“You are unhappy, Alonzo, said Beauman, in the death of your Melissa, to which it is possible I have been undesignedly accessory. I could say much on the subject, would my strength permit; but it is needless. She is gone, and I must soon go also. She was sent to her uncle’s at Charleston, by her father, where I was soon to follow her. It was supposed that thus widely removed from all access to your company, she would yield to the persuasion of her friends to renounce you: her unexpected death, however, frustrated every design of this nature, and overwhelmed her father and family in inexpressible woe.”
Here Beauman ceased. Alonzo found he wanted rest: he enquired whether he was in want of any thing to render him more comfortable. Beauman replied that he was not: “For the comforts of this life, said he, I have no relish; medical aid is applied, but without effect.” Alonzo then left him, promising to call again in the morning.
When Alonzo called the next morning, he perceived an alarming alteration in Beauman. His extremities were cold, a chilling, clammy sweat stood upon his face, his respiration was short and interrupted, his pulse weak and intermitting. He took the hand of Alonzo, and feebly pressing it,—“I am dying, said he in a faint voice. If ever you return to America, inform my friends of my fate.” This Alonzo readily engaged to do, and told him also that he would not leave him.
Beauman soon fell into a stupor; sensation became suspended; his eyes rolled up and fixed. Sometimes a partial revival would take place, when he would fall into incoherent muttering, calling on the names of his deceased father, his mother and Melissa; his voice dying away in imperfect moanings, till his lips continued to move without sound. Towards night he lay silent, and only continued to breathe with difficulty, till a slight convulsion gave the freed spirit to the unknown regions of immaterial existence. Alonzo followed his remains to the grave: a natural stone was placed at its head, on which Alonzo, unobserved, carved the initials of the deceased’s name, with the date of his death, and left him to moulder with his native dust.
A few days after this event, Jack Brown informed Alonzo that he had procured the means of his escape. “A person with whom I am acquainted, said he, and whom I suppose to be a smuggler, has agreed to carry you to France. There, by application to the American minister, you will be enabled to get to your own country, if that is your object. About midnight I will pilot you on board, and by to-morrow’s sun you may be in France.”
At the time appointed, Jack set out bearing a large trunk on his shoulder, and directed Alonzo to follow him. They proceeded down to a quay, and went on board a small skiff. “Here, said Jack to the captain, is the gentleman I spoke to you about,” and delivered him the trunk. Then taking Alonzo aside, “in that trunk, said he, are a few changes of linen, and here is something to help you till you can help yourself.” So saying, he slipped ten guineas into his hand. Alonzo expressed his gratitude with tears. “Say nothing, said Jack, we were born to help each other in distress, and may Jack never weather a storm or splice a rope, if he permits a fellow creature to suffer with want while he has a luncheon on board.” He then shook Alonzo by the hand, wishing him a good voyage, and went whistling away. The skiff soon sailed, and the next morning Alonzo was landed in France. Alonzo proceeded immediately to Paris, not with a view of returning to America; he had yet no relish for revisiting the land of his sorrows, the scenes where at every step his heart must bleed afresh, though to bleed it had never ceased. But he was friendless in a strange land: perhaps, through the aid of the American minister, Dr. Franklin, to whose fame Alonzo was no stranger, he might be placed in a situation to procure bread, which was all he at present hoped or wished.
He therefore presented himself before the doctor, whom he found in his study.
—To be informed that he was an American and unfortunate, was sufficient to arouse the feelings of Franklin. He desired Alonzo to be seated, and to recite his history. This he readily complied with, not concealing his attachment to Melissa, her father’s barbarity, and her death in consequence, his own father’s failure, with all the particulars of his leaving America, his capture, escape from prison, and arrival in France; as also the town of his nativity, the name of his father, and the particular circumstances of his family; concluding by expressing his unconquerable reluctance to return to his native country, which now would be to him only a gloomy wilderness, and that his present object was only some means of support.
The doctor enquired of Alonzo the particular circumstances and time of his father’s failure. Of this Alonzo gave him a minute account. Franklin then sat in deep contemplation for the space of fifteen minutes, without speaking a word.
He then took his pen, wrote a short note, directed it, and gave it to Alonzo: “Deliver this, said he, to the person to whom it is directed; he will find you employment, until something more favourable may offer.”