"The Woman in White\n\n\nby\n\nWilkie Collins\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\nFirst Epoch\n\n  THE STORY BEGUN BY WALTER HARTRIGHT\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY VINCENT GILMORE\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY MARIAN HALCOMBE\n\n\nSecond Epoch\n\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY MARIAN HALCOMBE.\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY FREDERICK FAIRLIE, ESQ.\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY ELIZA MICHELSON\n  THE STORY CONTINUED IN SEVERAL NARRATIVES\n\n     THE NARRATIVE OF HESTER PINHORN\n     THE NARRATIVE OF THE DOCTOR\n     THE NARRATIVE OF JANE GOULD\n     THE NARRATIVE OF THE TOMBSTONE\n     THE NARRATIVE OF WALTER HARTRIGHT\n\n\nThird Epoch\n\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY WALTER HARTRIGHT.\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY MRS. CATHERICK\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY WALTER HARTRIGHT\n  THE STORY CONTINUED BY ISIDOR, OTTAVIO, BALDASSARE FOSCO\n  THE STORY CONCLUDED BY WALTER HARTRIGHT\n\n\n\n\nTHE STORY BEGUN BY WALTER HARTRIGHT\n\n(of Clement's Inn, Teacher of Drawing)\n\n\nThis is the story of what a Woman's patience can endure, and what a\nMan's resolution can achieve.\n\nIf the machinery of the Law could be depended on to fathom every case\nof suspicion, and to conduct every process of inquiry, with moderate\nassistance only from the lubricating influences of oil of gold, the\nevents which fill these pages might have claimed their share of the\npublic attention in a Court of Justice.\n\nBut the Law is still, in certain inevitable cases, the pre-engaged\nservant of the long purse; and the story is left to be told, for the\nfirst time, in this place.  As the Judge might once have heard it, so\nthe Reader shall hear it now.  No circumstance of importance, from the\nbeginning to the end of the disclosure, shall be related on hearsay\nevidence.  When the writer of these introductory lines (Walter\nHartright by name) happens to be more closely connected than others\nwith the incidents to be recorded, he will describe them in his own\nperson.  When his experience fails, he will retire from the position of\nnarrator; and his task will be continued, from the point at which he\nhas left it off, by other persons who can speak to the circumstances\nunder notice from their own knowledge, just as clearly and positively\nas he has spoken before them.\n\nThus, the story here presented will be told by more than one pen, as\nthe story of an offence against the laws is told in Court by more than\none witness--with the same object, in both cases, to present the truth\nalways in its most direct and most intelligible aspect; and to trace\nthe course of one complete series of events, by making the persons who\nhave been most closely connected with them, at each successive stage,\nrelate their own experience, word for word.\n\nLet Walter Hartright, teacher of drawing, aged twenty-eight years, be\nheard first.\n\n\n\nII\n\nIt was the last day of July.  The long hot summer was drawing to a\nclose; and we, the weary pilgrims of the London pavement, were\nbeginning to think of the cloud-shadows on the corn-fields, and the\nautumn breezes on the sea-shore.\n\nFor my own poor part, the fading summer left me out of health, out of\nspirits, and, if the truth must be told, out of money as well. During\nthe past year I had not managed my professional resources as carefully\nas usual; and my extravagance now limited me to the prospect of\nspending the autumn economically between my mother's cottage at\nHampstead and my own chambers in town.\n\nThe evening, I remember, was still and cloudy; the London air was at\nits heaviest; the distant hum of the street-traffic was at its\nfaintest; the small pulse of the life within me, and the great heart of\nthe city around me, seemed to be sinking in unison, languidly and more\nlanguidly, with the sinking sun.  I roused myself from the book which I\nwas dreaming over rather than reading, and left my chambers to meet the\ncool night air in the suburbs.  It was one of the two evenings in every\nweek which I was accustomed to spend with my mother and my sister.  So\nI turned my steps northward in the direction of Hampstead.\n\nEvents which I have yet to relate make it necessary to mention in this\nplace that my father had been dead some years at the period of which I\nam now writing; and that my sister Sarah and I were the sole survivors\nof a family of five children.  My father was a drawing-master before\nme.  His exertions had made him highly successful in his profession;\nand his affectionate anxiety to provide for the future of those who\nwere dependent on his labours had impelled him, from the time of his\nmarriage, to devote to the insuring of his life a much larger portion\nof his income than most men consider it necessary to set aside for that\npurpose.  Thanks to his admirable prudence and self-denial my mother\nand sister were left, after his death, as independent of the world as\nthey had been during his lifetime.  I succeeded to his connection, and\nhad every reason to feel grateful for the prospect that awaited me at\nmy starting in life.\n\nThe quiet twilight was still trembling on the topmost ridges of the\nheath; and the view of London below me had sunk into a black gulf in\nthe shadow of the cloudy night, when I stood before the gate of my\nmother's cottage.  I had hardly rung the bell before the house door was\nopened violently; my worthy Italian friend, Professor Pesca, appeared\nin the servant's place; and darted out joyously to receive me, with a\nshrill foreign parody on an English cheer.\n\nOn his own account, and, I must be allowed to add, on mine also, the\nProfessor merits the honour of a formal introduction. Accident has made\nhim the starting-point of the strange family story which it is the\npurpose of these pages to unfold.\n\nI had first become acquainted with my Italian friend by meeting him at\ncertain great houses where he taught his own language and I taught\ndrawing.  All I then knew of the history of his life was, that he had\nonce held a situation in the University of Padua; that he had left\nItaly for political reasons (the nature of which he uniformly declined\nto mention to any one); and that he had been for many years respectably\nestablished in London as a teacher of languages.\n\nWithout being actually a dwarf--for he was perfectly well proportioned\nfrom head to foot--Pesca was, I think, the smallest human being I ever\nsaw out of a show-room.  Remarkable anywhere, by his personal\nappearance, he was still further distinguished among the rank and file\nof mankind by the harmless eccentricity of his character.  The ruling\nidea of his life appeared to be, that he was bound to show his\ngratitude to the country which had afforded him an asylum and a means\nof subsistence by doing his utmost to turn himself into an Englishman.\nNot content with paying the nation in general the compliment of\ninvariably carrying an umbrella, and invariably wearing gaiters and a\nwhite hat, the Professor further aspired to become an Englishman in his\nhabits and amusements, as well as in his personal appearance.  Finding\nus distinguished, as a nation, by our love of athletic exercises, the\nlittle man, in the innocence of his heart, devoted himself impromptu to\nall our English sports and pastimes whenever he had the opportunity of\njoining them; firmly persuaded that he could adopt our national\namusements of the field by an effort of will precisely as he had\nadopted our national gaiters and our national white hat.\n\nI had seen him risk his limbs blindly at a fox-hunt and in a\ncricket-field; and soon afterwards I saw him risk his life, just as\nblindly, in the sea at Brighton.\n\nWe had met there accidentally, and were bathing together.  If we had\nbeen engaged in any exercise peculiar to my own nation I should, of\ncourse, have looked after Pesca carefully; but as foreigners are\ngenerally quite as well able to take care of themselves in the water as\nEnglishmen, it never occurred to me that the art of swimming might\nmerely add one more to the list of manly exercises which the Professor\nbelieved that he could learn impromptu.  Soon after we had both struck\nout from shore, I stopped, finding my friend did not gain on me, and\nturned round to look for him.  To my horror and amazement, I saw\nnothing between me and the beach but two little white arms which\nstruggled for an instant above the surface of the water, and then\ndisappeared from view.  When I dived for him, the poor little man was\nlying quietly coiled up at the bottom, in a hollow of shingle, looking\nby many degrees smaller than I had ever seen him look before.  During\nthe few minutes that elapsed while I was taking him in, the air revived\nhim, and he ascended the steps of the machine with my assistance.  With\nthe partial recovery of his animation came the return of his wonderful\ndelusion on the subject of swimming.  As soon as his chattering teeth\nwould let him speak, he smiled vacantly, and said he thought it must\nhave been the Cramp.\n\nWhen he had thoroughly recovered himself, and had joined me on the\nbeach, his warm Southern nature broke through all artificial English\nrestraints in a moment.  He overwhelmed me with the wildest expressions\nof affection--exclaimed passionately, in his exaggerated Italian way,\nthat he would hold his life henceforth at my disposal--and declared\nthat he should never be happy again until he had found an opportunity\nof proving his gratitude by rendering me some service which I might\nremember, on my side, to the end of my days.\n\nI did my best to stop the torrent of his tears and protestations by\npersisting in treating the whole adventure as a good subject for a\njoke; and succeeded at last, as I imagined, in lessening Pesca's\noverwhelming sense of obligation to me.  Little did I think\nthen--little did I think afterwards when our pleasant holiday had drawn\nto an end--that the opportunity of serving me for which my grateful\ncompanion so ardently longed was soon to come; that he was eagerly to\nseize it on the instant; and that by so doing he was to turn the whole\ncurrent of my existence into a new channel, and to alter me to myself\nalmost past recognition.\n\nYet so it was.  If I had not dived for Professor Pesca when he lay\nunder water on his shingle bed, I should in all human probability never\nhave been connected with the story which these pages will relate--I\nshould never, perhaps, have heard even the name of the woman who has\nlived in all my thoughts, who has possessed herself of all my energies,\nwho has become the one guiding influence that now directs the purpose\nof my life.\n\n\n\nIII\n\nPesca's face and manner, on the evening when we confronted each other\nat my mother's gate, were more than sufficient to inform me that\nsomething extraordinary had happened.  It was quite useless, however,\nto ask him for an immediate explanation.  I could only conjecture,\nwhile he was dragging me in by both hands, that (knowing my habits) he\nhad come to the cottage to make sure of meeting me that night, and that\nhe had some news to tell of an unusually agreeable kind.\n\nWe both bounced into the parlour in a highly abrupt and undignified\nmanner.  My mother sat by the open window laughing and fanning herself.\nPesca was one of her especial favourites and his wildest eccentricities\nwere always pardonable in her eyes.  Poor dear soul! from the first\nmoment when she found out that the little Professor was deeply and\ngratefully attached to her son, she opened her heart to him\nunreservedly, and took all his puzzling foreign peculiarities for\ngranted, without so much as attempting to understand any one of them.\n\nMy sister Sarah, with all the advantages of youth, was, strangely\nenough, less pliable.  She did full justice to Pesca's excellent\nqualities of heart; but she could not accept him implicitly, as my\nmother accepted him, for my sake.  Her insular notions of propriety\nrose in perpetual revolt against Pesca's constitutional contempt for\nappearances; and she was always more or less undisguisedly astonished\nat her mother's familiarity with the eccentric little foreigner.  I\nhave observed, not only in my sister's case, but in the instances of\nothers, that we of the young generation are nothing like so hearty and\nso impulsive as some of our elders.  I constantly see old people\nflushed and excited by the prospect of some anticipated pleasure which\naltogether fails to ruffle the tranquillity of their serene\ngrandchildren.  Are we, I wonder, quite such genuine boys and girls now\nas our seniors were in their time? Has the great advance in education\ntaken rather too long a stride; and are we in these modern days, just\nthe least trifle in the world too well brought up?\n\nWithout attempting to answer those questions decisively, I may at least\nrecord that I never saw my mother and my sister together in Pesca's\nsociety, without finding my mother much the younger woman of the two.\nOn this occasion, for example, while the old lady was laughing heartily\nover the boyish manner in which we tumbled into the parlour, Sarah was\nperturbedly picking up the broken pieces of a teacup, which the\nProfessor had knocked off the table in his precipitate advance to meet\nme at the door.\n\n\"I don't know what would have happened, Walter,\" said my mother, \"if\nyou had delayed much longer.  Pesca has been half mad with impatience,\nand I have been half mad with curiosity.  The Professor has brought\nsome wonderful news with him, in which he says you are concerned; and\nhe has cruelly refused to give us the smallest hint of it till his\nfriend Walter appeared.\"\n\n\"Very provoking: it spoils the Set,\" murmured Sarah to herself,\nmournfully absorbed over the ruins of the broken cup.\n\nWhile these words were being spoken, Pesca, happily and fussily\nunconscious of the irreparable wrong which the crockery had suffered at\nhis hands, was dragging a large arm-chair to the opposite end of the\nroom, so as to command us all three, in the character of a public\nspeaker addressing an audience.  Having turned the chair with its back\ntowards us, he jumped into it on his knees, and excitedly addressed his\nsmall congregation of three from an impromptu pulpit.\n\n\"Now, my good dears,\" began Pesca (who always said \"good dears\" when he\nmeant \"worthy friends\"), \"listen to me.  The time has come--I recite my\ngood news--I speak at last.\"\n\n\"Hear, hear!\" said my mother, humouring the joke.\n\n\"The next thing he will break, mamma,\" whispered Sarah, \"will be the\nback of the best arm-chair.\"\n\n\"I go back into my life, and I address myself to the noblest of created\nbeings,\" continued Pesca, vehemently apostrophising my unworthy self\nover the top rail of the chair.  \"Who found me dead at the bottom of\nthe sea (through Cramp); and who pulled me up to the top; and what did\nI say when I got into my own life and my own clothes again?\"\n\n\"Much more than was at all necessary,\" I answered as doggedly as\npossible; for the least encouragement in connection with this subject\ninvariably let loose the Professor's emotions in a flood of tears.\n\n\"I said,\" persisted Pesca, \"that my life belonged to my dear friend,\nWalter, for the rest of my days--and so it does.  I said that I should\nnever be happy again till I had found the opportunity of doing a good\nSomething for Walter--and I have never been contented with myself till\nthis most blessed day.  Now,\" cried the enthusiastic little man at the\ntop of his voice, \"the overflowing happiness bursts out of me at every\npore of my skin, like a perspiration; for on my faith, and soul, and\nhonour, the something is done at last, and the only word to say now\nis--Right-all-right!\"\n\nIt may be necessary to explain here that Pesca prided himself on being\na perfect Englishman in his language, as well as in his dress, manners,\nand amusements.  Having picked up a few of our most familiar colloquial\nexpressions, he scattered them about over his conversation whenever\nthey happened to occur to him, turning them, in his high relish for\ntheir sound and his general ignorance of their sense, into compound\nwords and repetitions of his own, and always running them into each\nother, as if they consisted of one long syllable.\n\n\"Among the fine London Houses where I teach the language of my native\ncountry,\" said the Professor, rushing into his long-deferred\nexplanation without another word of preface, \"there is one, mighty\nfine, in the big place called Portland.  You all know where that is?\nYes, yes--course-of-course.  The fine house, my good dears, has got\ninside it a fine family.  A Mamma, fair and fat; three young Misses,\nfair and fat; two young Misters, fair and fat; and a Papa, the fairest\nand the fattest of all, who is a mighty merchant, up to his eyes in\ngold--a fine man once, but seeing that he has got a naked head and two\nchins, fine no longer at the present time.  Now mind! I teach the\nsublime Dante to the young Misses, and ah!--my-soul-bless-my-soul!--it\nis not in human language to say how the sublime Dante puzzles the\npretty heads of all three! No matter--all in good time--and the more\nlessons the better for me.  Now mind! Imagine to yourselves that I am\nteaching the young Misses to-day, as usual.  We are all four of us down\ntogether in the Hell of Dante.  At the Seventh Circle--but no matter\nfor that: all the Circles are alike to the three young Misses, fair and\nfat,--at the Seventh Circle, nevertheless, my pupils are sticking fast;\nand I, to set them going again, recite, explain, and blow myself up\nred-hot with useless enthusiasm, when--a creak of boots in the passage\noutside, and in comes the golden Papa, the mighty merchant with the\nnaked head and the two chins.--Ha! my good dears, I am closer than you\nthink for to the business, now. Have you been patient so far? or have\nyou said to yourselves, 'Deuce-what-the-deuce! Pesca is long-winded\nto-night?'\"\n\nWe declared that we were deeply interested.  The Professor went on:\n\n\"In his hand, the golden Papa has a letter; and after he has made his\nexcuse for disturbing us in our Infernal Region with the common mortal\nBusiness of the house, he addresses himself to the three young Misses,\nand begins, as you English begin everything in this blessed world that\nyou have to say, with a great O.  'O, my dears,' says the mighty\nmerchant, 'I have got here a letter from my friend, Mr.----'(the name\nhas slipped out of my mind; but no matter; we shall come back to that;\nyes, yes--right-all-right). So the Papa says, 'I have got a letter from\nmy friend, the Mister; and he wants a recommend from me, of a\ndrawing-master, to go down to his house in the country.'\nMy-soul-bless-my-soul! when I heard the golden Papa say those words, if\nI had been big enough to reach up to him, I should have put my arms\nround his neck, and pressed him to my bosom in a long and grateful hug!\nAs it was, I only bounced upon my chair.  My seat was on thorns, and my\nsoul was on fire to speak but I held my tongue, and let Papa go on.\n'Perhaps you know,' says this good man of money, twiddling his friend's\nletter this way and that, in his golden fingers and thumbs, 'perhaps\nyou know, my dears, of a drawing-master that I can recommend?'  The\nthree young Misses all look at each other, and then say (with the\nindispensable great O to begin) \"O, dear no, Papa! But here is Mr.\nPesca'  At the mention of myself I can hold no longer--the thought of\nyou, my good dears, mounts like blood to my head--I start from my seat,\nas if a spike had grown up from the ground through the bottom of my\nchair--I address myself to the mighty merchant, and I say (English\nphrase) 'Dear sir, I have the man! The first and foremost\ndrawing-master of the world! Recommend him by the post to-night, and\nsend him off, bag and baggage (English phrase again--ha!), send him\noff, bag and baggage, by the train to-morrow!'  'Stop, stop,' says\nPapa; 'is he a foreigner, or an Englishman?'  'English to the bone of\nhis back,' I answer. 'Respectable?' says Papa.  'Sir,' I say (for this\nlast question of his outrages me, and I have done being familiar with\nhim--) 'Sir! the immortal fire of genius burns in this Englishman's\nbosom, and, what is more, his father had it before him!'  'Never mind,'\nsays the golden barbarian of a Papa, 'never mind about his genius, Mr.\nPesca.  We don't want genius in this country, unless it is accompanied\nby respectability--and then we are very glad to have it, very glad\nindeed.  Can your friend produce testimonials--letters that speak to\nhis character?'  I wave my hand negligently. 'Letters?' I say.  'Ha!\nmy-soul-bless-my-soul! I should think so, indeed! Volumes of letters\nand portfolios of testimonials, if you like!' 'One or two will do,'\nsays this man of phlegm and money. 'Let him send them to me, with his\nname and address.  And--stop, stop, Mr. Pesca--before you go to your\nfriend, you had better take a note.' 'Bank-note!' I say, indignantly.\n'No bank-note, if you please, till my brave Englishman has earned it\nfirst.'  'Bank-note!' says Papa, in a great surprise, 'who talked of\nbank-note? I mean a note of the terms--a memorandum of what he is\nexpected to do.  Go on with your lesson, Mr. Pesca, and I will give you\nthe necessary extract from my friend's letter.' Down sits the man of\nmerchandise and money to his pen, ink, and paper; and down I go once\nagain into the Hell of Dante, with my three young Misses after me.  In\nten minutes' time the note is written, and the boots of Papa are\ncreaking themselves away in the passage outside.  From that moment, on\nmy faith, and soul, and honour, I know nothing more! The glorious\nthought that I have caught my opportunity at last, and that my grateful\nservice for my dearest friend in the world is as good as done already,\nflies up into my head and makes me drunk.  How I pull my young Misses\nand myself out of our Infernal Region again, how my other business is\ndone afterwards, how my little bit of dinner slides itself down my\nthroat, I know no more than a man in the moon.  Enough for me, that\nhere I am, with the mighty merchant's note in my hand, as large as\nlife, as hot as fire, and as happy as a king! Ha! ha! ha!\nright-right-right-all-right!\" Here the Professor waved the memorandum\nof terms over his head, and ended his long and voluble narrative with\nhis shrill Italian parody on an English cheer.\"\n\nMy mother rose the moment he had done, with flushed cheeks and\nbrightened eyes.  She caught the little man warmly by both hands.\n\n\"My dear, good Pesca,\" she said, \"I never doubted your true affection\nfor Walter--but I am more than ever persuaded of it now!\"\n\n\"I am sure we are very much obliged to Professor Pesca, for Walter's\nsake,\" added Sarah.  She half rose, while she spoke, as if to approach\nthe arm-chair, in her turn; but, observing that Pesca was rapturously\nkissing my mother's hands, looked serious, and resumed her seat.  \"If\nthe familiar little man treats my mother in that way, how will he treat\nME?\" Faces sometimes tell truth; and that was unquestionably the\nthought in Sarah's mind, as she sat down again.\n\nAlthough I myself was gratefully sensible of the kindness of Pesca's\nmotives, my spirits were hardly so much elevated as they ought to have\nbeen by the prospect of future employment now placed before me.  When\nthe Professor had quite done with my mother's hand, and when I had\nwarmly thanked him for his interference on my behalf, I asked to be\nallowed to look at the note of terms which his respectable patron had\ndrawn up for my inspection.\n\nPesca handed me the paper, with a triumphant flourish of the hand.\n\n\"Read!\" said the little man majestically.  \"I promise you my friend,\nthe writing of the golden Papa speaks with a tongue of trumpets for\nitself.\"\n\nThe note of terms was plain, straightforward, and comprehensive, at any\nrate.  It informed me,\n\nFirst, That Frederick Fairlie, Esquire, of Limmeridge House.\nCumberland, wanted to engage the services of a thoroughly competent\ndrawing-master, for a period of four months certain.\n\nSecondly, That the duties which the master was expected to perform\nwould be of a twofold kind.  He was to superintend the instruction of\ntwo young ladies in the art of painting in water-colours; and he was to\ndevote his leisure time, afterwards, to the business of repairing and\nmounting a valuable collection of drawings, which had been suffered to\nfall into a condition of total neglect.\n\nThirdly, That the terms offered to the person who should undertake and\nproperly perform these duties were four guineas a week; that he was to\nreside at Limmeridge House; and that he was to be treated there on the\nfooting of a gentleman.\n\nFourthly, and lastly, That no person need think of applying for this\nsituation unless he could furnish the most unexceptionable references\nto character and abilities.  The references were to be sent to Mr.\nFairlie's friend in London, who was empowered to conclude all necessary\narrangements.  These instructions were followed by the name and address\nof Pesca's employer in Portland Place--and there the note, or\nmemorandum, ended.\n\nThe prospect which this offer of an engagement held out was certainly\nan attractive one.  The employment was likely to be both easy and\nagreeable; it was proposed to me at the autumn time of the year when I\nwas least occupied; and the terms, judging by my personal experience in\nmy profession, were surprisingly liberal. I knew this; I knew that I\nought to consider myself very fortunate if I succeeded in securing the\noffered employment--and yet, no sooner had I read the memorandum than I\nfelt an inexplicable unwillingness within me to stir in the matter.  I\nhad never in the whole of my previous experience found my duty and my\ninclination so painfully and so unaccountably at variance as I found\nthem now.\n\n\"Oh, Walter, your father never had such a chance as this!\" said my\nmother, when she had read the note of terms and had handed it back to\nme.\n\n\"Such distinguished people to know,\" remarked Sarah, straightening\nherself in the chair; \"and on such gratifying terms of equality too!\"\n\n\"Yes, yes; the terms, in every sense, are tempting enough,\" I replied\nimpatiently.  \"But before I send in my testimonials, I should like a\nlittle time to consider----\"\n\n\"Consider!\" exclaimed my mother.  \"Why, Walter, what is the matter with\nyou?\"\n\n\"Consider!\" echoed my sister.  \"What a very extraordinary thing to say,\nunder the circumstances!\"\n\n\"Consider!\" chimed in the Professor.  \"What is there to consider about?\nAnswer me this! Have you not been complaining of your health, and have\nyou not been longing for what you call a smack of the country breeze?\nWell! there in your hand is the paper that offers you perpetual choking\nmouthfuls of country breeze for four months' time.  Is it not so? Ha!\nAgain--you want money.  Well! Is four golden guineas a week nothing?\nMy-soul-bless-my-soul! only give it to me--and my boots shall creak\nlike the golden Papa's, with a sense of the overpowering richness of\nthe man who walks in them! Four guineas a week, and, more than that,\nthe charming society of two young misses! and, more than that, your\nbed, your breakfast, your dinner, your gorging English teas and lunches\nand drinks of foaming beer, all for nothing--why, Walter, my dear good\nfriend--deuce-what-the-deuce!--for the first time in my life I have not\neyes enough in my head to look, and wonder at you!\"\n\nNeither my mother's evident astonishment at my behaviour, nor Pesca's\nfervid enumeration of the advantages offered to me by the new\nemployment, had any effect in shaking my unreasonable disinclination to\ngo to Limmeridge House.  After starting all the petty objections that I\ncould think of to going to Cumberland, and after hearing them answered,\none after another, to my own complete discomfiture, I tried to set up a\nlast obstacle by asking what was to become of my pupils in London while\nI was teaching Mr. Fairlie's young ladies to sketch from nature.  The\nobvious answer to this was, that the greater part of them would be away\non their autumn travels, and that the few who remained at home might be\nconfided to the care of one of my brother drawing-masters, whose pupils\nI had once taken off his hands under similar circumstances. My sister\nreminded me that this gentleman had expressly placed his services at my\ndisposal, during the present season, in case I wished to leave town; my\nmother seriously appealed to me not to let an idle caprice stand in the\nway of my own interests and my own health; and Pesca piteously\nentreated that I would not wound him to the heart by rejecting the\nfirst grateful offer of service that he had been able to make to the\nfriend who had saved his life.\n\nThe evident sincerity and affection which inspired these remonstrances\nwould have influenced any man with an atom of good feeling in his\ncomposition.  Though I could not conquer my own unaccountable\nperversity, I had at least virtue enough to be heartily ashamed of it,\nand to end the discussion pleasantly by giving way, and promising to do\nall that was wanted of me.\n\nThe rest of the evening passed merrily enough in humorous anticipations\nof my coming life with the two young ladies in Cumberland.  Pesca,\ninspired by our national grog, which appeared to get into his head, in\nthe most marvellous manner, five minutes after it had gone down his\nthroat, asserted his claims to be considered a complete Englishman by\nmaking a series of speeches in rapid succession, proposing my mother's\nhealth, my sister's health, my health, and the healths, in mass, of Mr.\nFairlie and the two young Misses, pathetically returning thanks\nhimself, immediately afterwards, for the whole party.  \"A secret,\nWalter,\" said my little friend confidentially, as we walked home\ntogether. \"I am flushed by the recollection of my own eloquence.  My\nsoul bursts itself with ambition.  One of these days I go into your\nnoble Parliament.  It is the dream of my whole life to be Honourable\nPesca, M.P.!\"\n\nThe next morning I sent my testimonials to the Professor's employer in\nPortland Place.  Three days passed, and I concluded, with secret\nsatisfaction, that my papers had not been found sufficiently explicit.\nOn the fourth day, however, an answer came.  It announced that Mr.\nFairlie accepted my services, and requested me to start for Cumberland\nimmediately.  All the necessary instructions for my journey were\ncarefully and clearly added in a postscript.\n\nI made my arrangements, unwillingly enough, for leaving London early\nthe next day.  Towards evening Pesca looked in, on his way to a\ndinner-party, to bid me good-bye.\n\n\"I shall dry my tears in your absence,\" said the Professor gaily, \"with\nthis glorious thought.  It is my auspicious hand that has given the\nfirst push to your fortune in the world.  Go, my friend! When your sun\nshines in Cumberland (English proverb), in the name of heaven make your\nhay.  Marry one of the two young Misses; become Honourable Hartright,\nM.P.; and when you are on the top of the ladder remember that Pesca, at\nthe bottom, has done it all!\"\n\nI tried to laugh with my little friend over his parting jest, but my\nspirits were not to be commanded.  Something jarred in me almost\npainfully while he was speaking his light farewell words.\n\nWhen I was left alone again nothing remained to be done but to walk to\nthe Hampstead cottage and bid my mother and Sarah good-bye.\n\n\n\nIV\n\nThe heat had been painfully oppressive all day, and it was now a close\nand sultry night.\n\nMy mother and sister had spoken so many last words, and had begged me\nto wait another five minutes so many times, that it was nearly midnight\nwhen the servant locked the garden-gate behind me.  I walked forward a\nfew paces on the shortest way back to London, then stopped and\nhesitated.\n\nThe moon was full and broad in the dark blue starless sky, and the\nbroken ground of the heath looked wild enough in the mysterious light\nto be hundreds of miles away from the great city that lay beneath it.\nThe idea of descending any sooner than I could help into the heat and\ngloom of London repelled me.  The prospect of going to bed in my\nairless chambers, and the prospect of gradual suffocation, seemed, in\nmy present restless frame of mind and body, to be one and the same\nthing.  I determined to stroll home in the purer air by the most\nroundabout way I could take; to follow the white winding paths across\nthe lonely heath; and to approach London through its most open suburb\nby striking into the Finchley Road, and so getting back, in the cool of\nthe new morning, by the western side of the Regent's Park.\n\nI wound my way down slowly over the heath, enjoying the divine\nstillness of the scene, and admiring the soft alternations of light and\nshade as they followed each other over the broken ground on every side\nof me.  So long as I was proceeding through this first and prettiest\npart of my night walk my mind remained passively open to the\nimpressions produced by the view; and I thought but little on any\nsubject--indeed, so far as my own sensations were concerned, I can\nhardly say that I thought at all.\n\nBut when I had left the heath and had turned into the by-road, where\nthere was less to see, the ideas naturally engendered by the\napproaching change in my habits and occupations gradually drew more and\nmore of my attention exclusively to themselves.  By the time I had\narrived at the end of the road I had become completely absorbed in my\nown fanciful visions of Limmeridge House, of Mr. Fairlie, and of the\ntwo ladies whose practice in the art of water-colour painting I was so\nsoon to superintend.\n\nI had now arrived at that particular point of my walk where four roads\nmet--the road to Hampstead, along which I had returned, the road to\nFinchley, the road to West End, and the road back to London.  I had\nmechanically turned in this latter direction, and was strolling along\nthe lonely high-road--idly wondering, I remember, what the Cumberland\nyoung ladies would look like--when, in one moment, every drop of blood\nin my body was brought to a stop by the touch of a hand laid lightly\nand suddenly on my shoulder from behind me.\n\nI turned on the instant, with my fingers tightening round the handle of\nmy stick.\n\nThere, in the middle of the broad bright high-road--there, as if it had\nthat moment sprung out of the earth or dropped from the heaven--stood\nthe figure of a solitary Woman, dressed from head to foot in white\ngarments, her face bent in grave inquiry on mine, her hand pointing to\nthe dark cloud over London, as I faced her.\n\nI was far too seriously startled by the suddenness with which this\nextraordinary apparition stood before me, in the dead of night and in\nthat lonely place, to ask what she wanted.  The strange woman spoke\nfirst.\n\n\"Is that the road to London?\" she said.\n\nI looked attentively at her, as she put that singular question to me.\nIt was then nearly one o'clock.  All I could discern distinctly by the\nmoonlight was a colourless, youthful face, meagre and sharp to look at\nabout the cheeks and chin; large, grave, wistfully attentive eyes;\nnervous, uncertain lips; and light hair of a pale, brownish-yellow hue.\nThere was nothing wild, nothing immodest in her manner: it was quiet\nand self-controlled, a little melancholy and a little touched by\nsuspicion; not exactly the manner of a lady, and, at the same time, not\nthe manner of a woman in the humblest rank of life.  The voice, little\nas I had yet heard of it, had something curiously still and mechanical\nin its tones, and the utterance was remarkably rapid. She held a small\nbag in her hand: and her dress--bonnet, shawl, and gown all of\nwhite--was, so far as I could guess, certainly not composed of very\ndelicate or very expensive materials.  Her figure was slight, and\nrather above the average height--her gait and actions free from the\nslightest approach to extravagance.  This was all that I could observe\nof her in the dim light and under the perplexingly strange\ncircumstances of our meeting.  What sort of a woman she was, and how\nshe came to be out alone in the high-road, an hour after midnight, I\naltogether failed to guess.  The one thing of which I felt certain was,\nthat the grossest of mankind could not have misconstrued her motive in\nspeaking, even at that suspiciously late hour and in that suspiciously\nlonely place.\n\n\"Did you hear me?\" she said, still quietly and rapidly, and without the\nleast fretfulness or impatience.  \"I asked if that was the way to\nLondon.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I replied, \"that is the way: it leads to St. John's Wood and the\nRegent's Park.  You must excuse my not answering you before.  I was\nrather startled by your sudden appearance in the road; and I am, even\nnow, quite unable to account for it.\"\n\n\"You don't suspect me of doing anything wrong, do you? I have done\nnothing wrong.  I have met with an accident--I am very unfortunate in\nbeing here alone so late.  Why do you suspect me of doing wrong?\"\n\nShe spoke with unnecessary earnestness and agitation, and shrank back\nfrom me several paces.  I did my best to reassure her.\n\n\"Pray don't suppose that I have any idea of suspecting you,\" I said,\n\"or any other wish than to be of assistance to you, if I can.  I only\nwondered at your appearance in the road, because it seemed to me to be\nempty the instant before I saw you.\"\n\nShe turned, and pointed back to a place at the junction of the road to\nLondon and the road to Hampstead, where there was a gap in the hedge.\n\n\"I heard you coming,\" she said, \"and hid there to see what sort of man\nyou were, before I risked speaking.  I doubted and feared about it till\nyou passed; and then I was obliged to steal after you, and touch you.\"\n\nSteal after me and touch me? Why not call to me? Strange, to say the\nleast of it.\n\n\"May I trust you?\" she asked.  \"You don't think the worse of me because\nI have met with an accident?\" She stopped in confusion; shifted her bag\nfrom one hand to the other; and sighed bitterly.\n\nThe loneliness and helplessness of the woman touched me.  The natural\nimpulse to assist her and to spare her got the better of the judgment,\nthe caution, the worldly tact, which an older, wiser, and colder man\nmight have summoned to help him in this strange emergency.\n\n\"You may trust me for any harmless purpose,\" I said.  \"If it troubles\nyou to explain your strange situation to me, don't think of returning\nto the subject again.  I have no right to ask you for any explanations.\nTell me how I can help you; and if I can, I will.\"\n\n\"You are very kind, and I am very, very thankful to have met you.\" The\nfirst touch of womanly tenderness that I had heard from her trembled in\nher voice as she said the words; but no tears glistened in those large,\nwistfully attentive eyes of hers, which were still fixed on me.  \"I\nhave only been in London once before,\" she went on, more and more\nrapidly, \"and I know nothing about that side of it, yonder.  Can I get\na fly, or a carriage of any kind? Is it too late? I don't know.  If you\ncould show me where to get a fly--and if you will only promise not to\ninterfere with me, and to let me leave you, when and how I please--I\nhave a friend in London who will be glad to receive me--I want nothing\nelse--will you promise?\"\n\nShe looked anxiously up and down the road; shifted her bag again from\none hand to the other; repeated the words, \"Will you promise?\" and\nlooked hard in my face, with a pleading fear and confusion that it\ntroubled me to see.\n\nWhat could I do? Here was a stranger utterly and helplessly at my\nmercy--and that stranger a forlorn woman.  No house was near; no one\nwas passing whom I could consult; and no earthly right existed on my\npart to give me a power of control over her, even if I had known how to\nexercise it.  I trace these lines, self-distrustfully, with the shadows\nof after-events darkening the very paper I write on; and still I say,\nwhat could I do?\n\nWhat I did do, was to try and gain time by questioning her.  \"Are you\nsure that your friend in London will receive you at such a late hour as\nthis?\" I said.\n\n\"Quite sure.  Only say you will let me leave you when and how I\nplease--only say you won't interfere with me.  Will you promise?\"\n\nAs she repeated the words for the third time, she came close to me and\nlaid her hand, with a sudden gentle stealthiness, on my bosom--a thin\nhand; a cold hand (when I removed it with mine) even on that sultry\nnight.  Remember that I was young; remember that the hand which touched\nme was a woman's.\n\n\"Will you promise?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nOne word! The little familiar word that is on everybody's lips, every\nhour in the day.  Oh me! and I tremble, now, when I write it.\n\nWe set our faces towards London, and walked on together in the first\nstill hour of the new day--I, and this woman, whose name, whose\ncharacter, whose story, whose objects in life, whose very presence by\nmy side, at that moment, were fathomless mysteries to me.  It was like\na dream.  Was I Walter Hartright? Was this the well-known, uneventful\nroad, where holiday people strolled on Sundays? Had I really left,\nlittle more than an hour since, the quiet, decent, conventionally\ndomestic atmosphere of my mother's cottage? I was too bewildered--too\nconscious also of a vague sense of something like self-reproach--to\nspeak to my strange companion for some minutes.  It was her voice again\nthat first broke the silence between us.\n\n\"I want to ask you something,\" she said suddenly.  \"Do you know many\npeople in London?\"\n\n\"Yes, a great many.\"\n\n\"Many men of rank and title?\" There was an unmistakable tone of\nsuspicion in the strange question.  I hesitated about answering it.\n\n\"Some,\" I said, after a moment's silence.\n\n\"Many\"--she came to a full stop, and looked me searchingly in the\nface--\"many men of the rank of Baronet?\"\n\nToo much astonished to reply, I questioned her in my turn.\n\n\"Why do you ask?\"\n\n\"Because I hope, for my own sake, there is one Baronet that you don't\nknow.\"\n\n\"Will you tell me his name?\"\n\n\"I can't--I daren't--I forget myself when I mention it.\" She spoke\nloudly and almost fiercely, raised her clenched hand in the air, and\nshook it passionately; then, on a sudden, controlled herself again, and\nadded, in tones lowered to a whisper \"Tell me which of them YOU know.\"\n\nI could hardly refuse to humour her in such a trifle, and I mentioned\nthree names.  Two, the names of fathers of families whose daughters I\ntaught; one, the name of a bachelor who had once taken me a cruise in\nhis yacht, to make sketches for him.\n\n\"Ah! you DON'T know him,\" she said, with a sigh of relief.  \"Are you a\nman of rank and title yourself?\"\n\n\"Far from it.  I am only a drawing-master.\"\n\nAs the reply passed my lips--a little bitterly, perhaps--she took my\narm with the abruptness which characterised all her actions.\n\n\"Not a man of rank and title,\" she repeated to herself.  \"Thank God! I\nmay trust HIM.\"\n\nI had hitherto contrived to master my curiosity out of consideration\nfor my companion; but it got the better of me now.\n\n\"I am afraid you have serious reason to complain of some man of rank\nand title?\" I said.  \"I am afraid the baronet, whose name you are\nunwilling to mention to me, has done you some grievous wrong? Is he the\ncause of your being out here at this strange time of night?\"\n\n\"Don't ask me: don't make me talk of it,\" she answered.  \"I'm not fit\nnow.  I have been cruelly used and cruelly wronged.  You will be kinder\nthan ever, if you will walk on fast, and not speak to me.  I sadly want\nto quiet myself, if I can.\"\n\nWe moved forward again at a quick pace; and for half an hour, at least,\nnot a word passed on either side.  From time to time, being forbidden\nto make any more inquiries, I stole a look at her face. It was always\nthe same; the lips close shut, the brow frowning, the eyes looking\nstraight forward, eagerly and yet absently.  We had reached the first\nhouses, and were close on the new Wesleyan college, before her set\nfeatures relaxed and she spoke once more.\n\n\"Do you live in London?\" she said.\n\n\"Yes.\" As I answered, it struck me that she might have formed some\nintention of appealing to me for assistance or advice, and that I ought\nto spare her a possible disappointment by warning her of my approaching\nabsence from home.  So I added, \"But to-morrow I shall be away from\nLondon for some time.  I am going into the country.\"\n\n\"Where?\" she asked.  \"North or south?\"\n\n\"North--to Cumberland.\"\n\n\"Cumberland!\" she repeated the word tenderly.  \"Ah! wish I was going\nthere too.  I was once happy in Cumberland.\"\n\nI tried again to lift the veil that hung between this woman and me.\n\n\"Perhaps you were born,\" I said, \"in the beautiful Lake country.\"\n\n\"No,\" she answered.  \"I was born in Hampshire; but I once went to\nschool for a little while in Cumberland.  Lakes? I don't remember any\nlakes.  It's Limmeridge village, and Limmeridge House, I should like to\nsee again.\"\n\nIt was my turn now to stop suddenly.  In the excited state of my\ncuriosity, at that moment, the chance reference to Mr. Fairlie's place\nof residence, on the lips of my strange companion, staggered me with\nastonishment.\n\n\"Did you hear anybody calling after us?\" she asked, looking up and down\nthe road affrightedly, the instant I stopped.\n\n\"No, no.  I was only struck by the name of Limmeridge House.  I heard\nit mentioned by some Cumberland people a few days since.\"\n\n\"Ah! not my people.  Mrs. Fairlie is dead; and her husband is dead; and\ntheir little girl may be married and gone away by this time.  I can't\nsay who lives at Limmeridge now.  If any more are left there of that\nname, I only know I love them for Mrs. Fairlie's sake.\"\n\nShe seemed about to say more; but while she was speaking, we came\nwithin view of the turnpike, at the top of the Avenue Road.  Her hand\ntightened round my arm, and she looked anxiously at the gate before us.\n\n\"Is the turnpike man looking out?\" she asked.\n\nHe was not looking out; no one else was near the place when we passed\nthrough the gate.  The sight of the gas-lamps and houses seemed to\nagitate her, and to make her impatient.\n\n\"This is London,\" she said.  \"Do you see any carriage I can get? I am\ntired and frightened.  I want to shut myself in and be driven away.\"\n\nI explained to her that we must walk a little further to get to a\ncab-stand, unless we were fortunate enough to meet with an empty\nvehicle; and then tried to resume the subject of Cumberland.  It was\nuseless.  That idea of shutting herself in, and being driven away, had\nnow got full possession of her mind.  She could think and talk of\nnothing else.\n\nWe had hardly proceeded a third of the way down the Avenue Road when I\nsaw a cab draw up at a house a few doors below us, on the opposite side\nof the way.  A gentleman got out and let himself in at the garden door.\nI hailed the cab, as the driver mounted the box again.  When we crossed\nthe road, my companion's impatience increased to such an extent that\nshe almost forced me to run.\n\n\"It's so late,\" she said.  \"I am only in a hurry because it's so late.\"\n\n\"I can't take you, sir, if you're not going towards Tottenham Court\nRoad,\" said the driver civilly, when I opened the cab door. \"My horse\nis dead beat, and I can't get him no further than the stable.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes.  That will do for me.  I'm going that way--I'm going that\nway.\" She spoke with breathless eagerness, and pressed by me into the\ncab.\n\nI had assured myself that the man was sober as well as civil before I\nlet her enter the vehicle.  And now, when she was seated inside, I\nentreated her to let me see her set down safely at her destination.\n\n\"No, no, no,\" she said vehemently.  \"I'm quite safe, and quite happy\nnow.  If you are a gentleman, remember your promise.  Let him drive on\ntill I stop him.  Thank you--oh! thank you, thank you!\"\n\nMy hand was on the cab door.  She caught it in hers, kissed it, and\npushed it away.  The cab drove off at the same moment--I started into\nthe road, with some vague idea of stopping it again, I hardly knew\nwhy--hesitated from dread of frightening and distressing her--called,\nat last, but not loudly enough to attract the driver's attention.  The\nsound of the wheels grew fainter in the distance--the cab melted into\nthe black shadows on the road--the woman in white was gone.\n\n\nTen minutes or more had passed.  I was still on the same side of the\nway; now mechanically walking forward a few paces; now stopping again\nabsently.  At one moment I found myself doubting the reality of my own\nadventure; at another I was perplexed and distressed by an uneasy sense\nof having done wrong, which yet left me confusedly ignorant of how I\ncould have done right.  I hardly knew where I was going, or what I\nmeant to do next; I was conscious of nothing but the confusion of my\nown thoughts, when I was abruptly recalled to myself--awakened, I might\nalmost say--by the sound of rapidly approaching wheels close behind me.\n\nI was on the dark side of the road, in the thick shadow of some garden\ntrees, when I stopped to look round.  On the opposite and lighter side\nof the way, a short distance below me, a policeman was strolling along\nin the direction of the Regent's Park.\n\nThe carriage passed me--an open chaise driven by two men.\n\n\"Stop!\" cried one.  \"There's a policeman.  Let's ask him.\"\n\nThe horse was instantly pulled up, a few yards beyond the dark place\nwhere I stood.\n\n\"Policeman!\" cried the first speaker.  \"Have you seen a woman pass this\nway?\"\n\n\"What sort of woman, sir?\"\n\n\"A woman in a lavender-coloured gown----\"\n\n\"No, no,\" interposed the second man.  \"The clothes we gave her were\nfound on her bed.  She must have gone away in the clothes she wore when\nshe came to us.  In white, policeman.  A woman in white.\"\n\n\"I haven't seen her, sir.\"\n\n\"If you or any of your men meet with the woman, stop her, and send her\nin careful keeping to that address.  I'll pay all expenses, and a fair\nreward into the bargain.\"\n\nThe policeman looked at the card that was handed down to him.\n\n\"Why are we to stop her, sir? What has she done?\"\n\n\"Done! She has escaped from my Asylum.  Don't forget; a woman in white.\nDrive on.\"\n\n\n\nV\n\n\"She has escaped from my Asylum!\"\n\nI cannot say with truth that the terrible inference which those words\nsuggested flashed upon me like a new revelation.  Some of the strange\nquestions put to me by the woman in white, after my ill-considered\npromise to leave her free to act as she pleased, had suggested the\nconclusion either that she was naturally flighty and unsettled, or that\nsome recent shock of terror had disturbed the balance of her faculties.\nBut the idea of absolute insanity which we all associate with the very\nname of an Asylum, had, I can honestly declare, never occurred to me,\nin connection with her.  I had seen nothing, in her language or her\nactions, to justify it at the time; and even with the new light thrown\non her by the words which the stranger had addressed to the policeman,\nI could see nothing to justify it now.\n\nWhat had I done? Assisted the victim of the most horrible of all false\nimprisonments to escape; or cast loose on the wide world of London an\nunfortunate creature, whose actions it was my duty, and every man's\nduty, mercifully to control?  I turned sick at heart when the question\noccurred to me, and when I felt self-reproachfully that it was asked\ntoo late.\n\nIn the disturbed state of my mind, it was useless to think of going to\nbed, when I at last got back to my chambers in Clement's Inn.  Before\nmany hours elapsed it would be necessary to start on my journey to\nCumberland.  I sat down and tried, first to sketch, then to read--but\nthe woman in white got between me and my pencil, between me and my\nbook.  Had the forlorn creature come to any harm? That was my first\nthought, though I shrank selfishly from confronting it.  Other thoughts\nfollowed, on which it was less harrowing to dwell.  Where had she\nstopped the cab? What had become of her now? Had she been traced and\ncaptured by the men in the chaise? Or was she still capable of\ncontrolling her own actions; and were we two following our widely\nparted roads towards one point in the mysterious future, at which we\nwere to meet once more?\n\nIt was a relief when the hour came to lock my door, to bid farewell to\nLondon pursuits, London pupils, and London friends, and to be in\nmovement again towards new interests and a new life. Even the bustle\nand confusion at the railway terminus, so wearisome and bewildering at\nother times, roused me and did me good.\n\n\n\nMy travelling instructions directed me to go to Carlisle, and then to\ndiverge by a branch railway which ran in the direction of the coast.\nAs a misfortune to begin with, our engine broke down between Lancaster\nand Carlisle.  The delay occasioned by this accident caused me to be\ntoo late for the branch train, by which I was to have gone on\nimmediately.  I had to wait some hours; and when a later train finally\ndeposited me at the nearest station to Limmeridge House, it was past\nten, and the night was so dark that I could hardly see my way to the\npony-chaise which Mr. Fairlie had ordered to be in waiting for me.\n\nThe driver was evidently discomposed by the lateness of my arrival.  He\nwas in that state of highly respectful sulkiness which is peculiar to\nEnglish servants.  We drove away slowly through the darkness in perfect\nsilence.  The roads were bad, and the dense obscurity of the night\nincreased the difficulty of getting over the ground quickly.  It was,\nby my watch, nearly an hour and a half from the time of our leaving the\nstation before I heard the sound of the sea in the distance, and the\ncrunch of our wheels on a smooth gravel drive.  We had passed one gate\nbefore entering the drive, and we passed another before we drew up at\nthe house.  I was received by a solemn man-servant out of livery, was\ninformed that the family had retired for the night, and was then led\ninto a large and lofty room where my supper was awaiting me, in a\nforlorn manner, at one extremity of a lonesome mahogany wilderness of\ndining-table.\n\nI was too tired and out of spirits to eat or drink much, especially\nwith the solemn servant waiting on me as elaborately as if a small\ndinner party had arrived at the house instead of a solitary man.  In a\nquarter of an hour I was ready to be taken up to my bedchamber.  The\nsolemn servant conducted me into a prettily furnished room--said,\n\"Breakfast at nine o'clock, sir\"--looked all round him to see that\neverything was in its proper place, and noiselessly withdrew.\n\n\"What shall I see in my dreams to-night?\" I thought to myself, as I put\nout the candle; \"the woman in white? or the unknown inhabitants of this\nCumberland mansion?\" It was a strange sensation to be sleeping in the\nhouse, like a friend of the family, and yet not to know one of the\ninmates, even by sight!\n\n\n\nVI\n\nWhen I rose the next morning and drew up my blind, the sea opened\nbefore me joyously under the broad August sunlight, and the distant\ncoast of Scotland fringed the horizon with its lines of melting blue.\n\nThe view was such a surprise, and such a change to me, after my weary\nLondon experience of brick and mortar landscape, that I seemed to burst\ninto a new life and a new set of thoughts the moment I looked at it.  A\nconfused sensation of having suddenly lost my familiarity with the\npast, without acquiring any additional clearness of idea in reference\nto the present or the future, took possession of my mind.\nCircumstances that were but a few days old faded back in my memory, as\nif they had happened months and months since.  Pesca's quaint\nannouncement of the means by which he had procured me my present\nemployment; the farewell evening I had passed with my mother and\nsister; even my mysterious adventure on the way home from\nHampstead--had all become like events which might have occurred at some\nformer epoch of my existence.  Although the woman in white was still in\nmy mind, the image of her seemed to have grown dull and faint already.\n\nA little before nine o'clock, I descended to the ground-floor of the\nhouse.  The solemn man-servant of the night before met me wandering\namong the passages, and compassionately showed me the way to the\nbreakfast-room.\n\nMy first glance round me, as the man opened the door, disclosed a\nwell-furnished breakfast-table, standing in the middle of a long room,\nwith many windows in it.  I looked from the table to the window\nfarthest from me, and saw a lady standing at it, with her back turned\ntowards me.  The instant my eyes rested on her, I was struck by the\nrare beauty of her form, and by the unaffected grace of her attitude.\nHer figure was tall, yet not too tall; comely and well-developed, yet\nnot fat; her head set on her shoulders with an easy, pliant firmness;\nher waist, perfection in the eyes of a man, for it occupied its natural\nplace, it filled out its natural circle, it was visibly and\ndelightfully undeformed by stays.  She had not heard my entrance into\nthe room; and I allowed myself the luxury of admiring her for a few\nmoments, before I moved one of the chairs near me, as the least\nembarrassing means of attracting her attention.  She turned towards me\nimmediately. The easy elegance of every movement of her limbs and body\nas soon as she began to advance from the far end of the room, set me in\na flutter of expectation to see her face clearly.  She left the\nwindow--and I said to myself, The lady is dark.  She moved forward a\nfew steps--and I said to myself, The lady is young.  She approached\nnearer--and I said to myself (with a sense of surprise which words fail\nme to express), The lady is ugly!\n\nNever was the old conventional maxim, that Nature cannot err, more\nflatly contradicted--never was the fair promise of a lovely figure more\nstrangely and startlingly belied by the face and head that crowned it.\nThe lady's complexion was almost swarthy, and the dark down on her\nupper lip was almost a moustache.  She had a large, firm, masculine\nmouth and jaw; prominent, piercing, resolute brown eyes; and thick,\ncoal-black hair, growing unusually low down on her forehead.  Her\nexpression--bright, frank, and intelligent--appeared, while she was\nsilent, to be altogether wanting in those feminine attractions of\ngentleness and pliability, without which the beauty of the handsomest\nwoman alive is beauty incomplete.  To see such a face as this set on\nshoulders that a sculptor would have longed to model--to be charmed by\nthe modest graces of action through which the symmetrical limbs\nbetrayed their beauty when they moved, and then to be almost repelled\nby the masculine form and masculine look of the features in which the\nperfectly shaped figure ended--was to feel a sensation oddly akin to\nthe helpless discomfort familiar to us all in sleep, when we recognise\nyet cannot reconcile the anomalies and contradictions of a dream.\n\n\"Mr. Hartright?\" said the lady interrogatively, her dark face lighting\nup with a smile, and softening and growing womanly the moment she began\nto speak.  \"We resigned all hope of you last night, and went to bed as\nusual.  Accept my apologies for our apparent want of attention; and\nallow me to introduce myself as one of your pupils.  Shall we shake\nhands? I suppose we must come to it sooner or later--and why not\nsooner?\"\n\nThese odd words of welcome were spoken in a clear, ringing, pleasant\nvoice.  The offered hand--rather large, but beautifully formed--was\ngiven to me with the easy, unaffected self-reliance of a highly-bred\nwoman.  We sat down together at the breakfast-table in as cordial and\ncustomary a manner as if we had known each other for years, and had met\nat Limmeridge House to talk over old times by previous appointment.\n\n\"I hope you come here good-humouredly determined to make the best of\nyour position,\" continued the lady.  \"You will have to begin this\nmorning by putting up with no other company at breakfast than mine.  My\nsister is in her own room, nursing that essentially feminine malady, a\nslight headache; and her old governess, Mrs. Vesey, is charitably\nattending on her with restorative tea.  My uncle, Mr. Fairlie, never\njoins us at any of our meals: he is an invalid, and keeps bachelor\nstate in his own apartments.  There is nobody else in the house but me.\nTwo young ladies have been staying here, but they went away yesterday,\nin despair; and no wonder.  All through their visit (in consequence of\nMr. Fairlie's invalid condition) we produced no such convenience in the\nhouse as a flirtable, danceable, small-talkable creature of the male\nsex; and the consequence was, we did nothing but quarrel, especially at\ndinner-time.  How can you expect four women to dine together alone\nevery day, and not quarrel? We are such fools, we can't entertain each\nother at table.  You see I don't think much of my own sex, Mr.\nHartright--which will you have, tea or coffee?--no woman does think\nmuch of her own sex, although few of them confess it as freely as I do.\nDear me, you look puzzled.  Why? Are you wondering what you will have\nfor breakfast? or are you surprised at my careless way of talking? In\nthe first case, I advise you, as a friend, to have nothing to do with\nthat cold ham at your elbow, and to wait till the omelette comes in.\nIn the second case, I will give you some tea to compose your spirits,\nand do all a woman can (which is very little, by-the-bye) to hold my\ntongue.\"\n\nShe handed me my cup of tea, laughing gaily.  Her light flow of talk,\nand her lively familiarity of manner with a total stranger, were\naccompanied by an unaffected naturalness and an easy inborn confidence\nin herself and her position, which would have secured her the respect\nof the most audacious man breathing.  While it was impossible to be\nformal and reserved in her company, it was more than impossible to take\nthe faintest vestige of a liberty with her, even in thought.  I felt\nthis instinctively, even while I caught the infection of her own bright\ngaiety of spirits--even while I did my best to answer her in her own\nfrank, lively way.\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" she said, when I had suggested the only explanation I could\noffer, to account for my perplexed looks, \"I understand. You are such a\nperfect stranger in the house, that you are puzzled by my familiar\nreferences to the worthy inhabitants.  Natural enough: I ought to have\nthought of it before.  At any rate, I can set it right now.  Suppose I\nbegin with myself, so as to get done with that part of the subject as\nsoon as possible? My name is Marian Halcombe; and I am as inaccurate as\nwomen usually are, in calling Mr. Fairlie my uncle, and Miss Fairlie my\nsister.  My mother was twice married: the first time to Mr. Halcombe,\nmy father; the second time to Mr. Fairlie, my half-sister's father.\nExcept that we are both orphans, we are in every respect as unlike each\nother as possible.  My father was a poor man, and Miss Fairlie's father\nwas a rich man.  I have got nothing, and she has a fortune.  I am dark\nand ugly, and she is fair and pretty. Everybody thinks me crabbed and\nodd (with perfect justice); and everybody thinks her sweet-tempered and\ncharming (with more justice still).  In short, she is an angel; and I\nam----  Try some of that marmalade, Mr. Hartright, and finish the\nsentence, in the name of female propriety, for yourself.  What am I to\ntell you about Mr. Fairlie? Upon my honour, I hardly know.  He is sure\nto send for you after breakfast, and you can study him for yourself. In\nthe meantime, I may inform you, first, that he is the late Mr.\nFairlie's younger brother; secondly, that he is a single man; and\nthirdly, that he is Miss Fairlie's guardian.  I won't live without her,\nand she can't live without me; and that is how I come to be at\nLimmeridge House.  My sister and I are honestly fond of each other;\nwhich, you will say, is perfectly unaccountable, under the\ncircumstances, and I quite agree with you--but so it is.  You must\nplease both of us, Mr. Hartright, or please neither of us: and, what is\nstill more trying, you will be thrown entirely upon our society.  Mrs.\nVesey is an excellent person, who possesses all the cardinal virtues,\nand counts for nothing; and Mr. Fairlie is too great an invalid to be a\ncompanion for anybody.  I don't know what is the matter with him, and\nthe doctors don't know what is the matter with him, and he doesn't know\nhimself what is the matter with him.  We all say it's on the nerves,\nand we none of us know what we mean when we say it.  However, I advise\nyou to humour his little peculiarities, when you see him to-day.\nAdmire his collection of coins, prints, and water-colour drawings, and\nyou will win his heart.  Upon my word, if you can be contented with a\nquiet country life, I don't see why you should not get on very well\nhere.  From breakfast to lunch, Mr. Fairlie's drawings will occupy you.\nAfter lunch, Miss Fairlie and I shoulder our sketch-books, and go out\nto misrepresent Nature, under your directions. Drawing is her favourite\nwhim, mind, not mine.  Women can't draw--their minds are too flighty,\nand their eyes are too inattentive. No matter--my sister likes it; so I\nwaste paint and spoil paper, for her sake, as composedly as any woman\nin England.  As for the evenings, I think we can help you through them.\nMiss Fairlie plays delightfully.  For my own poor part, I don't know\none note of music from the other; but I can match you at chess,\nbackgammon, ecarte, and (with the inevitable female drawbacks) even at\nbilliards as well.  What do you think of the programme? Can you\nreconcile yourself to our quiet, regular life? or do you mean to be\nrestless, and secretly thirst for change and adventure, in the humdrum\natmosphere of Limmeridge House?\"\n\nShe had run on thus far, in her gracefully bantering way, with no other\ninterruptions on my part than the unimportant replies which politeness\nrequired of me.  The turn of the expression, however, in her last\nquestion, or rather the one chance word, \"adventure,\" lightly as it\nfell from her lips, recalled my thoughts to my meeting with the woman\nin white, and urged me to discover the connection which the stranger's\nown reference to Mrs. Fairlie informed me must once have existed\nbetween the nameless fugitive from the Asylum, and the former mistress\nof Limmeridge House.\n\n\"Even if I were the most restless of mankind,\" I said, \"I should be in\nno danger of thirsting after adventures for some time to come.  The\nvery night before I arrived at this house, I met with an adventure; and\nthe wonder and excitement of it, I can assure you, Miss Halcombe, will\nlast me for the whole term of my stay in Cumberland, if not for a much\nlonger period.\"\n\n\"You don't say so, Mr. Hartright! May I hear it?\"\n\n\"You have a claim to hear it.  The chief person in the adventure was a\ntotal stranger to me, and may perhaps be a total stranger to you; but\nshe certainly mentioned the name of the late Mrs. Fairlie in terms of\nthe sincerest gratitude and regard.\"\n\n\"Mentioned my mother's name! You interest me indescribably.  Pray go\non.\"\n\nI at once related the circumstances under which I had met the woman in\nwhite, exactly as they had occurred; and I repeated what she had said\nto me about Mrs. Fairlie and Limmeridge House, word for word.\n\nMiss Halcombe's bright resolute eyes looked eagerly into mine, from the\nbeginning of the narrative to the end.  Her face expressed vivid\ninterest and astonishment, but nothing more.  She was evidently as far\nfrom knowing of any clue to the mystery as I was myself.\n\n\"Are you quite sure of those words referring to my mother?\" she asked.\n\n\"Quite sure,\" I replied.  \"Whoever she may be, the woman was once at\nschool in the village of Limmeridge, was treated with especial kindness\nby Mrs. Fairlie, and, in grateful remembrance of that kindness, feels\nan affectionate interest in all surviving members of the family.  She\nknew that Mrs. Fairlie and her husband were both dead; and she spoke of\nMiss Fairlie as if they had known each other when they were children.\"\n\n\"You said, I think, that she denied belonging to this place?\"\n\n\"Yes, she told me she came from Hampshire.\"\n\n\"And you entirely failed to find out her name?\"\n\n\"Entirely.\"\n\n\"Very strange.  I think you were quite justified, Mr. Hartright, in\ngiving the poor creature her liberty, for she seems to have done\nnothing in your presence to show herself unfit to enjoy it. But I wish\nyou had been a little more resolute about finding out her name.  We\nmust really clear up this mystery, in some way.  You had better not\nspeak of it yet to Mr. Fairlie, or to my sister. They are both of them,\nI am certain, quite as ignorant of who the woman is, and of what her\npast history in connection with us can be, as I am myself.  But they\nare also, in widely different ways, rather nervous and sensitive; and\nyou would only fidget one and alarm the other to no purpose.  As for\nmyself, I am all aflame with curiosity, and I devote my whole energies\nto the business of discovery from this moment.  When my mother came\nhere, after her second marriage, she certainly established the village\nschool just as it exists at the present time.  But the old teachers are\nall dead, or gone elsewhere; and no enlightenment is to be hoped for\nfrom that quarter.  The only other alternative I can think of----\"\n\nAt this point we were interrupted by the entrance of the servant, with\na message from Mr. Fairlie, intimating that he would be glad to see me,\nas soon as I had done breakfast.\n\n\"Wait in the hall,\" said Miss Halcombe, answering the servant for me,\nin her quick, ready way.  \"Mr. Hartright will come out directly.  I was\nabout to say,\" she went on, addressing me again, \"that my sister and I\nhave a large collection of my mother's letters, addressed to my father\nand to hers.  In the absence of any other means of getting information,\nI will pass the morning in looking over my mother's correspondence with\nMr. Fairlie.  He was fond of London, and was constantly away from his\ncountry home; and she was accustomed, at such times, to write and\nreport to him how things went on at Limmeridge.  Her letters are full\nof references to the school in which she took so strong an interest;\nand I think it more than likely that I may have discovered something\nwhen we meet again.  The luncheon hour is two, Mr. Hartright.  I shall\nhave the pleasure of introducing you to my sister by that time, and we\nwill occupy the afternoon in driving round the neighbourhood and\nshowing you all our pet points of view.  Till two o'clock, then,\nfarewell.\"\n\nShe nodded to me with the lively grace, the delightful refinement of\nfamiliarity, which characterised all that she did and all that she\nsaid; and disappeared by a door at the lower end of the room. As soon\nas she had left me, I turned my steps towards the hall, and followed\nthe servant, on my way, for the first time, to the presence of Mr.\nFairlie.\n\n\n\nVII\n\nMy conductor led me upstairs into a passage which took us back to the\nbedchamber in which I had slept during the past night; and opening the\ndoor next to it, begged me to look in.\n\n\"I have my master's orders to show you your own sitting-room, sir,\"\nsaid the man, \"and to inquire if you approve of the situation and the\nlight.\"\n\nI must have been hard to please, indeed, if I had not approved of the\nroom, and of everything about it.  The bow-window looked out on the\nsame lovely view which I had admired, in the morning, from my bedroom.\nThe furniture was the perfection of luxury and beauty; the table in the\ncentre was bright with gaily bound books, elegant conveniences for\nwriting, and beautiful flowers; the second table, near the window, was\ncovered with all the necessary materials for mounting water-colour\ndrawings, and had a little easel attached to it, which I could expand\nor fold up at will; the walls were hung with gaily tinted chintz; and\nthe floor was spread with Indian matting in maize-colour and red.  It\nwas the prettiest and most luxurious little sitting-room I had ever\nseen; and I admired it with the warmest enthusiasm.\n\nThe solemn servant was far too highly trained to betray the slightest\nsatisfaction.  He bowed with icy deference when my terms of eulogy were\nall exhausted, and silently opened the door for me to go out into the\npassage again.\n\nWe turned a corner, and entered a long second passage, ascended a short\nflight of stairs at the end, crossed a small circular upper hall, and\nstopped in front of a door covered with dark baize.  The servant opened\nthis door, and led me on a few yards to a second; opened that also, and\ndisclosed two curtains of pale sea-green silk hanging before us; raised\none of them noiselessly; softly uttered the words, \"Mr. Hartright,\" and\nleft me.\n\nI found myself in a large, lofty room, with a magnificent carved\nceiling, and with a carpet over the floor, so thick and soft that it\nfelt like piles of velvet under my feet.  One side of the room was\noccupied by a long book-case of some rare inlaid wood that was quite\nnew to me.  It was not more than six feet high, and the top was adorned\nwith statuettes in marble, ranged at regular distances one from the\nother.  On the opposite side stood two antique cabinets; and between\nthem, and above them, hung a picture of the Virgin and Child, protected\nby glass, and bearing Raphael's name on the gilt tablet at the bottom\nof the frame.  On my right hand and on my left, as I stood inside the\ndoor, were chiffoniers and little stands in buhl and marquetterie,\nloaded with figures in Dresden china, with rare vases, ivory ornaments,\nand toys and curiosities that sparkled at all points with gold, silver,\nand precious stones.  At the lower end of the room, opposite to me, the\nwindows were concealed and the sunlight was tempered by large blinds of\nthe same pale sea-green colour as the curtains over the door.  The\nlight thus produced was deliciously soft, mysterious, and subdued; it\nfell equally upon all the objects in the room; it helped to intensify\nthe deep silence, and the air of profound seclusion that possessed the\nplace; and it surrounded, with an appropriate halo of repose, the\nsolitary figure of the master of the house, leaning back, listlessly\ncomposed, in a large easy-chair, with a reading-easel fastened on one\nof its arms, and a little table on the other.\n\nIf a man's personal appearance, when he is out of his dressing-room,\nand when he has passed forty, can be accepted as a safe guide to his\ntime of life--which is more than doubtful--Mr. Fairlie's age, when I\nsaw him, might have been reasonably computed at over fifty and under\nsixty years.  His beardless face was thin, worn, and transparently\npale, but not wrinkled; his nose was high and hooked; his eyes were of\na dim greyish blue, large, prominent, and rather red round the rims of\nthe eyelids; his hair was scanty, soft to look at, and of that light\nsandy colour which is the last to disclose its own changes towards\ngrey.  He was dressed in a dark frock-coat, of some substance much\nthinner than cloth, and in waistcoat and trousers of spotless white.\nHis feet were effeminately small, and were clad in buff-coloured silk\nstockings, and little womanish bronze-leather slippers.  Two rings\nadorned his white delicate hands, the value of which even my\ninexperienced observation detected to be all but priceless.  Upon the\nwhole, he had a frail, languidly-fretful, over-refined look--something\nsingularly and unpleasantly delicate in its association with a man,\nand, at the same time, something which could by no possibility have\nlooked natural and appropriate if it had been transferred to the\npersonal appearance of a woman.  My morning's experience of Miss\nHalcombe had predisposed me to be pleased with everybody in the house;\nbut my sympathies shut themselves up resolutely at the first sight of\nMr. Fairlie.\n\nOn approaching nearer to him, I discovered that he was not so entirely\nwithout occupation as I had at first supposed.  Placed amid the other\nrare and beautiful objects on a large round table near him, was a dwarf\ncabinet in ebony and silver, containing coins of all shapes and sizes,\nset out in little drawers lined with dark purple velvet.  One of these\ndrawers lay on the small table attached to his chair; and near it were\nsome tiny jeweller's brushes, a wash-leather \"stump,\" and a little\nbottle of liquid, all waiting to be used in various ways for the\nremoval of any accidental impurities which might be discovered on the\ncoins.  His frail white fingers were listlessly toying with something\nwhich looked, to my uninstructed eyes, like a dirty pewter medal with\nragged edges, when I advanced within a respectful distance of his\nchair, and stopped to make my bow.\n\n\"So glad to possess you at Limmeridge, Mr. Hartright,\" he said in a\nquerulous, croaking voice, which combined, in anything but an agreeable\nmanner, a discordantly high tone with a drowsily languid utterance.\n\"Pray sit down.  And don't trouble yourself to move the chair, please.\nIn the wretched state of my nerves, movement of any kind is exquisitely\npainful to me.  Have you seen your studio? Will it do?\"\n\n\"I have just come from seeing the room, Mr. Fairlie; and I assure\nyou----\"\n\nHe stopped me in the middle of the sentence, by closing his eyes, and\nholding up one of his white hands imploringly.  I paused in\nastonishment; and the croaking voice honoured me with this explanation--\n\n\"Pray excuse me.  But could you contrive to speak in a lower key? In\nthe wretched state of my nerves, loud sound of any kind is\nindescribable torture to me.  You will pardon an invalid? I only say to\nyou what the lamentable state of my health obliges me to say to\neverybody.  Yes.  And you really like the room?\"\n\n\"I could wish for nothing prettier and nothing more comfortable,\" I\nanswered, dropping my voice, and beginning to discover already that Mr.\nFairlie's selfish affectation and Mr. Fairlie's wretched nerves meant\none and the same thing.\n\n\"So glad.  You will find your position here, Mr. Hartright, properly\nrecognised.  There is none of the horrid English barbarity of feeling\nabout the social position of an artist in this house.  So much of my\nearly life has been passed abroad, that I have quite cast my insular\nskin in that respect.  I wish I could say the same of the\ngentry--detestable word, but I suppose I must use it--of the gentry in\nthe neighbourhood. They are sad Goths in Art, Mr. Hartright.  People, I\ndo assure you, who would have opened their eyes in astonishment, if\nthey had seen Charles the Fifth pick up Titian's brush for him.  Do you\nmind putting this tray of coins back in the cabinet, and giving me the\nnext one to it? In the wretched state of my nerves, exertion of any\nkind is unspeakably disagreeable to me.  Yes.  Thank you.\"\n\nAs a practical commentary on the liberal social theory which he had\njust favoured me by illustrating, Mr. Fairlie's cool request rather\namused me.  I put back one drawer and gave him the other, with all\npossible politeness.  He began trifling with the new set of coins and\nthe little brushes immediately; languidly looking at them and admiring\nthem all the time he was speaking to me.\n\n\"A thousand thanks and a thousand excuses.  Do you like coins? Yes.  So\nglad we have another taste in common besides our taste for Art.  Now,\nabout the pecuniary arrangements between us--do tell me--are they\nsatisfactory?\"\n\n\"Most satisfactory, Mr. Fairlie.\"\n\n\"So glad.  And--what next? Ah! I remember.  Yes.  In reference to the\nconsideration which you are good enough to accept for giving me the\nbenefit of your accomplishments in art, my steward will wait on you at\nthe end of the first week, to ascertain your wishes.  And--what next?\nCurious, is it not? I had a great deal more to say: and I appear to\nhave quite forgotten it.  Do you mind touching the bell? In that\ncorner.  Yes.  Thank you.\"\n\nI rang; and a new servant noiselessly made his appearance--a foreigner,\nwith a set smile and perfectly brushed hair--a valet every inch of him.\n\n\"Louis,\" said Mr. Fairlie, dreamily dusting the tips of his fingers\nwith one of the tiny brushes for the coins, \"I made some entries in my\ntablettes this morning.  Find my tablettes.  A thousand pardons, Mr.\nHartright, I'm afraid I bore you.\"\n\nAs he wearily closed his eyes again, before I could answer, and as he\ndid most assuredly bore me, I sat silent, and looked up at the Madonna\nand Child by Raphael.  In the meantime, the valet left the room, and\nreturned shortly with a little ivory book.  Mr. Fairlie, after first\nrelieving himself by a gentle sigh, let the book drop open with one\nhand, and held up the tiny brush with the other, as a sign to the\nservant to wait for further orders.\n\n\"Yes.  Just so!\" said Mr. Fairlie, consulting the tablettes. \"Louis,\ntake down that portfolio.\" He pointed, as he spoke, to several\nportfolios placed near the window, on mahogany stands. \"No.  Not the\none with the green back--that contains my Rembrandt etchings, Mr.\nHartright.  Do you like etchings? Yes? So glad we have another taste in\ncommon.  The portfolio with the red back, Louis.  Don't drop it! You\nhave no idea of the tortures I should suffer, Mr. Hartright, if Louis\ndropped that portfolio.  Is it safe on the chair? Do YOU think it safe,\nMr. Hartright? Yes? So glad.  Will you oblige me by looking at the\ndrawings, if you really think they are quite safe.  Louis, go away.\nWhat an ass you are.  Don't you see me holding the tablettes? Do you\nsuppose I want to hold them? Then why not relieve me of the tablettes\nwithout being told? A thousand pardons, Mr. Hartright; servants are\nsuch asses, are they not? Do tell me--what do you think of the\ndrawings? They have come from a sale in a shocking state--I thought\nthey smelt of horrid dealers' and brokers' fingers when I looked at\nthem last.  CAN you undertake them?\"\n\nAlthough my nerves were not delicate enough to detect the odour of\nplebeian fingers which had offended Mr. Fairlie's nostrils, my taste\nwas sufficiently educated to enable me to appreciate the value of the\ndrawings, while I turned them over.  They were, for the most part,\nreally fine specimens of English water-colour art; and they had\ndeserved much better treatment at the hands of their former possessor\nthan they appeared to have received.\n\n\"The drawings,\" I answered, \"require careful straining and mounting;\nand, in my opinion, they are well worth----\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon,\" interposed Mr. Fairlie.  \"Do you mind my closing\nmy eyes while you speak? Even this light is too much for them.  Yes?\"\n\n\"I was about to say that the drawings are well worth all the time and\ntrouble----\"\n\nMr. Fairlie suddenly opened his eyes again, and rolled them with an\nexpression of helpless alarm in the direction of the window.\n\n\"I entreat you to excuse me, Mr. Hartright,\" he said in a feeble\nflutter.  \"But surely I hear some horrid children in the garden--my\nprivate garden--below?\"\n\n\"I can't say, Mr. Fairlie.  I heard nothing myself.\"\n\n\"Oblige me--you have been so very good in humouring my poor\nnerves--oblige me by lifting up a corner of the blind.  Don't let the\nsun in on me, Mr. Hartright! Have you got the blind up? Yes? Then will\nyou be so very kind as to look into the garden and make quite sure?\"\n\nI complied with this new request.  The garden was carefully walled in,\nall round.  Not a human creature, large or small, appeared in any part\nof the sacred seclusion.  I reported that gratifying fact to Mr.\nFairlie.\n\n\"A thousand thanks.  My fancy, I suppose.  There are no children, thank\nHeaven, in the house; but the servants (persons born without nerves)\nwill encourage the children from the village.  Such brats--oh, dear me,\nsuch brats! Shall I confess it, Mr. Hartright?--I sadly want a reform\nin the construction of children.  Nature's only idea seems to be to\nmake them machines for the production of incessant noise.  Surely our\ndelightful Raffaello's conception is infinitely preferable?\"\n\nHe pointed to the picture of the Madonna, the upper part of which\nrepresented the conventional cherubs of Italian Art, celestially\nprovided with sitting accommodation for their chins, on balloons of\nbuff-coloured cloud.\n\n\"Quite a model family!\" said Mr. Fairlie, leering at the cherubs. \"Such\nnice round faces, and such nice soft wings, and--nothing else.  No\ndirty little legs to run about on, and no noisy little lungs to scream\nwith.  How immeasurably superior to the existing construction! I will\nclose my eyes again, if you will allow me. And you really can manage\nthe drawings? So glad.  Is there anything else to settle? if there is,\nI think I have forgotten it. Shall we ring for Louis again?\"\n\nBeing, by this time, quite as anxious, on my side, as Mr. Fairlie\nevidently was on his, to bring the interview to a speedy conclusion, I\nthought I would try to render the summoning of the servant unnecessary,\nby offering the requisite suggestion on my own responsibility.\n\n\"The only point, Mr. Fairlie, that remains to be discussed,\" I said,\n\"refers, I think, to the instruction in sketching which I am engaged to\ncommunicate to the two young ladies.\"\n\n\"Ah! just so,\" said Mr. Fairlie.  \"I wish I felt strong enough to go\ninto that part of the arrangement--but I don't.  The ladies who profit\nby your kind services, Mr. Hartright, must settle, and decide, and so\non, for themselves.  My niece is fond of your charming art.  She knows\njust enough about it to be conscious of her own sad defects.  Please\ntake pains with her.  Yes.  Is there anything else? No.  We quite\nunderstand each other--don't we? I have no right to detain you any\nlonger from your delightful pursuit--have I? So pleasant to have\nsettled everything--such a sensible relief to have done business.  Do\nyou mind ringing for Louis to carry the portfolio to your own room?\"\n\n\"I will carry it there myself, Mr. Fairlie, if you will allow me.\"\n\n\"Will you really? Are you strong enough? How nice to be so strong! Are\nyou sure you won't drop it? So glad to possess you at Limmeridge, Mr.\nHartright.  I am such a sufferer that I hardly dare hope to enjoy much\nof your society.  Would you mind taking great pains not to let the\ndoors bang, and not to drop the portfolio? Thank you.  Gently with the\ncurtains, please--the slightest noise from them goes through me like a\nknife.  Yes. GOOD morning!\"\n\nWhen the sea-green curtains were closed, and when the two baize doors\nwere shut behind me, I stopped for a moment in the little circular hall\nbeyond, and drew a long, luxurious breath of relief. It was like coming\nto the surface of the water after deep diving, to find myself once more\non the outside of Mr. Fairlie's room.\n\nAs soon as I was comfortably established for the morning in my pretty\nlittle studio, the first resolution at which I arrived was to turn my\nsteps no more in the direction of the apartments occupied by the master\nof the house, except in the very improbable event of his honouring me\nwith a special invitation to pay him another visit.  Having settled\nthis satisfactory plan of future conduct in reference to Mr. Fairlie, I\nsoon recovered the serenity of temper of which my employer's haughty\nfamiliarity and impudent politeness had, for the moment, deprived me.\nThe remaining hours of the morning passed away pleasantly enough, in\nlooking over the drawings, arranging them in sets, trimming their\nragged edges, and accomplishing the other necessary preparations in\nanticipation of the business of mounting them.  I ought, perhaps, to\nhave made more progress than this; but, as the luncheon-time drew near,\nI grew restless and unsettled, and felt unable to fix my attention on\nwork, even though that work was only of the humble manual kind.\n\nAt two o'clock I descended again to the breakfast-room, a little\nanxiously.  Expectations of some interest were connected with my\napproaching reappearance in that part of the house.  My introduction to\nMiss Fairlie was now close at hand; and, if Miss Halcombe's search\nthrough her mother's letters had produced the result which she\nanticipated, the time had come for clearing up the mystery of the woman\nin white.\n\n\n\nVIII\n\nWhen I entered the room, I found Miss Halcombe and an elderly lady\nseated at the luncheon-table.\n\nThe elderly lady, when I was presented to her, proved to be Miss\nFairlie's former governess, Mrs. Vesey, who had been briefly described\nto me by my lively companion at the breakfast-table, as possessed of\n\"all the cardinal virtues, and counting for nothing.\" I can do little\nmore than offer my humble testimony to the truthfulness of Miss\nHalcombe's sketch of the old lady's character.  Mrs. Vesey looked the\npersonification of human composure and female amiability.  A calm\nenjoyment of a calm existence beamed in drowsy smiles on her plump,\nplacid face.  Some of us rush through life, and some of us saunter\nthrough life. Mrs. Vesey SAT through life.  Sat in the house, early and\nlate; sat in the garden; sat in unexpected window-seats in passages;\nsat (on a camp-stool) when her friends tried to take her out walking;\nsat before she looked at anything, before she talked of anything,\nbefore she answered Yes, or No, to the commonest question--always with\nthe same serene smile on her lips, the same vacantly-attentive turn of\nthe head, the same snugly-comfortable position of her hands and arms,\nunder every possible change of domestic circumstances.  A mild, a\ncompliant, an unutterably tranquil and harmless old lady, who never by\nany chance suggested the idea that she had been actually alive since\nthe hour of her birth.  Nature has so much to do in this world, and is\nengaged in generating such a vast variety of co-existent productions,\nthat she must surely be now and then too flurried and confused to\ndistinguish between the different processes that she is carrying on at\nthe same time. Starting from this point of view, it will always remain\nmy private persuasion that Nature was absorbed in making cabbages when\nMrs. Vesey was born, and that the good lady suffered the consequences\nof a vegetable preoccupation in the mind of the Mother of us all.\n\n\"Now, Mrs. Vesey,\" said Miss Halcombe, looking brighter, sharper, and\nreadier than ever, by contrast with the undemonstrative old lady at her\nside, \"what will you have? A cutlet?\"\n\nMrs. Vesey crossed her dimpled hands on the edge of the table, smiled\nplacidly, and said, \"Yes, dear.\"\n\n\"What is that opposite Mr. Hartright? Boiled chicken, is it not? I\nthought you liked boiled chicken better than cutlet, Mrs. Vesey?\"\n\nMrs. Vesey took her dimpled hands off the edge of the table and crossed\nthem on her lap instead; nodded contemplatively at the boiled chicken,\nand said, \"Yes, dear.\"\n\n\"Well, but which will you have, to-day? Shall Mr. Hartright give you\nsome chicken? or shall I give you some cutlet?\"\n\nMrs. Vesey put one of her dimpled hands back again on the edge of the\ntable; hesitated drowsily, and said, \"Which you please, dear.\"\n\n\"Mercy on me! it's a question for your taste, my good lady, not for\nmine.  Suppose you have a little of both? and suppose you begin with\nthe chicken, because Mr. Hartright looks devoured by anxiety to carve\nfor you.\"\n\nMrs. Vesey put the other dimpled hand back on the edge of the table;\nbrightened dimly one moment; went out again the next; bowed obediently,\nand said, \"If you please, sir.\"\n\nSurely a mild, a compliant, an unutterably tranquil and harmless old\nlady! But enough, perhaps, for the present, of Mrs. Vesey.\n\n\nAll this time, there were no signs of Miss Fairlie.  We finished our\nluncheon; and still she never appeared.  Miss Halcombe, whose quick eye\nnothing escaped, noticed the looks that I cast, from time to time, in\nthe direction of the door.\n\n\"I understand you, Mr. Hartright,\" she said; \"you are wondering what\nhas become of your other pupil.  She has been downstairs, and has got\nover her headache; but has not sufficiently recovered her appetite to\njoin us at lunch.  If you will put yourself under my charge, I think I\ncan undertake to find her somewhere in the garden.\"\n\nShe took up a parasol lying on a chair near her, and led the way out,\nby a long window at the bottom of the room, which opened on to the\nlawn.  It is almost unnecessary to say that we left Mrs. Vesey still\nseated at the table, with her dimpled hands still crossed on the edge\nof it; apparently settled in that position for the rest of the\nafternoon.\n\nAs we crossed the lawn, Miss Halcombe looked at me significantly, and\nshook her head.\n\n\"That mysterious adventure of yours,\" she said, \"still remains involved\nin its own appropriate midnight darkness.  I have been all the morning\nlooking over my mother's letters, and I have made no discoveries yet.\nHowever, don't despair, Mr. Hartright.  This is a matter of curiosity;\nand you have got a woman for your ally. Under such conditions success\nis certain, sooner or later.  The letters are not exhausted.  I have\nthree packets still left, and you may confidently rely on my spending\nthe whole evening over them.\"\n\nHere, then, was one of my anticipations of the morning still\nunfulfilled.  I began to wonder, next, whether my introduction to Miss\nFairlie would disappoint the expectations that I had been forming of\nher since breakfast-time.\n\n\"And how did you get on with Mr. Fairlie?\" inquired Miss Halcombe, as\nwe left the lawn and turned into a shrubbery.  \"Was he particularly\nnervous this morning? Never mind considering about your answer, Mr.\nHartright.  The mere fact of your being obliged to consider is enough\nfor me.  I see in your face that he WAS particularly nervous; and, as I\nam amiably unwilling to throw you into the same condition, I ask no\nmore.\"\n\nWe turned off into a winding path while she was speaking, and\napproached a pretty summer-house, built of wood, in the form of a\nminiature Swiss chalet.  The one room of the summer-house, as we\nascended the steps of the door, was occupied by a young lady.  She was\nstanding near a rustic table, looking out at the inland view of moor\nand hill presented by a gap in the trees, and absently turning over the\nleaves of a little sketch-book that lay at her side.  This was Miss\nFairlie.\n\nHow can I describe her? How can I separate her from my own sensations,\nand from all that has happened in the later time? How can I see her\nagain as she looked when my eyes first rested on her--as she should\nlook, now, to the eyes that are about to see her in these pages?\n\nThe water-colour drawing that I made of Laura Fairlie, at an after\nperiod, in the place and attitude in which I first saw her, lies on my\ndesk while I write.  I look at it, and there dawns upon me brightly,\nfrom the dark greenish-brown background of the summer-house, a light,\nyouthful figure, clothed in a simple muslin dress, the pattern of it\nformed by broad alternate stripes of delicate blue and white.  A scarf\nof the same material sits crisply and closely round her shoulders, and\na little straw hat of the natural colour, plainly and sparingly trimmed\nwith ribbon to match the gown, covers her head, and throws its soft\npearly shadow over the upper part of her face.  Her hair is of so faint\nand pale a brown--not flaxen, and yet almost as light; not golden, and\nyet almost as glossy--that it nearly melts, here and there, into the\nshadow of the hat.  It is plainly parted and drawn back over her ears,\nand the line of it ripples naturally as it crosses her forehead. The\neyebrows are rather darker than the hair; and the eyes are of that\nsoft, limpid, turquoise blue, so often sung by the poets, so seldom\nseen in real life.  Lovely eyes in colour, lovely eyes in form--large\nand tender and quietly thoughtful--but beautiful above all things in\nthe clear truthfulness of look that dwells in their inmost depths, and\nshines through all their changes of expression with the light of a\npurer and a better world.  The charm--most gently and yet most\ndistinctly expressed--which they shed over the whole face, so covers\nand transforms its little natural human blemishes elsewhere, that it is\ndifficult to estimate the relative merits and defects of the other\nfeatures.  It is hard to see that the lower part of the face is too\ndelicately refined away towards the chin to be in full and fair\nproportion with the upper part; that the nose, in escaping the aquiline\nbend (always hard and cruel in a woman, no matter how abstractedly\nperfect it may be), has erred a little in the other extreme, and has\nmissed the ideal straightness of line; and that the sweet, sensitive\nlips are subject to a slight nervous contraction, when she smiles,\nwhich draws them upward a little at one corner, towards the cheek.  It\nmight be possible to note these blemishes in another woman's face but\nit is not easy to dwell on them in hers, so subtly are they connected\nwith all that is individual and characteristic in her expression, and\nso closely does the expression depend for its full play and life, in\nevery other feature, on the moving impulse of the eyes.\n\nDoes my poor portrait of her, my fond, patient labour of long and happy\ndays, show me these things? Ah, how few of them are in the dim\nmechanical drawing, and how many in the mind with which I regard it! A\nfair, delicate girl, in a pretty light dress, trifling with the leaves\nof a sketch-book, while she looks up from it with truthful, innocent\nblue eyes--that is all the drawing can say; all, perhaps, that even the\ndeeper reach of thought and pen can say in their language, either.  The\nwoman who first gives life, light, and form to our shadowy conceptions\nof beauty, fills a void in our spiritual nature that has remained\nunknown to us till she appeared.  Sympathies that lie too deep for\nwords, too deep almost for thoughts, are touched, at such times, by\nother charms than those which the senses feel and which the resources\nof expression can realise.  The mystery which underlies the beauty of\nwomen is never raised above the reach of all expression until it has\nclaimed kindred with the deeper mystery in our own souls. Then, and\nthen only, has it passed beyond the narrow region on which light falls,\nin this world, from the pencil and the pen.\n\nThink of her as you thought of the first woman who quickened the pulses\nwithin you that the rest of her sex had no art to stir. Let the kind,\ncandid blue eyes meet yours, as they met mine, with the one matchless\nlook which we both remember so well.  Let her voice speak the music\nthat you once loved best, attuned as sweetly to your ear as to mine.\nLet her footstep, as she comes and goes, in these pages, be like that\nother footstep to whose airy fall your own heart once beat time.  Take\nher as the visionary nursling of your own fancy; and she will grow upon\nyou, all the more clearly, as the living woman who dwells in mine.\n\nAmong the sensations that crowded on me, when my eyes first looked upon\nher--familiar sensations which we all know, which spring to life in\nmost of our hearts, die again in so many, and renew their bright\nexistence in so few--there was one that troubled and perplexed me: one\nthat seemed strangely inconsistent and unaccountably out of place in\nMiss Fairlie's presence.\n\nMingling with the vivid impression produced by the charm of her fair\nface and head, her sweet expression, and her winning simplicity of\nmanner, was another impression, which, in a shadowy way, suggested to\nme the idea of something wanting.  At one time it seemed like something\nwanting in HER: at another, like something wanting in myself, which\nhindered me from understanding her as I ought.  The impression was\nalways strongest in the most contradictory manner, when she looked at\nme; or, in other words, when I was most conscious of the harmony and\ncharm of her face, and yet, at the same time, most troubled by the\nsense of an incompleteness which it was impossible to discover.\nSomething wanting, something wanting--and where it was, and what it\nwas, I could not say.\n\nThe effect of this curious caprice of fancy (as I thought it then) was\nnot of a nature to set me at my ease, during a first interview with\nMiss Fairlie.  The few kind words of welcome which she spoke found me\nhardly self-possessed enough to thank her in the customary phrases of\nreply.  Observing my hesitation, and no doubt attributing it, naturally\nenough, to some momentary shyness on my part, Miss Halcombe took the\nbusiness of talking, as easily and readily as usual, into her own hands.\n\n\"Look there, Mr. Hartright,\" she said, pointing to the sketch-book on\nthe table, and to the little delicate wandering hand that was still\ntrifling with it.  \"Surely you will acknowledge that your model pupil\nis found at last? The moment she hears that you are in the house, she\nseizes her inestimable sketch-book, looks universal Nature straight in\nthe face, and longs to begin!\"\n\nMiss Fairlie laughed with a ready good-humour, which broke out as\nbrightly as if it had been part of the sunshine above us, over her\nlovely face.\n\n\"I must not take credit to myself where no credit is due,\" she said,\nher clear, truthful blue eyes looking alternately at Miss Halcombe and\nat me.  \"Fond as I am of drawing, I am so conscious of my own ignorance\nthat I am more afraid than anxious to begin. Now I know you are here,\nMr. Hartright, I find myself looking over my sketches, as I used to\nlook over my lessons when I was a little girl, and when I was sadly\nafraid that I should turn out not fit to be heard.\"\n\nShe made the confession very prettily and simply, and, with quaint,\nchildish earnestness, drew the sketch-book away close to her own side\nof the table.  Miss Halcombe cut the knot of the little embarrassment\nforthwith, in her resolute, downright way.\n\n\"Good, bad, or indifferent,\" she said, \"the pupil's sketches must pass\nthrough the fiery ordeal of the master's judgment--and there's an end\nof it.  Suppose we take them with us in the carriage, Laura, and let\nMr. Hartright see them, for the first time, under circumstances of\nperpetual jolting and interruption? If we can only confuse him all\nthrough the drive, between Nature as it is, when he looks up at the\nview, and Nature as it is not when he looks down again at our\nsketch-books, we shall drive him into the last desperate refuge of\npaying us compliments, and shall slip through his professional fingers\nwith our pet feathers of vanity all unruffled.\"\n\n\"I hope Mr. Hartright will pay ME no compliments,\" said Miss Fairlie,\nas we all left the summer-house.\n\n\"May I venture to inquire why you express that hope?\" I asked.\n\n\"Because I shall believe all that you say to me,\" she answered simply.\n\nIn those few words she unconsciously gave me the key to her whole\ncharacter: to that generous trust in others which, in her nature, grew\ninnocently out of the sense of her own truth.  I only knew it\nintuitively then.  I know it by experience now.\n\nWe merely waited to rouse good Mrs. Vesey from the place which she\nstill occupied at the deserted luncheon-table, before we entered the\nopen carriage for our promised drive.  The old lady and Miss Halcombe\noccupied the back seat, and Miss Fairlie and I sat together in front,\nwith the sketch-book open between us, fairly exhibited at last to my\nprofessional eyes.  All serious criticism on the drawings, even if I\nhad been disposed to volunteer it, was rendered impossible by Miss\nHalcombe's lively resolution to see nothing but the ridiculous side of\nthe Fine Arts, as practised by herself, her sister, and ladies in\ngeneral.  I can remember the conversation that passed far more easily\nthan the sketches that I mechanically looked over.  That part of the\ntalk, especially, in which Miss Fairlie took any share, is still as\nvividly impressed on my memory as if I had heard it only a few hours\nago.\n\nYes! let me acknowledge that on this first day I let the charm of her\npresence lure me from the recollection of myself and my position.  The\nmost trifling of the questions that she put to me, on the subject of\nusing her pencil and mixing her colours; the slightest alterations of\nexpression in the lovely eyes that looked into mine with such an\nearnest desire to learn all that I could teach, and to discover all\nthat I could show, attracted more of my attention than the finest view\nwe passed through, or the grandest changes of light and shade, as they\nflowed into each other over the waving moorland and the level beach.\nAt any time, and under any circumstances of human interest, is it not\nstrange to see how little real hold the objects of the natural world\namid which we live can gain on our hearts and minds? We go to Nature\nfor comfort in trouble, and sympathy in joy, only in books.  Admiration\nof those beauties of the inanimate world, which modern poetry so\nlargely and so eloquently describes, is not, even in the best of us,\none of the original instincts of our nature.  As children, we none of\nus possess it.  No uninstructed man or woman possesses it. Those whose\nlives are most exclusively passed amid the ever-changing wonders of sea\nand land are also those who are most universally insensible to every\naspect of Nature not directly associated with the human interest of\ntheir calling.  Our capacity of appreciating the beauties of the earth\nwe live on is, in truth, one of the civilised accomplishments which we\nall learn as an Art; and, more, that very capacity is rarely practised\nby any of us except when our minds are most indolent and most\nunoccupied.  How much share have the attractions of Nature ever had in\nthe pleasurable or painful interests and emotions of ourselves or our\nfriends? What space do they ever occupy in the thousand little\nnarratives of personal experience which pass every day by word of mouth\nfrom one of us to the other? All that our minds can compass, all that\nour hearts can learn, can be accomplished with equal certainty, equal\nprofit, and equal satisfaction to ourselves, in the poorest as in the\nrichest prospect that the face of the earth can show.  There is surely\na reason for this want of inborn sympathy between the creature and the\ncreation around it, a reason which may perhaps be found in the\nwidely-differing destinies of man and his earthly sphere.  The grandest\nmountain prospect that the eye can range over is appointed to\nannihilation.  The smallest human interest that the pure heart can feel\nis appointed to immortality.\n\nWe had been out nearly three hours, when the carriage again passed\nthrough the gates of Limmeridge House.\n\nOn our way back I had let the ladies settle for themselves the first\npoint of view which they were to sketch, under my instructions, on the\nafternoon of the next day.  When they withdrew to dress for dinner, and\nwhen I was alone again in my little sitting-room, my spirits seemed to\nleave me on a sudden.  I felt ill at ease and dissatisfied with myself,\nI hardly knew why. Perhaps I was now conscious for the first time of\nhaving enjoyed our drive too much in the character of a guest, and too\nlittle in the character of a drawing-master.  Perhaps that strange\nsense of something wanting, either in Miss Fairlie or in myself, which\nhad perplexed me when I was first introduced to her, haunted me still.\nAnyhow, it was a relief to my spirits when the dinner-hour called me\nout of my solitude, and took me back to the society of the ladies of\nthe house.\n\nI was struck, on entering the drawing-room, by the curious contrast,\nrather in material than in colour, of the dresses which they now wore.\nWhile Mrs. Vesey and Miss Halcombe were richly clad (each in the manner\nmost becoming to her age), the first in silver-grey, and the second in\nthat delicate primrose-yellow colour which matches so well with a dark\ncomplexion and black hair, Miss Fairlie was unpretendingly and almost\npoorly dressed in plain white muslin.  It was spotlessly pure: it was\nbeautifully put on; but still it was the sort of dress which the wife\nor daughter of a poor man might have worn, and it made her, so far as\nexternals went, look less affluent in circumstances than her own\ngoverness.  At a later period, when I learnt to know more of Miss\nFairlie's character, I discovered that this curious contrast, on the\nwrong side, was due to her natural delicacy of feeling and natural\nintensity of aversion to the slightest personal display of her own\nwealth.  Neither Mrs. Vesey nor Miss Halcombe could ever induce her to\nlet the advantage in dress desert the two ladies who were poor, to lean\nto the side of the one lady who was rich.\n\nWhen the dinner was over we returned together to the drawing-room.\nAlthough Mr. Fairlie (emulating the magnificent condescension of the\nmonarch who had picked up Titian's brush for him) had instructed his\nbutler to consult my wishes in relation to the wine that I might prefer\nafter dinner, I was resolute enough to resist the temptation of sitting\nin solitary grandeur among bottles of my own choosing, and sensible\nenough to ask the ladies' permission to leave the table with them\nhabitually, on the civilised foreign plan, during the period of my\nresidence at Limmeridge House.\n\nThe drawing-room, to which we had now withdrawn for the rest of the\nevening, was on the ground-floor, and was of the same shape and size as\nthe breakfast-room.  Large glass doors at the lower end opened on to a\nterrace, beautifully ornamented along its whole length with a profusion\nof flowers.  The soft, hazy twilight was just shading leaf and blossom\nalike into harmony with its own sober hues as we entered the room, and\nthe sweet evening scent of the flowers met us with its fragrant welcome\nthrough the open glass doors.  Good Mrs. Vesey (always the first of the\nparty to sit down) took possession of an arm-chair in a corner, and\ndozed off comfortably to sleep.  At my request Miss Fairlie placed\nherself at the piano.  As I followed her to a seat near the instrument,\nI saw Miss Halcombe retire into a recess of one of the side windows, to\nproceed with the search through her mother's letters by the last quiet\nrays of the evening light.\n\nHow vividly that peaceful home-picture of the drawing-room comes back\nto me while I write! From the place where I sat I could see Miss\nHalcombe's graceful figure, half of it in soft light, half in\nmysterious shadow, bending intently over the letters in her lap; while,\nnearer to me, the fair profile of the player at the piano was just\ndelicately defined against the faintly-deepening background of the\ninner wall of the room.  Outside, on the terrace, the clustering\nflowers and long grasses and creepers waved so gently in the light\nevening air, that the sound of their rustling never reached us.  The\nsky was without a cloud, and the dawning mystery of moonlight began to\ntremble already in the region of the eastern heaven.  The sense of\npeace and seclusion soothed all thought and feeling into a rapt,\nunearthly repose; and the balmy quiet, that deepened ever with the\ndeepening light, seemed to hover over us with a gentler influence\nstill, when there stole upon it from the piano the heavenly tenderness\nof the music of Mozart.  It was an evening of sights and sounds never\nto forget.\n\nWe all sat silent in the places we had chosen--Mrs. Vesey still\nsleeping, Miss Fairlie still playing, Miss Halcombe still reading--till\nthe light failed us.  By this time the moon had stolen round to the\nterrace, and soft, mysterious rays of light were slanting already\nacross the lower end of the room.  The change from the twilight\nobscurity was so beautiful that we banished the lamps, by common\nconsent, when the servant brought them in, and kept the large room\nunlighted, except by the glimmer of the two candles at the piano.\n\nFor half an hour more the music still went on.  After that the beauty\nof the moonlight view on the terrace tempted Miss Fairlie out to look\nat it, and I followed her.  When the candles at the piano had been\nlighted Miss Halcombe had changed her place, so as to continue her\nexamination of the letters by their assistance. We left her, on a low\nchair, at one side of the instrument, so absorbed over her reading that\nshe did not seem to notice when we moved.\n\nWe had been out on the terrace together, just in front of the glass\ndoors, hardly so long as five minutes, I should think; and Miss Fairlie\nwas, by my advice, just tying her white handkerchief over her head as a\nprecaution against the night air--when I heard Miss Halcombe's\nvoice--low, eager, and altered from its natural lively tone--pronounce\nmy name.\n\n\"Mr. Hartright,\" she said, \"will you come here for a minute? I want to\nspeak to you.\"\n\nI entered the room again immediately.  The piano stood about half-way\ndown along the inner wall.  On the side of the instrument farthest from\nthe terrace Miss Halcombe was sitting with the letters scattered on her\nlap, and with one in her hand selected from them, and held close to the\ncandle.  On the side nearest to the terrace there stood a low ottoman,\non which I took my place. In this position I was not far from the glass\ndoors, and I could see Miss Fairlie plainly, as she passed and repassed\nthe opening on to the terrace, walking slowly from end to end of it in\nthe full radiance of the moon.\n\n\"I want you to listen while I read the concluding passages in this\nletter,\" said Miss Halcombe.  \"Tell me if you think they throw any\nlight upon your strange adventure on the road to London.  The letter is\naddressed by my mother to her second husband, Mr. Fairlie, and the date\nrefers to a period of between eleven and twelve years since.  At that\ntime Mr. and Mrs. Fairlie, and my half-sister Laura, had been living\nfor years in this house; and I was away from them completing my\neducation at a school in Paris.\"\n\nShe looked and spoke earnestly, and, as I thought, a little uneasily as\nwell.  At the moment when she raised the letter to the candle before\nbeginning to read it, Miss Fairlie passed us on the terrace, looked in\nfor a moment, and seeing that we were engaged, slowly walked on.\n\nMiss Halcombe began to read as follows:--\n\n\n\"'You will be tired, my dear Philip, of hearing perpetually about my\nschools and my scholars.  Lay the blame, pray, on the dull uniformity\nof life at Limmeridge, and not on me.  Besides, this time I have\nsomething really interesting to tell you about a new scholar.\n\n\"'You know old Mrs. Kempe at the village shop.  Well, after years of\nailing, the doctor has at last given her up, and she is dying slowly\nday by day.  Her only living relation, a sister, arrived last week to\ntake care of her.  This sister comes all the way from Hampshire--her\nname is Mrs. Catherick.  Four days ago Mrs. Catherick came here to see\nme, and brought her only child with her, a sweet little girl about a\nyear older than our darling Laura----'\"\n\n\nAs the last sentence fell from the reader's lips, Miss Fairlie passed\nus on the terrace once more.  She was softly singing to herself one of\nthe melodies which she had been playing earlier in the evening.  Miss\nHalcombe waited till she had passed out of sight again, and then went\non with the letter--\n\n\n\"'Mrs. Catherick is a decent, well-behaved, respectable woman;\nmiddle-aged, and with the remains of having been moderately, only\nmoderately, nice-looking.  There is something in her manner and in her\nappearance, however, which I can't make out.  She is reserved about\nherself to the point of downright secrecy, and there is a look in her\nface--I can't describe it--which suggests to me that she has something\non her mind.  She is altogether what you would call a walking mystery.\nHer errand at Limmeridge House, however, was simple enough.  When she\nleft Hampshire to nurse her sister, Mrs. Kempe, through her last\nillness, she had been obliged to bring her daughter with her, through\nhaving no one at home to take care of the little girl.  Mrs. Kempe may\ndie in a week's time, or may linger on for months; and Mrs. Catherick's\nobject was to ask me to let her daughter, Anne, have the benefit of\nattending my school, subject to the condition of her being removed from\nit to go home again with her mother, after Mrs. Kempe's death.  I\nconsented at once, and when Laura and I went out for our walk, we took\nthe little girl (who is just eleven years old) to the school that very\nday.'\"\n\n\nOnce more Miss Fairlie's figure, bright and soft in its snowy muslin\ndress--her face prettily framed by the white folds of the handkerchief\nwhich she had tied under her chin--passed by us in the moonlight.  Once\nmore Miss Halcombe waited till she was out of sight, and then went on--\n\n\n\"'I have taken a violent fancy, Philip, to my new scholar, for a reason\nwhich I mean to keep till the last for the sake of surprising you.  Her\nmother having told me as little about the child as she told me of\nherself, I was left to discover (which I did on the first day when we\ntried her at lessons) that the poor little thing's intellect is not\ndeveloped as it ought to be at her age.  Seeing this I had her up to\nthe house the next day, and privately arranged with the doctor to come\nand watch her and question her, and tell me what he thought.  His\nopinion is that she will grow out of it.  But he says her careful\nbringing-up at school is a matter of great importance just now, because\nher unusual slowness in acquiring ideas implies an unusual tenacity in\nkeeping them, when they are once received into her mind.  Now, my love,\nyou must not imagine, in your off-hand way, that I have been attaching\nmyself to an idiot.  This poor little Anne Catherick is a sweet,\naffectionate, grateful girl, and says the quaintest, prettiest things\n(as you shall judge by an instance), in the most oddly sudden,\nsurprised, half-frightened way.  Although she is dressed very neatly,\nher clothes show a sad want of taste in colour and pattern.  So I\narranged, yesterday, that some of our darling Laura's old white frocks\nand white hats should be altered for Anne Catherick, explaining to her\nthat little girls of her complexion looked neater and better all in\nwhite than in anything else.  She hesitated and seemed puzzled for a\nminute, then flushed up, and appeared to understand.  Her little hand\nclasped mine suddenly.  She kissed it, Philip, and said (oh, so\nearnestly!), \"I will always wear white as long as I live.  It will help\nme to remember you, ma'am, and to think that I am pleasing you still,\nwhen I go away and see you no more.\" This is only one specimen of the\nquaint things she says so prettily.  Poor little soul! She shall have a\nstock of white frocks, made with good deep tucks, to let out for her as\nshe grows----'\"\n\n\nMiss Halcombe paused, and looked at me across the piano.\n\n\"Did the forlorn woman whom you met in the high-road seem young?\" she\nasked.  \"Young enough to be two- or three-and-twenty?\"\n\n\"Yes, Miss Halcombe, as young as that.\"\n\n\"And she was strangely dressed, from head to foot, all in white?\"\n\n\"All in white.\"\n\nWhile the answer was passing my lips Miss Fairlie glided into view on\nthe terrace for the third time.  Instead of proceeding on her walk, she\nstopped, with her back turned towards us, and, leaning on the\nbalustrade of the terrace, looked down into the garden beyond.  My eyes\nfixed upon the white gleam of her muslin gown and head-dress in the\nmoonlight, and a sensation, for which I can find no name--a sensation\nthat quickened my pulse, and raised a fluttering at my heart--began to\nsteal over me.\n\n\"All in white?\" Miss Halcombe repeated.  \"The most important sentences\nin the letter, Mr. Hartright, are those at the end, which I will read\nto you immediately.  But I can't help dwelling a little upon the\ncoincidence of the white costume of the woman you met, and the white\nfrocks which produced that strange answer from my mother's little\nscholar.  The doctor may have been wrong when he discovered the child's\ndefects of intellect, and predicted that she would 'grow out of them.'\nShe may never have grown out of them, and the old grateful fancy about\ndressing in white, which was a serious feeling to the girl, may be a\nserious feeling to the woman still.\"\n\nI said a few words in answer--I hardly know what.  All my attention was\nconcentrated on the white gleam of Miss Fairlie's muslin dress.\n\n\"Listen to the last sentences of the letter,\" said Miss Halcombe. \"I\nthink they will surprise you.\"\n\nAs she raised the letter to the light of the candle, Miss Fairlie\nturned from the balustrade, looked doubtfully up and down the terrace,\nadvanced a step towards the glass doors, and then stopped, facing us.\n\nMeanwhile Miss Halcombe read me the last sentences to which she had\nreferred--\n\n\n\"'And now, my love, seeing that I am at the end of my paper, now for\nthe real reason, the surprising reason, for my fondness for little Anne\nCatherick.  My dear Philip, although she is not half so pretty, she is,\nnevertheless, by one of those extraordinary caprices of accidental\nresemblance which one sometimes sees, the living likeness, in her hair,\nher complexion, the colour of her eyes, and the shape of her face----'\"\n\n\nI started up from the ottoman before Miss Halcombe could pronounce the\nnext words.  A thrill of the same feeling which ran through me when the\ntouch was laid upon my shoulder on the lonely high-road chilled me\nagain.\n\nThere stood Miss Fairlie, a white figure, alone in the moonlight; in\nher attitude, in the turn of her head, in her complexion, in the shape\nof her face, the living image, at that distance and under those\ncircumstances, of the woman in white! The doubt which had troubled my\nmind for hours and hours past flashed into conviction in an instant.\nThat \"something wanting\" was my own recognition of the ominous likeness\nbetween the fugitive from the asylum and my pupil at Limmeridge House.\n\n\"You see it!\" said Miss Halcombe.  She dropped the useless letter, and\nher eyes flashed as they met mine.  \"You see it now, as my mother saw\nit eleven years since!\"\n\n\"I see it--more unwillingly than I can say.  To associate that forlorn,\nfriendless, lost woman, even by an accidental likeness only, with Miss\nFairlie, seems like casting a shadow on the future of the bright\ncreature who stands looking at us now.  Let me lose the impression\nagain as soon as possible.  Call her in, out of the dreary\nmoonlight--pray call her in!\"\n\n\"Mr. Hartright, you surprise me.  Whatever women may be, I thought that\nmen, in the nineteenth century, were above superstition.\"\n\n\"Pray call her in!\"\n\n\"Hush, hush! She is coming of her own accord.  Say nothing in her\npresence.  Let this discovery of the likeness be kept a secret between\nyou and me.  Come in, Laura, come in, and wake Mrs. Vesey with the\npiano.  Mr. Hartright is petitioning for some more music, and he wants\nit, this time, of the lightest and liveliest kind.\"\n\n\n\nIX\n\nSo ended my eventful first day at Limmeridge House.\n\nMiss Halcombe and I kept our secret.  After the discovery of the\nlikeness no fresh light seemed destined to break over the mystery of\nthe woman in white.  At the first safe opportunity Miss Halcombe\ncautiously led her half-sister to speak of their mother, of old times,\nand of Anne Catherick.  Miss Fairlie's recollections of the little\nscholar at Limmeridge were, however, only of the most vague and general\nkind.  She remembered the likeness between herself and her mother's\nfavourite pupil, as something which had been supposed to exist in past\ntimes; but she did not refer to the gift of the white dresses, or to\nthe singular form of words in which the child had artlessly expressed\nher gratitude for them. She remembered that Anne had remained at\nLimmeridge for a few months only, and had then left it to go back to\nher home in Hampshire; but she could not say whether the mother and\ndaughter had ever returned, or had ever been heard of afterwards.  No\nfurther search, on Miss Halcombe's part, through the few letters of\nMrs. Fairlie's writing which she had left unread, assisted in clearing\nup the uncertainties still left to perplex us.  We had identified the\nunhappy woman whom I had met in the night-time with Anne Catherick--we\nhad made some advance, at least, towards connecting the probably\ndefective condition of the poor creature's intellect with the\npeculiarity of her being dressed all in white, and with the\ncontinuance, in her maturer years, of her childish gratitude towards\nMrs. Fairlie--and there, so far as we knew at that time, our\ndiscoveries had ended.\n\n\nThe days passed on, the weeks passed on, and the track of the golden\nautumn wound its bright way visibly through the green summer of the\ntrees.  Peaceful, fast-flowing, happy time! my story glides by you now\nas swiftly as you once glided by me.  Of all the treasures of enjoyment\nthat you poured so freely into my heart, how much is left me that has\npurpose and value enough to be written on this page? Nothing but the\nsaddest of all confessions that a man can make--the confession of his\nown folly.\n\nThe secret which that confession discloses should be told with little\neffort, for it has indirectly escaped me already.  The poor weak words,\nwhich have failed to describe Miss Fairlie, have succeeded in betraying\nthe sensations she awakened in me.  It is so with us all.  Our words\nare giants when they do us an injury, and dwarfs when they do us a\nservice.\n\nI loved her.\n\nAh! how well I know all the sadness and all the mockery that is\ncontained in those three words.  I can sigh over my mournful confession\nwith the tenderest woman who reads it and pities me.  I can laugh at it\nas bitterly as the hardest man who tosses it from him in contempt.  I\nloved her! Feel for me, or despise me, I confess it with the same\nimmovable resolution to own the truth.\n\nWas there no excuse for me? There was some excuse to be found, surely,\nin the conditions under which my term of hired service was passed at\nLimmeridge House.\n\nMy morning hours succeeded each other calmly in the quiet and seclusion\nof my own room.  I had just work enough to do, in mounting my\nemployer's drawings, to keep my hands and eyes pleasurably employed,\nwhile my mind was left free to enjoy the dangerous luxury of its own\nunbridled thoughts.  A perilous solitude, for it lasted long enough to\nenervate, not long enough to fortify me.  A perilous solitude, for it\nwas followed by afternoons and evenings spent, day after day and week\nafter week alone in the society of two women, one of whom possessed all\nthe accomplishments of grace, wit, and high-breeding, the other all the\ncharms of beauty, gentleness, and simple truth, that can purify and\nsubdue the heart of man.  Not a day passed, in that dangerous intimacy\nof teacher and pupil, in which my hand was not close to Miss Fairlie's;\nmy cheek, as we bent together over her sketch-book, almost touching\nhers.  The more attentively she watched every movement of my brush, the\nmore closely I was breathing the perfume of her hair, and the warm\nfragrance of her breath.  It was part of my service to live in the very\nlight of her eyes--at one time to be bending over her, so close to her\nbosom as to tremble at the thought of touching it; at another, to feel\nher bending over me, bending so close to see what I was about, that her\nvoice sank low when she spoke to me, and her ribbons brushed my cheek\nin the wind before she could draw them back.\n\nThe evenings which followed the sketching excursions of the afternoon\nvaried, rather than checked, these innocent, these inevitable\nfamiliarities.  My natural fondness for the music which she played with\nsuch tender feeling, such delicate womanly taste, and her natural\nenjoyment of giving me back, by the practice of her art, the pleasure\nwhich I had offered to her by the practice of mine, only wove another\ntie which drew us closer and closer to one another.  The accidents of\nconversation; the simple habits which regulated even such a little\nthing as the position of our places at table; the play of Miss\nHalcombe's ever-ready raillery, always directed against my anxiety as\nteacher, while it sparkled over her enthusiasm as pupil; the harmless\nexpression of poor Mrs. Vesey's drowsy approval, which connected Miss\nFairlie and me as two model young people who never disturbed her--every\none of these trifles, and many more, combined to fold us together in\nthe same domestic atmosphere, and to lead us both insensibly to the\nsame hopeless end.\n\nI should have remembered my position, and have put myself secretly on\nmy guard.  I did so, but not till it was too late.  All the discretion,\nall the experience, which had availed me with other women, and secured\nme against other temptations, failed me with her.  It had been my\nprofession, for years past, to be in this close contact with young\ngirls of all ages, and of all orders of beauty.  I had accepted the\nposition as part of my calling in life; I had trained myself to leave\nall the sympathies natural to my age in my employer's outer hall, as\ncoolly as I left my umbrella there before I went upstairs.  I had long\nsince learnt to understand, composedly and as a matter of course, that\nmy situation in life was considered a guarantee against any of my\nfemale pupils feeling more than the most ordinary interest in me, and\nthat I was admitted among beautiful and captivating women much as a\nharmless domestic animal is admitted among them.  This guardian\nexperience I had gained early; this guardian experience had sternly and\nstrictly guided me straight along my own poor narrow path, without once\nletting me stray aside, to the right hand or to the left.  And now I\nand my trusty talisman were parted for the first time.  Yes, my\nhardly-earned self-control was as completely lost to me as if I had\nnever possessed it; lost to me, as it is lost every day to other men,\nin other critical situations, where women are concerned.  I know, now,\nthat I should have questioned myself from the first.  I should have\nasked why any room in the house was better than home to me when she\nentered it, and barren as a desert when she went out again--why I\nalways noticed and remembered the little changes in her dress that I\nhad noticed and remembered in no other woman's before--why I saw her,\nheard her, and touched her (when we shook hands at night and morning)\nas I had never seen, heard, and touched any other woman in my life? I\nshould have looked into my own heart, and found this new growth\nspringing up there, and plucked it out while it was young.  Why was\nthis easiest, simplest work of self-culture always too much for me? The\nexplanation has been written already in the three words that were many\nenough, and plain enough, for my confession.  I loved her.\n\nThe days passed, the weeks passed; it was approaching the third month\nof my stay in Cumberland.  The delicious monotony of life in our calm\nseclusion flowed on with me, like a smooth stream with a swimmer who\nglides down the current.  All memory of the past, all thought of the\nfuture, all sense of the falseness and hopelessness of my own position,\nlay hushed within me into deceitful rest. Lulled by the Syren-song that\nmy own heart sung to me, with eyes shut to all sight, and ears closed\nto all sound of danger, I drifted nearer and nearer to the fatal rocks.\nThe warning that aroused me at last, and startled me into sudden,\nself-accusing consciousness of my own weakness, was the plainest, the\ntruest, the kindest of all warnings, for it came silently from HER.\n\nWe had parted one night as usual.  No word had fallen from my lips, at\nthat time or at any time before it, that could betray me, or startle\nher into sudden knowledge of the truth.  But when we met again in the\nmorning, a change had come over her--a change that told me all.\n\nI shrank then--I shrink still--from invading the innermost sanctuary of\nher heart, and laying it open to others, as I have laid open my own.\nLet it be enough to say that the time when she first surprised my\nsecret was, I firmly believe, the time when she first surprised her\nown, and the time, also, when she changed towards me in the interval of\none night.  Her nature, too truthful to deceive others, was too noble\nto deceive itself.  When the doubt that I had hushed asleep first laid\nits weary weight on her heart, the true face owned all, and said, in\nits own frank, simple language--I am sorry for him; I am sorry for\nmyself.\n\nIt said this, and more, which I could not then interpret.  I understood\nbut too well the change in her manner, to greater kindness and quicker\nreadiness in interpreting all my wishes, before others--to constraint\nand sadness, and nervous anxiety to absorb herself in the first\noccupation she could seize on, whenever we happened to be left together\nalone.  I understood why the sweet sensitive lips smiled so rarely and\nso restrainedly now, and why the clear blue eyes looked at me,\nsometimes with the pity of an angel, sometimes with the innocent\nperplexity of a child. But the change meant more than this.  There was\na coldness in her hand, there was an unnatural immobility in her face,\nthere was in all her movements the mute expression of constant fear and\nclinging self-reproach.  The sensations that I could trace to herself\nand to me, the unacknowledged sensations that we were feeling in\ncommon, were not these.  There were certain elements of the change in\nher that were still secretly drawing us together, and others that were,\nas secretly, beginning to drive us apart.\n\nIn my doubt and perplexity, in my vague suspicion of something hidden\nwhich I was left to find by my own unaided efforts, I examined Miss\nHalcombe's looks and manner for enlightenment. Living in such intimacy\nas ours, no serious alteration could take place in any one of us which\ndid not sympathetically affect the others.  The change in Miss Fairlie\nwas reflected in her half-sister.  Although not a word escaped Miss\nHalcombe which hinted at an altered state of feeling towards myself,\nher penetrating eyes had contracted a new habit of always watching me.\nSometimes the look was like suppressed anger, sometimes like suppressed\ndread, sometimes like neither--like nothing, in short, which I could\nunderstand.  A week elapsed, leaving us all three still in this\nposition of secret constraint towards one another.  My situation,\naggravated by the sense of my own miserable weakness and forgetfulness\nof myself, now too late awakened in me, was becoming intolerable.  I\nfelt that I must cast off the oppression under which I was living, at\nonce and for ever--yet how to act for the best, or what to say first,\nwas more than I could tell.\n\nFrom this position of helplessness and humiliation I was rescued by\nMiss Halcombe.  Her lips told me the bitter, the necessary, the\nunexpected truth; her hearty kindness sustained me under the shock of\nhearing it; her sense and courage turned to its right use an event\nwhich threatened the worst that could happen, to me and to others, in\nLimmeridge House.\n\n\n\nX\n\nIt was on a Thursday in the week, and nearly at the end of the third\nmonth of my sojourn in Cumberland.\n\nIn the morning, when I went down into the breakfast-room at the usual\nhour, Miss Halcombe, for the first time since I had known her, was\nabsent from her customary place at the table.\n\nMiss Fairlie was out on the lawn.  She bowed to me, but did not come\nin.  Not a word had dropped from my lips, or from hers, that could\nunsettle either of us--and yet the same unacknowledged sense of\nembarrassment made us shrink alike from meeting one another alone.  She\nwaited on the lawn, and I waited in the breakfast-room, till Mrs. Vesey\nor Miss Halcombe came in.  How quickly I should have joined her: how\nreadily we should have shaken hands, and glided into our customary\ntalk, only a fortnight ago.\n\nIn a few minutes Miss Halcombe entered.  She had a preoccupied look,\nand she made her apologies for being late rather absently.\n\n\"I have been detained,\" she said, \"by a consultation with Mr. Fairlie\non a domestic matter which he wished to speak to me about.\"\n\nMiss Fairlie came in from the garden, and the usual morning greeting\npassed between us.  Her hand struck colder to mine than ever.  She did\nnot look at me, and she was very pale.  Even Mrs. Vesey noticed it when\nshe entered the room a moment after.\n\n\"I suppose it is the change in the wind,\" said the old lady.  \"The\nwinter is coming--ah, my love, the winter is coming soon!\"\n\nIn her heart and in mine it had come already!\n\nOur morning meal--once so full of pleasant good-humoured discussion of\nthe plans for the day--was short and silent.  Miss Fairlie seemed to\nfeel the oppression of the long pauses in the conversation, and looked\nappealingly to her sister to fill them up.  Miss Halcombe, after once\nor twice hesitating and checking herself, in a most uncharacteristic\nmanner, spoke at last.\n\n\"I have seen your uncle this morning, Laura,\" she said.  \"He thinks the\npurple room is the one that ought to be got ready, and he confirms what\nI told you.  Monday is the day--not Tuesday.\"\n\nWhile these words were being spoken Miss Fairlie looked down at the\ntable beneath her.  Her fingers moved nervously among the crumbs that\nwere scattered on the cloth.  The paleness on her cheeks spread to her\nlips, and the lips themselves trembled visibly.  I was not the only\nperson present who noticed this. Miss Halcombe saw it, too, and at once\nset us the example of rising from table.\n\nMrs. Vesey and Miss Fairlie left the room together.  The kind sorrowful\nblue eyes looked at me, for a moment, with the prescient sadness of a\ncoming and a long farewell.  I felt the answering pang in my own\nheart--the pang that told me I must lose her soon, and love her the\nmore unchangeably for the loss.