The Pimpernel Fails to Show, by Baroness Orczy

Time-lapse... Citizen Chauvelin waited in the dining-room at Lord Grenville’s ball for the Pimpernel to meet his confederate. But there was no one there apart from Sir Percy Blakeney, Marguerite’s silly society husband, and he was fast asleep.

The Pimpernel Fails to Show

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“CHAUVELIN,” she said at last desperately, “I must know what has happened.”

“What has happened, dear lady?” he said, with affected surprise. “Where? When?”

“You are torturing me, Chauvelin. I have helped you to-night … surely I have the right to know. What happened in the dining-room at one o’clock just now?”

She spoke in a whisper, trusting that in the general hubbub of the crowd her words would remain unheeded by all, save the man at her side.

“Quiet and peace reigned supreme, fair lady; at that hour I was asleep in one corner of one sofa and Sir Percy Blakeney in another.”

“Nobody came into the room at all?”

“Nobody.”

“Then we have failed, you and I?”

“Yes! we have failed — perhaps …”

“But Armand?” she pleaded.

“Ah! Armand St. Just’s chances hang on a thread … pray heaven, dear lady, that that thread may not snap.”

by Baroness Orczy 1865-1947

abridged

Abridged from ‘The Scarlet Pimpernel’ by Emma Orczy (1865-1947).

Précis

Chauvelin waits in Lord Grenville’s dining-room for the ‘Scarlet Pimpernal’ to appear. However, no one turns up at the appointed hour; Chauvelin is alone, except for a sleeping Sir Percy Blakeney. Marguerite begs for Chauvelin’s assurance that her brother might yet be saved, but he relishes keeping her in fear and doubt.

Questions for Critics

1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?

2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate her ideas more effectively?

3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?

Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.

Sevens

Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.

Why did Marguerite accuse of Chauvelin of torturing her?

Jigsaws

Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.

Sir Percy Blakeney was in the dining-room at one o’clock. He was asleep on a sofa. No one else came in.

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