But the new Ghosts book (published on October 26th) shows that this unhappy accident cut Kitty’s life short mere days after her fortunes changed for the better: she’d found love!
The book includes several of Kitty’s diary entries, which mostly reinforce the notion that her sister Eleanor was a right knob, constantly taking advantage of her trusting nature to inflict cruel, near-deadly pranks.
The last entry was written just days before she died – 7th March 1780, to be precise – and describes a blissful night at one of Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens’ famous masquerade balls. Eleanor had once again woken up and chosen violence, luring Kitty into one of the gardens’ notoriously hard-to-navigate walkways, known as “dark walks”, in an attempt to get her lost, before running away.
But these disorienting “dark walks” were also known for their romantic potential, and just as Kitty starts to panic and fall, she finds herself “caught in the safe arms of a young gentleman… his eyes so kind and gentle. He helped me to my feet and inquired if I was alright.”
When Kitty explains she’s lost, her mysterious stranger offers to help her find her way back to the party adding (rather dreamily): “He said he did not know the way himself, but at least if we were to be lost, it would be together!”
On the way back, they bond over their love of “music and fashion and animals” (the unfailingly positive Kitty also lists “talking” and “listening” among their shared interests), and once Kitty is reunited with her father her new friend introduces himself as Ernest Moore: