The wine from Champagne tasted dry and sharp. It pricked the inside of your mouth. It had little bubbles in it, as Chumley had said. They raced up to the surface and pipped, flicking you under the nose as you sipped, making you sneeze. Adam didn't think he liked it.
Passers in the street, still dark between the buildings, must have marveled, as they yawned and blinked, that any all-night revelers could sound so spirited. Again and again the glasses were filled.
Of them all, Adam Long alone was not bright. But he was conscious of his manners. After all, he had no complaint. He'd been treated well. These men were fools, but they were fair. They kept pumping his hand, then quickly dropping it, to blurt apologies, and he kept assuring them that the arm, bandaged and hidden by the coat sleeve now, was comfortable.
They would ask what part of the American colonies he came from and did he know So-and-So who lived near Philadelphia or maybe it was Charlestown?
Every one of them, at some time or other, asked him what he thought of London.
"Well, I'll tell you," Adam would answer. "It's all right to visit, but I wouldn't live here if you gave it to me."
Nevertheless they toasted London, as of course they toasted the Queen, and as they toasted also, at Johnston's suggestion, "the Colony of Rhode Island and the brave men it sends forth!" There was a lot of cheering.
What with the wine, and the fact that the party broke up rather abruptly, and also what with Adam's realization that he was something of a guest of honor, and as such had certain obligations, he found himself one of the last to leave.
The boniface leaned close to him, carefully taking him bv an arm, the left arm. He held something out.
"Excuse me, your worship. I was told to give this to you." It was the bill for the wine.
Magistrate Nixon had a ferret's face, which because of the length of his periwig looked even more lank than in truth it was. The periwig was cocked slightly to the left. The steel-rimmed spectacles were cocked to the right. Notwithstanding these and a few allied oddities, Magistrate Nixon presented an appearance sufficiently terrifying as he studied Adam Long.
Adam was sore. He wanted to be back in the Hearth Cricket, relaxed among friends, where he'd had as yet no fitting chance to discuss in detail the events of the previous night. It was there, at the inn, that he'd remembered the legal paper, and had examined it.
A good part of the Hearth Cricket clientele, and also the proprietor, indignant, had trailed Adam here. They stood in back of the courtroom now, their hats oflf, silent, yet frowning, for like Adam himself they were sore.
"What am I here for?" Adam demanded.
"Say your honor' when you address the judge," said a tipstaff.
"Your honor, what'm I here for?"
Magistrate Nixon hawked, and spat.
"You can't read?" he asked.
"I can read all right, my lord. Sure I can read. But only English. This thing"—he rattled the summons—"I don't know what language it's writ in."
"Lawyers must live," the magistrate said mildly.
"I don't see why."
A titter escaped from the spectators. The tipstaf? wheeled, gripping his truncheon. Magistrate Nixon, however, paid no heed.
"What are you here for? Why, murder, I should think. How manv men did you kill last night, Captain?"
"Only two that I can count for sure."
"You're a saucy fellow."
"This is the first time I've ever been in a court."
"If I am any judge of physiognomy. Captain, it won't prove to be the last."
"I sure hope it will, my lord."
"You don't call me 'my lord.' I'm not a lord, only a beak. You call me 'your honor.'"
"Your honor."
Magistrate Nixon leaned forward.
"I sent for you for two reasons, Captain."
"Because of the duel, too?"
"Have you been dueling? Damn it, man, then don't tell me! That happens to be against the law, too, just like murder is."
"I know it, my lord. I mean, your honor."
"Two reasons," the magistrate resumed. "The first was, to thank you for saving the Crown a very considerable hangman's fee. The second was, I wanted to see what you look like."
"Well— Well, here I am, your honor."
"Your honor, sir!" The magistrate came down off his bench, down to where Adam was, and he grasped Adam's hand. "Your honorl Damn me. Captain, if we had a few more like you in this city there'd be no need for so many of me! I want to hear about last night, every little thing about it. But we'll not have the tale here in court. We'll go to some more quiet place, eh?"
"We could go to the Hearth Cricket."
"Good! But right now I want to thank you. I want to congratulate you. I only hope you're staying with us here in London?"
"Thank you, sir, but I'm sailing tomorrow."
"Good luck. Captain." He put his left hand on Adam's right forearm. "And a good voyage. Come back whenever— Oh, Lord! I've pressed one of your wounds!"
No doubt Adam had winced involuntarily. He smiled now.
"That one don't hurt, your honor. Not any more."
Mistress Bingham had baked a partridge pie—a special pie, as Adam had promised Lil—and they had it, with trimmings, washing-downs, too, not in the ordinary, where they might be intruded upon by any customers, but in the kitchen, which was more private.
It was one of the best times Adam Long ever had in his life. They treated him like a member of the family, and he had to blink hard to keep the tears from breaking out of his eyes. When anybody spoke to him he had to swallow several times before he could be sure that his answer would come out clear. He grinned foolishly and fondly at everyone. Lillian sat on his lap, and if she spilled food now and then it did no great harm, for he wasn't wearing his fancy clothes now, only his freedom suit.
It was mid-afternoon when a drawer came in from the ordinary with a message that Mr. Chumley was waiting outside with two sedan chairs and asked that Captain Long go with him to Clark's coffee house.
"No," said Adam. "I don't have to go there any more, and why anybody'd go there who didn't have to is more than I can see."
But the drawer was soon back.
"He says to tell you, sir, that after the way you handled yourself in that affair of honor off Birdcage Walk this morning they're clamoring to meet you. He says to tell you you'll be the toast of the place."
"I don't like being a toast," said Adam. "It costs too much money."
"What shall I tell Mr. Chumley then, sir?"
"Tell him to go jump head-first down a jakes. Excuse me," added Adam. "I mean, down a necessary."
PART EIGHT. A Man in the Middle
An aspen, a poplar, a beech will get to whispering in any old breeze that should saunter past; but it takes something to make a maple talk, even more for an oak. The Queen's majesty as represented in New England was perturbed. Adam Long sensed this the moment he faced the new custos.
Mr. Macgregor was a far more effective official than Captain Wingfield. He had none of Wingfield's bowwow. Blusterless, never sneering, he went over Adam's papers with the painstaking thoroughness of a weevil.
Adam sat at a window, the same window he'd once jumped out of. Today as on the previous occasion a crowd had collected; but the other time the men had been caught by the sound of angry voices and the possibility of a fight, whereas today Mr. Macgregor was not going to make the mistake his predecessor had made. Mr. Macgregor had been selected indeed in large measure because he was a different kind of man —watchful, wary, above all thorough. He checked every figure, then checked his own check.
The other time it had been raining. Today it was bright; the sun was out; the town glittered, cold, windy, but somehow gay.