\n\nI turned towards the garden when the door had closed on her.  Miss\nHalcombe was standing with her hat in her hand, and her shawl over her\narm, by the large window that led out to the lawn, and was looking at\nme attentively.\n\n\"Have you any leisure time to spare,\" she asked, \"before you begin to\nwork in your own room?\"\n\n\"Certainly, Miss Halcombe.  I have always time at your service.\"\n\n\"I want to say a word to you in private, Mr. Hartright.  Get your hat\nand come out into the garden.  We are not likely to be disturbed there\nat this hour in the morning.\"\n\nAs we stepped out on to the lawn, one of the under-gardeners--a mere\nlad--passed us on his way to the house, with a letter in his hand.\nMiss Halcombe stopped him.\n\n\"Is that letter for me?\" she asked.\n\n\"Nay, miss; it's just said to be for Miss Fairlie,\" answered the lad,\nholding out the letter as he spoke.\n\nMiss Halcombe took it from him and looked at the address.\n\n\"A strange handwriting,\" she said to herself.  \"Who can Laura's\ncorrespondent be? Where did you get this?\" she continued, addressing\nthe gardener.\n\n\"Well, miss,\" said the lad, \"I just got it from a woman.\"\n\n\"What woman?\"\n\n\"A woman well stricken in age.\"\n\n\"Oh, an old woman.  Any one you knew?\"\n\n\"I canna' tak' it on mysel' to say that she was other than a stranger\nto me.\"\n\n\"Which way did she go?\"\n\n\"That gate,\" said the under-gardener, turning with great deliberation\ntowards the south, and embracing the whole of that part of England with\none comprehensive sweep of his arm.\n\n\"Curious,\" said Miss Halcombe; \"I suppose it must be a begging-letter.\nThere,\" she added, handing the letter back to the lad, \"take it to the\nhouse, and give it to one of the servants.  And now, Mr. Hartright, if\nyou have no objection, let us walk this way.\"\n\nShe led me across the lawn, along the same path by which I had followed\nher on the day after my arrival at Limmeridge.\n\nAt the little summer-house, in which Laura Fairlie and I had first seen\neach other, she stopped, and broke the silence which she had steadily\nmaintained while we were walking together.\n\n\"What I have to say to you I can say here.\"\n\nWith those words she entered the summer-house, took one of the chairs\nat the little round table inside, and signed to me to take the other.\nI suspected what was coming when she spoke to me in the breakfast-room;\nI felt certain of it now.\n\n\"Mr. Hartright,\" she said, \"I am going to begin by making a frank\navowal to you.  I am going to say--without phrase-making, which I\ndetest, or paying compliments, which I heartily despise--that I have\ncome, in the course of your residence with us, to feel a strong\nfriendly regard for you.  I was predisposed in your favour when you\nfirst told me of your conduct towards that unhappy woman whom you met\nunder such remarkable circumstances.  Your management of the affair\nmight not have been prudent, but it showed the self-control, the\ndelicacy, and the compassion of a man who was naturally a gentleman.\nIt made me expect good things from you, and you have not disappointed\nmy expectations.\"\n\nShe paused--but held up her hand at the same time, as a sign that she\nawaited no answer from me before she proceeded.  When I entered the\nsummer-house, no thought was in me of the woman in white.  But now,\nMiss Halcombe's own words had put the memory of my adventure back in my\nmind.  It remained there throughout the interview--remained, and not\nwithout a result.\n\n\"As your friend,\" she proceeded, \"I am going to tell you, at once, in\nmy own plain, blunt, downright language, that I have discovered your\nsecret--without help or hint, mind, from any one else.  Mr. Hartright,\nyou have thoughtlessly allowed yourself to form an attachment--a\nserious and devoted attachment I am afraid--to my sister Laura.  I\ndon't put you to the pain of confessing it in so many words, because I\nsee and know that you are too honest to deny it.  I don't even blame\nyou--I pity you for opening your heart to a hopeless affection.  You\nhave not attempted to take any underhand advantage--you have not spoken\nto my sister in secret. You are guilty of weakness and want of\nattention to your own best interests, but of nothing worse.  If you had\nacted, in any single respect, less delicately and less modestly, I\nshould have told you to leave the house without an instant's notice, or\nan instant's consultation of anybody.  As it is, I blame the misfortune\nof your years and your position--I don't blame YOU.  Shake hands--I\nhave given you pain; I am going to give you more, but there is no help\nfor it--shake hands with your friend, Marian Halcombe, first.\"\n\nThe sudden kindness--the warm, high-minded, fearless sympathy which met\nme on such mercifully equal terms, which appealed with such delicate\nand generous abruptness straight to my heart, my honour, and my\ncourage, overcame me in an instant.  I tried to look at her when she\ntook my hand, but my eves were dim.  I tried to thank her, but my voice\nfailed me.\n\n\"Listen to me,\" she said, considerately avoiding all notice of my loss\nof self-control.  \"Listen to me, and let us get it over at once.  It is\na real true relief to me that I am not obliged, in what I have now to\nsay, to enter into the question--the hard and cruel question as I think\nit--of social inequalities. Circumstances which will try you to the\nquick, spare me the ungracious necessity of paining a man who has lived\nin friendly intimacy under the same roof with myself by any humiliating\nreference to matters of rank and station.  You must leave Limmeridge\nHouse, Mr. Hartright, before more harm is done.  It is my duty to say\nthat to you; and it would be equally my duty to say it, under precisely\nthe same serious necessity, if you were the representative of the\noldest and wealthiest family in England. You must leave us, not because\nyou are a teacher of drawing----\"\n\nShe waited a moment, turned her face full on me, and reaching across\nthe table, laid her hand firmly on my arm.\n\n\"Not because you are a teacher of drawing,\" she repeated, \"but because\nLaura Fairlie is engaged to be married.\"\n\nThe last word went like a bullet to my heart.  My arm lost all\nsensation of the hand that grasped it.  I never moved and never spoke.\nThe sharp autumn breeze that scattered the dead leaves at our feet came\nas cold to me, on a sudden, as if my own mad hopes were dead leaves\ntoo, whirled away by the wind like the rest. Hopes! Betrothed, or not\nbetrothed, she was equally far from me. Would other men have remembered\nthat in my place? Not if they had loved her as I did.\n\nThe pang passed, and nothing but the dull numbing pain of it remained.\nI felt Miss Halcombe's hand again, tightening its hold on my arm--I\nraised my head and looked at her.  Her large black eyes were rooted on\nme, watching the white change on my face, which I felt, and which she\nsaw.\n\n\"Crush it!\" she said.  \"Here, where you first saw her, crush it! Don't\nshrink under it like a woman.  Tear it out; trample it under foot like\na man!\"\n\nThe suppressed vehemence with which she spoke, the strength which her\nwill--concentrated in the look she fixed on me, and in the hold on my\narm that she had not yet relinquished--communicated to mine, steadied\nme.  We both waited for a minute in silence.  At the end of that time I\nhad justified her generous faith in my manhood--I had, outwardly at\nleast, recovered my self-control.\n\n\"Are you yourself again?\"\n\n\"Enough myself, Miss Halcombe, to ask your pardon and hers. Enough\nmyself to be guided by your advice, and to prove my gratitude in that\nway, if I can prove it in no other.\"\n\n\"You have proved it already,\" she answered, \"by those words. Mr.\nHartright, concealment is at an end between us.  I cannot affect to\nhide from you what my sister has unconsciously shown to me. You must\nleave us for her sake, as well as for your own.  Your presence here,\nyour necessary intimacy with us, harmless as it has been, God knows, in\nall other respects, has unsteadied her and made her wretched.  I, who\nlove her better than my own life--I, who have learnt to believe in that\npure, noble, innocent nature as I believe in my religion--know but too\nwell the secret misery of self-reproach that she has been suffering\nsince the first shadow of a feeling disloyal to her marriage engagement\nentered her heart in spite of her.  I don't say--it would be useless to\nattempt to say it after what has happened--that her engagement has ever\nhad a strong hold on her affections.  It is an engagement of honour,\nnot of love; her father sanctioned it on his deathbed, two years since;\nshe herself neither welcomed it nor shrank from it--she was content to\nmake it.  Till you came here she was in the position of hundreds of\nother women, who marry men without being greatly attracted to them or\ngreatly repelled by them, and who learn to love them (when they don't\nlearn to hate!) after marriage, instead of before.  I hope more\nearnestly than words can say--and you should have the self-sacrificing\ncourage to hope too--that the new thoughts and feelings which have\ndisturbed the old calmness and the old content have not taken root too\ndeeply to be ever removed. Your absence (if I had less belief in your\nhonour, and your courage, and your sense, I should not trust to them as\nI am trusting now) your absence will help my efforts, and time will\nhelp us all three.  It is something to know that my first confidence in\nyou was not all misplaced.  It is something to know that you will not\nbe less honest, less manly, less considerate towards the pupil whose\nrelation to yourself you have had the misfortune to forget, than\ntowards the stranger and the outcast whose appeal to you was not made\nin vain.\"\n\nAgain the chance reference to the woman in white! Was there no\npossibility of speaking of Miss Fairlie and of me without raising the\nmemory of Anne Catherick, and setting her between us like a fatality\nthat it was hopeless to avoid?\n\n\"Tell me what apology I can make to Mr. Fairlie for breaking my\nengagement,\" I said.  \"Tell me when to go after that apology is\naccepted.  I promise implicit obedience to you and to your advice.\"\n\n\"Time is every way of importance,\" she answered.  \"You heard me refer\nthis morning to Monday next, and to the necessity of setting the purple\nroom in order.  The visitor whom we expect on Monday----\"\n\nI could not wait for her to be more explicit.  Knowing what I knew now,\nthe memory of Miss Fairlie's look and manner at the breakfast-table\ntold me that the expected visitor at Limmeridge House was her future\nhusband.  I tried to force it back; but something rose within me at\nthat moment stronger than my own will, and I interrupted Miss Halcombe.\n\n\"Let me go to-day,\" I said bitterly.  \"The sooner the better.\"\n\n\"No, not to-day,\" she replied.  \"The only reason you can assign to Mr.\nFairlie for your departure, before the end of your engagement, must be\nthat an unforeseen necessity compels you to ask his permission to\nreturn at once to London.  You must wait till to-morrow to tell him\nthat, at the time when the post comes in, because he will then\nunderstand the sudden change in your plans, by associating it with the\narrival of a letter from London.  It is miserable and sickening to\ndescend to deceit, even of the most harmless kind--but I know Mr.\nFairlie, and if you once excite his suspicions that you are trifling\nwith him, he will refuse to release you.  Speak to him on Friday\nmorning: occupy yourself afterwards (for the sake of your own interests\nwith your employer) in leaving your unfinished work in as little\nconfusion as possible, and quit this place on Saturday.  It will be\ntime enough then, Mr. Hartright, for you, and for all of us.\"\n\nBefore I could assure her that she might depend on my acting in the\nstrictest accordance with her wishes, we were both startled by\nadvancing footsteps in the shrubbery.  Some one was coming from the\nhouse to seek for us! I felt the blood rush into my cheeks and then\nleave them again.  Could the third person who was fast approaching us,\nat such a time and under such circumstances, be Miss Fairlie?\n\nIt was a relief--so sadly, so hopelessly was my position towards her\nchanged already--it was absolutely a relief to me, when the person who\nhad disturbed us appeared at the entrance of the summer-house, and\nproved to be only Miss Fairlie's maid.\n\n\"Could I speak to you for a moment, miss?\" said the girl, in rather a\nflurried, unsettled manner.\n\nMiss Halcombe descended the steps into the shrubbery, and walked aside\na few paces with the maid.\n\nLeft by myself, my mind reverted, with a sense of forlorn wretchedness\nwhich it is not in any words that I can find to describe, to my\napproaching return to the solitude and the despair of my lonely London\nhome.  Thoughts of my kind old mother, and of my sister, who had\nrejoiced with her so innocently over my prospects in\nCumberland--thoughts whose long banishment from my heart it was now my\nshame and my reproach to realise for the first time--came back to me\nwith the loving mournfulness of old, neglected friends.  My mother and\nmy sister, what would they feel when I returned to them from my broken\nengagement, with the confession of my miserable secret--they who had\nparted from me so hopefully on that last happy night in the Hampstead\ncottage!\n\nAnne Catherick again! Even the memory of the farewell evening with my\nmother and my sister could not return to me now unconnected with that\nother memory of the moonlight walk back to London.  What did it mean?\nWere that woman and I to meet once more? It was possible, at the least.\nDid she know that I lived in London? Yes; I had told her so, either\nbefore or after that strange question of hers, when she had asked me so\ndistrustfully if I knew many men of the rank of Baronet.  Either before\nor after--my mind was not calm enough, then, to remember which.\n\nA few minutes elapsed before Miss Halcombe dismissed the maid and came\nback to me.  She, too, looked flurried and unsettled now.\n\n\"We have arranged all that is necessary, Mr. Hartright,\" she said. \"We\nhave understood each other, as friends should, and we may go back at\nonce to the house.  To tell you the truth, I am uneasy about Laura.\nShe has sent to say she wants to see me directly, and the maid reports\nthat her mistress is apparently very much agitated by a letter that she\nhas received this morning--the same letter, no doubt, which I sent on\nto the house before we came here.\"\n\nWe retraced our steps together hastily along the shrubbery path.\nAlthough Miss Halcombe had ended all that she thought it necessary to\nsay on her side, I had not ended all that I wanted to say on mine.\nFrom the moment when I had discovered that the expected visitor at\nLimmeridge was Miss Fairlie's future husband, I had felt a bitter\ncuriosity, a burning envious eagerness, to know who he was.  It was\npossible that a future opportunity of putting the question might not\neasily offer, so I risked asking it on our way back to the house.\n\n\"Now that you are kind enough to tell me we have understood each other,\nMiss Halcombe,\" I said, \"now that you are sure of my gratitude for your\nforbearance and my obedience to your wishes, may I venture to ask\nwho\"--(I hesitated--I had forced myself to think of him, but it was\nharder still to speak of him, as her promised husband)--\"who the\ngentleman engaged to Miss Fairlie is?\"\n\nHer mind was evidently occupied with the message she had received from\nher sister.  She answered in a hasty, absent way--\n\n\"A gentleman of large property in Hampshire.\"\n\nHampshire! Anne Catherick's native place.  Again, and yet again, the\nwoman in white.  There WAS a fatality in it.\n\n\"And his name?\" I said, as quietly and indifferently as I could.\n\n\"Sir Percival Glyde.\"\n\nSIR--Sir Percival! Anne Catherick's question--that suspicious question\nabout the men of the rank of Baronet whom I might happen to know--had\nhardly been dismissed from my mind by Miss Halcombe's return to me in\nthe summer-house, before it was recalled again by her own answer.  I\nstopped suddenly, and looked at her.\n\n\"Sir Percival Glyde,\" she repeated, imagining that I had not heard her\nformer reply.\n\n\"Knight, or Baronet?\" I asked, with an agitation that I could hide no\nlonger.\n\nShe paused for a moment, and then answered, rather coldly--\n\n\"Baronet, of course.\"\n\n\n\nXI\n\nNot a word more was said, on either side, as we walked back to the\nhouse.  Miss Halcombe hastened immediately to her sister's room, and I\nwithdrew to my studio to set in order all of Mr. Fairlie's drawings\nthat I had not yet mounted and restored before I resigned them to the\ncare of other hands.  Thoughts that I had hitherto restrained, thoughts\nthat made my position harder than ever to endure, crowded on me now\nthat I was alone.\n\nShe was engaged to be married, and her future husband was Sir Percival\nGlyde.  A man of the rank of Baronet, and the owner of property in\nHampshire.\n\nThere were hundreds of baronets in England, and dozens of landowners in\nHampshire.  Judging by the ordinary rules of evidence, I had not the\nshadow of a reason, thus far, for connecting Sir Percival Glyde with\nthe suspicious words of inquiry that had been spoken to me by the woman\nin white.  And yet, I did connect him with them.  Was it because he had\nnow become associated in my mind with Miss Fairlie, Miss Fairlie being,\nin her turn, associated with Anne Catherick, since the night when I had\ndiscovered the ominous likeness between them? Had the events of the\nmorning so unnerved me already that I was at the mercy of any delusion\nwhich common chances and common coincidences might suggest to my\nimagination? Impossible to say.  I could only feel that what had passed\nbetween Miss Halcombe and myself, on our way from the summer-house, had\naffected me very strangely.  The foreboding of some undiscoverable\ndanger lying hid from us all in the darkness of the future was strong\non me.  The doubt whether I was not linked already to a chain of events\nwhich even my approaching departure from Cumberland would be powerless\nto snap asunder--the doubt whether we any of us saw the end as the end\nwould really be--gathered more and more darkly over my mind. Poignant\nas it was, the sense of suffering caused by the miserable end of my\nbrief, presumptuous love seemed to be blunted and deadened by the still\nstronger sense of something obscurely impending, something invisibly\nthreatening, that Time was holding over our heads.\n\nI had been engaged with the drawings little more than half an hour,\nwhen there was a knock at the door.  It opened, on my answering; and,\nto my surprise, Miss Halcombe entered the room.\n\nHer manner was angry and agitated.  She caught up a chair for herself\nbefore I could give her one, and sat down in it, close at my side.\n\n\"Mr. Hartright,\" she said, \"I had hoped that all painful subjects of\nconversation were exhausted between us, for to-day at least. But it is\nnot to be so.  There is some underhand villainy at work to frighten my\nsister about her approaching marriage.  You saw me send the gardener on\nto the house, with a letter addressed, in a strange handwriting, to\nMiss Fairlie?\"\n\n\"Certainly.\"\n\n\"The letter is an anonymous letter--a vile attempt to injure Sir\nPercival Glyde in my sister's estimation.  It has so agitated and\nalarmed her that I have had the greatest possible difficulty in\ncomposing her spirits sufficiently to allow me to leave her room and\ncome here.  I know this is a family matter on which I ought not to\nconsult you, and in which you can feel no concern or interest----\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon, Miss Halcombe.  I feel the strongest possible\nconcern and interest in anything that affects Miss Fairlie's happiness\nor yours.\"\n\n\"I am glad to hear you say so.  You are the only person in the house,\nor out of it, who can advise me.  Mr. Fairlie, in his state of health\nand with his horror of difficulties and mysteries of all kinds, is not\nto be thought of.  The clergyman is a good, weak man, who knows nothing\nout of the routine of his duties; and our neighbours are just the sort\nof comfortable, jog-trot acquaintances whom one cannot disturb in times\nof trouble and danger.  What I want to know is this: ought I at once to\ntake such steps as I can to discover the writer of the letter? or ought\nI to wait, and apply to Mr. Fairlie's legal adviser to-morrow? It is a\nquestion--perhaps a very important one--of gaining or losing a day.\nTell me what you think, Mr. Hartright.  If necessity had not already\nobliged me to take you into my confidence under very delicate\ncircumstances, even my helpless situation would, perhaps, be no excuse\nfor me.  But as things are I cannot surely be wrong, after all that has\npassed between us, in forgetting that you are a friend of only three\nmonths' standing.\"\n\nShe gave me the letter.  It began abruptly, without any preliminary\nform of address, as follows--\n\n\n\"Do you believe in dreams? I hope, for your own sake, that you do. See\nwhat Scripture says about dreams and their fulfilment (Genesis xl. 8,\nxli. 25; Daniel iv. 18-25), and take the warning I send you before it\nis too late.\n\n\"Last night I dreamed about you, Miss Fairlie.  I dreamed that I was\nstanding inside the communion rails of a church--I on one side of the\naltar-table, and the clergyman, with his surplice and his prayer-book,\non the other.\n\n\"After a time there walked towards us, down the aisle of the church, a\nman and a woman, coming to be married.  You were the woman.  You looked\nso pretty and innocent in your beautiful white silk dress, and your\nlong white lace veil, that my heart felt for you, and the tears came\ninto my eyes.\n\n\"They were tears of pity, young lady, that heaven blesses and instead\nof falling from my eyes like the everyday tears that we all of us shed,\nthey turned into two rays of light which slanted nearer and nearer to\nthe man standing at the altar with you, till they touched his breast.\nThe two rays sprang ill arches like two rainbows between me and him.  I\nlooked along them, and I saw down into his inmost heart.\n\n\"The outside of the man you were marrying was fair enough to see. He\nwas neither tall nor short--he was a little below the middle size.  A\nlight, active, high-spirited man--about five-and-forty years old, to\nlook at.  He had a pale face, and was bald over the forehead, but had\ndark hair on the rest of his head.  His beard was shaven on his chin,\nbut was let to grow, of a fine rich brown, on his cheeks and his upper\nlip.  His eyes were brown too, and very bright; his nose straight and\nhandsome and delicate enough to have done for a woman's.  His hands the\nsame.  He was troubled from time to time with a dry hacking cough, and\nwhen he put up his white right hand to his mouth, he showed the red\nscar of an old wound across the back of it.  Have I dreamt of the right\nman? You know best, Miss Fairlie and you can say if I was deceived or\nnot. Read next, what I saw beneath the outside--I entreat you, read,\nand profit.\n\n\"I looked along the two rays of light, and I saw down into his inmost\nheart.  It was black as night, and on it were written, in the red\nflaming letters which are the handwriting of the fallen angel, 'Without\npity and without remorse.  He has strewn with misery the paths of\nothers, and he will live to strew with misery the path of this woman by\nhis side.' I read that, and then the rays of light shifted and pointed\nover his shoulder; and there, behind him, stood a fiend laughing.  And\nthe rays of light shifted once more, and pointed over your shoulder;\nand there behind you, stood an angel weeping.  And the rays of light\nshifted for the third time, and pointed straight between you and that\nman.  They widened and widened, thrusting you both asunder, one from\nthe other.  And the clergyman looked for the marriage-service in vain:\nit was gone out of the book, and he shut up the leaves, and put it from\nhim in despair.  And I woke with my eyes full of tears and my heart\nbeating--for I believe in dreams.\n\n\"Believe too, Miss Fairlie--I beg of you, for your own sake, believe as\nI do.  Joseph and Daniel, and others in Scripture, believed in dreams.\nInquire into the past life of that man with the scar on his hand,\nbefore you say the words that make you his miserable wife.  I don't\ngive you this warning on my account, but on yours.  I have an interest\nin your well-being that will live as long as I draw breath.  Your\nmother's daughter has a tender place in my heart--for your mother was\nmy first, my best, my only friend.\"\n\n\nThere the extraordinary letter ended, without signature of any sort.\n\nThe handwriting afforded no prospect of a clue.  It was traced on ruled\nlines, in the cramped, conventional, copy-book character technically\ntermed \"small hand.\" It was feeble and faint, and defaced by blots, but\nhad otherwise nothing to distinguish it.\n\n\"That is not an illiterate letter,\" said Miss Halcombe, \"and at the\nsame time, it is surely too incoherent to be the letter of an educated\nperson in the higher ranks of life.  The reference to the bridal dress\nand veil, and other little expressions, seem to point to it as the\nproduction of some woman.  What do you think, Mr. Hartright?\"\n\n\"I think so too.  It seems to me to be not only the letter of a woman,\nbut of a woman whose mind must be----\"\n\n\"Deranged?\" suggested Miss Halcombe.  \"It struck me in that light too.\"\n\nI did not answer.  While I was speaking, my eyes rested on the last\nsentence of the letter: \"Your mother's daughter has a tender place in\nmy heart--for your mother was my first, my best, my only friend.\" Those\nwords and the doubt which had just escaped me as to the sanity of the\nwriter of the letter, acting together on my mind, suggested an idea,\nwhich I was literally afraid to express openly, or even to encourage\nsecretly.  I began to doubt whether my own faculties were not in danger\nof losing their balance.  It seemed almost like a monomania to be\ntracing back everything strange that happened, everything unexpected\nthat was said, always to the same hidden source and the same sinister\ninfluence.  I resolved, this time, in defence of my own courage and my\nown sense, to come to no decision that plain fact did not warrant, and\nto turn my back resolutely on everything that tempted me in the shape\nof surmise.\n\n\"If we have any chance of tracing the person who has written this,\" I\nsaid, returning the letter to Miss Halcombe, \"there can be no harm in\nseizing our opportunity the moment it offers.  I think we ought to\nspeak to the gardener again about the elderly woman who gave him the\nletter, and then to continue our inquiries in the village.  But first\nlet me ask a question.  You mentioned just now the alternative of\nconsulting Mr. Fairlie's legal adviser to-morrow.  Is there no\npossibility of communicating with him earlier? Why not to-day?\"\n\n\"I can only explain,\" replied Miss Halcombe, \"by entering into certain\nparticulars, connected with my sister's marriage-engagement, which I\ndid not think it necessary or desirable to mention to you this morning.\nOne of Sir Percival Glyde's objects in coming here on Monday, is to fix\nthe period of his marriage, which has hitherto been left quite\nunsettled.  He is anxious that the event should take place before the\nend of the year.\"\n\n\"Does Miss Fairlie know of that wish?\" I asked eagerly.\n\n\"She has no suspicion of it, and after what has happened, I shall not\ntake the responsibility upon myself of enlightening her.  Sir Percival\nhas only mentioned his views to Mr. Fairlie, who has told me himself\nthat he is ready and anxious, as Laura's guardian, to forward them.  He\nhas written to London, to the family solicitor, Mr. Gilmore.  Mr.\nGilmore happens to be away in Glasgow on business, and he has replied\nby proposing to stop at Limmeridge House on his way back to town.  He\nwill arrive to-morrow, and will stay with us a few days, so as to allow\nSir Percival time to plead his own cause.  If he succeeds, Mr. Gilmore\nwill then return to London, taking with him his instructions for my\nsister's marriage-settlement.  You understand now, Mr. Hartright, why I\nspeak of waiting to take legal advice until to-morrow? Mr. Gilmore is\nthe old and tried friend of two generations of Fairlies, and we can\ntrust him, as we could trust no one else.\"\n\nThe marriage-settlement! The mere hearing of those two words stung me\nwith a jealous despair that was poison to my higher and better\ninstincts.  I began to think--it is hard to confess this, but I must\nsuppress nothing from beginning to end of the terrible story that I now\nstand committed to reveal--I began to think, with a hateful eagerness\nof hope, of the vague charges against Sir Percival Glyde which the\nanonymous letter contained.  What if those wild accusations rested on a\nfoundation of truth? What if their truth could be proved before the\nfatal words of consent were spoken, and the marriage-settlement was\ndrawn? I have tried to think since, that the feeling which then\nanimated me began and ended in pure devotion to Miss Fairlie's\ninterests, but I have never succeeded in deceiving myself into\nbelieving it, and I must not now attempt to deceive others.  The\nfeeling began and ended in reckless, vindictive, hopeless hatred of the\nman who was to marry her.\n\n\"If we are to find out anything,\" I said, speaking under the new\ninfluence which was now directing me, \"we had better not let another\nminute slip by us unemployed.  I can only suggest, once more, the\npropriety of questioning the gardener a second time, and of inquiring\nin the village immediately afterwards.\"\n\n\"I think I may be of help to you in both cases,\" said Miss Halcombe,\nrising.  \"Let us go, Mr. Hartright, at once, and do the best we can\ntogether.\"\n\nI had the door in my hand to open it for her--but I stopped, on a\nsudden, to ask an important question before we set forth.\n\n\"One of the paragraphs of the anonymous letter,\" I said, \"contains some\nsentences of minute personal description.  Sir Percival Glyde's name is\nnot mentioned, I know--but does that description at all resemble him?\"\n\n\"Accurately--even in stating his age to be forty-five----\"\n\nForty-five; and she was not yet twenty-one! Men of his age married\nwives of her age every day--and experience had shown those marriages to\nbe often the happiest ones.  I knew that--and yet even the mention of\nhis age, when I contrasted it with hers, added to my blind hatred and\ndistrust of him.\n\n\"Accurately,\" Miss Halcombe continued, \"even to the scar on his right\nhand, which is the scar of a wound that he received years since when he\nwas travelling in Italy.  There can be no doubt that every peculiarity\nof his personal appearance is thoroughly well known to the writer of\nthe letter.\"\n\n\"Even a cough that he is troubled with is mentioned, if I remember\nright?\"\n\n\"Yes, and mentioned correctly.  He treats it lightly himself, though it\nsometimes makes his friends anxious about him.\"\n\n\"I suppose no whispers have ever been heard against his character?\"\n\n\"Mr. Hartright! I hope you are not unjust enough to let that infamous\nletter influence you?\"\n\nI felt the blood rush into my cheeks, for I knew that it HAD influenced\nme.\n\n\"I hope not,\" I answered confusedly.  \"Perhaps I had no right to ask\nthe question.\"\n\n\"I am not sorry you asked it,\" she said, \"for it enables me to do\njustice to Sir Percival's reputation.  Not a whisper, Mr. Hartright,\nhas ever reached me, or my family, against him.  He has fought\nsuccessfully two contested elections, and has come out of the ordeal\nunscathed.  A man who can do that, in England, is a man whose character\nis established.\"\n\nI opened the door for her in silence, and followed her out.  She had\nnot convinced me.  If the recording angel had come down from heaven to\nconfirm her, and had opened his book to my mortal eyes, the recording\nangel would not have convinced me.\n\nWe found the gardener at work as usual.  No amount of questioning could\nextract a single answer of any importance from the lad's impenetrable\nstupidity.  The woman who had given him the letter was an elderly\nwoman; she had not spoken a word to him, and she had gone away towards\nthe south in a great hurry.  That was all the gardener could tell us.\n\nThe village lay southward of the house.  So to the village we went next.\n\n\n\nXII\n\nOur inquiries at Limmeridge were patiently pursued in all directions,\nand among all sorts and conditions of people.  But nothing came of\nthem.  Three of the villagers did certainly assure us that they had\nseen the woman, but as they were quite unable to describe her, and\nquite incapable of agreeing about the exact direction in which she was\nproceeding when they last saw her, these three bright exceptions to the\ngeneral rule of total ignorance afforded no more real assistance to us\nthan the mass of their unhelpful and unobservant neighbours.\n\nThe course of our useless investigations brought us, in time, to the\nend of the village at which the schools established by Mrs. Fairlie\nwere situated.  As we passed the side of the building appropriated to\nthe use of the boys, I suggested the propriety of making a last inquiry\nof the schoolmaster, whom we might presume to be, in virtue of his\noffice, the most intelligent man in the place.\n\n\"I am afraid the schoolmaster must have been occupied with his\nscholars,\" said Miss Halcombe, \"just at the time when the woman passed\nthrough the village and returned again.  However, we can but try.\"\n\nWe entered the playground enclosure, and walked by the schoolroom\nwindow to get round to the door, which was situated at the back of the\nbuilding.  I stopped for a moment at the window and looked in.\n\nThe schoolmaster was sitting at his high desk, with his back to me,\napparently haranguing the pupils, who were all gathered together in\nfront of him, with one exception.  The one exception was a sturdy\nwhite-headed boy, standing apart from all the rest on a stool in a\ncorner--a forlorn little Crusoe, isolated in his own desert island of\nsolitary penal disgrace.\n\nThe door, when we got round to it, was ajar, and the school-master's\nvoice reached us plainly, as we both stopped for a minute under the\nporch.\n\n\"Now, boys,\" said the voice, \"mind what I tell you.  If I hear another\nword spoken about ghosts in this school, it will be the worse for all\nof you.  There are no such things as ghosts, and therefore any boy who\nbelieves in ghosts believes in what can't possibly be; and a boy who\nbelongs to Limmeridge School, and believes in what can't possibly be,\nsets up his back against reason and discipline, and must be punished\naccordingly.  You all see Jacob Postlethwaite standing up on the stool\nthere in disgrace.  He has been punished, not because he said he saw a\nghost last night, but because he is too impudent and too obstinate to\nlisten to reason, and because he persists in saying he saw the ghost\nafter I have told him that no such thing can possibly be. If nothing\nelse will do, I mean to cane the ghost out of Jacob Postlethwaite, and\nif the thing spreads among any of the rest of you, I mean to go a step\nfarther, and cane the ghost out of the whole school.\"\n\n\"We seem to have chosen an awkward moment for our visit,\" said Miss\nHalcombe, pushing open the door at the end of the schoolmaster's\naddress, and leading the way in.\n\nOur appearance produced a strong sensation among the boys.  They\nappeared to think that we had arrived for the express purpose of seeing\nJacob Postlethwaite caned.\n\n\"Go home all of you to dinner,\" said the schoolmaster, \"except Jacob.\nJacob must stop where he is; and the ghost may bring him his dinner, if\nthe ghost pleases.\"\n\nJacob's fortitude deserted him at the double disappearance of his\nschoolfellows and his prospect of dinner.  He took his hands out of his\npockets, looked hard at his knuckles, raised them with great\ndeliberation to his eyes, and when they got there, ground them round\nand round slowly, accompanying the action by short spasms of sniffing,\nwhich followed each other at regular intervals--the nasal minute guns\nof juvenile distress.\n\n\"We came here to ask you a question, Mr. Dempster,\" said Miss Halcombe,\naddressing the schoolmaster; \"and we little expected to find you\noccupied in exorcising a ghost.  What does it all mean? What has really\nhappened?\"\n\n\"That wicked boy has been frightening the whole school, Miss Halcombe,\nby declaring that he saw a ghost yesterday evening,\" answered the\nmaster; \"and he still persists in his absurd story, in spite of all\nthat I can say to him.\"\n\n\"Most extraordinary,\" said Miss Halcombe, \"I should not have thought it\npossible that any of the boys had imagination enough to see a ghost.\nThis is a new accession indeed to the hard labour of forming the\nyouthful mind at Limmeridge, and I heartily wish you well through it,\nMr. Dempster.  In the meantime, let me explain why you see me here, and\nwhat it is I want.\"\n\nShe then put the same question to the schoolmaster which we had asked\nalready of almost every one else in the village.  It was met by the\nsame discouraging answer Mr. Dempster had not set eyes on the stranger\nof whom we were in search.\n\n\"We may as well return to the house, Mr. Hartright,\" said Miss\nHalcombe; \"the information we want is evidently not to be found.\"\n\nShe had bowed to Mr. Dempster, and was about to leave the schoolroom,\nwhen the forlorn position of Jacob Postlethwaite, piteously sniffing on\nthe stool of penitence, attracted her attention as she passed him, and\nmade her stop good-humouredly to speak a word to the little prisoner\nbefore she opened the door.\n\n\"You foolish boy,\" she said, \"why don't you beg Mr. Dempster's pardon,\nand hold your tongue about the ghost?\"\n\n\"Eh!--but I saw t' ghaist,\" persisted Jacob Postlethwaite, with a stare\nof terror and a burst of tears.\n\n\"Stuff and nonsense! You saw nothing of the kind.  Ghost indeed! What\nghost----\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon, Miss Halcombe,\" interposed the schoolmaster a\nlittle uneasily--\"but I think you had better not question the boy. The\nobstinate folly of his story is beyond all belief; and you might lead\nhim into ignorantly----\"\n\n\"Ignorantly what?\" inquired Miss Halcombe sharply.\n\n\"Ignorantly shocking your feelings,\" said Mr. Dempster, looking very\nmuch discomposed.\n\n\"Upon my word, Mr. Dempster, you pay my feelings a great compliment in\nthinking them weak enough to be shocked by such an urchin as that!\" She\nturned with an air of satirical defiance to little Jacob, and began to\nquestion him directly.  \"Come!\" she said, \"I mean to know all about\nthis.  You naughty boy, when did you see the ghost?\"\n\n\"Yestere'en, at the gloaming,\" replied Jacob.\n\n\"Oh! you saw it yesterday evening, in the twilight? And what was it\nlike?\"\n\n\"Arl in white--as a ghaist should be,\" answered the ghost-seer, with a\nconfidence beyond his years.\n\n\"And where was it?\"\n\n\"Away yander, in t' kirkyard--where a ghaist ought to be.\"\n\n\"As a 'ghaist' should be--where a 'ghaist' ought to be--why, you little\nfool, you talk as if the manners and customs of ghosts had been\nfamiliar to you from your infancy! You have got your story at your\nfingers' ends, at any rate.  I suppose I shall hear next that you can\nactually tell me whose ghost it was?\"\n\n\"Eh! but I just can,\" replied Jacob, nodding his head with an air of\ngloomy triumph.\n\nMr. Dempster had already tried several times to speak while Miss\nHalcombe was examining his pupil, and he now interposed resolutely\nenough to make himself heard.\n\n\"Excuse me, Miss Halcombe,\" he said, \"if I venture to say that you are\nonly encouraging the boy by asking him these questions.\"\n\n\"I will merely ask one more, Mr. Dempster, and then I shall be quite\nsatisfied.  Well,\" she continued, turning to the boy, \"and whose ghost\nwas it?\"\n\n\"T' ghaist of Mistress Fairlie,\" answered Jacob in a whisper.\n\nThe effect which this extraordinary reply produced on Miss Halcombe\nfully justified the anxiety which the schoolmaster had shown to prevent\nher from hearing it.  Her face crimsoned with indignation--she turned\nupon little Jacob with an angry suddenness which terrified him into a\nfresh burst of tears--opened her lips to speak to him--then controlled\nherself, and addressed the master instead of the boy.\n\n\"It is useless,\" she said, \"to hold such a child as that responsible\nfor what he says.  I have little doubt that the idea has been put into\nhis head by others.  If there are people in this village, Mr. Dempster,\nwho have forgotten the respect and gratitude due from every soul in it\nto my mother's memory, I will find them out, and if I have any\ninfluence with Mr. Fairlie, they shall suffer for it.\"\n\n\"I hope--indeed, I am sure, Miss Halcombe--that you are mistaken,\" said\nthe schoolmaster.  \"The matter begins and ends with the boy's own\nperversity and folly.  He saw, or thought he saw, a woman in white,\nyesterday evening, as he was passing the churchyard; and the figure,\nreal or fancied, was standing by the marble cross, which he and every\none else in Limmeridge knows to be the monument over Mrs. Fairlie's\ngrave.  These two circumstances are surely sufficient to have suggested\nto the boy himself the answer which has so naturally shocked you?\"\n\nAlthough Miss Halcombe did not seem to be convinced, she evidently felt\nthat the schoolmaster's statement of the case was too sensible to be\nopenly combated.  She merely replied by thanking him for his attention,\nand by promising to see him again when her doubts were satisfied.  This\nsaid, she bowed, and led the way out of the schoolroom.\n\nThroughout the whole of this strange scene I had stood apart, listening\nattentively, and drawing my own conclusions.  As soon as we were alone\nagain, Miss Halcombe asked me if I had formed any opinion on what I had\nheard.\n\n\"A very strong opinion,\" I answered; \"the boy's story, as I believe,\nhas a foundation in fact.  I confess I am anxious to see the monument\nover Mrs. Fairlie's grave, and to examine the ground about it.\"\n\n\"You shall see the grave.\"\n\nShe paused after making that reply, and reflected a little as we walked\non.  \"What has happened in the schoolroom,\" she resumed, \"has so\ncompletely distracted my attention from the subject of the letter, that\nI feel a little bewildered when I try to return to it.  Must we give up\nall idea of making any further inquiries, and wait to place the thing\nin Mr. Gilmore's hands to-morrow?\"\n\n\"By no means, Miss Halcombe.  What has happened in the schoolroom\nencourages me to persevere in the investigation.\"\n\n\"Why does it encourage you?\"\n\n\"Because it strengthens a suspicion I felt when you gave me the letter\nto read.\"\n\n\"I suppose you had your reasons, Mr. Hartright, for concealing that\nsuspicion from me till this moment?\"\n\n\"I was afraid to encourage it in myself.  I thought it was utterly\npreposterous--I distrusted it as the result of some perversity in my\nown imagination.  But I can do so no longer.  Not only the boy's own\nanswers to your questions, but even a chance expression that dropped\nfrom the schoolmaster's lips in explaining his story, have forced the\nidea back into my mind.  Events may yet prove that idea to be a\ndelusion, Miss Halcombe; but the belief is strong in me, at this\nmoment, that the fancied ghost in the churchyard, and the writer of the\nanonymous letter, are one and the same person.\"\n\nShe stopped, turned pale, and looked me eagerly in the face.\n\n\"What person?\"\n\n\"The schoolmaster unconsciously told you.  When he spoke of the figure\nthat the boy saw in the churchyard he called it 'a woman in white.'\"\n\n\"Not Anne Catherick?\"\n\n\"Yes, Anne Catherick.\"\n\nShe put her hand through my arm and leaned on it heavily.\n\n\"I don't know why,\" she said in low tones, \"but there is something in\nthis suspicion of yours that seems to startle and unnerve me. I\nfeel----\" She stopped, and tried to laugh it off.  \"Mr. Hartright,\" she\nwent on, \"I will show you the grave, and then go back at once to the\nhouse.  I had better not leave Laura too long alone.  I had better go\nback and sit with her.\"\n\nWe were close to the churchyard when she spoke.  The church, a dreary\nbuilding of grey stone, was situated in a little valley, so as to be\nsheltered from the bleak winds blowing over the moorland all round it.\nThe burial-ground advanced, from the side of the church, a little way\nup the slope of the hill.  It was surrounded by a rough, low stone\nwall, and was bare and open to the sky, except at one extremity, where\na brook trickled down the stony hill-side, and a clump of dwarf trees\nthrew their narrow shadows over the short, meagre grass.  Just beyond\nthe brook and the trees, and not far from one of the three stone stiles\nwhich afforded entrance, at various points, to the churchyard, rose the\nwhite marble cross that distinguished Mrs. Fairlie's grave from the\nhumbler monuments scattered about it.\n\n\"I need go no farther with you,\" said Miss Halcombe, pointing to the\ngrave.  \"You will let me know if you find anything to confirm the idea\nyou have just mentioned to me.  Let us meet again at the house.\"\n\nShe left me.  I descended at once to the churchyard, and crossed the\nstile which led directly to Mrs. Fairlie's grave.\n\nThe grass about it was too short, and the ground too hard, to show any\nmarks of footsteps.  Disappointed thus far, I next looked attentively\nat the cross, and at the square block of marble below it, on which the\ninscription was cut.\n\nThe natural whiteness of the cross was a little clouded, here and\nthere, by weather stains, and rather more than one half of the square\nblock beneath it, on the side which bore the inscription, was in the\nsame condition.  The other half, however, attracted my attention at\nonce by its singular freedom from stain or impurity of any kind.  I\nlooked closer, and saw that it had been cleaned--recently cleaned, in a\ndownward direction from top to bottom.  The boundary line between the\npart that had been cleaned and the part that had not was traceable\nwherever the inscription left a blank space of marble--sharply\ntraceable as a line that had been produced by artificial means.  Who\nhad begun the cleansing of the marble, and who had left it unfinished?\n\nI looked about me, wondering how the question was to be solved. No sign\nof a habitation could be discerned from the point at which I was\nstanding--the burial-ground was left in the lonely possession of the\ndead.  I returned to the church, and walked round it till I came to the\nback of the building; then crossed the boundary wall beyond, by another\nof the stone stiles, and found myself at the head of a path leading\ndown into a deserted stone quarry.  Against one side of the quarry a\nlittle two-room cottage was built, and just outside the door an old\nwoman was engaged in washing.\n\nI walked up to her, and entered into conversation about the church and\nburial-ground.  She was ready enough to talk, and almost the first\nwords she said informed me that her husband filled the two offices of\nclerk and sexton.  I said a few words next in praise of Mrs. Fairlie's\nmonument.  The old woman shook her head, and told me I had not seen it\nat its best.  It was her husband's business to look after it, but he\nhad been so ailing and weak for months and months past, that he had\nhardly been able to crawl into church on Sundays to do his duty, and\nthe monument had been neglected in consequence.  He was getting a\nlittle better now, and in a week or ten days' time he hoped to be\nstrong enough to set to work and clean it.\n\nThis information--extracted from a long rambling answer in the broadest\nCumberland dialect--told me all that I most wanted to know.  I gave the\npoor woman a trifle, and returned at once to Limmeridge House.\n\nThe partial cleansing of the monument had evidently been accomplished\nby a strange hand.  Connecting what I had discovered, thus far, with\nwhat I had suspected after hearing the story of the ghost seen at\ntwilight, I wanted nothing more to confirm my resolution to watch Mrs.\nFairlie's grave, in secret, that evening, returning to it at sunset,\nand waiting within sight of it till the night fell.  The work of\ncleansing the monument had been left unfinished, and the person by whom\nit had been begun might return to complete it.\n\nOn getting back to the house I informed Miss Halcombe of what I\nintended to do.  She looked surprised and uneasy while I was explaining\nmy purpose, but she made no positive objection to the execution of it.\nShe only said, \"I hope it may end well.\"\n\nJust as she was leaving me again, I stopped her to inquire, as calmly\nas I could, after Miss Fairlie's health.  She was in better spirits,\nand Miss Halcombe hoped she might be induced to take a little walking\nexercise while the afternoon sun lasted.\n\nI returned to my own room to resume setting the drawings in order. It\nwas necessary to do this, and doubly necessary to keep my mind employed\non anything that would help to distract my attention from myself, and\nfrom the hopeless future that lay before me.  From time to time I\npaused in my work to look out of window and watch the sky as the sun\nsank nearer and nearer to the horizon.  On one of those occasions I saw\na figure on the broad gravel walk under my window.  It was Miss Fairlie.\n\nI had not seen her since the morning, and I had hardly spoken to her\nthen.  Another day at Limmeridge was all that remained to me, and after\nthat day my eyes might never look on her again.  This thought was\nenough to hold me at the window.  I had sufficient consideration for\nher to arrange the blind so that she might not see me if she looked up,\nbut I had no strength to resist the temptation of letting my eyes, at\nleast, follow her as far as they could on her walk.\n\nShe was dressed in a brown cloak, with a plain black silk gown under\nit.  On her head was the same simple straw hat which she had worn on\nthe morning when we first met.  A veil was attached to it now which hid\nher face from me.  By her side trotted a little Italian greyhound, the\npet companion of all her walks, smartly dressed in a scarlet cloth\nwrapper, to keep the sharp air from his delicate skin.  She did not\nseem to notice the dog.  She walked straight forward, with her head\ndrooping a little, and her arms folded in her cloak.  The dead leaves,\nwhich had whirled in the wind before me when I had heard of her\nmarriage engagement in the morning, whirled in the wind before her, and\nrose and fell and scattered themselves at her feet as she walked on in\nthe pale waning sunlight.  The dog shivered and trembled, and pressed\nagainst her dress impatiently for notice and encouragement.  But she\nnever heeded him.  She walked on, farther and farther away from me,\nwith the dead leaves whirling about her on the path--walked on, till my\naching eyes could see her no more, and I was left alone again with my\nown heavy heart.\n\nIn another hour's time I had done my work, and the sunset was at hand.\nI got my hat and coat in the hall, and slipped out of the house without\nmeeting any one.\n\nThe clouds were wild in the western heaven, and the wind blew chill\nfrom the sea.  Far as the shore was, the sound of the surf swept over\nthe intervening moorland, and beat drearily in my ears when I entered\nthe churchyard.  Not a living creature was in sight.  The place looked\nlonelier than ever as I chose my position, and waited and watched, with\nmy eyes on the white cross that rose over Mrs. Fairlie's grave.\n\n\n\nXIII\n\nThe exposed situation of the churchyard had obliged me to be cautious\nin choosing the position that I was to occupy.\n\nThe main entrance to the church was on the side next to the\nburial-ground, and the door was screened by a porch walled in on either\nside.  After some little hesitation, caused by natural reluctance to\nconceal myself, indispensable as that concealment was to the object in\nview, I had resolved on entering the porch. A loophole window was\npierced in each of its side walls.  Through one of these windows I\ncould see Mrs. Fairlie's grave.  The other looked towards the stone\nquarry in which the sexton's cottage was built.  Before me, fronting\nthe porch entrance, was a patch of bare burial-ground, a line of low\nstone wall, and a strip of lonely brown hill, with the sunset clouds\nsailing heavily over it before the strong, steady wind.  No living\ncreature was visible or audible--no bird flew by me, no dog barked from\nthe sexton's cottage.  The pauses in the dull beating of the surf were\nfilled up by the dreary rustling of the dwarf trees near the grave, and\nthe cold faint bubble of the brook over its stony bed.  A dreary scene\nand a dreary hour.  My spirits sank fast as I counted out the minutes\nof the evening in my hiding-place under the church porch.\n\nIt was not twilight yet--the light of the setting sun still lingered in\nthe heavens, and little more than the first half-hour of my solitary\nwatch had elapsed--when I heard footsteps and a voice.  The footsteps\nwere approaching from the other side of the church, and the voice was a\nwoman's.\n\n\"Don't you fret, my dear, about the letter,\" said the voice.  \"I gave\nit to the lad quite safe, and the lad he took it from me without a\nword.  He went his way and I went mine, and not a living soul followed\nme afterwards--that I'll warrant.\"\n\nThese words strung up my attention to a pitch of expectation that was\nalmost painful.  There was a pause of silence, but the footsteps still\nadvanced.  In another moment two persons, both women, passed within my\nrange of view from the porch window.  They were walking straight\ntowards the grave; and therefore they had their backs turned towards me.\n\nOne of the women was dressed in a bonnet and shawl.  The other wore a\nlong travelling-cloak of a dark-blue colour, with the hood drawn over\nher head.  A few inches of her gown were visible below the cloak.  My\nheart beat fast as I noted the colour--it was white.\n\nAfter advancing about half-way between the church and the grave they\nstopped, and the woman in the cloak turned her head towards her\ncompanion.  But her side face, which a bonnet might now have allowed me\nto see, was hidden by the heavy, projecting edge of the hood.\n\n\"Mind you keep that comfortable warm cloak on,\" said the same voice\nwhich I had already heard--the voice of the woman in the shawl.  \"Mrs.\nTodd is right about your looking too particular, yesterday, all in\nwhite.  I'll walk about a little while you're here, churchyards being\nnot at all in my way, whatever they may be in yours.  Finish what you\nwant to do before I come back, and let us be sure and get home again\nbefore night.\"\n\nWith those words she turned about, and retracing her steps, advanced\nwith her face towards me.  It was the face of an elderly woman, brown,\nrugged, and healthy, with nothing dishonest or suspicious in the look\nof it.  Close to the church she stopped to pull her shawl closer round\nher.\n\n\"Queer,\" she said to herself, \"always queer, with her whims and her\nways, ever since I can remember her.  Harmless, though--as harmless,\npoor soul, as a little child.\"\n\nShe sighed--looked about the burial-ground nervously--shook her head,\nas if the dreary prospect by no means pleased her, and disappeared\nround the corner of the church.\n\nI doubted for a moment whether I ought to follow and speak to her or\nnot.  My intense anxiety to find myself face to face with her companion\nhelped me to decide in the negative.  I could ensure seeing the woman\nin the shawl by waiting near the churchyard until she came\nback--although it seemed more than doubtful whether she could give me\nthe information of which I was in search.  The person who had delivered\nthe letter was of little consequence. The person who had written it was\nthe one centre of interest, and the one source of information, and that\nperson I now felt convinced was before me in the churchyard.\n\nWhile these ideas were passing through my mind I saw the woman in the\ncloak approach close to the grave, and stand looking at it for a little\nwhile.  She then glanced all round her, and taking a white linen cloth\nor handkerchief from under her cloak, turned aside towards the brook.\nThe little stream ran into the churchyard under a tiny archway in the\nbottom of the wall, and ran out again, after a winding course of a few\ndozen yards, under a similar opening.  She dipped the cloth in the\nwater, and returned to the grave.  I saw her kiss the white cross, then\nkneel down before the inscription, and apply her wet cloth to the\ncleansing of it.\n\nAfter considering how I could show myself with the least possible\nchance of frightening her, I resolved to cross the wall before me, to\nskirt round it outside, and to enter the churchyard again by the stile\nnear the grave, in order that she might see me as I approached.  She\nwas so absorbed over her employment that she did not hear me coming\nuntil I had stepped over the stile.  Then she looked up, started to her\nfeet with a faint cry, and stood facing me in speechless and motionless\nterror.\n\n\"Don't be frightened,\" I said.  \"Surely you remember me?\"\n\nI stopped while I spoke--then advanced a few steps gently--then stopped\nagain--and so approached by little and little till I was close to her.\nIf there had been any doubt still left in my mind, it must have been\nnow set at rest.  There, speaking affrightedly for itself--there was\nthe same face confronting me over Mrs. Fairlie's grave which had first\nlooked into mine on the high-road by night.\n\n\"You remember me?\" I said.  \"We met very late, and I helped you to find\nthe way to London.  Surely you have not forgotten that?\"\n\nHer features relaxed, and she drew a heavy breath of relief.  I saw the\nnew life of recognition stirring slowly under the death-like stillness\nwhich fear had set on her face.\n\n\"Don't attempt to speak to me just yet,\" I went on.  \"Take time to\nrecover yourself--take time to feel quite certain that I am a friend.\"\n\n\"You are very kind to me,\" she murmured.  \"As kind now as you were\nthen.\"\n\nShe stopped, and I kept silence on my side.  I was not granting time\nfor composure to her only, I was gaining time also for myself.  Under\nthe wan wild evening light, that woman and I were met together again, a\ngrave between us, the dead about us, the lonesome hills closing us\nround on every side.  The time, the place, the circumstances under\nwhich we now stood face to face in the evening stillness of that dreary\nvalley--the lifelong interests which might hang suspended on the next\nchance words that passed between us--the sense that, for aught I knew\nto the contrary, the whole future of Laura Fairlie's life might be\ndetermined, for good or for evil, by my winning or losing the\nconfidence of the forlorn creature who stood trembling by her mother's\ngrave--all threatened to shake the steadiness and the self-control on\nwhich every inch of the progress I might yet make now depended.  I\ntried hard, as I felt this, to possess myself of all my resources; I\ndid my utmost to turn the few moments for reflection to the best\naccount.\n\n\"Are you calmer now?\" I said, as soon as I thought it time to speak\nagain.  \"Can you talk to me without feeling frightened, and without\nforgetting that I am a friend?\"\n\n\"How did you come here?\" she asked, without noticing what I had just\nsaid to her.\n\n\"Don't you remember my telling you, when we last met, that I was going\nto Cumberland? I have been in Cumberland ever since--I have been\nstaying all the time at Limmeridge House.\"\n\n\"At Limmeridge House!\" Her pale face brightened as she repeated the\nwords, her wandering eyes fixed on me with a sudden interest. \"Ah, how\nhappy you must have been!\" she said, looking at me eagerly, without a\nshadow of its former distrust left in her expression.\n\nI took advantage of her newly-aroused confidence in me to observe her\nface, with an attention and a curiosity which I had hitherto restrained\nmyself from showing, for caution's sake.  I looked at her, with my mind\nfull of that other lovely face which had so ominously recalled her to\nmy memory on the terrace by moonlight. I had seen Anne Catherick's\nlikeness in Miss Fairlie.  I now saw Miss Fairlie's likeness in Anne\nCatherick--saw it all the more clearly because the points of\ndissimilarity between the two were presented to me as well as the\npoints of resemblance.  In the general outline of the countenance and\ngeneral proportion of the features--in the colour of the hair and in\nthe little nervous uncertainty about the lips--in the height and size\nof the figure, and the carriage of the head and body, the likeness\nappeared even more startling than I had ever felt it to be yet.  But\nthere the resemblance ended, and the dissimilarity, in details, began.\nThe delicate beauty of Miss Fairlie's complexion, the transparent\nclearness of her eyes, the smooth purity of her skin, the tender bloom\nof colour on her lips, were all missing from the worn weary face that\nwas now turned towards mine.  Although I hated myself even for thinking\nsuch a thing, still, while I looked at the woman before me, the idea\nwould force itself into my mind that one sad change, in the future, was\nall that was wanting to make the likeness complete, which I now saw to\nbe so imperfect in detail. If ever sorrow and suffering set their\nprofaning marks on the youth and beauty of Miss Fairlie's face, then,\nand then only, Anne Catherick and she would be the twin-sisters of\nchance resemblance, the living reflections of one another.\n\nI shuddered at the thought.  There was something horrible in the blind\nunreasoning distrust of the future which the mere passage of it through\nmy mind seemed to imply.  It was a welcome interruption to be roused by\nfeeling Anne Catherick's hand laid on my shoulder. The touch was as\nstealthy and as sudden as that other touch which had petrified me from\nhead to foot on the night when we first met.\n\n\"You are looking at me, and you are thinking of something,\" she said,\nwith her strange breathless rapidity of utterance.  \"What is it?\"\n\n\"Nothing extraordinary,\" I answered.  \"I was only wondering how you\ncame here.\"\n\n\"I came with a friend who is very good to me.  I have only been here\ntwo days.\"\n\n\"And you found your way to this place yesterday?\"\n\n\"How do you know that?\"\n\n\"I only guessed it.\"\n\nShe turned from me, and knelt down before the inscription once more.\n\n\"Where should I go if not here?\" she said.  \"The friend who was better\nthan a mother to me is the only friend I have to visit at Limmeridge.\nOh, it makes my heart ache to see a stain on her tomb! It ought to be\nkept white as snow, for her sake.  I was tempted to begin cleaning it\nyesterday, and I can't help coming back to go on with it to-day.  Is\nthere anything wrong in that? I hope not.  Surely nothing can be wrong\nthat I do for Mrs. Fairlie's sake?\"\n\nThe old grateful sense of her benefactress's kindness was evidently the\nruling idea still in the poor creature's mind--the narrow mind which\nhad but too plainly opened to no other lasting impression since that\nfirst impression of her younger and happier days.  I saw that my best\nchance of winning her confidence lay in encouraging her to proceed with\nthe artless employment which she had come into the burial-ground to\npursue.  She resumed it at once, on my telling her she might do so,\ntouching the hard marble as tenderly as if it had been a sentient\nthing, and whispering the words of the inscription to herself, over and\nover again, as if the lost days of her girlhood had returned and she\nwas patiently learning her lesson once more at Mrs. Fairlie's knees.\n\n\"Should you wonder very much,\" I said, preparing the way as cautiously\nas I could for the questions that were to come, \"if I owned that it is\na satisfaction to me, as well as a surprise, to see you here? I felt\nvery uneasy about you after you left me in the cab.\"\n\nShe looked up quickly and suspiciously.\n\n\"Uneasy,\" she repeated.  \"Why?\"\n\n\"A strange thing happened after we parted that night.  Two men overtook\nme in a chaise.  They did not see where I was standing, but they\nstopped near me, and spoke to a policeman on the other side of the way.\"\n\nShe instantly suspended her employment.  The hand holding the damp\ncloth with which she had been cleaning the inscription dropped to her\nside.  The other hand grasped the marble cross at the head of the\ngrave.  Her face turned towards me slowly, with the blank look of\nterror set rigidly on it once more.  I went on at all hazards--it was\ntoo late now to draw back.\n\n\"The two men spoke to the policeman,\" I said, \"and asked him if he had\nseen you.  He had not seen you; and then one of the men spoke again,\nand said you had escaped from his Asylum.\"\n\nShe sprang to her feet as if my last words had set the pursuers on her\ntrack.\n\n\"Stop! and hear the end,\" I cried.  \"Stop! and you shall know how I\nbefriended you.  A word from me would have told the men which way you\nhad gone--and I never spoke that word.  I helped your escape--I made it\nsafe and certain.  Think, try to think.  Try to understand what I tell\nyou.\"\n\nMy manner seemed to influence her more than my words.  She made an\neffort to grasp the new idea.  Her hands shifted the damp cloth\nhesitatingly from one to the other, exactly as they had shifted the\nlittle travelling-bag on the night when I first saw her. Slowly the\npurpose of my words seemed to force its way through the confusion and\nagitation of her mind.  Slowly her features relaxed, and her eyes\nlooked at me with their expression gaining in curiosity what it was\nfast losing in fear.\n\n\"YOU don't think I ought to be back in the Asylum, do you?\" she said.\n\n\"Certainly not.  I am glad you escaped from it--I am glad I helped you.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, you did help me indeed; you helped me at the hard part,\" she\nwent on a little vacantly.  \"It was easy to escape, or I should not\nhave got away.  They never suspected me as they suspected the others.\nI was so quiet, and so obedient, and so easily frightened.  The finding\nLondon was the hard part, and there you helped me.  Did I thank you at\nthe time? I thank you now very kindly.\"\n\n\"Was the Asylum far from where you met me? Come! show that you believe\nme to be your friend, and tell me where it was.\"\n\nShe mentioned the place--a private Asylum, as its situation informed\nme; a private Asylum not very far from the spot where I had seen\nher--and then, with evident suspicion of the use to which I might put\nher answer, anxiously repeated her former inquiry, \"You don't think I\nought to be taken back, do you?\"\n\n\"Once again, I am glad you escaped--I am glad you prospered well after\nyou left me,\" I answered.  \"You said you had a friend in London to go\nto.  Did you find the friend?\"\n\n\"Yes.  It was very late, but there was a girl up at needle-work in the\nhouse, and she helped me to rouse Mrs. Clements.  Mrs. Clements is my\nfriend.  A good, kind woman, but not like Mrs. Fairlie.  Ah no, nobody\nis like Mrs. Fairlie!\"\n\n\"Is Mrs. Clements an old friend of yours? Have you known her a long\ntime?\"\n\n\"Yes, she was a neighbour of ours once, at home, in Hampshire, and\nliked me, and took care of me when I was a little girl.  Years ago,\nwhen she went away from us, she wrote down in my Prayer-book for me\nwhere she was going to live in London, and she said, 'If you are ever\nin trouble, Anne, come to me.  I have no husband alive to say me nay,\nand no children to look after, and I will take care of you.' Kind\nwords, were they not? I suppose I remember them because they were kind.\nIt's little enough I remember besides--little enough, little enough!\"\n\n\"Had you no father or mother to take care of you?\"\n\n\"Father?--I never saw him--I never heard mother speak of him. Father?\nAh, dear! he is dead, I suppose.\"\n\n\"And your mother?\"\n\n\"I don't get on well with her.  We are a trouble and a fear to each\nother.\"\n\nA trouble and a fear to each other! At those words the suspicion\ncrossed my mind, for the first time, that her mother might be the\nperson who had placed her under restraint.\n\n\"Don't ask me about mother,\" she went on.  \"I'd rather talk of Mrs.\nClements.  Mrs. Clements is like you, she doesn't think that I ought to\nbe back in the Asylum, and she is as glad as you are that I escaped\nfrom it.  She cried over my misfortune, and said it must be kept secret\nfrom everybody.\"\n\nHer \"misfortune.\" In what sense was she using that word? In a sense\nwhich might explain her motive in writing the anonymous letter? In a\nsense which might show it to be the too common and too customary motive\nthat has led many a woman to interpose anonymous hindrances to the\nmarriage of the man who has ruined her? I resolved to attempt the\nclearing up of this doubt before more words passed between us on either\nside.\n\n\"What misfortune?\" I asked.\n\n\"The misfortune of my being shut up,\" she answered, with every\nappearance of feeling surprised at my question.  \"What other misfortune\ncould there be?\"\n\nI determined to persist, as delicately and forbearingly as possible.\nIt was of very great importance that I should be absolutely sure of\nevery step in the investigation which I now gained in advance.\n\n\"There is another misfortune,\" I said, \"to which a woman may be liable,\nand by which she may suffer lifelong sorrow and shame.\"\n\n\"What is it?\" she asked eagerly.\n\n\"The misfortune of believing too innocently in her own virtue, and in\nthe faith and honour of the man she loves,\" I answered.\n\nShe looked up at me with the artless bewilderment of a child.  Not the\nslightest confusion or change of colour--not the faintest trace of any\nsecret consciousness of shame struggling to the surface appeared in her\nface--that face which betrayed every other emotion with such\ntransparent clearness.  No words that ever were spoken could have\nassured me, as her look and manner now assured me, that the motive\nwhich I had assigned for her writing the letter and sending it to Miss\nFairlie was plainly and distinctly the wrong one.  That doubt, at any\nrate, was now set at rest; but the very removal of it opened a new\nprospect of uncertainty.  The letter, as I knew from positive\ntestimony, pointed at Sir Percival Glyde, though it did not name him.\nShe must have had some strong motive, originating in some deep sense of\ninjury, for secretly denouncing him to Miss Fairlie in such terms as\nshe had employed, and that motive was unquestionably not to be traced\nto the loss of her innocence and her character.  Whatever wrong he\nmight have inflicted on her was not of that nature.  Of what nature\ncould it be?\n\n\"I don't understand you,\" she said, after evidently trying hard, and\ntrying in vain, to discover the meaning of the words I had last said to\nher.\n\n\"Never mind,\" I answered.  \"Let us go on with what we were talking\nabout.  Tell me how long you stayed with Mrs. Clements in London, and\nhow you came here.\"\n\n\"How long?\" she repeated.  \"I stayed with Mrs. Clements till we both\ncame to this place, two days ago.\"\n\n\"You are living in the village, then?\" I said.  \"It is strange I should\nnot have heard of you, though you have only been here two days.\"\n\n\"No, no, not in the village.  Three miles away at a farm.  Do you know\nthe farm? They call it Todd's Corner.\"\n\nI remembered the place perfectly--we had often passed by it in our\ndrives.  It was one of the oldest farms in the neighbourhood, situated\nin a solitary, sheltered spot, inland at the junction of two hills.\n\n\"They are relations of Mrs. Clements at Todd's Corner,\" she went on,\n\"and they had often asked her to go and see them.  She said she would\ngo, and take me with her, for the quiet and the fresh air.  It was very\nkind, was it not? I would have gone anywhere to be quiet, and safe, and\nout of the way.  But when I heard that Todd's Corner was near\nLimmeridge--oh! I was so happy I would have walked all the way barefoot\nto get there, and see the schools and the village and Limmeridge House\nagain.  They are very good people at Todd's Corner.  I hope I shall\nstay there a long time.  There is only one thing I don't like about\nthem, and don't like about Mrs. Clements----\"\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\n\"They will tease me about dressing all in white--they say it looks so\nparticular.  How do they know? Mrs. Fairlie knew best.  Mrs. Fairlie\nwould never have made me wear this ugly blue cloak! Ah! she was fond of\nwhite in her lifetime, and here is white stone about her grave--and I\nam making it whiter for her sake.  She often wore white herself, and\nshe always dressed her little daughter in white.  Is Miss Fairlie well\nand happy? Does she wear white now, as she used when she was a girl?\"\n\nHer voice sank when she put the questions about Miss Fairlie, and she\nturned her head farther and farther away from me.  I thought I\ndetected, in the alteration of her manner, an uneasy consciousness of\nthe risk she had run in sending the anonymous letter, and I instantly\ndetermined so to frame my answer as to surprise her into owning it.\n\n\"Miss Fairlie was not very well or very happy this morning,\" I said.\n\nShe murmured a few words, but they were spoken so confusedly, and in\nsuch a low tone, that I could not even guess at what they meant.\n\n\"Did you ask me why Miss Fairlie was neither well nor happy this\nmorning?\" I continued.\n\n\"No,\" she said quickly and eagerly--\"oh no, I never asked that.\"\n\n\"I will tell you without your asking,\" I went on.  \"Miss Fairlie has\nreceived your letter.\"\n\nShe had been down on her knees for some little time past, carefully\nremoving the last weather-stains left about the inscription while we\nwere speaking together.  The first sentence of the words I had just\naddressed to her made her pause in her occupation, and turn slowly\nwithout rising from her knees, so as to face me.  The second sentence\nliterally petrified her.  The cloth she had been holding dropped from\nher hands--her lips fell apart--all the little colour that there was\nnaturally in her face left it in an instant.\n\n\"How do you know?\" she said faintly.  \"Who showed it to you?\" The blood\nrushed back into her face--rushed overwhelmingly, as the sense rushed\nupon her mind that her own words had betrayed her. She struck her hands\ntogether in despair.  \"I never wrote it,\" she gasped affrightedly; \"I\nknow nothing about it!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I said, \"you wrote it, and you know about it.  It was wrong to\nsend such a letter, it was wrong to frighten Miss Fairlie.  If you had\nanything to say that it was right and necessary for her to hear, you\nshould have gone yourself to Limmeridge House--you should have spoken\nto the young lady with your own lips.\"\n\nShe crouched down over the flat stone of the grave, till her face was\nhidden on it, and made no reply.\n\n\"Miss Fairlie will be as good and kind to you as her mother was, if you\nmean well,\" I went on.  \"Miss Fairlie will keep your secret, and not\nlet you come to any harm.  Will you see her to-morrow at the farm?\nWill you meet her in the garden at Limmeridge House?\"\n\n\"Oh, if I could die, and be hidden and at rest with YOU!\" Her lips\nmurmured the words close on the grave-stone, murmured them in tones of\npassionate endearment, to the dead remains beneath.  \"You know how I\nlove your child, for your sake! Oh, Mrs. Fairlie! Mrs. Fairlie! tell me\nhow to save her.  Be my darling and my mother once more, and tell me\nwhat to do for the best.\"\n\nI heard her lips kissing the stone--I saw her hands beating on it\npassionately.  The sound and the sight deeply affected me.  I stooped\ndown, and took the poor helpless hands tenderly in mine, and tried to\nsoothe her.\n\nIt was useless.  She snatched her hands from me, and never moved her\nface from the stone.  Seeing the urgent necessity of quieting her at\nany hazard and by any means, I appealed to the only anxiety that she\nappeared to feel, in connection with me and with my opinion of her--the\nanxiety to convince me of her fitness to be mistress of her own actions.\n\n\"Come, come,\" I said gently.  \"Try to compose yourself, or you will\nmake me alter my opinion of you.  Don't let me think that the person\nwho put you in the Asylum might have had some excuse----\"\n\nThe next words died away on my lips.  The instant I risked that chance\nreference to the person who had put her in the Asylum she sprang up on\nher knees.  A most extraordinary and startling change passed over her.\nHer face, at all ordinary times so touching to look at, in its nervous\nsensitiveness, weakness, and uncertainty, became suddenly darkened by\nan expression of maniacally intense hatred and fear, which communicated\na wild, unnatural force to every feature.  Her eyes dilated in the dim\nevening light, like the eyes of a wild animal.  She caught up the cloth\nthat had fallen at her side, as if it had been a living creature that\nshe could kill, and crushed it in both her hands with such convulsive\nstrength, that the few drops of moisture left in it trickled down on\nthe stone beneath her.\n\n\"Talk of something else,\" she said, whispering through her teeth. \"I\nshall lose myself if you talk of that.\"\n\nEvery vestige of the gentler thoughts which had filled her mind hardly\na minute since seemed to be swept from it now.  It was evident that the\nimpression left by Mrs. Fairlie's kindness was not, as I had supposed,\nthe only strong impression on her memory. With the grateful remembrance\nof her school-days at Limmeridge, there existed the vindictive\nremembrance of the wrong inflicted on her by her confinement in the\nAsylum.  Who had done that wrong? Could it really be her mother?\n\nIt was hard to give up pursuing the inquiry to that final point, but I\nforced myself to abandon all idea of continuing it.  Seeing her as I\nsaw her now, it would have been cruel to think of anything but the\nnecessity and the humanity of restoring her composure.\n\n\"I will talk of nothing to distress you,\" I said soothingly.\n\n\"You want something,\" she answered sharply and suspiciously. \"Don't\nlook at me like that.  Speak to me--tell me what you want.\"\n\n\"I only want you to quiet yourself, and when you are calmer, to think\nover what I have said.\"\n\n\"Said?\" She paused--twisted the cloth in her hands, backwards and\nforwards, and whispered to herself, \"What is it he said?\" She turned\nagain towards me, and shook her head impatiently.  \"Why don't you help\nme?\" she asked, with angry suddenness.\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" I said, \"I will help you, and you will soon remember. I ask\nyou to see Miss Fairlie to-morrow and to tell her the truth about the\nletter.\"\n\n\"Ah! Miss Fairlie--Fairlie--Fairlie----\"\n\nThe mere utterance of the loved familiar name seemed to quiet her. Her\nface softened and grew like itself again.\n\n\"You need have no fear of Miss Fairlie,\" I continued, \"and no fear of\ngetting into trouble through the letter.  She knows so much about it\nalready, that you will have no difficulty in telling her all.  There\ncan be little necessity for concealment where there is hardly anything\nleft to conceal.  You mention no names in the letter; but Miss Fairlie\nknows that the person you write of is Sir Percival Glyde----\"\n\nThe instant I pronounced that name she started to her feet, and a\nscream burst from her that rang through the churchyard, and made my\nheart leap in me with the terror of it.  The dark deformity of the\nexpression which had just left her face lowered on it once more, with\ndoubled and trebled intensity.  The shriek at the name, the reiterated\nlook of hatred and fear that instantly followed, told all.  Not even a\nlast doubt now remained.  Her mother was guiltless of imprisoning her\nin the Asylum.  A man had shut her up--and that man was Sir Percival\nGlyde.\n\nThe scream had reached other ears than mine.  On one side I heard the\ndoor of the sexton's cottage open; on the other I heard the voice of\nher companion, the woman in the shawl, the woman whom she had spoken of\nas Mrs. Clements.\n\n\"I'm coming! I'm coming!\" cried the voice from behind the clump of\ndwarf trees.\n\nIn a moment more Mrs. Clements hurried into view.\n\n\"Who are you?\" she cried, facing me resolutely as she set her foot on\nthe stile.  \"How dare you frighten a poor helpless woman like that?\"\n\nShe was at Anne Catherick's side, and had put one arm around her,\nbefore I could answer.  \"What is it, my dear?\" she said.  \"What has he\ndone to you?\"\n\n\"Nothing,\" the poor creature answered.  \"Nothing.  I'm only frightened.\"\n\nMrs. Clements turned on me with a fearless indignation, for which I\nrespected her.\n\n\"I should be heartily ashamed of myself if I deserved that angry look,\"\nI said.  \"But I do not deserve it.  I have unfortunately startled her\nwithout intending it.  This is not the first time she has seen me.  Ask\nher yourself, and she will tell you that I am incapable of willingly\nharming her or any woman.\"\n\nI spoke distinctly, so that Anne Catherick might hear and understand\nme, and I saw that the words and their meaning had reached her.\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" she said--\"he was good to me once--he helped me----\" She\nwhispered the rest into her friend's ear.\n\n\"Strange, indeed!\" said Mrs. Clements, with a look of perplexity. \"It\nmakes all the difference, though.  I'm sorry I spoke so rough to you,\nsir; but you must own that appearances looked suspicious to a stranger.\nIt's more my fault than yours, for humouring her whims, and letting her\nbe alone in such a place as this.  Come, my dear--come home now.\"\n\nI thought the good woman looked a little uneasy at the prospect of the\nwalk back, and I offered to go with them until they were both within\nsight of home.  Mrs. Clements thanked me civilly, and declined.  She\nsaid they were sure to meet some of the farm-labourers as soon as they\ngot to the moor.\n\n\"Try to forgive me,\" I said, when Anne Catherick took her friend's arm\nto go away.  Innocent as I had been of any intention to terrify and\nagitate her, my heart smote me as I looked at the poor, pale,\nfrightened face.\n\n\"I will try,\" she answered.  \"But you know too much--I'm afraid you'll\nalways frighten me now.\"\n\nMrs. Clements glanced at me, and shook her head pityingly.\n\n\"Good-night, sir,\" she said.  \"You couldn't help it, I know but I wish\nit was me you had frightened, and not her.\"\n\nThey moved away a few steps.  I thought they had left me, but Anne\nsuddenly stopped, and separated herself from her friend.\n\n\"Wait a little,\" she said.  \"I must say good-bye.\"\n\nShe returned to the grave, rested both hands tenderly on the marble\ncross, and kissed it.\n\n\"I'm better now,\" she sighed, looking up at me quietly.  \"I forgive\nyou.\"\n\nShe joined her companion again, and they left the burial-ground. I saw\nthem stop near the church and speak to the sexton's wife, who had come\nfrom the cottage, and had waited, watching us from a distance.  Then\nthey went on again up the path that led to the moor.  I looked after\nAnne Catherick as she disappeared, till all trace of her had faded in\nthe twilight--looked as anxiously and sorrowfully as if that was the\nlast I was to see in this weary world of the woman in white.\n\n\n\nXIV\n\nHalf an hour later I was back at the house, and was informing Miss\nHalcombe of all that had happened.\n\nShe listened to me from beginning to end with a steady, silent\nattention, which, in a woman of her temperament and disposition, was\nthe strongest proof that could be offered of the serious manner in\nwhich my narrative affected her.\n\n\"My mind misgives me,\" was all she said when I had done.  \"My mind\nmisgives me sadly about the future.\"\n\n\"The future may depend,\" I suggested, \"on the use we make of the\npresent.  It is not improbable that Anne Catherick may speak more\nreadily and unreservedly to a woman than she has spoken to me.  If Miss\nFairlie----\"\n\n\"Not to be thought of for a moment,\" interposed Miss Halcombe, in her\nmost decided manner.\n\n\"Let me suggest, then,\" I continued, \"that you should see Anne\nCatherick yourself, and do all you can to win her confidence.  For my\nown part, I shrink from the idea of alarming the poor creature a second\ntime, as I have most unhappily alarmed her already.  Do you see any\nobjection to accompanying me to the farmhouse to-morrow?\"\n\n\"None whatever.  I will go anywhere and do anything to serve Laura's\ninterests.  What did you say the place was called?\"\n\n\"You must know it well.  It is called Todd's Corner.\"\n\n\"Certainly.  Todd's Corner is one of Mr. Fairlie's farms.  Our\ndairymaid here is the farmer's second daughter.  She goes backwards and\nforwards constantly between this house and her father's farm, and she\nmay have heard or seen something which it may be useful to us to know.\nShall I ascertain, at once, if the girl is downstairs?\"\n\nShe rang the bell, and sent the servant with his message.  He returned,\nand announced that the dairymaid was then at the farm. She had not been\nthere for the last three days, and the housekeeper had given her leave\nto go home for an hour or two that evening.\n\n\"I can speak to her to-morrow,\" said Miss Halcombe, when the servant\nhad left the room again.  \"In the meantime, let me thoroughly\nunderstand the object to be gained by my interview with Anne Catherick.\nIs there no doubt in your mind that the person who confined her in the\nAsylum was Sir Percival Glyde?\"\n\n\"There is not the shadow of a doubt.  The only mystery that remains is\nthe mystery of his MOTIVE.  Looking to the great difference between his\nstation in life and hers, which seems to preclude all idea of the most\ndistant relationship between them, it is of the last importance--even\nassuming that she really required to be placed under restraint--to know\nwhy HE should have been the person to assume the serious responsibility\nof shutting her up----\"\n\n\"In a private Asylum, I think you said?\"\n\n\"Yes, in a private Asylum, where a sum of money, which no poor person\ncould afford to give, must have been paid for her maintenance as a\npatient.\"\n\n\"I see where the doubt lies, Mr. Hartright, and I promise you that it\nshall be set at rest, whether Anne Catherick assists us to-morrow or\nnot.  Sir Percival Glyde shall not be long in this house without\nsatisfying Mr. Gilmore, and satisfying me.  My sister's future is my\ndearest care in life, and I have influence enough over her to give me\nsome power, where her marriage is concerned, in the disposal of it.\"\n\nWe parted for the night.\n\n\nAfter breakfast the next morning, an obstacle, which the events of the\nevening before had put out of my memory, interposed to prevent our\nproceeding immediately to the farm.  This was my last day at Limmeridge\nHouse, and it was necessary, as soon as the post came in, to follow\nMiss Halcombe's advice, and to ask Mr. Fairlie's permission to shorten\nmy engagement by a month, in consideration of an unforeseen necessity\nfor my return to London.\n\nFortunately for the probability of this excuse, so far as appearances\nwere concerned, the post brought me two letters from London friends\nthat morning.  I took them away at once to my own room, and sent the\nservant with a message to Mr. Fairlie, requesting to know when I could\nsee him on a matter of business.\n\nI awaited the man's return, free from the slightest feeling of anxiety\nabout the manner in which his master might receive my application.\nWith Mr. Fairlie's leave or without it, I must go. The consciousness of\nhaving now taken the first step on the dreary journey which was\nhenceforth to separate my life from Miss Fairlie's seemed to have\nblunted my sensibility to every consideration connected with myself.  I\nhad done with my poor man's touchy pride--I had done with all my little\nartist vanities. No insolence of Mr. Fairlie's, if he chose to be\ninsolent, could wound me now.\n\nThe servant returned with a message for which I was not unprepared.\nMr. Fairlie regretted that the state of his health, on that particular\nmorning, was such as to preclude all hope of his having the pleasure of\nreceiving me.  He begged, therefore, that I would accept his apologies,\nand kindly communicate what I had to say in the form of a letter.\nSimilar messages to this had reached me, at various intervals, during\nmy three months' residence in the house.  Throughout the whole of that\nperiod Mr. Fairlie had been rejoiced to \"possess\" me, but had never\nbeen well enough to see me for a second time.  The servant took every\nfresh batch of drawings that I mounted and restored back to his master\nwith my \"respects,\" and returned empty-handed with Mr. Fairlie's \"kind\ncompliments,\" \"best thanks,\" and \"sincere regrets\" that the state of\nhis health still obliged him to remain a solitary prisoner in his own\nroom.  A more satisfactory arrangement to both sides could not possibly\nhave been adopted.  It would be hard to say which of us, under the\ncircumstances, felt the most grateful sense of obligation to Mr.\nFairlie's accommodating nerves.\n\nI sat down at once to write the letter, expressing myself in it as\ncivilly, as clearly, and as briefly as possible.  Mr. Fairlie did not\nhurry his reply.  Nearly an hour elapsed before the answer was placed\nin my hands.  It was written with beautiful regularity and neatness of\ncharacter, in violet-coloured ink, on note-paper as smooth as ivory and\nalmost as thick as cardboard, and it addressed me in these terms--\n\n\"Mr. Fairlie's compliments to Mr. Hartright.  Mr. Fairlie is more\nsurprised and disappointed than he can say (in the present state of his\nhealth) by Mr. Hartright's application.  Mr. Fairlie is not a man of\nbusiness, but he has consulted his steward, who is, and that person\nconfirms Mr. Fairlie's opinion that Mr. Hartright's request to be\nallowed to break his engagement cannot be justified by any necessity\nwhatever, excepting perhaps a case of life and death.  If the\nhighly-appreciative feeling towards Art and its professors, which it is\nthe consolation and happiness of Mr. Fairlie's suffering existence to\ncultivate, could be easily shaken, Mr. Hartright's present proceeding\nwould have shaken it. It has not done so--except in the instance of Mr.\nHartright himself.\n\n\"Having stated his opinion--so far, that is to say, as acute nervous\nsuffering will allow him to state anything--Mr. Fairlie has nothing to\nadd but the expression of his decision, in reference to the highly\nirregular application that has been made to him.  Perfect repose of\nbody and mind being to the last degree important in his case, Mr.\nFairlie will not suffer Mr. Hartright to disturb that repose by\nremaining in the house under circumstances of an essentially irritating\nnature to both sides. Accordingly, Mr. Fairlie waives his right of\nrefusal, purely with a view to the preservation of his own\ntranquillity--and informs Mr. Hartright that he may go.\"\n\nI folded the letter up, and put it away with my other papers.  The time\nhad been when I should have resented it as an insult--I accepted it now\nas a written release from my engagement.  It was off my mind, it was\nalmost out of my memory, when I went downstairs to the breakfast-room,\nand informed Miss Halcombe that I was ready to walk with her to the\nfarm.\n\n\"Has Mr. Fairlie given you a satisfactory answer?\" she asked as we left\nthe house.\n\n\"He has allowed me to go, Miss Halcombe.\"\n\nShe looked up at me quickly, and then, for the first time since I had\nknown her, took my arm of her own accord.  No words could have\nexpressed so delicately that she understood how the permission to leave\nmy employment had been granted, and that she gave me her sympathy, not\nas my superior, but as my friend.  I had not felt the man's insolent\nletter, but I felt deeply the woman's atoning kindness.\n\nOn our way to the farm we arranged that Miss Halcombe was to enter the\nhouse alone, and that I was to wait outside, within call.  We adopted\nthis mode of proceeding from an apprehension that my presence, after\nwhat had happened in the churchyard the evening before, might have the\neffect of renewing Anne Catherick's nervous dread, and of rendering her\nadditionally distrustful of the advances of a lady who was a stranger\nto her.  Miss Halcombe left me, with the intention of speaking, in the\nfirst instance, to the farmer's wife (of whose friendly readiness to\nhelp her in any way she was well assured), while I waited for her in\nthe near neighbourhood of the house.\n\nI had fully expected to be left alone for some time.  To my surprise,\nhowever, little more than five minutes had elapsed before Miss Halcombe\nreturned.\n\n\"Does Anne Catherick refuse to see you?\" I asked in astonishment.\n\n\"Anne Catherick is gone,\" replied Miss Halcombe.\n\n\"Gone?\"\n\n\"Gone with Mrs. Clements.  They both left the farm at eight o'clock\nthis morning.\"\n\nI could say nothing--I could only feel that our last chance of\ndiscovery had gone with them.\n\n\"All that Mrs. Todd knows about her guests, I know,\" Miss Halcombe went\non, \"and it leaves me, as it leaves her, in the dark.  They both came\nback safe last night, after they left you, and they passed the first\npart of the evening with Mr. Todd's family as usual.  Just before\nsupper-time, however, Anne Catherick startled them all by being\nsuddenly seized with faintness.  She had had a similar attack, of a\nless alarming kind, on the day she arrived at the farm; and Mrs. Todd\nhad connected it, on that occasion, with something she was reading at\nthe time in our local newspaper, which lay on the farm table, and which\nshe had taken up only a minute or two before.\"\n\n\"Does Mrs. Todd know what particular passage in the newspaper affected\nher in that way?\" I inquired.\n\n\"No,\" replied Miss Halcombe.  \"She had looked it over, and had seen\nnothing in it to agitate any one.  I asked leave, however, to look it\nover in my turn, and at the very first page I opened I found that the\neditor had enriched his small stock of news by drawing upon our family\naffairs, and had published my sister's marriage engagement, among his\nother announcements, copied from the London papers, of Marriages in\nHigh Life.  I concluded at once that this was the paragraph which had\nso strangely affected Anne Catherick, and I thought I saw in it, also,\nthe origin of the letter which she sent to our house the next day.\"\n\n\"There can be no doubt in either case.  But what did you hear about her\nsecond attack of faintness yesterday evening?\"\n\n\"Nothing.  The cause of it is a complete mystery.  There was no\nstranger in the room.  The only visitor was our dairymaid, who, as I\ntold you, is one of Mr. Todd's daughters, and the only conversation was\nthe usual gossip about local affairs.  They heard her cry out, and saw\nher turn deadly pale, without the slightest apparent reason.  Mrs. Todd\nand Mrs. Clements took her upstairs, and Mrs. Clements remained with\nher.  They were heard talking together until long after the usual\nbedtime, and early this morning Mrs. Clements took Mrs. Todd aside, and\namazed her beyond all power of expression by saying that they must go.\nThe only explanation Mrs. Todd could extract from her guest was, that\nsomething had happened, which was not the fault of any one at the\nfarmhouse, but which was serious enough to make Anne Catherick resolve\nto leave Limmeridge immediately.  It was quite useless to press Mrs.\nClements to be more explicit.  She only shook her head, and said that,\nfor Anne's sake, she must beg and pray that no one would question her.\nAll she could repeat, with every appearance of being seriously agitated\nherself, was that Anne must go, that she must go with her, and that the\ndestination to which they might both betake themselves must be kept a\nsecret from everybody.  I spare you the recital of Mrs. Todd's\nhospitable remonstrances and refusals. It ended in her driving them\nboth to the nearest station, more than three hours since.  She tried\nhard on the way to get them to speak more plainly, but without success;\nand she set them down outside the station-door, so hurt and offended by\nthe unceremonious abruptness of their departure and their unfriendly\nreluctance to place the least confidence in her, that she drove away in\nanger, without so much as stopping to bid them good-bye.  That is\nexactly what has taken place.  Search your own memory, Mr. Hartright,\nand tell me if anything happened in the burial-ground yesterday evening\nwhich can at all account for the extraordinary departure of those two\nwomen this morning.\"\n\n\"I should like to account first, Miss Halcombe, for the sudden change\nin Anne Catherick which alarmed them at the farmhouse, hours after she\nand I had parted, and when time enough had elapsed to quiet any violent\nagitation that I might have been unfortunate enough to cause.  Did you\ninquire particularly about the gossip which was going on in the room\nwhen she turned faint?\"\n\n\"Yes.  But Mrs. Todd's household affairs seem to have divided her\nattention that evening with the talk in the farmhouse parlour. She\ncould only tell me that it was 'just the news,'--meaning, I suppose,\nthat they all talked as usual about each other.\"\n\n\"The dairymaid's memory may be better than her mother's,\" I said. \"It\nmay be as well for you to speak to the girl, Miss Halcombe, as soon as\nwe get back.\"\n\nMy suggestion was acted on the moment we returned to the house. Miss\nHalcombe led me round to the servants' offices, and we found the girl\nin the dairy, with her sleeves tucked up to her shoulders, cleaning a\nlarge milk-pan and singing blithely over her work.\n\n\"I have brought this gentleman to see your dairy, Hannah,\" said Miss\nHalcombe.  \"It is one of the sights of the house, and it always does\nyou credit.\"\n\nThe girl blushed and curtseyed, and said shyly that she hoped she\nalways did her best to keep things neat and clean.\n\n\"We have just come from your father's,\" Miss Halcombe continued. \"You\nwere there yesterday evening, I hear, and you found visitors at the\nhouse?\"\n\n\"Yes, miss.\"\n\n\"One of them was taken faint and ill, I am told.  I suppose nothing was\nsaid or done to frighten her? You were not talking of anything very\nterrible, were you?\"\n\n\"Oh no, miss!\" said the girl, laughing.  \"We were only talking of the\nnews.\"\n\n\"Your sisters told you the news at Todd's Corner, I suppose?\"\n\n\"Yes, miss.\"\n\n\"And you told them the news at Limmeridge House?\"\n\n\"Yes, miss.  And I'm quite sure nothing was said to frighten the poor\nthing, for I was talking when she was taken ill.  It gave me quite a\nturn, miss, to see it, never having been taken faint myself.\"\n\nBefore any more questions could be put to her, she was called away to\nreceive a basket of eggs at the dairy door.  As she left us I whispered\nto Miss Halcombe--\n\n\"Ask her if she happened to mention, last night, that visitors were\nexpected at Limmeridge House.\"\n\nMiss Halcombe showed me, by a look, that she understood, and put the\nquestion as soon as the dairymaid returned to us.\n\n\"Oh yes, miss, I mentioned that,\" said the girl simply.  \"The company\ncoming, and the accident to the brindled cow, was all the news I had to\ntake to the farm.\"\n\n\"Did you mention names? Did you tell them that Sir Percival Glyde was\nexpected on Monday?\"\n\n\"Yes, miss--I told them Sir Percival Glyde was coming.  I hope there\nwas no harm in it--I hope I didn't do wrong.\"\n\n\"Oh no, no harm.  Come, Mr. Hartright, Hannah will begin to think us in\nthe way, if we interrupt her any longer over her work.\"\n\nWe stopped and looked at one another the moment we were alone again.\n\n\"Is there any doubt in your mind, NOW, Miss Halcombe?\"\n\n\"Sir Percival Glyde shall remove that doubt, Mr. Hartright--or Laura\nFairlie shall never be his wife.\"\n\n\n\nXV\n\nAs we walked round to the front of the house a fly from the railway\napproached us along the drive.  Miss Halcombe waited on the door-steps\nuntil the fly drew up, and then advanced to shake hands with an old\ngentleman, who got out briskly the moment the steps were let down.  Mr.\nGilmore had arrived.\n\nI looked at him, when we were introduced to each other, with an\ninterest and a curiosity which I could hardly conceal.  This old man\nwas to remain at Limmeridge House after I had left it, he was to hear\nSir Percival Glyde's explanation, and was to give Miss Halcombe the\nassistance of his experience in forming her judgment; he was to wait\nuntil the question of the marriage was set at rest; and his hand, if\nthat question were decided in the affirmative, was to draw the\nsettlement which bound Miss Fairlie irrevocably to her engagement.\nEven then, when I knew nothing by comparison with what I know now, I\nlooked at the family lawyer with an interest which I had never felt\nbefore in the presence of any man breathing who was a total stranger to\nme.\n\nIn external appearance Mr. Gilmore was the exact opposite of the\nconventional idea of an old lawyer.  His complexion was florid--his\nwhite hair was worn rather long and kept carefully brushed--his black\ncoat, waistcoat, and trousers fitted him with perfect neatness--his\nwhite cravat was carefully tied, and his lavender-coloured kid gloves\nmight have adorned the hands of a fashionable clergyman, without fear\nand without reproach.  His manners were pleasantly marked by the formal\ngrace and refinement of the old school of politeness, quickened by the\ninvigorating sharpness and readiness of a man whose business in life\nobliges him always to keep his faculties in good working order.  A\nsanguine constitution and fair prospects to begin with--a long\nsubsequent career of creditable and comfortable prosperity--a cheerful,\ndiligent, widely-respected old age--such were the general impressions I\nderived from my introduction to Mr. Gilmore, and it is but fair to him\nto add, that the knowledge I gained by later and better experience only\ntended to confirm them.\n\nI left the old gentleman and Miss Halcombe to enter the house together,\nand to talk of family matters undisturbed by the restraint of a\nstranger's presence.  They crossed the hall on their way to the\ndrawing-room, and I descended the steps again to wander about the\ngarden alone.\n\nMy hours were numbered at Limmeridge House--my departure the next\nmorning was irrevocably settled--my share in the investigation which\nthe anonymous letter had rendered necessary was at an end. No harm\ncould be done to any one but myself if I let my heart loose again, for\nthe little time that was left me, from the cold cruelty of restraint\nwhich necessity had forced me to inflict upon it, and took my farewell\nof the scenes which were associated with the brief dream-time of my\nhappiness and my love.\n\nI turned instinctively to the walk beneath my study-window, where I had\nseen her the evening before with her little dog, and followed the path\nwhich her dear feet had trodden so often, till I came to the wicket\ngate that led into her rose garden.  The winter bareness spread\ndrearily over it now.  The flowers that she had taught me to\ndistinguish by their names, the flowers that I had taught her to paint\nfrom, were gone, and the tiny white paths that led between the beds\nwere damp and green already.  I went on to the avenue of trees, where\nwe had breathed together the warm fragrance of August evenings, where\nwe had admired together the myriad combinations of shade and sunlight\nthat dappled the ground at our feet.  The leaves fell about me from the\ngroaning branches, and the earthy decay in the atmosphere chilled me to\nthe bones.  A little farther on, and I was out of the grounds, and\nfollowing the lane that wound gently upward to the nearest hills.  The\nold felled tree by the wayside, on which we had sat to rest, was sodden\nwith rain, and the tuft of ferns and grasses which I had drawn for her,\nnestling under the rough stone wall in front of us, had turned to a\npool of water, stagnating round an island of draggled weeds.  I gained\nthe summit of the hill, and looked at the view which we had so often\nadmired in the happier time.  It was cold and barren--it was no longer\nthe view that I remembered. The sunshine of her presence was far from\nme--the charm of her voice no longer murmured in my ear.  She had\ntalked to me, on the spot from which I now looked down, of her father,\nwho was her last surviving parent--had told me how fond of each other\nthey had been, and how sadly she missed him still when she entered\ncertain rooms in the house, and when she took up forgotten occupations\nand amusements with which he had been associated.  Was the view that I\nhad seen, while listening to those words, the view that I saw now,\nstanding on the hill-top by myself?  I turned and left it--I wound my\nway back again, over the moor, and round the sandhills, down to the\nbeach.  There was the white rage of the surf, and the multitudinous\nglory of the leaping waves--but where was the place on which she had\nonce drawn idle figures with her parasol in the sand--the place where\nwe had sat together, while she talked to me about myself and my home,\nwhile she asked me a woman's minutely observant questions about my\nmother and my sister, and innocently wondered whether I should ever\nleave my lonely chambers and have a wife and a house of my own? Wind\nand wave had long since smoothed out the trace of her which she had\nleft in those marks on the sand, I looked over the wide monotony of the\nsea-side prospect, and the place in which we two had idled away the\nsunny hours was as lost to me as if I had never known it, as strange to\nme as if I stood already on a foreign shore.\n\nThe empty silence of the beach struck cold to my heart.  I returned to\nthe house and the garden, where traces were left to speak of her at\nevery turn.\n\nOn the west terrace walk I met Mr. Gilmore.  He was evidently in search\nof me, for he quickened his pace when we caught sight of each other.\nThe state of my spirits little fitted me for the society of a stranger;\nbut the meeting was inevitable, and I resigned myself to make the best\nof it.\n\n\"You are the very person I wanted to see,\" said the old gentleman. \"I\nhad two words to say to you, my dear sir; and if you have no objection\nI will avail myself of the present opportunity.  To put it plainly,\nMiss Halcombe and I have been talking over family affairs--affairs\nwhich are the cause of my being here--and in the course of our\nconversation she was naturally led to tell me of this unpleasant matter\nconnected with the anonymous letter, and of the share which you have\nmost creditably and properly taken in the proceedings so far.  That\nshare, I quite understand, gives you an interest which you might not\notherwise have felt, in knowing that the future management of the\ninvestigation which you have begun will be placed in safe hands.  My\ndear sir, make yourself quite easy on that point--it will be placed in\nMY hands.\"\n\n\"You are, in every way, Mr. Gilmore, much fitter to advise and to act\nin the matter than I am.  Is it an indiscretion on my part to ask if\nyou have decided yet on a course of proceeding?\"\n\n\"So far as it is possible to decide, Mr. Hartright, I have decided.  I\nmean to send a copy of the letter, accompanied by a statement of the\ncircumstances, to Sir Percival Glyde's solicitor in London, with whom I\nhave some acquaintance.  The letter itself I shall keep here to show to\nSir Percival as soon as he arrives. The tracing of the two women I have\nalready provided for, by sending one of Mr. Fairlie's servants--a\nconfidential person--to the station to make inquiries.  The man has his\nmoney and his directions, and he will follow the women in the event of\nhis finding any clue.  This is all that can be done until Sir Percival\ncomes on Monday.  I have no doubt myself that every explanation which\ncan be expected from a gentleman and a man of honour, he will readily\ngive.  Sir Percival stands very high, sir--an eminent position, a\nreputation above suspicion--I feel quite easy about results--quite\neasy, I am rejoiced to assure you.  Things of this sort happen\nconstantly in my experience.  Anonymous letters--unfortunate\nwoman--sad state of society.  I don't deny that there are peculiar\ncomplications in this case; but the case itself is, most unhappily,\ncommon--common.\"\n\n\"I am afraid, Mr. Gilmore, I have the misfortune to differ from you in\nthe view I take of the case.\"\n\n\"Just so, my dear sir--just so.  I am an old man, and I take the\npractical view.  You are a young man, and you take the romantic view.\nLet us not dispute about our views.  I live professionally in an\natmosphere of disputation, Mr. Hartright, and I am only too glad to\nescape from it, as I am escaping here.  We will wait for events--yes,\nyes, yes--we will wait for events.  Charming place this.  Good\nshooting? Probably not, none of Mr. Fairlie's land is preserved, I\nthink.  Charming place, though, and delightful people.  You draw and\npaint, I hear, Mr. Hartright? Enviable accomplishment.  What style?\"\n\nWe dropped into general conversation, or rather, Mr. Gilmore talked and\nI listened.  My attention was far from him, and from the topics on\nwhich he discoursed so fluently.  The solitary walk of the last two\nhours had wrought its effect on me--it had set the idea in my mind of\nhastening my departure from Limmeridge House. Why should I prolong the\nhard trial of saying farewell by one unnecessary minute? What further\nservice was required of me by any one? There was no useful purpose to\nbe served by my stay in Cumberland--there was no restriction of time in\nthe permission to leave which my employer had granted to me.  Why not\nend it there and then?\n\nI determined to end it.  There were some hours of daylight still\nleft--there was no reason why my journey back to London should not\nbegin on that afternoon.  I made the first civil excuse that occurred\nto me for leaving Mr. Gilmore, and returned at once to the house.\n\nOn my way up to my own room I met Miss Halcombe on the stairs. She saw,\nby the hurry of my movements and the change in my manner, that I had\nsome new purpose in view, and asked what had happened.\n\nI told her the reasons which induced me to think of hastening my\ndeparture, exactly as I have told them here.\n\n\"No, no,\" she said, earnestly and kindly, \"leave us like a friend--break\nbread with us once more.  Stay here and dine, stay here and help\nus to spend our last evening with you as happily, as like our first\nevenings, as we can.  It is my invitation--Mrs. Vesey's invitation----\"\nshe hesitated a little, and then added, \"Laura's invitation as well.\"\n\nI promised to remain.  God knows I had no wish to leave even the shadow\nof a sorrowful impression with any one of them.\n\nMy own room was the best place for me till the dinner bell rang. I\nwaited there till it was time to go downstairs.\n\nI had not spoken to Miss Fairlie--I had not even seen her--all that\nday.  The first meeting with her, when I entered the drawing-room, was\na hard trial to her self-control and to mine.  She, too, had done her\nbest to make our last evening renew the golden bygone time--the time\nthat could never come again.  She had put on the dress which I used to\nadmire more than any other that she possessed--a dark blue silk,\ntrimmed quaintly and prettily with old-fashioned lace; she came forward\nto meet me with her former readiness--she gave me her hand with the\nfrank, innocent good-will of happier days.  The cold fingers that\ntrembled round mine--the pale cheeks with a bright red spot burning in\nthe midst of them--the faint smile that struggled to live on her lips\nand died away from them while I looked at it, told me at what sacrifice\nof herself her outward composure was maintained.  My heart could take\nher no closer to me, or I should have loved her then as I had never\nloved her yet.\n\nMr. Gilmore was a great assistance to us.  He was in high good-humour,\nand he led the conversation with unflagging spirit.  Miss Halcombe\nseconded him resolutely, and I did all I could to follow her example.\nThe kind blue eyes, whose slightest changes of expression I had learnt\nto interpret so well, looked at me appealingly when we first sat down\nto table.  Help my sister--the sweet anxious face seemed to say--help\nmy sister, and you will help me.\n\nWe got through the dinner, to all outward appearance at least, happily\nenough.  When the ladies had risen from table, and Mr. Gilmore and I\nwere left alone in the dining-room, a new interest presented itself to\noccupy our attention, and to give me an opportunity of quieting myself\nby a few minutes of needful and welcome silence.  The servant who had\nbeen despatched to trace Anne Catherick and Mrs. Clements returned with\nhis report, and was shown into the dining-room immediately.\n\n\"Well,\" said Mr. Gilmore, \"what have you found out?\"\n\n\"I have found out, sir,\" answered the man, \"that both the women took\ntickets at our station here for Carlisle.\"\n\n\"You went to Carlisle, of course, when you heard that?\"\n\n\"I did, sir, but I am sorry to say I could find no further trace of\nthem.\"\n\n\"You inquired at the railway?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"And at the different inns?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"And you left the statement I wrote for you at the police station?\"\n\n\"I did, sir.\"\n\n\"Well, my friend, you have done all you could, and I have done all I\ncould, and there the matter must rest till further notice.  We have\nplayed our trump cards, Mr. Hartright,\" continued the old gentleman\nwhen the servant had withdrawn.  \"For the present, at least, the women\nhave outmanoeuvred us, and our only resource now is to wait till Sir\nPercival Glyde comes here on Monday next. Won't you fill your glass\nagain? Good bottle of port, that--sound, substantial, old wine.  I have\ngot better in my own cellar, though.\"\n\nWe returned to the drawing-room--the room in which the happiest\nevenings of my life had been passed--the room which, after this last\nnight, I was never to see again.  Its aspect was altered since the days\nhad shortened and the weather had grown cold.  The glass doors on the\nterrace side were closed, and hidden by thick curtains.  Instead of the\nsoft twilight obscurity, in which we used to sit, the bright radiant\nglow of lamplight now dazzled my eyes.  All was changed--indoors and\nout all was changed.\n\nMiss Halcombe and Mr. Gilmore sat down together at the card-table--Mrs.\nVesey took her customary chair.  There was no restraint on the\ndisposal of THEIR evening, and I felt the restraint on the disposal of\nmine all the more painfully from observing it.  I saw Miss Fairlie\nlingering near the music-stand.  The time had been when I might have\njoined her there.  I waited irresolutely--I knew neither where to go\nnor what to do next.  She cast one quick glance at me, took a piece of\nmusic suddenly from the stand, and came towards me of her own accord.\n\n\"Shall I play some of those little melodies of Mozart's which you used\nto like so much?\" she asked, opening the music nervously, and looking\ndown at it while she spoke.\n\nBefore I could thank her she hastened to the piano.  The chair near it,\nwhich I had always been accustomed to occupy, stood empty.  She struck\na few chords--then glanced round at me--then looked back again at her\nmusic.\n\n\"Won't you take your old place?\" she said, speaking very abruptly and\nin very low tones.\n\n\"I may take it on the last night,\" I answered.\n\nShe did not reply--she kept her attention riveted on the music--music\nwhich she knew by memory, which she had played over and over again, in\nformer times, without the book.  I only knew that she had heard me, I\nonly knew that she was aware of my being close to her, by seeing the\nred spot on the cheek that was nearest to me fade out, and the face\ngrow pale all over.\n\n\"I am very sorry you are going,\" she said, her voice almost sinking to\na whisper, her eyes looking more and more intently at the music, her\nfingers flying over the keys of the piano with a strange feverish\nenergy which I had never noticed in her before.\n\n\"I shall remember those kind words, Miss Fairlie, long after to-morrow\nhas come and gone.\"\n\nThe paleness grew whiter on her face, and she turned it farther away\nfrom me.\n\n\"Don't speak of to-morrow,\" she said.  \"Let the music speak to us of\nto-night, in a happier language than ours.\"\n\nHer lips trembled--a faint sigh fluttered from them, which she tried\nvainly to suppress.  Her fingers wavered on the piano--she struck a\nfalse note, confused herself in trying to set it right, and dropped her\nhands angrily on her lap.  Miss Halcombe and Mr. Gilmore looked up in\nastonishment from the card-table at which they were playing.  Even Mrs.\nVesey, dozing in her chair, woke at the sudden cessation of the music,\nand inquired what had happened.\n\n\"You play at whist, Mr. Hartright?\" asked Miss Halcombe, with her eyes\ndirected significantly at the place I occupied.\n\nI knew what she meant--I knew she was right, and I rose at once to go\nto the card-table.  As I left the piano Miss Fairlie turned a page of\nthe music, and touched the keys again with a surer hand.\n\n\"I WILL play it,\" she said, striking the notes almost passionately.  \"I\nWILL play it on the last night.\"\n\n\"Come, Mrs. Vesey,\" said Miss Halcombe, \"Mr. Gilmore and I are tired of\necarte--come and be Mr. Hartright's partner at whist.\"\n\nThe old lawyer smiled satirically.  His had been the winning hand, and\nhe had just turned up a king.  He evidently attributed Miss Halcombe's\nabrupt change in the card-table arrangements to a lady's inability to\nplay the losing game.\n\nThe rest of the evening passed without a word or a look from her. She\nkept her place at the piano, and I kept mine at the card-table.  She\nplayed unintermittingly--played as if the music was her only refuge\nfrom herself.  Sometimes her fingers touched the notes with a lingering\nfondness--a soft, plaintive, dying tenderness, unutterably beautiful\nand mournful to hear; sometimes they faltered and failed her, or\nhurried over the instrument mechanically, as if their task was a burden\nto them.  But still, change and waver as they might in the expression\nthey imparted to the music, their resolution to play never faltered.\nShe only rose from the piano when we all rose to say Good-night.\n\nMrs. Vesey was the nearest to the door, and the first to shake hands\nwith me.\n\n\"I shall not see you again, Mr. Hartright,\" said the old lady.  \"I am\ntruly sorry you are going away.  You have been very kind and attentive,\nand an old woman like me feels kindness and attention. I wish you\nhappy, sir--I wish you a kind good-bye.\"\n\nMr. Gilmore came next.\n\n\"I hope we shall have a future opportunity of bettering our\nacquaintance, Mr. Hartright.  You quite understand about that little\nmatter of business being safe in my hands? Yes, yes, of course.  Bless\nme, how cold it is! Don't let me keep you at the door.  Bon voyage, my\ndear sir--bon voyage, as the French say.\"\n\nMiss Halcombe followed.\n\n\"Half-past seven to-morrow morning,\" she said--then added in a whisper,\n\"I have heard and seen more than you think.  Your conduct to-night has\nmade me your friend for life.\"\n\nMiss Fairlie came last.  I could not trust myself to look at her when I\ntook her hand, and when I thought of the next morning.\n\n\"My departure must be a very early one,\" I said.  \"I shall be gone,\nMiss Fairlie, before you----\"\n\n\"No, no,\" she interposed hastily, \"not before I am out of my room. I\nshall be down to breakfast with Marian.  I am not so ungrateful, not so\nforgetful of the past three months----\"\n\nHer voice failed her, her hand closed gently round mine--then dropped\nit suddenly.  Before I could say \"Good-night\" she was gone.\n\n\nThe end comes fast to meet me--comes inevitably, as the light of the\nlast morning came at Limmeridge House.\n\nIt was barely half-past seven when I went downstairs, but I found them\nboth at the breakfast-table waiting for me.  In the chill air, in the\ndim light, in the gloomy morning silence of the house, we three sat\ndown together, and tried to eat, tried to talk.  The struggle to\npreserve appearances was hopeless and useless, and I rose to end it.\n\nAs I held out my hand, as Miss Halcombe, who was nearest to me, took\nit, Miss Fairlie turned away suddenly and hurried from the room.\n\n\"Better so,\" said Miss Halcombe, when the door had closed--\"better so,\nfor you and for her.\"\n\nI waited a moment before I could speak--it was hard to lose her,\nwithout a parting word or a parting look.  I controlled myself--I tried\nto take leave of Miss Halcombe in fitting terms; but all the farewell\nwords I would fain have spoken dwindled to one sentence.\n\n\"Have I deserved that you should write to me?\" was all I could say.\n\n\"You have nobly deserved everything that I can do for you, as long as\nwe both live.  Whatever the end is you shall know it.\"\n\n\"And if I can ever be of help again, at any future time, long after the\nmemory of my presumption and my folly is forgotten . . .\"\n\nI could add no more.  My voice faltered, my eyes moistened in spite of\nme.\n\nShe caught me by both hands--she pressed them with the strong, steady\ngrasp of a man--her dark eyes glittered--her brown complexion flushed\ndeep--the force and energy of her face glowed and grew beautiful with\nthe pure inner light of her generosity and her pity.\n\n\"I will trust you--if ever the time comes I will trust you as my friend\nand HER friend, as my brother and HER brother.\" She stopped, drew me\nnearer to her--the fearless, noble creature--touched my forehead,\nsister-like, with her lips, and called me by my Christian name.  \"God\nbless you, Walter!\" she said.  \"Wait here alone and compose yourself--I\nhad better not stay for both our sakes--I had better see you go from\nthe balcony upstairs.\"\n\nShe left the room.  I turned away towards the window, where nothing\nfaced me but the lonely autumn landscape--I turned away to master\nmyself, before I too left the room in my turn, and left it for ever.\n\nA minute passed--it could hardly have been more--when I heard the door\nopen again softly, and the rustling of a woman's dress on the carpet\nmoved towards me.  My heart beat violently as I turned round.  Miss\nFairlie was approaching me from the farther end of the room.\n\nShe stopped and hesitated when our eyes met, and when she saw that we\nwere alone.  Then, with that courage which women lose so often in the\nsmall emergency, and so seldom in the great, she came on nearer to me,\nstrangely pale and strangely quiet, drawing one hand after her along\nthe table by which she walked, and holding something at her side in the\nother, which was hidden by the folds of her dress.\n\n\"I only went into the drawing-room,\" she said, \"to look for this. It\nmay remind you of your visit here, and of the friends you leave behind\nyou.  You told me I had improved very much when I did it, and I thought\nyou might like----\"\n\nShe turned her head away, and offered me a little sketch, drawn\nthroughout by her own pencil, of the summer-house in which we had first\nmet.  The paper trembled in her hand as she held it out to me--trembled\nin mine as I took it from her.\n\nI was afraid to say what I felt--I only answered, \"It shall never leave\nme--all my life long it shall be the treasure that I prize most.  I am\nvery grateful for it--very grateful to you, for not letting me go away\nwithout bidding you good-bye.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" she said innocently, \"how could I let you go, after we have\npassed so many happy days together!\"\n\n\"Those days may never return, Miss Fairlie--my way of life and yours\nare very far apart.  But if a time should come, when the devotion of my\nwhole heart and soul and strength will give you a moment's happiness,\nor spare you a moment's sorrow, will you try to remember the poor\ndrawing-master who has taught you? Miss Halcombe has promised to trust\nme--will you promise too?\"\n\nThe farewell sadness in the kind blue eyes shone dimly through her\ngathering tears.\n\n\"I promise it,\" she said in broken tones.  \"Oh, don't look at me like\nthat! I promise it with all my heart.\"\n\nI ventured a little nearer to her, and held out my hand.\n\n\"You have many friends who love you, Miss Fairlie.  Your happy future\nis the dear object of many hopes.  May I say, at parting, that it is\nthe dear object of MY hopes too?\"\n\nThe tears flowed fast down her cheeks.  She rested one trembling hand\non the table to steady herself while she gave me the other. I took it\nin mine--I held it fast.  My head drooped over it, my tears fell on it,\nmy lips pressed it--not in love; oh, not in love, at that last moment,\nbut in the agony and the self-abandonment of despair.\n\n\"For God's sake, leave me!\" she said faintly.\n\nThe confession of her heart's secret burst from her in those pleading\nwords.  I had no right to hear them, no right to answer them--they were\nthe words that banished me, in the name of her sacred weakness, from\nthe room.  It was all over.  I dropped her hand, I said no more.  The\nblinding tears shut her out from my eyes, and I dashed them away to\nlook at her for the last time. One look as she sank into a chair, as\nher arms fell on the table, as her fair head dropped on them wearily.\nOne farewell look, and the door had closed upon her--the great gulf of\nseparation had opened between us--the image of Laura Fairlie was a\nmemory of the past already.\n\n\nThe End of Hartright's Narrative.\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY VINCENT GILMORE\n\n(of Chancery Lane, Solicitor)\n\n\n\nI\n\nI write these lines at the request of my friend, Mr. Walter Hartright.\nThey are intended to convey a description of certain events which\nseriously affected Miss Fairlie's interests, and which took place after\nthe period of Mr. Hartright's departure from Limmeridge House.\n\nThere is no need for me to say whether my own opinion does or does not\nsanction the disclosure of the remarkable family story, of which my\nnarrative forms an important component part.  Mr. Hartright has taken\nthat responsibility on himself, and circumstances yet to be related\nwill show that he has amply earned the right to do so, if he chooses to\nexercise it.  The plan he has adopted for presenting the story to\nothers, in the most truthful and most vivid manner, requires that it\nshould be told, at each successive stage in the march of events, by the\npersons who were directly concerned in those events at the time of\ntheir occurrence.  My appearance here, as narrator, is the necessary\nconsequence of this arrangement.  I was present during the sojourn of\nSir Percival Glyde in Cumberland, and was personally concerned in one\nimportant result of his short residence under Mr. Fairlie's roof.  It\nis my duty, therefore, to add these new links to the chain of events,\nand to take up the chain itself at the point where, for the present\nonly Mr. Hartright has dropped it.\n\n\nI arrived at Limmeridge House on Friday the second of November.\n\nMy object was to remain at Mr. Fairlie's until the arrival of Sir\nPercival Glyde.  If that event led to the appointment of any given day\nfor Sir Percival's union with Miss Fairlie, I was to take the necessary\ninstructions back with me to London, and to occupy myself in drawing\nthe lady's marriage-settlement.\n\nOn the Friday I was not favoured by Mr. Fairlie with an interview. He\nhad been, or had fancied himself to be, an invalid for years past, and\nhe was not well enough to receive me.  Miss Halcombe was the first\nmember of the family whom I saw.  She met me at the house door, and\nintroduced me to Mr. Hartright, who had been staying at Limmeridge for\nsome time past.\n\nI did not see Miss Fairlie until later in the day, at dinner-time. She\nwas not looking well, and I was sorry to observe it.  She is a sweet\nlovable girl, as amiable and attentive to every one about her as her\nexcellent mother used to be--though, personally speaking, she takes\nafter her father.  Mrs. Fairlie had dark eyes and hair, and her elder\ndaughter, Miss Halcombe, strongly reminds me of her.  Miss Fairlie\nplayed to us in the evening--not so well as usual, I thought.  We had a\nrubber at whist, a mere profanation, so far as play was concerned, of\nthat noble game.  I had been favourably impressed by Mr. Hartright on\nour first introduction to one another, but I soon discovered that he\nwas not free from the social failings incidental to his age.  There are\nthree things that none of the young men of the present generation can\ndo.  They can't sit over their wine, they can't play at whist, and they\ncan't pay a lady a compliment.  Mr. Hartright was no exception to the\ngeneral rule.  Otherwise, even in those early days and on that short\nacquaintance, he struck me as being a modest and gentlemanlike young\nman.\n\nSo the Friday passed.  I say nothing about the more serious matters\nwhich engaged my attention on that day--the anonymous letter to Miss\nFairlie, the measures I thought it right to adopt when the matter was\nmentioned to me, and the conviction I entertained that every possible\nexplanation of the circumstances would be readily afforded by Sir\nPercival Glyde, having all been fully noticed, as I understand, in the\nnarrative which precedes this.\n\nOn the Saturday Mr. Hartright had left before I got down to breakfast.\nMiss Fairlie kept her room all day, and Miss Halcombe appeared to me to\nbe out of spirits.  The house was not what it used to be in the time of\nMr. and Mrs. Philip Fairlie.  I took a walk by myself in the forenoon,\nand looked about at some of the places which I first saw when I was\nstaying at Limmeridge to transact family business, more than thirty\nyears since.  They were not what they used to be either.\n\nAt two o'clock Mr. Fairlie sent to say he was well enough to see me.\nHE had not altered, at any rate, since I first knew him.  His talk was\nto the same purpose as usual--all about himself and his ailments, his\nwonderful coins, and his matchless Rembrandt etchings.  The moment I\ntried to speak of the business that had brought me to his house, he\nshut his eyes and said I \"upset\" him. I persisted in upsetting him by\nreturning again and again to the subject.  All I could ascertain was\nthat he looked on his niece's marriage as a settled thing, that her\nfather had sanctioned it, that he sanctioned it himself, that it was a\ndesirable marriage, and that he should be personally rejoiced when the\nworry of it was over.  As to the settlements, if I would consult his\nniece, and afterwards dive as deeply as I pleased into my own knowledge\nof the family affairs, and get everything ready, and limit his share in\nthe business, as guardian, to saying Yes, at the right moment--why, of\ncourse he would meet my views, and everybody else's views, with\ninfinite pleasure.  In the meantime, there I saw him, a helpless\nsufferer, confined to his room.  Did I think he looked as if he wanted\nteasing? No.  Then why tease him?\n\nI might, perhaps, have been a little astonished at this extraordinary\nabsence of all self-assertion on Mr. Fairlie's part, in the character\nof guardian, if my knowledge of the family affairs had not been\nsufficient to remind me that he was a single man, and that he had\nnothing more than a life-interest in the Limmeridge property.  As\nmatters stood, therefore, I was neither surprised nor disappointed at\nthe result of the interview.  Mr. Fairlie had simply justified my\nexpectations--and there was an end of it.\n\nSunday was a dull day, out of doors and in.  A letter arrived for me\nfrom Sir Percival Glyde's solicitor, acknowledging the receipt of my\ncopy of the anonymous letter and my accompanying statement of the case.\nMiss Fairlie joined us in the afternoon, looking pale and depressed,\nand altogether unlike herself.  I had some talk with her, and ventured\non a delicate allusion to Sir Percival.  She listened and said nothing.\nAll other subjects she pursued willingly, but this subject she allowed\nto drop.  I began to doubt whether she might not be repenting of her\nengagement--just as young ladies often do, when repentance comes too\nlate.\n\nOn Monday Sir Percival Glyde arrived.\n\nI found him to be a most prepossessing man, so far as manners and\nappearance were concerned.  He looked rather older than I had expected,\nhis head being bald over the forehead, and his face somewhat marked and\nworn, but his movements were as active and his spirits as high as a\nyoung man's.  His meeting with Miss Halcombe was delightfully hearty\nand unaffected, and his reception of me, upon my being presented to\nhim, was so easy and pleasant that we got on together like old friends.\nMiss Fairlie was not with us when he arrived, but she entered the room\nabout ten minutes afterwards.  Sir Percival rose and paid his\ncompliments with perfect grace.  His evident concern on seeing the\nchange for the worse in the young lady's looks was expressed with a\nmixture of tenderness and respect, with an unassuming delicacy of tone,\nvoice, and manner, which did equal credit to his good breeding and his\ngood sense.  I was rather surprised, under these circumstances, to see\nthat Miss Fairlie continued to be constrained and uneasy in his\npresence, and that she took the first opportunity of leaving the room\nagain.  Sir Percival neither noticed the restraint in her reception of\nhim, nor her sudden withdrawal from our society.  He had not obtruded\nhis attentions on her while she was present, and he did not embarrass\nMiss Halcombe by any allusion to her departure when she was gone.  His\ntact and taste were never at fault on this or on any other occasion\nwhile I was in his company at Limmeridge House.\n\nAs soon as Miss Fairlie had left the room he spared us all\nembarrassment on the subject of the anonymous letter, by adverting to\nit of his own accord.  He had stopped in London on his way from\nHampshire, had seen his solicitor, had read the documents forwarded by\nme, and had travelled on to Cumberland, anxious to satisfy our minds by\nthe speediest and the fullest explanation that words could convey.  On\nhearing him express himself to this effect, I offered him the original\nletter, which I had kept for his inspection.  He thanked me, and\ndeclined to look at it, saying that he had seen the copy, and that he\nwas quite willing to leave the original in our hands.\n\nThe statement itself, on which he immediately entered, was as simple\nand satisfactory as I had all along anticipated it would be.\n\nMrs. Catherick, he informed us, had in past years laid him under some\nobligations for faithful services rendered to his family connections\nand to himself.  She had been doubly unfortunate in being married to a\nhusband who had deserted her, and in having an only child whose mental\nfaculties had been in a disturbed condition from a very early age.\nAlthough her marriage had removed her to a part of Hampshire far\ndistant from the neighbourhood in which Sir Percival's property was\nsituated, he had taken care not to lose sight of her--his friendly\nfeeling towards the poor woman, in consideration of her past services,\nhaving been greatly strengthened by his admiration of the patience and\ncourage with which she supported her calamities.  In course of time the\nsymptoms of mental affliction in her unhappy daughter increased to such\na serious extent, as to make it a matter of necessity to place her\nunder proper medical care.  Mrs. Catherick herself recognised this\nnecessity, but she also felt the prejudice common to persons occupying\nher respectable station, against allowing her child to be admitted, as\na pauper, into a public Asylum.  Sir Percival had respected this\nprejudice, as he respected honest independence of feeling in any rank\nof life, and had resolved to mark his grateful sense of Mrs.\nCatherick's early attachment to the interests of himself and his\nfamily, by defraying the expense of her daughter's maintenance in a\ntrustworthy private Asylum.  To her mother's regret, and to his own\nregret, the unfortunate creature had discovered the share which\ncircumstances had induced him to take in placing her under restraint,\nand had conceived the most intense hatred and distrust of him in\nconsequence.  To that hatred and distrust--which had expressed itself\nin various ways in the Asylum--the anonymous letter, written after her\nescape, was plainly attributable.  If Miss Halcombe's or Mr. Gilmore's\nrecollection of the document did not confirm that view, or if they\nwished for any additional particulars about the Asylum (the address of\nwhich he mentioned, as well as the names and addresses of the two\ndoctors on whose certificates the patient was admitted), he was ready\nto answer any question and to clear up any uncertainty.  He had done\nhis duty to the unhappy young woman, by instructing his solicitor to\nspare no expense in tracing her, and in restoring her once more to\nmedical care, and he was now only anxious to do his duty towards Miss\nFairlie and towards her family, in the same plain, straightforward way.\n\nI was the first to speak in answer to this appeal.  My own course was\nplain to me.  It is the great beauty of the Law that it can dispute any\nhuman statement, made under any circumstances, and reduced to any form.\nIf I had felt professionally called upon to set up a case against Sir\nPercival Glyde, on the strength of his own explanation, I could have\ndone so beyond all doubt.  But my duty did not lie in this\ndirection--my function was of the purely judicial kind.  I was to weigh\nthe explanation we had just heard, to allow all due force to the high\nreputation of the gentleman who offered it, and to decide honestly\nwhether the probabilities, on Sir Percival's own showing, were plainly\nwith him, or plainly against him.  