Tell me of my good friend Captain Jack. Ah! if he could
have but stuck to honest trade, he and I might have made our
fortunes together ere now. Never was such a figure for showing off
coat or vest or sash, or a head upon which a peruke sat with a
daintier grace. But come, let us sit down together and quaff a cup
of wine, and you shall tell me all your history."
Dusk was falling between the high walls of the houses, and business
was over for the day. Cale led his guest into a room on the
basement floor, where a simple but substantial refection had been
laid out. He called out to his apprentice to get his supper in the
kitchen; and when the door was shut upon the pair, he listened with
interest whilst Tom gave a very fairly accurate history of his own
life up till the present moment.
Then the little man shook his head with an air of wisdom.
"The best advice I could give you, my young friend, is that you
should go home to your mother and your friends in Essex, and seek
to learn no more of the wickedness of the world than you know
already. But I suppose no words of mine would induce you to take
that course."
"Certes no," answered Tom with a short laugh. "I am sick of the
country. I have come forth to see the world, and see it I will, or
know the reason why.
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