My days were all twins to each other. Every morning, after breakfast, I
went abroad and always the same way: past the quaint Town House, down King
Street, and so on to the Long Wharf to see if a ship had come in from
England, and to ask the captain thereof if he had brought a letter for one
Oliver Wheatman at Mr. Peter Faneuil's. I got no letter and no news. Then,
always a little sad in heart, I strolled back, and looked in at Wilkins'
book-shop, where some of the town notables were always to be found, and
where, one May morning, as I was higgling over the purchase of a fine
Virgil, I made the acquaintance of a remarkable young gentleman, Mr. Sam
Adams, a genius by birth, a maltster by trade, and a politician by choice.
We would discuss books together in Master Wilkins', or slip out to a
retired inn called "The Two Palaverers" and discuss politics over a glass
of wine and a pipe of tobacco. I liked him so much that I was afraid to
tell him I had been fighting for the Stuarts, and was content to pass in
the role Mr. Faneuil had assigned to me of an ingenuous young English
gentleman who had come out to study colonial matters on the spot before
entering Parliament. Our talk over, I went on to Signor Zandra's and
worked at Italian for two hours. Most days I took him back to my lodging
for dinner and read and talked Italian with him for another hour or two.
The rest of the day I gave to reading, exercising, and, thanks to the good
merchant, to the best society in Boston.
Occasionally, when I knew for certain that no ship would clear for home
for two or three days, I made little shooting journeys inland, but in the
main this is how I spent my days, filling them with work and distraction
so as not to have idle hours for idler thinking. Spring passed, summer
came and went, and the leaves were turning from gold to brown when one
morning, as I was at breakfast, Mr. Faneuil's man came in with a letter.
It was from Master Freake, summoning me home as all was put right. It
contained a few lines from Margaret, written in Italian. A ship was
sailing for London that day, and I went on her.
* * * * *
Jonadab Kilroot had found his way across the Atlantic into Boston Harbour
much more easily than I was finding mine across London to Master Freake's
house in Queen Anne's Gate. It was after nine at night, at which late
hour, of course, I did not intend to arouse the inmates, but I meant to
find the place so that I could stand outside and imagine Margaret within,
perchance dreaming of me. At last I observed that men with torches were
clearly being used as guides through this black maze of streets, and I
stopped one such and offered him a guinea to do his office for me. He was
a lean, shabby, hungry-looking man, who might be forty by the look of him.
He stared vacantly at me for a few seconds, and then hurriedly led the
way, holding his link high over his head.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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