JOHN HOWARD PAYNE, WASHINGTON IRVING
157
Chas. (looking over the paper). Um! wine—punch—wine—punch—total five pounds ten—a mere trifle!
Copp. Do you call that a trifle?—Gad, messmate, you must have made good prizes in your last cruise—or you've high wages, mayhap.
Chas. (laughing). Ay, ay, I'm pretty well paid—Here, Tom Taffrel, pay Copp's bill, and let's be off.—(Looking round.) Hey—where is he?
Copp. Oh! he went off in a great hurry—he said he had to be aboard ship, but that you would pay the bill.
Chas. With all my heart. (Apart.) It's odd that he should leave me alone—my raillery has galled him.—Poor Rochester, (laughing,) how ill some people take a joke! (feeling in his pockets). Five pounds ten, you say?
Copp. Just so—five pounds ten.
Chas. (searching in all his pockets). Well! this is the oddest thing—I am certain I had my purse.
Copp. (apart). My neighbour seems rather
in a quandary.
Chas. (feeling more eagerly). Some one has picked my pocket.
Copp. Avast there, friend—none but honest people frequent the Grand Admiral.—(Apart.) I begin to suspect this spark, who spends so freely, is without a stiver in his pocket.
Chas. All I know, is, that one of these honest people must have taken my purse.
Copp. Come, come, messmate—I am too old a cruiser to be taken in by so shallow a manoeuvre—I understand all this—your companion makes sail—you pretend to have been robbed—it's all a cursed privateering trick—clear as day.
Chas. Friend Copp—if you will wait till to-morrow, I'll pay you double the sum.
Copp. Double the sum!!—thunder and lightning! what do you take me for?—Look ye, neighbour, to an honest tar in distress, my house and purse are open—to a jolly tar who wants a caper, and has no coin at hand, drink to-day and pay to-morrow is the word—but to a sharking land lubber, that hoists the colours of a gallant cruiser, to play off the tricks of a pirate, old Copp will show him his match any day.
Chas. A land lubber?
Copp. Ay, a land lubber.—D'ye think I can't see through you, and your shallow sailor phrases.—Who the devil are you?—none of the captains know you—what ship do you belong to?
Chas. What ship? why, to—to—(apart) what the deuce shall I say?
Copp. A pretty sailor, truly—not know the name of his ship—a downright swindler—a barefaced impudent swindler—comes into my house, kicks up a bobbery, puts every thing in an uproar—treats all the guests—touzles my niece—and then wants to make off without paying.
Chas. (apart). How shall I get out of this cursed scrape?—Oh, happy thought, my watch—(aloud) hearkee. Captain Copp—if I have n't money, may be this will do as well—what say you to my watch as pledge?
Copp (taking the watch). Let me see it—um—large diamonds. (Shaking his head.)
Chas. (gayly). Well—that's worth your five pounds ten—hey?
Copp. Um—I don't know that:—if the diamonds are false, it is not worth so much—if real, none but a great lord could own it—(turning quick to him),—how did you come by this watch?
Chas. It's my own.
Copp. Your own! A common sailor own a watch set with large diamonds! I'll tell you what, messmate, it's my opinion as how you stole this watch.
Chas. Stole it? Give back my watch, fellow, or I'll—
Copp. Softly, my lad, keep cool, or I'll have you laid by the heels in a twinkling.
Chas. (apart). What a bull-dog! Well, sir, what do you intend to do?
Copp. Lock you up here for the present, and have you lodged in limbo immediately.
Chas. Will you not listen to reason?
Copp (going). Yes, through the key-hole! (From the door.) You shall have news of me presently, my fine fellow. (Exit.)
Chas. Was ever monarch in such a predicament?—a prisoner in a tavern—to be presently dragged through the streets as a culprit—and to-morrow sung in lampoons, and stuck up in caricatures all through the city—What is to be done? This Copp seems a man of probity, suppose I avow myself to him? Um! will he credit me, and will he keep the matter secret? This sturdy veteran may be an old cruiser under the Commonwealth: if so, what have I not to apprehend? Alone—unarmed, at midnight (shaking his head). Charles! Charles! wilt thou
