“Be Jasus! and Misthress Rudd is complately in my power-r!” cried Captain O’Blunderbuss:—“just tell her that if she don’t manage the thing slily for ye, that I’ll split upon her and the Riverind Mr. Eminuel Flummery—and she’ll turn as make and as mild as a lamb. But I must be afther sinding her back her own toggery.”
“I’ve got a large band-box in my little bed-room adjoining,” said Mr. Scales; “and I don’t mind carrying out the gown and the bonnet and shawl in it. Never do things by halves—that’s my motto. In the meantime, you can put on my dressing-gown:—I am sorry my own clothes would be much too small for you—or else——”
“Oh! be Jasus! and I’d sooner get back my own,” cried the captain. “I niver should dar-r to prisint myself in any other toggery to my frind in the City.”
“Well and good: you can step into my bed-room and undress yourself,” said Mr. Scales; “and I’ll be off as soon as you are ready.”
“And them ould fogeys down stairs in the yard,” observed the captain,—“they’ll be afther quistioning ye, my frind, about the tall lady in the black silk gown that’s a foot and a half too shor-r-t for her.”
“Oh! leave them to me,” said the good-natured Brother of the Charter House: “I’ll tell them it’s my sister. Bless your soul, they’re all purblind, and never will have noticed any thing peculiar in your dress. It’s the nurses that I most fear—the charwomen of the establishment, I mean;—for if any of them saw you——”
“I didn’t observe one of them, my dear frind,” interrupted the captain. “But we’ve niver a ha’porth of time to lose—and so I’ll be afther getting out of this infer-r-nal silk gown and Lighorn bonnet.”
From the moderate-sized, but lofty and airy apartment in which this colloquy took place, the captain passed into a little chamber only just large enough to contain a bed, a chest of drawers, and a toilette-table: and there he speedily extricated himself from the feminine apparel, all of which he thrust pell-mell into the band-box which his friend had pointed out to him for the purpose. He then wrapped himself in Mr. Scales’s dressing-gown; and this being done, he gave the good-natured Brother the necessary instructions how to proceed with regard to the landlady and the tailor.
Having tied a string round the band-box, so as to carry it the more conveniently, and likewise with a better appearance of negligent ease, Mr. Scales now set out on his mission—previously enjoining the captain to keep the door carefully locked until his return, and mentioning a signal by which his knock at the door might be known, so that the gallant officer should not incur the danger of admitting any other person. The moment the martial gentleman was left to himself, he advanced straight up to the cupboard, which he unceremoniously opened; and, to his huge delight, perceived a bottle containing a fluid which was unmistakeably of that alcoholic species so widely known under the denomination of gin. The captain took a long draught of the raw spirit, and, much refreshed, sate down to await his new friend’s return.
A quarter of an hour passed, during which he calculated the chances of eventual escape from the bailiffs.