by Sara Fraser
A sudden premonition that she might lose him made Sarah speak out angrily. ‘It’s your own foolish vanity that causes you to think that. You sound like some silly addle-pated boy, when you say such things.’
He smiled gently and shook his head. ‘No, Sarah, in all honesty I do not think it to be my vanity that drives me in this matter . . . Rather it is my self-respect.’
‘And me?’ she cried out. ‘What of me, if you go to the wars? I thought that you had some tenderness of feeling for me, as I have for you.’
Jethro again kissed her mouth. ‘It may be that I am growing to love you, Sarah . . . But the sum total of a man is not to be found in his love for woman. He must firstly know and respect himself, and he can only achieve that by putting himself to the test in many different ways.’ He looked searchingly at her and asked gently, ‘If I should go away, will you wait for me to return?’
Her face set in stubborn lines and she would not meet his eyes or answer him. The hollow thump of a cannon shot sounded in the distance.
‘Dammit! That’s the evening gun. I’ll have to go back into the fort,’ Jethro told her, and touched her averted cheek. ‘We’ll talk of this again, love. Take care on your return journey.’
Still sulking, she would not reply. Jethro jumped from the carriage and headed back to the Land Gate. ‘She’ll recover her good humour in a couple of days,’ he smiled to himself. ‘How like a child she is at times . . . But then, are not we all—’
*
Sarah entered The Golden Venture through her private entrance and went up the stairs to the first floor. She walked along the passageway that led to the salon. Her partner was standing behind the bead curtain that covered the narrow-arched doorway.
‘So there you are, Sarah. I vas vondering when you might get around to doing some vork here.’ Shimson Levi’s protuberant dark eyes were as resentful as the tone in which he greeted her.
‘Look!’ He waved a bejewelled hand, pushing aside the strings of the bead curtain to point into the salon. The room was thronged with sunburned naval and marine officers, and prosperous-looking sharp-eyed civilians. ‘The busiest night ve have had for veeks and you vere novhere to be found.’
Sarah, having only parted a short while before from Jethro, and with anxiety about his possible transfer gnawing at her, tried her best to appear apologetic.
‘I’m sorry Shim. I didn’t expect this trade. Where have they all sprung from?’
‘The Aurolia,’ the Hebrew told her. ‘She’s in from the West Indies with two American merchantmen she took as prizes. They held rich cargoes. That’s vhy all these flash covers are down here, there’s good profits to be made for those who can find the rhino to bid at the auction. The officers have got an advance on the prize money I shouldn’t vonder. That’s vhy they’re all here to make their fortunes.’
Sarah nodded and let her gaze rove. The room was brilliantly lit by four great hanging chandeliers, each holding a mass of tall oil-lamps, burning yellow-flamed and giving off a pleasant smell from the scented oils they were filled with.
‘Are there any of the high flyers here yet?’ she asked.
Levi shook his head. ‘It’s a trifle early for them. But they’ll come, never fear. The governor and his hangers-on vill surely be along to try and get a share of all this money.’
Sarah continued to stare at the crowd. A great oblong table six yards long and two and a half yards broad used for the game of Rouge-et-Noir dominated the centre of the room. Around it were scattered other smaller tables for dice, French hazard, whist and a dozen other games of chance. Each table was presided over by a dealer, either a priest or priestess. The priests dressed well and sombrely in black with white linen. The priestesses wore scarlet gowns, but cut low to display their powdered shoulders and breasts. The gamblers were seated around the green baize-covered table, the colours of the military and naval uniforms outshone by the brilliant hues of the Corinthians and their women, while the graceful effeminate gestures and languid glances of a bevy of painted and powdered, scented and patched young creatures, whose sex was uncertain, outdid the most delicate moues and coy simpers of the fan-waving beauties who hung on the arms of their beaux or flirted with the hungry-eyed men.
White-aproned waiters hurried from group to group, and table to table, holding trays of bottles, glasses, lobsters, crabs, oysters and every conceivable variety of sweetmeat high above their heads. The perspiration caused by the thick heated air showed in great spreading patches on the waiters’ shirts and their cravats were sodden folds of cloth. At the end of the room an elegant screen of lacquered willow-work formed a separate section for the Roly-Poly table, or as the French termed the newly introduced game, La Roulette.
