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fictionturnedherbrain · 8 months ago

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Marguerite Blakeney - After The Scarlet Pimpernel

‘... this odd diversity of misery and joy’

The Elusive Pimpernel

Late September 1793

Exactly a year after the reunion with her estranged husband and Marguerite is still impulsive, still active – and still learning about the man she married.

Only one vital aspect of her character has changed, impacting her perspective and her priorities, and that is her love for Percy. While her husband remained distant and cold, uncertainty, loneliness and family loyalty forced Marguerite to act for herself and her brother, yet after the reconciliation she is proud and defiant in her husband’s protection, and lives solely for him and to be with him. That same ‘joy of living in her eyes’ is now a display of the ‘glorious pride’ of ‘happy wifehood’, and she openly parades her love for Percy, publicly revelling in his company amongst fashionable society. Where once her celebrity status as a witty and beautiful French actress, and her friendship with the Prince of Wales, protected Marguerite from wagging and critical tongues, Lady Blakeney is insulated against the speculation and dismissal of others by the restoration of her husband’s love; she does not care what is said about her, because she does not listen. Marguerite is content with only Percy, and no longer has need of the ‘frivolous set’ who once courted her as a novelty attraction.

Such independence comes at a price, however, for knowledge of Percy’s dual life is little compensation when he leaves her behind, alone again in her ‘heartbroken anxiety’, to risk his life as the Pimpernel. In this respect, Marguerite is unwilling to share her husband’s selfless honour and sacrifice her own happiness for others: Percy is her life, and she resents that she is not his only concern. Her possessive love for Armand now transferred to her husband, ‘the man she worshipped’ with ‘passionate pride’, she at once admires and challenges his noble cause. The transition from ignorant wife to League member, as Marguerite regards herself, has obviously been sudden and demanding – Percy is back in France by January 1793 (Sir Percy Leads the Band), barely allowing his wife time to adjust to either his loving presence or the agony of separation. Marguerite is tormented by the dual aspects of her husband’s nature – the lover and the adventurer, he who ‘loved her and went away’ – and which is the ruling passion in his life; she cannot doubt his love for her, a powerful bond that even Chauvelin is forced to notice, but is daunted by his strength of purpose and ‘this mad desire to save and help’. Honour drives Percy’s actions as the Scarlet Pimpernel, and Marguerite recognises how vitally he is defined by this duty to do what is right; possessed of a noble and generous heart herself, she bows to Chauvelin’s machinations and is ready to offer her life for the sake of Percy’s cause (‘how little she valued her life, how highly she prized his honour’).

In The Scarlet Pimpernel, Marguerite falls in love with the elusive hero she terms the ‘shadowy king of her heart’ for his bravery, and yet confesses to Armand that she married Percy because she thought him ‘slow and stupid’ and therefore a safe husband; when the two personalities meet in one man, she is in awe and afraid that she does not deserve him. Percy is a demonstrative lover at home, and Marguerite allows his ‘embraces’ and ‘passionate caresses’ as a means to prove his love and keep him by her side, but she is still making sense of the powerful transformation in his character. The unsettling contrast between his intimate and public reception of Marguerite, respectively affectionate and courteous, also disturbs her, and she wonders if he still harbours ‘in his mind a slight mistrust of her’ because she betrayed him as the Pimpernel. It is easier for Marguerite to continue worshipping her husband as a romantic hero, and when Chauvelin seeks to manipulate his opponent’s chivalry by ransoming Lady Blakeney, she proudly retorts that the Pimpernel will be indomitable ‘now that his purpose will be to try and drag me from out your clutches!’ Chauvelin has to admire her ‘attitude of defiant despair’, which stirs Marguerite’s spirit and heightens her beauty, but her confidence in the Scarlet Pimpernel is stronger than her conviction of Percy’s love. Confronted with her husband, under the perceptive eye of Chauvelin, Marguerite hesitates and then abandons caution to reassure her shaken judgement; unable to ‘restrain the wild beatings of her heart’, she displays her feelings for him as if they were alone and Percy guardedly retreats. Instantly penitent, she understands Percy’s impassive behaviour, and knows that Chauvelin has gained an advantage over them by this unwitting ‘glimpse into her soul’. Indeed, the former ambassador is keener to recognise this ‘tale of love and passion’ than either Marguerite or Percy, who are both still uncertain of their marriage and each other.

