My services were so satisfactory that when our paying teller was promoted to a higher place in another institution, I was advanced to his situation with a salary of eighteen hundred dollars, and a promise of an additional two hundred if I proved to be competent to discharge the duties of the office. My uncle and others were my bondsmen. Never did a young man look forward to a brighter future than I did.
Every evening in the week I went to Mr. Oliphant’s and was treated as one of the family. During the year I had been paying assiduous court to my beautiful charmer. I spent all my salary, and more than all, for I was in debt at the end of this time. I wore good clothes, for I wished Lilian to be proud of me; I sent her bouquets, I took her to the theatre, the opera, the concerts, and to balls and parties, a single one of which in some instances, spoiled a twenty dollar bill. I took her out to ride, and paid for many costly suppers. But Lilian appeared to love me with all her soul, and I was satisfied.
I had found the end of my twelve hundred dollars so easily that I dared not think of getting married; but my promotion decided me. Lilian offered no unreasonable objections, neither did her parents, and the happy day was fixed. Tom Flynn, who had taken my place as discount clerk in the Forty-ninth National, was to stand up with me. Somewhat oddly, as it seemed to me, my good friend advised me not to marry, and we almost quarrelled over some plain talking which he did. The die was cast; I would not have retreated if I could.
CHAPTER III.
GOING TO HOUSEKEEPING.
I was married in the spring, and the bank gave me my vacation on the joyous occasion, so that I was enabled to make a bridal tour of ten days to the South. I went to Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, and while I distinctly recollect that I enjoyed myself exceedingly, and traveled like a prince, I can more vividly recall the rapidity with which my funds were expended. It had cost me all my salary to pay my board and to take Miss Lilian to the opera and the balls, but I could not afford to deprive Mrs. Glasswood of any luxury.
Before we started I was “hard up,” and I tried to contrive some clever expedient by which the bridal tour might be dispensed with. I suggested to Lilian that the journey was not absolutely necessary; that some very “nobby” people staid at home after they were married. Her chin dropped down as though a ten pound weight had been attached to it, and she looked so sad and gloomy that I could not think for a moment longer of depriving her of this triumphal march, for so I am afraid she regarded it. Of course I did not hint to her that I could not afford to spend two or three hundred dollars in travelling, for we were still lovingly cheating each other into the belief that she was a princess and I was a representative of Crœsus himself.