The History and Remarkable Life of the Truly Honourable Colonel Jacque, Commonly Called Colonel JackDefoe, Daniel
General
The History and Remarkable Life of the Truly Honourable Colonel Jacque, Commonly Called Colonel Jack
Defoe, Daniel
Adventure stories, English; England -- Social life and customs -- 18th century -- Fiction; Picaresque fiction
The rogue, my master, knew what belonged to the goldsmiths’ bills well
enough, and I observed, when he read the bill of Sir Stephen, he said,
“This is too big for me to meddle with;” but when he came to the bill
£12, 10s., he said to me, “This will do. Come hither, Jacque;” so away
he runs to Lombard Street, and I after him, huddling the other papers
into the letter-case. As he went along he inquired the name out
immediately, and went directly to the shop, put on a good, grave
countenance, and had the money paid him without any stop or question
asked. I stood on the other side the way looking about the street, as
not at all concerned with anybody that way, but observed that when he
presented the bill he pulled out the letter-case, as if he had been a
merchant’s boy, acquainted with business, and had other bills about
him.
They paid him the money in gold, and he made haste enough in telling it
over, and came away, passing by me, and going into Three King Court, on
the other side of the way; then we crossed back into Clement’s Lane,
made the best of our way to Cole Harbour, at the water-side, and got a
sculler for a penny to carry us over the water to St. Mary Overy’s
stairs, where we landed, and were safe enough.
Here he turns to me; “Colonel Jacque,” says he, “I believe you are a
lucky boy; this is a good job. We’ll go away to St. George’s Fields and
share our booty.” Away we went to the Fields, and sitting down in the
grass, far enough out of the path, he pulled out the money. “Look here,
Jacque,” says he, “did you ever see the like before in your life?” “No,
never,” says I; and added very innocently, “Must we have it all?” “We
have it!” says he, “who should have it?” “Why,” says I, “must the man
have none of it again that lost it?” “He have it again!” says he. “What
d’ye mean by that?” “Nay, I don’t know,” says I. “Why, you said just
now you would let him have the t’other bill again, that you said was
too big for you.”
He laughed at me. “You are but a little boy,” says he, “that’s true,
but I thought you had not been such a child neither;” so he mighty
gravely explained the thing to me thus: that the bill of Sir Stephen
Evans was a great bill for £300, “and if I,” says he, “that am but a
poor lad, should venture to go for the money, they will presently say,
how should I come by such a bill, and that I certainly found it or
stole it; so they will stop me,” says he, “and take it away from me,
and it may bring me into trouble for it too; so,” says he, “I did say
it was too big for me to meddle with, and that I would let the man have
it again, if I could tell how. But for the money, Jacque, the money
that we have got, I warrant you he should have none of that. Besides,”
says he, “whoever he be that has lost this letter-case, to be sure, as
soon as he missed it, he would run to the goldsmith and give notice
that if anybody came for the money they would be stopped; but I am too
old for him there,” says he.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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