Oddly enough, at this juncture of affairs, a neighbouring lady who was in want of a postilion chanced to ask the family who employed young Robert what had become of their smart young man, and, when informed of the situation, engaged him.
At this time he was close upon twenty years of age. Described as being by no means handsome, he was of a cheerful and obliging temperament, and might have long retained the post, had his employer not discovered him in a discreditable love-affair with one of the maid-servants. He was dismissed, but soon found another situation: but he never afterwards kept a place for any length of time. Roystering companions unsettled him and made him undesirable as a postilion.
Coming up to London, he found employment in a livery-stable in Piccadilly, but presently his father died and he found himself the owner of his savings, amounting to £57. Alas! poor Robert. He had never before possessed at one time the half of what he had now, and he acted as though the sum of £57 was an endowment for life. He threw up the Piccadilly livery-stable, and came out upon the world as a "gentleman"; or in other words, ruffled it in fine clothes in fashionable places. He frequented theatres in this novel character, and seems to have impressed a number of perhaps not very critical people. Amongst these was a dissolute woman whom he met at Drury Lane. She believed him to be a man of wealth, and sought to obtain a share of it. Ferguson flung away all his money on her. It could not have been a difficult task, one would say, nor have occupied him long. And when all the money was gone, he went back, sadder possibly, but still not wiser, to his livery-stable situation in Piccadilly, as postilion. It was in this employment that he observed the debonair gentlemen who had been his rivals in the affections of this woman calling upon her, and received, where he had been thrust forth with contumely when his money was at an end, and when she discovered that he was no man about town, but only one who got his living in the stables. False, perfidious Nancy!
It was some time before the true character of those visitors was revealed to him; but one day, acting as a postilion on the Great North Road, the chaise he was driving was stopped by two highwaymen, duly masked. One stood by the horses, while his companion robbed the occupants of the chaise. It was a windy day, and a more than usually violent gust blew the first highwayman's mask off. Instantly Ferguson recognised the man who stood by the horses as one of his Nancy's visitors.