The Season 4 premiere of Bridgerton offered us a look at the ball where our Cinderella, Sophie Baek, stealthily sneaked in and met her Prince Charming, Benedict Bridgerton. In Dpisode 2, we actually learn just how she managed to pull off her grand adventure, and what happens once her cruel stepmother, Lady Penwood, finds out about what she did.
Sophie (Yerin Ha) has spent weeks sewing a mask suitable for her stepsister Rosamund to wear to the masquerade ball being thrown at the Bridgerton home, but the mask has gone missing, so with just moments before their carriage is set to leave for the ball, Sophie is tasked with making a second one. Rosamund does find the original mask under her dressing table, but she blames Sophie for misplacing it, and declares Sophie jealous of her. All this to say that Rosamund is terrible and deserves to catch typhoid or consumption or whatever ailments even the wealthy can’t avoid.
So now that Sophie has a second mask made… well, it’d be a pity to let it go to waste. As Sophie’s fellow house staff, chef Irma and footman Alfie, listen to her bemoan the fact that Lady Penwood, Rosamund and Posy are so miserable that they won’t even appreciate how glorious an evening the ball will be, they convince Sophie to sneak in. “It’s only one night. One glorious night. All to yourself. Serving no one. Being a lady,” Alfie says dreamily. It’s a masquerade ball, after all, and no one will even suspect she’s there. Sophie dons the glittery silver mask, digs out an old gown and some gloves from the attic and a sparkling silver pair of shoes from Lady Penwood’s closet. The shoes are a risk, if Lady Penwood notices Sophie in them she’ll be done for, but Sophie takes that risk, saying, “Lady Penwood has more shoes than I can count. I doubt she will even notice.” (She will. Eventually.) For a hastily thrown-together outfit, it coordinates perfectly.
What follows is the most glorious night of Sophie’s life, one where she meets Benedict Bridgerton (Luke Thompson) and has a magical, fleeting moment of life as a real member of society. The thing is, Sophie should be a member of society, because the scene where she gets ready for the ball is not the only flashback in this episode. Throughout this episode, there are scenes from years earlier, when Sophie’s father, Lord Penwood, introduces his young daughter to his new wife, Araminta Gun (Katie Leung), who is now Lady Penwood. Sophie is introduced to her new stepmother as Lord Penwood’s ward, his illegitimate daughter from his relationship with a mistress. Lady Penwood is resentful of Sophie from the moment they meet, treating her cruelly and placing her own daughters in higher regard. Once Lord Penwood dies, Lady Penwood reveals to Sophie that she was left out of her father’s will and therefore, Sophie is entitled to nothing (this seems… false). But she adds that, as a kindness to Sophie, she’ll allow Sophie to live in the Penwood home… as a maid. It’s truly diabolical and backhanded, but Sophie has no other prospects, and that’s how she ends up going from having a noble father to working as a servant in her own home.
The fact that Sophie is not officially a noblewoman is making it difficult for Benedict to locate her. Without a name or address, he’s at a loss. He shows his sister Eloise (Claudia Jessie) the glove he has as a reminder of his time with Sophie –– honestly, it may as well be Sophie’s underpants, that’s how scandalous it is for him to possess it –– and she’s stunned that he’s showing this much interest in a woman. He knows this will fuel their mother’s desire for him to get married so he swears Eloise to secrecy about the glove and the woman once attached to it.
There is someone else who might be able to help Benedict locate the Lady in Silver, and that’s Penelope (Nicola Coughlan). As Lady Whistledown, Penelope is the eyes and ears of the ton, but even she has no clue who Benedict’s mystery woman is, she agrees to drop hints about Benedict’s search for his mystery woman in her newsletter. Once everyone reads in Whistledown that Benedict Bridgerton is searching for a young lady, the local mothers of the ton go crazy. Everyone is delulu and thinks that maybe their daughter is the one he’s after but of course none are correct.
