To persuade me of it.
I’d watched him climb and claw his way back again when he slipped. And I loved him best when, in cold adversity, he’d find within himself the spark of his genius and stoke it to an inferno. But I didn’t need him to blaze with glory. I only needed his love.
Anger, after all, does not obliterate love, I thought.
And I still loved him as strongly as the day I first consented to be his wife, perhaps stronger now that I knew him better. In these moments, which might be my last, I had to honor that love or die bitter and alone. “You were never unworthy of me, Alexander. If anything, I’ve been unworthy of you. I’ve not been the wife that you’ve needed. I hope you’ll forgive it.”
“You have been the best of wives and best of women, beyond what I deserve—”
“Alexander,” I broke in, belatedly realizing that though he’d failed me, I’d failed him, too. I’d known how to be a soldier’s wife. I’d grown up knowing. Be strong, be brave, be like my mother. But I’d had no inkling of how to be Alexander Hamilton’s wife.
And how could I? How could any woman know how to be the wife of a lightning rod? A man who electrified his enemies as well as his friends. He was not merely a soldier nor a statesman. He was a man who was, almost single-handedly, forging an economy, a government, and a nation. He didn’t need the Finest Tempered Girl in the World.
He was a lion who had needed a lioness. And I had been a lamb.
I’d been too attached to our friendship with the Burrs to have foreseen or prevented that betrayal. Too awed by Jefferson’s reputation and eloquence to suspect him for the cold-blooded Jacobin that he was. And too fond of James Madison to suspect he might be an enemy in truth.
And now, when we were so soon to meet our maker, I wished that I’d never threatened to abandon my husband. It had made me feel stronger to threaten it, it made me feel more valuable to put him in fear. But now I wanted our marriage to be a fortress against all fear in this world and the next. “Please forgive me, Alexander, as I forgive you.”
In the midst of that peaceful, country field, he stopped me with a hand upon my elbow. “You forgive me?”
“For everything. With all my heart.” I reached for his hand, which he took and squeezed like a drowning man.
And yet he didn’t look convinced. “You say this only because you want to die at peace with me. But what if we live? Can you live with—” He shook his head and swallowed, as if remembering our last quarrel. “Can you choose each morning to live with me in forgiveness, despite what I’ve done?”
What had he done, after all? He’d put his hands on another woman. He’d taken momentary pleasure in guttural breaths and animal spasms. Yes, Alexander had done violence to my feelings and to my pride and to our wedding vows. But it all seemed so transient, so temporal now. For whatever wrongs he’d done me, he’d also given me a happier life than I’d believed myself destined for. He’d opened my heart and my mind; he’d taught me to think and to see injustice where I’d not seen it before. He’d taught me to stand for righteous causes. I could do more.
And if I lived, I would do more.
But first, I forgave my husband. Because I was a Christian, because I loved him, and because I must never allow Maria Reynolds to define us. “I do so choose to live with you, Alexander Hamilton,” I said, as if it were a wedding vow. “In forgiveness and grace and love, so long as we draw breath.”
I expected he would kiss me.
But either the illness or the weight of my words forced his knees to go soft. He lowered himself onto the grass of that isolated field, where insects buzzed amongst wildflowers, and the coming harvest stood in a golden line in the distance. And I sat beside him in the waning sun as we leaned, shoulder to shoulder.
“You mustn’t think that what I did stems from some deficiency in you,” he said. “The fault was mine. And I’ll make of myself a better husband, Betsy. I promise you.”
“And I will be a different wife,” I vowed. I wasn’t entirely sure how yet, but I felt more like a woman and less of a girl than I’d ever before been. “I think . . . I should prefer henceforth to be called Eliza. Or Elizabeth. Not Betsy.”
He nodded, clearly moved, his eyes blazing from blue to violet in the late-day sun. “So be it, my Eliza.”
Of course, starting anew depended on our surviving. But, for now, we had this moment. “Perhaps . . . should we write our last wishes while we’re still capable?”