“But, my dear Crispin, all this lawlessness nowadays!”
Crispin shrugged his shoulders with a smile.
“My dear fellow, you gentlemen of England, who live at home in ease, do not know what lawlessness still exists in the East. To be sure, I speak of over ten years ago, and things are better now; still, I think a good many things go on in the vicinity of Melnos which Justice would scarcely approve of; but, as long as nothing very bad happens, why, she winks at small crimes. If I had been dropped into the sea, who would have been a bit the wiser? no one except the islanders, and they would not have troubled themselves over such a trifle, especially as I was not popular among them. Caliphronas, Justinian, and Alcibiades are all their divinities, not a poor poet like me, who shrinks from their scampish ways.”
“So you left Melnos in the end?”
“Yes; like the boy in the fairy tale, I went out into the wide, wide world to seek my fortune. I managed to work my passage to Athens, and arrived there without even the traditional penny. Fortunately, I knew modern Greek and English thoroughly well, so was fortunate enough to obtain a situation as a corresponding clerk in a firm of merchants who traded with England, but I did not remain there long.”
“Where did you make all your money?”
“Ah, that is what I am now going to tell you. Fortune evidently wished to make reparation for having brought me into the world with a stigma on my name, so threw me into the way of a rich Englishman, whom I met at the house of my employer. He heard my story, and was much impressed with it; and then discovered that I had the talent to string verses together, and also a faculty for music. Being passionately fond of such things he made up his mind that he had discovered a genius; and, being without a relative in the world, he adopted me as his son and made me his heir.”
“You seem to have passed your life in being adopted,” said Maurice, who was deeply interested in this romantic history.
“Only twice. First Justinian, then my English father. I need not tell you his name, as I did not take it, preferring to be called Crispin until such time as I discovered my real parent. Well, my benefactor, who was very learned, began to educate me, and also placed me at school. I suppose I made good use of my time, as I soon became sufficiently accomplished to win his approval. We travelled all over the Continent—a great deal in the East—until I was about twenty-seven years of age, when he died at Damascus, and left me heir to all his property, amounting to about twelve thousand a year.”
“Fortunate man!”