For six years M. Radisson had not seen Mistress Mary Kirke--as his wife
styled herself after he broke from the English--and I had not heard one
word of Hortense for nigh as many months. Say what you will of the
dandified dolls who wasted half a day before the looking-glass in the
reign of Charles Stuart, there are times when the bravest of men had best
look twice in the glass ere he set himself to the task of conquering fair
eyes. We did not drag our linen through a scent bath nor loll all
morning in the hands of a man milliner charged with the duty of turning
us into showmen's dummies--as was the way of young sparks in that age.
But that was how I came to buy yon monstrous wig costing forty guineas
and weighing ten pounds and coming half-way to a man's waist. And you
may set it down to M. Radisson's credit that he went with his wiry hair
flying wild as a lion's mane. Nothing I could say would make him
exchange his Indian moccasins for the high-heeled pumps with a buckle at
the instep.
"I suppose," he had conceded grudgingly, "we must have a brat to carry
swords and cloaks for us, or we'll be taken for some o' your cheap-jack
hucksters parading latest fashions," and he bade our host of the Star and
Garter have some lad searched out for us by the time we should be coming
home from Sir John Kirke's that night.
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