Description: Petty Treason One I t is one thing, and a quite considerable thing, to be a lady. A true lady is a person of virtue and beauty, of accomplishment and talent, of gentle birth and rigorous upbringing. She inspires love in her suitors and obedience in her servants, and knows how to hold housekeeping and bully the butcher and chandler so cleverly that those persons feel it their privilege to serve her. The suggestion of strife oppresses her, and her pleasures are the mildest and most delicate. Her honor is a possession prized above rubies, and even the gentlest breath of scandal damages it forever. If adventure offers itself she understands that her reputation is at stake, and wisely settles for tedium. Or so the theory goes. A gentleman, however, is not contained by prudishness. His sex licenses him, even encourages him, to seek out adventure and prove himself. There is no woman too low, no bottle too deep, no horse too fast or play too high, but there are gentlemen willing to swive, drink, race or wager. It is customary for a young man to prowl the fleshpots of London before he marries, to exercise his appetites to the fullest and slake them so that he does not appall the sensibilities of the Fair Flower he ultimately takes to wife. And for most gentlemen that is exactly what happens: each finds his favored dissipation--the bottle, the bootmaker, the bookmaker orthe brothel--and falls violently in love for a time. And the passion runs its course and the young man is then suited for matrimony. Or so the theory goes. But there are some gentlemen who find that giving rein to their desires only leads to the increase of those desires; and a man who lives for pleasure, and for the pleasure of being more debauched, more drunken, more spendthrift, more heedless, than his peers, is called a Rake. Young men with more money than sense who aspire to something higher than mere Fashion strive to be as thoughtless and wasteful as they may, ruining themselves pell-mell at drink, venery and gaming. But the true Rake has something more of imagination than of spendthrift waste, and his motto might well be "Because I wish it." Many Rakes combine considerable address and genuine thoughtfulness for the welfare of their tenants and aged parents, but it is also true that where the gratification of their wishes is concerned, they can be merciless. To be that man or woman who stands between a Rake and his desire--or as likely, comprises that desire--is not an enviable thing. Of course, as in every other field of human endeavor, some men have more natural talent as Rakes than others. For every true Rake in London in the year 1810 there were likely a dozen pretenders to the title. The Dueling Notices in the weekly Gazette were peopled with those wounded or killed in pursuit, either of vice or honor. Spunging houses and debtor''s prisons were likewise occupied by those who had been stripped of their fortunes by improvident congress with Rakes. As for women--those of both high and low estate were accosted with such regularity that it is surprising there were half the number of respectable females remaining in the nation. And the alleys and corners of gin-shops and taverns were lined with young inebriates whose ambitions outmatched their tolerance for drink. Thus, Mr. Maurice Waldegreen, who was very drunk. "Good God, I''m foxed!" he said thickly. "Cup-shot. Drunk as David''s sow. No, drunker!" He giggled. "Drunk as ... drunk as what?" "A hippogriff?" his companion suggested politely. They had only met that evening, but Mr. Waldegreen clearly regarded brevity of acquaintance as no bar to friendship. His arm flungheavily across his new friend''s neck, he leaned down until their faces were but a few inches apart. His breath was very foul. "What''s a hippogriff?" he inquired, his head weaving back and forth. "Perhaps I meant hippopotamus?" his friend suggested, shrugging to shift the weight of Mr. Waldegreen''s arm from collar to shoulder. Mr. Waldegreen considered, tilting his head. Alas, as slight as this motion was, it overset him. Mr. Waldegreen stumbled, falling forward until he encountered, with every evidence of surprise, a wall of grimy brick. They had emerged only a moment before from a wine-shop into the icy November night, but the chill was not exercising a sobering effect on Mr. Waldegreen. "Drunk as a hippogriff!" he announced, and groped his way down the wall until he was sitting in the mud and cobbles. His coat, which must have recently been clean and well tended, was wrinkled and dirty. His neckcloth had come untied and was stippled with wine, demonstrating that Mr. Waldegreen was not one of those dandies for whom elegance was a bar to dissipation. He leaned back against the wall and squinted up at his new friend. "Damn, what are you doing all the