“Always—but I suspect him of nothing worse than of being an equally worthy blacksmith.”
“Who can tell? In any case, the Queen spoke in a way which—”
“May I hear what she said?”
She related it plainly and simply, not emphasizing a word, adding as she finished:
“My impression is that it would be a relief at the Court here if your relations with Emma were on a more regular footing. No, cousin—don’t throw your head up! Don’t be angry! No one has the right to interfere with your private life or prescribe, yet it must be owned that it is a delicate matter for the Queen and that an Ambassadress at the Palazzo Sessa would make matters easier in many directions.”
“You cannot possibly advise me to marry a woman of her birth, however good and charming, madam? Your kind heart surely misleads you there. The Queen would never receive her; could never do so.”
“There you are mistaken.” The Duchess again repeated the Queen’s words, and went on, “I dare not advise you. Who could, in such a matter? But I will ask you a question. Do you believe your Emma to be a bad woman?”
All the gentleman, all the lover in Hamilton spoke in his resolute “No! I believe her to be a good woman, and who should know better than I? But there are reasons—”
They were naturally not perceptible to the Duchess and she went on quietly with her argument.
“Then, if I take your own word for it, here is a good woman, fallen by pressure of circumstances into a great misfortune. In what does she differ from the charming Clarissa of Richardson’s imagination, cruelly ruined but pure in heart? And if this is so, should there not be some reparation?”