Elusive is a romantic interlude; a journey of discovery for husband and wife, and a confirmation of the promises made in The Scarlet Pimpernel. Almost immediately after they were married, Percy closed his heart to Marguerite, afraid to trust her, and she felt disappointed and abandoned in response; retreating behind the defences of their mutual pride, they endured a year of misunderstanding and estrangement before confessing their love on the cliffs of Calais. Percy learned how Marguerite had suffered, and how much she was willing to sacrifice on his behalf, and Marguerite’s instinct about her husband’s hidden strength and bravery was rewarded with the discovery that she was married to the Scarlet Pimpernel, but both had still to experience the smaller, intimate details about each other that make a marriage.

Marguerite is defined through her husband, and her love for him, in this story. She continues to enjoy the luxury and authority of her role in society, recalling with pride her ‘beautiful home at Richmond, her brilliant array of servants and guests, His Royal Highness at her side!’ As Lady Blakeney, her ‘strength of character and firmness of purpose’ inspire her young protégée, Juliette Marny, and Marguerite is confident as both chatelaine and hostess, ‘authoritatively’ reminding the interfering Desirée Candeille that she is a guest at Blakeney Manor and must respect her wishes.

As the wife of the Scarlet Pimpernel, the charismatic and celebrated Lady Blakeney also leads her small circle of close friends at home in Richmond (‘instinctively the idle throng of her friends followed her)’, and continues to influence fashion and fascinate society; although her ‘court’ in London is smaller and more intimate than her coterie in Paris, Marguerite manages to maintain her sense of the grand dame and is still surrounded by adoring acquaintances and doting admirers. Socially and diplomatically influential through her husband’s and her own connections, Lady Blakeney also plays an important, if generally passive, part in the League by receiving and protecting the émigrés brought over from France by Percy and his men.

Chauvelin might have reason to mock ‘the irony’ of Marguerite’s former reputation as ‘the cleverest woman in Europe’, but it is not stupidity or ignorance that lures the wife of the Scarlet Pimpernel into his enemy’s trap, but her ‘noble devotion’ and a passionate love for her heroic husband. Marguerite is correctly suspicious of Desirée Candeille, but accepts her treacherous peace offering in order to be with Percy; her impulsive and dramatic nature will not allow her to wait in England while he risks his life in France, and she defiantly and decisively sets out after him. In this way at least, Marguerite remains the familiar and flawed heroine of The Scarlet Pimpernel.

Eldorado

January-February 1794

The fear and anguish that Marguerite must endure during Percy’s incarceration in Paris defines her character as Lady Blakeney, but also removes any final vestiges of the naive and playful actress witnessed in The Scarlet Pimpernel.

To support and protect her husband, Marguerite sacrifices the comfort and stature of her position in society, a little of her pride and dignity, but also the bond between Armand and herself. The inconsistency of her brother’s age aside, their roles are reversed by the time of Armand’s betrayal, and Marguerite enjoys more of a balanced relationship with Sir Andrew than her own kin; in TSP, Armand is the older sibling, rational and reassuring, and Marguerite depends upon this close relationship, but all she has left for him after Eldorado is unconditional and ‘unalterable’ love. The ‘strong, almost motherly passion’ with which she once held onto her brother is transferred to her weakened and defenceless husband, whom she defends with a ‘beautiful gesture of protecting motherhood’ in the Conciergerie. Percy swears Armand to secrecy about the full extent of his disloyalty, but it is sadly obvious that Marguerite understands, or at least suspects, the greater part her brother played in Percy’s capture and torture, and therefore her own suffering; magnanimous and caring, Marguerite is able to comfort Jeanne, her brother’s fiancée, and help to ease Armand’s misery of guilt, but he is no longer her first consideration. It is natural that she should release the familial ties of childhood upon marrying, and even in TSP both she and Armand have a ‘secret orchard’ which the other can no longer penetrate, but the destruction of trust and confidence in Eldorado is devastating. Bar the constant and steadfast protection offered by Sir Andrew, Marguerite is alone again and must be strong for her own sake, as well as for Percy.

