"Ay, they are married. What are you saying at all? They were married a month syne, and they are as happy as robins in spring, I'm thinking. I'll drink their health, sir, if you'll gie me the bit o' siller."
Gavin gave the silver and turned away dazed and sick at heart. His business in Scotland was over. The quiet Lothian country sickened him; he turned his face to London, and very soon went back to New York. He had lost Jean, and he had lost Jean's fortune; and there were no words to express his chagrin and disappointment. His sister felt the first weight of it. He blamed her entirely. She had lied to him about Jean's beauty. He believed he would have liked the photo but for Mary. And all for Annie Riley! He hated Annie Riley! He was resolved never to marry her, and he let the girl feel his dislike in no equivocal manner.
For a time Annie was tearful and conciliating. Then she wrote him a touching letter, and asked him to tell her frankly if he had ceased to love her, and was resolved to break their marriage off. And Gavin did tell her, with almost brutal frankness, that he no longer loved her, and that he had firmly made up his mind not to marry her. He said something about his heart being in Scotland, but that was only a bit of sentiment that he thought gave a better air to his unfaithfulness.
Annie did not answer his letter, but Messrs. Howe & Hummel did, and Gavin soon found himself the centre of a breach of promise trial, with damages laid at fifty thousand dollars. All his fine poetical love letters were in the newspapers; he was ashamed to look men and women in the face; he suffered a constant pillory for weeks; through his vanity, his self-consciousness, his egotism he was perpetually wounded. But pretty Annie Riley was the object of public pity and interest, and she really seemed to enjoy her notoriety. The verdict was righteously enough in her favor. The jury gave her ten thousand dollars, and all expenses, and Gavin Burns was a ruined man. His eleven years savings only amounted to nine thousand dollars, and for the balance he was compelled to sell his furniture and give notes payable out of his next year's salary. He wept like a child as he signed these miserable vouchers for his folly, and for some days was completely prostrated by the evil he had called unto himself. Then the necessities of his position compelled him to go to work again, though it was with a completely broken spirit.
"I'm getting on to forty," he said to his sister, "and I am beginning the world over again! One woman has given me a disappointment that I will carry to the grave; and another woman is laughing at me, for she has got all my saved siller, and more too; forbye, she is like to marry Bob Severs and share it with him. Then I have them weary notes to meet beyond all. There never was a man so badly used as I have been!"
No one pitied him much. Whatever his acquaintances said to his face he knew right well their private opinion was that he had received just what he deserved.
AN ONLY OFFER.
"Aunt Phoebe, were you ever pretty?"