The man looked at the sword, then into Miss Tolerance’s face. His eyes narrowed, but he let go, stepped back, and dusted his coat off. He murmured something in French and turned away.
Miss Tolerance replied in that language to his retreating back. The man stopped for a moment but did not look back. Then he walked on.
The whore sighed. “Thank you, sir. A thousand times. If I’d known he was a foreigner I’d never ’ave let him come near me.” Her tone changed. “If you’ll let me thank you proper-like, sir—”
Amused, Miss Tolerance replied that that would not be necessary.
“No, really. No charge and all, sir. For the rescue.”
“Go home,” Miss Tolerance advised. “It’s late, girl. Just—go home.”
The girl looked confused. “Honest, sir. And I’m clean. For free, sir.” She started to run her hand along Miss Tolerance’s sleeve. Miss Tolerance stopped the hand with her own and pushed the girl away.
“Go home,” she said again.
The girl took a few steps away, then turned back, puzzled.
“Was it what the foreigner said, sir? Did he say some lie about me?”
“About you? Not really. He said he did not understand the such a fuss over a blow or two to a whore.”
“And what did you say, sir?”
Miss Tolerance smiled. “I said when someone fetches him a blow or two perhaps he’ll understand it too.”
The girl grinned. “I’ll dream of that, then, sir. Not likely, though, is it?”
Miss Tolerance shook her head. “No, not likely. Good night.” She turned toward Duke Street, grateful now that she was near home.
T
orches burned at the large, fine house on the corner of Spanish Place in Manchester Square. When Miss Tolerance knocked, the door was opened at once.
“Miss Sarah! We’d not expected to see you this evening.”
“Good evening, Keefe.” Miss Tolerance entered the house blinking in the sudden light afforded by a chandelier and branches of candles liberally stationed around the front hall. It occurred to her, not for the first time, that a brothel such as Mrs. Brereton’s must keep a chandler in business with the number of wax candles used there each week. “How is custom this evening?”
The footman considered. “Solid, but not bustling, miss. When the quality finish with their shooting parties up north and come back to town again, then we’ll be on the hop.”
“Passion is so seasonal a business?”
Keefe, who after nearly a decade at Mrs. Brereton’s considered himself something of an authority upon the subject of brothels and their clientele, shook his head. “T’ain’t the season, miss. It’s the inconvenience. Not even the hottest buck’s like to come two hundred miles from the shooting for his piece. He’ll find a laundry maid or some obliging local girl to see to him until he comes back to London. And in course, them that stay in London at this time of year are not generally them that can afford a night at Mrs. Brereton’s. Come December, when Parliament meets again, we’ll see most of the government here.”
“What a happy reflection upon the Nation.” Miss Tolerance shrugged off her Gunnard coat but kept it draped over one arm rather than surrender it to Keefe. “Surely there must be some MPs who do not patronize this house?”
“Prigs,” the footman said dismissively. “Chapel evangelicals.”
There was a murmur of conversation from the front salon, and a laugh. Miss Tolerance raised an inquiring eyebrow.
“A couple of gentlemen haven’t settled on their girls yet,” Keefe said. “Not regulars. And—Mrs. B is—engaged.”
Again Miss Tolerance raised her eyebrow. Mrs. Brereton, as owner and manageress of the operation, had only a few patrons and entertained infrequently.
“Marianne as well?” she asked.
Keefe nodded. “All that’s in the salon is three girls: Emma, Chloe, and the new girl, Lizzie.”
Miss Tolerance nodded. No one she wished to talk to. Fatigue, which had not touched her during her adventure on Oxford Street, suddenly came over her again.
“Perhaps I shall go down to the kitchen and beg a cup of soup before I go home.”
“Cook will have kept something for you,” Keefe suggested. It would have surprised Miss Tolerance to learn that she was something of a pet among the staff, one for whom favors large and small were often undertaken. It was not merely that she was liberal with her thanks, or that she gave generous tips whenever she was in funds; there was something about Miss Tolerance which commanded their imaginations. She was Mrs. Brereton’s niece, and rented the tiny cottage which stood in the rear of the garden. She had the appearance and manner of a lady but had, like the women who worked above-stairs at Mrs. Brereton’s, long ago lost her virtue and all the claims upon polite society to which it entitled her. Like the women above-stairs, she worked at all hours, and her work sometimes put her in peril. She had few friends and not even as much society as the whores, who when not employed spent their time in gossip and shopping.
