Moll Flanders (14 page)

My new friend appeared sensibly affected with my condition, and indeed was so very kind as to reduce the rate of my living with her to so low a price during the winter that she convinced me she got nothing by me; and as for lodging, during the winter I paid nothing at all.

When the spring season came on, she continued to be as kind to me as she could, and I lodged with her for a time till it was found necessary to do otherwise. She had some persons of character that frequently lodged in her house, and in particular the gentleman who, as I said, singled me out for his companion in the winter before; and he came down again with another gentleman in his company and two servants and lodged in the same house. I suspected that my landlady had invited him thither, letting him know that I was still with her; but she denied it.

In a word, this gentleman came down and continued to single me out for his peculiar confidence. He was a complete gentleman—that must be confessed—and his company was agreeable to me as mine, if I might believe him, was to him. He made no professions to me but of an extraordinary respect, and he had such an opinion of my virtue that, as he often professed, he believed if he should offer anything else, I should reject him with contempt. He soon understood from me that I was a widow; that I had arrived at Bristol from Virginia by the last ships; and that I waited at the Bath till the next Virginia fleet should arrive, by which I expected considerable effects. I understood by him that he had a wife, but that the lady was distempered in her head and was under the conduct of her own relations, which he consented to, to avoid any reflection that might be cast upon him for mismanaging her cure; and in the meantime he came to the Bath to divert his thoughts under such a melancholy circumstance.

My landlady, who of her own accord encouraged the correspondence on all occasions, gave me an advantageous character of him, as a man of honour and of virtue, as well as of a great estate. And indeed I had reason to say so of him too; for though we lodged both on a floor, and he had frequently come into my chamber even when I was in bed, and I also into his, yet he never offered anything to me farther than a kiss or so much as solicited me to anything till long after, as you shall hear.

I frequently took notice to my landlady of his exceeding modesty, and she again used to tell me she believed it was so from the beginning; however, she used to tell me that she thought I ought to expect some gratifications from him for my company, for indeed he did, as it were, engross me. I told her I had not given him the least occasion to think I wanted it or that I would accept of it from him. She told me she would take that part upon her, and she managed it so dexterously that the first time we were together alone, after she had talked with him, he began to inquire a little into my circumstances, as how I had subsisted myself since I came on shore and whether I did not want money. I stood off very boldly. I told him that though my cargo of tobacco was damaged, yet that it was not quite lost; that the merchant that I had been consigned to had so honestly managed for me that I had not wanted, and that I hoped with frugal management I should make it hold out till more would come, which I expected by the next fleet; that in the meantime I had retrenched my expenses, and whereas I kept a maid last season, now I lived without; and whereas I had a chamber and a dining-room then on the first floor, I now had but one room two pair of stairs, and the like; “but I live,” said I, “as well satisfied now as then”; adding that his company had made me live much more cheerfully than otherwise I should have done, for which I was much obliged to him; and so I put off all room for any offer at the present. It was not long before he attacked me again and told me he found that I was backward to trust him with the secret of my circumstances, which he was sorry for; assuring me that he inquired into it with no design to satisfy his own curiosity, but merely to assist me if there was any occasion; but since I would not own myself to stand in need of any assistance, he had but one thing more to desire of me, and that was that I would promise him that when I was any way straitened, I would frankly tell him of it, and that I would make use of him with the same freedom that he made the offer; adding that I should always find I had a true friend though perhaps I was afraid to trust him.

I omitted nothing that was fit to be said by one infinitely obliged, to let him know that I had a due sense of his kindness; and indeed from that time I did not appear so much reserved to him as I had done before, though still within the bounds of the strictest virtue on both sides; but how free soever our conversation was, I could not arrive to that freedom which he desired,
viz.
, to tell him I wanted money, though I was secretly very glad of his offer.

Some weeks passed after this, and still I never asked him for money, when my landlady, a cunning creature, who had often pressed me to it but found that I could not do it, makes a story of her own inventing and comes in bluntly to me when we were together. “Oh, widow!” says she, “I have bad news to tell you this morning.” “What is that?” said I. “Is the Virginia ships taken by the French?”—for that was my fear. “No, no,” says she, “but the man you sent to Bristol yesterday for money is come back and says he has brought none.”

I could by no means like her project; I thought it looked too much like prompting him, which he did not want, and I saw that I should lose nothing by being backward, so took her up short. “I can’t imagine why he should say so,” said I, “for I assure you he brought me all the money I sent him for, and here it is,” said I (pulling out my purse, with about twelve guineas in it); and added, “I intend you shall have most of it by and by.”

He seemed distasted a little at her talking as she did, as well as I, taking it, as I fancied he would, as something forward of her; but when he saw me give such an answer, he came immediately to himself. The next morning we talked of it again, when I found he was fully satisfied and, smiling, said he hoped I would not want money and not tell him of it, and that I had promised him otherwise. I told him I had been very much dissatisfied at my landlady’s talking so publicly the day before of what she had nothing to do with; but I supposed she wanted what I owed her, which was about eight guineas, which I had resolved to give her and had given it her the same night.

He was in a mighty good humour when he heard me say I had paid her, and it went off into some other discourse at that time. But the next morning, he having heard me up before him, he called to me and I answered. He asked me to come into his chamber; he was in bed when I came in, and he made me come and sit down on his bedside, for he said he had something to say to me. After some very kind expressions, he asked me if I would be very honest to him and give a sincere answer to one thing he would desire of me. After some little cavil with him at the word “sincere,” and asking him if I had ever given him any answers which were not sincere, I promised him I would. Why, then, his request was, he said, to let him see my purse. I immediately put my hand into my pocket and, laughing at him, pulled it out, and there was in it three guineas and a half. Then he asked me if there was all the money I had. I told him no, laughing again, not by a great deal.

