The mother and daughter were at the same employment: but Miss, imagining it was my knock, sent her attendant to inquire, and immediately huddled on her bed-gown and mob-cap to come down to me. Her tongue was eager to do its office.
'Lord! Mr. Trevor! We have had such doings! Papa and mamma and I have been at it almost ever since! But don't you fear: I am your true friend, and I have made mamma your friend, and she insists upon it that papa shall be your friend too; and so he is forced to comply: though the bishop had convinced him that you are a very imprudent young gentleman; and my papa will have it you don't understand common sense; and that you have ruined yourself, though you had the finest opportunity on earth; and that you will ruin every body that takes your part! You can't think how surprised and how angry he is, that you should oppose your will to an earl, and a bishop, and lose the means of making your fortune, and perhaps of making your friends' fortunes too: for there it is that the shoe pinches; because I understand the bishop is very kind to papa at present; and, if he should take your part, papa says he will never see him again. But mamma and I argued, what of that? Would the bishop give papa a good living, said mamma? And what if he would, says I? Shall we give up those that we love best in the world, because it is the will and pleasure of a bishop! No, indeed! I don't know that bishops are better than other people, for my part; and perhaps not so good as those that are to be given up. So mamma told me to be silent; but she took my part, and I took yours, and I assure you, for all what they both said, I did not spare the bishop! So my papa fell into a passion, and pretended that I was too forward; and I assure you he accused me of having my likings. I don't know whether he did not make me blush! But I answered for all that, and said well, and if I have, who can help having their likings? I have heard you and my mamma say often enough that you both had had your likings; and that you did not like one another; and that that was the reason that you quarrel like cat and dog; and so if people will be happy they must marry according to their likings. So said my mamma well but, Eliza, have you any reason to think that Mr. Trevor has any notions of marriage? So I boldly answered yes, I had; for you know, Mr. Trevor, what passed between us at the play-house, and the kind squeeze of the hand you gave me at parting with me: and so why should I be afraid to speak, and tell the truth? And so mamma says it shall all be cleared up!'
Her eagerness would admit of no interruption, till it was checked for a moment by the entrance of Enoch, and the mamma. I suspected a part of what was to come, and never in my life had I felt so much embarrassment. 'Well Eliza,' said the matron, 'have you and Mr. Trevor been talking? Have you come to an explanation?'
I would have answered, but Miss was an age too quick for me. 'Yes, mamma; we have explained every thing to the full and whole. I have told it all over to him just now, every syllable the same as I told it to you, and he does not contradict a word of it.'
'Contradict?' interrupted Enoch. 'But does he say the same?' 'No, Sir!' answered I with eagerness; that I might if possible, by a single word, put an end to the eternal clack and false deductions of this very loving young lady. 'Lord! Mr. Trevor!' exclaimed Miss, her passions all flying to her eyes, part fire and part water. 'Sure you are not in earnest? You don't mean as you say?'—'I am very serious, Miss Ellis; and am exceedingly sorry to have been so misunderstood!'—'Why will you pretend to deny, Mr. Trevor, that all that I have been rehearsing here, about the play-house; and about the kindness with which you paid your addresses to me there, and indeed elsewhere, often and before time; and about your leading me to the chair; and then your tenderly taking my hand and squeezing it; and then the look you gave with your eyes; and more than all the loving manner in which you said good night? Not to mention as before all that you said and did, sitting next to me in the play-house; enough to win the affections of any poor innocent virgin! You are not such a deceiver as that comes to I am sure, Mr. Trevor: you have a more generous and noble heart!'
Here Miss burst into a flood of tears, and mamma exclaimed—'I am very much afraid, Mr. Trevor, there have been some improper doings!'
Enoch's anger for once made him honest. 'No such a thing!' said he. 'It is the forward fool's own fault. This is neither the first, second, nor third time she has played the same pranks.'
The mother and daughter instantly raised their pipes like fifty ciphered keys in an organ, first against Enoch, then against all the male kind, and lastly turned so furiously upon me that there seemed to be danger of their tearing me piece-meal, like as the mad females of Thrace did the disconsolate Orpheus.
At length I started up in a passion, and exclaimed—'Will you hear me, ladies?' 'No! no! no!' screamed Miss. 'We won't hear a word! Don't listen to him, mamma! He is a deceiver! A faithless man! I did not think there could have been such a one in the whole world! and I am sure I warned him often enough against it. And after the true friend that I have been to you, Mr. Trevor! and have taken your part, tooth and nail! Papa himself knows I have; and would take your part, through fire and water, against the whole world! and to be so ungrateful, and so false, and faithless to me in return! Oh shame, Mr. Trevor! Is that a man? A fine manly part truly! to win a poor virgin's heart and then to forsake her!'
Finding the sobs and the rhetoric of Miss inexhaustible and every effort to elucidate fruitless, I rose, told Enoch I would explain myself to him by letter, opened the door to go, was seized by the coat by the young lady, and could not without violence, or leaving like Joseph my garment behind me, have torn myself away, if I had not been aided by Enoch; who, having according to his own story been probably present at such scenes before, had sense enough I suppose to be ashamed of his daughter's conduct.