University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.

At the close of the last chapter, the reader will remember that we
left Mrs. Mitten resolved to marry Twattle, against the wishes of
brother and daughters—Capt. Thompson sick in bed from over excitement—his
two nieces in tears—Billy comfortable, and his teacher
missing. How did Twattle happen to be out of his room in the day
time? Doubtless, Mrs. Mitten had advised him to take an airing,
while her brother was swelling. Current as was the report of the
intended marriage, and strengthened as it was by what had passed
between Capt. Thompson and his sister, Mrs. Glib did not believe it.

“Mark what I tell you,” she would say, with a great deal of self-complacency,
“it will never take place.”

Her visits to Mrs. Mitten had not entirely ceased from the last
which we have noticed; but they had become much less frequent,
and much less cordial than before. And when she heard of what had
passed between Thompson and his sister, at their last meeting, she
appeared rather pleased than pained by it.

Captain Thompson had kept his bed two days, when the Postmaster
of the village visited him with a letter in his hand, and
mystery in his face.

“I have come over,” said the Postmaster, “to make enquiries of
you concerning Mr. Twattle. Here is a letter from a Mr. Charter
Sanders, written at Athens, mailed at Lexington, and requesting an
immediate answer directed to Washington; enquiring, whether there

is not a man here by the name of Twattle; and whether he goes by
the name of John, Jacob, Joseph, James, Jeremiah, or any other
given name beginning with a `J;' and requesting a particular description
of him. The writer begs me to say nothing about this
letter; but as I hardly know Twattle, I have come to you for the
information required, as well as to let you know that there is probably
something wrong in this Twattle, whom report says your sister
is about to marry.”

“The dirty scoundrel!” exclaimed the Captain, “it now occurs
to me that every certificate which he produced, I believe without a
solitary exception, save two which Doctored him, was in behalf of
`J' Twattle; and the rogue's going through the country under every
name that `J' is the initial of. Set down here, and answer it immediately;
and don't whisper a word about that letter to any
one else.”

It was done accordingly; but unfortunately, the gentlemen had
not noticed a servant girl who was in attendance on the Captain;
during the conversation, and before the answer was finished, the
servant informed Miss Jane that Charter Sanders, “who lived in
Washington, had written about Mr. Twattle, and said his name was
John, Jim, and a heap more names, and that he was a dirty scoundrel.”
Miss Jane hastened home, and conveyed the information to
her mother, and her mother to Twattle.

He received it with a smile, mingled with a little indignation, and
observed:

“That worthless fourth cousin of mine, Mrs. Mitten! He keeps
me making explanations wherever I go. I hope Sanders will find
him, and bring him to justice. Now, I must post off to Washington,
to see Mr. Sanders, or lie under the suspicions of the town until he
comes here. Is your brother able to leave his bed yet?”

“No sir; but he is better, and I hope to see him out in two or
three days.”

This day, and the next, the Doctor was out more than usual;
and the day following he was missing.

About this time, the impression became general that the Doctor
had run away. Mrs. Mitten became very uneasy; and Mrs. Glib
came over to console her.

“Did he make no explanations to you?” said Mrs. Glib.

“None about leaving; though I know what took him away.”

“Why, he explained the whole matter to me.”

“That is very strange!”

“You may rest perfectly easy, Mrs. Mitten; he will return next
Thursday week.”

“Why, it should not take him that long to go to Washington and
back.”

“Washington! He's not gone to Washington; he's gone to
South Carolina to receive a valuable rice plantation, which his lawyer
writes he has recovered for him in that State.”

“How did he go?”

“I sold him a horse. I offered to loan him one; but he said he
never borrowed a horse for more than a day. He could have no
peace on a journey of a week, upon a borrowed horse, for fear of accidents
and delays that might injure the animal or incommode the
owner.”

“What did he give you for him?”

“More than I asked, by fifty dollars; and when I objected to receiving
more than my price, (which was up to the full value of the
horse,) he begged me to accept it, `as an earnest of further and
larger favors that he meant to show me;' so he gave me his note for
two hundred dollars.”

“His note! Why, he had money, I know.”

“Yes; he told me you had been kind enough to advance him
thirty-two dollars and a half since the last contract with him; but
that, he said, would hardly bear his expenses to Charleston; so I
loaned him three hundred dollars to pay his lawyer's fees.”