For all the numbers of people present the noise was curiously muted, only the occasional loud uttered oath at bad luck, or cry of pleasure at a winning hand breaking the low-pitched murmurous speech of the players and spectators.
‘I see Molly Bawn is not here,’ Sarah stated. ‘It’s becoming a matter of some concern to me . . . She’s not been seen for over two weeks now.’
‘The disappearance of a bloody doxy is of no concern to me,’ Shimson snapped gruffly. ‘It’s your frequent absences that are my concern.’
Sarah stopped trying to apologize. ‘I can come and go as I please,’ she said frostily. ‘I’m equal partners with you in this club, Shimson. You have no right to dictate my mode of life.’
‘I thought that when we opened the club, ve vould be more than just business partners,’ he muttered sullenly. ‘At least, that is vhat you led me to believe.’
Not for the first time in her life Sarah inwardly cursed the fact that a great many men desired her. ‘You chose to believe what your fancies dictated,’ her voice was adamant. ‘I have never given you cause to think that I wanted to, or would share your bed.’
The Hebrew’s tone became placatory. ‘It could be an honourable bed, Sarah. I will marry you, if that is what you want.’
‘Oh Shim!’ She shook her head wearily. ‘I do like you a great deal, but as a friend . . . Not as a lover.’ She placed her gloved hand on his arm. ‘Let us not haggle any more. We seem to do naught else these days and now that your uncle and Portugal John have gone back to London, we need to work closely togeth . . . Oh my God!’ Her exclamation was given added intensity by the force with which her fingers suddenly dug deep into his arm.
‘Vot is it, Sarah?’
‘Over there,’ she said faintly, and her face was pale. ‘In the main doorway.’
His black eyes scanned the spot she indicated.
‘Veil, veil . . . the return of the Prodigal Daughter. She looks ill, don’t she?’
Molly Bawn had come into the room. The weeks of absence could have been years, so greatly had she altered. She was dressed once more in the bedraggled body-displaying finery of a street prostitute. Her hair was piled high under a garish plumed turban and the heavily rouged and painted face beneath could have been that of a doll, so devoid was it of all the animated spirit and gaiety that had been her most noticeable attribute. By her side was William Seymour, clad in bottle-green coat and white pantaloons. Immaculately groomed and barbered, and in glaring contrast to the woman, his features glowed with health and vitality, while his whole being radiated an air of barely suppressed glee.
The couple were closely followed by another man. A very tall, very fat man dressed in the latest high-ton of fashionable pastel-coloured dress-coat and breeches with dainty satin dancing pumps on his incongruously tiny feet. His thick silver-bleached hair was trimmed in the Brutus mode, and he haughtily surveyed the room through gold-handled quizzing glasses. The great moon of a face under the frame of silver hair was rouged and powdered and even his pudgy hands had their palms tinted with vermilion and the backs whitened with enamel. His bizarre appearance was heightened by the unmistakable wasp waist effect of an Apollo corset.
Shimson Levi’s brow furrowed and he beckoned to a passing waiter. ‘Go to Andrew and ask him
if he can put a name to the big cove who’s just come in.’
The man hurried to the dice table where the London-imported head priest was presiding. The priest stared at the fat man while the waiter whispered in his ear then handed the dice to another croupier and sidled across to Shimson.
‘I fear we’ve got trouble here, Master Shimson,’ the man said urgently. ‘That fat cove who’s new come is Mother Bunch. He’s one o’ the flyest sharps in the whole o’ London. He’s probably brought a few pigeons wi’ him. Yes, I thought so . . .’
A party of young bucks, half-drunk and in high spirits came into the room to cluster about the man known as Mother Bunch.
‘He’ll not be here long enough to finish plucking his pigeons,’ Levi growled, and moved forwards but halfway through the curtains the priest prevented him.
‘Hold hard, Master Levi. I knows that fat cove of old. He’ll no ha’ come alone . . . There ’ull be one or two bruisers wi’ him to take care of any flat who might take objection to being fleeced by Mother Bunch.’
