A Curious Beginning

Among Veronica’s limited set of personal effects is her flask, which contains the liquor aguardiente. Aguardiente originates from Spain, Portugal, and various South American countries like Colombia and Brazil, which were once colonized by Spain and Portugal, respectively. Veronica’s flask symbolizes her adventures before the start of the novel—both in reference to her wide geographic travels and her sexual history, as a former sexual partner introduced her to the liquor. Her choice to carry the flask further illustrates her rejection of gendered social norms of the Victorian era; hard liquor was a drink associated with men and considered inappropriate for women.

The novel presents the flask in a primarily positive light, given its overall approval of Veronica’s rebellion against Victorian social norms. The flask is also framed as a useful item, not merely a symbolic one. When Veronica refills the flask with whiskey in Chapter 21, she observes that this is “not half as potent [as aguardiente] but useful in a pinch” (223). There are, however, occasional suggestions that her use of alcohol may be somewhat inappropriate or dangerous. When she drinks from the flask to quell her nerves in advance of the first knife-throwing show, she puts herself at greater risk from Stoker’s throws. The disregard she shows for Cordelia’s warnings about Stoker’s alcohol misuse also suggests that Veronica’s understanding of alcohol as potentially dangerous is too limited. These criticisms are mild in the text and not fully resolved, but they reveal that Veronica has vulnerabilities. She is not always as pragmatic as she appears, and her consumption of alcohol prompts moments of weakness. As she is otherwise lacking faults, these events are helpful in creating a complex, more realistic character.