America's First Daughter: A Novel

by Stephanie Dray

  Poor Papa had been snubbed. By Aunt Elizabeth, by Polly, and by King George, too, in London. But at least there was a little good news from Papa’s trip: Nabby Adams was to marry her father’s secretary. Upon hearing the news, an unaccountable blush discomfited me. Papa noticed. “Don’t fall prey to jealousy, Patsy. There’s time enough for you to be a wife.”

  But time passed too slowly for my taste. I chafed at being treated like a little girl who understood nothing. I wanted to travel and attend lectures in the salons and go to balls. I wanted to be presented in French society like some of the other girls in the convent. Alas, it wasn’t until I was nearly fourteen that Papa announced he’d take me to the opera in September.

  “The opera!” I cried. “I’ll need a new dress.”

  “Yes. You’re growing so fast that I cannot keep you in clothes. But this will be a special gown. One ornamented with bows and such fripperies as the most fashionable woman in France might desire. Would that meet with your liking?”

  I was so excited I nearly squeaked. The opera was no house party where I’d be swiftly sent to bed when the adult discussions began. This was the opera, where the cream of French society gathered to see and be seen. Papa would take me in my new dress, and I knew I must be well rested because the opera started late; I might not even be back to the convent by curfew!

  My friends suffered with envy. None of them had ever gone to the opera on the arm of a minister to the Court of Versailles. And I gloried to know I’d have all Papa’s attention for myself and imagined how we would ride together in a glittering coach. The girls at the convent told me that I ought to be very careful alighting the carriage in my new gown, so I practiced holding my skirts in one hand and stepping down with the other.

  Then I counted the days until the leaves began to fall off the trees.

  On the night we were to attend, my friends tittered around me as I dressed. My stays dug into my sides and the shoes pinched my toes—but I looked womanly with my hair tied back and the faintest dusting of powder upon my nose. Marie slipped a little pot of rouge into my hand, but I dared not wear it where the nuns could see.

  When the coach arrived to fetch me, I was surprised to find it empty. I’d imagined Papa would hold his hand forth to help me up. No matter, I told myself. Papa would be waiting there for me at the opera, his blue eyes bright and intent upon my face. When the carriage stopped I peeked out to see a beautiful building illuminated by lamps against the coming darkness of night. It was a magical sight, and so I stepped down just as I’d practiced and the coachman escorted me into the carpeted reception hall. I thanked him very properly and smiled at the young men who gazed curiously upon me. But my eyes were all for Papa.

  He was easy to find in a crowd because he was so tall. He wore his best blue coat, and his bright white wig was perfectly arranged. As I approached, he was smiling. He looked young and vibrant—his cheeks infused with a healthy pink, as if he’d just returned from riding. He turned, summoning me closer.

  Then I saw with sinking spirits that his smile wasn’t for me.

  Standing with him was a little goldfinch of a woman, colorful and delicate, her tinkling laugh lighting up my father’s expression. He’d never looked at me like that; I feared he’d never looked at anyone like that. “Allow me to make introductions. Maria Cosway, this is my daughter Patsy.”

  It was the first time I heard her name, but I heard it a hundred more times by the end of the night. Maria. Maria. Maria.

  Papa seemed to like the sound of it on his lips.

  When and how did they meet? They didn’t behave as old friends. Yet they spoke affectionately of an outing to see the crown jewels. How could my father have made such a dear friend—dear enough that he felt free to use her given name in public—without my having known about it? And where was her husband? She was a married lady—the ring on her finger revealed as much—and not a widow, I was told, when I asked.

  But she didn’t behave as if there were any man in her world but my father.

  The three of us sat together in our box, but only I seemed to be paying any attention to the performance of Richard Coeur-de-Lion and the farcical comedy that followed. Maria laughed during serious moments, while Papa was serious when he ought to have laughed.

  And he couldn’t take his eyes off her.

