Girard Callard peered from the front door of his fashionable London confectionary to see a fine spring Tuesday. New orders for his curiously strong mints were coming in by the score. The lovely spring weather was marred only by the fact that, once again, Mad King George demanded the greatest part of Girard's mints. Another week's work done, and Girard had yet to see a farthing of payment from the Exchequer. The King now owed him a full seventy pounds. And how was Girard to collect?
Girard saw that a new customer was making his way up Bond Street at that moment. An oddly-dressed fellow, but a gentleman all the same. He rode a well-turned out white steed, and led a yellow mule behind him. His waistcoat of green baize stretched unevenly over his stout chest and belly. As the gray-haired fellow approached, Girard realized that the coat was fastened one button off. He wore a curled and powdered white wig, which, like the jacket, was slightly askew.
An eccentric, he thought. Perhaps a scribbler, like that odd fellow, Dr. Johnson. Gods, it could be him! This fellow was stout and clumsy, just as Girard had heard the famous Dr. Johnson described.
Just his luck, Girard sighed, as the fellow approached. Everyone knew that Dr. Johnson the scribbler never paid his bills. Just like the Mad King.
"Hullo," the fellow called as he dismounted. "Have you a place to tie my mule?"
Girard nodded. The mule was a loathsome, spavined creature, yet he couldn't tell the fellow no. He was obviously a gentleman while Girard was a mere shopkeeper. The jeweler across the way peered disapprovingly from his shop. In ten minutes, word that Girard had a scrofulous yellow mule tied in front of his shop would be up and down Bond Street.
"You're the young man who makes the mints," the visitor said, wheezing with the effort of tying up his mule. His great white horse stood there with no restraint. Girard noticed the creature's fine mane and tail and its rolling black eyes. A gentleman's horse indeed, worth several hundred pounds, perhaps more. How as such a horse married with such a worthless old creature as the mule?
"Yes, I make the mints," Girard said. "Curiously strong, to aid digestion." Ten bushels were in the back of the shop, waiting for the King's footmen. And another bushel, hidden carefully, that Girard had promised to the good Earl of Buckingham, hoping against hope that the Earl's payment for it would be quick and in full.
"So I've heard," the customer said, smiling. There was something odd about the fellow's voice. Girard could not quite place the accent, though he'd known many foreigners.
"I'd like to try some," the man said. "Look here, as many as I can get. I've brought my own mule to carry them."
So that explained the difference between the fellow's creatures. Girard looked at the fine white horse. Surely the fellow had money. Would that Girard had any mints.
"Come inside," he said. "You may look all you like, but I'm terribly sorry."
The fellow stopped in the door, fingering his chin and muttering to himself.
"Sorry," he said. "Now why would a young man like you be sorry?"
"I'm afraid I have no--"
"I wish that I were young once more," the customer said, interrupting. He fiddled with his crooked waistcoat, then added, "would I? Could I? My name is Collins, by the way. Come to London by way of Caernarvon."
If Girard knew a single thing, it was that this "Collins" had no Welsh accent. Nor was he any Irishman, as the name suggested.
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