"Rachel! dear Rachel! what is the matter, love?" cried her mother and myself at the same instant.
"O Elizabeth!—Elizabeth is away!" sobbed my poor bairn.
Priscilla was stupified, and she repeated the word "Away!" but the truth broke over me in a moment; and I sank back into a chair, as helpless, for all the world, as a new-born infant.
Rachel tried to compose herself the best way she could; and she informed us that her sister had left the house about ten o'clock in the forenoon, and that she had not since returned. She also mentioned that Elizabeth had been seen in the company of Charles Austin shortly after leaving the house; and that, when she did not return in the course of the day, suspecting that they had fled to Gretna, she had sent my principal clerk, Thomas Galloway, after them, in a chaise-and-four, to bring back Elizabeth.
Distressed as I was, I admired the presence of mind which Rachel had exhibited. She had done all that I could have done myself, had I been at home; and a fitter person than Thomas Galloway could not have been sent. His zeal, honesty, and industry, had long rendered him a favourite with me; and, though he was but a young man, I treated him more as an equal than a clerk. Nor had I any doubt but in the mission he was sent upon, he would show as much courage, if such an article were required, as he had at all times shown zeal and prudence in my service.
But Thomas returned. He had heard nothing of them on the road, and they had not been at Gretna. These tidings threw us all into deeper affliction; and a week passed, and we could hear nothing of my daughter, and our misery increased. But, on the ninth day after her disappearance, a letter arrived from her. It was dated Coldstream. My fears read its contents before it was opened. In it she poured forth a rhapsody in praise of her "dear Charles," as she termed him, and said, if we knew his virtues as well as she knew them, we would love him as she did. She begged forgiveness for the step she had taken, and sought permission to return with her husband, and receive mine and her mother's blessing. She concluded the letter by signing herself our "affectionate and dutiful daughter, Elizabeth Austin."
"Dutiful!—the ungrateful, the silly gipsy!" cried I, flinging down the letter, and trampling it under my feet, in pure madness; "she shall never inherit a penny of mine—she shall never enter my door. She is ruined—she has married worthlessness and misery!"
It was some time before Priscilla said anything; but I saw she was very greatly affected. At last, the mother's love for her offspring got the better of every other consideration in her heart, and she endeavoured to soothe me, and to prevail on me to forgive Elizabeth, and to see her again.
I had intended that the marriage portion of my daughters, on the very day they became wives, should be ten thousand each, providing that I approved of the match—though I by no manner of means wished or intended to direct their choice, or control their affections, further than it was my duty as a parent to see that they did not throw themselves away. But I was perfectly persuaded that, to give ten thousand, or the half of it, or any sum, to such a person as Elizabeth had got, would be no better than to fling it into the fire.
However, the entreaties and persuasion of Priscilla prevailed. I consented that Elizabeth should return, and gave her husband five thousand pounds as her dowery, with a promise of more, if they should conduct themselves to my satisfaction. He had not received the money many days when they set out for London.