Petty Treason

by Madeleine E. Robins

  “I understand, Miss Tolerance. I appreciate your kindness.” She ran her hands over her cheeks to wipe away any evidence of tears and rose to make her farewell. “You must come to me with any other questions you have.”

  Miss Tolerance curtsied. “I will, ma’am. Thank you.”

  A last glance as she left the room showed her the widow seated again, staring thoughtfully at the fire. The book of sermons lay forgotten at her feet. As she went down the stairs Miss Tolerance reflected, not for the first time, that whoever had killed the Chevalier d’Aubigny had done the world a considerable service.

  There was still enough light left to admit of a visit to the area of Marylebone to seek out Mrs. Vose. Miss Tolerance pulled the collar of the Gunnard coat closer to her face against the rising wind and hailed a hackney carriage. She gave the jarvey the direction of a tavern she remembered in that area. Miss Tolerance liked taverns; they were hotbeds of useful gossip, often with keepers who were not particular with whom they shared this largesse. She settled back in the carriage, an old, ill-sprung specimen smelling of piss and chypre, and tried to piece together what she had learned.

  She was frankly curious to meet Mrs. Vose again. On the first meeting the woman had made little impression upon her except as a barrier to her task. In a sober gown and close-dressed hair she had looked more like the housekeeper Miss Tolerance had taken her to be than a courtesan specializing in the more exotic branches of Eros. The woman she had seen at Camille Touvois’ was more in that line, gowned and jeweled and glowing in the golden candlelight, coming forward to curtsy to the Duke of Cumberland with an expression half salacious and half speculative.

  There is a considerable distance between an émigré civil servant and a royal duke. Mrs. Vose had certainly set her sights high since taking leave of the Chevalier d’Aubigny.

  Miss Tolerance considered.

  Anne d’Aubigny had said that Mrs. Vose’s last visit to the Half Moon Street house had been a day or two before d’Aubigny’s murder. But Mrs. Lasher had said that a woman called Josie, lately d‘Aubigny’s mistress, had split with him some weeks before his death. If Josie and Josette Vose were one and the same, which seemed to Miss Tolerance’s mind a logical assumption, then what had brought Mrs. Vose to Half Moon Street a fortnight after the relation between herself and d’Aubigny had been severed? And why would the woman come back to the house after the murder? Anne d’Aubigny might believe it to be disinterested kindness on Mrs. Vose’s part, but professionally Miss Tolerance did not place much reliance upon disinterested kindness.

  Mrs. Vose was not known at the first alehouse Miss Tolerance tried. At the second, a small, dark room lit by a sullen fire, a few lanterns hung up too high to do much good, and a quantity of greasy yellow candles, the barman agreed that he did know a working woman by name of Josie Vose, who lived with two others in a similar line of work in rooms on Balcombe Street, near Boston Place. Miss Tolerance gratefully slid a coin across the bar and left the Queen’s Head. It had been warmer in the alehouse, but only slightly so.

  A crowd of boys hovered on the corner of Boston Place. A few held brooms and looked hopeful as Miss Tolerance passed; the others were content to dance in the cold, beating their arms against their sides and commenting loudly upon passersby. Miss Tolerance beckoned to the nearest of the crossing-sweeps, a fair, grubby, red-nosed boy of about seven years, and asked him her question.

  “Do I know ’er, sir?” the boy croaked.

  “Know’oo?” one of mates asked, crowding in. In a second Miss Tolerance was surrounded by the boys—seven or eight of them—all offering to give directions, sweep the street, call a chair for the “gentleman.”

  The name Miss Tolerance had given the boy was murmured among them. “Josie Vo-sie,” one of the boys chortled, and several of them began to chant the name. So much, she thought drily, for circumspection and a quiet interview with Mrs. Vose.

  “A penny for the one who sweeps my path,” she offered firmly. “And”—she raised her voice slightly—“tuppence to the one who brings me to Mrs. Vose’s rooms.”

  That quieted the noise. The boys who held the brooms jostled each other, pressing forward to get her custom. In most of the others she recognized a speculative expression which suggested they were wondering how to cozen tuppence from this well-heeled mark. Miss Tolerance chose the first boy to sweep the ordure and muck from the crossing. Then, with another look at the boys, she beckoned to one whom she noted was looking, not at her, but at a building across the street and several doors distant. The other boys protested loudly as the boy pushed forward.

