"Oh! do not speak so cruelly, aunt Barnaby!" cried Agnes, greatly shocked at having her conduct thus described to one whose love she so ardently wished to gain.... "Tell my aunt Compton what it was you asked of me, and let her judge between us."
"Shut the door, Agnes!..." said Miss Compton sternly; and then, re-seating herself, she addressed Mrs. Barnaby with an air of much anxiety and interest: "Niece Martha, I must indeed beg of you to tell me in what manner this young girl has conducted herself since she has been with you, for, I can assure you, much depends upon the opinion I shall now form of her. I have no longer any reason to conceal from you that my circumstances are considerably more affluent than anybody but myself and my man of business is aware of.... Nearly forty years of strict economy, niece Martha, have enabled me to realize a very respectable little fortune. It was I, and not my tenant, who purchased your poor father's moiety of Compton Basett; and as I have scarcely ever touched the rents, a little study of the theory of interest and compound interest will prevent your being surprised, when I tell you that my present income is fifteen hundred per annum, clear of all outgoings whatever."
"Is it possible!" exclaimed Mrs. Barnaby, with an accent and a look of reverence, which very nearly destroyed the gravity of her old aunt.
"Yes, Mrs. Barnaby," she resumed, "such is my income. With less than this, a gentlewoman of a good old family, desirous of bringing forward a niece into the world in such a manner as to do her credit, could not venture to take her place in society; and I have therefore waited till my increasing revenues should amount to this sum before I declared my intentions, and proclaimed my heiress. Such being the case, you will not be surprised that I should be anxious to ascertain which of my two nieces best deserves my favour. I do not mean to charge myself with both.... Let that be clearly understood.... The doing so would entirely defeat my object, which is to leave one representative of the Compton Basett family with a fortune sufficient to restore its former respectability."
"And everybody must admire such an intention," replied Mrs. Barnaby, in an accent of inexpressible gentleness; "and I, for one, most truly hope, that whoever you decide to leave it to, may deserve such generosity, and have a grateful heart to requite it with."
"That is just what I should wish to find," returned the spinster; "and before you came in, I had quite made up my mind that Agnes Willoughby should be the person; but I confess, Mrs. Barnaby, that what you have said alarms me, and I shall be very much obliged if you will immediately let me know what Agnes has done to merit the accusation of having deserted her benefactress?"
"It is but too easy to answer that, aunt Compton," replied the widow, "and I am sorry to speak against my own sister's child; ... but truth is truth, and since you command me to tell you what I meant when I said she had deserted me, I will.... I have been arrested, aunt Compton, and that for no reason on the earth but because I was tempted to stay three or four days longer in London than I intended. Of course, I meant to go back to that paltry place, Cheltenham, and pay every farthing I owed there, the proof of which is that I have paid every farthing, though it would have served them right to have kept them a year out of their money, instead of a month; ... but that's neither here nor there ... though there was no danger of my staying in prison, I WAS there for three days, and Agnes could not tell but I might have been there for ever; ... yet, when I wrote her a most affectionate letter, begging her only to call upon me in my miserable solitude, she answered my petition, which might have moved a heart of stone, with a flat refusal.... Ask her if she can deny this?"
"What say you, Agnes?... Is this so?" said the old lady, turning to the party accused.
"Aunt Betsy!..." said Agnes, and then stopped, as if unwilling, for some reason or other, to say more.
"Yes or NO?" demanded Mrs. Barnaby, vehemently. "Did you refuse to come to me, or not?"