My own conviction was that they were\nplainly with him, and I accordingly declared that his explanation was,\nto my mind, unquestionably a satisfactory one.\n\nMiss Halcombe, after looking at me very earnestly, said a few words, on\nher side, to the same effect--with a certain hesitation of manner,\nhowever, which the circumstances did not seem to me to warrant.  I am\nunable to say, positively, whether Sir Percival noticed this or not.\nMy opinion is that he did, seeing that he pointedly resumed the\nsubject, although he might now, with all propriety, have allowed it to\ndrop.\n\n\"If my plain statement of facts had only been addressed to Mr.\nGilmore,\" he said, \"I should consider any further reference to this\nunhappy matter as unnecessary.  I may fairly expect Mr. Gilmore, as a\ngentleman, to believe me on my word, and when he has done me that\njustice, all discussion of the subject between us has come to an end.\nBut my position with a lady is not the same.  I owe to her--what I\nwould concede to no man alive--a PROOF of the truth of my assertion.\nYou cannot ask for that proof, Miss Halcombe, and it is therefore my\nduty to you, and still more to Miss Fairlie, to offer it.  May I beg\nthat you will write at once to the mother of this unfortunate woman--to\nMrs. Catherick--to ask for her testimony in support of the explanation\nwhich I have just offered to you.\"\n\nI saw Miss Halcombe change colour, and look a little uneasy.  Sir\nPercival's suggestion, politely as it was expressed, appeared to her,\nas it appeared to me, to point very delicately at the hesitation which\nher manner had betrayed a moment or two since.\n\n\"I hope, Sir Percival, you don't do me the injustice to suppose that I\ndistrust you,\" she said quickly.\n\n\"Certainly not, Miss Halcombe.  I make my proposal purely as an act of\nattention to YOU.  Will you excuse my obstinacy if I still venture to\npress it?\"\n\nHe walked to the writing-table as he spoke, drew a chair to it, and\nopened the paper case.\n\n\"Let me beg you to write the note,\" he said, \"as a favour to ME. It\nneed not occupy you more than a few minutes.  You have only to ask Mrs.\nCatherick two questions.  First, if her daughter was placed in the\nAsylum with her knowledge and approval.  Secondly, if the share I took\nin the matter was such as to merit the expression of her gratitude\ntowards myself? Mr. Gilmore's mind is at ease on this unpleasant\nsubject, and your mind is at ease--pray set my mind at ease also by\nwriting the note.\"\n\n\"You oblige me to grant your request, Sir Percival, when I would much\nrather refuse it.\"\n\nWith those words Miss Halcombe rose from her place and went to the\nwriting-table.  Sir Percival thanked her, handed her a pen, and then\nwalked away towards the fireplace.  Miss Fairlie's little Italian\ngreyhound was lying on the rug.  He held out his hand, and called to\nthe dog good-humouredly.\n\n\"Come, Nina,\" he said, \"we remember each other, don't we?\"\n\nThe little beast, cowardly and cross-grained, as pet-dogs usually are,\nlooked up at him sharply, shrank away from his outstretched hand,\nwhined, shivered, and hid itself under a sofa.  It was scarcely\npossible that he could have been put out by such a trifle as a dog's\nreception of him, but I observed, nevertheless, that he walked away\ntowards the window very suddenly.  Perhaps his temper is irritable at\ntimes.  If so, I can sympathise with him.  My temper is irritable at\ntimes too.\n\nMiss Halcombe was not long in writing the note.  When it was done she\nrose from the writing-table, and handed the open sheet of paper to Sir\nPercival.  He bowed, took it from her, folded it up immediately without\nlooking at the contents, sealed it, wrote the address, and handed it\nback to her in silence.  I never saw anything more gracefully and more\nbecomingly done in my life.\n\n\"You insist on my posting this letter, Sir Percival?\" said Miss\nHalcombe.\n\n\"I beg you will post it,\" he answered.  \"And now that it is written and\nsealed up, allow me to ask one or two last questions about the unhappy\nwoman to whom it refers.  I have read the communication which Mr.\nGilmore kindly addressed to my solicitor, describing the circumstances\nunder which the writer of the anonymous letter was identified.  But\nthere are certain points to which that statement does not refer.  Did\nAnne Catherick see Miss Fairlie?\"\n\n\"Certainly not,\" replied Miss Halcombe.\n\n\"Did she see you?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"She saw nobody from the house then, except a certain Mr. Hartright,\nwho accidentally met with her in the churchyard here?\"\n\n\"Nobody else.\"\n\n\"Mr. Hartright was employed at Limmeridge as a drawing-master, I\nbelieve? Is he a member of one of the Water-Colour Societies?\"\n\n\"I believe he is,\" answered Miss Halcombe.\n\nHe paused for a moment, as if he was thinking over the last answer, and\nthen added--\n\n\"Did you find out where Anne Catherick was living, when she was in this\nneighbourhood?\"\n\n\"Yes.  At a farm on the moor, called Todd's Corner.\"\n\n\"It is a duty we all owe to the poor creature herself to trace her,\"\ncontinued Sir Percival.  \"She may have said something at Todd's Corner\nwhich may help us to find her.  I will go there and make inquiries on\nthe chance.  In the meantime, as I cannot prevail on myself to discuss\nthis painful subject with Miss Fairlie, may I beg, Miss Halcombe, that\nyou will kindly undertake to give her the necessary explanation,\ndeferring it of course until you have received the reply to that note.\"\n\nMiss Halcombe promised to comply with his request.  He thanked her,\nnodded pleasantly, and left us, to go and establish himself in his own\nroom.  As he opened the door the cross-grained greyhound poked out her\nsharp muzzle from under the sofa, and barked and snapped at him.\n\n\"A good morning's work, Miss Halcombe,\" I said, as soon as we were\nalone.  \"Here is an anxious day well ended already.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she answered; \"no doubt.  I am very glad your mind is satisfied.\"\n\n\"My mind! Surely, with that note in your hand, your mind is at ease\ntoo?\"\n\n\"Oh yes--how can it be otherwise? I know the thing could not be,\" she\nwent on, speaking more to herself than to me; \"but I almost wish Walter\nHartright had stayed here long enough to be present at the explanation,\nand to hear the proposal to me to write this note.\"\n\nI was a little surprised--perhaps a little piqued also--by these last\nwords.\n\n\"Events, it is true, connected Mr. Hartright very remarkably with the\naffair of the letter,\" I said; \"and I readily admit that he conducted\nhimself, all things considered, with great delicacy and discretion.\nBut I am quite at a loss to understand what useful influence his\npresence could have exercised in relation to the effect of Sir\nPercival's statement on your mind or mine.\"\n\n\"It was only a fancy,\" she said absently.  \"There is no need to discuss\nit, Mr. Gilmore.  Your experience ought to be, and is, the best guide I\ncan desire.\"\n\nI did not altogether like her thrusting the whole responsibility, in\nthis marked manner, on my shoulders.  If Mr. Fairlie had done it, I\nshould not have been surprised.  But resolute, clear-minded Miss\nHalcombe was the very last person in the world whom I should have\nexpected to find shrinking from the expression of an opinion of her own.\n\n\"If any doubts still trouble you,\" I said, \"why not mention them to me\nat once? Tell me plainly, have you any reason to distrust Sir Percival\nGlyde?\"\n\n\"None whatever.\"\n\n\"Do you see anything improbable, or contradictory, in his explanation?\"\n\n\"How can I say I do, after the proof he has offered me of the truth of\nit? Can there be better testimony in his favour, Mr. Gilmore, than the\ntestimony of the woman's mother?\"\n\n\"None better.  If the answer to your note of inquiry proves to be\nsatisfactory, I for one cannot see what more any friend of Sir\nPercival's can possibly expect from him.\"\n\n\"Then we will post the note,\" she said, rising to leave the room, \"and\ndismiss all further reference to the subject until the answer arrives.\nDon't attach any weight to my hesitation.  I can give no better reason\nfor it than that I have been over-anxious about Laura lately--and\nanxiety, Mr. Gilmore, unsettles the strongest of us.\"\n\nShe left me abruptly, her naturally firm voice faltering as she spoke\nthose last words.  A sensitive, vehement, passionate nature--a woman\nof ten thousand in these trivial, superficial times.  I had known her\nfrom her earliest years--I had seen her tested, as she grew up, in more\nthan one trying family crisis, and my long experience made me attach an\nimportance to her hesitation under the circumstances here detailed,\nwhich I should certainly not have felt in the case of another woman.  I\ncould see no cause for any uneasiness or any doubt, but she had made me\na little uneasy, and a little doubtful, nevertheless.  In my youth, I\nshould have chafed and fretted under the irritation of my own\nunreasonable state of mind.  In my age, I knew better, and went out\nphilosophically to walk it off.\n\n\n\nII\n\nWe all met again at dinner-time.\n\nSir Percival was in such boisterous high spirits that I hardly\nrecognised him as the same man whose quiet tact, refinement, and good\nsense had impressed me so strongly at the interview of the morning.\nThe only trace of his former self that I could detect reappeared, every\nnow and then, in his manner towards Miss Fairlie.  A look or a word\nfrom her suspended his loudest laugh, checked his gayest flow of talk,\nand rendered him all attention to her, and to no one else at table, in\nan instant.  Although he never openly tried to draw her into the\nconversation, he never lost the slightest chance she gave him of\nletting her drift into it by accident, and of saying the words to her,\nunder those favourable circumstances, which a man with less tact and\ndelicacy would have pointedly addressed to her the moment they occurred\nto him.  Rather to my surprise, Miss Fairlie appeared to be sensible of\nhis attentions without being moved by them.  She was a little confused\nfrom time to time when he looked at her, or spoke to her; but she never\nwarmed towards him.  Rank, fortune, good breeding, good looks, the\nrespect of a gentleman, and the devotion of a lover were all humbly\nplaced at her feet, and, so far as appearances went, were all offered\nin vain.\n\nOn the next day, the Tuesday, Sir Percival went in the morning (taking\none of the servants with him as a guide) to Todd's Corner. His\ninquiries, as I afterwards heard, led to no results.  On his return he\nhad an interview with Mr. Fairlie, and in the afternoon he and Miss\nHalcombe rode out together.  Nothing else happened worthy of record.\nThe evening passed as usual.  There was no change in Sir Percival, and\nno change in Miss Fairlie.\n\nThe Wednesday's post brought with it an event--the reply from Mrs.\nCatherick.  I took a copy of the document, which I have preserved, and\nwhich I may as well present in this place.  It ran as follows--\n\n\n\n\"MADAM,--I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your letter, inquiring\nwhether my daughter, Anne, was placed under medical superintendence\nwith my knowledge and approval, and whether the share taken in the\nmatter by Sir Percival Glyde was such as to merit the expression of my\ngratitude towards that gentleman.  Be pleased to accept my answer in\nthe affirmative to both those questions, and believe me to remain, your\nobedient servant,\n\n                            \"JANE ANNE CATHERICK.\"\n\n\nShort, sharp, and to the point; in form rather a business-like letter\nfor a woman to write--in substance as plain a confirmation as could be\ndesired of Sir Percival Glyde's statement.  This was my opinion, and\nwith certain minor reservations, Miss Halcombe's opinion also.  Sir\nPercival, when the letter was shown to him, did not appear to be struck\nby the sharp, short tone of it.  He told us that Mrs. Catherick was a\nwoman of few words, a clear-headed, straightforward, unimaginative\nperson, who wrote briefly and plainly, just as she spoke.\n\nThe next duty to be accomplished, now that the answer had been\nreceived, was to acquaint Miss Fairlie with Sir Percival's explanation.\nMiss Halcombe had undertaken to do this, and had left the room to go to\nher sister, when she suddenly returned again, and sat down by the\neasy-chair in which I was reading the newspaper.  Sir Percival had gone\nout a minute before to look at the stables, and no one was in the room\nbut ourselves.\n\n\"I suppose we have really and truly done all we can?\" she said, turning\nand twisting Mrs. Catherick's letter in her hand.\n\n\"If we are friends of Sir Percival's, who know him and trust him, we\nhave done all, and more than all, that is necessary,\" I answered, a\nlittle annoyed by this return of her hesitation.  \"But if we are\nenemies who suspect him----\"\n\n\"That alternative is not even to be thought of,\" she interposed. \"We\nare Sir Percival's friends, and if generosity and forbearance can add\nto our regard for him, we ought to be Sir Percival's admirers as well.\nYou know that he saw Mr. Fairlie yesterday, and that he afterwards went\nout with me.\"\n\n\"Yes.  I saw you riding away together.\"\n\n\"We began the ride by talking about Anne Catherick, and about the\nsingular manner in which Mr. Hartright met with her.  But we soon\ndropped that subject, and Sir Percival spoke next, in the most\nunselfish terms, of his engagement with Laura.  He said he had observed\nthat she was out of spirits, and he was willing, if not informed to the\ncontrary, to attribute to that cause the alteration in her manner\ntowards him during his present visit. If, however, there was any more\nserious reason for the change, he would entreat that no constraint\nmight be placed on her inclinations either by Mr. Fairlie or by me.\nAll he asked, in that case, was that she would recall to mind, for the\nlast time, what the circumstances were under which the engagement\nbetween them was made, and what his conduct had been from the beginning\nof the courtship to the present time.  If, after due reflection on\nthose two subjects, she seriously desired that he should withdraw his\npretensions to the honour of becoming her husband--and if she would\ntell him so plainly with her own lips--he would sacrifice himself by\nleaving her perfectly free to withdraw from the engagement.\"\n\n\"No man could say more than that, Miss Halcombe.  As to my experience,\nfew men in his situation would have said as much.\"\n\nShe paused after I had spoken those words, and looked at me with a\nsingular expression of perplexity and distress.\n\n\"I accuse nobody, and I suspect nothing,\" she broke out abruptly. \"But\nI cannot and will not accept the responsibility of persuading Laura to\nthis marriage.\"\n\n\"That is exactly the course which Sir Percival Glyde has himself\nrequested you to take,\" I replied in astonishment.  \"He has begged you\nnot to force her inclinations.\"\n\n\"And he indirectly obliges me to force them, if I give her his message.\"\n\n\"How can that possibly be?\"\n\n\"Consult your own knowledge of Laura, Mr. Gilmore.  If I tell her to\nreflect on the circumstances of her engagement, I at once appeal to two\nof the strongest feelings in her nature--to her love for her father's\nmemory, and to her strict regard for truth.  You know that she never\nbroke a promise in her life--you know that she entered on this\nengagement at the beginning of her father's fatal illness, and that he\nspoke hopefully and happily of her marriage to Sir Percival Glyde on\nhis deathbed.\"\n\nI own that I was a little shocked at this view of the case.\n\n\"Surely,\" I said, \"you don't mean to infer that when Sir Percival spoke\nto you yesterday he speculated on such a result as you have just\nmentioned?\"\n\nHer frank, fearless face answered for her before she spoke.\n\n\"Do you think I would remain an instant in the company of any man whom\nI suspected of such baseness as that?\" she asked angrily.\n\nI liked to feel her hearty indignation flash out on me in that way.  We\nsee so much malice and so little indignation in my profession.\n\n\"In that case,\" I said, \"excuse me if I tell you, in our legal phrase,\nthat you are travelling out of the record.  Whatever the consequences\nmay be, Sir Percival has a right to expect that your sister should\ncarefully consider her engagement from every reasonable point of view\nbefore she claims her release from it. If that unlucky letter has\nprejudiced her against him, go at once, and tell her that he has\ncleared himself in your eyes and in mine. What objection can she urge\nagainst him after that? What excuse can she possibly have for changing\nher mind about a man whom she had virtually accepted for her husband\nmore than two years ago?\"\n\n\"In the eyes of law and reason, Mr. Gilmore, no excuse, I daresay. If\nshe still hesitates, and if I still hesitate, you must attribute our\nstrange conduct, if you like, to caprice in both cases, and we must\nbear the imputation as well as we can.\"\n\nWith those words she suddenly rose and left me.  When a sensible woman\nhas a serious question put to her, and evades it by a flippant answer,\nit is a sure sign, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, that she has\nsomething to conceal.  I returned to the perusal of the newspaper,\nstrongly suspecting that Miss Halcombe and Miss Fairlie had a secret\nbetween them which they were keeping from Sir Percival, and keeping\nfrom me.  I thought this hard on both of us, especially on Sir Percival.\n\nMy doubts--or to speak more correctly, my convictions--were confirmed\nby Miss Halcombe's language and manner when I saw her again later in\nthe day.  She was suspiciously brief and reserved in telling me the\nresult of her interview with her sister.  Miss Fairlie, it appeared,\nhad listened quietly while the affair of the letter was placed before\nher in the right point of view, but when Miss Halcombe next proceeded\nto say that the object of Sir Percival's visit at Limmeridge was to\nprevail on her to let a day be fixed for the marriage she checked all\nfurther reference to the subject by begging for time.  If Sir Percival\nwould consent to spare her for the present, she would undertake to give\nhim his final answer before the end of the year.  She pleaded for this\ndelay with such anxiety and agitation, that Miss Halcombe had promised\nto use her influence, if necessary, to obtain it, and there, at Miss\nFairlie's earnest entreaty, all further discussion of the marriage\nquestion had ended.\n\nThe purely temporary arrangement thus proposed might have been\nconvenient enough to the young lady, but it proved somewhat\nembarrassing to the writer of these lines.  That morning's post had\nbrought a letter from my partner, which obliged me to return to town\nthe next day by the afternoon train.  It was extremely probable that I\nshould find no second opportunity of presenting myself at Limmeridge\nHouse during the remainder of the year.  In that case, supposing Miss\nFairlie ultimately decided on holding to her engagement, my necessary\npersonal communication with her, before I drew her settlement, would\nbecome something like a downright impossibility, and we should be\nobliged to commit to writing questions which ought always to be\ndiscussed on both sides by word of mouth.  I said nothing about this\ndifficulty until Sir Percival had been consulted on the subject of the\ndesired delay. He was too gallant a gentleman not to grant the request\nimmediately.  When Miss Halcombe informed me of this I told her that I\nmust absolutely speak to her sister before I left Limmeridge, and it\nwas, therefore, arranged that I should see Miss Fairlie in her own\nsitting-room the next morning.  She did not come down to dinner, or\njoin us in the evening.  Indisposition was the excuse, and I thought\nSir Percival looked, as well he might, a little annoyed when he heard\nof it.\n\nThe next morning, as soon as breakfast was over, I went up to Miss\nFairlie's sitting-room.  The poor girl looked so pale and sad, and came\nforward to welcome me so readily and prettily, that the resolution to\nlecture her on her caprice and indecision, which I had been forming all\nthe way upstairs, failed me on the spot.  I led her back to the chair\nfrom which she had risen, and placed myself opposite to her.  Her\ncross-grained pet greyhound was in the room, and I fully expected a\nbarking and snapping reception. Strange to say, the whimsical little\nbrute falsified my expectations by jumping into my lap and poking its\nsharp muzzle familiarly into my hand the moment I sat down.\n\n\"You used often to sit on my knee when you were a child,  my dear,\" I\nsaid, \"and now your little dog seems determined to succeed you in the\nvacant throne.  Is that pretty drawing your doing?\"\n\nI pointed to a little album which lay on the table by her side and\nwhich she had evidently been looking over when I came in.  The page\nthat lay open had a small water-colour landscape very neatly mounted on\nit.  This was the drawing which had suggested my question--an idle\nquestion enough--but how could I begin to talk of business to her the\nmoment I opened my lips?\n\n\"No,\" she said, looking away from the drawing rather confusedly, \"it is\nnot my doing.\"\n\nHer fingers had a restless habit, which I remembered in her as a child,\nof always playing with the first thing that came to hand whenever any\none was talking to her.  On this occasion they wandered to the album,\nand toyed absently about the margin of the little water-colour drawing.\nThe expression of melancholy deepened on her face.  She did not look at\nthe drawing, or look at me.  Her eyes moved uneasily from object to\nobject in the room, betraying plainly that she suspected what my\npurpose was in coming to speak to her.  Seeing that, I thought it best\nto get to the purpose with as little delay as possible.\n\n\"One of the errands, my dear, which brings me here is to bid you\ngood-bye,\" I began.  \"I must get back to London to-day: and, before I\nleave, I want to have a word with you on the subject of your own\naffairs.\"\n\n\"I am very sorry you are going, Mr. Gilmore,\" she said, looking at me\nkindly.  \"It is like the happy old times to have you here.\n\n\"I hope I may be able to come back and recall those pleasant memories\nonce more,\" I continued; \"but as there is some uncertainty about the\nfuture, I must take my opportunity when I can get it, and speak to you\nnow.  I am your old lawyer and your old friend, and I may remind you, I\nam sure, without offence, of the possibility of your marrying Sir\nPercival Glyde.\"\n\nShe took her hand off the little album as suddenly as if it had turned\nhot and burnt her.  Her fingers twined together nervously in her lap,\nher eyes looked down again at the floor, and an expression of\nconstraint settled on her face which looked almost like an expression\nof pain.\n\n\"Is it absolutely necessary to speak of my marriage engagement?\" she\nasked in low tones.\n\n\"It is necessary to refer to it,\" I answered, \"but not to dwell on it.\nLet us merely say that you may marry, or that you may not marry.  In\nthe first case, I must be prepared, beforehand, to draw your\nsettlement, and I ought not to do that without, as a matter of\npoliteness, first consulting you.  This may be my only chance of\nhearing what your wishes are.  Let us, therefore, suppose the case of\nyour marrying, and let me inform you, in as few words as possible, what\nyour position is now, and what you may make it, if you please, in the\nfuture.\"\n\nI explained to her the object of a marriage-settlement, and then told\nher exactly what her prospects were--in the first place, on her coming\nof age, and in the second place, on the decease of her uncle--marking\nthe distinction between the property in which she had a life-interest\nonly, and the property which was left at her own control.  She listened\nattentively, with the constrained expression still on her face, and her\nhands still nervously clasped together in her lap.\n\n\"And now,\" I said in conclusion, \"tell me if you can think of any\ncondition which, in the case we have supposed, you would wish me to\nmake for you--subject, of course, to your guardian's approval, as you\nare not yet of age.\"\n\nShe moved uneasily in her chair, then looked in my face on a sudden\nvery earnestly.\n\n\"If it does happen,\" she began faintly, \"if I am----\"\n\n\"If you are married,\" I added, helping her out.\n\n\"Don't let him part me from Marian,\" she cried, with a sudden outbreak\nof energy.  \"Oh, Mr. Gilmore, pray make it law that Marian is to live\nwith me!\"\n\nUnder other circumstances I might, perhaps, have been amused at this\nessentially feminine interpretation of my question, and of the long\nexplanation which had preceded it.  But her looks and tones, when she\nspoke, were of a kind to make me more than serious--they distressed me.\nHer words, few as they were, betrayed a desperate clinging to the past\nwhich boded ill for the future.\n\n\"Your having Marian Halcombe to live with you can easily be settled by\nprivate arrangement,\" I said.  \"You hardly understood my question, I\nthink.  It referred to your own property--to the disposal of your\nmoney.  Supposing you were to make a will when you come of age, who\nwould you like the money to go to?\"\n\n\"Marian has been mother and sister both to me,\" said the good,\naffectionate girl, her pretty blue eyes glistening while she spoke.\n\"May I leave it to Marian, Mr. Gilmore?\"\n\n\"Certainly, my love,\" I answered.  \"But remember what a large sum it\nis.  Would you like it all to go to Miss Halcombe?\"\n\nShe hesitated; her colour came and went, and her hand stole back again\nto the little album.\n\n\"Not all of it,\" she said.  \"There is some one else besides Marian----\"\n\nShe stopped; her colour heightened, and the fingers of the hand that\nrested upon the album beat gently on the margin of the drawing, as if\nher memory had set them going mechanically with the remembrance of a\nfavourite tune.\n\n\"You mean some other member of the family besides Miss Halcombe?\" I\nsuggested, seeing her at a loss to proceed.\n\nThe heightening colour spread to her forehead and her neck, and the\nnervous fingers suddenly clasped themselves fast round the edge of the\nbook.\n\n\"There is some one else,\" she said, not noticing my last words, though\nshe had evidently heard them; \"there is some one else who might like a\nlittle keepsake if--if I might leave it.  There would be no harm if I\nshould die first----\"\n\nShe paused again.  The colour that had spread over her cheeks suddenly,\nas suddenly left them.  The hand on the album resigned its hold,\ntrembled a little, and moved the book away from her. She looked at me\nfor an instant--then turned her head aside in the chair.  Her\nhandkerchief fell to the floor as she changed her position, and she\nhurriedly hid her face from me in her hands.\n\nSad! To remember her, as I did, the liveliest, happiest child that ever\nlaughed the day through, and to see her now, in the flower of her age\nand her beauty, so broken and so brought down as this!\n\nIn the distress that she caused me I forgot the years that had passed,\nand the change they had made in our position towards one another.  I\nmoved my chair close to her, and picked up her handkerchief from the\ncarpet, and drew her hands from her face gently.  \"Don't cry, my love,\"\nI said, and dried the tears that were gathering in her eyes with my own\nhand, as if she had been the little Laura Fairlie of ten long years ago.\n\nIt was the best way I could have taken to compose her.  She laid her\nhead on my shoulder, and smiled faintly through her tears.\n\n\"I am very sorry for forgetting myself,\" she said artlessly.  \"I have\nnot been well--I have felt sadly weak and nervous lately, and I often\ncry without reason when I am alone.  I am better now--I can answer you\nas I ought, Mr. Gilmore, I can indeed.\"\n\n\"No, no, my dear,\" I replied, \"we will consider the subject as done\nwith for the present.  You have said enough to sanction my taking the\nbest possible care of your interests, and we can settle details at\nanother opportunity.  Let us have done with business now, and talk of\nsomething else.\"\n\nI led her at once into speaking on other topics.  In ten minutes' time\nshe was in better spirits, and I rose to take my leave.\n\n\"Come here again,\" she said earnestly.  \"I will try to be worthier of\nyour kind feeling for me and for my interests if you will only come\nagain.\"\n\nStill clinging to the past--that past which I represented to her, in my\nway, as Miss Halcombe did in hers! It troubled me sorely to see her\nlooking back, at the beginning of her career, just as I look back at\nthe end of mine.\n\n\"If I do come again, I hope I shall find you better,\" I said; \"better\nand happier.  God bless you, my dear!\"\n\nShe only answered by putting up her cheek to me to be kissed. Even\nlawyers have hearts, and mine ached a little as I took leave of her.\n\nThe whole interview between us had hardly lasted more than half an\nhour--she had not breathed a word, in my presence, to explain the\nmystery of her evident distress and dismay at the prospect of her\nmarriage, and yet she had contrived to win me over to her side of the\nquestion, I neither knew how nor why.  I had entered the room, feeling\nthat Sir Percival Glyde had fair reason to complain of the manner in\nwhich she was treating him.  I left it, secretly hoping that matters\nmight end in her taking him at his word and claiming her release.  A\nman of my age and experience ought to have known better than to\nvacillate in this unreasonable manner.  I can make no excuse for\nmyself; I can only tell the truth, and say--so it was.\n\nThe hour for my departure was now drawing near.  I sent to Mr. Fairlie\nto say that I would wait on him to take leave if he liked, but that he\nmust excuse my being rather in a hurry.  He sent a message back,\nwritten in pencil on a slip of paper: \"Kind love and best wishes, dear\nGilmore.  Hurry of any kind is inexpressibly injurious to me.  Pray\ntake care of yourself.  Good-bye.\"\n\nJust before I left I saw Miss Halcombe for a moment alone.\n\n\"Have you said all you wanted to Laura?\" she asked.\n\n\"Yes,\" I replied.  \"She is very weak and nervous--I am glad she has you\nto take care of her.\"\n\nMiss Halcombe's sharp eyes studied my face attentively.\n\n\"You are altering your opinion about Laura,\" she said.  \"You are\nreadier to make allowances for her than you were yesterday.\"\n\nNo sensible man ever engages, unprepared, in a fencing match of words\nwith a woman.  I only answered--\n\n\"Let me know what happens.  I will do nothing till I hear from you.\"\n\nShe still looked hard in my face.  \"I wish it was all over, and well\nover, Mr. Gilmore--and so do you.\" With those words she left me.\n\nSir Percival most politely insisted on seeing me to the carriage door.\n\n\"If you are ever in my neighbourhood,\" he said, \"pray don't forget that\nI am sincerely anxious to improve our acquaintance.  The tried and\ntrusted old friend of this family will be always a welcome visitor in\nany house of mine.\"\n\nA really irresistible man--courteous, considerate, delightfully free\nfrom pride--a gentleman, every inch of him.  As I drove away to the\nstation I felt as if I could cheerfully do anything to promote the\ninterests of Sir Percival Glyde--anything in the world, except drawing\nthe marriage settlement of his wife.\n\n\n\nIII\n\nA week passed, after my return to London, without the receipt of any\ncommunication from Miss Halcombe.\n\nOn the eighth day a letter in her handwriting was placed among the\nother letters on my table.\n\nIt announced that Sir Percival Glyde had been definitely accepted, and\nthat the marriage was to take place, as he had originally desired,\nbefore the end of the year.  In all probability the ceremony would be\nperformed during the last fortnight in December. Miss Fairlie's\ntwenty-first birthday was late in March.  She would, therefore, by this\narrangement, become Sir Percival's wife about three months before she\nwas of age.\n\nI ought not to have been surprised, I ought not to have been sorry, but\nI was surprised and sorry, nevertheless.  Some little disappointment,\ncaused by the unsatisfactory shortness of Miss Halcombe's letter,\nmingled itself with these feelings, and contributed its share towards\nupsetting my serenity for the day. In six lines my correspondent\nannounced the proposed marriage--in three more, she told me that Sir\nPercival had left Cumberland to return to his house in Hampshire, and\nin two concluding sentences she informed me, first, that Laura was\nsadly in want of change and cheerful society; secondly, that she had\nresolved to try the effect of some such change forthwith, by taking her\nsister away with her on a visit to certain old friends in Yorkshire.\nThere the letter ended, without a word to explain what the\ncircumstances were which had decided Miss Fairlie to accept Sir\nPercival Glyde in one short week from the time when I had last seen her.\n\nAt a later period the cause of this sudden determination was fully\nexplained to me.  It is not my business to relate it imperfectly, on\nhearsay evidence.  The circumstances came within the personal\nexperience of Miss Halcombe, and when her narrative succeeds mine, she\nwill describe them in every particular exactly as they happened.  In\nthe meantime, the plain duty for me to perform--before I, in my turn,\nlay down my pen and withdraw from the story--is to relate the one\nremaining event connected with Miss Fairlie's proposed marriage in\nwhich I was concerned, namely, the drawing of the settlement.\n\nIt is impossible to refer intelligibly to this document without first\nentering into certain particulars in relation to the bride's pecuniary\naffairs.  I will try to make my explanation briefly and plainly, and to\nkeep it free from professional obscurities and technicalities.  The\nmatter is of the utmost importance.  I warn all readers of these lines\nthat Miss Fairlie's inheritance is a very serious part of Miss\nFairlie's story, and that Mr. Gilmore's experience, in this particular,\nmust be their experience also, if they wish to understand the\nnarratives which are yet to come.\n\nMiss Fairlie's expectations, then, were of a twofold kind, comprising\nher possible inheritance of real property, or land, when her uncle\ndied, and her absolute inheritance of personal property, or money, when\nshe came of age.\n\nLet us take the land first.\n\nIn the time of Miss Fairlie's paternal grandfather (whom we will call\nMr. Fairlie, the elder) the entailed succession to the Limmeridge\nestate stood thus--\n\nMr. Fairlie, the elder, died and left three sons, Philip, Frederick,\nand Arthur.  As eldest son, Philip succeeded to the estate, if he died\nwithout leaving a son, the property went to the second brother,\nFrederick; and if Frederick died also without leaving a son, the\nproperty went to the third brother, Arthur.\n\nAs events turned out, Mr. Philip Fairlie died leaving an only daughter,\nthe Laura of this story, and the estate, in consequence, went, in\ncourse of law, to the second brother, Frederick, a single man.  The\nthird brother, Arthur, had died many years before the decease of\nPhilip, leaving a son and a daughter.  The son, at the age of eighteen,\nwas drowned at Oxford.  His death left Laura, the daughter of Mr.\nPhilip Fairlie, presumptive heiress to the estate, with every chance of\nsucceeding to it, in the ordinary course of nature, on her uncle\nFrederick's death, if the said Frederick died without leaving male\nissue.\n\nExcept in the event, then, of Mr. Frederick Fairlie's marrying and\nleaving an heir (the two very last things in the world that he was\nlikely to do), his niece, Laura, would have the property on his death,\npossessing, it must be remembered, nothing more than a life-interest in\nit.  If she died single, or died childless, the estate would revert to\nher cousin, Magdalen, the daughter of Mr. Arthur Fairlie.  If she\nmarried, with a proper settlement--or, in other words, with the\nsettlement I meant to make for her--the income from the estate (a good\nthree thousand a year) would, during her lifetime, be at her own\ndisposal.  If she died before her husband, he would naturally expect to\nbe left in the enjoyment of the income, for HIS lifetime.  If she had a\nson, that son would be the heir, to the exclusion of her cousin\nMagdalen.  Thus, Sir Percival's prospects in marrying Miss Fairlie (so\nfar as his wife's expectations from real property were concerned)\npromised him these two advantages, on Mr. Frederick Fairlie's death:\nFirst, the use of three thousand a year (by his wife's permission,\nwhile she lived, and in his own right, on her death, if he survived\nher); and, secondly, the inheritance of Limmeridge for his son, if he\nhad one.\n\nSo much for the landed property, and for the disposal of the income\nfrom it, on the occasion of Miss Fairlie's marriage.  Thus far, no\ndifficulty or difference of opinion on the lady's settlement was at all\nlikely to arise between Sir Percival's lawyer and myself.\n\nThe personal estate, or, in other words, the money to which Miss\nFairlie would become entitled on reaching the age of twenty-one years,\nis the next point to consider.\n\nThis part of her inheritance was, in itself, a comfortable little\nfortune.  It was derived under her father's will, and it amounted to\nthe sum of twenty thousand pounds.  Besides this, she had a\nlife-interest in ten thousand pounds more, which latter amount was to\ngo, on her decease, to her aunt Eleanor, her father's only sister.  It\nwill greatly assist in setting the family affairs before the reader in\nthe clearest possible light, if I stop here for a moment, to explain\nwhy the aunt had been kept waiting for her legacy until the death of\nthe niece.\n\nMr. Philip Fairlie had lived on excellent terms with his sister\nEleanor, as long as she remained a single woman.  But when her marriage\ntook place, somewhat late in life, and when that marriage united her to\nan Italian gentleman named Fosco, or, rather, to an Italian\nnobleman--seeing that he rejoiced in the title of Count--Mr. Fairlie\ndisapproved of her conduct so strongly that he ceased to hold any\ncommunication with her, and even went the length of striking her name\nout of his will.  The other members of the family all thought this\nserious manifestation of resentment at his sister's marriage more or\nless unreasonable.  Count Fosco, though not a rich man, was not a\npenniless adventurer either.  He had a small but sufficient income of\nhis own.  He had lived many years in England, and he held an excellent\nposition in society.  These recommendations, however, availed nothing\nwith Mr. Fairlie.  In many of his opinions he was an Englishman of the\nold school, and he hated a foreigner simply and solely because he was a\nforeigner. The utmost that he could be prevailed on to do, in after\nyears--mainly at Miss Fairlie's intercession--was to restore his\nsister's name to its former place in his will, but to keep her waiting\nfor her legacy by giving the income of the money to his daughter for\nlife, and the money itself, if her aunt died before her, to her cousin\nMagdalen.  Considering the relative ages of the two ladies, the aunt's\nchance, in the ordinary course of nature, of receiving the ten thousand\npounds, was thus rendered doubtful in the extreme; and Madame Fosco\nresented her brother's treatment of her as unjustly as usual in such\ncases, by refusing to see her niece, and declining to believe that Miss\nFairlie's intercession had ever been exerted to restore her name to Mr.\nFairlie's will.\n\nSuch was the history of the ten thousand pounds.  Here again no\ndifficulty could arise with Sir Percival's legal adviser.  The income\nwould be at the wife's disposal, and the principal would go to her aunt\nor her cousin on her death.\n\nAll preliminary explanations being now cleared out of the way, I come\nat last to the real knot of the case--to the twenty thousand pounds.\n\nThis sum was absolutely Miss Fairlie's own on her completing her\ntwenty-first year, and the whole future disposition of it depended, in\nthe first instance, on the conditions I could obtain for her in her\nmarriage-settlement.  The other clauses contained in that document were\nof a formal kind, and need not be recited here.  But the clause\nrelating to the money is too important to be passed over.  A few lines\nwill be sufficient to give the necessary abstract of it.\n\nMy stipulation in regard to the twenty thousand pounds was simply this:\nThe whole amount was to be settled so as to give the income to the lady\nfor her life--afterwards to Sir Percival for his life--and the\nprincipal to the children of the marriage.  In default of issue, the\nprincipal was to be disposed of as the lady might by her will direct,\nfor which purpose I reserved to her the right of making a will.  The\neffect of these conditions may be thus summed up.  If Lady Glyde died\nwithout leaving children, her half-sister Miss Halcombe, and any other\nrelatives or friends whom she might be anxious to benefit, would, on\nher husband's death, divide among them such shares of her money as she\ndesired them to have.  If, on the other hand, she died leaving\nchildren, then their interest, naturally and necessarily, superseded\nall other interests whatsoever.  This was the clause--and no one who\nreads it can fail, I think, to agree with me that it meted out equal\njustice to all parties.\n\nWe shall see how my proposals were met on the husband's side.\n\nAt the time when Miss Halcombe's letter reached me I was even more\nbusily occupied than usual.  But I contrived to make leisure for the\nsettlement.  I had drawn it, and had sent it for approval to Sir\nPercival's solicitor, in less than a week from the time when Miss\nHalcombe had informed me of the proposed marriage.\n\nAfter a lapse of two days the document was returned to me, with notes\nand remarks of the baronet's lawyer.  His objections, in general,\nproved to be of the most trifling and technical kind, until he came to\nthe clause relating to the twenty thousand pounds.  Against this there\nwere double lines drawn in red ink, and the following note was appended\nto them--\n\n\"Not admissible.  The PRINCIPAL to go to Sir Percival Glyde, in the\nevent of his surviving Lady Glyde, and there being no issue.\"\n\nThat is to say, not one farthing of the twenty thousand pounds was to\ngo to Miss Halcombe, or to any other relative or friend of Lady\nGlyde's.  The whole sum, if she left no children, was to slip into the\npockets of her husband.\n\nThe answer I wrote to this audacious proposal was as short and sharp as\nI could make it.  \"My dear sir.  Miss Fairlie's settlement.  I maintain\nthe clause to which you object, exactly as it stands.  Yours truly.\"\nThe rejoinder came back in a quarter of an hour.  \"My dear sir.  Miss\nFairlie's settlement.  I maintain the red ink to which you object,\nexactly as it stands.  Yours truly.\" In the detestable slang of the\nday, we were now both \"at a deadlock,\" and nothing was left for it but\nto refer to our clients on either side.\n\nAs matters stood, my client--Miss Fairlie not having yet completed her\ntwenty-first year--Mr. Frederick Fairlie, was her guardian.  I wrote by\nthat day's post, and put the case before him exactly as it stood, not\nonly urging every argument I could think of to induce him to maintain\nthe clause as I had drawn it, but stating to him plainly the mercenary\nmotive which was at the bottom of the opposition to my settlement of\nthe twenty thousand pounds.  The knowledge of Sir Percival's affairs\nwhich I had necessarily gained when the provisions of the deed on HIS\nside were submitted in due course to my examination, had but too\nplainly informed me that the debts on his estate were enormous, and\nthat his income, though nominally a large one, was virtually, for a man\nin his position, next to nothing.  The want of ready money was the\npractical necessity of Sir Percival's existence, and his lawyer's note\non the clause in the settlement was nothing but the frankly selfish\nexpression of it.\n\nMr. Fairlie's answer reached me by return of post, and proved to be\nwandering and irrelevant in the extreme.  Turned into plain English, it\npractically expressed itself to this effect: \"Would dear Gilmore be so\nvery obliging as not to worry his friend and client about such a trifle\nas a remote contingency? Was it likely that a young woman of twenty-one\nwould die before a man of forty five, and die without children? On the\nother hand, in such a miserable world as this, was it possible to\nover-estimate the value of peace and quietness? If those two heavenly\nblessings were offered in exchange for such an earthly trifle as a\nremote chance of twenty thousand pounds, was it not a fair bargain?\nSurely, yes. Then why not make it?\"\n\nI threw the letter away in disgust.  Just as it had fluttered to the\nground, there was a knock at my door, and Sir Percival's solicitor, Mr.\nMerriman, was shown in.  There are many varieties of sharp\npractitioners in this world, but I think the hardest of all to deal\nwith are the men who overreach you under the disguise of inveterate\ngood-humour.  A fat, well fed, smiling, friendly man of business is of\nall parties to a bargain the most hopeless to deal with.  Mr. Merriman\nwas one of this class.\n\n\"And how is good Mr. Gilmore?\" he began, all in a glow with the warmth\nof his own amiability.  \"Glad to see you, sir, in such excellent\nhealth.  I was passing your door, and I thought I would look in in case\nyou might have something to say to me.  Do--now pray do let us settle\nthis little difference of ours by word of mouth, if we can! Have you\nheard from your client yet?\"\n\n\"Yes.  Have you heard from yours?\"\n\n\"My dear, good sir! I wish I had heard from him to any purpose--I wish,\nwith all my heart, the responsibility was off my shoulders; but he is\nobstinate--or let me rather say, resolute--and he won't take it off.\n'Merriman, I leave details to you.  Do what you think right for my\ninterests, and consider me as having personally withdrawn from the\nbusiness until it is all over.' Those were Sir Percival's words a\nfortnight ago, and all I can get him to do now is to repeat them.  I am\nnot a hard man, Mr. Gilmore, as you know. Personally and privately, I\ndo assure you, I should like to sponge out that note of mine at this\nvery moment.  But if Sir Percival won't go into the matter, if Sir\nPercival will blindly leave all his interests in my sole care, what\ncourse can I possibly take except the course of asserting them? My\nhands are bound--don't you see, my dear sir?--my hands are bound.\"\n\n\"You maintain your note on the clause, then, to the letter?\" I said.\n\n\"Yes--deuce take it! I have no other alternative.\" He walked to the\nfireplace and warmed himself, humming the fag end of a tune in a rich\nconvivial bass voice.  \"What does your side say?\" he went on; \"now pray\ntell me--what does your side say?\"\n\nI was ashamed to tell him.  I attempted to gain time--nay, I did worse.\nMy legal instincts got the better of me, and I even tried to bargain.\n\n\"Twenty thousand pounds is rather a large sum to be given up by the\nlady's friends at two days' notice,\" I said.\n\n\"Very true,\" replied Mr. Merriman, looking down thoughtfully at his\nboots.  \"Properly put, sir--most properly put!\"\n\n\"A compromise, recognising the interests of the lady's family as well\nas the interests of the husband, might not perhaps have frightened my\nclient quite so much,\" I went on.  \"Come, come! this contingency\nresolves itself into a matter of bargaining after all. What is the\nleast you will take?\"\n\n\"The least we will take,\" said Mr. Merriman, \"is nineteen-\nthousand-nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine-pounds-nineteen-shillings-\nand-elevenpence-three-farthings.  Ha! ha! ha! Excuse me, Mr. Gilmore.\nI must have my little joke.\"\n\n\"Little enough,\" I remarked.  \"The joke is just worth the odd farthing\nit was made for.\"\n\nMr. Merriman was delighted.  He laughed over my retort till the room\nrang again.  I was not half so good-humoured on my side; I came back to\nbusiness, and closed the interview.\n\n\"This is Friday,\" I said.  \"Give us till Tuesday next for our final\nanswer.\"\n\n\"By all means,\" replied Mr. Merriman.  \"Longer, my dear sir, if you\nlike.\" He took up his hat to go, and then addressed me again. \"By the\nway,\" he said, \"your clients in Cumberland have not heard anything more\nof the woman who wrote the anonymous letter, have they?\"\n\n\"Nothing more,\" I answered.  \"Have you found no trace of her?\"\n\n\"Not yet,\" said my legal friend.  \"But we don't despair.  Sir Percival\nhas his suspicions that Somebody is keeping her in hiding, and we are\nhaving that Somebody watched.\"\n\n\"You mean the old woman who was with her in Cumberland,\" I said.\n\n\"Quite another party, sir,\" answered Mr. Merriman.  \"We don't happen to\nhave laid hands on the old woman yet.  Our Somebody is a man.  We have\ngot him close under our eye here in London, and we strongly suspect he\nhad something to do with helping her in the first instance to escape\nfrom the Asylum.  Sir Percival wanted to question him at once, but I\nsaid, 'No.  Questioning him will only put him on his guard--watch him,\nand wait.' We shall see what happens.  A dangerous woman to be at\nlarge, Mr. Gilmore; nobody knows what she may do next.  I wish you\ngood-morning, sir.  On Tuesday next I shall hope for the pleasure of\nhearing from you.\" He smiled amiably and went out.\n\nMy mind had been rather absent during the latter part of the\nconversation with my legal friend.  I was so anxious about the matter\nof the settlement that I had little attention to give to any other\nsubject, and the moment I was left alone again I began to think over\nwhat my next proceeding ought to be.\n\nIn the case of any other client I should have acted on my instructions,\nhowever personally distasteful to me, and have given up the point about\nthe twenty thousand pounds on the spot.  But I could not act with this\nbusiness-like indifference towards Miss Fairlie.  I had an honest\nfeeling of affection and admiration for her--I remembered gratefully\nthat her father had been the kindest patron and friend to me that ever\nman had--I had felt towards her while I was drawing the settlement as I\nmight have felt, if I had not been an old bachelor, towards a daughter\nof my own, and I was determined to spare no personal sacrifice in her\nservice and where her interests were concerned.  Writing a second time\nto Mr. Fairlie was not to be thought of--it would only be giving him a\nsecond opportunity of slipping through my fingers.  Seeing him and\npersonally remonstrating with him might possibly be of more use. The\nnext day was Saturday.  I determined to take a return ticket and jolt\nmy old bones down to Cumberland, on the chance of persuading him to\nadopt the just, the independent, and the honourable course.  It was a\npoor chance enough, no doubt, but when I had tried it my conscience\nwould be at ease.  I should then have done all that a man in my\nposition could do to serve the interests of my old friend's only child.\n\nThe weather on Saturday was beautiful, a west wind and a bright sun.\nHaving felt latterly a return of that fulness and oppression of the\nhead, against which my doctor warned me so seriously more than two\nyears since, I resolved to take the opportunity of getting a little\nextra exercise by sending my bag on before me and walking to the\nterminus in Euston Square.  As I came out into Holborn a gentleman\nwalking by rapidly stopped and spoke to me. It was Mr. Walter Hartright.\n\nIf he had not been the first to greet me I should certainly have passed\nhim.  He was so changed that I hardly knew him again.  His face looked\npale and haggard--his manner was hurried and uncertain--and his dress,\nwhich I remembered as neat and gentlemanlike when I saw him at\nLimmeridge, was so slovenly now that I should really have been ashamed\nof the appearance of it on one of my own clerks.\n\n\"Have you been long back from Cumberland?\" he asked.  \"I heard from\nMiss Halcombe lately.  I am aware that Sir Percival Glyde's explanation\nhas been considered satisfactory. Will the marriage take place soon? Do\nyou happen to know Mr. Gilmore?\"\n\nHe spoke so fast, and crowded his questions together so strangely and\nconfusedly, that I could hardly follow him.  However accidentally\nintimate he might have been with the family at Limmeridge, I could not\nsee that he had any right to expect information on their private\naffairs, and I determined to drop him, as easily as might be, on the\nsubject of Miss Fairlie's marriage.\n\n\"Time will show, Mr. Hartright,\" I said--\"time will show.  I dare say\nif we look out for the marriage in the papers we shall not be far\nwrong.  Excuse my noticing it, but I am sorry to see you not looking so\nwell as you were when we last met.\"\n\nA momentary nervous contraction quivered about his lips and eyes, and\nmade me half reproach myself for having answered him in such a\nsignificantly guarded manner.\n\n\"I had no right to ask about her marriage,\" he said bitterly.  \"I must\nwait to see it in the newspapers like other people.  Yes,\"--he went on\nbefore I could make any apologies--\"I have not been well lately.  I am\ngoing to another country to try a change of scene and occupation.  Miss\nHalcombe has kindly assisted me with her influence, and my testimonials\nhave been found satisfactory. It is a long distance off, but I don't\ncare where I go, what the climate is, or how long I am away.\" He looked\nabout him while he said this at the throng of strangers passing us by\non either side, in a strange, suspicious manner, as if he thought that\nsome of them might be watching us.\n\n\"I wish you well through it, and safe back again,\" I said, and then\nadded, so as not to keep him altogether at arm's length on the subject\nof the Fairlies, \"I am going down to Limmeridge to-day on business.\nMiss Halcombe and Miss Fairlie are away just now on a visit to some\nfriends in Yorkshire.\"\n\nHis eyes brightened, and he seemed about to say something in answer,\nbut the same momentary nervous spasm crossed his face again.  He took\nmy hand, pressed it hard, and disappeared among the crowd without\nsaying another word.  Though he was little more than a stranger to me,\nI waited for a moment, looking after him almost with a feeling of\nregret.  I had gained in my profession sufficient experience of young\nmen to know what the outward signs and tokens were of their beginning\nto go wrong, and when I resumed my walk to the railway I am sorry to\nsay I felt more than doubtful about Mr. Hartright's future.\n\n\n\nIV\n\nLeaving by an early train, I got to Limmeridge in time for dinner. The\nhouse was oppressively empty and dull.  I had expected that good Mrs.\nVesey would have been company for me in the absence of the young\nladies, but she was confined to her room by a cold.  The servants were\nso surprised at seeing me that they hurried and bustled absurdly, and\nmade all sorts of annoying mistakes.  Even the butler, who was old\nenough to have known better, brought me a bottle of port that was\nchilled.  The reports of Mr. Fairlie's health were just as usual, and\nwhen I sent up a message to announce my arrival, I was told that he\nwould be delighted to see me the next morning but that the sudden news\nof my appearance had prostrated him with palpitations for the rest of\nthe evening.  The wind howled dismally all night, and strange cracking\nand groaning noises sounded here, there, and everywhere in the empty\nhouse.  I slept as wretchedly as possible, and got up in a mighty bad\nhumour to breakfast by myself the next morning.\n\nAt ten o'clock I was conducted to Mr. Fairlie's apartments.  He was in\nhis usual room, his usual chair, and his usual aggravating state of\nmind and body.  When I went in, his valet was standing before him,\nholding up for inspection a heavy volume of etchings, as long and as\nbroad as my office writing-desk.  The miserable foreigner grinned in\nthe most abject manner, and looked ready to drop with fatigue, while\nhis master composedly turned over the etchings, and brought their\nhidden beauties to light with the help of a magnifying glass.\n\n\"You very best of good old friends,\" said Mr. Fairlie, leaning back\nlazily before he could look at me, \"are you QUITE well? How nice of you\nto come here and see me in my solitude.  Dear Gilmore!\"\n\nI had expected that the valet would be dismissed when I appeared, but\nnothing of the sort happened.  There he stood, in front of his master's\nchair, trembling under the weight of the etchings, and there Mr.\nFairlie sat, serenely twirling the magnifying glass between his white\nfingers and thumbs.\n\n\"I have come to speak to you on a very important matter,\" I said, \"and\nyou will therefore excuse me, if I suggest that we had better be alone.\"\n\nThe unfortunate valet looked at me gratefully.  Mr. Fairlie faintly\nrepeated my last three words, \"better be alone,\" with every appearance\nof the utmost possible astonishment.\n\nI was in no humour for trifling, and I resolved to make him understand\nwhat I meant.\n\n\"Oblige me by giving that man permission to withdraw,\" I said, pointing\nto the valet.\n\nMr. Fairlie arched his eyebrows and pursed up his lips in sarcastic\nsurprise.\n\n\"Man?\" he repeated.  \"You provoking old Gilmore, what can you possibly\nmean by calling him a man? He's nothing of the sort.  He might have\nbeen a man half an hour ago, before I wanted my etchings, and he may be\na man half an hour hence, when I don't want them any longer.  At\npresent he is simply a portfolio stand. Why object, Gilmore, to a\nportfolio stand?\"\n\n\"I DO object.  For the third time, Mr. Fairlie, I beg that we may be\nalone.\"\n\nMy tone and manner left him no alternative but to comply with my\nrequest.  He looked at the servant, and pointed peevishly to a chair at\nhis side.\n\n\"Put down the etchings and go away,\" he said.  \"Don't upset me by\nlosing my place.  Have you, or have you not, lost my place? Are you\nsure you have not? And have you put my hand-bell quite within my reach?\nYes? Then why the devil don't you go?\"\n\nThe valet went out.  Mr. Fairlie twisted himself round in his chair,\npolished the magnifying glass with his delicate cambric handkerchief,\nand indulged himself with a sidelong inspection of the open volume of\netchings.  It was not easy to keep my temper under these circumstances,\nbut I did keep it.\n\n\"I have come here at great personal inconvenience,\" I said, \"to serve\nthe interests of your niece and your family, and I think I have\nestablished some slight claim to be favoured with your attention in\nreturn.\"\n\n\"Don't bully me!\" exclaimed Mr. Fairlie, falling back helplessly in the\nchair, and closing his eyes.  \"Please don't bully me.  I'm not strong\nenough.\"\n\nI was determined not to let him provoke me, for Laura Fairlie's sake.\n\n\"My object,\" I went on, \"is to entreat you to reconsider your letter,\nand not to force me to abandon the just rights of your niece, and of\nall who belong to her.  Let me state the case to you once more, and for\nthe last time.\"\n\nMr. Fairlie shook his head and sighed piteously.\n\n\"This is heartless of you, Gilmore--very heartless,\" he said. \"Never\nmind, go on.\"\n\nI put all the points to him carefully--I set the matter before him in\nevery conceivable light.  He lay back in the chair the whole time I was\nspeaking with his eyes closed.  When I had done he opened them\nindolently, took his silver smelling-bottle from the table, and sniffed\nat it with an air of gentle relish.\n\n\"Good Gilmore!\" he said between the sniffs, \"how very nice this is of\nyou! How you reconcile one to human nature!\"\n\n\"Give me a plain answer to a plain question, Mr. Fairlie.  I tell you\nagain, Sir Percival Glyde has no shadow of a claim to expect more than\nthe income of the money.  The money itself if your niece has no\nchildren, ought to be under her control, and to return to her family.\nIf you stand firm, Sir Percival must give way--he must give way, I tell\nyou, or he exposes himself to the base imputation of marrying Miss\nFairlie entirely from mercenary motives.\"\n\nMr. Fairlie shook the silver smelling-bottle at me playfully.\n\n\"You dear old Gilmore, how you do hate rank and family, don't you? How\nyou detest Glyde because he happens to be a baronet.  What a Radical\nyou are--oh, dear me, what a Radical you are!\"\n\nA Radical!!! I could put up with a good deal of provocation, but, after\nholding the soundest Conservative principles all my life, I could NOT\nput up with being called a Radical.  My blood boiled at it--I started\nout of my chair--I was speechless with Indignation.\n\n\"Don't shake the room!\" cried Mr. Fairlie--\"for Heaven's sake don't\nshake the room! Worthiest of all possible Gilmores, I meant no offence.\nMy own views are so extremely liberal that I think I am a Radical\nmyself.  Yes.  We are a pair of Radicals.  Please don't be angry.  I\ncan't quarrel--I haven't stamina enough.  Shall we drop the subject?\nYes.  Come and look at these sweet etchings. Do let me teach you to\nunderstand the heavenly pearliness of these lines.  Do now, there's a\ngood Gilmore!\"\n\nWhile he was maundering on in this way I was, fortunately for my own\nself-respect, returning to my senses.  When I spoke again I was\ncomposed enough to treat his impertinence with the silent contempt that\nit deserved.\n\n\"You are entirely wrong, sir,\" I said, \"in supposing that I speak from\nany prejudice against Sir Percival Glyde.  I may regret that he has so\nunreservedly resigned himself in this matter to his lawyer's direction\nas to make any appeal to himself impossible, but I am not prejudiced\nagainst him.  What I have said would equally apply to any other man in\nhis situation, high or low.  The principle I maintain is a recognised\nprinciple.  If you were to apply at the nearest town here, to the first\nrespectable solicitor you could find, he would tell you as a stranger\nwhat I tell you as a friend.  He would inform you that it is against\nall rule to abandon the lady's money entirely to the man she marries.\nHe would decline, on grounds of common legal caution, to give the\nhusband, under any circumstances whatever, an interest of twenty\nthousand pounds in his wife's death.\"\n\n\"Would he really, Gilmore?\" said Mr. Fairlie.  \"If he said anything\nhalf so horrid, I do assure you I should tinkle my bell for Louis, and\nhave him sent out of the house immediately.\"\n\n\"You shall not irritate me, Mr. Fairlie--for your niece's sake and for\nher father's sake, you shall not irritate me.  You shall take the whole\nresponsibility of this discreditable settlement on your own shoulders\nbefore I leave the room.\"\n\n\"Don't!--now please don't!\" said Mr. Fairlie.  \"Think how precious your\ntime is, Gilmore, and don't throw it away.  I would dispute with you if\nI could, but I can't--I haven't stamina enough.  You want to upset me,\nto upset yourself, to upset Glyde, and to upset Laura; and--oh, dear\nme!--all for the sake of the very last thing in the world that is\nlikely to happen.  No, dear friend, in the interests of peace and\nquietness, positively No!\"\n\n\"I am to understand, then, that you hold by the determination expressed\nin your letter?\"\n\n\"Yes, please.  So glad we understand each other at last.  Sit down\nagain--do!\"\n\nI walked at once to the door, and Mr. Fairlie resignedly \"tinkled\" his\nhand-bell.  Before I left the room I turned round and addressed him for\nthe last time.\n\n\"Whatever happens in the future, sir,\" I said, \"remember that my plain\nduty of warning you has been performed.  As the faithful friend and\nservant of your family, I tell you, at parting, that no daughter of\nmine should be married to any man alive under such a settlement as you\nare forcing me to make for Miss Fairlie.\"\n\nThe door opened behind me, and the valet stood waiting on the threshold.\n\n\"Louis,\" said Mr. Fairlie, \"show Mr. Gilmore out, and then come back\nand hold up my etchings for me again.  Make them give you a good lunch\ndownstairs.  Do, Gilmore, make my idle beasts of servants give you a\ngood lunch!\"\n\nI was too much disgusted to reply--I turned on my heel, and left him in\nsilence.  There was an up train at two o'clock in the afternoon, and by\nthat train I returned to London.\n\nOn the Tuesday I sent in the altered settlement, which practically\ndisinherited the very persons whom Miss Fairlie's own lips had informed\nme she was most anxious to benefit.  I had no choice. Another lawyer\nwould have drawn up the deed if I had refused to undertake it.\n\n\nMy task is done.  My personal share in the events of the family story\nextends no farther than the point which I have just reached. Other pens\nthan mine will describe the strange circumstances which are now shortly\nto follow.  Seriously and sorrowfully I close this brief record.\nSeriously and sorrowfully I repeat here the parting words that I spoke\nat Limmeridge House:--No daughter of mine should have been married to\nany man alive under such a settlement as I was compelled to make for\nLaura Fairlie.\n\nThe End of Mr. Gilmore's Narrative.\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY MARIAN HALCOMBE\n\n(in Extracts from her Diary)\n\n\n                   LIMMERIDGE HOUSE, Nov. 8.[1]\n\n[1] The passages omitted, here and elsewhere, in Miss Halcombe's Diary\nare only those which bear no reference to Miss Fairlie or to any of the\npersons with whom she is associated in these pages.\n\n\nThis morning Mr. Gilmore left us.\n\nHis interview with Laura had evidently grieved and surprised him more\nthan he liked to confess.  I felt afraid, from his look and manner when\nwe parted, that she might have inadvertently betrayed to him the real\nsecret of her depression and my anxiety.  This doubt grew on me so,\nafter he had gone, that I declined riding out with Sir Percival, and\nwent up to Laura's room instead.\n\nI have been sadly distrustful of myself, in this difficult and\nlamentable matter, ever since I found out my own ignorance of the\nstrength of Laura's unhappy attachment.  I ought to have known that the\ndelicacy and forbearance and sense of honour which drew me to poor\nHartright, and made me so sincerely admire and respect him, were just\nthe qualities to appeal most irresistibly to Laura's natural\nsensitiveness and natural generosity of nature. And yet, until she\nopened her heart to me of her own accord, I had no suspicion that this\nnew feeling had taken root so deeply.  I once thought time and care\nmight remove it.  I now fear that it will remain with her and alter her\nfor life.  The discovery that I have committed such an error in\njudgment as this makes me hesitate about everything else.  I hesitate\nabout Sir Percival, in the face of the plainest proofs.  I hesitate\neven in speaking to Laura.  On this very morning I doubted, with my\nhand on the door, whether I should ask her the questions I had come to\nput, or not.\n\nWhen I went into her room I found her walking up and down in great\nimpatience.  She looked flushed and excited, and she came forward at\nonce, and spoke to me before I could open my lips.\n\n\"I wanted you,\" she said.  \"Come and sit down on the sofa with me.\nMarian! I can bear this no longer--I must and will end it.\"\n\nThere was too much colour in her cheeks, too much energy in her manner,\ntoo much firmness in her voice.  The little book of Hartright's\ndrawings--the fatal book that she will dream over whenever she is\nalone--was in one of her hands.  I began by gently and firmly taking it\nfrom her, and putting it out of sight on a side-table.\n\n\"Tell me quietly, my darling, what you wish to do,\" I said.  \"Has Mr.\nGilmore been advising you?\"\n\nShe shook her head.  \"No, not in what I am thinking of now.  He was\nvery kind and good to me, Marian, and I am ashamed to say I distressed\nhim by crying.  I am miserably helpless--I can't control myself.  For\nmy own sake, and for all our sakes, I must have courage enough to end\nit.\"\n\n\"Do you mean courage enough to claim your release?\" I asked.\n\n\"No,\" she said simply.  \"Courage, dear, to tell the truth.\"\n\nShe put her arms round my neck, and rested her head quietly on my\nbosom.  On the opposite wall hung the miniature portrait of her father.\nI bent over her, and saw that she was looking at it while her head lay\non my breast.\n\n\"I can never claim my release from my engagement,\" she went on.\n\"Whatever way it ends it must end wretchedly for me.  All I can do,\nMarian, is not to add the remembrance that I have broken my promise and\nforgotten my father's dying words, to make that wretchedness worse.\"\n\n\"What is it you propose, then?\" I asked.\n\n\"To tell Sir Percival Glyde the truth with my own lips,\" she answered,\n\"and to let him release me, if he will, not because I ask him, but\nbecause he knows all.\"\n\n\"What do you mean, Laura, by 'all'? Sir Percival will know enough (he\nhas told me so himself) if he knows that the engagement is opposed to\nyour own wishes.\"\n\n\"Can I tell him that, when the engagement was made for me by my father,\nwith my own consent? I should have kept my promise, not happily, I am\nafraid, but still contentedly--\" she stopped, turned her face to me,\nand laid her cheek close against mine--\"I should have kept my\nengagement, Marian, if another love had not grown up in my heart, which\nwas not there when I first promised to be Sir Percival's wife.\"\n\n\"Laura! you will never lower yourself by making a confession to him?\"\n\n\"I shall lower myself, indeed, if I gain my release by hiding from him\nwhat he has a right to know.\"\n\n\"He has not the shadow of a right to know it!\"\n\n\"Wrong, Marian, wrong! I ought to deceive no one--least of all the man\nto whom my father gave me, and to whom I gave myself.\" She put her lips\nto mine, and kissed me.  \"My own love,\" she said softly, \"you are so\nmuch too fond of me, and so much too proud of me, that you forget, in\nmy case, what you would remember in your own. Better that Sir Percival\nshould doubt my motives, and misjudge my conduct if he will, than that\nI should be first false to him in thought, and then mean enough to\nserve my own interests by hiding the falsehood.\"\n\nI held her away from me in astonishment.  For the first time in our\nlives we had changed places--the resolution was all on her side, the\nhesitation all on mine.  I looked into the pale, quiet, resigned young\nface--I saw the pure, innocent heart, in the loving eyes that looked\nback at me--and the poor worldly cautions and objections that rose to\nmy lips dwindled and died away in their own emptiness.  I hung my head\nin silence.  In her place the despicably small pride which makes so\nmany women deceitful would have been my pride, and would have made me\ndeceitful too.\n\n\"Don't be angry with me, Marian,\" she said, mistaking my silence.\n\nI only answered by drawing her close to me again.  I was afraid of\ncrying if I spoke.  My tears do not flow so easily as they ought--they\ncome almost like men's tears, with sobs that seem to tear me in pieces,\nand that frighten every one about me.\n\n\"I have thought of this, love, for many days,\" she went on, twining and\ntwisting my hair with that childish restlessness in her fingers, which\npoor Mrs. Vesey still tries so patiently and so vainly to cure her\nof--\"I have thought of it very seriously, and I can be sure of my\ncourage when my own conscience tells me I am right.  Let me speak to\nhim to-morrow--in your presence, Marian. I will say nothing that is\nwrong, nothing that you or I need be ashamed of--but, oh, it will ease\nmy heart so to end this miserable concealment! Only let me know and\nfeel that I have no deception to answer for on my side, and then, when\nhe has heard what I have to say, let him act towards me as he will.\"\n\nShe sighed, and put her head back in its old position on my bosom. Sad\nmisgivings about what the end would be weighed upon my mind, but still\ndistrusting myself, I told her that I would do as she wished.  She\nthanked me, and we passed gradually into talking of other things.\n\nAt dinner she joined us again, and was more easy and more herself with\nSir Percival than I have seen her yet.  In the evening she went to the\npiano, choosing new music of the dexterous, tuneless, florid kind.  The\nlovely old melodies of Mozart, which poor Hartright was so fond of, she\nhas never played since he left.  The book is no longer in the\nmusic-stand.  She took the volume away herself, so that nobody might\nfind it out and ask her to play from it.\n\nI had no opportunity of discovering whether her purpose of the morning\nhad changed or not, until she wished Sir Percival good-night--and then\nher own words informed me that it was unaltered. She said, very\nquietly, that she wished to speak to him after breakfast, and that he\nwould find her in her sitting-room with me. He changed colour at those\nwords, and I felt his hand trembling a little when it came to my turn\nto take it.  The event of the next morning would decide his future\nlife, and he evidently knew it.\n\nI went in, as usual, through the door between our two bedrooms, to bid\nLaura good-night before she went to sleep.  In stooping over her to\nkiss her I saw the little book of Hartright's drawings half hidden\nunder her pillow, just in the place where she used to hide her\nfavourite toys when she was a child.  I could not find it in my heart\nto say anything, but I pointed to the book and shook my head.  She\nreached both hands up to my cheeks, and drew my face down to hers till\nour lips met.\n\n\"Leave it there to-night,\" she whispered; \"to-morrow may be cruel, and\nmay make me say good-bye to it for ever.\"\n\n\n9th.--The first event of the morning was not of a kind to raise my\nspirits--a letter arrived for me from poor Walter Hartright.  It is the\nanswer to mine describing the manner in which Sir Percival cleared\nhimself of the suspicions raised by Anne Catherick's letter.  He writes\nshortly and bitterly about Sir Percival's explanations, only saying\nthat he has no right to offer an opinion on the conduct of those who\nare above him.  This is sad, but his occasional references to himself\ngrieve me still more.  He says that the effort to return to his old\nhabits and pursuits grows harder instead of easier to him every day and\nhe implores me, if I have any interest, to exert it to get him\nemployment that will necessitate his absence from England, and take him\namong new scenes and new people.  I have been made all the readier to\ncomply with this request by a passage at the end of his letter, which\nhas almost alarmed me.\n\nAfter mentioning that he has neither seen nor heard anything of Anne\nCatherick, he suddenly breaks off, and hints in the most abrupt,\nmysterious manner, that he has been perpetually watched and followed by\nstrange men ever since he returned to London.  He acknowledges that he\ncannot prove this extraordinary suspicion by fixing on any particular\npersons, but he declares that the suspicion itself is present to him\nnight and day.  This has frightened me, because it looks as if his one\nfixed idea about Laura was becoming too much for his mind.  I will\nwrite immediately to some of my mother's influential old friends in\nLondon, and press his claims on their notice.  Change of scene and\nchange of occupation may really be the salvation of him at this crisis\nin his life.\n\nGreatly to my relief, Sir Percival sent an apology for not joining us\nat breakfast.  He had taken an early cup of coffee in his own room, and\nhe was still engaged there in writing letters.  At eleven o'clock, if\nthat hour was convenient, he would do himself the honour of waiting on\nMiss Fairlie and Miss Halcombe.\n\nMy eyes were on Laura's face while the message was being delivered.  I\nhad found her unaccountably quiet and composed on going into her room\nin the morning, and so she remained all through breakfast.  Even when\nwe were sitting together on the sofa in her room, waiting for Sir\nPercival, she still preserved her self-control.\n\n\"Don't be afraid of me, Marian,\" was all she said; \"I may forget myself\nwith an old friend like Mr. Gilmore, or with a dear sister like you,\nbut I will not forget myself with Sir Percival Glyde.\"\n\nI looked at her, and listened to her in silent surprise.  Through all\nthe years of our close intimacy this passive force in her character had\nbeen hidden from me--hidden even from herself, till love found it, and\nsuffering called it forth.\n\nAs the clock on the mantelpiece struck eleven Sir Percival knocked at\nthe door and came in.  There was suppressed anxiety and agitation in\nevery line of his face.  The dry, sharp cough, which teases him at most\ntimes, seemed to be troubling him more incessantly than ever.  He sat\ndown opposite to us at the table, and Laura remained by me.  I looked\nattentively at them both, and he was the palest of the two.\n\nHe said a few unimportant words, with a visible effort to preserve his\ncustomary ease of manner.  But his voice was not to be steadied, and\nthe restless uneasiness in his eyes was not to be concealed.  He must\nhave felt this himself, for he stopped in the middle of a sentence, and\ngave up even the attempt to hide his embarrassment any longer.\n\nThere was just one moment of dead silence before Laura addressed him.\n\n\"I wish to speak to you, Sir Percival,\" she said, \"on a subject that is\nvery important to us both.  My sister is here, because her presence\nhelps me and gives me confidence.  She has not suggested one word of\nwhat I am going to say--I speak from my own thoughts, not from hers.  I\nam sure you will be kind enough to understand that before I go any\nfarther?\"\n\nSir Percival bowed.  She had proceeded thus far, with perfect outward\ntranquillity and perfect propriety of manner.  She looked at him, and\nhe looked at her.  They seemed, at the outset, at least, resolved to\nunderstand one another plainly.\n\n\"I have heard from Marian,\" she went on, \"that I have only to claim my\nrelease from our engagement to obtain that release from you.  It was\nforbearing and generous on your part, Sir Percival, to send me such a\nmessage.  It is only doing you justice to say that I am grateful for\nthe offer, and I hope and believe that it is only doing myself justice\nto tell you that I decline to accept it.\"\n\nHis attentive face relaxed a little.  But I saw one of his feet,\nsoftly, quietly, incessantly beating on the carpet under the table, and\nI felt that he was secretly as anxious as ever.\n\n\"I have not forgotten,\" she said, \"that you asked my father's\npermission before you honoured me with a proposal of marriage. Perhaps\nyou have not forgotten either what I said when I consented to our\nengagement? I ventured to tell you that my father's influence and\nadvice had mainly decided me to give you my promise. I was guided by my\nfather, because I had always found him the truest of all advisers, the\nbest and fondest of all protectors and friends.  I have lost him now--I\nhave only his memory to love, but my faith in that dear dead friend has\nnever been shaken.  I believe at this moment, as truly as I ever\nbelieved, that he knew what was best, and that his hopes and wishes\nought to be my hopes and wishes too.\"\n\nHer voice trembled for the first time.  Her restless fingers stole\ntheir way into my lap, and held fast by one of my hands.  There was\nanother moment of silence, and then Sir Percival spoke.\n\n\"May I ask,\" he said, \"if I have ever proved myself unworthy of the\ntrust which it has been hitherto my greatest honour and greatest\nhappiness to possess?\"\n\n\"I have found nothing in your conduct to blame,\" she answered. \"You\nhave always treated me with the same delicacy and the same forbearance.\nYou have deserved my trust, and, what is of far more importance in my\nestimation, you have deserved my father's trust, out of which mine\ngrew.  You have given me no excuse, even if I had wanted to find one,\nfor asking to be released from my pledge. What I have said so far has\nbeen spoken with the wish to acknowledge my whole obligation to you.\nMy regard for that obligation, my regard for my father's memory, and my\nregard for my own promise, all forbid me to set the example, on my\nside, of withdrawing from our present position.  The breaking of our\nengagement must be entirely your wish and your act, Sir Percival--not\nmine.\"\n\nThe uneasy beating of his foot suddenly stopped, and he leaned forward\neagerly across the table.\n\n\"My act?\" he said.  \"What reason can there be on my side for\nwithdrawing?\"\n\nI heard her breath quickening--I felt her hand growing cold.  In spite\nof what she had said to me when we were alone, I began to be afraid of\nher.  I was wrong.\n\n\"A reason that it is very hard to tell you,\" she answered.  \"There is a\nchange in me, Sir Percival--a change which is serious enough to justify\nyou, to yourself and to me, in breaking off our engagement.\"\n\nHis face turned so pale again that even his lips lost their colour.  He\nraised the arm which lay on the table, turned a little away in his\nchair, and supported his head on his hand, so that his profile only was\npresented to us.\n\n\"What change?\" he asked.  The tone in which he put the question jarred\non me--there was something painfully suppressed in it.\n\nShe sighed heavily, and leaned towards me a little, so as to rest her\nshoulder against mine.  I felt her trembling, and tried to spare her by\nspeaking myself.  She stopped me by a warning pressure of her hand, and\nthen addressed Sir Percival one more, but this time without looking at\nhim.\n\n\"I have heard,\" she said, \"and I believe it, that the fondest and\ntruest of all affections is the affection which a woman ought to bear\nto her husband.  When our engagement began that affection was mine to\ngive, if I could, and yours to win, if you could.  Will you pardon me,\nand spare me, Sir Percival, if I acknowledge that it is not so any\nlonger?\"\n\nA few tears gathered in her eyes, and dropped over her cheeks slowly as\nshe paused and waited for his answer.  He did not utter a word.  At the\nbeginning of her reply he had moved the hand on which his head rested,\nso that it hid his face.  I saw nothing but the upper part of his\nfigure at the table.  Not a muscle of him moved.  The fingers of the\nhand which supported his head were dented deep in his hair.  They might\nhave expressed hidden anger or hidden grief--it was hard to say\nwhich--there was no significant trembling in them.  There was nothing,\nabsolutely nothing, to tell the secret of his thoughts at that\nmoment--the moment which was the crisis of his life and the crisis of\nhers.\n\nI was determined to make him declare himself, for Laura's sake.\n\n\"Sir Percival!\" I interposed sharply, \"have you nothing to say when my\nsister has said so much? More, in my opinion,\" I added, my unlucky\ntemper getting the better of me, \"than any man alive, in your position,\nhas a right to hear from her.\"\n\nThat last rash sentence opened a way for him by which to escape me if\nhe chose, and he instantly took advantage of it.\n\n\"Pardon me, Miss Halcombe,\" he said, still keeping his hand over his\nface, \"pardon me if I remind you that I have claimed no such right.\"\n\nThe few plain words which would have brought him back to the point from\nwhich he had wandered were just on my lips, when Laura checked me by\nspeaking again.\n\n\"I hope I have not made my painful acknowledgment in vain,\" she\ncontinued.  \"I hope it has secured me your entire confidence in what I\nhave still to say?\"\n\n\"Pray be assured of it.\" He made that brief reply warmly, dropping his\nhand on the table while he spoke, and turning towards us again.\nWhatever outward change had passed over him was gone now. His face was\neager and expectant--it expressed nothing but the most intense anxiety\nto hear her next words.\n\n\"I wish you to understand that I have not spoken from any selfish\nmotive,\" she said.  \"If you leave me, Sir Percival, after what you have\njust heard, you do not leave me to marry another man, you only allow me\nto remain a single woman for the rest of my life. My fault towards you\nhas begun and ended in my own thoughts.  It can never go any farther.\nNo word has passed--\" She hesitated, in doubt about the expression she\nshould use next, hesitated in a momentary confusion which it was very\nsad and very painful to see. \"No word has passed,\" she patiently and\nresolutely resumed, \"between myself and the person to whom I am now\nreferring for the first and last time in your presence of my feelings\ntowards him, or of his feelings towards me--no word ever can\npass--neither he nor I are likely, in this world, to meet again.  I\nearnestly beg you to spare me from saying any more, and to believe me,\non my word, in what I have just told you.  It is the truth.  Sir\nPercival, the truth which I think my promised husband has a claim to\nhear, at any sacrifice of my own feelings.  I trust to his generosity\nto pardon me, and to his honour to keep my secret.\"\n\n\"Both those trusts are sacred to me,\" he said, \"and both shall be\nsacredly kept.\"\n\nAfter answering in those terms he paused, and looked at her as if he\nwas waiting to hear more.\n\n\"I have said all I wish to say,\" she added quietly--\"I have said more\nthan enough to justify you in withdrawing from your engagement.\"\n\n\"You have said more than enough,\" he answered, \"to make it the dearest\nobject of my life to KEEP the engagement.\" With those words he rose\nfrom his chair, and advanced a few steps towards the place where she\nwas sitting.\n\nShe started violently, and a faint cry of surprise escaped her. Every\nword she had spoken had innocently betrayed her purity and truth to a\nman who thoroughly understood the priceless value of a pure and true\nwoman.  Her own noble conduct had been the hidden enemy, throughout, of\nall the hopes she had trusted to it.  I had dreaded this from the\nfirst.  I would have prevented it, if she had allowed me the smallest\nchance of doing so.  I even waited and watched now, when the harm was\ndone, for a word from Sir Percival that would give me the opportunity\nof putting him in the wrong.\n\n\"You have left it to ME, Miss Fairlie, to resign you,\" he continued.\n\"I am not heartless enough to resign a woman who has just shown herself\nto be the noblest of her sex.\"\n\nHe spoke with such warmth and feeling, with such passionate enthusiasm,\nand yet with such perfect delicacy, that she raised her head, flushed\nup a little, and looked at him with sudden animation and spirit.\n\n\"No!\" she said firmly.  \"The most wretched of her sex, if she must give\nherself in marriage when she cannot give her love.\"\n\n\"May she not give it in the future,\" he asked, \"if the one object of\nher husband's life is to deserve it?\"\n\n\"Never!\" she answered.  \"If you still persist in maintaining our\nengagement, I may be your true and faithful wife, Sir Percival--your\nloving wife, if I know my own heart, never!\"\n\nShe looked so irresistibly beautiful as she said those brave words that\nno man alive could have steeled his heart against her.  I tried hard to\nfeel that Sir Percival was to blame, and to say so, but my womanhood\nwould pity him, in spite of myself.\n\n\"I gratefully accept your faith and truth,\" he said.  \"The least that\nyou can offer is more to me than the utmost that I could hope for from\nany other woman in the world.\"\n\nHer left hand still held mine, but her right hand hung listlessly at\nher side.  He raised it gently to his lips--touched it with them,\nrather than kissed it--bowed to me--and then, with perfect delicacy and\ndiscretion, silently quitted the room.\n\nShe neither moved nor said a word when he was gone--she sat by me, cold\nand still, with her eyes fixed on the ground.  I saw it was hopeless\nand useless to speak, and I only put my arm round her, and held her to\nme in silence.  We remained together so for what seemed a long and\nweary time--so long and so weary, that I grew uneasy and spoke to her\nsoftly, in the hope of producing a change.\n\nThe sound of my voice seemed to startle her into consciousness. She\nsuddenly drew herself away from me and rose to her feet.\n\n\"I must submit, Marian, as well as I can,\" she said.  \"My new life has\nits hard duties, and one of them begins to-day.\"\n\nAs she spoke she went to a side-table near the window, on which her\nsketching materials were placed, gathered them together carefully, and\nput them in a drawer of her cabinet.  She locked the drawer and brought\nthe key to me.\n\n\"I must part from everything that reminds me of him,\" she said. \"Keep\nthe key wherever you please--I shall never want it again.\"\n\nBefore I could say a word she had turned away to her book-case, and had\ntaken from it the album that contained Walter Hartright's drawings.\nShe hesitated for a moment, holding the little volume fondly in her\nhands--then lifted it to her lips and kissed it.\n\n\"Oh, Laura! Laura!\" I said, not angrily, not reprovingly--with nothing\nbut sorrow in my voice, and nothing but sorrow in my heart.\n\n\"It is the last time, Marian,\" she pleaded.  \"I am bidding it good-bye\nfor ever.\"\n\nShe laid the book on the table and drew out the comb that fastened her\nhair.  It fell, in its matchless beauty, over her back and shoulders,\nand dropped round her, far below her waist.  She separated one long,\nthin lock from the rest, cut it off, and pinned it carefully, in the\nform of a circle, on the first blank page of the album.  The moment it\nwas fastened she closed the volume hurriedly, and placed it in my hands.\n\n\"You write to him and he writes to you,\" she said.  \"While I am alive,\nif he asks after me always tell him I am well, and never say I am\nunhappy.  Don't distress him, Marian, for my sake, don't distress him.\nIf I die first, promise you will give him this little book of his\ndrawings, with my hair in it.  There can be no harm, when I am gone, in\ntelling him that I put it there with my own hands.  And say--oh,\nMarian, say for me, then, what I can never say for myself--say I loved\nhim!\"\n\nShe flung her arms round my neck, and whispered the last words in my\near with a passionate delight in uttering them which it almost broke my\nheart to hear.  All the long restraint she had imposed on herself gave\nway in that first last outburst of tenderness.  She broke from me with\nhysterical vehemence, and threw herself on the sofa in a paroxysm of\nsobs and tears that shook her from head to foot.\n\nI tried vainly to soothe her and reason with her--she was past being\nsoothed, and past being reasoned with.  It was the sad, sudden end for\nus two of this memorable day.  When the fit had worn itself out she was\ntoo exhausted to speak.  She slumbered towards the afternoon, and I put\naway the book of drawings so that she might not see it when she woke.\nMy face was calm, whatever my heart might be, when she opened her eyes\nagain and looked at me. We said no more to each other about the\ndistressing interview of the morning.  Sir Percival's name was not\nmentioned.  Walter Hartright was not alluded to again by either of us\nfor the remainder of the day.\n\n\n10th.--Finding that she was composed and like herself this morning, I\nreturned to the painful subject of yesterday, for the sole purpose of\nimploring her to let me speak to Sir Percival and Mr. Fairlie, more\nplainly and strongly than she could speak to either of them herself,\nabout this lamentable marriage.  She interposed, gently but firmly, in\nthe middle of my remonstrances.\n\n\"I left yesterday to decide,\" she said; \"and yesterday HAS decided.  It\nis too late to go back.\"\n\nSir Percival spoke to me this afternoon about what had passed in\nLaura's room.  He assured me that the unparalleled trust she had placed\nin him had awakened such an answering conviction of her innocence and\nintegrity in his mind, that he was guiltless of having felt even a\nmoment's unworthy jealousy, either at the time when he was in her\npresence, or afterwards when he had withdrawn from it.  Deeply as he\nlamented the unfortunate attachment which had hindered the progress he\nmight otherwise have made in her esteem and regard, he firmly believed\nthat it had remained unacknowledged in the past, and that it would\nremain, under all changes of circumstance which it was possible to\ncontemplate, unacknowledged in the future.  This was his absolute\nconviction; and the strongest proof he could give of it was the\nassurance, which he now offered, that he felt no curiosity to know\nwhether the attachment was of recent date or not, or who had been the\nobject of it.  His implicit confidence in Miss Fairlie made him\nsatisfied with what she had thought fit to say to him, and he was\nhonestly innocent of the slightest feeling of anxiety to hear more.\n\nHe waited after saying those words and looked at me.  I was so\nconscious of my unreasonable prejudice against him--so conscious of an\nunworthy suspicion that he might be speculating on my impulsively\nanswering the very questions which he had just described himself as\nresolved not to ask--that I evaded all reference to this part of the\nsubject with something like a feeling of confusion on my own part.  At\nthe same time I was resolved not to lose even the smallest opportunity\nof trying to plead Laura's cause, and I told him boldly that I\nregretted his generosity had not carried him one step farther, and\ninduced him to withdraw from the engagement altogether.\n\nHere, again, he disarmed me by not attempting to defend himself. He\nwould merely beg me to remember the difference there was between his\nallowing Miss Fairlie to give him up, which was a matter of submission\nonly, and his forcing himself to give up Miss Fairlie, which was, in\nother words, asking him to be the suicide of his own hopes.  Her\nconduct of the day before had so strengthened the unchangeable love and\nadmiration of two long years, that all active contention against those\nfeelings, on his part, was henceforth entirely out of his power.  I\nmust think him weak, selfish, unfeeling towards the very woman whom he\nidolised, and he must bow to my opinion as resignedly as he could--only\nputting it to me, at the same time, whether her future as a single\nwoman, pining under an unhappily placed attachment which she could\nnever acknowledge, could be said to promise her a much brighter\nprospect than her future as the wife of a man who worshipped the very\nground she walked on? In the last case there was hope from time,\nhowever slight it might be--in the first case, on her own showing,\nthere was no hope at all.\n\nI answered him--more because my tongue is a woman's, and must answer,\nthan because I had anything convincing to say.  It was only too plain\nthat the course Laura had adopted the day before had offered him the\nadvantage if he chose to take it--and that he HAD chosen to take it.  I\nfelt this at the time, and I feel it just as strongly now, while I\nwrite these lines, in my own room. The one hope left is that his\nmotives really spring, as he says they do, from the irresistible\nstrength of his attachment to Laura.\n\nBefore I close my diary for to-night I must record that I wrote to-day,\nin poor Hartright's interest, to two of my mother's old friends in\nLondon--both men of influence and position.  If they can do anything\nfor him, I am quite sure they will.  Except Laura, I never was more\nanxious about any one than I am now about Walter. All that has happened\nsince he left us has only increased my strong regard and sympathy for\nhim.  I hope I am doing right in trying to help him to employment\nabroad--I hope, most earnestly and anxiously, that it will end well.\n\n\n11th.--Sir Percival had an interview with Mr.  Fairlie, and I was sent\nfor to join them.\n\nI found Mr. Fairlie greatly relieved at the prospect of the \"family\nworry\" (as he was pleased to describe his niece's marriage) being\nsettled at last.  So far, I did not feel called on to say anything to\nhim about my own opinion, but when he proceeded, in his most\naggravatingly languid manner, to suggest that the time for the marriage\nhad better be settled next, in accordance with Sir Percival's wishes, I\nenjoyed the satisfaction of assailing Mr. Fairlie's nerves with as\nstrong a protest against hurrying Laura's decision as I could put into\nwords.  Sir Percival immediately assured me that he felt the force of\nmy objection, and begged me to believe that the proposal had not been\nmade in consequence of any interference on his part.  Mr. Fairlie\nleaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, said we both of us did\nhonour to human nature, and then repeated his suggestion as coolly as\nif neither Sir Percival nor I had said a word in opposition to it. It\nended in my flatly declining to mention the subject to Laura, unless\nshe first approached it of her own accord.  I left the room at once\nafter making that declaration.  Sir Percival looked seriously\nembarrassed and distressed, Mr. Fairlie stretched out his lazy legs on\nhis velvet footstool, and said, \"Dear Marian! how I envy you your\nrobust nervous system! Don't bang the door!\"\n\nOn going to Laura's room I found that she had asked for me, and that\nMrs. Vesey had informed her that I was with Mr. Fairlie.  She inquired\nat once what I had been wanted for, and I told her all that had passed,\nwithout attempting to conceal the vexation and annoyance that I really\nfelt.  Her answer surprised and distressed me inexpressibly--it was the\nvery last reply that I should have expected her to make.\n\n\"My uncle is right,\" she said.  \"I have caused trouble and anxiety\nenough to you, and to all about me.  Let me cause no more, Marian--let\nSir Percival decide.\"\n\nI remonstrated warmly, but nothing that I could say moved her.\n\n\"I am held to my engagement,\" she replied; \"I have broken with my old\nlife.  The evil day will not come the less surely because I put it off.\nNo, Marian! once again my uncle is right.  I have caused trouble enough\nand anxiety enough, and I will cause no more.\"\n\nShe used to be pliability itself, but she was now inflexibly passive in\nher resignation--I might almost say in her despair. Dearly as I love\nher, I should have been less pained if she had been violently\nagitated--it was so shockingly unlike her natural character to see her\nas cold and insensible as I saw her now.\n\n\n12th.--Sir Percival put some questions to me at breakfast about Laura,\nwhich left me no choice but to tell him what she had said.\n\nWhile we were talking she herself came down and joined us.  She was\njust as unnaturally composed in Sir Percival's presence as she had been\nin mine.  When breakfast was over he had an opportunity of saying a few\nwords to her privately, in a recess of one of the windows.  They were\nnot more than two or three minutes together, and on their separating\nshe left the room with Mrs. Vesey, while Sir Percival came to me.  He\nsaid he had entreated her to favour him by maintaining her privilege of\nfixing the time for the marriage at her own will and pleasure.  In\nreply she had merely expressed her acknowledgments, and had desired him\nto mention what his wishes were to Miss Halcombe.\n\nI have no patience to write more.  In this instance, as in every other,\nSir Percival has carried his point with the utmost possible credit to\nhimself, in spite of everything that I can say or do. His wishes are\nnow, what they were, of course, when he first came here; and Laura\nhaving resigned herself to the one inevitable sacrifice of the\nmarriage, remains as coldly hopeless and enduring as ever.  In parting\nwith the little occupations and relics that reminded her of Hartright,\nshe seems to have parted with all her tenderness and all her\nimpressibility.  It is only three o'clock in the afternoon while I\nwrite these lines, and Sir Percival has left us already, in the happy\nhurry of a bridegroom, to prepare for the bride's reception at his\nhouse in Hampshire.  Unless some extraordinary event happens to prevent\nit they will be married exactly at the time when he wished to be\nmarried--before the end of the year.  My very fingers burn as I write\nit!\n\n\n13th.--A sleepless night, through uneasiness about Laura.  Towards the\nmorning I came to a resolution to try what change of scene would do to\nrouse her.  She cannot surely remain in her present torpor of\ninsensibility, if I take her away from Limmeridge and surround her with\nthe pleasant faces of old friends? After some consideration I decided\non writing to the Arnolds, in Yorkshire. They are simple, kind-hearted,\nhospitable people, and she has known them from her childhood.  When I\nhad put the letter in the post-bag I told her what I had done.  It\nwould have been a relief to me if she had shown the spirit to resist\nand object.  But no--she only said, \"I will go anywhere with you,\nMarian.  I dare say you are right--I dare say the change will do me\ngood.\"\n\n\n14th.--I wrote to Mr. Gilmore, informing him that there was really a\nprospect of this miserable marriage taking place, and also mentioning\nmy idea of trying what change of scene would do for Laura.  I had no\nheart to go into particulars.  Time enough for them when we get nearer\nto the end of the year.\n\n\n15th.--Three letters for me.  The first, from the Arnolds, full of\ndelight at the prospect of seeing Laura and me.  The second, from one\nof the gentlemen to whom I wrote on Walter Hartright's behalf,\ninforming me that he has been fortunate enough to find an opportunity\nof complying with my request.  The third, from Walter himself, thanking\nme, poor fellow, in the warmest terms, for giving him an opportunity of\nleaving his home, his country, and his friends.  A private expedition\nto make excavations among the ruined cities of Central America is, it\nseems, about to sail from Liverpool.  The draughtsman who had been\nalready appointed to accompany it has lost heart, and withdrawn at the\neleventh hour, and Walter is to fill his place.  He is to be engaged\nfor six months certain, from the time of the landing in Honduras, and\nfor a year afterwards, if the excavations are successful, and if the\nfunds hold out.  His letter ends with a promise to write me a farewell\nline when they are all on board ship, and when the pilot leaves them.\nI can only hope and pray earnestly that he and I are both acting in\nthis matter for the best.  It seems such a serious step for him to\ntake, that the mere contemplation of it startles me.  And yet, in his\nunhappy position, how can I expect him or wish him to remain at home?\n\n\n16th.--The carriage is at the door.  Laura and I set out on our visit\nto the Arnolds to-day.\n\n\n\nPOLESDEAN LODGE, YORKSHIRE.\n\n23rd.--A week in these new scenes and among these kind-hearted people\nhas done her some good, though not so much as I had hoped. I have\nresolved to prolong our stay for another week at least.  It is useless\nto go back to Limmeridge till there is an absolute necessity for our\nreturn.\n\n\n24th.--Sad news by this morning's post.  The expedition to Central\nAmerica sailed on the twenty-first.  We have parted with a true man--we\nhave lost a faithful friend.  Water Hartright has left England.\n\n\n25th.--Sad news yesterday--ominous news to-day.  Sir Percival Glyde has\nwritten to Mr. Fairlie, and Mr. Fairlie has written to Laura and me, to\nrecall us to Limmeridge immediately.\n\nWhat can this mean? Has the day for the marriage been fixed in our\nabsence?\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nLIMMERIDGE HOUSE.\n\nNovember 27th.--My forebodings are realised.  The marriage is fixed for\nthe twenty-second of December.\n\nThe day after we left for Polesdean Lodge Sir Percival wrote, it seems,\nto Mr. Fairlie, to say that the necessary repairs and alterations in\nhis house in Hampshire would occupy a much longer time in completion\nthan he had originally anticipated.  The proper estimates were to be\nsubmitted to him as soon as possible, and it would greatly facilitate\nhis entering into definite arrangements with the workpeople, if he\ncould be informed of the exact period at which the wedding ceremony\nmight be expected to take place.  He could then make all his\ncalculations in reference to time, besides writing the necessary\napologies to friends who had been engaged to visit him that winter, and\nwho could not, of course, be received when the house was in the hands\nof the workmen.\n\nTo this letter Mr. Fairlie had replied by requesting Sir Percival\nhimself to suggest a day for the marriage, subject to Miss Fairlie's\napproval, which her guardian willingly undertook to do his best to\nobtain.  Sir Percival wrote back by the next post, and proposed (in\naccordance with his own views and wishes from the first?) the latter\npart of December--perhaps the twenty-second, or twenty-fourth, or any\nother day that the lady and her guardian might prefer.  The lady not\nbeing at hand to speak for herself, her guardian had decided, in her\nabsence, on the earliest day mentioned--the twenty-second of December,\nand had written to recall us to Limmeridge in consequence.\n\nAfter explaining these particulars to me at a private interview\nyesterday, Mr. Fairlie suggested, in his most amiable manner, that I\nshould open the necessary negotiations to-day.  Feeling that resistance\nwas useless, unless I could first obtain Laura's authority to make it,\nI consented to speak to her, but declared, at the same time, that I\nwould on no consideration undertake to gain her consent to Sir\nPercival's wishes.  Mr. Fairlie complimented me on my \"excellent\nconscience,\" much as he would have complimented me, if he had been out\nwalking, on my \"excellent constitution,\" and seemed perfectly\nsatisfied, so far, with having simply shifted one more family\nresponsibility from his own shoulders to mine.\n\nThis morning I spoke to Laura as I had promised.  The composure--I may\nalmost say, the insensibility--which she has so strangely and so\nresolutely maintained ever since Sir Percival left us, was not proof\nagainst the shock of the news I had to tell her.  She turned pale and\ntrembled violently.\n\n\"Not so soon!\" she pleaded.  \"Oh, Marian, not so soon!\"\n\nThe slightest hint she could give was enough for me.  I rose to leave\nthe room, and fight her battle for her at once with Mr. Fairlie.\n\nJust as my hand was on the door, she caught fast hold of my dress and\nstopped me.\n\n\"Let me go!\" I said.  \"My tongue burns to tell your uncle that he and\nSir Percival are not to have it all their own way.\"\n\nShe sighed bitterly, and still held my dress.\n\n\"No!\" she said faintly.  \"Too late, Marian, too late!\"\n\n\"Not a minute too late,\" I retorted.  \"The question of time is OUR\nquestion--and trust me, Laura, to take a woman's full advantage of it.\"\n\nI unclasped her hand from my gown while I spoke; but she slipped both\nher arms round my waist at the same moment, and held me more\neffectually than ever.\n\n\"It will only involve us in more trouble and more confusion,\" she said.\n\"It will set you and my uncle at variance, and bring Sir Percival here\nagain with fresh causes of complaint--\"\n\n\"So much the better!\" I cried out passionately.  \"Who cares for his\ncauses of complaint? Are you to break your heart to set his mind at\nease? No man under heaven deserves these sacrifices from us women.\nMen! They are the enemies of our innocence and our peace--they drag us\naway from our parents' love and our sisters' friendship--they take us\nbody and soul to themselves, and fasten our helpless lives to theirs as\nthey chain up a dog to his kennel. And what does the best of them give\nus in return? Let me go, Laura--I'm mad when I think of it!\"\n\nThe tears--miserable, weak, women's tears of vexation and rage--started\nto my eyes.  She smiled sadly, and put her handkerchief over my\nface to hide for me the betrayal of my own weakness--the weakness of\nall others which she knew that I most despised.\n\n\"Oh, Marian!\" she said.  \"You crying! Think what you would say to me,\nif the places were changed, and if those tears were mine.  All your\nlove and courage and devotion will not alter what must happen, sooner\nor later.  Let my uncle have his way.  Let us have no more troubles and\nheart-burnings that any sacrifice of mine can prevent.  Say you will\nlive with me, Marian, when I am married--and say no more.\"\n\nBut I did say more.  I forced back the contemptible tears that were no\nrelief to ME, and that only distressed HER, and reasoned and pleaded as\ncalmly as I could.  It was of no avail.  She made me twice repeat the\npromise to live with her when she was married, and then suddenly asked\na question which turned my sorrow and my sympathy for her into a new\ndirection.\n\n\"While we were at Polesdean,\" she said, \"you had a letter, Marian----\"\n\nHer altered tone--the abrupt manner in which she looked away from me\nand hid her face on my shoulder--the hesitation which silenced her\nbefore she had completed her question, all told me, but too plainly, to\nwhom the half-expressed inquiry pointed.\n\n\"I thought, Laura, that you and I were never to refer to him again,\" I\nsaid gently.\n\n\"You had a letter from him?\" she persisted.\n\n\"Yes,\" I replied, \"if you must know it.\"\n\n\"Do you mean to write to him again?\"\n\nI hesitated.  I had been afraid to tell her of his absence from\nEngland, or of the manner in which my exertions to serve his new hopes\nand projects had connected me with his departure.  What answer could I\nmake? He was gone where no letters could reach him for months, perhaps\nfor years, to come.\n\n\"Suppose I do mean to write to him again,\" I said at last.  \"What then,\nLaura?\"\n\nHer cheek grew burning hot against my neck, and her arms trembled and\ntightened round me.\n\n\"Don't tell him about THE TWENTY-SECOND,\" she whispered. \"Promise,\nMarian--pray promise you will not even mention my name to him when you\nwrite next.\"\n\nI gave the promise.  No words can say how sorrowfully I gave it. She\ninstantly took her arm from my waist, walked away to the window, and\nstood looking out with her back to me.  After a moment she spoke once\nmore, but without turning round, without allowing me to catch the\nsmallest glimpse of her face.\n\n\"Are you going to my uncle's room?\" she asked.  \"Will you say that I\nconsent to whatever arrangement he may think best? Never mind leaving\nme, Marian.  I shall be better alone for a little while.\"\n\nI went out.  If, as soon as I got into the passage, I could have\ntransported Mr. Fairlie and Sir Percival Glyde to the uttermost ends of\nthe earth by lifting one of my fingers, that finger would have been\nraised without an instant's hesitation.  For once my unhappy temper now\nstood my friend.  I should have broken down altogether and burst into a\nviolent fit of crying, if my tears had not been all burnt up in the\nheat of my anger.  As it was, I dashed into Mr. Fairlie's room--called\nto him as harshly as possible, \"Laura consents to the\ntwenty-second\"--and dashed out again without waiting for a word of\nanswer.  I banged the door after me, and I hope I shattered Mr.\nFairlie's nervous system for the rest of the day.\n\n\n28th.--This morning I read poor Hartright's farewell letter over again,\na doubt having crossed my mind since yesterday, whether I am acting\nwisely in concealing the fact of his departure from Laura.\n\nOn reflection, I still think I am right.  The allusions in his letter\nto the preparations made for the expedition to Central America, all\nshow that the leaders of it know it to be dangerous. If the discovery\nof this makes me uneasy, what would it make HER? It is bad enough to\nfeel that his departure has deprived us of the friend of all others to\nwhose devotion we could trust in the hour of need, if ever that hour\ncomes and finds us helpless; but it is far worse to know that he has\ngone from us to face the perils of a bad climate, a wild country, and a\ndisturbed population.  Surely it would be a cruel candour to tell Laura\nthis, without a pressing and a positive necessity for it?\n\nI almost doubt whether I ought not to go a step farther, and burn the\nletter at once, for fear of its one day falling into wrong hands.  It\nnot only refers to Laura in terms which ought to remain a secret for\never between the writer and me, but it reiterates his suspicion--so\nobstinate, so unaccountable, and so alarming--that he has been secretly\nwatched since he left Limmeridge.  He declares that he saw the faces of\nthe two strange men who followed him about the streets of London,\nwatching him among the crowd which gathered at Liverpool to see the\nexpedition embark, and he positively asserts that he heard the name of\nAnne Catherick pronounced behind him as he got into the boat.  His own\nwords are, \"These events have a meaning, these events must lead to a\nresult. The mystery of Anne Catherick is NOT cleared up yet.  She may\nnever cross my path again, but if ever she crosses yours, make better\nuse of the opportunity, Miss Halcombe, than I made of it. I speak on\nstrong conviction--I entreat you to remember what I say.\" These are his\nown expressions.  There is no danger of my forgetting them--my memory\nis only too ready to dwell on any words of Hartright's that refer to\nAnne Catherick.  But there is danger in my keeping the letter.  The\nmerest accident might place it at the mercy of strangers.  I may fall\nill--I may die.  Better to burn it at once, and have one anxiety the\nless.\n\nIt is burnt.  The ashes of his farewell letter--the last he may ever\nwrite to me--lie in a few black fragments on the hearth.  Is this the\nsad end to all that sad story? Oh, not the end--surely, surely not the\nend already!\n\n\n29th.--The preparations for the marriage have begun.  The dressmaker\nhas come to receive her orders.  Laura is perfectly impassive,\nperfectly careless about the question of all others in which a woman's\npersonal interests are most closely bound up. She has left it all to\nthe dressmaker and to me.  If poor Hartright had been the baronet, and\nthe husband of her father's choice, how differently she would have\nbehaved! How anxious and capricious she would have been, and what a\nhard task the best of dressmakers would have found it to please her!\n\n\n30th.--We hear every day from Sir Percival.  The last news is that the\nalterations in his house will occupy from four to six months before\nthey can be properly completed.  If painters, paperhangers, and\nupholsterers could make happiness as well as splendour, I should be\ninterested about their proceedings in Laura's future home.  As it is,\nthe only part of Sir Percival's last letter which does not leave me as\nit found me, perfectly indifferent to all his plans and projects, is\nthe part which refers to the wedding tour. He proposes, as Laura is\ndelicate, and as the winter threatens to be unusually severe, to take\nher to Rome, and to remain in Italy until the early part of next\nsummer.  If this plan should not be approved, he is equally ready,\nalthough he has no establishment of his own in town, to spend the\nseason in London, in the most suitable furnished house that can be\nobtained for the purpose.\n\nPutting myself and my own feelings entirely out of the question (which\nit is my duty to do, and which I have done), I, for one, have no doubt\nof the propriety of adopting the first of these proposals.  In either\ncase a separation between Laura and me is inevitable.  It will be a\nlonger separation, in the event of their going abroad, than it would be\nin the event of their remaining in London--but we must set against this\ndisadvantage the benefit to Laura, on the other side, of passing the\nwinter in a mild climate, and more than that, the immense assistance in\nraising her spirits, and reconciling her to her new existence, which\nthe mere wonder and excitement of travelling for the first time in her\nlife in the most interesting country in the world, must surely afford.\nShe is not of a disposition to find resources in the conventional\ngaieties and excitements of London.  They would only make the first\noppression of this lamentable marriage fall the heavier on her.  I\ndread the beginning of her new life more than words can tell, but I see\nsome hope for her if she travels--none if she remains at home.\n\nIt is strange to look back at this latest entry in my journal, and to\nfind that I am writing of the marriage and the parting with Laura, as\npeople write of a settled thing.  It seems so cold and so unfeeling to\nbe looking at the future already in this cruelly composed way.  But\nwhat other way is possible, now that the time is drawing so near?\nBefore another month is over our heads she will be HIS Laura instead of\nmine! HIS Laura! I am as little able to realise the idea which those\ntwo words convey--my mind feels almost as dulled and stunned by it--as\nif writing of her marriage were like writing of her death.\n\n\nDecember 1st.--A sad, sad day--a day that I have no heart to describe\nat any length.  After weakly putting it off last night, I was obliged\nto speak to her this morning of Sir Percival's proposal about the\nwedding tour.\n\nIn the full conviction that I should be with her wherever she went, the\npoor child--for a child she is still in many things--was almost happy\nat the prospect of seeing the wonders of Florence and Rome and Naples.\nIt nearly broke my heart to dispel her delusion, and to bring her face\nto face with the hard truth.  I was obliged to tell her that no man\ntolerates a rival--not even a woman rival--in his wife's affections,\nwhen he first marries, whatever he may do afterwards.  I was obliged to\nwarn her that my chance of living with her permanently under her own\nroof, depended entirely on my not arousing Sir Percival's jealousy and\ndistrust by standing between them at the beginning of their marriage,\nin the position of the chosen depositary of his wife's closest secrets.\nDrop by drop I poured the profaning bitterness of this world's wisdom\ninto that pure heart and that innocent mind, while every higher and\nbetter feeling within me recoiled from my miserable task.  It is over\nnow.  She has learnt her hard, her inevitable lesson.  The simple\nillusions of her girlhood are gone, and my hand has stripped them off.\nBetter mine than his--that is all my consolation--better mine than his.\n\nSo the first proposal is the proposal accepted.  They are to go to\nItaly, and I am to arrange, with Sir Percival's permission, for meeting\nthem and staying with them when they return to England. In other words,\nI am to ask a personal favour, for the first time in my life, and to\nask it of the man of all others to whom I least desire to owe a serious\nobligation of any kind.  Well! I think I could do even more than that,\nfor Laura's sake.\n\n\n2nd.--On looking back, I find myself always referring to Sir Percival\nin disparaging terms.  In the turn affairs have now taken.  I must and\nwill root out my prejudice against him, I cannot think how it first got\ninto my mind.  It certainly never existed in former times.\n\nIs it Laura's reluctance to become his wife that has set me against\nhim? Have Hartright's perfectly intelligible prejudices infected me\nwithout my suspecting their influence? Does that letter of Anne\nCatherick's still leave a lurking distrust in my mind, in spite of Sir\nPercival's explanation, and of the proof in my possession of the truth\nof it? I cannot account for the state of my own feelings; the one thing\nI am certain of is, that it is my duty--doubly my duty now--not to\nwrong Sir Percival by unjustly distrusting him.  If it has got to be a\nhabit with me always to write of him in the same unfavourable manner, I\nmust and will break myself of this unworthy tendency, even though the\neffort should force me to close the pages of my journal till the\nmarriage is over! I am seriously dissatisfied with myself--I will write\nno more to-day.\n\n\n\nDecember 16th.--A whole fortnight has passed, and I have not once\nopened these pages.  I have been long enough away from my journal to\ncome back to it with a healthier and better mind, I hope, so far as Sir\nPercival is concerned.\n\nThere is not much to record of the past two weeks.  The dresses are\nalmost all finished, and the new travelling trunks have been sent here\nfrom London.  Poor dear Laura hardly leaves me for a moment all day,\nand last night, when neither of us could sleep, she came and crept into\nmy bed to talk to me there.  \"I shall lose you so soon, Marian,\" she\nsaid; \"I must make the most of you while I can.\"\n\nThey are to be married at Limmeridge Church, and thank Heaven, not one\nof the neighbours is to be invited to the ceremony.  The only visitor\nwill be our old friend, Mr. Arnold, who is to come from Polesdean to\ngive Laura away, her uncle being far too delicate to trust himself\noutside the door in such inclement weather as we now have.  If I were\nnot determined, from this day forth, to see nothing but the bright side\nof our prospects, the melancholy absence of any male relative of\nLaura's, at the most important moment of her life, would make me very\ngloomy and very distrustful of the future.  But I have done with gloom\nand distrust--that is to say, I have done with writing about either the\none or the other in this journal.\n\nSir Percival is to arrive to-morrow.  He offered, in case we wished to\ntreat him on terms of rigid etiquette, to write and ask our clergyman\nto grant him the hospitality of the rectory, during the short period of\nhis sojourn at Limmeridge, before the marriage.  Under the\ncircumstances, neither Mr. Fairlie nor I thought it at all necessary\nfor us to trouble ourselves about attending to trifling forms and\nceremonies.  In our wild moorland country, and in this great lonely\nhouse, we may well claim to be beyond the reach of the trivial\nconventionalities which hamper people in other places.  I wrote to Sir\nPercival to thank him for his polite offer, and to beg that he would\noccupy his old rooms, just as usual, at Limmeridge House.\n\n\n17th.--He arrived to-day, looking, as I thought, a little worn and\nanxious, but still talking and laughing like a man in the best possible\nspirits.  He brought with him some really beautiful presents in\njewellery, which Laura received with her best grace, and, outwardly at\nleast, with perfect self-possession.  The only sign I can detect of the\nstruggle it must cost her to preserve appearances at this trying time,\nexpresses itself in a sudden unwillingness, on her part, ever to be\nleft alone.  Instead of retreating to her own room, as usual, she seems\nto dread going there.  When I went upstairs to-day, after lunch, to put\non my bonnet for a walk, she volunteered to join me, and again, before\ndinner, she threw the door open between our two rooms, so that we might\ntalk to each other while we were dressing.  \"Keep me always doing\nsomething,\" she said; \"keep me always in company with somebody.  Don't\nlet me think--that is all I ask now, Marian--don't let me think.\"\n\nThis sad change in her only increases her attractions for Sir Percival.\nHe interprets it, I can see, to his own advantage. There is a feverish\nflush in her cheeks, a feverish brightness in her eyes, which he\nwelcomes as the return of her beauty and the recovery of her spirits.\nShe talked to-day at dinner with a gaiety and carelessness so false, so\nshockingly out of her character, that I secretly longed to silence her\nand take her away.  Sir Percival's delight and surprise appeared to be\nbeyond all expression.  The anxiety which I had noticed on his face\nwhen he arrived totally disappeared from it, and he looked, even to my\neyes, a good ten years younger than he really is.\n\nThere can be no doubt--though some strange perversity prevents me from\nseeing it myself--there can be no doubt that Laura's future husband is\na very handsome man.  Regular features form a personal advantage to\nbegin with--and he has them.  Bright brown eyes, either in man or\nwoman, are a great attraction--and he has them. Even baldness, when it\nis only baldness over the forehead (as in his case), is rather becoming\nthan not in a man, for it heightens the head and adds to the\nintelligence of the face.  Grace and ease of movement, untiring\nanimation of manner, ready, pliant, conversational powers--all these\nare unquestionable merits, and all these he certainly possesses.\nSurely Mr. Gilmore, ignorant as he is of Laura's secret, was not to\nblame for feeling surprised that she should repent of her marriage\nengagement? Any one else in his place would have shared our good old\nfriend's opinion.  If I were asked, at this moment, to say plainly what\ndefects I have discovered in Sir Percival, I could only point out two.\nOne, his incessant restlessness and excitability--which may be caused,\nnaturally enough, by unusual energy of character.  The other, his\nshort, sharp, ill-tempered manner of speaking to the servants--which\nmay be only a bad habit after all.  No, I cannot dispute it, and I will\nnot dispute it--Sir Percival is a very handsome and a very agreeable\nman.  There! I have written it down at last, and I am glad it's over.\n\n\n18th.--Feeling weary and depressed this morning, I left Laura with Mrs.\nVesey, and went out alone for one of my brisk midday walks, which I\nhave discontinued too much of late.  I took the dry airy road over the\nmoor that leads to Todd's Corner.  After having been out half an hour,\nI was excessively surprised to see Sir Percival approaching me from the\ndirection of the farm.  He was walking rapidly, swinging his stick, his\nhead erect as usual, and his shooting jacket flying open in the wind.\nWhen we met he did not wait for me to ask any questions--he told me at\nonce that he had been to the farm to inquire if Mr. or Mrs. Todd had\nreceived any tidings, since his last visit to Limmeridge, of Anne\nCatherick.\n\n\"You found, of course, that they had heard nothing?\" I said.\n\n\"Nothing whatever,\" he replied.  \"I begin to be seriously afraid that\nwe have lost her.  Do you happen to know,\" he continued, looking me in\nthe face very attentively \"if the artist--Mr. Hartright--is in a\nposition to give us any further information?\"\n\n\"He has neither heard of her, nor seen her, since he left Cumberland,\"\nI answered.\n\n\"Very sad,\" said Sir Percival, speaking like a man who was\ndisappointed, and yet, oddly enough, looking at the same time like a\nman who was relieved.  \"It is impossible to say what misfortunes may\nnot have happened to the miserable creature.  I am inexpressibly\nannoyed at the failure of all my efforts to restore her to the care and\nprotection which she so urgently needs.\"\n\nThis time he really looked annoyed.  I said a few sympathising words,\nand we then talked of other subjects on our way back to the house.\nSurely my chance meeting with him on the moor has disclosed another\nfavourable trait in his character? Surely it was singularly considerate\nand unselfish of him to think of Anne Catherick on the eve of his\nmarriage, and to go all the way to Todd's Corner to make inquiries\nabout her, when he might have passed the time so much more agreeably in\nLaura's society? Considering that he can only have acted from motives\nof pure charity, his conduct, under the circumstances, shows unusual\ngood feeling and deserves extraordinary praise.  Well! I give him\nextraordinary praise--and there's an end of it.\n\n\n\n19th.--More discoveries in the inexhaustible mine of Sir Percival's\nvirtues.\n\nTo-day I approached the subject of my proposed sojourn under his wife's\nroof when he brings her back to England.  I had hardly dropped my first\nhint in this direction before he caught me warmly by the hand, and said\nI had made the very offer to him which he had been, on his side, most\nanxious to make to me.  I was the companion of all others whom he most\nsincerely longed to secure for his wife, and he begged me to believe\nthat I had conferred a lasting favour on him by making the proposal to\nlive with Laura after her marriage, exactly as I had always lived with\nher before it.\n\nWhen I had thanked him in her name and mine for his considerate\nkindness to both of us, we passed next to the subject of his wedding\ntour, and began to talk of the English society in Rome to which Laura\nwas to be introduced.  He ran over the names of several friends whom he\nexpected to meet abroad this winter.  They were all English, as well as\nI can remember, with one exception. The one exception was Count Fosco.\n\nThe mention of the Count's name, and the discovery that he and his wife\nare likely to meet the bride and bridegroom on the continent, puts\nLaura's marriage, for the first time, in a distinctly favourable light.\nIt is likely to be the means of healing a family feud.  Hitherto Madame\nFosco has chosen to forget her obligations as Laura's aunt out of sheer\nspite against the late Mr. Fairlie for his conduct in the affair of the\nlegacy.  Now however, she can persist in this course of conduct no\nlonger.  Sir Percival and Count Fosco are old and fast friends, and\ntheir wives will have no choice but to meet on civil terms.  Madame\nFosco in her maiden days was one of the most impertinent women I ever\nmet with--capricious, exacting, and vain to the last degree of\nabsurdity.  If her husband has succeeded in bringing her to her senses,\nhe deserves the gratitude of every member of the family, and he may\nhave mine to begin with.\n\nI am becoming anxious to know the Count.  He is the most intimate\nfriend of Laura's husband, and in that capacity he excites my strongest\ninterest.  Neither Laura nor I have ever seen him.  All I know of him\nis that his accidental presence, years ago, on the steps of the Trinita\ndel Monte at Rome, assisted Sir Percival's escape from robbery and\nassassination at the critical moment when he was wounded in the hand,\nand might the next instant have been wounded in the heart.  I remember\nalso that, at the time of the late Mr. Fairlie's absurd objections to\nhis sister's marriage, the Count wrote him a very temperate and\nsensible letter on the subject, which, I am ashamed to say, remained\nunanswered.  This is all I know of Sir Percival's friend.  I wonder if\nhe will ever come to England? I wonder if I shall like him?\n\nMy pen is running away into mere speculation.  Let me return to sober\nmatter of fact.  It is certain that Sir Percival's reception of my\nventuresome proposal to live with his wife was more than kind, it was\nalmost affectionate.  I am sure Laura's husband will have no reason to\ncomplain of me if I can only go on as I have begun.  I have already\ndeclared him to be handsome, agreeable, full of good feeling towards\nthe unfortunate and full of affectionate kindness towards me.  Really,\nI hardly know myself again, in my new character of Sir Percival's\nwarmest friend.\n\n\n20th.--I hate Sir Percival! I flatly deny his good looks.  I consider\nhim to be eminently ill-tempered and disagreeable, and totally wanting\nin kindness and good feeling.  Last night the cards for the married\ncouple were sent home.  Laura opened the packet and saw her future name\nin print for the first time.  Sir Percival looked over her shoulder\nfamiliarly at the new card which had already transformed Miss Fairlie\ninto Lady Glyde--smiled with the most odious self-complacency, and\nwhispered something in her ear.  I don't know what it was--Laura has\nrefused to tell me--but I saw her face turn to such a deadly whiteness\nthat I thought she would have fainted.  He took no notice of the\nchange--he seemed to be barbarously unconscious that he had said\nanything to pain her. All my old feelings of hostility towards him\nrevived on the instant, and all the hours that have passed since have\ndone nothing to dissipate them.  I am more unreasonable and more unjust\nthan ever.  In three words--how glibly my pen writes them!--in three\nwords, I hate him.\n\n\n21st.--Have the anxieties of this anxious time shaken me a little, at\nlast? I have been writing, for the last few days, in a tone of levity\nwhich, Heaven knows, is far enough from my heart, and which it has\nrather shocked me to discover on looking back at the entries in my\njournal.\n\nPerhaps I may have caught the feverish excitement of Laura's spirits\nfor the last week.  If so, the fit has already passed away from me, and\nhas left me in a very strange state of mind.  A persistent idea has\nbeen forcing itself on my attention, ever since last night, that\nsomething will yet happen to prevent the marriage.  What has produced\nthis singular fancy? Is it the indirect result of my apprehensions for\nLaura's future? Or has it been unconsciously suggested to me by the\nincreasing restlessness and irritability which I have certainly\nobserved in Sir Percival's manner as the wedding-day draws nearer and\nnearer? Impossible to say.  I know that I have the idea--surely the\nwildest idea, under the circumstances, that ever entered a woman's\nhead?--but try as I may, I cannot trace it back to its source.\n\nThis last day has been all confusion and wretchedness.  How can I write\nabout it?--and yet, I must write.  Anything is better than brooding\nover my own gloomy thoughts.\n\nKind Mrs. Vesey, whom we have all too much overlooked and forgotten of\nlate, innocently caused us a sad morning to begin with.  She has been,\nfor months past, secretly making a warm Shetland shawl for her dear\npupil--a most beautiful and surprising piece of work to be done by a\nwoman at her age and with her habits.  The gift was presented this\nmorning, and poor warm-hearted Laura completely broke down when the\nshawl was put proudly on her shoulders by the loving old friend and\nguardian of her motherless childhood.  I was hardly allowed time to\nquiet them both, or even to dry my own eyes, when I was sent for by Mr.\nFairlie, to be favoured with a long recital of his arrangements for the\npreservation of his own tranquillity on the wedding-day.\n\n\"Dear Laura\" was to receive his present--a shabby ring, with her\naffectionate uncle's hair for an ornament, instead of a precious stone,\nand with a heartless French inscription inside, about congenial\nsentiments and eternal friendship--\"dear Laura\" was to receive this\ntender tribute from my hands immediately, so that she might have plenty\nof time to recover from the agitation produced by the gift before she\nappeared in Mr. Fairlie's presence.  \"Dear Laura\" was to pay him a\nlittle visit that evening, and to be kind enough not to make a scene.\n\"Dear Laura\" was to pay him another little visit in her wedding-dress\nthe next morning, and to be kind enough, again, not to make a scene.\n\"Dear Laura\" was to look in once more, for the third time, before going\naway, but without harrowing his feelings by saying WHEN she was going\naway, and without tears--\"in the name of pity, in the name of\neverything, dear Marian, that is most affectionate and most domestic,\nand most delightfully and charmingly self-composed, WITHOUT TEARS!\" I\nwas so exasperated by this miserable selfish trifling, at such a time,\nthat I should certainly have shocked Mr. Fairlie by some of the hardest\nand rudest truths he has ever heard in his life, if the arrival of Mr.\nArnold from Polesdean had not called me away to new duties downstairs.\n\nThe rest of the day is indescribable.  I believe no one in the house\nreally knew how it passed.  The confusion of small events, all huddled\ntogether one on the other, bewildered everybody. There were dresses\nsent home that had been forgotten--there were trunks to be packed and\nunpacked and packed again--there were presents from friends far and\nnear, friends high and low.  We were all needlessly hurried, all\nnervously expectant of the morrow. Sir Percival, especially, was too\nrestless now to remain five minutes together in the same place.  That\nshort, sharp cough of his troubled him more than ever.  He was in and\nout of doors all day long, and he seemed to grow so inquisitive on a\nsudden, that he questioned the very strangers who came on small errands\nto the house.  Add to all this, the one perpetual thought in Laura's\nmind and mine, that we were to part the next day, and the haunting\ndread, unexpressed by either of us, and yet ever present to both, that\nthis deplorable marriage might prove to be the one fatal error of her\nlife and the one hopeless sorrow of mine.  For the first time in all\nthe years of our close and happy intercourse we almost avoided looking\neach other in the face, and we refrained, by common consent, from\nspeaking together in private through the whole evening.  I can dwell on\nit no longer.  Whatever future sorrows may be in store for me, I shall\nalways look back on this twenty-first of December as the most\ncomfortless and most miserable day of my life.\n\nI am writing these lines in the solitude of my own room, long after\nmidnight, having just come back from a stolen look at Laura in her\npretty little white bed--the bed she has occupied since the days of her\ngirlhood.\n\nThere she lay, unconscious that I was looking at her--quiet, more quiet\nthan I had dared to hope, but not sleeping.  The glimmer of the\nnight-light showed me that her eyes were only partially closed--the\ntraces of tears glistened between her eyelids.  My little\nkeepsake--only a brooch--lay on the table at her bedside, with her\nprayer-book, and the miniature portrait of her father which she takes\nwith her wherever she goes.  I waited a moment, looking at her from\nbehind her pillow, as she lay beneath me, with one arm and hand resting\non the white coverlid, so still, so quietly breathing, that the frill\non her night-dress never moved--I waited, looking at her, as I have\nseen her thousands of times, as I shall never see her again--and then\nstole back to my room. My own love! with all your wealth, and all your\nbeauty, how friendless you are! The one man who would give his heart's\nlife to serve you is far away, tossing, this stormy night, on the awful\nsea.  Who else is left to you? No father, no brother--no living\ncreature but the helpless, useless woman who writes these sad lines,\nand watches by you for the morning, in sorrow that she cannot compose,\nin doubt that she cannot conquer.  