Feral Park (60 page)

Catching Mr. Jackson before he disappeared into the drawing-room, Dr. Bosworthy said,“I wish to offer an alcohol-based antisepsis solution that I have been formulating on an experimental basis within my room. It is producing remarkable results; the incisions I have made into my cony friends are healing four times faster than those one would make without application of the solution.”

Mr. Peppercorn nodded to shew that he approved of Dr. Bosworthy’s contribution to the surgery, and Mr. Jackson reluctantly acquiesced.

The constable, who had been ruminating upon what had just been told to him about the true sex of John Dray, now emerged from his brown study to announce that he wished to take Miss Godby into a private interview to determine if a capital offence had been committed.

“Capital offence!” exclaimed Anna. “What do you mean?”

“I mean I that I wish to ascertain if there have been unnatural acts committed by each of these two young women within my jurisdiction. I must also determine, as acting magistrate of the parish during the period between the azzizes, if capital execution under the criminal code will be required.”

“
Execution
?” Felicity stood aghast. “Nullification of the marriage, I should think, would be the extent of a magistrate’s duty here. But to charge Johanna and myself with a capital offence? Were you, sir, suckled by a madwoman?”

“Shew me another outburst of insolence, madam, and I will have you arrested without any further ado. Now
will
you or will you
not
come with me to a private chamber so that I should find out what exactly has been done between you and this oddball woman-who-wishes-to-be-a-man that could prove prosecutable?”

Gemma bristled. “That ‘oddball woman’ to whom you refer is my cousin, and I would prefer that you henceforth withhold all aspersions on these grounds and a good many other grounds as well!”

The constable, his patience exhausted, renewed in a low authoritative voice his demand for a private interview with Felicity Godby, this time directing the request to the master of the house.

“Yes, I will take you to my library,” said Anna’s father. “Come, Miss Godby—” (correcting himself,) “—Mrs. Dray—
Miss
Dray. Drat! I know not what to call you now.”

“Any interview with Miss Godby will not take place without my father and myself also within the room,” said Anna, “for this is
our
home and you are presently under
our
jurisdiction.”

Constable Whitaker consented to allow Anna and Mr. Peppercorn to sit in the library, if they would remain quiet and unobtrusive.

Through harsh questioning, the salacious specificity of which gave Anna every reason to wish that the examiner would suddenly suspend breath and drop dead upon the floor, Constable Whitaker was able to get Miss Godby to admit that the re-union between herself and Johanna Dray had been cause for some kissing and touching of a sort that did not usually take place between even the most devoted sisters and same-gender friends. At the conclusion of the probe the following determination was made: that Miss Dray and Miss Godby had participated in unnatural, carnal acts, one with the other, both within the parish and without, and though the acts within his jurisdiction were perhaps of a less debauched nature than the acts which took place
outside
the parish, even these should fit the legal standard required for trial before the circuit judge who was due to take the bench at Michaelmas.

“So I am to be arrested!” The gentleness and docility which had characterised Miss Godby since her conversion to one who did not live to drink, was gone; there was newly-minted spit and fire and cheeky impudence in its place—a jarring reminder of her
former
disposition, but now put to greater purpose.

“Aye,” said the constable. “And your paramour, as well, once the surgeon has done mending her.”

“But I will not allow it!” Miss Godby was in a fury. She leapt to her feet and put herself nearly into the face of the constable. Anna cringed at what she thought would be an attack; yet no blows were struck. Instead, the insulted one glared and scowled and then turned on her heel and marched in high dudgeon to the door. She flung it open as if to make an affronted exit, but her path was fully blocked by two deputies standing guard. Behind the impromptu turnkeys stood Mr. and Mrs. Epping and Gemma, wishing to come in.

“I demand that you step aside!” hurled Miss Godby at the deputies. Then to Gemma, she proclaimed with frothing indignation,“Can you believe it? I am to be put on trial and possibly executed for unnatural acts! I have committed a crime of the Bloody Code! It is as preposterous as those who hang for taking stones from the Westminster Bridge.”