Well, then, he said, he would have me promise to go and fetch him all the money I had, every farthing. I told him I would, and I went into my chamber and fetched him a little private drawer, where I had about six guineas more and some silver, and threw it all down upon the bed and told him there was all my wealth, honestly to a shilling. He looked a little at it, but did not tell it, and huddled it all into the drawer again, and then, reaching his pocket, pulled out a key and bade me open a little walnut-tree box he had upon the table, and bring him such a drawer, which I did. In this drawer there was a great deal of money in gold, I believe near two hundred guineas, but I knew not how much. He took the drawer and, taking me by the hand, made me put it in and take a whole handful; I was backward at that, but he held my hand hard in his hand and put it into the drawer and made me take out as many guineas almost as I could well take up at once.

When I had done so, he made me put them into my lap, and took my little drawer and poured out all my own money among his, and bade me get me gone and carry it all into my own chamber.

I relate this story the more particularly because of the good humour of it, and to show the temper with which we conversed. It was not long after this but he began every day to find fault with my clothes, with my laces, and head-dresses, and in a word pressed me to buy better, which, by the way, I was willing enough to do though I did not seem to be so. I loved nothing in the world better than fine clothes; but I told him I must housewife the money he had lent me or else I should not be able to pay him again. He then told me in a few words that as he had a sincere respect for me and knew my circumstances, he had not lent me that money, but given it me, and that he thought I had merited it from him by giving him my company so entirely as I had done. After this he made me take a maid and keep house, and his friend being gone, he obliged me to diet him, which I did very willingly, believing, as it appeared, that I should lose nothing by it, nor did the woman of the house fail to find her account in it too.

We had lived thus near three months when, the company beginning to wear away at the Bath, he talked of going away, and fain he would have me to go to London with him. I was not very easy in that proposal, not knowing what posture I was to live in there or how he might use me. But while this was in debate he fell very sick; he had gone out to a place in Somersetshire, called Shepton, and was there taken very ill, and so ill that he could not travel; so he sent his man back to the Bath to beg me that I would hire a coach and come over to him. Before he went, he had left his money and other things of value with me, and what to do with them I did not know, but I secured them as well as I could and locked up the lodgings and went to him, where I found him very ill indeed, so I persuaded him to be carried in a litter to the Bath, where was more help and better advice to be had.

He consented, and I brought him to the Bath, which was about fifteen miles, as I remember. Here he continued very ill of a fever and kept his bed five weeks, all which time I nursed him and tended him as carefully as if I had been his wife; indeed, if I had been his wife I could not have done more. I sat up with him so much and so often that at last, indeed, he would not let me sit up any longer, and then I got a pallet-bed into his room and lay in it just at his bed’s feet.

I was indeed sensibly affected with his condition, and with the apprehensions of losing such a friend as he was and was like to be to me, and I used to sit and cry by him many hours together. At last he grew better and gave hopes that he would recover, as indeed he did, though very slowly.

Were it otherwise than what I am going to say, I should not be backward to disclose it, as it is apparent I have done in other cases; but I affirm, through all this conversation, abating the coming into the chamber when I or he was in bed, and the necessary offices of attending him night and day when he was sick, there had not passed the least immodest word or action between us. Oh, that it had been so to the last!

After some time he gathered strength and grew well apace, and I would have removed my pallet-bed, but he would not let me till he was able to venture himself without anybody to sit up with him, when I removed to my own chamber.

He took many occasions to express his sense of my tenderness for him; and when he grew well he made me a present of fifty guineas for my care and, as he called it, hazarding my life to save his.

And now he made deep protestations of a sincere, inviolable affection for me, but with the utmost reserve for my virtue and his own. I told him I was fully satisfied of it. He carried it that length that he protested to me that if he was naked in bed with me, he would as sacredly preserve my virtue as he would defend it if I was assaulted by a ravisher. I believed him and told him I did so; but this did not satisfy him; he would, he said, wait for some opportunity to give me an undoubted testimony of it.

It was a great while after this that I had occasion on my business to go to Bristol, upon which he hired me a coach and would go with me; and now indeed our intimacy increased. From Bristol he carried me to Gloucester, which was merely a journey of pleasure, to take the air; and here it was our hap to have no lodgings in the inn, but in one large chamber with two beds in it. The master of the house, going with us to show his rooms and coming into that room, said very frankly to him, “Sir, it is none of my business to inquire whether the lady be your spouse or no, but if not, you may lie as honestly in these two beds as if you were in two chambers,” and with that he pulls a great curtain which drew quite across the room and effectually divided the beds. “Well,” says my friend very readily, “these beds will do; and as for the rest, we are too near akin to be together though we may lodge near one another”; and this put an honest face on the thing too. When we came to go to bed, he decently went out of the room till I was in bed, and then went to bed in the other bed, but lay there talking to me a great while.

At last, repeating his usual saying, that he could lie naked in the bed with me and not offer me the least injury, he starts out of his bed. “And now, my dear,” says he, “you shall see how just I will be to you, and that I can keep my word,” and away he comes to my bed.

I resisted a little, but I must confess I should not have resisted him much if he had not made those promises at all; so after a little struggle I lay still and let him come to bed. When he was there he took me in his arms, and so I lay all night with him, but he had no more to do with me or offered anything to me other than embracing me, as I say, in his arms, no, not the whole night, but rose up and dressed him in the morning and left me as innocent for him as I was the day I was born.

This was a surprising thing to me, and perhaps may be so to others who know how the laws of nature work; for he was a vigorous, brisk person. Nor did he act thus on a principle of religion at all, but of mere affection; insisting on it that though I was to him the most agreeable woman in the world, yet because he loved me, he could not injure me.