Oh, what a trust is to be placed in\nthat man's hands to-morrow! If ever he forgets it--if ever he injures a\nhair of her head!----\n\n\nTHE TWENTY-SECOND OF DECEMBER.  Seven o'clock.  A wild, unsettled\nmorning.  She has just risen--better and calmer, now that the time has\ncome, than she was yesterday.\n\n\n\nTen o'clock.  She is dressed.  We have kissed each other--we have\npromised each other not to lose courage.  I am away for a moment in my\nown room.  In the whirl and confusion of my thoughts, I can detect that\nstrange fancy of some hindrance happening to stop the marriage still\nhanging about my mind.  Is it hanging about HIS mind too? I see him\nfrom the window, moving hither and thither uneasily among the carriages\nat the door.--How can I write such folly! The marriage is a certainty.\nIn less than half an hour we start for the church.\n\n\nEleven o'clock.  It is all over.  They are married.\n\n\nThree o'clock.  They are gone! I am blind with crying--I can write no\nmore----\n\n*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *\n\n[The First Epoch of the Story closes here.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE SECOND EPOCH\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY MARIAN HALCOMBE.\n\n\nI\n\nBLACKWATER PARK, HAMPSHIRE.\n\n\nJune 11th, 1850.--Six months to look back on--six long, lonely months\nsince Laura and I last saw each other!\n\nHow many days have I still to wait? Only one! To-morrow, the twelfth,\nthe travellers return to England.  I can hardly realise my own\nhappiness--I can hardly believe that the next four-and-twenty hours\nwill complete the last day of separation between Laura and me.\n\nShe and her husband have been in Italy all the winter, and afterwards\nin the Tyrol.  They come back, accompanied by Count Fosco and his wife,\nwho propose to settle somewhere in the neighbourhood of London, and who\nhave engaged to stay at Blackwater Park for the summer months before\ndeciding on a place of residence.  So long as Laura returns, no matter\nwho returns with her.  Sir Percival may fill the house from floor to\nceiling, if he likes, on condition that his wife and I inhabit it\ntogether.\n\nMeanwhile, here I am, established at Blackwater Park, \"the ancient and\ninteresting seat\" (as the county history obligingly informs me) \"of Sir\nPercival Glyde, Bart.,\" and the future abiding-place (as I may now\nventure to add on my account) of plain Marian Halcombe, spinster, now\nsettled in a snug little sitting-room, with a cup of tea by her side,\nand all her earthly possessions ranged round her in three boxes and a\nbag.\n\nI left Limmeridge yesterday, having received Laura's delightful letter\nfrom Paris the day before.  I had been previously uncertain whether I\nwas to meet them in London or in Hampshire, but this last letter\ninformed me that Sir Percival proposed to land at Southampton, and to\ntravel straight on to his country-house.  He has spent so much money\nabroad that he has none left to defray the expenses of living in London\nfor the remainder of the season, and he is economically resolved to\npass the summer and autumn quietly at Blackwater.  Laura has had more\nthan enough of excitement and change of scene, and is pleased at the\nprospect of country tranquillity and retirement which her husband's\nprudence provides for her.  As for me, I am ready to be happy anywhere\nin her society.  We are all, therefore, well contented in our various\nways, to begin with.\n\nLast night I slept in London, and was delayed there so long to-day by\nvarious calls and commissions, that I did not reach Blackwater this\nevening till after dusk.\n\nJudging by my vague impressions of the place thus far, it is the exact\nopposite of Limmeridge.\n\nThe house is situated on a dead flat, and seems to be shut in--almost\nsuffocated, to my north-country notions, by trees.  I have seen nobody\nbut the man-servant who opened the door to me, and the housekeeper, a\nvery civil person, who showed me the way to my own room, and got me my\ntea.  I have a nice little boudoir and bedroom, at the end of a long\npassage on the first floor.  The servants and some of the spare rooms\nare on the second floor, and all the living rooms are on the ground\nfloor.  I have not seen one of them yet, and I know nothing about the\nhouse, except that one wing of it is said to be five hundred years old,\nthat it had a moat round it once, and that it gets its name of\nBlackwater from a lake in the park.\n\nEleven o'clock has just struck, in a ghostly and solemn manner, from a\nturret over the centre of the house, which I saw when I came in.  A\nlarge dog has been woke, apparently by the sound of the bell, and is\nhowling and yawning drearily, somewhere round a corner.  I hear echoing\nfootsteps in the passages below, and the iron thumping of bolts and\nbars at the house door.  The servants are evidently going to bed.\nShall I follow their example?\n\nNo, I am not half sleepy enough.  Sleepy, did I say? I feel as if I\nshould never close my eyes again.  The bare anticipation of seeing that\ndear face, and hearing that well-known voice to-morrow, keeps me in a\nperpetual fever of excitement.  If I only had the privileges of a man,\nI would order out Sir Percival's best horse instantly, and tear away on\na night-gallop, eastward, to meet the rising sun--a long, hard, heavy,\nceaseless gallop of hours and hours, like the famous highwayman's ride\nto York. Being, however, nothing but a woman, condemned to patience,\npropriety, and petticoats for life, I must respect the house-keeper's\nopinions, and try to compose myself in some feeble and feminine way.\n\nReading is out of the question--I can't fix my attention on books. Let\nme try if I can write myself into sleepiness and fatigue.  My journal\nhas been very much neglected of late.  What can I recall--standing, as\nI now do, on the threshold of a new life--of persons and events, of\nchances and changes, during the past six months--the long, weary,\nempty interval since Laura's wedding-day?\n\n\nWalter Hartright is uppermost in my memory, and he passes first in the\nshadowy procession of my absent friends.  I received a few lines from\nhim, after the landing of the expedition in Honduras, written more\ncheerfully and hopefully than he has written yet.  A month or six weeks\nlater I saw an extract from an American newspaper, describing the\ndeparture of the adventurers on their inland journey.  They were last\nseen entering a wild primeval forest, each man with his rifle on his\nshoulder and his baggage at his back.  Since that time, civilisation\nhas lost all trace of them.  Not a line more have I received from\nWalter, not a fragment of news from the expedition has appeared in any\nof the public journals.\n\nThe same dense, disheartening obscurity hangs over the fate and\nfortunes of Anne Catherick, and her companion, Mrs. Clements. Nothing\nwhatever has been heard of either of them.  Whether they are in the\ncountry or out of it, whether they are living or dead, no one knows.\nEven Sir Percival's solicitor has lost all hope, and has ordered the\nuseless search after the fugitives to be finally given up.\n\nOur good old friend Mr. Gilmore has met with a sad check in his active\nprofessional career.  Early in the spring we were alarmed by hearing\nthat he had been found insensible at his desk, and that the seizure was\npronounced to be an apoplectic fit.  He had been long complaining of\nfulness and oppression in the head, and his doctor had warned him of\nthe consequences that would follow his persistency in continuing to\nwork, early and late, as if he were still a young man.  The result now\nis that he has been positively ordered to keep out of his office for a\nyear to come, at least, and to seek repose of body and relief of mind\nby altogether changing his usual mode of life.  The business is left,\naccordingly, to be carried on by his partner, and he is himself, at\nthis moment, away in Germany, visiting some relations who are settled\nthere in mercantile pursuits.  Thus another true friend and trustworthy\nadviser is lost to us--lost, I earnestly hope and trust, for a time\nonly.\n\nPoor Mrs. Vesey travelled with me as far as London.  It was impossible\nto abandon her to solitude at Limmeridge after Laura and I had both\nleft the house, and we have arranged that she is to live with an\nunmarried younger sister of hers, who keeps a school at Clapham.  She\nis to come here this autumn to visit her pupil--I might almost say her\nadopted child.  I saw the good old lady safe to her destination, and\nleft her in the care of her relative, quietly happy at the prospect of\nseeing Laura again in a few months' time.\n\nAs for Mr. Fairlie, I believe I am guilty of no injustice if I describe\nhim as being unutterably relieved by having the house clear of us\nwomen.  The idea of his missing his niece is simply preposterous--he\nused to let months pass in the old times without attempting to see\nher--and in my case and Mrs. Vesey's, I take leave to consider his\ntelling us both that he was half heart-broken at our departure, to be\nequivalent to a confession that he was secretly rejoiced to get rid of\nus.  His last caprice has led him to keep two photographers incessantly\nemployed in producing sun-pictures of all the treasures and curiosities\nin his possession.  One complete copy of the collection of the\nphotographs is to be presented to the Mechanics' Institution of\nCarlisle, mounted on the finest cardboard, with ostentatious red-letter\ninscriptions underneath, \"Madonna and Child by Raphael.  In the\npossession of Frederick Fairlie, Esquire.\" \"Copper coin of the period\nof Tiglath Pileser.  In the possession of Frederick Fairlie, Esquire.\"\n\"Unique Rembrandt etching.  Known all over Europe as THE SMUDGE, from a\nprinter's blot in the corner which exists in no other copy.  Valued at\nthree hundred guineas.  In the possession of Frederick Fairlie, Esq.\"\nDozens of photographs of this sort, and all inscribed in this manner,\nwere completed before I left Cumberland, and hundreds more remain to be\ndone.  With this new interest to occupy him, Mr. Fairlie will be a\nhappy man for months and months to come, and the two unfortunate\nphotographers will share the social martyrdom which he has hitherto\ninflicted on his valet alone.\n\nSo much for the persons and events which hold the foremost place in my\nmemory.  What next of the one person who holds the foremost place in my\nheart? Laura has been present to my thoughts all the while I have been\nwriting these lines.  What can I recall of her during the past six\nmonths, before I close my journal for the night?\n\nI have only her letters to guide me, and on the most important of all\nthe questions which our correspondence can discuss, every one of those\nletters leaves me in the dark.\n\nDoes he treat her kindly? Is she happier now than she was when I parted\nwith her on the wedding-day? All my letters have contained these two\ninquiries, put more or less directly, now in one form, and now in\nanother, and all, on that point only, have remained without reply, or\nhave been answered as if my questions merely related to the state of\nher health.  She informs me, over and over again, that she is perfectly\nwell--that travelling agrees with her--that she is getting through the\nwinter, for the first time in her life, without catching cold--but not\na word can I find anywhere which tells me plainly that she is\nreconciled to her marriage, and that she can now look back to the\ntwenty-second of December without any bitter feelings of repentance and\nregret. The name of her husband is only mentioned in her letters, as\nshe might mention the name of a friend who was travelling with them,\nand who had undertaken to make all the arrangements for the journey.\n\"Sir Percival\" has settled that we leave on such a day--\"Sir Percival\"\nhas decided that we travel by such a road. Sometimes she writes\n\"Percival\" only, but very seldom--in nine cases out of ten she gives\nhim his title.\n\nI cannot find that his habits and opinions have changed and coloured\nhers in any single particular.  The usual moral transformation which is\ninsensibly wrought in a young, fresh, sensitive woman by her marriage,\nseems never to have taken place in Laura.  She writes of her own\nthoughts and impressions, amid all the wonders she has seen, exactly as\nshe might have written to some one else, if I had been travelling with\nher instead of her husband.  I see no betrayal anywhere of sympathy of\nany kind existing between them.  Even when she wanders from the subject\nof her travels, and occupies herself with the prospects that await her\nin England, her speculations are busied with her future as my sister,\nand persistently neglect to notice her future as Sir Percival's wife.\nIn all this there is no undertone of complaint to warn me that she is\nabsolutely unhappy in her married life. The impression I have derived\nfrom our correspondence does not, thank God, lead me to any such\ndistressing conclusion as that.  I only see a sad torpor, an\nunchangeable indifference, when I turn my mind from her in the old\ncharacter of a sister, and look at her, through the medium of her\nletters, in the new character of a wife.  In other words, it is always\nLaura Fairlie who has been writing to me for the last six months, and\nnever Lady Glyde.\n\nThe strange silence which she maintains on the subject of her husband's\ncharacter and conduct, she preserves with almost equal resolution in\nthe few references which her later letters contain to the name of her\nhusband's bosom friend, Count Fosco.\n\nFor some unexplained reason the Count and his wife appear to have\nchanged their plans abruptly, at the end of last autumn, and to have\ngone to Vienna instead of going to Rome, at which latter place Sir\nPercival had expected to find them when he left England. They only\nquitted Vienna in the spring, and travelled as far as the Tyrol to meet\nthe bride and bridegroom on their homeward journey.  Laura writes\nreadily enough about the meeting with Madame Fosco, and assures me that\nshe has found her aunt so much changed for the better--so much quieter,\nand so much more sensible as a wife than she was as a single\nwoman--that I shall hardly know her again when I see her here.  But on\nthe subject of Count Fosco (who interests me infinitely more than his\nwife), Laura is provokingly circumspect and silent.  She only says that\nhe puzzles her, and that she will not tell me what her impression of\nhim is until I have seen him, and formed my own opinion first.\n\nThis, to my mind, looks ill for the Count.  Laura has preserved, far\nmore perfectly than most people do in later life, the child's subtle\nfaculty of knowing a friend by instinct, and if I am right in assuming\nthat her first impression of Count Fosco has not been favourable, I for\none am in some danger of doubting and distrusting that illustrious\nforeigner before I have so much as set eyes on him.  But, patience,\npatience--this uncertainty, and many uncertainties more, cannot last\nmuch longer.  To-morrow will see all my doubts in a fair way of being\ncleared up, sooner or later.\n\nTwelve o'clock has struck, and I have just come back to close these\npages, after looking out at my open window.\n\nIt is a still, sultry, moonless night.  The stars are dull and few.\nThe trees that shut out the view on all sides look dimly black and\nsolid in the distance, like a great wall of rock.  I hear the croaking\nof frogs, faint and far off, and the echoes of the great clock hum in\nthe airless calm long after the strokes have ceased.  I wonder how\nBlackwater Park will look in the daytime? I don't altogether like it by\nnight.\n\n\n12th.--A day of investigations and discoveries--a more interesting day,\nfor many reasons, than I had ventured to anticipate.\n\nI began my sight-seeing, of course, with the house.\n\nThe main body of the building is of the time of that highly-overrated\nwoman, Queen Elizabeth.  On the ground floor there are two hugely long\ngalleries, with low ceilings lying parallel with each other, and\nrendered additionally dark and dismal by hideous family\nportraits--every one of which I should like to burn.  The rooms on the\nfloor above the two galleries are kept in tolerable repair, but are\nvery seldom used.  The civil housekeeper, who acted as my guide,\noffered to show me over them, but considerately added that she feared I\nshould find them rather out of order.  My respect for the integrity of\nmy own petticoats and stockings infinitely exceeds my respect for all\nthe Elizabethan bedrooms in the kingdom, so I positively declined\nexploring the upper regions of dust and dirt at the risk of soiling my\nnice clean clothes. The housekeeper said, \"I am quite of your opinion,\nmiss,\" and appeared to think me the most sensible woman she had met\nwith for a long time past.\n\nSo much, then, for the main building.  Two wings are added at either\nend of it.  The half-ruined wing on the left (as you approach the\nhouse) was once a place of residence standing by itself, and was built\nin the fourteenth century.  One of Sir Percival's maternal ancestors--I\ndon't remember, and don't care which--tacked on the main building, at\nright angles to it, in the aforesaid Queen Elizabeth's time.  The\nhousekeeper told me that the architecture of \"the old wing,\" both\noutside and inside, was considered remarkably fine by good judges.  On\nfurther investigation I discovered that good judges could only exercise\ntheir abilities on Sir Percival's piece of antiquity by previously\ndismissing from their minds all fear of damp, darkness, and rats. Under\nthese circumstances, I unhesitatingly acknowledged myself to be no\njudge at all, and suggested that we should treat \"the old wing\"\nprecisely as we had previously treated the Elizabethan bedrooms.  Once\nmore the housekeeper said, \"I am quite of your opinion, miss,\" and once\nmore she looked at me with undisguised admiration of my extraordinary\ncommon-sense.\n\nWe went next to the wing on the right, which was built, by way of\ncompleting the wonderful architectural jumble at Blackwater Park, in\nthe time of George the Second.\n\nThis is the habitable part of the house, which has been repaired and\nredecorated inside on Laura's account.  My two rooms, and all the good\nbedrooms besides, are on the first floor, and the basement contains a\ndrawing-room, a dining-room, a morning-room, a library, and a pretty\nlittle boudoir for Laura, all very nicely ornamented in the bright\nmodern way, and all very elegantly furnished with the delightful modern\nluxuries.  None of the rooms are anything like so large and airy as our\nrooms at Limmeridge, but they all look pleasant to live in.  I was\nterribly afraid, from what I had heard of Blackwater Park, of fatiguing\nantique chairs, and dismal stained glass, and musty, frouzy hangings,\nand all the barbarous lumber which people born without a sense of\ncomfort accumulate about them, in defiance of the consideration due to\nthe convenience of their friends.  It is an inexpressible relief to\nfind that the nineteenth century has invaded this strange future home\nof mine, and has swept the dirty \"good old times\" out of the way of our\ndaily life.\n\nI dawdled away the morning--part of the time in the rooms downstairs,\nand part out of doors in the great square which is formed by the three\nsides of the house, and by the lofty iron railings and gates which\nprotect it in front.  A large circular fish-pond with stone sides, and\nan allegorical leaden monster in the middle, occupies the centre of the\nsquare.  The pond itself is full of gold and silver fish, and is\nencircled by a broad belt of the softest turf I ever walked on.  I\nloitered here on the shady side pleasantly enough till luncheon-time,\nand after that took my broad straw hat and wandered out alone in the\nwarm lovely sunlight to explore the grounds.\n\nDaylight confirmed the impression which I had felt the night before, of\nthere being too many trees at Blackwater.  The house is stifled by\nthem.  They are, for the most part, young, and planted far too thickly.\nI suspect there must have been a ruinous cutting down of timber all\nover the estate before Sir Percival's time, and an angry anxiety on the\npart of the next possessor to fill up all the gaps as thickly and\nrapidly as possible.  After looking about me in front of the house, I\nobserved a flower-garden on my left hand, and walked towards it to see\nwhat I could discover in that direction.\n\nOn a nearer view the garden proved to be small and poor and ill kept.\nI left it behind me, opened a little gate in a ring fence, and found\nmyself in a plantation of fir-trees.\n\nA pretty winding path, artificially made, led me on among the trees,\nand my north-country experience soon informed me that I was approaching\nsandy, heathy ground.  After a walk of more than half a mile, I should\nthink, among the firs, the path took a sharp turn--the trees abruptly\nceased to appear on either side of me, and I found myself standing\nsuddenly on the margin of a vast open space, and looking down at the\nBlackwater lake from which the house takes its name.\n\nThe ground, shelving away below me, was all sand, with a few little\nheathy hillocks to break the monotony of it in certain places.  The\nlake itself had evidently once flowed to the spot on which I stood, and\nhad been gradually wasted and dried up to less than a third of its\nformer size.  I saw its still, stagnant waters, a quarter of a mile\naway from me in the hollow, separated into pools and ponds by twining\nreeds and rushes, and little knolls of earth.  On the farther bank from\nme the trees rose thickly again, and shut out the view, and cast their\nblack shadows on the sluggish, shallow water.  As I walked down to the\nlake, I saw that the ground on its farther side was damp and marshy,\novergrown with rank grass and dismal willows.  The water, which was\nclear enough on the open sandy side, where the sun shone, looked black\nand poisonous opposite to me, where it lay deeper under the shade of\nthe spongy banks, and the rank overhanging thickets and tangled trees.\nThe frogs were croaking, and the rats were slipping in and out of the\nshadowy water, like live shadows themselves, as I got nearer to the\nmarshy side of the lake.  I saw here, lying half in and half out of the\nwater, the rotten wreck of an old overturned boat, with a sickly spot\nof sunlight glimmering through a gap in the trees on its dry surface,\nand a snake basking in the midst of the spot, fantastically coiled and\ntreacherously still.  Far and near the view suggested the same dreary\nimpressions of solitude and decay, and the glorious brightness of the\nsummer sky overhead seemed only to deepen and harden the gloom and\nbarrenness of the wilderness on which it shone.  I turned and retraced\nmy steps to the high heathy ground, directing them a little aside from\nmy former path towards a shabby old wooden shed, which stood on the\nouter skirt of the fir plantation, and which had hitherto been too\nunimportant to share my notice with the wide, wild prospect of the lake.\n\nOn approaching the shed I found that it had once been a boat-house,\nand that an attempt had apparently been made to convert it afterwards\ninto a sort of rude arbour, by placing inside it a firwood seat, a few\nstools, and a table.  I entered the place, and sat down for a little\nwhile to rest and get my breath again.\n\nI had not been in the boat-house more than a minute when it struck me\nthat the sound of my own quick breathing was very strangely echoed by\nsomething beneath me.  I listened intently for a moment, and heard a\nlow, thick, sobbing breath that seemed to come from the ground under\nthe seat which I was occupying.  My nerves are not easily shaken by\ntrifles, but on this occasion I started to my feet in a fright--called\nout--received no answer--summoned back my recreant courage, and looked\nunder the seat.\n\nThere, crouched up in the farthest corner, lay the forlorn cause of my\nterror, in the shape of a poor little dog--a black and white spaniel.\nThe creature moaned feebly when I looked at it and called to it, but\nnever stirred.  I moved away the seat and looked closer.  The poor\nlittle dog's eyes were glazing fast, and there were spots of blood on\nits glossy white side.  The misery of a weak, helpless, dumb creature\nis surely one of the saddest of all the mournful sights which this\nworld can show.  I lifted the poor dog in my arms as gently as I could,\nand contrived a sort of make-shift hammock for him to lie in, by\ngathering up the front of my dress all round him.  In this way I took\nthe creature, as painlessly as possible, and as fast as possible, back\nto the house.\n\nFinding no one in the hall I went up at once to my own sitting-room,\nmade a bed for the dog with one of my old shawls, and rang the bell.\nThe largest and fattest of all possible house-maids answered it, in a\nstate of cheerful stupidity which would have provoked the patience of a\nsaint.  The girl's fat, shapeless face actually stretched into a broad\ngrin at the sight of the wounded creature on the floor.\n\n\"What do you see there to laugh at?\" I asked, as angrily as if she had\nbeen a servant of my own.  \"Do you know whose dog it is?\"\n\n\"No, miss, that I certainly don't.\" She stooped, and looked down at the\nspaniel's injured side--brightened suddenly with the irradiation of a\nnew idea--and pointing to the wound with a chuckle of satisfaction,\nsaid, \"That's Baxter's doings, that is.\"\n\nI was so exasperated that I could have boxed her ears.  \"Baxter?\" I\nsaid.  \"Who is the brute you call Baxter?\"\n\nThe girl grinned again more cheerfully than ever.  \"Bless you, miss!\nBaxter's the keeper, and when he finds strange dogs hunting about, he\ntakes and shoots 'em.  It's keeper's dooty miss, I think that dog will\ndie.  Here's where he's been shot, ain't it? That's Baxter's doings,\nthat is.  Baxter's doings, miss, and Baxter's dooty.\"\n\nI was almost wicked enough to wish that Baxter had shot the housemaid\ninstead of the dog.  Seeing that it was quite useless to expect this\ndensely impenetrable personage to give me any help in relieving the\nsuffering creature at our feet, I told her to request the housekeeper's\nattendance with my compliments.  She went out exactly as she had come\nin, grinning from ear to ear.  As the door closed on her she said to\nherself softly, \"It's Baxter's doings and Baxter's dooty--that's what\nit is.\"\n\nThe housekeeper, a person of some education and intelligence,\nthoughtfully brought upstairs with her some milk and some warm water.\nThe instant she saw the dog on the floor she started and changed colour.\n\n\"Why, Lord bless me,\" cried the housekeeper, \"that must be Mrs.\nCatherick's dog!\"\n\n\"Whose?\" I asked, in the utmost astonishment.\n\n\"Mrs. Catherick's.  You seem to know Mrs. Catherick, Miss Halcombe?\"\n\n\"Not personally, but I have heard of her.  Does she live here? Has she\nhad any news of her daughter?\"\n\n\"No, Miss Halcombe, she came here to ask for news.\"\n\n\"When?\"\n\n\"Only yesterday.  She said some one had reported that a stranger\nanswering to the description of her daughter had been seen in our\nneighbourhood.  No such report has reached us here, and no such report\nwas known in the village, when I sent to make inquiries there on Mrs.\nCatherick's account.  She certainly brought this poor little dog with\nher when she came, and I saw it trot out after her when she went away.\nI suppose the creature strayed into the plantations, and got shot.\nWhere did you find it, Miss Halcombe?\"\n\n\"In the old shed that looks out on the lake.\"\n\n\"Ah, yes, that is the plantation side, and the poor thing dragged\nitself, I suppose, to the nearest shelter, as dogs will, to die. If you\ncan moisten its lips with the milk, Miss Halcombe, I will wash the\nclotted hair from the wound.  I am very much afraid it is too late to\ndo any good.  However, we can but try.\"\n\nMrs. Catherick! The name still rang in my ears, as if the housekeeper\nhad only that moment surprised me by uttering it. While we were\nattending to the dog, the words of Walter Hartright's caution to me\nreturned to my memory: \"If ever Anne Catherick crosses your path, make\nbetter use of the opportunity, Miss Halcombe, than I made of it.\" The\nfinding of the wounded spaniel had led me already to the discovery of\nMrs. Catherick's visit to Blackwater Park, and that event might lead in\nits turn, to something more.  I determined to make the most of the\nchance which was now offered to me, and to gain as much information as\nI could.\n\n\"Did you say that Mrs. Catherick lived anywhere in this neighbourhood?\"\nI asked.\n\n\"Oh dear, no,\" said the housekeeper.  \"She lives at Welmingham, quite\nat the other end of the county--five-and-twenty miles off, at least.\"\n\n\"I suppose you have known Mrs. Catherick for some years?\"\n\n\"On the contrary, Miss Halcombe, I never saw her before she came here\nyesterday.  I had heard of her, of course, because I had heard of Sir\nPercival's kindness in putting her daughter under medical care.  Mrs.\nCatherick is rather a strange person in her manners, but extremely\nrespectable-looking.  She seemed sorely put out when she found that\nthere was no foundation--none, at least, that any of us could\ndiscover--for the report of her daughter having been seen in this\nneighbourhood.\"\n\n\"I am rather interested about Mrs. Catherick,\" I went on, continuing\nthe conversation as long as possible.  \"I wish I had arrived here soon\nenough to see her yesterday.  Did she stay for any length of time?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said the housekeeper, \"she stayed for some time; and I think she\nwould have remained longer, if I had not been called away to speak to a\nstrange gentleman--a gentleman who came to ask when Sir Percival was\nexpected back.  Mrs. Catherick got up and left at once, when she heard\nthe maid tell me what the visitor's errand was.  She said to me, at\nparting, that there was no need to tell Sir Percival of her coming\nhere.  I thought that rather an odd remark to make, especially to a\nperson in my responsible situation.\"\n\nI thought it an odd remark too.  Sir Percival had certainly led me to\nbelieve, at Limmeridge, that the most perfect confidence existed\nbetween himself and Mrs. Catherick.  If that was the case, why should\nshe be anxious to have her visit at Blackwater Park kept a secret from\nhim?\n\n\"Probably,\" I said, seeing that the housekeeper expected me to give my\nopinion on Mrs. Catherick's parting words, \"probably she thought the\nannouncement of her visit might vex Sir Percival to no purpose, by\nreminding him that her lost daughter was not found yet.  Did she talk\nmuch on that subject?\"\n\n\"Very little,\" replied the housekeeper.  \"She talked principally of Sir\nPercival, and asked a great many questions about where he had been\ntravelling, and what sort of lady his new wife was.  She seemed to be\nmore soured and put out than distressed, by failing to find any traces\nof her daughter in these parts.  'I give her up,' were the last words\nshe said that I can remember; 'I give her up, ma'am, for lost.' And\nfrom that she passed at once to her questions about Lady Glyde, wanting\nto know if she was a handsome, amiable lady, comely and healthy and\nyoung----Ah, dear! I thought how it would end.  Look, Miss Halcombe,\nthe poor thing is out of its misery at last!\"\n\nThe dog was dead.  It had given a faint, sobbing cry, it had suffered\nan instant's convulsion of the limbs, just as those last words, \"comely\nand healthy and young,\" dropped from the housekeeper's lips.  The\nchange had happened with startling suddenness--in one moment the\ncreature lay lifeless under our hands.\n\nEight o'clock.  I have just returned from dining downstairs, in\nsolitary state.  The sunset is burning redly on the wilderness of trees\nthat I see from my window, and I am poring over my journal again, to\ncalm my impatience for the return of the travellers. They ought to have\narrived, by my calculations, before this.  How still and lonely the\nhouse is in the drowsy evening quiet! Oh me! how many minutes more\nbefore I hear the carriage wheels and run downstairs to find myself in\nLaura's arms?\n\nThe poor little dog! I wish my first day at Blackwater Park had not\nbeen associated with death, though it is only the death of a stray\nanimal.\n\nWelmingham--I see, on looking back through these private pages of mine,\nthat Welmingham is the name of the place where Mrs. Catherick lives.\nHer note is still in my possession, the note in answer to that letter\nabout her unhappy daughter which Sir Percival obliged me to write.  One\nof these days, when I can find a safe opportunity, I will take the note\nwith me by way of introduction, and try what I can make of Mrs.\nCatherick at a personal interview.  I don't understand her wishing to\nconceal her visit to this place from Sir Percival's knowledge, and I\ndon't feel half so sure, as the housekeeper seems to do, that her\ndaughter Anne is not in the neighbourhood after all.  What would Walter\nHartright have said in this emergency? Poor, dear Hartright! I am\nbeginning to feel the want of his honest advice and his willing help\nalready.\n\nSurely I heard something.  Was it a bustle of footsteps below stairs?\nYes! I hear the horses' feet--I hear the rolling wheels----\n\n\n\nII\n\nJune 15th.--The confusion of their arrival has had time to subside.\nTwo days have elapsed since the return of the travellers, and that\ninterval has sufficed to put the new machinery of our lives at\nBlackwater Park in fair working order. I may now return to my journal,\nwith some little chance of being able to continue the entries in it as\ncollectedly as usual.\n\nI think I must begin by putting down an odd remark which has suggested\nitself to me since Laura came back.\n\nWhen two members of a family or two intimate friends are separated, and\none goes abroad and one remains at home, the return of the relative or\nfriend who has been travelling always seems to place the relative or\nfriend who has been staying at home at a painful disadvantage when the\ntwo first meet.  The sudden encounter of the new thoughts and new\nhabits eagerly gained in the one case, with the old thoughts and old\nhabits passively preserved in the other, seems at first to part the\nsympathies of the most loving relatives and the fondest friends, and to\nset a sudden strangeness, unexpected by both and uncontrollable by\nboth, between them on either side.  After the first happiness of my\nmeeting with Laura was over, after we had sat down together hand in\nhand to recover breath enough and calmness enough to talk, I felt this\nstrangeness instantly, and I could see that she felt it too.  It has\npartially worn away, now that we have fallen back into most of our old\nhabits, and it will probably disappear before long.  But it has\ncertainly had an influence over the first impressions that I have\nformed of her, now that we are living together again--for which reason\nonly I have thought fit to mention it here.\n\nShe has found me unaltered, but I have found her changed.\n\nChanged in person, and in one respect changed in character.  I cannot\nabsolutely say that she is less beautiful than she used to be--I can\nonly say that she is less beautiful to me.\n\nOthers, who do not look at her with my eyes and my recollections, would\nprobably think her improved.  There is more colour and more decision\nand roundness of outline in her face than there used to be, and her\nfigure seems more firmly set and more sure and easy in all its\nmovements than it was in her maiden days.  But I miss something when I\nlook at her--something that once belonged to the happy, innocent life\nof Laura Fairlie, and that I cannot find in Lady Glyde.  There was in\nthe old times a freshness, a softness, an ever-varying and yet\never-remaining tenderness of beauty in her face, the charm of which it\nis not possible to express in words, or, as poor Hartright used often\nto say, in painting either.  This is gone.  I thought I saw the faint\nreflection of it for a moment when she turned pale under the agitation\nof our sudden meeting on the evening of her return, but it has never\nreappeared since. None of her letters had prepared me for a personal\nchange in her. On the contrary, they had led me to expect that her\nmarriage had left her, in appearance at least, quite unaltered.\nPerhaps I read her letters wrongly in the past, and am now reading her\nface wrongly in the present? No matter! Whether her beauty has gained\nor whether it has lost in the last six months, the separation either\nway has made her own dear self more precious to me than ever, and that\nis one good result of her marriage, at any rate!\n\nThe second change, the change that I have observed in her character,\nhas not surprised me, because I was prepared for it in this case by the\ntone of her letters.  Now that she is at home again, I find her just as\nunwilling to enter into any details on the subject of her married life\nas I had previously found her all through the time of our separation,\nwhen we could only communicate with each other by writing.  At the\nfirst approach I made to the forbidden topic she put her hand on my\nlips with a look and gesture which touchingly, almost painfully,\nrecalled to my memory the days of her girlhood and the happy bygone\ntime when there were no secrets between us.\n\n\"Whenever you and I are together, Marian,\" she said, \"we shall both be\nhappier and easier with one another, if we accept my married life for\nwhat it is, and say and think as little about it as possible.  I would\ntell you everything, darling, about myself,\" she went on, nervously\nbuckling and unbuckling the ribbon round my waist, \"if my confidences\ncould only end there.  But they could not--they would lead me into\nconfidences about my husband too; and now I am married, I think I had\nbetter avoid them, for his sake, and for your sake, and for mine.  I\ndon't say that they would distress you, or distress me--I wouldn't have\nyou think that for the world.  But--I want to be so happy, now I have\ngot you back again, and I want you to be so happy too----\" She broke\noff abruptly, and looked round the room, my own sitting-room, in which\nwe were talking.  \"Ah!\" she cried, clapping her hands with a bright\nsmile of recognition, \"another old friend found already! Your\nbook-case, Marian--your dear-little-shabby-old-satin-wood\nbook-case--how glad I am you brought it with you from Limmeridge! And\nthe horrid heavy man's umbrella, that you always would walk out with\nwhen it rained! And first and foremost of all, your own dear, dark,\nclever, gipsy-face, looking at me just as usual! It is so like home\nagain to be here.  How can we make it more like home still? I will put\nmy father's portrait in your room instead of in mine--and I will keep\nall my little treasures from Limmeridge here--and we will pass hours\nand hours every day with these four friendly walls round us.  Oh,\nMarian!\" she said, suddenly seating herself on a footstool at my knees,\nand looking up earnestly in my face, \"promise you will never marry, and\nleave me.  It is selfish to say so, but you are so much better off as a\nsingle woman--unless--unless you are very fond of your husband--but\nyou won't be very fond of anybody but me, will you?\" She stopped again,\ncrossed my hands on my lap, and laid her face on them.  \"Have you been\nwriting many letters, and receiving many letters lately?\" she asked, in\nlow, suddenly-altered tones.  I understood what the question meant, but\nI thought it my duty not to encourage her by meeting her half way.\n\"Have you heard from him?\" she went on, coaxing me to forgive the more\ndirect appeal on which she now ventured, by kissing my hands, upon\nwhich her face still rested. \"Is he well and happy, and getting on in\nhis profession? Has he recovered himself--and forgotten me?\"\n\nShe should not have asked those questions.  She should have remembered\nher own resolution, on the morning when Sir Percival held her to her\nmarriage engagement, and when she resigned the book of Hartright's\ndrawings into my hands for ever.  But, ah me! where is the faultless\nhuman creature who can persevere in a good resolution, without\nsometimes failing and falling back? Where is the woman who has ever\nreally torn from her heart the image that has been once fixed in it by\na true love? Books tell us that such unearthly creatures have\nexisted--but what does our own experience say in answer to books?\n\nI made no attempt to remonstrate with her: perhaps, because I sincerely\nappreciated the fearless candour which let me see, what other women in\nher position might have had reasons for concealing even from their\ndearest friends--perhaps, because I felt, in my own heart and\nconscience, that in her place I should have asked the same questions\nand had the same thoughts.  All I could honestly do was to reply that I\nhad not written to him or heard from him lately, and then to turn the\nconversation to less dangerous topics.\n\nThere has been much to sadden me in our interview--my first\nconfidential interview with her since her return.  The change which her\nmarriage has produced in our relations towards each other, by placing a\nforbidden subject between us, for the first time in our lives; the\nmelancholy conviction of the dearth of all warmth of feeling, of all\nclose sympathy, between her husband and herself, which her own\nunwilling words now force on my mind; the distressing discovery that\nthe influence of that ill-fated attachment still remains (no matter how\ninnocently, how harmlessly) rooted as deeply as ever in her heart--all\nthese are disclosures to sadden any woman who loves her as dearly, and\nfeels for her as acutely, as I do.\n\nThere is only one consolation to set against them--a consolation that\nought to comfort me, and that does comfort me.  All the graces and\ngentleness of her character--all the frank affection of her nature--all\nthe sweet, simple, womanly charms which used to make her the darling\nand delight of every one who approached her, have come back to me with\nherself.  Of my other impressions I am sometimes a little inclined to\ndoubt.  Of this last, best, happiest of all impressions, I grow more\nand more certain every hour in the day.\n\nLet me turn, now, from her to her travelling companions.  Her husband\nmust engage my attention first.  What have I observed in Sir Percival,\nsince his return, to improve my opinion of him?\n\nI can hardly say.  Small vexations and annoyances seem to have beset\nhim since he came back, and no man, under those circumstances, is ever\npresented at his best.  He looks, as I think, thinner than he was when\nhe left England.  His wearisome cough and his comfortless restlessness\nhave certainly increased. His manner--at least his manner towards\nme--is much more abrupt than it used to be.  He greeted me, on the\nevening of his return, with little or nothing of the ceremony and\ncivility of former times--no polite speeches of welcome--no appearance\nof extraordinary gratification at seeing me--nothing but a short shake\nof the hand, and a sharp \"How-d'ye-do, Miss Halcombe--glad to see you\nagain.\" He seemed to accept me as one of the necessary fixtures of\nBlackwater Park, to be satisfied at finding me established in my proper\nplace, and then to pass me over altogether.\n\nMost men show something of their disposition in their own houses, which\nthey have concealed elsewhere, and Sir Percival has already displayed a\nmania for order and regularity, which is quite a new revelation of him,\nso far as my previous knowledge of his character is concerned.  If I\ntake a book from the library and leave it on the table, he follows me\nand puts it back again.  If I rise from a chair, and let it remain\nwhere I have been sitting, he carefully restores it to its proper place\nagainst the wall.  He picks up stray flower-blossoms from the carpet,\nand mutters to himself as discontentedly as if they were hot cinders\nburning holes in it, and he storms at the servants if there is a crease\nin the tablecloth, or a knife missing from its place at the dinner-table,\nas fiercely as if they had personally insulted him.\n\nI have already referred to the small annoyances which appear to have\ntroubled him since his return.  Much of the alteration for the worse\nwhich I have noticed in him may be due to these.  I try to persuade\nmyself that it is so, because I am anxious not to be disheartened\nalready about the future.  It is certainly trying to any man's temper\nto be met by a vexation the moment he sets foot in his own house again,\nafter a long absence, and this annoying circumstance did really happen\nto Sir Percival in my presence.\n\nOn the evening of their arrival the housekeeper followed me into the\nhall to receive her master and mistress and their guests.  The instant\nhe saw her, Sir Percival asked if any one had called lately.  The\nhousekeeper mentioned to him, in reply, what she had previously\nmentioned to me, the visit of the strange gentleman to make inquiries\nabout the time of her master's return.  He asked immediately for the\ngentleman's name.  No name had been left.  The gentleman's business? No\nbusiness had been mentioned.  What was the gentleman like? The\nhousekeeper tried to describe him, but failed to distinguish the\nnameless visitor by any personal peculiarity which her master could\nrecognise.  Sir Percival frowned, stamped angrily on the floor, and\nwalked on into the house, taking no notice of anybody.  Why he should\nhave been so discomposed by a trifle I cannot say--but he was seriously\ndiscomposed, beyond all doubt.\n\nUpon the whole, it will be best, perhaps, if I abstain from forming a\ndecisive opinion of his manners, language, and conduct in his own\nhouse, until time has enabled him to shake off the anxieties, whatever\nthey may be, which now evidently troubled his mind in secret.  I will\nturn over to a new page, and my pen shall let Laura's husband alone for\nthe present.\n\nThe two guests--the Count and Countess Fosco--come next in my\ncatalogue.  I will dispose of the Countess first, so as to have done\nwith the woman as soon as possible.\n\nLaura was certainly not chargeable with any exaggeration, in writing me\nword that I should hardly recognise her aunt again when we met.  Never\nbefore have I beheld such a change produced in a woman by her marriage\nas has been produced in Madame Fosco.\n\nAs Eleanor Fairlie (aged seven-and-thirty), she was always talking\npretentious nonsense, and always worrying the unfortunate men with\nevery small exaction which a vain and foolish woman can impose on\nlong-suffering male humanity.  As Madame Fosco (aged three-and-forty),\nshe sits for hours together without saying a word, frozen up in the\nstrangest manner in herself.  The hideously ridiculous love-locks which\nused to hang on either side of her face are now replaced by stiff\nlittle rows of very short curls, of the sort one sees in old-fashioned\nwigs.  A plain, matronly cap covers her head, and makes her look, for\nthe first time in her life since I remember her, like a decent woman.\nNobody (putting her husband out of the question, of course) now sees in\nher, what everybody once saw--I mean the structure of the female\nskeleton, in the upper regions of the collar-bones and the\nshoulder-blades.  Clad in quiet black or grey gowns, made high round\nthe throat--dresses that she would have laughed at, or screamed at, as\nthe whim of the moment inclined her, in her maiden days--she sits\nspeechless in corners; her dry white hands (so dry that the pores of\nher skin look chalky) incessantly engaged, either in monotonous\nembroidery work or in rolling up endless cigarettes for the Count's own\nparticular smoking.  On the few occasions when her cold blue eyes are\noff her work, they are generally turned on her husband, with the look\nof mute submissive inquiry which we are all familiar with in the eyes\nof a faithful dog.  The only approach to an inward thaw which I have\nyet detected under her outer covering of icy constraint, has betrayed\nitself, once or twice, in the form of a suppressed tigerish jealousy of\nany woman in the house (the maids included) to whom the Count speaks,\nor on whom he looks with anything approaching to special interest or\nattention.  Except in this one particular, she is always, morning,\nnoon, and night, indoors and out, fair weather or foul, as cold as a\nstatue, and as impenetrable as the stone out of which it is cut.  For\nthe common purposes of society the extraordinary change thus produced\nin her is, beyond all doubt, a change for the better, seeing that it\nhas transformed her into a civil, silent, unobtrusive woman, who is\nnever in the way.  How far she is really reformed or deteriorated in\nher secret self, is another question.  I have once or twice seen sudden\nchanges of expression on her pinched lips, and heard sudden inflexions\nof tone in her calm voice, which have led me to suspect that her\npresent state of suppression may have sealed up something dangerous in\nher nature, which used to evaporate harmlessly in the freedom of her\nformer life.  It is quite possible that I may be altogether wrong in\nthis idea.  My own impression, however, is, that I am right.  Time will\nshow.\n\nAnd the magician who has wrought this wonderful transformation--the\nforeign husband who has tamed this once wayward English woman till her\nown relations hardly know her again--the Count himself? What of the\nCount?\n\nThis in two words: He looks like a man who could tame anything. If he\nhad married a tigress, instead of a woman, he would have tamed the\ntigress.  If he had married me, I should have made his cigarettes, as\nhis wife does--I should have held my tongue when he looked at me, as\nshe holds hers.\n\nI am almost afraid to confess it, even to these secret pages.  The man\nhas interested me, has attracted me, has forced me to like him.  In two\nshort days he has made his way straight into my favourable estimation,\nand how he has worked the miracle is more than I can tell.\n\nIt absolutely startles me, now he is in my mind, to find how plainly I\nsee him!--how much more plainly than I see Sir Percival, or Mr.\nFairlie, or Walter Hartright, or any other absent person of whom I\nthink, with the one exception of Laura herself! I can hear his voice,\nas if he was speaking at this moment.  I know what his conversation was\nyesterday, as well as if I was hearing it now. How am I to describe\nhim? There are peculiarities in his personal appearance, his habits,\nand his amusements, which I should blame in the boldest terms, or\nridicule in the most merciless manner, if I had seen them in another\nman.  What is it that makes me unable to blame them, or to ridicule\nthem in HIM?\n\nFor example, he is immensely fat.  Before this time I have always\nespecially disliked corpulent humanity.  I have always maintained that\nthe popular notion of connecting excessive grossness of size and\nexcessive good-humour as inseparable allies was equivalent to\ndeclaring, either that no people but amiable people ever get fat, or\nthat the accidental addition of so many pounds of flesh has a directly\nfavourable influence over the disposition of the person on whose body\nthey accumulate.  I have invariably combated both these absurd\nassertions by quoting examples of fat people who were as mean, vicious,\nand cruel as the leanest and the worst of their neighbours.  I have\nasked whether Henry the Eighth was an amiable character?  Whether Pope\nAlexander the Sixth was a good man? Whether Mr. Murderer and Mrs.\nMurderess Manning were not both unusually stout people? Whether hired\nnurses, proverbially as cruel a set of women as are to be found in all\nEngland, were not, for the most part, also as fat a set of women as are\nto be found in all England?--and so on, through dozens of other\nexamples, modern and ancient, native and foreign, high and low.\nHolding these strong opinions on the subject with might and main as I\ndo at this moment, here, nevertheless, is Count Fosco, as fat as Henry\nthe Eighth himself, established in my favour, at one day's notice,\nwithout let or hindrance from his own odious corpulence. Marvellous\nindeed!\n\nIs it his face that has recommended him?\n\nIt may be his face.  He is a most remarkable likeness, on a large\nscale, of the great Napoleon.  His features have Napoleon's magnificent\nregularity--his expression recalls the grandly calm, immovable power of\nthe Great Soldier's face.  This striking resemblance certainly\nimpressed me, to begin with; but there is something in him besides the\nresemblance, which has impressed me more.  I think the influence I am\nnow trying to find is in his eyes.  They are the most unfathomable grey\neyes I ever saw, and they have at times a cold, clear, beautiful,\nirresistible glitter in them which forces me to look at him, and yet\ncauses me sensations, when I do look, which I would rather not feel.\nOther parts of his face and head have their strange peculiarities.  His\ncomplexion, for instance, has a singular sallow-fairness, so much at\nvariance with the dark-brown colour of his hair, that I suspect the\nhair of being a wig, and his face, closely shaven all over, is smoother\nand freer from all marks and wrinkles than mine, though (according to\nSir Percival's account of him) he is close on sixty years of age.  But\nthese are not the prominent personal characteristics which distinguish\nhim, to my mind, from all the other men I have ever seen.  The marked\npeculiarity which singles him out from the rank and file of humanity\nlies entirely, so far as I can tell at present, in the extraordinary\nexpression and extraordinary power of his eyes.\n\nHis manner and his command of our language may also have assisted him,\nin some degree, to establish himself in my good opinion.  He has that\nquiet deference, that look of pleased, attentive interest in listening\nto a woman, and that secret gentleness in his voice in speaking to a\nwoman, which, say what we may, we can none of us resist.  Here, too,\nhis unusual command of the English language necessarily helps him.  I\nhad often heard of the extraordinary aptitude which many Italians show\nin mastering our strong, hard, Northern speech; but, until I saw Count\nFosco, I had never supposed it possible that any foreigner could have\nspoken English as he speaks it.  There are times when it is almost\nimpossible to detect by his accent that he is not a countryman of our\nown, and as for fluency, there are very few born Englishmen who can\ntalk with as few stoppages and repetitions as the Count.  He may\nconstruct his sentences more or less in the foreign way, but I have\nnever yet heard him use a wrong expression, or hesitate for a moment in\nhis choice of a word.\n\nAll the smallest characteristics of this strange man have something\nstrikingly original and perplexingly contradictory in them.  Fat as he\nis and old as he is, his movements are astonishingly light and easy.\nHe is as noiseless in a room as any of us women, and more than that,\nwith all his look of unmistakable mental firmness and power, he is as\nnervously sensitive as the weakest of us.  He starts at chance noises\nas inveterately as Laura herself.  He winced and shuddered yesterday,\nwhen Sir Percival beat one of the spaniels, so that I felt ashamed of\nmy own want of tenderness and sensibility by comparison with the Count.\n\nThe relation of this last incident reminds me of one of his most\ncurious peculiarities, which I have not yet mentioned--his\nextraordinary fondness for pet animals.\n\nSome of these he has left on the Continent, but he has brought with him\nto this house a cockatoo, two canary-birds, and a whole family of white\nmice.  He attends to all the necessities of these strange favourites\nhimself, and he has taught the creatures to be surprisingly fond of him\nand familiar with him.  The cockatoo, a most vicious and treacherous\nbird towards every one else, absolutely seems to love him.  When he\nlets it out of its cage, it hops on to his knee, and claws its way up\nhis great big body, and rubs its top-knot against his sallow double\nchin in the most caressing manner imaginable.  He has only to set the\ndoors of the canaries' cages open, and to call them, and the pretty\nlittle cleverly trained creatures perch fearlessly on his hand, mount\nhis fat outstretched fingers one by one, when he tells them to \"go\nupstairs,\" and sing together as if they would burst their throats with\ndelight when they get to the top finger.  His white mice live in a\nlittle pagoda of gaily-painted wirework, designed and made by himself.\nThey are almost as tame as the canaries, and they are perpetually let\nout like the canaries.  They crawl all over him, popping in and out of\nhis waistcoat, and sitting in couples, white as snow, on his capacious\nshoulders.  He seems to be even fonder of his mice than of his other\npets, smiles at them, and kisses them, and calls them by all sorts of\nendearing names.  If it be possible to suppose an Englishman with any\ntaste for such childish interests and amusements as these, that\nEnglishman would certainly feel rather ashamed of them, and would be\nanxious to apologise for them, in the company of grown-up people.  But\nthe Count, apparently, sees nothing ridiculous in the amazing contrast\nbetween his colossal self and his frail little pets.  He would blandly\nkiss his white mice and twitter to his canary-birds amid an assembly of\nEnglish fox-hunters, and would only pity them as barbarians when they\nwere all laughing their loudest at him.\n\nIt seems hardly credible while I am writing it down, but it is\ncertainly true, that this same man, who has all the fondness of an old\nmaid for his cockatoo, and all the small dexterities of an organ-boy in\nmanaging his white mice, can talk, when anything happens to rouse him,\nwith a daring independence of thought, a knowledge of books in every\nlanguage, and an experience of society in half the capitals of Europe,\nwhich would make him the prominent personage of any assembly in the\ncivilised world.  This trainer of canary-birds, this architect of a\npagoda for white mice, is (as Sir Percival himself has told me) one of\nthe first experimental chemists living, and has discovered, among other\nwonderful inventions, a means of petrifying the body after death, so as\nto preserve it, as hard as marble, to the end of time.  This fat,\nindolent, elderly man, whose nerves are so finely strung that he starts\nat chance noises, and winces when he sees a house-spaniel get a\nwhipping, went into the stable-yard on the morning after his arrival,\nand put his hand on the head of a chained bloodhound--a beast so savage\nthat the very groom who feeds him keeps out of his reach.  His wife and\nI were present, and I shall not forget the scene that followed, short\nas it was.\n\n\"Mind that dog, sir,\" said the groom; \"he flies at everybody!\" \"He does\nthat, my friend,\" replied the Count quietly, \"because everybody is\nafraid of him.  Let us see if he flies at me.\" And he laid his plump,\nyellow-white fingers, on which the canary-birds had been perching ten\nminutes before, upon the formidable brute's head, and looked him\nstraight in the eyes.  \"You big dogs are all cowards,\" he said,\naddressing the animal contemptuously, with his face and the dog's\nwithin an inch of each other.  \"You would kill a poor cat, you infernal\ncoward.  You would fly at a starving beggar, you infernal coward.\nAnything that you can surprise unawares--anything that is afraid of\nyour big body, and your wicked white teeth, and your slobbering,\nbloodthirsty mouth, is the thing you like to fly at.  You could\nthrottle me at this moment, you mean, miserable bully, and you daren't\nso much as look me in the face, because I'm not afraid of you.  Will\nyou think better of it, and try your teeth in my fat neck? Bah! not\nyou!\" He turned away, laughing at the astonishment of the men in the\nyard, and the dog crept back meekly to his kennel.  \"Ah! my nice\nwaistcoat!\" he said pathetically.  \"I am sorry I came here.  Some of\nthat brute's slobber has got on my pretty clean waistcoat.\" Those words\nexpress another of his incomprehensible oddities.  He is as fond of\nfine clothes as the veriest fool in existence, and has appeared in four\nmagnificent waistcoats already--all of light garish colours, and all\nimmensely large even for him--in the two days of his residence at\nBlackwater Park.\n\nHis tact and cleverness in small things are quite as noticeable as the\nsingular inconsistencies in his character, and the childish triviality\nof his ordinary tastes and pursuits.\n\nI can see already that he means to live on excellent terms with all of\nus during the period of his sojourn in this place.  He has evidently\ndiscovered that Laura secretly dislikes him (she confessed as much to\nme when I pressed her on the subject)--but he has also found out that\nshe is extravagantly fond of flowers. Whenever she wants a nosegay he\nhas got one to give her, gathered and arranged by himself, and greatly\nto my amusement, he is always cunningly provided with a duplicate,\ncomposed of exactly the same flowers, grouped in exactly the same way,\nto appease his icily jealous wife before she can so much as think\nherself aggrieved. His management of the Countess (in public) is a\nsight to see.  He bows to her, he habitually addresses her as \"my\nangel,\" he carries his canaries to pay her little visits on his fingers\nand to sing to her, he kisses her hand when she gives him his\ncigarettes; he presents her with sugar-plums in return, which he puts\ninto her mouth playfully, from a box in his pocket.  The rod of iron\nwith which he rules her never appears in company--it is a private rod,\nand is always kept upstairs.\n\nHis method of recommending himself to me is entirely different. He\nflatters my vanity by talking to me as seriously and sensibly as if I\nwas a man.  Yes! I can find him out when I am away from him--I know he\nflatters my vanity, when I think of him up here in my own room--and\nyet, when I go downstairs, and get into his company again, he will\nblind me again, and I shall be flattered again, just as if I had never\nfound him out at all! He can manage me as he manages his wife and\nLaura, as he managed the bloodhound in the stable-yard, as he manages\nSir Percival himself, every hour in the day.  \"My good Percival! how I\nlike your rough English humour!\"--\"My good Percival! how I enjoy your\nsolid English sense!\" He puts the rudest remarks Sir Percival can make\non his effeminate tastes and amusements quietly away from him in that\nmanner--always calling the baronet by his Christian name, smiling at\nhim with the calmest superiority, patting him on the shoulder, and\nbearing with him benignantly, as a good-humoured father bears with a\nwayward son.\n\nThe interest which I really cannot help feeling in this strangely\noriginal man has led me to question Sir Percival about his past life.\n\nSir Percival either knows little, or will tell me little, about it.  He\nand the Count first met many years ago, at Rome, under the dangerous\ncircumstances to which I have alluded elsewhere.  Since that time they\nhave been perpetually together in London, in Paris, and in Vienna--but\nnever in Italy again; the Count having, oddly enough, not crossed the\nfrontiers of his native country for years past.  Perhaps he has been\nmade the victim of some political persecution? At all events, he seems\nto be patriotically anxious not to lose sight of any of his own\ncountrymen who may happen to be in England.  On the evening of his\narrival he asked how far we were from the nearest town, and whether we\nknew of any Italian gentlemen who might happen to be settled there.  He\nis certainly in correspondence with people on the Continent, for his\nletters have all sorts of odd stamps on them, and I saw one for him\nthis morning, waiting in his place at the breakfast-table, with a huge,\nofficial-looking seal on it.  Perhaps he is in correspondence with his\ngovernment? And yet, that is hardly to be reconciled either with my\nother idea that he may be a political exile.\n\nHow much I seem to have written about Count Fosco! And what does it all\namount to?--as poor, dear Mr. Gilmore would ask, in his impenetrable\nbusiness-like way I can only repeat that I do assuredly feel, even on\nthis short acquaintance, a strange, half-willing, half-unwilling\nliking for the Count.  He seems to have established over me the same\nsort of ascendency which he has evidently gained over Sir Percival.\nFree, and even rude, as he may occasionally be in his manner towards\nhis fat friend, Sir Percival is nevertheless afraid, as I can plainly\nsee, of giving any serious offence to the Count.  I wonder whether I am\nafraid too? I certainly never saw a man, in all my experience, whom I\nshould be so sorry to have for an enemy.  Is this because I like him,\nor because I am afraid of him? Chi sa?--as Count Fosco might say in his\nown language.  Who knows?\n\n\nJune 16th.--Something to chronicle to-day besides my own ideas and\nimpressions.  A visitor has arrived--quite unknown to Laura and to me,\nand apparently quite unexpected by Sir Percival.\n\nWe were all at lunch, in the room with the new French windows that open\ninto the verandah, and the Count (who devours pastry as I have never\nyet seen it devoured by any human beings but girls at boarding-schools)\nhad just amused us by asking gravely for his fourth tart--when the\nservant entered to announce the visitor.\n\n\"Mr. Merriman has just come, Sir Percival, and wishes to see you\nimmediately.\"\n\nSir Percival started, and looked at the man with an expression of angry\nalarm.\n\n\"Mr. Merriman!\" he repeated, as if he thought his own ears must have\ndeceived him.\n\n\"Yes, Sir Percival--Mr. Merriman, from London.\"\n\n\"Where is he?\"\n\n\"In the library, Sir Percival.\"\n\nHe left the table the instant the last answer was given, and hurried\nout of the room without saying a word to any of us.\n\n\"Who is Mr. Merriman?\" asked Laura, appealing to me.\n\n\"I have not the least idea,\" was all I could say in reply.\n\nThe Count had finished his fourth tart, and had gone to a side-table\nto look after his vicious cockatoo.  He turned round to us with the\nbird perched on his shoulder.\n\n\"Mr. Merriman is Sir Percival's solicitor,\" he said quietly.\n\nSir Percival's solicitor.  It was a perfectly straightforward answer to\nLaura's question, and yet, under the circumstances, it was not\nsatisfactory.  If Mr. Merriman had been specially sent for by his\nclient, there would have been nothing very wonderful in his leaving\ntown to obey the summons.  But when a lawyer travels from London to\nHampshire without being sent for, and when his arrival at a gentleman's\nhouse seriously startles the gentleman himself, it may be safely taken\nfor granted that the legal visitor is the bearer of some very important\nand very unexpected news--news which may be either very good or very\nbad, but which cannot, in either case, be of the common everyday kind.\n\nLaura and I sat silent at the table for a quarter of an hour or more,\nwondering uneasily what had happened, and waiting for the chance of Sir\nPercival's speedy return.  There were no signs of his return, and we\nrose to leave the room.\n\nThe Count, attentive as usual, advanced from the corner in which he had\nbeen feeding his cockatoo, with the bird still perched on his shoulder,\nand opened the door for us.  Laura and Madame Fosco went out first.\nJust as I was on the point of following them he made a sign with his\nhand, and spoke to me, before I passed him, in the oddest manner.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said, quietly answering the unexpressed idea at that moment\nin my mind, as if I had plainly confided it to him in so many\nwords--\"yes, Miss Halcombe, something HAS happened.\"\n\nI was on the point of answering, \"I never said so,\" but the vicious\ncockatoo ruffled his clipped wings and gave a screech that set all my\nnerves on edge in an instant, and made me only too glad to get out of\nthe room.\n\nI joined Laura at the foot of the stairs.  The thought in her mind was\nthe same as the thought in mine, which Count Fosco had surprised, and\nwhen she spoke her words were almost the echo of his.  She, too, said\nto me secretly that she was afraid something had happened.\n\n\n\nIII\n\nJune 16th.--I have a few lines more to add to this day's entry before I\ngo to bed to-night.\n\nAbout two hours after Sir Percival rose from the luncheon-table to\nreceive his solicitor, Mr. Merriman, in the library, I left my room\nalone to take a walk in the plantations.  Just as I was at the end of\nthe landing the library door opened and the two gentlemen came out.\nThinking it best not to disturb them by appearing on the stairs, I\nresolved to defer going down till they had crossed the hall.  Although\nthey spoke to each other in guarded tones, their words were pronounced\nwith sufficient distinctness of utterance to reach my ears.\n\n\"Make your mind easy, Sir Percival,\" I heard the lawyer say; \"it all\nrests with Lady Glyde.\"\n\nI had turned to go back to my own room for a minute or two, but the\nsound of Laura's name on the lips of a stranger stopped me instantly.\nI daresay it was very wrong and very discreditable to listen, but where\nis the woman, in the whole range of our sex, who can regulate her\nactions by the abstract principles of honour, when those principles\npoint one way, and when her affections, and the interests which grow\nout of them, point the other?\n\nI listened--and under similar circumstances I would listen again--yes!\nwith my ear at the keyhole, if I could not possibly manage it in any\nother way.\n\n\"You quite understand, Sir Percival,\" the lawyer went on.  \"Lady Glyde\nis to sign her name in the presence of a witness--or of two witnesses,\nif you wish to be particularly careful--and is then to put her finger\non the seal and say, 'I deliver this as my act and deed.' If that is\ndone in a week's time the arrangement will be perfectly successful, and\nthe anxiety will be all over.  If not----\"\n\n\"What do you mean by 'if not'?\" asked Sir Percival angrily.  \"If the\nthing must be done it SHALL be done.  I promise you that, Merriman.\"\n\n\"Just so, Sir Percival--just so; but there are two alternatives in all\ntransactions, and we lawyers like to look both of them in the face\nboldly.  If through any extraordinary circumstance the arrangement\nshould not be made, I think I may be able to get the parties to accept\nbills at three months.  But how the money is to be raised when the\nbills fall due----\"\n\n\"Damn the bills! The money is only to be got in one way, and in that\nway, I tell you again, it SHALL be got.  Take a glass of wine,\nMerriman, before you go.\"\n\n\"Much obliged, Sir Percival, I have not a moment to lose if I am to\ncatch the up-train.  You will let me know as soon as the arrangement is\ncomplete? and you will not forget the caution I recommended----\"\n\n\"Of course I won't.  There's the dog-cart at the door for you.  My\ngroom will get you to the station in no time.  Benjamin, drive like\nmad! Jump in.  If Mr. Merriman misses the train you lose your place.\nHold fast, Merriman, and if you are upset trust to the devil to save\nhis own.\" With that parting benediction the baronet turned about and\nwalked back to the library.\n\nI had not heard much, but the little that had reached my ears was\nenough to make me feel uneasy.  The \"something\" that \"had happened\" was\nbut too plainly a serious money embarrassment, and Sir Percival's\nrelief from it depended upon Laura.  The prospect of seeing her\ninvolved in her husband's secret difficulties filled me with dismay,\nexaggerated, no doubt, by my ignorance of business and my settled\ndistrust of Sir Percival.  Instead of going out, as I proposed, I went\nback immediately to Laura's room to tell her what I had heard.\n\nShe received my bad news so composedly as to surprise me.  She\nevidently knows more of her husband's character and her husband's\nembarrassments than I have suspected up to this time.\n\n\"I feared as much,\" she said, \"when I heard of that strange gentleman\nwho called, and declined to leave his name.\"\n\n\"Who do you think the gentleman was, then?\" I asked.\n\n\"Some person who has heavy claims on Sir Percival,\" she answered, \"and\nwho has been the cause of Mr. Merriman's visit here to-day.\"\n\n\"Do you know anything about those claims?\"\n\n\"No, I know no particulars.\"\n\n\"You will sign nothing, Laura, without first looking at it?\"\n\n\"Certainly not, Marian.  Whatever I can harmlessly and honestly do to\nhelp him I will do--for the sake of making your life and mine, love, as\neasy and as happy as possible.  But I will do nothing ignorantly, which\nwe might, one day, have reason to feel ashamed of.  Let us say no more\nabout it now.  You have got your hat on--suppose we go and dream away\nthe afternoon in the grounds?\"\n\nOn leaving the house we directed our steps to the nearest shade.\n\nAs we passed an open space among the trees in front of the house, there\nwas Count Fosco, slowly walking backwards and forwards on the grass,\nsunning himself in the full blaze of the hot June afternoon.  He had a\nbroad straw hat on, with a violet-coloured ribbon round it.  A blue\nblouse, with profuse white fancy-work over the bosom, covered his\nprodigious body, and was girt about the place where his waist might\nonce have been with a broad scarlet leather belt.  Nankeen trousers,\ndisplaying more white fancy-work over the ankles, and purple morocco\nslippers, adorned his lower extremities.  He was singing Figaro's\nfamous song in the Barber of Seville, with that crisply fluent\nvocalisation which is never heard from any other than an Italian\nthroat, accompanying himself on the concertina, which he played with\necstatic throwings-up of his arms, and graceful twistings and turnings\nof his head, like a fat St. Cecilia masquerading in male attire.\n\"Figaro qua! Figaro la! Figaro su! Figaro giu!\" sang the Count,\njauntily tossing up the concertina at arm's length, and bowing to us,\non one side of the instrument, with the airy grace and elegance of\nFigaro himself at twenty years of age.\n\n\"Take my word for it, Laura, that man knows something of Sir Percival's\nembarrassments,\" I said, as we returned the Count's salutation from a\nsafe distance.\n\n\"What makes you think that?\" she asked.\n\n\"How should he have known, otherwise, that Mr. Merriman was Sir\nPercival's solicitor?\" I rejoined.  \"Besides, when I followed you out\nof the luncheon-room, he told me, without a single word of inquiry on\nmy part, that something had happened.  Depend upon it, he knows more\nthan we do.\"\n\n\"Don't ask him any questions if he does.  Don't take him into our\nconfidence!\"\n\n\"You seem to dislike him, Laura, in a very determined manner. What has\nhe said or done to justify you?\"\n\n\"Nothing, Marian.  On the contrary, he was all kindness and attention\non our journey home, and he several times checked Sir Percival's\noutbreaks of temper, in the most considerate manner towards me.\nPerhaps I dislike him because he has so much more power over my husband\nthan I have.  Perhaps it hurts my pride to be under any obligations to\nhis interference.  All I know is, that I DO dislike him.\"\n\nThe rest of the day and evening passed quietly enough.  The Count and I\nplayed at chess.  For the first two games he politely allowed me to\nconquer him, and then, when he saw that I had found him out, begged my\npardon, and at the third game checkmated me in ten minutes.  Sir\nPercival never once referred, all through the evening, to the lawyer's\nvisit.  But either that event, or something else, had produced a\nsingular alteration for the better in him.  He was as polite and\nagreeable to all of us, as he used to be in the days of his probation\nat Limmeridge, and he was so amazingly attentive and kind to his wife,\nthat even icy Madame Fosco was roused into looking at him with a grave\nsurprise.  What does this mean? I think I can guess--I am afraid Laura\ncan guess--and I am sure Count Fosco knows.  I caught Sir Percival\nlooking at him for approval more than once in the course of the evening.\n\n\nJune 17th.--A day of events.  I most fervently hope I may not have to\nadd, a day of disasters as well.\n\nSir Percival was as silent at breakfast as he had been the evening\nbefore, on the subject of the mysterious \"arrangement\" (as the lawyer\ncalled it) which is hanging over our heads.  An hour afterwards,\nhowever, he suddenly entered the morning-room, where his wife and I\nwere waiting, with our hats on, for Madame Fosco to join us, and\ninquired for the Count.\n\n\"We expect to see him here directly,\" I said.\n\n\"The fact is,\" Sir Percival went on, walking nervously about the room,\n\"I want Fosco and his wife in the library, for a mere business\nformality, and I want you there, Laura, for a minute too.\" He stopped,\nand appeared to notice, for the first time, that we were in our walking\ncostume.  \"Have you just come in?\" he asked, \"or were you just going\nout?\"\n\n\"We were all thinking of going to the lake this morning,\" said Laura.\n\"But if you have any other arrangement to propose----\"\n\n\"No, no,\" he answered hastily.  \"My arrangement can wait.  After lunch\nwill do as well for it as after breakfast. All going to the lake, eh? A\ngood idea.  Let's have an idle morning--I'll be one of the party.\"\n\nThere was no mistaking his manner, even if it had been possible to\nmistake the uncharacteristic readiness which his words expressed, to\nsubmit his own plans and projects to the convenience of others. He was\nevidently relieved at finding any excuse for delaying the business\nformality in the library, to which his own words had referred.  My\nheart sank within me as I drew the inevitable inference.\n\nThe Count and his wife joined us at that moment.  The lady had her\nhusband's embroidered tobacco-pouch, and her store of paper in her\nhand, for the manufacture of the eternal cigarettes.  The gentleman,\ndressed, as usual, in his blouse and straw hat, carried the gay little\npagoda-cage, with his darling white mice in it, and smiled on them, and\non us, with a bland amiability which it was impossible to resist.\n\n\"With your kind permission,\" said the Count, \"I will take my small\nfamily here--my poor-little-harmless-pretty-Mouseys, out for an airing\nalong with us.  There are dogs about the house, and shall I leave my\nforlorn white children at the mercies of the dogs? Ah, never!\"\n\nHe chirruped paternally at his small white children through the bars of\nthe pagoda, and we all left the house for the lake.\n\nIn the plantation Sir Percival strayed away from us.  It seems to be\npart of his restless disposition always to separate himself from his\ncompanions on these occasions, and always to occupy himself when he is\nalone in cutting new walking-sticks for his own use.  The mere act of\ncutting and lopping at hazard appears to please him.  He has filled the\nhouse with walking-sticks of his own making, not one of which he ever\ntakes up for a second time. When they have been once used his interest\nin them is all exhausted, and he thinks of nothing but going on and\nmaking more.\n\nAt the old boat-house he joined us again.  I will put down the\nconversation that ensued when we were all settled in our places exactly\nas it passed.  It is an important conversation, so far as I am\nconcerned, for it has seriously disposed me to distrust the influence\nwhich Count Fosco has exercised over my thoughts and feelings, and to\nresist it for the future as resolutely as I can.\n\nThe boat-house was large enough to hold us all, but Sir Percival\nremained outside trimming the last new stick with his pocket-axe. We\nthree women found plenty of room on the large seat.  Laura took her\nwork, and Madame Fosco began her cigarettes.  I, as usual, had nothing\nto do.  My hands always were, and always will be, as awkward as a\nman's.  The Count good-humouredly took a stool many sizes too small for\nhim, and balanced himself on it with his back against the side of the\nshed, which creaked and groaned under his weight.  He put the\npagoda-cage on his lap, and let out the mice to crawl over him as\nusual.  They are pretty, innocent-looking little creatures, but the\nsight of them creeping about a man's body is for some reason not\npleasant to me.  It excites a strange responsive creeping in my own\nnerves, and suggests hideous ideas of men dying in prison with the\ncrawling creatures of the dungeon preying on them undisturbed.\n\nThe morning was windy and cloudy, and the rapid alternations of shadow\nand sunlight over the waste of the lake made the view look doubly wild,\nweird, and gloomy.\n\n\"Some people call that picturesque,\" said Sir Percival, pointing over\nthe wide prospect with his half-finished walking-stick.  \"I call it a\nblot on a gentleman's property.  In my great-grandfather's time the\nlake flowed to this place.  Look at it now! It is not four feet deep\nanywhere, and it is all puddles and pools.  I wish I could afford to\ndrain it, and plant it all over. My bailiff (a superstitious idiot)\nsays he is quite sure the lake has a curse on it, like the Dead Sea.\nWhat do you think, Fosco? It looks just the place for a murder, doesn't\nit?\"\n\n\"My good Percival,\" remonstrated the Count.  \"What is your solid\nEnglish sense thinking of? The water is too shallow to hide the body,\nand there is sand everywhere to print off the murderer's footsteps.  It\nis, upon the whole, the very worst place for a murder that I ever set\nmy eyes on.\"\n\n\"Humbug!\" said Sir Percival, cutting away fiercely at his stick. \"You\nknow what I mean.  The dreary scenery, the lonely situation. If you\nchoose to understand me, you can--if you don't choose, I am not going\nto trouble myself to explain my meaning.\"\n\n\"And why not,\" asked the Count, \"when your meaning can be explained by\nanybody in two words? If a fool was going to commit a murder, your lake\nis the first place he would choose for it.  If a wise man was going to\ncommit a murder, your lake is the last place he would choose for it.\nIs that your meaning? If it is, there is your explanation for you ready\nmade.  Take it, Percival, with your good Fosco's blessing.\"\n\nLaura looked at the Count with her dislike for him appearing a little\ntoo plainly in her face.  He was so busy with his mice that he did not\nnotice her.\n\n\"I am sorry to hear the lake-view connected with anything so horrible\nas the idea of murder,\" she said.  \"And if Count Fosco must divide\nmurderers into classes, I think he has been very unfortunate in his\nchoice of expressions.  To describe them as fools only seems like\ntreating them with an indulgence to which they have no claim.  And to\ndescribe them as wise men sounds to me like a downright contradiction\nin terms.  I have always heard that truly wise men are truly good men,\nand have a horror of crime.\"\n\n\"My dear lady,\" said the Count, \"those are admirable sentiments, and I\nhave seen them stated at the tops of copy-books.\" He lifted one of the\nwhite mice in the palm of his hand, and spoke to it in his whimsical\nway.  \"My pretty little smooth white rascal,\" he said, \"here is a moral\nlesson for you.  A truly wise mouse is a truly good mouse.  Mention\nthat, if you please, to your companions, and never gnaw at the bars of\nyour cage again as long as you live.\"\n\n\"It is easy to turn everything into ridicule,\" said Laura resolutely;\n\"but you will not find it quite so easy, Count Fosco, to give me an\ninstance of a wise man who has been a great criminal.\"\n\nThe Count shrugged his huge shoulders, and smiled on Laura in the\nfriendliest manner.\n\n\"Most true!\" he said.  \"The fool's crime is the crime that is found\nout, and the wise man's crime is the crime that is NOT found out.  If I\ncould give you an instance, it would not be the instance of a wise man.\nDear Lady Glyde, your sound English common sense has been too much for\nme.  It is checkmate for me this time, Miss Halcombe--ha?\"\n\n\"Stand to your guns, Laura,\" sneered Sir Percival, who had been\nlistening in his place at the door.  \"Tell him next, that crimes cause\ntheir own detection.  There's another bit of copy-book morality for\nyou, Fosco.  Crimes cause their own detection.  What infernal humbug!\"\n\n\"I believe it to be true,\" said Laura quietly.\n\nSir Percival burst out laughing, so violently, so outrageously, that he\nquite startled us all--the Count more than any of us.\n\n\"I believe it too,\" I said, coming to Laura's rescue.\n\nSir Percival, who had been unaccountably amused at his wife's remark,\nwas just as unaccountably irritated by mine.  He struck the new stick\nsavagely on the sand, and walked away from us.\n\n\"Poor dear Percival!\" cried Count Fosco, looking after him gaily, \"he\nis the victim of English spleen.  But, my dear Miss Halcombe, my dear\nLady Glyde, do you really believe that crimes cause their own\ndetection? And you, my angel,\" he continued, turning to his wife, who\nhad not uttered a word yet, \"do you think so too?\"\n\n\"I wait to be instructed,\" replied the Countess, in tones of freezing\nreproof, intended for Laura and me, \"before I venture on giving my\nopinion in the presence of well-informed men.\"\n\n\"Do you, indeed?\" I said.  \"I remember the time, Countess, when you\nadvocated the Rights of Women, and freedom of female opinion was one of\nthem.\"\n\n\"What is your view of the subject, Count?\" asked Madame Fosco, calmly\nproceeding with her cigarettes, and not taking the least notice of me.\n\nThe Count stroked one of his white mice reflectively with his chubby\nlittle finger before he answered.\n\n\"It is truly wonderful,\" he said, \"how easily Society can console\nitself for the worst of its shortcomings with a little bit of\nclap-trap.  The machinery it has set up for the detection of crime is\nmiserably ineffective--and yet only invent a moral epigram, saying that\nit works well, and you blind everybody to its blunders from that\nmoment.  Crimes cause their own detection, do they? And murder will out\n(another moral epigram), will it? Ask Coroners who sit at inquests in\nlarge towns if that is true, Lady Glyde.  Ask secretaries of\nlife-assurance companies if that is true, Miss Halcombe.  Read your own\npublic journals.  In the few cases that get into the newspapers, are\nthere not instances of slain bodies found, and no murderers ever\ndiscovered? Multiply the cases that are reported by the cases that are\nNOT reported, and the bodies that are found by the bodies that are NOT\nfound, and what conclusion do you come to? This.  That there are\nfoolish criminals who are discovered, and wise criminals who escape.\nThe hiding of a crime, or the detection of a crime, what is it? A trial\nof skill between the police on one side, and the individual on the\nother. When the criminal is a brutal, ignorant fool, the police in nine\ncases out of ten win.  When the criminal is a resolute, educated,\nhighly-intelligent man, the police in nine cases out of ten lose. If\nthe police win, you generally hear all about it.  If the police lose,\nyou generally hear nothing.  And on this tottering foundation you build\nup your comfortable moral maxim that Crime causes its own detection!\nYes--all the crime you know of.  And what of the rest?\"\n\n\"Devilish true, and very well put,\" cried a voice at the entrance of\nthe boat-house.  Sir Percival had recovered his equanimity, and had\ncome back while we were listening to the Count.\n\n\"Some of it may be true,\" I said, \"and all of it may be very well put.\nBut I don't see why Count Fosco should celebrate the victory of the\ncriminal over Society with so much exultation, or why you, Sir\nPercival, should applaud him so loudly for doing it.\"\n\n\"Do you hear that, Fosco?\" asked Sir Percival.  \"Take my advice, and\nmake your peace with your audience.  Tell them virtue's a fine\nthing--they like that, I can promise you.\"\n\nThe Count laughed inwardly and silently, and two of the white mice in\nhis waistcoat, alarmed by the internal convulsion going on beneath\nthem, darted out in a violent hurry, and scrambled into their cage\nagain.\n\n\"The ladies, my good Percival, shall tell me about virtue,\" he said.\n\"They are better authorities than I am, for they know what virtue is,\nand I don't.\"\n\n\"You hear him?\" said Sir Percival.  \"Isn't it awful?\"\n\n\"It is true,\" said the Count quietly.  \"I am a citizen of the world,\nand I have met, in my time, with so many different sorts of virtue,\nthat I am puzzled, in my old age, to say which is the right sort and\nwhich is the wrong.  Here, in England, there is one virtue.  And there,\nin China, there is another virtue.  And John Englishman says my virtue\nis the genuine virtue.  And John Chinaman says my virtue is the genuine\nvirtue.  And I say Yes to one, or No to the other, and am just as much\nbewildered about it in the case of John with the top-boots as I am in\nthe case of John with the pigtail.  Ah, nice little Mousey! come, kiss\nme.  What is your own private notion of a virtuous man, my\npret-pret-pretty? A man who keeps you warm, and gives you plenty to\neat.  And a good notion, too, for it is intelligible, at the least.\"\n\n\"Stay a minute, Count,\" I interposed.  \"Accepting your illustration,\nsurely we have one unquestionable virtue in England which is wanting in\nChina.  The Chinese authorities kill thousands of innocent people on\nthe most frivolous pretexts.  We in England are free from all guilt of\nthat kind--we commit no such dreadful crime--we abhor reckless\nbloodshed with all our hearts.\"\n\n\"Quite right, Marian,\" said Laura.  \"Well thought of, and well\nexpressed.\"\n\n\"Pray allow the Count to proceed,\" said Madame Fosco, with stern\ncivility.  \"You will find, young ladies, that HE never speaks without\nhaving excellent reasons for all that he says.\"\n\n\"Thank you, my angel,\" replied the Count.  \"Have a bon-bon?\" He took\nout of his pocket a pretty little inlaid box, and placed it open on the\ntable.  \"Chocolat a la Vanille,\" cried the impenetrable man, cheerfully\nrattling the sweetmeats in the box, and bowing all round.  \"Offered by\nFosco as an act of homage to the charming society.\"\n\n\"Be good enough to go on, Count,\" said his wife, with a spiteful\nreference to myself.  \"Oblige me by answering Miss Halcombe.\"\n\n\"Miss Halcombe is unanswerable,\" replied the polite Italian; \"that is\nto say, so far as she goes.  Yes! I agree with her.  John Bull does\nabhor the crimes of John Chinaman.  He is the quickest old gentleman at\nfinding out faults that are his neighbours', and the slowest old\ngentleman at finding out the faults that are his own, who exists on the\nface of creation.  Is he so very much better in this way than the\npeople whom he condemns in their way? English Society, Miss Halcombe,\nis as often the accomplice as it is the enemy of crime.  Yes! yes!\nCrime is in this country what crime is in other countries--a good\nfriend to a man and to those about him as often as it is an enemy.  A\ngreat rascal provides for his wife and family.  The worse he is the\nmore he makes them the objects for your sympathy.  He often provides\nalso for himself.  A profligate spendthrift who is always borrowing\nmoney will get more from his friends than the rigidly honest man who\nonly borrows of them once, under pressure of the direst want.  In the\none case the friends will not be at all surprised, and they will give.\nIn the other case they will be very much surprised, and they will\nhesitate.  Is the prison that Mr. Scoundrel lives in at the end of his\ncareer a more uncomfortable place than the workhouse that Mr. Honesty\nlives in at the end of his career? When John-Howard-Philanthropist\nwants to relieve misery he goes to find it in prisons, where crime is\nwretched--not in huts and hovels, where virtue is wretched too.  Who is\nthe English poet who has won the most universal sympathy--who makes the\neasiest of all subjects for pathetic writing and pathetic painting?\nThat nice young person who began life with a forgery, and ended it by a\nsuicide--your dear, romantic, interesting Chatterton.  Which gets on\nbest, do you think, of two poor starving dressmakers--the woman who\nresists temptation and is honest, or the woman who falls under\ntemptation and steals? You all know that the stealing is the making of\nthat second woman's fortune--it advertises her from length to breadth\nof good-humoured, charitable England--and she is relieved, as the\nbreaker of a commandment, when she would have been left to starve, as\nthe keeper of it.  Come here, my jolly little Mouse! Hey! presto! pass!\nI transform you, for the time being, into a respectable lady.  Stop\nthere, in the palm of my great big hand, my dear, and listen.  You\nmarry the poor man whom you love, Mouse, and one half your friends\npity, and the other half blame you.  And now, on the contrary, you sell\nyourself for gold to a man you don't care for, and all your friends\nrejoice over you, and a minister of public worship sanctions the base\nhorror of the vilest of all human bargains, and smiles and smirks\nafterwards at your table, if you are polite enough to ask him to\nbreakfast. Hey! presto! pass! Be a mouse again, and squeak.  If you\ncontinue to be a lady much longer, I shall have you telling me that\nSociety abhors crime--and then, Mouse, I shall doubt if your own eyes\nand ears are really of any use to you.  Ah! I am a bad man, Lady Glyde,\nam I not? I say what other people only think, and when all the rest of\nthe world is in a conspiracy to accept the mask for the true face, mine\nis the rash hand that tears off the plump pasteboard, and shows the\nbare bones beneath.  I will get up on my big elephant's legs, before I\ndo myself any more harm in your amiable estimations--I will get up and\ntake a little airy walk of my own.  Dear ladies, as your excellent\nSheridan said, I go--and leave my character behind me.\"\n\nHe got up, put the cage on the table, and paused for a moment to count\nthe mice in it.  \"One, two, three, four----Ha!\" he cried, with a look\nof horror, \"where, in the name of Heaven, is the fifth--the youngest,\nthe whitest, the most amiable of all--my Benjamin of mice!\"\n\nNeither Laura nor I were in any favorable disposition to be amused.\nThe Count's glib cynicism had revealed a new aspect of his nature from\nwhich we both recoiled.  But it was impossible to resist the comical\ndistress of so very large a man at the loss of so very small a mouse.\nWe laughed in spite of ourselves; and when Madame Fosco rose to set the\nexample of leaving the boat-house empty, so that her husband might\nsearch it to its remotest corners, we rose also to follow her out.\n\nBefore we had taken three steps, the Count's quick eye discovered the\nlost mouse under the seat that we had been occupying.  He pulled aside\nthe bench, took the little animal up in his hand, and then suddenly\nstopped, on his knees, looking intently at a particular place on the\nground just beneath him.\n\nWhen he rose to his feet again, his hand shook so that he could hardly\nput the mouse back in the cage, and his face was of a faint livid\nyellow hue all over.\n\n\"Percival!\" he said, in a whisper.  \"Percival! come here.\"\n\nSir Percival had paid no attention to any of us for the last ten\nminutes.  He had been entirely absorbed in writing figures on the sand,\nand then rubbing them out again with the point of his stick.\n\n\"What's the matter now?\" he asked, lounging carelessly into the\nboat-house.\n\n\"Do you see nothing there?\" said the Count, catching him nervously by\nthe collar with one hand, and pointing with the other to the place near\nwhich he had found the mouse.\n\n\"I see plenty of dry sand,\" answered Sir Percival, \"and a spot of dirt\nin the middle of it.\"\n\n\"Not dirt,\" whispered the Count, fastening the other hand suddenly on\nSir Percival's collar, and shaking it in his agitation. \"Blood.\"\n\nLaura was near enough to hear the last word, softly as he whispered it.\nShe turned to me with a look of terror.\n\n\"Nonsense, my dear,\" I said.  \"There is no need to be alarmed.  It is\nonly the blood of a poor little stray dog.\"\n\nEverybody was astonished, and everybody's eyes were fixed on me\ninquiringly.\n\n\"How do you know that?\" asked Sir Percival, speaking first.\n\n\"I found the dog here, dying, on the day when you all returned from\nabroad,\" I replied.  \"The poor creature had strayed into the\nplantation, and had been shot by your keeper.\"\n\n\"Whose dog was it?\" inquired Sir Percival.  \"Not one of mine?\"\n\n\"Did you try to save the poor thing?\" asked Laura earnestly. \"Surely\nyou tried to save it, Marian?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I said, \"the housekeeper and I both did our best--but the dog\nwas mortally wounded, and he died under our hands.\"\n\n\"Whose dog was it?\" persisted Sir Percival, repeating his question a\nlittle irritably.  \"One of mine?\"\n\n\"No, not one of yours.\"\n\n\"Whose then? Did the housekeeper know?\"\n\nThe housekeeper's report of Mrs. Catherick's desire to conceal her\nvisit to Blackwater Park from Sir Percival's knowledge recurred to my\nmemory the moment he put that last question, and I half doubted the\ndiscretion of answering it; but in my anxiety to quiet the general\nalarm, I had thoughtlessly advanced too far to draw back, except at the\nrisk of exciting suspicion, which might only make matters worse.  There\nwas nothing for it but to answer at once, without reference to results.\n\n\"Yes,\" I said.  \"The housekeeper knew.  She told me it was Mrs.\nCatherick's dog.\"\n\nSir Percival had hitherto remained at the inner end of the boat-house\nwith Count Fosco, while I spoke to him from the door.  But the instant\nMrs. Catherick's name passed my lips he pushed by the Count roughly,\nand placed himself face to face with me under the open daylight.\n\n\"How came the housekeeper to know it was Mrs. Catherick's dog?\" he\nasked, fixing his eyes on mine with a frowning interest and attention,\nwhich half angered, half startled me.\n\n\"She knew it,\" I said quietly, \"because Mrs. Catherick brought the dog\nwith her.\"\n\n\"Brought it with her? Where did she bring it with her?\"\n\n\"To this house.\"\n\n\"What the devil did Mrs. Catherick want at this house?\"\n\nThe manner in which he put the question was even more offensive than\nthe language in which he expressed it.  I marked my sense of his want\nof common politeness by silently turning away from him.\n\nJust as I moved the Count's persuasive hand was laid on his shoulder,\nand the Count's mellifluous voice interposed to quiet him.\n\n\"My dear Percival!--gently--gently!\"\n\nSir Percival looked round in his angriest manner.  The Count only\nsmiled and repeated the soothing application.\n\n\"Gently, my good friend--gently!\"\n\nSir Percival hesitated, followed me a few steps, and, to my great\nsurprise, offered me an apology.\n\n\"I beg your pardon, Miss Halcombe,\" he said.  \"I have been out of order\nlately, and I am afraid I am a little irritable.  But I should like to\nknow what Mrs. Catherick could possibly want here. When did she come?\nWas the housekeeper the only person who saw her?\"\n\n\"The only person,\" I answered, \"so far as I know.\"\n\nThe Count interposed again.\n\n\"In that case why not question the housekeeper?\" he said.  \"Why not go,\nPercival, to the fountain-head of information at once?\"\n\n\"Quite right!\" said Sir Percival.  \"Of course the housekeeper is the\nfirst person to question.  Excessively stupid of me not to see it\nmyself.\" With those words he instantly left us to return to the house.\n\nThe motive of the Count's interference, which had puzzled me at first,\nbetrayed itself when Sir Percival's back was turned.  He had a host of\nquestions to put to me about Mrs. Catherick, and the cause of her visit\nto Blackwater Park, which he could scarcely have asked in his friend's\npresence.  I made my answers as short as I civilly could, for I had\nalready determined to check the least approach to any exchanging of\nconfidences between Count Fosco and myself.  Laura, however,\nunconsciously helped him to extract all my information, by making\ninquiries herself, which left me no alternative but to reply to her, or\nto appear in the very unenviable and very false character of a\ndepositary of Sir Percival's secrets.  The end of it was, that, in\nabout ten minutes' time, the Count knew as much as I know of Mrs.\nCatherick, and of the events which have so strangely connected us with\nher daughter, Anne, from the time when Hartright met with her to this\nday.\n\nThe effect of my information on him was, in one respect, curious enough.\n\nIntimately as he knows Sir Percival, and closely as he appears to be\nassociated with Sir Percival's private affairs in general, he is\ncertainly as far as I am from knowing anything of the true story of\nAnne Catherick.  The unsolved mystery in connection with this unhappy\nwoman is now rendered doubly suspicious, in my eyes, by the absolute\nconviction which I feel, that the clue to it has been hidden by Sir\nPercival from the most intimate friend he has in the world.  It was\nimpossible to mistake the eager curiosity of the Count's look and\nmanner while he drank in greedily every word that fell from my lips.\nThere are many kinds of curiosity, I know--but there is no\nmisinterpreting the curiosity of blank surprise: if I ever saw it in my\nlife I saw it in the Count's face.\n\nWhile the questions and answers were going on, we had all been\nstrolling quietly back through the plantation.  As soon as we reached\nthe house the first object that we saw in front of it was Sir\nPercival's dog-cart, with the horse put to and the groom waiting by it\nin his stable-jacket.  If these unexpected appearances were to be\ntrusted, the examination of the house-keeper had produced important\nresults already.\n\n\"A fine horse, my friend,\" said the Count, addressing the groom with\nthe most engaging familiarity of manner, \"You are going to drive out?\"\n\n\"I am not going, sir,\" replied the man, looking at his stable-jacket,\nand evidently wondering whether the foreign gentleman took it for his\nlivery.  \"My master drives himself.\"\n\n\"Aha!\" said the Count, \"does he indeed? I wonder he gives himself the\ntrouble when he has got you to drive for him.  Is he going to fatigue\nthat nice, shining, pretty horse by taking him very far to-day?\"\n\n\"I don't know, sir,\" answered the man.  \"The horse is a mare, if you\nplease, sir.  She's the highest-couraged thing we've got in the\nstables.  Her name's Brown Molly, sir, and she'll go till she drops.\nSir Percival usually takes Isaac of York for the short distances.\"\n\n\"And your shining courageous Brown Molly for the long?\"\n\n\"Logical inference, Miss Halcombe,\" continued the Count, wheeling round\nbriskly, and addressing me.  \"Sir Percival is going a long distance\nto-day.\"\n\nI made no reply.  I had my own inferences to draw, from what I knew\nthrough the housekeeper and from what I saw before me, and I did not\nchoose to share them with Count Fosco.\n\nWhen Sir Percival was in Cumberland (I thought to myself), he walked\naway a long distance, on Anne's account, to question the family at\nTodd's Corner.  Now he is in Hampshire, is he going to drive away a\nlong distance, on Anne's account again, to question Mrs. Catherick at\nWelmingham?\n\nWe all entered the house.  As we crossed the hall Sir Percival came out\nfrom the library to meet us.  He looked hurried and pale and\nanxious--but for all that, he was in his most polite mood when he spoke\nto us.\n\n\"I am sorry to say I am obliged to leave you,\" he began--\"a long\ndrive--a matter that I can't very well put off.  I shall be back in\ngood time to-morrow--but before I go I should like that little\nbusiness-formality, which I spoke of this morning, to be settled.\nLaura, will you come into the library? It won't take a minute--a mere\nformality.  Countess, may I trouble you also? I want you and the\nCountess, Fosco, to be witnesses to a signature--nothing more. Come in\nat once and get it over.\"\n\nHe held the library door open until they had passed in, followed them,\nand shut it softly.\n\nI remained, for a moment afterwards, standing alone in the hall, with\nmy heart beating fast and my mind misgiving me sadly.  Then I went on\nto the staircase, and ascended slowly to my own room.\n\n\n\nIV\n\nJune 17th.--Just as my hand was on the door of my room, I heard Sir\nPercival's voice calling to me from below.\n\n\"I must beg you to come downstairs again,\" he said.  \"It is Fosco's\nfault, Miss Halcombe, not mine.  He has started some nonsensical\nobjection to his wife being one of the witnesses, and has obliged me to\nask you to join us in the library.\"\n\nI entered the room immediately with Sir Percival.  Laura was waiting by\nthe writing-table, twisting and turning her garden hat uneasily in her\nhands.  Madame Fosco sat near her, in an arm-chair, imperturbably\nadmiring her husband, who stood by himself at the other end of the\nlibrary, picking off the dead leaves from the flowers in the window.\n\nThe moment I appeared the Count advanced to meet me, and to offer his\nexplanations.\n\n\"A thousand pardons, Miss Halcombe,\" he said.  \"You know the character\nwhich is given to my countrymen by the English? We Italians are all\nwily and suspicious by nature, in the estimation of the good John Bull.\nSet me down, if you please, as being no better than the rest of my\nrace.  I am a wily Italian and a suspicious Italian.  You have thought\nso yourself, dear lady, have you not? Well! it is part of my wiliness\nand part of my suspicion to object to Madame Fosco being a witness to\nLady Glyde's signature, when I am also a witness myself.\"\n\n\"There is not the shadow of a reason for his objection,\" interposed Sir\nPercival.  \"I have explained to him that the law of England allows\nMadame Fosco to witness a signature as well as her husband.\"\n\n\"I admit it,\" resumed the Count.  \"The law of England says, Yes, but\nthe conscience of Fosco says, No.\" He spread out his fat fingers on the\nbosom of his blouse, and bowed solemnly, as if he wished to introduce\nhis conscience to us all, in the character of an illustrious addition\nto the society.  \"What this document which Lady Glyde is about to sign\nmay be,\" he continued, \"I neither know nor desire to know.  I only say\nthis, circumstances may happen in the future which may oblige Percival,\nor his representatives, to appeal to the two witnesses, in which case\nit is certainly desirable that those witnesses should represent two\nopinions which are perfectly independent the one of the other.  This\ncannot be if my wife signs as well as myself, because we have but one\nopinion between us, and that opinion is mine.  I will not have it cast\nin my teeth, at some future day, that Madame Fosco acted under my\ncoercion, and was, in plain fact, no witness at all.  I speak in\nPercival's interest, when I propose that my name shall appear (as the\nnearest friend of the husband), and your name, Miss Halcombe (as the\nnearest friend of the wife).  I am a Jesuit, if you please to think\nso--a splitter of straws--a man of trifles and crochets and\nscruples--but you will humour me, I hope, in merciful consideration for\nmy suspicious Italian character, and my uneasy Italian conscience.\" He\nbowed again, stepped back a few paces, and withdrew his conscience from\nour society as politely as he had introduced it.\n\nThe Count's scruples might have been honourable and reasonable enough,\nbut there was something in his manner of expressing them which\nincreased my unwillingness to be concerned in the business of the\nsignature.  No consideration of less importance than my consideration\nfor Laura would have induced me to consent to be a witness at all.  One\nlook, however, at her anxious face decided me to risk anything rather\nthan desert her.\n\n\"I will readily remain in the room,\" I said.  \"And if I find no reason\nfor starting any small scruples on my side, you may rely on me as a\nwitness.\"\n\nSir Percival looked at me sharply, as if he was about to say something.\nBut at the same moment, Madame Fosco attracted his attention by rising\nfrom her chair.  She had caught her husband's eye, and had evidently\nreceived her orders to leave the room.\n\n\"You needn't go,\" said Sir Percival.\n\nMadame Fosco looked for her orders again, got them again, said she\nwould prefer leaving us to our business, and resolutely walked out.\nThe Count lit a cigarette, went back to the flowers in the window, and\npuffed little jets of smoke at the leaves, in a state of the deepest\nanxiety about killing the insects.\n\nMeanwhile Sir Percival unlocked a cupboard beneath one of the\nbook-cases, and produced from it a piece of parchment, folded longwise,\nmany times over.  He placed it on the table, opened the last fold only,\nand kept his hand on the rest. The last fold displayed a strip of blank\nparchment with little wafers stuck on it at certain places.  Every line\nof the writing was hidden in the part which he still held folded up\nunder his hand.  Laura and I looked at each other.  Her face was pale,\nbut it showed no indecision and no fear.\n\nSir Percival dipped a pen in ink, and handed it to his wife. \"Sign your\nname there,\" he said, pointing to the place.  \"You and Fosco are to\nsign afterwards, Miss Halcombe, opposite those two wafers. Come here,\nFosco! witnessing a signature is not to be done by mooning out of\nwindow and smoking into the flowers.\"\n\nThe Count threw away his cigarette, and joined us at the table, with\nhis hands carelessly thrust into the scarlet belt of his blouse, and\nhis eyes steadily fixed on Sir Percival's face. Laura, who was on the\nother side of her husband, with the pen in her hand, looked at him too.\nHe stood between them holding the folded parchment down firmly on the\ntable, and glancing across at me, as I sat opposite to him, with such a\nsinister mixture of suspicion and embarrassment on his face that he\nlooked more like a prisoner at the bar than a gentleman in his own\nhouse.\n\n\"Sign there,\" he repeated, turning suddenly on Laura, and pointing once\nmore to the place on the parchment.\n\n\"What is it I am to sign?\" she asked quietly.\n\n\"I have no time to explain,\" he answered.  \"The dog-cart is at the\ndoor, and I must go directly.  Besides, if I had time, you wouldn't\nunderstand.  It is a purely formal document, full of legal\ntechnicalities, and all that sort of thing.  Come! come! sign your\nname, and let us have done as soon as possible.\"\n\n\"I ought surely to know what I am signing, Sir Percival, before I write\nmy name?\"\n\n\"Nonsense! What have women to do with business? I tell you again, you\ncan't understand it.\"\n\n\"At any rate, let me try to understand it.  Whenever Mr. Gilmore had\nany business for me to do, he always explained it first, and I always\nunderstood him.\"\n\n\"I dare say he did.  He was your servant, and was obliged to explain.\nI am your husband, and am NOT obliged.  How much longer do you mean to\nkeep me here? I tell you again, there is no time for reading\nanything--the dog-cart is waiting at the door.  Once for all, will you\nsign or will you not?\"\n\nShe still had the pen in her hand, but she made no approach to signing\nher name with it.\n\n\"If my signature pledges me to anything,\" she said, \"surely I have some\nclaim to know what that pledge is?\"\n\nHe lifted up the parchment, and struck it angrily on the table.\n\n\"Speak out!\" he said.  \"You were always famous for telling the truth.\nNever mind Miss Halcombe, never mind Fosco--say, in plain terms, you\ndistrust me.\"\n\nThe Count took one of his hands out of his belt and laid it on Sir\nPercival's shoulder.  Sir Percival shook it off irritably.  The Count\nput it on again with unruffled composure.\n\n\"Control your unfortunate temper, Percival,\" he said \"Lady Glyde is\nright.\"\n\n\"Right!\" cried Sir Percival.  \"A wife right in distrusting her husband!\"\n\n\"It is unjust and cruel to accuse me of distrusting you,\" said Laura.\n\"Ask Marian if I am not justified in wanting to know what this writing\nrequires of me before I sign it.\"\n\n\"I won't have any appeals made to Miss Halcombe,\" retorted Sir\nPercival.  \"Miss Halcombe has nothing to do with the matter.\"\n\nI had not spoken hitherto, and I would much rather not have spoken now.\nBut the expression of distress in Laura's face when she turned it\ntowards me, and the insolent injustice of her husband's conduct, left\nme no other alternative than to give my opinion, for her sake, as soon\nas I was asked for it.\n\n\"Excuse me, Sir Percival,\" I said--\"but as one of the witnesses to the\nsignature, I venture to think that I HAVE something to do with the\nmatter.  Laura's objection seems to me a perfectly fair one, and\nspeaking for myself only, I cannot assume the responsibility of\nwitnessing her signature, unless she first understands what the writing\nis which you wish her to sign.\"\n\n\"A cool declaration, upon my soul!\" cried Sir Percival.  \"The next time\nyou invite yourself to a man's house, Miss Halcombe, I recommend you\nnot to repay his hospitality by taking his wife's side against him in a\nmatter that doesn't concern you.\"\n\nI started to my feet as suddenly as if he had struck me.  If I had been\na man, I would have knocked him down on the threshold of his own door,\nand have left his house, never on any earthly consideration to enter it\nagain.  But I was only a woman--and I loved his wife so dearly!\n\nThank God, that faithful love helped me, and I sat down again without\nsaying a word.  SHE knew what I had suffered and what I had suppressed.\nShe ran round to me, with the tears streaming from her eyes.  \"Oh,\nMarian!\" she whispered softly.  \"If my mother had been alive, she could\nhave done no more for me!\"\n\n\"Come back and sign!\" cried Sir Percival from the other side of the\ntable.\n\n\"Shall I?\" she asked in my ear; \"I will, if you tell me.\"\n\n\"No,\" I answered.  \"The right and the truth are with you--sign nothing,\nunless you have read it first.\"\n\n\"Come back and sign!\" he reiterated, in his loudest and angriest tones.\n\nThe Count, who had watched Laura and me with a close and silent\nattention, interposed for the second time.\n\n\"Percival!\" he said.  \"I remember that I am in the presence of ladies.\nBe good enough, if you please, to remember it too.\"\n\nSir Percival turned on him speechless with passion.  The Count's firm\nhand slowly tightened its grasp on his shoulder, and the Count's steady\nvoice quietly repeated, \"Be good enough, if you please, to remember it\ntoo.\"\n\nThey both looked at each other.  Sir Percival slowly drew his shoulder\nfrom under the Count's hand, slowly turned his face away from the\nCount's eyes, doggedly looked down for a little while at the parchment\non the table, and then spoke, with the sullen submission of a tamed\nanimal, rather than the becoming resignation of a convinced man.\n\n\"I don't want to offend anybody,\" he said, \"but my wife's obstinacy is\nenough to try the patience of a saint.  I have told her this is merely\na formal document--and what more can she want? You may say what you\nplease, but it is no part of a woman's duty to set her husband at\ndefiance.  Once more, Lady Glyde, and for the last time, will you sign\nor will you not?\"\n\nLaura returned to his side of the table, and took up the pen again.\n\n\"I will sign with pleasure,\" she said, \"if you will only treat me as a\nresponsible being.  I care little what sacrifice is required of me, if\nit will affect no one else, and lead to no ill results--\"\n\n\"Who talked of a sacrifice being required of You?\" he broke in, with a\nhalf-suppressed return of his former violence.\n\n\"I only meant,\" she resumed, \"that I would refuse no concession which I\ncould honourably make.  If I have a scruple about signing my name to an\nengagement of which I know nothing, why should you visit it on me so\nseverely? It is rather hard, I think, to treat Count Fosco's scruples\nso much more indulgently than you have treated mine.\"\n\nThis unfortunate, yet most natural, reference to the Count's\nextraordinary power over her husband, indirect as it was, set Sir\nPercival's smouldering temper on fire again in an instant.\n\n\"Scruples!\" he repeated.  \"YOUR scruples! It is rather late in the day\nfor you to be scrupulous.  I should have thought you had got over all\nweakness of that sort, when you made a virtue of necessity by marrying\nme.\"\n\nThe instant he spoke those words, Laura threw down the pen--looked at\nhim with an expression in her eyes which, throughout all my experience\nof her, I had never seen in them before, and turned her back on him in\ndead silence.\n\nThis strong expression of the most open and the most bitter contempt\nwas so entirely unlike herself, so utterly out of her character, that\nit silenced us all.  There was something hidden, beyond a doubt, under\nthe mere surface-brutality of the words which her husband had just\naddressed to her.  There was some lurking insult beneath them, of which\nI was wholly ignorant, but which had left the mark of its profanation\nso plainly on her face that even a stranger might have seen it.\n\nThe Count, who was no stranger, saw it as distinctly as I did. When I\nleft my chair to join Laura, I heard him whisper under his breath to\nSir Percival, \"You idiot!\"\n\nLaura walked before me to the door as I advanced, and at the same time\nher husband spoke to her once more.\n\n\"You positively refuse, then, to give me your signature?\" he said, in\nthe altered tone of a man who was conscious that he had let his own\nlicence of language seriously injure him.\n\n\"After what you have just said to me,\" she replied firmly, \"I refuse my\nsignature until I have read every line in that parchment from the first\nword to the last. Come away, Marian, we have remained here long enough.\"\n\n\"One moment!\" interposed the Count before Sir Percival could speak\nagain--\"one moment, Lady Glyde, I implore you!\"\n\nLaura would have left the room without noticing him, but I stopped her.\n\n\"Don't make an enemy of the Count!\" I whispered.  \"Whatever you do,\ndon't make an enemy of the Count!\"\n\nShe yielded to me.  I closed the door again, and we stood near it\nwaiting.  Sir Percival sat down at the table, with his elbow on the\nfolded parchment, and his head resting on his clenched fist. The Count\nstood between us--master of the dreadful position in which we were\nplaced, as he was master of everything else.\n\n\"Lady Glyde,\" he said, with a gentleness which seemed to address itself\nto our forlorn situation instead of to ourselves, \"pray pardon me if I\nventure to offer one suggestion, and pray believe that I speak out of\nmy profound respect and my friendly regard for the mistress of this\nhouse.\" He turned sharply towards Sir Percival.  \"Is it absolutely\nnecessary,\" he asked \"that this thing here, under your elbow, should be\nsigned to-day?\"\n\n\"It is necessary to my plans and wishes,\" returned the other sulkily.\n\"But that consideration, as you may have noticed, has no influence with\nLady Glyde.\"\n\n\"Answer my plain question plainly.  Can the business of the signature\nbe put off till to-morrow--Yes or No?\"\n\n\"Yes, if you will have it so.\"\n\n\"Then what are you wasting your time for here? Let the signature wait\ntill to-morrow--let it wait till you come back.\"\n\nSir Percival looked up with a frown and an oath.\n\n\"You are taking a tone with me that I don't like,\" he said.  \"A tone I\nwon't bear from any man.\"\n\n\"I am advising you for your good,\" returned the Count, with a smile of\nquiet contempt.  \"Give yourself time--give Lady Glyde time.  Have you\nforgotten that your dog-cart is waiting at the door? My tone surprises\nyou--ha? I dare say it does--it is the tone of a man who can keep his\ntemper.  How many doses of good advice have I given you in my time?\nMore than you can count.  Have I ever been wrong? I defy you to quote\nme an instance of it.  Go! take your drive.  The matter of the\nsignature can wait till to-morrow.  Let it wait--and renew it when you\ncome back.\"\n\nSir Percival hesitated and looked at his watch.  His anxiety about the\nsecret journey which he was to take that day, revived by the Count's\nwords, was now evidently disputing possession of his mind with his\nanxiety to obtain Laura's signature.  He considered for a little while,\nand then got up from his chair.\n\n\"It is easy to argue me down,\" he said, \"when I have no time to answer\nyou.  I will take your advice, Fosco--not because I want it, or believe\nin it, but because I can't stop here any longer.\" He paused, and looked\nround darkly at his wife.  \"If you don't give me your signature when I\ncome back to-morrow!\" The rest was lost in the noise of his opening the\nbook-case cupboard again, and locking up the parchment once more.  He\ntook his hat and gloves off the table, and made for the door.  Laura\nand I drew back to let him pass.  \"Remember to-morrow!\" he said to his\nwife, and went out.\n\nWe waited to give him time to cross the hall and drive away.  The Count\napproached us while we were standing near the door.\n\n\"You have just seen Percival at his worst, Miss Halcombe,\" he said.\n\"As his old friend, I am sorry for him and ashamed of him. As his old\nfriend, I promise you that he shall not break out to-morrow in the\nsame disgraceful manner in which he has broken out to-day.\"\n\nLaura had taken my arm while he was speaking and she pressed it\nsignificantly when he had done.  It would have been a hard trial to any\nwoman to stand by and see the office of apologist for her husband's\nmisconduct quietly assumed by his male friend in her own house--and it\nwas a trial to HER.  I thanked the Count civilly, and let her out.\nYes! I thanked him: for I felt already, with a sense of inexpressible\nhelplessness and humiliation, that it was either his interest or his\ncaprice to make sure of my continuing to reside at Blackwater Park, and\nI knew after Sir Percival's conduct to me, that without the support of\nthe Count's influence, I could not hope to remain there.  His\ninfluence, the influence of all others that I dreaded most, was\nactually the one tie which now held me to Laura in the hour of her\nutmost need!\n\nWe heard the wheels of the dog-cart crashing on the gravel of the drive\nas we came into the hall.  Sir Percival had started on his journey.\n\n\"Where is he going to, Marian?\" Laura whispered.  \"Every fresh thing he\ndoes seems to terrify me about the future.  Have you any suspicions?\"\n\nAfter what she had undergone that morning, I was unwilling to tell her\nmy suspicions.\n\n\"How should I know his secrets?\" I said evasively.\n\n\"I wonder if the housekeeper knows?\" she persisted.\n\n\"Certainly not,\" I replied.  \"She must be quite as ignorant as we are.\"\n\nLaura shook her head doubtfully.\n\n\"Did you not hear from the housekeeper that there was a report of Anne\nCatherick having been seen in this neighbourhood? Don't you think he\nmay have gone away to look for her?\"\n\n\"I would rather compose myself, Laura, by not thinking about it at all,\nand after what has happened, you had better follow my example.  Come\ninto my room, and rest and quiet yourself a little.\"\n\nWe sat down together close to the window, and let the fragrant summer\nair breathe over our faces.\n\n\"I am ashamed to look at you, Marian,\" she said, \"after what you\nsubmitted to downstairs, for my sake.  Oh, my own love, I am almost\nheartbroken when I think of it! But I will try to make it up to you--I\nwill indeed!\"\n\n\"Hush! hush!\" I replied; \"don't talk so.  What is the trifling\nmortification of my pride compared to the dreadful sacrifice of your\nhappiness?\"\n\n\"You heard what he said to me?\" she went on quickly and vehemently.\n\"You heard the words--but you don't know what they meant--you don't\nknow why I threw down the pen and turned my back on him.\" She rose in\nsudden agitation, and walked about the room. \"I have kept many things\nfrom your knowledge, Marian, for fear of distressing you, and making\nyou unhappy at the outset of our new lives.  You don't know how he has\nused me.  And yet you ought to know, for you saw how he used me to-day.\nYou heard him sneer at my presuming to be scrupulous--you heard him say\nI had made a virtue of necessity in marrying him.\" She sat down again,\nher face flushed deeply, and her hands twisted and twined together in\nher lap.  \"I can't tell you about it now,\" she said; \"I shall burst out\ncrying if I tell you now--later, Marian, when I am more sure of myself.\nMy poor head aches, darling--aches, aches, aches. Where is your\nsmelling-bottle? Let me talk to you about yourself. I wish I had given\nhim my signature, for your sake.  Shall I give it to him to-morrow? I\nwould rather compromise myself than compromise you.  After your taking\nmy part against him, he will lay all the blame on you if I refuse\nagain.  What shall we do? Oh, for a friend to help us and advise us!--a\nfriend we could really trust!\"\n\nShe sighed bitterly.  I saw in her face that she was thinking of\nHartright--saw it the more plainly because her last words set me\nthinking of him too.  In six months only from her marriage we wanted\nthe faithful service he had offered to us in his farewell words.  How\nlittle I once thought that we should ever want it at all!\n\n\"We must do what we can to help ourselves,\" I said.  \"Let us try to\ntalk it over calmly, Laura--let us do all in our power to decide for\nthe best.\"\n\nPutting what she knew of her husband's embarrassments and what I had\nheard of his conversation with the lawyer together, we arrived\nnecessarily at the conclusion that the parchment in the library had\nbeen drawn up for the purpose of borrowing money, and that Laura's\nsignature was absolutely necessary to fit it for the attainment of Sir\nPercival's object.\n\nThe second question, concerning the nature of the legal contract by\nwhich the money was to be obtained, and the degree of personal\nresponsibility to which Laura might subject herself if she signed it in\nthe dark, involved considerations which lay far beyond any knowledge\nand experience that either of us possessed.  My own convictions led me\nto believe that the hidden contents of the parchment concealed a\ntransaction of the meanest and the most fraudulent kind.\n\nI had not formed this conclusion in consequence of Sir Percival's\nrefusal to show the writing or to explain it, for that refusal might\nwell have proceeded from his obstinate disposition and his domineering\ntemper alone.  My sole motive for distrusting his honesty sprang from\nthe change which I had observed in his language and his manners at\nBlackwater Park, a change which convinced me that he had been acting a\npart throughout the whole period of his probation at Limmeridge House.\nHis elaborate delicacy, his ceremonious politeness which harmonised so\nagreeably with Mr. Gilmore's old-fashioned notions, his modesty with\nLaura, his candour with me, his moderation with Mr. Fairlie--all these\nwere the artifices of a mean, cunning, and brutal man, who had dropped\nhis disguise when his practised duplicity had gained its end, and had\nopenly shown himself in the library on that very day. I say nothing of\nthe grief which this discovery caused me on Laura's account, for it is\nnot to be expressed by any words of mine.  I only refer to it at all,\nbecause it decided me to oppose her signing the parchment, whatever the\nconsequences might be, unless she was first made acquainted with the\ncontents.\n\nUnder these circumstances, the one chance for us when to-morrow came\nwas to be provided with an objection to giving the signature, which\nmight rest on sufficiently firm commercial or legal grounds to shake\nSir Percival's resolution, and to make him suspect that we two women\nunderstood the laws and obligations of business as well as himself.\n\nAfter some pondering, I determined to write to the only honest man\nwithin reach whom we could trust to help us discreetly in our forlorn\nsituation.  That man was Mr. Gilmore's partner, Mr. Kyrle, who\nconducted the business now that our old friend had been obliged to\nwithdraw from it, and to leave London on account of his health.  I\nexplained to Laura that I had Mr. Gilmore's own authority for placing\nimplicit confidence in his partner's integrity, discretion, and\naccurate knowledge of all her affairs, and with her full approval I sat\ndown at once to write the letter, I began by stating our position to\nMr. Kyrle exactly as it was, and then asked for his advice in return,\nexpressed in plain, downright terms which he could comprehend without\nany danger of misinterpretations and mistakes.  My letter was as short\nas I could possibly make it, and was, I hope, unencumbered by needless\napologies and needless details.\n\nJust as I was about to put the address on the envelope an obstacle was\ndiscovered by Laura, which in the effort and preoccupation of writing\nhad escaped my mind altogether.\n\n\"How are we to get the answer in time?\" she asked.  \"Your letter will\nnot be delivered in London before to-morrow morning, and the post will\nnot bring the reply here till the morning after.\"\n\nThe only way of overcoming this difficulty was to have the answer\nbrought to us from the lawyer's office by a special messenger.  I wrote\na postscript to that effect, begging that the messenger might be\ndespatched with the reply by the eleven o'clock morning train, which\nwould bring him to our station at twenty minutes past one, and so\nenable him to reach Blackwater Park by two o'clock at the latest. He\nwas to be directed to ask for me, to answer no questions addressed to\nhim by any one else, and to deliver his letter into no hands but mine.\n\n\"In case Sir Percival should come back to-morrow before two o'clock,\" I\nsaid to Laura, \"the wisest plan for you to adopt is to be out in the\ngrounds all the morning with your book or your work, and not to appear\nat the house till the messenger has had time to arrive with the letter.\nI will wait here for him all the morning, to guard against any\nmisadventures or mistakes.  By following this arrangement I hope and\nbelieve we shall avoid being taken by surprise.  Let us go down to the\ndrawing-room now.  We may excite suspicion if we remain shut up\ntogether too long.\"\n\n\"Suspicion?\" she repeated.  \"Whose suspicion can we excite, now that\nSir Percival has left the house? Do you mean Count Fosco?\"\n\n\"Perhaps I do, Laura.\"\n\n\"You are beginning to dislike him as much as I do, Marian.\"\n\n\"No, not to dislike him.  Dislike is always more or less associated\nwith contempt--I can see nothing in the Count to despise.\"\n\n\"You are not afraid of him, are you?\"\n\n\"Perhaps I am--a little.\"\n\n\"Afraid of him, after his interference in our favour to-day!\"\n\n\"Yes.  I am more afraid of his interference than I am of Sir Percival's\nviolence.  Remember what I said to you in the library. Whatever you do,\nLaura, don't make an enemy of the Count!\"\n\nWe went downstairs.  Laura entered the drawing-room, while I proceeded\nacross the hall, with my letter in my hand, to put it into the\npost-bag, which hung against the wall opposite to me.\n\nThe house door was open, and as I crossed past it, I saw Count Fosco\nand his wife standing talking together on the steps outside, with their\nfaces turned towards me.\n\nThe Countess came into the hall rather hastily, and asked if I had\nleisure enough for five minutes' private conversation.  Feeling a\nlittle surprised by such an appeal from such a person, I put my letter\ninto the bag, and replied that I was quite at her disposal. She took my\narm with unaccustomed friendliness and familiarity, and instead of\nleading me into an empty room, drew me out with her to the belt of turf\nwhich surrounded the large fish-pond.\n\nAs we passed the Count on the steps he bowed and smiled, and then went\nat once into the house, pushing the hall door to after him, but not\nactually closing it.\n\nThe Countess walked me gently round the fish-pond.  I expected to be\nmade the depositary of some extraordinary confidence, and I was\nastonished to find that Madame Fosco's communication for my private ear\nwas nothing more than a polite assurance of her sympathy for me, after\nwhat had happened in the library.  Her husband had told her of all that\nhad passed, and of the insolent manner in which Sir Percival had spoken\nto me.  This information had so shocked and distressed her, on my\naccount and on Laura's, that she had made up her mind, if anything of\nthe sort happened again, to mark her sense of Sir Percival's outrageous\nconduct by leaving the house.  The Count had approved of her idea, and\nshe now hoped that I approved of it too.\n\nI thought this a very strange proceeding on the part of such a\nremarkably reserved woman as Madame Fosco, especially after the\ninterchange of sharp speeches which had passed between us during the\nconversation in the boat-house on that very morning.  However, it was\nmy plain duty to meet a polite and friendly advance on the part of one\nof my elders with a polite and friendly reply.  I answered the Countess\naccordingly in her own tone, and then, thinking we had said all that\nwas necessary on either side, made an attempt to get back to the house.\n\nBut Madame Fosco seemed resolved not to part with me, and to my\nunspeakable amazement, resolved also to talk.  Hitherto the most silent\nof women, she now persecuted me with fluent conventionalities on the\nsubject of married life, on the subject of Sir Percival and Laura, on\nthe subject of her own happiness, on the subject of the late Mr.\nFairlie's conduct to her in the matter of her legacy, and on half a\ndozen other subjects besides, until she had detained me walking round\nand round the fish-pond for more than half an hour, and had quite\nwearied me out.  Whether she discovered this or not, I cannot say, but\nshe stopped as abruptly as she had begun--looked towards the house\ndoor, resumed her icy manner in a moment, and dropped my arm of her own\naccord before I could think of an excuse for accomplishing my own\nrelease from her.\n\nAs I pushed open the door and entered the hall, I found myself suddenly\nface to face with the Count again.  He was just putting a letter into\nthe post-bag.\n\nAfter he had dropped it in and had closed the bag, he asked me where I\nhad left Madame Fosco.  I told him, and he went out at the hall door\nimmediately to join his wife.  His manner when he spoke to me was so\nunusually quiet and subdued that I turned and looked after him,\nwondering if he were ill or out of spirits.\n\nWhy my next proceeding was to go straight up to the post-bag and take\nout my own letter and look at it again, with a vague distrust on me,\nand why the looking at it for the second time instantly suggested the\nidea to my mind of sealing the envelope for its greater security--are\nmysteries which are either too deep or too shallow for me to fathom.\nWomen, as everybody knows, constantly act on impulses which they cannot\nexplain even to themselves, and I can only suppose that one of those\nimpulses was the hidden cause of my unaccountable conduct on this\noccasion.\n\nWhatever influence animated me, I found cause to congratulate myself on\nhaving obeyed it as soon as I prepared to seal the letter in my own\nroom.  I had originally closed the envelope in the usual way by\nmoistening the adhesive point and pressing it on the paper beneath, and\nwhen I now tried it with my finger, after a lapse of full\nthree-quarters of an hour, the envelope opened on the instant, without\nsticking or tearing.  Perhaps I had fastened it insufficiently? Perhaps\nthere might have been some defect in the adhesive gum?\n\nOr, perhaps----No! it is quite revolting enough to feel that third\nconjecture stirring in my mind.  I would rather not see it confronting\nme in plain black and white.\n\nI almost dread to-morrow--so much depends on my discretion and\nself-control.  There are two precautions, at all events, which I am\nsure not to forget.  I must be careful to keep up friendly appearances\nwith the Count, and I must be well on my guard when the messenger from\nthe office comes here with the answer to my letter.\n\n\n\nV\n\nJune 17th.--When the dinner hour brought us together again, Count Fosco\nwas in his usual excellent spirits.  He exerted himself to interest and\namuse us, as if he was determined to efface from our memories all\nrecollection of what had passed in the library that afternoon.  Lively\ndescriptions of his adventures in travelling, amusing anecdotes of\nremarkable people whom he had met with abroad, quaint comparisons\nbetween the social customs of various nations, illustrated by examples\ndrawn from men and women indiscriminately all over Europe, humorous\nconfessions of the innocent follies of his own early life, when he\nruled the fashions of a second-rate Italian town, and wrote\npreposterous romances on the French model for a second-rate Italian\nnewspaper--all flowed in succession so easily and so gaily from his\nlips, and all addressed our various curiosities and various interests\nso directly and so delicately, that Laura and I listened to him with as\nmuch attention and, inconsistent as it may seem, with as much\nadmiration also, as Madame Fosco herself.  Women can resist a man's\nlove, a man's fame, a man's personal appearance, and a man's money, but\nthey cannot resist a man's tongue when he knows how to talk to them.\n\nAfter dinner, while the favourable impression which he had produced on\nus was still vivid in our minds, the Count modestly withdrew to read in\nthe library.\n\nLaura proposed a stroll in the grounds to enjoy the close of the long\nevening.  It was necessary in common politeness to ask Madame Fosco to\njoin us, but this time she had apparently received her orders\nbeforehand, and she begged we would kindly excuse her. \"The Count will\nprobably want a fresh supply of cigarettes,\" she remarked by way of\napology, \"and nobody can make them to his satisfaction but myself.\" Her\ncold blue eyes almost warmed as she spoke the words--she looked\nactually proud of being the officiating medium through which her lord\nand master composed himself with tobacco-smoke!\n\nLaura and I went out together alone.\n\nIt was a misty, heavy evening.  There was a sense of blight in the air;\nthe flowers were drooping in the garden, and the ground was parched and\ndewless.  