“There was gooseberry tarts for the supper,” Keefe said. “Tell Cook to put some out for you.”
Miss Tolerance smiled. “Perhaps I shall.” She stifled a yawn. “Or perhaps I shall forget my supper and go straight to sleep.”
Keefe shook his head and looked as though he would offer advice, but did not.
“You think I should eat something, Keefe?”
“Miss Sarah, Cook would be hurt if you didn’t take a little something, you being in the house and all.”
“Ah, well. I must on no account ruffle Cook’s feathers,” Miss Tolerance agreed. She thanked Keefe for his care and set off for the kitchen in search of gooseberry tarts.
R
ising early the next morning, Miss Tolerance dispatched a note detailing her expenses, and a receipt, to Lord Pethridge. With the matter of Mr. Waldegreen and Mr. Haskett so profitably resolved, she was able to turn her attention to another pending inquiry. A wealthy brewer desired that she determine whether the fortune of his daughter’s intended was as extensive as he claimed. Mr. Wheelock was short, stocky and mistrustful: “I’ll be frank with you, miss: I fully expected Betty to be wed for my money by some down-at-heels nobleman, but this fellow says his pocket’s as well lined as mine. I don’t mind she’s marrying
up,
as the phrase is—but I want to make sure the boy’s all he says he is.”
It took her several days to run to ground all her sources; she then had the pleasure of informing Mr. Wheelock that Mr. Colcannon’s property was extensive, unmortgaged and, if anything, more productive than the gentleman had represented it. She turned in her account to the suspicious brewer, who sniffed as he read it and commented that his Betty had shown better sense than he’d ever expected of her. Miss Tolerance received her payment, and found herself at liberty.
It had been some time since she had last achieved this enviable state. Country-bred, she liked to keep busy as much from a preference
for employment as for the sake of her pocketbook (although that object was a matter of constant interest; a Fallen Woman may count upon no one but herself for security in her old age). In the last few months she had been unusually busy, taking any task that was offered her. As she had lately been a witness in a murder trial of considerable notoriety, her star had risen sharply and several interesting opportunities had been offered her. It came as a shock to her to realize that there was nowhere she need be that day, no question to ask or goal to pursue. One day of idleness was delicious. Two days was enjoyable. Three was torture.
There were always a few matters of housekeeping and bookkeeping to attend to, but these barely filled the first empty day. The usual occupations open to a lady of leisure seemed singularly without luster. She enjoyed shopping as an occasional pastime. Her needlework was generally of the practical and not the decorative variety, and represented only duty. She was not addicted to reading for pleasure, rarely indulged in the theater, and only recalled how much she enjoyed musical performance when she found herself at one. She did not feel inclined to seek out the company of her small circle of friends; her two closest friends were Sir Walter Mandif, magistrate of Bow Street, and Marianne Touchwell, one of Mrs. Brereton’s whores. Sir Walter was in the midlands for the hunting, and Marianne had professional constraints upon her time which Miss Tolerance was bound to respect. There was no one else she wished to call upon, and while Miss Tolerance spent part of each day at Tarsio’s, making herself available to anyone who might look for her, no one did.
By the end of her third day of liberty, Miss Tolerance was aware of the imminence of a sort of mental languor which dismayed her. She had experienced this state only once before, after the death of Charles Connell, the man who had taught her to fence and had, coincidentally, ruined her. They had been living abroad when Connell died. She had fallen into a state of melancholy which nothing, not even the hazards of being English in French-occupied Belgium, had been able to pierce. She had slept for days on end; forgotten to eat; sat with a pen in her hand, poised to write to whom she knew not. It was only when her landlord threatened to turn her out, or worse, denounce her to the French
authorities, that she had broken from this stupor and arranged to return home on one of the privateers which plied the waters between England and the continent.
