Moll Flanders (30 page)

He told her he had a great desire to see me, that he would give her any assurances that were in his power not to take any advantages of me, and that in the first place he would give me a general release from all demands of any kind. She insisted how it might tend to farther divulging the secret and might be injurious to him, entreating him not to press for it; so at length he desisted.

They had some discourse upon the subject of the things he had lost, and he seemed to be very desirous of his gold watch, and told her if she could procure that for him, he would willingly give as much for it as it was worth. She told him she would endeavour to procure it for him and leave the valuing it to himself.

Accordingly the next day she carried the watch, and he gave her thirty guineas for it, which was more than I should have been able to make of it, though it seems it cost much more. He spoke something of his periwig, which it seems cost him threescore guineas, and his snuff-box; and in a few days more she carried them too, which obliged him very much, and he gave her thirty more. The next day I sent him his fine sword and cane gratis, and demanded nothing of him, but had no mind to see him unless he might be satisfied I knew who he was, which he was not willing to.

Then he entered into a long talk with her of the manner how she came to know all this matter. She formed a long tale of that part; how she had it from one that I had told the whole story to and that was to help me dispose of the goods; and this confidante brought things to her, she being by profession a pawnbroker; and she, hearing of his worship’s disaster, guessed at the thing in general; that having gotten the things into her hands, she had resolved to come and try as she had done. She then gave him repeated assurances that it should never go out of her mouth, and though she knew the woman very well, yet she had not let her know, meaning me, anything of who the person was, which, by the way, was false; but, however, it was not to his damage, for I never opened my mouth of it to anybody.

I had a great many thoughts in my head about my seeing him again and was often sorry that I had refused it. I was persuaded that if I had seen him and let him know that I knew him, I should have made some advantage of him and perhaps have had some maintenance from him; and though it was a life wicked enough, yet it was not so full of danger as this I was engaged in. However, those thoughts wore off, and I declined seeing him again for that time; but my governess saw him often, and he was very kind to her, giving her something almost every time he saw her. One time in particular she found him very merry, and as she thought he had some wine in his head then, and he pressed her again to let him see that woman that, as he said, had bewitched him so that night, my governess, who was from the beginning for my seeing him, told him he was so desirous of it that she could almost yield to it if she could prevail upon me; adding that if he would please to come to her house in the evening, she would endeavour it upon his repeated assurances of forgetting what was past.

Accordingly she came to me and told me all the discourse; in short, she soon biased me to consent in a case which I had some regret in my mind for declining before; so I prepared to see him. I dressed me to all the advantage possible, I assure you, and for the first time used a little art; I say for the first time, for I had never yielded to the baseness of paint before, having always had vanity enough to believe I had no need of it.

At the hour appointed he came; and as she observed before, so it was plain still that he had been drinking, though very far from what we call being in drink. He appeared exceeding pleased to see me and entered into a long discourse with me upon the old affair. I begged his pardon very often for my share of it, protested I had not any such design when first I met him, that I had not gone out with him but that I took him for a very civil gentleman, and that he made me so many promises of offering no incivility to me.

He alleged the wine he drank, and that he scarce knew what he did, and that if it had not been so, he should never have taken the freedom with me he had done. He protested to me that he never touched any woman but me since he was married to his wife, and it was a surprise upon him; complimented me upon being so particularly agreeable to him, and the like; and talked so much of that kind till I found he had talked himself almost into a temper to do the thing again. But I took him up short. I protested I had never suffered any man to touch me since my husband died, which was near eight years. He said he believed it and added that madam had intimated as much to him, and that it was his opinion of that part which made him desire to see me again; and since he had once broken in upon his virtue with me and found no ill consequences, he could be safe in venturing again; and so, in short, he went on to what I expected and to what will not bear relating.

My old governess had foreseen it, as well as I, and therefore led him into a room which had not a bed in it, and yet had a chamber within it which had a bed, whither we withdrew for the rest of the night; and in short, after some time being together, he went to bed and lay there all night. I withdrew, but came again undressed before it was day and lay with him the rest of the time.