way up there?" "Wondering where my hackney coach is." Relieved of Mr. Waldegreen''s weight, his companion stepped back a pace and straightened the collar of her coat. A careful observer--of whom there were none at that moment--would have discerned despite the darkness and her garb--breeches, boots, neatly tied neckcloth and a long, caped greatcoat from the Belgian tailor Gunnard--that Mr. Waldegreen''s companion was young, female, and quite handsome. But Miss Sarah Tolerance had discovered that most people saw what they expected to see unless the truth of her sex was forced upon them. In more than three hours spent at Mr. Waldegreen''s side, he had not focused his gaze upon her long enough to uncover her imposture. If their neighbors at the wine-shop they had just left had discerned her sex, none had seen fit to mention it. Miss Tolerance looked down at Waldegreen with amusement. "Are you comfortable, sir?" "Aye, Frenchy, fine as frog hair," Mr. Waldegreen said. "Just aslight case of barrel fever is all. Don''t know how, though. My father always said it wasn''t possible to get drunk on Bordeaux--" "Your father perhaps never encountered Bordeaux that bad. And of course, much is possible to a man of dedicated purpose." Waldegreen snickered. "Dedicated purpose! Z''all clear to me! My father never ''preciated my dedi-dedi--" he belched loudly. "My dedi-cated purpose! Always wearing on about--" He belched again and took his head in his hands, as if all the less pleasant aspects of his condition had suddenly threatened to visit themselves upon him. Miss Tolerance regarded him with a mixture of sympathy and impatience. "How am I to get you home," she muttered. It had been a long night, she had necessarily drunk enough wine to pretend to keep pace with Waldegreen, and the thought of now having to raise the man''s unreliable person to its feet and move him along the alley to Fleet Street did not appeal to her. "If the hackney''s gone, how the Devil am I going to find another in this neighborhood?" Mr. Waldegreen vomited. Miss Tolerance jumped nimbly to avoid being caught by the flow, and after a moment offered her handkerchief to the young man. He mumbled a thank you and mopped at his face. "Drunk as a hippogriff, Frenchy. How is it you''re not?" "A naturally more abstemious character, Mr. Waldegreen." She refused the return of the besmirched handkerchief, but added its cost to a mental reckoning. He shook his head. "Mustn''t call me that. Poggy, that''s what you call me. That''s what everyone calls me. ''Cept milord father." Mr. Waldegreen was dearly descending into the morose stage of drunkenness. "Milord father don''t call me at all if he can help it. A fierce disappointment I am to milord father. Dammit, m''mouth tastes like a stable. Haven''t a sip of brandy, have you?" Miss Tolerance regretted that she did not. "I think perhaps I ought to go look out a hackney coach, Poggy," she said. "You''ll have the Devil of a head tomorrow." She regarded her charge for a moment longer, then looked up and down the empty length of thealleyway. They were some paces away from the wine-shop in which she had found him, and its door was shut tight against the cold. In the chill post-midnight it was unlikely that Waldegreen would be troubled by idle passersby. She went down the lane to the corner of Fleet Street. Finding a hackney, even on this thoroughfare, proved to be as thankless a chore as she had expected. It was a full ten minutes before she reappeared at the corner with the bulk of a disreputable coach paused behind her on the street. "All right, Poggy," she began. Then stopped, when she saw three men clustered around Mr. Waldegreen. Miss Tolerance prepared for the worst--pushing her coat aside to free the hilt of her smallsword--but spoke with unruffled politeness. "It''s kind of you to concern yourselves, but my friend will recover when I get him home, gentlemen." The men turned to her, scowling. The man nearest Miss Tolerance appeared, by his attitude and appearance, to be the leader. He was short and extremely fat, his coat and breeches so tight that he gave the impression of being almost explosively compressed into his clothing. His several chins were forced up by the elaborate style of his neckcloth, and his face was shadowed by a small hat with a shallow, curled brim. The moon was not full, but there was some light from two torches flanking the door of the wine-shop from which Miss Tolerance and Mr. Waldegreen had lately emerged. She could see enough to know that the fat man meant her charge no good. "Go away, boy." The fat man barely wasted a glance upon her. His voice was gravely, punctuated by audible wheezing. "This ''ere ain''t none of your business." She stepped forward. "I''m afraid I cannot do that, sir. I promised my friend''s fathe

Please Wait