by M. J. Logue
"Oh indeed - Once to go, and once to apologise!"
"Gentlemen!" Fairmantle roared. "And Wilmot - leash that damnable ape and be seated!"
It was an ape. The lap-dog was a monkey, and it grinned amiably up at Thomazine from where it was presently engaged in picking the paint from the sky-blue wall with fingers that were all too human. A tall, dark-haired young man rose from his seat on the far side of the room and lifted the monkey as if it were a naughty child, talking sternly to it the while. "My apologies, madam," he said gloomily, and she deduced he had been the impromptu poet. "We keep him - a reminder of our own baser natures, my lady. I can only offer my humblest apologies for the beast's animal rudeness. A brute - what can I say, except to beg that he has not caused offence?"
With the creature's head nestled against his throat like some sort of hairy baby, she could only stammer that no, of course not, no offence had been taken, all high spirits -
"For if he had caused you offence, Penthesilea," the young man breathed over her hand, "I should tell his wife of his antics."
And by the hilarity that followed, she deduced that it had been a rather unkind joke, and not speaking of the monkey at all. "The Earl of Rochester," Fairmantle said, "who thinks he is a wit, and is not. You’re not funny, Wilmot, and you’re drunk. Sit down, sir. Mistress Russell - Major Russell - " he spread his hands, you see what I have to put up with? - "I am surrounded by puppies at play -"
"Woof," someone else said, very quietly, and she giggled.
They were late. The company had been at the theatre - "Hence," Wilmot said, "hence our pitiable state, for news is new come of a second war against the Dutch, and we must drown our cares ere the Dutch Navy drown us."
"Def'ntely drunk," the cheerful, slightly balding cherub Fairmantle had called Sedley said firmly. "Being silly, now, Wilmot. Don' say that to the lady. You going to hold her hand, Crophead?"
"They are always like this," Russell said grimly, carefully picking his way around the monkey's discarded fruit. "I imagine he dismisses his household staff -" looking up at the stony-faced manservant who held chairs out for them, - "should they betray any expression."
"He's not a Crophead any more," one of the ladies said firmly, and Thomazine stared at her in amazement, for she was dressed in silk and jewels and yet she spoke like a good plain countrywoman. "Let it grow a bit, haven't you, lovey?"
Sedley put his arm round the woman's shoulders and squeezed her familiarly, and Thomazine was unsure whether to laugh or to cry, for these women were whores: gaudy, cheap, noisy whores. Her first supper in London was in the company of blowsy tarts and drunken fat cherubs. She had dressed in her fine array for this.
Under the table, something touched her hand, and she pulled her fingers away, fully expecting it to be the monkey - or worse. It touched her again, and this time she looked down, and realised that it was her husband's hand. He squeezed her fingers, gently.
"I am holding her hand, Sir Charles," he said, eyeing Sedley balefully. "So the whole poxed crew of you may stop behaving like Wilmot's ape in an attempt to impress my wife. We now comprehend fully that you are carefree gentlemen who are not restrained by the conventions of society. May we now proceed to behaving like civilised men of reason?"
It seemed that the doleful young man, Wilmot, had just volunteered himself to serve in the Navy, in an attempt to redeem himself for some stupid prank that had earned the King's disfavour. And that this riotous affair had begun in sobriety and decency, as a modest supper for friends. (There was a lot of guffawing at that, by which she deduced that it was an untruth.)
Thomazine looked at the candlelight glittering on plate and crystal, at the great engraved silver bowl half-filled with fruit that the ape was presently selecting the choicest titbits from. Very modest. She was suddenly glad that Russell had insisted on the bronze gown, for in her yaffingale-green she would have felt dowdy and out of place.
"May I help you to some chicken, madam?" Wilmot said gravely.
He seemed a very serious young man. Perhaps whatever naughty prank he had played on the King, he had learned the error of his ways, and a little military service would go all the way to making him a sober and respectable citizen.
She glanced under her lashes at her husband, who was presently engaged in some intense and earnest discourse with Master Sedley.