As to Percy, Marguerite finds grim solace in coming to her husband’s aid (‘never had she felt him so completely her own’); although horrified by his treatment at the hands of Chauvelin and Héron, and sickened at thought of losing him, she is grateful to be actively serving and supporting Percy, instead of waiting for news or depending on him to rescue her. Her enforced passivity as a member of the League (‘Oh yes I am!’ she defiantly asserts) sits awkwardly with Marguerite, and she eagerly bids Sir Andrew, her husband’s – and her own – best friend, to once again accompany her across the Channel, as he did in TSP. Nor does she succumb to the incredible emotional and physical strain she is under, until Chauvelin shatters her fragile self-control by threatening to destroy Percy, and even then she is too proud to let him witness his triumph over her spirit. The only man who comes near to breaking Marguerite’s strength and her heart, however, is Percy himself: ‘It was he – and he alone – who was making her suffer’. Whereas her love for Armand is natural and enduring, she thrives on her husband’s passion and devotion and cannot imagine living without him; ‘his death – that would be beyond my strength,’ she confesses to Sir Andrew. She needs to be near him, whether she can help or not, to ‘breathe the air that he breathes’, and she knows that he will be longing for her in return; just as Percy comes to recognise that the woman he loves ‘thinks, loves and sins’ as he does (I Will Repay, chapter 7), Marguerite understands that ‘long ago he had mapped out the course of his life’ and that she, as his wife, cannot alter the course he has chosen.

From impulsive risks to noble sacrifice, Marguerite remains active and involved in Eldorado, but her energy is crushed by the very crisis that demands her participation in the League – her husband’s capture. Percy is revived by her visit to his cell in the Conciergerie and enlists her help, which Marguerite provides capably and bravely, but her one goal in returning to Paris is to support and protect him. With her brother Armand, once the only person whom ‘she dared to love’ (TSP), she is patient and considerate, but her thoughts are always with Percy – or perhaps she would not be so forgiving with the man who carelessly betrayed her husband. Sir Andrew, her friend and chaperone, protects and cares for her as a brother should, but still cannot unravel the complexities of her character or her bond with Percy; as a loving husband, he can empathise with her pain and sadness, and he knows his two close friends well, but their mutual honour, bold spirit and unspoken pledge is beyond his traditional sensibilities.

Mam’zelle Guillotine

February 1794

In Elusive, Marguerite learns that she must love the dual aspects of her husband’s complex personality instead of fighting the adventurer to possess the lover; in Eldorado, she accepts that Percy loves her ‘only one degree less than he worshipped his honour’, and in helping to guard his noble reputation she is able to claim his ‘whole soul’ for herself; but in Mam’zelle Guillotine, Marguerite is determined to share the adventure, whatever the risks, as a member of the League, the ‘loyal helpmate’ of its chief – and most vitally, as Percy’s wife.

It is hardly surprising that Marguerite is afraid to let Percy return to France after the fear and sadness she endured in Eldorado; nor that she might resort to the weak and futile pleading that was once her only response to being left behind. Selfishly, Marguerite demands that Percy put her needs and feelings first, instead of the anonymous lives that he is duty bound to save, and issues the desperate ultimatum of: ‘If you love me, do not go!’ In Elusive, she insists that he has already ‘fulfilled to its uttermost that self-imposed duty to others’, telling him that his life is more important to her than ‘the lives of ten thousand others’, and this nervous insularity resurfaces when she realises that his mind is set on another mission. Percy is equally stubborn and insensitive in both cases, refusing to listen to his wife’s heartfelt pleas and sorrow, and both understand each other’s motives well, but Marguerite in particular is asking too much – it is, after all, the Pimpernel’s sense of obligation which saved the lives of many of her close friends, including her own brother Armand. She can support and befriend the émigrés rescued by the League because they represent ‘the dangers Percy had passed’ on their behalf, and ‘the anxieties she herself had endured’ (Elusive), but such depth of pride and generosity is only accessible in retrospect. Marguerite is afraid for Percy’s life, but also unwilling to sacrifice her temporary victory over the ‘bold leader’ of the League, the Scarlet Pimpernel; whilst he depended on her to act on his behalf and care for him in Eldorado, Marguerite could be at least be sure that he was safe and that he loved her. When the tormented appeal she makes to her husband is once again unsuccessful, Marguerite actively rebels: ‘If you go, I go with you’, she wearily informs him, and decides to join the League that she cannot conquer.

