The Mark of the Golden Dragon: Being an Account of the Further Adventures of Jacky Faber, Jewel of the East, Vexation of the West, and Pearl of the South China Sea by Louis A. Meyer

Author:Louis A. Meyer [Meyer, L. A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The cavalrymen of the Horse Guard are done with their exercise for the day and they retreat from the field.

It's getting toward evening, so I expect there will be no more prancing around this day. Time for the lads to hit their pubs, I'm thinking, and there's a likely looking tavern right over there. Its sign proclaims it the Spur and Stirrup, and red-coated patrons are pouring in.

I bounce on in, a very small sailor boy amongst all these big, loud, coarse, foulmouthed, red-coated soldiers. Ah. There's an open-faced bloke at that table by himself. He looks pleasant enough. I head for him and plunk myself down.

He looks at me quizzically.

"What you want, swabby?"

"I wants to buy you a drink, chappy," says I, reaching into my money belt.

"Well, all right, pull out yer tin and put it on the table, lad, and you'll find a true friend in Private Thomas Patton."

A barmaid comes over and I say, "A pint fer me mate 'ere and one fer me, too ... and one for 'im, too."

Another grinning bloke has come up and sat down and asks, "What's up, Tommy?"

"This 'ere navvy is buying us fine fellows some pints, is what," he announces.

When the mugs come, I bury my face in the foam of my mine and say, "In returns for me kindness, maybe you can help me find a fellow soldier, one who done me a good turn, onc't."

"Well, spit it out, boy. 'Oo is it?"

"Have you ever heard of Captain Richard Allen of the First Dragoons?"

"Ha! Lord Allen himself, the tyke asks after! What could you have to do wi' 'im?"

"He ... he done a favor for me mum once."

Gales of laughter.

"So you're lookin' fer yer daddy, are you, boy. Ha! Lord Dick, as handy with a maid as with a sword, I'll own!"

Hmmmm...

"I already know that, Sir"—and indeed I do—"but if you could just tell where I could find 'im?"

"I'll wager yer mum was a pretty one, wasn't she, boy?" crows Patton, pounding the table and roaring with laughter.

"Well, give us a song or two, and we might just tell you, Richard Junior!"

Why not?

I pop up and whip out my pennywhistle and do the "British Grenadier" and then sing "The Girls Along the Road" to great hilarity, and Private Patton takes me outside and points up to a window on the barracks across the way.

"Y'see that window, lad? Well, if you see a light there tonight, then you'll know that our commanding officer, Lord Richard Allen, will be in residence."

"Thanks, Thomas, you're a good mate, you are," I say, marking well the window and the handy drainpipe that runs down alongside it. "Now let's get back to the party!"

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