Confessions of the Fox

by Jordy Rosenberg

  And now she un-cupped her hands. The creature had gone docile in the shadow of her palms. She petted its strange tan body. You, she coaxed, smiling when the creature rose up on its back fronds. How did you get here?

  “You’re staring,” she said after a beat. It was true. Jack could have watched her coddle this mysterious insect all night with that open, undefended Smile across her face.

  “Sorry.” He swallow’d a gulp of his ale, sucking down confidence and a blissful forgetting. She doesn’t outshine and outclass you in every possible way—(this last he repeated to himself without believing)— You’re just another dry boots at the Black Lion Inn talking sweet with a beautiful doxy— You’re not a—

  But he put the thought out of his mind. His ribs ached against the tightly wrapped bandages. No need to dwell on questions without answers—he wasn’t anything but another clinker*11 fox*12 tonight.

  “Not seen one of those before.” He strove to return to casual banter.

  “Must’ve traveled in a satchel from the countryside. Haven’t seen one like this in some time.”

  “Where in the countryside?”

  “Do you know anything about the countryside?” She assessed that the answer was most certainly no. Londoners—she sigh’d inwardly. Why are city folk possess’d of the insupportable and yet unshakable belief that their knowledge extends far beyond the bounds of their experience? “To return to my point,” she continued. “Screwsman, Cracksman and Latch-Drawer are nice, Jack”—Bess focus’d her gaze on his strong-jointed fingers—“but you should be King of the Screwsmen. Now you’ll excuse me while I let this centipede into the yard.”

  Just like that, she planted a seed. And she meant to let it grow.

  *1 A broad term that would have covered a range of (what might anachronistically and unsatisfactorily be described as) queer boys and transfemmes. Their houses of love and congress—molly houses—were routinely raided. It is likely that the seventeen recorded molly-house raids between 1726 and 1737 are a huge understatement. (Cf. Randolph Trumbach, Sex and the Gender Revolution, Vol. 1: Heterosexuality and the Third Gender in Enlightenment London, University of Chicago Press, 1998.)

  *2 Beautiful

  *3 Speak in underworld tongues/speak cant

  *4 Cant

  *5 Engage me for intercourse

  *6 Copulation without emission

  *7 Beggar

  *8 A thief expert in unscrewing hinges

  *9 A thief expert in breaking windows

  *10 Pick locks

  *11 Clever

  *12 Man. Although eighteenth-century usage of “fox” indicated a man, now, of course, “fox” broadly denotes a fetching individual of whatever gender. Perhaps “fox” has transited through underworld patois? After all, one of the first things lost in translation is the apparent fixity of gender. As Hobson-Jobson note in their—supremely orientalizing and fucked up—A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, a translation results in an androgynization of language wherein “all traces of gender are lost.”

  This seems a marvelous loss. Perhaps “fox” has emerged, ungendered, from the embrace of early modern rogues to signify simply an object of desire. An endearment. Rather: an enfoxment.

  7.

  The next night, Jack jump’d his confinement again.

  Descended from his garret—

  Powered down the lantern-lit streets—

  * * *

  —

  At Cresswell’s Seraglio, a splendid house of prostitution in a fine brick building that lorded over the low structures of Oxford Street, the door blasted open and the scent of lime and bluebell—the season’s fashion—pour’d out, along with two doxies. The heat of the interior blew across Jack’s face. There was the crashing din of laughter, light drunken debating, and the flicking sound of cards being shuffled. He caught the eye of the Lady Abbess, sitting high on a stool just at the threshold’s interior sporting a powdered cloud of a wig. She extended her hand, palm cupped expectantly open.

  “Ten p.”

  Jack hiccupp’d at the sum and darted backwards, leaning out of sight as the door closed.

  * * *

  —

  Near midnight and still waiting—

  The Evening was spectacular. Deep dark washed with the pale metallic Cloud of constellations slash’d across the upper Vault. Jack was kicking at broken chips of cobblestone when Bess tumbl’d up noisily behind.

  She leaned on his shoulder.

  “Jack.”

  Her breath was a warm Dense weather he wanted to inhabit.