  Chapter Seven

  Paris, 12 October 1786

  From Thomas Jefferson to Maria Cosway

  Having handed you into your carriage, and seen the wheels in motion, I turned and walked, more dead than alive, solitary and sad. A dialogue took place between my Head and my Heart. We have no rose without its thorn; it is the law of our existence; it is the condition annexed to all our pleasures. True, this condition is pressing cruelly on me at this moment. I feel more fit for death than life. But the pleasures were worth the price I’m paying. Hope is sweeter than despair. In the summer, said the gentleman; but in the spring, said the lady: and I should love her forever, were it only for that!

  I SHOULD BURN MY FATHER’S COPY OF THIS LETTER—a love letter, to be certain, written in a fashion only a sensitive heart and brilliant mind like his could’ve imagined. It unfolds, page after page, in a lengthy debate over whether or not he ought to have loved her.

  This letter is a beautiful embarrassment that the world should never see.

  But I cannot bring myself to destroy it with all the other evidence of his folly.

  In the first place, I’m sure the wretched woman kept the original. And in the second place, I tried to burn it once before… .

  That autumn, in Paris, somehow the duet of my life with Papa had become a trio. But the music stopped altogether when, in a foolish attempt to impress Maria Cosway by jumping over a fence, Papa badly injured his wrist. The echo of how he’d hurt himself trying to impress my mother all those years ago made me furious.

  Mrs. Cosway was now leaving the city—and good riddance to her!—yet, Papa was chancing making a greater fool of himself by insisting on offering a personal farewell. On the dreary October day I returned from the convent to find my father gone, I fretted to Mr. Short, “But the doctor who set his bones said that he shouldn’t go anywhere!”

  Mr. Short rose from the desk chair where he’d been conducting his work. “Your father insisted, Patsy. I offered my opinion that it wasn’t in his best interest to accompany Mrs. Cosway, but he’s my employer. I’m not his.”

  There was something strange in the way he phrased it; something that made me worry Mr. Short also suspected the entanglement between Papa and Mrs. Cosway was improper. So I tried to cast the shameful matter in terms of my father’s health. “He’s barely sleeping for the pain. Saint-Denis is two hours by carriage each way. He’s canceled every other engagement these past weeks, yet, for her …” I shook my head, angrily, recalling the migraine that had kept Papa from my birthday dinner and his presentation of the Marquis de Lafayette’s bust to the citizens of Paris the next day. In both cases, Mr. Short had appeared in Papa’s stead.

  “I share your concern, Patsy, but Mr. Jefferson was intent on seeing Mrs. Cosway off on her departure to London.”

  I wondered if Mr. Short not only suspected but knew the danger Maria Cosway presented—to Papa’s heart, mind, and reputation. If Mr. Short knew of my father’s affair, ought I be glad or horrified? Horrified, I decided, and tried to deflect suspicion. “I suppose Papa has such tender sentiments toward his friends that he must see them off personally.”

  Mr. Short wasn’t fooled by my efforts. “You’re a good daughter, Patsy. But you must try to remember … it’s been nearly four years since he lost your mother.”

  My cheeks warmed. “I never forget it, for now I’m all he has.”

  A vigorous shake of his head released a lock of sandy hair to shadow his eyes. “No, Patsy. That’s not true.”

  “It is true.” My chest rose and fell swiftly under the weight of my obligation. I couldn’t bear for anything to tempt Papa’s melancholy to return. And I was the only one who co
uld protect him from it. “Our kin are far across the sea. Even if they weren’t, I’m the only one who understands… .” I trailed off, twice as convinced. “I am all Papa has.”

  “Patsy, you’re much mistaken,” he said with insistence, standing so close that the weight of his presence steadied me. “Mr. Jefferson has me, too. He’s a father to me, and ours is a bond of affection that cannot be broken. I honor him. He’s the beating pulse of every cause dear to me. He may always rely upon me, and so may you.”

  The words were a balm to my heart. Mr. Short had repaid my father’s patronage with a devotion as clear-eyed as it was ardent. He’d seen my father in strength and weakness, cleaving to his side no matter how his fortunes rose or fell.

  Dear Mr. Short.

