“Do you think so? A Scotch bonnet, though, ought to look well on a Scotchman. I’m such by birth. Is the gold band too much?”
“I like the gold band, Captain. It looks something as I should think a crown might on a king.”
“Aye?”
“You would make a better-looking king than George III.”
“Did you ever see that old granny? Waddles about in farthingales, and carries a peacock fan, don’t he? Did you ever see him?”
“Was as close to him as I am to you now, Captain. In Kew Gardens it was, where I worked gravelling the walks. I was all alone with him, talking for some ten minutes.”
“By Jove, what a chance! Had I but been there! What an opportunity for kidnapping a British king, and carrying him off in a fast sailing smack to Boston, a hostage for American freedom. But what did you? Didn’t you try to do something to him?”
“I had a wicked thought or two, Captain, but I got the better of it. Besides, the king behaved handsomely towards me; yes, like a true man. God bless him for it. But it was before that, that I got the better of the wicked thought.”
“Ah, meant to stick him, I suppose. Glad you didn’t. It would have been very shabby. Never kill a king, but make him captive. He looks better as a led horse, than a dead carcass. I propose now, this trip, falling on the grounds of the Earl of Selkirk, a privy counsellor and particular private friend of George III. But I won’t hurt a hair of his head. When I get him on board here, he shall lodge in my best state-room, which I mean to hang with damask for him. I shall drink wine with him, and be very friendly; take him to America, and introduce his lordship into the best circles there; only I shall have him accompanied on his calls by a sentry or two disguised as valets. For the Earl’s to be on sale, mind; so much ransom; that is, the nobleman, Lord Selkirk, shall have a bodily price pinned on his coat-tail, like any slave up at auction in Charleston. But, my lad with the yellow mane, you very strangely draw out my secrets. And yet you don’t talk. Your honesty is a magnet which attracts my sincerity. But I rely on your fidelity.”
“I shall be a vice to your plans, Captain Paul. I will receive, but I won’t let go, unless you alone loose the screw.”