On the long and trying journey to France, Marguerite is placated, satisfied merely to be accompanying Percy; when her husband leaves her in the familiar and friendly company of Sir Andrew, Marguerite, though daunted by what is expected of her, becomes a capable and determined member of the League, playing her part with ease. A former actress, she adjusts quickly to her ‘role’ and her only fears are for Percy’s safety and the success of his mission; as the wife of the Pimpernel, surrounded by his friends, Marguerite knows that she is as safe as she can be, accepting danger and discomfort as a matter of course for the League. She is also inspired by an honest and ardent letter from her husband, which gives her courage and reaffirms his love for her. In it, Percy admits that he ‘thought more of an ideal’ than of her happiness when he allowed her to join him, inferring that her presence is a means to an end – as Sir Andrew is there for Marguerite, she is to be the guardian of two small children until Percy can reunite them with their mother in England. Yet Marguerite understands that he must do this to earn her devotion: ‘I love you with my whole soul, with every fibre of my being, more than life and eternity,’ he pledges, ‘but I could not love you, dear, so much, loved I not honour more.’ As a member of the League, ‘the most adored, the most revered amongst all’, Marguerite worships rather than resents the adventurer who replaces the lover; as with the men, she seeks to earn his trust and his approval, carrying out orders and enduring hardships without complaint. As his wife, Marguerite fears only their separation, and clings pitifully to him when they are briefly reunited, pleading that she be allowed to remain at his side. Percy reminds her of the deep and powerful bond they share – ‘Are we not one, you and I?’ – and instructs her that now they must test that union to ‘work together – and suffer together’ for the sake of others. Humbled, Marguerite accepts the inevitable, and even allows with a smile Percy’s small acts of consideration for her immediate comfort, resting for the night on two awkwardly placed cushions upon the bare floor.

Marguerite is affectionate and indulgent, yet willing to sacrifice her happiness for Percy’s cause; he is dedicated and reserved, but also patient and loving with his beautiful wife. Their marriage is a compromise of independence and understanding, of maintaining identities and sharing intimacy, but their relationship is as strong as it is complex. Sir Andrew, Percy’s best friend, believes that both are ‘ready to sacrifice everything for the cause they have at heart’, from the vast Blakeney fortune to their very lives, yet Percy is also willing to put his love for his wife after his duty to humanity; Ffoulkes admits that he is uncertain if Lady Blakeney would do the same, as she is more of an enigma to him than his friend. Entrusted with Marguerite’s welfare and protection on more than one occasion, Sir Andrew is perhaps the closest ally she has, and they have been ‘made to understand one another’ over the three years of their friendship, but he is above all polite and deferential with her. Still addressing each other by their titles, Sir Andrew and Lady Blakeney maintain a respectful and honest acquaintance that is based upon their mutual love and admiration for one man, as well as the danger and anxiety they have faced together.