  “You know Mrs. Vose?”

  “I know a Josie, got a lot of names.” His eyes stayed upon Miss Tolerance’s face. After a moment they widened, and he looked around him to see if anyone else had discerned her sex.

  Miss Tolerance called his attention back. “What does this Josie look like?”

  “Pretty, like. Clean, for a whore—”

  “Yah, you’d know, woun’t you? Your mam and sister is whores!” one of the boys said cheerily. This started a small riot of amusement.

  The boy ignored them. “She got dark hair, and dresses fine some times. Other times she dresses like—like t’ parson’s mother.”

  Miss Tolerance nodded. “Show me.” She gave the sweep his penny and held out her hand to the other boy, and after a moment he slid his own, cold, moist and filthy, into it. They left the crowd of boys behind, crossing Balcombe Street and entering a building opposite. The boy led her into a public hallway that was lit only by a lantern on the ground floor, then up two flights of narrow stairs.

  “That’s ’er door,” he said. He held out his hand for his reward.

  Miss Tolerance put two tuppenny pieces into it. “A reward for prompt service and discretion,” she said. “You might want to go out the back and give your friends the slip.”

  The boy snorted. “Yeah, I might. Ta, miss. Sir, I mean.”

  He was gone, and Miss Tolerance knocked on the door. It was opened immediately by a young, fair-haired woman in a work gown and several shawls. She had a scarred lip and the squint of nearsightedness, and the scent of gin hung about her. Miss Tolerance asked for Mrs. Vose.

  “Who? Oh, right. Josie. She don’t go much by that name round a’ here, sir. You come on in, I’ll see if she’s to home.”

  “What name does she go by?” Miss Tolerance asked, escaping from the dark hallway into a somewhat brighter room.

  “Mostly called Josie Whipsmart in these parts. ‘Mrs. Vose’ is for her gentry followers.” She gave Miss Tolerance a coquettish look. “My name is Susie Lickmettle, dearie. In case Josie don’t give you what you want.”

  “And my name is Sarah Tolerance, Mrs. Lickmettle. You said you would see if Mrs. Whipsmart will see me?”

  Expressions of dismay, revelation and disappointment chased across the woman’s face. Then she laughed, called Miss Tolerance a caution, and left her for the moment. In her absence Miss Tolerance looked around, noting that the room was tidy and fairly clean, lit with tallow candles which had a reek of mutton fat, and showed evidence of occupancy by several persons.

  “Miss Tolerance?”

  The woman Miss Tolerance knew as Josette Vose stood in the doorway. She wore a dark green wrapper and an expression of surprise. Her feet were bare.

  “Mrs. Vose. Or am I to call you Mrs. Whipsmart?” Miss Tolerance bowed.

  “Oh, Vose will do, as that is how we began.” Josette Vose motioned Miss Tolerance to follow her into the next room, while Susie Lickmettle pushed past her to return to the outer room, sat down by the grate, and took up some knitting. Miss Tolerance followed Mrs. Vose into a room which, like the first, was well ordered, if very crowded. There were three cots against the wall, two wardrobes, two chests, and a single chair, all crammed into the room. On one of the cots a woman slept heavily. The square blue gin bottle near her outstretched hand suggested that she would not wake to interrupt their conversation.

  “So you’ve smok
ed me,” Mrs. Vose said coolly. She waved Miss Tolerance to the chair and seated herself on the nearest cot. Today she was neither the severe duenna of Half Moon Street nor the glittering courtesan of Camille Touvois’ salon. Her dark hair was parted and swept smoothly in a soft knot at the nape of her neck. When she leaned forward the green wrapper gaped at the neck, showing several inches of white chemise.

  “It only required a little willingness to ask questions,” she answered.

  “And you hope I’ll answer some of your asking.” Mrs. Vose’s chin thrust forward militantly. “Why should I?”

