Famous Imposters 26

Famous Imposters 26

But abstract law and the executive are quite different things--at least

they were in France at the close of the seventeenth century: as indeed

they are occasionally in other countries and at varying times. La

Maupin, being a woman and a clever one, procured sufficient influence

to have the execution postponed, and so had the full punishment

delayed, if not entirely avoided. More than this, she managed to get

back to Paris and so to begin her noxious career all over again. Of

course she had strong help from her popularity. She was a favourite at

the opera, and the class which patronises and supports this kind of

artistic effort is a rich and powerful one, which governments do not

care to displease by the refusal of such a small favour as making the

law hold its hand with regard to an erring favourite.

 

But La Maupin’s truculent tendencies were not to be restrained. In

Paris in 1695 whilst she was one of the audience at a theatre she took

umbrage at some act or speech of one of the comedians playing in the

piece, and leaving her seat went round to the stage and caned him in

the presence of the audience. The actor, M. Dumenil, an accomplished

and favourite performer but a man of peaceful disposition, submitted

to the affront and took no action in the matter. La Maupin, however,

suffered, through herself, the penalty of her conduct. She had

entered on a course of violence which became a habit. For some years

she flourished and exercised all the tyrannies of her own sex and

in addition those habitual to men which came from expert use of the

sword. Thus she went attired as a man to a ball given by a Prince of

the blood. In that garb she treated a fellow-guest, a woman, with

indecency; and she was challenged by three different men--each of

whom, when the consequent fight came on, she ran through the body,

after which she returned to the ball. Shortly afterwards she fought

and wounded a man, M. de Servan, who had affronted a woman. For these

escapades she was again pardoned. She then went to Brussels where she

lived under the protection of Count Albert of Bavaria, the Elector.

With him she remained until the quarrel, inevitable in such a life,

came. After much bickering he agreed to her demand of a settlement,

but in order to show his anger by affronting her he sent the large

amount of his involuntary bequest by the servile hand of the husband

of his mistress, Countess d’Arcos, who had supplanted her, with a

curt message that she must leave Brussels at once. The bearer of such

a message to such a woman as La Maupin had probably reckoned on an

unfriendly reception; but he evidently underestimated her anger. Not

contented with flinging at his head the large _douceur_ of which he was

the bearer, she expressed in her direct way her unfavourable opinion,

of him, of his master, and of the message which he had carried for

the latter. She ended her tirade by kicking him downstairs, with the

justification for her form of physical violence that she would not

sully her sword with his blood.

 

From Brussels she went to Spain as _femme de chambre_ to the Countess

Marino but returned to Paris in 1704. Once more she took up her work as

an opera singer; or rather she tried to take it up, but she had lost

her vogue, and the public would have none of her. As a matter of fact,

she was only just above thirty years of age, which should under normal

circumstances be the beginning of a woman’s prime. But the life she

had been leading since her early girlhood was not one which made for

true happiness or for physical health; she was prematurely old, and her

artistic powers were worn out.

 

Still, her pluck, and the obstinacy on which it was grafted, remained.

For a whole year she maintained a never-failing struggle for her old

supremacy, but without avail. Seeing that all was lost, she left the

stage and returned to her husband who, realising that she was rich,

managed to reconcile whatever shreds of honour he had to her infamous

record. The Church, too, accepted her--and her riches--within its

sheltering portals. By the aid of a tolerant priest she got absolution,

and two years after her retirement from the opera she died in a convent

in all the odour of sanctity.

 

 

D. MARY EAST

 

The story of Mary East is a pitiful one, and gives a picture of

the civil life of the eighteenth century which cannot be lightly

forgotten. The condition of things has so changed that already we

almost need a new terminology in order that we may understand as our

great-grandfathers did. Take for instance the following sentence and

try individually how many points in it there are, the full meaning of

which we are unable to understand:

 

“A young fellow courted one Mary East, and for him she conceived the

greatest liking; but he going upon the highway, was tried for a robbery

and cast, but was afterwards transported.”

 

The above was written by an accomplished scholar, a Doctor of Divinity,

rector of an English parish. At the time of its writing, 1825, every

word of it was entirely comprehensible. If a reader of that time could

see it translated into modern phraseology he would be almost as much

surprised as we are when we look back upon an age holding possibilities

no longer imaginable.

 

“Going upon the highway” was in Mary East’s time and a hundred years

later a euphemism for becoming a highway robber; “cast” meant condemned

to death; “transported” meant exiled to a far distant place where one

was guarded, and escape from which was punishable with death. Moreover

robbery was at this time a capital offence.

