One man at that time appeared at the Cocoa Tree and Cribb’s with a new richness of garb and a look in his face such as had not been seen there for many a day.  In truth, for some time the coffee-houses had seen but little of him, and it had sometimes been said that he had fled the country to escape his creditors, or might be spending his days in a debtors’ prison, since he had no acquaintances who would care to look for him if he were missing, and he might escape to France, or be seized and rot in gaol, and none be the wiser.

But on a night even a little before the throwing open of Dunstanwolde House, he sauntered into the Cocoa Tree and, having become so uncommon a sight, several turned to glance at him.

“Egad!” one cried low to another, “’tis Jack Oxon back again.  Where doth the fellow spring from?”

His good looks it had been hard for him to lose, they being such as were built of delicately cut features, graceful limbs, and an elegant air, but during the past year he had often enough looked haggard, vicious, and of desperate ill-humour, besides out of fashion, if not out at elbow.  Now his look had singularly changed, his face was fresher, his eye brighter, though a little feverish in its light, and he wore a new sword and velvet scabbard, a rich lace steenkirk, and a modish coat of pale violet brocade.

“Where hast come from, Jack?” someone asked him.  “Hast been into a nunnery?”

“Yes,” he answered, “doing penance for thy sins, having none of my own.”

“Hast got credit again, I swear,” cried the other, “or thou wouldst not look such a dandy.”

Sir John sate down and called for refreshment, which a drawer brought him.

“A man can always get credit,” he said, with an ironic, cool little smile, “when his fortunes take a turn.”

“Thou look’st as if thine had turned,” said his companion.  “Purple and silver, and thy ringlets brushed and perfumed like a girl’s.  In thy eyes ’tis a finer mop than any other man’s French periwig, all know.”

Sir John looked down on his shoulders at his soft rich fall of curls and smiled. “’Tis finer,” he said. “’Tis as fine for a man as a certain beauty’s, we once talked of, was for a woman.”

The man who talked with him laughed with a half-sneer.

“Thou canst not forget her hair, Jack,” he said, “but the lock stayed on her head despite thee.  Art going to try again, now she is a widow?”

Sir John looked up from his drink and in his eye there leapt up a devil in spite of himself, for he had meant—­if he could—­to keep cool.

“Ay,” he said, “by God!  I am.”