'Belle has not returned yet from Mrs. Caruthers's. It is rather strange. I have just sent the carriage for her. Wakeman brings back word that she is not there.'
'Wakeman is an idiot!' exclaimed Hiram, with a degree of temper so unusual, that Mrs. Meeker started—'an idiot! I dare say he did not make his message intelligible.'
Now, 'Wakeman' was Mrs. Meeker's private servant—a family servant, she was pleased to say; thereby meaning, not that he had been in the employ of her father, honest Thorn the plumber, nor yet in the service of her mother, the "poor relation," but that in fact he was her servant before she was married, and had remained par excellence her servant ever since.
She therefore rose in arms at once, in vindication of her favorite, and was about to work herself into one of her customary manifestations, which Hiram was evidently in no state of mind to bear, when there was suddenly a ring at the door. An instant's parley, and the servant entered, bearing a note to Mr. Meeker.
The superscription was in Belle's handwriting.
A 'terrible sagacity' informed Hiram's heart of something dreadful about to shock it. He tore open the envelope with fierceness, and read as follows:
'Dear Papa: Don't be angry with me. I was married yesterday to Filippo Barbone. I married him because I love him, and could never love any one else. I knew you would not consent, but I could not live without him. Forgive your little girl, dear papa, and write me to come back to you with my dear Filippo. Oh, I know you will like him. Send to me at the Gresham House, Philadelphia. I shall be in agony till I hear from you. Love to dear mamma and Harriet. If I only had your forgiveness, how happy I should be, dear, dear papa!
'Your little Belle.'
[This letter, mainly the production of the Signor, was prepared and put into the hands of his accomplice before the runaways set off, with directions to watch for Hiram's entrance into his house, and deliver immediately after.]
Never before did Hiram Meeker give way to such an exhibition of rage.