Let’s back
up just a tad. One of Mary’s recent friends was Isabella Robinson, a young
unwed mother—and Mary helped Isabella conceal her situation from society. And—almost impossible to believe—from
Isabella’s own family, none of whom ever
seemed to know that she had been pregnant or
that she’d delivered a child, daughter Adeline, an infant Isabella immediately
sent to stay with a wet nurse.
Had the news
of any of this emerged, of course,
Isabella would have been ruined. With Mary’s aid, she began presenting herself (to
those who did not know her) as one “Mrs. Douglas,” and Mary helped her
construct an elaborate plan to escape to the Continent with her child—and with
a husband.
The plot
thickens.
As I’ve
mentioned, another of Mary’s friends, Mary Diana Dods (aka “Doddy”), was
writing and publishing as “David Lyndsay.” But Dods’ story was even more
complicated. She cross-dressed, too, easily passing as a man. And so—with Mary
Shelley’s encouragement—she adopted the identity of a man, Walter Sholto
Douglas, and agreed to pass herself off as the husband of Isabella.
They
successfully acquired passports and escaped to Paris, where Mary visited them
in April 1828. Isabella and “Walter” would live together as husband and wife
for about two years. And no one, it seems, was ever the wiser.
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