Page:Adventures of Rachel Cunningham.djvu/24

 will not be doubted, that she so managed them (the sums of none; drawn,) to her own will and advantage that they were, after coming to hand, very speedily disposed of; for her profligate extravagance exceeded all bounds of liberal indulgence as her avarice was to get hold; but not to hold, at least not long, whatever monies or valuables she could possibly obtain possession of; all was wasted in riotous profusion and prodigal folly that came within her grasp.

Over Mr. L's will her power was imperatively resistless; she was the ruling deity of all his thoughts, his hopes, and his enjoyments: he would sit whole days gazing on her charms, till his enraptured fancy, led through bewildering admiration, absorbed his senses and involved his faculties in a maze of extatic delirium. When and wherever she moved his eyes would follow her with ineffable delight, while his heart fluttered in excessive transport, and his whole frame shook with blissful agitation. Her presence was his heaven of happiness, and if, but for a few minutes, she quitted the apartment he suffered most distressing impatience for her reappearance; when the spoke her voice was a celestial charm of divine music to his ear which seemed to vivify his very inmost soul; but her touch was positively electric, at which his passions became suddenly inflamed to amorous madness, his blood in hurried pulse rushed through each swelling vein, and every trembling nerve was instantaneously in motion!

Whatever she wished and however enormous the request might be, her surety for obtaining the object of it lay in her wheedling wiles; it was but to hang upon his neck, toy on his bosom, pat his cheek, apply her lips in wanton kisses to his, tickle him and amorously convolve herself with and about his person, to entrap his consent to and compliance with her fullest desires, in grant and execution to the utmost extent she willed and urged him to effect.

Daring the summer months, in gratification of her attached inclining to fashionable show and wasteful prodigality, he