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Updated: May 22, 2025
The two men looked at each other and Mountchance trembled. The crowd outside were not officers of the law, neither were they soldiery. What had caused them to hunt down Rofflash? Not because he had committed a robbery on the King's highway. The rabble had a secret sympathy with highwaymen. "What have you done?" whispered the old man through his white lips. "Shot a man.
I can take him to a doctor who'll attend him and who'll hold his tongue, which is more to the purpose. It'll mean a few guineas, but 'twill be money well spent." "See to it, then, Rofflash. Where's the man to be found?" "His house is on London Bridge. The tide's running down fairly, and the waterman ought to get us to the bridge in half an hour." Dorrimore assented gloomily.
But she gave him no chance. She remained impassive. "You've been very unfortunate, Mr. Vane. I'm truly sorry for you." "That's something," said he gratefully. "It consoles me for what I've gone through. The lies told by Rofflash and Jarvis, who I thought was my friend, nearly sent me to Tyburn." "And Mistress Salisbury?" Lavinia's manner was as cold as ice.
Rofflash would have accompanied the party but that a hand was laid on his arm and a masked lady whispered: "One moment, captain, I want you." He turned. He recognised the speaker by the lower part of her face, the round, somewhat prominent chin, the imperious mouth with its sensual lower lip, the bold sweeping contour from the chin to the ear. "Sally Salisbury the devil!" he ejaculated.
He and Rofflash betook themselves to the coach which landed them at a tavern in St. James's Street, where Dorrimore drank and drank until he fell under the table and was carried out by a couple of waiters, put in a hackney coach and conveyed to his chambers in the Temple. Rofflash left his patron at the tavern long before this period arrived.
Trust Jeremy Rofflash for that. By God, sir, I'll swear there's no man in the world readier with a plan when its wanted. Look ye here, Mr. Dorrimore, I've the whole thing cut and dried in the hollow of my hand. To come to the point. The old harridan means to fleece you. I don't. Damme sir, I'm a man of my word.
You'll find it as empty as yonder bottle. I'll swear now that you set greater store by his heart." Rofflash glanced shrewdly at Sally's face. Her lips were working convulsively. He knew he was right. "You're a cunning devil, captain. You've the wheedling tongue of Satan himself and his black soul, too, I doubt not. You're all ears and eyes when money's to be picked up.
Highwaymen haunted Hammersmith and Turnham Green, and had the landlord of the "Red Cow" chosen to open his mouth he might have thrown a little light upon the man who had stopped the Bath coach. Once more the coach was on its way and following it went Captain Rofflash, dogging it to its destination at the Belle Savage. He watched Lavinia alight and wherever she went he went too.
Rofflash had made for the network of courts and allies of Clare Market hoping to double upon his pursuers and gain the Strand, and then hurry to the Alsatia of Whitefriars.
The captain had not reckoned upon Lavinia taking flight before he and his employer arrived on the scene. The plot of which she was the objective was common enough in those days of free and easy lovemaking. Merely an abduction. Rofflash had an intimate knowledge of Whitefriars, not then, perhaps, so lawless a place as in the times of the Stuarts, but sufficiently lawless for his purpose.
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