Joseph Wilmot, or, The Memoirs of a Man-Servant — page 90: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

rr a ee - JOSEPH WILMOT; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF A MAN-SERVANT. from Rome to Florence; and immediately on their arrival in that city, you must despatch a letter to the post-office at Pistoja, directed to Signor Philippo, my wortby interpreter, who is now perpetrating this scrawl to my dictation. He shall be in Pistoja to look out for the letter, about the time you specify as that when “the affair is likely to come off; and he will send you an intimation at what hour and place he will meet you in Florence for a few minutes, so that he may communicate verbally with you. This is absolutely necessary, for more reasons than one. In the first place, he must ascertain from you the precise time when Heseltine and the ladies take their departure trom Florence, as well as the exact route they pursue; and these particulars you must manage to glean from some hostler or under- ling at the hotel whence they start. Be as particular as you can in respect to time and route; because I cannot keep my band in an idle ambush for many long hours together. There is another reason why Philippo must see you personally ; and that is in order to give you the pass-word by means of which you could alone penetrate in safety through the fastnesses of my domain, and thereby avoid the chance of being shot down or knocked on the head by any of my brave fellows whom you might happen to meet. When the birds are safe in my custody, I will lodge them in the tower; and you may rest assured that they shall receive decent attentions and honourable treatment,—always excepting, however, the surrendering up on their part of their money and jewels as my perquisites. You may then make your appearance here as soon as ever you like, and drive your bargain with the old man as you think fit: but remember that the first thing to be done is to place in my hands the promised amount of two hundred pounds or a bank-bill for that sum. ay: «« By the bye, I may as well observe that if it do not suit your purpose to come in person, and 35 you mean to employ some agent to carry out the business with the old man, all yon have to do is to give him the pass-word and the money— (do not by any means forget the latter) —and your deputy will be as welcome as yourself. But don’t omit the pass-word, Sono more at present from your loving friend, “MARCO UBERTI.” This precious document, in which villany ran in a vein of flippant familiarity, gave me a complete insight into the execrable proceedings of Mr. Lanover; and if anything were wanting to com- plete the clue to his perfidious intentions, 1t was furnished by another document in the pocket-book and to which I will presently refer. But in respect to the letter I had just read, it showed me how Lanover had bribed Marco Uberti to capture Sir | Matthew Heseltine and the rest of the party—to carry them to his tower—and to hold them pri- soners there until he (Lanover) should have dic- tated his terms to the Baronet. I now compre- hended that the man on horseback whom Lanover had met at a particular spot in Florence, could have been none other than Philippo, Marco Uberti’s interpreter ; and let the reader remember that this meeting took place on the very evening, and only a few hours after Sir Matthew Heseltine and his party had quitted Florence. It was moreover evident that Philippo, having received from Mr. Lanover the requisite information with regard to the travellers, must have sped back in all haste to Marco Uberti’s head-quarters in the Apennines, so that the banditti might repair to a suitable ambush in order to waylay those whom they intended to capture. Amidst all the bitterest grief and indignation which I experienced on account of what had thus occurred, there was a Single source of solace—and that by no means an 77 insignificant one: it was the assurance which Marco Uberti’s letter afforded that no ill-treatment was intended on his own part towards the pri- soners. I did not however pause to reflect for many moments ere I proceeded to the farther examina- tion of the contents of Lanover’s pocket-book. The other document to which I have above alluded, was a deed evidently drawn up by an English attorney, and to the following effect :— that on condition that Mr. Lanover initiated na process for the restitution of conjugal rights in respect to his wife, and that he consented thence- forth to a complete separation from her, leaving her at the same time the whole and sole control over her daughter Annabel, Sir Matthew Heseltine was by that deed to guarantee the payment of one thousand pounds a year to the said Mr. Lanover for the remainder of his life; and Sir Matthew Heseltine was so to charge his estate that at his death the said annual payment of one thousand pounds should continue to be made to Mr. Lanover throughout the lifetime of the latter. The deed farther set forth that this arrangement was willingly and spontaneously entered into by Sir Matthew Heseltine—that it emanated from a pro- position on his own part—and that no illegitimate suasion or coercion were used to induce him to sign it. | Here was another phase in Lanover’s villanous proceedings. Doubtless he had hitherto failed to extort from Sir Matthew the unconscionably large income he sought to obtain; and he thus put in execution these detestable devices in order to accomplish his aims. I continued my examination of the contents of the pocket-book; and I found a bank-bill issued by a firm at Florence, and for a sum which, reduced into English money, would be equivalent to two hundred pounds precisely. This therefore was the amount which Mr. Lanover had to pay to Marco Uberti; and in default of which pay- ment there could be no doubt that the un- scrupulous bandit would keep his prisoners in custody until they made arrangements to ransom themselves. In a word, their freedom could not be effected without this payment being made to Uberti. With my own money, and that which Captain Raymond had so generously placed in my hand, I had but one hundred pounds; and all this I should require for certain purposes. Not therefore for an instant did I hesitate to consign Mr. Lanover’s bank-bill to my own pocket,—re- solving that if fortune continued to favour my enterprise, this amount should go to its original destination. I felt confident that in the hasty examination which the landlord and surgeon had made of the contents of the pocket-book, they had overlooked the*bank-bill : for it was enclosed in a letter which was itself contained in an envelope— and I argued that if the bill had been discovered it would have been taken possession of by the landlord or doctor for security’s sake. However, whether I were right or not in my surmise, I chose to run the risk of this self-appropriation of the bank-bill. As for the other contents of the pocket-book, beyond those which I have enume- rated and described, they were of no consequence, One thing struck me as extraordinary—that the name of Marco Uberti should have escaped the ElO@OO SS (CO) im