The western heaven, as we saw it over the quiet trees, was of\na pale yellow hue, and the sun was setting faintly in a haze.  Coming\nrain seemed near--it would fall probably with the fall of night.\n\n\"Which way shall we go?\" I asked\n\n\"Towards the lake, Marian, if you like,\" she answered.\n\n\"You seem unaccountably fond, Laura, of that dismal lake.\"\n\n\"No, not of the lake but of the scenery about it.  The sand and heath\nand the fir-trees are the only objects I can discover, in all this\nlarge place, to remind me of Limmeridge.  But we will walk in some\nother direction if you prefer it.\"\n\n\"I have no favourite walks at Blackwater Park, my love.  One is the\nsame as another to me.  Let us go to the lake--we may find it cooler in\nthe open space than we find it here.\"\n\nWe walked through the shadowy plantation in silence.  The heaviness in\nthe evening air oppressed us both, and when we reached the boat-house\nwe were glad to sit down and rest inside.\n\nA white fog hung low over the lake.  The dense brown line of the trees\non the opposite bank appeared above it, like a dwarf forest floating in\nthe sky.  The sandy ground, shelving downward from where we sat, was\nlost mysteriously in the outward layers of the fog.  The silence was\nhorrible.  No rustling of the leaves--no bird's note in the wood--no\ncry of water-fowl from the pools of the hidden lake.  Even the croaking\nof the frogs had ceased to-night.\n\n\"It is very desolate and gloomy,\" said Laura.  \"But we can be more\nalone here than anywhere else.\"\n\nShe spoke quietly and looked at the wilderness of sand and mist with\nsteady, thoughtful eyes.  I could see that her mind was too much\noccupied to feel the dreary impressions from without which had fastened\nthemselves already on mine.\n\n\"I promised, Marian, to tell you the truth about my married life,\ninstead of leaving you any longer to guess it for yourself,\" she began.\n\"That secret is the first I have ever had from you, love, and I am\ndetermined it shall be the last. I was silent, as you know, for your\nsake--and perhaps a little for my own sake as well. It is very hard for\na woman to confess that the man to whom she has given her whole life is\nthe man of all others who cares least for the gift.  If you were\nmarried yourself, Marian--and especially if you were happily\nmarried--you would feel for me as no single woman CAN feel, however\nkind and true she may be.\"\n\nWhat answer could I make? I could only take her hand and look at her\nwith my whole heart as well as my eyes would let me.\n\n\"How often,\" she went on, \"I have heard you laughing over what you used\nto call your 'poverty!' how often you have made me mock-speeches of\ncongratulation on my wealth! Oh, Marian, never laugh again.  Thank God\nfor your poverty--it has made you your own mistress, and has saved you\nfrom the lot that has fallen on ME.\"\n\nA sad beginning on the lips of a young wife!--sad in its quiet\nplain-spoken truth.  The few days we had all passed together at\nBlackwater Park had been many enough to show me--to show any one--what\nher husband had married her for.\n\n\"You shall not be distressed,\" she said, \"by hearing how soon my\ndisappointments and my trials began--or even by knowing what they were.\nIt is bad enough to have them on my memory.  If I tell you how he\nreceived the first and last attempt at remonstrance that I ever made,\nyou will know how he has always treated me, as well as if I had\ndescribed it in so many words.  It was one day at Rome when we had\nridden out together to the tomb of Cecilia Metella. The sky was calm\nand lovely, and the grand old ruin looked beautiful, and the\nremembrance that a husband's love had raised it in the old time to a\nwife's memory, made me feel more tenderly and more anxiously towards my\nhusband than I had ever felt yet. 'Would you build such a tomb for ME,\nPercival?' I asked him.  'You said you loved me dearly before we were\nmarried, and yet, since that time----' I could get no farther.  Marian!\nhe was not even looking at me! I pulled down my veil, thinking it best\nnot to let him see that the tears were in my eyes.  I fancied he had\nnot paid any attention to me, but he had.  He said, 'Come away,' and\nlaughed to himself as he helped me on to my horse.  He mounted his own\nhorse and laughed again as we rode away.  'If I do build you a tomb,'\nhe said, 'it will be done with your own money.  I wonder whether\nCecilia Metella had a fortune and paid for hers.' I made no reply--how\ncould I, when I was crying behind my veil? 'Ah, you light-complexioned\nwomen are all sulky,' he said.  'What do you want? compliments and soft\nspeeches? Well! I'm in a good humour this morning. Consider the\ncompliments paid and the speeches said.' Men little know when they say\nhard things to us how well we remember them, and how much harm they do\nus.  It would have been better for me if I had gone on crying, but his\ncontempt dried up my tears and hardened my heart.  From that time,\nMarian, I never checked myself again in thinking of Walter Hartright.\nI let the memory of those happy days, when we were so fond of each\nother in secret, come back and comfort me.  What else had I to look to\nfor consolation? If we had been together you would have helped me to\nbetter things.  I know it was wrong, darling, but tell me if I was\nwrong without any excuse.\"\n\nI was obliged to turn my face from her.  \"Don't ask me!\" I said. \"Have\nI suffered as you have suffered? What right have I to decide?\"\n\n\"I used to think of him,\" she pursued, dropping her voice and moving\ncloser to me, \"I used to think of him when Percival left me alone at\nnight to go among the Opera people.  I used to fancy what I might have\nbeen if it had pleased God to bless me with poverty, and if I had been\nhis wife.  I used to see myself in my neat cheap gown, sitting at home\nand waiting for him while he was earning our bread--sitting at home and\nworking for him and loving him all the better because I had to work for\nhim--seeing him come in tired and taking off his hat and coat for him,\nand, Marian, pleasing him with little dishes at dinner that I had\nlearnt to make for his sake.  Oh! I hope he is never lonely enough and\nsad enough to think of me and see me as I have thought of HIM and see\nHIM!\"\n\nAs she said those melancholy words, all the lost tenderness returned to\nher voice, and all the lost beauty trembled back into her face.  Her\neyes rested as lovingly on the blighted, solitary, ill-omened view\nbefore us, as if they saw the friendly hills of Cumberland in the dim\nand threatening sky.\n\n\"Don't speak of Walter any more,\" I said, as soon as I could control\nmyself.  \"Oh, Laura, spare us both the wretchedness of talking of him\nnow!\"\n\nShe roused herself, and looked at me tenderly.\n\n\"I would rather be silent about him for ever,\" she answered, \"than\ncause you a moment's pain.\"\n\n\"It is in your interests,\" I pleaded; \"it is for your sake that I\nspeak.  If your husband heard you----\"\n\n\"It would not surprise him if he did hear me.\"\n\nShe made that strange reply with a weary calmness and coldness. The\nchange in her manner, when she gave the answer, startled me almost as\nmuch as the answer itself.\n\n\"Not surprise him!\" I repeated.  \"Laura! remember what you are\nsaying--you frighten me!\"\n\n\"It is true,\" she said; \"it is what I wanted to tell you to-day, when\nwe were talking in your room.  My only secret when I opened my heart to\nhim at Limmeridge was a harmless secret, Marian--you said so yourself.\nThe name was all I kept from him, and he has discovered it.\"\n\nI heard her, but I could say nothing.  Her last words had killed the\nlittle hope that still lived in me.\n\n\"It happened at Rome,\" she went on, as wearily calm and cold as ever.\n\"We were at a little party given to the English by some friends of Sir\nPercival's--Mr. and Mrs. Markland.  Mrs. Markland had the reputation of\nsketching very beautifully, and some of the guests prevailed on her to\nshow us her drawings.  We all admired them, but something I said\nattracted her attention particularly to me.  'Surely you draw\nyourself?' she asked.  'I used to draw a little once,' I answered, 'but\nI have given it up.' 'If you have once drawn,' she said, 'you may take\nto it again one of these days, and if you do, I wish you would let me\nrecommend you a master.' I said nothing--you know why, Marian--and\ntried to change the conversation.  But Mrs. Markland persisted.  'I\nhave had all sorts of teachers,' she went on, 'but the best of all, the\nmost intelligent and the most attentive, was a Mr. Hartright.  If you\never take up your drawing again, do try him as a master.  He is a young\nman--modest and gentlemanlike--I am sure you will like him. 'Think of\nthose words being spoken to me publicly, in the presence of\nstrangers--strangers who had been invited to meet the bride and\nbridegroom! I did all I could to control myself--I said nothing, and\nlooked down close at the drawings.  When I ventured to raise my head\nagain, my eyes and my husband's eyes met, and I knew, by his look, that\nmy face had betrayed me.  'We will see about Mr. Hartright,' he said,\nlooking at me all the time, 'when we get back to England.  I agree with\nyou, Mrs. Markland--I think Lady Glyde is sure to like him.' He laid an\nemphasis on the last words which made my cheeks burn, and set my heart\nbeating as if it would stifle me.  Nothing more was said.  We came away\nearly.  He was silent in the carriage driving back to the hotel.  He\nhelped me out, and followed me upstairs as usual.  But the moment we\nwere in the drawing-room, he locked the door, pushed me down into a\nchair, and stood over me with his hands on my shoulders.  'Ever since\nthat morning when you made your audacious confession to me at\nLimmeridge,' he said, 'I have wanted to find out the man, and I found\nhim in your face to-night.  Your drawing-master was the man, and his\nname is Hartright.  You shall repent it, and he shall repent it, to the\nlast hour of your lives.  Now go to bed and dream of him if you like,\nwith the marks of my horsewhip on his shoulders.' Whenever he is angry\nwith me now he refers to what I acknowledged to him in your presence\nwith a sneer or a threat.  I have no power to prevent him from putting\nhis own horrible construction on the confidence I placed in him.  I\nhave no influence to make him believe me, or to keep him silent.  You\nlooked surprised to-day when you heard him tell me that I had made a\nvirtue of necessity in marrying him.  You will not be surprised again\nwhen you hear him repeat it, the next time he is out of temper----Oh,\nMarian! don't! don't! you hurt me!\"\n\nI had caught her in my arms, and the sting and torment of my remorse\nhad closed them round her like a vice.  Yes! my remorse. The white\ndespair of Walter's face, when my cruel words struck him to the heart\nin the summer-house at Limmeridge, rose before me in mute, unendurable\nreproach.  My hand had pointed the way which led the man my sister\nloved, step by step, far from his country and his friends.  Between\nthose two young hearts I had stood, to sunder them for ever, the one\nfrom the other, and his life and her life lay wasted before me alike in\nwitness of the deed.  I had done this, and done it for Sir Percival\nGlyde.\n\nFor Sir Percival Glyde.\n\n\nI heard her speaking, and I knew by the tone of her voice that she was\ncomforting me--I, who deserved nothing but the reproach of her silence!\nHow long it was before I mastered the absorbing misery of my own\nthoughts, I cannot tell.  I was first conscious that she was kissing\nme, and then my eyes seemed to wake on a sudden to their sense of\noutward things, and I knew that I was looking mechanically straight\nbefore me at the prospect of the lake.\n\n\"It is late,\" I heard her whisper.  \"It will be dark in the\nplantation.\" She shook my arm and repeated, \"Marian! it will be dark in\nthe plantation.\"\n\n\"Give me a minute longer,\" I said--\"a minute, to get better in.\"\n\nI was afraid to trust myself to look at her yet, and I kept my eyes\nfixed on the view.\n\nIt WAS late.  The dense brown line of trees in the sky had faded in the\ngathering darkness to the faint resemblance of a long wreath of smoke.\nThe mist over the lake below had stealthily enlarged, and advanced on\nus.  The silence was as breathless as ever, but the horror of it had\ngone, and the solemn mystery of its stillness was all that remained.\n\n\"We are far from the house,\" she whispered.  \"Let us go back.\"\n\nShe stopped suddenly, and turned her face from me towards the entrance\nof the boat-house.\n\n\"Marian!\" she said, trembling violently.  \"Do you see nothing? Look!\"\n\n\"Where?\"\n\n\"Down there, below us.\"\n\nShe pointed.  My eyes followed her hand, and I saw it too.\n\nA living figure was moving over the waste of heath in the distance.  It\ncrossed our range of view from the boat-house, and passed darkly along\nthe outer edge of the mist. It stopped far off, in front of\nus--waited--and passed on; moving slowly, with the white cloud of mist\nbehind it and above it--slowly, slowly, till it glided by the edge of\nthe boat-house, and we saw it no more.\n\nWe were both unnerved by what had passed between us that evening. Some\nminutes elapsed before Laura would venture into the plantation, and\nbefore I could make up my mind to lead her back to the house.\n\n\"Was it a man or a woman?\" she asked in a whisper, as we moved at last\ninto the dark dampness of the outer air.\n\n\"I am not certain.\"\n\n\"Which do you think?\"\n\n\"It looked like a woman.\"\n\n\"I was afraid it was a man in a long cloak.\"\n\n\"It may be a man.  In this dim light it is not possible to be certain.\"\n\n\"Wait, Marian! I'm frightened--I don't see the path.  Suppose the\nfigure should follow us?\"\n\n\"Not at all likely, Laura.  There is really nothing to be alarmed\nabout.  The shores of the lake are not far from the village, and they\nare free to any one to walk on by day or night.  It is only wonderful\nwe have seen no living creature there before.\"\n\nWe were now in the plantation.  It was very dark--so dark, that we\nfound some difficulty in keeping the path.  I gave Laura my arm, and we\nwalked as fast as we could on our way back.\n\nBefore we were half-way through she stopped, and forced me to stop with\nher.  She was listening.\n\n\"Hush,\" she whispered.  \"I hear something behind us.\"\n\n\"Dead leaves,\" I said to cheer her, \"or a twig blown off the trees.\"\n\n\"It is summer time, Marian, and there is not a breath of wind. Listen!\"\n\nI heard the sound too--a sound like a light footstep following us.\n\n\"No matter who it is, or what it is,\" I said, \"let us walk on.  In\nanother minute, if there is anything to alarm us, we shall be near\nenough to the house to be heard.\"\n\nWe went on quickly--so quickly, that Laura was breathless by the time\nwe were nearly through the plantation, and within sight of the lighted\nwindows.\n\nI waited a moment to give her breathing-time. Just as we were about to\nproceed she stopped me again, and signed to me with her hand to listen\nonce more. We both heard distinctly a long, heavy sigh behind us, in\nthe black depths of the trees.\n\n\"Who's there?\" I called out.\n\nThere was no answer.\n\n\"Who's there?\" I repeated.\n\nAn instant of silence followed, and then we heard the light fall of the\nfootsteps again, fainter and fainter--sinking away into the\ndarkness--sinking, sinking, sinking--till they were lost in the silence.\n\nWe hurried out from the trees to the open lawn beyond, crossed it\nrapidly; and without another word passing between us, reached the house.\n\nIn the light of the hall-lamp Laura looked at me, with white cheeks and\nstartled eyes.\n\n\"I am half dead with fear,\" she said. \"Who could it have been?\"\n\n\"We will try to guess to-morrow,\" I replied. \"In the meantime say\nnothing to any one of what we have heard and seen.\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"Because silence is safe, and we have need of safety in this house.\"\n\nI sent Laura upstairs immediately, waited a minute to take off my hat\nand put my hair smooth, and then went at once to make my first\ninvestigations in the library, on pretence of searching for a book.\n\nThere sat the Count, filling out the largest easy-chair in the house,\nsmoking and reading calmly, with his feet on an ottoman, his cravat\nacross his knees, and his shirt collar wide open.  And there sat Madame\nFosco, like a quiet child, on a stool by his side, making cigarettes.\nNeither husband nor wife could, by any possibility, have been out late\nthat evening, and have just got back to the house in a hurry.  I felt\nthat my object in visiting the library was answered the moment I set\neyes on them.\n\nCount Fosco rose in polite confusion and tied his cravat on when I\nentered the room.\n\n\"Pray don't let me disturb you,\" I said.  \"I have only come here to get\na book.\"\n\n\"All unfortunate men of my size suffer from the heat,\" said the Count,\nrefreshing himself gravely with a large green fan.  \"I wish I could\nchange places with my excellent wife.  She is as cool at this moment as\na fish in the pond outside.\"\n\nThe Countess allowed herself to thaw under the influence of her\nhusband's quaint comparison.  \"I am never warm, Miss Halcombe,\" she\nremarked, with the modest air of a woman who was confessing to one of\nher own merits.\n\n\"Have you and Lady Glyde been out this evening?\" asked the Count, while\nI was taking a book from the shelves to preserve appearances.\n\n\"Yes, we went out to get a little air.\"\n\n\"May I ask in what direction?\"\n\n\"In the direction of the lake--as far as the boat-house.\"\n\n\"Aha? As far as the boat-house?\"\n\nUnder other circumstances I might have resented his curiosity. But\nto-night I hailed it as another proof that neither he nor his wife were\nconnected with the mysterious appearance at the lake.\n\n\"No more adventures, I suppose, this evening?\" he went on.  \"No more\ndiscoveries, like your discovery of the wounded dog?\"\n\nHe fixed his unfathomable grey eyes on me, with that cold, clear,\nirresistible glitter in them which always forces me to look at him, and\nalways makes me uneasy while I do look.  An unutterable suspicion that\nhis mind is prying into mine overcomes me at these times, and it\novercame me now.\n\n\"No,\" I said shortly; \"no adventures--no discoveries.\"\n\nI tried to look away from him and leave the room.  Strange as it seems,\nI hardly think I should have succeeded in the attempt if Madame Fosco\nhad not helped me by causing him to move and look away first.\n\n\"Count, you are keeping Miss Halcombe standing,\" she said.\n\nThe moment he turned round to get me a chair, I seized my\nopportunity--thanked him--made my excuses--and slipped out.\n\nAn hour later, when Laura's maid happened to be in her mistress's room,\nI took occasion to refer to the closeness of the night, with a view to\nascertaining next how the servants had been passing their time.\n\n\"Have you been suffering much from the heat downstairs?\" I asked.\n\n\"No, miss,\" said the girl, \"we have not felt it to speak of.\"\n\n\"You have been out in the woods then, I suppose?\"\n\n\"Some of us thought of going, miss.  But cook said she should take her\nchair into the cool court-yard, outside the kitchen door, and on second\nthoughts, all the rest of us took our chairs out there too.\"\n\nThe housekeeper was now the only person who remained to be accounted\nfor.\n\n\"Is Mrs. Michelson gone to bed yet?\" I inquired.\n\n\"I should think not, miss,\" said the girl, smiling.  \"Mrs. Michelson is\nmore likely to be getting up just now than going to bed.\"\n\n\"Why? What do you mean? Has Mrs. Michelson been taking to her bed in\nthe daytime?\"\n\n\"No, miss, not exactly, but the next thing to it.  She's been asleep\nall the evening on the sofa in her own room.\"\n\nPutting together what I observed for myself in the library, and what I\nhave just heard from Laura's maid, one conclusion seems inevitable.\nThe figure we saw at the lake was not the figure of Madame Fosco, of\nher husband, or of any of the servants.  The footsteps we heard behind\nus were not the footsteps of any one belonging to the house.\n\nWho could it have been?\n\nIt seems useless to inquire.  I cannot even decide whether the figure\nwas a man's or a woman's.  I can only say that I think it was a woman's.\n\n\n\nVI\n\nJune 18th.--The misery of self-reproach which I suffered yesterday\nevening, on hearing what Laura told me in the boat-house, returned in\nthe loneliness of the night, and kept me waking and wretched for hours.\n\nI lighted my candle at last, and searched through my old journals to\nsee what my share in the fatal error of her marriage had really been,\nand what I might have once done to save her from it.  The result\nsoothed me a little for it showed that, however blindly and ignorantly\nI acted, I acted for the best. Crying generally does me harm; but it\nwas not so last night--I think it relieved me.  I rose this morning\nwith a settled resolution and a quiet mind. Nothing Sir Percival can\nsay or do shall ever irritate me again, or make me forget for one\nmoment that I am staying here in defiance of mortifications, insults,\nand threats, for Laura's service and for Laura's sake.\n\nThe speculations in which we might have indulged this morning, on the\nsubject of the figure at the lake and the footsteps in the plantation,\nhave been all suspended by a trifling accident which has caused Laura\ngreat regret.  She has lost the little brooch I gave her for a keepsake\non the day before her marriage.  As she wore it when we went out\nyesterday evening we can only suppose that it must have dropped from\nher dress, either in the boat-house or on our way back.  The servants\nhave been sent to search, and have returned unsuccessful.  And now\nLaura herself has gone to look for it.  Whether she finds it or not the\nloss will help to excuse her absence from the house, if Sir Percival\nreturns before the letter from Mr. Gilmore's partner is placed in my\nhands.\n\nOne o'clock has just struck.  I am considering whether I had better\nwait here for the arrival of the messenger from London, or slip away\nquietly, and watch for him outside the lodge gate.\n\nMy suspicion of everybody and everything in this house inclines me to\nthink that the second plan may be the best. The Count is safe in the\nbreakfast-room.  I heard him, through the door, as I ran upstairs ten\nminutes since, exercising his canary-birds at their tricks:--\"Come out\non my little finger, my pret-pret-pretties! Come out, and hop upstairs!\nOne, two, three--and up! Three, two, one--and down! One, two,\nthree--twit-twit-twit-tweet!\" The birds burst into their usual ecstasy\nof singing, and the Count chirruped and whistled at them in return, as\nif he was a bird himself.  My room door is open, and I can hear the\nshrill singing and whistling at this very moment.  If I am really to\nslip out without being observed, now is my time.\n\n\nFOUR O'CLOCK.  The three hours that have passed since I made my last\nentry have turned the whole march of events at Blackwater Park in a new\ndirection.  Whether for good or for evil, I cannot and dare not decide.\n\nLet me get back first to the place at which I left off, or I shall lose\nmyself in the confusion of my own thoughts.\n\nI went out, as I had proposed, to meet the messenger with my letter\nfrom London at the lodge gate.  On the stairs I saw no one. In the hall\nI heard the Count still exercising his birds.  But on crossing the\nquadrangle outside, I passed Madame Fosco, walking by herself in her\nfavourite circle, round and round the great fish-pond.  I at once\nslackened my pace, so as to avoid all appearance of being in a hurry,\nand even went the length, for caution's sake, of inquiring if she\nthought of going out before lunch.  She smiled at me in the friendliest\nmanner--said she preferred remaining near the house, nodded pleasantly,\nand re-entered the hall.  I looked back, and saw that she had closed\nthe door before I had opened the wicket by the side of the carriage\ngates.\n\nIn less than a quarter of an hour I reached the lodge.\n\nThe lane outside took a sudden turn to the left, ran on straight for a\nhundred yards or so, and then took another sharp turn to the right to\njoin the high-road.  Between these two turns, hidden from the lodge on\none side, and from the way to the station on the other, I waited,\nwalking backwards and forwards.  High hedges were on either side of me,\nand for twenty minutes, by my watch, I neither saw nor heard anything.\nAt the end of that time the sound of a carriage caught my ear, and I\nwas met, as I advanced towards the second turning, by a fly from the\nrailway.  I made a sign to the driver to stop.  As he obeyed me a\nrespectable-looking man put his head out of the window to see what was\nthe matter.\n\n\"I beg your pardon,\" I said, \"but am I right in supposing that you are\ngoing to Blackwater Park?\"\n\n\"Yes, ma'am.\"\n\n\"With a letter for any one?\"\n\n\"With a letter for Miss Halcombe, ma'am.\"\n\n\"You may give me the letter.  I am Miss Halcombe.\"\n\nThe man touched his hat, got out of the fly immediately, and gave me\nthe letter.\n\nI opened it at once and read these lines.  I copy them here, thinking\nit best to destroy the original for caution's sake.\n\n\n\n\"DEAR MADAM,--Your letter received this morning has caused me very\ngreat anxiety.  I will reply to it as briefly and plainly as possible.\n\n\"My careful consideration of the statement made by yourself, and my\nknowledge of Lady Glyde's position, as defined in the settlement, lead\nme, I regret to say, to the conclusion that a loan of the trust money\nto Sir Percival (or, in other words, a loan of some portion of the\ntwenty thousand pounds of Lady Glyde's fortune) is in contemplation,\nand that she is made a party to the deed, in order to secure her\napproval of a flagrant breach of trust, and to have her signature\nproduced against her if she should complain hereafter.  It is\nimpossible, on any other supposition, to account, situated as she is,\nfor her execution to a deed of any kind being wanted at all.\n\n\"In the event of Lady Glyde's signing such a document, as I am\ncompelled to suppose the deed in question to be, her trustees would be\nat liberty to advance money to Sir Percival out of her twenty thousand\npounds.  If the amount so lent should not be paid back, and if Lady\nGlyde should have children, their fortune will then be diminished by\nthe sum, large or small, so advanced.  In plainer terms still, the\ntransaction, for anything that Lady Glyde knows to the contrary, may be\na fraud upon her unborn children.\n\n\"Under these serious circumstances, I would recommend Lady Glyde to\nassign as a reason for withholding her signature, that she wishes the\ndeed to be first submitted to myself, as her family solicitor (in the\nabsence of my partner, Mr. Gilmore).  No reasonable objection can be\nmade to taking this course--for, if the transaction is an honourable\none, there will necessarily be no difficulty in my giving my approval.\n\n\"Sincerely assuring you of my readiness to afford any additional help\nor advice that may be wanted, I beg to remain, Madam, your faithful\nservant,\n\n\"WILLIAM KYRLE.\"\n\n\nI read this kind and sensible letter very thankfully.  It supplied\nLaura with a reason for objecting to the signature which was\nunanswerable, and which we could both of us understand.  The messenger\nwaited near me while I was reading to receive his directions when I had\ndone.\n\n\"Will you be good enough to say that I understand the letter, and that\nI am very much obliged?\" I said.  \"There is no other reply necessary at\npresent.\"\n\nExactly at the moment when I was speaking those words, holding the\nletter open in my hand, Count Fosco turned the corner of the lane from\nthe high-road, and stood before me as if he had sprung up out of the\nearth.\n\nThe suddenness of his appearance, in the very last place under heaven\nin which I should have expected to see him, took me completely by\nsurprise.  The messenger wished me good-morning, and got into the fly\nagain.  I could not say a word to him--I was not even able to return\nhis bow.  The conviction that I was discovered--and by that man, of all\nothers--absolutely petrified me.\n\n\"Are you going back to the house, Miss Halcombe?\" he inquired, without\nshowing the least surprise on his side, and without even looking after\nthe fly, which drove off while he was speaking to me.\n\nI collected myself sufficiently to make a sign in the affirmative.\n\n\"I am going back too,\" he said.  \"Pray allow me the pleasure of\naccompanying you.  Will you take my arm? You look surprised at seeing\nme!\"\n\nI took his arm.  The first of my scattered senses that came back was\nthe sense that warned me to sacrifice anything rather than make an\nenemy of him.\n\n\"You look surprised at seeing me!\" he repeated in his quietly\npertinacious way.\n\n\"I thought, Count, I heard you with your birds in the breakfast-room,\"\nI answered, as quietly and firmly as I could.\n\n\"Surely.  But my little feathered children, dear lady, are only too\nlike other children.  They have their days of perversity, and this\nmorning was one of them.  My wife came in as I was putting them back in\ntheir cage, and said she had left you going out alone for a walk.  You\ntold her so, did you not?\"\n\n\"Certainly.\"\n\n\"Well, Miss Halcombe, the pleasure of accompanying you was too great a\ntemptation for me to resist. At my age there is no harm in confessing\nso much as that, is there? I seized my hat, and set off to offer myself\nas your escort.  Even so fat an old man as Fosco is surely better than\nno escort at all?  I took the wrong path--I came back in despair, and\nhere I am, arrived (may I say it?) at the height of my wishes.\"\n\nHe talked on in this complimentary strain with a fluency which left me\nno exertion to make beyond the effort of maintaining my composure.  He\nnever referred in the most distant manner to what he had seen in the\nlane, or to the letter which I still had in my hand.  This ominous\ndiscretion helped to convince me that he must have surprised, by the\nmost dishonourable means, the secret of my application in Laura's\ninterest to the lawyer; and that, having now assured himself of the\nprivate manner in which I had received the answer, he had discovered\nenough to suit his purposes, and was only bent on trying to quiet the\nsuspicions which he knew he must have aroused in my mind.  I was wise\nenough, under these circumstances, not to attempt to deceive him by\nplausible explanations, and woman enough, notwithstanding my dread of\nhim, to feel as if my hand was tainted by resting on his arm.\n\nOn the drive in front of the house we met the dog-cart being taken\nround to the stables.  Sir Percival had just returned.  He came out to\nmeet us at the house-door.  Whatever other results his journey might\nhave had, it had not ended in softening his savage temper.\n\n\"Oh! here are two of you come back,\" he said, with a lowering face.\n\"What is the meaning of the house being deserted in this way? Where is\nLady Glyde?\"\n\nI told him of the loss of the brooch, and said that Laura had gone into\nthe plantation to look for it.\n\n\"Brooch or no brooch,\" he growled sulkily, \"I recommend her not to\nforget her appointment in the library this afternoon.  I shall expect\nto see her in half an hour.\"\n\nI took my hand from the Count's arm, and slowly ascended the steps.  He\nhonoured me with one of his magnificent bows, and then addressed\nhimself gaily to the scowling master of the house.\n\n\"Tell me, Percival,\" he said, \"have you had a pleasant drive? And has\nyour pretty shining Brown Molly come back at all tired?\"\n\n\"Brown Molly be hanged--and the drive too! I want my lunch.\"\n\n\"And I want five minutes' talk with you, Percival, first,\" returned the\nCount.  \"Five minutes' talk, my friend, here on the grass.\"\n\n\"What about?\"\n\n\"About business that very much concerns you.\"\n\nI lingered long enough in passing through the hall-door to hear this\nquestion and answer, and to see Sir Percival thrust his hands into his\npockets in sullen hesitation.\n\n\"If you want to badger me with any more of your infernal scruples,\" he\nsaid, \"I for one won't hear them.  I want my lunch.\"\n\n\"Come out here and speak to me,\" repeated the Count, still perfectly\nuninfluenced by the rudest speech that his friend could make to him.\n\nSir Percival descended the steps.  The Count took him by the arm, and\nwalked him away gently.  The \"business,\" I was sure, referred to the\nquestion of the signature.  They were speaking of Laura and of me\nbeyond a doubt.  I felt heart-sick and faint with anxiety. It might be\nof the last importance to both of us to know what they were saying to\neach other at that moment, and not one word of it could by any\npossibility reach my ears.\n\nI walked about the house, from room to room, with the lawyer's letter\nin my bosom (I was afraid by this time even to trust it under lock and\nkey), till the oppression of my suspense half maddened me.  There were\nno signs of Laura's return, and I thought of going out to look for her.\nBut my strength was so exhausted by the trials and anxieties of the\nmorning that the heat of the day quite overpowered me, and after an\nattempt to get to the door I was obliged to return to the drawing-room\nand lie down on the nearest sofa to recover.\n\nI was just composing myself when the door opened softly and the Count\nlooked in.\n\n\"A thousand pardons, Miss Halcombe,\" he said; \"I only venture to\ndisturb you because I am the bearer of good news.  Percival--who is\ncapricious in everything, as you know--has seen fit to alter his mind\nat the last moment, and the business of the signature is put off for\nthe present.  A great relief to all of us, Miss Halcombe, as I see with\npleasure in your face.  Pray present my best respects and\nfelicitations, when you mention this pleasant change of circumstances\nto Lady Glyde.\"\n\nHe left me before I had recovered my astonishment.  There could be no\ndoubt that this extraordinary alteration of purpose in the matter of\nthe signature was due to his influence, and that his discovery of my\napplication to London yesterday, and of my having received an answer to\nit to-day, had offered him the means of interfering with certain\nsuccess.\n\nI felt these impressions, but my mind seemed to share the exhaustion of\nmy body, and I was in no condition to dwell on them with any useful\nreference to the doubtful present or the threatening future.  I tried a\nsecond time to run out and find Laura, but my head was giddy and my\nknees trembled under me. There was no choice but to give it up again\nand return to the sofa, sorely against my will.\n\nThe quiet in the house, and the low murmuring hum of summer insects\noutside the open window, soothed me.  My eyes closed of themselves, and\nI passed gradually into a strange condition, which was not waking--for\nI knew nothing of what was going on about me, and not sleeping--for I\nwas conscious of my own repose.  In this state my fevered mind broke\nloose from me, while my weary body was at rest, and in a trance, or\nday-dream of my fancy--I know not what to call it--I saw Walter\nHartright.  I had not thought of him since I rose that morning--Laura\nhad not said one word to me either directly or indirectly referring to\nhim--and yet I saw him now as plainly as if the past time had returned,\nand we were both together again at Limmeridge House.\n\nHe appeared to me as one among many other men, none of whose faces I\ncould plainly discern.  They were all lying on the steps of an immense\nruined temple.  Colossal tropical trees--with rank creepers twining\nendlessly about their trunks, and hideous stone idols glimmering and\ngrinning at intervals behind leaves and stalks and branches--surrounded\nthe temple and shut out the sky, and threw a dismal shadow over the\nforlorn band of men on the steps.  White exhalations twisted and curled\nup stealthily from the ground, approached the men in wreaths like\nsmoke, touched them, and stretched them out dead, one by one, in the\nplaces where they lay.  An agony of pity and fear for Walter loosened\nmy tongue, and I implored him to escape.  \"Come back, come back!\" I\nsaid.  \"Remember your promise to HER and to ME.  Come back to us before\nthe Pestilence reaches you and lays you dead like the rest!\"\n\nHe looked at me with an unearthly quiet in his face.  \"Wait,\" he said,\n\"I shall come back.  The night when I met the lost Woman on the highway\nwas the night which set my life apart to be the instrument of a Design\nthat is yet unseen.  Here, lost in the wilderness, or there, welcomed\nback in the land of my birth, I am still walking on the dark road which\nleads me, and you, and the sister of your love and mine, to the unknown\nRetribution and the inevitable End.  Wait and look.  The Pestilence\nwhich touches the rest will pass ME.\"\n\nI saw him again.  He was still in the forest, and the numbers of his\nlost companions had dwindled to very few.  The temple was gone, and the\nidols were gone--and in their place the figures of dark, dwarfish men\nlurked murderously among the trees, with bows in their hands, and\narrows fitted to the string.  Once more I feared for Walter, and cried\nout to warn him.  Once more he turned to me, with the immovable quiet\nin his face.\n\n\"Another step,\" he said, \"on the dark road.  Wait and look.  The arrows\nthat strike the rest will spare me.\"\n\nI saw him for the third time in a wrecked ship, stranded on a wild,\nsandy shore.  The overloaded boats were making away from him for the\nland, and he alone was left to sink with the ship.  I cried to him to\nhail the hindmost boat, and to make a last effort for his life.  The\nquiet face looked at me in return, and the unmoved voice gave me back\nthe changeless reply.  \"Another step on the journey.  Wait and look.\nThe Sea which drowns the rest will spare me.\"\n\nI saw him for the last time.  He was kneeling by a tomb of white\nmarble, and the shadow of a veiled woman rose out of the grave beneath\nand waited by his side.  The unearthly quiet of his face had changed to\nan unearthly sorrow.  But the terrible certainty of his words remained\nthe same.  \"Darker and darker,\" he said; \"farther and farther yet.\nDeath takes the good, the beautiful, and the young--and spares me.  The\nPestilence that wastes, the Arrow that strikes, the Sea that drowns,\nthe Grave that closes over Love and Hope, are steps of my journey, and\ntake me nearer and nearer to the End.\"\n\nMy heart sank under a dread beyond words, under a grief beyond tears.\nThe darkness closed round the pilgrim at the marble tomb--closed round\nthe veiled woman from the grave--closed round the dreamer who looked on\nthem.  I saw and heard no more.\n\nI was aroused by a hand laid on my shoulder.  It was Laura's.\n\nShe had dropped on her knees by the side of the sofa.  Her face was\nflushed and agitated, and her eyes met mine in a wild bewildered\nmanner.  I started the instant I saw her.\n\n\"What has happened?\" I asked.  \"What has frightened you?\"\n\nShe looked round at the half-open door, put her lips close to my ear,\nand answered in a whisper--\n\n\"Marian!--the figure at the lake--the footsteps last night--I've just\nseen her! I've just spoken to her!\"\n\n\"Who, for Heaven's sake?\"\n\n\"Anne Catherick.\"\n\nI was so startled by the disturbance in Laura's face and manner, and so\ndismayed by the first waking impressions of my dream, that I was not\nfit to bear the revelation which burst upon me when that name passed\nher lips.  I could only stand rooted to the floor, looking at her in\nbreathless silence.\n\nShe was too much absorbed by what had happened to notice the effect\nwhich her reply had produced on me.  \"I have seen Anne Catherick! I\nhave spoken to Anne Catherick!\" she repeated as if I had not heard her.\n\"Oh, Marian, I have such things to tell you! Come away--we may be\ninterrupted here--come at once into my room.\"\n\nWith those eager words she caught me by the hand, and led me through\nthe library, to the end room on the ground floor, which had been fitted\nup for her own especial use.  No third person, except her maid, could\nhave any excuse for surprising us here. She pushed me in before her,\nlocked the door, and drew the chintz curtains that hung over the inside.\n\nThe strange, stunned feeling which had taken possession of me still\nremained.  But a growing conviction that the complications which had\nlong threatened to gather about her, and to gather about me, had\nsuddenly closed fast round us both, was now beginning to penetrate my\nmind.  I could not express it in words--I could hardly even realise it\ndimly in my own thoughts.  \"Anne Catherick!\" I whispered to myself,\nwith useless, helpless reiteration--\"Anne Catherick!\"\n\nLaura drew me to the nearest seat, an ottoman in the middle of the\nroom.  \"Look!\" she said, \"look here!\"--and pointed to the bosom of her\ndress.\n\nI saw, for the first time, that the lost brooch was pinned in its place\nagain.  There was something real in the sight of it, something real in\nthe touching of it afterwards, which seemed to steady the whirl and\nconfusion in my thoughts, and to help me to compose myself.\n\n\"Where did you find your brooch?\" The first words I could say to her\nwere the words which put that trivial question at that important moment.\n\n\"SHE found it, Marian.\"\n\n\"Where?\"\n\n\"On the floor of the boat-house.  Oh, how shall I begin--how shall I\ntell you about it! She talked to me so strangely--she looked so\nfearfully ill--she left me so suddenly!\"\n\nHer voice rose as the tumult of her recollections pressed upon her\nmind.  The inveterate distrust which weighs, night and day, on my\nspirits in this house, instantly roused me to warn her--just as the\nsight of the brooch had roused me to question her, the moment before.\n\n\"Speak low,\" I said.  \"The window is open, and the garden path runs\nbeneath it.  Begin at the beginning, Laura.  Tell me, word for word,\nwhat passed between that woman and you.\"\n\n\"Shall I close the window?\"\n\n\"No, only speak low--only remember that Anne Catherick is a dangerous\nsubject under your husband's roof.  Where did you first see her?\"\n\n\"At the boat-house, Marian.  I went out, as you know, to find my\nbrooch, and I walked along the path through the plantation, looking\ndown on the ground carefully at every step.  In that way I got on,\nafter a long time, to the boat-house, and as soon as I was inside it, I\nwent on my knees to hunt over the floor.  I was still searching with my\nback to the doorway, when I heard a soft, strange voice behind me say,\n'Miss Fairlie.'\"\n\n\"Miss Fairlie!\"\n\n\"Yes, my old name--the dear, familiar name that I thought I had parted\nfrom for ever.  I started up--not frightened, the voice was too kind\nand gentle to frighten anybody--but very much surprised. There, looking\nat me from the doorway, stood a woman, whose face I never remembered to\nhave seen before--\"\n\n\"How was she dressed?\"\n\n\"She had a neat, pretty white gown on, and over it a poor worn thin\ndark shawl.  Her bonnet was of brown straw, as poor and worn as the\nshawl.  I was struck by the difference between her gown and the rest of\nher dress, and she saw that I noticed it.  'Don't look at my bonnet and\nshawl,' she said, speaking in a quick, breathless, sudden way; 'if I\nmustn't wear white, I don't care what I wear.  Look at my gown as much\nas you please--I'm not ashamed of that.' Very strange, was it not?\nBefore I could say anything to soothe her, she held out one of her\nhands, and I saw my brooch in it.  I was so pleased and so grateful,\nthat I went quite close to her to say what I really felt.  'Are you\nthankful enough to do me one little kindness?' she asked.  'Yes,\nindeed,' I answered, 'any kindness in my power I shall be glad to show\nyou.' 'Then let me pin your brooch on for you, now I have found it.'\nHer request was so unexpected, Marian, and she made it with such\nextraordinary eagerness, that I drew back a step or two, not well\nknowing what to do.  'Ah!' she said, 'your mother would have let me pin\non the brooch.' There was something in her voice and her look, as well\nas in her mentioning my mother in that reproachful manner, which made\nme ashamed of my distrust. I took her hand with the brooch in it, and\nput it up gently on the bosom of my dress. 'You knew my mother?' I\nsaid.  'Was it very long ago? have I ever seen you before?' Her hands\nwere busy fastening the brooch: she stopped and pressed them against my\nbreast. 'You don't remember a fine spring day at Limmeridge,' she said,\n'and your mother walking down the path that led to the school, with a\nlittle girl on each side of her? I have had nothing else to think of\nsince, and I remember it.  You were one of the little girls, and I was\nthe other.  Pretty, clever Miss Fairlie, and poor dazed Anne Catherick\nwere nearer to each other then than they are now!'\"\n\n\"Did you remember her, Laura, when she told you her name?\"\n\n\"Yes, I remembered your asking me about Anne Catherick at Limmeridge,\nand your saying that she had once been considered like me.\"\n\n\"What reminded you of that, Laura?\"\n\n\"SHE reminded me.  While I was looking at her, while she was very close\nto me, it came over my mind suddenly that we were like each other! Her\nface was pale and thin and weary--but the sight of it startled me, as\nif it had been the sight of my own face in the glass after a long\nillness.  The discovery--I don't know why--gave me such a shock, that I\nwas perfectly incapable of speaking to her for the moment.\"\n\n\"Did she seem hurt by your silence?\"\n\n\"I am afraid she was hurt by it.  'You have not got your mother's\nface,' she said, 'or your mother's heart.  Your mother's face was dark,\nand your mother's heart, Miss Fairlie, was the heart of an angel.' 'I\nam sure I feel kindly towards you,' I said, 'though I may not be able\nto express it as I ought.  Why do you call me Miss Fairlie?----'\n'Because I love the name of Fairlie and hate the name of Glyde,' she\nbroke out violently.  I had seen nothing like madness in her before\nthis, but I fancied I saw it now in her eyes.  'I only thought you\nmight not know I was married,' I said, remembering the wild letter she\nwrote to me at Limmeridge, and trying to quiet her.  She sighed\nbitterly, and turned away from me.  'Not know you were married?' she\nrepeated.  'I am here BECAUSE you are married.  I am here to make\natonement to you, before I meet your mother in the world beyond the\ngrave.' She drew farther and farther away from me, till she was out of\nthe boat-house, and then she watched and listened for a little while.\nWhen she turned round to speak again, instead of coming back, she\nstopped where she was, looking in at me, with a hand on each side of\nthe entrance.  'Did you see me at the lake last night?' she said.  'Did\nyou hear me following you in the wood? I have been waiting for days\ntogether to speak to you alone--I have left the only friend I have in\nthe world, anxious and frightened about me--I have risked being shut\nup again in the mad-house--and all for your sake, Miss Fairlie, all for\nyour sake.' Her words alarmed me, Marian, and yet there was something\nin the way she spoke that made me pity her with all my heart.  I am\nsure my pity must have been sincere, for it made me bold enough to ask\nthe poor creature to come in, and sit down in the boat-house, by my\nside.\"\n\n\"Did she do so?\"\n\n\"No.  She shook her head, and told me she must stop where she was, to\nwatch and listen, and see that no third person surprised us. And from\nfirst to last, there she waited at the entrance, with a hand on each\nside of it, sometimes bending in suddenly to speak to me, sometimes\ndrawing back suddenly to look about her.  'I was here yesterday,' she\nsaid, 'before it came dark, and I heard you, and the lady with you,\ntalking together.  I heard you tell her about your husband.  I heard\nyou say you had no influence to make him believe you, and no influence\nto keep him silent.  Ah! I knew what those words meant--my conscience\ntold me while I was listening.  Why did I ever let you marry him! Oh,\nmy fear--my mad, miserable, wicked fear! 'She covered up her face in\nher poor worn shawl, and moaned and murmured to herself behind it.  I\nbegan to be afraid she might break out into some terrible despair which\nneither she nor I could master.  'Try to quiet yourself,' I said; 'try\nto tell me how you might have prevented my marriage.' She took the\nshawl from her face, and looked at me vacantly.  'I ought to have had\nheart enough to stop at Limmeridge,' she answered.  'I ought never to\nhave let the news of his coming there frighten me away.  I ought to\nhave warned you and saved you before it was too late.  Why did I only\nhave courage enough to write you that letter? Why did I only do harm,\nwhen I wanted and meant to do good? Oh, my fear--my mad, miserable,\nwicked fear!' She repeated those words again, and hid her face again in\nthe end of her poor worn shawl.  It was dreadful to see her, and\ndreadful to hear her.\"\n\n\"Surely, Laura, you asked what the fear was which she dwelt on so\nearnestly?\"\n\n\"Yes, I asked that.\"\n\n\"And what did she say?\"\n\n\"She asked me in return, if I should not be afraid of a man who had\nshut me up in a mad-house, and who would shut me up again, if he could?\nI said, 'Are you afraid still? Surely you would not be here if you were\nafraid now?' 'No,' she said, 'I am not afraid now.' I asked why not.\nShe suddenly bent forward into the boat-house, and said, 'Can't you\nguess why?' I shook my head.  'Look at me,' she went on.  I told her I\nwas grieved to see that she looked very sorrowful and very ill.  She\nsmiled for the first time. 'Ill?' she repeated; 'I'm dying.  You know\nwhy I'm not afraid of him now.  Do you think I shall meet your mother\nin heaven? Will she forgive me if I do?' I was so shocked and so\nstartled, that I could make no reply.  'I have been thinking of it,'\nshe went on, 'all the time I have been in hiding from your husband, all\nthe time I lay ill.  My thoughts have driven me here--I want to make\natonement--I want to undo all I can of the harm I once did.' I begged\nher as earnestly as I could to tell me what she meant.  She still\nlooked at me with fixed vacant eyes.  'SHALL I undo the harm?' she said\nto herself doubtfully.  'You have friends to take your part.  If YOU\nknow his Secret, he will be afraid of you, he won't dare use you as he\nused me.  He must treat you mercifully for his own sake, if he is\nafraid of you and your friends.  And if he treats you mercifully, and\nif I can say it was my doing----' I listened eagerly for more, but she\nstopped at those words.\"\n\n\"You tried to make her go on?\"\n\n\"I tried, but she only drew herself away from me again, and leaned her\nface and arms against the side of the boat-house.  'Oh!' I heard her\nsay, with a dreadful, distracted tenderness in her voice, 'oh! if I\ncould only be buried with your mother! If I could only wake at her\nside, when the angel's trumpet sounds, and the graves give up their\ndead at the resurrection!'--Marian! I trembled from head to foot--it\nwas horrible to hear her.  'But there is no hope of that,' she said,\nmoving a little, so as to look at me again, 'no hope for a poor\nstranger like me.  I shall not rest under the marble cross that I\nwashed with my own hands, and made so white and pure for her sake.  Oh\nno! oh no! God's mercy, not man's, will take me to her, where the\nwicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest.' She spoke those\nwords quietly and sorrowfully, with a heavy, hopeless sigh, and then\nwaited a little.  Her face was confused and troubled, she seemed to be\nthinking, or trying to think.  'What was it I said just now?' she asked\nafter a while.  'When your mother is in my mind, everything else goes\nout of it.  What was I saying? what was I saying?' I reminded the poor\ncreature, as kindly and delicately as I could.  'Ah, yes, yes,' she\nsaid, still in a vacant, perplexed manner.  'You are helpless with your\nwicked husband.  Yes.  And I must do what I have come to do here--I\nmust make it up to you for having been afraid to speak out at a better\ntime.' 'What IS it you have to tell me?' I asked.  'The Secret that\nyour cruel husband is afraid of,' she answered.  'I once threatened him\nwith the Secret, and frightened him.  You shall threaten him with the\nSecret, and frighten him too.' Her face darkened, and a hard, angry\nstare fixed itself in her eyes.  She began waving her hand at me in a\nvacant, unmeaning manner.  'My mother knows the Secret,' she said. 'My\nmother has wasted under the Secret half her lifetime.  One day, when I\nwas grown up, she said something to ME.  And the next day your\nhusband----'\"\n\n\"Yes! yes! Go on.  What did she tell you about your husband?\"\n\n\"She stopped again, Marian, at that point----\"\n\n\"And said no more?\"\n\n\"And listened eagerly.  'Hush!' she whispered, still waving her hand at\nme.  'Hush!' She moved aside out of the doorway, moved slowly and\nstealthily, step by step, till I lost her past the edge of the\nboat-house.\"\n\n\"Surely you followed her?\"\n\n\"Yes, my anxiety made me bold enough to rise and follow her.  Just as I\nreached the entrance, she appeared again suddenly, round the side of\nthe boat-house.  'The Secret,' I whispered to her--'wait and tell me\nthe Secret!' She caught hold of my arm, and looked at me with wild\nfrightened eyes.  'Not now,' she said, 'we are not alone--we are\nwatched.  Come here to-morrow at this time--by yourself--mind--by\nyourself.' She pushed me roughly into the boat-house again, and I saw\nher no more.\"\n\n\"Oh, Laura, Laura, another chance lost! If I had only been near you she\nshould not have escaped us.  On which side did you lose sight of her?\"\n\n\"On the left side, where the ground sinks and the wood is thickest.\"\n\n\"Did you run out again? did you call after her?\"\n\n\"How could I? I was too terrified to move or speak.\"\n\n\"But when you DID move--when you came out?\"\n\n\"I ran back here, to tell you what had happened.\"\n\n\"Did you see any one, or hear any one, in the plantation?\"\n\n\"No, it seemed to be all still and quiet when I passed through it.\"\n\nI waited for a moment to consider.  Was this third person, supposed to\nhave been secretly present at the interview, a reality, or the creature\nof Anne Catherick's excited fancy? It was impossible to determine.  The\none thing certain was, that we had failed again on the very brink of\ndiscovery--failed utterly and irretrievably, unless Anne Catherick kept\nher appointment at the boat-house for the next day.\n\n\"Are you quite sure you have told me everything that passed? Every word\nthat was said?\" I inquired.\n\n\"I think so,\" she answered.  \"My powers of memory, Marian, are not like\nyours.  But I was so strongly impressed, so deeply interested, that\nnothing of any importance can possibly have escaped me.\"\n\n\"My dear Laura, the merest trifles are of importance where Anne\nCatherick is concerned.  Think again.  Did no chance reference escape\nher as to the place in which she is living at the present time?\"\n\n\"None that I can remember.\"\n\n\"Did she not mention a companion and friend--a woman named Mrs.\nClements?\"\n\n\"Oh yes! yes! I forgot that.  She told me Mrs. Clements wanted sadly to\ngo with her to the lake and take care of her, and begged and prayed\nthat she would not venture into this neighbourhood alone.\"\n\n\"Was that all she said about Mrs. Clements?\"\n\n\"Yes, that was all.\"\n\n\"She told you nothing about the place in which she took refuge after\nleaving Todd's Corner?\"\n\n\"Nothing--I am quite sure.\"\n\n\"Nor where she has lived since? Nor what her illness had been?\"\n\n\"No, Marian, not a word.  Tell me, pray tell me, what you think about\nit.  I don't know what to think, or what to do next.\"\n\n\"You must do this, my love: You must carefully keep the appointment at\nthe boat-house to-morrow.  It is impossible to say what interests may\nnot depend on your seeing that woman again. You shall not be left to\nyourself a second time.  I will follow you at a safe distance.  Nobody\nshall see me, but I will keep within hearing of your voice, if anything\nhappens.  Anne Catherick has escaped Walter Hartright, and has escaped\nyou.  Whatever happens, she shall not escape ME.\"\n\nLaura's eyes read mine attentively.\n\n\"You believe,\" she said, \"in this secret that my husband is afraid of?\nSuppose, Marian, it should only exist after all in Anne Catherick's\nfancy? Suppose she only wanted to see me and to speak to me, for the\nsake of old remembrances? Her manner was so strange--I almost doubted\nher.  Would you trust her in other things?\"\n\n\"I trust nothing, Laura, but my own observation of your husband's\nconduct.  I judge Anne Catherick's words by his actions, and I believe\nthere is a secret.\"\n\nI said no more, and got up to leave the room. Thoughts were troubling\nme which I might have told her if we had spoken together longer, and\nwhich it might have been dangerous for her to know. The influence of\nthe terrible dream from which she had awakened me hung darkly and\nheavily over every fresh impression which the progress of her narrative\nproduced on my mind.  I felt the ominous future coming close, chilling\nme with an unutterable awe, forcing on me the conviction of an unseen\ndesign in the long series of complications which had now fastened round\nus.  I thought of Hartright--as I saw him in the body when he said\nfarewell; as I saw him in the spirit in my dream--and I too began to\ndoubt now whether we were not advancing blindfold to an appointed and\nan inevitable end.\n\nLeaving Laura to go upstairs alone, I went out to look about me in the\nwalks near the house.  The circumstances under which Anne Catherick had\nparted from her had made me secretly anxious to know how Count Fosco\nwas passing the afternoon, and had rendered me secretly distrustful of\nthe results of that solitary journey from which Sir Percival had\nreturned but a few hours since.\n\nAfter looking for them in every direction and discovering nothing, I\nreturned to the house, and entered the different rooms on the ground\nfloor one after another.  They were all empty.  I came out again into\nthe hall, and went upstairs to return to Laura.  Madame Fosco opened\nher door as I passed it in my way along the passage, and I stopped to\nsee if she could inform me of the whereabouts of her husband and Sir\nPercival.  Yes, she had seen them both from her window more than an\nhour since.  The Count had looked up with his customary kindness, and\nhad mentioned with his habitual attention to her in the smallest\ntrifles, that he and his friend were going out together for a long walk.\n\nFor a long walk! They had never yet been in each other's company with\nthat object in my experience of them.  Sir Percival cared for no\nexercise but riding, and the Count (except when he was polite enough to\nbe my escort) cared for no exercise at all.\n\nWhen I joined Laura again, I found that she had called to mind in my\nabsence the impending question of the signature to the deed, which, in\nthe interest of discussing her interview with Anne Catherick, we had\nhitherto overlooked.  Her first words when I saw her expressed her\nsurprise at the absence of the expected summons to attend Sir Percival\nin the library.\n\n\"You may make your mind easy on that subject,\" I said.  \"For the\npresent, at least, neither your resolution nor mine will be exposed to\nany further trial.  Sir Percival has altered his plans--the business\nof the signature is put off.\"\n\n\"Put off?\" Laura repeated amazedly.  \"Who told you so?\"\n\n\"My authority is Count Fosco.  I believe it is to his interference that\nwe are indebted for your husband's sudden change of purpose.\"\n\n\"It seems impossible, Marian.  If the object of my signing was, as we\nsuppose, to obtain money for Sir Percival that he urgently wanted, how\ncan the matter be put off?\"\n\n\"I think, Laura, we have the means at hand of setting that doubt at\nrest. Have you forgotten the conversation that I heard between Sir\nPercival and the lawyer as they were crossing the hall?\"\n\n\"No, but I don't remember----\"\n\n\"I do.  There were two alternatives proposed.  One was to obtain your\nsignature to the parchment.  The other was to gain time by giving bills\nat three months.  The last resource is evidently the resource now\nadopted, and we may fairly hope to be relieved from our share in Sir\nPercival's embarrassments for some time to come.\"\n\n\"Oh, Marian, it sounds too good to be true!\"\n\n\"Does it, my love? You complimented me on my ready memory not long\nsince, but you seem to doubt it now.  I will get my journal, and you\nshall see if I am right or wrong.\"\n\nI went away and got the book at once.\n\nOn looking back to the entry referring to the lawyer's visit, we found\nthat my recollection of the two alternatives presented was accurately\ncorrect.  It was almost as great a relief to my mind as to Laura's, to\nfind that my memory had served me, on this occasion, as faithfully as\nusual.  In the perilous uncertainty of our present situation, it is\nhard to say what future interests may not depend upon the regularity of\nthe entries in my journal, and upon the reliability of my recollection\nat the time when I make them.\n\nLaura's face and manner suggested to me that this last consideration\nhad occurred to her as well as to myself.  Anyway, it is only a\ntrifling matter, and I am almost ashamed to put it down here in\nwriting--it seems to set the forlornness of our situation in such a\nmiserably vivid light.  We must have little indeed to depend on, when\nthe discovery that my memory can still be trusted to serve us is hailed\nas if it was the discovery of a new friend!\n\nThe first bell for dinner separated us.  Just as it had done ringing,\nSir Percival and the Count returned from their walk.  We heard the\nmaster of the house storming at the servants for being five minutes\nlate, and the master's guest interposing, as usual, in the interests of\npropriety, patience, and peace.\n\n*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *\n\nThe evening has come and gone.  No extraordinary event has happened.\nBut I have noticed certain peculiarities in the conduct of Sir Percival\nand the Count, which have sent me to my bed feeling very anxious and\nuneasy about Anne Catherick, and about the results which to-morrow may\nproduce.\n\nI know enough by this time, to be sure, that the aspect of Sir Percival\nwhich is the most false, and which, therefore, means the worst, is his\npolite aspect.  That long walk with his friend had ended in improving\nhis manners, especially towards his wife.  To Laura's secret surprise\nand to my secret alarm, he called her by her Christian name, asked if\nshe had heard lately from her uncle, inquired when Mrs. Vesey was to\nreceive her invitation to Blackwater, and showed her so many other\nlittle attentions that he almost recalled the days of his hateful\ncourtship at Limmeridge House.  This was a bad sign to begin with, and\nI thought it more ominous still that he should pretend after dinner to\nfall asleep in the drawing-room, and that his eyes should cunningly\nfollow Laura and me when he thought we neither of us suspected him.  I\nhave never had any doubt that his sudden journey by himself took him to\nWelmingham to question Mrs. Catherick--but the experience of to-night\nhas made me fear that the expedition was not undertaken in vain, and\nthat he has got the information which he unquestionably left us to\ncollect.  If I knew where Anne Catherick was to be found, I would be up\nto-morrow with sunrise and warn her.\n\nWhile the aspect under which Sir Percival presented himself to-night\nwas unhappily but too familiar to me, the aspect under which the Count\nappeared was, on the other hand, entirely new in my experience of him.\nHe permitted me, this evening, to make his acquaintance, for the first\ntime, in the character of a Man of Sentiment--of sentiment, as I\nbelieve, really felt, not assumed for the occasion.\n\nFor instance, he was quiet and subdued--his eyes and his voice\nexpressed a restrained sensibility.  He wore (as if there was some\nhidden connection between his showiest finery and his deepest feeling)\nthe most magnificent waistcoat he has yet appeared in--it was made of\npale sea-green silk, and delicately trimmed with fine silver braid.\nHis voice sank into the tenderest inflections, his smile expressed a\nthoughtful, fatherly admiration, whenever he spoke to Laura or to me.\nHe pressed his wife's hand under the table when she thanked him for\ntrifling little attentions at dinner.  He took wine with her.  \"Your\nhealth and happiness, my angel!\" he said, with fond glistening eyes.\nHe ate little or nothing, and sighed, and said \"Good Percival!\" when\nhis friend laughed at him.  After dinner, he took Laura by the hand,\nand asked her if she would be \"so sweet as to play to him.\" She\ncomplied, through sheer astonishment.  He sat by the piano, with his\nwatch-chain resting in folds, like a golden serpent, on the sea-green\nprotuberance of his waistcoat.  His immense head lay languidly on one\nside, and he gently beat time with two of his yellow-white fingers.  He\nhighly approved of the music, and tenderly admired Laura's manner of\nplaying--not as poor Hartright used to praise it, with an innocent\nenjoyment of the sweet sounds, but with a clear, cultivated, practical\nknowledge of the merits of the composition, in the first place, and of\nthe merits of the player's touch in the second.  As the evening closed\nin, he begged that the lovely dying light might not be profaned, just\nyet, by the appearance of the lamps.  He came, with his horribly silent\ntread, to the distant window at which I was standing, to be out of his\nway and to avoid the very sight of him--he came to ask me to support\nhis protest against the lamps.  If any one of them could only have\nburnt him up at that moment, I would have gone down to the kitchen and\nfetched it myself.\n\n\"Surely you like this modest, trembling English twilight?\" he said\nsoftly.  \"Ah! I love it.  I feel my inborn admiration of all that is\nnoble, and great, and good, purified by the breath of heaven on an\nevening like this.  Nature has such imperishable charms, such\ninextinguishable tenderness for me!--I am an old, fat man--talk which\nwould become your lips, Miss Halcombe, sounds like a derision and a\nmockery on mine.  It is hard to be laughed at in my moments of\nsentiment, as if my soul was like myself, old and overgrown.  Observe,\ndear lady, what a light is dying on the trees! Does it penetrate your\nheart, as it penetrates mine?\"\n\nHe paused, looked at me, and repeated the famous lines of Dante on the\nEvening-time, with a melody and tenderness which added a charm of their\nown to the matchless beauty of the poetry itself.\n\n\"Bah!\" he cried suddenly, as the last cadence of those noble Italian\nwords died away on his lips; \"I make an old fool of myself, and only\nweary you all! Let us shut up the window in our bosoms and get back to\nthe matter-of-fact world.  Percival! I sanction the admission of the\nlamps.  Lady Glyde--Miss Halcombe--Eleanor, my good wife--which of you\nwill indulge me with a game at dominoes?\"\n\nHe addressed us all, but he looked especially at Laura.\n\nShe had learnt to feel my dread of offending him, and she accepted his\nproposal.  It was more than I could have done at that moment. I could\nnot have sat down at the same table with him for any consideration.\nHis eyes seemed to reach my inmost soul through the thickening\nobscurity of the twilight.  His voice trembled along every nerve in my\nbody, and turned me hot and cold alternately.  The mystery and terror\nof my dream, which had haunted me at intervals all through the evening,\nnow oppressed my mind with an unendurable foreboding and an unutterable\nawe.  I saw the white tomb again, and the veiled woman rising out of it\nby Hartright's side.  The thought of Laura welled up like a spring in\nthe depths of my heart, and filled it with waters of bitterness, never,\nnever known to it before.  I caught her by the hand as she passed me on\nher way to the table, and kissed her as if that night was to part us\nfor ever.  While they were all gazing at me in astonishment, I ran out\nthrough the low window which was open before me to the ground--ran out\nto hide from them in the darkness, to hide even from myself.\n\n\nWe separated that evening later than usual.  Towards midnight the\nsummer silence was broken by the shuddering of a low, melancholy wind\namong the trees.  We all felt the sudden chill in the atmosphere, but\nthe Count was the first to notice the stealthy rising of the wind.  He\nstopped while he was lighting my candle for me, and held up his hand\nwarningly--\n\n\"Listen!\" he said.  \"There will be a change to-morrow.\"\n\n\n\nVII\n\nJune 19th.--The events of yesterday warned me to be ready, sooner or\nlater, to meet the worst. To-day is not yet at an end, and the worst\nhas come.\n\nJudging by the closest calculation of time that Laura and I could make,\nwe arrived at the conclusion that Anne Catherick must have appeared at\nthe boat-house at half-past two o'clock on the afternoon of yesterday.\nI accordingly arranged that Laura should just show herself at the\nluncheon-table to-day, and should then slip out at the first\nopportunity, leaving me behind to preserve appearances, and to follow\nher as soon as I could safely do so. This mode of proceeding, if no\nobstacles occurred to thwart us, would enable her to be at the\nboat-house before half-past two, and (when I left the table, in my\nturn) would take me to a safe position in the plantation before three.\n\nThe change in the weather, which last night's wind warned us to expect,\ncame with the morning.  It was raining heavily when I got up, and it\ncontinued to rain until twelve o'clock--when the clouds dispersed, the\nblue sky appeared, and the sun shone again with the bright promise of a\nfine afternoon.\n\nMy anxiety to know how Sir Percival and the Count would occupy the\nearly part of the day was by no means set at rest, so far as Sir\nPercival was concerned, by his leaving us immediately after breakfast,\nand going out by himself, in spite of the rain.  He neither told us\nwhere he was going nor when we might expect him back.  We saw him pass\nthe breakfast-room window hastily, with his high boots and his\nwaterproof coat on--and that was all.\n\nThe Count passed the morning quietly indoors, some part of it in the\nlibrary, some part in the drawing-room, playing odds and ends of music\non the piano, and humming to himself.  Judging by appearances, the\nsentimental side of his character was persistently inclined to betray\nitself still.  He was silent and sensitive, and ready to sigh and\nlanguish ponderously (as only fat men CAN sigh and languish) on the\nsmallest provocation.\n\nLuncheon-time came and Sir Percival did not return.  The Count took his\nfriend's place at the table, plaintively devoured the greater part of a\nfruit tart, submerged under a whole jugful of cream, and explained the\nfull merit of the achievement to us as soon as he had done.  \"A taste\nfor sweets,\" he said in his softest tones and his tenderest manner, \"is\nthe innocent taste of women and children.  I love to share it with\nthem--it is another bond, dear ladies, between you and me.\"\n\nLaura left the table in ten minutes' time.  I was sorely tempted to\naccompany her.  But if we had both gone out together we must have\nexcited suspicion, and worse still, if we allowed Anne Catherick to see\nLaura, accompanied by a second person who was a stranger to her, we\nshould in all probability forfeit her confidence from that moment,\nnever to regain it again.\n\nI waited, therefore, as patiently as I could, until the servant came in\nto clear the table.  When I quitted the room, there were no signs, in\nthe house or out of it, of Sir Percival's return.  I left the Count\nwith a piece of sugar between his lips, and the vicious cockatoo\nscrambling up his waistcoat to get at it, while Madame Fosco, sitting\nopposite to her husband, watched the proceedings of his bird and\nhimself as attentively as if she had never seen anything of the sort\nbefore in her life.  On my way to the plantation I kept carefully\nbeyond the range of view from the luncheon-room window.  Nobody saw me\nand nobody followed me.  It was then a quarter to three o'clock by my\nwatch.\n\nOnce among the trees I walked rapidly, until I had advanced more than\nhalf-way through the plantation.  At that point I slackened my pace and\nproceeded cautiously, but I saw no one, and heard no voices.  By little\nand little I came within view of the back of the boat-house--stopped\nand listened--then went on, till I was close behind it, and must have\nheard any persons who were talking inside.  Still the silence was\nunbroken--still far and near no sign of a living creature appeared\nanywhere.\n\nAfter skirting round by the back of the building, first on one side and\nthen on the other, and making no discoveries, I ventured in front of\nit, and fairly looked in.  The place was empty.\n\nI called, \"Laura!\"--at first softly, then louder and louder.  No one\nanswered and no one appeared.  For all that I could see and hear, the\nonly human creature in the neighbourhood of the lake and the plantation\nwas myself.\n\nMy heart began to beat violently, but I kept my resolution, and\nsearched, first the boat-house and then the ground in front of it, for\nany signs which might show me whether Laura had really reached the\nplace or not.  No mark of her presence appeared inside the building,\nbut I found traces of her outside it, in footsteps on the sand.\n\nI detected the footsteps of two persons--large footsteps like a man's,\nand small footsteps, which, by putting my own feet into them and\ntesting their size in that manner, I felt certain were Laura's.  The\nground was confusedly marked in this way just before the boat-house.\nClose against one side of it, under shelter of the projecting roof, I\ndiscovered a little hole in the sand--a hole artificially made, beyond\na doubt.  I just noticed it, and then turned away immediately to trace\nthe footsteps as far as I could, and to follow the direction in which\nthey might lead me.\n\nThey led me, starting from the left-hand side of the boat-house, along\nthe edge of the trees, a distance, I should think, of between two and\nthree hundred yards, and then the sandy ground showed no further trace\nof them.  Feeling that the persons whose course I was tracking must\nnecessarily have entered the plantation at this point, I entered it\ntoo.  At first I could find no path, but I discovered one afterwards,\njust faintly traced among the trees, and followed it.  It took me, for\nsome distance, in the direction of the village, until I stopped at a\npoint where another foot-track crossed it.  The brambles grew thickly\non either side of this second path.  I stood looking down it, uncertain\nwhich way to take next, and while I looked I saw on one thorny branch\nsome fragments of fringe from a woman's shawl.  A closer examination of\nthe fringe satisfied me that it had been torn from a shawl of Laura's,\nand I instantly followed the second path.  It brought me out at last,\nto my great relief, at the back of the house.  I say to my great\nrelief, because I inferred that Laura must, for some unknown reason,\nhave returned before me by this roundabout way.  I went in by the\ncourt-yard and the offices.  The first person whom I met in crossing\nthe servants' hall was Mrs. Michelson, the housekeeper.\n\n\"Do you know,\" I asked, \"whether Lady Glyde has come in from her walk\nor not?\"\n\n\"My lady came in a little while ago with Sir Percival,\" answered the\nhousekeeper.  \"I am afraid, Miss Halcombe, something very distressing\nhas happened.\"\n\nMy heart sank within me.  \"You don't mean an accident?\" I said faintly.\n\n\"No, no--thank God, no accident.  But my lady ran upstairs to her own\nroom in tears, and Sir Percival has ordered me to give Fanny warning to\nleave in an hour's time.\"\n\nFanny was Laura's maid--a good affectionate girl who had been with her\nfor years--the only person in the house whose fidelity and devotion we\ncould both depend upon.\n\n\"Where is Fanny?\" I inquired.\n\n\"In my room, Miss Halcombe.  The young woman is quite overcome, and I\ntold her to sit down and try to recover herself.\"\n\nI went to Mrs. Michelson's room, and found Fanny in a corner, with her\nbox by her side, crying bitterly.\n\nShe could give me no explanation whatever of her sudden dismissal. Sir\nPercival had ordered that she should have a month's wages, in place of\na month's warning, and go.  No reason had been assigned--no objection\nhad been made to her conduct.  She had been forbidden to appeal to her\nmistress, forbidden even to see her for a moment to say good-bye.  She\nwas to go without explanations or farewells, and to go at once.\n\nAfter soothing the poor girl by a few friendly words, I asked where she\nproposed to sleep that night.  She replied that she thought of going to\nthe little inn in the village, the landlady of which was a respectable\nwoman, known to the servants at Blackwater Park.  The next morning, by\nleaving early, she might get back to her friends in Cumberland without\nstopping in London, where she was a total stranger.\n\nI felt directly that Fanny's departure offered us a safe means of\ncommunication with London and with Limmeridge House, of which it might\nbe very important to avail ourselves.  Accordingly, I told her that she\nmight expect to hear from her mistress or from me in the course of the\nevening, and that she might depend on our both doing all that lay in\nour power to help her, under the trial of leaving us for the present.\nThose words said, I shook hands with her and went upstairs.\n\nThe door which led to Laura's room was the door of an ante-chamber\nopening on to the passage.  When I tried it, it was bolted on the\ninside.\n\nI knocked, and the door was opened by the same heavy, overgrown\nhousemaid whose lumpish insensibility had tried my patience so severely\non the day when I found the wounded dog.\n\nI had, since that time, discovered that her name was Margaret Porcher,\nand that she was the most awkward, slatternly, and obstinate servant in\nthe house.\n\nOn opening the door she instantly stepped out to the threshold, and\nstood grinning at me in stolid silence.\n\n\"Why do you stand there?\" I said.  \"Don't you see that I want to come\nin?\"\n\n\"Ah, but you mustn't come in,\" was the answer, with another and a\nbroader grin still.\n\n\"How dare you talk to me in that way? Stand back instantly!\"\n\nShe stretched out a great red hand and arm on each side of her, so as\nto bar the doorway, and slowly nodded her addle head at me.\n\n\"Master's orders,\" she said, and nodded again.\n\nI had need of all my self-control to warn me against contesting the\nmatter with HER, and to remind me that the next words I had to say must\nbe addressed to her master.  I turned my back on her, and instantly\nwent downstairs to find him.  My resolution to keep my temper under all\nthe irritations that Sir Percival could offer was, by this time, as\ncompletely forgotten--I say so to my shame--as if I had never made it.\nIt did me good, after all I had suffered and suppressed in that\nhouse--it actually did me good to feel how angry I was.\n\nThe drawing-room and the breakfast-room were both empty.  I went on to\nthe library, and there I found Sir Percival, the Count, and Madame\nFosco.  They were all three standing up, close together, and Sir\nPercival had a little slip of paper in his hand.  As I opened the door\nI heard the Count say to him, \"No--a thousand times over, no.\"\n\nI walked straight up to him, and looked him full in the face.\n\n\"Am I to understand, Sir Percival, that your wife's room is a prison,\nand that your housemaid is the gaoler who keeps it?\" I asked.\n\n\"Yes, that is what you are to understand,\" he answered.  \"Take care my\ngaoler hasn't got double duty to do--take care your room is not a\nprison too.\"\n\n\"Take YOU care how you treat your wife, and how you threaten ME,\" I\nbroke out in the heat of my anger.  \"There are laws in England to\nprotect women from cruelty and outrage.  If you hurt a hair of Laura's\nhead, if you dare to interfere with my freedom, come what may, to those\nlaws I will appeal.\"\n\nInstead of answering me he turned round to the Count.\n\n\"What did I tell you?\" he asked.  \"What do you say now?\"\n\n\"What I said before,\" replied the Count--\"No.\"\n\nEven in the vehemence of my anger I felt his calm, cold, grey eyes on\nmy face.  They turned away from me as soon as he had spoken, and looked\nsignificantly at his wife.  Madame Fosco immediately moved close to my\nside, and in that position addressed Sir Percival before either of us\ncould speak again.\n\n\"Favour me with your attention for one moment,\" she said, in her clear\nicily-suppressed tones.  \"I have to thank you, Sir Percival, for your\nhospitality, and to decline taking advantage of it any longer.  I\nremain in no house in which ladies are treated as your wife and Miss\nHalcombe have been treated here to-day!\"\n\nSir Percival drew back a step, and stared at her in dead silence. The\ndeclaration he had just heard--a declaration which he well knew, as I\nwell knew, Madame Fosco would not have ventured to make without her\nhusband's permission--seemed to petrify him with surprise.  The Count\nstood by, and looked at his wife with the most enthusiastic admiration.\n\n\"She is sublime!\" he said to himself.  He approached her while he\nspoke, and drew her hand through his arm.  \"I am at your service,\nEleanor,\" he went on, with a quiet dignity that I had never noticed in\nhim before.  \"And at Miss Halcombe's service, if she will honour me by\naccepting all the assistance I can offer her.\"\n\n\"Damn it! what do you mean?\" cried Sir Percival, as the Count quietly\nmoved away with his wife to the door.\n\n\"At other times I mean what I say, but at this time I mean what my wife\nsays,\" replied the impenetrable Italian.  \"We have changed places,\nPercival, for once, and Madame Fosco's opinion is--mine.\"\n\nSir Percival crumpled up the paper in his hand, and pushing past the\nCount, with another oath, stood between him and the door.\n\n\"Have your own way,\" he said, with baffled rage in his low,\nhalf-whispering tones.  \"Have your own way--and see what comes of it.\"\nWith those words he left the room.\n\nMadame Fosco glanced inquiringly at her husband.  \"He has gone away\nvery suddenly,\" she said.  \"What does it mean?\"\n\n\"It means that you and I together have brought the worst-tempered man\nin all England to his senses,\" answered the Count.  \"It means, Miss\nHalcombe, that Lady Glyde is relieved from a gross indignity, and you\nfrom the repetition of an unpardonable insult.  Suffer me to express my\nadmiration of your conduct and your courage at a very trying moment.\"\n\n\"Sincere admiration,\" suggested Madame Fosco.\n\n\"Sincere admiration,\" echoed the Count.\n\nI had no longer the strength of my first angry resistance to outrage\nand injury to support me.  My heart-sick anxiety to see Laura, my sense\nof my own helpless ignorance of what had happened at the boat-house,\npressed on me with an intolerable weight.  I tried to keep up\nappearances by speaking to the Count and his wife in the tone which\nthey had chosen to adopt in speaking to me, but the words failed on my\nlips--my breath came short and thick--my eyes looked longingly, in\nsilence, at the door.  The Count, understanding my anxiety, opened it,\nwent out, and pulled it to after him.  At the same time Sir Percival's\nheavy step descended the stairs.  I heard them whispering together\noutside, while Madame Fosco was assuring me, in her calmest and most\nconventional manner, that she rejoiced, for all our sakes, that Sir\nPercival's conduct had not obliged her husband and herself to leave\nBlackwater Park.  Before she had done speaking the whispering ceased,\nthe door opened, and the Count looked in.\n\n\"Miss Halcombe,\" he said, \"I am happy to inform you that Lady Glyde is\nmistress again in her own house.  I thought it might be more agreeable\nto you to hear of this change for the better from me than from Sir\nPercival, and I have therefore expressly returned to mention it.\"\n\n\"Admirable delicacy!\" said Madame Fosco, paying back her husband's\ntribute of admiration with the Count's own coin, in the Count's own\nmanner.  He smiled and bowed as if he had received a formal compliment\nfrom a polite stranger, and drew back to let me pass out first.\n\nSir Percival was standing in the hall.  As I hurried to the stairs I\nheard him call impatiently to the Count to come out of the library.\n\n\"What are you waiting there for?\" he said.  \"I want to speak to you.\"\n\n\"And I want to think a little by myself,\" replied the other. \"Wait till\nlater, Percival, wait till later.\"\n\nNeither he nor his friend said any more.  I gained the top of the\nstairs and ran along the passage.  In my haste and my agitation I left\nthe door of the ante-chamber open, but I closed the door of the bedroom\nthe moment I was inside it.\n\nLaura was sitting alone at the far end of the room, her arms resting\nwearily on a table, and her face hidden in her hands.  She started up\nwith a cry of delight when she saw me.\n\n\"How did you get here?\" she asked.  \"Who gave you leave? Not Sir\nPercival?\"\n\nIn my overpowering anxiety to hear what she had to tell me, I could not\nanswer her--I could only put questions on my side. Laura's eagerness to\nknow what had passed downstairs proved, however, too strong to be\nresisted.  She persistently repeated her inquiries.\n\n\"The Count, of course,\" I answered impatiently.  \"Whose influence in\nthe house----\"\n\nShe stopped me with a gesture of disgust.\n\n\"Don't speak of him,\" she cried.  \"The Count is the vilest creature\nbreathing! The Count is a miserable Spy----!\"\n\nBefore we could either of us say another word we were alarmed by a soft\nknocking at the door of the bedroom.\n\nI had not yet sat down, and I went first to see who it was.  When I\nopened the door Madame Fosco confronted me with my handkerchief in her\nhand.\n\n\"You dropped this downstairs, Miss Halcombe,\" she said, \"and I thought\nI could bring it to you, as I was passing by to my own room.\"\n\nHer face, naturally pale, had turned to such a ghastly whiteness that I\nstarted at the sight of it.  Her hands, so sure and steady at all other\ntimes, trembled violently, and her eyes looked wolfishly past me\nthrough the open door, and fixed on Laura.\n\nShe had been listening before she knocked! I saw it in her white face,\nI saw it in her trembling hands, I saw it in her look at Laura.\n\nAfter waiting an instant she turned from me in silence, and slowly\nwalked away.\n\nI closed the door again.  \"Oh, Laura! Laura! We shall both rue the day\nwhen you called the Count a Spy!\"\n\n\"You would have called him so yourself, Marian, if you had known what I\nknow.  Anne Catherick was right.  There was a third person watching us\nin the plantation yesterday, and that third person---\"\n\n\"Are you sure it was the Count?\"\n\n\"I am absolutely certain.  He was Sir Percival's spy--he was Sir\nPercival's informer--he set Sir Percival watching and waiting, all the\nmorning through, for Anne Catherick and for me.\"\n\n\"Is Anne found? Did you see her at the lake?\"\n\n\"No.  She has saved herself by keeping away from the place.  When I got\nto the boat-house no one was there.\"\n\n\"Yes? Yes?\"\n\n\"I went in and sat waiting for a few minutes.  But my restlessness made\nme get up again, to walk about a little.  As I passed out I saw some\nmarks on the sand, close under the front of the boat-house.  I stooped\ndown to examine them, and discovered a word written in large letters on\nthe sand.  The word was--LOOK.\"\n\n\"And you scraped away the sand, and dug a hollow place in it?\"\n\n\"How do you know that, Marian?\"\n\n\"I saw the hollow place myself when I followed you to the boat-house.\nGo on--go on!\"\n\n\"Yes, I scraped away the sand on the surface, and in a little while I\ncame to a strip of paper hidden beneath, which had writing on it.  The\nwriting was signed with Anne Catherick's initials.\"\n\n\"Where is it?\"\n\n\"Sir Percival has taken it from me.\"\n\n\"Can you remember what the writing was? Do you think you can repeat it\nto me?\"\n\n\"In substance I can, Marian.  It was very short.  You would have\nremembered it, word for word.\"\n\n\"Try to tell me what the substance was before we go any further.\"\n\nShe complied.  I write the lines down here exactly as she repeated them\nto me.  They ran thus--\n\n\n\"I was seen with you, yesterday, by a tall, stout old man, and had to\nrun to save myself.  He was not quick enough on his feet to follow me,\nand he lost me among the trees.  I dare not risk coming back here\nto-day at the same time.  I write this, and hide it in the sand, at six\nin the morning, to tell you so.  When we speak next of your wicked\nhusband's Secret we must speak safely, or not at all.  Try to have\npatience.  I promise you shall see me again and that soon.--A. C.\"\n\n\nThe reference to the \"tall, stout old man\" (the terms of which Laura\nwas certain that she had repeated to me correctly) left no doubt as to\nwho the intruder had been.  I called to mind that I had told Sir\nPercival, in the Count's presence the day before, that Laura had gone\nto the boat-house to look for her brooch.  In all probability he had\nfollowed her there, in his officious way, to relieve her mind about the\nmatter of the signature, immediately after he had mentioned the change\nin Sir Percival's plans to me in the drawing-room.  In this case he\ncould only have got to the neighbourhood of the boat-house at the very\nmoment when Anne Catherick discovered him.  The suspiciously hurried\nmanner in which she parted from Laura had no doubt prompted his useless\nattempt to follow her.  Of the conversation which had previously taken\nplace between them he could have heard nothing.  The distance between\nthe house and the lake, and the time at which he left me in the\ndrawing-room, as compared with the time at which Laura and Anne\nCatherick had been speaking together, proved that fact to us at any\nrate, beyond a doubt.\n\nHaving arrived at something like a conclusion so far, my next great\ninterest was to know what discoveries Sir Percival had made after Count\nFosco had given him his information.\n\n\"How came you to lose possession of the letter?\" I asked.  \"What did\nyou do with it when you found it in the sand?\"\n\n\"After reading it once through,\" she replied, \"I took it into the\nboat-house with me to sit down and look over it a second time. While I\nwas reading a shadow fell across the paper.  I looked up, and saw Sir\nPercival standing in the doorway watching me.\"\n\n\"Did you try to hide the letter?\"\n\n\"I tried, but he stopped me.  'You needn't trouble to hide that,' he\nsaid.  'I happen to have read it.' I could only look at him\nhelplessly--I could say nothing.  'You understand?' he went on; 'I have\nread it.  I dug it up out of the sand two hours since, and buried it\nagain, and wrote the word above it again, and left it ready to your\nhands.  You can't lie yourself out of the scrape now.  You saw Anne\nCatherick in secret yesterday, and you have got her letter in your hand\nat this moment.  I have not caught HER yet, but I have caught YOU.\nGive me the letter.' He stepped close up to me--I was alone with him,\nMarian--what could I do?--I gave him the letter.\"\n\n\"What did he say when you gave it to him?\"\n\n\"At first he said nothing.  He took me by the arm, and led me out of\nthe boat-house, and looked about him on all sides, as if he was afraid\nof our being seen or heard.  Then he clasped his hand fast round my\narm, and whispered to me, 'What did Anne Catherick say to you\nyesterday? I insist on hearing every word, from first to last.'\"\n\n\"Did you tell him?\"\n\n\"I was alone with him, Marian--his cruel hand was bruising my arm--what\ncould I do?\"\n\n\"Is the mark on your arm still? Let me see it.\"\n\n\"Why do you want to see it?\"\n\n\"I want to see it, Laura, because our endurance must end, and our\nresistance must begin to-day.  That mark is a weapon to strike him\nwith.  Let me see it now--I may have to swear to it at some future\ntime.\"\n\n\"Oh, Marian, don't look so--don't talk so! It doesn't hurt me now!\"\n\n\"Let me see it!\"\n\nShe showed me the marks.  I was past grieving over them, past crying\nover them, past shuddering over them.  They say we are either better\nthan men, or worse.  If the temptation that has fallen in some women's\nway, and made them worse, had fallen in mine at that moment--Thank God!\nmy face betrayed nothing that his wife could read.  The gentle,\ninnocent, affectionate creature thought I was frightened for her and\nsorry for her, and thought no more.\n\n\"Don't think too seriously of it, Marian,\" she said simply, as she\npulled her sleeve down again.  \"It doesn't hurt me now.\"\n\n\"I will try to think quietly of it, my love, for your sake.--Well!\nwell! And you told him all that Anne Catherick had said to you--all\nthat you told me?\"\n\n\"Yes, all.  He insisted on it--I was alone with him--I could conceal\nnothing.\"\n\n\"Did he say anything when you had done?\"\n\n\"He looked at me, and laughed to himself in a mocking, bitter way. 'I\nmean to have the rest out of you,' he said, 'do you hear?--the rest.' I\ndeclared to him solemnly that I had told him everything I knew.  'Not\nyou,' he answered, 'you know more than you choose to tell.  Won't you\ntell it? You shall! I'll wring it out of you at home if I can't wring\nit out of you here.' He led me away by a strange path through the\nplantation--a path where there was no hope of our meeting you--and he\nspoke no more till we came within sight of the house.  Then he stopped\nagain, and said, 'Will you take a second chance, if I give it to you?\nWill you think better of it, and tell me the rest?' I could only repeat\nthe same words I had spoken before.  He cursed my obstinacy, and went\non, and took me with him to the house.  'You can't deceive me,' he\nsaid, 'you know more than you choose to tell.  I'll have your secret\nout of you, and I'll have it out of that sister of yours as well.\nThere shall be no more plotting and whispering between you.  Neither\nyou nor she shall see each other again till you have confessed the\ntruth.  I'll have you watched morning, noon, and night, till you\nconfess the truth.' He was deaf to everything I could say.  He took me\nstraight upstairs into my own room.  Fanny was sitting there, doing\nsome work for me, and he instantly ordered her out. 'I'll take good\ncare YOU'RE not mixed up in the conspiracy,' he said.  'You shall leave\nthis house to-day.  If your mistress wants a maid, she shall have one\nof my choosing.' He pushed me into the room, and locked the door on me.\nHe set that senseless woman to watch me outside, Marian! He looked and\nspoke like a madman.  You may hardly understand it--he did indeed.\"\n\n\"I do understand it, Laura.  He is mad--mad with the terrors of a\nguilty conscience.  Every word you have said makes me positively\ncertain that when Anne Catherick left you yesterday you were on the eve\nof discovering a secret which might have been your vile husband's ruin,\nand he thinks you HAVE discovered it.  Nothing you can say or do will\nquiet that guilty distrust, and convince his false nature of your\ntruth.  I don't say this, my love, to alarm you.  I say it to open your\neyes to your position, and to convince you of the urgent necessity of\nletting me act, as I best can, for your protection while the chance is\nour own.  Count Fosco's interference has secured me access to you\nto-day, but he may withdraw that interference to-morrow.  Sir Percival\nhas already dismissed Fanny because she is a quick-witted girl, and\ndevotedly attached to you, and has chosen a woman to take her place who\ncares nothing for your interests, and whose dull intelligence lowers\nher to the level of the watch-dog in the yard.  It is impossible to say\nwhat violent measures he may take next, unless we make the most of our\nopportunities while we have them.\"\n\n\"What can we do, Marian? Oh, if we could only leave this house, never\nto see it again!\"\n\n\"Listen to me, my love, and try to think that you are not quite\nhelpless so long as I am here with you.\"\n\n\"I will think so--I do think so.  Don't altogether forget poor Fanny in\nthinking of me.  She wants help and comfort too.\"\n\n\"I will not forget her.  I saw her before I came up here, and I have\narranged to communicate with her to-night.  Letters are not safe in the\npost-bag at Blackwater Park, and I shall have two to write to-day, in\nyour interests, which must pass through no hands but Fanny's.\"\n\n\"What letters?\"\n\n\"I mean to write first, Laura, to Mr. Gilmore's partner, who has\noffered to help us in any fresh emergency.  Little as I know of the\nlaw, I am certain that it can protect a woman from such treatment as\nthat ruffian has inflicted on you to-day.  I will go into no details\nabout Anne Catherick, because I have no certain information to give.\nBut the lawyer shall know of those bruises on your arm, and of the\nviolence offered to you in this room--he shall, before I rest to-night!\"\n\n\"But think of the exposure, Marian!\"\n\n\"I am calculating on the exposure.  Sir Percival has more to dread from\nit than you have.  The prospect of an exposure may bring him to terms\nwhen nothing else will.\"\n\nI rose as I spoke, but Laura entreated me not to leave her.  \"You will\ndrive him to desperation,\" she said, \"and increase our dangers tenfold.\"\n\nI felt the truth--the disheartening truth--of those words.  But I could\nnot bring myself plainly to acknowledge it to her.  In our dreadful\nposition there was no help and no hope for us but in risking the worst.\nI said so in guarded terms.  She sighed bitterly, but did not contest\nthe matter.  She only asked about the second letter that I had proposed\nwriting.  To whom was it to be addressed?\n\n\"To Mr. Fairlie,\" I said.  \"Your uncle is your nearest male relative,\nand the head of the family.  He must and shall interfere.\"\n\nLaura shook her head sorrowfully.\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" I went on, \"your uncle is a weak, selfish, worldly man, I\nknow, but he is not Sir Percival Glyde, and he has no such friend about\nhim as Count Fosco.  I expect nothing from his kindness or his\ntenderness of feeling towards you or towards me, but he will do\nanything to pamper his own indolence, and to secure his own quiet.  Let\nme only persuade him that his interference at this moment will save him\ninevitable trouble and wretchedness and responsibility hereafter, and\nhe will bestir himself for his own sake.  I know how to deal with him,\nLaura--I have had some practice.\"\n\n\"If you could only prevail on him to let me go back to Limmeridge for a\nlittle while and stay there quietly with you, Marian, I could be almost\nas happy again as I was before I was married!\"\n\nThose words set me thinking in a new direction.  Would it be possible\nto place Sir Percival between the two alternatives of either exposing\nhimself to the scandal of legal interference on his wife's behalf, or\nof allowing her to be quietly separated from him for a time under\npretext of a visit to her uncle's house? And could he, in that case, be\nreckoned on as likely to accept the last resource? It was\ndoubtful--more than doubtful.  And yet, hopeless as the experiment\nseemed, surely it was worth trying.  I resolved to try it in sheer\ndespair of knowing what better to do.\n\n\"Your uncle shall know the wish you have just expressed,\" I said, \"and\nI will ask the lawyer's advice on the subject as well.  Good may come\nof it--and will come of it, I hope.\"\n\nSaying that I rose again, and again Laura tried to make me resume my\nseat.\n\n\"Don't leave me,\" she said uneasily.  \"My desk is on that table. You\ncan write here.\"\n\nIt tried me to the quick to refuse her, even in her own interests. But\nwe had been too long shut up alone together already.  Our chance of\nseeing each other again might entirely depend on our not exciting any\nfresh suspicions.  It was full time to show myself, quietly and\nunconcernedly, among the wretches who were at that very moment,\nperhaps, thinking of us and talking of us downstairs. I explained the\nmiserable necessity to Laura, and prevailed on her to recognise it as I\ndid.\n\n\"I will come back again, love, in an hour or less,\" I said.  \"The worst\nis over for to-day.  Keep yourself quiet and fear nothing.\"\n\n\"Is the key in the door, Marian? Can I lock it on the inside?\"\n\n\"Yes, here is the key.  Lock the door, and open it to nobody until I\ncome upstairs again.\"\n\nI kissed her and left her.  It was a relief to me as I walked away to\nhear the key turned in the lock, and to know that the door was at her\nown command.\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\nJune 19th.--I had only got as far as the top of the stairs when the\nlocking of Laura's door suggested to me the precaution of also locking\nmy own door, and keeping the key safely about me while I was out of the\nroom.  My journal was already secured with other papers in the table\ndrawer, but my writing materials were left out.  These included a seal\nbearing the common device of two doves drinking out of the same cup,\nand some sheets of blotting-paper, which had the impression on them of\nthe closing lines of my writing in these pages traced during the past\nnight.  Distorted by the suspicion which had now become a part of\nmyself, even such trifles as these looked too dangerous to be trusted\nwithout a guard--even the locked table drawer seemed to be not\nsufficiently protected in my absence until the means of access to it\nhad been carefully secured as well.\n\nI found no appearance of any one having entered the room while I had\nbeen talking with Laura.  My writing materials (which I had given the\nservant instructions never to meddle with) were scattered over the\ntable much as usual.  The only circumstance in connection with them\nthat at all struck me was that the seal lay tidily in the tray with the\npencils and the wax.  It was not in my careless habits (I am sorry to\nsay) to put it there, neither did I remember putting it there.  But as\nI could not call to mind, on the other hand, where else I had thrown it\ndown, and as I was also doubtful whether I might not for once have laid\nit mechanically in the right place, I abstained from adding to the\nperplexity with which the day's events had filled my mind by troubling\nit afresh about a trifle.  I locked the door, put the key in my pocket,\nand went downstairs.\n\nMadame Fosco was alone in the hall looking at the weather-glass.\n\n\"Still falling,\" she said.  \"I am afraid we must expect more rain.\"\n\nHer face was composed again to its customary expression and its\ncustomary colour.  But the hand with which she pointed to the dial of\nthe weather-glass still trembled.\n\nCould she have told her husband already that she had overheard Laura\nreviling him, in my company, as a \"spy?\"  My strong suspicion that she\nmust have told him, my irresistible dread (all the more overpowering\nfrom its very vagueness) of the consequences which might follow, my\nfixed conviction, derived from various little self-betrayals which\nwomen notice in each other, that Madame Fosco, in spite of her\nwell-assumed external civility, had not forgiven her niece for\ninnocently standing between her and the legacy of ten thousand\npounds--all rushed upon my mind together, all impelled me to speak in\nthe vain hope of using my own influence and my own powers of persuasion\nfor the atonement of Laura's offence.\n\n\"May I trust to your kindness to excuse me, Madame Fosco, if I venture\nto speak to you on an exceedingly painful subject?\"\n\nShe crossed her hands in front of her and bowed her head solemnly,\nwithout uttering a word, and without taking her eyes off mine for a\nmoment.\n\n\"When you were so good as to bring me back my handkerchief,\" I went on,\n\"I am very, very much afraid you must have accidentally heard Laura say\nsomething which I am unwilling to repeat, and which I will not attempt\nto defend.  I will only venture to hope that you have not thought it of\nsufficient importance to be mentioned to the Count?\"\n\n\"I think it of no importance whatever,\" said Madame Fosco sharply and\nsuddenly.  \"But,\" she added, resuming her icy manner in a moment, \"I\nhave no secrets from my husband even in trifles.  When he noticed just\nnow that I looked distressed, it was my painful duty to tell him why I\nwas distressed, and I frankly acknowledge to you, Miss Halcombe, that I\nHAVE told him.\"\n\nI was prepared to hear it, and yet she turned me cold all over when she\nsaid those words.\n\n\"Let me earnestly entreat you, Madame Fosco--let me earnestly entreat\nthe Count--to make some allowances for the sad position in which my\nsister is placed.  She spoke while she was smarting under the insult\nand injustice inflicted on her by her husband, and she was not herself\nwhen she said those rash words.  May I hope that they will be\nconsiderately and generously forgiven?\"\n\n\"Most assuredly,\" said the Count's quiet voice behind me.  He had\nstolen on us with his noiseless tread and his book in his hand from the\nlibrary.\n\n\"When Lady Glyde said those hasty words,\" he went on, \"she did me an\ninjustice which I lament--and forgive.  Let us never return to the\nsubject, Miss Halcombe; let us all comfortably combine to forget it\nfrom this moment.\"\n\n\"You are very kind,\" I said, \"you relieve me inexpressibly.\"\n\nI tried to continue, but his eyes were on me; his deadly smile that\nhides everything was set, hard, and unwavering on his broad, smooth\nface.  My distrust of his unfathomable falseness, my sense of my own\ndegradation in stooping to conciliate his wife and himself, so\ndisturbed and confused me, that the next words failed on my lips, and I\nstood there in silence.\n\n\"I beg you on my knees to say no more, Miss Halcombe--I am truly\nshocked that you should have thought it necessary to say so much.\" With\nthat polite speech he took my hand--oh, how I despise myself! oh, how\nlittle comfort there is even in knowing that I submitted to it for\nLaura's sake!--he took my hand and put it to his poisonous lips.  Never\ndid I know all my horror of him till then. That innocent familiarity\nturned my blood as if it had been the vilest insult that a man could\noffer me.  Yet I hid my disgust from him--I tried to smile--I, who once\nmercilessly despised deceit in other women, was as false as the worst\nof them, as false as the Judas whose lips had touched my hand.\n\nI could not have maintained my degrading self-control--it is all that\nredeems me in my own estimation to know that I could not--if he had\nstill continued to keep his eyes on my face.  His wife's tigerish\njealousy came to my rescue and forced his attention away from me the\nmoment he possessed himself of my hand.  Her cold blue eyes caught\nlight, her dull white cheeks flushed into bright colour, she looked\nyears younger than her age in an instant.\n\n\"Count!\" she said.  \"Your foreign forms of politeness are not\nunderstood by Englishwomen.\"\n\n\"Pardon me, my angel! The best and dearest Englishwoman in the world\nunderstands them.\" With those words he dropped my hand and quietly\nraised his wife's hand to his lips in place of it.\n\nI ran back up the stairs to take refuge in my own room.  If there had\nbeen time to think, my thoughts, when I was alone again, would have\ncaused me bitter suffering.  But there was no time to think. Happily\nfor the preservation of my calmness and my courage there was time for\nnothing but action.\n\nThe letters to the lawyer and to Mr. Fairlie were still to be written,\nand I sat down at once without a moment's hesitation to devote myself\nto them.\n\nThere was no multitude of resources to perplex me--there was absolutely\nno one to depend on, in the first instance, but myself. Sir Percival\nhad neither friends nor relatives in the neighbourhood whose\nintercession I could attempt to employ.  He was on the coldest\nterms--in some cases on the worst terms with the families of his own\nrank and station who lived near him.  We two women had neither father\nnor brother to come to the house and take our parts.  There was no\nchoice but to write those two doubtful letters, or to put Laura in the\nwrong and myself in the wrong, and to make all peaceable negotiation in\nthe future impossible by secretly escaping from Blackwater Park.\nNothing but the most imminent personal peril could justify our taking\nthat second course.  The letters must be tried first, and I wrote them.\n\nI said nothing to the lawyer about Anne Catherick, because (as I had\nalready hinted to Laura) that topic was connected with a mystery which\nwe could not yet explain, and which it would therefore be useless to\nwrite about to a professional man.  I left my correspondent to\nattribute Sir Percival's disgraceful conduct, if he pleased, to fresh\ndisputes about money matters, and simply consulted him on the\npossibility of taking legal proceedings for Laura's protection in the\nevent of her husband's refusal to allow her to leave Blackwater Park\nfor a time and return with me to Limmeridge.  I referred him to Mr.\nFairlie for the details of this last arrangement--I assured him that I\nwrote with Laura's authority--and I ended by entreating him to act in\nher name to the utmost extent of his power and with the least possible\nloss of time.\n\nThe letter to Mr. Fairlie occupied me next.  I appealed to him on the\nterms which I had mentioned to Laura as the most likely to make him\nbestir himself; I enclosed a copy of my letter to the lawyer to show\nhim how serious the case was, and I represented our removal to\nLimmeridge as the only compromise which would prevent the danger and\ndistress of Laura's present position from inevitably affecting her\nuncle as well as herself at no very distant time.\n\nWhen I had done, and had sealed and directed the two envelopes, I went\nback with the letters to Laura's room, to show her that they were\nwritten.\n\n\"Has anybody disturbed you?\" I asked, when she opened the door to me.\n\n\"Nobody has knocked,\" she replied.  \"But I heard some one in the outer\nroom.\"\n\n\"Was it a man or a woman?\"\n\n\"A woman.  I heard the rustling of her gown.\"\n\n\"A rustling like silk?\"\n\n\"Yes, like silk.\"\n\nMadame Fosco had evidently been watching outside.  The mischief she\nmight do by herself was little to be feared.  But the mischief she\nmight do, as a willing instrument in her husband's hands, was too\nformidable to be overlooked.\n\n\"What became of the rustling of the gown when you no longer heard it in\nthe ante-room?\" I inquired.  \"Did you hear it go past your wall, along\nthe passage?\"\n\n\"Yes.  I kept still and listened, and just heard it.\"\n\n\"Which way did it go?\"\n\n\"Towards your room.\"\n\nI considered again.  The sound had not caught my ears.  But I was then\ndeeply absorbed in my letters, and I write with a heavy hand and a\nquill pen, scraping and scratching noisily over the paper. It was more\nlikely that Madame Fosco would hear the scraping of my pen than that I\nshould hear the rustling of her dress.  Another reason (if I had wanted\none) for not trusting my letters to the post-bag in the hall.\n\nLaura saw me thinking.  \"More difficulties!\" she said wearily; \"more\ndifficulties and more dangers!\"\n\n\"No dangers,\" I replied.  \"Some little difficulty, perhaps.  I am\nthinking of the safest way of putting my two letters into Fanny's\nhands.\"\n\n\"You have really written them, then? Oh, Marian, run no risks--pray,\npray run no risks!\"\n\n\"No, no--no fear.  Let me see--what o'clock is it now?\"\n\nIt was a quarter to six.  There would be time for me to get to the\nvillage inn, and to come back again before dinner.  If I waited till\nthe evening I might find no second opportunity of safely leaving the\nhouse.\n\n\"Keep the key turned in the lock.  Laura,\" I said, \"and don't be afraid\nabout me.  If you hear any inquiries made, call through the door, and\nsay that I am gone out for a walk.\"\n\n\"When shall you be back?\"\n\n\"Before dinner, without fail.  Courage, my love.  By this time to-morrow\nyou will have a clear-headed, trustworthy man acting for your\ngood.  Mr. Gilmore's partner is our next best friend to Mr. Gilmore\nhimself.\"\n\nA moment's reflection, as soon as I was alone, convinced me that I had\nbetter not appear in my walking-dress until I had first discovered what\nwas going on in the lower part of the house.  I had not ascertained yet\nwhether Sir Percival was indoors or out.\n\nThe singing of the canaries in the library, and the smell of\ntobacco-smoke that came through the door, which was not closed, told me\nat once where the Count was.  I looked over my shoulder as I passed the\ndoorway, and saw to my surprise that he was exhibiting the docility of\nthe birds in his most engagingly polite manner to the housekeeper.  He\nmust have specially invited her to see them--for she would never have\nthought of going into the library of her own accord.  The man's\nslightest actions had a purpose of some kind at the bottom of every one\nof them.  What could be his purpose here?\n\nIt was no time then to inquire into his motives.  I looked about for\nMadame Fosco next, and found her following her favourite circle round\nand round the fish-pond.\n\nI was a little doubtful how she would meet me, after the outbreak of\njealousy of which I had been the cause so short a time since. But her\nhusband had tamed her in the interval, and she now spoke to me with the\nsame civility as usual.  My only object in addressing myself to her was\nto ascertain if she knew what had become of Sir Percival.  I contrived\nto refer to him indirectly, and after a little fencing on either side\nshe at last mentioned that he had gone out.\n\n\"Which of the horses has he taken?\" I asked carelessly.\n\n\"None of them,\" she replied.  \"He went away two hours since on foot.\nAs I understood it, his object was to make fresh inquiries about the\nwoman named Anne Catherick.  He appears to be unreasonably anxious\nabout tracing her.  Do you happen to know if she is dangerously mad,\nMiss Halcombe?\"\n\n\"I do not, Countess.\"\n\n\"Are you going in?\"\n\n\"Yes, I think so.  I suppose it will soon be time to dress for dinner.\"\n\nWe entered the house together.  Madame Fosco strolled into the library,\nand closed the door.  I went at once to fetch my hat and shawl.  Every\nmoment was of importance, if I was to get to Fanny at the inn and be\nback before dinner.\n\nWhen I crossed the hall again no one was there, and the singing of the\nbirds in the library had ceased.  I could not stop to make any fresh\ninvestigations.  I could only assure myself that the way was clear, and\nthen leave the house with the two letters safe in my pocket.\n\nOn my way to the village I prepared myself for the possibility of\nmeeting Sir Percival.  As long as I had him to deal with alone I felt\ncertain of not losing my presence of mind.  Any woman who is sure of\nher own wits is a match at any time for a man who is not sure of his\nown temper.  I had no such fear of Sir Percival as I had of the Count.\nInstead of fluttering, it had composed me, to hear of the errand on\nwhich he had gone out.  While the tracing of Anne Catherick was the\ngreat anxiety that occupied him, Laura and I might hope for some\ncessation of any active persecution at his hands.  For our sakes now,\nas well as for Anne's, I hoped and prayed fervently that she might\nstill escape him.\n\nI walked on as briskly as the heat would let me till I reached the\ncross-road which led to the village, looking back from time to time to\nmake sure that I was not followed by any one.\n\nNothing was behind me all the way but an empty country waggon. The\nnoise made by the lumbering wheels annoyed me, and when I found that\nthe waggon took the road to the village, as well as myself, I stopped\nto let it go by and pass out of hearing.  As I looked toward it, more\nattentively than before, I thought I detected at intervals the feet of\na man walking close behind it, the carter being in front, by the side\nof his horses.  The part of the cross-road which I had just passed over\nwas so narrow that the waggon coming after me brushed the trees and\nthickets on either side, and I had to wait until it went by before I\ncould test the correctness of my impression.  Apparently that\nimpression was wrong, for when the waggon had passed me the road behind\nit was quite clear.\n\nI reached the inn without meeting Sir Percival, and without noticing\nanything more, and was glad to find that the landlady had received\nFanny with all possible kindness.  The girl had a little parlour to sit\nin, away from the noise of the taproom, and a clean bedchamber at the\ntop of the house.  She began crying again at the sight of me, and said,\npoor soul, truly enough, that it was dreadful to feel herself turned\nout into the world as if she had committed some unpardonable fault,\nwhen no blame could be laid at her door by anybody--not even by her\nmaster, who had sent her away.\n\n\"Try to make the best of it, Fanny,\" I said.  \"Your mistress and I will\nstand your friends, and will take care that your character shall not\nsuffer.  Now, listen to me.  I have very little time to spare, and I am\ngoing to put a great trust in your hands.  I wish you to take care of\nthese two letters.  The one with the stamp on it you are to put into\nthe post when you reach London to-morrow. The other, directed to Mr.\nFairlie, you are to deliver to him yourself as soon as you get home.\nKeep both the letters about you and give them up to no one.  They are\nof the last importance to your mistress's interests.\"\n\nFanny put the letters into the bosom of her dress.  \"There they shall\nstop, miss,\" she said, \"till I have done what you tell me.\"\n\n\"Mind you are at the station in good time to-morrow morning,\" I\ncontinued.  \"And when you see the housekeeper at Limmeridge give her my\ncompliments, and say that you are in my service until Lady Glyde is\nable to take you back.  We may meet again sooner than you think.  So\nkeep a good heart, and don't miss the seven o'clock train.\"\n\n\"Thank you, miss--thank you kindly.  It gives one courage to hear your\nvoice again.  Please to offer my duty to my lady, and say I left all\nthe things as tidy as I could in the time.  Oh, dear! dear! who will\ndress her for dinner to-day? It really breaks my heart, miss, to think\nof it.\"\n\n\nWhen I got back to the house I had only a quarter of an hour to spare\nto put myself in order for dinner, and to say two words to Laura before\nI went downstairs.\n\n\"The letters are in Fanny's hands,\" I whispered to her at the door.\n\"Do you mean to join us at dinner?\"\n\n\"Oh, no, no--not for the world.\"\n\n\"Has anything happened? Has any one disturbed you?\"\n\n\"Yes--just now--Sir Percival----\"\n\n\"Did he come in?\"\n\n\"No, he frightened me by a thump on the door outside.  I said, 'Who's\nthere?' 'You know,' he answered.  'Will you alter your mind, and tell\nme the rest? You shall! Sooner or later I'll wring it out of you.  You\nknow where Anne Catherick is at this moment.' 'Indeed, indeed,' I said,\n'I don't.' 'You do!' he called back. 'I'll crush your obstinacy--mind\nthat!--I'll wring it out of you!' He went away with those words--went\naway, Marian, hardly five minutes ago.\"\n\nHe had not found Anne! We were safe for that night--he had not found\nher yet.\n\n\"You are going downstairs, Marian? Come up again in the evening.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes.  Don't be uneasy if I am a little late--I must be careful\nnot to give offence by leaving them too soon.\"\n\nThe dinner-bell rang and I hastened away.\n\nSir Percival took Madame Fosco into the dining-room, and the Count gave\nme his arm.  He was hot and flushed, and was not dressed with his\ncustomary care and completeness.  Had he, too, been out before dinner,\nand been late in getting back? or was he only suffering from the heat a\nlittle more severely than usual?\n\nHowever this might be, he was unquestionably troubled by some secret\nannoyance or anxiety, which, with all his powers of deception, he was\nnot able entirely to conceal.  Through the whole of dinner he was\nalmost as silent as Sir Percival himself, and he, every now and then,\nlooked at his wife with an expression of furtive uneasiness which was\nquite new in my experience of him. The one social obligation which he\nseemed to be self-possessed enough to perform as carefully as ever was\nthe obligation of being persistently civil and attentive to me.  What\nvile object he has in view I cannot still discover, but be the design\nwhat it may, invariable politeness towards myself, invariable humility\ntowards Laura, and invariable suppression (at any cost) of Sir\nPercival's clumsy violence, have been the means he has resolutely and\nimpenetrably used to get to his end ever since he set foot in this\nhouse.  I suspected it when he first interfered in our favour, on the\nday when the deed was produced in the library, and I feel certain of it\nnow.\n\nWhen Madame Fosco and I rose to leave the table, the Count rose also to\naccompany us back to the drawing-room.\n\n\"What are you going away for?\" asked Sir Percival--\"I mean YOU, Fosco.\"\n\n\"I am going away because I have had dinner enough, and wine enough,\"\nanswered the Count.  \"Be so kind, Percival, as to make allowances for\nmy foreign habit of going out with the ladies, as well as coming in\nwith them.\"\n\n\"Nonsense! Another glass of claret won't hurt you.  Sit down again like\nan Englishman.  I want half an hour's quiet talk with you over our\nwine.\"\n\n\"A quiet talk, Percival, with all my heart, but not now, and not over\nthe wine.  Later in the evening, if you please--later in the evening.\"\n\n\"Civil!\" said Sir Percival savagely.  \"Civil behaviour, upon my soul,\nto a man in his own house!\"\n\nI had more than once seen him look at the Count uneasily during\ndinner-time, and had observed that the Count carefully abstained from\nlooking at him in return.  This circumstance, coupled with the host's\nanxiety for a little quiet talk over the wine, and the guest's\nobstinate resolution not to sit down again at the table, revived in my\nmemory the request which Sir Percival had vainly addressed to his\nfriend earlier in the day to come out of the library and speak to him.\nThe Count had deferred granting that private interview, when it was\nfirst asked for in the afternoon, and had again deferred granting it,\nwhen it was a second time asked for at the dinner-table.  Whatever the\ncoming subject of discussion between them might be, it was clearly an\nimportant subject in Sir Percival's estimation--and perhaps (judging\nfrom his evident reluctance to approach it) a dangerous subject as\nwell, in the estimation of the Count.\n\nThese considerations occurred to me while we were passing from the\ndining-room to the drawing-room.  Sir Percival's angry commentary on\nhis friend's desertion of him had not produced the slightest effect.\nThe Count obstinately accompanied us to the tea-table--waited a minute\nor two in the room--went out into the hall--and returned with the\npost-bag in his hands.  It was then eight o'clock--the hour at which\nthe letters were always despatched from Blackwater Park.\n\n\"Have you any letter for the post, Miss Halcombe?\" he asked,\napproaching me with the bag.\n\nI saw Madame Fosco, who was making the tea, pause, with the sugar-tongs\nin her hand, to listen for my answer.\n\n\"No, Count, thank you.  No letters to-day.\"\n\nHe gave the bag to the servant, who was then in the room; sat down at\nthe piano, and played the air of the lively Neapolitan street-song,\n\"La mia Carolina,\" twice over.  His wife, who was usually the most\ndeliberate of women in all her movements, made the tea as quickly as I\ncould have made it myself--finished her own cup in two minutes, and\nquietly glided out of the room.\n\nI rose to follow her example--partly because I suspected her of\nattempting some treachery upstairs with Laura, partly because I was\nresolved not to remain alone in the same room with her husband.\n\nBefore I could get to the door the Count stopped me, by a request for a\ncup of tea.  I gave him the cup of tea, and tried a second time to get\naway.  He stopped me again--this time by going back to the piano, and\nsuddenly appealing to me on a musical question in which he declared\nthat the honour of his country was concerned.\n\nI vainly pleaded my own total ignorance of music, and total want of\ntaste in that direction.  He only appealed to me again with a vehemence\nwhich set all further protest on my part at defiance. \"The English and\nthe Germans (he indignantly declared) were always reviling the Italians\nfor their inability to cultivate the higher kinds of music.  We were\nperpetually talking of our Oratorios, and they were perpetually talking\nof their Symphonies.  Did we forget and did they forget his immortal\nfriend and countryman, Rossini? What was Moses in Egypt but a sublime\noratorio, which was acted on the stage instead of being coldly sung in\na concert-room? What was the overture to Guillaume Tell but a symphony\nunder another name? Had I heard Moses in Egypt? Would I listen to this,\nand this, and this, and say if anything more sublimely sacred and grand\nhad ever been composed by mortal man?\"--And without waiting for a word\nof assent or dissent on my part, looking me hard in the face all the\ntime, he began thundering on the piano, and singing to it with loud and\nlofty enthusiasm--only interrupting himself, at intervals, to announce\nto me fiercely the titles of the different pieces of music: \"Chorus of\nEgyptians in the Plague of Darkness, Miss Halcombe!\"--\"Recitativo of\nMoses with the tables of the Law.\"--\"Prayer of Israelites, at the\npassage of the Red Sea.  Aha! Aha! Is that sacred? is that sublime?\"\nThe piano trembled under his powerful hands, and the teacups on the\ntable rattled, as his big bass voice thundered out the notes, and his\nheavy foot beat time on the floor.\n\nThere was something horrible--something fierce and devilish--in the\noutburst of his delight at his own singing and playing, and in the\ntriumph with which he watched its effect upon me as I shrank nearer and\nnearer to the door.  I was released at last, not by my own efforts, but\nby Sir Percival's interposition.  He opened the dining-room door, and\ncalled out angrily to know what \"that infernal noise\" meant.  The Count\ninstantly got up from the piano. \"Ah! if Percival is coming,\" he said,\n\"harmony and melody are both at an end.  The Muse of Music, Miss\nHalcombe, deserts us in dismay, and I, the fat old minstrel, exhale the\nrest of my enthusiasm in the open air!\" He stalked out into the\nverandah, put his hands in his pockets, and resumed the Recitativo of\nMoses, sotto voce, in the garden.\n\nI heard Sir Percival call after him from the dining-room window. But he\ntook no notice--he seemed determined not to hear.  That long-deferred\nquiet talk between them was still to be put off, was still to wait for\nthe Count's absolute will and pleasure.\n\nHe had detained me in the drawing-room nearly half an hour from the\ntime when his wife left us.  Where had she been, and what had she been\ndoing in that interval?\n\nI went upstairs to ascertain, but I made no discoveries, and when I\nquestioned Laura, I found that she had not heard anything. Nobody had\ndisturbed her, no faint rustling of the silk dress had been audible,\neither in the ante-room or in the passage.\n\nIt was then twenty minutes to nine.  After going to my room to get my\njournal, I returned, and sat with Laura, sometimes writing, sometimes\nstopping to talk with her.  Nobody came near us, and nothing happened.\nWe remained together till ten o'clock.  I then rose, said my last\ncheering words, and wished her good-night.  She locked her door again\nafter we had arranged that I should come in and see her the first thing\nin the morning.\n\nI had a few sentences more to add to my diary before going to bed\nmyself, and as I went down again to the drawing-room after leaving\nLaura for the last time that weary day, I resolved merely to show\nmyself there, to make my excuses, and then to retire an hour earlier\nthan usual for the night.\n\nSir Percival, and the Count and his wife, were sitting together. Sir\nPercival was yawning in an easy-chair, the Count was reading, Madame\nFosco was fanning herself.  Strange to say, HER face was flushed now.\nShe, who never suffered from the heat, was most undoubtedly suffering\nfrom it to-night.\n\n\"I am afraid, Countess, you are not quite so well as usual?\" I said.\n\n\"The very remark I was about to make to you,\" she replied.  \"You are\nlooking pale, my dear.\"\n\nMy dear! It was the first time she had ever addressed me with that\nfamiliarity! There was an insolent smile too on her face when she said\nthe words.\n\n\"I am suffering from one of my bad headaches,\" I answered coldly.\n\n\"Ah, indeed? Want of exercise, I suppose? A walk before dinner would\nhave been just the thing for you.\" She referred to the \"walk\" with a\nstrange emphasis.  Had she seen me go out? No matter if she had.  The\nletters were safe now in Fanny's hands.\n\n\"Come and have a smoke, Fosco,\" said Sir Percival, rising, with another\nuneasy look at his friend.\n\n\"With pleasure, Percival, when the ladies have gone to bed,\" replied\nthe Count.\n\n\"Excuse me, Countess, if I set you the example of retiring,\" I said.\n\"The only remedy for such a headache as mine is going to bed.\"\n\nI took my leave.  There was the same insolent smile on the woman's face\nwhen I shook hands with her.  Sir Percival paid no attention to me.  He\nwas looking impatiently at Madame Fosco, who showed no signs of leaving\nthe room with me.  The Count smiled to himself behind his book.  There\nwas yet another delay to that quiet talk with Sir Percival--and the\nCountess was the impediment this time.\n\n\n\nIX\n\nJune 19th.--Once safely shut into my own room, I opened these pages,\nand prepared to go on with that part of the day's record which was\nstill left to write.\n\nFor ten minutes or more I sat idle, with the pen in my hand, thinking\nover the events of the last twelve hours.  When I at last addressed\nmyself to my task, I found a difficulty in proceeding with it which I\nhad never experienced before.  In spite of my efforts to fix my\nthoughts on the matter in hand, they wandered away with the strangest\npersistency in the one direction of Sir Percival and the Count, and all\nthe interest which I tried to concentrate on my journal centred instead\nin that private interview between them which had been put off all\nthrough the day, and which was now to take place in the silence and\nsolitude of the night.\n\nIn this perverse state of my mind, the recollection of what had passed\nsince the morning would not come back to me, and there was no resource\nbut to close my journal and to get away from it for a little while.\n\nI opened the door which led from my bedroom into my sitting-room, and\nhaving passed through, pulled it to again, to prevent any accident in\ncase of draught with the candle left on the dressing-table.  My\nsitting-room window was wide open, and I leaned out listlessly to look\nat the night.\n\nIt was dark and quiet.  Neither moon nor stars were visible. There was\na smell like rain in the still, heavy air, and I put my hand out of\nwindow.  No.  The rain was only threatening, it had not come yet.\n\nI remained leaning on the window-sill for nearly a quarter of an hour,\nlooking out absently into the black darkness, and hearing nothing,\nexcept now and then the voices of the servants, or the distant sound of\na closing door, in the lower part of the house.\n\nJust as I was turning away wearily from the window to go back to the\nbedroom and make a second attempt to complete the unfinished entry in\nmy journal, I smelt the odour of tobacco-smoke stealing towards me on\nthe heavy night air.  The next moment I saw a tiny red spark advancing\nfrom the farther end of the house in the pitch darkness.  I heard no\nfootsteps, and I could see nothing but the spark.  It travelled along\nin the night, passed the window at which I was standing, and stopped\nopposite my bedroom window, inside which I had left the light burning\non the dressing-table.\n\nThe spark remained stationary for a moment, then moved back again in\nthe direction from which it had advanced.  As I followed its progress I\nsaw a second red spark, larger than the first, approaching from the\ndistance.  The two met together in the darkness.  Remembering who\nsmoked cigarettes and who smoked cigars, I inferred immediately that\nthe Count had come out first to look and listen under my window, and\nthat Sir Percival had afterwards joined him.  They must both have been\nwalking on the lawn--or I should certainly have heard Sir Percival's\nheavy footfall, though the Count's soft step might have escaped me,\neven on the gravel walk.\n\nI waited quietly at the window, certain that they could neither of them\nsee me in the darkness of the room.\n\n\"What's the matter?\" I heard Sir Percival say in a low voice. \"Why\ndon't you come in and sit down?\"\n\n\"I want to see the light out of that window,\" replied the Count softly.\n\n\"What harm does the light do?\"\n\n\"It shows she is not in bed yet.  She is sharp enough to suspect\nsomething, and bold enough to come downstairs and listen, if she can\nget the chance.  Patience, Percival--patience.\"\n\n\"Humbug! You're always talking of patience.\"\n\n\"I shall talk of something else presently.  My good friend, you are on\nthe edge of your domestic precipice, and if I let you give the women\none other chance, on my sacred word of honour they will push you over\nit!\"\n\n\"What the devil do you mean?\"\n\n\"We will come to our explanations, Percival, when the light is out of\nthat window, and when I have had one little look at the rooms on each\nside of the library, and a peep at the staircase as well.\"\n\nThey slowly moved away, and the rest of the conversation between them\n(which had been conducted throughout in the same low tones) ceased to\nbe audible.  It was no matter.  I had heard enough to determine me on\njustifying the Count's opinion of my sharpness and my courage.  Before\nthe red sparks were out of sight in the darkness I had made up my mind\nthat there should be a listener when those two men sat down to their\ntalk--and that the listener, in spite of all the Count's precautions to\nthe contrary, should be myself.  I wanted but one motive to sanction\nthe act to my own conscience, and to give me courage enough for\nperforming it--and that motive I had.  Laura's honour, Laura's\nhappiness--Laura's life itself--might depend on my quick ears and my\nfaithful memory to-night.\n\nI had heard the Count say that he meant to examine the rooms on each\nside of the library, and the staircase as well, before he entered on\nany explanation with Sir Percival.  This expression of his intentions\nwas necessarily sufficient to inform me that the library was the room\nin which he proposed that the conversation should take place.  The one\nmoment of time which was long enough to bring me to that conclusion was\nalso the moment which showed me a means of baffling his\nprecautions--or, in other words, of hearing what he and Sir Percival\nsaid to each other, without the risk of descending at all into the\nlower regions of the house.\n\nIn speaking of the rooms on the ground floor I have mentioned\nincidentally the verandah outside them, on which they all opened by\nmeans of French windows, extending from the cornice to the floor.  The\ntop of this verandah was flat, the rain-water being carried off from it\nby pipes into tanks which helped to supply the house.  On the narrow\nleaden roof, which ran along past the bedrooms, and which was rather\nless, I should think, than three feet below the sills of the window, a\nrow of flower-pots was ranged, with wide intervals between each\npot--the whole being protected from falling in high winds by an\nornamental iron railing along the edge of the roof.\n\nThe plan which had now occurred to me was to get out at my sitting-room\nwindow on to this roof, to creep along noiselessly till I reached that\npart of it which was immediately over the library window, and to crouch\ndown between the flower-pots, with my ear against the outer railing.\nIf Sir Percival and the Count sat and smoked to-night, as I had seen\nthem sitting and smoking many nights before, with their chairs close at\nthe open window, and their feet stretched on the zinc garden seats\nwhich were placed under the verandah, every word they said to each\nother above a whisper (and no long conversation, as we all know by\nexperience, can be carried on IN a whisper) must inevitably reach my\nears.  If, on the other hand, they chose to-night to sit far back\ninside the room, then the chances were that I should hear little or\nnothing--and in that case, I must run the far more serious risk of\ntrying to outwit them downstairs.\n\nStrongly as I was fortified in my resolution by the desperate nature of\nour situation, I hoped most fervently that I might escape this last\nemergency.  My courage was only a woman's courage after all, and it was\nvery near to failing me when I thought of trusting myself on the ground\nfloor, at the dead of night, within reach of Sir Percival and the Count.\n\nI went softly back to my bedroom to try the safer experiment of the\nverandah roof first.\n\nA complete change in my dress was imperatively necessary for many\nreasons.  I took off my silk gown to begin with, because the slightest\nnoise from it on that still night might have betrayed me.  I next\nremoved the white and cumbersome parts of my underclothing, and\nreplaced them by a petticoat of dark flannel. Over this I put my black\ntravelling cloak, and pulled the hood on to my head.  In my ordinary\nevening costume I took up the room of three men at least.  