Victorians! discussion

Welcome to Week 7! This week we hear the rest of Franklin’s testimony. At first it seems he will never learn the truth... but a mysterious gentleman hold the key.

Second Period: The Discovery of the Truth 1848-1849 (several narratives)

Week 7
Third Narrative Ch. 7-10
Mr. Franklin Blake, cousin of Rachel Verinder

Lover and Lawyer conspire to force a confrontation with Rachel. They suspect that she believes him guilty of theft based on Roseanna’s influence. To his horrified surprise, Rachel confesses that she saw him steal her diamond with her own eyes. That she believes him to have been a deceitful manipulator in the “search” for the stone. Finally, we have the secret to her strange behavior…. Rachel has protected her thieving, two-faced lover with her silence, while condemning him in her heart. Franklin leaves her with the promise that he will prove his innocence or never see her again.

In the aftermath, Franklin pursues everyone who was at the birthday party in hopes of gaining more information about the events of the evening. He is repeatedly thwarted in this pursuit… Cuff is in Ireland; Abelwhite has gone abroad; Clack is in France; Murthwaite has returned to his travels; and Dr. Candy has become a shell of his former self due to illness.

In leaving Dr. Candy, Franklin connects with Ezra Jennings, who has key information gained in his care of Dr. Candy. Ezra makes a daring proposal on how to discover what actually happened on the night the diamond disappeared.

Questions
1. Franklin seems genuinely surprised by her revelation. Is Rachel’s secret what you expected?
2. Do you find it suspicious that everyone from the birthday dinner is unreachable? How does this device help the author’s plot?
3. What inferences can we make from the information about Godfrey’s life since the party?
4. How does Ezra Jennings change the trajectory of the plot? Does his experiment seem likely to succeed?

I remember being very much surprised by Rachel's confession. I never thought she could be suspecting Franklin. The confession puts an intriguing front to the story. Rachel has seen Franklin taking the diamond, so in her eyes, he is the thief. But why did he take it? What happened to it afterward? And above all, why can't he remember all this? Is he play-acting or genuine? At this point, I will still hold for Franklin's innocence. The confidence with which he vows to clear himself or never to see her again is a plus point in his favor in my opinion.

It's nice finally to know the real reason for Rachel's behavior. Her position was awkward and I felt sorry for her. She loved Franklin, so, had to protect him. But it must have been hard, believing that she was protecting a thief!

Agreed!
How awful to watch your beloved lie and manipulate to throw suspicion off his own devious deeds! (Or so she believed.)

I

Both Rachel’s revelation and Ezra Jenning’s notes helped a great deal in understanding how Franklin and Rachel could both be believed. Their meeting was electric. I loved the way they couldn’t stop holding each other, demonstrating their physical and emotional bond, whilst being mentally so far apart. Franklin could have wilted under Rachel’s barrage, but he stood his ground. His final words to her proved his love, his innocence ( I believe) and a determination to get to the truth.

(See images at links below) "You villain, I saw you take the Diamond with my own eyes."
https://victorianweb.org/victorian///...

”She caught me by the arm and barred my way out…… Why did you come here?" she persisted, desperately. "I ask you again — why did you come here? Are you afraid I shall expose you? Now you are a rich man, now you have got a place in the world, now you may marry the best lady in the land — are you afraid I shall say the words which I have never said yet to anybody but you? I can't say the words! I can't expose you! I am worse, if worse can be, than you are yourself." Sobs and tears burst from her. She struggled with them fiercely; she held me more and more firmly. "I can't tear you out of my heart," she said, "even now! You may trust in the shameful, shameful weakness which can only struggle against you in this way!" She suddenly let go of me — she threw up her hands, and wrung them frantically in the air. "Any other woman living would shrink from the disgrace of touching him!" she exclaimed. "Oh, God! I despise myself even more heartily than I despise him!".”
https://victorianweb.org/victorian///...
…. "You shall know that you have wronged me, yet," I said. "Or you shall never see me again!"

The fact that none of the original party attendees were available only added to Franklin’s frustration and ramped up the tension, but Ezra Jennings, despised by almost everyone, came to his rescue. It was a clever device to render the doctor incapable of remembering his actions otherwise the issue of how the jewel had been taken from the cabinet would have been revealed the day after the robbery.

Wilkie Collin’s own use of laudanum must have led him to believe that a jewel can be unknowingly stolen whilst under the influence of the drug and then to decide to insert it into the plot of The Moonstone. Ezra’s notes certainly point towards that solution. However, Franklin has an unlikely (and not well liked) ally, so it might prove difficult to convince Rachel and the others that the experiment is no more than a trick designed to make Franklin seem innocent.

Such a moving scene! My heart went out to both of them!

I didn't expect the opium to become a device! Yikes!

Right?

I had also wondered how Franklin could commit the theft without knowing it. Looking ahead to the solution.