“Ay, my lord,” says I, “and much beside.”
“Pooh, pooh!” says my lord sharply, “you are too nice and too calculating, sir. What is there that renders your services at Surat so valuable that they would be missed should you accept of my offer?”
“My lord,” says I, “the meanest Englishman hath three things to consider—viz., his honour, his soul, and his body—whereof the last is precious to his friends, the second to God, and the first to himself. Under your lordship’s leave, I believe that I should put in jeopardy all three of these, did I accept of your most obliging offer, and I must therefore ask humbly to be allowed to decline it.”
“Now, by my faith!” cried his lordship, “will you talk of your body in the same breath with your honour, sir? You do yourself wrong, Mr Carlyon, by these barbarous notions. Come, think over my proposition. I will give you fifteen days for’t. Until then we will say nothing, but I hope to find you then less blind to your own advantage. You must perceive how highly I esteem you, by my daughter’s admitting you so continually to her saloon. Is it possible that after a sojourn of some weeks at St Thomas, you can look forward to return with contentment to your life at Surat? There is, as I understand, no ladies there whose company you may enjoy as you have done that of my family.”
“Indeed, my lord,” said I, imagining to myself the pain I should feel on quitting the vicinage of Madam Heliodora, and shuddering at the very thought, “ ’twould be a new expulsion from Paradise.”
“So I had divined,” says he, “and therefore counselled you to remain with us. When you have duly considered of the matter, I have little fear but you will follow my advice. But take counsel with your pillow, ponder for a fortnight what I have said to you, and then we will speak again upon this topic.”
Now by this time we were returned to the landing-place, and my lord signifying that he desired me still to attend him, I did accompany him to the palace, and being there dismissed by his lordship, took occasion to go to the chamber where I had lain during his absence, for to seek one of my lace-bands[97] that I had left there. And finding it, I was about returning to my lodging at Mr Marigny’s, when I come again upon his lordship, looking over a part of the palace which wan’t then used, being too large for his family, but so complete and so shut off as to be almost a separate palace in itself. And my lord seeing me, would have me go over these buildings with him, and showed himself most gracious towards me, and was pleased to tell me his plans for the ornamenting and furnishing this place when it should be needed. And when all was seen and done, and I departing, he saith on a sudden—
“When my daughter marries she will dwell here beside me, and so shall I have her almost in my own house still.”
Now this word of his lordship’s filled me with thought, and sent me home very busy. For you will smile to hear that until now I had never so much as dreamed of espousing Madam Heliodora, although I knew and had assured myself that I loved her. It had seemed to me a sufficiency of bliss to behold her every day, as I now did, and to enjoy her sweet company and wise discourse. Nay, now that the thought was presented to my mind, it seemed to me a kind of sacrilege to imagine that so divine a creature was to be wooed and wedded like any other woman, since she seemed to be set far above all such common ways, like the fabled goddess Minerva of the ancients, or our own Qu. Elizabeth, of glorious memory. And by reason of this new thought I went about all day heavy and, as it were, guilty in my own esteem. But this did not continue long, for growing used to the notion, I reasoned with myself that since her ladyship refused not to condescend to the joys and sorrows of common mortals, why should she not espouse me as soon as any other? And though this argument filled me at first with a great trembling and fear, by reason of my own presumption, yet I soon accustomed myself thereto, and even dwelt upon it with great delight. And in this frame of mind I abode for several days, seeing Madam Heliodora as before, only in the evening, when I found myself so timid and bashful as scarce to be able to utter a word in her ladyship’s presence, and on leaving did always curse myself for my folly in daring to suppose that she could ever deign to smile upon me. And as though I wan’t enough troubled already, a chance word of my lady’s brought back to my mind that which in this sweet madness I had clean forgot, yea, and had been fain to forget longer—viz., that I was betrothed already to my little cousin Dorothy Brandon, and that both she and my father would look for me to fulfil my contract with her.
Now this for some time filled me with such heaviness that I knew not what to do, finding myself as it were stranded between inclination on the one hand and honour on the other. And being thus situated, I did as men are wont to do in such a case, that is to say, I stood wavering between the two difficulties. For I could not altogether resolve to adopt my lord’s offer and enter the French service, cutting myself off entirely from my own country, and designing never to see my father’s face again, lest he should reproach me, and yet I could not make up my mind to retire immediately to Maderas and return to my duty. And while in this pother, that ingenious sophistry, wherewith the devil is wont to bewilder our minds in such cases of temptation, came to the aid of my own inclination. For (so said the tempter to me), your cousin is yet very young, and may reasonably look for a far better settlement than you can offer her. Moreover, she hath not seen you for many years, and her childish fancy for you can’t fail by now to have faded away, while as for any more enduring affection for you that might replace it, how can it have sprung up in your absence? Nay, how do you know that she han’t already fallen in with some gentleman to whom her wishes might incline, were it not for her engagement with you? An’t this more probable, and will you force her to sacrifice her love and herself to a contract made by your father when you were both infants?