"Hush! hush!" said the landlord,--"let us name no names."
"Well! no matter for the name: but we all know that love had turned his brain: he was desperate; and for this last year and a half it's notorious that he has been as mad as a March hare."
"Nicholas in love!" said Mr. Bloodingstone, "well, now that sounds as comical to me as if I should say, that my bull-dog Towser was in love with a bull."
"Why, God bless my soul! haven't the Rotterdam merchants turned him out of their service for that very reason? I know it to be a fact that, no farther back than last February, when one of them was promising him 400 guineas if he'd do this and that,--'Damn your guineas!' says he, 'if it were not for a fairer face than ever I saw on a guinea, I would never set foot in Wales again.' And he raved at such a rate about the young lady, that all the owners began to be shy of him: and the end of it was, that Captain le----what's his name?--has been put in his room."
"Captain Jackson you mean," said the landlord, "for that's his real name; aye, it's true enough that Jackson has now got the command."
"Well, but mad or not mad, what became of Nicholas after the Bow-street officers had laid hold of him? Mr. Dulberry, you had the paper: what became of him? Clapt into a post-chaise for London, eh?"
"No, sir: with all their plots, it seems government couldn't make sure of catching him on the Cato-street business: witnesses couldn't be bought, or juries couldn't be packed, I suppose: and so they've sent him to this part of the country; and he's to take his trial at Dolgelly or Carnarvon for some old affairs, God knows what, with the Custom-house or the Blazer."
"God bless me!" exclaimed almost every man in the room, "so then we shall see Edward Nicholas once more; and I'll walk fifty miles rather than miss the sight. And which way does he come, Mr. Dulberry?"
"By sea, gentlemen; they shipped him on board the steam-packet Halcyon; and God, in his mercy, grant that this cursed instrument of despotic power may blow up and deliver so good a patriot from their snares!"
"The Halcyon!" exclaimed Bertram, with a vehemence proportioned to his sudden surprise and the interest which by this time he felt in the subject of the conversation--"The Halcyon! Why then, Mr. Dulberry, your prayer is granted: for the Halcyon blew up two days ago in St. George's Channel; somewhere, I believe, off the Isle of Anglesea: I was one of the passengers; and, to the best of my belief, all on board have perished--except myself."