O my Liege,
You gave me Being, Bred me, dearly Love me…
“What the devil do you think you’re doing, Miss Darby! Don’t shout! Don’t declaim. Do not emote. Whom are you addressing? The empty air? You speak to a king, girl. A king who is your father. The man who gave you life. Convince me of Cordelia’s earnestness. You are honest and sincere. Now, speak to me sincerely—and loudly. I have expressed every confidence that you shall take the theatre by storm; do not make me doubt my judgment by mumbling one moment and shouting the next like some green girl in a tavern skit. ‘Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounc’d it to you, trippingly on the tongue.’ Now, let’s continue the scene. I can’t bear to hear you do those lines again. Next time you’ll play them exactly as I’ve schooled you.” Mr. Garrick cued me with Lear’s next speech, and I daresay I could not tell whether the anger was his own or the ancient king’s.
…Repent, for know Our nature cannot brook
A Child so young and so Ungentle.
But when I gave my reply, “So young my Lord and True,” he again interrupted. “Why did you emphasize the word young, Miss Darby? We all know Cordelia is young. Is there a better word to accentuate? What is the very essence of Cordelia?”
I blushed. “So young my Lord and True.”
“Eureka!”
Whilst I fretted that I might not be up to the challenge after all, Mother worried about my reputation. For her, the fact that I was already wildly popular—and still to set foot upon the boards—nearly palsied her resolution to allow my debut.
My ardent fancy, however, was busied in contemplating a thousand triumphs, in which my vanity would be publicly gratified, without the smallest sacrifice of my private character.
And yet the temptations did present themselves. While nightly I had been holding court in Mr. Garrick’s box at the Theatre Royal, receiving visitors throughout the various overtures, main plays, musical interludes, and farcical afterpieces, a number of gentlemen—as well as those of a less moral stamp—had made their intentions known to us.
One professed admirer was a man of splendid fortune, but old enough to be my grandfather. This suit I never would listen to. But there was another man, a naval officer, graceful and handsome of face and figure, who took to following me to and from the theatre.
I was eventually persuaded, through the most ardent letter delivered into my hands by an abigail, that he wished to know me. The writer avowed himself the son of a lady—and offered marriage! I instantly delivered the letter to my mother, and shortly after he was, by an acquaintance, presented to me with decorous ceremony.
Naturally, his proposal came with terms. Any wife of his was not to set foot upon the stage. Mother, who but half approved a dramatic life, was more than half inclined to favor the addresses of this most accomplished suitor. If she could nip my theatrical career in the bud and couple me with a man of good family, such a consummation was devoutly to be wish’d.
But oh, not all “actors” tread the boards! Some merely tread upon unassuming and innocent hearts. For it came to pass that the acquaintance who paved the path for the handsome captain to inveigle his way into our society became alarmed for my safety and laid open his bosom to us, confessing the captain’s secret. It seemed that this paragon of paramours already had a young and amiable wife in a sister kingdom!
Mother’s consternation was infinite. But I felt little regret in the loss of a husband, when I reflected that this matrimonial alliance would have compelled me to relinquish my theatrical profession. All my dreams were then focused on a single shining goal. The drama, the delightful drama, seemed the very criterion of all human happiness, and I looked forward to the evening of my debut with all the anticipation of an eager and curious bride on her wedding night.
Seven
Mr. Robinson
Early 1773…age fifteen
“That’s enough.” Mother closed the lower shutters of our drawing room with an air of finality and a sigh of resignation. “Don’t think I’m not aware of your behavior, Mary.”
I feigned ignorance. “You fancy every man a seducer and every hour an hour of accumulating peril!”
“I well remember your father’s admonition. That young man opposite never misses a moment to come to his window when you’re at ours. It’s a wonder his employer keeps him on.”
The employer in question was the eminent solicitor John Vernon, and the interesting-looking young man, one of his articled clerks. ’Twas true that the clerk did seem somewhat lovestruck, but I rather fancied his attentions and enjoyed what I had believed, until that moment, to have been a covert flirtation. He was handsome in person and his countenance was overcast by a sort of languor, the effect of sickness, I imagined, finding him all the more attractive for having suffered.
Mother was certain she had effected a logjam in the stream of my maiden affections, but some weeks later, after we had moved to the York Buildings in Villiers Street, off the Strand, we received an invitation to form part of a party of six for an excursion to dine in Greenwich the following Sunday. The host was Mr. Wayman, an attorney of whom my mother entertained the highest opinion, his having the patronage of her much-respected Mr. Cox. After a goodly deal of persuasion, my mother consented to go, and to allow that I should also attend her. As it was then the fashion to wear silks, on the day of recreation itself I wore a gown of pale blue lustring, with a chip hat trimmed with ribbands of the same color. Never was I dressed so perfectly to my