In my\npresent dress, when it was held close about me, no man could have\npassed through the narrowest spaces more easily than I.  The little\nbreadth left on the roof of the verandah, between the flower-pots on\none side and the wall and the windows of the house on the other, made\nthis a serious consideration.  If I knocked anything down, if I made\nthe least noise, who could say what the consequences might be?\n\nI only waited to put the matches near the candle before I extinguished\nit, and groped my way back into the sitting-room, I locked that door,\nas I had locked my bedroom door--then quietly got out of the window,\nand cautiously set my feet on the leaden roof of the verandah.\n\nMy two rooms were at the inner extremity of the new wing of the house\nin which we all lived, and I had five windows to pass before I could\nreach the position it was necessary to take up immediately over the\nlibrary.  The first window belonged to a spare room which was empty.\nThe second and third windows belonged to Laura's room. The fourth\nwindow belonged to Sir Percival's room.  The fifth belonged to the\nCountess's room.  The others, by which it was not necessary for me to\npass, were the windows of the Count's dressing-room, of the bathroom,\nand of the second empty spare room.\n\nNo sound reached my ears--the black blinding darkness of the night was\nall round me when I first stood on the verandah, except at that part of\nit which Madame Fosco's window overlooked.  There, at the very place\nabove the library to which my course was directed--there I saw a gleam\nof light! The Countess was not yet in bed.\n\nIt was too late to draw back--it was no time to wait.  I determined to\ngo on at all hazards, and trust for security to my own caution and to\nthe darkness of the night.  \"For Laura's sake!\" I thought to myself, as\nI took the first step forward on the roof, with one hand holding my\ncloak close round me, and the other groping against the wall of the\nhouse.  It was better to brush close by the wall than to risk striking\nmy feet against the flower-pots within a few inches of me, on the other\nside.\n\nI passed the dark window of the spare room, trying the leaden roof at\neach step with my foot before I risked resting my weight on it. I\npassed the dark windows of Laura's room (\"God bless her and keep her\nto-night!\").  I passed the dark window of Sir Percival's room. Then I\nwaited a moment, knelt down with my hands to support me, and so crept\nto my position, under the protection of the low wall between the bottom\nof the lighted window and the verandah roof.\n\nWhen I ventured to look up at the window itself I found that the top of\nit only was open, and that the blind inside was drawn down. While I was\nlooking I saw the shadow of Madame Fosco pass across the white field of\nthe blind--then pass slowly back again.  Thus far she could not have\nheard me, or the shadow would surely have stopped at the blind, even if\nshe had wanted courage enough to open the window and look out?\n\nI placed myself sideways against the railing of the verandah--first\nascertaining, by touching them, the position of the flower-pots on\neither side of me.  There was room enough for me to sit between them\nand no more.  The sweet-scented leaves of the flower on my left hand\njust brushed my cheek as I lightly rested my head against the railing.\n\nThe first sounds that reached me from below were caused by the opening\nor closing (most probably the latter) of three doors in succession--the\ndoors, no doubt, leading into the hall and into the rooms on each side\nof the library, which the Count had pledged himself to examine.  The\nfirst object that I saw was the red spark again travelling out into the\nnight from under the verandah, moving away towards my window, waiting a\nmoment, and then returning to the place from which it had set out.\n\n\"The devil take your restlessness! When do you mean to sit down?\"\ngrowled Sir Percival's voice beneath me.\n\n\"Ouf! how hot it is!\" said the Count, sighing and puffing wearily.\n\nHis exclamation was followed by the scraping of the garden chairs on\nthe tiled pavement under the verandah--the welcome sound which told me\nthey were going to sit close at the window as usual.  So far the chance\nwas mine.  The clock in the turret struck the quarter to twelve as they\nsettled themselves in their chairs.  I heard Madame Fosco through the\nopen window yawning, and saw her shadow pass once more across the white\nfield of the blind.\n\nMeanwhile, Sir Percival and the Count began talking together below, now\nand then dropping their voices a little lower than usual, but never\nsinking them to a whisper.  The strangeness and peril of my situation,\nthe dread, which I could not master, of Madame Fosco's lighted window,\nmade it difficult, almost impossible, for me, at first, to keep my\npresence of mind, and to fix my attention solely on the conversation\nbeneath.  For some minutes I could only succeed in gathering the\ngeneral substance of it.  I understood the Count to say that the one\nwindow alight was his wife's, that the ground floor of the house was\nquite clear, and that they might now speak to each other without fear\nof accidents.  Sir Percival merely answered by upbraiding his friend\nwith having unjustifiably slighted his wishes and neglected his\ninterests all through the day.  The Count thereupon defended himself by\ndeclaring that he had been beset by certain troubles and anxieties\nwhich had absorbed all his attention, and that the only safe time to\ncome to an explanation was a time when they could feel certain of being\nneither interrupted nor overheard. \"We are at a serious crisis in our\naffairs, Percival,\" he said, \"and if we are to decide on the future at\nall, we must decide secretly to-night.\"\n\nThat sentence of the Count's was the first which my attention was ready\nenough to master exactly as it was spoken.  From this point, with\ncertain breaks and interruptions, my whole interest fixed breathlessly\non the conversation, and I followed it word for word.\n\n\"Crisis?\" repeated Sir Percival.  \"It's a worse crisis than you think\nfor, I can tell you.\"\n\n\"So I should suppose, from your behaviour for the last day or two,\"\nreturned the other coolly.  \"But wait a little.  Before we advance to\nwhat I do NOT know, let us be quite certain of what I DO know.  Let us\nfirst see if I am right about the time that is past, before I make any\nproposal to you for the time that is to come.\"\n\n\"Stop till I get the brandy and water.  Have some yourself.\"\n\n\"Thank you, Percival.  The cold water with pleasure, a spoon, and the\nbasin of sugar.  Eau sucree, my friend--nothing more.\"\n\n\"Sugar-and-water for a man of your age!--There! mix your sickly mess.\nYou foreigners are all alike.\"\n\n\"Now listen, Percival.  I will put our position plainly before you, as\nI understand it, and you shall say if I am right or wrong. You and I\nboth came back to this house from the Continent with our affairs very\nseriously embarrassed--\"\n\n\"Cut it short! I wanted some thousands and you some hundreds, and\nwithout the money we were both in a fair way to go to the dogs\ntogether.  There's the situation.  Make what you can of it.  Go on.\"\n\n\"Well, Percival, in your own solid English words, you wanted some\nthousands and I wanted some hundreds, and the only way of getting them\nwas for you to raise the money for your own necessity (with a small\nmargin beyond for my poor little hundreds) by the help of your wife.\nWhat did I tell you about your wife on our way to England?--and what\ndid I tell you again when we had come here, and when I had seen for\nmyself the sort of woman Miss Halcombe was?\"\n\n\"How should I know? You talked nineteen to the dozen, I suppose, just\nas usual.\"\n\n\"I said this: Human ingenuity, my friend, has hitherto only discovered\ntwo ways in which a man can manage a woman.  One way is to knock her\ndown--a method largely adopted by the brutal lower orders of the\npeople, but utterly abhorrent to the refined and educated classes above\nthem.  The other way (much longer, much more difficult, but in the end\nnot less certain) is never to accept a provocation at a woman's hands.\nIt holds with animals, it holds with children, and it holds with women,\nwho are nothing but children grown up.  Quiet resolution is the one\nquality the animals, the children, and the women all fail in.  If they\ncan once shake this superior quality in their master, they get the\nbetter of HIM.  If they can never succeed in disturbing it, he gets the\nbetter of THEM.  I said to you, Remember that plain truth when you want\nyour wife to help you to the money.  I said, Remember it doubly and\ntrebly in the presence of your wife's sister, Miss Halcombe.  Have you\nremembered it? Not once in all the implications that have twisted\nthemselves about us in this house.  Every provocation that your wife\nand her sister could offer to you, you instantly accepted from them.\nYour mad temper lost the signature to the deed, lost the ready money,\nset Miss Halcombe writing to the lawyer for the first time.\"\n\n\"First time! Has she written again?\"\n\n\"Yes, she has written again to-day.\"\n\nA chair fell on the pavement of the verandah--fell with a crash, as if\nit had been kicked down.\n\nIt was well for me that the Count's revelation roused Sir Percival's\nanger as it did.  On hearing that I had been once more discovered I\nstarted so that the railing against which I leaned cracked again.  Had\nhe followed me to the inn? Did he infer that I must have given my\nletters to Fanny when I told him I had none for the post-bag.  Even if\nit was so, how could he have examined the letters when they had gone\nstraight from my hand to the bosom of the girl's dress?\n\n\"Thank your lucky star,\" I heard the Count say next, \"that you have me\nin the house to undo the harm as fast as you do it.  Thank your lucky\nstar that I said No when you were mad enough to talk of turning the key\nto-day on Miss Halcombe, as you turned it in your mischievous folly on\nyour wife.  Where are your eyes? Can you look at Miss Halcombe and not\nsee that she has the foresight and the resolution of a man? With that\nwoman for my friend I would snap these fingers of mine at the world.\nWith that woman for my enemy, I, with all my brains and experience--I,\nFosco, cunning as the devil himself, as you have told me a hundred\ntimes--I walk, in your English phrase, upon egg-shells! And this grand\ncreature--I drink her health in my sugar-and-water--this grand\ncreature, who stands in the strength of her love and her courage, firm\nas a rock, between us two and that poor, flimsy, pretty blonde wife of\nyours--this magnificent woman, whom I admire with all my soul, though I\noppose her in your interests and in mine, you drive to extremities as\nif she was no sharper and no bolder than the rest of her sex.\nPercival! Percival! you deserve to fail, and you HAVE failed.\"\n\nThere was a pause.  I write the villain's words about myself because I\nmean to remember them--because I hope yet for the day when I may speak\nout once for all in his presence, and cast them back one by one in his\nteeth.\n\nSir Percival was the first to break the silence again.\n\n\"Yes, yes, bully and bluster as much as you like,\" he said sulkily;\n\"the difficulty about the money is not the only difficulty.  You would\nbe for taking strong measures with the women yourself--if you knew as\nmuch as I do.\"\n\n\"We will come to that second difficulty all in good time,\" rejoined the\nCount.  \"You may confuse yourself, Percival, as much as you please, but\nyou shall not confuse me.  Let the question of the money be settled\nfirst.  Have I convinced your obstinacy? have I shown you that your\ntemper will not let you help yourself?--Or must I go back, and (as you\nput it in your dear straightforward English) bully and bluster a little\nmore?\"\n\n\"Pooh! It's easy enough to grumble at ME.  Say what is to be done--that's\na little harder.\"\n\n\"Is it? Bah! This is what is to be done: You give up all direction in\nthe business from to-night--you leave it for the future in my hands\nonly.  I am talking to a Practical British man--ha? Well, Practical,\nwill that do for you?\"\n\n\"What do you propose if I leave it all to you?\"\n\n\"Answer me first.  Is it to be in my hands or not?\"\n\n\"Say it is in your hands--what then?\"\n\n\"A few questions, Percival, to begin with.  I must wait a little yet,\nto let circumstances guide me, and I must know, in every possible way,\nwhat those circumstances are likely to be.  There is no time to lose.\nI have told you already that Miss Halcombe has written to the lawyer\nto-day for the second time.\"\n\n\"How did you find it out? What did she say?\"\n\n\"If I told you, Percival, we should only come back at the end to where\nwe are now.  Enough that I have found it out--and the finding has\ncaused that trouble and anxiety which made me so inaccessible to you\nall through to-day.  Now, to refresh my memory about your affairs--it\nis some time since I talked them over with you.  The money has been\nraised, in the absence of your wife's signature, by means of bills at\nthree months--raised at a cost that makes my poverty-stricken foreign\nhair stand on end to think of it! When the bills are due, is there\nreally and truly no earthly way of paying them but by the help of your\nwife?\"\n\n\"None.\"\n\n\"What! You have no money at the bankers?\"\n\n\"A few hundreds, when I want as many thousands.\"\n\n\"Have you no other security to borrow upon?\"\n\n\"Not a shred.\"\n\n\"What have you actually got with your wife at the present moment?\"\n\n\"Nothing but the interest of her twenty thousand pounds--barely enough\nto pay our daily expenses.\"\n\n\"What do you expect from your wife?\"\n\n\"Three thousand a year when her uncle dies.\"\n\n\"A fine fortune, Percival.  What sort of a man is this uncle? Old?\"\n\n\"No--neither old nor young.\"\n\n\"A good-tempered, freely-living man?  Married?  No--I think my wife\ntold me, not married.\"\n\n\"Of course not.  If he was married, and had a son, Lady Glyde would not\nbe next heir to the property.  I'll tell you what he is. He's a\nmaudlin, twaddling, selfish fool, and bores everybody who comes near\nhim about the state of his health.\"\n\n\"Men of that sort, Percival, live long, and marry malevolently when you\nleast expect it.  I don't give you much, my friend, for your chance of\nthe three thousand a year.  Is there nothing more that comes to you\nfrom your wife?\"\n\n\"Nothing.\"\n\n\"Absolutely nothing?\"\n\n\"Absolutely nothing--except in case of her death.\"\n\n\"Aha! in the case of her death.\"\n\nThere was another pause.  The Count moved from the verandah to the\ngravel walk outside.  I knew that he had moved by his voice.  \"The rain\nhas come at last,\" I heard him say.  It had come.  The state of my\ncloak showed that it had been falling thickly for some little time.\n\nThe Count went back under the verandah--I heard the chair creak beneath\nhis weight as he sat down in it again.\n\n\"Well, Percival,\" he said, \"and in the case of Lady Glyde's death, what\ndo you get then?\"\n\n\"If she leaves no children----\"\n\n\"Which she is likely to do?\"\n\n\"Which she is not in the least likely to do----\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"Why, then I get her twenty thousand pounds.\"\n\n\"Paid down?\"\n\n\"Paid down.\"\n\nThey were silent once more.  As their voices ceased Madame Fosco's\nshadow darkened the blind again.  Instead of passing this time, it\nremained, for a moment, quite still.  I saw her fingers steal round the\ncorner of the blind, and draw it on one side.  The dim white outline of\nher face, looking out straight over me, appeared behind the window.  I\nkept still, shrouded from head to foot in my black cloak.  The rain,\nwhich was fast wetting me, dripped over the glass, blurred it, and\nprevented her from seeing anything. \"More rain!\" I heard her say to\nherself.  She dropped the blind, and I breathed again freely.\n\nThe talk went on below me, the Count resuming it this time.\n\n\"Percival! do you care about your wife?\"\n\n\"Fosco! that's rather a downright question.\"\n\n\"I am a downright man, and I repeat it.\"\n\n\"Why the devil do you look at me in that way?\"\n\n\"You won't answer me? Well, then, let us say your wife dies before the\nsummer is out----\"\n\n\"Drop it, Fosco!\"\n\n\"Let us say your wife dies----\"\n\n\"Drop it, I tell you!\"\n\n\"In that case, you would gain twenty thousand pounds, and you would\nlose----\"\n\n\"I should lose the chance of three thousand a year.\"\n\n\"The REMOTE chance, Percival--the remote chance only.  And you want\nmoney, at once.  In your position the gain is certain--the loss\ndoubtful.\"\n\n\"Speak for yourself as well as for me.  Some of the money I want has\nbeen borrowed for you.  And if you come to gain, my wife's death would\nbe ten thousand pounds in your wife's pocket.  Sharp as you are, you\nseem to have conveniently forgotten Madame Fosco's legacy.  Don't look\nat me in that way! I won't have it! What with your looks and your\nquestions, upon my soul, you make my flesh creep!\"\n\n\"Your flesh? Does flesh mean conscience in English? I speak of your\nwife's death as I speak of a possibility.  Why not? The respectable\nlawyers who scribble-scrabble your deeds and your wills look the deaths\nof living people in the face.  Do lawyers make your flesh creep? Why\nshould I? It is my business to-night to clear up your position beyond\nthe possibility of mistake, and I have now done it.  Here is your\nposition. If your wife lives, you pay those bills with her signature to\nthe parchment.  If your wife dies, you pay them with her death.\"\n\nAs he spoke the light in Madame Fosco's room was extinguished, and the\nwhole second floor of the house was now sunk in darkness.\n\n\"Talk! talk!\" grumbled Sir Percival.  \"One would think, to hear you,\nthat my wife's signature to the deed was got already.\"\n\n\"You have left the matter in my hands,\" retorted the Count, \"and I have\nmore than two months before me to turn round in.  Say no more about it,\nif you please, for the present.  When the bills are due, you will see\nfor yourself if my 'talk! talk!' is worth something, or if it is not.\nAnd now, Percival, having done with the money matters for to-night, I\ncan place my attention at your disposal, if you wish to consult me on\nthat second difficulty which has mixed itself up with our little\nembarrassments, and which has so altered you for the worse, that I\nhardly know you again.  Speak, my friend--and pardon me if I shock your\nfiery national tastes by mixing myself a second glass of\nsugar-and-water.\"\n\n\"It's very well to say speak,\" replied Sir Percival, in a far more\nquiet and more polite tone than he had yet adopted, \"but it's not so\neasy to know how to begin.\"\n\n\"Shall I help you?\" suggested the Count.  \"Shall I give this private\ndifficulty of yours a name? What if I call it--Anne Catherick?\"\n\n\"Look here, Fosco, you and I have known each other for a long time, and\nif you have helped me out of one or two scrapes before this, I have\ndone the best I could to help you in return, as far as money would go.\nWe have made as many friendly sacrifices, on both sides, as men could,\nbut we have had our secrets from each other, of course--haven't we?\"\n\n\"You have had a secret from me, Percival.  There is a skeleton in your\ncupboard here at Blackwater Park that has peeped out in these last few\ndays at other people besides yourself.\"\n\n\"Well, suppose it has.  If it doesn't concern you, you needn't be\ncurious about it, need you?\"\n\n\"Do I look curious about it?\"\n\n\"Yes, you do.\"\n\n\"So! so! my face speaks the truth, then? What an immense foundation of\ngood there must be in the nature of a man who arrives at my age, and\nwhose face has not yet lost the habit of speaking the truth!--Come,\nGlyde! let us be candid one with the other.  This secret of yours has\nsought me: I have not sought it. Let us say I am curious--do you ask\nme, as your old friend, to respect your secret, and to leave it, once\nfor all, in your own keeping?\"\n\n\"Yes--that's just what I do ask.\"\n\n\"Then my curiosity is at an end.  It dies in me from this moment.\"\n\n\"Do you really mean that?\"\n\n\"What makes you doubt me?\"\n\n\"I have had some experience, Fosco, of your roundabout ways, and I am\nnot so sure that you won't worm it out of me after all.\"\n\nThe chair below suddenly creaked again--I felt the trellis-work pillar\nunder me shake from top to bottom.  The Count had started to his feet,\nand had struck it with his hand in indignation.\n\n\"Percival! Percival!\" he cried passionately, \"do you know me no better\nthan that? Has all your experience shown you nothing of my character\nyet? I am a man of the antique type! I am capable of the most exalted\nacts of virtue--when I have the chance of performing them.  It has been\nthe misfortune of my life that I have had few chances.  My conception\nof friendship is sublime! Is it my fault that your skeleton has peeped\nout at me? Why do I confess my curiosity? You poor superficial\nEnglishman, it is to magnify my own self-control.  I could draw your\nsecret out of you, if I liked, as I draw this finger out of the palm of\nmy hand--you know I could! But you have appealed to my friendship, and\nthe duties of friendship are sacred to me.  See! I trample my base\ncuriosity under my feet.  My exalted sentiments lift me above it.\nRecognise them, Percival! imitate them, Percival! Shake hands--I\nforgive you.\"\n\nHis voice faltered over the last words--faltered, as if he were\nactually shedding tears!\n\nSir Percival confusedly attempted to excuse himself, but the Count was\ntoo magnanimous to listen to him.\n\n\"No!\" he said.  \"When my friend has wounded me, I can pardon him\nwithout apologies.  Tell me, in plain words, do you want my help?\"\n\n\"Yes, badly enough.\"\n\n\"And you can ask for it without compromising yourself?\"\n\n\"I can try, at any rate.\"\n\n\"Try, then.\"\n\n\"Well, this is how it stands:--I told you to-day that I had done my\nbest to find Anne Catherick, and failed.\"\n\n\"Yes, you did.\"\n\n\"Fosco! I'm a lost man if I DON'T find her.\"\n\n\"Ha! Is it so serious as that?\"\n\nA little stream of light travelled out under the verandah, and fell\nover the gravel-walk.  The Count had taken the lamp from the inner part\nof the room to see his friend clearly by the light of it.\n\n\"Yes!\" he said.  \"Your face speaks the truth this time.  Serious,\nindeed--as serious as the money matters themselves.\"\n\n\"More serious.  As true as I sit here, more serious!\"\n\nThe light disappeared again and the talk went on.\n\n\"I showed you the letter to my wife that Anne Catherick hid in the\nsand,\" Sir Percival continued.  \"There's no boasting in that letter,\nFosco--she DOES know the Secret.\"\n\n\"Say as little as possible, Percival, in my presence, of the Secret.\nDoes she know it from you?\"\n\n\"No, from her mother.\"\n\n\"Two women in possession of your private mind--bad, bad, bad, my\nfriend! One question here, before we go any farther.  The motive of\nyour shutting up the daughter in the asylum is now plain enough to me,\nbut the manner of her escape is not quite so clear.  Do you suspect the\npeople in charge of her of closing their eyes purposely, at the\ninstance of some enemy who could afford to make it worth their while?\"\n\n\"No, she was the best-behaved patient they had--and, like fools, they\ntrusted her.  She's just mad enough to be shut up, and just sane enough\nto ruin me when she's at large--if you understand that?\"\n\n\"I do understand it.  Now, Percival, come at once to the point, and\nthen I shall know what to do.  Where is the danger of your position at\nthe present moment?\"\n\n\"Anne Catherick is in this neighbourhood, and in communication with\nLady Glyde--there's the danger, plain enough.  Who can read the letter\nshe hid in the sand, and not see that my wife is in possession of the\nSecret, deny it as she may?\"\n\n\"One moment, Percival.  If Lady Glyde does know the Secret, she must\nknow also that it is a compromising secret for you.  As your wife,\nsurely it is her interest to keep it?\"\n\n\"Is it? I'm coming to that.  It might be her interest if she cared two\nstraws about me.  But I happen to be an encumbrance in the way of\nanother man.  She was in love with him before she married me--she's in\nlove with him now--an infernal vagabond of a drawing-master, named\nHartright.\"\n\n\"My dear friend! what is there extraordinary in that? They are all in\nlove with some other man.  Who gets the first of a woman's heart? In\nall my experience I have never yet met with the man who was Number One.\nNumber Two, sometimes.  Number Three, Four, Five, often.  Number One,\nnever! He exists, of course--but I have not met with him.\"\n\n\"Wait! I haven't done yet.  Who do you think helped Anne Catherick to\nget the start, when the people from the mad-house were after her?\nHartright.  Who do you think saw her again in Cumberland? Hartright.\nBoth times he spoke to her alone.  Stop! don't interrupt me.  The\nscoundrel's as sweet on my wife as she is on him.  He knows the Secret,\nand she knows the Secret.  Once let them both get together again, and\nit's her interest and his interest to turn their information against\nme.\"\n\n\"Gently, Percival--gently! Are you insensible to the virtue of Lady\nGlyde?\"\n\n\"That for the virtue of Lady Glyde! I believe in nothing about her but\nher money.  Don't you see how the case stands? She might be harmless\nenough by herself; but if she and that vagabond Hartright----\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, I see.  Where is Mr. Hartright?\"\n\n\"Out of the country.  If he means to keep a whole skin on his bones, I\nrecommend him not to come back in a hurry.\"\n\n\"Are you sure he is out of the country?\"\n\n\"Certain.  I had him watched from the time he left Cumberland to the\ntime he sailed.  Oh, I've been careful, I can tell you! Anne Catherick\nlived with some people at a farmhouse near Limmeridge. I went there\nmyself, after she had given me the slip, and made sure that they knew\nnothing.  I gave her mother a form of letter to write to Miss Halcombe,\nexonerating me from any bad motive in putting her under restraint.\nI've spent, I'm afraid to say how much, in trying to trace her, and in\nspite of it all, she turns up here and escapes me on my own property!\nHow do I know who else may see her, who else may speak to her? That\nprying scoundrel, Hartright, may come back without my knowing it, and\nmay make use of her to-morrow----\"\n\n\"Not he, Percival! While I am on the spot, and while that woman is in\nthe neighbourhood, I will answer for our laying hands on her before Mr.\nHartright--even if he does come back.  I see! yes, yes, I see! The\nfinding of Anne Catherick is the first necessity--make your mind easy\nabout the rest.  Your wife is here, under your thumb--Miss Halcombe is\ninseparable from her, and is, therefore, under your thumb also--and Mr.\nHartright is out of the country. This invisible Anne of yours is all we\nhave to think of for the present.  You have made your inquiries?\"\n\n\"Yes.  I have been to her mother, I have ransacked the village--and\nall to no purpose.\"\n\n\"Is her mother to be depended on?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"She has told your secret once.\"\n\n\"She won't tell it again.\"\n\n\"Why not? Are her own interests concerned in keeping it, as well as\nyours?\"\n\n\"Yes--deeply concerned.\"\n\n\"I am glad to hear it, Percival, for your sake.  Don't be discouraged,\nmy friend.  Our money matters, as I told you, leave me plenty of time\nto turn round in, and I may search for Anne Catherick to-morrow to\nbetter purpose than you.  One last question before we go to bed.\"\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\n\"It is this.  When I went to the boat-house to tell Lady Glyde that the\nlittle difficulty of her signature was put off, accident took me there\nin time to see a strange woman parting in a very suspicious manner from\nyour wife.  But accident did not bring me near enough to see this same\nwoman's face plainly.  I must know how to recognise our invisible Anne.\nWhat is she like?\"\n\n\"Like? Come! I'll tell you in two words.  She's a sickly likeness of my\nwife.\"\n\nThe chair creaked, and the pillar shook once more.  The Count was on\nhis feet again--this time in astonishment.\n\n\"What!!!\" he exclaimed eagerly.\n\n\"Fancy my wife, after a bad illness, with a touch of something wrong in\nher head--and there is Anne Catherick for you,\" answered Sir Percival.\n\n\"Are they related to each other?\"\n\n\"Not a bit of it.\"\n\n\"And yet so like?\"\n\n\"Yes, so like.  What are you laughing about?\"\n\nThere was no answer, and no sound of any kind.  The Count was laughing\nin his smooth silent internal way.\n\n\"What are you laughing about?\" reiterated Sir Percival.\n\n\"Perhaps at my own fancies, my good friend.  Allow me my Italian\nhumour--do I not come of the illustrious nation which invented the\nexhibition of Punch? Well, well, well, I shall know Anne Catherick when\nI see her--and so enough for to-night.  Make your mind easy, Percival.\nSleep, my son, the sleep of the just, and see what I will do for you\nwhen daylight comes to help us both.  I have my projects and my plans\nhere in my big head.  You shall pay those bills and find Anne\nCatherick--my sacred word of honour on it, but you shall! Am I a friend\nto be treasured in the best corner of your heart, or am I not?  Am I\nworth those loans of money which you so delicately reminded me of a\nlittle while since? Whatever you do, never wound me in my sentiments\nany more.  Recognise them, Percival! imitate them, Percival! I forgive\nyou again--I shake hands again.  Good-night!\"\n\n\nNot another word was spoken.  I heard the Count close the library door.\nI heard Sir Percival barring up the window-shutters.  It had been\nraining, raining all the time.  I was cramped by my position and\nchilled to the bones.  When I first tried to move, the effort was so\npainful to me that I was obliged to desist.  I tried a second time, and\nsucceeded in rising to my knees on the wet roof.\n\nAs I crept to the wall, and raised myself against it, I looked back,\nand saw the window of the Count's dressing-room gleam into light.  My\nsinking courage flickered up in me again, and kept my eyes fixed on his\nwindow, as I stole my way back, step by step, past the wall of the\nhouse.\n\nThe clock struck the quarter after one, when I laid my hands on the\nwindow-sill of my own room.  I had seen nothing and heard nothing which\ncould lead me to suppose that my retreat had been discovered.\n\n\n\nX\n\nJune 20th.--Eight o'clock.  The sun is shining in a clear sky.  I have\nnot been near my bed--I have not once closed my weary wakeful eyes.\nFrom the same window at which I looked out into the darkness of last\nnight, I look out now at the bright stillness of the morning.\n\nI count the hours that have passed since I escaped to the shelter of\nthis room by my own sensations--and those hours seem like weeks.\n\nHow short a time, and yet how long to ME--since I sank down in the\ndarkness, here, on the floor--drenched to the skin, cramped in every\nlimb, cold to the bones, a useless, helpless, panic-stricken creature.\n\nI hardly know when I roused myself.  I hardly know when I groped my way\nback to the bedroom, and lighted the candle, and searched (with a\nstrange ignorance, at first, of where to look for them) for dry clothes\nto warm me.  The doing of these things is in my mind, but not the time\nwhen they were done.\n\nCan I even remember when the chilled, cramped feeling left me, and the\nthrobbing heat came in its place?\n\nSurely it was before the sun rose? Yes, I heard the clock strike three.\nI remember the time by the sudden brightness and clearness, the\nfeverish strain and excitement of all my faculties which came with it.\nI remember my resolution to control myself, to wait patiently hour\nafter hour, till the chance offered of removing Laura from this\nhorrible place, without the danger of immediate discovery and pursuit.\nI remember the persuasion settling itself in my mind that the words\nthose two men had said to each other would furnish us, not only with\nour justification for leaving the house, but with our weapons of\ndefence against them as well.  I recall the impulse that awakened in me\nto preserve those words in writing, exactly as they were spoken, while\nthe time was my own, and while my memory vividly retained them.  All\nthis I remember plainly: there is no confusion in my head yet.  The\ncoming in here from the bedroom, with my pen and ink and paper, before\nsunrise--the sitting down at the widely-opened window to get all the\nair I could to cool me--the ceaseless writing, faster and faster,\nhotter and hotter, driving on more and more wakefully, all through the\ndreadful interval before the house was astir again--how clearly I\nrecall it, from the beginning by candle-light, to the end on the page\nbefore this, in the sunshine of the new day!\n\nWhy do I sit here still? Why do I weary my hot eyes and my burning head\nby writing more? Why not lie down and rest myself, and try to quench\nthe fever that consumes me, in sleep?\n\nI dare not attempt it.  A fear beyond all other fears has got\npossession of me.  I am afraid of this heat that parches my skin. I am\nafraid of the creeping and throbbing that I feel in my head. If I lie\ndown now, how do I know that I may have the sense and the strength to\nrise again?\n\nOh, the rain, the rain--the cruel rain that chilled me last night!\n\nNine o'clock.  Was it nine struck, or eight? Nine, surely? I am\nshivering again--shivering, from head to foot, in the summer air. Have\nI been sitting here asleep? I don't know what I have been doing.\n\nOh, my God! am I going to be ill?\n\n\nIll, at such a time as this!\n\nMy head--I am sadly afraid of my head.  I can write, but the lines all\nrun together.  I see the words.  Laura--I can write Laura, and see I\nwrite it.  Eight or nine--which was it?\n\nSo cold, so cold--oh, that rain last night!--and the strokes of the\nclock, the strokes I can't count, keep striking in my head----\n\n*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *\n\nNote [At this place the entry in the Diary ceases to be legible.  The\ntwo or three lines which follow contain fragments of words only,\nmingled with blots and scratches of the pen.  The last marks on the\npaper bear some resemblance to the first two letters (L and A) of the\nname of Lady Glyde.\n\nOn the next page of the Diary, another entry appears.  It is in a man's\nhandwriting, large, bold, and firmly regular, and the date is \"June the\n21st.\" It contains these lines--]\n\n\n\nPOSTSCRIPT BY A SINCERE FRIEND\n\n\nThe illness of our excellent Miss Halcombe has afforded me the\nopportunity of enjoying an unexpected intellectual pleasure.\n\nI refer to the perusal (which I have just completed) of this\ninteresting Diary.\n\nThere are many hundred pages here.  I can lay my hand on my heart, and\ndeclare that every page has charmed, refreshed, delighted me.\n\nTo a man of my sentiments it is unspeakably gratifying to be able to\nsay this.\n\nAdmirable woman!\n\nI allude to Miss Halcombe.\n\nStupendous effort!\n\nI refer to the Diary.\n\nYes! these pages are amazing.  The tact which I find here, the\ndiscretion, the rare courage, the wonderful power of memory, the\naccurate observation of character, the easy grace of style, the\ncharming outbursts of womanly feeling, have all inexpressibly increased\nmy admiration of this sublime creature, of this magnificent Marian.\nThe presentation of my own character is masterly in the extreme.  I\ncertify, with my whole heart, to the fidelity of the portrait.  I feel\nhow vivid an impression I must have produced to have been painted in\nsuch strong, such rich, such massive colours as these.  I lament afresh\nthe cruel necessity which sets our interests at variance, and opposes\nus to each other.  Under happier circumstances how worthy I should have\nbeen of Miss Halcombe--how worthy Miss Halcombe would have been of ME.\n\nThe sentiments which animate my heart assure me that the lines I have\njust written express a Profound Truth.\n\nThose sentiments exalt me above all merely personal considerations.  I\nbear witness, in the most disinterested manner, to the excellence of\nthe stratagem by which this unparalleled woman surprised the private\ninterview between Percival and myself--also to the marvellous accuracy\nof her report of the whole conversation from its beginning to its end.\n\nThose sentiments have induced me to offer to the unimpressionable\ndoctor who attends on her my vast knowledge of chemistry, and my\nluminous experience of the more subtle resources which medical and\nmagnetic science have placed at the disposal of mankind.  He has\nhitherto declined to avail himself of my assistance.  Miserable man!\n\nFinally, those sentiments dictate the lines--grateful, sympathetic,\npaternal lines--which appear in this place.  I close the book.  My\nstrict sense of propriety restores it (by the hands of my wife) to its\nplace on the writer's table.  Events are hurrying me away.\nCircumstances are guiding me to serious issues. Vast perspectives of\nsuccess unroll themselves before my eyes.  I accomplish my destiny with\na calmness which is terrible to myself. Nothing but the homage of my\nadmiration is my own.  I deposit it with respectful tenderness at the\nfeet of Miss Halcombe.\n\nI breathe my wishes for her recovery.\n\nI condole with her on the inevitable failure of every plan that she has\nformed for her sister's benefit.  At the same time, I entreat her to\nbelieve that the information which I have derived from her Diary will\nin no respect help me to contribute to that failure.  It simply\nconfirms the plan of conduct which I had previously arranged.  I have\nto thank these pages for awakening the finest sensibilities in my\nnature--nothing more.\n\nTo a person of similar sensibility this simple assertion will explain\nand excuse everything.\n\nMiss Halcombe is a person of similar sensibility.\n\nIn that persuasion I sign myself,\n                                    Fosco.\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY FREDERICK FAIRLIE, ESQ., OF LIMMERIDGE HOUSE[2]\n\n\n[2] The manner in which Mr. Fairlie's Narrative and other Narratives\nthat are shortly to follow it, were originally obtained, forms the\nsubject of an explanation which will appear at a later period.\n\n\nIt is the grand misfortune of my life that nobody will let me alone.\n\nWhy--I ask everybody--why worry ME? Nobody answers that question, and\nnobody lets me alone.  Relatives, friends, and strangers all combine to\nannoy me.  What have I done? I ask myself, I ask my servant, Louis,\nfifty times a day--what have I done? Neither of us can tell.  Most\nextraordinary!\n\nThe last annoyance that has assailed me is the annoyance of being\ncalled upon to write this Narrative.  Is a man in my state of nervous\nwretchedness capable of writing narratives? When I put this extremely\nreasonable objection, I am told that certain very serious events\nrelating to my niece have happened within my experience, and that I am\nthe fit person to describe them on that account.  I am threatened if I\nfail to exert myself in the manner required, with consequences which I\ncannot so much as think of without perfect prostration.  There is\nreally no need to threaten me.  Shattered by my miserable health and my\nfamily troubles, I am incapable of resistance.  If you insist, you take\nyour unjust advantage of me, and I give way immediately.  I will\nendeavour to remember what I can (under protest), and to write what I\ncan (also under protest), and what I can't remember and can't write,\nLouis must remember and write for me.  He is an ass, and I am an\ninvalid, and we are likely to make all sorts of mistakes between us.\nHow humiliating!\n\nI am told to remember dates.  Good heavens! I never did such a thing in\nmy life--how am I to begin now?\n\nI have asked Louis.  He is not quite such an ass as I have hitherto\nsupposed.  He remembers the date of the event, within a week or\ntwo--and I remember the name of the person.  The date was towards the\nend of June, or the beginning of July, and the name (in my opinion a\nremarkably vulgar one) was Fanny.\n\nAt the end of June, or the beginning of July, then, I was reclining in\nmy customary state, surrounded by the various objects of Art which I\nhave collected about me to improve the taste of the barbarous people in\nmy neighbourhood.  That is to say, I had the photographs of my\npictures, and prints, and coins, and so forth, all about me, which I\nintend, one of these days, to present (the photographs, I mean, if the\nclumsy English language will let me mean anything) to present to the\ninstitution at Carlisle (horrid place!), with a view to improving the\ntastes of the members (Goths and Vandals to a man).  It might be\nsupposed that a gentleman who was in course of conferring a great\nnational benefit on his countrymen was the last gentleman in the world\nto be unfeelingly worried about private difficulties and family\naffairs.  Quite a mistake, I assure you, in my case.\n\nHowever, there I was, reclining, with my art-treasures about me, and\nwanting a quiet morning.  Because I wanted a quiet morning, of course\nLouis came in.  It was perfectly natural that I should inquire what the\ndeuce he meant by making his appearance when I had not rung my bell.  I\nseldom swear--it is such an ungentlemanlike habit--but when Louis\nanswered by a grin, I think it was also perfectly natural that I should\ndamn him for grinning. At any rate, I did.\n\nThis rigorous mode of treatment, I have observed, invariably brings\npersons in the lower class of life to their senses.  It brought Louis\nto HIS senses.  He was so obliging as to leave off grinning, and inform\nme that a Young Person was outside wanting to see me.  He added (with\nthe odious talkativeness of servants), that her name was Fanny.\n\n\"Who is Fanny?\"\n\n\"Lady Glyde's maid, sir.\"\n\n\"What does Lady Glyde's maid want with me?\"\n\n\"A letter, sir----\"\n\n\"Take it.\"\n\n\"She refuses to give it to anybody but you, sir.\"\n\n\"Who sends the letter?\"\n\n\"Miss Halcombe, sir.\"\n\nThe moment I heard Miss Halcombe's name I gave up.  It is a habit of\nmine always to give up to Miss Halcombe.  I find, by experience, that\nit saves noise.  I gave up on this occasion. Dear Marian!\n\n\"Let Lady Glyde's maid come in, Louis.  Stop! Do her shoes creak?\"\n\nI was obliged to ask the question.  Creaking shoes invariably upset me\nfor the day.  I was resigned to see the Young Person, but I was NOT\nresigned to let the Young Person's shoes upset me. There is a limit\neven to my endurance.\n\nLouis affirmed distinctly that her shoes were to be depended upon. I\nwaved my hand.  He introduced her.  Is it necessary to say that she\nexpressed her sense of embarrassment by shutting up her mouth and\nbreathing through her nose? To the student of female human nature in\nthe lower orders, surely not.\n\nLet me do the girl justice.  Her shoes did NOT creak.  But why do Young\nPersons in service all perspire at the hands? Why have they all got fat\nnoses and hard cheeks? And why are their faces so sadly unfinished,\nespecially about the corners of the eyelids? I am not strong enough to\nthink deeply myself on any subject, but I appeal to professional men,\nwho are.  Why have we no variety in our breed of Young Persons?\n\n\"You have a letter for me, from Miss Halcombe? Put it down on the\ntable, please, and don't upset anything.  How is Miss Halcombe?\"\n\n\"Very well, thank you, sir.\"\n\n\"And Lady Glyde?\"\n\nI received no answer.  The Young Person's face became more unfinished\nthan ever, and I think she began to cry.  I certainly saw something\nmoist about her eyes.  Tears or perspiration? Louis (whom I have just\nconsulted) is inclined to think, tears.  He is in her class of life,\nand he ought to know best.  Let us say, tears.\n\nExcept when the refining process of Art judiciously removes from them\nall resemblance to Nature, I distinctly object to tears. Tears are\nscientifically described as a Secretion.  I can understand that a\nsecretion may be healthy or unhealthy, but I cannot see the interest of\na secretion from a sentimental point of view.  Perhaps my own\nsecretions being all wrong together, I am a little prejudiced on the\nsubject.  No matter.  I behaved, on this occasion, with all possible\npropriety and feeling.  I closed my eyes and said to Louis--\n\n\"Endeavour to ascertain what she means.\"\n\nLouis endeavoured, and the Young Person endeavoured. They succeeded in\nconfusing each other to such an extent that I am bound in common\ngratitude to say, they really amused me.  I think I shall send for them\nagain when I am in low spirits.  I have just mentioned this idea to\nLouis.  Strange to say, it seems to make him uncomfortable.  Poor devil!\n\nSurely I am not expected to repeat my niece's maid's explanation of her\ntears, interpreted in the English of my Swiss valet? The thing is\nmanifestly impossible.  I can give my own impressions and feelings\nperhaps.  Will that do as well? Please say, Yes.\n\nMy idea is that she began by telling me (through Louis) that her master\nhad dismissed her from her mistress's service.  (Observe, throughout,\nthe strange irrelevancy of the Young Person.  Was it my fault that she\nhad lost her place?) On her dismissal, she had gone to the inn to\nsleep.  (I don't keep the inn--why mention it to ME?) Between six\no'clock and seven Miss Halcombe had come to say good-bye, and had given\nher two letters, one for me, and one for a gentleman in London.  (I am\nnot a gentleman in London--hang the gentleman in London!) She had\ncarefully put the two letters into her bosom (what have I to do with\nher bosom?); she had been very unhappy, when Miss Halcombe had gone\naway again; she had not had the heart to put bit or drop between her\nlips till it was near bedtime, and then, when it was close on nine\no'clock, she had thought she should like a cup of tea.  (Am I\nresponsible for any of these vulgar fluctuations, which begin with\nunhappiness and end with tea?) Just as she was WARMING THE POT (I give\nthe words on the authority of Louis, who says he knows what they mean,\nand wishes to explain, but I snub him on principle)--just as she was\nwarming the pot the door opened, and she was STRUCK OF A HEAP (her own\nwords again, and perfectly unintelligible this time to Louis, as well\nas to myself) by the appearance in the inn parlour of her ladyship the\nCountess.  I give my niece's maid's description of my sister's title\nwith a sense of the highest relish.  My poor dear sister is a tiresome\nwoman who married a foreigner.  To resume: the door opened, her\nladyship the Countess appeared in the parlour, and the Young Person was\nstruck of a heap.  Most remarkable!\n\n\nI must really rest a little before I can get on any farther.  When I\nhave reclined for a few minutes, with my eyes closed, and when Louis\nhas refreshed my poor aching temples with a little eau-de-Cologne, I\nmay be able to proceed.\n\nHer ladyship the Countess----\n\nNo.  I am able to proceed, but not to sit up.  I will recline and\ndictate.  Louis has a horrid accent, but he knows the language, and can\nwrite.  How very convenient!\n\n\nHer ladyship, the Countess, explained her unexpected appearance at the\ninn by telling Fanny that she had come to bring one or two little\nmessages which Miss Halcombe in her hurry had forgotten. The Young\nPerson thereupon waited anxiously to hear what the messages were, but\nthe Countess seemed disinclined to mention them (so like my sister's\ntiresome way!) until Fanny had had her tea. Her ladyship was\nsurprisingly kind and thoughtful about it (extremely unlike my sister),\nand said, \"I am sure, my poor girl, you must want your tea.  We can let\nthe messages wait till afterwards.  Come, come, if nothing else will\nput you at your ease, I'll make the tea and have a cup with you.\" I\nthink those were the words, as reported excitably, in my presence, by\nthe Young Person.  At any rate, the Countess insisted on making the\ntea, and carried her ridiculous ostentation of humility so far as to\ntake one cup herself, and to insist on the girl's taking the other.\nThe girl drank the tea, and according to her own account, solemnised\nthe extraordinary occasion five minutes afterwards by fainting dead\naway for the first time in her life.  Here again I use her own words.\nLouis thinks they were accompanied by an increased secretion of tears.\nI can't say myself.  The effort of listening being quite as much as I\ncould manage, my eyes were closed.\n\nWhere did I leave off? Ah, yes--she fainted after drinking a cup of tea\nwith the Countess--a proceeding which might have interested me if I had\nbeen her medical man, but being nothing of the sort I felt bored by\nhearing of it, nothing more.  When she came to herself in half an\nhour's time she was on the sofa, and nobody was with her but the\nlandlady.  The Countess, finding it too late to remain any longer at\nthe inn, had gone away as soon as the girl showed signs of recovering,\nand the landlady had been good enough to help her upstairs to bed.\n\nLeft by herself, she had felt in her bosom (I regret the necessity of\nreferring to this part of the subject a second time), and had found the\ntwo letters there quite safe, but strangely crumpled. She had been\ngiddy in the night, but had got up well enough to travel in the\nmorning.  She had put the letter addressed to that obtrusive stranger,\nthe gentleman in London into the post, and had now delivered the other\nletter into my hands as she was told. This was the plain truth, and\nthough she could not blame herself for any intentional neglect, she was\nsadly troubled in her mind, and sadly in want of a word of advice.  At\nthis point Louis thinks the secretions appeared again.  Perhaps they\ndid, but it is of infinitely greater importance to mention that at this\npoint also I lost my patience, opened my eyes, and interfered.\n\n\"What is the purport of all this?\" I inquired.\n\nMy niece's irrelevant maid stared, and stood speechless.\n\n\"Endeavour to explain,\" I said to my servant.  \"Translate me, Louis.\"\n\nLouis endeavoured and translated.  In other words, he descended\nimmediately into a bottomless pit of confusion, and the Young Person\nfollowed him down.  I really don't know when I have been so amused.  I\nleft them at the bottom of the pit as long as they diverted me.  When\nthey ceased to divert me, I exerted my intelligence, and pulled them up\nagain.\n\nIt is unnecessary to say that my interference enabled me, in due course\nof time, to ascertain the purport of the Young Person's remarks.\n\nI discovered that she was uneasy in her mind, because the train of\nevents that she had just described to me had prevented her from\nreceiving those supplementary messages which Miss Halcombe had\nintrusted to the Countess to deliver.  She was afraid the messages\nmight have been of great importance to her mistress's interests. Her\ndread of Sir Percival had deterred her from going to Blackwater Park\nlate at night to inquire about them, and Miss Halcombe's own directions\nto her, on no account to miss the train in the morning, had prevented\nher from waiting at the inn the next day.  She was most anxious that\nthe misfortune of her fainting-fit should not lead to the second\nmisfortune of making her mistress think her neglectful, and she would\nhumbly beg to ask me whether I would advise her to write her\nexplanations and excuses to Miss Halcombe, requesting to receive the\nmessages by letter, if it was not too late.  I make no apologies for\nthis extremely prosy paragraph.  I have been ordered to write it.\nThere are people, unaccountable as it may appear, who actually take\nmore interest in what my niece's maid said to me on this occasion than\nin what I said to my niece's maid.  Amusing perversity!\n\n\"I should feel very much obliged to you, sir, if you would kindly tell\nme what I had better do,\" remarked the Young Person.\n\n\"Let things stop as they are,\" I said, adapting my language to my\nlistener.  \"I invariably let things stop as they are.  Yes.  Is that\nall?\"\n\n\"If you think it would be a liberty in me, sir, to write, of course I\nwouldn't venture to do so.  But I am so very anxious to do all I can to\nserve my mistress faithfully----\"\n\nPeople in the lower class of life never know when or how to go out of a\nroom.  They invariably require to be helped out by their betters.  I\nthought it high time to help the Young Person out.  I did it with two\njudicious words--\n\n\"Good-morning.\"\n\nSomething outside or inside this singular girl suddenly creaked. Louis,\nwho was looking at her (which I was not), says she creaked when she\ncurtseyed.  Curious.  Was it her shoes, her stays, or her bones? Louis\nthinks it was her stays.  Most extraordinary!\n\n\n\nAs soon as I was left by myself I had a little nap--I really wanted it.\nWhen I awoke again I noticed dear Marian's letter.  If I had had the\nleast idea of what it contained I should certainly not have attempted\nto open it.  Being, unfortunately for myself, quite innocent of all\nsuspicion, I read the letter.  It immediately upset me for the day.\n\nI am, by nature, one of the most easy-tempered creatures that ever\nlived--I make allowances for everybody, and I take offence at nothing.\nBut as I have before remarked, there are limits to my endurance.  I\nlaid down Marian's letter, and felt myself--justly felt myself--an\ninjured man.\n\nI am about to make a remark.  It is, of course, applicable to the very\nserious matter now under notice, or I should not allow it to appear in\nthis place.\n\nNothing, in my opinion, sets the odious selfishness of mankind in such\na repulsively vivid light as the treatment, in all classes of society,\nwhich the Single people receive at the hands of the Married people.\nWhen you have once shown yourself too considerate and self-denying to\nadd a family of your own to an already overcrowded population, you are\nvindictively marked out by your married friends, who have no similar\nconsideration and no similar self-denial, as the recipient of half\ntheir conjugal troubles, and the born friend of all their children.\nHusbands and wives TALK of the cares of matrimony, and bachelors and\nspinsters BEAR them. Take my own case.  I considerately remain single,\nand my poor dear brother Philip inconsiderately marries.  What does he\ndo when he dies? He leaves his daughter to ME.  She is a sweet\ngirl--she is also a dreadful responsibility.  Why lay her on my\nshoulders? Because I am bound, in the harmless character of a single\nman, to relieve my married connections of all their own troubles.  I do\nmy best with my brother's responsibility--I marry my niece, with\ninfinite fuss and difficulty, to the man her father wanted her to\nmarry.  She and her husband disagree, and unpleasant consequences\nfollow.  What does she do with those consequences? She transfers them\nto ME.  Why transfer them to ME?  Because I am bound, in the harmless\ncharacter of a single man, to relieve my married connections of all\ntheir own troubles.  Poor single people! Poor human nature!\n\nIt is quite unnecessary to say that Marian's letter threatened me.\nEverybody threatens me.  All sorts of horrors were to fall on my\ndevoted head if I hesitated to turn Limmeridge House into an asylum for\nmy niece and her misfortunes.  I did hesitate, nevertheless.\n\nI have mentioned that my usual course, hitherto, had been to submit to\ndear Marian, and save noise.  But on this occasion, the consequences\ninvolved in her extremely inconsiderate proposal were of a nature to\nmake me pause.  If I opened Limmeridge House as an asylum to Lady\nGlyde, what security had I against Sir Percival Glyde's following her\nhere in a state of violent resentment against ME for harbouring his\nwife? I saw such a perfect labyrinth of troubles involved in this\nproceeding that I determined to feel my ground, as it were.  I wrote,\ntherefore, to dear Marian to beg (as she had no husband to lay claim to\nher) that she would come here by herself, first, and talk the matter\nover with me.  If she could answer my objections to my own perfect\nsatisfaction, then I assured her that I would receive our sweet Laura\nwith the greatest pleasure, but not otherwise.\n\nI felt, of course, at the time, that this temporising on my part would\nprobably end in bringing Marian here in a state of virtuous\nindignation, banging doors.  But then, the other course of proceeding\nmight end in bringing Sir Percival here in a state of virtuous\nindignation, banging doors also, and of the two indignations and\nbangings I preferred Marian's, because I was used to her.  Accordingly\nI despatched the letter by return of post. It gained me time, at all\nevents--and, oh dear me! what a point that was to begin with.\n\nWhen I am totally prostrated (did I mention that I was totally\nprostrated by Marian's letter?) it always takes me three days to get up\nagain.  I was very unreasonable--I expected three days of quiet.  Of\ncourse I didn't get them.\n\nThe third day's post brought me a most impertinent letter from a person\nwith whom I was totally unacquainted.  He described himself as the\nacting partner of our man of business--our dear, pig-headed old\nGilmore--and he informed me that he had lately received, by the post, a\nletter addressed to him in Miss Halcombe's handwriting.  On opening the\nenvelope, he had discovered, to his astonishment, that it contained\nnothing but a blank sheet of note-paper.  This circumstance appeared to\nhim so suspicious (as suggesting to his restless legal mind that the\nletter had been tampered with) that he had at once written to Miss\nHalcombe, and had received no answer by return of post.  In this\ndifficulty, instead of acting like a sensible man and letting things\ntake their proper course, his next absurd proceeding, on his own\nshowing, was to pester me by writing to inquire if I knew anything\nabout it.  What the deuce should I know about it? Why alarm me as well\nas himself? I wrote back to that effect.  It was one of my keenest\nletters.  I have produced nothing with a sharper epistolary edge to it\nsince I tendered his dismissal in writing to that extremely troublesome\nperson, Mr. Walter Hartright.\n\nMy letter produced its effect.  I heard nothing more from the lawyer.\n\nThis perhaps was not altogether surprising.  But it was certainly a\nremarkable circumstance that no second letter reached me from Marian,\nand that no warning signs appeared of her arrival.  Her unexpected\nabsence did me amazing good.  It was so very soothing and pleasant to\ninfer (as I did of course) that my married connections had made it up\nagain.  Five days of undisturbed tranquillity, of delicious single\nblessedness, quite restored me. On the sixth day I felt strong enough\nto send for my photographer, and to set him at work again on the\npresentation copies of my art-treasures, with a view, as I have\nalready mentioned, to the improvement of taste in this barbarous\nneighbourhood.  I had just dismissed him to his workshop, and had just\nbegun coquetting with my coins, when Louis suddenly made his appearance\nwith a card in his hand.\n\n\"Another Young Person?\" I said.  \"I won't see her.  In my state of\nhealth Young Persons disagree with me.  Not at home.\"\n\n\"It is a gentleman this time, sir.\"\n\nA gentleman of course made a difference.  I looked at the card.\n\nGracious Heaven! my tiresome sister's foreign husband, Count Fosco.\n\n\n\nIs it necessary to say what my first impression was when I looked at my\nvisitor's card? Surely not! My sister having married a foreigner, there\nwas but one impression that any man in his senses could possibly feel.\nOf course the Count had come to borrow money of me.\n\n\"Louis,\" I said, \"do you think he would go away if you gave him five\nshillings?\"\n\nLouis looked quite shocked.  He surprised me inexpressibly by declaring\nthat my sister's foreign husband was dressed superbly, and looked the\npicture of prosperity.  Under these circumstances my first impression\naltered to a certain extent.  I now took it for granted that the Count\nhad matrimonial difficulties of his own to contend with, and that he\nhad come, like the rest of the family, to cast them all on my shoulders.\n\n\"Did he mention his business?\" I asked.\n\n\"Count Fosco said he had come here, sir, because Miss Halcombe was\nunable to leave Blackwater Park.\"\n\nFresh troubles, apparently.  Not exactly his own, as I had supposed,\nbut dear Marian's.  Troubles, anyway.  Oh dear!\n\n\"Show him in,\" I said resignedly.\n\nThe Count's first appearance really startled me.  He was such an\nalarmingly large person that I quite trembled.  I felt certain that he\nwould shake the floor and knock down my art-treasures.  He did neither\nthe one nor the other.  He was refreshingly dressed in summer\ncostume--his manner was delightfully self-possessed and quiet--he had a\ncharming smile.  My first impression of him was highly favourable.  It\nis not creditable to my penetration--as the sequel will show--to\nacknowledge this, but I am a naturally candid man, and I DO acknowledge\nit notwithstanding.\n\n\"Allow me to present myself, Mr. Fairlie,\" he said.  \"I come from\nBlackwater Park, and I have the honour and the happiness of being\nMadame Fosco's husband.  Let me take my first and last advantage of\nthat circumstance by entreating you not to make a stranger of me.  I\nbeg you will not disturb yourself--I beg you will not move.\"\n\n\"You are very good,\" I replied.  \"I wish I was strong enough to get up.\nCharmed to see you at Limmeridge.  Please take a chair.\"\n\n\"I am afraid you are suffering to-day,\" said the Count.\n\n\"As usual,\" I said.  \"I am nothing but a bundle of nerves dressed up to\nlook like a man.\"\n\n\"I have studied many subjects in my time,\" remarked this sympathetic\nperson.  \"Among others the inexhaustible subject of nerves.  May I make\na suggestion, at once the simplest and the most profound? Will you let\nme alter the light in your room?\"\n\n\"Certainly--if you will be so very kind as not to let any of it in on\nme.\"\n\nHe walked to the window.  Such a contrast to dear Marian! so extremely\nconsiderate in all his movements!\n\n\"Light,\" he said, in that delightfully confidential tone which is so\nsoothing to an invalid, \"is the first essential.  Light stimulates,\nnourishes, preserves.  You can no more do without it, Mr. Fairlie, than\nif you were a flower.  Observe.  Here, where you sit, I close the\nshutters to compose you.  There, where you do NOT sit, I draw up the\nblind and let in the invigorating sun.  Admit the light into your room\nif you cannot bear it on yourself. Light, sir, is the grand decree of\nProvidence.  You accept Providence with your own restrictions.  Accept\nlight on the same terms.\"\n\nI thought this very convincing and attentive.  He had taken me in up to\nthat point about the light, he had certainly taken me in.\n\n\"You see me confused,\" he said, returning to his place--\"on my word of\nhonour, Mr. Fairlie, you see me confused in your presence.\"\n\n\"Shocked to hear it, I am sure.  May I inquire why?\"\n\n\"Sir, can I enter this room (where you sit a sufferer), and see you\nsurrounded by these admirable objects of Art, without discovering that\nyou are a man whose feelings are acutely impressionable, whose\nsympathies are perpetually alive? Tell me, can I do this?\"\n\nIf I had been strong enough to sit up in my chair I should, of course,\nhave bowed.  Not being strong enough, I smiled my acknowledgments\ninstead.  It did just as well, we both understood one another.\n\n\"Pray follow my train of thought,\" continued the Count.  \"I sit here, a\nman of refined sympathies myself, in the presence of another man of\nrefined sympathies also.  I am conscious of a terrible necessity for\nlacerating those sympathies by referring to domestic events of a very\nmelancholy kind.  What is the inevitable consequence? I have done\nmyself the honour of pointing it out to you already.  I sit confused.\"\n\nWas it at this point that I began to suspect he was going to bore me? I\nrather think it was.\n\n\"Is it absolutely necessary to refer to these unpleasant matters?\" I\ninquired.  \"In our homely English phrase, Count Fosco, won't they keep?\"\n\nThe Count, with the most alarming solemnity, sighed and shook his head.\n\n\"Must I really hear them?\"\n\nHe shrugged his shoulders (it was the first foreign thing he had done\nsince he had been in the room), and looked at me in an unpleasantly\npenetrating manner.  My instincts told me that I had better close my\neyes.  I obeyed my instincts.\n\n\"Please break it gently,\" I pleaded.  \"Anybody dead?\"\n\n\"Dead!\" cried the Count, with unnecessary foreign fierceness. \"Mr.\nFairlie, your national composure terrifies me.  In the name of Heaven,\nwhat have I said or done to make you think me the messenger of death?\"\n\n\"Pray accept my apologies,\" I answered.  \"You have said and done\nnothing.  I make it a rule in these distressing cases always to\nanticipate the worst.  It breaks the blow by meeting it half-way, and\nso on.  Inexpressibly relieved, I am sure, to hear that nobody is dead.\nAnybody ill?\"\n\nI opened my eyes and looked at him.  Was he very yellow when he came\nin, or had he turned very yellow in the last minute or two? I really\ncan't say, and I can't ask Louis, because he was not in the room at the\ntime.\n\n\"Anybody ill?\" I repeated, observing that my national composure still\nappeared to affect him.\n\n\"That is part of my bad news, Mr. Fairlie.  Yes.  Somebody is ill.\"\n\n\"Grieved, I am sure.  Which of them is it?\"\n\n\"To my profound sorrow, Miss Halcombe.  Perhaps you were in some degree\nprepared to hear this? Perhaps when you found that Miss Halcombe did\nnot come here by herself, as you proposed, and did not write a second\ntime, your affectionate anxiety may have made you fear that she was\nill?\"\n\nI have no doubt my affectionate anxiety had led to that melancholy\napprehension at some time or other, but at the moment my wretched\nmemory entirely failed to remind me of the circumstance.  However, I\nsaid yes, in justice to myself.  I was much shocked.  It was so very\nuncharacteristic of such a robust person as dear Marian to be ill, that\nI could only suppose she had met with an accident.  A horse, or a false\nstep on the stairs, or something of that sort.\n\n\"Is it serious?\" I asked.\n\n\"Serious--beyond a doubt,\" he replied.  \"Dangerous--I hope and trust\nnot.  Miss Halcombe unhappily exposed herself to be wetted through by a\nheavy rain.  The cold that followed was of an aggravated kind, and it\nhas now brought with it the worst consequence--fever.\"\n\nWhen I heard the word fever, and when I remembered at the same moment\nthat the unscrupulous person who was now addressing me had just come\nfrom Blackwater Park, I thought I should have fainted on the spot.\n\n\"Good God!\" I said.  \"Is it infectious?\"\n\n\"Not at present,\" he answered, with detestable composure.  \"It may turn\nto infection--but no such deplorable complication had taken place when\nI left Blackwater Park.  I have felt the deepest interest in the case,\nMr. Fairlie--I have endeavoured to assist the regular medical attendant\nin watching it--accept my personal assurances of the uninfectious\nnature of the fever when I last saw it.\"\n\nAccept his assurances! I never was farther from accepting anything in\nmy life.  I would not have believed him on his oath.  He was too yellow\nto be believed.  He looked like a walking-West-Indian-epidemic.  He\nwas big enough to carry typhus by the ton, and to dye the very carpet\nhe walked on with scarlet fever.  In certain emergencies my mind is\nremarkably soon made up.  I instantly determined to get rid of him.\n\n\"You will kindly excuse an invalid,\" I said--\"but long conferences of\nany kind invariably upset me.  May I beg to know exactly what the\nobject is to which I am indebted for the honour of your visit?\"\n\nI fervently hoped that this remarkably broad hint would throw him off\nhis balance--confuse him--reduce him to polite apologies--in short, get\nhim out of the room.  On the contrary, it only settled him in his\nchair.  He became additionally solemn, and dignified, and confidential.\nHe held up two of his horrid fingers and gave me another of his\nunpleasantly penetrating looks.  What was I to do? I was not strong\nenough to quarrel with him.  Conceive my situation, if you please.  Is\nlanguage adequate to describe it? I think not.\n\n\"The objects of my visit,\" he went on, quite irrepressibly, \"are\nnumbered on my fingers.  They are two.  First, I come to bear my\ntestimony, with profound sorrow, to the lamentable disagreements\nbetween Sir Percival and Lady Glyde.  I am Sir Percival's oldest\nfriend--I am related to Lady Glyde by marriage--I am an eye-witness of\nall that has happened at Blackwater Park.  In those three capacities I\nspeak with authority, with confidence, with honourable regret.  Sir, I\ninform you, as the head of Lady Glyde's family, that Miss Halcombe has\nexaggerated nothing in the letter which she wrote to your address.  I\naffirm that the remedy which that admirable lady has proposed is the\nonly remedy that will spare you the horrors of public scandal.  A\ntemporary separation between husband and wife is the one peaceable\nsolution of this difficulty.  Part them for the present, and when all\ncauses of irritation are removed, I, who have now the honour of\naddressing you--I will undertake to bring Sir Percival to reason.  Lady\nGlyde is innocent, Lady Glyde is injured, but--follow my thought\nhere!--she is, on that very account (I say it with shame), the cause\nof irritation while she remains under her husband's roof.  No other\nhouse can receive her with propriety but yours.  I invite you to open\nit.\"\n\nCool.  Here was a matrimonial hailstorm pouring in the South of\nEngland, and I was invited, by a man with fever in every fold of his\ncoat, to come out from the North of England and take my share of the\npelting.  I tried to put the point forcibly, just as I have put it\nhere.  The Count deliberately lowered one of his horrid fingers, kept\nthe other up, and went on--rode over me, as it were, without even the\ncommon coach-manlike attention of crying \"Hi!\" before he knocked me\ndown.\n\n\"Follow my thought once more, if you please,\" he resumed.  \"My first\nobject you have heard.  My second object in coming to this house is to\ndo what Miss Halcombe's illness has prevented her from doing for\nherself.  My large experience is consulted on all difficult matters at\nBlackwater Park, and my friendly advice was requested on the\ninteresting subject of your letter to Miss Halcombe.  I understood at\nonce--for my sympathies are your sympathies--why you wished to see her\nhere before you pledged yourself to inviting Lady Glyde.  You are most\nright, sir, in hesitating to receive the wife until you are quite\ncertain that the husband will not exert his authority to reclaim her.\nI agree to that.  I also agree that such delicate explanations as this\ndifficulty involves are not explanations which can be properly disposed\nof by writing only.  My presence here (to my own great inconvenience)\nis the proof that I speak sincerely.  As for the explanations\nthemselves, I--Fosco--I, who know Sir Percival much better than Miss\nHalcombe knows him, affirm to you, on my honour and my word, that he\nwill not come near this house, or attempt to communicate with this\nhouse, while his wife is living in it.  His affairs are embarrassed.\nOffer him his freedom by means of the absence of Lady Glyde.  I promise\nyou he will take his freedom, and go back to the Continent at the\nearliest moment when he can get away.  Is this clear to you as crystal?\nYes, it is.  Have you questions to address to me? Be it so, I am here\nto answer.  Ask, Mr. Fairlie--oblige me by asking to your heart's\ncontent.\"\n\nHe had said so much already in spite of me, and he looked so dreadfully\ncapable of saying a great deal more also in spite of me, that I\ndeclined his amiable invitation in pure self-defence.\n\n\"Many thanks,\" I replied.  \"I am sinking fast.  In my state of health I\nmust take things for granted.  Allow me to do so on this occasion.  We\nquite understand each other.  Yes.  Much obliged, I am sure, for your\nkind interference.  If I ever get better, and ever have a second\nopportunity of improving our acquaintance--\"\n\nHe got up.  I thought he was going.  No.  More talk, more time for the\ndevelopment of infectious influences--in my room, too--remember that,\nin my room!\n\n\"One moment yet,\" he said, \"one moment before I take my leave.  I ask\npermission at parting to impress on you an urgent necessity. It is\nthis, sir.  You must not think of waiting till Miss Halcombe recovers\nbefore you receive Lady Glyde.  Miss Halcombe has the attendance of the\ndoctor, of the housekeeper at Blackwater Park, and of an experienced\nnurse as well--three persons for whose capacity and devotion I answer\nwith my life.  I tell you that.  I tell you, also, that the anxiety and\nalarm of her sister's illness has already affected the health and\nspirits of Lady Glyde, and has made her totally unfit to be of use in\nthe sick-room.  Her position with her husband grows more and more\ndeplorable and dangerous every day.  If you leave her any longer at\nBlackwater Park, you do nothing whatever to hasten her sister's\nrecovery, and at the same time, you risk the public scandal, which you\nand I, and all of us, are bound in the sacred interests of the family\nto avoid.  With all my soul, I advise you to remove the serious\nresponsibility of delay from your own shoulders by writing to Lady\nGlyde to come here at once.  Do your affectionate, your honourable,\nyour inevitable duty, and whatever happens in the future, no one can\nlay the blame on you.  I speak from my large experience--I offer my\nfriendly advice.  Is it accepted--Yes, or No?\"\n\nI looked at him--merely looked at him--with my sense of his amazing\nassurance, and my dawning resolution to ring for Louis and have him\nshown out of the room expressed in every line of my face. It is\nperfectly incredible, but quite true, that my face did not appear to\nproduce the slightest impression on him.  Born without\nnerves--evidently born without nerves.\n\n\"You hesitate?\" he said.  \"Mr. Fairlie! I understand that hesitation.\nYou object--see, sir, how my sympathies look straight down into your\nthoughts!--you object that Lady Glyde is not in health and not in\nspirits to take the long journey, from Hampshire to this place, by\nherself.  Her own maid is removed from her, as you know, and of other\nservants fit to travel with her, from one end of England to another,\nthere are none at Blackwater Park.  You object, again, that she cannot\ncomfortably stop and rest in London, on her way here, because she\ncannot comfortably go alone to a public hotel where she is a total\nstranger.  In one breath, I grant both objections--in another breath, I\nremove them.  Follow me, if you please, for the last time.  It was my\nintention, when I returned to England with Sir Percival, to settle\nmyself in the neighbourhood of London.  That purpose has just been\nhappily accomplished.  I have taken, for six months, a little furnished\nhouse in the quarter called St. John's Wood.  Be so obliging as to keep\nthis fact in your mind, and observe the programme I now propose.  Lady\nGlyde travels to London (a short journey)--I myself meet her at the\nstation--I take her to rest and sleep at my house, which is also the\nhouse of her aunt--when she is restored I escort her to the station\nagain--she travels to this place, and her own maid (who is now under\nyour roof) receives her at the carriage-door.  Here is comfort\nconsulted--here are the interests of propriety consulted--here is your\nown duty--duty of hospitality, sympathy, protection, to an unhappy lady\nin need of all three--smoothed and made easy, from the beginning to\nthe end.  I cordially invite you, sir, to second my efforts in the\nsacred interests of the family.  I seriously advise you to write, by my\nhands, offering the hospitality of your house (and heart), and the\nhospitality of my house (and heart), to that injured and unfortunate\nlady whose cause I plead to-day.\"\n\nHe waved his horrid hand at me--he struck his infectious breast--he\naddressed me oratorically, as if I was laid up in the House of Commons.\nIt was high time to take a desperate course of some sort.  It was also\nhigh time to send for Louis, and adopt the precaution of fumigating the\nroom.\n\nIn this trying emergency an idea occurred to me--an inestimable idea\nwhich, so to speak, killed two intrusive birds with one stone.  I\ndetermined to get rid of the Count's tiresome eloquence, and of Lady\nGlyde's tiresome troubles, by complying with this odious foreigner's\nrequest, and writing the letter at once.  There was not the least\ndanger of the invitation being accepted, for there was not the least\nchance that Laura would consent to leave Blackwater Park while Marian\nwas lying there ill.  How this charmingly convenient obstacle could\nhave escaped the officious penetration of the Count, it was impossible\nto conceive--but it HAD escaped him.  My dread that he might yet\ndiscover it, if I allowed him any more time to think, stimulated me to\nsuch an amazing degree, that I struggled into a sitting\nposition--seized, really seized, the writing materials by my side, and\nproduced the letter as rapidly as if I had been a common clerk in an\noffice. \"Dearest Laura, Please come, whenever you like.  Break the\njourney by sleeping in London at your aunt's house.  Grieved to hear of\ndear Marian's illness.  Ever affectionately yours.\" I handed these\nlines, at arm's length, to the Count--I sank back in my chair--I said,\n\"Excuse me--I am entirely prostrated--I can do no more. Will you rest\nand lunch downstairs? Love to all, and sympathy, and so on.\nGood-morning.\"\n\nHe made another speech--the man was absolutely inexhaustible.  I closed\nmy eyes--I endeavoured to hear as little as possible.  In spite of my\nendeavours I was obliged to hear a great deal.  My sister's endless\nhusband congratulated himself, and congratulated me, on the result of\nour interview--he mentioned a great deal more about his sympathies and\nmine--he deplored my miserable health--he offered to write me a\nprescription--he impressed on me the necessity of not forgetting what\nhe had said about the importance of light--he accepted my obliging\ninvitation to rest and lunch--he recommended me to expect Lady Glyde in\ntwo or three days' time--he begged my permission to look forward to our\nnext meeting, instead of paining himself and paining me, by saying\nfarewell--he added a great deal more, which, I rejoice to think, I did\nnot attend to at the time, and do not remember now.  I heard his\nsympathetic voice travelling away from me by degrees--but, large as he\nwas, I never heard him.  He had the negative merit of being absolutely\nnoiseless.  I don't know when he opened the door, or when he shut it.\nI ventured to make use of my eyes again, after an interval of\nsilence--and he was gone.\n\nI rang for Louis, and retired to my bathroom.  Tepid water,\nstrengthened with aromatic vinegar, for myself, and copious fumigation\nfor my study, were the obvious precautions to take, and of course I\nadopted them.  I rejoice to say they proved successful.  I enjoyed my\ncustomary siesta.  I awoke moist and cool.\n\nMy first inquiries were for the Count.  Had we really got rid of him?\nYes--he had gone away by the afternoon train.  Had he lunched, and if\nso, upon what? Entirely upon fruit-tart and cream. What a man! What a\ndigestion!\n\n\n\nAm I expected to say anything more? I believe not.  I believe I have\nreached the limits assigned to me.  The shocking circumstances which\nhappened at a later period did not, I am thankful to say, happen in my\npresence.  I do beg and entreat that nobody will be so very unfeeling\nas to lay any part of the blame of those circumstances on me.  I did\neverything for the best. I am not answerable for a deplorable calamity,\nwhich it was quite impossible to foresee.  I am shattered by it--I have\nsuffered under it, as nobody else has suffered.  My servant, Louis (who\nis really attached to me in his unintelligent way), thinks I shall\nnever get over it.  He sees me dictating at this moment, with my\nhandkerchief to my eyes.  I wish to mention, in justice to myself, that\nit was not my fault, and that I am quite exhausted and heartbroken.\nNeed I say more?\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY ELIZA MICHELSON\n\n(Housekeeper at Blackwater Park)\n\n\n\nI\n\n\nI am asked to state plainly what I know of the progress of Miss\nHalcombe's illness and of the circumstances under which Lady Glyde left\nBlackwater Park for London.\n\nThe reason given for making this demand on me is, that my testimony is\nwanted in the interests of truth.  As the widow of a clergyman of the\nChurch of England (reduced by misfortune to the necessity of accepting\na situation), I have been taught to place the claims of truth above all\nother considerations.  I therefore comply with a request which I might\notherwise, through reluctance to connect myself with distressing family\naffairs, have hesitated to grant.\n\nI made no memorandum at the time, and I cannot therefore be sure to a\nday of the date, but I believe I am correct in stating that Miss\nHalcombe's serious illness began during the last fortnight or ten days\nin June.  The breakfast hour was late at Blackwater Park--sometimes as\nlate as ten, never earlier than half-past nine.  On the morning to\nwhich I am now referring, Miss Halcombe (who was usually the first to\ncome down) did not make her appearance at the table.  After the family\nhad waited a quarter of an hour, the upper housemaid was sent to see\nafter her, and came running out of the room dreadfully frightened.  I\nmet the servant on the stairs, and went at once to Miss Halcombe to see\nwhat was the matter.  The poor lady was incapable of telling me.  She\nwas walking about her room with a pen in her hand, quite light-headed,\nin a state of burning fever.\n\nLady Glyde (being no longer in Sir Percival's service, I may, without\nimpropriety, mention my former mistress by her name, instead of calling\nher my lady) was the first to come in from her own bedroom.  She was so\ndreadfully alarmed and distressed that she was quite useless.  The\nCount Fosco, and his lady, who came upstairs immediately afterwards,\nwere both most serviceable and kind.  Her ladyship assisted me to get\nMiss Halcombe to her bed. His lordship the Count remained in the\nsitting-room, and having sent for my medicine-chest, made a mixture for\nMiss Halcombe, and a cooling lotion to be applied to her head, so as to\nlose no time before the doctor came.  We applied the lotion, but we\ncould not get her to take the mixture.  Sir Percival undertook to send\nfor the doctor.  He despatched a groom, on horseback, for the nearest\nmedical man, Mr. Dawson, of Oak Lodge.\n\nMr. Dawson arrived in less than an hour's time.  He was a respectable\nelderly man, well known all round the country, and we were much alarmed\nwhen we found that he considered the case to be a very serious one.\n\nHis lordship the Count affably entered into conversation with Mr.\nDawson, and gave his opinions with a judicious freedom.  Mr. Dawson,\nnot over-courteously, inquired if his lordship's advice was the advice\nof a doctor, and being informed that it was the advice of one who had\nstudied medicine unprofessionally, replied that he was not accustomed\nto consult with amateur physicians. The Count, with truly Christian\nmeekness of temper, smiled and left the room.  Before he went out he\ntold me that he might be found, in case he was wanted in the course of\nthe day, at the boat-house on the banks of the lake.  Why he should\nhave gone there, I cannot say.  But he did go, remaining away the whole\nday till seven o'clock, which was dinner-time.  Perhaps he wished to\nset the example of keeping the house as quiet as possible.  It was\nentirely in his character to do so.  He was a most considerate nobleman.\n\nMiss Halcombe passed a very bad night, the fever coming and going, and\ngetting worse towards the morning instead of better.  No nurse fit to\nwait on her being at hand in the neighbourhood, her ladyship the\nCountess and myself undertook the duty, relieving each other.  Lady\nGlyde, most unwisely, insisted on sitting up with us.  She was much too\nnervous and too delicate in health to bear the anxiety of Miss\nHalcombe's illness calmly.  She only did herself harm, without being of\nthe least real assistance.  A more gentle and affectionate lady never\nlived--but she cried, and she was frightened, two weaknesses which made\nher entirely unfit to be present in a sick-room.\n\nSir Percival and the Count came in the morning to make their inquiries.\n\nSir Percival (from distress, I presume, at his lady's affliction and at\nMiss Halcombe's illness) appeared much confused and unsettled in his\nmind.  His lordship testified, on the contrary, a becoming composure\nand interest. He had his straw hat in one hand, and his book in the\nother, and he mentioned to Sir Percival in my hearing that he would go\nout again and study at the lake.  \"Let us keep the house quiet,\" he\nsaid.  \"Let us not smoke indoors, my friend, now Miss Halcombe is ill.\nYou go your way, and I will go mine.  When I study I like to be alone.\nGood-morning, Mrs. Michelson.\"\n\nSir Percival was not civil enough--perhaps I ought in justice to say,\nnot composed enough--to take leave of me with the same polite\nattention.  The only person in the house, indeed, who treated me, at\nthat time or at any other, on the footing of a lady in distressed\ncircumstances, was the Count.  He had the manners of a true\nnobleman--he was considerate towards every one.  Even the young person\n(Fanny by name) who attended on Lady Glyde was not beneath his notice.\nWhen she was sent away by Sir Percival, his lordship (showing me his\nsweet little birds at the time) was most kindly anxious to know what\nhad become of her, where she was to go the day she left Blackwater\nPark, and so on.  It is in such little delicate attentions that the\nadvantages of aristocratic birth always show themselves.  I make no\napology for introducing these particulars--they are brought forward in\njustice to his lordship, whose character, I have reason to know, is\nviewed rather harshly in certain quarters.  A nobleman who can respect\na lady in distressed circumstances, and can take a fatherly interest in\nthe fortunes of an humble servant girl, shows principles and feelings\nof too high an order to be lightly called in question.  I advance no\nopinions--I offer facts only.  My endeavour through life is to judge\nnot that I be not judged.  One of my beloved husband's finest sermons\nwas on that text.  I read it constantly--in my own copy of the edition\nprinted by subscription, in the first days of my widowhood--and at\nevery fresh perusal I derive an increase of spiritual benefit and\nedification.\n\nThere was no improvement in Miss Halcombe, and the second night was\neven worse than the first. Mr. Dawson was constant in his attendance.\nThe practical duties of nursing were still divided between the Countess\nand myself, Lady Glyde persisting in sitting up with us, though we both\nentreated her to take some rest. \"My place is by Marian's bedside,\" was\nher only answer.  \"Whether I am ill, or well, nothing will induce me to\nlose sight of her.\"\n\nTowards midday I went downstairs to attend to some of my regular\nduties.  An hour afterwards, on my way back to the sick-room, I saw the\nCount (who had gone out again early, for the third time) entering the\nhall, to all appearance in the highest good spirits. Sir Percival, at\nthe same moment, put his head out of the library door, and addressed\nhis noble friend, with extreme eagerness, in these words--\n\n\"Have you found her?\"\n\nHis lordship's large face became dimpled all over with placid smiles,\nbut he made no reply in words.  At the same time Sir Percival turned\nhis head, observed that I was approaching the stairs, and looked at me\nin the most rudely angry manner possible.\n\n\"Come in here and tell me about it,\" he said to the Count. \"Whenever\nthere are women in a house they're always sure to be going up or down\nstairs.\"\n\n\"My dear Percival,\" observed his lordship kindly, \"Mrs. Michelson has\nduties.  Pray recognise her admirable performance of them as sincerely\nas I do! How is the sufferer, Mrs. Michelson?\"\n\n\"No better, my lord, I regret to say.\"\n\n\"Sad--most sad!\" remarked the Count.  \"You look fatigued, Mrs.\nMichelson.  It is certainly time you and my wife had some help in\nnursing.  I think I may be the means of offering you that help.\nCircumstances have happened which will oblige Madame Fosco to travel to\nLondon either to-morrow or the day after.  She will go away in the\nmorning and return at night, and she will bring back with her, to\nrelieve you, a nurse of excellent conduct and capacity, who is now\ndisengaged.  The woman is known to my wife as a person to be trusted.\nBefore she comes here say nothing about her, if you please, to the\ndoctor, because he will look with an evil eye on any nurse of my\nproviding.  When she appears in this house she will speak for herself,\nand Mr. Dawson will be obliged to acknowledge that there is no excuse\nfor not employing her. Lady Glyde will say the same.  Pray present my\nbest respects and sympathies to Lady Glyde.\"\n\nI expressed my grateful acknowledgments for his lordship's kind\nconsideration.  Sir Percival cut them short by calling to his noble\nfriend (using, I regret to say, a profane expression) to come into the\nlibrary, and not to keep him waiting there any longer.\n\nI proceeded upstairs.  We are poor erring creatures, and however well\nestablished a woman's principles may be she cannot always keep on her\nguard against the temptation to exercise an idle curiosity.  I am\nashamed to say that an idle curiosity, on this occasion, got the better\nof my principles, and made me unduly inquisitive about the question\nwhich Sir Percival had addressed to his noble friend at the library\ndoor.  Who was the Count expected to find in the course of his studious\nmorning rambles at Blackwater Park? A woman, it was to be presumed,\nfrom the terms of Sir Percival's inquiry.  I did not suspect the Count\nof any impropriety--I knew his moral character too well.  The only\nquestion I asked myself was--Had he found her?\n\nTo resume.  The night passed as usual without producing any change for\nthe better in Miss Halcombe.  The next day she seemed to improve a\nlittle.  The day after that her ladyship the Countess, without\nmentioning the object of her journey to any one in my hearing,\nproceeded by the morning train to London--her noble husband, with his\ncustomary attention, accompanying her to the station.\n\nI was now left in sole charge of Miss Halcombe, with every apparent\nchance, in consequence of her sister's resolution not to leave the\nbedside, of having Lady Glyde herself to nurse next.\n\nThe only circumstance of any importance that happened in the course of\nthe day was the occurrence of another unpleasant meeting between the\ndoctor and the Count.\n\nHis lordship, on returning from the station, stepped up into Miss\nHalcombe's sitting-room to make his inquiries.  I went out from the\nbedroom to speak to him, Mr. Dawson and Lady Glyde being both with the\npatient at the time.  The Count asked me many questions about the\ntreatment and the symptoms.  I informed him that the treatment was of\nthe kind described as \"saline,\" and that the symptoms, between the\nattacks of fever, were certainly those of increasing weakness and\nexhaustion.  Just as I was mentioning these last particulars, Mr.\nDawson came out from the bedroom.\n\n\"Good-morning, sir,\" said his lordship, stepping forward in the most\nurbane manner, and stopping the doctor, with a high-bred resolution\nimpossible to resist, \"I greatly fear you find no improvement in the\nsymptoms to-day?\"\n\n\"I find decided improvement,\" answered Mr. Dawson.\n\n\"You still persist in your lowering treatment of this case of fever?\"\ncontinued his lordship.\n\n\"I persist in the treatment which is justified by my own professional\nexperience,\" said Mr. Dawson.\n\n\"Permit me to put one question to you on the vast subject of\nprofessional experience,\" observed the Count.  \"I presume to offer no\nmore advice--I only presume to make an inquiry.  You live at some\ndistance, sir, from the gigantic centres of scientific activity--London\nand Paris.  Have you ever heard of the wasting effects of fever being\nreasonably and intelligibly repaired by fortifying the exhausted\npatient with brandy, wine, ammonia, and quinine? Has that new heresy of\nthe highest medical authorities ever reached your ears--Yes or No?\"\n\n\"When a professional man puts that question to me I shall be glad to\nanswer him,\" said the doctor, opening the door to go out.  \"You are not\na professional man, and I beg to decline answering you.\"\n\nBuffeted in this inexcusably uncivil way on one cheek, the Count, like\na practical Christian, immediately turned the other, and said, in the\nsweetest manner, \"Good-morning, Mr. Dawson.\"\n\nIf my late beloved husband had been so fortunate as to know his\nlordship, how highly he and the Count would have esteemed each other!\n\nHer ladyship the Countess returned by the last train that night, and\nbrought with her the nurse from London.  I was instructed that this\nperson's name was Mrs. Rubelle.  Her personal appearance, and her\nimperfect English when she spoke, informed me that she was a foreigner.\n\nI have always cultivated a feeling of humane indulgence for foreigners.\nThey do not possess our blessings and advantages, and they are, for the\nmost part, brought up in the blind errors of Popery.  It has also\nalways been my precept and practice, as it was my dear husband's\nprecept and practice before me (see Sermon XXIX. in the Collection by\nthe late Rev. Samuel Michelson, M.A.), to do as I would be done by.  On\nboth these accounts I will not say that Mrs. Rubelle struck me as being\na small, wiry, sly person, of fifty or thereabouts, with a dark brown\nor Creole complexion and watchful light grey eyes.  Nor will I mention,\nfor the reasons just alleged, that I thought her dress, though it was\nof the plainest black silk, inappropriately costly in texture and\nunnecessarily refined in trimming and finish, for a person in her\nposition in life.  I should not like these things to be said of me, and\ntherefore it is my duty not to say them of Mrs. Rubelle. I will merely\nmention that her manners were, not perhaps unpleasantly reserved, but\nonly remarkably quiet and retiring--that she looked about her a great\ndeal, and said very little, which might have arisen quite as much from\nher own modesty as from distrust of her position at Blackwater Park;\nand that she declined to partake of supper (which was curious perhaps,\nbut surely not suspicious?), although I myself politely invited her to\nthat meal in my own room.\n\nAt the Count's particular suggestion (so like his lordship's forgiving\nkindness!), it was arranged that Mrs. Rubelle should not enter on her\nduties until she had been seen and approved by the doctor the next\nmorning.  I sat up that night.  Lady Glyde appeared to be very\nunwilling that the new nurse should be employed to attend on Miss\nHalcombe.  Such want of liberality towards a foreigner on the part of a\nlady of her education and refinement surprised me.  I ventured to say,\n\"My lady, we must all remember not to be hasty in our judgments on our\ninferiors--especially when they come from foreign parts.\" Lady Glyde\ndid not appear to attend to me.  She only sighed, and kissed Miss\nHalcombe's hand as it lay on the counterpane.  Scarcely a judicious\nproceeding in a sick-room, with a patient whom it was highly desirable\nnot to excite.  But poor Lady Glyde knew nothing of nursing--nothing\nwhatever, I am sorry to say.\n\nThe next morning Mrs. Rubelle was sent to the sitting-room, to be\napproved by the doctor on his way through to the bedroom.\n\nI left Lady Glyde with Miss Halcombe, who was slumbering at the time,\nand joined Mrs. Rubelle, with the object of kindly preventing her from\nfeeling strange and nervous in consequence of the uncertainty of her\nsituation.  She did not appear to see it in that light.  She seemed to\nbe quite satisfied, beforehand, that Mr. Dawson would approve of her,\nand she sat calmly looking out of window, with every appearance of\nenjoying the country air.  Some people might have thought such conduct\nsuggestive of brazen assurance.  I beg to say that I more liberally set\nit down to extraordinary strength of mind.\n\nInstead of the doctor coming up to us, I was sent for to see the\ndoctor.  I thought this change of affairs rather odd, but Mrs. Rubelle\ndid not appear to be affected by it in any way.  I left her still\ncalmly looking out of the window, and still silently enjoying the\ncountry air.\n\nMr. Dawson was waiting for me by himself in the breakfast-room.\n\n\"About this new nurse, Mrs. Michelson,\" said the doctor.\n\n\"Yes, sir?\"\n\n\"I find that she has been brought here from London by the wife of that\nfat old foreigner, who is always trying to interfere with me. Mrs.\nMichelson, the fat old foreigner is a quack.\"\n\nThis was very rude.  I was naturally shocked at it.\n\n\"Are you aware, sir,\" I said, \"that you are talking of a nobleman?\"\n\n\"Pooh! He isn't the first quack with a handle to his name. They're all\nCounts--hang 'em!\"\n\n\"He would not be a friend of Sir Percival Glyde's, sir, if he was not a\nmember of the highest aristocracy--excepting the English aristocracy,\nof course.\"\n\n\"Very well, Mrs. Michelson, call him what you like, and let us get back\nto the nurse.  I have been objecting to her already.\"\n\n\"Without having seen her, sir?\"\n\n\"Yes, without having seen her.  She may be the best nurse in existence,\nbut she is not a nurse of my providing.  I have put that objection to\nSir Percival, as the master of the house.  He doesn't support me.  He\nsays a nurse of my providing would have been a stranger from London\nalso, and he thinks the woman ought to have a trial, after his wife's\naunt has taken the trouble to fetch her from London.  There is some\njustice in that, and I can't decently say No.  But I have made it a\ncondition that she is to go at once, if I find reason to complain of\nher.  This proposal being one which I have some right to make, as\nmedical attendant, Sir Percival has consented to it.  Now, Mrs.\nMichelson, I know I can depend on you, and I want you to keep a sharp\neye on the nurse for the first day or two, and to see that she gives\nMiss Halcombe no medicines but mine.  This foreign nobleman of yours is\ndying to try his quack remedies (mesmerism included) on my patient, and\na nurse who is brought here by his wife may be a little too willing to\nhelp him.  You understand? Very well, then, we may go upstairs. Is the\nnurse there? I'll say a word to her before she goes into the sick-room.\"\n\nWe found Mrs. Rubelle still enjoying herself at the window.  When I\nintroduced her to Mr. Dawson, neither the doctor's doubtful looks nor\nthe doctor's searching questions appeared to confuse her in the least.\nShe answered him quietly in her broken English, and though he tried\nhard to puzzle her, she never betrayed the least ignorance, so far,\nabout any part of her duties.  This was doubtless the result of\nstrength of mind, as I said before, and not of brazen assurance, by any\nmeans.\n\nWe all went into the bedroom.\n\nMrs. Rubelle looked very attentively at the patient, curtseyed to Lady\nGlyde, set one or two little things right in the room, and sat down\nquietly in a corner to wait until she was wanted.  Her ladyship seemed\nstartled and annoyed by the appearance of the strange nurse.  No one\nsaid anything, for fear of rousing Miss Halcombe, who was still\nslumbering, except the doctor, who whispered a question about the\nnight.  I softly answered, \"Much as usual,\" and then Mr. Dawson went\nout.  Lady Glyde followed him, I suppose to speak about Mrs. Rubelle.\nFor my own part, I had made up my mind already that this quiet foreign\nperson would keep her situation.  She had all her wits about her, and\nshe certainly understood her business.  So far, I could hardly have\ndone much better by the bedside myself.\n\nRemembering Mr. Dawson's caution to me, I subjected Mrs. Rubelle to a\nsevere scrutiny at certain intervals for the next three or four days.\nI over and over again entered the room softly and suddenly, but I never\nfound her out in any suspicious action. Lady Glyde, who watched her as\nattentively as I did, discovered nothing either.  I never detected a\nsign of the medicine bottles being tampered with, I never saw Mrs.\nRubelle say a word to the Count, or the Count to her.  She managed Miss\nHalcombe with unquestionable care and discretion.  The poor lady\nwavered backwards and forwards between a sort of sleepy exhaustion,\nwhich was half faintness and half slumbering, and attacks of fever\nwhich brought with them more or less of wandering in her mind.  Mrs.\nRubelle never disturbed her in the first case, and never startled her\nin the second, by appearing too suddenly at the bedside in the\ncharacter of a stranger.  Honour to whom honour is due (whether foreign\nor English)--and I give her privilege impartially to Mrs. Rubelle.  She\nwas remarkably uncommunicative about herself, and she was too quietly\nindependent of all advice from experienced persons who understood the\nduties of a sick-room--but with these drawbacks, she was a good nurse,\nand she never gave either Lady Glyde or Mr. Dawson the shadow of a\nreason for complaining of her.\n\nThe next circumstance of importance that occurred in the house was the\ntemporary absence of the Count, occasioned by business which took him\nto London.  He went away (I think) on the morning of the fourth day\nafter the arrival of Mrs. Rubelle, and at parting he spoke to Lady\nGlyde very seriously, in my presence, on the subject of Miss Halcombe.\n\n\"Trust Mr. Dawson,\" he said, \"for a few days more, if you please. But\nif there is not some change for the better in that time, send for\nadvice from London, which this mule of a doctor must accept in spite of\nhimself.  Offend Mr. Dawson, and save Miss Halcombe.  I say this\nseriously, on my word of honour and from the bottom of my heart.\"\n\nHis lordship spoke with extreme feeling and kindness.  But poor Lady\nGlyde's nerves were so completely broken down that she seemed quite\nfrightened at him.  She trembled from head to foot, and allowed him to\ntake his leave without uttering a word on her side. She turned to me\nwhen he had gone, and said, \"Oh, Mrs. Michelson, I am heartbroken about\nmy sister, and I have no friend to advise me! Do you think Mr. Dawson\nis wrong? He told me himself this morning that there was no fear, and\nno need to send for another doctor.\"\n\n\"With all respect to Mr. Dawson,\" I answered, \"in your ladyship's place\nI should remember the Count's advice.\"\n\nLady Glyde turned away from me suddenly, with an appearance of despair,\nfor which I was quite unable to account.\n\n\"HIS advice!\" she said to herself.  \"God help us--HIS advice!\"\n\n\n\nThe Count was away from Blackwater Park, as nearly as I remember, a\nweek.\n\nSir Percival seemed to feel the loss of his lordship in various ways,\nand appeared also, I thought, much depressed and altered by the\nsickness and sorrow in the house.  Occasionally he was so very restless\nthat I could not help noticing it, coming and going, and wandering here\nand there and everywhere in the grounds.  His inquiries about Miss\nHalcombe, and about his lady (whose failing health seemed to cause him\nsincere anxiety), were most attentive. I think his heart was much\nsoftened.  If some kind clerical friend--some such friend as he might\nhave found in my late excellent husband--had been near him at this\ntime, cheering moral progress might have been made with Sir Percival.\nI seldom find myself mistaken on a point of this sort, having had\nexperience to guide me in my happy married days.\n\nHer ladyship the Countess, who was now the only company for Sir\nPercival downstairs, rather neglected him, as I considered--or,\nperhaps, it might have been that he neglected her.  A stranger might\nalmost have supposed that they were bent, now they were left together\nalone, on actually avoiding one another.  This, of course, could not\nbe.  But it did so happen, nevertheless, that the Countess made her\ndinner at luncheon-time, and that she always came upstairs towards\nevening, although Mrs. Rubelle had taken the nursing duties entirely\noff her hands.  Sir Percival dined by himself, and William (the man out\nof livery) make the remark, in my hearing, that his master had put\nhimself on half rations of food and on a double allowance of drink.  I\nattach no importance to such an insolent observation as this on the\npart of a servant. I reprobated it at the time, and I wish to be\nunderstood as reprobating it once more on this occasion.\n\nIn the course of the next few days Miss Halcombe did certainly seem to\nall of us to be mending a little.  Our faith in Mr. Dawson revived.  He\nappeared to be very confident about the case, and he assured Lady\nGlyde, when she spoke to him on the subject, that he would himself\npropose to send for a physician the moment he felt so much as the\nshadow of a doubt crossing his own mind.\n\nThe only person among us who did not appear to be relieved by these\nwords was the Countess.  She said to me privately, that she could not\nfeel easy about Miss Halcombe on Mr. Dawson's authority, and that she\nshould wait anxiously for her husband's opinion on his return.  That\nreturn, his letters informed her, would take place in three days' time.\nThe Count and Countess corresponded regularly every morning during his\nlordship's absence.  They were in that respect, as in all others, a\npattern to married people.\n\nOn the evening of the third day I noticed a change in Miss Halcombe,\nwhich caused me serious apprehension.  Mrs. Rubelle noticed it too.  We\nsaid nothing on the subject to Lady Glyde, who was then lying asleep,\ncompletely overpowered by exhaustion, on the sofa in the sitting-room.\n\nMr. Dawson did not pay his evening visit till later than usual. As soon\nas he set eyes on his patient I saw his face alter.  He tried to hide\nit, but he looked both confused and alarmed.  A messenger was sent to\nhis residence for his medicine-chest, disinfecting preparations were\nused in the room, and a bed was made up for him in the house by his own\ndirections.  \"Has the fever turned to infection?\" I whispered to him.\n\"I am afraid it has,\" he answered; \"we shall know better to-morrow\nmorning.\"\n\nBy Mr. Dawson's own directions Lady Glyde was kept in ignorance of this\nchange for the worse.  He himself absolutely forbade her, on account of\nher health, to join us in the bedroom that night.  She tried to\nresist--there was a sad scene--but he had his medical authority to\nsupport him, and he carried his point.\n\nThe next morning one of the men-servants was sent to London at eleven\no'clock, with a letter to a physician in town, and with orders to bring\nthe new doctor back with him by the earliest possible train.  Half an\nhour after the messenger had gone the Count returned to Blackwater Park.\n\nThe Countess, on her own responsibility, immediately brought him in to\nsee the patient.  There was no impropriety that I could discover in her\ntaking this course.  His lordship was a married man, he was old enough\nto be Miss Halcombe's father, and he saw her in the presence of a\nfemale relative, Lady Glyde's aunt.  Mr. Dawson nevertheless protested\nagainst his presence in the room, but I could plainly remark the doctor\nwas too much alarmed to make any serious resistance on this occasion.\n\nThe poor suffering lady was past knowing any one about her.  She seemed\nto take her friends for enemies.  When the Count approached her bedside\nher eyes, which had been wandering incessantly round and round the room\nbefore, settled on his face with a dreadful stare of terror, which I\nshall remember to my dying day.  The Count sat down by her, felt her\npulse and her temples, looked at her very attentively, and then turned\nround upon the doctor with such an expression of indignation and\ncontempt in his face, that the words failed on Mr. Dawson's lips, and\nhe stood for a moment, pale with anger and alarm--pale and perfectly\nspeechless.\n\nHis lordship looked next at me.\n\n\"When did the change happen?\" he asked.\n\nI told him the time.\n\n\"Has Lady Glyde been in the room since?\"\n\nI replied that she had not.  The doctor had absolutely forbidden her to\ncome into the room on the evening before, and had repeated the order\nagain in the morning.\n\n\"Have you and Mrs. Rubelle been made aware of the full extent of the\nmischief?\" was his next question.\n\nWe were aware, I answered, that the malady was considered infectious.\nHe stopped me before I could add anything more.\n\n\"It is typhus fever,\" he said.\n\nIn the minute that passed, while these questions and answers were going\non, Mr. Dawson recovered himself, and addressed the Count with his\ncustomary firmness.\n\n\"It is NOT typhus fever,\" he remarked sharply.  \"I protest against this\nintrusion, sir.  No one has a right to put questions here but me.  I\nhave done my duty to the best of my ability--\"\n\nThe Count interrupted him--not by words, but only by pointing to the\nbed.  Mr. Dawson seemed to feel that silent contradiction to his\nassertion of his own ability, and to grow only the more angry under it.\n\n\"I say I have done my duty,\" he reiterated.  \"A physician has been sent\nfor from London.  I will consult on the nature of the fever with him,\nand with no one else.  I insist on your leaving the room.\"\n\n\"I entered this room, sir, in the sacred interests of humanity,\" said\nthe Count.  \"And in the same interests, if the coming of the physician\nis delayed, I will enter it again.  I warn you once more that the fever\nhas turned to typhus, and that your treatment is responsible for this\nlamentable change.  If that unhappy lady dies, I will give my testimony\nin a court of justice that your ignorance and obstinacy have been the\ncause of her death.\"\n\nBefore Mr. Dawson could answer, before the Count could leave us, the\ndoor was opened from the sitting-room, and we saw Lady Glyde on the\nthreshold.\n\n\"I MUST and WILL come in,\" she said, with extraordinary firmness.\n\nInstead of stopping her, the Count moved into the sitting-room, and\nmade way for her to go in.  On all other occasions he was the last man\nin the world to forget anything, but in the surprise of the moment he\napparently forgot the danger of infection from typhus, and the urgent\nnecessity of forcing Lady Glyde to take proper care of herself.\n\nTo my astonishment Mr. Dawson showed more presence of mind.  He stopped\nher ladyship at the first step she took towards the bedside.  \"I am\nsincerely sorry, I am sincerely grieved,\" he said. \"The fever may, I\nfear, be infectious.  Until I am certain that it is not, I entreat you\nto keep out of the room.\"\n\nShe struggled for a moment, then suddenly dropped her arms and sank\nforward.  She had fainted.  The Countess and I took her from the doctor\nand carried her into her own room.  The Count preceded us, and waited\nin the passage till I came out and told him that we had recovered her\nfrom the swoon.\n\nI went back to the doctor to tell him, by Lady Glyde's desire, that she\ninsisted on speaking to him immediately.  He withdrew at once to quiet\nher ladyship's agitation, and to assure her of the physician's arrival\nin the course of a few hours.  Those hours passed very slowly.  Sir\nPercival and the Count were together downstairs, and sent up from time\nto time to make their inquiries. At last, between five and six o'clock,\nto our great relief, the physician came.\n\nHe was a younger man than Mr. Dawson, very serious and very decided.\nWhat he thought of the previous treatment I cannot say, but it struck\nme as curious that he put many more questions to myself and to Mrs.\nRubelle than he put to the doctor, and that he did not appear to listen\nwith much interest to what Mr. Dawson said, while he was examining Mr.\nDawson's patient.  I began to suspect, from what I observed in this\nway, that the Count had been right about the illness all the way\nthrough, and I was naturally confirmed in that idea when Mr. Dawson,\nafter some little delay, asked the one important question which the\nLondon doctor had been sent for to set at rest.\n\n\"What is your opinion of the fever?\" he inquired.\n\n\"Typhus,\" replied the physician \"Typhus fever beyond all doubt.\"\n\nThat quiet foreign person, Mrs. Rubelle, crossed her thin brown hands\nin front of her, and looked at me with a very significant smile.  The\nCount himself could hardly have appeared more gratified if he had been\npresent in the room and had heard the confirmation of his own opinion.\n\nAfter giving us some useful directions about the management of the\npatient, and mentioning that he would come again in five days' time,\nthe physician withdrew to consult in private with Mr. Dawson.  He would\noffer no opinion on Miss Halcombe's chances of recovery--he said it was\nimpossible at that stage of the illness to pronounce one way or the\nother.\n\n\n\nThe five days passed anxiously.\n\nCountess Fosco and myself took it by turns to relieve Mrs. Rubelle,\nMiss Halcombe's condition growing worse and worse, and requiring our\nutmost care and attention.  It was a terribly trying time.  Lady Glyde\n(supported, as Mr. Dawson said, by the constant strain of her suspense\non her sister's account) rallied in the most extraordinary manner, and\nshowed a firmness and determination for which I should myself never\nhave given her credit.  She insisted on coming into the sick-room two\nor three times every day, to look at Miss Halcombe with her own eyes,\npromising not to go too close to the bed, if the doctor would consent\nto her wishes so far.  Mr. Dawson very unwillingly made the concession\nrequired of him--I think he saw that it was hopeless to dispute with\nher. She came in every day, and she self-denyingly kept her promise.  I\nfelt it personally so distressing (as reminding me of my own affliction\nduring my husband's last illness) to see how she suffered under these\ncircumstances, that I must beg not to dwell on this part of the subject\nany longer.  It is more agreeable to me to mention that no fresh\ndisputes took place between Mr. Dawson and the Count.  His lordship\nmade all his inquiries by deputy, and remained continually in company\nwith Sir Percival downstairs.\n\nOn the fifth day the physician came again and gave us a little hope.\nHe said the tenth day from the first appearance of the typhus would\nprobably decide the result of the illness, and he arranged for his\nthird visit to take place on that date.  The interval passed as\nbefore--except that the Count went to London again one morning and\nreturned at night.\n\nOn the tenth day it pleased a merciful Providence to relieve our\nhousehold from all further anxiety and alarm.  The physician positively\nassured us that Miss Halcombe was out of danger.  \"She wants no doctor\nnow--all she requires is careful watching and nursing for some time to\ncome, and that I see she has.\"  Those were his own words.  That evening\nI read my husband's touching sermon on Recovery from Sickness, with\nmore happiness and advantage (in a spiritual point of view) than I ever\nremember to have derived from it before.\n\nThe effect of the good news on poor Lady Glyde was, I grieve to say,\nquite overpowering.  She was too weak to bear the violent reaction, and\nin another day or two she sank into a state of debility and depression\nwhich obliged her to keep her room.  Rest and quiet, and change of air\nafterwards, were the best remedies which Mr. Dawson could suggest for\nher benefit.  It was fortunate that matters were no worse, for, on the\nvery day after she took to her room, the Count and the doctor had\nanother disagreement--and this time the dispute between them was of so\nserious a nature that Mr. Dawson left the house.\n\nI was not present at the time, but I understood that the subject of\ndispute was the amount of nourishment which it was necessary to give to\nassist Miss Halcombe's convalescence after the exhaustion of the fever.\nMr. Dawson, now that his patient was safe, was less inclined than ever\nto submit to unprofessional interference, and the Count (I cannot\nimagine why) lost all the self-control which he had so judiciously\npreserved on former occasions, and taunted the doctor, over and over\nagain, with his mistake about the fever when it changed to typhus.  The\nunfortunate affair ended in Mr. Dawson's appealing to Sir Percival, and\nthreatening (now that he could leave without absolute danger to Miss\nHalcombe) to withdraw from his attendance at Blackwater Park if the\nCount's interference was not peremptorily suppressed from that moment.\nSir Percival's reply (though not designedly uncivil) had only resulted\nin making matters worse, and Mr. Dawson had thereupon withdrawn from\nthe house in a state of extreme indignation at Count Fosco's usage of\nhim, and had sent in his bill the next morning.\n\nWe were now, therefore, left without the attendance of a medical man.\nAlthough there was no actual necessity for another doctor--nursing and\nwatching being, as the physician had observed, all that Miss Halcombe\nrequired--I should still, if my authority had been consulted, have\nobtained professional assistance from some other quarter, for form's\nsake.\n\nThe matter did not seem to strike Sir Percival in that light.  He said\nit would be time enough to send for another doctor if Miss Halcombe\nshowed any signs of a relapse.  In the meanwhile we had the Count to\nconsult in any minor difficulty, and we need not unnecessarily disturb\nour patient in her present weak and nervous condition by the presence\nof a stranger at her bedside.  There was much that was reasonable, no\ndoubt, in these considerations, but they left me a little anxious\nnevertheless.  Nor was I quite satisfied in my own mind of the\npropriety of our concealing the doctor's absence as we did from Lady\nGlyde.  It was a merciful deception, I admit--for she was in no state\nto bear any fresh anxieties.  But still it was a deception, and, as\nsuch, to a person of my principles, at best a doubtful proceeding.\n\n\n\nA second perplexing circumstance which happened on the same day, and\nwhich took me completely by surprise, added greatly to the sense of\nuneasiness that was now weighing on my mind.\n\nI was sent for to see Sir Percival in the library.  The Count, who was\nwith him when I went in, immediately rose and left us alone together.\nSir Percival civilly asked me to take a seat, and then, to my great\nastonishment, addressed me in these terms--\n\n\"I want to speak to you, Mrs. Michelson, about a matter which I decided\non some time ago, and which I should have mentioned before, but for the\nsickness and trouble in the house.  In plain words, I have reasons for\nwishing to break up my establishment immediately at this place--leaving\nyou in charge, of course, as usual.  As soon as Lady Glyde and Miss\nHalcombe can travel they must both have change of air.  My friends,\nCount Fosco and the Countess, will leave us before that time to live in\nthe neighbourhood of London, and I have reasons for not opening the\nhouse to any more company, with a view to economising as carefully as I\ncan.  I don't blame you, but my expenses here are a great deal too\nheavy.  In short, I shall sell the horses, and get rid of all the\nservants at once.  I never do things by halves, as you know, and I mean\nto have the house clear of a pack of useless people by this time\nto-morrow.\"\n\nI listened to him, perfectly aghast with astonishment.\n\n\"Do you mean, Sir Percival, that I am to dismiss the indoor servants\nunder my charge without the usual month's warning?\" I asked.\n\n\"Certainly I do.  We may all be out of the house before another month,\nand I am not going to leave the servants here in idleness, with no\nmaster to wait on.\"\n\n\"Who is to do the cooking, Sir Percival, while you are still staying\nhere?\"\n\n\"Margaret Porcher can roast and boil--keep her.  What do I want with a\ncook if I don't mean to give any dinner-parties?\"\n\n\"The servant you have mentioned is the most unintelligent servant in\nthe house, Sir Percival.\"\n\n\"Keep her, I tell you, and have a woman in from the village to do the\ncleaning and go away again.  My weekly expenses must and shall be\nlowered immediately.  I don't send for you to make objections, Mrs.\nMichelson--I send for you to carry out my plans of economy. Dismiss the\nwhole lazy pack of indoor servants to-morrow, except Porcher.  She is\nas strong as a horse--and we'll make her work like a horse.\"\n\n\"You will excuse me for reminding you, Sir Percival, that if the\nservants go to-morrow they must have a month's wages in lieu of a\nmonth's warning.\"\n\n\"Let them! A month's wages saves a month's waste and gluttony in the\nservants' hall.\"\n\nThis last remark conveyed an aspersion of the most offensive kind on my\nmanagement.  I had too much self-respect to defend myself under so\ngross an imputation.  Christian consideration for the helpless position\nof Miss Halcombe and Lady Glyde, and for the serious inconvenience\nwhich my sudden absence might inflict on them, alone prevented me from\nresigning my situation on the spot. I rose immediately.  It would have\nlowered me in my own estimation to have permitted the interview to\ncontinue a moment longer.\n\n\"After that last remark, Sir Percival, I have nothing more to say. Your\ndirections shall be attended to.\" Pronouncing those words, I bowed my\nhead with the most distant respect, and went out of the room.\n\nThe next day the servants left in a body.  Sir Percival himself\ndismissed the grooms and stablemen, sending them, with all the horses\nbut one, to London.  Of the whole domestic establishment, indoors and\nout, there now remained only myself, Margaret Porcher, and the\ngardener--this last living in his own cottage, and being wanted to take\ncare of the one horse that remained in the stables.\n\nWith the house left in this strange and lonely condition--with the\nmistress of it ill in her room--with Miss Halcombe still as helpless as\na child--and with the doctor's attendance withdrawn from us in\nenmity--it was surely not unnatural that my spirits should sink, and my\ncustomary composure be very hard to maintain. My mind was ill at ease.\nI wished the poor ladies both well again, and I wished myself away from\nBlackwater Park.\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nThe next event that occurred was of so singular a nature that it might\nhave caused me a feeling of superstitious surprise, if my mind had not\nbeen fortified by principle against any pagan weakness of that sort.\nThe uneasy sense of something wrong in the family which had made me\nwish myself away from Blackwater Park, was actually followed, strange\nto say, by my departure from the house.  It is true that my absence was\nfor a temporary period only, but the coincidence was, in my opinion,\nnot the less remarkable on that account.\n\nMy departure took place under the following circumstances--\n\nA day or two after the servants all left I was again sent for to see\nSir Percival.  The undeserved slur which he had cast on my management\nof the household did not, I am happy to say, prevent me from returning\ngood for evil to the best of my ability, by complying with his request\nas readily and respectfully as ever. It cost me a struggle with that\nfallen nature, which we all share in common, before I could suppress my\nfeelings.  Being accustomed to self-discipline, I accomplished the\nsacrifice.\n\nI found Sir Percival and Count Fosco sitting together again.  On this\noccasion his lordship remained present at the interview, and assisted\nin the development of Sir Percival's views.\n\nThe subject to which they now requested my attention related to the\nhealthy change of air by which we all hoped that Miss Halcombe and Lady\nGlyde might soon be enabled to profit.  Sir Percival mentioned that\nboth the ladies would probably pass the autumn (by invitation of\nFrederick Fairlie, Esquire) at Limmeridge House, Cumberland.  But\nbefore they went there, it was his opinion, confirmed by Count Fosco\n(who here took up the conversation and continued it to the end), that\nthey would benefit by a short residence first in the genial climate of\nTorquay.  The great object, therefore, was to engage lodgings at that\nplace, affording all the comforts and advantages of which they stood in\nneed, and the great difficulty was to find an experienced person\ncapable of choosing the sort of residence which they wanted.  In this\nemergency the Count begged to inquire, on Sir Percival's behalf,\nwhether I would object to give the ladies the benefit of my assistance,\nby proceeding myself to Torquay in their interests.\n\nIt was impossible for a person in my situation to meet any proposal,\nmade in these terms, with a positive objection.\n\nI could only venture to represent the serious inconvenience of my\nleaving Blackwater Park in the extraordinary absence of all the indoor\nservants, with the one exception of Margaret Porcher.  But Sir Percival\nand his lordship declared that they were both willing to put up with\ninconvenience for the sake of the invalids.  I next respectfully\nsuggested writing to an agent at Torquay, but I was met here by being\nreminded of the imprudence of taking lodgings without first seeing\nthem.  I was also informed that the Countess (who would otherwise have\ngone to Devonshire herself) could not, in Lady Glyde's present\ncondition, leave her niece, and that Sir Percival and the Count had\nbusiness to transact together which would oblige them to remain at\nBlackwater Park.  In short, it was clearly shown me that if I did not\nundertake the errand, no one else could be trusted with it.  Under\nthese circumstances, I could only inform Sir Percival that my services\nwere at the disposal of Miss Halcombe and Lady Glyde.\n\nIt was thereupon arranged that I should leave the next morning, that I\nshould occupy one or two days in examining all the most convenient\nhouses in Torquay, and that I should return with my report as soon as I\nconveniently could.  A memorandum was written for me by his lordship,\nstating the requisites which the place I was sent to take must be found\nto possess, and a note of the pecuniary limit assigned to me was added\nby Sir Percival.\n\nMy own idea on reading over these instructions was, that no such\nresidence as I saw described could be found at any watering-place in\nEngland, and that, even if it could by chance be discovered, it would\ncertainly not be parted with for any period on such terms as I was\npermitted to offer.  I hinted at these difficulties to both the\ngentlemen, but Sir Percival (who undertook to answer me) did not appear\nto feel them.  It was not for me to dispute the question.  I said no\nmore, but I felt a very strong conviction that the business on which I\nwas sent away was so beset by difficulties that my errand was almost\nhopeless at starting.\n\nBefore I left I took care to satisfy myself that Miss Halcombe was\ngoing on favourably.\n\nThere was a painful expression of anxiety in her face which made me\nfear that her mind, on first recovering itself, was not at ease.  But\nshe was certainly strengthening more rapidly than I could have ventured\nto anticipate, and she was able to send kind messages to Lady Glyde,\nsaying that she was fast getting well, and entreating her ladyship not\nto exert herself again too soon.  I left her in charge of Mrs. Rubelle,\nwho was still as quietly independent of every one else in the house as\never.  When I knocked at Lady Glyde's door before going away, I was\ntold that she was still sadly weak and depressed, my informant being\nthe Countess, who was then keeping her company in her room.  Sir\nPercival and the Count were walking on the road to the lodge as I was\ndriven by in the chaise.  I bowed to them and quitted the house, with\nnot a living soul left in the servants' offices but Margaret Porcher.\n\nEvery one must feel what I have felt myself since that time, that these\ncircumstances were more than unusual--they were! almost suspicious.\nLet me, however, say again that it was impossible for me, in my\ndependent position, to act otherwise than I did.\n\nThe result of my errand at Torquay was exactly what I had foreseen.  No\nsuch lodgings as I was instructed to take could be found in the whole\nplace, and the terms I was permitted to give were much too low for the\npurpose, even if I had been able to discover what I wanted.  I\naccordingly returned to Blackwater Park, and informed Sir Percival, who\nmet me at the door, that my journey had been taken in vain.  He seemed\ntoo much occupied with some other subject to care about the failure of\nmy errand, and his first words informed me that even in the short time\nof my absence another remarkable change had taken place in the house.\n\nThe Count and Countess Fosco had left Blackwater Park for their new\nresidence in St. John's Wood.\n\nI was not made aware of the motive for this sudden departure--I was\nonly told that the Count had been very particular in leaving his kind\ncompliments to me.  When I ventured on asking Sir Percival whether Lady\nGlyde had any one to attend to her comforts in the absence of the\nCountess, he replied that she had Margaret Porcher to wait on her, and\nhe added that a woman from the village had been sent for to do the work\ndownstairs.\n\nThe answer really shocked me--there was such a glaring impropriety in\npermitting an under-housemaid to fill the place of confidential\nattendant on Lady Glyde.  I went upstairs at once, and met Margaret on\nthe bedroom landing.  Her services had not been required (naturally\nenough), her mistress having sufficiently recovered that morning to be\nable to leave her bed.  I asked next after Miss Halcombe, but I was\nanswered in a slouching, sulky way, which left me no wiser than I was\nbefore.\n\nI did not choose to repeat the question, and perhaps provoke an\nimpertinent reply.  It was in every respect more becoming to a person\nin my position to present myself immediately in Lady Glyde's room.\n\nI found that her ladyship had certainly gained in health during the\nlast few days.  Although still sadly weak and nervous, she was able to\nget up without assistance, and to walk slowly about her room, feeling\nno worse effect from the exertion than a slight sensation of fatigue.\nShe had been made a little anxious that morning about Miss Halcombe,\nthrough having received no news of her from any one.  I thought this\nseemed to imply a blamable want of attention on the part of Mrs.\nRubelle, but I said nothing, and remained with Lady Glyde to assist her\nto dress.  When she was ready we both left the room together to go to\nMiss Halcombe.\n\nWe were stopped in the passage by the appearance of Sir Percival. He\nlooked as if he had been purposely waiting there to see us.\n\n\"Where are you going?\" he said to Lady Glyde.\n\n\"To Marian's room,\" she answered.\n\n\"It may spare you a disappointment,\" remarked Sir Percival, \"if I tell\nyou at once that you will not find her there.\"\n\n\"Not find her there!\"\n\n\"No.  She left the house yesterday morning with Fosco and his wife.\"\n\nLady Glyde was not strong enough to bear the surprise of this\nextraordinary statement.  She turned fearfully pale, and leaned back\nagainst the wall, looking at her husband in dead silence.\n\nI was so astonished myself that I hardly knew what to say.  I asked Sir\nPercival if he really meant that Miss Halcombe had left Blackwater Park.\n\n\"I certainly mean it,\" he answered.\n\n\"In her state, Sir Percival! Without mentioning her intentions to Lady\nGlyde!\"\n\nBefore he could reply her ladyship recovered herself a little and spoke.\n\n\"Impossible!\" she cried out in a loud, frightened manner, taking a step\nor two forward from the wall.  \"Where was the doctor? where was Mr.\nDawson when Marian went away?\"\n\n\"Mr. Dawson wasn't wanted, and wasn't here,\" said Sir Percival. \"He\nleft of his own accord, which is enough of itself to show that she was\nstrong enough to travel.  How you stare! If you don't believe she has\ngone, look for yourself.  Open her room door, and all the other room\ndoors if you like.\"\n\nShe took him at his word, and I followed her.  There was no one in Miss\nHalcombe's room but Margaret Porcher, who was busy setting it to\nrights.  There was no one in the spare rooms or the dressing-rooms\nwhen we looked into them afterwards.  Sir Percival still waited for us\nin the passage.  As we were leaving the last room that we had examined\nLady Glyde whispered, \"Don't go, Mrs. Michelson! don't leave me, for\nGod's sake!\" Before I could say anything in return she was out again in\nthe passage, speaking to her husband.\n\n\"What does it mean, Sir Percival? I insist--I beg and pray you will\ntell me what it means.\"\n\n\"It means,\" he answered, \"that Miss Halcombe was strong enough\nyesterday morning to sit up and be dressed, and that she insisted on\ntaking advantage of Fosco's going to London to go there too.\"\n\n\"To London!\"\n\n\"Yes--on her way to Limmeridge.\"\n\nLady Glyde turned and appealed to me.\n\n\"You saw Miss Halcombe last,\" she said.  \"Tell me plainly, Mrs.\nMichelson, did you think she looked fit to travel?\"\n\n\"Not in MY opinion, your ladyship.\"\n\nSir Percival, on his side, instantly turned and appealed to me also.\n\n\"Before you went away,\" he said, \"did you, or did you not, tell the\nnurse that Miss Halcombe looked much stronger and better?\"\n\n\"I certainly made the remark, Sir Percival.\"\n\nHe addressed her ladyship again the moment I offered that reply.\n\n\"Set one of Mrs. Michelson's opinions fairly against the other,\" he\nsaid, \"and try to be reasonable about a perfectly plain matter. If she\nhad not been well enough to be moved do you think we should any of us\nhave risked letting her go? She has got three competent people to look\nafter her--Fosco and your aunt, and Mrs. Rubelle, who went away with\nthem expressly for that purpose.  They took a whole carriage yesterday,\nand made a bed for her on the seat in case she felt tired.  To-day,\nFosco and Mrs. Rubelle go on with her themselves to Cumberland.\"\n\n\"Why does Marian go to Limmeridge and leave me here by myself?\" said\nher ladyship, interrupting Sir Percival.\n\n\"Because your uncle won't receive you till he has seen your sister\nfirst,\" he replied.  \"Have you forgotten the letter he wrote to her at\nthe beginning of her illness? It was shown to you, you read it\nyourself, and you ought to remember it.\"\n\n\"I do remember it.\"\n\n\"If you do, why should you be surprised at her leaving you? You want to\nbe back at Limmeridge, and she has gone there to get your uncle's leave\nfor you on his own terms.\"\n\nPoor Lady Glyde's eyes filled with tears.\n\n\"Marian never left me before,\" she said, \"without bidding me good-bye.\"\n\n\"She would have bid you good-bye this time,\" returned Sir Percival, \"if\nshe had not been afraid of herself and of you.  She knew you would try\nto stop her, she knew you would distress her by crying.  Do you want to\nmake any more objections? If you do, you must come downstairs and ask\nquestions in the dining-room.  These worries upset me.  I want a glass\nof wine.\"\n\nHe left us suddenly.\n\nHis manner all through this strange conversation had been very unlike\nwhat it usually was.  He seemed to be almost as nervous and fluttered,\nevery now and then, as his lady herself.  I should never have supposed\nthat his health had been so delicate, or his composure so easy to upset.\n\nI tried to prevail on Lady Glyde to go back to her room, but it was\nuseless.  She stopped in the passage, with the look of a woman whose\nmind was panic-stricken.\n\n\"Something has happened to my sister!\" she said.\n\n\"Remember, my lady, what surprising energy there is in Miss Halcombe,\"\nI suggested.  \"She might well make an effort which other ladies in her\nsituation would be unfit for.  I hope and believe there is nothing\nwrong--I do indeed.\"\n\n\"I must follow Marian,\" said her ladyship, with the same panic-stricken\nlook.  \"I must go where she has gone, I must see that she is\nalive and well with my own eyes.  Come! come down with me to Sir\nPercival.\"\n\nI hesitated, fearing that my presence might be considered an intrusion.\nI attempted to represent this to her ladyship, but she was deaf to me.\nShe held my arm fast enough to force me to go downstairs with her, and\nshe still clung to me with all the little strength she had at the\nmoment when I opened the dining-room door.\n\nSir Percival was sitting at the table with a decanter of wine before\nhim.  He raised the glass to his lips as we went in and drained it at a\ndraught.  Seeing that he looked at me angrily when he put it down\nagain, I attempted to make some apology for my accidental presence in\nthe room.\n\n\"Do you suppose there are any secrets going on here?\" he broke out\nsuddenly; \"there are none--there is nothing underhand, nothing kept\nfrom you or from any one.\" After speaking those strange words loudly\nand sternly, he filled himself another glass of wine and asked Lady\nGlyde what she wanted of him.\n\n\"If my sister is fit to travel I am fit to travel\" said her ladyship,\nwith more firmness than she had yet shown.  \"I come to beg you will\nmake allowances for my anxiety about Marian, and let me follow her at\nonce by the afternoon train.\"\n\n\"You must wait till to-morrow,\" replied Sir Percival, \"and then if you\ndon't hear to the contrary you can go.  I don't suppose you are at all\nlikely to hear to the contrary, so I shall write to Fosco by to-night's\npost.\"\n\nHe said those last words holding his glass up to the light, and looking\nat the wine in it instead of at Lady Glyde.  Indeed he never once\nlooked at her throughout the conversation.  