Misliking as she did the idea of slipping into this drowsy fog, Miss Tolerance embraced a feverish routine of fencing drills. Her gender barred her from public practice at the
salles des armes
around town, and while she was known to several of the
maitres defence
and sometimes went to work with them privately, it was not often enough to keep her skills honed. In warm weather she drilled up and down the garden; now it was too cold to work out of doors, so she pushed the furniture against the wall of her cottage and drilled, stocking-footed, across the room and back for hours until she was exhausted and the paper target she had pinned on the back of the door bristled with tiny holes. When she was done, she could spend an hour cleaning, filing and oiling her blade, by which time she had generally disposed of the better part of a day.
Out of deference to her aunt and other neighbors she forbore to practice with her pistols in the garden, and thus target practice generally meant retiring to some secluded place in the near-countryside. The unusually cold November weather made this a less than appealing notion, and Miss Tolerance did no more than clean and oil her pistols in the evening as she sat before the fire.
At the end of a fortnight Mrs. Brereton, having heard of her niece’s activity, sent to invite her for tea. Miss Tolerance presented herself in her aunt’s parlor quite careless of her appearance. Mrs. Brereton was never less than elegantly dressed herself, her short dark hair lightly pomaded and styled and her complexion improved by the discreet touch of the haresfoot.
“You look more hoydenish than usual, Sarah. Have you nothing better to do than thrash about with your sword all day?”
Miss Tolerance shrugged. “Apparently not, Aunt.”
“You might help me with my bookkeeping,” Mrs. Brereton suggested briskly. “You have an aptitude for it.”
Miss Tolerance interpreted this suggestion as a part of the ongoing attempt by her aunt to interest her in managing the brothel. As the family to which both women belonged had cut them off entirely at the time of their respective ruins, each was the only relative who would acknowledge the other. Mrs. Brereton often
spoke of someday transferring management of her business to her niece. Despite a face and figure that belied the fact, the madam was well into middle age, and could speak most feelingly upon the subject of advancing years and the property she would leave behind. That Miss Tolerance had no interest in assuming the role of madam, as she had resisted her aunt’s attempts to interest her in turning prostitute, grieved the dynastic-minded Mrs. Brereton deeply.
“Ask Marianne,” Miss Tolerance suggested. “She has a practical mind, and I’m sure she could do the sums.”
“I don’t want the girls involved in management of the house.”
“Why not, Aunt? Have you something to hide?”
Mrs. Brereton’s chin went up. “I built this house with my savings and my wit, both earned on my back. I run it as I see fit, and the girls in my house have no cause for complaint. I offer to make you a part of it because we are family—and because you’ve a mind for figures and for managing things. Marianne is just a whore.”
“You limit yourself if you believe that, Aunt—”
Mrs. Brereton shrugged. “Then I limit myself.”
They sat in Mrs. Brereton’s private salon, a chamber expensively and handsomely furnished in the classical style favored by the former empress of France. A tray, upon which the remains of a light meal were evident, sat between them, and beyond that the
Gazette,
the sight of which reminded Miss Tolerance that she had not looked at a newspaper for more than a week. Half the windows in the room were still curtained, despite the advanced hour: Mrs. Brereton was of the opinion that sunlight was injurious to a woman’s complexion. The remaining light, bright as it was on this clear day, did not dispel the chill between the two women.
Miss Tolerance filled the silence by checking the teapot, although she knew very well that it was empty. In recent months her relationship with her aunt, once easy and affectionate, had become awkward. Miss Tolerance could not trust her aunt to keep a confidence, and the necessity of guarding what she said made her cross in her aunt’s company. Mrs. Brereton, for her part, treated her niece with the resentment common to those who have done wrong and dislike to be reminded of it. Miss Tolerance missed the
communication of a six-month ago but had not the least idea how to restore it. Even maintaining a conversation with her aunt was now fatiguing.
“Have you any news from the warehouses?” Mrs. Brereton asked politely.
Miss Tolerance shook her head. Discussing bolts of dress-stuff would have been a safe topic, but her most recent intelligence from her wharf-side contacts had long ago been discussed with her aunt.
“The new figured muslins at Beady’s is all that I have heard of recently. After the new year, when mantua-makers are planning for the season, I’m sure there will be more to hear.”
