So saying, Lord Dalgarno left the scrivener's habitation.
Skurliewhitter, having dispatched his boy to get porters of trust for transporting the money, remained alone and in dismay, meditating by what means he could shake himself free of the vindictive and ferocious nobleman, who possessed at once a dangerous knowledge of his character, and the power of exposing him, where exposure would be ruin. He had indeed acquiesced in the plan, rapidly sketched, for obtaining possession of the ransomed estate, but his experience foresaw that this would be impossible; while, on the other hand, he could not anticipate the various consequences of Lord Dalgarno's resentment, without fears, from which his sordid soul recoiled. To be in the power, and subject both to the humours and the extortions of a spendthrift young lord, just when his industry had shaped out the means of fortune,—it was the most cruel trick which fate could have played the incipient usurer.
While the scrivener was in this fit of anxious anticipation, one knocked at the door of the apartment; and, being desired to enter, appeared in the coarse riding-cloak of uncut Wiltshire cloth, fastened by a broad leather belt and brass buckle, which was then generally worn by graziers and countrymen. Skurliewhitter, believing he saw in his visitor a country client who might prove profitable, had opened his mouth to request him to be seated, when the stranger, throwing back his frieze hood which he had drawn over his face, showed the scrivener features well imprinted in his recollection, but which he never saw without a disposition to swoon.
“Is it you?” he said, faintly, as the stranger replaced the hood which concealed his features.
“Who else should it be?” said his visitor.
“Thou son of parchment, got betwixt the inkhorn And the stuff'd process-bag—that mayest call The pen thy father, and the ink thy mother,
The wax thy brother, and the sand thy sister
And the good pillory thy cousin allied—
Rise, and do reverence unto me, thy better!”
“Not yet down to the country,” said the scrivener, “after every warning? Do not think your grazier's cloak will bear you out, captain—no, nor your scraps of stage-plays.”
“Why, what would you have me to do?” said the captain—“Would you have me starve? If I am to fly, you must eke my wings with a few feathers. You can spare them, I think.”
“You had means already—you have had ten pieces—What is become of them?”