University of Virginia Library

LETTER XV.

I will never yield to you, my friend,
in zeal for one whom I reverence and love so
much as Mary Wilmot. How I adore your
generous, your noble spirit. While limited
to the real good of that girl; while zealous
to confer happiness on her, without an equivalent
injury to others, I applaud, and will
strive to emulate your generosity....

An incident has just occurred, that seems
to promise some intelligence concerning her.
It has made me very uneasy. I am afraid she
is not happy. I am afraid she is....is not happy;
I mean, I fear she is....unhappy. But I know
not what I would say. I am bewildered....by

my terrors on her account. Let me tell you
what I have heard. Judge for yourself. Unhappy
the hour that I wrote the last letter from
Hatfield. Yet, who could imagine that the intelligence
contained in it would suggest so
rash, so precipitate a flight!

This Sedley, whose fidelity, whose honour
I have so often applauded, is, I am afraid, a
miscreant; a villain. Mary....the very thought
takes away my breath....is, I fear, a lost, undone
creature....

Yet how? Such a fall surely was impossible.
Mary Wilmot, whose whole life has been exposed
to my view; whom I have seen in the
most unguarded moments; whose indifference
to Sedley; whose unconquerable aversion to
his most honourable and flattering offers, I
have so often witnessed, could not forget herself;
her dignity. I will not believe it.

But what am I saying? Let me recollect
myself, and lay, distinctly, before you, the
cause of my apprehensions.

This morning being disengaged, and the
air mild, instead of going on with this letter,
I stole abroad to enjoy the sweet breath of
heaven. My feet carried me, unaware, to the

door of the house in which I formerly passed
a servitude of three years. My old master,
Watkins, of time-measuring memory, has
been some time dead. The widow turned
her stock into revenue, and now lives at her
ease. Though not eminently good, she is far
from being a bad woman. She never behaved
otherwise than kindly to “Neddy Sobersides,”
as she used to call me, and I feel somewhat
like gratitude, which would not let me pass
the door. So I called, to see the old dame.

I found her by a close-stove, in the parlour,
knitting a blue stocking.... Lack a day, said she,
why as I's a living soul, this is our Ned.

After the usual congratulations and inquiries
were made, she proceeded: Why, what
a fine story is this, Neddy, that we hear of
you? Why, they say you've grown a rich man's
son, and are going to be married to a fine rich,
great lady, from some other country.

I avoided a direct answer. She continued:
Ah! dear me, we all thought you were going
to be married to poor Molly Wilmot, the
mantua-maker. Nay, for the matter o' that,
my poor dear man, I remember, said, as how,
that if so be, we'd wait a year or so, we should

see things turn up so, that you and her should
be married already; at that time; and that, I
remember, was just as your time was up. But
Molly, (with a very significant air this was
said) has carried her goods to a much worse
market it seems.

Why, know you any thing of miss Wilmot?

Why, I don't know but as I does. I doesn't
know much to her advantage though, you
may depend, Neddy.

I was startled. What do you know of her?
Tell me, I beseech you, all you know?

Why, I don't know much, not I; but Peggy,
my nurse, said something or other about
her, yesterday. She drank tea with me....

Pray, said I, impatiently, what said your
nurse of miss Wilmot?

Why, I don't know as I ought to tell.... But
I will not tease you, Clara, as I was tired with
the jargon of the old woman. I will give you
the sum of her intelligence in my own words.

The nurse had lately been in the family of
Mr. Kalm, of Germantown....between which
and that of Mrs. Valentine, I have long known
that much intimacy subsisted. Sedley, it

seems, passed through this city about three
weeks ago, and spent a day at Mr. Kalm's.
At dinner, when the nurse was present, the
conversation turned upon the marriage of Sedley,
which, it seems, was just concerted with
the daughter of a wealthy family in Virginia.
The lady's name was mentioned, but the nurse
forgot it.

Mrs. Kalm, who is noted for the freedom
of her discourse, reminded Mr. Sedley of
the mantua-maker who eloped with him from
Abingdon last autumn, and jestingly inquired
into her present condition. Sedley dealt in
hints and innuendoes, which imported that he
was on as good terms with Molly Wilmot as
he desired to be; that all his wishes, with respect
to her, were now accomplished; that she
knew her own interest too well to allow any
obstruction to his marriage to come from her;
that she would speedily resume her customary
station in society, as the cause of her present
disappearance was likely to be soon removed.

I will not torment you or myself, by dwelling
on further particulars. My informant
was deplorably defective in the means of imparting
any clear and consistent meaning. An

hour was employed in recollecting facts and
answering questions, all which, taken together,
imported nothing less than that an improper
connection had, for some months, subsisted
between Sedley and my friend; a connection
of such a nature as was consistent with his marriage
with another.

Comfort me; counsel me, my angel. I gathered
from the beldame's tale, the probability
at least, that miss Wilmot was still in this city.
Shall I seek her? shall I.... Tell me, in short,
what I must believe? what I shall do?