“And more buyers to drive the prices up,” Mrs. Brereton objected.
That appeared to be the final conversational coffin-nail. It was a fortunate moment for an interruption. Cole, the junior of the footmen at Mrs. Brereton’s, entered and announced that Miss Tolerance had a caller.
“Here?”
“Aye, miss. I put him in the little salon, as it’s unoccupied just now.”
“Did the caller give a name?”
“Colcannon, miss. Matter of business, the gentleman said. Very agitated.”
The effect of this intelligence upon Miss Tolerance was considerable. Curiosity and the hope of occupation energized her: Colcannon was the name of the young man whose finances she had investigated a fortnight before. So this was either the young man himself, or a member of his family. What reason could he have for calling? And why call at Mrs. Brereton’s, when she kept up her membership at Tarsio’s specifically to have an address to which inquiries could be directed.
Whatever the reason, she had no intention of talking to her visitor under her aunt’s eye or in her aunt’s house. This meant she must walk him to Tarsio’s—or take him through the garden to her cottage, a place which she generally tried to keep free of business.
“I will be down directly, Cole.” Miss Tolerance made a curtsy to her aunt and begged her leave.
“By all means, my dear.” Mrs. Brereton, turning her cheek to receive her niece’s kiss, was already reaching for the
Gazette.
M
r. Colcannon was a man of about Miss Tolerance’s own age of eight and twenty, bandy-legged and stocky, as if he were not unacquainted with physical effort. He was neatly dressed in riding coat, buckskin breeches and plain-topped boots, all well made but none modish; his brown hair was worn longer than the fashion; his long, flat cheeks were as rosy as if he had just come from a brisk ride. Country-bred, Miss Tolerance knew from her investigation, and without any Town-polish to speak of. He jumped to his feet when Miss Tolerance entered the room, clearly anxious, and uncertain of what to expect.
Miss Tolerance dropped a curtsy; Mr. Colcannon bowed.
“I beg your pardon for coming unexpected,” he said. “You are Miss Sarah Tolerance? I was told I would find you here—but this is not—that is—” He looked around the small room a bit wildly. “Perhaps I have—”
“Mr. Colcannon, if we have business to discuss, we will both be more comfortable speaking in my little house across the garden. Will you follow me, sir?” Miss Tolerance smiled and turned to lead the man to the conservatory at the rear of the house, thence across the garden to the door of her cottage. Mr. Colcannon had the appearance of one already bewildered, now grappling with a further confusion.
“You are—I was given to believe—” he stopped. “That is, I did not know you were a part of a …”
A mischievous impulse took Miss Tolerance. “You did not know you had been referred to a
pushing academy,
sir?” She used the vulgar expression deliberately to shock, hoping that with the worst out of the way Mr. Colcannon would speak more rationally, but she smiled kindly as she took the key from her pocket and opened the door to her tiny cottage.
Colcannon blushed. He nodded. “Perhaps this was someone’s idea of a joke,” he said. He followed Miss Tolerance into the cottage and looked about him, blinking. There was little
enough to see: a table and several straight-back chairs, a settle on one side of the fireplace, the fireplace itself, walled in old Dutch tiles, and a cupboard of dark old wood. There were shelves on two walls that held an assortment of books and papers, and a second cupboard under the window opposite the fireplace. Candlesticks were grouped atop each cupboard; on the one next to the fireplace a small neat stack of dishes also stood. At the back of the room a narrow stair led to a chamber above.
Miss Tolerance’s visitor recalled himself.
“You see me somewhat confounded,” he said. “I was given the address of—that
bagnio
—and told that I might find a Miss Tolerance there, who was accustomed to make inquiries of a confidential nature. Perhaps it was naive of me, but it never occurred to me that you would be a—”
“A whore, sir?”
Colcannon nodded.
“Please rest your mind upon that point; I am Fallen and I keep this little house here because it is convenient for me, but I am not one of Mrs. Brereton’s employees. I generally meet prospective clients at Tarsio’s club, where I am a member—”
“Should I have gone there? I am sorry if I did this improperly, Miss Tolerance, but my business is very urgent. The man who sent me to you—”