Chapter Twenty-Two
September 1791
Philadelphia
AFTER A BLISSFUL summer with my family in Albany, I returned to a new house. Situated just across the street from the president’s mansion in Philadelphia, it was bigger and more majestic in every way with Corinthian pilasters, dentil molding, and arched windows. My new drawing room alone was twenty-five feet square, and Lady Washington’s voice echoed in its empty confines. “How lovely.”
It was lovely. It was also more than I thought we could afford on my husband’s paltry government salary. But when I expressed this worry, Alexander said he’d take a loan from Angelica’s husband, and that we must keep up appearances.
Perhaps Lady Washington agreed, because she leaned in to confide, “I shall be so grateful for you to entertain here, in my place.”
“I could never take your place,” I said.
Though I knew she was weary and longed for the quiet solitude of Mount Vernon when she confided, “They call me the first lady in the land and think I must be extremely happy, but they might more properly call me the chief state prisoner.”
I laughed. “Then I certainly would not wish to take your place, even if I could.”
A sparkle came to her eye. “Oh, but you’re too young to deny yourself the pleasure. When I was your age, I enjoyed the innocent gayeties of life. Thanks to the kindness of our numerous friends, my new and unwished-for situation is not too much a burden. That is why I am delighted we are closer neighbors. With a little bit of furnishing, this fine new house shall become the social center of the city.”
Should that prove true, I would rise to the occasion. I’d learned from my mother how to set a fine table and behave with decorum. I’d learned from my sister how to dress and to flatter. I now knew how to preside over a grand salon, and Hamilton expected no less from me.
“It will need lights,” I said, fretfully, hoping that my sister could send me elegant chandeliers and torchères from London. Rustic lights and lanterns would not do for the secretary of the treasury, for whom our previous abode had become suddenly unbearable. Too small for a growing family, my husband said. Too small for a man of his stature, he meant, a man whose portrait now hung in City Hall. A man whose department of government was growing every day, and whose power grew larger with it.
Certainly my husband’s physical stature had become somewhat larger. Sedentary toil had taken its toll. But I rather liked the softer lines of Alexander’s face, and the new weight of his arms around me, as if it somehow made his need for me more substantial. In truth, I liked it so well that when the winter’s snow came, I wasn’t surprised to discover I was again with child. And my husband startled at my suggestion for a name, should it be a boy. “John?”
“After your friend,” I said, gently, hoping to please him. But instead of it drawing him closer to me, he stared into the distance. To prevent the complete retreat that any mention of John Laurens inevitably occasioned, I quickly added, “And after my brother-in-law. If Church brings Angelica home, I could forgive him everything. It cannot hurt to remind the man of his family bonds in America . . .”
Hamilton nodded, slowly. “Clever. I fear I have finally corrupted you and turned you into a politician.”
“Never,” I replied, for I was still sometimes too earnest for the insincerity and idle gossip that served as currency amongst politicians and their wives. I disliked immensely the game I called Who Is Out of Fashion, in which the ladies of the town seemed to collectively decide who must be shunned for some embarrassing faux pas, exaggerated sleight—or even for wearing the wrong gown. Lady Washington’s dignity was such that she transcended the game, and my dear Hamilton teased that I was too much of an angel to know the rules. But I did know the rules of the game. I just didn’t wish to play.
Especially not now, when my husband was a man of fraying nerves.
Darting in and out of the house for meetings at irregular hours. Short-tempered with the children—even the girls, whom he doted on. If I didn’t know his urgency about the country’s business—and a vengeful obsession with keeping Aaron Burr from running for governor of New York—I might have suspected something nefarious afoot.
Especially when, one afternoon in December of 1792, my husband advised me not to answer the door to strangers when he wasn’t at home. “Are we in some danger?” I asked.
Snapping open a gazette, Alexander said, “It’s only that I have enemies in this city who would be happy to abuse my wife’s ears. And you’re too far gone with child to risk any unhappiness.”