“What’s the truth, James?” cried the mistress, coming in at the door. “Let’s hear the truth from your lips, it will be something new.”
“I said that I was sent here for finding a pocket-book, mistress; that’s all.”
“Yes; but you did not tell him where you found it—at the bottom of a gentleman’s coat-pocket, you know. You can only tell the truth by halves yet, I see.”
Wishing to ascertain how far the man’s suspicions were correct, I said to her:
“I have good friends in James Town: if I were once there I could procure money and anything else to any amount that I required.”
“Well,” says she, “you may have; but I’m afraid that the post don’t go out to-day. One would think, after all your wanderings and difficulties, that you’d be glad to be quiet a little, and remain here; so we’ll talk about James Town some time about next spring.”
“Indeed, mistress, I hope you will not detain me here. I can pay you handsomely, on my arrival at James Town, for your kind treatment and any trouble you may take for me.”
“Pay me! What do I want with money?—there’s no shops here with ribbons, and calicoes, and muslims; and if there were, I’m not a fine madam. Money! Why I’ve no child to leave what I have to—no husband to spend it for me. I have bags and bags of dollars, young man, which my husband heaped up, and they are of as much use to me as they are now to him.”
“I am glad that you are so rich, mistress, and more glad that your money is so little cared for and so little wanted; but if you do not want money, I do very much want to get back to my friends, who think I am dead, and mourn for me.”
“Well, if they have mourned, their sorrow is over by this time, and therefore your staying here will not distress them more. I may as well tell you at once that you shall not go; so make up your mind to be contented, and you’ll fare none the worse for it.”