A Spectacle of Corruption (27 page)

We all took our seats in the box, and I glanced over to the stage where the play, Addison’s
Cato,
was already well under way. A fine choice, certainly, for this election season, for the play celebrated a great statesman who embraced civic virtue over fashionable corruption. No doubt the theater manager had thought to draw a large crowd with this choice, and he had successfully done so, but so volatile a play could easily ignite public passion—and it did.

We had been sitting not ten minutes when Mr. Barton Booth, in the role of Cato, began to deliver a rousing speech on corruption in the senate. A fellow in the pit shouted, “Corruption in the senate? We wouldn’t know nothing about that one.”

This drew a great laugh from the audience, and while the intrepid thespian plowed ahead with his lines, another man shouted, “Melbury’s our Cato! He’s the only one with virtue here!”

Now I looked up. Mr. Melbury was in a box across the theater from ours, and he rose and took a bow to the cheers of the audience.

Onstage, the players ceased their playing, waiting for the audience to return some small fraction of their attention. I could see that they would have a long wait. “Melbury be damned,” someone else called. “The damned Romish Jacobite Tories be damned!”

At all of this, Hertcomb began to turn the color of an old farmer’s cheese, and he slumped his head into his chest. The very last thing in the world he desired was that an incensed crowd of Tory theatergoers should recognize him. I can hardly say I blamed him. By the time I saw a few pieces of fruit take flight, I took hold of Miss Dogmill’s arm. “I believe it is time I took you someplace less combustible.”

She laughed good-naturedly in my ear. “Oh, Mr. Hertcomb is perhaps right to wish to avoid notice, but we’ve nothing to worry about. Perhaps they don’t have such riotous audiences in the West Indies, Mr. Evans, but here they are no uncommon thing.”

Now there were warring factions in the theater. Half cried out that Mr. Melbury should be damned, the other half encouraged the damnation of Mr. Hertcomb. The famous comedian of Drury Lane, Mr. Colley Cibber, now stepped foot onto the stage in the hopes of quelling these violent sentiments but was answered only with apples to his head for his troubles. I could tell now that the Hertcomb party was losing out, their voices being drowned by the Melbury camp.

And then I heard something that astonished me to my core. “God bless Griffin Melbury,” one man shouted, “and God bless Benjamin Weaver.”

It would seem that Johnson’s praise of me in the Tory papers had taken root. Soon the cry, all but destroying all trace of the Hertcomb faction, was “Melbury and Weaver!” over and over again, as though we ran for the House together. And Melbury stood waving at the crowd, glowing in the premature glory of victory, while Hertcomb attempted to bury his face in his hands. Now the chanting was accompanied by the stomping of feet, and the whole building shook with the rhythm of the crowd’s mayhem.

“Are you sure there is no cause for alarm?” I asked Miss Dogmill. I have been among boisterous theater audiences many times, and I felt I knew when a crowd had begun to turn dangerous. Melbury no longer waved and was attempting to quiet the crowd, but he was no longer of interest to them. Pieces of fruit, paper, shoes, and hats were now soaring through the air like sparks at a fireworks show. We were on the cusp of riot.

“No,” Miss Dogmill said, her voice now shaking with concern, “I am no longer sure. Indeed, I begin to fear for Mr. Hertcomb’s safety, perhaps even my own.”

“Then let us go,” I said.

The rest of our companions were in agreement, and we vacated the premises in a rushed if orderly manner, along with the majority of the patrons in the boxes. If the ruffians in the pit were to destroy the place, let them destroy only themselves. There was much murmuring about the unruliness of the lower orders, a sentiment Hertcomb heartily agreed with by nodding vigorously, though he hid his face behind a handkerchief.

Our evening entertainment having been prematurely ended, there was some discussion as to where to go next. As the evening was unusually warm for the season, the general agreement was for dining al fresco at a garden in St. James’s, so we repaired there and enjoyed a hearty fare of beef and warm punch while the heating torches blazed nearby.

