Perdita: The Life of Mary Robinson. Paula Byrne

Scandal. But Lyttelton wanted to be more than Mary’s friend and companion. He expected a payoff for the investment he had made in the Robinsons. When he realized that flattery was not the way to her bed, he tried a more perverse route: he insulted her in public and ‘affected great indifference’ in a vain attempt to excite her interest. He mocked her for being young and insipid and when she lost her temper he would apologize for making the ‘pretty child angry’. He would repeatedly call her ‘the child’ in public to humiliate her. He mocked her literary endeavours and her thwarted plans to play Cordelia at Drury Lane. His final resort was to get to her through her weak husband. He embarked upon a strategy of ruination and bankruptcy for Robinson, taking him to gaming houses and brothels, ‘the haunts of profligate debasement’.¹² They were seen often at the races, at Ascot and Epsom.

      Whilst Robinson led a riotous life, gambling, drinking, and womanizing with his aristocratic friends, his pregnant wife was left neglected and alone. She missed the counsel of her mother, who had repaired to Bristol with young George to help him recuperate from illness. Mary blamed Lyttelton for the change in her husband’s behaviour. In her Memoirs she said that she reacted by devoting her time to poetry, but this picture of her confined existence devoted to literary pursuits is contradicted by her own claim that ‘Dress, parties, adulation, occupied all my hours.’¹³

      As her pregnancy advanced in the summer of 1774 she felt resentful that she was being left alone without protection or companionship. One of the most pernicious effects of her husband’s neglect was the temptation opened up by her countless admirers. The ‘most dangerous’ rake was George Fitzgerald, whose ‘manners towards women were interesting and attentive’. He sympathized with her plight of being left without her husband, then proclaimed his devotion. Though ‘surrounded by temptation, and mortified by neglect’, Mary did not waver.¹⁴

      It was not long before the couple plunged into debt. For all her claims that she knew little about their financial affairs, Mary was quite aware that they were living beyond their means – though when she did make enquiries about their financial position, her husband assured her that they were well provided for. Lyttelton promised to procure advancement for his young friend, though Thomas was sceptical that he would do anything for them.

      Lyttelton tried one last desperate attempt to win Mary away from her husband. With her usual aplomb for setting a scene, she describes the day when Lyttelton called upon her for a meeting, pleading important business. He told Mary that he had a secret to reveal about Robinson. Lyttelton then confessed to his part in alienating her husband’s ‘conjugal affections’, revealing that Thomas Robinson had a mistress, ‘a woman of abandoned character’ who lived in Princes Street, Soho. He told Mary that Robinson spent money on his mistress, money that they should have been saving for the birth of the baby. He even named the other woman: she was called Harriet Wilmot. Robinson visited her every day.

      Lyttelton made Mary promise not to tell her husband who was the source of the revelation. If she did, there would have to be a duel. Having reduced her to tears of sorrow and mortification, Lyttelton suggested that Mary should take revenge on her husband by placing herself under his protection: ‘You cannot be a stranger to my motives for thus cultivating the friendship of your husband; my fortune is at your disposal. Robinson is a ruined man; his debts are considerable, and nothing but destruction can await you. Leave him! Command my powers to serve you.’¹⁵

      Mary was mortified at the proposal, but she was also angry and determined enough to face her rival. Perhaps she was spurred by the memory that her mother had had to endure a similar revelation. The encounter in Soho is described in the Memoirs in the style of sentimental fiction. Needless to say, the virtuous young wife vanquishes the profligate mistress. With her novelist’s eye for detail, Mary recalled the dirty servant girl who let her into Miss Wilmot’s apartment, the incriminating new white silk underwear spread out on the bed, her beating heart as she heard Miss Wilmot’s footsteps approach the room.

      Mary’s rival was a handsome older woman who was visibly distressed by the presence of her lover’s pregnant young wife. Her lips were ‘as pale as ashes’. She did not deny the charges levelled against her, and as she drew off her gloves to cover her eyes, presumably from shame, Mary noticed Tom’s ring on her finger. Harriet tried to return the ring, to no avail. Mary refused to take it. Harriet said, ‘Had I known that Mr Robinson was the husband of such a woman—’ As Mary rose to leave, Harriet spoke, ‘I never will see him more – unworthy man – I never will again receive him.’ Mary swept out of the room without a further word. As usual, Mary remembered her costume for the occasion, as though she were an actress playing her part: she wore a morning dress of white muslin, with a white lawn cloak and a straw bonnet. Her rival was dressed in a printed Irish muslin and wore a black gauze cloak and a chip hat trimmed with lilac ribbons.¹⁶

      Devastated by the encounter as Mary claimed to be, she accompanied her husband to Drury Lane that evening with Lord Lyttelton. She concealed her true feelings and participated in the fun with her usual gusto. It was only in the morning that she confronted Robinson. He did not deny the charge. Mary learned that he had had another mistress at the time of their marriage, and that his infidelities were public knowledge. The extent of his debts also became clear to her. Robinson had got himself caught in the invidious position of borrowing money from loan sharks to pay off his creditors. He was deeply involved with King the moneylender. Indeed, ‘the parlour of our house was almost as much frequented by Jews as though it had been their synagogue’.¹⁷ Mary’s protestations that she was a ‘total stranger’ to the business transactions were, of course, untrue – John King had the proof of that.

      Despite Robinson’s infidelity, he is not depicted in Mary’s narrative as the outright villain of the piece. She presents her husband as weak and impressionable, rather than vicious. It was Lord Lyttelton she blamed. She despised him for the way he treated women, in particular for his contemptuous behaviour towards his estranged wife and his mistress, a Miss Dawson. The press suggested that Mary and Lyttelton were having an affair, a claim that she vehemently denied: ‘he was the very last man in the world for whom I ever could have entertained the smallest partiality; he was to me the most hateful of existing beings’.¹⁸

      Handsome George Fitzgerald was quite another matter: ‘his manners towards women were beautifully interesting’. He tried to seduce Mary on a warm summer’s evening at Vauxhall. The Robinsons stayed until the early hours of the morning and then while they were waiting for their carriage to take them home, Fitzgerald made his move. A late night quarrel broke out between two men and Robinson and Fitzgerald took off to view the commotion. Mary tried to follow but was soon lost in the throng of people. Later, only Fitzgerald returned. He took Mary towards the exit to wait for her husband. To her alarm, Fitzgerald’s carriage appeared as if out of nowhere and he tried to bundle Mary in. As the door swung open, she noticed a pistol in the pocket of the door. His servants, who were clearly in on the attempted abduction, kept at a discreet distance, while Fitzgerald grabbed Mary around the waist. She struggled free and ran back towards the entrance to the pleasure gardens, where she found her husband. Fitzgerald acted as though nothing had happened: ‘Here he comes!’ he exclaimed with an easy nonchalance, ‘we had found the wrong carriage, Mr Robinson, we have been looking after you, and Mrs Robinson is alarmed beyond expression.’ ‘I am indeed!’ replied Mary.¹⁹

      She decided to say nothing to Robinson for fear of repercussions: an advanced state of pregnancy was no time to lose one’s husband in a duel. ‘Fighting Fitzgerald’ was a brilliant shot. He killed eighteen men in the course of his duelling career, before being hanged. From that point on, Mary avoided Fitzgerald’s company despite – or because of – his charisma: ‘he was too daring, and too fascinating a being to be allowed the smallest marks of confidence’.

      As