'He would, indeed, have deserved it,' cries Booth. 'But pray, sir, how came you by it?'
'I took it,' said the colonel, 'from a sett of idle young rascals, one of whom was reading it out aloud upon a stool, while the rest were attempting to make a jest, not only of the letter, but of all decency, virtue, and religion. A sett of fellows that you must have seen or heard of about the town, that are, d--n me, a disgrace to the dignity of manhood; puppies that mistake noise and impudence, rudeness and profaneness, for wit. If the drummers of my company had not more understanding than twenty such fellows, I'd have them both whipt out of the regiment.'
'So, then, you do not know the person to whom it was writ?' said Booth.
'Lieutenant,' cries the colonel, 'your question deserves no answer. I ought to take time to consider whether I ought not to resent the supposition. Do you think, sir, I am acquainted with a rascal?'
'I do not suppose, colonel,' cries Booth, 'that you would willingly cultivate an intimacy with such a person; but a man must have good luck who hath any acquaintance if there are not some rascals among them.'
'I am not offended with you, child,' says the colonel. 'I know you did not intend to offend me.'
'No man, I believe, dares intend it,' said Booth.
'I believe so too,' said the colonel; 'd--n me, I know it. But you know, child, how tender I am on this subject. If I had been ever married myself, I should have cleft the man's skull who had dared look wantonly at my wife.'
'It is certainly the most cruel of all injuries,' said Booth. 'How finely doth Shakespeare express it in his Othello!
'But there, where I had treasured up my soul.''
'That Shakespeare,' cries the colonel, 'was a fine fellow. He was a very pretty poet indeed. Was it not Shakespeare that wrote the play about Hotspur? You must remember these lines. I got them almost by heart at the playhouse; for I never missed that play whenever it was acted, if I was in town:--
By Heav'n it was an easy leap,
To pluck bright honour into the full moon,
Or drive into the bottomless deep.
And--and--faith, I have almost forgot them; but I know it is something about saving your honour from drowning--O! it is very fine! I say, d-- n me, the man that writ those lines was the greatest poet the world ever produced. There is dignity of expression and emphasis of thinking, d--n me.'
Booth assented to the colonel's criticism, and then cried, 'I wish, colonel, you would be so kind to give me that letter.' The colonel answered, if he had any particular use for it he would give it him with all his heart, and presently delivered it; and soon afterwards they parted.
Several passages now struck all at once upon Booth's mind, which gave him great uneasiness. He became confident now that he had mistaken one colonel for another; and, though he could not account for the letter's getting into those hands from whom Bath had taken it (indeed James had dropt it out of his pocket), yet a thousand circumstances left him no room to doubt the identity of the person, who was a man much more liable to raise the suspicion of a husband than honest Bath, who would at any time have rather fought with a man than lain with a woman.
The whole behaviour of Amelia now rushed upon his memory. Her resolution not to take up her residence at the colonel's house, her backwardness even to dine there, her unwillingness to go to the masquerade, many of her unguarded expressions, and some where she had been more guarded, all joined together to raise such an idea in Mr. Booth, that he had almost taken a resolution to go and cut the colonel to pieces in his own house. Cooler thoughts, however, suggested themselves to him in time. He recollected the promise he had so solemnly made to the doctor. He considered, moreover, that he was yet in the dark as to the extent of the colonel's guilt. Having nothing, therefore, to fear from it, he contented himself to postpone a resentment which he nevertheless resolved to take of the colonel hereafter, if he found he was in any degree a delinquent.
