Fortunately, he only smiled. “You overestimate my popularity, ma chère.”
“I do not,” she replied staunchly, leaning toward him in her eagerness. “When the Constitution was confirmed last summer, Eliza wrote to me that the people were dancing in the streets to the tune of your name, and that there were even some who wished to change the name of the city to Hamiltoniana.”
His smile widened, and I admired once again how adept my sister was at flattering gentlemen without them realizing it.
“That was here in the city,” he said. “Unfortunately, there is the rest of the state to consider as well. Citizens to the north do not find me to be nearly as palatable.”
Angelica nodded sagely, as if this were the wisest of conclusions, rather than simply common sense to anyone familiar with New York.
“Then you must forget them, and their petty concerns,” she said. “You are meant for grander things. What a pity you are not to be the vice president in Mr. Adams’s place. What marvelous things you and the president could accomplish together!”
I expected him to demur again, as he had in regard to the governorship. To my surprise, he didn’t, I suppose because he liked Angelica too well to rebuff her. But he did glance briefly at me, as if to reassure me first that he’d no plans to usurp Mr. Adams.
“We could,” he said, smiling. “For now I will be content to serve wherever His Excellency believes I’ll be of the greatest use.”
But my sister wouldn’t accept this as an answer.
“Do not put me off with empty platitudes, mon cher frère,” she persisted. “What true statesmen doesn’t wish to climb to the loftiest heights of his country’s Olympus?”
“In time, Angelica, all in good time,” he said with good-humored patience. “New York is not Delphi, and there are no oracles here for predicting my future. Or perhaps there are in London?”
“Mr. Church shall win his borough, if that is what you mean,” she said, managing to sound both blithe and bitter, an unhappy combination. “The British elections are so terribly corrupt that so long as enough money is passed about, he is guaranteed his precious seat in Parliament. It’s not as it is here, not at all. Nothing is.”
Abruptly she looked down at her lap and her shoulders sagged as she buried her face in her hands. Hastily I put aside my sewing and went to sit beside her on the sofa, my arm around her shoulders.
“You’ve had a long day,” I said gently, “and a longer voyage. I cannot conceive of how weary you must be, and yet here Alexander and I have been prattling on and keeping you awake.”
She raised her face and shook her head, as if to shake off the excuses I’d offered her. I’d expected her to be crying, but her eyes were dry, her mouth a tight line of self-control.
Alexander rose, and yawned. “I, for one, am thoroughly spent,” he announced. “Angelica, Betsey and I are delighted to have you safely with us.”
“Thank you, Hamilton,” she said, standing as well in a rustle of silk. “Your kindness—yours and Eliza’s—is more welcome than I can ever say.”
He stepped forward to bid her good night, and she kissed him lightly on each cheek, in the French manner she’d acquired whilst living in Paris. He bowed, and then left us alone together as he went to check the locks and doors one last time before bed.
“Shall I call for your maid to help you undress?” I asked as I linked my arm through Angelica’s. “Or shall we pretend we’re girls again, making do for each other?”
I was glad to see that made her smile. “Dear Eliza,” she said. “I should like that above all things.”
Since her maid had already helped her from her traveling clothes and she now wore only her nightshift beneath the sultana, there wasn’t much left for me to do but brush out her hair. When we’d been girls, she, Peggy, and I had taken turns each night brushing and plaiting one another’s hair, a constant, calming ritual before prayers and bed that had always ended our days.
Now Angelica sat before me once again in a straight-backed chair, her hands folded quietly in her lap as I began to pull the pins that held the stiff, arranged curls in place. One by one I dropped them into the dish on the nearby table until her hair was free and loose. At last I began to draw the brush through her heavy hair, a deep brown like my own. It took long strokes to brush out the stickiness of the salt spray from the sea as well as the fashionable powder that her maid had dusted on this morning.
She sighed with contentment and let her head drop back as her neck relaxed with each pull of the brush. I was surprised to see gray scattered through her dark hair; she was only thirty-three, a year older than I.
“You don’t have to tell me tonight if you don’t wish to,” I asked. “But if there is anything that either Alexander or I can do to help you, then—”
“There isn’t,” she said quietly, her voice leaden with melancholy. “These last years I have done my best to make England my home for the sake of John and our children, but it’s a dreary place, filled with cold and chilly people, and—and it is not here.”
There was nothing I could say to that. “I’m glad Mr. Church permitted you to come visit now.”
“I begged,” she said flatly. “I told him Mamma and Papa were unwell, and I was needed here.”
“They aren’t well,” I said. “Papa’s legs have become so bad that on his worst days he’s nearly a cripple, and cannot climb the stairs without assistance, while Mamma is troubled by her lungs. You didn’t lie.”
“I would have done so if I’d needed to.” She sighed deeply. “If it were not for my children, I do not think I would return to England at all, but remain here forever.”
A dreadful thought rose unbidden. “Is that why you didn’t bring the children with you? Because Mr. Church wants to make certain you’d return to him?”
She sighed again, more restlessly this time, and her folded hands twisted together into a tight knot in her lap.
