"I have heard a tale of horror"

Eh.... Not really.

Okay, Matilda, I did forget you. And I remember why I didn't finish this novel. Because after the horrors of the castle, it gets boring.

After the whole Gossip Gothic thing they go to England and the Marquis settles it with Uncle/Not-Uncle Weimar that Matilda has a year to find her parents before he can carry her away. And everyone settles down to happiness and so forth.

The Countess Wolfenbach managed to escape being kidnapped (like Joseph because a fortuitous carriage of nobles just happen to be randomly travelling through this out of the way woodland and just happens to see her and stop. It's amazing how many nobles go through this place.

And the Countess manages to find Matilda and company in England and they all settle down to "the delights of love and friendship, in little excursions round the neighborhood, and in viewing the delightful prospects the Surrey hills afforded them. 

We finally learn the Countess's story. She was forced to marry Count Wolfenbach but her heart loved another man, a poor chevalier. 

What is with their arm movements here?

He did ask her father for her hand in marriage, but he didn't have the title, the position, or the money. So she was forced to marry the evil count. He's the jealous sort and takes her off to the secluded country. But the chevalier won't give up and finds her. He slips a note through her window and she rebukes him, tears it up and tells him to go away.

But he won't. The Count discovers him, refuses to believe that she wasn't a part of it. Violence ensues and the Chevalier is murdered.

The Count takes the Countess's baby (oh, yeah, she was pregnant) and locks her away in Castle Wolfenbach with two attendants (Joseph and the woman murdered in the kidnapping). He says if she tries to escape or tells anyone anything that he will harm the child, so she swears, "taking a solemn oath, with the sacrament, that without [the Count's] permission [she] will never reveal" the murder or mention the Chevalier or contradict the Count's report that she is dead. Because, the Count says, "I prefer revenge to my own quiet; because I will be feared, and make your destiny hand on my pleasure." To keep the child safe, she agrees.

Dammit, now I will have that song stuck in my head all day.

Then Matilda shows up, the Count hears word of it, assumes the Countess broke her oath, and hence the kidnapping, etc. Which get's us to where we were in England all happy and having fun.

Aaaaand this has now lost all gothic and horridness. 

It is among the novels Isabella recommends to Catherine in Northanger Abbey. Catherine even asks, "but are they all horrid, are you sure they are all horrid?" Isabella assures her they are. 

Ah well. Not Isabella's worst crime as a friend and we'll hope the other recommendations are better. Anything called Necromancer of the Black Forest does have to be truly horrid, doesn't it?

I digress. To further the plot Parson's needs Matilda to get away from all the fun and protection in England. So Matilda decides that she is miserable.

She goes off to a convent in France and now out of the Marquis's protection, Uncle Weimar breaks the year long restraining order that was in effect in England and spirits her away. Because who didn't see that one coming?

The Countess's problems are all solved when Count Wolfenbach suddenly gets ill and on the verge of dying is gripped with remorse and confesses everything.

He explains he was a man obsessed with her and full of jealousy and love and that is why he made her life a hell and murdered people. He asks her forgiveness. She forgives him and he dies, telling her what happened to the child.

Meanwhile Uncle Weimar takes her across the sea, where they are beset by pirates. He tries to kill her and then himself as the ship is boarded (can't blame him, pirates were not good and what they were going to do to people captured was going to be horrific). But he fails and it turns out the pirates who have captured them just so happen to be good pirates, who impressed by Matilda's countenance, decide to help her.

Uncle Weimar, believing he is dying from the wound he gave himself as they were being boarded, then is filled with remorse and confesses everything. Because, hey, why not use it twice in one book? (Turns out she was absolutely right about what he meant by going into her room at night and making himself "happy.") He begs forgiveness. Matilda forgives him everything. (Honestly, by the end Matilda and Co. were so virtuous that I hated them.)

Incidentally, Uncle Weimar doesn't die, but still filled with remorse goes to become a monk. Turns out that Matilda comes from Italian nobility and is therefore able to return to her friends. She meets her mother. The Countess meets her son. Various people get happily coupled off and married. Everyone faints a lot.

It's too bad. It started out so well, with every proper cliche and a lot of fun. Then it lamed out like a Stephen King novel.

But for the next book, I am straying from Isabella Thorpe's recommendations and reading what is considered to be one of the most frightful and atmospheric books of all time.

Fainting fit count: 18

I haven't forgotten you, Matilda!!!

My Last Finals Ever are here.

In the meantime, I started a different blog of modern fairy tales, because I don't keep up on the blog I do have enough, so why not start a new one?

It is called Strange and Wicked Stories and can be found here.

Will get to this this week.