  Knowing that there existed someone else who cared so much for Papa was the greatest relief. And for the first time, I felt understood. I believed Mr. Short understood me completely. It was such a revelation that it felt oddly intimate, forcing me to take a step back. “Thank you—”

  The jingle and clatter of a carriage sounded from the front of the house. I headed for the stairs, with Mr. Short following, knowing it must be Papa returned from his ill-advised adventure. My father’s face was white as a bedsheet, each step costing him a great deal. Mr. Short poured a glass of amber liquor for Papa, who emptied it with a grimace. In a flat voice that invited no discussion, my father said, “Go to bed, Patsy.”

  I was forever being sent to bed early, but what argument could I make to convince him that I should stay? When Papa was in such a dark mood, he wouldn’t hear me. His wrist clearly pained him, but there was something else. Something else terribly wrong. And I knew that it must have something to do with Maria.

  Acid flooded into my stomach at the realization that Mrs. Cosway had said or done something. Maybe she had quarreled with Papa. I was desperate to know how she returned him to such melancholy, but I dared not ask because I was afraid he’d taken this woman to his heart—a heart he pledged forever to my mother on her deathbed. Having captured that heart, was it possible that Maria had shattered it?

  If so, perhaps it was no more than he deserved.

  Angry, I pushed up from my chair. “Good night, Papa.”

  But it wasn’t a good night. And my father’s mood failed to improve. Indeed, much of the weekend he closed himself in his chamber struggling to write with his uninjured left hand, with which his penmanship was quite poor. Each time I entered to check on him, he scrambled to secure the pages. He didn’t fool me, of course. I knew he was writing to her. He was writing a secret letter to a married woman. And I knew that it must be a shameful letter if he wouldn’t even let Mr. Short write it for him.

  What new kind of madness was this?

  I feared he had written a love letter—which Maria Cosway might use to embarrass him. Worse, I feared he’d written a plea for her to leave her husband and take up notorious residence as my father’s illicit lover. Such scandalous arrangements were not uncommon in France. Indeed, they were common enough for my classmates at the convent to discuss them in excited whispers. But they’d destroy Papa’s reputation with our countrymen. And, as Papa had said of the French queen, reputation is everything.

  Of course, I’d also heard him say that a person ought to give up money, fame, and the earth itself, rather than do an immoral act. Ask yourself how you’d act if all the world was looking and act accordingly. This was the advice Papa gave all the men who looked up to him. He said it to his nephews, to Mr. Madison, to Mr. Monroe, and to Mr. Short. He’d also given this advice to me.

  But in the matter of Mrs. Cosway, he seemed to have forgotten it.

  So it was that I found myself doing a dishonorable thing, telling myself that I was doing so in order to protect Papa from his own folly. Having heard my father give instructions that his secret letter should be posted to Maria Cosway, I decided that I must find the letter before Mr. Short had the chance to seal it. Reading Papa’s private letters would be wrong, and I knew that, but I could think of no other way.

  I dared not sit upon the stiff-backed desk chair for fear it might make the floorboards creak beneath my feet, so I held my skirts tight in one hand while sifting through the stack of letters with the other. My fingers brushed an envelope so thick it formed a packet and my heart dropped. I pulled it from the pile, knowing before I saw the address it was the one I sought.

  Dread washed over me as I unfolded the pages.

  My hand shaking, I read Papa’s secret words.

  My heart suddenly beat in my throat.

  He characterized himself as more dead than alive?

  The words pulled me into the past, into the woods surrounding Monticello upon Caractacus’s strong back, into our wandering journeys looking for a ship to set sail, into the time when Papa still yearned for the grave. I thought him quite beyond that, quite recovered, but he still claimed, in this extraordinary letter, to feel more fit for death than life.

  And oh, how furious it made me to read it! It was one thing for Papa to have longed to die of grief for my mother, but to feel that impulse over this … this … this foreign harlot? Anger and panic tingled up my spine and my gaze flew over Papa’s words, some of which leaped up from the parchment as he likened himself to a gloomy monk, sequestered from the world. Had the promise he made never to remarry left him to compare himself to a monk? My gaze rushed on. “The human heart knows no joy which I have not lost, no sorrow of which I have not drank.” The sentiment made my chest tighten, and then I gasped as Papa expressed his wish that Mrs. Cosway never suffer widowhood, but that he, above all men, could offer solace if she did.

