I had hardly taken leave of the Captain, and sat down again with the women, when Will came; and calling me out, “Sir, Sir,” said he, grinning with a familiarity in his looks as if what he had to say entitled him to take liberties; “I have got the fellow down!—I have got old Grimes—hah, hah, hah, hah!—He is at the Lower Flask—almost in the condition of David’s sow, and please your honour—(the dog himself not much better) here is his letter—from—from Miss Howe—ha, ha, ha, ha,” laughed the varlet; holding it fast, as if to make conditions with me, and to excite my praises, as well as my impatience.
I could have knocked him down; but he would have his say out—“old Grimes knows not that I have the letter—I must get back to him before he misses it—I only make a pretence to go out for a few minutes—but—but”—and then the dog laughed again—“he must stay—old Grimes must stay—till I go back to pay the reckoning.”
D⸺n the prater; grinning rascal! The letter! The letter!
He gathered in his wide mothe, as he calls it, and gave me the letter; but with a strut, rather than a bow; and then sidled off like one of widow Sorlings’s dunghill cocks, exulting after a great feat performed. And all the time that I was holding up the billet to the light, to try to get at its contents without breaking the seal, (for, dispatched in a hurry, it had no cover), there stood he, laughing, shrugging, playing off his legs; now stroking his shining chin, now turning his hat upon his thumb! then leering in my face, flourishing with his head—O Christ! now-and-then cried the rascal—
What joy has this dog in mischief!—More than I can have in the completion of my most favourite purposes!—These fellows are ever happier than their masters.
I was once thinking to rumple up this billet till I had broken the seal. Young families (Miss Howe’s is not an ancient one) love ostentatious sealings: and it might have been supposed to have been squeezed in pieces in old Grimes’s breeches-pocket. But I was glad to be saved the guilt as well as suspicion of having a hand in so dirty a trick; for thus much of the contents (enough for my purpose) I was enabled to scratch out in character without it; the folds depriving me only of a few connecting words, which I have supplied between hooks.
My Miss Harlowe, thou knowest, had before changed her name to Miss Laetitia Beaumont. Another alias now, Jack, to it; for this billet was directed to her by the name of Mrs. Harriot Lucas. I have learned her to be half a rogue, thou seest.
I congratulate you, my dear, with all my heart and soul, upon [your escape] from the villain. [I long] for the particulars of all. [My mother] is out; but, expecting her return every minute, I dispatched [your] messenger instantly. [I will endeavour to come at] Mrs. Townsend without loss of time; and will write at large in a day or two, if in that time I can see her. [Meantime I] am excessively uneasy for a letter I sent you yesterday by Collins, [who must have left it at] Wilson’s after you got away. [It is of very] great importance. [I hope the] villain has it not. I would not for the world [that he should.] Immediately send for it, if, by doing so, the place you are at [will not be] discovered. If he has it, let me know it by some way [out of] hand. If not, you need not send.
O Jack! what heart’s-ease does this interception give me!—I sent the rascal back with the letter to old Grimes, and charged him to drink no deeper. He owned, that he was half-seas over, as he phrased it.
Dog! said I, are you not to court one of Mrs. Moore’s maids tonight?—
Cry your mercy, Sir!—I will be sober.—I had forgot that—but old Grimes is plaguey tough, I thought I should never have got him down.
Away, villain! Let old Grimes come, and on horseback too, to the door—
He shall, and please your honour, if I can get him on the saddle, and if he can sit—
And charge him not to have alighted, nor to have seen anybody—
Enough, Sir, familiarly nodding his head, to show he took me. And away went the villain—into the parlour, to the women, I.
In a quarter of an hour came old Grimes on horseback, waving to his saddlebow, now on this side, now on that; his head, at others, joining to that of his more sober beast.
It looked very well to the women that I made no effort to speak to old Grimes, (though I wished, before them, that I knew the contents of what he brought); but, on the contrary, desired that they would instantly let my spouse know that her messenger was returned.
Down she flew, violently as she had the headache!
O how I prayed for an opportunity to be revenged of her for the ungrateful trouble she had given to her uncle’s friend!
She took the letter from old Grimes with her own hands, and retired to an inner parlour to read it.
She presently came out again to the fellow, who had much ado to sit his horse—Here is your money, friend.—I thought you long: but what shall I do to get somebody to go to town immediately for me? I see you cannot.
Old Grimes took his money, let fall his hat in doffing it; had it given him, and rode away; his eyes isinglass, and set in his head, as I saw through the window, and in a manner speechless—all his language hiccup. My dog needed not to have gone so deep with this tough old Grimes. But the rascal was in his kingdom with him.
The lady applied to
