities glide toward hysteria, which in English society passes for joy. I prefer observation to participation; it requires fewer repairs afterward. Still, as I descended the stairs later I glimpsed myself by accident in one of the great mirrors: a reflection among reflections, a figure nearly merry, lit from without. I thought—might they envy me, this luxury of unimportance? Nearly possible.
Now, candle spent, I write in borrowed ink. My sister sleeps behind walls of satin. I, behind linen. Difference measured, perhaps, in thread. The house grows quiet except for music that refuses to stop because no one has commanded it not to.
I shall remain another week. People need someone calm to misunderstand.
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