"my dearest Matilda, permit me to offer you my hand"

Yes, that line is spoken by the creepy Uncle Weimar, who we've just found out is not her uncle. Ew.

I'll get back to that in a moment.

The last time I wrote about this book I really did Matilda a disservice. I didn't like her going on and on and weeping. This time I'm a bit more kindly disposed. Considering the time period, yes, this would not only be a huge shock, but also completely upend her life and change how everyone sees her.

I've talked before on this blog on how the lower class aren't expected to be intelligent or witty or capable because they are not gentry. Parsons makes this clear in the way Matilda and Victoria talk about their servants as if they own them and how Joseph and Bertha don't argue with either Uncle Weimar or Count Wolfenbach because those men are their "betters."

By rights she shouldn't even have been talking to the gentry, much less be among them as an equal, as she had been.

But I'm out of time for posting for today, so tomorrow I'll get to the uncle. I promise.

"i am not your uncle"

Back to Gossip Gothic.

In the midst of all the life altering gossip about Matilda she does the proper gothic heroine thing and develops a fever. They send for a doctor "who ordered her to be bled and kept very quiet." It always makes me shudder to read the bleeding thing. But the weirder thing is that the fever and the bleeding makes her more beautiful. "From the quantity of blood taken from her in the morning, and the little hectic which the fever occasioned, she looked uncommonly delicate and beautiful." So beautiful that when her friend Adelaide, friend and sister of the good count, comes to visit, she tells Matilda, "My dear, Miss Weimar, you look quite enchanting."

I've been around a fair number of sick and recovering people. It is generally not a good look. I don't think I've ever been complimented on looking good. The only people who look good while sick or crying have make up artists, hair retouches, and are in front of a camera, perfectly well, and acting.

But she's a heroine. Heroines are always beautiful even when the rest of us would look like warmed over death. Horrible fevers and blood loss make me pale and give me deep circles under my eyes. Matilda looks beautiful and delicate. Maybe circles under the eyes was a thing back then.

In the midst of Matilda's illness, the evil Uncle Weimar shows up unannounced and demands Matilda and Albert, claiming the robbed him. The Marquis isn't around to be the man and deal with this, but that's okay. The Marchioness is up to the task of sending him on his way.

"Robbing you, Sir! take care what you say; you shall bring proofs of your assertions, and then we will answer you: at present Miss Weimar is safe in our protection, and you will find, Sir, she has powerful friends to guard her, and expose those who are her enemies."

To which the evil Uncle Weimar responds with the 18th century version of, "You'll be hearing from my lawyer!"  He "bowed and quitted the house," at which point the Marchioness starts to make plans, thinks of how they can legal help her, and is generally all around awesome.

As this is happening, mean girl Mme. De Fontelle is wasting no time going to the good Count and spreading all the gossip. But the good Count is good and sends her away with dispatch saying he doesn't believe her and he doesn't like people who tell petty tales. ELIZA PARSONS YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG!!

They are supposed to be immediately deeply attracted to each other if not in love.
Then against all reason he is supposed to believe the lie and think badly of the innocent and put upon Matilda.

So that Matilda can cry a lot.

Parsons! Your version makes too much sense. Stop it and get dramatic right now!
(I have to admit, that little trite formula can get me every time. There is a romance writer, Julie James, whose books for Harlequin Presents bring me to tears. I just cry for the terribly put upon and slandered heroine. This is my deep admission that while I find Parsons refreshing and marvelous, I'm really so familiar with the trope she's NOT using because I love it.)

But I digress. Uncle Weimar, having had no luck with the Marchioness, goes off in search of the Marquis and starts talking to him in the middle of the street. The Marquis isn't the Marchioness. He actually listens to the uncle.

And they have a nice chat and Uncle Weimar states that, "as [Matilda's] uncle, he has a right to claim her: her behavior to him made her undeserving protection, but duty to his deceased brother called upon him to protect his child." The Marquis then explains what Matilda said of why she ran away (that she'd overheard the uncle's plans to break into her room at night and "be happy) and the Uncle says the elegant equivalent of "oh she heard me wrong." "Upon hearing imperfectly a desultory conversation which, if she heard the whole, and its true meaning, she would have formed a very different judgement of." He the asks to see his niece alone for a bit. And the Marquis says that he can see Uncle Weimar's point about the misunderstanding and agrees to the meeting, assuming Matilda approves. (At least he left that open to Matilda.)

Marquis. I don't think she misunderstood anything about a conversation that talks about breaking into her room while she's sleeping. There isn't a lot to misunderstand there.

He talks the Marchioness and Matilda into letting the uncle see her alone for a bit, but only on the condition that the Marchioness can hide in the closet in case the uncle gets creepy or grabby or whatever, because the Marchioness is awesome and doesn't trust the uncle.