Hertcomb played his distress with a skill that would have impressed the thespians of Drury Lane. Though he glanced over at Miss Dogmill no more than two or three times each minute, he found comfort in one of her companions, a pert little creature with mouse-colored hair and a long thin nose. Not the prettiest young lady in town but certainly amiable, and I believed I could see Hertcomb find more to like about her with each glass of punch he swallowed. By the time he had put his arm around her waist and shouted out that dear Henrietta (though her name was Harriet) was his own true darling and the finest girl in the kingdom, I ceased to concern myself about his feelings.

As Hertcomb fell more securely into a delightful stupor, I allowed myself to relax and enjoy myself entire. Pressed into close conversation, I found Miss Dogmill’s companions all sufficiently agreeable, if unremarkable. None of them had any particular interest in my story but the most minimal details, and I took some pleasure in having to tell so few lies over the course of the evening. Instead, warmed by drink and food, the roaring fires of the garden, and the nearness of Miss Dogmill’s body, I could almost convince myself that this was my life, that I was Matthew Evans, and that there was no unmasking in my future. I now know I was overly optimistic, for an unmasking was to come, and very quickly too.

P
erhaps if I had been enjoying less drink, I would not have permitted such a thing to happen, but after the evening’s events I found myself traveling alone with Miss Dogmill in her equipage. She had agreed to take me home, and I had assumed that others would be joining us, but I soon found myself alone with her in the darkness of the coach.

“Your rooms are so close to my house,” she said. “Perhaps you would like to come in first for some refreshment before going home.”

“I should love to, but I fear that your brother might not wish me to pay a call.”

“It is my home too,” she said sweetly.

Here things began to grow delicate. I had long since come to suspect that Miss Dogmill might not be, let us say, the most scrupulous guardian of her virtue, and though I was never a man to resist the allure of Venus, I had taken far too great a liking to her to allow her to compromise herself with me while I remained in disguise. I certainly had no intentions of revealing to her my true name, but I feared that if I rejected her proposal I might seem to her something overly principled or, perhaps worse, uninterested in her charms. What could I do but acquiesce to her offer?

We retired at once to the parlor, and after her maid brought us a decanter of wine we were soon left alone entirely. A rich blaze roared in the fireplace, and two of the sconces of the room had been lit, but we were still largely veiled in shadow. I had cautiously taken a seat across from Miss Dogmill, who sat on a sofa, and I lamented that I could not very well see her lovely eyes as we spoke.

“I have recently learned that you paid a visit to my brother at his goose pull,” she said to me.

“It was perhaps not the least provocative thing I’ve ever done,” I admitted.

“You are a mystery, sir. You are a Tory, yet you seek the help of a great Whig when you arrive in our city. Then, rebuffed by him, perhaps unkindly, you attend him when he is certain to find your attendance infuriating.”

“Does my having done so anger you?” I asked.

She laughed. “No, it amuses me. I love my brother, and he has always been kind to me, but I know he is not always kind to other people: poor Mr. Hertcomb, for instance, whom he treats like a drunken butler. I cannot but smile at seeing a man who does not hesitate to stand up to him. But it puzzles me as well.”

“I cannot fully account for my whims,” I said by way of explanation. “Taking upon myself the defense of that goose seemed to me, at that moment, the right thing to do. My doing so does not mean that I would not sit down for supper and eat the better part of a goose with great relish.”

“Do you know, Mr. Evans,” she said to me, “that you speak of yourself less than any man I have met?”

“How can you say so? Have I not, just this moment, expounded my opinions on goose and man?”

“You surely have, but I am far more interested in the man than I am the goose.”

“I do not wish to chatter on about myself. Not when there is someone as interesting as yourself in the room. I should very much like to know more about you than hear myself speak of what I know so well.”

“I have told you of my life. But you have been very withholding. I know nothing of your family, your friends, your life in Jamaica. Most men who make their living from the land love to talk of their estates and their holdings, but you have said nothing. Why, if I were to ask you the size of your plantation, I doubt you should even be able to tell me.”

I forced a laugh. “You are surely unique of all the ladies I have known, madam, in wanting to be taxed with tedious knowledge.”

Miss Dogmill said nothing for a moment. She then took a drink of her wine and slowly set down the goblet. I could hear the soft tap of the silver base against the wood. “Tell me the truth. Why did you call on my brother?” she asked at last, her voice heavy and somber. Something, I knew, had changed.