Thus, you see, having committed a crime once is a sad handle to the committing of it again; all the reflections wear off when the temptation renews itself. Had I not yielded to see him again, the corrupt desire in him had worn off, and ’tis very probable he had never fallen into it with anybody else, as I really believe he had not done before.

When he went away, I told him I hoped he was satisfied he had not been robbed again. He told me he was fully satisfied in that point and, putting his hand in his pocket, gave me five guineas, which was the first money I had gained that way for many years.

I had several visits of the like kind from him, but he never came into a settled way of maintenance, which was what I would have been best pleased with. Once, indeed, he asked me how I did to live. I answered him pretty quick that I assured him I had never taken that course that I took with him, but that indeed I worked at my needle and could just maintain myself; that sometimes it was as much as I was able to do, and I shifted hard enough.

He seemed to reflect upon himself that he should be the first person to lead me into that which he assured me he never intended to do himself; and it touched him a little, he said, that he should be the cause of his own sin and mine too. He would often make just reflections also upon the crime itself and upon the particular circumstances of it, with respect to himself; how wine introduced the inclinations, how the devil led him to the place and found out an object to tempt him, and he made the moral always himself.

When these thoughts were upon him, he would go away and perhaps not come again in a month’s time or longer; but then as the serious part wore off the lewd part would wear in, and then he came prepared for the wicked part. Thus we lived for some time; though he did not keep, as they call it, yet he never failed doing things that were handsome, and sufficient to maintain me without working, and, which was better, without following my old trade.

But this affair had its end too; for after about a year, I found that he did not come so often as usual, and at last he left it off altogether without any dislike or bidding adieu; and so there was an end of that short scene of life, which added no great store to me, only to make more work for repentance.

During this interval I confined myself pretty much at home; at least, being thus provided for, I made no adventures, no, not for a quarter of a year after; but then, finding the fund fail and being loath to spend upon the main stock, I began to think of my old trade and to look abroad into the street; and my first step was lucky enough.

I had dressed myself up in a very mean habit, for as I had several shapes to appear in, I was now in an ordinary stuff gown, a blue apron, and a straw hat; and I placed myself at the door of the Three Cups Inn in St. John’s Street. There were several carriers used the inn, and the stage-coaches for Barnet, for Totteridge, and other towns that way stood always in the street in the evening, when they prepared to set out, so that I was ready for anything that offered. The meaning was this: people come frequently with bundles and small parcels to those inns, and call for such carriers or coaches as they want to carry them into the country; and there generally attends women, porters’ wives or daughters, ready to take in such things for the people that employ them.

It happened very oddly that I was standing at the inn-gate, and a woman that stood there before, and which was the porter’s wife belonging to the Barnet stage-coach, having observed me, asked if I waited for any of the coaches. I told her yes, I waited for my mistress, that was coming to go to Barnet. She asked me who was my mistress, and I told her any madam’s name that came next me; but it seemed I happened upon a name a family of which name lived at Hadley, near Barnet.

I said no more to her or she to me a good while; but by and by, somebody calling her at a door a little way off, she desired me that if anybody called for the Barnet coach, I would step and call her at the house, which it seems was an ale-house. I said yes very readily, and away she went.

She was no sooner gone but comes a wench and a child, puffing and sweating, and asks for the Barnet coach. I answered presently, “Here.” “Do you belong to the Barnet coach?” says she. “Yes, sweetheart,” said I. “What do you want?” “I want room for two passengers,” says she. “Where are they, sweetheart?” said I. “Here’s this girl; pray let her go into the coach,” says she, “and I’ll go and fetch my mistress.” “Make haste, then, sweetheart,” says I, “for we may be full else.” The maid had a great bundle under her arm; so she put the child into the coach, and I said, “You had best put your bundle into the coach too.” “No,” said she, “I am afraid somebody should slip it away from the child.” “Give it me, then,” said I. “Take it, then,” says she, “and be sure you take care of it.” “I’ll answer for it,” said I, “if it were twenty-pound value.” “There, take it, then,” says she, and away she goes.

