 | The American lounger, or, Tales, sketches, and legends, gathered in sundry journeyings |  |
1. PART I.
Hostess.Prove me this rogue a villain, good Jicol.
Jicol.
He is most damnably in debt! Is't not a rogue?
Hostess.
In debt, say'st thou? I would have sworn 'fore God,
Thou couldst not have proved him such a rogue.
“A letter, 'Bel,” said Colonel Willis, without lifting
his eyes from the morning gazette, in which he
was reading an account of Perry's victory—for at that
period of the late war our story opens, “it is from
Charlotte, no doubt. Pray Heaven that scape-grace,
her husband, may have run away from her.”
'Bel, who had entered the breakfast room, brilliant
with health and beauty, turned pale, and with an eager
yet trembling hand, took the letter from the table, and
retiring to a recess of one of the windows, hastily tore
the seal, and earnestly perused its contents.
“How I yearn to be once more folded in your sisterly
embrace, to lean my aching head upon your bosom,
and pour my heart into yours. It is near midnight.
the pittance which is now our daily support. Poor
Edward! How he exists under such an accumulation
of misery, I know not. His trials have nearly broken
his proud and sensitive spirit. Since his cruel arrest,
his heart is crushed. He will never hold up his head
again. He sits with me all day long, gloomy and desponding,
and never speaks. Oh how thankful I feel
that he has never yet been tempted to embrace the
dreadful alternative to which young men in his circumstances
too often fly! May he never fly to the
oblivious wine cup to fly from himself. In this, dear
Isabel, God has been, indeed, merciful to me. Last
night Edward came home, after offering himself even
as a day laborer, and yet no man would hire him, and
threw himself upon the floor and wept long and bitterly.
When he became calmer, he spoke of my sufferings
and his own, in the most hopeless manner, and
prayed that he might be taken from the world, for Pa
would then forgive me. But this will never be. One
grave will hold us both. I have not a great while to
live, Isabel! But I do not fear to die! Edward! 'tis
for Edward my heart is wrung. Alas his heart is hardened
to every religious impression—the Bible he
never opens, family prayers are neglected, and affliction
has so changed him altogether, that you can no
longer recognise the handsome, agreeable and fascinating
Edward you once knew. Oh, if pa would relent,
how happy we might all be again. If dear Edward's
debts were paid, and they do not amount to
nine hundred dollars altogether, accumulated during
the three years of our marriage, he might become an
ornament to society, which none are better fitted to
adorn. Do, dearest Isabel, use your influence with pa,
for we are really very wretched, and Edward has been
so often defeated in the most mortifying efforts to obtain
employment—for no one would assist him because
he is in debt—(the very reason why they should) that
refusals, not unfrequently accompanied with insult,
and always with contempt. My situation at this time,
dearest sister, is one also of peculiar delicacy, and I
need your sisterly support and sympathy. Come and
see me, if only for one day. Do not refuse me this,
perhaps the last request I shall ever make of you.
Plead eloquently with pa, perhaps he will not persevere
longer in his cruel system of severity. Edward
is not guilty—he is unfortunate. But alas, in this
world, there is little distinction between guilt and misery!
Come, dearest Isabel—I cannot be said “No.”
I hear Edward's footstep on the stair. God bless and
make you happier than your wretched sister,
With her eyes overflowing with tears, Isabel folded
the letter, and buried her face in the drapery of the
window to hide her emotion. Colonel Willis, still intent
upon the gazette, was at length startled by a suppressed
sobbing, as if the mourner's heart would break.
Hastily crushing the paper in his hand, and laying
aside his spectacles, he approached the window: 'Bel,
my love, what has caused this violent agitation?” he
said, passing his arm around her waist, and gently
drawing her to his bosom.
She threw her arms about his neck exclaiming,
“Poor, poor Charlotte!” and the tears fell faster.
“What, what of Charlotte? no worse news I hope?”
“Oh, pa, you must do something for them,” and she
looked up into his face with her liquid eyes, which
pleaded with all the eloquence of sisterly affection.
“Isabel,” said Colonel Willis, sternly, “have I not
sworn that I never will forgive them? Why will you,
my child” he continued in a milder tone, “incur my
displeasure by a request so often made, and so repeatedly
refused!”
“Yes, but pa, consider that poor Charlotte —”
“Charlotte is only receiving the reward of her own
folly,” interrupted the parent impatiently; “when she
eloped with this fortune hunter of a poor student, she
knew the consequences. As she has sown, so let her
reap. I forbid you, Isabel, on pain of my severest displeasure,
to name the subject to me again.”
“Oh, no, no! hear me this once, my dear, dear pa,”
continued the lovely pleader, following him to his arm-chair,
in which he had reseated himself and resumed
the paper, “I have just received such a letter from
Charlotte!”
“And haven't I been pestered to death with letters,
till I have ordered the post master to direct back all
letters, addressed to me bearing the Covington post
mark? Isabel, it is useless for you to say any thing
more. My mind is made up—The laws of the Medes
and Persians were not more unchangeable than my
determination. I would not aid them to keep him
from the gallows, and her from—”
“Pa, pa!” cried Isabel, placing her hand upon his
mouth, “Oh, my dear father, why will you be so rigid?”
and the distressed maiden burst into tears.
Colonel Willis was moved by the depth and energy
of her emotion. “Forgive me, my child,” he said affectionately
embracing her, “you, at least, have never
disobeyed me, and I would not intentionally wound
your feelings. You are now my only child,” he added
with tenderness, yet with better emphasis; and he pressed
for a moment his hand to his forehead, as if painful
thoughts were passing through his mind.
“Pa,” said Isabel, in a low, sweet, coaxing tone,
seizing a mood so favorable to her wishes, determined
not to be defeated in her benevolent object, “now
wont you read poor Charlotte's letter?”
“I am very busily reading,” he said in a gruff, decided
tone, rattling the paper and bringing it closer to
his eyes emphatically, as if to silence importunity.
“But, pa, sister Charlotte writes me to visit her for
a few days!”
The whole attention of Colonel Willis was directed
still more perseveringly to the columns of the gazette,
notwithstanding his spectacles, without the assistance
of which he could not see a letter, were lying behind
him on the table.
“She writes me,” continued the persevering girl,
“that she is very ill.”
“Ill! ill, did you say, Isabel?” he cried, thrown off
his guard, all the father struggling in his bosom for the
mastery.
“N—no, not exactly ill—just now, pa—but—
but—” and the confused and blushing girl hesitated.
Turning sharply round at her embarrassment, her father
repeated—“`N—no, not exactly ill—but—but—
but—' What is the meaning of this hesitancy, Isabel?
I have never known you to deceive me, and I
cannot think you would fabricate an untruth even to
see your worthless sister. Give me the letter!” he
added, sternly. Isabel gave it to him in silence. He
adjusted his spectacles and commenced perusing it;
uttering a “pshaw” at every few lines; but when he
came to the sentence in which his daughter alluded to
her approaching illness, earnestly beseeching her sister
to be with her at that time, Isabel, who had
watched every movement of his features, observed a
softened expression pass over them, and a tear which
he in vain strove to crush with his eye lid, steal down
his browned cheek. Nature, true to herself, at such
a moment, would assert her empire. “Poor Charlotte
indeed!” he said, half aloud, closing the letter, as the
tear dropped upon it and blotted her name, “Isabel,
you may go to her.”
The next moment she was weeping for joy in her
father's arms.
| The American lounger, or, Tales, sketches, and legends, gathered in sundry journeyings | |