Cinderella in Bath

Happy November! Are you doing NaNoWriMo? I'm not this year, but I have written a little something for you to (hopefully) enjoy today!

I recently realized that I love both Cinderella and Jane Austen for the same reason: the balls. The balls are my favorite part of every tale, not only because of the glamor, although that plays a big part too, but because of the possibility (which is also, come to think of it, my defense for liking airports); the possibility that a plain, poor, or shy girl could attract the attention–the admiration, even!–of a Prince Charming or a Lord Orville (read Evelina to get that last reference). What I like, in short, is the romance.

So here's my newest idea: a retelling of Cinderella set in Regency England.

Here's how I imagine it would go:

Elinor Burgess is the daughter of a respectably middle class gentleman. When Elinor is sixteen, her mother dies of consumption and Mr. Burgess, finding himself lonely, seeks another wife. The woman he settles on is Augusta Thorpe, the widow of an army captain, whose tastes, while unrefined, are ruinously above Mr. Burgess's means. Mrs. Thorpe has two daughters, Selina and Isabella, who quickly make Elinor the object of their scorn and ridicule, though she is better educated and much prettier than they.

Mr. Burgess soon realizes his mistake after the nuptials have taken place, but by that time it is too late. He slowly sinks into apathy, while Augusta Burgess (nee Thorpe) takes over the household, riding it to its steady financial demise as she indulges her expensive tastes. By Elinor's eighteenth birthday (which is marked by no gifts and no well wishes), it has become clear that the family will have to sell either their country estate or their house in town. Augusta Burgess, fancying the faster pace of London, wheedles Mr. Burgess into selling the estate. 

Once in London, however, Augusta finds the town home outdated and shabby, and proceeds to spend even more of their rapidly diminishing funds on decor updates. Soon enough, they are forced by pecuniary distress to dismiss all of their maids, footmen, and cooks, making Elinor the de facto servant of Augusta and her two vulgar daughters.

The only benefit that Elinor can see of their move to London is that she is reacquainted and becomes fast friends with Sophia Gray, a mantua maker who happens to be a distant cousin, and whom she has not seen since they were both very young.

Even in the midst of the Burgesses' dire financial straits, they attempt to keep up appearances by making use of Mr. Burgess's well-to-do connections in town. One of these connections is Lord Allen, a handsome and well-bred man of twenty-five with a large fortune at his disposal. Left to his own devices, he would be always riding, hunting, or reading at his country residence, but he has an intimate friend, a Mr. Tom Price, who is not so retiring and manages to convince him to host parties and balls for the fashionable set once or twice a year. Not many months after the Burgesses move to London, Lord Allen hosts his most elaborate ball yet, inviting all his acquaintance. A rumor begins to circulate hinting that Lord Allen is using this ball as an opportunity to look for a wife ...

Augusta, Selina, and Isabella are ecstatic to be invited to such a grand affair and immediately start planning their costumes. Elinor makes her own quiet preparations as well, patiently making over an old gown of her mother's. However, on the night of the ball, her stepmother forbids her to go while her stepsisters titter behind their hands at her. In a fit of malicious frenzy, the three tear Elinor's dress to ribbons and then leave in the Burgesses' aging coach.

Bitterly disappointed, Elinor flees to Sophia's shop, where she pours out her woes to her friend. Immediately, Sophia disappears to the back room and comes back a moment later with the most beautiful gown Elinor has ever seen. To her astonishment, it fits perfectly. With many expressions of thanks to Sophia, Elinor calls a hackney coach and speeds to the ball.

At Lord Allen's house, Elinor feels overwhelmed by the number of people and the glamor of the ballroom. She drifts to the side of the room and sits down, nervously keeping an eye out for her stepmother and stepsisters. She hasn't been seated long before a handsome gentleman makes his way over to her and asks for the honor of her hand in the next dance. Shyly, she accepts, not realizing that this is Lord Allen himself, as they haven't seen each other since she was five and he twelve. 

In dancing with Lord Allen, she quickly forgets all her worries. He engages her for every dance, until Sophia Gray suddenly appears just before midnight and draws Elinor aside, telling her that she must go home. Confused but trusting Sophia, Elinor rushes out without saying goodbye to Lord Allen. A hackney carries her home; Sophia has disappeared. Moments after Elinor has climbed the stairs to the top of the house where her room in the old servants' quarters are and has shut the door behind her, a disturbance arises below. Hastily taking off Sophia's ball gown and donning her own ragged dress, Elinor runs downstairs and finds Augusta and her two daughters returned without having even gone to the ball, as their carriage unaccountably broke down on the way to Lord Allen's house. Augusta is furious at losing the chance to toady up to a title.

The next day, Elinor goes to Sophia's shop to return the dress, but Sophia refuses to take it back, hinting that Elinor might need it again.

Soon after the ball, Augusta and her two daughters receive an invitation to spend a month at a better-off friend's home in Bath. They snatch at the opportunity and take Elinor along with them to act as a maid.

The friends in Bath turn out to be not much more genteel than Elinor's stepmother and stepsisters, and she finds herself happier in the company of the other maids, with whom she spends much of her time, as she is being forced to masquerade as a maid herself. Her only pleasures are writing letters to Sophia and sneaking out of the house to take long walks through the streets of Bath until the city turns into the country and she can feel the wind in her hair.

One day, as she is attending her stepsisters during the afternoon visiting hours, a gentleman and lady pay a call. Elinor keeps her gaze down, as befits a maid, until she feels the gentleman staring at her. Then she dares a quick glance up at his face and realizes that it is the very same gentleman she danced with at Lord Allen's ball (not realizing that it was Lord Allen himself). Their eyes meet, and quickly Elinor looks away. She is glad for the excuse to slip out of the room when, a few moments later, Selina requests her to go get a shawl. Instead of going upstairs to the girls' room and retrieving it, Elinor lets herself out into the garden and walks up and down (without a shawl or jacket, despite the autumn chill), trying to compose herself enough to go back inside. She doesn't go back until she hears the gentleman and lady's carriage depart. She can't help wondering who the lady was.

A few nights later, Selina and Isabella attend a public ball at the Bath Assembly Rooms. They leave Elinor at home–but she doesn't intend to stay there. Wondering if she might catch sight of the mysterious gentleman again, she dons the dress Sophia gave her and travels to the ball by herself an hour after her stepsisters leave. 

She doesn't see him at first, although she spots Selina and Isabella almost at once, and has to spend most of her energy avoiding them for the first half hour. Finally, she sees him making his way across the room–towards her! He solicits a dance from her, and afterwards, saying she looks flushed with heat, draws her towards a more private side room. There he asks her why she was being treated as a maid when he saw her last, and she explains her situation. She then ventures to ask the identity of the lady who was with him on that occasion, and he tells her it was his sister.

At this moment, Isabella bursts into the room and demands to know what Elinor is doing here–and then curtsies politely, if a little affectedly, to Lord Allen, addressing him by name. Elinor, shocked at the turn of events, leaves quickly, despite him calling after her. Her lodgings are no secret to him now, however, and the next day he pays a call–to ask for Elinor's hand in marriage. She accepts, and they are married in a month's time. Elinor wears Sophia's dress.

Sorry the ending was rushed, but I ran out of time! I'll be back next Wednesday with my October reading recap!