As soon as I got the bundle and the maid was out of sight, I goes on towards the ale-house where the porter’s wife was, so that if I met her, I had then only been going to give her the bundle and to call her to her business, as if I was going away and could stay no longer; but as I did not meet her, I walked away, and turning into Charterhouse Lane, made off through Charterhouse Yard into Long Lane, then into Bartholomew Close, so into Little Britain, and through the Bluecoat Hospital to Newgate Street.

To prevent being known, I pulled off my blue apron and wrapt the bundle in it, which was made up in a piece of painted calico; I also wrapt up my straw hat in it, and so put the bundle upon my head; and it was very well that I did thus, for, coming through the Bluecoat Hospital, who should I meet but the wench that had given me the bundle to hold. It seems she was going with her mistress, who she had been to fetch, to the Barnet coaches.

I saw she was in haste, and I had no business to stop her; so away she went, and I brought my bundle safe to my governess. There was no money, plate, or jewels in it, but a very good suit of Indian damask, a gown and petticoat, a laced head and ruffles of very good Flanders lace, and some other things, such as I knew very well the value of.

This was not indeed my own invention, but was given me by one that had practised it with success, and my governess liked it extremely; and indeed I tried it again several times, though never twice near the same place; for the next time I tried in Whitechapel, just by the corner of Petticoat Lane, where the coaches stand that go out to Stratford and Bow and that side of the country; and another time at the Flying Horse, without Bishopsgate, where the Cheston coaches then lay; and I had always the good luck to come off with some booty.

Another time I placed myself at a warehouse by the waterside, where the coasting vessels from the north come, such as Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Sunderland, and other places. Here, the warehouse being shut, comes a young fellow with a letter; and he wanted a box and a hamper that was come from Newcastle-upon-Tyne. I asked him if he had the marks of it; so he shows me the letter by virtue of which he was to ask for it and which gave an account of the contents, the box being full of linen and the hamper full of glass-ware. I read the letter and took care to see the name, and the marks, the name of the person that sent the goods, and the name of the person they were sent to; then I bade the messenger come in the morning, for that the warehouse-keeper would not be there any more that night.

Away went I and wrote a letter from Mr. John Richardson of Newcastle to his dear cousin, Jemmy Cole, in London, with an account that he had sent by such a vessel (for I remembered all the particulars to a tittle) so many pieces of huckaback linen, and so many ells of Dutch holland, and the like, in a box, and a hamper of flintglasses from Mr. Henzill’s glass-house; and that the box was marked I. C. No. 1, and the hamper was directed by a label on the cording.

About an hour after, I came to the warehouse, found the warehouse-keeper, and had the goods delivered me without any scruple, the value of the linen being about £22.

I could fill up this whole discourse with the variety of such adventures which daily invention directed to, and which I managed with the utmost dexterity, and always with success.

At length—as when does the pitcher come safe home that goes so often to the well?—I fell into some broils, which though they could not affect me fatally, yet made me known, which was the worst thing next to being found guilty that could befall me.

I had taken up the disguise of a widow’s dress; it was without any real design in view, but only waiting for anything that might offer, as I often did. It happened that while I was going along a street in Covent Garden there was a great cry of “Stop, thief! Stop, thief!” Some artists had, it seems, put a trick upon a shopkeeper, and being pursued, some of them fled one way and some another; and one of them was, they said, dressed up in widow’s weeds, upon which the mob gathered about me, and some said I was the person, others said no. Immediately came the mercer’s journeyman, and he swore aloud I was the person, and so seized on me. However, when I was brought back by the mob to the mercer’s shop, the master of the house said freely that I was not the woman, and would have let me go immediately, but another fellow said gravely, “Pray stay till Mr. ——,” meaning the journeyman, “comes back, for he knows her”; so they kept me near half an hour. They had called a constable, and he stood in the shop as my jailer. In talking with the constable I inquired where he lived and what trade he was; the man, not apprehending in the least what happened afterwards, readily told me his name and where he lived, and told me as a jest that I might be sure to hear of his name when I came to the Old Bailey.