Levi hesitated and turned the problem in his agile brain. There were no strong-arm men employed as bullies at the club. Levi himself was a handy man with his fists and was quite capable of dealing with any troublemaker or obstreperous drunk. But this was a lot more difficult to handle. A notorious sharp in company with a group of young bloods, who would regard the man as a dear friend and who would undoubtedly turn on anyone who challenged him, not to mention the possibility of a couple of professional bullies employed as bodyguards.
Sarah had drawn farther back behind the curtains at the sight of Molly Bawn and Seymour. Unable to take her eyes from them, she had only half-heard the conversation between the two men. Now she saw Seymour turn briefly and nod to the big fat man behind him.
The fat man returned the nod, and then in a fluting, lisping voice herded his pigeons across to the table where rouge-et-noir was being played.
‘Come my chickth . . . come my heartth delightth . . . Your thaintly Mother Hen will thow you how to lothe all your ill-gotten gainth.’
‘Shim!’ Sarah tugged at the Hebrew’s coat. ‘What you were just talking about . . . the bullies, I mean. I think that man with Molly is one of them.’
Levi gazed hard at Seymour and observed, ‘There’s a dangerous look about the cove, that’s for sure . . . Do you know him, Andrew?’
The priest shook his head.
‘Very well.’ Levi came to a decision. ‘Sarah, you stay here and watch for anything else that might mean trouble. Andrew, you and me vill take the deals at rouge-et-noir. That way ve can be sure that if there’s any cribbin’, it’ll not have come from us, and ve can act accordingly . . .’
Some of the other club servants and dealers had by this time seen Molly and her companion, but they only winked and smiled knowingly at each other. If Molly had got herself a rich fancy-man, then good luck to the wench. Only two of the priestesses, wise in the ways of men with bought women, recognized the deadness in Molly’s eyes for what it was. The hopelessness of utter misery and despair.
‘More fool her,’ the one girl muttered to her friend. ‘You’d ha’ thought she’d ha’ learned by now what a load o’ pigs men are.’
Her friend slipped her arm about the slim waist next to her in a fond caress.
William Seymour was deeply happy. He had spent his time first in London, where he had disposed of the stolen banknotes and jewellery for a very good sum, then back here in Portsmouth, making careful and detailed plans with his old acquaintance, Mother Bunch. The fat man’s demands had taken nearly all Seymour’s new found wealth, but he thought it well worth the price. Molly had been an added inducement for Mother Bunch to join with Seymour. The fat man had very peculiar sexual requirements. Requirements of such a nature, that after one experience of them it was almost impossible for Mother Bunch to persuade any woman to meet them again. Seymour had needed Molly to cater to the fat man’s needs. At first her gutter temper had caused her to rebel furiously, but Seymour knew only too well how to break the most turbulent spirit and, in only days in a filthy cellar in the Seven Dials, had reduced Molly Bawn to a cowed, subservient slave. Seymour glanced at the girl distastefully.
‘I couldn’t bear to touch her again, after what she and Mother Bunch have been doing together,’ he thought, then smiled to himself. ‘Thank God, that after tonight I’ll not need her any more.’
The only thing that marred his pleasure at this moment was that he could not see Sarah Jenkins in the room. He wanted her to be there, so that at the end of the night she would know who had been responsible for her ruin. There came another flurry of movement, loud voices, and laughter at the doorway as the General the Earl of Harcourt made his robust and genial entrance.
Seymour’s thin lips curved in a smile. ‘Perfect!’ he thought. ‘That’s another factor of the plan fulfilled. The rest will be easy.’
By this time, Shimson Levi and his head dealer Andrew, had taken the dealers’ chairs facing each other across the great oblong rouge-et-noir table. Lord Harcourt lowered his plump hips into a seat to the left side of Shimson, while Mother Bunch, with a couple of his pigeons was almost opposite the earl. The table could accommodate a score of players and each seat was taken with spectators crowding at the chair backs, eager to fill any vacated place. There was an atmosphere of expectant excitement charging the air. Everyone knew that with the fresh prize money about, the stakes would run high and heavy. The game itself was basically simple, and Shimson thought it to be the most satisfactory possible from the club’s point of view. The odds in the bank’s favour were two and a half percent, even without the priests cheating the flats.
