# Mrs. Verplank — The Monster character guide

> Mrs. Verplank in The Monster by Edgar Saltus.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Verplank, the too charming Verplank, the deadly Verplank

**First appearance:** 0000-i

## Snapshot

Known at the club as the too charming, the deadly Verplank, she is the woman whose flush betrays what her words deny and whose refusal to leave undoes Gulian.

## Who they are

Mrs. Verplank is the woman at the center of the Verplank affair — the one who told Gulian she had taken Barouffski as a barricade between them, then flushed when he pressed her, revealing relations and consequences she had not admitted. She is desired, judged, and discussed at the Opéra and the club, where her daily presence at the Ritz is tallied against her supposed meetings with d'Arcy. She matters because her divided will — wanting one thing, doing another — is the engine of the novel's central crisis, and because the men around her keep mistaking her body for a territory to be won.

## In the story

### [IX](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_monster_se/chapters/ix)

Participates in the duel, wounded in the cheek by Barouffski's premature lunge, and arranges to meet Leilah at five.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_monster_se/characters/mrs_verplank
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_monster_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_monster_se/characters