The colonel had not been two days in the family before it was regarded as settled that he and Amy were affianced. Aunt Adeline eagerly gave her consent, notwithstanding some little eccentricities in the young man’s conduct, of which she did not wholly approve. For instance, when she undertook to bore him with an explanation of her family tree, he laughed in her face, and told her that his mare Betsey could boast a better pedigree. This was touching the old woman on a tender point, but she suppressed the exhibition of her chagrin through a secret admiration of that superiority in blood, which could afford to sneer at her genealogy. Another circumstance was rather annoying, and some illiberal people might have considered the trait it displayed objectionable in a lover. The colonel, who had apparently been indulging too freely in strong potations, on meeting Aunt Adeline alone on the stairs, was rude to the ancient vestal, and even attempted to throw his arms about her neck. To tell the truth, Aunt Adeline was a very little shocked at this ebullition, but when she recollected that the aggressor was the son of an earl, she forgave him with all her heart, and determined not to mention the occurrence to her niece.
These, however, were but trivial symptoms of depravity, compared with those which were soon developed. The colonel had not been engaged two days when he petrified the “old woman,” as he called her to her face, by applying to her for money. She could have endured any thing but this without faltering in her alliance. He might have been as tipsy and profligate as he pleased, and still she would have thought him an excellent match for Amy; but in money matters, Aunt Adeline was rigid and inexorable as death itself. Although in the receipt of a competent annuity, she had always contrived, from parsimonious motives, to live upon her friends and relatives; and it was rare indeed that a dollar found its way from her store. And now Colonel Mornington called upon her, peremptorily, for a hundred dollars, and would not listen to a refusal! It was like draining her of her life-blood, but there was no remedy. With a heavy heart, and with many a longing, lingering look at the money, she placed it in his hands. She had hoped that he would of his own accord offer to give her his acceptance for the sum; but the idea evidently did not occur to him, and she timidly hinted something about a receipt.
“A what!” exclaimed the colonel in a tone, and with a stare, which effectually prevented her from renewing the suggestion.
The very next day the colonel applied for another hundred dollars, ingenuously informing her that he had experienced heavy losses at the village nine-pin alley. Aunt Adeline at first peremptorily refused to give him the amount, but she was finally so worked upon by his taunts and menaces that she acceded to his exorbitant demands. The same scene was repeated the next day, and the next, and the next, until the colonel was her debtor to the amount of five hundred dollars, when she unequivocally declared that she would advance him no more money. The colonel left her presence, muttering mysterious threats.
Late that night, as Aunt Adeline, with a mind torn by unavailing regrets and painful conjectures as to the probabilities of her ever getting back her loan, was vainly trying to compose herself to sleep, she heard a slight noise at the handle of her chamber door, and, turning her eyes in the direction, saw to her horror the colonel enter with a dark lanthorn in his hand and two enormous pistols under his arms. Gently closing the door, he locked it, and stealthily advanced toward the toilet table, where he deposited one of the murderous weapons, and then cocking the other, approached the bed-side. Although Aunt Adeline was shaking with fright, she had sense enough to feign slumber, and the colonel, after examining her features and muttering, “it is lucky for the old girl she is asleep,” proceeded to search the various drawers and trunks in the room for plunder, having first abstracted a formidable bunch of keys from under the venerable spinster’s pillow. The most valuable articles he found were a bag filled with golden half eagles and a little casket of jewels. Thrusting these into the pockets of his dressing-gown, he replaced the keys where he had found them, took another look at Aunt Adeline, to assure himself that she was asleep, and glided quietly out of the room.
At the breakfast-table the next morning, when Aunt Adeline made her appearance, both her niece and the colonel professed to be very much shocked at her pale and altered features; and the latter pressed upon her some patent pills, in regard to the efficacy of which he told some wonderful stories. Had not Aunt Adeline been thoroughly convinced of his wish to poison her, she might have taken some. The poor woman’s troubles were by no means lessened on the reception of the following letter from her brother, which was handed to her while her coffee was cooling:
“Dear Adeline,—Far from having my indignation awakened by your account of Amy’s attachment to young Greenleaf, I was heartily glad to hear that she had fixed it on so worthy an object. I have the most satisfactory assurances as to his worth, his unexceptionable habits, and his ability to make my daughter happy. What more shall we look for? You say he is a milk-man’s son, and ask if I am willing to see my child wedded to a clodhopper. Let me tell you, it is no small distinction in these days, when whole states have set the example of repudiating their debts (or, in plain, downright English, of swindling their creditors,) to be descended from an honest man, let his vocation have been what it might. At any rate, I am delighted at Amy’s choice, and I most earnestly forbid your throwing any obstacle in the way of its fulfillment. I remain your affectionate brother, etc., etc.”
As Aunt Adeline lifted her eyes from the letter, she beheld Amy seated in the colonel’s lap, and playfully feeding him with a spoon, while at intervals she smoothed back his hair and kissed his forehead. The girl was evidently wildly enamored of a character who had shown himself a most eligible candidate for Sing Sing; and Aunt Adeline had the soothing reflection, that she herself had originated and encouraged the attachment. Requesting Amy to follow her to the library, she at once made known to her the fact of the colonel’s unworthiness, and related the occurrence of the night before. Amy professed her utter disbelief of the charges against her “own Arthur,” as she called him, and on her aunt’s offering to prove them, by calling in a magistrate, and having the colonel’s trunk searched, the infatuated girl exclaimed:
“Well, what if he is guilty? His father is an earl, and his aunt is the daughter-in-law of a duke, and happen what may I won’t give up my own Arthur.”
Aunt Adeline groaned in spirit as she replied—“Have you so soon forgotten that nice, respectable, amiable young man, Greenleaf, to whom you gave so much encouragement? I never believed you could be so fickle, Amy!”