“Mrs. Glib, he's an imposter; and we have both been made the
dupes of his villainy, as sure as you live.”

“Now, how it would distress you if I were to tell the Doctor that,
on his return, cousin Mit.”

“No, it wouldn't in the least. He'll never return, unless he is
brought by Mr. Sanders.”

“What Mr. Sanders?”

“Why, haven't you heard of the letter from Mr. Sanders, inquiring
about him, and representing him as a scoundrel, and I know not
what all?”

“Why, no. Is there such a letter in town?”

“To be sure there is.”

“Well, if I had known of such a letter, Mrs. Mitten, I would
have told you of it.”

“I have had no opportunity of telling you of it.”

“But I can hardly think him an imposter, after all, Mrs. Mitten.
Have you any reason to think him so?”

“Yes, abundant reason. On the day he left, he borrowed two
hundred and fifty dollars of me—all I had—telling me that he
had just discovered where a distant relation of his was, who under
his name, was imposing upon people everywhere, and constantly
bringing him into discredit; and that, if he could borrow five hundred
dollars, he would conduct Mr. Sanders to the rogue, and take
all the expenses of prosecuting him on his own shoulders. As I had
a deep interest in the matter—that is, in seeing all rogues brought
to justice—I advanced him two hundred and fifty dollars, to get legal
advice, a horse, &c., that he might be prepared to set out with Mr.
Sanders, as soon as he arrived, in quest of his rascally fourth
cousin, of whose iniquities he had long before informed me. I concluded
he had gone to Washington to meet Mr. S.”

“Well, he told me about that cousin, too; and a long cock and
bull story about the death of his dear wife Bridgeta. I told him I
didn't think there was a woman in the world, besides myself, who
bore that name—”

“Did he say her name was Bridgeta? Why, he told me her
name was Anna.”

“Why, the hypocritical, lying scoundrel! I'll make brother
John cut his ears off at sight, if he prove to be the villian I fear
he is.”

Brother John, nor brother David, will ever get sight of him.”

“Well, if he has taken my best horse, and choused me out of
three hundred dollars, I'll spend a thousand dollars but what I'll
bring him to justice.”

“Well, now, Mrs. Glib, we have both been imposed upon; our
best way will be to keep the whole matter to ourselves.”

“No; I am determined to expose him, and to seek legal redress.
I can't sit down quietly under a loss of a fine horse, and three hundred
dollars, without making some effort to save them. Let people
say what they may, I'll try and get hold of this rice plantation at
least.”

“Believe me, that story about the rice plantation is all a fabrication.
Did he tell you about the fund that he got by his dear
Bridgeta?”

“Oh, yes. It amounted to what he called the insignificant sum
of ten or twelve thousand dollars, and was held sacred, and all that
rigmarole; which, he said, nobody in the world knew about, but me;
and which he didn't wish to have known.”

“Precisely what he told me!”

“The infamous raseal! If I was near him, I'd claw his eyes out.
I'll pursue him to the end of the earth but what I'll have satisfaction!”
So saying she left in a great hurry and a great flurry.

In a few days, Mr. Sanders arrived. His report was that Twattle
had two wives then living, whose property he had squandered.
That he had courted many widows and old maids, all of whom he
had fleeced to a greater or less extent; and some of whom he had
treated even worse. That his title of Doctor was assumed by himself
for purposes of villainy. That he passed under every given
name that “J” would suit; with much more that need not be repeated.

Captain Thompson recovered rapidly after Mr. Sanders' letter
reached the village. As soon as the latter had told his story, the
Captain visited his sister, whom he saluted very pleasantly.

“Well, sister, have you heard Doctor Twattle's history?”

“As much of it as I wish to hear of.”

“When does the wedding come off?”

“When men cease to be scoundrels.”

“But surely you don't think `Good Doctor Twattle' a scoundrel;
you, who know him so much better than any body else knows him.”

“Well, brother David, if you men will be such infamous, hypocritical,
lying villains, how are we women to find it out?”

A very proper question, Mrs. Mitten! We can excuse Captain
Thompson for a little raillery, under the circumstances; but we cannot
excuse the indifference of mankind generally to the iniquities of
men, and their want of charity for the errors and weaknesses of
women. Many a man in high life is in the daily commission of
crimes which would blast a woman's reputation forever! By what
law is this distinction made between the sexes?

