The Scarlet Pimpernel · Chapter
XII: The Scrap of Paper explained
At Lord Grenville's ball, Marguerite Blakeney, tormented by Chauvelin's ultimatum to betray the Scarlet Pimpernel or sacrifice her brother Armand, observes Sir Andrew Ffoulkes receive a secret note from Lord Hastings.
What happens
At Lord Grenville's ball, Marguerite Blakeney, tormented by Chauvelin's ultimatum to betray the Scarlet Pimpernel or sacrifice her brother Armand, observes Sir Andrew Ffoulkes receive a secret note from Lord Hastings. Feigning faintness, she distracts Sir Andrew, knocks over a candelabra, and in the chaos reads the note—a message in the same disguised hand and with the red star-flower device she saw before. She then playfully allows him to burn it, concealing her discovery.
Themes in this chapter
Secrecy and Trust
Marguerite's deception of Sir Andrew and her hidden reading of the note underscore the theme of broken trust and hidden agendas.
Love and Betrayal
Marguerite's love for Armand compels her to betray the League's secret, while her marriage to Percy is strained by mutual ignorance.
Courage and Risk
Marguerite risks her social standing and safety to spy on Sir Andrew, driven by desperation and courage.
Characters to notice
- Marguerite Blakeney
Torn between love for her brother and horror at Chauvelin's demands; she cunningly intercepts and reads the secret note.
- Sir Percy Blakeney
Present at the ball, recites the doggerel about the Scarlet Pimpernel, then retires to the card-room, oblivious to Marguerite's turmoil.
- Sir Andrew Ffoulkes
Receives the secret note from Lord Hastings; is outmaneuvered by Marguerite and burns the note, unaware she has read it.
- Chauvelin
Not physically present, but his ultimatum drives Marguerite's actions throughout the chapter.
- Armand St. Just
The brother whose life hangs in the balance, motivating Marguerite's desperate spying.
- Suzanne de Tournay
Seen in earnest conversation with Sir Andrew; her family's rescue is part of the League's plan.
- Lord Hastings
Slyly slips the secret note to Sir Andrew, setting the chapter's central intrigue in motion.
Key passages
“Vaguely she began to wonder, as she looked at the brilliant and fashionable in the gaily-lighted ballroom, which of these worldly men round her was the mysterious 'Scarlet Pimpernel,' who held the threads of such daring plots, and the fate of valuable lives in his hands.”
Scanning the glittering crowd, she wondered which of these elegant gentlemen could be the elusive Scarlet Pimpernel, master of dangerous conspiracies and keeper of many lives.
Marguerite's curiosity about the Pimpernel's identity intensifies.
“Now Lady Blakeney had suddenly ceased to exist. It was Marguerite St. Just who was there only: Marguerite St. Just who had passed her childhood, her early youth, in the protecting arms of her brother Armand.”
In that moment, her identity as Lady Blakeney vanished; she became simply Marguerite St. Just, the girl who had grown up under her brother Armand's care.
Her primal loyalty to Armand overrides her social persona.
“She felt like one condemned to death, living her last day upon this earth.”
She felt as if she were a prisoner on death row, experiencing her final hours.
Marguerite's intense emotional state at the ball.
“We seek him here, we seek him there, Those Frenchies seek him everywhere. Is he in heaven?—Is he in hell, That demmed, elusive Pimpernel?”
We search for him here and there, the French hunt him everywhere. Is he in heaven or in hell? That damned, elusive Pimpernel.
Sir Percy's mocking verse about the Scarlet Pimpernel, which becomes a popular refrain.
