Smoke-Jack’s stoicism was for once put to flight.
“Say the word, marm!” exclaimed the old seaman, “and we’ll pull the street down. Who began it?” he added, looking round and doubling his great round fists. “Who began it?—that’s all I want to know. Ain’t nobody to be started for this here game? Ain’t nobody to get his allowance? I’ll give it him, hot and hot!”
With difficulty Smoke-Jack was persuaded that no benefit would accrue to the Marquise from his doing immediate battle with the bystanders, consisting by this time of a few women and street-urchins, for most of the able-bodied rioters had slunk away before the threatening faces of the seamen. He had to content himself, therefore, with administering sundry kicks and cuffs to the chairmen, both of whom were too drunk to proceed, and with carrying the Marquise home, in person, assisted by a certain elderly boatswain’s mate, on whom he seemed to place some reliance, while the rest of the sailors sought their favourite resort once more, to drink success and a pleasant voyage to the lady, in the money with which she had liberally rewarded them.
“It is droll!” thought Madame de Montmirail, as she felt the chair jerk and sway to the unaccustomed action of its maritime bearers. “Droll enough to be thus carried through the streets of London by the British navy! and droller than all, that I should have met Smoke-Jack at a time like the present. This accident may prove extremely useful in the end. Doubtless, he is still devoted to his old captain. Everybody seems devoted to that man. Can I wonder at my little Cerise? And Sir George may be none the worse of a faithful follower in days like these. I will ask him, at any rate, and it is not often when I ask anything that I am refused!”
So when the chair halted at last before Madame de Montmirail’s door, she dismissed the boatswain’s mate delighted, with many kind words and a couple of broad pieces, while Smoke-Jack, no less delighted, found himself ushered into the sitting-room upstairs, even before he had time to look round and take his bearings.
The Marquise prided herself on knowledge of mankind, and offered him refreshment on the spot.
“Will you have grog?” she said. “It is bad for you sailors to talk with the mouth dry.”
Smoke-Jack, again, prided himself on his manners, and declined strenuously. Neither would he be prevailed upon to sit down, but balanced his person on either leg alternately, holding his hat with both hands before the pit of his stomach.
“Smoke-Jack,” said the Marquise, “I know you of old; brave, discreet, and trustworthy. I am bound on a journey in which there is some little danger, and much necessity for caution; have you the time and the inclination to accompany me?”
His impulse was to follow her to the end of the world, but he mistrusted these sirens precisely because it was always his impulse so to follow them.