It was at that moment that three who heard the last of Miss Godby’s declaration thought the very same thing in concomitance: Anna and Mr. Epping and Mrs. Epping; but it was Mr. Epping who put the thing to words. Pushing past the deputies and into the room, and with a finger pointed accusingly at Constable Whitaker, Epping averred, “If what Miss Dray and Miss Godby have done constitutes a violation of the Bloody Code, then you too, sir, are guilty by that code, and should
also
be hanged!”

“What sort of nonsense is this,Epping?”replied the constable with impatience.

“I contend that there is no nonsense to it at all. I was at the Three Horse Tavern the night that you and your brother and Sir Thomas and Mr. Quarrels shook in agreement over your new business venture. I heard every syllable of your conference—even the part in which you introduced your lucky stone to the others, the stone upon which all four of you placed your hands to seal your agreement. I clearly heard you say from whence it came—and from whence it came, as you will certainly recall, sir, was Westminster Bridge.”

“Aye, but what difference—”

“A big one, I should think,” interrupted Dr. Bosworthy, now having made his own way into the library. “As one who has studied the offences of the Bloody Code at great length, Your Worship, I can tell you unequivocally that doing damage to that bridge, which includes taking its stones to turn into auspicious fetishes, is as much a capital offence as attempting to burn down a building in which women dance in monkey fur. I do not know the style of the statute, but I have only to make a brief visit to my room to retrieve the book and properly cite it.”

The constable shook his head, his face suddenly ashen. “No, no, you need not. I now recall it. Oh, good God, I thought that it was
London
Bridge which was addressed by the code.” Constable Whitaker slumped back into his chair, overcome.

Anna, observing that the man did not look at all well, asked if he desired a glass of punch. There were no spirits in it, unless, of course, there were.

The constable declined the offer with another shake of the head. Then he leant himself over the arm of the chair and vomited. Anna, who could not see vomit without producing it herself, turned and regurgitated into the fireplace, her delicate stomach proving even more delicate during moments of great agitation. A female guest who was out in the corridor, hearing the sound of vomit production, began gagging on her own, and then she was joined by others down the gallery and into the hall and then into the saloon, until there was a chain of gagging and retching from Constable Whitaker all the way to young Dalwin Dalrymple, who pebbled his flute with gastric gravel.

“Shut the door! My crime cannot be known,” cried the constable, wiping his mouth with his handkerchief and looking wild-eyed and desperate. “I will dispose of the bridge stone and we will all say that this conversation never took place.”

“We will do that, sir, for a price,” said Anna, wiping her own mouth with Gemma’s handkerchief.

“Tell it to me. I will pay it. It is not fair that I should be hanged for a foolish act from my childhood.”

“And yet children are hanged every day for picking a pocket or two,” said Dr. Bosworthy with gravity.

“It is not the same! Not the same at all!”

“We will bargain for the freedom of Miss Dray and Miss Godby,” said Anna in a level voice, “but also for the freedom of every poor girl who is dancing at this very moment at your odious monkey parlour. We will bargain for the preservation of their good reputations by the closing down of that place for ever.”

“Do not forget Tripp and Trapp,” urged Mrs. Epping.

“I had not forgotten them,” said Anna. “I was merely taking a breath.”

The constable rose unsteadily from his chair to say, “That is a heavy and ridiculously impracticable demand, Miss Peppercorn, and it requires a transaction which I am not in a position to make on my own. I possess only a quarter’s ownership of the parlour, as you certainly must know.”

“Then summon your partners and we shall all decide what is to be done. And have one of your men instruct your brother Mr. Whitaker that there will be no more dancing at the Three Whores M.P. for the remainder of this night—
and
, I hope and pray, for ever more.”