“He wanted them to be safe,” she said. “A long voyage is taxing on a child’s constitution. Besides, Philip and Kitty are both at school now, and John and Elizabeth have their tutor and governess. I could hardly interrupt their education.”
I scarcely bit back my words as I put aside the hairbrush and began to braid her hair in a single thick plait. I’d always thought Mr. Church a taciturn gentleman, but never a cruel one. Yet to deny Angelica the pleasure of bringing their children to visit their Schuyler grandparents seemed cruel indeed.
“It will all be well enough, Eliza,” my sister said, as if she’d read my thoughts. “John will see that our children are well looked after. He’s an excellent father that way, and a good husband, too. He loves them—and me—dearly, you know. But when I see your Hamilton, how handsome and clever and kind he is, and how happy you make each other, and how he looks at you, and you look at him . . . but no, I will not be sentimental, or maudlin. While I am here in New York, I am resolved to be content, and find pleasure in every moment, and most especially in my time with you and Hamilton.”
Alexander was still awake and reading when I later joined him in bed.
“You were gone much longer than I expected,” he said, closing his book to watch me. “Is your sister that unhappy?”
“She is,” I said as I undressed myself, not bothering to call my maid. “She misses her children, and in her way I believe she misses Mr. Church as well. You’ve read her letters. Even with all her fine talk of Prince This and Lord That, she dislikes London and misses America, and wants nothing more than to live here instead.”
“Ma pauvre soeur,” he said. “I am sorry that she didn’t bring at least one of her children with her. Your parents will be disappointed she didn’t.”
“Mr. Church wouldn’t permit it,” I said, unable to keep the indignation from my voice. “She hinted that he was keeping them in England almost as hostages, to make certain she returned.”
Alexander frowned. “I find that difficult to believe of him.”
“You wouldn’t say so if you’d
seen Angelica’s face,” I said, sitting on the edge of the bed as I braided my own hair for the night. “I know he is the father of those children, but she is their mother, and she should be permitted to bring her children to see her family.”
“Did you say that to her, Betsey?”
“No,” I said, though now I wished I had. “I wanted to, but I feared it would only make her more unhappy in her situation.”
“Every law in both Britain and America would claim that Church is completely within his rights,” he said. “As the head of his family, it is the father who is entitled to make whatever decision he deems best for the welfare of his children.”
I paused my braiding to look at him. “Even if that is completely counter to the mother’s wishes?”
“The law doesn’t see it that way.” He tapped his fingers lightly on the cover of the book in his hand. “You’d trust me to decide the best for our children, wouldn’t you?”
“Of course I would,” I said. “I do. But you are not Mr. Church.”
He smiled. “Nor are you Angelica.”
I wished he wouldn’t smile, not about this. “But according to the law, then, the only right a mother has to her child is to give it life. That isn’t fair, Alexander.”
“Perhaps it’s not,” he said patiently, “but it is the law, and I’m afraid it’s your misfortune to be married to a lawyer who will tell you so, even if it pertains to a woman I regard as my sister as well as yours.”
No argument with the law was ever tolerated in our house, nor, if I were honest, anywhere else. The laws weren’t fair to Angelica or any other mother like her, but it could not be helped, no matter how much I wished otherwise.
I knelt beside the bed and put aside my frustration before I said my evening prayers, making sure to include an extra plea for Angelica’s happiness and Mr. Church’s understanding. As always, I wished that Alexander would join me, but he claimed that Sunday service was sufficient for him, and instead returned to his book until I was done.
When at last I climbed into bed beside my husband, he was yawning as he reached out to snuff the candlestick on the table beside the bed.
He put his arm over my waist, and I moved closer to him. “You know I would never do what Angelica has done.”
He grunted drowsily, clearly wishing our conversation was over so he could sleep. “In what sense, angel?”
“I would never board a ship and sail so far and be away from you and our children for months and months,” I said, lowering my voice to a whisper. “I couldn’t. I love you too much to be apart for so long like that.”
“I know you wouldn’t,” he said softly. “But that’s the difference between you two, isn’t it? I may love Angelica as a sister, but I love you as my dearest wife.”
I smiled and he kissed me in the dark, and then, finally, we slept.
* * *
On April 30, 1789, General Washington swore the most solemn of oaths to become President Washington, the first for our country. He took the oath standing on the balcony of Federal Hall, now the home of Congress, and in plain view of the thousands of people who thronged the streets nearby. Not wishing to be crushed in the crowds, Alexander, Angelica, and I instead stood on our own little balcony, and peered down Wall Street to make out what we could of the momentous event.
The new president had consulted Alexander as one of his most trusted advisors on the details of the ceremony, and so my husband could describe what we weren’t able to see. The swearing of the oath was as simply done as possible, without crowns, trains, scepters, or any other of the empty trappings of royalty. Instead our new leader was clearly regarded by all as first gentleman of the country, a man of unimpeachable honor and courage chosen for his merits rather than his bloodlines. The new president even wore a plain suit of clothes for his inauguration, fashioned from cloth of American manufacture and without so much as a hint of regal ermine.