  “Let’s on with it,” grumbled a cove lurking behind her—a real burgher-type, with a bright cravat—his dark hair sprouted in a damp crown and his navy topcoat hung loosely off his shoulders. Jack envy’d even his thinning hair and the Hollows under his eyes. The cove looked so…cove-like. Dogged, persistent, sufferingly intent on his Desire.

  “Thought you’d have found your way in, King Screwsman,” Bess said as she was towed towards the door, which opened to the shaft of red and gold interior, then shut, and the street was returned to Silence and Dark once again.

  * * *

  —

  Jack stepp’d back, taking care to vault over the Sewers trickling down the sides of the street, crawling with vermin and slimed with Refuse.

  He watched the windows.

  All with curtains shut but one. High on the third floor. A dark Room that now lit up with the arrival of a lantern, then the shadow of a Body crossing, and a hand holding the cloth. Bess’s? Then the curtains slid shut.

  Jack rounded the back of the seraglio. The verso face was a hectic Assemblage. Bricks unlaced from their mortar moorings, windowsills tonguing out over the alley.

  He would skip the bricks that poked out most. These were the bricks jutting up against the wooden Studs, and likely loose. Instead, he pinch’d his fingers around the bricks flush to the face of the building. The effort of the ascent sent sharp twinges under his arms where the bandages abraded his skin. Jack stopped once or twice to gasp against the hard Wrap before achieving the roof—a landscape of crumbling brick that was soft underfoot. He looked over the city. Long parks to the north surrounded by bright mansions ringed ’round with Lanterns. Chaotic huts piled one on top of another to the south. A glob of sea-coal Smoke hung over the outer reaches and the poorer areas, striating to a fine gray mist over Whitechapel and Marylebone.

  He perch’d at the high ridge of the parapet above the front façade. Waited.

  Bess’s high-pitched calls mixed with the grunts of the customer. There was a strange incongruity, Jack thought, between her low tone at the Black Lion and these lilting emanations. Then came a very regular series of Weepings-out that seemed to provoke and escalate the grunting on the part of the balding burgher, which concluded in a soprano Squeak that was somewhere between defeat and surprise—not a way Jack thought a man could sound— But perhaps this was how men resonated when taken over, however briefly, by a Woman.

  * * *

  —

  Soon after, the clatter of boots and the pop of a door closing. A light project’d across the alley as the curtains just below were opened. Bess’s voice—low again—Come’n.

  Jack peer’d down. The hang to the window was considerable. But with strong joints, a set of fingers could grab hold of the nails poking from the parapet just enough to flip one’s legs into a waiting, open window.

  Mid-flight, a flash of Disaster—considering the Consequences if Bess had not thought to press the window fully open— He flinch’d, bracing for impact—and plung’d forward through the wide-open frame.

  He half-sailed, half-tumbled, landing just a hair past a daybed that rested under the window. The room was sweet with the ammonia of male emission and amber with Candlelight. A dresser, an armoire, a well-turned mahogany bed with fine linens, an upho
lstered daybed in crimson damask—enough furniture for a parlor room in a fine townhouse. Bess was standing at an ivory basin in the far corner, patting her neck with a handkerchief. She did not turn, but regarded him out of the corner of her eye—from nerves or disinterest, ’twas difficult to say.

  Jack shook out his hands—red and cramped from the recent effort, veins bloated like an animal furrowing under the Skin.

  “What did you mean about King Screwsman?” An unfortunate opening salvo. He sounded anxious.

  “Only that you seem more than your current station.”

  Until two nights ago he’d been squirrel’d away at Kneebone’s, unaware of anything other than the endless reach of days and nights of his servitude. Now that there was a Horizon, he saw just how far off it was. And if it was unreachable? There was something about the banter, the exclusiveness of her chambers. Bess was accomplished—accomplished and musky and sharply wry.

  His stomach lurched. I can’t be this—this Jack. He turned towards the window to leave, craning his head at the roof, which now appear’d farther off than when he had come in. Well, it’s Manageable, he assess’d, perhaps wrongly.

