Still they all pretended not to believe him, and his nervousness became chronic. Cromwell was only amused at his distress. He never forgot the letter to "T." The joke appealed to the Protector's peculiar sense of humour. Nearly three years later, when Monk one day returned to Dalkeith, he found a letter had been mysteriously left with the guard. It proved apparently to be one of the same tenor as the first, and more furious than ever he sent a copy of it up to the Secretary of State. "I did not think fit to trouble his Highness with it," the general wrote, "it being, as I conceive it is, a knavish trick of some Scotchman or other.... I hope God will enable me as I make them smart for this roguery and the former report which they made of me." Of course Thurloe told Cromwell, and the Protector could not resist adding his well-known "drolling" postscript to his next despatch. "There be some that tell me," he wrote to Monk shortly before his death, "that there is a certain cunning fellow in Scotland called George Monk who is said to lie in wait there to introduce Charles Stuart; I pray you use your diligence to apprehend him and send him up to me." Clearly he was poking fun at his lieutenant. The Protector knew well enough he was to be trusted implicitly. He sent him up all his most disaffected troops, knowing that under Monk's stern discipline they would soon be brought to their senses. He gave him full powers to cashier any officer he liked. He abandoned his intention of reducing the army when Monk said it was not safe. He even left him nearly two years without a Council to watch him, and only restored it upon Monk's urgent and repeated entreaties for help in his work. As part of their intrigues the Cavaliers industriously spread reports that Cromwell was afraid of his lieutenant. They said the Protector tried to get him out of Scotland by offering him the command of the great Jamaica expedition, and that Monk, seeing through his designs, refused. As a matter of fact Cromwell did want to see his darling project conducted by the most able and experienced commander in his service, but reluctantly abandoned the idea in consequence of a confidential report that Scotland would not be safe out of Monk's hands. So the post was not offered him. If it had been he would certainly have accepted it. To lead such an enterprise was the dream of Monk's life. The rumour was revived in 1658 because the general did not attend Cromwell's "other House," to which he had been called. It was said that he had refused the summons, but it was untrue. The real explanation of his absence is that there were at the time signs of a Royalist descent, and he told the Protector he dared not come till some one was appointed to take his place. No one was appointed, and he remained.