Such a singular want of\ngood breeding in a gentleman of his rank impressed me, I own, very\npainfully.\n\n\"Why should you write to Count Fosco?\" she asked, in extreme surprise.\n\n\"To tell him to expect you by the midday train,\" said Sir Percival.\n\"He will meet you at the station when you get to London, and take you\non to sleep at your aunt's in St. John's Wood.\"\n\nLady Glyde's hand began to tremble violently round my arm--why I could\nnot imagine.\n\n\"There is no necessity for Count Fosco to meet me,\" she said.  \"I would\nrather not stay in London to sleep.\"\n\n\"You must. You can't take the whole journey to Cumberland in one day.\nYou must rest a night in London--and I don't choose you to go by\nyourself to an hotel.  Fosco made the offer to your uncle to give you\nhouse-room on the way down, and your uncle has accepted it.  Here! here\nis a letter from him addressed to yourself.  I ought to have sent it up\nthis morning, but I forgot.  Read it and see what Mr. Fairlie himself\nsays to you.\"\n\nLady Glyde looked at the letter for a moment and then placed it in my\nhands.\n\n\"Read it,\" she said faintly.  \"I don't know what is the matter with me.\nI can't read it myself.\"\n\nIt was a note of only four lines--so short and so careless that it\nquite struck me.  If I remember correctly it contained no more than\nthese words--\n\n\"Dearest Laura, Please come whenever you like.  Break the journey by\nsleeping at your aunt's house.  Grieved to hear of dear Marian's\nillness.  Affectionately yours, Frederick Fairlie.\"\n\n\"I would rather not go there--I would rather not stay a night in\nLondon,\" said her ladyship, breaking out eagerly with those words\nbefore I had quite done reading the note, short as it was.  \"Don't\nwrite to Count Fosco! Pray, pray don't write to him!\"\n\nSir Percival filled another glass from the decanter so awkwardly that\nhe upset it and spilt all the wine over the table.  \"My sight seems to\nbe failing me,\" he muttered to himself, in an odd, muffled voice.  He\nslowly set the glass up again, refilled it, and drained it once more at\na draught.  I began to fear, from his look and manner, that the wine\nwas getting into his head.\n\n\"Pray don't write to Count Fosco,\" persisted Lady Glyde, more earnestly\nthan ever.\n\n\"Why not, I should like to know?\" cried Sir Percival, with a sudden\nburst of anger that startled us both.  \"Where can you stay more\nproperly in London than at the place your uncle himself chooses for\nyou--at your aunt's house? Ask Mrs. Michelson.\"\n\nThe arrangement proposed was so unquestionably the right and the proper\none, that I could make no possible objection to it.  Much as I\nsympathised with Lady Glyde in other respects, I could not sympathise\nwith her in her unjust prejudices against Count Fosco. I never before\nmet with any lady of her rank and station who was so lamentably\nnarrow-minded on the subject of foreigners.  Neither her uncle's note\nnor Sir Percival's increasing impatience seemed to have the least\neffect on her.  She still objected to staying a night in London, she\nstill implored her husband not to write to the Count.\n\n\"Drop it!\" said Sir Percival, rudely turning his back on us.  \"If you\nhaven't sense enough to know what is best for yourself other people\nmust know it for you.  The arrangement is made and there is an end of\nit.  You are only wanted to do what Miss Halcombe has done for you---\"\n\n\"Marian?\" repeated her Ladyship, in a bewildered manner; \"Marian\nsleeping in Count Fosco's house!\"\n\n\"Yes, in Count Fosco's house.  She slept there last night to break the\njourney, and you are to follow her example, and do what your uncle\ntells you.  You are to sleep at Fosco's to-morrow night, as your sister\ndid, to break the journey.  Don't throw too many obstacles in my way!\ndon't make me repent of letting you go at all!\"\n\nHe started to his feet, and suddenly walked out into the verandah\nthrough the open glass doors.\n\n\"Will your ladyship excuse me,\" I whispered, \"if I suggest that we had\nbetter not wait here till Sir Percival comes back? I am very much\nafraid he is over-excited with wine.\"\n\nShe consented to leave the room in a weary, absent manner.\n\nAs soon as we were safe upstairs again, I did all I could to compose\nher ladyship's spirits.  I reminded her that Mr. Fairlie's letters to\nMiss Halcombe and to herself did certainly sanction, and even render\nnecessary, sooner or later, the course that had been taken.  She agreed\nto this, and even admitted, of her own accord, that both letters were\nstrictly in character with her uncle's peculiar disposition--but her\nfears about Miss Halcombe, and her unaccountable dread of sleeping at\nthe Count's house in London, still remained unshaken in spite of every\nconsideration that I could urge.  I thought it my duty to protest\nagainst Lady Glyde's unfavourable opinion of his lordship, and I did\nso, with becoming forbearance and respect.\n\n\"Your ladyship will pardon my freedom,\" I remarked, in conclusion, \"but\nit is said, 'by their fruits ye shall know them.' I am sure the Count's\nconstant kindness and constant attention, from the very beginning of\nMiss Halcombe's illness, merit our best confidence and esteem.  Even\nhis lordship's serious misunderstanding with Mr. Dawson was entirely\nattributable to his anxiety on Miss Halcombe's account.\"\n\n\"What misunderstanding?\" inquired her ladyship, with a look of sudden\ninterest.\n\nI related the unhappy circumstances under which Mr. Dawson had\nwithdrawn his attendance--mentioning them all the more readily because\nI disapproved of Sir Percival's continuing to conceal what had happened\n(as he had done in my presence) from the knowledge of Lady Glyde.\n\nHer ladyship started up, with every appearance of being additionally\nagitated and alarmed by what I had told her.\n\n\"Worse! worse than I thought!\" she said, walking about the room, in a\nbewildered manner.  \"The Count knew Mr. Dawson would never consent to\nMarian's taking a journey--he purposely insulted the doctor to get him\nout of the house.\"\n\n\"Oh, my lady! my lady!\" I remonstrated.\n\n\"Mrs. Michelson!\" she went on vehemently, \"no words that ever were\nspoken will persuade me that my sister is in that man's power and in\nthat man's house with her own consent.  My horror of him is such, that\nnothing Sir Percival could say and no letters my uncle could write,\nwould induce me, if I had only my own feelings to consult, to eat,\ndrink, or sleep under his roof.  But my misery of suspense about Marian\ngives me the courage to follow her anywhere, to follow her even into\nCount Fosco's house.\"\n\nI thought it right, at this point, to mention that Miss Halcombe had\nalready gone on to Cumberland, according to Sir Percival's account of\nthe matter.\n\n\"I am afraid to believe it!\" answered her ladyship.  \"I am afraid she\nis still in that man's house.  If I am wrong, if she has really gone on\nto Limmeridge, I am resolved I will not sleep to-morrow night under\nCount Fosco's roof.  My dearest friend in the world, next to my sister,\nlives near London.  You have heard me, you have heard Miss Halcombe,\nspeak of Mrs. Vesey? I mean to write, and propose to sleep at her\nhouse.  I don't know how I shall get there--I don't know how I shall\navoid the Count--but to that refuge I will escape in some way, if my\nsister has gone to Cumberland.  All I ask of you to do, is to see\nyourself that my letter to Mrs. Vesey goes to London to-night, as\ncertainly as Sir Percival's letter goes to Count Fosco.  I have reasons\nfor not trusting the post-bag downstairs.  Will you keep my secret, and\nhelp me in this? it is the last favour, perhaps, that I shall ever ask\nof you.\"\n\nI hesitated, I thought it all very strange, I almost feared that her\nladyship's mind had been a little affected by recent anxiety and\nsuffering.  At my own risk, however, I ended by giving my consent.  If\nthe letter had been addressed to a stranger, or to any one but a lady\nso well known to me by report as Mrs. Vesey, I might have refused.  I\nthank God--looking to what happened afterwards--I thank God I never\nthwarted that wish, or any other, which Lady Glyde expressed to me, on\nthe last day of her residence at Blackwater Park.\n\nThe letter was written and given into my hands.  I myself put it into\nthe post-box in the village that evening.\n\nWe saw nothing more of Sir Percival for the rest of the day.\n\nI slept, by Lady Glyde's own desire, in the next room to hers, with the\ndoor open between us.  There was something so strange and dreadful in\nthe loneliness and emptiness of the house, that I was glad, on my side,\nto have a companion near me.  Her ladyship sat up late, reading letters\nand burning them, and emptying her drawers and cabinets of little\nthings she prized, as if she never expected to return to Blackwater\nPark.  Her sleep was sadly disturbed when she at last went to bed--she\ncried out in it several times, once so loud that she woke herself.\nWhatever her dreams were, she did not think fit to communicate them to\nme. Perhaps, in my situation, I had no right to expect that she should\ndo so.  It matters little now.  I was sorry for her, I was indeed\nheartily sorry for her all the same.\n\nThe next day was fine and sunny.  Sir Percival came up, after\nbreakfast, to tell us that the chaise would be at the door at a quarter\nto twelve--the train to London stopping at our station at twenty\nminutes after.  He informed Lady Glyde that he was obliged to go out,\nbut added that he hoped to be back before she left.  If any unforeseen\naccident delayed him, I was to accompany her to the station, and to\ntake special care that she was in time for the train.  Sir Percival\ncommunicated these directions very hastily--walking here and there\nabout the room all the time.  Her ladyship looked attentively after him\nwherever he went.  He never once looked at her in return.\n\nShe only spoke when he had done, and then she stopped him as he\napproached the door, by holding out her hand.\n\n\"I shall see you no more,\" she said, in a very marked manner. \"This is\nour parting--our parting, it may be for ever.  Will you try to forgive\nme, Percival, as heartily as I forgive YOU?\"\n\nHis face turned of an awful whiteness all over, and great beads of\nperspiration broke out on his bald forehead.  \"I shall come back,\" he\nsaid, and made for the door, as hastily as if his wife's farewell words\nhad frightened him out of the room.\n\nI had never liked Sir Percival, but the manner in which he left Lady\nGlyde made me feel ashamed of having eaten his bread and lived in his\nservice.  I thought of saying a few comforting and Christian words to\nthe poor lady, but there was something in her face, as she looked after\nher husband when the door closed on him, that made me alter my mind and\nkeep silence.\n\nAt the time named the chaise drew up at the gates.  Her ladyship was\nright--Sir Percival never came back.  I waited for him till the last\nmoment, and waited in vain.\n\nNo positive responsibility lay on my shoulders, and yet I did not feel\neasy in my mind.  \"It is of your own free will,\" I said, as the chaise\ndrove through the lodge-gates, \"that your ladyship goes to London?\"\n\n\"I will go anywhere,\" she answered, \"to end the dreadful suspense that\nI am suffering at this moment.\"\n\nShe had made me feel almost as anxious and as uncertain about Miss\nHalcombe as she felt herself.  I presumed to ask her to write me a\nline, if all went well in London.  She answered, \"Most willingly, Mrs.\nMichelson.\"\n\n\"We all have our crosses to bear, my lady,\" I said, seeing her silent\nand thoughtful, after she had promised to write.\n\nShe made no reply--she seemed to be too much wrapped up in her own\nthoughts to attend to me.\n\n\"I fear your ladyship rested badly last night,\" I remarked, after\nwaiting a little.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said, \"I was terribly disturbed by dreams.\"\n\n\"Indeed, my lady?\" I thought she was going to tell me her dreams, but\nno, when she spoke next it was only to ask a question.\n\n\"You posted the letter to Mrs. Vesey with your own hands?\"\n\n\"Yes, my lady.\"\n\n\"Did Sir Percival say, yesterday, that Count Fosco was to meet me at\nthe terminus in London?\"\n\n\"He did, my lady.\"\n\nShe sighed heavily when I answered that last question, and said no more.\n\nWe arrived at the station, with hardly two minutes to spare.  The\ngardener (who had driven us) managed about the luggage, while I took\nthe ticket.  The whistle of the train was sounding when I joined her\nladyship on the platform.  She looked very strangely, and pressed her\nhand over her heart, as if some sudden pain or fright had overcome her\nat that moment.\n\n\"I wish you were going with me!\" she said, catching eagerly at my arm\nwhen I gave her the ticket.\n\nIf there had been time, if I had felt the day before as I felt then, I\nwould have made my arrangements to accompany her, even though the doing\nso had obliged me to give Sir Percival warning on the spot.  As it was,\nher wishes, expressed at the last moment only, were expressed too late\nfor me to comply with them.  She seemed to understand this herself\nbefore I could explain it, and did not repeat her desire to have me for\na travelling companion. The train drew up at the platform.  She gave\nthe gardener a present for his children, and took my hand, in her\nsimple hearty manner, before she got into the carriage.\n\n\"You have been very kind to me and to my sister,\" she said--\"kind when\nwe were both friendless.  I shall remember you gratefully, as long as I\nlive to remember any one.  Good-bye--and God bless you!\"\n\nShe spoke those words with a tone and a look which brought the tears\ninto my eyes--she spoke them as if she was bidding me farewell for ever.\n\n\"Good-bye, my lady,\" I said, putting her into the carriage, and trying\nto cheer her; \"good-bye, for the present only; good-bye, with my best\nand kindest wishes for happier times.\"\n\nShe shook her head, and shuddered as she settled herself in the\ncarriage.  The guard closed the door.  \"Do you believe in dreams?\" she\nwhispered to me at the window.  \"My dreams, last night, were dreams I\nhave never had before.  The terror of them is hanging over me still.\"\nThe whistle sounded before I could answer, and the train moved.  Her\npale quiet face looked at me for the last time--looked sorrowfully and\nsolemnly from the window.  She waved her hand, and I saw her no more.\n\n\nTowards five o'clock on the afternoon of that same day, having a little\ntime to myself in the midst of the household duties which now pressed\nupon me, I sat down alone in my own room, to try and compose my mind\nwith the volume of my husband's Sermons.  For the first time in my life\nI found my attention wandering over those pious and cheering words.\nConcluding that Lady Glyde's departure must have disturbed me far more\nseriously than I had myself supposed, I put the book aside, and went\nout to take a turn in the garden.  Sir Percival had not yet returned,\nto my knowledge, so I could feel no hesitation about showing myself in\nthe grounds.\n\nOn turning the corner of the house, and gaining a view of the garden, I\nwas startled by seeing a stranger walking in it.  The stranger was a\nwoman--she was lounging along the path with her back to me, and was\ngathering the flowers.\n\nAs I approached she heard me, and turned round.\n\nMy blood curdled in my veins.  The strange woman in the garden was Mrs.\nRubelle!\n\nI could neither move nor speak.  She came up to me, as composedly as\never, with her flowers in her hand.\n\n\"What is the matter, ma'am?\" she said quietly.\n\n\"You here!\" I gasped out.  \"Not gone to London! Not gone to Cumberland!\"\n\nMrs. Rubelle smelt at her flowers with a smile of malicious pity.\n\n\"Certainly not,\" she said.  \"I have never left Blackwater Park.\"\n\nI summoned breath enough and courage enough for another question.\n\n\"Where is Miss Halcombe?\"\n\nMrs. Rubelle fairly laughed at me this time, and replied in these\nwords--\n\n\"Miss Halcombe, ma'am, has not left Blackwater Park either.\"\n\nWhen I heard that astounding answer, all my thoughts were startled back\non the instant to my parting with Lady Glyde.  I can hardly say I\nreproached myself, but at that moment I think I would have given many a\nyear's hard savings to have known four hours earlier what I knew now.\n\nMrs. Rubelle waited, quietly arranging her nosegay, as if she expected\nme to say something.\n\nI could say nothing.  I thought of Lady Glyde's worn-out energies and\nweakly health, and I trembled for the time when the shock of the\ndiscovery that I had made would fall on her.  For a minute or more my\nfears for the poor ladies silenced me.  At the end of that time Mrs.\nRubelle looked up sideways from her flowers, and said, \"Here is Sir\nPercival, ma'am, returned from his ride.\"\n\nI saw him as soon as she did.  He came towards us, slashing viciously\nat the flowers with his riding-whip.  When he was near enough to see my\nface he stopped, struck at his boot with the whip, and burst out\nlaughing, so harshly and so violently that the birds flew away,\nstartled, from the tree by which he stood.\n\n\"Well, Mrs. Michelson,\" he said, \"you have found it out at last, have\nyou?\"\n\nI made no reply.  He turned to Mrs. Rubelle.\n\n\"When did you show yourself in the garden?\"\n\n\"I showed myself about half an hour ago, sir.  You said I might take my\nliberty again as soon as Lady Glyde had gone away to London.\"\n\n\"Quite right.  I don't blame you--I only asked the question.\" He waited\na moment, and then addressed himself once more to me.  \"You can't\nbelieve it, can you?\" he said mockingly.  \"Here! come along and see for\nyourself.\"\n\nHe led the way round to the front of the house.  I followed him, and\nMrs. Rubelle followed me.  After passing through the iron gates he\nstopped, and pointed with his whip to the disused middle wing of the\nbuilding.\n\n\"There!\" he said.  \"Look up at the first floor.  You know the old\nElizabethan bedrooms? Miss Halcombe is snug and safe in one of the best\nof them at this moment.  Take her in, Mrs. Rubelle (you have got your\nkey?); take Mrs. Michelson in, and let her own eyes satisfy her that\nthere is no deception this time.\"\n\nThe tone in which he spoke to me, and the minute or two that had passed\nsince we left the garden, helped me to recover my spirits a little.\nWhat I might have done at this critical moment, if all my life had been\npassed in service, I cannot say.  As it was, possessing the feelings,\nthe principles, and the bringing up of a lady, I could not hesitate\nabout the right course to pursue.  My duty to myself, and my duty to\nLady Glyde, alike forbade me to remain in the employment of a man who\nhad shamefully deceived us both by a series of atrocious falsehoods.\n\n\"I must beg permission, Sir Percival, to speak a few words to you in\nprivate,\" I said.  \"Having done so, I shall be ready to proceed with\nthis person to Miss Halcombe's room.\"\n\nMrs. Rubelle, whom I had indicated by a slight turn of my head,\ninsolently sniffed at her nosegay and walked away, with great\ndeliberation, towards the house door.\n\n\"Well,\" said Sir Percival sharply, \"what is it now?\"\n\n\"I wish to mention, sir, that I am desirous of resigning the situation\nI now hold at Blackwater Park.\"  That was literally how I put it.  I\nwas resolved that the first words spoken in his presence should be\nwords which expressed my intention to leave his service.\n\nHe eyed me with one of his blackest looks, and thrust his hands\nsavagely into the pockets of his riding-coat.\n\n\"Why?\" he said, \"why, I should like to know?\"\n\n\"It is not for me, Sir Percival, to express an opinion on what has\ntaken place in this house.  I desire to give no offence.  I merely wish\nto say that I do not feel it consistent with my duty to Lady Glyde and\nto myself to remain any longer in your service.\"\n\n\"Is it consistent with your duty to me to stand there, casting\nsuspicion on me to my face?\" he broke out in his most violent manner.\n\"I see what you're driving at.  You have taken your own mean, underhand\nview of an innocent deception practised on Lady Glyde for her own good.\nIt was essential to her health that she should have a change of air\nimmediately, and you know as well as I do she would never have gone\naway if she had been told Miss Halcombe was still left here.  She has\nbeen deceived in her own interests--and I don't care who knows it.  Go,\nif you like--there are plenty of housekeepers as good as you to be had\nfor the asking.  Go when you please--but take care how you spread\nscandals about me and my affairs when you're out of my service.  Tell\nthe truth, and nothing but the truth, or it will be the worse for you!\nSee Miss Halcombe for yourself--see if she hasn't been as well taken\ncare of in one part of the house as in the other.  Remember the\ndoctor's own orders that Lady Glyde was to have a change of air at the\nearliest possible opportunity.  Bear all that well in mind, and then\nsay anything against me and my proceedings if you dare!\"\n\nHe poured out these words fiercely, all in a breath, walking backwards\nand forwards, and striking about him in the air with his whip.\n\nNothing that he said or did shook my opinion of the disgraceful series\nof falsehoods that he had told in my presence the day before, or of the\ncruel deception by which he had separated Lady Glyde from her sister,\nand had sent her uselessly to London, when she was half distracted with\nanxiety on Miss Halcombe's account. I naturally kept these thoughts to\nmyself, and said nothing more to irritate him; but I was not the less\nresolved to persist in my purpose.  A soft answer turneth away wrath,\nand I suppressed my own feelings accordingly when it was my turn to\nreply.\n\n\"While I am in your service, Sir Percival,\" I said, \"I hope I know my\nduty well enough not to inquire into your motives.  When I am out of\nyour service, I hope I know my own place well enough not to speak of\nmatters which don't concern me--\"\n\n\"When do you want to go?\" he asked, interrupting me without ceremony.\n\"Don't suppose I am anxious to keep you--don't suppose I care about\nyour leaving the house.  I am perfectly fair and open in this matter,\nfrom first to last. When do you want to go?\"\n\n\"I should wish to leave at your earliest convenience, Sir Percival.\"\n\n\"My convenience has nothing to do with it.  I shall be out of the house\nfor good and all to-morrow morning, and I can settle your accounts\nto-night.  If you want to study anybody's convenience, it had better be\nMiss Halcombe's.  Mrs. Rubelle's time is up to-day, and she has reasons\nfor wishing to be in London to-night.  If you go at once, Miss Halcombe\nwon't have a soul left here to look after her.\"\n\nI hope it is unnecessary for me to say that I was quite incapable of\ndeserting Miss Halcombe in such an emergency as had now befallen Lady\nGlyde and herself.  After first distinctly ascertaining from Sir\nPercival that Mrs. Rubelle was certain to leave at once if I took her\nplace, and after also obtaining permission to arrange for Mr. Dawson's\nresuming his attendance on his patient, I willingly consented to remain\nat Blackwater Park until Miss Halcombe no longer required my services.\nIt was settled that I should give Sir Percival's solicitor a week's\nnotice before I left, and that he was to undertake the necessary\narrangements for appointing my successor.  The matter was discussed in\nvery few words.  At its conclusion Sir Percival abruptly turned on his\nheel, and left me free to join Mrs. Rubelle.  That singular foreign\nperson had been sitting composedly on the door-step all this time,\nwaiting till I could follow her to Miss Halcombe's room.\n\nI had hardly walked half-way towards the house when Sir Percival, who\nhad withdrawn in the opposite direction, suddenly stopped and called me\nback.\n\n\"Why are you leaving my service?\" he asked.\n\nThe question was so extraordinary, after what had just passed between\nus, that I hardly knew what to say in answer to it.\n\n\"Mind! I don't know why you are going,\" he went on.  \"You must give a\nreason for leaving me, I suppose, when you get another situation.  What\nreason? The breaking up of the family? Is that it?\"\n\n\"There can be no positive objection, Sir Percival, to that reason----\"\n\n\"Very well! That's all I want to know.  If people apply for your\ncharacter, that's your reason, stated by yourself.  You go in\nconsequence of the breaking up of the family.\"\n\nHe turned away again before I could say another word, and walked out\nrapidly into the grounds.  His manner was as strange as his language.\nI acknowledge he alarmed me.\n\nEven the patience of Mrs. Rubelle was getting exhausted, when I joined\nher at the house door.\n\n\"At last!\" she said, with a shrug of her lean foreign shoulders. She\nled the way into the inhabited side of the house, ascended the stairs,\nand opened with her key the door at the end of the passage, which\ncommunicated with the old Elizabethan rooms--a door never previously\nused, in my time, at Blackwater Park.  The rooms themselves I knew\nwell, having entered them myself on various occasions from the other\nside of the house.  Mrs. Rubelle stopped at the third door along the\nold gallery, handed me the key of it, with the key of the door of\ncommunication, and told me I should find Miss Halcombe in that room.\nBefore I went in I thought it desirable to make her understand that her\nattendance had ceased. Accordingly, I told her in plain words that the\ncharge of the sick lady henceforth devolved entirely on myself.\n\n\"I am glad to hear it, ma'am,\" said Mrs. Rubelle.  \"I want to go very\nmuch.\"\n\n\"Do you leave to-day?\" I asked, to make sure of her.\n\n\"Now that you have taken charge, ma'am, I leave in half an hour's time.\nSir Percival has kindly placed at my disposition the gardener, and the\nchaise, whenever I want them.  I shall want them in half an hour's time\nto go to the station.  I am packed up in anticipation already.  I wish\nyou good-day, ma'am.\"\n\nShe dropped a brisk curtsey, and walked back along the gallery, humming\na little tune, and keeping time to it cheerfully with the nosegay in\nher hand.  I am sincerely thankful to say that was the last I saw of\nMrs. Rubelle.\n\nWhen I went into the room Miss Halcombe was asleep.  I looked at her\nanxiously, as she lay in the dismal, high, old-fashioned bed. She was\ncertainly not in any respect altered for the worse since I had seen her\nlast.  She had not been neglected, I am bound to admit, in any way that\nI could perceive.  The room was dreary, and dusty, and dark, but the\nwindow (looking on a solitary court-yard at the back of the house) was\nopened to let in the fresh air, and all that could be done to make the\nplace comfortable had been done.  The whole cruelty of Sir Percival's\ndeception had fallen on poor Lady Glyde.  The only ill-usage which\neither he or Mrs. Rubelle had inflicted on Miss Halcombe consisted, so\nfar as I could see, in the first offence of hiding her away.\n\nI stole back, leaving the sick lady still peacefully asleep, to give\nthe gardener instructions about bringing the doctor.  I begged the man,\nafter he had taken Mrs. Rubelle to the station, to drive round by Mr.\nDawson's, and leave a message in my name, asking him to call and see\nme.  I knew he would come on my account, and I knew he would remain\nwhen he found Count Fosco had left the house.\n\nIn due course of time the gardener returned, and said that he had\ndriven round by Mr. Dawson's residence, after leaving Mrs. Rubelle at\nthe station.  The doctor sent me word that he was poorly in health\nhimself, but that he would call, if possible, the next morning.\n\nHaving delivered his message the gardener was about to withdraw, but I\nstopped him to request that he would come back before dark, and sit up\nthat night, in one of the empty bedrooms, so as to be within call in\ncase I wanted him.  He understood readily enough my unwillingness to be\nleft alone all night in the most desolate part of that desolate house,\nand we arranged that he should come in between eight and nine.\n\nHe came punctually, and I found cause to be thankful that I had adopted\nthe precaution of calling him in.  Before midnight Sir Percival's\nstrange temper broke out in the most violent and most alarming manner,\nand if the gardener had not been on the spot to pacify him on the\ninstant, I am afraid to think what might have happened.\n\nAlmost all the afternoon and evening he had been walking about the\nhouse and grounds in an unsettled, excitable manner, having, in all\nprobability, as I thought, taken an excessive quantity of wine at his\nsolitary dinner.  However that may be, I heard his voice calling loudly\nand angrily in the new wing of the house, as I was taking a turn\nbackwards and forwards along the gallery the last thing at night.  The\ngardener immediately ran down to him, and I closed the door of\ncommunication, to keep the alarm, if possible, from reaching Miss\nHalcombe's ears.  It was full half an hour before the gardener came\nback.  He declared that his master was quite out of his senses--not\nthrough the excitement of drink, as I had supposed, but through a kind\nof panic or frenzy of mind, for which it was impossible to account.  He\nhad found Sir Percival walking backwards and forwards by himself in the\nhall, swearing, with every appearance of the most violent passion, that\nhe would not stop another minute alone in such a dungeon as his own\nhouse, and that he would take the first stage of his journey\nimmediately in the middle of the night.  The gardener, on approaching\nhim, had been hunted out, with oaths and threats, to get the horse and\nchaise ready instantly.  In a quarter of an hour Sir Percival had\njoined him in the yard, had jumped into the chaise, and, lashing the\nhorse into a gallop, had driven himself away, with his face as pale as\nashes in the moonlight.  The gardener had heard him shouting and\ncursing at the lodge-keeper to get up and open the gate--had heard the\nwheels roll furiously on again in the still night, when the gate was\nunlocked--and knew no more.\n\nThe next day, or a day or two after, I forget which, the chaise was\nbrought back from Knowlesbury, our nearest town, by the ostler at the\nold inn.  Sir Percival had stopped there, and had afterwards left by\nthe train--for what destination the man could not tell.  I never\nreceived any further information, either from himself or from any one\nelse, of Sir Percival's proceedings, and I am not even aware, at this\nmoment, whether he is in England or out of it.  He and I have not met\nsince he drove away like an escaped criminal from his own house, and it\nis my fervent hope and prayer that we may never meet again.\n\n\n\nMy own part of this sad family story is now drawing to an end.\n\nI have been informed that the particulars of Miss Halcombe's waking,\nand of what passed between us when she found me sitting by her bedside,\nare not material to the purpose which is to be answered by the present\nnarrative.  It will be sufficient for me to say in this place, that she\nwas not herself conscious of the means adopted to remove her from the\ninhabited to the uninhabited part of the house.  She was in a deep\nsleep at the time, whether naturally or artificially produced she could\nnot say.  In my absence at Torquay, and in the absence of all the\nresident servants except Margaret Porcher (who was perpetually eating,\ndrinking, or sleeping, when she was not at work), the secret transfer\nof Miss Halcombe from one part of the house to the other was no doubt\neasily performed.  Mrs. Rubelle (as I discovered for myself, in looking\nabout the room) had provisions, and all other necessaries, together\nwith the means of heating water, broth, and so on, without kindling a\nfire, placed at her disposal during the few days of her imprisonment\nwith the sick lady.  She had declined to answer the questions which\nMiss Halcombe naturally put, but had not, in other respects, treated\nher with unkindness or neglect. The disgrace of lending herself to a\nvile deception is the only disgrace with which I can conscientiously\ncharge Mrs. Rubelle.\n\nI need write no particulars (and I am relieved to know it) of the\neffect produced on Miss Halcombe by the news of Lady Glyde's departure,\nor by the far more melancholy tidings which reached us only too soon\nafterwards at Blackwater Park.  In both cases I prepared her mind\nbeforehand as gently and as carefully as possible, having the doctor's\nadvice to guide me, in the last case only, through Mr. Dawson's being\ntoo unwell to come to the house for some days after I had sent for him.\nIt was a sad time, a time which it afflicts me to think of or to write\nof now.  The precious blessings of religious consolation which I\nendeavoured to convey were long in reaching Miss Halcombe's heart, but\nI hope and believe they came home to her at last. I never left her till\nher strength was restored.  The train which took me away from that\nmiserable house was the train which took her away also.  We parted very\nmournfully in London.  I remained with a relative at Islington, and she\nwent on to Mr. Fairlie's house in Cumberland.\n\nI have only a few lines more to write before I close this painful\nstatement.  They are dictated by a sense of duty.\n\nIn the first place, I wish to record my own personal conviction that no\nblame whatever, in connection with the events which I have now related,\nattaches to Count Fosco.  I am informed that a dreadful suspicion has\nbeen raised, and that some very serious constructions are placed upon\nhis lordship's conduct.  My persuasion of the Count's innocence\nremains, however, quite unshaken.  If he assisted Sir Percival in\nsending me to Torquay, he assisted under a delusion, for which, as a\nforeigner and a stranger, he was not to blame.  If he was concerned in\nbringing Mrs. Rubelle to Blackwater Park, it was his misfortune and not\nhis fault, when that foreign person was base enough to assist a\ndeception planned and carried out by the master of the house.  I\nprotest, in the interests of morality, against blame being gratuitously\nand wantonly attached to the proceedings of the Count.\n\nIn the second place, I desire to express my regret at my own inability\nto remember the precise day on which Lady Glyde left Blackwater Park\nfor London.  I am told that it is of the last importance to ascertain\nthe exact date of that lamentable journey, and I have anxiously taxed\nmy memory to recall it.  The effort has been in vain.  I can only\nremember now that it was towards the latter part of July.  We all know\nthe difficulty, after a lapse of time, of fixing precisely on a past\ndate unless it has been previously written down.  That difficulty is\ngreatly increased in my case by the alarming and confusing events which\ntook place about the period of Lady Glyde's departure.  I heartily wish\nI had made a memorandum at the time.  I heartily wish my memory of the\ndate was as vivid as my memory of that poor lady's face, when it looked\nat me sorrowfully for the last time from the carriage window.\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED IN SEVERAL NARRATIVES\n\n1.  THE NARRATIVE OF HESTER PINHORN, COOK IN THE SERVICE OF COUNT FOSCO\n\n[Taken down from her own statement]\n\n\nI am sorry to say that I have never learnt to read or write.  I have\nbeen a hard-working woman all my life, and have kept a good character.\nI know that it is a sin and wickedness to say the thing which is not,\nand I will truly beware of doing so on this occasion.  All that I know\nI will tell, and I humbly beg the gentleman who takes this down to put\nmy language right as he goes on, and to make allowances for my being no\nscholar.\n\nIn this last summer I happened to be out of place (through no fault of\nmy own), and I heard of a situation as plain cook, at Number Five,\nForest Road, St. John's Wood.  I took the place on trial.  My master's\nname was Fosco.  My mistress was an English lady.  He was Count and she\nwas Countess.  There was a girl to do housemaid's work when I got\nthere.  She was not over-clean or tidy, but there was no harm in her.\nI and she were the only servants in the house.\n\nOur master and mistress came after we got in; and as soon as they did\ncome we were told, downstairs, that company was expected from the\ncountry.\n\nThe company was my mistress's niece, and the back bedroom on the first\nfloor was got ready for her.  My mistress mentioned to me that Lady\nGlyde (that was her name) was in poor health, and that I must be\nparticular in my cooking accordingly.  She was to come that day, as\nwell as I can remember--but whatever you do, don't trust my memory in\nthe matter.  I am sorry to say it's no use asking me about days of the\nmonth, and such-like.  Except Sundays, half my time I take no heed of\nthem, being a hard-working woman and no scholar.  All I know is Lady\nGlyde came, and when she did come, a fine fright she gave us all\nsurely.  I don't know how master brought her to the house, being hard\nat work at the time. But he did bring her in the afternoon, I think,\nand the housemaid opened the door to them, and showed them into the\nparlour.  Before she had been long down in the kitchen again with me,\nwe heard a hurry-skurry upstairs, and the parlour bell ringing like\nmad, and my mistress's voice calling out for help.\n\nWe both ran up, and there we saw the lady laid on the sofa, with her\nface ghastly white, and her hands fast clenched, and her head drawn\ndown to one side.  She had been taken with a sudden fright, my mistress\nsaid, and master he told us she was in a fit of convulsions.  I ran\nout, knowing the neighbourhood a little better than the rest of them,\nto fetch the nearest doctor's help.  The nearest help was at\nGoodricke's and Garth's, who worked together as partners, and had a\ngood name and connection, as I have heard, all round St. John's Wood.\nMr. Goodricke was in, and he came back with me directly.\n\nIt was some time before he could make himself of much use.  The poor\nunfortunate lady fell out of one fit into another, and went on so till\nshe was quite wearied out, and as helpless as a new-born babe.  We\nthen got her to bed.  Mr. Goodricke went away to his house for\nmedicine, and came back again in a quarter of an hour or less.  Besides\nthe medicine he brought a bit of hollow mahogany wood with him, shaped\nlike a kind of trumpet, and after waiting a little while, he put one\nend over the lady's heart and the other to his ear, and listened\ncarefully.\n\nWhen he had done he says to my mistress, who was in the room, \"This is\na very serious case,\" he says, \"I recommend you to write to Lady\nGlyde's friends directly.\" My mistress says to him, \"Is it\nheart-disease?\" And he says, \"Yes, heart-disease of a most dangerous\nkind.\" He told her exactly what he thought was the matter, which I was\nnot clever enough to understand.  But I know this, he ended by saying\nthat he was afraid neither his help nor any other doctor's help was\nlikely to be of much service.\n\nMy mistress took this ill news more quietly than my master.  He was a\nbig, fat, odd sort of elderly man, who kept birds and white mice, and\nspoke to them as if they were so many Christian children.  He seemed\nterribly cut up by what had happened.  \"Ah! poor Lady Glyde! poor dear\nLady Glyde!\" he says, and went stalking about, wringing his fat hands\nmore like a play-actor than a gentleman.  For one question my mistress\nasked the doctor about the lady's chances of getting round, he asked a\ngood fifty at least. I declare he quite tormented us all, and when he\nwas quiet at last, out he went into the bit of back garden, picking\ntrumpery little nosegays, and asking me to take them upstairs and make\nthe sick-room look pretty with them.  As if THAT did any good.  I think\nhe must have been, at times, a little soft in his head.  But he was not\na bad master--he had a monstrous civil tongue of his own, and a jolly,\neasy, coaxing way with him.  I liked him a deal better than my\nmistress.  She was a hard one, if ever there was a hard one yet.\n\nTowards night-time the lady roused up a little.  She had been so\nwearied out, before that, by the convulsions, that she never stirred\nhand or foot, or spoke a word to anybody.  She moved in the bed now,\nand stared about her at the room and us in it.  She must have been a\nnice-looking lady when well, with light hair, and blue eyes and all\nthat.  Her rest was troubled at night--at least so I heard from my\nmistress, who sat up alone with her.  I only went in once before going\nto bed to see if I could be of any use, and then she was talking to\nherself in a confused, rambling manner.  She seemed to want sadly to\nspeak to somebody who was absent from her somewhere.  I couldn't catch\nthe name the first time, and the second time master knocked at the\ndoor, with his regular mouthful of questions, and another of his\ntrumpery nosegays.\n\nWhen I went in early the next morning, the lady was clean worn out\nagain, and lay in a kind of faint sleep.  Mr. Goodricke brought his\npartner, Mr. Garth, with him to advise.  They said she must not be\ndisturbed out of her rest on any account.  They asked my mistress many\nquestions, at the other end of the room, about what the lady's health\nhad been in past times, and who had attended her, and whether she had\never suffered much and long together under distress of mind.  I\nremember my mistress said \"Yes\" to that last question.  And Mr.\nGoodricke looked at Mr. Garth, and shook his head; and Mr. Garth looked\nat Mr. Goodricke, and shook his head.  They seemed to think that the\ndistress might have something to do with the mischief at the lady's\nheart.  She was but a frail thing to look at, poor creature! Very\nlittle strength at any time, I should say--very little strength.\n\nLater on the same morning, when she woke, the lady took a sudden turn,\nand got seemingly a great deal better.  I was not let in again to see\nher, no more was the housemaid, for the reason that she was not to be\ndisturbed by strangers.  What I heard of her being better was through\nmy master.  He was in wonderful good spirits about the change, and\nlooked in at the kitchen window from the garden, with his great big\ncurly-brimmed white hat on, to go out.\n\n\"Good Mrs. Cook,\" says he, \"Lady Glyde is better.  My mind is more easy\nthan it was, and I am going out to stretch my big legs with a sunny\nlittle summer walk.  Shall I order for you, shall I market for you,\nMrs. Cook? What are you making there? A nice tart for dinner? Much\ncrust, if you please--much crisp crust, my dear, that melts and\ncrumbles delicious in the mouth.\" That was his way.  He was past sixty,\nand fond of pastry.  Just think of that!\n\nThe doctor came again in the forenoon, and saw for himself that Lady\nGlyde had woke up better.  He forbid us to talk to her, or to let her\ntalk to us, in case she was that way disposed, saying she must be kept\nquiet before all things, and encouraged to sleep as much as possible.\nShe did not seem to want to talk whenever I saw her, except overnight,\nwhen I couldn't make out what she was saying--she seemed too much worn\ndown.  Mr. Goodricke was not nearly in such good spirits about her as\nmaster.  He said nothing when he came downstairs, except that he would\ncall again at five o'clock.\n\nAbout that time (which was before master came home again) the bell rang\nhard from the bedroom, and my mistress ran out into the landing, and\ncalled to me to go for Mr. Goodricke, and tell him the lady had\nfainted.  I got on my bonnet and shawl, when, as good luck would have\nit, the doctor himself came to the house for his promised visit.\n\nI let him in, and went upstairs along with him.  \"Lady Glyde was just\nas usual,\" says my mistress to him at the door; \"she was awake, and\nlooking about her in a strange, forlorn manner, when I heard her give a\nsort of half cry, and she fainted in a moment.\" The doctor went up to\nthe bed, and stooped down over the sick lady.  He looked very serious,\nall on a sudden, at the sight of her, and put his hand on her heart.\n\nMy mistress stared hard in Mr. Goodricke's face.  \"Not dead!\" says she,\nwhispering, and turning all of a tremble from head to foot.\n\n\"Yes,\" says the doctor, very quiet and grave.  \"Dead.  I was afraid it\nwould happen suddenly when I examined her heart yesterday.\" My mistress\nstepped back from the bedside while he was speaking, and trembled and\ntrembled again.  \"Dead!\" she whispers to herself; \"dead so suddenly!\ndead so soon! What will the Count say?\" Mr. Goodricke advised her to go\ndownstairs, and quiet herself a little.  \"You have been sitting up all\nnight,\" says he, \"and your nerves are shaken.  This person,\" says he,\nmeaning me, \"this person will stay in the room till I can send for the\nnecessary assistance.\" My mistress did as he told her.  \"I must prepare\nthe Count,\" she says.  \"I must carefully prepare the Count.\" And so she\nleft us, shaking from head to foot, and went out.\n\n\"Your master is a foreigner,\" says Mr. Goodricke, when my mistress had\nleft us.  \"Does he understand about registering the death?\" \"I can't\nrightly tell, sir,\" says I, \"but I should think not.\" The doctor\nconsidered a minute, and then says he, \"I don't usually do such\nthings,\" says he, \"but it may save the family trouble in this case if I\nregister the death myself.  I shall pass the district office in half an\nhour's time, and I can easily look in. Mention, if you please, that I\nwill do so.\"  \"Yes, sir,\" says I, \"with thanks, I'm sure, for your\nkindness in thinking of it.\" \"You don't mind staying here till I can\nsend you the proper person?\" says he.  \"No, sir,\" says I; \"I'll stay\nwith the poor lady till then.  I suppose nothing more could be done,\nsir, than was done?\" says I.  \"No,\" says he, \"nothing; she must have\nsuffered sadly before ever I saw her--the case was hopeless when I was\ncalled in.\"  \"Ah, dear me! we all come to it, sooner or later, don't\nwe, sir?\" says I.  He gave no answer to that--he didn't seem to care\nabout talking.  He said, \"Good-day,\" and went out.\n\nI stopped by the bedside from that time till the time when Mr.\nGoodricke sent the person in, as he had promised.  She was, by name,\nJane Gould.  I considered her to be a respectable-looking woman.  She\nmade no remark, except to say that she understood what was wanted of\nher, and that she had winded a many of them in her time.\n\nHow master bore the news, when he first heard it, is more than I can\ntell, not having been present.  When I did see him he looked awfully\novercome by it, to be sure.  He sat quiet in a corner, with his fat\nhands hanging over his thick knees, and his head down, and his eyes\nlooking at nothing.  He seemed not so much sorry, as scared and dazed\nlike, by what had happened.  My mistress managed all that was to be\ndone about the funeral.  It must have cost a sight of money--the\ncoffin, in particular, being most beautiful.  The dead lady's husband\nwas away, as we heard, in foreign parts.  But my mistress (being her\naunt) settled it with her friends in the country (Cumberland, I think)\nthat she should be buried there, in the same grave along with her\nmother. Everything was done handsomely, in respect of the funeral, I\nsay again, and master went down to attend the burying in the country\nhimself.  He looked grand in his deep mourning, with his big solemn\nface, and his slow walk, and his broad hatband--that he did!\n\nIn conclusion.  I have to say, in answer to questions put to me--\n\n(1) That neither I nor my fellow-servant ever saw my master give Lady\nGlyde any medicine himself.\n\n(2) That he was never, to my knowledge and belief, left alone in the\nroom with Lady Glyde.\n\n(3) That I am not able to say what caused the sudden fright, which my\nmistress informed me had seized the lady on her first coming into the\nhouse.  The cause was never explained, either to me or to my\nfellow-servant.\n\nThe above statement has been read over in my presence.  I have nothing\nto add to it, or to take away from it.  I say, on my oath as a\nChristian woman, this is the truth.\n\n           (Signed) HESTER PINHORN, Her + Mark.\n\n\n\n2.  THE NARRATIVE OF THE DOCTOR\n\n\nTo the Registrar of the Sub-District in which the undermentioned death\ntook place.--I hereby certify that I attended Lady Glyde, aged\nTwenty-One last Birthday; that I last saw her on Thursday the 25th July\n1850; that she died on the same day at No. 5 Forest Road, St. John's\nWood, and that the cause of her death was Aneurism.  Duration of\ndisease not known.\n\n                    (Signed) Alfred Goodricke.\n\nProf. Title.  M.R.C.S. Eng., L.S.A.\n  Address,  12 Croydon Gardens\n     St. John's Wood.\n\n\n3.  THE NARRATIVE OF JANE GOULD\n\n\nI was the person sent in by Mr. Goodricke to do what was right and\nneedful by the remains of a lady who had died at the house named in the\ncertificate which precedes this.  I found the body in charge of the\nservant, Hester Pinhorn.  I remained with it, and prepared it at the\nproper time for the grave.  It was laid in the coffin in my presence,\nand I afterwards saw the coffin screwed down previous to its removal.\nWhen that had been done, and not before, I received what was due to me\nand left the house.  I refer persons who may wish to investigate my\ncharacter to Mr. Goodricke. He will bear witness that I can be trusted\nto tell the truth.\n\n                      (Signed) JANE GOULD\n\n\n\n4.  THE NARRATIVE OF THE TOMBSTONE\n\n\nSacred to the Memory of Laura, Lady Glyde, wife of Sir Percival Glyde,\nBart., of Blackwater Park, Hampshire, and daughter of the late Philip\nFairlie, Esq., of Limmeridge House, in this parish. Born March 27th,\n1829; married December 22nd, 1849; died July 25th, 1850.\n\n\n\n5.  THE NARRATIVE OF WALTER HARTRIGHT\n\n\nEarly in the summer of 1850 I and my surviving companions left the\nwilds and forests of Central America for home.  Arrived at the coast,\nwe took ship there for England.  The vessel was wrecked in the Gulf of\nMexico--I was among the few saved from the sea.  It was my third escape\nfrom peril of death.  Death by disease, death by the Indians, death by\ndrowning--all three had approached me; all three had passed me by.\n\nThe survivors of the wreck were rescued by an American vessel bound for\nLiverpool.  The ship reached her port on the thirteenth day of October\n1850.  We landed late in the afternoon, and I arrived in London the\nsame night.\n\nThese pages are not the record of my wanderings and my dangers away\nfrom home.  The motives which led me from my country and my friends to\na new world of adventure and peril are known.  From that self-imposed\nexile I came back, as I had hoped, prayed, believed I should come\nback--a changed man.  In the waters of a new life I had tempered my\nnature afresh.  In the stern school of extremity and danger my will had\nlearnt to be strong, my heart to be resolute, my mind to rely on\nitself.  I had gone out to fly from my own future.  I came back to face\nit, as a man should.\n\nTo face it with that inevitable suppression of myself which I knew it\nwould demand from me.  I had parted with the worst bitterness of the\npast, but not with my heart's remembrance of the sorrow and the\ntenderness of that memorable time.  I had not ceased to feel the one\nirreparable disappointment of my life--I had only learnt to bear it.\nLaura Fairlie was in all my thoughts when the ship bore me away, and I\nlooked my last at England.  Laura Fairlie was in all my thoughts when\nthe ship brought me back, and the morning light showed the friendly\nshore in view.\n\nMy pen traces the old letters as my heart goes back to the old love.  I\nwrite of her as Laura Fairlie still.  It is hard to think of her, it is\nhard to speak of her, by her husband's name.\n\nThere are no more words of explanation to add on my appearance for the\nsecond time in these pages.  This narrative, if I have the strength and\nthe courage to write it, may now go on.\n\n\nMy first anxieties and first hopes when the morning came centred in my\nmother and my sister.  I felt the necessity of preparing them for the\njoy and surprise of my return, after an absence during which it had\nbeen impossible for them to receive any tidings of me for months past.\nEarly in the morning I sent a letter to the Hampstead Cottage, and\nfollowed it myself in an hour's time.\n\nWhen the first meeting was over, when our quiet and composure of other\ndays began gradually to return to us, I saw something in my mother's\nface which told me that a secret oppression lay heavy on her heart.\nThere was more than love--there was sorrow in the anxious eyes that\nlooked on me so tenderly--there was pity in the kind hand that slowly\nand fondly strengthened its hold on mine. We had no concealments from\neach other.  She knew how the hope of my life had been wrecked--she\nknew why I had left her.  It was on my lips to ask as composedly as I\ncould if any letter had come for me from Miss Halcombe, if there was\nany news of her sister that I might hear.  But when I looked in my\nmother's face I lost courage to put the question even in that guarded\nform.  I could only say, doubtingly and restrainedly--\n\n\"You have something to tell me.\"\n\nMy sister, who had been sitting opposite to us, rose suddenly without a\nword of explanation--rose and left the room.\n\nMy mother moved closer to me on the sofa and put her arms round my\nneck.  Those fond arms trembled--the tears flowed fast over the\nfaithful loving face.\n\n\"Walter!\" she whispered, \"my own darling! my heart is heavy for you.\nOh, my son! my son! try to remember that I am still left!\"\n\nMy head sank on her bosom.  She had said all in saying those words.\n\n*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *\n\nIt was the morning of the third day since my return--the morning of the\nsixteenth of October.\n\nI had remained with them at the cottage--I had tried hard not to\nembitter the happiness of my return to THEM as it was embittered to ME.\nI had done all man could to rise after the shock, and accept my life\nresignedly--to let my great sorrow come in tenderness to my heart, and\nnot in despair.  It was useless and hopeless.  No tears soothed my\naching eyes, no relief came to me from my sister's sympathy or my\nmother's love.\n\nOn that third morning I opened my heart to them.  At last the words\npassed my lips which I had longed to speak on the day when my mother\ntold me of her death.\n\n\"Let me go away alone for a little while,\" I said.  \"I shall bear it\nbetter when I have looked once more at the place where I first saw\nher--when I have knelt and prayed by the grave where they have laid her\nto rest.\"\n\nI departed on my journey--my journey to the grave of Laura Fairlie.\n\nIt was a quiet autumn afternoon when I stopped at the solitary station,\nand set forth alone on foot by the well-remembered road. The waning sun\nwas shining faintly through thin white clouds--the air was warm and\nstill--the peacefulness of the lonely country was overshadowed and\nsaddened by the influence of the falling year.\n\nI reached the moor--I stood again on the brow of the hill--I looked on\nalong the path--and there were the familiar garden trees in the\ndistance, the clear sweeping semicircle of the drive, the high white\nwalls of Limmeridge House.  The chances and changes, the wanderings and\ndangers of months and months past, all shrank and shrivelled to nothing\nin my mind.  It was like yesterday since my feet had last trodden the\nfragrant heathy ground.  I thought I should see her coming to meet me,\nwith her little straw hat shading her face, her simple dress fluttering\nin the air, and her well-filled sketch-book ready in her hand.\n\nOh death, thou hast thy sting! oh, grave, thou hast thy victory!\n\nI turned aside, and there below me in the glen was the lonesome grey\nchurch, the porch where I had waited for the coming of the woman in\nwhite, the hills encircling the quiet burial-ground, the brook bubbling\ncold over its stony bed.  There was the marble cross, fair and white,\nat the head of the tomb--the tomb that now rose over mother and\ndaughter alike.\n\nI approached the grave.  I crossed once more the low stone stile, and\nbared my head as I touched the sacred ground.  Sacred to gentleness and\ngoodness, sacred to reverence and grief.\n\nI stopped before the pedestal from which the cross rose.  On one side\nof it, on the side nearest to me, the newly-cut inscription met my\neyes--the hard, clear, cruel black letters which told the story of her\nlife and death.  I tried to read them.  I did read as far as the name.\n\"Sacred to the Memory of Laura----\" The kind blue eyes dim with\ntears--the fair head drooping wearily--the innocent parting words which\nimplored me to leave her--oh, for a happier last memory of her than\nthis; the memory I took away with me, the memory I bring back with me\nto her grave!\n\nA second time I tried to read the inscription.  I saw at the end the\ndate of her death, and above it----\n\nAbove it there were lines on the marble--there was a name among them\nwhich disturbed my thoughts of her.  I went round to the other side of\nthe grave, where there was nothing to read, nothing of earthly vileness\nto force its way between her spirit and mine.\n\nI knelt down by the tomb.  I laid my hands, I laid my head on the broad\nwhite stone, and closed my weary eyes on the earth around, on the light\nabove.  I let her come back to me.  Oh, my love! my love! my heart may\nspeak to you NOW! It is yesterday again since we parted--yesterday,\nsince your dear hand lay in mine--yesterday, since my eyes looked their\nlast on you.  My love! my love!\n\n*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *\n\nTime had flowed on, and silence had fallen like thick night over its\ncourse.\n\nThe first sound that came after the heavenly peace rustled faintly like\na passing breath of air over the grass of the burial-ground. I heard it\nnearing me slowly, until it came changed to my ear--came like\nfootsteps moving onward--then stopped.\n\nI looked up.\n\nThe sunset was near at hand.  The clouds had parted--the slanting light\nfell mellow over the hills.  The last of the day was cold and clear and\nstill in the quiet valley of the dead.\n\nBeyond me, in the burial-ground, standing together in the cold\nclearness of the lower light, I saw two women.  They were looking\ntowards the tomb, looking towards me.\n\nTwo.\n\nThey came a little on, and stopped again.  Their veils were down, and\nhid their faces from me.  When they stopped, one of them raised her\nveil.  In the still evening light I saw the face of Marian Halcombe.\n\nChanged, changed as if years had passed over it! The eyes large and\nwild, and looking at me with a strange terror in them.  The face worn\nand wasted piteously.  Pain and fear and grief written on her as with a\nbrand.\n\nI took one step towards her from the grave.  She never moved--she never\nspoke.  The veiled woman with her cried out faintly.  I stopped.  The\nsprings of my life fell low, and the shuddering of an unutterable dread\ncrept over me from head to foot.\n\nThe woman with the veiled face moved away from her companion, and came\ntowards me slowly.  Left by herself, standing by herself, Marian\nHalcombe spoke.  It was the voice that I remembered--the voice not\nchanged, like the frightened eyes and the wasted face.\n\n\"My dream! my dream!\" I heard her say those words softly in the awful\nsilence.  She sank on her knees, and raised her clasped hands to\nheaven.  \"Father! strengthen him.  Father! help him in his hour of\nneed.\"\n\nThe woman came on, slowly and silently came on.  I looked at her--at\nher, and at none other, from that moment.\n\nThe voice that was praying for me faltered and sank low--then rose on a\nsudden, and called affrightedly, called despairingly to me to come away.\n\nBut the veiled woman had possession of me, body and soul.  She stopped\non one side of the grave.  We stood face to face with the tombstone\nbetween us.  She was close to the inscription on the side of the\npedestal.  Her gown touched the black letters.\n\nThe voice came nearer, and rose and rose more passionately still. \"Hide\nyour face! don't look at her! Oh, for God's sake, spare him----\"\n\nThe woman lifted her veil.\n\n\n\"Sacred to the Memory of Laura, Lady Glyde----\"\n\n\nLaura, Lady Glyde, was standing by the inscription, and was looking at\nme over the grave.\n\n\n[The Second Epoch of the Story closes here.]\n\n\n\nTHE THIRD EPOCH\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY WALTER HARTRIGHT.\n\n\nI\n\n\nI open a new page.  I advance my narrative by one week.\n\nThe history of the interval which I thus pass over must remain\nunrecorded.  My heart turns faint, my mind sinks in darkness and\nconfusion when I think of it.  This must not be, if I who write am to\nguide, as I ought, you who read.  This must not be, if the clue that\nleads through the windings of the story is to remain from end to end\nuntangled in my hands.\n\nA life suddenly changed--its whole purpose created afresh, its hopes\nand fears, its struggles, its interests, and its sacrifices all turned\nat once and for ever into a new direction--this is the prospect which\nnow opens before me, like the burst of view from a mountain's top.  I\nleft my narrative in the quiet shadow of Limmeridge church--I resume\nit, one week later, in the stir and turmoil of a London street.\n\n\nThe street is in a populous and a poor neighbourhood.  The ground floor\nof one of the houses in it is occupied by a small newsvendor's shop,\nand the first floor and the second are let as furnished lodgings of the\nhumblest kind.\n\nI have taken those two floors in an assumed name.  On the upper floor I\nlive, with a room to work in, a room to sleep in.  On the lower floor,\nunder the same assumed name, two women live, who are described as my\nsisters.  I get my bread by drawing and engraving on wood for the cheap\nperiodicals.  My sisters are supposed to help me by taking in a little\nneedle-work.  Our poor place of abode, our humble calling, our assumed\nrelationship, and our assumed name, are all used alike as a means of\nhiding us in the house-forest of London.  We are numbered no longer\nwith the people whose lives are open and known.  I am an obscure,\nunnoticed man, without patron or friend to help me.  Marian Halcombe is\nnothing now but my eldest sister, who provides for our household wants\nby the toil of her own hands.  We two, in the estimation of others, are\nat once the dupes and the agents of a daring imposture.  We are\nsupposed to be the accomplices of mad Anne Catherick, who claims the\nname, the place, and the living personality of dead Lady Glyde.\n\nThat is our situation.  That is the changed aspect in which we three\nmust appear, henceforth, in this narrative, for many and many a page to\ncome.\n\nIn the eye of reason and of law, in the estimation of relatives and\nfriends, according to every received formality of civilised society,\n\"Laura, Lady Glyde,\" lay buried with her mother in Limmeridge\nchurchyard.  Torn in her own lifetime from the list of the living, the\ndaughter of Philip Fairlie and the wife of Percival Glyde might still\nexist for her sister, might still exist for me, but to all the world\nbesides she was dead.  Dead to her uncle, who had renounced her; dead\nto the servants of the house, who had failed to recognise her; dead to\nthe persons in authority, who had transmitted her fortune to her\nhusband and her aunt; dead to my mother and my sister, who believed me\nto be the dupe of an adventuress and the victim of a fraud; socially,\nmorally, legally--dead.\n\nAnd yet alive! Alive in poverty and in hiding.  Alive, with the poor\ndrawing-master to fight her battle, and to win the way back for her to\nher place in the world of living beings.\n\nDid no suspicion, excited by my own knowledge of Anne Catherick's\nresemblance to her, cross my mind, when her face was first revealed to\nme? Not the shadow of a suspicion, from the moment when she lifted her\nveil by the side of the inscription which recorded her death.\n\nBefore the sun of that day had set, before the last glimpse of the home\nwhich was closed against her had passed from our view, the farewell\nwords I spoke, when we parted at Limmeridge House, had been recalled by\nboth of us--repeated by me, recognised by her. \"If ever the time comes,\nwhen the devotion of my whole heart and soul and strength will give you\na moment's happiness, or spare you a moment's sorrow, will you try to\nremember the poor drawing-master who has taught you?\" She, who now\nremembered so little of the trouble and terror of a later time,\nremembered those words, and laid her poor head innocently and\ntrustingly on the bosom of the man who had spoken them.  In that\nmoment, when she called me by my name, when she said, \"They have tried\nto make me forget everything, Walter; but I remember Marian, and I\nremember YOU\"--in that moment, I, who had long since given her my love,\ngave her my life, and thanked God that it was mine to bestow on her.\nYes! the time had come.  From thousands on thousands of miles\naway--through forest and wilderness, where companions stronger than I\nhad fallen by my side, through peril of death thrice renewed, and\nthrice escaped, the Hand that leads men on the dark road to the future\nhad led me to meet that time.  Forlorn and disowned, sorely tried and\nsadly changed--her beauty faded, her mind clouded--robbed of her\nstation in the world, of her place among living creatures--the devotion\nI had promised, the devotion of my whole heart and soul and strength,\nmight be laid blamelessly now at those dear feet. In the right of her\ncalamity, in the right of her friendlessness, she was mine at last!\nMine to support, to protect, to cherish, to restore.  Mine to love and\nhonour as father and brother both. Mine to vindicate through all risks\nand all sacrifices--through the hopeless struggle against Rank and\nPower, through the long fight with armed deceit and fortified Success,\nthrough the waste of my reputation, through the loss of my friends,\nthrough the hazard of my life.\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nMy position is defined--my motives are acknowledged.  The story of\nMarian and the story of Laura must come next.\n\nI shall relate both narratives, not in the words (often interrupted,\noften inevitably confused) of the speakers themselves, but in the words\nof the brief, plain, studiously simple abstract which I committed to\nwriting for my own guidance, and for the guidance of my legal adviser.\nSo the tangled web will be most speedily and most intelligibly unrolled.\n\nThe story of Marian begins where the narrative of the housekeeper at\nBlackwater Park left off.\n\n\nOn Lady Glyde's departure from her husband's house, the fact of that\ndeparture, and the necessary statement of the circumstances under which\nit had taken place, were communicated to Miss Halcombe by the\nhousekeeper.  It was not till some days afterwards (how many days\nexactly, Mrs. Michelson, in the absence of any written memorandum on\nthe subject, could not undertake to say) that a letter arrived from\nMadame Fosco announcing Lady Glyde's sudden death in Count Fosco's\nhouse.  The letter avoided mentioning dates, and left it to Mrs.\nMichelson's discretion to break the news at once to Miss Halcombe, or\nto defer doing so until that lady's health should be more firmly\nestablished.\n\nHaving consulted Mr. Dawson (who had been himself delayed, by ill\nhealth, in resuming his attendance at Blackwater Park), Mrs. Michelson,\nby the doctor's advice, and in the doctor's presence, communicated the\nnews, either on the day when the letter was received, or on the day\nafter.  It is not necessary to dwell here upon the effect which the\nintelligence of Lady Glyde's sudden death produced on her sister.  It\nis only useful to the present purpose to say that she was not able to\ntravel for more than three weeks afterwards.  At the end of that time\nshe proceeded to London accompanied by the housekeeper.  They parted\nthere--Mrs. Michelson previously informing Miss Halcombe of her\naddress, in case they might wish to communicate at a future period.\n\nOn parting with the housekeeper Miss Halcombe went at once to the\noffice of Messrs. Gilmore & Kyrle to consult with the latter gentleman\nin Mr. Gilmore's absence.  She mentioned to Mr. Kyrle what she had\nthought it desirable to conceal from every one else (Mrs. Michelson\nincluded)--her suspicion of the circumstances under which Lady Glyde\nwas said to have met her death.  Mr. Kyrle, who had previously given\nfriendly proof of his anxiety to serve Miss Halcombe, at once undertook\nto make such inquiries as the delicate and dangerous nature of the\ninvestigation proposed to him would permit.\n\nTo exhaust this part of the subject before going farther, it may be\nmentioned that Count Fosco offered every facility to Mr. Kyrle, on that\ngentleman's stating that he was sent by Miss Halcombe to collect such\nparticulars as had not yet reached her of Lady Glyde's decease.  Mr.\nKyrle was placed in communication with the medical man, Mr. Goodricke,\nand with the two servants.  In the absence of any means of ascertaining\nthe exact date of Lady Glyde's departure from Blackwater Park, the\nresult of the doctor's and the servants' evidence, and of the\nvolunteered statements of Count Fosco and his wife, was conclusive to\nthe mind of Mr. Kyrle. He could only assume that the intensity of Miss\nHalcombe's suffering, under the loss of her sister, had misled her\njudgment in a most deplorable manner, and he wrote her word that the\nshocking suspicion to which she had alluded in his presence was, in his\nopinion, destitute of the smallest fragment of foundation in truth.\nThus the investigation by Mr. Gilmore's partner began and ended.\n\nMeanwhile, Miss Halcombe had returned to Limmeridge House, and had\nthere collected all the additional information which she was able to\nobtain.\n\nMr. Fairlie had received his first intimation of his niece's death from\nhis sister, Madame Fosco, this letter also not containing any exact\nreference to dates.  He had sanctioned his sister's proposal that the\ndeceased lady should be laid in her mother's grave in Limmeridge\nchurchyard.  Count Fosco had accompanied the remains to Cumberland, and\nhad attended the funeral at Limmeridge, which took place on the 30th of\nJuly.  It was followed, as a mark of respect, by all the inhabitants of\nthe village and the neighbourhood.  On the next day the inscription\n(originally drawn out, it was said, by the aunt of the deceased lady,\nand submitted for approval to her brother, Mr. Fairlie) was engraved on\none side of the monument over the tomb.\n\nOn the day of the funeral, and for one day after it, Count Fosco had\nbeen received as a guest at Limmeridge House, but no interview had\ntaken place between Mr. Fairlie and himself, by the former gentleman's\ndesire.  They had communicated by writing, and through this medium\nCount Fosco had made Mr. Fairlie acquainted with the details of his\nniece's last illness and death.  The letter presenting this information\nadded no new facts to the facts already known, but one very remarkable\nparagraph was contained in the postscript.  It referred to Anne\nCatherick.\n\nThe substance of the paragraph in question was as follows--\n\nIt first informed Mr. Fairlie that Anne Catherick (of whom he might\nhear full particulars from Miss Halcombe when she reached Limmeridge)\nhad been traced and recovered in the neighbourhood of Blackwater Park,\nand had been for the second time placed under the charge of the medical\nman from whose custody she had once escaped.\n\nThis was the first part of the postscript.  The second part warned Mr.\nFairlie that Anne Catherick's mental malady had been aggravated by her\nlong freedom from control, and that the insane hatred and distrust of\nSir Percival Glyde, which had been one of her most marked delusions in\nformer times, still existed under a newly-acquired form.  The\nunfortunate woman's last idea in connection with Sir Percival was the\nidea of annoying and distressing him, and of elevating herself, as she\nsupposed, in the estimation of the patients and nurses, by assuming the\ncharacter of his deceased wife, the scheme of this personation having\nevidently occurred to her after a stolen interview which she had\nsucceeded in obtaining with Lady Glyde, and at which she had observed\nthe extraordinary accidental likeness between the deceased lady and\nherself.  It was to the last degree improbable that she would succeed a\nsecond time in escaping from the Asylum, but it was just possible she\nmight find some means of annoying the late Lady Glyde's relatives with\nletters, and in that case Mr. Fairlie was warned beforehand how to\nreceive them.\n\nThe postscript, expressed in these terms, was shown to Miss Halcombe\nwhen she arrived at Limmeridge.  There were also placed in her\npossession the clothes Lady Glyde had worn, and the other effects she\nhad brought with her to her aunt's house.  They had been carefully\ncollected and sent to Cumberland by Madame Fosco.\n\nSuch was the posture of affairs when Miss Halcombe reached Limmeridge\nin the early part of September.\n\nShortly afterwards she was confined to her room by a relapse, her\nweakened physical energies giving way under the severe mental\naffliction from which she was now suffering.  On getting stronger\nagain, in a month's time, her suspicion of the circumstances described\nas attending her sister's death still remained unshaken. She had heard\nnothing in the interim of Sir Percival Glyde, but letters had reached\nher from Madame Fosco, making the most affectionate inquiries on the\npart of her husband and herself. Instead of answering these letters,\nMiss Halcombe caused the house in St. John's Wood, and the proceedings\nof its inmates, to be privately watched.\n\nNothing doubtful was discovered.  The same result attended the next\ninvestigations, which were secretly instituted on the subject of Mrs.\nRubelle.  She had arrived in London about six months before with her\nhusband.  They had come from Lyons, and they had taken a house in the\nneighbourhood of Leicester Square, to be fitted up as a boarding-house\nfor foreigners, who were expected to visit England in large numbers to\nsee the Exhibition of 1851. Nothing was known against husband or wife\nin the neighbourhood. They were quiet people, and they had paid their\nway honestly up to the present time.  The final inquiries related to\nSir Percival Glyde.  He was settled in Paris, and living there quietly\nin a small circle of English and French friends.\n\nFoiled at all points, but still not able to rest, Miss Halcombe next\ndetermined to visit the Asylum in which she then supposed Anne\nCatherick to be for the second time confined.  She had felt a strong\ncuriosity about the woman in former days, and she was now doubly\ninterested--first, in ascertaining whether the report of Anne\nCatherick's attempted personation of Lady Glyde was true, and secondly\n(if it proved to be true), in discovering for herself what the poor\ncreature's real motives were for attempting the deceit.\n\nAlthough Count Fosco's letter to Mr. Fairlie did not mention the\naddress of the Asylum, that important omission cast no difficulties in\nMiss Halcombe's way.  When Mr. Hartright had met Anne Catherick at\nLimmeridge, she had informed him of the locality in which the house was\nsituated, and Miss Halcombe had noted down the direction in her diary,\nwith all the other particulars of the interview exactly as she heard\nthem from Mr. Hartright's own lips. Accordingly she looked back at the\nentry and extracted the address--furnished herself with the Count's\nletter to Mr. Fairlie as a species of credential which might be useful\nto her, and started by herself for the Asylum on the eleventh of\nOctober.\n\nShe passed the night of the eleventh in London.  It had been her\nintention to sleep at the house inhabited by Lady Glyde's old\ngoverness, but Mrs. Vesey's agitation at the sight of her lost pupil's\nnearest and dearest friend was so distressing that Miss Halcombe\nconsiderately refrained from remaining in her presence, and removed to\na respectable boarding-house in the neighbourhood, recommended by Mrs.\nVesey's married sister.  The next day she proceeded to the Asylum,\nwhich was situated not far from London on the northern side of the\nmetropolis.\n\nShe was immediately admitted to see the proprietor.\n\nAt first he appeared to be decidedly unwilling to let her communicate\nwith his patient.  But on her showing him the postscript to Count\nFosco's letter--on her reminding him that she was the \"Miss Halcombe\"\nthere referred to--that she was a near relative of the deceased Lady\nGlyde--and that she was therefore naturally interested, for family\nreasons, in observing for herself the extent of Anne Catherick's\ndelusion in relation to her late sister--the tone and manner of the\nowner of the Asylum altered, and he withdrew his objections.  He\nprobably felt that a continued refusal, under these circumstances,\nwould not only be an act of discourtesy in itself, but would also imply\nthat the proceedings in his establishment were not of a nature to bear\ninvestigation by respectable strangers.\n\nMiss Halcombe's own impression was that the owner of the Asylum had not\nbeen received into the confidence of Sir Percival and the Count.  His\nconsenting at all to let her visit his patient seemed to afford one\nproof of this, and his readiness in making admissions which could\nscarcely have escaped the lips of an accomplice, certainly appeared to\nfurnish another.\n\nFor example, in the course of the introductory conversation which took\nplace, he informed Miss Halcombe that Anne Catherick had been brought\nback to him with the necessary order and certificates by Count Fosco on\nthe twenty-seventh of July--the Count also producing a letter of\nexplanations and instructions signed by Sir Percival Glyde.  On\nreceiving his inmate again, the proprietor of the Asylum acknowledged\nthat he had observed some curious personal changes in her.  Such\nchanges no doubt were not without precedent in his experience of\npersons mentally afflicted.  Insane people were often at one time,\noutwardly as well as inwardly, unlike what they were at another--the\nchange from better to worse, or from worse to better, in the madness\nhaving a necessary tendency to produce alterations of appearance\nexternally.  He allowed for these, and he allowed also for the\nmodification in the form of Anne Catherick's delusion, which was\nreflected no doubt in her manner and expression.  But he was still\nperplexed at times by certain differences between his patient before\nshe had escaped and his patient since she had been brought back.  Those\ndifferences were too minute to be described.  He could not say of\ncourse that she was absolutely altered in height or shape or\ncomplexion, or in the colour of her hair and eyes, or in the general\nform of her face--the change was something that he felt more than\nsomething that he saw.  In short, the case had been a puzzle from the\nfirst, and one more perplexity was added to it now.\n\nIt cannot be said that this conversation led to the result of even\npartially preparing Miss Halcombe's mind for what was to come. But it\nproduced, nevertheless, a very serious effect upon her. She was so\ncompletely unnerved by it, that some little time elapsed before she\ncould summon composure enough to follow the proprietor of the Asylum to\nthat part of the house in which the inmates were confined.\n\nOn inquiry, it turned out that the supposed Anne Catherick was then\ntaking exercise in the grounds attached to the establishment. One of\nthe nurses volunteered to conduct Miss Halcombe to the place, the\nproprietor of the Asylum remaining in the house for a few minutes to\nattend to a case which required his services, and then engaging to join\nhis visitor in the grounds.\n\nThe nurse led Miss Halcombe to a distant part of the property, which\nwas prettily laid out, and after looking about her a little, turned\ninto a turf walk, shaded by a shrubbery on either side. About half-way\ndown this walk two women were slowly approaching. The nurse pointed to\nthem and said, \"There is Anne Catherick, ma'am, with the attendant who\nwaits on her.  The attendant will answer any questions you wish to\nput.\" With those words the nurse left her to return to the duties of\nthe house.\n\nMiss Halcombe advanced on her side, and the women advanced on theirs.\nWhen they were within a dozen paces of each other, one of the women\nstopped for an instant, looked eagerly at the strange lady, shook off\nthe nurse's grasp on her, and the next moment rushed into Miss\nHalcombe's arms.  In that moment Miss Halcombe recognised her\nsister--recognised the dead-alive.\n\nFortunately for the success of the measures taken subsequently, no one\nwas present at that moment but the nurse.  She was a young woman, and\nshe was so startled that she was at first quite incapable of\ninterfering.  When she was able to do so her whole services were\nrequired by Miss Halcombe, who had for the moment sunk altogether in\nthe effort to keep her own senses under the shock of the discovery.\nAfter waiting a few minutes in the fresh air and the cool shade, her\nnatural energy and courage helped her a little, and she became\nsufficiently mistress of herself to feel the necessity of recalling her\npresence of mind for her unfortunate sister's sake.\n\nShe obtained permission to speak alone with the patient, on condition\nthat they both remained well within the nurse's view. There was no time\nfor questions--there was only time for Miss Halcombe to impress on the\nunhappy lady the necessity of controlling herself, and to assure her of\nimmediate help and rescue if she did so.  The prospect of escaping from\nthe Asylum by obedience to her sister's directions was sufficient to\nquiet Lady Glyde, and to make her understand what was required of her.\nMiss Halcombe next returned to the nurse, placed all the gold she then\nhad in her pocket (three sovereigns) in the nurse's hands, and asked\nwhen and where she could speak to her alone.\n\nThe woman was at first surprised and distrustful.  But on Miss\nHalcombe's declaring that she only wanted to put some questions which\nshe was too much agitated to ask at that moment, and that she had no\nintention of misleading the nurse into any dereliction of duty, the\nwoman took the money, and proposed three o'clock on the next day as the\ntime for the interview.  She might then slip out for half an hour,\nafter the patients had dined, and she would meet the lady in a retired\nplace, outside the high north wall which screened the grounds of the\nhouse.  Miss Halcombe had only time to assent, and to whisper to her\nsister that she should hear from her on the next day, when the\nproprietor of the Asylum joined them.  He noticed his visitor's\nagitation, which Miss Halcombe accounted for by saying that her\ninterview with Anne Catherick had a little startled her at first. She\ntook her leave as soon after as possible--that is to say, as soon as\nshe could summon courage to force herself from the presence of her\nunfortunate sister.\n\nA very little reflection, when the capacity to reflect returned,\nconvinced her that any attempt to identify Lady Glyde and to rescue her\nby legal means, would, even if successful, involve a delay that might\nbe fatal to her sister's intellects, which were shaken already by the\nhorror of the situation to which she had been consigned.  By the time\nMiss Halcombe had got back to London, she had determined to effect Lady\nGlyde's escape privately, by means of the nurse.\n\nShe went at once to her stockbroker, and sold out of the funds all the\nlittle property she possessed, amounting to rather less than seven\nhundred pounds.  Determined, if necessary, to pay the price of her\nsister's liberty with every farthing she had in the world, she repaired\nthe next day, having the whole sum about her in bank-notes, to her\nappointment outside the Asylum wall.\n\nThe nurse was there.  Miss Halcombe approached the subject cautiously\nby many preliminary questions.  She discovered, among other\nparticulars, that the nurse who had in former times attended on the\ntrue Anne Catherick had been held responsible (although she was not to\nblame for it) for the patient's escape, and had lost her place in\nconsequence.  The same penalty, it was added, would attach to the\nperson then speaking to her, if the supposed Anne Catherick was missing\na second time; and, moreover, the nurse in this case had an especial\ninterest in keeping her place.  She was engaged to be married, and she\nand her future husband were waiting till they could save, together,\nbetween two and three hundred pounds to start in business.  The nurse's\nwages were good, and she might succeed, by strict economy, in\ncontributing her small share towards the sum required in two years'\ntime.\n\nOn this hint Miss Halcombe spoke.  She declared that the supposed Anne\nCatherick was nearly related to her, that she had been placed in the\nAsylum under a fatal mistake, and that the nurse would be doing a good\nand a Christian action in being the means of restoring them to one\nanother.  Before there was time to start a single objection, Miss\nHalcombe took four bank-notes of a hundred pounds each from her\npocket-book, and offered them to the woman, as a compensation for the\nrisk she was to run, and for the loss of her place.\n\nThe nurse hesitated, through sheer incredulity and surprise.  Miss\nHalcombe pressed the point on her firmly.\n\n\"You will be doing a good action,\" she repeated; \"you will be helping\nthe most injured and unhappy woman alive.  There is your marriage\nportion for a reward.  Bring her safely to me here, and I will put\nthese four bank-notes into your hand before I claim her.\"\n\n\"Will you give me a letter saying those words, which I can show to my\nsweetheart when he asks how I got the money?\" inquired the woman.\n\n\"I will bring the letter with me, ready written and signed,\" answered\nMiss Halcombe.\n\n\"Then I'll risk it,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"When?\"\n\n\"To-morrow.\"\n\nIt was hastily agreed between them that Miss Halcombe should return\nearly the next morning and wait out of sight among the trees--always,\nhowever, keeping near the quiet spot of ground under the north wall.\nThe nurse could fix no time for her appearance, caution requiring that\nshe should wait and be guided by circumstances.  On that understanding\nthey separated.\n\nMiss Halcombe was at her place, with the promised letter and the\npromised bank-notes, before ten the next morning.  She waited more than\nan hour and a half.  At the end of that time the nurse came quickly\nround the corner of the wall holding Lady Glyde by the arm.  The moment\nthey met Miss Halcombe put the bank-notes and the letter into her hand,\nand the sisters were united again.\n\nThe nurse had dressed Lady Glyde, with excellent forethought, in a\nbonnet, veil, and shawl of her own.  Miss Halcombe only detained her to\nsuggest a means of turning the pursuit in a false direction, when the\nescape was discovered at the Asylum.  She was to go back to the house,\nto mention in the hearing of the other nurses that Anne Catherick had\nbeen inquiring latterly about the distance from London to Hampshire, to\nwait till the last moment, before discovery was inevitable, and then to\ngive the alarm that Anne was missing.  The supposed inquiries about\nHampshire, when communicated to the owner of the Asylum, would lead him\nto imagine that his patient had returned to Blackwater Park, under the\ninfluence of the delusion which made her persist in asserting herself\nto be Lady Glyde, and the first pursuit would, in all probability, be\nturned in that direction.\n\nThe nurse consented to follow these suggestions, the more readily as\nthey offered her the means of securing herself against any worse\nconsequences than the loss of her place, by remaining in the Asylum,\nand so maintaining the appearance of innocence, at least. She at once\nreturned to the house, and Miss Halcombe lost no time in taking her\nsister back with her to London.  They caught the afternoon train to\nCarlisle the same afternoon, and arrived at Limmeridge, without\naccident or difficulty of any kind, that night.\n\nDuring the latter part of their journey they were alone in the\ncarriage, and Miss Halcombe was able to collect such remembrances of\nthe past as her sister's confused and weakened memory was able to\nrecall.  The terrible story of the conspiracy so obtained was presented\nin fragments, sadly incoherent in themselves, and widely detached from\neach other.  Imperfect as the revelation was, it must nevertheless be\nrecorded here before this explanatory narrative closes with the events\nof the next day at Limmeridge House.\n\n\nLady Glyde's recollection of the events which followed her departure\nfrom Blackwater Park began with her arrival at the London terminus of\nthe South Western Railway.  She had omitted to make a memorandum\nbeforehand of the day on which she took the journey.  All hope of\nfixing that important date by any evidence of hers, or of Mrs.\nMichelson's, must be given up for lost.\n\nOn the arrival of the train at the platform Lady Glyde found Count\nFosco waiting for her.  He was at the carriage door as soon as the\nporter could open it.  The train was unusually crowded, and there was\ngreat confusion in getting the luggage.  Some person whom Count Fosco\nbrought with him procured the luggage which belonged to Lady Glyde.  It\nwas marked with her name.  She drove away alone with the Count in a\nvehicle which she did not particularly notice at the time.\n\nHer first question, on leaving the terminus, referred to Miss Halcombe.\nThe Count informed her that Miss Halcombe had not yet gone to\nCumberland, after-consideration having caused him to doubt the prudence\nof her taking so long a journey without some days' previous rest.\n\nLady Glyde next inquired whether her sister was then staying in the\nCount's house.  Her recollection of the answer was confused, her only\ndistinct impression in relation to it being that the Count declared he\nwas then taking her to see Miss Halcombe.  Lady Glyde's experience of\nLondon was so limited that she could not tell, at the time, through\nwhat streets they were driving.  But they never left the streets, and\nthey never passed any gardens or trees.  When the carriage stopped, it\nstopped in a small street behind a square--a square in which there were\nshops, and public buildings, and many people.  From these recollections\n(of which Lady Glyde was certain) it seems quite clear that Count Fosco\ndid not take her to his own residence in the suburb of St. John's Wood.\n\nThey entered the house, and went upstairs to a back room, either on the\nfirst or second floor.  The luggage was carefully brought in.  A female\nservant opened the door, and a man with a dark beard, apparently a\nforeigner, met them in the hall, and with great politeness showed them\nthe way upstairs.  In answer to Lady Glyde's inquiries, the Count\nassured her that Miss Halcombe was in the house, and that she should be\nimmediately informed of her sister's arrival.  He and the foreigner\nthen went away and left her by herself in the room.  It was poorly\nfurnished as a sitting-room, and it looked out on the backs of houses.\n\nThe place was remarkably quiet--no footsteps went up or down the\nstairs--she only heard in the room beneath her a dull, rumbling sound\nof men's voices talking.  Before she had been long left alone the Count\nreturned, to explain that Miss Halcombe was then taking rest, and could\nnot be disturbed for a little while.  He was accompanied into the room\nby a gentleman (an Englishman), whom he begged to present as a friend\nof his.\n\nAfter this singular introduction--in the course of which no names, to\nthe best of Lady Glyde's recollection, had been mentioned--she was left\nalone with the stranger.  He was perfectly civil, but he startled and\nconfused her by some odd questions about herself, and by looking at\nher, while he asked them, in a strange manner. After remaining a short\ntime he went out, and a minute or two afterwards a second\nstranger--also an Englishman--came in.  This person introduced himself\nas another friend of Count Fosco's, and he, in his turn, looked at her\nvery oddly, and asked some curious questions--never, as well as she\ncould remember, addressing her by name, and going out again, after a\nlittle while, like the first man.  By this time she was so frightened\nabout herself, and so uneasy about her sister, that she had thoughts of\nventuring downstairs again, and claiming the protection and assistance\nof the only woman she had seen in the house--the servant who answered\nthe door.\n\nJust as she had risen from her chair, the Count came back into the room.\n\nThe moment he appeared she asked anxiously how long the meeting between\nher sister and herself was to be still delayed.  At first he returned\nan evasive answer, but on being pressed, he acknowledged, with great\napparent reluctance, that Miss Halcombe was by no means so well as he\nhad hitherto represented her to be. His tone and manner, in making this\nreply, so alarmed Lady Glyde, or rather so painfully increased the\nuneasiness which she had felt in the company of the two strangers, that\na sudden faintness overcame her, and she was obliged to ask for a glass\nof water. The Count called from the door for water, and for a bottle of\nsmelling-salts.  Both were brought in by the foreign-looking man with\nthe beard.  The water, when Lady Glyde attempted to drink it, had so\nstrange a taste that it increased her faintness, and she hastily took\nthe bottle of salts from Count Fosco, and smelt at it.  Her head became\ngiddy on the instant.  The Count caught the bottle as it dropped out of\nher hand, and the last impression of which she was conscious was that\nhe held it to her nostrils again.\n\nFrom this point her recollections were found to be confused,\nfragmentary, and difficult to reconcile with any reasonable probability.\n\nHer own impression was that she recovered her senses later in the\nevening, that she then left the house, that she went (as she had\npreviously arranged to go, at Blackwater Park) to Mrs. Vesey's--that\nshe drank tea there, and that she passed the night under Mrs. Vesey's\nroof.  She was totally unable to say how, or when, or in what company\nshe left the house to which Count Fosco had brought her.  But she\npersisted in asserting that she had been to Mrs. Vesey's, and still\nmore extraordinary, that she had been helped to undress and get to bed\nby Mrs. Rubelle! She could not remember what the conversation was at\nMrs. Vesey's or whom she saw there besides that lady, or why Mrs.\nRubelle should have been present in the house to help her.\n\nHer recollection of what happened to her the next morning was still\nmore vague and unreliable.\n\nShe had some dim idea of driving out (at what hour she could not say)\nwith Count Fosco, and with Mrs. Rubelle again for a female attendant.\nBut when, and why, she left Mrs. Vesey she could not tell; neither did\nshe know what direction the carriage drove in, or where it set her\ndown, or whether the Count and Mrs. Rubelle did or did not remain with\nher all the time she was out.  At this point in her sad story there was\na total blank.  She had no impressions of the faintest kind to\ncommunicate--no idea whether one day, or more than one day, had\npassed--until she came to herself suddenly in a strange place,\nsurrounded by women who were all unknown to her.\n\nThis was the Asylum.  Here she first heard herself called by Anne\nCatherick's name, and here, as a last remarkable circumstance in the\nstory of the conspiracy, her own eyes informed her that she had Anne\nCatherick's clothes on.  The nurse, on the first night in the Asylum,\nhad shown her the marks on each article of her underclothing as it was\ntaken off, and had said, not at all irritably or unkindly, \"Look at\nyour own name on your own clothes, and don't worry us all any more\nabout being Lady Glyde.  She's dead and buried, and you're alive and\nhearty.  Do look at your clothes now!  There it is, in good marking\nink, and there you will find it on all your old things, which we have\nkept in the house--Anne Catherick, as plain as print!\" And there it\nwas, when Miss Halcombe examined the linen her sister wore, on the\nnight of their arrival at Limmeridge House.\n\n\nThese were the only recollections--all of them uncertain, and some of\nthem contradictory--which could be extracted from Lady Glyde by careful\nquestioning on the journey to Cumberland.  Miss Halcombe abstained from\npressing her with any inquiries relating to events in the Asylum--her\nmind being but too evidently unfit to bear the trial of reverting to\nthem.  It was known, by the voluntary admission of the owner of the\nmad-house, that she was received there on the twenty-seventh of July.\nFrom that date until the fifteenth of October (the day of her rescue)\nshe had been under restraint, her identity with Anne Catherick\nsystematically asserted, and her sanity, from first to last,\npractically denied. Faculties less delicately balanced, constitutions\nless tenderly organised, must have suffered under such an ordeal as\nthis.  No man could have gone through it and come out of it unchanged.\n\nArriving at Limmeridge late on the evening of the fifteenth, Miss\nHalcombe wisely resolved not to attempt the assertion of Lady Glyde's\nidentity until the next day.\n\nThe first thing in the morning she went to Mr. Fairlie's room, and\nusing all possible cautions and preparations beforehand, at last told\nhim in so many words what had happened.  As soon as his first\nastonishment and alarm had subsided, he angrily declared that Miss\nHalcombe had allowed herself to be duped by Anne Catherick.  He\nreferred her to Count Fosco's letter, and to what she had herself told\nhim of the personal resemblance between Anne and his deceased niece,\nand he positively declined to admit to his presence, even for one\nminute only, a madwoman, whom it was an insult and an outrage to have\nbrought into his house at all.\n\nMiss Halcombe left the room--waited till the first heat of her\nindignation had passed away--decided on reflection that Mr. Fairlie\nshould see his niece in the interests of common humanity before he\nclosed his doors on her as a stranger--and thereupon, without a word of\nprevious warning, took Lady Glyde with her to his room.  The servant\nwas posted at the door to prevent their entrance, but Miss Halcombe\ninsisted on passing him, and made her way into Mr. Fairlie's presence,\nleading her sister by the hand.\n\nThe scene that followed, though it only lasted for a few minutes, was\ntoo painful to be described--Miss Halcombe herself shrank from\nreferring to it.  Let it be enough to say that Mr. Fairlie declared, in\nthe most positive terms, that he did not recognise the woman who had\nbeen brought into his room--that he saw nothing in her face and manner\nto make him doubt for a moment that his niece lay buried in Limmeridge\nchurchyard, and that he would call on the law to protect him if before\nthe day was over she was not removed from the house.\n\nTaking the very worst view of Mr. Fairlie's selfishness, indolence, and\nhabitual want of feeling, it was manifestly impossible to suppose that\nhe was capable of such infamy as secretly recognising and openly\ndisowning his brother's child. Miss Halcombe humanely and sensibly\nallowed all due force to the influence of prejudice and alarm in\npreventing him from fairly exercising his perceptions, and accounted\nfor what had happened in that way.  But when she next put the servants\nto the test, and found that they too were, in every case, uncertain, to\nsay the least of it, whether the lady presented to them was their young\nmistress or Anne Catherick, of whose resemblance to her they had all\nheard, the sad conclusion was inevitable that the change produced in\nLady Glyde's face and manner by her imprisonment in the Asylum was far\nmore serious than Miss Halcombe had at first supposed.  The vile\ndeception which had asserted her death defied exposure even in the\nhouse where she was born, and among the people with whom she had lived.\n\nIn a less critical situation the effort need not have been given up as\nhopeless even yet.\n\nFor example, the maid, Fanny, who happened to be then absent from\nLimmeridge, was expected back in two days, and there would be a chance\nof gaining her recognition to start with, seeing that she had been in\nmuch more constant communication with her mistress, and had been much\nmore heartily attached to her than the other servants.  Again, Lady\nGlyde might have been privately kept in the house or in the village to\nwait until her health was a little recovered and her mind was a little\nsteadied again.  When her memory could be once more trusted to serve\nher, she would naturally refer to persons and events in the past with a\ncertainty and a familiarity which no impostor could simulate, and so\nthe fact of her identity, which her own appearance had failed to\nestablish, might subsequently be proved, with time to help her, by the\nsurer test of her own words.\n\nBut the circumstances under which she had regained her freedom rendered\nall recourse to such means as these simply impracticable. The pursuit\nfrom the Asylum, diverted to Hampshire for the time only, would\ninfallibly next take the direction of Cumberland.  The persons\nappointed to seek the fugitive might arrive at Limmeridge House at a\nfew hours' notice, and in Mr. Fairlie's present temper of mind they\nmight count on the immediate exertion of his local influence and\nauthority to assist them.  The commonest consideration for Lady Glyde's\nsafety forced on Miss Halcombe the necessity of resigning the struggle\nto do her justice, and of removing her at once from the place of all\nothers that was now most dangerous to her--the neighbourhood of her own\nhome.\n\nAn immediate return to London was the first and wisest measure of\nsecurity which suggested itself.  In the great city all traces of them\nmight be most speedily and most surely effaced.  There were no\npreparations to make--no farewell words of kindness to exchange with\nany one.  On the afternoon of that memorable day of the sixteenth Miss\nHalcombe roused her sister to a last exertion of courage, and without a\nliving soul to wish them well at parting, the two took their way into\nthe world alone, and turned their backs for ever on Limmeridge House.\n\nThey had passed the hill above the churchyard, when Lady Glyde insisted\non turning back to look her last at her mother's grave. Miss Halcombe\ntried to shake her resolution, but, in this one instance, tried in\nvain.  She was immovable.  Her dim eyes lit with a sudden fire, and\nflashed through the veil that hung over them--her wasted fingers\nstrengthened moment by moment round the friendly arm by which they had\nheld so listlessly till this time. I believe in my soul that the hand\nof God was pointing their way back to them, and that the most innocent\nand the most afflicted of His creatures was chosen in that dread moment\nto see it.\n\nThey retraced their steps to the burial-ground, and by that act sealed\nthe future of our three lives.\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nThis was the story of the past--the story so far as we knew it then.\n\nTwo obvious conclusions presented themselves to my mind after hearing\nit.  In the first place, I saw darkly what the nature of the conspiracy\nhad been, how chances had been watched, and how circumstances had been\nhandled to ensure impunity to a daring and an intricate crime.  While\nall details were still a mystery to me, the vile manner in which the\npersonal resemblance between the woman in white and Lady Glyde had been\nturned to account was clear beyond a doubt.  It was plain that Anne\nCatherick had been introduced into Count Fosco's house as Lady\nGlyde--it was plain that Lady Glyde had taken the dead woman's place in\nthe Asylum--the substitution having been so managed as to make\ninnocent people (the doctor and the two servants certainly, and the\nowner of the mad-house in all probability) accomplices in the crime.\n\nThe second conclusion came as the necessary consequence of the first.\nWe three had no mercy to expect from Count Fosco and Sir Percival\nGlyde.  The success of the conspiracy had brought with it a clear gain\nto those two men of thirty thousand pounds--twenty thousand to one, ten\nthousand to the other through his wife.  They had that interest, as\nwell as other interests, in ensuring their impunity from exposure, and\nthey would leave no stone unturned, no sacrifice unattempted, no\ntreachery untried, to discover the place in which their victim was\nconcealed, and to part her from the only friends she had in the\nworld--Marian Halcombe and myself.\n\nThe sense of this serious peril--a peril which every day and every hour\nmight bring nearer and nearer to us--was the one influence that guided\nme in fixing the place of our retreat.  I chose it in the far east of\nLondon, where there were fewest idle people to lounge and look about\nthem in the streets.  I chose it in a poor and a populous\nneighbourhood--because the harder the struggle for existence among the\nmen and women about us, the less the risk of their having the time or\ntaking the pains to notice chance strangers who came among them.  These\nwere the great advantages I looked to, but our locality was a gain to\nus also in another and a hardly less important respect.  We could live\ncheaply by the daily work of my hands, and could save every farthing we\npossessed to forward the purpose, the righteous purpose, of redressing\nan infamous wrong--which, from first to last, I now kept steadily in\nview.\n\nIn a week's time Marian Halcombe and I had settled how the course of\nour new lives should be directed.\n\nThere were no other lodgers in the house, and we had the means of going\nin and out without passing through the shop.  I arranged, for the\npresent at least, that neither Marian nor Laura should stir outside the\ndoor without my being with them, and that in my absence from home they\nshould let no one into their rooms on any pretence whatever.  This rule\nestablished, I went to a friend whom I had known in former days--a wood\nengraver in large practice--to seek for employment, telling him, at the\nsame time, that I had reasons for wishing to remain unknown.\n\nHe at once concluded that I was in debt, expressed his regret in the\nusual forms, and then promised to do what he could to assist me.  I\nleft his false impression undisturbed, and accepted the work he had to\ngive.  He knew that he could trust my experience and my industry.  I\nhad what he wanted, steadiness and facility, and though my earnings\nwere but small, they sufficed for our necessities.  As soon as we could\nfeel certain of this, Marian Halcombe and I put together what we\npossessed.  She had between two and three hundred pounds left of her\nown property, and I had nearly as much remaining from the\npurchase-money obtained by the sale of my drawing-master's practice\nbefore I left England. Together we made up between us more than four\nhundred pounds.  I deposited this little fortune in a bank, to be kept\nfor the expense of those secret inquiries and investigations which I\nwas determined to set on foot, and to carry on by myself if I could\nfind no one to help me.  We calculated our weekly expenditure to the\nlast farthing, and we never touched our little fund except in Laura's\ninterests and for Laura's sake.\n\nThe house-work, which, if we had dared trust a stranger near us, would\nhave been done by a servant, was taken on the first day, taken as her\nown right, by Marian Halcombe.  \"What a woman's hands ARE fit for,\" she\nsaid, \"early and late, these hands of mine shall do.\"  They trembled as\nshe held them out.  The wasted arms told their sad story of the past,\nas she turned up the sleeves of the poor plain dress that she wore for\nsafety's sake; but the unquenchable spirit of the woman burnt bright in\nher even yet.  I saw the big tears rise thick in her eyes, and fall\nslowly over her cheeks as she looked at me.  She dashed them away with\na touch of her old energy, and smiled with a faint reflection of her\nold good spirits.  \"Don't doubt my courage, Walter,\" she pleaded, \"it's\nmy weakness that cries, not ME.  The house-work shall conquer it if I\ncan't.\"  And she kept her word--the victory was won when we met in the\nevening, and she sat down to rest.  Her large steady black eyes looked\nat me with a flash of their bright firmness of bygone days.  \"I am not\nquite broken down yet,\" she said.  \"I am worth trusting with my share\nof the work.\"  Before I could answer, she added in a whisper, \"And\nworth trusting with my share in the risk and the danger too.  Remember\nthat, if the time comes!\"\n\nI did remember it when the time came.\n\n\n\nAs early as the end of October the daily course of our lives had\nassumed its settled direction, and we three were as completely isolated\nin our place of concealment as if the house we lived in had been a\ndesert island, and the great network of streets and the thousands of\nour fellow-creatures all round us the waters of an illimitable sea.  I\ncould now reckon on some leisure time for considering what my future\nplan of action should be, and how I might arm myself most securely at\nthe outset for the coming struggle with Sir Percival and the Count.\n\nI gave up all hope of appealing to my recognition of Laura, or to\nMarian's recognition of her, in proof of her identity.  If we had loved\nher less dearly, if the instinct implanted in us by that love had not\nbeen far more certain than any exercise of reasoning, far keener than\nany process of observation, even we might have hesitated on first\nseeing her.\n\nThe outward changes wrought by the suffering and the terror of the past\nhad fearfully, almost hopelessly, strengthened the fatal resemblance\nbetween Anne Catherick and herself.  In my narrative of events at the\ntime of my residence in Limmeridge House, I have recorded, from my own\nobservation of the two, how the likeness, striking as it was when\nviewed generally, failed in many important points of similarity when\ntested in detail.  In those former days, if they had both been seen\ntogether side by side, no person could for a moment have mistaken them\none for the other--as has happened often in the instances of twins.  I\ncould not say this now.  The sorrow and suffering which I had once\nblamed myself for associating even by a passing thought with the future\nof Laura Fairlie, HAD set their profaning marks on the youth and beauty\nof her face; and the fatal resemblance which I had once seen and\nshuddered at seeing, in idea only, was now a real and living\nresemblance which asserted itself before my own eyes.  Strangers,\nacquaintances, friends even who could not look at her as we looked, if\nshe had been shown to them in the first days of her rescue from the\nAsylum, might have doubted if she were the Laura Fairlie they had once\nseen, and doubted without blame.\n\nThe one remaining chance, which I had at first thought might be trusted\nto serve us--the chance of appealing to her recollection of persons and\nevents with which no impostor could be familiar, was proved, by the sad\ntest of our later experience, to be hopeless.  Every little caution\nthat Marian and I practised towards her--every little remedy we tried,\nto strengthen and steady slowly the weakened, shaken faculties, was a\nfresh protest in itself against the risk of turning her mind back on\nthe troubled and the terrible past.\n\nThe only events of former days which we ventured on encouraging her to\nrecall were the little trivial domestic events of that happy time at\nLimmeridge, when I first went there and taught her to draw.  The day\nwhen I roused those remembrances by showing her the sketch of the\nsummer-house which she had given me on the morning of our farewell, and\nwhich had never been separated from me since, was the birthday of our\nfirst hope.  Tenderly and gradually, the memory of the old walks and\ndrives dawned upon her, and the poor weary pining eyes looked at Marian\nand at me with a new interest, with a faltering thoughtfulness in them,\nwhich from that moment we cherished and kept alive.  I bought her a\nlittle box of colours, and a sketch-book like the old sketch-book which\nI had seen in her hands on the morning that we first met.  Once\nagain--oh me, once again!--at spare hours saved from my work, in the\ndull London light, in the poor London room, I sat by her side to guide\nthe faltering touch, to help the feeble hand.  Day by day I raised and\nraised the new interest till its place in the blank of her existence\nwas at last assured--till she could think of her drawing and talk of\nit, and patiently practise it by herself, with some faint reflection of\nthe innocent pleasure in my encouragement, the growing enjoyment in her\nown progress, which belonged to the lost life and the lost happiness of\npast days.\n\nWe helped her mind slowly by this simple means, we took her out between\nus to walk on fine days, in a quiet old City square near at hand, where\nthere was nothing to confuse or alarm her--we spared a few pounds from\nthe fund at the banker's to get her wine, and the delicate\nstrengthening food that she required--we amused her in the evenings\nwith children's games at cards, with scrap-books full of prints which\nI borrowed from the engraver who employed me--by these, and other\ntrifling attentions like them, we composed her and steadied her, and\nhoped all things, as cheerfully as we could from time and care, and\nlove that never neglected and never despaired of her.  But to take her\nmercilessly from seclusion and repose--to confront her with strangers,\nor with acquaintances who were little better than strangers--to rouse\nthe painful impressions of her past life which we had so carefully\nhushed to rest--this, even in her own interests, we dared not do.\nWhatever sacrifices it cost, whatever long, weary, heartbreaking delays\nit involved, the wrong that had been inflicted on her, if mortal means\ncould grapple it, must be redressed without her knowledge and without\nher help.\n\nThis resolution settled, it was next necessary to decide how the first\nrisk should be ventured, and what the first proceedings should be.\n\nAfter consulting with Marian, I resolved to begin by gathering together\nas many facts as could be collected--then to ask the advice of Mr.\nKyrle (whom we knew we could trust), and to ascertain from him, in the\nfirst instance, if the legal remedy lay fairly within our reach.  I\nowed it to Laura's interests not to stake her whole future on my own\nunaided exertions, so long as there was the faintest prospect of\nstrengthening our position by obtaining reliable assistance of any kind.\n\nThe first source of information to which I applied was the journal kept\nat Blackwater Park by Marian Halcombe.  There were passages in this\ndiary relating to myself which she thought it best that I should not\nsee.  Accordingly, she read to me from the manuscript, and I took the\nnotes I wanted as she went on.  We could only find time to pursue this\noccupation by sitting up late at night.  Three nights were devoted to\nthe purpose, and were enough to put me in possession of all that Marian\ncould tell.\n\nMy next proceeding was to gain as much additional evidence as I could\nprocure from other people without exciting suspicion.  I went myself to\nMrs. Vesey to ascertain if Laura's impression of having slept there was\ncorrect or not.  In this case, from consideration for Mrs. Vesey's age\nand infirmity, and in all subsequent cases of the same kind from\nconsiderations of caution, I kept our real position a secret, and was\nalways careful to speak of Laura as \"the late Lady Glyde.\"\n\nMrs. Vesey's answer to my inquiries only confirmed the apprehensions\nwhich I had previously felt.  Laura had certainly written to say she\nwould pass the night under the roof of her old friend--but she had\nnever been near the house.\n\nHer mind in this instance, and, as I feared, in other instances\nbesides, confusedly presented to her something which she had only\nintended to do in the false light of something which she had really\ndone.  The unconscious contradiction of herself was easy to account for\nin this way--but it was likely to lead to serious results.  It was a\nstumble on the threshold at starting--it was a flaw in the evidence\nwhich told fatally against us.\n\nWhen I next asked for the letter which Laura had written to Mrs. Vesey\nfrom Blackwater Park, it was given to me without the envelope, which\nhad been thrown into the wastepaper basket, and long since destroyed.\nIn the letter itself no date was mentioned--not even the day of the\nweek.  It only contained these lines:--\"Dearest Mrs. Vesey, I am in\nsad distress and anxiety, and I may come to your house to-morrow night,\nand ask for a bed.  I can't tell you what is the matter in this\nletter--I write it in such fear of being found out that I can fix my\nmind on nothing.  Pray be at home to see me.  I will give you a\nthousand kisses, and tell you everything.  Your affectionate Laura.\"\nWhat help was there in those lines? None.\n\nOn returning from Mrs. Vesey's, I instructed Marian to write (observing\nthe same caution which I practised myself) to Mrs. Michelson.  She was\nto express, if she pleased, some general suspicion of Count Fosco's\nconduct, and she was to ask the housekeeper to supply us with a plain\nstatement of events, in the interests of truth.  While we were waiting\nfor the answer, which reached us in a week's time, I went to the doctor\nin St. John's Wood, introducing myself as sent by Miss Halcombe to\ncollect, if possible, more particulars of her sister's last illness\nthan Mr. Kyrle had found the time to procure.  By Mr. Goodricke's\nassistance, I obtained a copy of the certificate of death, and an\ninterview with the woman (Jane Gould) who had been employed to prepare\nthe body for the grave.  Through this person I also discovered a means\nof communicating with the servant, Hester Pinhorn.  She had recently\nleft her place in consequence of a disagreement with her mistress, and\nshe was lodging with some people in the neighbourhood whom Mrs. Gould\nknew.  In the manner here indicated I obtained the Narratives of the\nhousekeeper, of the doctor, of Jane Gould, and of Hester Pinhorn,\nexactly as they are presented in these pages.\n\nFurnished with such additional evidence as these documents afforded, I\nconsidered myself to be sufficiently prepared for a consultation with\nMr. Kyrle, and Marian wrote accordingly to mention my name to him, and\nto specify the day and hour at which I requested to see him on private\nbusiness.\n\nThere was time enough in the morning for me to take Laura out for her\nwalk as usual, and to see her quietly settled at her drawing\nafterwards.  She looked up at me with a new anxiety in her face as I\nrose to leave the room, and her fingers began to toy doubtfully, in the\nold way, with the brushes and pencils on the table.\n\n\"You are not tired of me yet?\" she said.  \"You are not going away\nbecause you are tired of me? I will try to do better--I will try to get\nwell.  Are you as fond of me, Walter as you used to be, now I am so\npale and thin, and so slow in learning to draw?\"\n\nShe spoke as a child might have spoken, she showed me her thoughts as a\nchild might have shown them.  I waited a few minutes longer--waited to\ntell her that she was dearer to me now than she had ever been in the\npast times.  \"Try to get well again,\" I said, encouraging the new hope\nin the future which I saw dawning in her mind, \"try to get well again,\nfor Marian's sake and for mine.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she said to herself, returning to her drawing.  \"I must try,\nbecause they are both so fond of me.\" She suddenly looked up again.\n\"Don't be gone long! I can't get on with my drawing, Walter, when you\nare not here to help me.\"\n\n\"I shall soon be back, my darling--soon be back to see how you are\ngetting on.\"\n\nMy voice faltered a little in spite of me.  I forced myself from the\nroom.  It was no time, then, for parting with the self-control which\nmight yet serve me in my need before the day was out.\n\nAs I opened the door, I beckoned to Marian to follow me to the stairs.\nIt was necessary to prepare her for a result which I felt might sooner\nor later follow my showing myself openly in the streets.\n\n\"I shall, in all probability, be back in a few hours,\" I said, \"and you\nwill take care, as usual, to let no one inside the doors in my absence.\nBut if anything happens----\"\n\n\"What can happen?\" she interposed quickly.  \"Tell me plainly, Walter,\nif there is any danger, and I shall know how to meet it.\"\n\n\"The only danger,\" I replied, \"is that Sir Percival Glyde may have been\nrecalled to London by the news of Laura's escape.  You are aware that\nhe had me watched before I left England, and that he probably knows me\nby sight, although I don't know him?\"\n\nShe laid her hand on my shoulder and looked at me in anxious silence.\nI saw she understood the serious risk that threatened us.\n\n\"It is not likely,\" I said, \"that I shall be seen in London again so\nsoon, either by Sir Percival himself or by the persons in his employ.\nBut it is barely possible that an accident may happen. In that case,\nyou will not be alarmed if I fail to return to-night, and you will\nsatisfy any inquiry of Laura's with the best excuse that you can make\nfor me? If I find the least reason to suspect that I am watched, I will\ntake good care that no spy follows me back to this house.  Don't doubt\nmy return, Marian, however it may be delayed--and fear nothing.\"\n\n\"Nothing!\" she answered firmly.  \"You shall not regret, Walter, that\nyou have only a woman to help you.\" She paused, and detained me for a\nmoment longer.  \"Take care!\" she said, pressing my hand\nanxiously--\"take care!\"\n\nI left her, and set forth to pave the way for discovery--the dark and\ndoubtful way, which began at the lawyer's door.\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\nNo circumstance of the slightest importance happened on my way to the\noffices of Messrs.  Gilmore & Kyrle, in Chancery Lane.\n\nWhile my card was being taken in to Mr. Kyrle, a consideration occurred\nto me which I deeply regretted not having thought of before.  The\ninformation derived from Marian's diary made it a matter of certainty\nthat Count Fosco had opened her first letter from Blackwater Park to\nMr. Kyrle, and had, by means of his wife, intercepted the second.  He\nwas therefore well aware of the address of the office, and he would\nnaturally infer that if Marian wanted advice and assistance, after\nLaura's escape from the Asylum, she would apply once more to the\nexperience of Mr. Kyrle. In this case the office in Chancery Lane was\nthe very first place which he and Sir Percival would cause to be\nwatched, and if the same persons were chosen for the purpose who had\nbeen employed to follow me, before my departure from England, the fact\nof my return would in all probability be ascertained on that very day.\nI had thought, generally, of the chances of my being recognised in the\nstreets, but the special risk connected with the office had never\noccurred to me until the present moment.  It was too late now to repair\nthis unfortunate error in judgment--too late to wish that I had made\narrangements for meeting the lawyer in some place privately appointed\nbeforehand.  I could only resolve to be cautious on leaving Chancery\nLane, and not to go straight home again under any circumstances\nwhatever.\n\nAfter waiting a few minutes I was shown into Mr. Kyrle's private room.\nHe was a pale, thin, quiet, self-possessed man, with a very attentive\neye, a very low voice, and a very undemonstrative manner--not (as I\njudged) ready with his sympathy where strangers were concerned, and not\nat all easy to disturb in his professional composure.  A better man for\nmy purpose could hardly have been found.  If he committed himself to a\ndecision at all, and if the decision was favourable, the strength of\nour case was as good as proved from that moment.\n\n\"Before I enter on the business which brings me here,\" I said, \"I ought\nto warn you, Mr. Kyrle, that the shortest statement I can make of it\nmay occupy some little time.\"\n\n\"My time is at Miss Halcombe's disposal,\" he replied.  \"Where any\ninterests of hers are concerned, I represent my partner personally, as\nwell as professionally.  It was his request that I should do so, when\nhe ceased to take an active part in business.\"\n\n\"May I inquire whether Mr. Gilmore is in England?\"\n\n\"He is not, he is living with his relatives in Germany.  His health has\nimproved, but the period of his return is still uncertain.\"\n\nWhile we were exchanging these few preliminary words, he had been\nsearching among the papers before him, and he now produced from them a\nsealed letter.  I thought he was about to hand the letter to me, but,\napparently changing his mind, he placed it by itself on the table,\nsettled himself in his chair, and silently waited to hear what I had to\nsay.\n\nWithout wasting a moment in prefatory words of any sort, I entered on\nmy narrative, and put him in full possession of the events which have\nalready been related in these pages.\n\nLawyer as he was to the very marrow of his bones, I startled him out of\nhis professional composure.  Expressions of incredulity and surprise,\nwhich he could not repress, interrupted me several times before I had\ndone.  I persevered, however, to the end, and as soon as I reached it,\nboldly asked the one important question--\n\n\"What is your opinion, Mr. Kyrle?\"\n\nHe was too cautious to commit himself to an answer without taking time\nto recover his self-possession first.\n\n\"Before I give my opinion,\" he said, \"I must beg permission to clear\nthe ground by a few questions.\"\n\nHe put the questions--sharp, suspicious, unbelieving questions, which\nclearly showed me, as they proceeded, that he thought I was the victim\nof a delusion, and that he might even have doubted, but for my\nintroduction to him by Miss Halcombe, whether I was not attempting the\nperpetration of a cunningly-designed fraud.\n\n\"Do you believe that I have spoken the truth, Mr. Kyrle?\" I asked, when\nhe had done examining me.\n\n\"So far as your own convictions are concerned, I am certain you have\nspoken the truth,\" he replied.  \"I have the highest esteem for Miss\nHalcombe, and I have therefore every reason to respect a gentleman\nwhose mediation she trusts in a matter of this kind.  I will even go\nfarther, if you like, and admit, for courtesy's sake and for argument's\nsake, that the identity of Lady Glyde as a living person is a proved\nfact to Miss Halcombe and yourself.  But you come to me for a legal\nopinion.  As a lawyer, and as a lawyer only, it is my duty to tell you,\nMr.  Hartright, that you have not the shadow of a case.\"\n\n\"You put it strongly, Mr. Kyrle.\"\n\n\"I will try to put it plainly as well.  The evidence of Lady Glyde's\ndeath is, on the face of it, clear and satisfactory. There is her\naunt's testimony to prove that she came to Count Fosco's house, that\nshe fell ill, and that she died.  There is the testimony of the medical\ncertificate to prove the death, and to show that it took place under\nnatural circumstances.  There is the fact of the funeral at Limmeridge,\nand there is the assertion of the inscription on the tomb.  That is the\ncase you want to overthrow.  What evidence have you to support the\ndeclaration on your side that the person who died and was buried was\nnot Lady Glyde? Let us run through the main points of your statement\nand see what they are worth.  Miss Halcombe goes to a certain private\nAsylum, and there sees a certain female patient.  It is known that a\nwoman named Anne Catherick, and bearing an extraordinary personal\nresemblance to Lady Glyde, escaped from the Asylum; it is known that\nthe person received there last July was received as Anne Catherick\nbrought back; it is known that the gentleman who brought her back\nwarned Mr. Fairlie that it was part of her insanity to be bent on\npersonating his dead niece; and it is known that she did repeatedly\ndeclare herself in the Asylum (where no one believed her) to be Lady\nGlyde.  These are all facts.  What have you to set against them? Miss\nHalcombe's recognition of the woman, which recognition after-events\ninvalidate or contradict. Does Miss Halcombe assert her supposed\nsister's identity to the owner of the Asylum, and take legal means for\nrescuing her? No, she secretly bribes a nurse to let her escape.  When\nthe patient has been released in this doubtful manner, and is taken to\nMr. Fairlie, does he recognise her? Is he staggered for one instant in\nhis belief of his niece's death?  No.  Do the servants recognise her?\nNo.  Is she kept in the neighbourhood to assert her own identity, and\nto stand the test of further proceedings? No, she is privately taken to\nLondon.  In the meantime you have recognised her also, but you are not\na relative--you are not even an old friend of the family.  The servants\ncontradict you, and Mr. Fairlie contradicts Miss Halcombe, and the\nsupposed Lady Glyde contradicts herself.  She declares she passed the\nnight in London at a certain house.  Your own evidence shows that she\nhas never been near that house, and your own admission is that her\ncondition of mind prevents you from producing her anywhere to submit to\ninvestigation, and to speak for herself.  I pass over minor points of\nevidence on both sides to save time, and I ask you, if this case were\nto go now into a court of law--to go before a jury, bound to take facts\nas they reasonably appear--where are your proofs?\"\n\nI was obliged to wait and collect myself before I could answer him.  It\nwas the first time the story of Laura and the story of Marian had been\npresented to me from a stranger's point of view--the first time the\nterrible obstacles that lay across our path had been made to show\nthemselves in their true character.\n\n\"There can be no doubt,\" I said, \"that the facts, as you have stated\nthem, appear to tell against us, but----\"\n\n\"But you think those facts can be explained away,\" interposed Mr.\nKyrle.  \"Let me tell you the result of my experience on that point.\nWhen an English jury has to choose between a plain fact ON the surface\nand a long explanation UNDER the surface, it always takes the fact in\npreference to the explanation.  For example, Lady Glyde (I call the\nlady you represent by that name for argument's sake) declares she has\nslept at a certain house, and it is proved that she has not slept at\nthat house.  You explain this circumstance by entering into the state\nof her mind, and deducing from it a metaphysical conclusion.  I don't\nsay the conclusion is wrong--I only say that the jury will take the\nfact of her contradicting herself in preference to any reason for the\ncontradiction that you can offer.\"\n\n\"But is it not possible,\" I urged, \"by dint of patience and exertion,\nto discover additional evidence? Miss Halcombe and I have a few hundred\npounds----\"\n\nHe looked at me with a half-suppressed pity, and shook his head.\n\n\"Consider the subject, Mr. Hartright, from your own point of view,\" he\nsaid.  \"If you are right about Sir Percival Glyde and Count Fosco\n(which I don't admit, mind), every imaginable difficulty would be\nthrown in the way of your getting fresh evidence.  Every obstacle of\nlitigation would be raised--every point in the case would be\nsystematically contested--and by the time we had spent our thousands\ninstead of our hundreds, the final result would, in all probability, be\nagainst us.  Questions of identity, where instances of personal\nresemblance are concerned, are, in themselves, the hardest of all\nquestions to settle--the hardest, even when they are free from the\ncomplications which beset the case we are now discussing.  I really see\nno prospect of throwing any light whatever on this extraordinary\naffair.  Even if the person buried in Limmeridge churchyard be not Lady\nGlyde, she was, in life, on your own showing, so like her, that we\nshould gain nothing, if we applied for the necessary authority to have\nthe body exhumed.  In short, there is no case, Mr. Hartright--there is\nreally no case.\"\n\nI was determined to believe that there WAS a case, and in that\ndetermination shifted my ground, and appealed to him once more.\n\n\"Are there not other proofs that we might produce besides the proof of\nidentity?\" I asked.\n\n\"Not as you are situated,\" he replied.  \"The simplest and surest of all\nproofs, the proof by comparison of dates, is, as I understand,\naltogether out of your reach.  If you could show a discrepancy between\nthe date of the doctor's certificate and the date of Lady Glyde's\njourney to London, the matter would wear a totally different aspect,\nand I should be the first to say, Let us go on.\"\n\n\"That date may yet be recovered, Mr. Kyrle.\"\n\n\"On the day when it is recovered, Mr. Hartright, you will have a case.\nIf you have any prospect, at this moment, of getting at it--tell me,\nand we shall see if I can advise you.\"\n\nI considered.  The housekeeper could not help us--Laura could not help\nus--Marian could not help us.  In all probability, the only persons in\nexistence who knew the date were Sir Percival and the Count.\n\n\"I can think of no means of ascertaining the date at present,\" I said,\n\"because I can think of no persons who are sure to know it, but Count\nFosco and Sir Percival Glyde.\"\n\nMr. Kyrle's calmly attentive face relaxed, for the first time, into a\nsmile.\n\n\"With your opinion of the conduct of those two gentlemen,\" he said,\n\"you don't expect help in that quarter, I presume? If they have\ncombined to gain large sums of money by a conspiracy, they are not\nlikely to confess it, at any rate.\"\n\n\"They may be forced to confess it, Mr. Kyrle.\"\n\n\"By whom?\"\n\n\"By me.\"\n\nWe both rose.  He looked me attentively in the face with more\nappearance of interest than he had shown yet.  I could see that I had\nperplexed him a little.\n\n\"You are very determined,\" he said.  \"You have, no doubt, a personal\nmotive for proceeding, into which it is not my business to inquire.  If\na case can be produced in the future, I can only say, my best\nassistance is at your service.  At the same time I must warn you, as\nthe money question always enters into the law question, that I see\nlittle hope, even if you ultimately established the fact of Lady\nGlyde's being alive, of recovering her fortune.  The foreigner would\nprobably leave the country before proceedings were commenced, and Sir\nPercival's embarrassments are numerous enough and pressing enough to\ntransfer almost any sum of money he may possess from himself to his\ncreditors.  You are of course aware----\"\n\nI stopped him at that point.\n\n\"Let me beg that we may not discuss Lady Glyde's affairs,\" I said. \"I\nhave never known anything about them in former times, and I know\nnothing of them now--except that her fortune is lost. You are right in\nassuming that I have personal motives for stirring in this matter.  I\nwish those motives to be always as disinterested as they are at the\npresent moment----\"\n\nHe tried to interpose and explain.  I was a little heated, I suppose,\nby feeling that he had doubted me, and I went on bluntly, without\nwaiting to hear him.\n\n\"There shall be no money motive,\" I said, \"no idea of personal\nadvantage in the service I mean to render to Lady Glyde.  She has been\ncast out as a stranger from the house in which she was born--a lie\nwhich records her death has been written on her mother's tomb--and\nthere are two men, alive and unpunished, who are responsible for it.\nThat house shall open again to receive her in the presence of every\nsoul who followed the false funeral to the grave--that lie shall be\npublicly erased from the tombstone by the authority of the head of the\nfamily, and those two men shall answer for their crime to ME, though\nthe justice that sits in tribunals is powerless to pursue them.  I have\ngiven my life to that purpose, and, alone as I stand, if God spares me,\nI will accomplish it.\"\n\nHe drew back towards his table, and said nothing.  His face showed\nplainly that he thought my delusion had got the better of my reason,\nand that he considered it totally useless to give me any more advice.\n\n\"We each keep our opinion, Mr. Kyrle,\" I said, \"and we must wait till\nthe events of the future decide between us.  In the meantime, I am much\nobliged to you for the attention you have given to my statement.  You\nhave shown me that the legal remedy lies, in every sense of the word,\nbeyond our means.  We cannot produce the law proof, and we are not rich\nenough to pay the law expenses.  It is something gained to know that.\"\n\nI bowed and walked to the door.  He called me back and gave me the\nletter which I had seen him place on the table by itself at the\nbeginning of our interview.\n\n\"This came by post a few days ago,\" he said.  \"Perhaps you will not\nmind delivering it? Pray tell Miss Halcombe, at the same time, that I\nsincerely regret being, thus far, unable to help her, except by advice,\nwhich will not be more welcome, I am afraid, to her than to you.\"\n\nI looked at the letter while he was speaking.  It was addressed to\n\"Miss Halcombe.  Care of Messrs.  Gilmore & Kyrle, Chancery Lane.\" The\nhandwriting was quite unknown to me.\n\nOn leaving the room I asked one last question.\n\n\"Do you happen to know,\" I said, \"if Sir Percival Glyde is still in\nParis?\"\n\n\"He has returned to London,\" replied Mr. Kyrle.  \"At least I heard so\nfrom his solicitor, whom I met yesterday.\"\n\nAfter that answer I went out.\n\nOn leaving the office the first precaution to be observed was to\nabstain from attracting attention by stopping to look about me.  I\nwalked towards one of the quietest of the large squares on the north of\nHolborn, then suddenly stopped and turned round at a place where a long\nstretch of pavement was left behind me.