"I wouldn't, for my part, have the woman with twice her money."
What did it matter to me, whether the woman was good or not, provided she was rich? My course was quite clear. I told Dobble all that this gentleman had informed me, and being a pretty good hand at making a story, I made the widow appear so bad, that the poor fellow was quite frightened, and fairly quitted the field. Ha! ha! I'm dashed if I did not make him believe that Mrs. Manasseh had murdered her last husband.
I played my game so well, thanks to the information that my friend the lawyer had given me, that, in a month, I had got the widow to show a most decided partiality for me. I sat by her at dinner; I drank with her at the Wells; I rode with her; I danced with her; and at a pic-nic to Kenilworth, where we drank a good deal of champagne, I actually popped the question, and was accepted. In another month, Robert Stubbs, Esq., led to the altar Leah, widow of the late Z. Manasseh, Esq., of St. Kitt's!
We drove up to London in her comfortable chariot; the children and servants following in a post-chaise. I paid, of course, for everything; and until our house in Berkeley Square was painted, we stopped at Stevens's Hotel.
My own estate had been sold, and the money was lying at a bank, in the city. About three days after our arrival, as we took our breakfast in the hotel, previous to a visit to Mrs. Stubbs's banker, where certain little transfers were to be made, a gentleman was introduced, who, I saw at a glance, was of my wife's persuasion.
He looked at Mrs. Stubbs, and made a bow. "Perhaps it will be convenient to you to pay this little bill, one hundred and fifty-two poundsh?"
"My love," says she, "will you pay this? It is a trifle which I had really forgotten." "My soul!" said I, "I have really not the money in the house."
"Vel, denn, Captain Shtubbsh," says he, "I must do my duty—and arrest you—here is the writ! Tom, keep the door!"—My wife fainted—the children screamed, and I—fancy my condition, as I was obliged to march off to a sponging house, along with a horrid sheriff's officer!