"I am very sure she did not," she heard him say, and Sedley cackled. "I am very sure she did, too, major. In the silver-cupboard. With the head footman. Now that, sir, is what you might call a rattling."
The which Thomazine thought might be a dirty joke, and she was not sure if she ought to have heard it, so she applied herself to her plate with downcast eyes and tried not to giggle.
"Shocked, my lady Penthesilea?" Wilmot's dry voice at her elbow.
"Amused, rather," she said truthfully. "Though I suspect I ought not to know what it means."
"Ah. The Puritan does not rattle his lady?"
Which stung, actually, and she raised her eyes and looked at him - at this solemn-faced boy who was younger than she was, who was stroking his monkey as if he hoped the sight of it might offend her, who had a mocking smile on his lovely mouth that had no humour in it at all. She wondered why a young man who was handsome and witty and learned ought to be so downright mean-spirited, and then decided it was none of her business. "The Puritan, sir, rattles like a hired carriage," she said sweetly, and had the pleasure of watching his eyes widen slightly in shock. So you see, Master Wilmot, two of us can play at childish games.
"Good God, Strephon," he said faintly to the monkey. "The age of miracles is not yet past. A wench of wit. Well, Penthesilea, are you determined to set the town about its ears with so devastating a combination of beauty and daring?" He rubbed the monkey's head again, and she thought he might be smiling, though his eyes were as modestly downcast as hers. "Or are you so innocent that you still see the world as a place of high romance? Amor vincit omnia," he said wryly, "God help you."
"I may be," she said, and squeezed her husband's hand where it was comfortably, wickedly settled on her knee under the table. "It may be."
"Good God, my Amazon, next you will be telling me that our gallant Crophead pursues a second career as a, a highwayman, or some such lawlessness!"
He laughed. Russell turned round, and did not. "My lord, if it amuses you to fill my wife's head with foolishness, I may assure you, sir, I am not amused." He bit into a strawberry, and placed the uneaten half back on his plate with malevolent precision. "I will not have her made game of, sir."
"Jealous?" Wilmot said, and his lips twitched.
"Very," Russell said levelly. "And violent-tempered, to boot. You may do well to remember that."
"You would have done better not to lay - temptation - in my way, then, major. To bring such a pearl beyond price within my lewd compass -" and he said it in such a perfect imitation of Russell's chilly society tones that she was hard put to it not to laugh, because could the dear man not see that he was being deliberately baited?
"The pearl has a fairly sturdy oyster," she said firmly, and looked over her shoulder at him in case he hadn't quite got it.
"I trust he pays sufficient attentions to the pearl," Wilmot said, and the lady at his side snorted with unladylike giggles.
She'd said something she ought not to have, then.
“If you did not choose to have her admired, sir, you should not have brought her.”
“Should she not have the liberty to see some society unmolested?”
“She has a tongue in her head,” she said mildly, and Russell forgot himself and smiled at her, not his careful company-smile but the real one, the slightly lopsided one.
He pushed his plate to her and she picked up his half-eaten strawberry and, very deliberately, set her teeth in the exact same place where his had been. “On the contrary, my lord,” she said demurely. “I am entitled to enjoy my husband’s company, and he mine. We neither of us can be responsible for your temptation, sir.”
27
She grew confident, after that. Understood little of what Wilmot and Sedley said, it being mostly in Latin, or in tortuous Classical analogy, but she did understand that they thought she was amusing, and pretty. She even fed the little monkey, rather absently, on grapes from her plate, and it grew sufficiently accustomed to her to allow her to stroke its head.
But mostly, she watched her husband, which was a thing she liked to do, and sipped wine from the delicate glass that Master Wilmot kept refilling for her, and said nothing.
She wasn't sure if she liked it or not, but everyone else seemed to be swilling the stuff like ale, and even her darling grew a little flushed. Which made her prop her chin in her hands and watch him, more animated than was customary, bright-eyed and almost lovely, from this side.