Who could not be an avid patriot on such a day? From our little balcony, we cheered as lustily as we could, and afterward together drank a toast to our new president, and to the success and prosperity of our brave new country.
Inspired perhaps by the general excitement and celebration that vibrated through New York, Angelica was able to keep true to her word to put aside her unhappiness. Although we spoke often of her children and her husband, she showed no more of the misery that she’d revealed on the first night. I didn’t doubt that it remained buried deep within her breast, and it saddened me that she’d become so adept at hiding her true thoughts and sorrows, especially from those who loved her most. Still, I reveled in her company, and while her family doubtless missed her presence in London, mine in New York were delighted to have her in their midst.
It seemed as if there were some new entertainment—a ball, a supper, a patriotic play—every night in honor of the president, but the greatest of them all was the Inauguration Ball, given during the first week of May at the Assembly Rooms on Broadway, not far from our house. Like every other lady who’d been invited, I’d a new gown for the ball, and at Alexander’s insistence, it was the most expensive I’d had since we’d been married. Cut from pale blue silk that shimmered by candlelight, the gown followed the newest fashion, and was so light and airy that it floated like a silken cloud around me as I walked or danced. With the gown I wore a sheer embroidered kerchief crossed over my breast and a darker blue sash at my waist, white plumes in my hair, and the gold necklace that Angelica had given me.
As had always been the case, my sister outshone me in a brilliant red dress edged with a Roman pattern of gold embroidery with a patriotic sash of red-, blue-, and white-striped silk, and the largest pearls New York had ever seen around her throat. She wore no kerchief, instead presenting her bosom framed by a daringly low neckline edged with a stiffened lace collar.
Pinned on her bodice was a brooch with a miniature portrait of Mr. Church, framed in diamond brilliants. As she explained to anyone who’d listen, she’d promised him to wear it to the ball so he could attend in painted spirit, if not in person. It was a wise thing to do, too, for there were many people acquainted with Mr. Church who wondered why she was in this country whilst he remained in England, and would be quick to taint her visit alone with slanderous speculation.
But the most stylish member of our trio was my handsome husband. If my gown had been costly, I wouldn’t have been surprised if his French tailor’s bill was even greater. His coat was green-striped silk, cut away at the waist in the newest style, and worn over a heavily embroidered waistcoat and close-fitting black silk breeches. He’d both the confidence and the bearing to wear such fashionable attire with elegance, and he was without doubt the most dashing gentleman in the room. I didn’t doubt that he set numerous female hearts fluttering, and I was glad that the only one that mattered to him was my own.
The company at the ball was the most notable and brilliant ever assembled in our country. In addition to the president and vice president, those in attendance included the cabinet officers, most of the members of Congress, the French and Spanish ministers, and various military and civic officers, as well as the wives and daughters of these gentlemen. The ladies wore jewels and plumes in their hair, and the military gentlemen were in full dress, their chests glittering with medals and ribbons.
As souvenirs, every lady was given an ivory fan, made in Paris, that opened to reveal a likeness of Washington in profile. Every gentleman received a commemoratory sash, skillfully painted with an American eagle and embroidered with a constellation of stars spelling out the new president’s initials.
The guests that we were most eager to see, however, were my sister Peggy and her husband, Stephen Van Rensselaer, down from Albany for the festivities. The grief over the deaths of their first two children had been somewhat softened by the birth of another son, Stephen, the year before, and I was glad to see that he’d helped restore much of my younger sister’s former high spirits. The reunion of Peggy and Angelica was filled with tears that were both happy and
sad, shared by me as well. We three sisters had been so inseparable as girls, yet husbands and circumstances had parted us for too many years.
To my considerable honor, I danced with President Washington. He recalled me warmly from the days of Morristown and New Windsor as a young acquaintance of Lady Washington’s, as well as being Alexander’s wife and my father’s daughter. In truth, to say I danced with the new president is not quite accurate; President Washington never actually danced, but chose instead to walk through the steps of a dance. He was said to do this to preserve the dignity and gravity of his station, but I’d always suspected it was more that, being so large a man, he wasn’t comfortable attempting the hops and runs required by most dances.
By contrast, my husband was never one of those gloomy men who clung to the walls at a ball, but enjoyed dancing and the gallantry that accompanied it. While I danced with numerous gentlemen, Alexander took particular care to dance often with Angelica, so that she, too, was never without a partner. They made a splendid couple, enough that others paused to watch them dance, and I enjoyed seeing my dear husband and sister so happy in each other’s company.
As the evening progressed, and the celebratory wine flowed, our spirits rose, too. At one point after Angelica had completed a particularly lively jig with my husband, one of her garters came untied, and dropped to the floor beneath her skirts. Alexander noticed the fallen ribbon, and retrieved it for her.
Now, at that time, a woman’s garter was regarded as an essential but intimate part of her dress, often imprinted with the shape and size of the fair limb that it embraced. As a result, garters often became tokens between lovers, and the fact that Alexander now dangled my sister’s garter before her like an impudent silken worm was exactly the kind of bawdy silliness that often appeared in comic plays from London.
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