| Everyone has already noticed how often Beckett Longbottom and Helga Scamander have been seen in each other's company, which begs the question: why hasn't anything come of it? | Helga Scamander: Hidden Scandal? Miss Helga Scamander: a debutante that many socialites assumed was destined for greatness, a year or two ago. Now, the merry miss has entered her fifth season, which as anyone knows all but marks her for spinsterhood. She may still be relatively young in years, since she debuted immediately following Hogwarts, but if no one has taken a liking to her after five seasons what reason does anyone have to believe her next five seasons will be any different? Some think Miss Scamander has set her sights too high and been a touch too picky in the types of men whose affections she encourages. It is no secret to anyone with eyes that she desires a wealthy, pureblood husband (despite the fact that she herself comes from only modest means and a family riddled with oddities and social stigmas), and she seems particularly to have set her sights on one Mr. Beckett Longbottom, a well-connected but chronically unattached bachelor engaged in the Quidditch industry. Miss Scamander has been seen frequently in his presence, including quite recently at the Sanditon opening ball, where the blush on her cheeks indicated she was as smitten as ever. And why not be smitten? Mr. Longbottom is wealthy, well-connected, from a family of impeccable breeding and of at least moderate good looks. As some of our readers may know, he is also an incorrigible flirt, which is good enough reason for any woman who considers herself charmed by him not to set her hopes too high. While all of society understands Beckett Longbottom to be a man of considerable charm but no substance, Miss Scamander may have learned this particular lesson too late. The two evidently met after Miss Scamander's second season (the beginning of the end for a debutante, but not yet the point of total desperation), and we believe that Mr. Longbottom may have charmed Miss Scamander right into a position that no lady ought to find herself in. If so, this would certainly explain how smitten she has been with him ever since — what lady can ever forget her first moments of intimacy? — but may also explain why she has remained so long unmarried despite having some advantages which ought to have worked in her favor by now. Mr. Longbottom is well-connected, so if he did take Miss Scamander's virtue it is likely that every eligible bachelor in magical London knows of it; rakes do like to brag. No other gentleman would deign to make a wife of someone else's cast-off, and certainly Mr. Longbottom himself would never marry her after he had already sullied her. While some women think that offering themselves to gentlemen will speed the engagement along, let us warn our readers that this sort of thing only happens in romance novels. In real life, men would never marry a woman they know to be so loose with her virtue unless forced to do so by outside influences. And clearly, no one is around to force Mr. Longbottom. Miss Scamander may have been lucky to escape the fate of an unwed mother (or did she? the timing of the birth of her 'nephew' begins to look a little suspect in this light...) but she seems destined for the life of a spinster, all due to youthful folly. Readers take note: hers is a cautionary tale. No rakish man, being satisfied before the wedding night, will ever make a dutiful husband. |
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