I tried hard to show that I saw nothing alarming in her tone. “I have thought to make myself a purchasing agent for Jamaica tobacco,” I said, repeating the oft-told lie, “and I had hoped your brother would provide some guidance.”

“I very much doubt he would do that.”

“As it turns out, your doubts would have served me well had I known of them prior to my visit.”

“But the results of your calling upon Mr. Dogmill cannot have surprised you. My brother’s reputation as a ruthless businessman must extend to the West Indies. There is not a farmer in Virginia who does not fear his grasp. Do you mean to say you had never heard him to be ungenerous in these regards? Surely there was some other purchasing agent, some smaller fellow, who would have made a superior mentor.”

“I wished to go to the most powerful,” I said hastily, “for your brother’s success testifies to his skill.”

I thought she would press me now with another hard question, but I found I was mistaken. “I can hardly see you over there,” she said. “Not even when I lean forward.”

As it is so dark,
I should have said,
I ought to make my way home.
But I did not say that. Instead, I said, “Then I must join you on your sofa.”

And that is what I did. I moved next to Miss Dogmill, feeling the delicious warmth of her body as we sat only inches apart. I had hardly settled before I made bold to take her hand in mine. It was as though my higher self had become frozen inside me, and my baser instincts ruled my actions. The urge to feel her skin against mine silenced all other voices inside me. “I have longed to hold your hand in mine all evening,” I said. “Since the moment I first saw you.”

She said nothing, but she did not take her hand away either. Even in the dark, I observed an amused smile.

I had hoped for more encouragement, but I was willing to make do with none. “Miss Dogmill, I must tell you that you are the most beautiful young lady I have met in these many ages. You are charming and vivacious and lovely in all regards.”

Here she allowed herself a laugh. “I must take that as a sound compliment,” she said, “for you have a reputation as a man well acquainted with the ladies.”

I felt my heart pound in my chest. “I? A reputation? I have hardly been on these shores long enough for such a thing.”

She opened her mouth to say something, but she said nothing. Instead she leaned forward—yes,
she
leaned forward, and kissed me. Soon I had my arms around her sweet form, as we gave ourselves over to the delicious lure of passion. All of my determination to keep my distance from her was forgotten, and I cannot say to what degree we would have lost ourselves had not two things happened that cut short our delights.

The second, and less troubling of the two, was that the door burst open and Mr. Dogmill, along with a half dozen or so of his friends, entered the room with their blades drawn.

The first was that, in the very instant before our privacy was so utterly shattered by Dogmill and his bravos, Miss Dogmill broke off her kiss and whispered something in my ear. She said, “I know who you are, Mr. Weaver.”

I
t was unfortunate timing, in more ways than one, that led Dennis Dogmill and his friends to break open the room at that instant, for I could not but conclude that all of this had been an elaborate trap. Having been lost in the pleasing fog of passion, I lamented that I was now in a position of having to strike dead this lady’s brother if I did not wish to be returned to Newgate.

I leaped to my feet and searched the room for a weapon sufficient to fend off so many men, but found nothing.

“Get away from my sister, Evans,” Dogmill spat at me.

Evans.
He called me
Evans.
He was not here to drag Benjamin Weaver to prison. He was here only to protect his sister’s honor. I breathed a sigh of relief, for it looked far less likely that I would have to seriously harm anyone.

“Dear God, Denny!” Miss Dogmill shouted. “What are you doing here?”

“Be quiet. I’ll have plenty to say to you anon. And don’t swear. It is unladylike.” He turned to me. “How dare you, sir, think to dishonor my sister in my own home?”

“How did you know he was here?” Grace asked.

“I did not much like the looks he gave you at the assembly, so I instructed Molly to contact me if he showed his face here. Now,” he said to me, “we’ll have no more rudeness from you. We are all gentlemen who know how to attend a man who would attempt a rape.”

“A rape!” Grace cried out. “Don’t be absurd. Mr. Evans has behaved in all ways like a gentleman, here by my invitation and guilty of nothing improper.”