Chapter Text
John is sitting at his desk in front of a letter from one of his American friends, while Angelica lounges nearby on the settee, trying to wrap her mind around this new treatise laid across her lap, published just recently by a mathematician she met once at a salon in Paris. She's attempting to understand one of Lagrange's algebraic proofs of something (something to do with deriving something expanding a function — what exactly was it that he's trying to derive? — she flips back to the previous page) when John murmurs, "Dear Lord!"
And with that, she's lost her place on the page. Angelica looks up, her focus popped.
Her husband doesn't show much expression in his face, even now, but his voice is a bit more emphatic than usual now as he continues, "You'll never believe what Hamilton's done."
That boy, she thinks fondly. "What, what has he done now?"
She's expecting an amusing anecdote about some new quarrel with Thomas Jefferson, but John doesn't doesn't begin to recount the story; instead, he holds out the letter and says, "I don't think I can read this out loud." When she reaches out and takes the papers out of his hand, he stands and rubs his temples. "Better take a deep breath. You won't like it."
"Oh, no," she says, and repeats, in a completely different tone, "what has he done now, John?"
John steps beside her, but doesn't respond. She starts to read, and after a beat, he awkwardly pats a hand on her shoulder.
Angelica reads the letter straight through and feels faint.
*****
"We have to go back," Angelica says during breakfast the next morning.
John raises his cup to his mouth and takes a sip of tea, nodding once as if to say, Go on.
So she continues, "I know that you have business and everything here, but Eliza needs me. I can't let her fight this on her own."
"That can be arranged," says John.
"As soon as possible, please," Angelica says. "I know the school session's just started, so the children will need to remain there, but Philip will be here, in case... and you have your solicitor, and when we come back, we'll... " her voice trails off as she realizes she has no idea how to handle the long term of this.
John picks up where she left off. "And haven't we been saying for years that it's about time to go back to America for good? I have a few new prospects in New York, so the timing is no inconvenience. We'll go as soon as we can, the two of us. I'll come back here in the spring to tie up loose ends, and I'll return with the children as soon as everything is ready. It'll be fine. It's not good for you to be away from your family for so long." No mention of his own family, who cut him off the first time he ran away to America and haven't been a part of their lives in London at all, but Angelica has come to realize that not all families are like the Schuylers.
She's felt cold inside ever since reading about her brother-in-law's misdeeds, but John's helpfulness sends a pinprick of warmth through her, which feels excruciating in the same way that running one's hands through warm water after playing in the snow does. He'd stayed awake well into the night the previous evening, claiming overdue paperwork, and all of a sudden she realizes that he must have started putting all of these pieces together while she was still in shock. She has to count in French in her head to hold back the tears, and she's in the twenties before she has any sort of handle on herself.
"By the way, if you're thinking of calling him out," John remarks, "please feel free to use my new Wogdon set. They were very expensive and I'm quite proud of them."
The house is in upheaval all day, as they direct the packing, send out letters to the children, and acquire tickets so that they can leave the very next day. She spends a precious hour writing a letter to her sister to send ahead of them, a long, rambling thing where she goes on about how the first thing she's going to do is to murder Hamilton, and how his ambition and self-importance has blinded him to the things that matter in life, something or other about Icarus and his downfall, and finally, how Eliza is absolutely not to blame herself (as the papers, and the gossip in New York City — if she knows anything about the gossip in New York City, and she knows plenty about the gossip in New York City — are already doing that for her).
One thing she doesn't mention is how sorry she is.
She can't bring herself to ask for the forgiveness she doesn't deserve.
*****
I just might regret that night for the rest of my days —
Angelica doesn't sleep well on the voyage to New York.
The cabin is not large, and the bed they're sharing is cramped. She has the sweats and the chills simultaneously; meanwhile, John sleeps restfully, sprawled out as if he hasn't a care in the world. She tries to avoid tossing and turning so as not to disturb him, and the pent-up energy eats and eats and eats at her.
She tries to tell herself she had no idea anything like this would happen. She tries to tell herself that introducing Eliza to Alexander was intended to be a selfless act of sisterly sacrifice.
And yet.
She tries to tell herself that though she knew that Alexander was a social climber, she wasn't a snob enough to hold the details of his birth against him; that though she saw the way his eyes lit up when he heard the name "Schuyler," that didn't mean he wouldn't be a good husband.
And yet.
And yet, she passed him off to Eliza because it wasn't enough. She had wanted more, had wanted to be chosen as Angelica, not as Miss Schuyler. So she ceded him to her little sister, and now her little sister's name is being dragged through the mud by that lowlife Callender and his pack of creeps.
If I had married him instead, would he have been satisfied?
She only lets herself wonder this once, and the guilt she feels for even daring to think of it nearly overwhelms her. She's relieved when she remembers the summer of 1791, the unanswered letters from both her and Eliza. At the time, they'd fretted that Alexander was worrying himself to death over his financial plan, but in retrospect, he must have been too busy with personal activities to answer their letters.
It comforts her, but just a little, to realize that he didn't choose this Mrs. Reynolds over Eliza; rather, he chose himself over the Schuyler sisters.
If she had married him, and Eliza had married John, it would be her right now in Eliza's position. She's sure of it.
She tries to tell herself that Eliza wouldn't have wanted to switch places. Eliza would have hated the glittering ballrooms of London and Paris. Eliza likes to sleep at night and give of herself during the day.
She tries to tell herself that no matter what happens with Alexander, Eliza will make it back to the top. Eliza's dignity and intrinsic goodness will become clear to the entire country soon enough. On the other hand, if Angelica were in Eliza's position, she wouldn't bother with a challenge — one of those Wogdons would be out of John's case and the bullet would go right through Hamilton's sensitive areas before he knew what hit him.
But in the end, it boils down to one thing, which is this: If Angelica were in Eliza's position, Eliza wouldn't be.