  “I meant, for one thing”—her voice was close behind him. When he turn’d, she was pushing her hair behind an ear—“that you seem different than the coves that come through here—the ones who see only a harlot or a desperate jilt scouring for a husband.”

  “You’re not hunting for a h-husband?” The stutter again.

  He felt the trace of her breath on his face when she said, “Not quite.”

  Total silence between them.

  Then: “Are you hungry?”

  Well, yes.

  Though he hadn’t realized it until she ask’d. He wanted to eat and swallow and—there was no other way to put it but that he wanted to have a Body in her presence—a Body— Now here was another Horizon come swinging up, this one bury’d so deep inside him it was a Thing unfamiliar.

  “Very. But—”

  Ordinarily at this hour Jack would be asleep, exhaustion overcoming hunger and empty pockets.

  “I’ll take you.” She handed him a topcoat. “Nicked it from a cove too soused to notice.”

  The coat was a deep maroon with velvet trimmings. Jack slipp’d his arm into the heavy satin sleeve. It was both too long and too wide. He glimpsed himself in the mirror. He looked surprisingly buckish*1. Maybe a touch too deft*2 for his own liking—he’d like to look a bull-beef*3. But he looked buckish enough, and this pleased him, despite the flash he got of his mother’s face hardening in Horror.*4

  * * *

  —

  At the late hour, the George on Borough High Street was sparse with gentry. The wood floors were swept clean, there was a Fire going, and the tables were set farther apart than at the Black Lion. Bess led Jack towards a corner in the back. He whizz’d around to pull out her chair, which she squinted at, then accepted.

  Once they were seated, a well-fed pale woman in a complex many-tiered outfit of blue petticoats approach’d the table.

  “I’m the wife of the owner. Barmaid’s taken to bed.”

  Jack look’d down. He had never eaten at a pub before.

  Bess ordered two teapots for them and lamb and mint peas for Jack. Neither she nor the pub owner’s wife met each other’s eye.

  “Did you want to take that off? It’s warm in here.”

  Jack hunch’d more resolutely inside the husk of the coat. He liked how it biggened him.

  The pub owner’s wife return’d with Jack’s tea and the peas and Lamb.

  “Last helping of the night. Was going to have it myself, but since we’ve got a hungry cove amongst us…” She poured the tea into a mug.

  Jack grunted an approximation of thanks, then address’d the food. He sat, elbows on his knees, alternately scooping at mint peas and sipping at his boiling Tea.

  Bess watched him. “You’re bound in Service.”

  “Who said.” This came out who shayd, due to the quantity of peas in his mouth.

  “What else would you be. You’ve thus far appeared only at night. You’ve one set of clothes—as far as I can see. You quite enjoy oiling that apron.” She smiled. “And you’ve strong hands.”

  Jack made a note not to oil his apron so much. “Carpentry. At Kneebone’s.”

  “That’s skilled labor.”

  He shrugged. “It’s mostly a lot of tuffets.”

  “How long’ve you been at it?”

  “Nine years.”

  Bess nodded. “Been in London about that long, myself.”

  The pub owner’s wife arriv’d with the tea for Bess. Set the pot and an empty mug down with a clank and left them there. Under her breath, she muttered a cruel slur.*5

  Jack study’d Bess’s face. It was very still.

  He was up from his seat before he even meant to be.

  She put her hand on his arm.

  “Sit down.”

  “She’s the b——*6.”

  “Please”—her voice was urgent—“you’re creating a scene.”

  He sat. Reach’d across the table to pour her tea for her.

  Now Bess’s face flick’d through a series of Expressions too fast to discern.

  “Don’t call Attention to what you don’t understand,” she said. She placed her hand on the kettle, pushing it gently down and away from her cup. Her voice was measured. “I can handle my own slights.”

  A stupid rush of Heroism. Jack placed his hands in his lap.

  Bess poured her tea and wrapped her palms around the mug. “Anyway you could have shared yours.” She lowered her head over the trickle of Steam.

  “You’re good at getting in places,” she said, after some time. She nodded at the veins and knuckles in his hand. “Must be the tuffet-caning.” Her gaze on the back of his hand caused his entire system to Boil.