Violet Bridgerton (Ruth Gemmell), who knows more than her children give her credit for, is the one who knows exactly how to find the owner of the glove. After she reads Whistledown, she later learns Benedict has Sophie’s glove which she instantly recognizes as a Penwood glove, which has distinctive embroidery sewn inside. Armed with that knowledge, Benedict goes to the Penwood home. He already knowns Rosamund is not the Lady in Silver, but he calls on Posy, having overlooked her in the past.
Of course, it’s not Posy he’s after, but Sophie overhears him while he’s there, she debates whether she should just reveal herself. She wishes more than anything that she could and Alfie, a solid wingman if ever there was one, encourages her to, but she just can’t. “He does not want to find me, he wants to find the lady in the silver gown,” she tells Alfie, adding, “And she is not real.”
As Benedict asks Posy whether or not she was wearing any silver at the masquerade, Araminta starts to realize that he’s not actually looking for one of her daughters. She starts piecing together clues –– her new silver shoes that were scuffed after the ball, Benedict’s curiosity about whether there are any other family members who live with them, the fact that he’s in possession of a Penwood’s glove –– and she realizes exactly who Benedict is looking for. This is exactly the excuse Lady Penwood needs to get rid of Sophie forever. “I have suffered having you under my roof all these years,” she tells Sophie, “and you repay me with this duplicity?” She even goes so far as to call Sophie her father’s “error,” whom she never should have even tried to help, and with that she kicks Sophie out. Sophie packs her only belongings into a bag and as she says her goodbyes, Alfie, who might be my favorite character this season, hugs her and says, “Don’t say anything, I want to stay angry.” Posy, proving to be the only member of the family with a conscience, also comes to say goodbye to Sophie and gifts her a set of jeweled show clips she can sell which earn her enough to pay for a carriage out of the city where she can, hopefully, find a new job and a new life.
Over in this episode’s B-story, Lady Danbury has been avoiding Queen Charlotte ever since Charlotte forbade her from leaving London. Lady Danbury has been itching to retire from society and return to her ancestral home, but Charlotte flatly refused the request in episode 1, and the two women have been ice cold to each other ever since. And Charlotte’s footman Brimsley has proven to be a poor substitute for Danbury, so he visits her and begs Danbury to return, telling her to apologize and all will be well. When Danbury refuses, he hilariously tells her, “You know you do not need to have something to apologize for. If Her Majesty needs an apology, one apologizes for nothing.”
Danbury realizes at that at this stage in their lives, she is Charlotte’s only true friend, and she agrees to visit her. It begins uncomfortably, with Charlotte once again forbidding Agatha to leave her, a command from the Queen to her royal subject. Agatha is hurt that she is is considered simply a subject and not a friend, and turns to leave. But then, Charlotte does something she’s never done before: she apologizes to Agatha and then she breaks down, revealing that she’s terrified to be left alone, especially once her husband, the ailing King George dies. She wilts into Agatha’s arms in tears at the thought.
Also on the verge of an emotional breakdown? Benedict! He is growing weary at the thought that maybe the Lady in Silver doesn’t want to be found, and he starts to worry that he really is an lovable rake, so he goes on a bender. He wakes up after days of drinking at a country estate that’s the Regency version of Epstein Island, where every man is powerful and terrible, and every woman is a potential assault victim.
As Benedict tries to sober up, it’s clear that he’s starting to realize that these men, this lifestyle… well, maybe it’s not for him anymore. When he goes outside, he sees some of these men attempting to assault a maid, when another maid, Sophie, steps in to rescue her. Benedict then steps in to fight the men off, and that’s when he’s finally reunited with Sophie, he just doesn’t realize it’s her. “Are you certain we have not met?” he asks her, feeling a flutter of recognition when he looks at her. “How could we have, sir? I am only a maid,” she tells him. Come ON, Sophie, tell him who you are! We need this!
Liz Kocan is a pop culture writer living in Massachusetts. Her biggest claim to fame is the time she won on the game show Chain Reaction.