  It wasn’t difficult to see Papa’s fantasy through the thin veil of his prose: he wished not only for Mrs. Cosway to be his mistress, but perhaps even for her husband to die so that she might come to live with us at Monticello. Despair rushed through me. This letter was such a betrayal of my mother’s memory that I was eager to hurl it into the fire!

  Intending to destroy the letter—every scrap of it—I returned my attention to the pile of letters to make sure that I had all the pages. That’s when my gaze landed upon my own name within the missive that sat atop the stack. Not in my father’s handwriting, but in the hand of Mr. Short. It was a scribbled note to a painter of some renown, from whom my father had commissioned a miniature of himself to give as a gift to Maria Cosway.

  Mr. Short might have taken it upon himself to cancel such an unwise commission—but instead, he requested the painter make another miniature for me. More astonishingly, Mr. Short asked the painter to pretend the request came from my father. This gesture, at once thoughtful, gallant, and modest, moved me deeply. It also shamed me, for there I was, snooping about in Mr. Short’s desk.

  I began to wonder how many times Mr. Short had secretly interceded on my behalf. How many men with such responsibilities would take the time to worry after the feelings of a girl? How had I betrayed the trust of such a friend, even if my intentions were good? The full measure of my wickedness sank in, like a stone dropping to the bottom of the sea, when the door creaked open.

  Mr. Short caught me where I should not be, still clutching my father’s love letter. Given the soft look of reproach in his eyes, he knew just what I’d come here for and why. He came toward me, reaching wordlessly for the letter. “Don’t make me wrestle it away from you, Patsy.”

  I couldn’t excuse myself—nor could I lie. Red-faced and miserable in my guilt, I let him take it from me, but pleaded, “Pray throw that letter in the fire!”

  He replied with an indulgent chuckle. “I’d never do such a thing. Every shining word that flows from your father’s pen is a national treasure.”

  He was jesting, but I couldn’t smile. “You don’t know what’s in that letter, or how it might embarrass Papa or sully his honor.” I hated that I had to speak the words, but it was better than admitting that my father was slipping back into the state of mind that nearly ruined him.

  Mr. Short gave a rueful sigh. “I
have a rather good idea of what’s in this letter. Your father confided that it was a debate between the wishes of his heart and the restraint of his intellect.”

  Stung that Papa had confided in Mr. Short what he wouldn’t confide in me, I said, “Then you know it’s better burned. He compared himself to a lonely monk! How can he still be so unhappy when he has your company and mine?”

  Mr. Short started to reply, then snapped his mouth shut again before giving a rueful little shake of his head. “Oh, Patsy.”

  My nostrils flared at his condescension. “Didn’t you tell me that my father may rely upon you? Isn’t it your duty to keep him from making an error in judgment? Sending this letter would be a grave error!”

  “Patsy, it’s the very essence of liberty that a person be allowed to err.”

  And we both knew how I had erred in being there like a thief in the night.

  Mr. Short met my eyes. “Besides, I’m the last man on earth who may judge another for unwise associations and attachments.”

  He must’ve meant the notorious women of whom he and I had once spoken. The Belle of Saint-Germain and the married Rosalie, the Duchess de La Rochefoucauld. But something made me dare to hope that Mr. Short aimed this pointed remark at me. Was he forming an attachment to me and did he think it unwise?

  And yet, his apparent reference to those women made my face heat such that it took me a moment to find my voice. “It’s for God to judge, but perhaps you can advise Papa against—”

  “I’ve advised your father to make a long trip to the south of France.”

  So he’d counseled my papa to go somewhere he might forget Mrs. Cosway; perhaps it was good counsel. I didn’t wish to be left behind in Paris, but I wouldn’t be lonely. I had friends at the convent and no harm came to my father when he traveled to London, save for the snubbing at the hands of the English king… .

  As if to forestall objection, Mr. Short added, “He can use the trip to investigate commercial opportunities that will enable our new nation to meet its financial obligations. It will keep him busy.”