I had never pretended to the
second-sight, or anything of that kind, but certainly, if any one ever
had such a thing, I had it at this time, for I saw him as plainly in all
those terrible shapes as above; first, as a skeleton, not dead only, but
rotten and wasted; secondly, as killed, and his face bloody; and,
thirdly, his clothes bloody, and all within the space of one minute, or
indeed of a very few moments.

These things amazed me, and I was a good while as one stupid. However,
after some time I began to recover, and look into my affairs. I had the
satisfaction not to be left in distress, or in danger of poverty. On the
contrary, besides what he had put into my hands fairly in his lifetime,
which amounted to a very considerable value, I found above seven hundred
pistoles in gold in his scrutoire, of which he had given me the key; and
I found foreign bills accepted for about twelve thousand livres; so
that, in a word, I found myself possessed of almost ten thousand pounds
sterling in a very few days after the disaster.

The first thing I did upon this occasion was to send a letter to my
maid, as I still called her, Amy, wherein I gave her an account of my
disaster, how my husband, as she called him (for I never called him so),
was murdered; and as I did not know how his relations, or his wife's
friends might act upon that occasion, I ordered her to convey away all
the plate, linen, and other things of value, and to secure them in a
person's hands that I directed her to, and then to sell or dispose of
the furniture of the house, if she could, and so, without acquainting
anybody with the reason of her going, withdraw; sending notice to his
head manager at London that the house was quitted by the tenant, and
they might come and take possession of it for the executors. Amy was so
dexterous, and did her work so nimbly, that she gutted the house, and
sent the key to the said manager, almost as soon as he had notice of the
misfortune that befell their master.

Upon their receiving the surprising news of his death, the head manager
came over to Paris, and came to the house. I made no scruple of calling
myself Madame ----, the widow of Monsieur ----, the English jeweller.
And as I spoke French naturally, I did not let him know but that I was
his wife, married in France, and that I had not heard that he had any
wife in England, but pretended to be surprised, and exclaim against him
for so base an action; and that I had good f