"But run home," says I, "and I'll warrant you'll find him a-rubbing of his head, and Nunky a-hugging him for joy and gratitude."
But even ere I had finished she was gone, flying lightly into the grey of the coming dawn, and, as I heard afterwards from Costley, what I had forecast was pretty accurate. But I had finished with miss then, and the next business was to divide with Old Irons. 'Twas the first time that I had ever engaged in a job with him, and I vow 'twill be the last; so scurvy was he in the partition. But, then, I had always a detestation of so ungentlemanly a game as cracking cribs.
[MISS AND MY LADY]
There are few people that can truly say they have tricked Dick Ryder, and fewer still can say that in the end he did not wriggle out of his predicament (whatsoever it might be) and turn the tables on them. Yet of these few one, I will confess, was a woman, and a woman I had eyes for, though I am not fool enough to cast my wits away for a petticoat. I have always admired spirit in the sex, but there is a point at which it degenerates into vice, and of such shrews or vixens I wish any man joy. They are good to be beat if you be so inclined, but for myself I have never taken up stick, lash, or fist against any woman, and never would so long as I am free of the topsman.
The adventure happened when I was by Maidstone in the summer of 1683, coming up from Dover very merry. I had ridden round from Deal and lain at the Crown in Dover the night before, and I warrant I had made the people of the inn open their eyes with what tales I told of Court and Old Rowley and affairs of State. I cannot say why, but all the way from Deal to London I seemed possessed of a devil that would wag me, whether I willed it or not. I am not used to be so precipitate, but 'twas as if a cask of French brandy had gotten into my brains and set 'em a-quarrelling. At least, I was gay-headed and recked of nothing. Not that I care for any risk or peril under the sun if it be necessary; but this was to go rollicking, with the gait, so to say, of a drunken man, whistling on danger and leering at fate—a mighty foolish thing to do for any man. There is no question but I would not have fallen into that blunder by Leeds Castle if I had been in any other mood. But there it was—the devil was in me, as I say.
I pulled out of Dover pretty late, and with a parting wave of my hand at as sweet a kinxiewinsy as I have seen, I started on the London Road in good temper and good fettle. But ere I had gone a mile or so, I came up with a little fat, dark fellow that had been at the inn and had listened agog to my tales. It was, "Lord, sir, say you so?" and "Bless me, I would not ha' believed it!" and then again, "Save us, what shall we hear next?" Well, this little black man, as it seems, was steward, or factotum, or what-ye-may-call-it to my Lady Dane, who, also, as it seemed, had lain at Dover overnight, having crossed in a packet from France, and was on her way to Winchester by Reigate and Guildford. The fellow was not given to talking, but more to listening, with his "bless me-s," but he was a simple rustic, and you may fancy that I led him on so that he opened his mouth as wide as I my ears. For this Lady Dane was a rich widow (so he said), and, moreover, a woman that was greatly besought in marriage by many suitors of all degrees, and both for her looks and her money. 'Tis not I that would blame any man that saw his chance to seize beauty and booty alike together. 'Tis the worst of it that they generally go singly—at least, to judge by what I have seen of fine ladies. Well, says the little black man, my Lady Dane was on a journey to her home on the Itchin in the company of her niece, that was daughter to the late Sir Philip's brother, and he was going afore to prepare for them at Maidstone, as they were not yet started. It seemed that my lady had property in Maidstone, and was for giving a water-fountain to the town in her kindness.
"My lady," says he, puffing himself out, "rises late, like any lady of the Court."
"Why," said I, "she must be a rare fine woman—that she must, from your accounts. I would like to clap eyes on her, so that I might compare her with the beauties;" for he was the most obsequious in praise of his mistress that ever you heard, and vexed my soul. "And the niece," says I, "would be pretty handsome too."