Night after night the precise Richie stood before the mansion of the late Sir Toby Plum, enwrapt in his dreadnought, and in thoughts equally fearless. The same low, considerate, but somewhat confidential rap admitted him; the same sweet little parlour and its fair occupant received him; the same confidence was expressed in his integrity and skill. Financial arrangements, discussed by proportions, he found irresistibly conclusive; till, in the fulness of time,—according to Richie's own account, three months after sight,—he became one of the happiest of husbands, and forthwith began to make arrangements for husbanding—now that he was qualified—their joint stock; and Richie Barter was a happy man. Richie was also a cautious man; but how absurd a thing is caution, particularly in affairs of the heart!—with which, if they would prosper, the head must have nothing to do. In a short time Richie began to discover that he might possibly have been a little too precipitate in marriage; that proportions, which gave forty thousand pounds as a result of the most correct calculation, were not to be relied upon; in short, that he might have looked before him;—and Richie sighed profoundly as he exclaimed, "I should—but did not!"
The moon that generally succeeds matrimony, and upon which all the sweets of poetry, and prose, and the grocer's shop, have been expended to give an adequate idea of its deliciousness,—thus "gilding refined gold," and making a planet, supposed to be green cheese, the very essence of honey,—that luminary had run its course, and found Richie Barter one day in the dishabille becoming a Benedict, flung on a sofa, with his dexter hand thrown across the back of it, lost in a reverie as profound as his breeches-pocket, with something like a "pale cast of thought" on a countenance once rubicund, and now rendered perfectly cadaverous by a glance at a letter which he was crumpling in his fist.
"How is this, Julia, dear? there must be some mistake," said the agitated Richie to the most prudent of wives, as she entered the room. "Only a paltry five hundred, when I thought forty thousand was in the way!—Surely there must be a mistake in this!"
"In matters of business, Mr. Barter,—you know I hate business,—there will be mistakes," quoth the lady; "business is my aversion;" and she swept by the amazed Richie with all the dignity of a Siddons. "I married you, Mr. Barter, to get rid of business and its degrading details;" and she looked with no very equivocal air of contempt on the bulk of Richie as he lay coiled on the sofa, crumpling the letter.
"Mr. Smyrk," said a servant half opening the door.
"Wish you ten thousand joys, Mrs. Barter," said Sir Toby's man of business as he entered. "An excellent character,—a most prudent man, is Mr. Barter."
"Why not make it forty thousand joys, sir?" exclaimed Richie.
"Very facetious, Mr. Barter; but this just reminds me of a little business I came about,—a few debts of your good lady, which her creditors are a little clamorous for, particularly since you've got the reputation of having got forty thousand pounds with her."
"Forty thousand devils!" roared the furious Richie. "Will the reputation of that sum pay one shilling of her debts?—tell me that."
"Can't exactly say; but, as the friend of the late Sir Toby, I looked in, in the family way. A little business of my own—a trifle over three hundred pounds;—Mrs. Barter will tell you the value received." And the prudent Mr. Smyrk presented his bill to that amount, and left Richie glaring and grinning at this fresh demand.