So Matilda and Uncle Weimar meet alone in the Marquis's house, with the Marchioness hidden nearby and so starts a creepy conversation of such underhanded abusiveness it could be used as a textbook in gaslighting and guilt tripping.

The uncle says he understands from the Marquis's description of what she heard, and isn't angry with her anymore, but then says she "acted precipitantly, and on very slight grounds, the conversation you only partially heard and little understood."

Matilda holds her ground. "I head enough, Sir, to inform me I was not in safety in a house with a woman of Agatha's principles."

Since that didn't work, the uncle falls back on the mind game Matilda is always vulnerable to, guilt and what she "owes" him for him having raised her. "Before I explain myself farther, tell me, Matilda, is there no gratitude, no affection due to the man who has supported you from childhood, who took you a helpless infant, without a friend to protect you from every evil incident to deserted infancy? Did I not treat you, love you, as a blessing sent from heaven?"

It works to a point. Matilda starts to cry and says, yes, she owes him everything and, "heaven can witness for me how grateful I was for your kindness, until my delicacy was alarmed by freedoms I though improper from our near connexion." In other words, vulnerable spot hit, but not giving in.

"'One question more,' said he; 'should you have been offended at those freedoms (as you call very innocent attentions), had they been offered by a man who designed to make you his wife?'"

Matilda still knows her mind. Breaking into bedrooms in the middle of the night is not very innocent at all. "His wife! 'tis a strange question" Yeah, considering uncle and all. "but I answer, yes, Sir, I should; for confined as my knowledge of mankind was, nature and decency had taught me the impropriety of such behaviour."

Uncle keeps being a sick, gross man, saying, "Perhaps you carried your ideas of propriety too far."

No. No. She didn't.

But then Uncle Weimar goes in for this is either gothic novel or daytime soap opera limits.

Uncle Weimar drops the bombshell. "But now, Matilda, I am going to disclose a secret, known only to Agatha, and which occasioned the conversation you misunderstood and misrepresented-- I am not your uncle."

Random side note on insults

Found a Shakespeare's Insult Generator. I mean, the Bard was incredible at insults. You cannot go wrong.

Don't expect too much of the generator though. Nothing on there will get you up to the Marchioness's witty put down standards.

"she turns out to be an imposter, and a shocking creature"

ELIZA PARSONS YOU ARE DOING IT ALL WRONG AGAIN!!!!!!!

MUST I EXPLAIN ABOUT THE LOVE THING OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN?

But more on this in a bit.

Things start coming fast and furious and a lot is happening and there is an emotional roller coaster. In the next few posts the fainting fit count trebles. Prepare for all the emotions.

And there will be a lot of hearkening back to previous things in the next few posts, but I'll put in links for the previous posts and also put the relevant bits in so you don't need to go hunting for it all.

We stop for a bit to spend a lot of time where a bunch of French nobles talk about how England is so much superior to France in so many ways, which is so utterly ridiculous I did a post on that the first time.

The good Count De Bouville does indeed like Matilda and she likes him back. But neither of them seem to recognize this or why this is. Matilda just decides to dress up for a thing she knows the count will be at and "for the first time in her life, took some pains with her dress, and felt an anxiety about her appearance." And she has no idea why. "Unconscious of her motives, she attributed them solely to a desire of pleasing the Marchioness."

Right. Sure. Ummmm.

The good count is just as clueless, "he scarcely knew the nature of the sentiments he entertained for Matilda."

Parsons, really? You can't have the lovers be ambivalent to each other at first!! That's not how this works. You finally add in a man who isn't either married or creepy, hint attraction, and then they go about being sensible about it! Wrong! They need to fall in love! Immediately! Right now!

 But at least he good count does favor Matilda enough to make the mean girl from the assembly So after the assembly, where everyone loves everyone (except one old "coquet" who is too into flirting with men, and her niece, an 18th century mean girl, who has also taken up the habit. She's determined to gain the affection of Adelaide's brother, the Count De Bouville--foreshadowing, bet he falls for Matilda and she gets shit from that woman--oh wait. I've already read the book once... Anyway Parsons calls the old aunt of the mean girl a "ridiculous old woman.")who had designs on him really jealous. Jealous enough to cause trouble.

So the mean girl (Mme De Fontelle, by the way) lets slip a bit of information to Matilda. "I forgot to ask if you have a relation of your name now in Paris?" Matilda, of course blanches at this information, and trembles, and everyone notices this. Mme De Fontelle strikes harder, "Bless me! Has my question disordered you; I only asked because I was in the company yesterday with a gentleman of your name, just arrived from Germany."

Matilda faints.