The Triumph of the Scarlet Pimpernel

May-July 1794

Serene, accepting and tender, Marguerite Blakeney waits resignedly in Dover for her husband to return to her; two years of waiting and enduring have seemingly drained her lively and impulsive nature of any impetus, and she is content to meet her lover halfway between his adventures and their home together. The mutual attraction and potent desire that smouldered in The Scarlet Pimpernel is still strong, heightened by long and constant separations, and Marguerite welcomes the ‘rapture’ of reunion, but the foundation of their marriage is trust and companionship: ‘the happiness that comes from perfect love, perfect altruism, a complete understanding and measureless sympathy’. Percy shares his dual life in France with her, and ‘what he did not tell her, that she easily guessed’; as in Eldorado, there is an unspoken connection between husband and wife, a ‘magnetic current’ that penetrates his reserve and her cynical facade, uniting their thoughts. Marguerite relies on his judgement of people and situations, and follows his lead; when Theresia Cabarrus appears at their cottage in Dover, in disguise and proclaiming a sob story, Marguerite is sympathetic yet guarded, alerted by Percy’s suspicions (‘Marguerite understood the hint’).

Alone, Marguerite’s ‘tenderness and compassion’, and the complacency of her love for Percy, leaves her vulnerable to deception. The fanciful explanation of ‘Madame de Fontenay’ sits uneasily with Marguerite, who feels ‘cold and unresponsive’ where pity has been her natural reaction in the past; ashamed of her ‘disloyalty and cowardice’, Marguerite strives to imitate her husband’s charitable deeds and suppress her mistrust of Theresia. Acting on her own fears and her husband’s veiled warnings, Marguerite avoids her in London society, but she cannot resist an appeal for help; on behalf of her husband, ‘because of the dangers which he had braved for their sakes’, she sets out to reconcile a family of émigrés lately brought to England by the Pimpernel. As in Elusive, this is a trap, and Marguerite once again becomes a device in Chauvelin’s scheme to capture her husband. Immediately she understands her position, aware of the ‘bitter rancour’ felt against Percy and, indirectly, herself, but is confident that Percy will rescue her as he did in Boulogne; this is not the resignation of a docile woman, but the foresight of a wife secure in her husband’s love. Aware that she is being used, Marguerite fears for her husband and the success of his plans, but knows to bide her time. But when faced with Chauvelin, her forbearance already weakened by ‘the loneliness, the mystery, the silence’, she struggles to maintain her impassive demeanour. To different ends, the enemy and the wife are both relying on the certainty that ‘sooner or later Percy would learn where she was; and then he would come’. Marguerite trusts her husband implicitly, but two days of enforced seclusion begin to test her patience and her endurance; memories of her home and of Percy, of ‘her senses swooning in the ecstasy of that perfect moment which comes just before a kiss’, at once sustain and discourage her. In a return to the fatalist acceptance of events that she displayed in The Scarlet Pimpernel, Marguerite is ready to sacrifice her own life for the safety and freedom of her husband, and when he finally comes for her, she ‘scarcely dared trust her eyes and ears’. Always humanitarian, Marguerite forgets her own suffering to ask after Percy, and even spares a thought for Chauvelin.

After Paris ...

October 1792 to July 1794 is just under two years in a life and a marriage, but in that time Marguerite Blakeney abandons almost every vestige of her youthful personality, and matures through great anxiety and suffering into a trusting wife. Although no longer an actress, Marguerite must continue to guard her feelings in public, hiding the pride she has for her husband to protect his secret; the strength of her love for him is impossible to hide, but her obvious attraction is easily put down to ‘foreign eccentricity’. She cares little for anyone but Percy, inspired by his own passionate and noble soul to lay aside her instinctive cynicism and selfishness, and although this dulls the edges of her impulsive nature, it is a natural development. As Marguerite St Just, success and celebrity were fleeting; as Lady Blakeney, her happiness is complete.

Theresia Cabbarus comments to Percy that Lady Blakeney has become ‘very English’, but there is still a little of the Parisienne in Marguerite; she proclaims England as ‘a dull old country, but safe’, yet considers Richmond and London her home whilst Percy is with her. Still spirited and expressive, Marguerite is a character upon the stage, meeting climax and crisis as they touch her life, and acting in the moment.

#the scarlet pimpernel #marguerite st just #marguerite blakeney #sir percy blakeney #fan meta #not me copying and pasting from livejournal #ah those were the obsessive days!#looooong ass post

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