Wisps of hair had worked loose to frame his face and she forgot for a moment that they were in civilised company, and reached up to tuck it behind his ear, and he glanced at her sideways under his lashes. Forgot they were in such company, for when he was amongst decent people - when he was at her parents' table - he was different. Here he was disapproving and cool, but he was not out of place. His wit was less rapier-thrust than plain cavalry backsword, but it was every bit as sharp and true.
(She had definitely had too much wine. The look he gave her made all her bones turn to water, and the hairs stand up sparkling on her neck And she left her hand on his shoulder, daringly, because this was not a thing that a gently-born young woman should do in company at supper. Even at a table-full of whores and ruffians.)
And Russell put his hand over hers - his warm, competent, slightly rough hand, that was so out of keeping with his elegant dark grey silk waistcoat and the embroidered ribbon that caught his hair into a tail -
"Oh, Apple," she breathed, and the corner of his mouth lifted very faintly. "Oh, you dear, foolish thing!"
For the ribbon in his hair was one of her bridal favours, a length of golden-green silk that she had embroidered herself with a trailing spring of rosemary. She stroked it with a finger. "You silly."
That wry smile widened. He knew exactly what she meant. And without missing a word of his conversation with Sedley, he rubbed his jaw against the back of her hand, and carried on talking - of taxes, she thought, or the price of barrels of salt fish or something. He wasn't paying any attention, of course. She could feel his heart suddenly take flight under her stroking finger, and a fierce heat on his skin. No, Master Sedley could be asking if he might dance upon the table for all Thomazine's husband cared, presently.
And that was a powerful and a joyous thing to be able to do, to hold a man's heart in the palm of your hand so.
(Well. Possibly not just his heart, then.)
"I see," the Earl of Rochester said at her other side, and there was that in his voice that was not mocking, any more. "I see."
And she thought he probably did not, actually. But she had shocked him, and that was funny, because around this table these men did nothing but try and shock each other with their casual talk of women and debauchery: and Thomazine Russell had shocked him by loving her husband. It was funny, and it was sad all at once. "I hope you do," she said, and meant it. "One day."
"Is that an offer, Penthesilea?"
She shook her head, smiling, and Russell turned his head and looked at her questioningly.
(Surely not jealous, husband?)
"No, Master Wilmot," she said. "I am well content."
28
It was raining, when they came to leave.
She did not think she had ever eaten so much rich food in her whole life, and certainly she had never drunk so much wine – and she did not think she had ever seen him so intemperate, either.
It suited him, and he hadn’t let go of her hand (which had possibly inhibited her eating as well as his own, but given the tightness of her lacing that was possibly no bad thing) and they stood hand-in-hand in the great marble-lined hall peering out at the swirling mizzly darkness with a very childish foreboding.
"Thankful, it's raining," she said wanly, and he looked down at her, the marred half of his face hidden in shadow, and she thought he was the loveliest thing she had ever seen. With a little sob, she unwound the fur wrap from about her shoulders and wound it about his, for he would be cold, and wet, in his plain cloak, and she could not bear that he might be cold and wet -
"'M all right, tibber," he said, and his eyes sparkled above the creamy fur. "Be home soon, and I asked Mistress Bartholomew would she put a hot brick in the bed -"
"Your poor hands," she said ardently, and slipped her hand from her muff and tucked his into the warm place it left, and there they stood, -
"A pair of very slightly cupshot lovers," he said, and ducked his head and bumped her nose with his own, both of them with their fingers laced inside the snug fur. "I have never come away from one of Master Fairmantle's suppers strictly sober, my tibber, and I fear I never shall."
“Major Russell,” the smooth voice of one of those expressionless servants broke in, “if I may be so bold, sir, Sir Charles has sent for his own carriage for yourself and the lady. Given that the party will not be broken up for some time, he was not anticipating to require it so early -“
And for the first time, the man’s eyes rested on the pair of them with a degree of emotion. Amusement, which was a little awkward. “The night is yet young for the other young gentlemen,” he said kindly.
