Free To Love and to Cherish by Patricia Gaffney

wanted her to be. But alas, I can’t like her. She reminds me of a mistress Papa had in Aix-en-Provence—Mademoiselle Bected was her name. Bected the Affected, I called her. Miss Vanstone might be slightly less insincere, but I doubt she’s any less ambitious. Reverend Morrell would probably find excuses for her, mitigating influences such as her self-important father, or the lack of strong female guidance—but I am not nearly so charitable. I see a stiff-necked, humorless woman who dislikes and distrusts me even while she tries to ingratiate herself with me. Perhaps being Lady D’Aubrey won’t be quite so tiring after all if it means I can lord it occasionally over the likes of Honoria Vanstone.
    Now, that’s a petty notion. What would the Archangel think if he knew I harbored such mean sentiments toward one of his flock? He watches me when he believes I’m not looking. I can’t begin to imagine what he thinks of me, what kind of woman he’s decided I am. Fallen? Lost? In need of saving? All of those, I suppose, and too far gone even for the best efforts of the very Reverend Morrell.
    I must call him Christy, he says. His coloring is so fair, I always know when he’s blushing. He has a big, strong-boned head, almost bust-like, and fine silver-blue eyes, gentle, not cold, in spite of their icy color. A good-humored mouth, very expressive. I see tolerance in his face, a deep sympathy for other people’s pain and uncertainty. And he’s the opposite of pompous. He strikes me as a man who could forgive anything in others, perhaps not as much in himself. Today he made me think of Rubens’ painting
Daniel in the Lion’s Den
. Only it’s not Daniel he looks like, it’s the lion in the middle, the standing one with the gorgeous mane and the fierce but worried look in his yellow eyes.
    In church, giving his interminable sermon, he was so very earnest, so heartbreakingly sincere, I felt almost like weeping. Most unusual, not like me at all; I still can’t quite account for it. And no doubt I would have been crying for myself, not him. I wonder what he would think if I told him the truth: that I have no religious faith at all, that his God is as apocryphal to me as Zeus or Apollo are to him. Would he try to convert me? What an amusing prospect. There was a mesmerist in Papa’s artist circle one summer in Aix who attempted to hypnotize me, but without success; I remained disappointingly wide awake and rational. As I would, I’m afraid, if Reverend Morrell tried his Anglican catechism on me.
    Too bad. Faith in God must be a very comforting thing. A merciful analgesic. A painkiller for the soul. Yes, it’s too bad.
    5 May
    They delivered Geoffrey’s horse today. He calls it Devil, even though it came with another name; Cupcake, for all I know. At any rate, Devil is a black stallion with a white blaze on its nose and two white socks. He’s “a real cracker,” and racing him against Reverend Morrell’s horse has become Geoffrey’s latest idée fixe. Are ministers allowed to run in horse races? Probably not; too worldly, I should think.
    Geoffrey’s captain’s commission hasn’t come yet (which is why he has time on his hands to entice innocent clergymen into sinful pursuits). The English army hasn’t fought in a real war in thirty years, and the men at the top, says Geoffrey, are all doddering veterans of the Peninsula. In my (unspoken) opinion, that’s to his advantage, since I can imagine only senile old men allowing him into their ranks during wartime. But he looks better lately, and he isn’t drinking so much. I suppose he’s a good soldier when he’s healthy. God knows he loves it; the only time he seems truly alive is when he’s recounting the gory particulars of some battle he’s fought. So I watch the mail as anxiously as he does, and offer consolation when he’s disappointed. Better that only
one
of us is completely miserable, after all, and for now Geoffrey has a better chance than I of climbing