How comes it to pass, that men are not only indulged in their
own dereliction from virtue, but in laying siege to the virtue of the
better sex? And why is man allowed to avail himself of the most
lovely traits of woman's character—her warm affections, her unsuspecting
confidence, her generous hospitality, her admiration of what is
noble in human nature, and attractive in human conduct—to ruin or
to swindle her? If there be no better world than this, where more
even-handed justice is meted out, than this, God help the women!
But to return from this digression—

Mrs. Mitten's question stumped the Captain, and he turned the
subject:

“And what are you going to do with William, now?” said he.

“Heaven only knows, brother David. I regret my vow not to
send him to Mr. Markham; but it is out, and I must keep it.”

The Captain tried to convince her that her vow was not binding,
but without effect. Fortunately, a young man of liberal education
and good character opened a school in the village, within three days
after Twattle left, and William was sent to school to him.

William had just got into his new quarters, when the Captain
visited his sister, bearing with him a letter from the Post Office, to
her address.

“Anna,” said he, as he entered the house, “did you lend Twattle
two hundred and fifty dollars before he went away?”

“Yes,” said she, blushing blue, “but I've got his note.”

“Oh, well, if you've got his note, that will make you just as safe as
if you had got his tooth-pick. I do hope I'll come across the scoundrel
yet, before I die. You would do well to set down and calculate
how much your tenderness for Bill's legs have cost you in actual
cash, to say nothing of trouble. Who is your letter from?”

She opened and read as follows:

“18—

“Mar'. 4th. To 47 insertions of advertisement for private
teacher from Mar. 4, 18—, to date, $1.00
for the first, and 75 cents each, for the remainder,.........
$35 50

“Rec'd payment.”

“Why, brother,” said Mrs. M., as she closed the letter, “I can't
surely be compelled to pay this bill, which has been running on for
nine months after I got my teacher.”

“Yes you can, sister; unless the stoppage of it in the village

paper, where it first appeared, required them, by the custom of
printers, to stop it. I stopt it here as soon as you got Twattle; but
I knew nothing of this advertisement; and don't remember seeing
any order, through this paper, to other papers to publish it.”

“No, I wrote to H. & B. to publish it in the Herald, and to Dr.
C. to publish it in the Argus.”

“Well, you'll have to pay both for publishing it until you order it
stopped. So put down seventy or eighty dollars more to account of
love for Bill's legs; and then hang him up by the legs, and whip
his back for a week, if you'll allow nobody else to do it.”

“Brother, how have you taken such a prejudice against my poor,
unfortunate child? If you'd talk to him kindly, and advise him, I
have no doubt he would do well; for he loves and fears you, both.”

“No, Anna; if you had let him follow my advice when he wished
to do it, he would ever after have done it, and in the end he would
have been an honor to the country; but he won't follow it now.”

“Well, brother, after all, I don't see that he is so very bad.”

“Well, I know him to be very bad, from men who would not deceive
me.”

“I've very little confidence in men.”

“So have I; but there are some honest ones among them; and
even dishonest ones may be trusted when they tell of bad boys who
infest the village. I will go and stop the advertisement in the
Argus; and much as I sympathize with you, and regret your losses,
I am so rejoiced at the escape you have made from the clutches of
that rascal, and the ruin that threatened you, that they seem to me
almost nothing. It looks to me as if a kind Providence had interfered
in your behalf.”

“I have no doubt of it, brother; and I wish I could see you putting
your trust in Providence more than you do. I will endeavor to
live better than I have ever lived, do better than I have ever done,
and be more humble, than I have ever been for the balance of my
life.”

“Why, as to that matter, Anna, I don't see how you are to get any
better than you are. I wish I was half as good in moral character
as you are. Even your “faults lean to virtue's side”—but like all
women, you let your feelings get the better of your good judgment.
Your difficulties all spring out of your affections, which blind you to
defects in the objects of them, and make you the easy dupe of men,
women, and children, whom you love—. Why do you weep?
Now is the time you ought to rejoice—. I've left my pocket

handkerchief at home—Good morning I'll stop the advertisement,
and pay up both bills for you, and talk to William. He may do well
at the new school. Young Smith, his teacher, seems to be a fine
young man, and—good morning.”