UNTITLED

Myself and three other men were spending our Sunday evening at a gentlemen’s club in East London. The surrounding windows were open fully to allow the mist of tobacco and opium to escape into the night. We sat around a table in the corner with red wine and a solid silver candelabra dripping red wax from its red candles. Some way into our evening, the conversation turned to that topic that we were oh so fond of; that of love.
“De Flores, your goblet is empty, do pass it hither and let me set that right” I said. De Flores leaned his velvet sleeve past the candle flame to pass me his empty glass. I placed it firmly on the table and trickled out the last droplets of the Nebuchadnezzar.
“Thank you kindly” he said as I handed it back to his smooth almost feminine hands. De Flores and I had known each other since birth and had spent most of our boyhood adventuring on the Somerset Downs. The other two in our company were more recent acquaintances that we had invited over for no other reason that social gains. They had been in a separate conversation of their own before we all merged in an argument over a Miss Venetia Rose.
The two men had raised their voices quite some degree over the general murmur of the club and De Flores and I overheard Lucius say, “But no my Decimus, do you really mean to suggest that we are sharing Miss Venetia Rose in much the same way that we are sharing this bottle of wine!?” My friend looked over at me and joined to say “I do think I hear you men are talking about a miss Venetia Rose.”
“Why yes we are De Flores” replied Lucius. De Flores moved a little closer to Lucius and said “but surely you men don’t mean the Miss Venetia Rose that I was somewhat intimately acquainted with this summer last: the miss Venetia Rose that was later secretly involved with my dear friend who sits with us tonight?” The two men looked wholly confused and Decimus said, “I do fear it is, for how many Miss Venetia Rose of London can there be”
“Well it would seem there are four” said Lucius positively.
“Oh don’t be ridiculous!” I interrupted, there is surely but one my men and we have all been had by the harlot.”
“Not my rose bud! She is no harlot.”
“Well she’s something beginning with H or thereabouts sounding,” I said
I looked over at my friend who was suppressing a smile, he winked at me and then the other men’s attention shifted to him as he said “Please dear men, let us not argue. Stay positive. I interject that yes it is unlikely there be four Miss Venetia Rose, but more likely to be two. If there be two then this might raise each consecutive Miss Venetia Rose by fifty percent in your estimations and therefore repair you egos by half. Is that not correct?”
“No. For what if one Venetia Rose is the strumpet who has acquainted herself with three men and the other the delicate angel who has been true to one of us?”
“Fair point” said my friend “but which ones of us have pulled the three jokers from the deck of hearts?”
“Surely not I, I am almost certain it is not I” Said Decimus. He turned to Lucius and continued “My Venetia Rose who so divinely acquainted herself with me is surely not such the same Venetia Rose who would acquaint herself with you Lucius.”
“What do you mean by that sir?” said Lucius
“Well, thou Lucius of such puny mind and even punier purse. She would not tolerate you. My Venetia Rose enjoys to be spoilt with lavish gifts that I am only too pleased to provide, and you my man could not produce a ham!”
Whilst the two men continued to shout and curse in there own world of Miss Venetia Rose I moved over to sit by my friend. I squeezed his soft hand, looked forward and smiled. We knew no Miss Venetia Rose.