The constable sent word to his brother and his other two partners that they were to come immediately to Feral Park by magisterial order. Within an hour all three had arrived and none was happy to see his evening so disrupted, each man, consequently, being most out of sorts. Nancy Henshawe had not yet stept out upon the stage when the show was stopt, although Sophia had already danced with two other girls in a “see-no-evil/hear-no-evil/speak-noevil” configuration of their bodies that was funny to those who had heard the parlour spoken of as evil and inexplicable to those who had not.

Along with Sir Thomas, Mr. Ross Whitaker, and Mr. Charles Quarrels, as had been requested, came now Sophia and Nancy Henshawe, scrubbed and clothed and free of all pasted fur upon the skin.

Into the drawing-room they all went—everyone who was to have a say in what was to be decided. Johanna Dray sat upon the sofa, bandaged and alert. Next to her was Miss Felicity Godby, defiantly holding the hand of her lover (but, alas, no longer her spouse). Also within the room was Gemma, clutching the arms of both of the Misses Henshawe. Anna and her father and Dr. Bosworthy were also within the room, as were the Eppings—all of the above keeping a safe distance from the monkey parlour owner-partners—the constable, who was heavily perspiring at the temples and fidgeting nervously, and the other three, who were fuming and snorting to be ordered about so, and to see their large investment so poorly respected as to have its doors closed so early on its very first night of operation.

The drawing-room door was shut. The constable spoke first, relating to Mr. Whitaker, Mr. Quarrels, and Sir Thomas the proposal which had earlier been put forth by Anna.

“Absolutely absurd!” brayed Charles Quarrels. “Cousin Anna, you are an idiot—a discredit to the family name. That we should close down the parlour and lose every penny we have put into it, simply to keep this imbecilic bridge-wrecker from the noose and all this other rubbish; it is a preposterous proposition!”

Constable Whitaker and his brother scowled at the former being called an imbecilic bridge-wrecker. With difficulty the constable responded: “So the life of your partner means nothing to you?”

“Of course your life has worth, Constable. But it does not rise to the level of my investment. It is your problem alone to resolve, for I want no part of it. You took the stone from the Westminster Bridge and now you must pay the price.” Mr. Quarrels’ position was articulated in a calm and steady voice. There was hardly any movement to the body, as well, except that the legs were crossed in a casual manner and then re-crossed again in the opposite way.

“But as I have already said, I did not know at the time that I was breaking the law. Nor even an hour ago. I have better things to do with my time than to memorize the Code as has Dr. Bosworthy. It is much too long.”

“Yet you knew enough of it to try to use it against Johanna and me!” spat Miss Godby with vehemence.

Sir Thomas, who had not yet said a thing, now sat up in his chair and declared with unsettling imperiousness, “I am to understand, then, that the youthful indiscretion of our dear constable is to go unreported in exchange for everyone forgetting that Miss Dray and Miss Godby have engaged in the unnatural act of tribade love—of lesbos coupling—that is the word, is it not? From the Isle of Lesbos, where there is no need for men?—if such a thing can be imagined. But also we must close down the monkey parlour—shut it down entirely? And just
what
, may I ask, do Quarrels and I receive from this arrangement to keep you amongst the living, Constable? It is a one-sided business, if you ask me.”

Replied the constable: “My brother and I will pay you back every farthing you have put into the tavern for fitting it up as a monkey parlour.”

“Over how many years? And without additional compensation to Quarrels and myself for the loss of future earnings in this most promising venture? My dear Constable Whitaker, you must do better than that!”

“But I
cannot
,” said the constable, who appeared again as if he would vomit.

“Is that all there is to it?” asked Charles Quarrels. “If so, then take the constable and hang him. There will only in subsequence be a bigger share in the business for the rest of us. Nancy and Sophia: to-night is spoilt and our clientele have all been sent home. But to-morrow is another work night for the two of you, so off to bed with the both of you, so that you should be fully rested and ready to shake and wriggle anew.”