  “Tuffets are not very interesting.” He picked up his Fork again, impaling peas on the tines. “It’s just an S-caning technique and a pillow top that we get from the quilter.” He ate a forkful, then mimicked the caning technique, weaving his hands in the air.

  Through the fog of tea-Mist that lifted from her cup. “What do you intend to do after your service with Kneebone is complete?”

  “Join Kneebone as a colleague?”

  Bess arch’d an eyebrow.

  “Has Kneebone mentioned joining him as a colleague?”

  “No.”

  “Is Kneebone the promoting sort of man?”

  He wanted to say: No, Kneebone’s a bitter old husk who chains me to the workbench during the day and to my bedpost at night. But then Bess would know just how Owned he was—

  He swallow’d a pea. “Maybe?”

  “I’ve not heard of a master ever once promoting a servant like that.”

  “He’s not extraordinarily cruel,” Jack heard himself echoing Kneebone’s self-depiction. “He’s just a precise bookkeeper.”

  “Hm.” Bess sipp’d tea. She was a loud sipper. He liked the Sound of it.

  “On the off chance that Kneebone doesn’t fancy promoting you, but instead has it in mind to work you to Death and then turn you out onto the streets like the starving dog you already halfway are, you might consider turning your capacities for squirreling in places to a different account. A life of nabbing*7 beats a life of cadging*8, you know. And that’s”—she held his gaze—“what I meant when I called you King Screwsman.”

  *1 Masculine

  *2 Pretty

  *3 Thick

  *4 Thank god for the women who rescue us from the medusan horror of our mothers’ gazes; for the women who see us as…us.

  Relatedly, a couple of weeks ago I stopped into the Rite Aid on my way to work. An ordinary day, my regular stop-by. I could have called in the prescription, sure, but I like the routin
e and the personal touch. My single-mom neighbor, Ursula, is the head pharmacist there.

  Ursula wasn’t single when she moved across the street from me. Had a red-haired, thick, rough-looking guy who worked for the Department of Public Works. Always heading out on an ATV at dawn during snowstorms and shit. One night there’s a raging fight conducted half inside, half outside on their porch. The next day a trailer appears in their yard. By that evening you can tell he’s living in it. A couple of weeks later the trailer and the guy are gone and now it’s just her and her kid.

  P.S. Ursula is pretty hot. Short, well endowed, and funny. That combination that absolutely destroys me. I enjoy looking at her precisely slipping pills into vials and taping on labels, standing behind the counter at the pharmacy. Her hair all dark and glossy against her white lab coat. Her focused look. I’ve always thought Hot Pharmacist (also: Hot Vet) would be a good idea for a sitcom. But then again my bar for sitcoms is very low.

  I sometimes bring Ursula a macchiato from the artisanal coffee shop next door—the one that specializes in humane-egg challah and Italian coffee—and we chat for a bit if it isn’t busy. She has that kind of skeptical squint I tend to fall for.

  So I go in with my little gifts. Ursula’s back behind the counter, and I hand her the macchiato, which she always laughs at. You know you can bring me Dunkin’ Donuts, right? she says. I shrug. I like to make it seem that I would only bring her the best Italian macchiato, but also Dunkin’ Donuts is out of the way, and the macchiato-and-humane-egg-challah place is next door. Ultimately I can be a little spendy and lazy in my present-giving. I wasn’t the one who pointed that out to me.

  So I hand her the macchiato and we get to chatting—I ask her about her daughter and how “pharmacisting” is going—and then, I don’t know why, but I tell her about the manuscript. I hadn’t told anyone else. I mean, I hadn’t spoken to anyone to tell. But, still, I hadn’t told anyone.

  She starts asking encouraging and really, actually, specific and interested questions. What “trans” meant in the period. Whether anyone else had found documents like this before. And weirdly she has some speculations of her own about early modern endocrinology. Says they’d learned in pharmacist classes something about nineteenth-century experiments on French roosters. She really seems to have an interest in the whole thing. Needless to say, this is opening me up and shit, and once I start talking, it all comes out. I even forget about my unpaid-leave woes for a bit.