"His own carriage?" she said faintly, and Russell gave her a sidelong smile.
"Oh, my lord Birstall has money, tibber. Have no fear of that. Most of his friends are bought and paid for. He is still working on those young gentlemen back in there- though I fear his purse is bottomless enough to manage it."
“You are unkind, sir,” she murmured.
There was a rumble of wheels outside, and her eyes widened a little in spite of her determination not to look like the veriest country bumpkin. “He has more money than sense,” Russell said, very close to her ear. “Try not to look shocked, my tibber. It resembles a wheeled bordello.”
It did. Sir Charles’s personal conveyance was gilded, painted in a celestial shade of dawn’s roseate hue, and topped with more curlicues and swirls –
“Than his damnable wig. And probably fuller of fleas.”
“Thankful, hush! Someone will hear you!”
“Say what I like, tibber. ‘S a free country, and I’m known for a perverse humour, remember?” He helped her into the carriage, and she lay back on the soft velvet squabs with a sigh of luxurious contentment.
"He brought me to the banqueting house," she said, "and his banner over me was love -"
“He would like to get you home from the banqueting house in one piece, young lady! Your father would skin me and eat me if he thought you had been drunk in my care!”
“I am no such thing,” she said, and curled her hand round the back of his neck, and pulled him into the carriage after her.
She was behaving improperly. She knew it. She liked it. If he was different in this company, so could she be. “I am going to kiss you, husband,” she said firmly. “I have been wanting to do so all evening, and now I am going to do it. No –“ and she put her fingers to his lips, “I don’t care if you protest. I am going to kiss you till you squeak, sir.”
He said something against her hand.
She moved her fingers, and he gave her a happy lopsided grin. “I said, madam, am I known for my squeaking?”
“Absolutely.”
And she wrapped her arms round him, exactly as he was, and kissed him with a somewhat wine-flown abandon. (He did not squeak. He did, however, rearrange himself more comfortably so that only most of his weight was on one knee on the carriage’s dusty floor, and he was braced on both hands against the cushions when the carriage jerked and rolled into swaying motion.)
“I did not tell the driver to move off!”
“You thumped,” he said, and he looked very pleased with himself. “I, squeak? You squeaked, madam.”
“I did no such thing! I –“
“Squeaked,” he said, and ran his thumb up along the angle of her jaw till she did not squeak: she murmured, and tipped her head back so that he cupped her face in his hands. “You squeaked.”
She probably had. It must be growing late, for despite the fairness of his bristles his cheek was rough where he rubbed it against hers, and she definitely squeaked then, because it tickled. He blinked at her slowly, like a great barley-pale cat, and settled himself into the seat opposite her, lifting her feet into his lap.
“Mistress Russell,” he said with mock severity, “your poor feet, in those wretched slippers, are like ice!”
And Thomazine, whose feet were in truth like ice in her silly impractical high-heeled slippers, let him roll her damp stockings down and rub her frog-cold toes between his hands till the feeling came back into them. And then his thumbs started to work little circles of magic on the arch of her instep, so that all the ache of a night in those -
“Bloody ridiculous shoes,” he said, and frowned over the red furrow where the embroidered band of the too-tight slipper had dug into her instep. “Poor tibber. My poor lamb,” and he touched his fingertips to his lips, and then to that tiny hurt.
Truly, she did not mind the little raw patch, much. She had liked being beautiful, and she had liked having all eyes on her and being on his arm and more than that, she was growing to like the way his clever, loving fingers on her skin made her feel. She liked it when they were in bed together, and it was just they two by candlelight and she could take heaven’s own sweet time in exploring him. But this -
“Major Russell,” she said, and her voice sounded odd and drowsy and - womanly, she sounded like a woman, not a girl: like a woman of the world, and a wife.
He looked up from what he was doing, though his thumb carried on doing marvellous things to the cramped flesh of her foot. Looked up, with an expression of such tenderness that she thought her heart might bump right through her stays -