  “Perhaps to help your friend Anne d’Aubigny? Or to oblige me in hopes that I’ll not inform His Highness the Duke of Cumberland of your connection to a scandalous murder? To keep me from telling Bow Street that your relations with the late Chevalier d’Aubigny were more carnal than cousinly? Or possibly because I can reward you generously if you assist me.”

  “All excellent reasons.”

  “I forgot to include, of course, your fondness for the late chevalier.”

  Mrs. Vose gave a snort of laughter. “Of course. Poor Etienne.” She leaned back against a pile of cushions in an attitude of sensual relaxation. “Ask your questions.”

  “I will, thank you. When did you last see the Chevalier d’Aubigny?”

  “A little more than a fortnight before his death. We were both at Madame Touvois’ salon. That’s where I met him: Madame Touvois is a knacky matchmaker.”

  “So I have heard. There was nothing between them?”

  Mrs. Vose seemed to find the question funny. “Nothing and everything,” she said. “What is the expression? Thick as thieves. Not for fucking, though. It was the challenge, each one trying to get the upper hand of the other. It drove him mad that she wouldn’t take him at his own estimation—”

  “And that was?”

  “As a dangerous man. Which he could be, I can tell you that. And it drove her mad that no matter how she abused him, he kept trying to have the mastery of her. As good as a play, it was, to watch them together. I think they were beginning to tire of the game, though.”

  “Why do you think so?”

  Mrs. Vose shrugged. “Something in the way Madame Touvois looked at d’Aubigny. Nothing more than that.”

  “Even the most exciting relationship may grow stale after a while.” Miss Tolerance added, as if upon the same thought, “And you were his mistress for how long?”

  Mrs. Vose did not miss the jibe, but appeared more amused than angered. “A little more than a year, until he ran out of money.”

  “Ran out of money?” Back to d’Aubigny’s finances again! “When did that happen?”

  “As I said, a few weeks before his death. There was never any illusion of true love, Miss Tolerance. A man of d’Aubigny’s sort knows what he is, and pays for his pleasure. When he could no longer pay, I would no longer stay.” She smiled as if the rhyme pleased her.

  “Now that is curious, Mrs. Vose; at about the time you say you were leaving the chevalier because he said he could not afford you, he was paying all the debts he had racked up around town—with money whose source I cannot find. I was hoping you could suggest such a source.”

  “I? I could tell you a great number of things about the chevalier, Miss Tolerance, but where he got his money ain’t one of them. I thought he had married all the money he owned.”

  “You knew some of his intimate friends, I presume. None of them might have loaned him the money?”

  “None of them was monstrous intelligent, but neither was they stupid enough to loan money to D’Aubigny. He spent it far too easily on what amused him.”

  “Then I may assume that his inability to pay you what you wanted was because you no longer amused him?”

  “No, you may assume no such thing. His play had got too rough for me. It’s a thing that happens with some men like him: after a time the old games don’t get a rise in’em. They want more. According to my thinking, a rise in the stakes demands a rise in payment. The chevalier and I disagreed upon the point, and we parted company. I had thought it was simply because he hadn’t the silver.”

  “And you went to work for Mrs. Lasher in Green Street.”

  “You are well informed.”

  “You are kind to notice it. It is curious, though, that Mrs. d’Aubigny swears you were in the house only a day or two before the chevalier’s death.”

  “She is mistaken.”

  “Ah,” Miss Tolerance said. “Yet, given the friendliness of her feelings for you, I am surprised that she should make such a mistake. And then, after the chevalier’s death, you went back to the house?”

  “I felt sorry for her.”

  “How kind of you,” Miss Tolerance said drily. “There was no other reason?”

  “What a suspicious mind you have, Miss Tolerance. The little missus is a lost soul—her marriage was her great disaster. It deprived her of friends and fortune and innocence, all at once. It wasn’t hard to be friendly to her—grateful for crumbs, she was, after a year or so of M’sieur d’Aubigny. When I heard of d’Aubigny’s death I thought she’d be overset, so I went to her.”

  “How kind.”

