The Confusion

“You are right and I am wrong. I shall make it up to you: As it happens, I shall see the King in a few hours-I have been summoned to his levee! We will discuss naval finance. Is there anything you would like me to pass on to his majesty?”

What could she say? I don’t really mean to kill William of Orange was not the sort of message she could ask Captain Bart to blurt out at the levee; nor was I don’t really know precisely who it is I mean to kill.

“It is sweet of you to offer and I do forgive you. Does the King talk much at his levees, I wonder?”

“How should I know? Ask me tomorrow. Why?”

“Does he gossip, tell stories? I am curious. For I told him something, just now, that, if it were to get around, would make me very unpopular in England.”

“Pfft!” said Jean Bart, and rolled his eyes, dispensing with the entire subject of England.

“Do ask the King one thing for me, please.”

“Only name it, mademoiselle.”

“The name of a physician who is good down here.” She let her hand slide down a few inches and patted him. She did it with exquisite caution. But nonetheless Jean Bart yelped and jumped, his face split open in agony. Eliza gasped and jumped back in horror; but his grimace relaxed into a smile, and he lunged after her and snared her back, for he was only joking.

“I have already been to see such a physician.”

“That is good,” said Eliza, still laughing, “for I would see you sit down before you go home.”

“Fifty-two hours of rowing did its damage, this is true; but this physician has been at my arse with all manner of poultices, and unmentionable procedures, and I am healing well. And this is the best bandage of all!” brushing some lint from the epaulet of his new red coat.

“If only all wounds could be healed by putting on new clothes, monsieur!”

“Don’t all women believe this to be true?”

“Sometimes they behave as if they did, Captain Bart. Perhaps I simply have not picked out the right dress yet.”

“Then you should go shopping tomorrow!”

“It is a fine thought, Captain. But first I need some money. And as there is none in France, you must go out to sea and capture some gold for me.”

“Consider it done! I owe it to you!”

“Try to keep that in mind tomorrow, Jean Bart.”

Letter from Daniel Waterhouse to Eliza JANUARY-FEBUARY 1690

Mademoiselle de la Zeur,

Thank you for yours of December ’89. It took some time crossing the Channel, and I daresay this shall fare no better. I was touched by your expression of concern, and amused by the narrative of the timber. I had not appreciated how fortunate England is in this respect, for if we want timber in London, we need only denude some part of Scotland or Ireland where a few trees still stand.

I would be of help to you in your quest to understand money, if for no other reason than that I would understand it myself. But I am perfectly useless. Our money has been wretched for as long as I have been alive. When it is so bad, it is no easy matter to discern when it is getting worse; but hard as it might be to believe, this seems to be occurring. I was bedridden for some months following the removal of my Stone, and did not have to go out and buy things. But when I had recovered sufficiently that I could venture out once again, I found it clearly worse. Or perhaps the long time spent not having to haggle over daily purchases, lifted the scales from my eyes, so that the absurdity of the situation was made clear to me.

I keep running accounts at several coffee-houses, pubs, and a bottle-ale house in my street, so that every small purchase need not be attended by a tedious and irksome transfer of coin. Many who go out more often than I do have formed together into societies, called Clubbs, which facilitate purchase of food, drink, snuff, pipe-tobacco, amp;c., on credit. When, through some miracle, one comes into possession of coins recognizable as such, one runs out and tries to settle one’s more important accounts. The system staggers along. People do not know any better.

Here we have Whigs and Tories now. In essence these are, respectively, Roundheads and Cavaliers, under new guises, and less heavily armed. Tories get their money from the land that they own. To simplify matters greatly, one might say that France is a country consisting entirely of Tories; for all of the money there derives ultimately from the land. You might have had Whigs too, if you’d not expelled the Huguenots. And some of your Atlantic seaports are said to be a bit Whiggish. But as I said, I am over-simplifying to make a point: If you understand how money works in France, then you know everything about our Tories. And if you understand how it works in Amsterdam, then you know our Whigs.