"I'll visit him myself, if you will," says Jack, "and wring his hand to show my gratitude. I warrant I'll make him wince, such a grip will I give him. And I'll talk of nothing else but seas and winds, and the manner of ship I'll have for his money."
The following morning before Moll was stirring, Don Sanchez and Dawson set forth on their journey, and I going with them beyond the park gates to the bend of the road, we took leave of each other with a great show of cheerfulness on both sides. But Lord! my heart lay in my breast like any lump of lead, and when Jack turned his back on me, the tears sprang up in my eyes as though indeed this was my brother and I was never to see him more. And long after he was out of sight I sat on the bank by the roadside, sick with pain to think of his sorrow in going forth like this, without one last loving word of parting from his dear Moll, to find no home in London, no friend to cheer him, and he the most companionable man in the world.
CHAPTER XVIII.
Of our getting a painter into the Court, with whom our Moll falls straightway in love.
Being somewhat of a coward, I essayed to put Moll off with a story of her father having gone a-frolicking with Don Sanchez, leaving it to the Don to break the truth to her on his return. And a sorry, bungling business I made of it, to be sure. For, looking me straight in the eyes, whenever I dared lift them, she did seem to perceive that I was lying, from the very first, which so disconcerted me, though she interrupted me by never a word, that I could scarce stammer to the end of my tale. Then, without asking a single question, or once breaking her painful silence, she laid her face in her hands, her shoulders shook, and the tears ran out between her fingers, and fell upon her lap.
"I know, I know," says she, putting me away, when I attempted to speak. "He has gone away for my sake, and will come back no more; and 'tis all my fault, that I could not play my part better."
Then, what words of comfort I could find, I offered her; but she would not be consoled, and shut herself up in her room all that morning. Nevertheless, she ate more heartily than I at dinner, and fresh visitors coming in the afternoon, she entertained them as though no grief lay at her heart. Indeed, she recovered of this cruel blow much easier than I looked for; and but that she would at times sit pensive, with melancholy, wistful eyes, and rise from her seat with a troubled sigh, one would have said, at the end of the week, that she had ceased to feel for her father. But this was not so (albeit wounds heal quickly in the young and healthful), for I believe that they who weep the least do ache the most.
Then, for her further excuse (if it be needed), Don Sanchez brought back good tidings of her father,--how he was neatly lodged near the Cherry garden, where he could hear the birds all day and the fiddles all night, with abundance of good entertainment, etc. To confirm which, she got a letter from him, three days later, very loving and cheerful, telling how, his landlord being a carpenter, he did amuse himself mightily at his old trade in the workshop, and was all agog for learning to turn wood in a lathe, promising that he would make her a set of egg-cups against her birthday, please God. Added to this, the number of her friends multiplying apace, every day brought some new occupation to her thoughts; also, having now those three thousand pounds old Simon had promised us, Moll set herself to spending of them as quickly as possible, by furnishing herself with all sorts of rich gowns and appointments, which is as pretty a diversion of melancholy from a young woman's thoughts as any. And so I think I need dwell no longer on this head.
About the beginning of October, Simon comes, cap in hand, and very humble, to the Court to crave Moll's consent to his setting some men with guns in her park at night, to lie in ambush for poachers, telling how they had shot one man in the act last spring, and had hanged another the year before for stealing of a sheep; adding that a stranger had been seen loitering in the neighbourhood, who, he doubted not, was of their thieving crew.
"What makes you think that?" asks Moll. "He has been seen lingering about here these three days," answers Simon. "Yet to my knowledge he hath not slept at either of the village inns. Moreover, he hath the look of a desperate, starving rascal, ripe for such work."