Page:Edgar Huntly, or The Sleep Walker.djvu/144

 summoned to my assistance, and in seven months I was restored to my present state of health.

"At Oporto I embarked in an American ship for New York. I was destitute of all property, and relied for the payment of the debts which I was obliged to contract, as well as for my future subsistence, on my remittance to Waldegrave. I hastened to Philadelphia, and was soon informed that my friend was dead. His death had taken place a long time since my remittance to him; hence this disaster was a subject of regret chiefly on his own account: I entertained no doubt but that my property had been secured, and that either some testamentary directions or some papers had been left behind respecting this affair.

"I sought out those who were formerly our mutual acquaintance: I found that they were wholly strangers to his affairs; they could merely relate some particulars of his singular death, and point out the lodgings which he formerly occupied: hither I forthwith repaired, and discovered that he lived in this house with his sister, disconnected with its other inhabitants. They described his mode of life in terms that showed them to be very imperfectly acquainted with it: it was easy indeed to infer from their aspect and manners, that little sympathy or union could have subsisted between them and their co-tenants; and this inference was confirmed by their insinuations, the growth of prejudice and envy. They told me that Waldegrave's sister had gone to live in the country; but whither, or for how long, she had not condescended to inform them, and they did not care to ask: she was a topping dame, whose notions were much too high for her station; who was more nice than wise, and yet was one who could stoop when it most became her to stand upright. It was no business of theirs, but they could not but mention their suspicions that she had good reasons for leaving the city, and for concealing the place of her retreat: some things were hard to be disguised; they spoke for themselves, and the only way to hinder disagreeable discoveries, was to keep out of sight.

"I was wholly a stranger to Waldegrave's sister—I knew merely that he had such a relation: there was nothing