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By Root 1408 0

determined to hook an heiress. He faced a lot of competition. Contemporary newspapers were full of advertisements for "a Girl of moderate fortune, who hath the good sense and generosity to prefer a good husband to a rich one" from a "young man of liberal education" using an address at a coffeehouse for correspondence.10 As a minor aristocrat with just £500 a year, which wasn't much by their standards, and onerous debts, famous only for having a gorgeous mistress displayed in sexy poses in galleries and print shops across town, Greville was not much of a catch. Only if Sir William confirmed him as his heir could he attract the interest of wealthy women. As he wrote to his uncle, "suppose a lady of 30,000 was to marry me, the interest of her fortune would not prove equal to her pretentions" unless "your goodness should ensure me at a future period an estate which would come hereafter." Everything depended on him winning Sir William to his cause. If he wanted to grab an heiress, he would have to do it before his amorous uncle found a new wife.

CHAPTER 17

Negotiations

The thought of your coming home so soon makes me so happy, I don't know what to do," Emma gushed to her lover from Parkgate in August 1784. When she returned from the seaside, Greville allowed her to bring her daughter to live with her while he searched for another establishment for the child. Sir William left a month or so later to return to Naples before the weather turned too harsh to travel, and she waved him off, still buoyant and happy. Sir William nodded and smiled indulgently when she told him how much she was looking forward to seeing him again. Greville, he knew, was about to cast her off

After turning Emma into the epitome of the virtuous housewife, Greville was no longer attracted to her. In fact, he had begun on a secret double life (so secret that it has never been noted). He was having an affair with Elizabeth, Lady Craven, a playwright and daring socialite who was separated from her husband. Lady Craven gave no precise dates for the affair but boasted that when Greville left his position as treasurer to the royal household, which he did in late 1783, his leisure "was bestowed on me."1 He spent as much of his time with her as he could, leaving Emma to pose for Romney entertain Sir William, and play with her daughter. The less he saw his mistress, the less he desired her.

Although Greville was falling out of love with Emma, he continued to feel responsible for her. He did not want to simply abandon her, as Sir Harry had done, but he could not afford to pension her off, and he knew she would make violent scenes—perhaps even in public—when he rejected her. By December, he was weary of little Emma, and he found a Mr. and Mrs. Blackburn in Manchester who would raise her with their daughters and send her to school, guaranteeing discretion for a high fee. When their maid came to collect the child in the second week of the month, Emma was devastated, and Greville was infuriated by her distress, hardening his resolve to dispose of her, even though he had no idea how to do it. At the same time, he heard that his uncle had proposed to a cultured young widow, Lady Clarges, who he thought "would suit me well."2 She turned him down, but Greville knew he might not be so lucky next time.

Christmas gave Greville time to think. By the beginning of 1785, he had developed an audacious plan: to send Emma to Sir William as his mistress. In one fell swoop, he would put someone else into the Palazzo Sessa to discourage canny widows and foist on his uncle the responsibility of giving Emma a pension. He prepared his mistress to obey, pressing her to read the flurry of moralizing tales that suddenly appeared in the European Magazine. As his friends wrote for the magazine, it is perhaps no coincidence that at the moment when he wanted to dispose of Emma, it began to publish tales about how Cleora was ruined because she was too fond of her own way, while Louisa was obsessed with praise and "vainly imagines that those that admire her are always her adorers."3

Greville