Shimson’s mercenary heart gloried in it. With three six-pack deals taking place every hour and the game continuing for perhaps eight hours a night, the profits were of a comforting steadiness for the club.
Andrew took and shuffled the six new packs of cards and invited a further shuffle. The governor, mellow with good wine, accepted. The players backed their fancies and the game began.
Shimson toyed idly with the pile of gold and banknotes that both he and his head priest had in front of them and watched Mother Bunch closely. The fat man appeared unconscious of the attention he was getting from Levi. He laughed and joked in his lisping voice and placed smallish bets. Losing a little, winning a little. The long flexible fingers of Andrew riffled and shuffled and flicked the cards over on to the green cloth. An ace, an eight, a ten, a five, a queen, total thirty-four . . .
‘Four!’ Andrew called loudly, and dealt the second row. Knave, ten, queen, two, total thirty-two. ‘Two, red wins!’ His voice sounded out and in concert with Shimson, he used his wooden hoe-shaped rake to draw in the losers’ stakes and push gold and banknotes to the winners. The green of the cloth, the clicking of the cards, the rustle of white banknotes, the heavy chink of golden guineas, the slithering of rakes, the minute scintillating flashes from jewelled rings on smooth hands . . . the shimmering, blurring, ever-shifting blues, creams, scarlets, lavenders, yellows, purples, magentas, cerises and silver of buckles, buttons, braids, coats, jewels, gowns, fans . . . the scents of perfumes, pomades, snuffs, tobaccos, wines, brandies, took soothing effect on Shimson’s senses and calmed and lulled the shivers of dangers invoked by Mother Bunch’s presence.
‘One apres. Will you halve your stakes, gentlemen?’ ‘Six, red wins!’ ‘Three, red loses!’ ‘Two, red wins!’ ‘Eight, red wins!’ ‘Six, red loses!’ ‘Four, red wins!’ Will any gentleman shuffle?’ ‘Eight . . . nine, red loses!’ ‘Damn my luck!’ ‘That’s the card, sir.’ ‘Blast it!’ ‘God rot me!’ ‘Oh, you little beauty you!’ The muted murmurs and whispers of the players was a constant susurration over the table. ‘Five . . . two, red wins! Seven . . . nine, red loses!’
The piles of banknotes and gold before the dealers began to increase perceptibly as the hours wore on. Gamblers lost their all and left the table . . . Others took their places. Voices grew hushed and hoarse, and stakes grew bigger as those
who won gained confidence in their luck. Then, for the first time Mother Bunch took the offered shuffle. Shimson’s eyes gave bleak warning to the great rouged, decadent Roman Emperor’s face, now overlaid with a sheen of sweat. Mother Bunch’s tiny rosebud of purple-painted mouth moued at the Hebrew.
‘Heaventh! What mutht you think of me, thir? Thtaring at me in thuch a thearching manner?’
The table tittered at the words and Shimson felt momentarily outfaced.
‘Forgive me, sir,’ he replied. ‘I was sure for a moment that ve had met before . . . In London, perhaps?’
‘Heaventh! That think of iniquity . . . That Thodom and Gomorrah!’ The fat man rolled his kohled eyes in flirtatious roguishness. ‘Let me athure you, thir, that if I had met thuch a handthome devil ath you, ethpethially in London, then athuredly you would remember me perfectly.’
The table exploded with laughter and Shimson forced himself to share in this joke at his expense. The forced smile died on his lips when in the next series of coups that comprised the full six-pack deal, Mother Bunch suddenly upped his stakes and ended by winning about five hundred guineas, an amount that equalled a week’s good gross takings at the club. Shimson’s thoughts raced. He had watched the shuffle closely and had not taken his eyes from the fat man while he played. Shimson was sure that the sharp had not switched any cards or been able to cheat in any other way. He glanced at Andrew who slightly narrowed his eyes to negate any idea that the fat man had cheated them. The deal finished and the cards were taken by Andrew.