  “Wasn’t it?” Mrs. Vose laughed. “Don’t think me a paragon, I beg you. I went by as soon as I’d heard of the murder, and the poor little missus wept and begged me to stay. Like a soggy kitten she was, curled up crying upon my shoulder. How could I refuse her? And to tell the truth, she needed a bit of protecting, those first few days. The staff was all in a tear—as how should they not be?—and her brother had filled them with tales of murderers waiting under the bed to kill them all.”

  “You don’t believe in murderers under the bed?”

  Mrs. Vose shook her head, all levity gone. “The chevalier wasn’t a man much liked. If someone came to kill him, the job was done. I doubt anyone is waiting to kill again in that house.”

  “I am of the same opinion,” Miss Tolerance agreed. “The question remains, however, who did kill him?” She spoke with rather more force than she had intended.

  “I did not,” Mrs. Vose said firmly. “I have no idea who might have.”

  Miss Tolerance believed the truth of Mrs. Vose’s first statement, but not the second. The woman knew more than she said, and she suspected someone.

  “For a man so unpleasant, it is curious how many people have not the first idea who might have killed him.”

  Mrs. Vose smiled politely. The two women sat for a few minutes listening to the snoring of the drunken woman on the cot a few feet away. At last Miss Tolerance rose to her feet. Mrs. Vose stopped her with a hand on her elbow.

  “May I ask you a question now, Miss Tolerance? How is it you style yourself Miss rather than Mrs.? You do not pretend, walking about the streets in such an outfit, to be anything other than Fallen?”

  “No, ma’am. But I do not pretend to be a whore, either.”

  “Was that supposed to sting?”

  Miss Tolerance thought. “Perhaps it was,” she said. “I have little patience with half truths. They are ineffective guardians, and generally serve to wave a flag that something has not been said. This discussion would be far more profitable for both of us if you dealt straight with me.”

  “Perhaps,” Mrs. Vose said. “But profit is not the only motive for a woman in my position—despite your obvious belief. What does it profit a woman that she gain thirty pieces of silver and a broken neck?” She rose from the bed. “Now, Miss Tolerance, I must send you away. I have business in Green Street this evening, and it is high time I was dressed and on my way. Perhaps you will come again some time and we can continue this discussion.”

  She offered her hand. Miss Tolerance put a ten-shilling note in it.

  “If you ever decide to speak plain truth, Mrs. Vose, I hope you will let me know.”

  “It is unlikely, but I shall remember.” Josette Vose folded the note thoughtfully.

  “Do you really fear for your life?” Miss Tolerance asked at the door.

 
; “Always,” Mrs. Vose said. “This is not a safe world for a woman alone.”

  Nine

  It was dark when Miss Tolerance emerged from the house on Balcombe Street, and an icy rain had begun. Miss Tolerance pulled her hat down low and the collar of her greatcoat up higher and began to walk toward Marylebone Street, looking for a hackney carriage. There were, of course, none to be had. It was not a great walk back to Manchester Square, and she set her mind to it, thinking less of the interview just past than of a change of clothing and a cup of warm soup and a good fire. There was little light on the street, and the weather had driven most foot travelers inside for their suppers. She turned south on Baker Street and plied her way steadily along the dark streets to turn again on Blandford Street.

  She did not hear her attacker until he was just upon her.

  She had been walking with her head down against the rain and her hands in her pockets, trying to make connections between Mrs. Vose’s testimony and other facts in the case. There was a long low rumble of thunder which all but swallowed the scuff of boot leather upon the cobbles just behind her. She raised her head, her right hand already pushing through her coat for the hilt of her sword, when she was circled by strong arms that pulled her backward, all but off her feet. The man—it was undoubtedly a man from the strength and size of him—was taller than she and heavy, with a sizable gut against which the arms pinned her. Without thought Miss Tolerance raised her foot and brought the heel down hard; at the same moment she drove her elbow back with force.

  The man whuffed at the blow but did not release her; her heel, which had come down on nothing more useful than an icy pavement stone, hurt. She raised her foot again and brought it down again, this time hitting her target squarely.

  He swore, dropped one arm, and staggered back. Miss Tolerance pulled away, her hands free now, and made to draw her sword, but the man had raised his own hand and dealt her a blow across the face with enough force to knock her onto her back upon the stones. Her head hit a set of stone steps hard, and her hat went flying across the flags.