So the evil uncle has come back and told De Fontelle everything, in the worst light ever, and De Fontelle loves it. "She's run away from his house with a servant, and jointly robbed him of his property, and now has contrived to impose herself upon the Marchioness for a different person."

And so does everyone else in town. The Marchioness goes out to find out how far it has spread and "to her great mortification she was told of it everywhere, some condoled with her on being so greatly imposed upon, others affected to resent such a creature should have the assurance to get herself introduced into company, but all agreed, 'They saw what she was, nothing but a little pretender, who was a stranger to good breading; no body was deceived but the Marchioness, for every one could see art and duplicity in her face.'"

A complete turn around from their opinion when on "the preceding evening [Matilda] was the most delightful, most engaging, most elegant girl in the world."

Don't worry. The Marchioness comes from a time when insults had class.

These days, someone known for their insults says "fuck" a lot and things like this:

The Marchioness, oh no. It's going down.

The Marchioness congratulated the ladies on their ingenuity, in finding every virtue and every vice, every charm and deformity in the same person, within the space of eight and forty hours. Their candour and good nature was highly commendable and the compliments they paid her judgment were certainly very flattering.

 Now that's using some wit and irony in a put down.

Fainting Fit Count: 3

"good heavens! what a villian!"

Midterms are done. Let the rejoicing commence!

Where was I?

Oh yes. We finally get to learn Victoria's horrible story from her sister, the Marchioness... except we don't. Because the sister really doesn't know all that much, because Victoria writes her, "a solemn vow has passed [my] lips, never to disclose preceding events without permission--ask no questions." So we only get to hear bits.

And where we'd left off was the Marchioness learning Victoria is dead. (Except since this is flashback, we know she won't be or else Matilda wouldn't have met her so many years later. So the Marchioness learns her sister died in childbirth and grieves. Then....

"About six weeks after the dreadful information we had received, a letter came to me, directed in an unknown hand; I opened it-- judge what were my emotions in reading these words, deeply impressed upon my memory. "Your sister lives, though dead to all the world but you... you shall soon hear more, but more than one life depends upon your secrecy."

Oh also that, "she perhaps might never see me more."

Such gothic perfection!!! Just the words, "might never see me more." Imprisoned ladies with secrets.

I don't know if these were gothic cliches before or after Parsons, but it's wonderful. Like the very beginning with the unnamed lady (Matilda) coming into a poor cottage in a storm and there happens to be a terrible haunted castle nearby.

But then the story stops because "you know all I know of this melancholy affair." Parsons will only divulge so many secrets at once.

At this point they reflect on Victoria's fate now and actually think of doing something to help her. In fact, "the Marquis can scarcely be restrained from exerting himself." But they decide to wait for more information on Victoria. (because the Count might decide, hey, you know that kidnapping? I should tell someone.--- yeah.) Though there is also the evil uncle count to contend with. He's headed for Paris and we wouldn't want to miss Matilda being terrorized by him, would we? So Matilda pulls a Joseph and waits around to be caught by the person she's running from, even though she knows she should run.

I love this one and will find any excuse to post it.

But in the meantime... We finally have an eligible man for the heroine. (About time, Parsons!)

It is indeed the brother of her new friend, Adelaide De Bouville, and he is a count, but not evil! (Thus ruining the entire premise of my blog. Damn you, Parsons!!!!!) And we know he is not evil because of his countenance. Pretty people must be good, right? Matilda was "uncommonly struck by his appearance; she thought him (and with justice), the most amiable man she had ever seen."

He is everything he ought to be according to English standards but in a novel where he has to be French for story reasons. "He had all the elegance of  French manners, without their frivolities, an exchellent understanding, and a desire of improving it induced him to visit England." Which is, of course, the mecca of learning and proper behavior.

He "returned a truly accomplished young man, with much good sense and polished manners, a strict integrity of heart, and the highest sense of duty and love for his mother and sister." It's a good thing he went to England. Without England he would have had no good qualities at all.

He, of course, falls in love with her immediately because she was "so easily understood in a short visit, from the frankness and naivety of her manners." She knows nothing of the world and is therefore all "unaffected sweetness" that "rendered it impossible to avoid bestowing that homage to which she made no claims." Etc, etc, etc, sweetness and light, etc, sweetness, etc, and light, etc.

Moral of the story: women with too much knowledge are dangerous and unattractive.

Better to find the dumb, uneducated ones.

So then he leaves and they get a letter from Joseph where he tells about the terrible fire and Bertha's death. At which point Marchioness utters the line in the title, and the Marquis almost decides to do something!!

"I shall never forgive myself for not interfering in this business years ago," he cries. (Or, you know, even interfering a couple of weeks ago when she was kidnapped.)

"I am determined, if no news arrives from her shortly, to enter a process against the Count, and oblige him to produce her."