 

In 1736, when Mary East was sixteen, life was especially hard on women.

Few honest occupations were open to them, and they were subject to all

the hardships consequent on a system in which physical weakness was

handicapped to a frightful extent. When this poor girl was bereft of

her natural hope of a settlement in life she determined, as the least

unattractive form of living open to her, to remain single. About the

same time a friend of hers arrived at the same resolution but by a

different road, her course being guided thereto by having “met with

many crosses in love.” The two girls determined to join forces; and

on consulting as to ways and means decided that the likeliest way to

avoid suspicion was to live together under the guise of man and wife.

The toss of a coin decided their respective rôles, the “breeches part”

as it is called in the argot of the theatre, falling to East. The

combined resources of the girls totalled some thirty pounds sterling,

so after buying masculine garb for Mary they set out to find a place

where they were unknown and so might settle down in peace. They found

the sort of place they sought in the neighbourhood of Epping Forest

where, there being a little public-house vacant, Mary--now under the

name of James How--became the tenant. For some time they lived in peace

at Epping, with the exception of a quarrel forced by a young gentleman

on the alleged James How in which the latter was wounded in the hand.

It must have been a very one-sided affair, for when the injured “man”

took action he was awarded £500 damages--a large sum in those days

and for such a cause. With this increase to their capital the two

women moved to Limehouse on the east side of London where they took at

Limehouse-hole a more important public-house. This they managed in so

excellent a manner that they won the respect of their neighbours and

throve exceedingly.

 

After a time they moved from Limehouse to Poplar where they bought

another house and added to their little estate by the purchase of other

houses.

 

Peace, hard work, and prosperity marked their life thence-forward, till

fourteen years had passed since the beginning of their joint venture.

 

Peace and prosperity are, however, but feeble guardians to weakness.

Nay, rather are they incentive to evil doing. For all these years

the two young women had conducted themselves with such rectitude,

and observed so much discretion, that even envy could not assail

them through the web of good repute which they had woven round their

masquerade. Alone they lived, keeping neither female servant nor male

assistant. They were scrupulously honest in their many commercial

dealings and, absolutely punctual in their agreements and obligations.

James How took a part in the public life of his locality, filling in

turn every parish office except those of Constable and Churchwarden.

From the former he was excused on account of the injury to his hand

from which he had never completely recovered. Regarding the other his

time had not yet come, but he was named for Churchwarden in the year

following to that in which a bolt fell from the blue, 1730. It came

in this wise: A woman whose name of coverture was Bently, and who was

now resident in Poplar, had known the alleged James How in the days

when they were both young. Her own present circumstances were poor

and she looked on the prosperity of her old acquaintance as a means

to her own betterment. It was but another instance of the old crime

of “blackmail.” She sent to the former Mary East for a loan of £10,

intimating that if the latter did not send it she would make known the

secret of her sex. The poor panic-stricken woman foolishly complied

with the demand, thus forcing herself deeper into the mire of the other

woman’s unscrupulousness. The forced loan, together with Bently’s

fears for her own misdeed procured immunity for some fifteen years from

further aggression. At the end of that time, however, under the renewed

pressure of need Bently repeated her demand. “James How” had not the

sum by her, but she sent £5--another link in the chain of her thraldom.

 

From that time on there was no more peace for poor Mary East. Her

companion of nearly thirty-five years died and she, having a secret

to guard and no assistance being possible, was more helpless than

ever and more than ever under the merciless yoke of the blackmailer.

Mrs. Bently had a fair idea of how to play her own despicable game.

As her victim’s fear was her own stock-in-trade she supplemented the

sense of fear which she knew to exist by a conspiracy strengthened by

all sorts of schemes to support its seeming _bona fides_. She took

in two male accomplices and, thus enforced, began operations. Her

confederates called on James How, one armed with a constable’s staff,

the other appearing as one of the “thief-takers” of the gang of the

notorious magistrate, Fielding--an evil product of an evil time. Having

confronted How they told him that they had come by order of Mr. Justice

Fielding to arrest him for the commission of a robbery over forty years

before, alleging that they were aware of his being a woman. Mary East,

though quite innocent of any such offence but acutely conscious of her

imposture of manhood, in her dismay sought the aid of a friend called

Williams who understood and helped her. He went to the magistrates

of the district and then to Sir John Fielding to make inquiries and

claim protection. During his absence the two villains took Mary East

from her house and by threats secured from her a draft on Williams

for £100. With this in hand they released their victim who was even

more anxious than themselves not to let the matter have greater

publicity than it had already obtained. However, Justice demanded a

further investigation, and one of the men being captured--the other