\n\nThere were two men at the corner of the square who had stopped also,\nand who were standing talking together.  After a moment's reflection I\nturned back so as to pass them.  One moved as I came near, and turned\nthe corner leading from the square into the street.  The other remained\nstationary.  I looked at him as I passed and instantly recognised one\nof the men who had watched me before I left England.\n\nIf I had been free to follow my own instincts, I should probably have\nbegun by speaking to the man, and have ended by knocking him down.  But\nI was bound to consider consequences.  If I once placed myself publicly\nin the wrong, I put the weapons at once into Sir Percival's hands.\nThere was no choice but to oppose cunning by cunning.  I turned into\nthe street down which the second man had disappeared, and passed him,\nwaiting in a doorway.  He was a stranger to me, and I was glad to make\nsure of his personal appearance in case of future annoyance.  Having\ndone this, I again walked northward till I reached the New Road.  There\nI turned aside to the west (having the men behind me all the time), and\nwaited at a point where I knew myself to be at some distance from a\ncab-stand, until a fast two-wheel cab, empty, should happen to pass me.\nOne passed in a few minutes.  I jumped in and told the man to drive\nrapidly towards Hyde Park.  There was no second fast cab for the spies\nbehind me.  I saw them dart across to the other side of the road, to\nfollow me by running, until a cab or a cab-stand came in their way.\nBut I had the start of them, and when I stopped the driver and got out,\nthey were nowhere in sight.  I crossed Hyde Park and made sure, on the\nopen ground, that I was free.  When I at last turned my steps\nhomewards, it was not till many hours later--not till after dark.\n\n\n\nI found Marian waiting for me alone in the little sitting-room. She had\npersuaded Laura to go to rest, after first promising to show me her\ndrawing the moment I came in.  The poor little dim faint sketch--so\ntrifling in itself, so touching in its associations--was propped up\ncarefully on the table with two books, and was placed where the faint\nlight of the one candle we allowed ourselves might fall on it to the\nbest advantage.  I sat down to look at the drawing, and to tell Marian,\nin whispers, what had happened.  The partition which divided us from\nthe next room was so thin that we could almost hear Laura's breathing,\nand we might have disturbed her if we had spoken aloud.\n\nMarian preserved her composure while I described my interview with Mr.\nKyrle.  But her face became troubled when I spoke next of the men who\nhad followed me from the lawyer's office, and when I told her of the\ndiscovery of Sir Percival's return.\n\n\"Bad news, Walter,\" she said, \"the worst news you could bring. Have you\nnothing more to tell me?\"\n\n\"I have something to give you,\" I replied, handing her the note which\nMr. Kyrle had confided to my care.\n\nShe looked at the address and recognised the handwriting instantly.\n\n\"You know your correspondent?\" I said.\n\n\"Too well,\" she answered.  \"My correspondent is Count Fosco.\"\n\nWith that reply she opened the note.  Her face flushed deeply while she\nread it--her eyes brightened with anger as she handed it to me to read\nin my turn.\n\nThe note contained these lines--\n\n\n\n\"Impelled by honourable admiration--honourable to myself, honourable to\nyou--I write, magnificent Marian, in the interests of your\ntranquillity, to say two consoling words--\n\n\"Fear nothing!\n\n\"Exercise your fine natural sense and remain in retirement.  Dear and\nadmirable woman, invite no dangerous publicity.  Resignation is\nsublime--adopt it.  The modest repose of home is eternally fresh--enjoy\nit.  The storms of life pass harmless over the valley of\nSeclusion--dwell, dear lady, in the valley.\n\n\"Do this and I authorise you to fear nothing.  No new calamity shall\nlacerate your sensibilities--sensibilities precious to me as my own.\nYou shall not be molested, the fair companion of your retreat shall not\nbe pursued.  She has found a new asylum in your heart.  Priceless\nasylum!--I envy her and leave her there.\n\n\"One last word of affectionate warning, of paternal caution, and I tear\nmyself from the charm of addressing you--I close these fervent lines.\n\n\"Advance no farther than you have gone already, compromise no serious\ninterests, threaten nobody.  Do not, I implore you, force me into\naction--ME, the Man of Action--when it is the cherished object of my\nambition to be passive, to restrict the vast reach of my energies and\nmy combinations for your sake.  If you have rash friends, moderate\ntheir deplorable ardour.  If Mr. Hartright returns to England, hold no\ncommunication with him.  I walk on a path of my own, and Percival\nfollows at my heels.  On the day when Mr. Hartright crosses that path,\nhe is a lost man.\"\n\n\n\nThe only signature to these lines was the initial letter F, surrounded\nby a circle of intricate flourishes.  I threw the letter on the table\nwith all the contempt that I felt for it.\n\n\"He is trying to frighten you--a sure sign that he is frightened\nhimself,\" I said.\n\nShe was too genuine a woman to treat the letter as I treated it. The\ninsolent familiarity of the language was too much for her self-control.\nAs she looked at me across the table, her hands clenched themselves in\nher lap, and the old quick fiery temper flamed out again brightly in\nher cheeks and her eyes.\n\n\"Walter!\" she said, \"if ever those two men are at your mercy, and if\nyou are obliged to spare one of them, don't let it be the Count.\"\n\n\"I will keep this letter, Marian, to help my memory when the time\ncomes.\"\n\nShe looked at me attentively as I put the letter away in my pocket-book.\n\n\"When the time comes?\" she repeated.  \"Can you speak of the future as\nif you were certain of it?--certain after what you have heard in Mr.\nKyrle's office, after what has happened to you to-day?\"\n\n\"I don't count the time from to-day, Marian.  All I have done to-day\nis to ask another man to act for me.  I count from to-morrow----\"\n\n\"Why from to-morrow?\"\n\n\"Because to-morrow I mean to act for myself.\"\n\n\"How?\"\n\n\"I shall go to Blackwater by the first train, and return, I hope, at\nnight.\"\n\n\"To Blackwater!\"\n\n\"Yes.  I have had time to think since I left Mr. Kyrle.  His opinion on\none point confirms my own.  We must persist to the last in hunting down\nthe date of Laura's journey.  The one weak point in the conspiracy, and\nprobably the one chance of proving that she is a living woman, centre\nin the discovery of that date.\"\n\n\"You mean,\" said Marian, \"the discovery that Laura did not leave\nBlackwater Park till after the date of her death on the doctor's\ncertificate?\"\n\n\"Certainly.\"\n\n\"What makes you think it might have been AFTER?  Laura can tell us\nnothing of the time she was in London.\"\n\n\"But the owner of the Asylum told you that she was received there on\nthe twenty-seventh of July.  I doubt Count Fosco's ability to keep her\nin London, and to keep her insensible to all that was passing around\nher, more than one night.  In that case, she must have started on the\ntwenty-sixth, and must have come to London one day after the date of\nher own death on the doctor's certificate. If we can prove that date,\nwe prove our case against Sir Percival and the Count.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes--I see! But how is the proof to be obtained?\"\n\n\"Mrs. Michelson's narrative has suggested to me two ways of trying to\nobtain it.  One of them is to question the doctor, Mr. Dawson, who must\nknow when he resumed his attendance at Blackwater Park after Laura left\nthe house.  The other is to make inquiries at the inn to which Sir\nPercival drove away by himself at night.  We know that his departure\nfollowed Laura's after the lapse of a few hours, and we may get at the\ndate in that way.  The attempt is at least worth making, and to-morrow\nI am determined it shall be made.\"\n\n\"And suppose it fails--I look at the worst now, Walter; but I will look\nat the best if disappointments come to try us--suppose no one can help\nyou at Blackwater?\"\n\n\"There are two men who can help me, and shall help me in London--Sir\nPercival and the Count.  Innocent people may well forget the date--but\nTHEY are guilty, and THEY know it.  If I fail everywhere else, I mean\nto force a confession out of one or both of them on my own terms.\"\n\nAll the woman flushed up in Marian's face as I spoke.\n\n\"Begin with the Count,\" she whispered eagerly.  \"For my sake, begin\nwith the Count.\"\n\n\"We must begin, for Laura's sake, where there is the best chance of\nsuccess,\" I replied.\n\nThe colour faded from her face again, and she shook her head sadly.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said, \"you are right--it was mean and miserable of me to say\nthat.  I try to be patient, Walter, and succeed better now than I did\nin happier times.  But I have a little of my old temper still left, and\nit will get the better of me when I think of the Count!\"\n\n\"His turn will come,\" I said.  \"But, remember, there is no weak place\nin his life that we know of yet.\" I waited a little to let her recover\nher self-possession, and then spoke the decisive words--\n\n\"Marian! There is a weak place we both know of in Sir Percival's\nlife----\"\n\n\"You mean the Secret!\"\n\n\"Yes: the Secret.  It is our only sure hold on him.  I can force him\nfrom his position of security, I can drag him and his villainy into the\nface of day, by no other means.  Whatever the Count may have done, Sir\nPercival has consented to the conspiracy against Laura from another\nmotive besides the motive of gain.  You heard him tell the Count that\nhe believed his wife knew enough to ruin him? You heard him say that he\nwas a lost man if the secret of Anne Catherick was known?\"\n\n\"Yes! yes! I did.\"\n\n\"Well, Marian, when our other resources have failed us, I mean to know\nthe Secret.  My old superstition clings to me, even yet.  I say again\nthe woman in white is a living influence in our three lives.  The End\nis appointed--the End is drawing us on--and Anne Catherick, dead in her\ngrave, points the way to it still!\"\n\n\nV\n\n\nThe story of my first inquiries in Hampshire is soon told.\n\nMy early departure from London enabled me to reach Mr. Dawson's house\nin the forenoon.  Our interview, so far as the object of my visit was\nconcerned, led to no satisfactory result.\n\nMr. Dawson's books certainly showed when he had resumed his attendance\non Miss Halcombe at Blackwater Park, but it was not possible to\ncalculate back from this date with any exactness, without such help\nfrom Mrs. Michelson as I knew she was unable to afford.  She could not\nsay from memory (who, in similar cases, ever can?) how many days had\nelapsed between the renewal of the doctor's attendance on his patient\nand the previous departure of Lady Glyde.  She was almost certain of\nhaving mentioned the circumstance of the departure to Miss Halcombe, on\nthe day after it happened--but then she was no more able to fix the\ndate of the day on which this disclosure took place, than to fix the\ndate of the day before, when Lady Glyde had left for London.  Neither\ncould she calculate, with any nearer approach to exactness, the time\nthat had passed from the departure of her mistress, to the period when\nthe undated letter from Madame Fosco arrived.  Lastly, as if to\ncomplete the series of difficulties, the doctor himself, having been\nill at the time, had omitted to make his usual entry of the day of the\nweek and month when the gardener from Blackwater Park had called on him\nto deliver Mrs. Michelson's message.\n\nHopeless of obtaining assistance from Mr. Dawson, I resolved to try\nnext if I could establish the date of Sir Percival's arrival at\nKnowlesbury.\n\nIt seemed like a fatality! When I reached Knowlesbury the inn was shut\nup, and bills were posted on the walls.  The speculation had been a bad\none, as I was informed, ever since the time of the railway.  The new\nhotel at the station had gradually absorbed the business, and the old\ninn (which we knew to be the inn at which Sir Percival had put up), had\nbeen closed about two months since. The proprietor had left the town\nwith all his goods and chattels, and where he had gone I could not\npositively ascertain from any one.  The four people of whom I inquired\ngave me four different accounts of his plans and projects when he left\nKnowlesbury.\n\nThere were still some hours to spare before the last train left for\nLondon, and I drove back again in a fly from the Knowlesbury station to\nBlackwater Park, with the purpose of questioning the gardener and the\nperson who kept the lodge.  If they, too, proved unable to assist me,\nmy resources for the present were at an end, and I might return to town.\n\nI dismissed the fly a mile distant from the park, and getting my\ndirections from the driver, proceeded by myself to the house.\n\nAs I turned into the lane from the high-road, I saw a man, with a\ncarpet-bag, walking before me rapidly on the way to the lodge.  He was\na little man, dressed in shabby black, and wearing a remarkably large\nhat.  I set him down (as well as it was possible to judge) for a\nlawyer's clerk, and stopped at once to widen the distance between us.\nHe had not heard me, and he walked on out of sight, without looking\nback.  When I passed through the gates myself, a little while\nafterwards, he was not visible--he had evidently gone on to the house.\n\nThere were two women in the lodge.  One of them was old, the other I\nknew at once, by Marian's description of her, to be Margaret Porcher.\n\nI asked first if Sir Percival was at the Park, and receiving a reply in\nthe negative, inquired next when he had left it.  Neither of the women\ncould tell me more than that he had gone away in the summer.  I could\nextract nothing from Margaret Porcher but vacant smiles and shakings of\nthe head.  The old woman was a little more intelligent, and I managed\nto lead her into speaking of the manner of Sir Percival's departure,\nand of the alarm that it caused her. She remembered her master calling\nher out of bed, and remembered his frightening her by swearing--but the\ndate at which the occurrence happened was, as she honestly\nacknowledged, \"quite beyond her.\"\n\nOn leaving the lodge I saw the gardener at work not far off.  When I\nfirst addressed him, he looked at me rather distrustfully, but on my\nusing Mrs. Michelson's name, with a civil reference to himself, he\nentered into conversation readily enough.  There is no need to describe\nwhat passed between us--it ended, as all my other attempts to discover\nthe date had ended.  The gardener knew that his master had driven away,\nat night, \"some time in July, the last fortnight or the last ten days\nin the month\"--and knew no more.\n\nWhile we were speaking together I saw the man in black, with the large\nhat, come out from the house, and stand at some little distance\nobserving us.\n\nCertain suspicions of his errand at Blackwater Park had already crossed\nmy mind.  They were now increased by the gardener's inability (or\nunwillingness) to tell me who the man was, and I determined to clear\nthe way before me, if possible, by speaking to him.  The plainest\nquestion I could put as a stranger would be to inquire if the house was\nallowed to be shown to visitors.  I walked up to the man at once, and\naccosted him in those words.\n\nHis look and manner unmistakably betrayed that he knew who I was, and\nthat he wanted to irritate me into quarrelling with him.  His reply was\ninsolent enough to have answered the purpose, if I had been less\ndetermined to control myself.  As it was, I met him with the most\nresolute politeness, apologised for my involuntary intrusion (which he\ncalled a \"trespass,\") and left the grounds. It was exactly as I\nsuspected.  The recognition of me when I left Mr. Kyrle's office had\nbeen evidently communicated to Sir Percival Glyde, and the man in black\nhad been sent to the Park in anticipation of my making inquiries at the\nhouse or in the neighbourhood.  If I had given him the least chance of\nlodging any sort of legal complaint against me, the interference of the\nlocal magistrate would no doubt have been turned to account as a clog\non my proceedings, and a means of separating me from Marian and Laura\nfor some days at least.\n\nI was prepared to be watched on the way from Blackwater Park to the\nstation, exactly as I had been watched in London the day before.  But I\ncould not discover at the time, whether I was really followed on this\noccasion or not.  The man in black might have had means of tracking me\nat his disposal of which I was not aware, but I certainly saw nothing\nof him, in his own person, either on the way to the station, or\nafterwards on my arrival at the London terminus in the evening.  I\nreached home on foot, taking the precaution, before I approached our\nown door, of walking round by the loneliest street in the\nneighbourhood, and there stopping and looking back more than once over\nthe open space behind me.  I had first learnt to use this stratagem\nagainst suspected treachery in the wilds of Central America--and now I\nwas practising it again, with the same purpose and with even greater\ncaution, in the heart of civilised London!\n\nNothing had happened to alarm Marian during my absence.  She asked\neagerly what success I had met with.  When I told her she could not\nconceal her surprise at the indifference with which I spoke of the\nfailure of my investigations thus far.\n\nThe truth was, that the ill-success of my inquiries had in no sense\ndaunted me.  I had pursued them as a matter of duty, and I had expected\nnothing from them.  In the state of my mind at that time, it was almost\na relief to me to know that the struggle was now narrowed to a trial of\nstrength between myself and Sir Percival Glyde.  The vindictive motive\nhad mingled itself all along with my other and better motives, and I\nconfess it was a satisfaction to me to feel that the surest way, the\nonly way left, of serving Laura's cause, was to fasten my hold firmly\non the villain who had married her.\n\nWhile I acknowledge that I was not strong enough to keep my motives\nabove the reach of this instinct of revenge, I can honestly say\nsomething in my own favour on the other side.  No base speculation on\nthe future relations of Laura and myself, and on the private and\npersonal concessions which I might force from Sir Percival if I once\nhad him at my mercy, ever entered my mind. I never said to myself, \"If\nI do succeed, it shall be one result of my success that I put it out of\nher husband's power to take her from me again.\" I could not look at her\nand think of the future with such thoughts as those.  The sad sight of\nthe change in her from her former self, made the one interest of my\nlove an interest of tenderness and compassion which her father or her\nbrother might have felt, and which I felt, God knows, in my inmost\nheart.  All my hopes looked no farther on now than to the day of her\nrecovery. There, till she was strong again and happy again--there, till\nshe could look at me as she had once looked, and speak to me as she had\nonce spoken--the future of my happiest thoughts and my dearest wishes\nended.\n\nThese words are written under no prompting of idle self-contemplation.\nPassages in this narrative are soon to come which will set the minds of\nothers in judgment on my conduct.  It is right that the best and the\nworst of me should be fairly balanced before that time.\n\n\n\nOn the morning after my return from Hampshire I took Marian upstairs\ninto my working-room, and there laid before her the plan that I had\nmatured thus far, for mastering the one assailable point in the life of\nSir Percival Glyde.\n\nThe way to the Secret lay through the mystery, hitherto impenetrable to\nall of us, of the woman in white.  The approach to that in its turn\nmight be gained by obtaining the assistance of Anne Catherick's mother,\nand the only ascertainable means of prevailing on Mrs. Catherick to act\nor to speak in the matter depended on the chance of my discovering\nlocal particulars and family particulars first of all from Mrs.\nClements.  After thinking the subject over carefully, I felt certain\nthat I could only begin the new inquiries by placing myself in\ncommunication with the faithful friend and protectress of Anne\nCatherick.\n\nThe first difficulty then was to find Mrs. Clements.\n\nI was indebted to Marian's quick perception for meeting this necessity\nat once by the best and simplest means.  She proposed to write to the\nfarm near Limmeridge (Todd's Corner), to inquire whether Mrs. Clements\nhad communicated with Mrs. Todd during the past few months.  How Mrs.\nClements had been separated from Anne it was impossible for us to say,\nbut that separation once effected, it would certainly occur to Mrs.\nClements to inquire after the missing woman in the neighbourhood of all\nothers to which she was known to be most attached--the neighbourhood of\nLimmeridge.  I saw directly that Marian's proposal offered us a\nprospect of success, and she wrote to Mrs. Todd accordingly by that\nday's post.\n\nWhile we were waiting for the reply, I made myself master of all the\ninformation Marian could afford on the subject of Sir Percival's\nfamily, and of his early life.  She could only speak on these topics\nfrom hearsay, but she was reasonably certain of the truth of what\nlittle she had to tell.\n\nSir Percival was an only child.  His father, Sir Felix Glyde, had\nsuffered from his birth under a painful and incurable deformity, and\nhad shunned all society from his earliest years.  His sole happiness\nwas in the enjoyment of music, and he had married a lady with tastes\nsimilar to his own, who was said to be a most accomplished musician.\nHe inherited the Blackwater property while still a young man.  Neither\nhe nor his wife after taking possession, made advances of any sort\ntowards the society of the neighbourhood, and no one endeavoured to\ntempt them into abandoning their reserve, with the one disastrous\nexception of the rector of the parish.\n\nThe rector was the worst of all innocent mischief-makers--an\nover-zealous  man.  He had heard that Sir Felix had left College with\nthe character of being little better than a revolutionist in politics\nand an infidel in religion, and he arrived conscientiously at the\nconclusion that it was his bounden duty to summon the lord of the manor\nto hear sound views enunciated in the parish church.  Sir Felix\nfiercely resented the clergyman's well-meant but ill-directed\ninterference, insulting him so grossly and so publicly, that the\nfamilies in the neighbourhood sent letters of indignant remonstrance to\nthe Park, and even the tenants of the Blackwater property expressed\ntheir opinion as strongly as they dared.  The baronet, who had no\ncountry tastes of any kind, and no attachment to the estate or to any\none living on it, declared that society at Blackwater should never have\na second chance of annoying him, and left the place from that moment.\n\nAfter a short residence in London he and his wife departed for the\nContinent, and never returned to England again.  They lived part of the\ntime in France and part in Germany--always keeping themselves in the\nstrict retirement which the morbid sense of his own personal deformity\nhad made a necessity to Sir Felix.  Their son, Percival, had been born\nabroad, and had been educated there by private tutors.  His mother was\nthe first of his parents whom he lost. His father had died a few years\nafter her, either in 1825 or 1826.  Sir Percival had been in England,\nas a young man, once or twice before that period, but his acquaintance\nwith the late Mr. Fairlie did not begin till after the time of his\nfather's death.  They soon became very intimate, although Sir Percival\nwas seldom, or never, at Limmeridge House in those days.  Mr. Frederick\nFairlie might have met him once or twice in Mr. Philip Fairlie's\ncompany, but he could have known little of him at that or at any other\ntime.  Sir Percival's only intimate friend in the Fairlie family had\nbeen Laura's father.\n\nThese were all the particulars that I could gain from Marian. They\nsuggested nothing which was useful to my present purpose, but I noted\nthem down carefully, in the event of their proving to be of importance\nat any future period.\n\nMrs. Todd's reply (addressed, by our own wish, to a post-office at some\ndistance from us) had arrived at its destination when I went to apply\nfor it.  The chances, which had been all against us hitherto, turned\nfrom this moment in our favour.  Mrs. Todd's letter contained the first\nitem of information of which we were in search.\n\nMrs. Clements, it appeared, had (as we had conjectured) written to\nTodd's Corner, asking pardon in the first place for the abrupt manner\nin which she and Anne had left their friends at the farm-house (on the\nmorning after I had met the woman in white in Limmeridge churchyard),\nand then informing Mrs. Todd of Anne's disappearance, and entreating\nthat she would cause inquiries to be made in the neighbourhood, on the\nchance that the lost woman might have strayed back to Limmeridge. In\nmaking this request, Mrs. Clements had been careful to add to it the\naddress at which she might always be heard of, and that address Mrs.\nTodd now transmitted to Marian.  It was in London, and within half an\nhour's walk of our own lodging.\n\nIn the words of the proverb, I was resolved not to let the grass grow\nunder my feet.  The next morning I set forth to seek an interview with\nMrs.  Clements.  This was my first step forward in the investigation.\nThe story of the desperate attempt to which I now stood committed\nbegins here.\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\nThe address communicated by Mrs. Todd took me to a lodging-house\nsituated in a respectable street near the Gray's Inn Road.\n\nWhen I knocked the door was opened by Mrs. Clements herself.  She did\nnot appear to remember me, and asked what my business was.  I recalled\nto her our meeting in Limmeridge churchyard at the close of my\ninterview there with the woman in white, taking special care to remind\nher that I was the person who assisted Anne Catherick (as Anne had\nherself declared) to escape the pursuit from the Asylum.  This was my\nonly claim to the confidence of Mrs. Clements.  She remembered the\ncircumstance the moment I spoke of it, and asked me into the parlour,\nin the greatest anxiety to know if I had brought her any news of Anne.\n\nIt was impossible for me to tell her the whole truth without, at the\nsame time, entering into particulars on the subject of the conspiracy,\nwhich it would have been dangerous to confide to a stranger.  I could\nonly abstain most carefully from raising any false hopes, and then\nexplain that the object of my visit was to discover the persons who\nwere really responsible for Anne's disappearance.  I even added, so as\nto exonerate myself from any after-reproach of my own conscience, that\nI entertained not the least hope of being able to trace her--that I\nbelieved we should never see her alive again--and that my main interest\nin the affair was to bring to punishment two men whom I suspected to be\nconcerned in luring her away, and at whose hands I and some dear\nfriends of mine had suffered a grievous wrong.  With this explanation I\nleft it to Mrs. Clements to say whether our interest in the matter\n(whatever difference there might be in the motives which actuated us)\nwas not the same, and whether she felt any reluctance to forward my\nobject by giving me such information on the subject of my inquiries as\nshe happened to possess.\n\nThe poor woman was at first too much confused and agitated to\nunderstand thoroughly what I said to her.  She could only reply that I\nwas welcome to anything she could tell me in return for the kindness I\nhad shown to Anne; but as she was not very quick and ready, at the best\nof times, in talking to strangers, she would beg me to put her in the\nright way, and to say where I wished her to begin.\n\nKnowing by experience that the plainest narrative attainable from\npersons who are not accustomed to arrange their ideas, is the narrative\nwhich goes far enough back at the beginning to avoid all impediments of\nretrospection in its course, I asked Mrs. Clements to tell me first\nwhat had happened after she had left Limmeridge, and so, by watchful\nquestioning, carried her on from point to point, till we reached the\nperiod of Anne's disappearance.\n\nThe substance of the information which I thus obtained was as follows:--\n\nOn leaving the farm at Todd's Corner, Mrs. Clements and Anne had\ntravelled that day as far as Derby, and had remained there a week on\nAnne's account.  They had then gone on to London, and had lived in the\nlodging occupied by Mrs. Clements at that time for a month or more,\nwhen circumstances connected with the house and the landlord had\nobliged them to change their quarters.  Anne's terror of being\ndiscovered in London or its neighbourhood, whenever they ventured to\nwalk out, had gradually communicated itself to Mrs. Clements, and she\nhad determined on removing to one of the most out-of-the-way places in\nEngland--to the town of Grimsby in Lincolnshire, where her deceased\nhusband had passed all his early life.  His relatives were respectable\npeople settled in the town--they had always treated Mrs. Clements with\ngreat kindness, and she thought it impossible to do better than go\nthere and take the advice of her husband's friends.  Anne would not\nhear of returning to her mother at Welmingham, because she had been\nremoved to the Asylum from that place, and because Sir Percival would\nbe certain to go back there and find her again.  There was serious\nweight in this objection, and Mrs. Clements felt that it was not to be\neasily removed.\n\nAt Grimsby the first serious symptoms of illness had shown themselves\nin Anne.  They appeared soon after the news of Lady Glyde's marriage\nhad been made public in the newspapers, and had reached her through\nthat medium.\n\nThe medical man who was sent for to attend the sick woman discovered at\nonce that she was suffering from a serious affection of the heart.  The\nillness lasted long, left her very weak, and returned at intervals,\nthough with mitigated severity, again and again.  They remained at\nGrimsby, in consequence, during the first half of the new year, and\nthere they might probably have stayed much longer, but for the sudden\nresolution which Anne took at this time to venture back to Hampshire,\nfor the purpose of obtaining a private interview with Lady Glyde.\n\nMrs. Clements did all in her power to oppose the execution of this\nhazardous and unaccountable project.  No explanation of her motives was\noffered by Anne, except that she believed the day of her death was not\nfar off, and that she had something on her mind which must be\ncommunicated to Lady Glyde, at any risk, in secret. Her resolution to\naccomplish this purpose was so firmly settled that she declared her\nintention of going to Hampshire by herself if Mrs. Clements felt any\nunwillingness to go with her.  The doctor, on being consulted, was of\nopinion that serious opposition to her wishes would, in all\nprobability, produce another and perhaps a fatal fit of illness, and\nMrs. Clements, under this advice, yielded to necessity, and once more,\nwith sad forebodings of trouble and danger to come, allowed Anne\nCatherick to have her own way.\n\nOn the journey from London to Hampshire Mrs. Clements discovered that\none of their fellow-passengers was well acquainted with the\nneighbourhood of Blackwater, and could give her all the information she\nneeded on the subject of localities.  In this way she found out that\nthe only place they could go to, which was not dangerously near to Sir\nPercival's residence, was a large village called Sandon.  The distance\nhere from Blackwater Park was between three and four miles--and that\ndistance, and back again, Anne had walked on each occasion when she had\nappeared in the neighbourhood of the lake.\n\nFor the few days during which they were at Sandon without being\ndiscovered they had lived a little away from the village, in the\ncottage of a decent widow-woman who had a bedroom to let, and whose\ndiscreet silence Mrs. Clements had done her best to secure, for the\nfirst week at least.  She had also tried hard to induce Anne to be\ncontent with writing to Lady Glyde, in the first instance; but the\nfailure of the warning contained in the anonymous letter sent to\nLimmeridge had made Anne resolute to speak this time, and obstinate in\nthe determination to go on her errand alone.\n\nMrs. Clements, nevertheless, followed her privately on each occasion\nwhen she went to the lake, without, however, venturing near enough to\nthe boat-house to be witness of what took place there.  When Anne\nreturned for the last time from the dangerous neighbourhood, the\nfatigue of walking, day after day, distances which were far too great\nfor her strength, added to the exhausting effect of the agitation from\nwhich she had suffered, produced the result which Mrs. Clements had\ndreaded all along.  The old pain over the heart and the other symptoms\nof the illness at Grimsby returned, and Anne was confined to her bed in\nthe cottage.\n\nIn this emergency the first necessity, as Mrs. Clements knew by\nexperience, was to endeavour to quiet Anne's anxiety of mind, and for\nthis purpose the good woman went herself the next day to the lake, to\ntry if she could find Lady Glyde (who would be sure, as Anne said, to\ntake her daily walk to the boat-house), and prevail on her to come back\nprivately to the cottage near Sandon.  On reaching the outskirts of the\nplantation Mrs. Clements encountered, not Lady Glyde, but a tall,\nstout, elderly gentleman, with a book in his hand--in other words,\nCount Fosco.\n\nThe Count, after looking at her very attentively for a moment, asked if\nshe expected to see any one in that place, and added, before she could\nreply, that he was waiting there with a message from Lady Glyde, but\nthat he was not quite certain whether the person then before him\nanswered the description of the person with whom he was desired to\ncommunicate.\n\nUpon this Mrs. Clements at once confided her errand to him, and\nentreated that he would help to allay Anne's anxiety by trusting his\nmessage to her.  The Count most readily and kindly complied with her\nrequest.  The message, he said, was a very important one. Lady Glyde\nentreated Anne and her good friend to return immediately to London, as\nshe felt certain that Sir Percival would discover them if they remained\nany longer in the neighbourhood of Blackwater.  She was herself going\nto London in a short time, and if Mrs. Clements and Anne would go there\nfirst, and would let her know what their address was, they should hear\nfrom her and see her in a fortnight or less.  The Count added that he\nhad already attempted to give a friendly warning to Anne herself, but\nthat she had been too much startled by seeing that he was a stranger to\nlet him approach and speak to her.\n\nTo this Mrs. Clements replied, in the greatest alarm and distress, that\nshe asked nothing better than to take Anne safely to London, but that\nthere was no present hope of removing her from the dangerous\nneighbourhood, as she lay ill in her bed at that moment. The Count\ninquired if Mrs. Clements had sent for medical advice, and hearing that\nshe had hitherto hesitated to do so, from the fear of making their\nposition publicly known in the village, informed her that he was\nhimself a medical man, and that he would go back with her if she\npleased, and see what could be done for Anne.  Mrs. Clements (feeling a\nnatural confidence in the Count, as a person trusted with a secret\nmessage from Lady Glyde) gratefully accepted the offer, and they went\nback together to the cottage.\n\nAnne was asleep when they got there.  The Count started at the sight of\nher (evidently from astonishment at her resemblance to Lady Glyde).\nPoor Mrs. Clements supposed that he was only shocked to see how ill she\nwas.  He would not allow her to be awakened--he was contented with\nputting questions to Mrs. Clements about her symptoms, with looking at\nher, and with lightly touching her pulse.  Sandon was a large enough\nplace to have a grocer's and druggist's shop in it, and thither the\nCount went to write his prescription and to get the medicine made up.\nHe brought it back himself, and told Mrs. Clements that the medicine\nwas a powerful stimulant, and that it would certainly give Anne\nstrength to get up and bear the fatigue of a journey to London of only\na few hours.  The remedy was to be administered at stated times on that\nday and on the day after.  On the third day she would be well enough to\ntravel, and he arranged to meet Mrs. Clements at the Blackwater\nstation, and to see them off by the midday train.  If they did not\nappear he would assume that Anne was worse, and would proceed at once\nto the cottage.\n\nAs events turned out, no such emergency as this occurred.\n\nThis medicine had an extraordinary effect on Anne, and the good results\nof it were helped by the assurance Mrs. Clements could now give her\nthat she would soon see Lady Glyde in London.  At the appointed day and\ntime (when they had not been quite so long as a week in Hampshire\naltogether), they arrived at the station.  The Count was waiting there\nfor them, and was talking to an elderly lady, who appeared to be going\nto travel by the train to London also.  He most kindly assisted them,\nand put them into the carriage himself, begging Mrs. Clements not to\nforget to send her address to Lady Glyde.  The elderly lady did not\ntravel in the same compartment, and they did not notice what became of\nher on reaching the London terminus.  Mrs. Clements secured respectable\nlodgings in a quiet neighbourhood, and then wrote, as she had engaged\nto do, to inform Lady Glyde of the address.\n\nA little more than a fortnight passed, and no answer came.\n\nAt the end of that time a lady (the same elderly lady whom they had\nseen at the station) called in a cab, and said that she came from Lady\nGlyde, who was then at an hotel in London, and who wished to see Mrs.\nClements, for the purpose of arranging a future interview with Anne.\nMrs. Clements expressed her willingness (Anne being present at the\ntime, and entreating her to do so) to forward the object in view,\nespecially as she was not required to be away from the house for more\nthan half an hour at the most. She and the elderly lady (clearly Madame\nFosco) then left in the cab.  The lady stopped the cab, after it had\ndriven some distance, at a shop before they got to the hotel, and\nbegged Mrs. Clements to wait for her for a few minutes while she made a\npurchase that had been forgotten.  She never appeared again.\n\nAfter waiting some time Mrs. Clements became alarmed, and ordered the\ncabman to drive back to her lodgings.  When she got there, after an\nabsence of rather more than half an hour, Anne was gone.\n\nThe only information to be obtained from the people of the house was\nderived from the servant who waited on the lodgers.  She had opened the\ndoor to a boy from the street, who had left a letter for \"the young\nwoman who lived on the second floor\" (the part of the house which Mrs.\nClements occupied).  The servant had delivered the letter, had then\ngone downstairs, and five minutes afterwards had observed Anne open the\nfront door and go out, dressed in her bonnet and shawl.  She had\nprobably taken the letter with her, for it was not to be found, and it\nwas therefore impossible to tell what inducement had been offered to\nmake her leave the house.  It must have been a strong one, for she\nwould never stir out alone in London of her own accord.  If Mrs.\nClements had not known this by experience nothing would have induced\nher to go away in the cab, even for so short a time as half an hour\nonly.\n\nAs soon as she could collect her thoughts, the first idea that\nnaturally occurred to Mrs. Clements was to go and make inquiries at the\nAsylum, to which she dreaded that Anne had been taken back.\n\nShe went there the next day, having been informed of the locality in\nwhich the house was situated by Anne herself.  The answer she received\n(her application having in all probability been made a day or two\nbefore the false Anne Catherick had really been consigned to safe\nkeeping in the Asylum) was, that no such person had been brought back\nthere.  She had then written to Mrs. Catherick at Welmingham to know if\nshe had seen or heard anything of her daughter, and had received an\nanswer in the negative. After that reply had reached her, she was at\nthe end of her resources, and perfectly ignorant where else to inquire\nor what else to do.  From that time to this she had remained in total\nignorance of the cause of Anne's disappearance and of the end of Anne's\nstory.\n\n\n\nVII\n\n\nThus far the information which I had received from Mrs. Clements--though\nit established facts of which I had not previously been\naware--was of a preliminary character only.\n\nIt was clear that the series of deceptions which had removed Anne\nCatherick to London, and separated her from Mrs. Clements, had been\naccomplished solely by Count Fosco and the Countess, and the question\nwhether any part of the conduct of husband or wife had been of a kind\nto place either of them within reach of the law might be well worthy of\nfuture consideration.  But the purpose I had now in view led me in\nanother direction than this.  The immediate object of my visit to Mrs.\nClements was to make some approach at least to the discovery of Sir\nPercival's secret, and she had said nothing as yet which advanced me on\nmy way to that important end.  I felt the necessity of trying to awaken\nher recollections of other times, persons, and events than those on\nwhich her memory had hitherto been employed, and when I next spoke I\nspoke with that object indirectly in view.\n\n\"I wish I could be of any help to you in this sad calamity,\" I said.\n\"All I can do is to feel heartily for your distress.  If Anne had been\nyour own child, Mrs. Clements, you could have shown her no truer\nkindness--you could have made no readier sacrifices for her sake.\"\n\n\"There's no great merit in that, sir,\" said Mrs. Clements simply. \"The\npoor thing was as good as my own child to me.  I nursed her from a\nbaby, sir, bringing her up by hand--and a hard job it was to rear her.\nIt wouldn't go to my heart so to lose her if I hadn't made her first\nshort clothes and taught her to walk.  I always said she was sent to\nconsole me for never having chick or child of my own.  And now she's\nlost the old times keep coming back to my mind, and even at my age I\ncan't help crying about her--I can't indeed, sir!\"\n\nI waited a little to give Mrs. Clements time to compose herself. Was\nthe light that I had been looking for so long glimmering on me--far\noff, as yet--in the good woman's recollections of Anne's early life?\n\n\"Did you know Mrs. Catherick before Anne was born?\" I asked.\n\n\"Not very long, sir--not above four months.  We saw a great deal of\neach other in that time, but we were never very friendly together.\"\n\nHer voice was steadier as she made that reply.  Painful as many of her\nrecollections might be, I observed that it was unconsciously a relief\nto her mind to revert to the dimly-seen troubles of the past, after\ndwelling so long on the vivid sorrows of the present.\n\n\"Were you and Mrs. Catherick neighbours?\" I inquired, leading her\nmemory on as encouragingly as I could.\n\n\"Yes, sir--neighbours at Old Welmingham.\"\n\n\"OLD Welmingham? There are two places of that name, then, in Hampshire?\"\n\n\"Well, sir, there used to be in those days--better than three-and-twenty\nyears ago.  They built a new town about two miles off, convenient to the\nriver--and Old Welmingham, which was never much more than a village, got\nin time to be deserted.  The new town is the place they call Welmingham\nnow--but the old parish church is the parish church still.  It stands by\nitself, with the houses pulled down or gone to ruin all round it.  I've\nlived to see sad changes.  It was a pleasant, pretty place in my time.\"\n\n\"Did you live there before your marriage, Mrs. Clements?\"\n\n\"No, sir--I'm a Norfolk woman.  It wasn't the place my husband belonged\nto either.  He was from Grimsby, as I told you, and he served his\napprenticeship there.  But having friends down south, and hearing of an\nopening, he got into business at Southampton. It was in a small way,\nbut he made enough for a plain man to retire on, and settled at Old\nWelmingham.  I went there with him when he married me.  We were neither\nof us young, but we lived very happy together--happier than our\nneighbour, Mr. Catherick, lived along with his wife when they came to\nOld Welmingham a year or two afterwards.\"\n\n\"Was your husband acquainted with them before that?\"\n\n\"With Catherick, sir--not with his wife.  She was a stranger to both of\nus.  Some gentlemen had made interest for Catherick, and he got the\nsituation of clerk at Welmingham church, which was the reason of his\ncoming to settle in our neighbourhood.  He brought his newly-married\nwife along with him, and we heard in course of time she had been\nlady's-maid in a family that lived at Varneck Hall, near Southampton.\nCatherick had found it a hard matter to get her to marry him, in\nconsequence of her holding herself uncommonly high.  He had asked and\nasked, and given the thing up at last, seeing she was so contrary about\nit.  When he HAD given it up she turned contrary just the other way,\nand came to him of her own accord, without rhyme or reason seemingly.\nMy poor husband always said that was the time to have given her a\nlesson. But Catherick was too fond of her to do anything of the\nsort--he never checked her either before they were married or after.\nHe was a quick man in his feelings, letting them carry him a deal too\nfar, now in one way and now in another, and he would have spoilt a\nbetter wife than Mrs. Catherick if a better had married him.  I don't\nlike to speak ill of any one, sir, but she was a heartless woman, with\na terrible will of her own--fond of foolish admiration and fine\nclothes, and not caring to show so much as decent outward respect to\nCatherick, kindly as he always treated her.  My husband said he thought\nthings would turn out badly when they first came to live near us, and\nhis words proved true.  Before they had been quite four months in our\nneighbourhood there was a dreadful scandal and a miserable break-up in\ntheir household.  Both of them were in fault--I am afraid both of them\nwere equally in fault.\"\n\n\"You mean both husband and wife?\"\n\n\"Oh, no, sir! I don't mean Catherick--he was only to be pitied.  I\nmeant his wife and the person--\"\n\n\"And the person who caused the scandal?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.  A gentleman born and brought up, who ought to have set a\nbetter example.  You know him, sir--and my poor dear Anne knew him only\ntoo well.\"\n\n\"Sir Percival Glyde?\"\n\n\"Yes, Sir Percival Glyde.\"\n\nMy heart beat fast--I thought I had my hand on the clue.  How little I\nknew then of the windings of the labyrinths which were still to mislead\nme!\n\n\"Did Sir Percival live in your neighbourhood at that time?\" I asked.\n\n\"No, sir.  He came among us as a stranger.  His father had died not\nlong before in foreign parts.  I remember he was in mourning. He put up\nat the little inn on the river (they have pulled it down since that\ntime), where gentlemen used to go to fish.  He wasn't much noticed when\nhe first came--it was a common thing enough for gentlemen to travel\nfrom all parts of England to fish in our river.\"\n\n\"Did he make his appearance in the village before Anne was born?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.  Anne was born in the June month of eighteen hundred and\ntwenty-seven--and I think he came at the end of April or the beginning\nof May.\"\n\n\"Came as a stranger to all of you? A stranger to Mrs. Catherick as well\nas to the rest of the neighbours?\"\n\n\"So we thought at first, sir.  But when the scandal broke out, nobody\nbelieved they were strangers.  I remember how it happened as well as if\nit was yesterday.  Catherick came into our garden one night, and woke\nus by throwing up a handful of gravel from the walk at our window.  I\nheard him beg my husband, for the Lord's sake, to come down and speak\nto him.  They were a long time together talking in the porch.  When my\nhusband came back upstairs he was all of a tremble.  He sat down on the\nside of the bed and he says to me, 'Lizzie! I always told you that\nwoman was a bad one--I always said she would end ill, and I'm afraid in\nmy own mind that the end has come already.  Catherick has found a lot\nof lace handkerchiefs, and two fine rings, and a new gold watch and\nchain, hid away in his wife's drawer--things that nobody but a born\nlady ought ever to have--and his wife won't say how she came by them.'\n'Does he think she stole them?' says I.  'No,' says he, 'stealing would\nbe bad enough.  But it's worse than that, she's had no chance of\nstealing such things as those, and she's not a woman to take them if\nshe had.  They're gifts, Lizzie--there's her own initials engraved\ninside the watch--and Catherick has seen her talking privately, and\ncarrying on as no married woman should, with that gentleman in\nmourning, Sir Percival Glyde.  Don't you say anything about it--I've\nquieted Catherick for to-night.  I've told him to keep his tongue to\nhimself, and his eyes and his ears open, and to wait a day or two, till\nhe can be quite certain.' 'I believe you are both of you wrong,' says\nI.  'It's not in nature, comfortable and respectable as she is here,\nthat Mrs. Catherick should take up with a chance stranger like Sir\nPercival Glyde.' 'Ay, but is he a stranger to her?' says my husband.\n'You forget how Catherick's wife came to marry him.  She went to him of\nher own accord, after saying No over and over again when he asked her.\nThere have been wicked women before her time, Lizzie, who have used\nhonest men who loved them as a means of saving their characters, and\nI'm sorely afraid this Mrs. Catherick is as wicked as the worst of\nthem.  We shall see,' says my husband, 'we shall soon see.' And only\ntwo days afterwards we did see.\"\n\nMrs. Clements waited for a moment before she went on.  Even in that\nmoment, I began to doubt whether the clue that I thought I had found\nwas really leading me to the central mystery of the labyrinth after\nall.  Was this common, too common, story of a man's treachery and a\nwoman's frailty the key to a secret which had been the lifelong terror\nof Sir Percival Glyde?\n\n\"Well, sir, Catherick took my husband's advice and waited,\" Mrs.\nClements continued.  \"And as I told you, he hadn't long to wait. On the\nsecond day he found his wife and Sir Percival whispering together quite\nfamiliar, close under the vestry of the church.  I suppose they thought\nthe neighbourhood of the vestry was the last place in the world where\nanybody would think of looking after them, but, however that may be,\nthere they were.  Sir Percival, being seemingly surprised and\nconfounded, defended himself in such a guilty way that poor Catherick\n(whose quick temper I have told you of already) fell into a kind of\nfrenzy at his own disgrace, and struck Sir Percival.  He was no match\n(and I am sorry to say it) for the man who had wronged him, and he was\nbeaten in the cruelest manner, before the neighbours, who had come to\nthe place on hearing the disturbance, could run in to part them.  All\nthis happened towards evening, and before nightfall, when my husband\nwent to Catherick's house, he was gone, nobody knew where.  No living\nsoul in the village ever saw him again.  He knew too well, by that\ntime, what his wife's vile reason had been for marrying him, and he\nfelt his misery and disgrace, especially after what had happened to him\nwith Sir Percival, too keenly.  The clergyman of the parish put an\nadvertisement in the paper begging him to come back, and saying that he\nshould not lose his situation or his friends.  But Catherick had too\nmuch pride and spirit, as some people said--too much feeling, as I\nthink, sir--to face his neighbours again, and try to live down the\nmemory of his disgrace. My husband heard from him when he had left\nEngland, and heard a second time, when he was settled and doing well in\nAmerica.  He is alive there now, as far as I know, but none of us in\nthe old country--his wicked wife least of all--are ever likely to set\neyes on him again.\"\n\n\"What became of Sir Percival?\" I inquired.  \"Did he stay in the\nneighbourhood?\"\n\n\"Not he, sir.  The place was too hot to hold him.  He was heard at high\nwords with Mrs. Catherick the same night when the scandal broke out,\nand the next morning he took himself off.\"\n\n\"And Mrs. Catherick? Surely she never remained in the village among the\npeople who knew of her disgrace?\"\n\n\"She did, sir.  She was hard enough and heartless enough to set the\nopinions of all her neighbours at flat defiance.  She declared to\neverybody, from the clergyman downwards, that she was the victim of a\ndreadful mistake, and that all the scandal-mongers in the place should\nnot drive her out of it, as if she was a guilty woman.  All through my\ntime she lived at Old Welmingham, and after my time, when the new town\nwas building, and the respectable neighbours began moving to it, she\nmoved too, as if she was determined to live among them and scandalise\nthem to the very last.  There she is now, and there she will stop, in\ndefiance of the best of them, to her dying day.\"\n\n\"But how has she lived through all these years?\" I asked.  \"Was her\nhusband able and willing to help her?\"\n\n\"Both able and willing, sir,\" said Mrs. Clements.  \"In the second\nletter he wrote to my good man, he said she had borne his name, and\nlived in his home, and, wicked as she was, she must not starve like a\nbeggar in the street.  He could afford to make her some small\nallowance, and she might draw for it quarterly at a place in London.\"\n\n\"Did she accept the allowance?\"\n\n\"Not a farthing of it, sir.  She said she would never be beholden to\nCatherick for bit or drop, if she lived to be a hundred.  And she has\nkept her word ever since.  When my poor dear husband died, and left all\nto me, Catherick's letter was put in my possession with the other\nthings, and I told her to let me know if she was ever in want.  'I'll\nlet all England know I'm in want,' she said, 'before I tell Catherick,\nor any friend of Catherick's.  Take that for your answer, and give it\nto HIM for an answer, if he ever writes again.'\"\n\n\"Do you suppose that she had money of her own?\"\n\n\"Very little, if any, sir.  It was said, and said truly, I am afraid,\nthat her means of living came privately from Sir Percival Glyde.\"\n\n\nAfter that last reply I waited a little, to reconsider what I had\nheard.  If I unreservedly accepted the story so far, it was now plain\nthat no approach, direct or indirect, to the Secret had yet been\nrevealed to me, and that the pursuit of my object had ended again in\nleaving me face to face with the most palpable and the most\ndisheartening failure.\n\nBut there was one point in the narrative which made me doubt the\npropriety of accepting it unreservedly, and which suggested the idea of\nsomething hidden below the surface.\n\nI could not account to myself for the circumstance of the clerk's\nguilty wife voluntarily living out all her after-existence on the scene\nof her disgrace.  The woman's own reported statement that she had taken\nthis strange course as a practical assertion of her innocence did not\nsatisfy me.  It seemed, to my mind, more natural and more probable to\nassume that she was not so completely a free agent in this matter as\nshe had herself asserted.  In that case, who was the likeliest person\nto possess the power of compelling her to remain at Welmingham? The\nperson unquestionably from whom she derived the means of living.  She\nhad refused assistance from her husband, she had no adequate resources\nof her own, she was a friendless, degraded woman--from what source\nshould she derive help but from the source at which report pointed--Sir\nPercival Glyde?\n\nReasoning on these assumptions, and always bearing in mind the one\ncertain fact to guide me, that Mrs. Catherick was in possession of the\nSecret, I easily understood that it was Sir Percival's interest to keep\nher at Welmingham, because her character in that place was certain to\nisolate her from all communication with female neighbours, and to allow\nher no opportunities of talking incautiously in moments of free\nintercourse with inquisitive bosom friends.  But what was the mystery\nto be concealed? Not Sir Percival's infamous connection with Mrs.\nCatherick's disgrace, for the neighbours were the very people who knew\nof it--not the suspicion that he was Anne's father, for Welmingham was\nthe place in which that suspicion must inevitably exist.  If I accepted\nthe guilty appearances described to me as unreservedly as others had\naccepted them, if I drew from them the same superficial conclusion\nwhich Mr. Catherick and all his neighbours had drawn, where was the\nsuggestion, in all that I had heard, of a dangerous secret between Sir\nPercival and Mrs. Catherick, which had been kept hidden from that time\nto this?\n\nAnd yet, in those stolen meetings, in those familiar whisperings\nbetween the clerk's wife and \"the gentleman in mourning,\" the clue to\ndiscovery existed beyond a doubt.\n\nWas it possible that appearances in this case had pointed one way while\nthe truth lay all the while unsuspected in another direction? Could\nMrs. Catherick's assertion, that she was the victim of a dreadful\nmistake, by any possibility be true? Or, assuming it to be false, could\nthe conclusion which associated Sir Percival with her guilt have been\nfounded in some inconceivable error? Had Sir Percival, by any chance,\ncourted the suspicion that was wrong for the sake of diverting from\nhimself some other suspicion that was right? Here--if I could find\nit--here was the approach to the Secret, hidden deep under the surface\nof the apparently unpromising story which I had just heard.\n\n\nMy next questions were now directed to the one object of ascertaining\nwhether Mr. Catherick had or had not arrived truly at the conviction of\nhis wife's misconduct.  The answers I received from Mrs. Clements left\nme in no doubt whatever on that point. Mrs. Catherick had, on the\nclearest evidence, compromised her reputation, while a single woman,\nwith some person unknown, and had married to save her character.  It\nhad been positively ascertained, by calculations of time and place into\nwhich I need not enter particularly, that the daughter who bore her\nhusband's name was not her husband's child.\n\nThe next object of inquiry, whether it was equally certain that Sir\nPercival must have been the father of Anne, was beset by far greater\ndifficulties.  I was in no position to try the probabilities on one\nside or on the other in this instance by any better test than the test\nof personal resemblance.\n\n\"I suppose you often saw Sir Percival when he was in your village?\" I\nsaid.\n\n\"Yes, sir, very often,\" replied Mrs. Clements.\n\n\"Did you ever observe that Anne was like him?\"\n\n\"She was not at all like him, sir.\"\n\n\"Was she like her mother, then?\"\n\n\"Not like her mother either, sir.  Mrs. Catherick was dark, and full in\nthe face.\"\n\nNot like her mother and not like her (supposed) father.  I knew that\nthe test by personal resemblance was not to be implicitly trusted, but,\non the other hand, it was not to be altogether rejected on that\naccount.  Was it possible to strengthen the evidence by discovering any\nconclusive facts in relation to the lives of Mrs. Catherick and Sir\nPercival before they either of them appeared at Old Welmingham? When I\nasked my next questions I put them with this view.\n\n\"When Sir Percival first arrived in your neighbourhood,\" I said, \"did\nyou hear where he had come from last?\"\n\n\"No, sir.  Some said from Blackwater Park, and some said from\nScotland--but nobody knew.\"\n\n\"Was Mrs. Catherick living in service at Varneck Hall immediately\nbefore her marriage?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"And had she been long in her place?\"\n\n\"Three or four years, sir; I am not quite certain which.\"\n\n\"Did you ever hear the name of the gentleman to whom Varneck Hall\nbelonged at that time?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.  His name was Major Donthorne.\"\n\n\"Did Mr. Catherick, or did any one else you knew, ever hear that Sir\nPercival was a friend of Major Donthorne's, or ever see Sir Percival in\nthe neighbourhood of Varneck Hall?\"\n\n\"Catherick never did, sir, that I can remember--nor any one else\neither, that I know of.\"\n\nI noted down Major Donthorne's name and address, on the chance that he\nmight still be alive, and that it might be useful at some future time\nto apply to him.  Meanwhile, the impression on my mind was now\ndecidedly adverse to the opinion that Sir Percival was Anne's father,\nand decidedly favourable to the conclusion that the secret of his\nstolen interviews with Mrs. Catherick was entirely unconnected with the\ndisgrace which the woman had inflicted on her husband's good name.  I\ncould think of no further inquiries which I might make to strengthen\nthis impression--I could only encourage Mrs. Clements to speak next of\nAnne's early days, and watch for any chance-suggestion which might in\nthis way offer itself to me.\n\n\"I have not heard yet,\" I said, \"how the poor child, born in all this\nsin and misery, came to be trusted, Mrs. Clements, to your care.\"\n\n\"There was nobody else, sir, to take the little helpless creature in\nhand,\" replied Mrs. Clements.  \"The wicked mother seemed to hate it--as\nif the poor baby was in fault!--from the day it was born.  My heart was\nheavy for the child, and I made the offer to bring it up as tenderly as\nif it was my own.\"\n\n\"Did Anne remain entirely under your care from that time?\"\n\n\"Not quite entirely, sir.  Mrs. Catherick had her whims and fancies\nabout it at times, and used now and then to lay claim to the child, as\nif she wanted to spite me for bringing it up.  But these fits of hers\nnever lasted for long.  Poor little Anne was always returned to me, and\nwas always glad to get back--though she led but a gloomy life in my\nhouse, having no playmates, like other children, to brighten her up.\nOur longest separation was when her mother took her to Limmeridge.\nJust at that time I lost my husband, and I felt it was as well, in that\nmiserable affliction, that Anne should not be in the house.  She was\nbetween ten and eleven years old then, slow at her lessons, poor soul,\nand not so cheerful as other children--but as pretty a little girl to\nlook at as you would wish to see.  I waited at home till her mother\nbrought her back, and then I made the offer to take her with me to\nLondon--the truth being, sir, that I could not find it in my heart to\nstop at Old Welmingham after my husband's death, the place was so\nchanged and so dismal to me.\"\n\n\"And did Mrs. Catherick consent to your proposal?\"\n\n\"No, sir.  She came back from the north harder and bitterer than ever.\nFolks did say that she had been obliged to ask Sir Percival's leave to\ngo, to begin with; and that she only went to nurse her dying sister at\nLimmeridge because the poor woman was reported to have saved money--the\ntruth being that she hardly left enough to bury her.  These things may\nhave soured Mrs. Catherick likely enough, but however that may be, she\nwouldn't hear of my taking the child away.  She seemed to like\ndistressing us both by parting us.  All I could do was to give Anne my\ndirection, and to tell her privately, if she was ever in trouble, to\ncome to me. But years passed before she was free to come.  I never saw\nher again, poor soul, till the night she escaped from the mad-house.\"\n\n\"You know, Mrs. Clements, why Sir Percival Glyde shut her up?\"\n\n\"I only know what Anne herself told me, sir.  The poor thing used to\nramble and wander about it sadly.  She said her mother had got some\nsecret of Sir Percival's to keep, and had let it out to her long after\nI left Hampshire--and when Sir Percival found she knew it, he shut her\nup.  But she never could say what it was when I asked her.  All she\ncould tell me was, that her mother might be the ruin and destruction of\nSir Percival if she chose.  Mrs. Catherick may have let out just as\nmuch as that, and no more.  I'm next to certain I should have heard the\nwhole truth from Anne, if she had really known it as she pretended to\ndo, and as she very likely fancied she did, poor soul.\"\n\nThis idea had more than once occurred to my own mind.  I had already\ntold Marian that I doubted whether Laura was really on the point of\nmaking any important discovery when she and Anne Catherick were\ndisturbed by Count Fosco at the boat-house.  It was perfectly in\ncharacter with Anne's mental affliction that she should assume an\nabsolute knowledge of the secret on no better grounds than vague\nsuspicion, derived from hints which her mother had incautiously let\ndrop in her presence.  Sir Percival's guilty distrust would, in that\ncase, infallibly inspire him with the false idea that Anne knew all\nfrom her mother, just as it had afterwards fixed in his mind the\nequally false suspicion that his wife knew all from Anne.\n\nThe time was passing, the morning was wearing away.  It was doubtful,\nif I stayed longer, whether I should hear anything more from Mrs.\nClements that would be at all useful to my purpose.  I had already\ndiscovered those local and family particulars, in relation to Mrs.\nCatherick, of which I had been in search, and I had arrived at certain\nconclusions, entirely new to me, which might immensely assist in\ndirecting the course of my future proceedings.  I rose to take my\nleave, and to thank Mrs. Clements for the friendly readiness she had\nshown in affording me information.\n\n\"I am afraid you must have thought me very inquisitive,\" I said. \"I\nhave troubled you with more questions than many people would have cared\nto answer.\"\n\n\"You are heartily welcome, sir, to anything I can tell you,\" answered\nMrs. Clements.  She stopped and looked at me wistfully. \"But I do\nwish,\" said the poor woman, \"you could have told me a little more about\nAnne, sir.  I thought I saw something in your face when you came in\nwhich looked as if you could.  You can't think how hard it is not even\nto know whether she is living or dead.  I could bear it better if I was\nonly certain.  You said you never expected we should see her alive\nagain.  Do you know, sir--do you know for truth--that it has pleased\nGod to take her?\"\n\nI was not proof against this appeal, it would have been unspeakably\nmean and cruel of me if I had resisted it.\n\n\"I am afraid there is no doubt of the truth,\" I answered gently; \"I\nhave the certainty in my own mind that her troubles in this world are\nover.\"\n\nThe poor woman dropped into her chair and hid her face from me. \"Oh,\nsir,\" she said, \"how do you know it? Who can have told you?\"\n\n\"No one has told me, Mrs. Clements.  But I have reasons for feeling\nsure of it--reasons which I promise you shall know as soon as I can\nsafely explain them.  I am certain she was not neglected in her last\nmoments--I am certain the heart complaint from which she suffered so\nsadly was the true cause of her death.  You shall feel as sure of this\nas I do, soon--you shall know, before long, that she is buried in a\nquiet country churchyard--in a pretty, peaceful place, which you might\nhave chosen for her yourself.\"\n\n\"Dead!\" said Mrs. Clements, \"dead so young, and I am left to hear it! I\nmade her first short frocks.  I taught her to walk.  The first time she\never said Mother she said it to me--and now I am left and Anne is\ntaken! Did you say, sir,\" said the poor woman, removing the\nhandkerchief from her face, and looking up at me for the first time,\n\"did you say that she had been nicely buried? Was it the sort of\nfuneral she might have had if she had really been my own child?\"\n\nI assured her that it was.  She seemed to take an inexplicable pride in\nmy answer--to find a comfort in it which no other and higher\nconsiderations could afford.  \"It would have broken my heart,\" she said\nsimply, \"if Anne had not been nicely buried--but how do you know it,\nsir? who told you?\" I once more entreated her to wait until I could\nspeak to her unreservedly.  \"You are sure to see me again,\" I said,\n\"for I have a favour to ask when you are a little more\ncomposed--perhaps in a day or two.\"\n\n\"Don't keep it waiting, sir, on my account,\" said Mrs. Clements. \"Never\nmind my crying if I can be of use.  If you have anything on your mind\nto say to me, sir, please to say it now.\"\n\n\"I only wish to ask you one last question,\" I said.  \"I only want to\nknow Mrs. Catherick's address at Welmingham.\"\n\nMy request so startled Mrs. Clements, that, for the moment, even the\ntidings of Anne's death seemed to be driven from her mind. Her tears\nsuddenly ceased to flow, and she sat looking at me in blank amazement.\n\n\"For the Lord's sake, sir!\" she said, \"what do you want with Mrs.\nCatherick!\"\n\n\"I want this, Mrs. Clements,\" I replied, \"I want to know the secret of\nthose private meetings of hers with Sir Percival Glyde. There is\nsomething more in what you have told me of that woman's past conduct,\nand of that man's past relations with her, than you or any of your\nneighbours ever suspected.  There is a secret we none of us know\nbetween those two, and I am going to Mrs. Catherick with the resolution\nto find it out.\"\n\n\"Think twice about it, sir!\" said Mrs. Clements, rising in her\nearnestness and laying her hand on my arm.  \"She's an awful woman--you\ndon't know her as I do.  Think twice about it.\"\n\n\"I am sure your warning is kindly meant, Mrs. Clements.  But I am\ndetermined to see the woman, whatever comes of it.\"\n\nMrs. Clements looked me anxiously in the face.\n\n\"I see your mind is made up, sir,\" she said.  \"I will give you the\naddress.\"\n\nI wrote it down in my pocket-book and then took her hand to say\nfarewell.\n\n\"You shall hear from me soon,\" I said; \"you shall know all that I have\npromised to tell you.\"\n\nMrs. Clements sighed and shook her head doubtfully.\n\n\"An old woman's advice is sometimes worth taking, sir,\" she said.\n\"Think twice before you go to Welmingham.\"\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\nWhen I reached home again after my interview with Mrs. Clements, I was\nstruck by the appearance of a change in Laura.\n\nThe unvarying gentleness and patience which long misfortune had tried\nso cruelly and had never conquered yet, seemed now to have suddenly\nfailed her.  Insensible to all Marian's attempts to soothe and amuse\nher, she sat, with her neglected drawing pushed away on the table, her\neyes resolutely cast down, her fingers twining and untwining themselves\nrestlessly in her lap.  Marian rose when I came in, with a silent\ndistress in her face, waited for a moment to see if Laura would look up\nat my approach, whispered to me, \"Try if you can rouse her,\" and left\nthe room.\n\nI sat down in the vacant chair--gently unclasped the poor, worn,\nrestless fingers, and took both her hands in mine.\n\n\"What are you thinking of, Laura? Tell me, my darling--try and tell me\nwhat it is.\"\n\nShe struggled with herself, and raised her eyes to mine.  \"I can't feel\nhappy,\" she said, \"I can't help thinking----\" She stopped, bent forward\na little, and laid her head on my shoulder, with a terrible mute\nhelplessness that struck me to the heart.\n\n\"Try to tell me,\" I repeated gently; \"try to tell me why you are not\nhappy.\"\n\n\"I am so useless--I am such a burden on both of you,\" she answered,\nwith a weary, hopeless sigh.  \"You work and get money, Walter, and\nMarian helps you.  Why is there nothing I can do? You will end in\nliking Marian better than you like me--you will, because I am so\nhelpless! Oh, don't, don't, don't treat me like a child!\"\n\nI raised her head, and smoothed away the tangled hair that fell over\nher face, and kissed her--my poor, faded flower! my lost, afflicted\nsister! \"You shall help us, Laura,\" I said, \"you shall begin, my\ndarling, to-day.\"\n\nShe looked at me with a feverish eagerness, with a breathless interest,\nthat made me tremble for the new life of hope which I had called into\nbeing by those few words.\n\nI rose, and set her drawing materials in order, and placed them near\nher again.\n\n\"You know that I work and get money by drawing,\" I said.  \"Now you have\ntaken such pains, now you are so much improved, you shall begin to work\nand get money too.  Try to finish this little sketch as nicely and\nprettily as you can.  When it is done I will take it away with me, and\nthe same person will buy it who buys all that I do.  You shall keep\nyour own earnings in your own purse, and Marian shall come to you to\nhelp us, as often as she comes to me. Think how useful you are going to\nmake yourself to both of us, and you will soon be as happy, Laura, as\nthe day is long.\"\n\nHer face grew eager, and brightened into a smile.  In the moment while\nit lasted, in the moment when she again took up the pencils that had\nbeen laid aside, she almost looked like the Laura of past days.\n\nI had rightly interpreted the first signs of a new growth and strength\nin her mind, unconsciously expressing themselves in the notice she had\ntaken of the occupations which filled her sister's life and mine.\nMarian (when I told her what had passed) saw, as I saw, that she was\nlonging to assume her own little position of importance, to raise\nherself in her own estimation and in ours--and, from that day, we\ntenderly helped the new ambition which gave promise of the hopeful,\nhappier future, that might now not be far off.  Her drawings, as she\nfinished them, or tried to finish them, were placed in my hands.\nMarian took them from me and hid them carefully, and I set aside a\nlittle weekly tribute from my earnings, to be offered to her as the\nprice paid by strangers for the poor, faint, valueless sketches, of\nwhich I was the only purchaser.  It was hard sometimes to maintain our\ninnocent deception, when she proudly brought out her purse to\ncontribute her share towards the expenses, and wondered with serious\ninterest, whether I or she had earned the most that week.  I have all\nthose hidden drawings in my possession still--they are my treasures\nbeyond price--the dear remembrances that I love to keep alive--the\nfriends in past adversity that my heart will never part from, my\ntenderness never forget.\n\nAm I trifling, here, with the necessities of my task? am I looking\nforward to the happier time which my narrative has not yet reached?\nYes.  Back again--back to the days of doubt and dread, when the spirit\nwithin me struggled hard for its life, in the icy stillness of\nperpetual suspense.  I have paused and rested for a while on my forward\ncourse.  It is not, perhaps, time wasted, if the friends who read these\npages have paused and rested too.\n\n\nI took the first opportunity I could find of speaking to Marian in\nprivate, and of communicating to her the result of the inquiries which\nI had made that morning.  She seemed to share the opinion on the\nsubject of my proposed journey to Welmingham, which Mrs. Clements had\nalready expressed to me.\n\n\"Surely, Walter,\" she said, \"you hardly know enough yet to give you any\nhope of claiming Mrs. Catherick's confidence? Is it wise to proceed to\nthese extremities, before you have really exhausted all safer and\nsimpler means of attaining your object? When you told me that Sir\nPercival and the Count were the only two people in existence who knew\nthe exact date of Laura's journey, you forgot, and I forgot, that there\nwas a third person who must surely know it--I mean Mrs. Rubelle.  Would\nit not be far easier, and far less dangerous, to insist on a confession\nfrom her, than to force it from Sir Percival?\"\n\n\"It might be easier,\" I replied, \"but we are not aware of the full\nextent of Mrs. Rubelle's connivance and interest in the conspiracy, and\nwe are therefore not certain that the date has been impressed on her\nmind, as it has been assuredly impressed on the minds of Sir Percival\nand the Count.  It is too late, now, to waste the time on Mrs. Rubelle,\nwhich may be all-important to the discovery of the one assailable point\nin Sir Percival's life. Are you thinking a little too seriously,\nMarian, of the risk I may run in returning to Hampshire? Are you\nbeginning to doubt whether Sir Percival Glyde may not in the end be\nmore than a match for me?\"\n\n\"He will not be more than your match,\" she replied decidedly, \"because\nhe will not be helped in resisting you by the impenetrable wickedness\nof the Count.\"\n\n\"What has led you to that conclusion?\" I replied, in some surprise.\n\n\"My own knowledge of Sir Percival's obstinacy and impatience of the\nCount's control,\" she answered.  \"I believe he will insist on meeting\nyou single-handed--just as he insisted at first on acting for himself\nat Blackwater Park.  The time for suspecting the Count's interference\nwill be the time when you have Sir Percival at your mercy.  His own\ninterests will then be directly threatened, and he will act, Walter, to\nterrible purpose in his own defence.\"\n\n\"We may deprive him of his weapons beforehand,\" I said.  \"Some of the\nparticulars I have heard from Mrs. Clements may yet be turned to\naccount against him, and other means of strengthening the case may be\nat our disposal.  There are passages in Mrs. Michelson's narrative\nwhich show that the Count found it necessary to place himself in\ncommunication with Mr. Fairlie, and there may be circumstances which\ncompromise him in that proceeding.  While I am away, Marian, write to\nMr. Fairlie and say that you want an answer describing exactly what\npassed between the Count and himself, and informing you also of any\nparticulars that may have come to his knowledge at the same time in\nconnection with his niece.  Tell him that the statement you request\nwill, sooner or later, be insisted on, if he shows any reluctance to\nfurnish you with it of his own accord.\"\n\n\"The letter shall be written, Walter.  But are you really determined to\ngo to Welmingham?\"\n\n\"Absolutely determined.  I will devote the next two days to earning\nwhat we want for the week to come, and on the third day I go to\nHampshire.\"\n\nWhen the third day came I was ready for my journey.\n\nAs it was possible that I might be absent for some little time, I\narranged with Marian that we were to correspond every day--of course\naddressing each other by assumed names, for caution's sake. As long as\nI heard from her regularly, I should assume that nothing was wrong.\nBut if the morning came and brought me no letter, my return to London\nwould take place, as a matter of course, by the first train.  I\ncontrived to reconcile Laura to my departure by telling her that I was\ngoing to the country to find new purchasers for her drawings and for\nmine, and I left her occupied and happy.  Marian followed me downstairs\nto the street door.\n\n\"Remember what anxious hearts you leave here,\" she whispered, as we\nstood together in the passage.  \"Remember all the hopes that hang on\nyour safe return.  If strange things happen to you on this journey--if\nyou and Sir Percival meet----\"\n\n\"What makes you think we shall meet?\" I asked.\n\n\"I don't know--I have fears and fancies that I cannot account for.\nLaugh at them, Walter, if you like--but, for God's sake, keep your\ntemper if you come in contact with that man!\"\n\n\"Never fear, Marian! I answer for my self-control.\"\n\nWith those words we parted.\n\nI walked briskly to the station.  There was a glow of hope in me. There\nwas a growing conviction in my mind that my journey this time would not\nbe taken in vain.  It was a fine, clear, cold morning.  My nerves were\nfirmly strung, and I felt all the strength of my resolution stirring in\nme vigorously from head to foot.\n\nAs I crossed the railway platform, and looked right and left among the\npeople congregated on it, to search for any faces among them that I\nknew, the doubt occurred to me whether it might not have been to my\nadvantage if I had adopted a disguise before setting out for Hampshire.\nBut there was something so repellent to me in the idea--something so\nmeanly like the common herd of spies and informers in the mere act of\nadopting a disguise--that I dismissed the question from consideration\nalmost as soon as it had risen in my mind.  Even as a mere matter of\nexpediency the proceeding was doubtful in the extreme.  If I tried the\nexperiment at home the landlord of the house would sooner or later\ndiscover me, and would have his suspicions aroused immediately.  If I\ntried it away from home the same persons might see me, by the commonest\naccident, with the disguise and without it, and I should in that way be\ninviting the notice and distrust which it was my most pressing interest\nto avoid.  In my own character I had acted thus far--and in my own\ncharacter I was resolved to continue to the end.\n\nThe train left me at Welmingham early in the afternoon.\n\n\nIs there any wilderness of sand in the deserts of Arabia, is there any\nprospect of desolation among the ruins of Palestine, which can rival\nthe repelling effect on the eye, and the depressing influence on the\nmind, of an English country town in the first stage of its existence,\nand in the transition state of its prosperity? I asked myself that\nquestion as I passed through the clean desolation, the neat ugliness,\nthe prim torpor of the streets of Welmingham.  And the tradesmen who\nstared after me from their lonely shops--the trees that drooped\nhelpless in their arid exile of unfinished crescents and squares--the\ndead house-carcasses that waited in vain for the vivifying human\nelement to animate them with the breath of life--every creature that I\nsaw, every object that I passed, seemed to answer with one accord: The\ndeserts of Arabia are innocent of our civilised desolation--the ruins\nof Palestine are incapable of our modern gloom!\n\nI inquired my way to the quarter of the town in which Mrs. Catherick\nlived, and on reaching it found myself in a square of small houses, one\nstory high.  There was a bare little plot of grass in the middle,\nprotected by a cheap wire fence.  An elderly nursemaid and two children\nwere standing in a corner of the enclosure, looking at a lean goat\ntethered to the grass.  Two foot-passengers were talking together on\none side of the pavement before the houses, and an idle little boy was\nleading an idle little dog along by a string on the other.  I heard the\ndull tinkling of a piano at a distance, accompanied by the intermittent\nknocking of a hammer nearer at hand.  These were all the sights and\nsounds of life that encountered me when I entered the square.\n\nI walked at once to the door of Number Thirteen--the number of Mrs.\nCatherick's house--and knocked, without waiting to consider beforehand\nhow I might best present myself when I got in.  The first necessity was\nto see Mrs. Catherick.  I could then judge, from my own observation, of\nthe safest and easiest manner of approaching the object of my visit.\n\nThe door was opened by a melancholy middle-aged woman servant.  I gave\nher my card, and asked if I could see Mrs. Catherick.  The card was\ntaken into the front parlour, and the servant returned with a message\nrequesting me to mention what my business was.\n\n\"Say, if you please, that my business relates to Mrs. Catherick's\ndaughter,\" I replied.  This was the best pretext I could think of, on\nthe spur of the moment, to account for my visit.\n\nThe servant again retired to the parlour, again returned, and this time\nbegged me, with a look of gloomy amazement, to walk in.\n\nI entered a little room, with a flaring paper of the largest pattern on\nthe walls.  Chairs, tables, cheffonier, and sofa, all gleamed with the\nglutinous brightness of cheap upholstery.  On the largest table, in the\nmiddle of the room, stood a smart Bible, placed exactly in the centre\non a red and yellow woollen mat and at the side of the table nearest to\nthe window, with a little knitting-basket on her lap, and a wheezing,\nblear-eyed old spaniel crouched at her feet, there sat an elderly\nwoman, wearing a black net cap and a black silk gown, and having\nslate-coloured mittens on her hands.  Her iron-grey hair hung in heavy\nbands on either side of her face--her dark eyes looked straight\nforward, with a hard, defiant, implacable stare.  She had full square\ncheeks, a long, firm chin, and thick, sensual, colourless lips.  Her\nfigure was stout and sturdy, and her manner aggressively\nself-possessed. This was Mrs. Catherick.\n\n\"You have come to speak to me about my daughter,\" she said, before I\ncould utter a word on my side.  \"Be so good as to mention what you have\nto say.\"\n\nThe tone of her voice was as hard, as defiant, as implacable as the\nexpression of her eyes.  She pointed to a chair, and looked me all over\nattentively, from head to foot, as I sat down in it.  I saw that my\nonly chance with this woman was to speak to her in her own tone, and to\nmeet her, at the outset of our interview, on her own ground.\n\n\"You are aware,\" I said, \"that your daughter has been lost?\"\n\n\"I am perfectly aware of it.\"\n\n\"Have you felt any apprehension that the misfortune of her loss might\nbe followed by the misfortune of her death?\"\n\n\"Yes.  Have you come here to tell me she is dead?\"\n\n\"I have.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\nShe put that extraordinary question without the slightest change in her\nvoice, her face, or her manner.  She could not have appeared more\nperfectly unconcerned if I had told her of the death of the goat in the\nenclosure outside.\n\n\"Why?\" I repeated.  \"Do you ask why I come here to tell you of your\ndaughter's death?\"\n\n\"Yes.  What interest have you in me, or in her? How do you come to know\nanything about my daughter?\"\n\n\"In this way.  I met her on the night when she escaped from the Asylum,\nand I assisted her in reaching a place of safety.\"\n\n\"You did very wrong.\"\n\n\"I am sorry to hear her mother say so.\"\n\n\"Her mother does say so.  How do you know she is dead?\"\n\n\"I am not at liberty to say how I know it--but I DO know it.\"\n\n\"Are you at liberty to say how you found out my address?\"\n\n\"Certainly.  I got your address from Mrs. Clements.\"\n\n\"Mrs. Clements is a foolish woman.  Did she tell you to come here?\"\n\n\"She did not.\"\n\n\"Then, I ask you again, why did you come?\"\n\nAs she was determined to have her answer, I gave it to her in the\nplainest possible form.\n\n\"I came,\" I said, \"because I thought Anne Catherick's mother might have\nsome natural interest in knowing whether she was alive or dead.\"\n\n\"Just so,\" said Mrs. Catherick, with additional self-possession. \"Had\nyou no other motive?\"\n\nI hesitated.  The right answer to that question was not easy to find at\na moment's notice.\n\n\"If you have no other motive,\" she went on, deliberately taking off her\nslate-coloured mittens, and rolling them up, \"I have only to thank you\nfor your visit, and to say that I will not detain you here any longer.\nYour information would be more satisfactory if you were willing to\nexplain how you became possessed of it. However, it justifies me, I\nsuppose, in going into mourning. There is not much alteration necessary\nin my dress, as you see. When I have changed my mittens, I shall be all\nin black.\"\n\nShe searched in the pocket of her gown, drew out a pair of black lace\nmittens, put them on with the stoniest and steadiest composure, and\nthen quietly crossed her hands in her lap.\n\n\"I wish you good morning,\" she said.\n\nThe cool contempt of her manner irritated me into directly avowing that\nthe purpose of my visit had not been answered yet.\n\n\"I HAVE another motive in coming here,\" I said.\n\n\"Ah! I thought so,\" remarked Mrs. Catherick.\n\n\"Your daughter's death----\"\n\n\"What did she die of?\"\n\n\"Of disease of the heart.\"\n\n\"Yes.  Go on.\"\n\n\"Your daughter's death has been made the pretext for inflicting serious\ninjury on a person who is very dear to me.  Two men have been\nconcerned, to my certain knowledge, in doing that wrong.  One of them\nis Sir Percival Glyde.\"\n\n\"Indeed!\"\n\nI looked attentively to see if she flinched at the sudden mention of\nthat name.  Not a muscle of her stirred--the hard, defiant, implacable\nstare in her eyes never wavered for an instant.\n\n\"You may wonder,\" I went on, \"how the event of your daughter's death\ncan have been made the means of inflicting injury on another person.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Mrs. Catherick; \"I don't wonder at all.  This appears to be\nyour affair.  You are interested in my affairs.  I am not interested in\nyours.\"\n\n\"You may ask, then,\" I persisted, \"why I mention the matter in your\npresence.\"\n\n\"Yes, I DO ask that.\"\n\n\"I mention it because I am determined to bring Sir Percival Glyde to\naccount for the wickedness he has committed.\"\n\n\"What have I to do with your determination?\"\n\n\"You shall hear.  There are certain events in Sir Percival's past life\nwhich it is necessary for my purpose to be fully acquainted with.  YOU\nknow them--and for that reason I come to YOU.\"\n\n\"What events do you mean?\"\n\n\"Events that occurred at Old Welmingham when your husband was\nparish-clerk at that place, and before the time when your daughter was\nborn.\"\n\nI had reached the woman at last through the barrier of impenetrable\nreserve that she had tried to set up between us.  I saw her temper\nsmouldering in her eyes--as plainly as I saw her hands grow restless,\nthen unclasp themselves, and begin mechanically smoothing her dress\nover her knees.\n\n\"What do you know of those events?\" she asked.\n\n\"All that Mrs. Clements could tell me,\" I answered.\n\nThere was a momentary flush on her firm square face, a momentary\nstillness in her restless hands, which seemed to betoken a coming\noutburst of anger that might throw her off her guard.  But no--she\nmastered the rising irritation, leaned back in her chair, crossed her\narms on her broad bosom, and with a smile of grim sarcasm on her thick\nlips, looked at me as steadily as ever.\n\n\"Ah! I begin to understand it all now,\" she said, her tamed and\ndisciplined anger only expressing itself in the elaborate mockery of\nher tone and manner.  \"You have got a grudge of your own against Sir\nPercival Glyde, and I must help you to wreak it.  I must tell you this,\nthat, and the other about Sir Percival and myself, must I? Yes, indeed?\nYou have been prying into my private affairs.  You think you have found\na lost woman to deal with, who lives here on sufferance, and who will\ndo anything you ask for fear you may injure her in the opinions of the\ntown's-people.  I see through you and your precious speculation--I do!\nand it amuses me.  Ha! ha!\"\n\nShe stopped for a moment, her arms tightened over her bosom, and she\nlaughed to herself--a hard, harsh, angry laugh.\n\n\"You don't know how I have lived in this place, and what I have done in\nthis place, Mr. What's-your-name,\" she went on.  \"I'll tell you, before\nI ring the bell and have you shown out.  I came here a wronged woman--I\ncame here robbed of my character and determined to claim it back.  I've\nbeen years and years about it--and I HAVE claimed it back.  I have\nmatched the respectable people fairly and openly on their own ground.\nIf they say anything against me now they must say it in secret--they\ncan't say it, they daren't say it, openly.  I stand high enough in this\ntown to be out of your reach. THE CLERGYMAN BOWS TO ME.  Aha! you\ndidn't bargain for that when you came here.  Go to the church and\ninquire about me--you will find Mrs. Catherick has her sitting like the\nrest of them, and pays the rent on the day it's due.  Go to the\ntown-hall.  There's a petition lying there--a petition of the\nrespectable inhabitants against allowing a circus to come and perform\nhere and corrupt our morals--yes! OUR morals.  I signed that petition\nthis morning.  Go to the bookseller's shop.  The clergyman's Wednesday\nevening Lectures on Justification by Faith are publishing there by\nsubscription--I'm down on the list. The doctor's wife only put a\nshilling in the plate at our last charity sermon--I put half-a-crown.\nMr. Churchwarden Soward held the plate, and bowed to me.  Ten years ago\nhe told Pigrum the chemist I ought to be whipped out of the town at the\ncart's tail.  Is your mother alive? Has she got a better Bible on her\ntable than I have got on mine? Does she stand better with her\ntrades-people than I do with mine? Has she always lived within her\nincome? I have always lived within mine.  Ah! there IS the clergyman\ncoming along the square.  Look, Mr. What's-your-name--look, if you\nplease!\"\n\nShe started up with the activity of a young woman, went to the window,\nwaited till the clergyman passed, and bowed to him solemnly.  The\nclergyman ceremoniously raised his hat, and walked on.  Mrs. Catherick\nreturned to her chair, and looked at me with a grimmer sarcasm than\never.\n\n\"There!\" she said.  \"What do you think of that for a woman with a lost\ncharacter? How does your speculation look now?\"\n\nThe singular manner in which she had chosen to assert herself, the\nextraordinary practical vindication of her position in the town which\nshe had just offered, had so perplexed me that I listened to her in\nsilent surprise.  I was not the less resolved, however, to make another\neffort to throw her off her guard.  If the woman's fierce temper once\ngot beyond her control, and once flamed out on me, she might yet say\nthe words which would put the clue in my hands.\n\n\"How does your speculation look now?\" she repeated.\n\n\"Exactly as it looked when I first came in,\" I answered.  \"I don't\ndoubt the position you have gained in the town, and I don't wish to\nassail it even if I could.  I came here because Sir Percival Glyde is,\nto my certain knowledge, your enemy, as well as mine. If I have a\ngrudge against him, you have a grudge against him too. You may deny it\nif you like, you may distrust me as much as you please, you may be as\nangry as you will--but, of all the women in England, you, if you have\nany sense of injury, are the woman who ought to help me to crush that\nman.\"\n\n\"Crush him for yourself,\" she said; \"then come back here, and see what\nI say to you.\"\n\nShe spoke those words as she had not spoken yet, quickly, fiercely,\nvindictively.  I had stirred in its lair the serpent-hatred of years,\nbut only for a moment.  Like a lurking reptile it leaped up at me as\nshe eagerly bent forward towards the place in which I was sitting.\nLike a lurking reptile it dropped out of sight again as she instantly\nresumed her former position in the chair.\n\n\"You won't trust me?\" I said.\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"You are afraid?\"\n\n\"Do I look as if I was?\"\n\n\"You are afraid of Sir Percival Glyde?\"\n\n\"Am I?\"\n\nHer colour was rising, and her hands were at work again smoothing her\ngown.  I pressed the point farther and farther home, I went on without\nallowing her a moment of delay.\n\n\"Sir Percival has a high position in the world,\" I said; \"it would be\nno wonder if you were afraid of him.  Sir Percival is a powerful man, a\nbaronet, the possessor of a fine estate, the descendant of a great\nfamily----\"\n\nShe amazed me beyond expression by suddenly bursting out laughing.\n\n\"Yes,\" she repeated, in tones of the bitterest, steadiest contempt.  \"A\nbaronet, the possessor of a fine estate, the descendant of a great\nfamily.  Yes, indeed! A great family--especially by the mother's side.\"\n\nThere was no time to reflect on the words that had just escaped her,\nthere was only time to feel that they were well worth thinking over the\nmoment I left the house.\n\n\"I am not here to dispute with you about family questions,\" I said.  \"I\nknow nothing of Sir Percival's mother----\"\n\n\"And you know as little of Sir Percival himself,\" she interposed\nsharply.\n\n\"I advise you not to be too sure of that,\" I rejoined.  \"I know some\nthings about him, and I suspect many more.\"\n\n\"What do you suspect?\"\n\n\"I'll tell you what I DON'T suspect.  I DON'T suspect him of being\nAnne's father.\"\n\nShe started to her feet, and came close up to me with a look of fury.\n\n\"How dare you talk to me about Anne's father! How dare you say who was\nher father, or who wasn't!\" she broke out, her face quivering, her\nvoice trembling with passion.\n\n\"The secret between you and Sir Percival is not THAT secret,\" I\npersisted.  \"The mystery which darkens Sir Percival's life was not born\nwith your daughter's birth, and has not died with your daughter's\ndeath.\"\n\nShe drew back a step.  \"Go!\" she said, and pointed sternly to the door.\n\n\"There was no thought of the child in your heart or in his,\" I went on,\ndetermined to press her back to her last defences. \"There was no bond\nof guilty love between you and him when you held those stolen meetings,\nwhen your husband found you whispering together under the vestry of the\nchurch.\"\n\nHer pointing hand instantly dropped to her side, and the deep flush of\nanger faded from her face while I spoke.  I saw the change pass over\nher--I saw that hard, firm, fearless, self-possessed woman quail under\na terror which her utmost resolution was not strong enough to resist\nwhen I said those five last words, \"the vestry of the church.\"\n\nFor a minute or more we stood looking at each other in silence.  I\nspoke first.\n\n\"Do you still refuse to trust me?\" I asked.\n\nShe could not call the colour that had left it back to her face, but\nshe had steadied her voice, she had recovered the defiant\nself-possession of her manner when she answered me.\n\n\"I do refuse,\" she said.\n\n\"Do you still tell me to go?\"\n\n\"Yes.  Go--and never come back.\"\n\nI walked to the door, waited a moment before I opened it, and turned\nround to look at her again.\n\n\"I may have news to bring you of Sir Percival which you don't expect,\"\nI said, \"and in that case I shall come back.\"\n\n\"There is no news of Sir Percival that I don't expect, except----\"\n\nShe stopped, her pale face darkened, and she stole back with a quiet,\nstealthy, cat-like step to her chair.\n\n\"Except the news of his death,\" she said, sitting down again, with the\nmockery of a smile just hovering on her cruel lips, and the furtive\nlight of hatred lurking deep in her steady eyes.\n\nAs I opened the door of the room to go out, she looked round at me\nquickly.  The cruel smile slowly widened her lips--she eyed me, with a\nstrange stealthy interest, from head to foot--an unutterable\nexpectation showed itself wickedly all over her face. Was she\nspeculating, in the secrecy of her own heart, on my youth and strength,\non the force of my sense of injury and the limits of my self-control,\nand was she considering the lengths to which they might carry me, if\nSir Percival and I ever chanced to meet? The bare doubt that it might\nbe so drove me from her presence, and silenced even the common forms of\nfarewell on my lips.  Without a word more, on my side or on hers, I\nleft the room.\n\nAs I opened the outer door, I saw the same clergyman who had already\npassed the house once, about to pass it again, on his way back through\nthe square.  I waited on the door-step to let him go by, and looked\nround, as I did so, at the parlour window.\n\nMrs. Catherick had heard his footsteps approaching, in the silence of\nthat lonely place, and she was on her feet at the window again, waiting\nfor him.  Not all the strength of all the terrible passions I had\nroused in that woman's heart, could loosen her desperate hold on the\none fragment of social consideration which years of resolute effort had\njust dragged within her grasp.  There she was again, not a minute after\nI had left her, placed purposely in a position which made it a matter\nof common courtesy on the part of the clergyman to bow to her for a\nsecond time.  He raised his hat once more.  I saw the hard ghastly face\nbehind the window soften, and light up with gratified pride--I saw the\nhead with the grim black cap bend ceremoniously in return.  The\nclergyman had bowed to her, and in my presence, twice in one day!\n\n\n\nIX\n\n\nI Left the house, feeling that Mrs. Catherick had helped me a step\nforward, in spite of herself.  Before I had reached the turning which\nled out of the square, my attention was suddenly aroused by the sound\nof a closing door behind me.\n\nI looked round, and saw an undersized man in black on the door-step of\na house, which, as well as I could judge, stood next to Mrs.\nCatherick's place of abode--next to it, on the side nearest to me.  The\nman did not hesitate a moment about the direction he should take.  He\nadvanced rapidly towards the turning at which I had stopped.  I\nrecognised him as the lawyer's clerk, who had preceded me in my visit\nto Blackwater Park, and who had tried to pick a quarrel with me, when I\nasked him if I could see the house.\n\nI waited where I was, to ascertain whether his object was to come to\nclose quarters and speak on this occasion.  To my surprise he passed on\nrapidly, without saying a word, without even looking up in my face as\nhe went by.  This was such a complete inversion of the course of\nproceeding which I had every reason to expect on his part, that my\ncuriosity, or rather my suspicion, was aroused, and I determined on my\nside to keep him cautiously in view, and to discover what the business\nmight be in which he was now employed. Without caring whether he saw me\nor not, I walked after him.  He never looked back, and he led me\nstraight through the streets to the railway station.\n\nThe train was on the point of starting, and two or three passengers who\nwere late were clustering round the small opening through which the\ntickets were issued.  I joined them, and distinctly heard the lawyer's\nclerk demand a ticket for the Blackwater station. I satisfied myself\nthat he had actually left by the train before I came away.\n\nThere was only one interpretation that I could place on what I had just\nseen and heard.  I had unquestionably observed the man leaving a house\nwhich closely adjoined Mrs. Catherick's residence. He had been probably\nplaced there, by Sir Percival's directions, as a lodger, in\nanticipation of my inquiries leading me, sooner or later, to\ncommunicate with Mrs. Catherick.  He had doubtless seen me go in and\ncome out, and he had hurried away by the first train to make his report\nat Blackwater Park, to which place Sir Percival would naturally betake\nhimself (knowing what he evidently knew of my movements), in order to\nbe ready on the spot, if I returned to Hampshire.  Before many days\nwere over, there seemed every likelihood now that he and I might meet.\n\nWhatever result events might be destined to produce, I resolved to\npursue my own course, straight to the end in view, without stopping or\nturning aside for Sir Percival or for any one.  The great\nresponsibility which weighed on me heavily in London--the\nresponsibility of so guiding my slightest actions as to prevent them\nfrom leading accidentally to the discovery of Laura's place of\nrefuge--was removed, now that I was in Hampshire.  I could go and come\nas I pleased at Welmingham, and if I chanced to fail in observing any\nnecessary precautions, the immediate results, at least, would affect no\none but myself.\n\nWhen I left the station the winter evening was beginning to close in.\nThere was little hope of continuing my inquiries after dark to any\nuseful purpose in a neighbourhood that was strange to me. Accordingly,\nI made my way to the nearest hotel, and ordered my dinner and my bed.\nThis done, I wrote to Marian, to tell her that I was safe and well, and\nthat I had fair prospects of success.  I had directed her, on leaving\nhome, to address the first letter she wrote to me (the letter I\nexpected to receive the next morning) to \"The Post-Office, Welmingham,\"\nand I now begged her to send her second day's letter to the same\naddress.\n\nI could easily receive it by writing to the postmaster if I happened to\nbe away from the town when it arrived.\n\nThe coffee-room of the hotel, as it grew late in the evening, became a\nperfect solitude.  I was left to reflect on what I had accomplished\nthat afternoon as uninterruptedly as if the house had been my own.\nBefore I retired to rest I had attentively thought over my\nextraordinary interview with Mrs. Catherick from beginning to end, and\nhad verified at my leisure the conclusions which I had hastily drawn in\nthe earlier part of the day.\n\nThe vestry of Old Welmingham church was the starting-point from which\nmy mind slowly worked its way back through all that I had heard Mrs.\nCatherick say, and through all I had seen Mrs. Catherick do.\n\nAt the time when the neighbourhood of the vestry was first referred to\nin my presence by Mrs. Clements, I had thought it the strangest and\nmost unaccountable of all places for Sir Percival to select for a\nclandestine meeting with the clerk's wife. Influenced by this\nimpression, and by no other, I had mentioned \"the vestry of the church\"\nbefore Mrs. Catherick on pure speculation--it represented one of the\nminor peculiarities of the story which occurred to me while I was\nspeaking.  I was prepared for her answering me confusedly or angrily,\nbut the blank terror that seized her when I said the words took me\ncompletely by surprise.  I had long before associated Sir Percival's\nSecret with the concealment of a serious crime which Mrs. Catherick\nknew of, but I had gone no further than this.  Now the woman's paroxysm\nof terror associated the crime, either directly or indirectly, with the\nvestry, and convinced me that she had been more than the mere witness\nof it--she was also the accomplice, beyond a doubt.\n\nWhat had been the nature of the crime? Surely there was a contemptible\nside to it, as well as a dangerous side, or Mrs. Catherick would not\nhave repeated my own words, referring to Sir Percival's rank and power,\nwith such marked disdain as she had certainly displayed.  It was a\ncontemptible crime then and a dangerous crime, and she had shared in\nit, and it was associated with the vestry of the church.\n\nThe next consideration to be disposed of led me a step farther from\nthis point.\n\nMrs. Catherick's undisguised contempt for Sir Percival plainly extended\nto his mother as well.  She had referred with the bitterest sarcasm to\nthe great family he had descended from--\"especially by the mother's\nside.\" What did this mean?\n\nThere appeared to be only two explanations of it.  Either his mother's\nbirth had been low, or his mother's reputation was damaged by some\nhidden flaw with which Mrs. Catherick and Sir Percival were both\nprivately acquainted? I could only put the first explanation to the\ntest by looking at the register of her marriage, and so ascertaining\nher maiden name and her parentage as a preliminary to further inquiries.\n\nOn the other hand, if the second case supposed were the true one, what\nhad been the flaw in her reputation? Remembering the account which\nMarian had given me of Sir Percival's father and mother, and of the\nsuspiciously unsocial secluded life they had both led, I now asked\nmyself whether it might not be possible that his mother had never been\nmarried at all.  Here again the register might, by offering written\nevidence of the marriage, prove to me, at any rate, that this doubt had\nno foundation in truth.  But where was the register to be found? At\nthis point I took up the conclusions which I had previously formed, and\nthe same mental process which had discovered the locality of the\nconcealed crime, now lodged the register also in the vestry of Old\nWelmingham church.\n\nThese were the results of my interview with Mrs. Catherick--these were\nthe various considerations, all steadily converging to one point, which\ndecided the course of my proceedings on the next day.\n\n\nThe morning was cloudy and lowering, but no rain fell.  I left my bag\nat the hotel to wait there till I called for it, and, after inquiring\nthe way, set forth on foot for Old Welmingham church.\n\nIt was a walk of rather more than two miles, the ground rising slowly\nall the way.\n\nOn the highest point stood the church--an ancient, weather-beaten\nbuilding, with heavy buttresses at its sides, and a clumsy square tower\nin front.  The vestry at the back was built out from the church, and\nseemed to be of the same age.  Round the building at intervals appeared\nthe remains of the village which Mrs. Clements had described to me as\nher husband's place of abode in former years, and which the principal\ninhabitants had long since deserted for the new town.  Some of the\nempty houses had been dismantled to their outer walls, some had been\nleft to decay with time, and some were still inhabited by persons\nevidently of the poorest class. It was a dreary scene, and yet, in the\nworst aspect of its ruin, not so dreary as the modern town that I had\njust left.  Here there was the brown, breezy sweep of surrounding\nfields for the eye to repose on--here the trees, leafless as they were,\nstill varied the monotony of the prospect, and helped the mind to look\nforward to summer-time and shade.\n\nAs I moved away from the back of the church, and passed some of the\ndismantled cottages in search of a person who might direct me to the\nclerk, I saw two men saunter out after me from behind a wall.  The\ntallest of the two--a stout muscular man in the dress of a\ngamekeeper--was a stranger to me.  The other was one of the men who had\nfollowed me in London on the day when I left Mr. Kyrle's office.  I had\ntaken particular notice of him at the time; and I felt sure that I was\nnot mistaken in identifying the fellow on this occasion.\n\nNeither he nor his companion attempted to speak to me, and both kept\nthemselves at a respectful distance, but the motive of their presence\nin the neighbourhood of the church was plainly apparent. It was exactly\nas I had supposed--Sir Percival was already prepared for me.  My visit\nto Mrs. Catherick had been reported to him the evening before, and\nthose two men had been placed on the look-out near the church in\nanticipation of my appearance at Old Welmingham.  If I had wanted any\nfurther proof that my investigations had taken the right direction at\nlast, the plan now adopted for watching me would have supplied it.\n\nI walked on away from the church till I reached one of the inhabited\nhouses, with a patch of kitchen garden attached to it on which a\nlabourer was at work.  He directed me to the clerk's abode, a cottage\nat some little distance off, standing by itself on the outskirts of the\nforsaken village.  The clerk was indoors, and was just putting on his\ngreatcoat.  He was a cheerful, familiar, loudly-talkative old man, with\na very poor opinion (as I soon discovered) of the place in which he\nlived, and a happy sense of superiority to his neighbours in virtue of\nthe great personal distinction of having once been in London.\n\n\"It's well you came so early, sir,\" said the old man, when I had\nmentioned the object of my visit.  \"I should have been away in ten\nminutes more.  Parish business, sir, and a goodish long trot before\nit's all done for a man at my age.  But, bless you, I'm strong on my\nlegs still! As long as a man don't give at his legs, there's a deal of\nwork left in him.  Don't you think so yourself, sir?\"\n\nHe took his keys down while he was talking from a hook behind the\nfireplace, and locked his cottage door behind us.\n\n\"Nobody at home to keep house for me,\" said the clerk, with a cheerful\nsense of perfect freedom from all family encumbrances. \"My wife's in\nthe churchyard there, and my children are all married.  A wretched\nplace this, isn't it, sir? But the parish is a large one--every man\ncouldn't get through the business as I do. It's learning does it, and\nI've had my share, and a little more. I can talk the Queen's English\n(God bless the Queen!), and that's more than most of the people about\nhere can do.  You're from London, I suppose, sir? I've been in London a\nmatter of five-and-twenty year ago.  What's the news there now, if you\nplease?\"\n\nChattering on in this way, he led me back to the vestry.  I looked\nabout to see if the two spies were still in sight.  They were not\nvisible anywhere.  After having discovered my application to the clerk,\nthey had probably concealed themselves where they could watch my next\nproceedings in perfect freedom.\n\nThe vestry door was of stout old oak, studded with strong nails, and\nthe clerk put his large heavy key into the lock with the air of a man\nwho knew that he had a difficulty to encounter, and who was not quite\ncertain of creditably conquering it.\n\n\"I'm obliged to bring you this way, sir,\" he said, \"because the door\nfrom the vestry to the church is bolted on the vestry side. We might\nhave got in through the church otherwise.  This is a perverse lock, if\never there was one yet.  It's big enough for a prison-door--it's been\nhampered over and over again, and it ought to be changed for a new one.\nI've mentioned that to the churchwarden fifty times over at least--he's\nalways saying, 'I'll see about it'--and he never does see.  Ah, It's a\nsort of lost corner, this place.  Not like London--is it, sir? Bless\nyou, we are all asleep here! We don't march with the times.\"\n\nAfter some twisting and turning of the key, the heavy lock yielded, and\nhe opened the door.\n\nThe vestry was larger than I should have supposed it to be, judging\nfrom the outside only.  It was a dim, mouldy, melancholy old room, with\na low, raftered ceiling.  Round two sides of it, the sides nearest to\nthe interior of the church, ran heavy wooden presses, worm-eaten and\ngaping with age.  Hooked to the inner corner of one of these presses\nhung several surplices, all bulging out at their lower ends in an\nirreverent-looking bundle of limp drapery.  Below the surplices, on the\nfloor, stood three packing-cases, with the lids half off, half on, and\nthe straw profusely bursting out of their cracks and crevices in every\ndirection. Behind them, in a corner, was a litter of dusty papers, some\nlarge and rolled up like architects' plans, some loosely strung\ntogether on files like bills or letters.  The room had once been\nlighted by a small side window, but this had been bricked up, and a\nlantern skylight was now substituted for it.  The atmosphere of the\nplace was heavy and mouldy, being rendered additionally oppressive by\nthe closing of the door which led into the church.  This door also was\ncomposed of solid oak, and was bolted at the top and bottom on the\nvestry side.\n\n\"We might be tidier, mightn't we, sir?\" said the cheerful clerk; \"but\nwhen you're in a lost corner of a place like this, what are you to do?\nWhy, look here now, just look at these packing-cases. There they've\nbeen, for a year or more, ready to go down to London--there they are,\nlittering the place, and there they'll stop as long as the nails hold\nthem together.  I'll tell you what, sir, as I said before, this is not\nLondon.  We are all asleep here.  Bless you, WE don't march with the\ntimes!\"\n\n\"What is there in the packing-cases?\" I asked.\n\n\"Bits of old wood carvings from the pulpit, and panels from the\nchancel, and images from the organ-loft,\" said the clerk. \"Portraits of\nthe twelve apostles in wood, and not a whole nose among 'em.  All\nbroken, and worm-eaten, and crumbling to dust at the edges.  As brittle\nas crockery, sir, and as old as the church, if not older.\"\n\n\"And why were they going to London? To be repaired?\"\n\n\"That's it, sir, to be repaired, and where they were past repair, to be\ncopied in sound wood.  But, bless you, the money fell short, and there\nthey are, waiting for new subscriptions, and nobody to subscribe.  It\nwas all done a year ago, sir.  Six gentlemen dined together about it,\nat the hotel in the new town.  They made speeches, and passed\nresolutions, and put their names down, and printed off thousands of\nprospectuses.  Beautiful prospectuses, sir, all flourished over with\nGothic devices in red ink, saying it was a disgrace not to restore the\nchurch and repair the famous carvings, and so on.  There are the\nprospectuses that couldn't be distributed, and the architect's plans\nand estimates, and the whole correspondence which set everybody at\nloggerheads and ended in a dispute, all down together in that corner,\nbehind the packing-cases.  The money dribbled in a little at first--but\nwhat CAN you expect out of London? There was just enough, you know, to\npack the broken carvings, and get the estimates, and pay the printer's\nbill, and after that there wasn't a halfpenny left. There the things\nare, as I said before.  We have nowhere else to put them--nobody in the\nnew town cares about accommodating us--we're in a lost corner--and\nthis is an untidy vestry--and who's to help it?--that's what I want to\nknow.\"\n\nMy anxiety to examine the register did not dispose me to offer much\nencouragement to the old man's talkativeness.  I agreed with him that\nnobody could help the untidiness of the vestry, and then suggested that\nwe should proceed to our business without more delay.\n\n\"Ay, ay, the marriage-register, to be sure,\" said the clerk, taking a\nlittle bunch of keys from his pocket.  \"How far do you want to look\nback, sir?\"\n\nMarian had informed me of Sir Percival's age at the time when we had\nspoken together of his marriage engagement with Laura.  She had then\ndescribed him as being forty-five years old.  Calculating back from\nthis, and making due allowance for the year that had passed since I had\ngained my information, I found that he must have been born in eighteen\nhundred and four, and that I might safely start on my search through\nthe register from that date.\n\n\"I want to begin with the year eighteen hundred and four,\" I said.\n\n\"Which way after that, sir?\" asked the clerk.  \"Forwards to our time or\nbackwards away from us?\"\n\n\"Backwards from eighteen hundred and four.\"\n\nHe opened the door of one of the presses--the press from the side of\nwhich the surplices were hanging--and produced a large volume bound in\ngreasy brown leather.  I was struck by the insecurity of the place in\nwhich the register was kept.  The door of the press was warped and\ncracked with age, and the lock was of the smallest and commonest kind.\nI could have forced it easily with the walking-stick I carried in my\nhand.\n\n\"Is that considered a sufficiently secure place for the register?\" I\ninquired.  \"Surely a book of such importance as this ought to be\nprotected by a better lock, and kept carefully in an iron safe?\"\n\n\"Well, now, that's curious!\" said the clerk, shutting up the book\nagain, just after he had opened it, and smacking his hand cheerfully on\nthe cover.  \"Those were the very words my old master was always saying\nyears and years ago, when I was a lad.  'Why isn't the register'\n(meaning this register here, under my hand)--'why isn't it kept in an\niron safe?' If I've heard him say that once, I've heard him say it a\nhundred times.  He was the solicitor in those days, sir, who had the\nappointment of vestry-clerk to this church.  A fine hearty old\ngentleman, and the most particular man breathing.  As long as he lived\nhe kept a copy of this book in his office at Knowlesbury, and had it\nposted up regular, from time to time, to correspond with the fresh\nentries here.  You would hardly think it, but he had his own appointed\ndays, once or twice in every quarter, for riding over to this church on\nhis old white pony, to check the copy, by the register, with his own\neyes and hands.  'How do I know?' (he used to say) 'how do I know that\nthe register in this vestry may not be stolen or destroyed? Why isn't\nit kept in an iron safe? Why can't I make other people as careful as I\nam myself? Some of these days there will be an accident happen, and\nwhen the register's lost, then the parish will find out the value of my\ncopy.' He used to take his pinch of snuff after that, and look about\nhim as bold as a lord.  Ah! the like of him for doing business isn't\neasy to find now.  You may go to London and not match him, even THERE.\nWhich year did you say, sir? Eighteen hundred and what?\"\n\n\"Eighteen hundred and four,\" I replied, mentally resolving to give the\nold man no more opportunities of talking, until my examination of the\nregister was over.\n\nThe clerk put on his spectacles, and turned over the leaves of the\nregister, carefully wetting his finger and thumb at every third page.\n\"There it is, sir,\" said he, with another cheerful smack on the open\nvolume.  \"There's the year you want.\"\n\nAs I was ignorant of the month in which Sir Percival was born, I began\nmy backward search with the early part of the year.  The register-book\nwas of the old-fashioned kind, the entries being all made on blank\npages in manuscript, and the divisions which separated them being\nindicated by ink lines drawn across the page at the close of each entry.\n\nI reached the beginning of the year eighteen hundred and four without\nencountering the marriage, and then travelled back through December\neighteen hundred and three--through November and October--through----\n\nNo! not through September also.  Under the heading of that month in the\nyear I found the marriage.\n\nI looked carefully at the entry.  It was at the bottom of a page, and\nwas for want of room compressed into a smaller space than that occupied\nby the marriages above.  The marriage immediately before it was\nimpressed on my attention by the circumstance of the bridegroom's\nChristian name being the same as my own.  The entry immediately\nfollowing it (on the top of the next page) was noticeable in another\nway from the large space it occupied, the record in this case\nregistering the marriages of two brothers at the same time.  The\nregister of the marriage of Sir Felix Glyde was in no respect\nremarkable except for the narrowness of the space into which it was\ncompressed at the bottom of the page.  The information about his wife\nwas the usual information given in such cases.  She was described as\n\"Cecilia Jane Elster, of Park-View Cottages, Knowlesbury, only daughter\nof the late Patrick Elster, Esq., formerly of Bath.\"\n\nI noted down these particulars in my pocket-book, feeling as I did so\nboth doubtful and disheartened about my next proceedings.  The Secret\nwhich I had believed until this moment to be within my grasp seemed now\nfarther from my reach than ever.\n\nWhat suggestions of any mystery unexplained had arisen out of my visit\nto the vestry? I saw no suggestions anywhere.  What progress had I made\ntowards discovering the suspected stain on the reputation of Sir\nPercival's mother? The one fact I had ascertained vindicated her\nreputation.  Fresh doubts, fresh difficulties, fresh delays began to\nopen before me in interminable prospect.  What was I to do next? The\none immediate resource left to me appeared to be this.  I might\ninstitute inquiries about \"Miss Elster of Knowlesbury,\" on the chance\nof advancing towards the main object of my investigation, by first\ndiscovering the secret of Mrs. Catherick's contempt for Sir Percival's\nmother.\n\n\"Have you found what you wanted, sir?\" said the clerk, as I closed the\nregister-book.\n\n\"Yes,\" I replied, \"but I have some inquiries still to make.  I suppose\nthe clergyman who officiated here in the year eighteen hundred and\nthree is no longer alive?\"\n\n\"No, no, sir, he was dead three or four years before I came here, and\nthat was as long ago as the year twenty-seven.  I got this place, sir,\"\npersisted my talkative old friend, \"through the clerk before me leaving\nit.  They say he was driven out of house and home by his wife--and\nshe's living still down in the new town there.  I don't know the rights\nof the story myself--all I know is I got the place.  Mr. Wansborough\ngot it for me--the son of my old master that I was tell you of.  He's a\nfree, pleasant gentleman as ever lived--rides to the hounds, keeps his\npointers and all that. He's vestry-clerk here now as his father was\nbefore him.\"\n\n\"Did you not tell me your former master lived at Knowlesbury?\" I asked,\ncalling to mind the long story about the precise gentleman of the old\nschool with which my talkative friend had wearied me before he opened\nthe register-book.\n\n\"Yes, to be sure, sir,\" replied the clerk.  \"Old Mr. Wansborough lived\nat Knowlesbury, and young Mr. Wansborough lives there too.\"\n\n\"You said just now he was vestry-clerk, like his father before him.  I\nam not quite sure that I know what a vestry-clerk is.\"\n\n\"Don't you indeed, sir?--and you come from London too! Every parish\nchurch, you know, has a vestry-clerk and a parish-clerk. The\nparish-clerk is a man like me (except that I've got a deal more\nlearning than most of them--though I don't boast of it).  The\nvestry-clerk is a sort of an appointment that the lawyers get, and if\nthere's any business to be done for the vestry, why there they are to\ndo it.  It's just the same in London.  Every parish church there has\ngot its vestry-clerk--and you may take my word for it he's sure to be a\nlawyer.\"\n\n\"Then young Mr. Wansborough is a lawyer, I suppose?\"\n\n\"Of course he is, sir! A lawyer in High Street, Knowlesbury--the old\noffices that his father had before him.  The number of times I've swept\nthose offices out, and seen the old gentleman come trotting in to\nbusiness on his white pony, looking right and left all down the street\nand nodding to everybody! Bless you, he was a popular character!--he'd\nhave done in London!\"\n\n\"How far is it to Knowlesbury from this place?\"\n\n\"A long stretch, sir,\" said the clerk, with that exaggerated idea of\ndistances, and that vivid perception of difficulties in getting from\nplace to place, which is peculiar to all country people. \"Nigh on five\nmile, I can tell you!\"\n\nIt was still early in the forenoon.  There was plenty of time for a\nwalk to Knowlesbury and back again to Welmingham; and there was no\nperson probably in the town who was fitter to assist my inquiries about\nthe character and position of Sir Percival's mother before her marriage\nthan the local solicitor.  Resolving to go at once to Knowlesbury on\nfoot, I led the way out of the vestry.\n\n\"Thank you kindly, sir,\" said the clerk, as I slipped my little present\ninto his hand.  \"Are you really going to walk all the way to\nKnowlesbury and back? Well! you're strong on your legs, too--and what\na blessing that is, isn't it? There's the road, you can't miss it.  I\nwish I was going your way--it's pleasant to meet with gentlemen from\nLondon in a lost corner like this.  One hears the news.  Wish you\ngood-morning, sir, and thank you kindly once more.\"\n\nWe parted.  As I left the church behind me I looked back, and there\nwere the two men again on the road below, with a third in their\ncompany, that third person being the short man in black whom I had\ntraced to the railway the evening before.\n\nThe three stood talking together for a little while, then separated.\nThe man in black went away by himself towards Welmingham--the other two\nremained together, evidently waiting to follow me as soon as I walked\non.\n\nI proceeded on my way without letting the fellows see that I took any\nspecial notice of them.  They caused me no conscious irritation of\nfeeling at that moment--on the contrary, they rather revived my sinking\nhopes.  In the surprise of discovering the evidence of the marriage, I\nhad forgotten the inference I had drawn on first perceiving the men in\nthe neighbourhood of the vestry.  Their reappearance reminded me that\nSir Percival had anticipated my visit to Old Welmingham church as the\nnext result of my interview with Mrs. Catherick--otherwise he would\nnever have placed his spies there to wait for me.  Smoothly and fairly\nas appearances looked in the vestry, there was something wrong beneath\nthem--there was something in the register-book, for aught I knew, that\nI had not discovered yet.\n\n\n\nX\n\n\nOnce out of sight of the church, I pressed forward briskly on my way to\nKnowlesbury.\n\nThe road was, for the most part, straight and level.  Whenever I looked\nback over it I saw the two spies steadily following me. For the greater\npart of the way they kept at a safe distance behind.  But once or twice\nthey quickened their pace, as if with the purpose of overtaking me,\nthen stopped, consulted together, and fell back again to their former\nposition.  They had some special object evidently in view, and they\nseemed to be hesitating or differing about the best means of\naccomplishing it.  I could not guess exactly what their design might\nbe, but I felt serious doubts of reaching Knowlesbury without some\nmischance happening to me on the way.  These doubts were realised.\n\nI had just entered on a lonely part of the road, with a sharp turn at\nsome distance ahead, and had just concluded (calculating by time) that\nI must be getting near to the town, when I suddenly heard the steps of\nthe men close behind me.\n\nBefore I could look round, one of them (the man by whom I had been\nfollowed in London) passed rapidly on my left side and hustled me with\nhis shoulder.  I had been more irritated by the manner in which he and\nhis companion had dogged my steps all the way from Old Welmingham than\nI was myself aware of, and I unfortunately pushed the fellow away\nsmartly with my open hand.  He instantly shouted for help.  His\ncompanion, the tall man in the gamekeeper's clothes, sprang to my right\nside, and the next moment the two scoundrels held me pinioned between\nthem in the middle of the road.\n\nThe conviction that a trap had been laid for me, and the vexation of\nknowing that I had fallen into it, fortunately restrained me from\nmaking my position still worse by an unavailing struggle with two men,\none of whom would, in all probability, have been more than a match for\nme single-handed.  I repressed the first natural movement by which I\nhad attempted to shake them off, and looked about to see if there was\nany person near to whom I could appeal.\n\nA labourer was at work in an adjoining field who must have witnessed\nall that had passed.  I called to him to follow us to the town.  He\nshook his head with stolid obstinacy, and walked away in the direction\nof a cottage which stood back from the high-road.  At the same time\nthe men who held me between them declared their intention of charging\nme with an assault.  I was cool enough and wise enough now to make no\nopposition.  \"Drop your hold of my arms,\" I said, \"and I will go with\nyou to the town.\" The man in the gamekeeper's dress roughly refused.\nBut the shorter man was sharp enough to look to consequences, and not\nto let his companion commit himself by unnecessary violence.  He made a\nsign to the other, and I walked on between them with my arms free.\n\nWe reached the turning in the road, and there, close before us, were\nthe suburbs of Knowlesbury.  One of the local policemen was walking\nalong the path by the roadside.  The men at once appealed to him.  He\nreplied that the magistrate was then sitting at the town-hall, and\nrecommended that we should appear before him immediately.\n\nWe went on to the town-hall.  The clerk made out a formal summons, and\nthe charge was preferred against me, with the customary exaggeration\nand the customary perversion of the truth on such occasions.  The\nmagistrate (an ill-tempered man, with a sour enjoyment in the exercise\nof his own power) inquired if any one on or near the road had witnessed\nthe assault, and, greatly to my surprise, the complainant admitted the\npresence of the labourer in the field.  I was enlightened, however, as\nto the object of the admission by the magistrate's next words.  He\nremanded me at once for the production of the witness, expressing, at\nthe same time, his willingness to take bail for my reappearance if I\ncould produce one responsible surety to offer it.  If I had been known\nin the town he would have liberated me on my own recognisances, but as\nI was a total stranger it was necessary that I should find responsible\nbail.\n\nThe whole object of the stratagem was now disclosed to me.  It had been\nso managed as to make a remand necessary in a town where I was a\nperfect stranger, and where I could not hope to get my liberty on bail.\nThe remand merely extended over three days, until the next sitting of\nthe magistrate.  But in that time, while I was in confinement, Sir\nPercival might use any means he pleased to embarrass my future\nproceedings--perhaps to screen himself from detection\naltogether--without the slightest fear of any hindrance on my part.  At\nthe end of the three days the charge would, no doubt, be withdrawn, and\nthe attendance of the witness would be perfectly useless.\n\nMy indignation, I may almost say, my despair, at this mischievous check\nto all further progress--so base and trifling in itself, and yet so\ndisheartening and so serious in its probable results--quite unfitted me\nat first to reflect on the best means of extricating myself from the\ndilemma in which I now stood.  I had the folly to call for writing\nmaterials, and to think of privately communicating my real position to\nthe magistrate.  The hopelessness and the imprudence of this proceeding\nfailed to strike me before I had actually written the opening lines of\nthe letter.  It was not till I had pushed the paper away--not till, I\nam ashamed to say, I had almost allowed the vexation of my helpless\nposition to conquer me--that a course of action suddenly occurred to my\nmind, which Sir Percival had probably not anticipated, and which might\nset me free again in a few hours.  I determined to communicate the\nsituation in which I was placed to Mr. Dawson, of Oak Lodge.\n\nI had visited this gentleman's house, it may be remembered, at the time\nof my first inquiries in the Blackwater Park neighbourhood, and I had\npresented to him a letter of introduction from Miss Halcombe, in which\nshe recommended me to his friendly attention in the strongest terms.  I\nnow wrote, referring to this letter, and to what I had previously told\nMr. Dawson of the delicate and dangerous nature of my inquiries.  I had\nnot revealed to him the truth about Laura, having merely described my\nerrand as being of the utmost importance to private family interests\nwith which Miss Halcombe was concerned.  Using the same caution still,\nI now accounted for my presence at Knowlesbury in the same manner, and\nI put it to the doctor to say whether the trust reposed in me by a lady\nwhom he well knew, and the hospitality I had myself received in his\nhouse, justified me or not in asking him to come to my assistance in a\nplace where I was quite friendless.\n\nI obtained permission to hire a messenger to drive away at once with my\nletter in a conveyance which might be used to bring the doctor back\nimmediately.  Oak Lodge was on the Knowlesbury side of Blackwater.  The\nman declared he could drive there in forty minutes, and could bring Mr.\nDawson back in forty more.  I directed him to follow the doctor\nwherever he might happen to be, if he was not at home, and then sat\ndown to wait for the result with all the patience and all the hope that\nI could summon to help me.\n\nIt was not quite half-past one when the messenger departed. Before\nhalf-past three he returned, and brought the doctor with him.  Mr.\nDawson's kindness, and the delicacy with which he treated his prompt\nassistance quite as a matter of course, almost overpowered me.  The\nbail required was offered, and accepted immediately.  Before four\no'clock, on that afternoon, I was shaking hands warmly with the good\nold doctor--a free man again--in the streets of Knowlesbury.\n\nMr. Dawson hospitably invited me to go back with him to Oak Lodge, and\ntake up my quarters there for the night.  I could only reply that my\ntime was not my own, and I could only ask him to let me pay my visit in\na few days, when I might repeat my thanks, and offer to him all the\nexplanations which I felt to be only his due, but which I was not then\nin a position to make.  We parted with friendly assurances on both\nsides, and I turned my steps at once to Mr. Wansborough's office in the\nHigh Street.\n\nTime was now of the last importance.\n\nThe news of my being free on bail would reach Sir Percival, to an\nabsolute certainty, before night.  If the next few hours did not put me\nin a position to justify his worst fears, and to hold him helpless at\nmy mercy, I might lose every inch of the ground I had gained, never to\nrecover it again.  The unscrupulous nature of the man, the local\ninfluence he possessed, the desperate peril of exposure with which my\nblindfold inquiries threatened him--all warned me to press on to\npositive discovery, without the useless waste of a single minute.  I\nhad found time to think while I was waiting for Mr. Dawson's arrival,\nand I had well employed it. Certain portions of the conversation of the\ntalkative old clerk, which had wearied me at the time, now recurred to\nmy memory with a new significance, and a suspicion crossed my mind\ndarkly which had not occurred to me while I was in the vestry.  On my\nway to Knowlesbury, I had only proposed to apply to Mr. Wansborough for\ninformation on the subject of Sir Percival's mother.  My object now was\nto examine the duplicate register of Old Welmingham Church.\n\nMr. Wansborough was in his office when I inquired for him.\n\nHe was a jovial, red-faced, easy-looking man--more like a country\nsquire than a lawyer--and he seemed to be both surprised and amused by\nmy application.  He had heard of his father's copy of the register, but\nhad not even seen it himself.  It had never been inquired after, and it\nwas no doubt in the strong room among other papers that had not been\ndisturbed since his father's death.  It was a pity (Mr. Wansborough\nsaid) that the old gentleman was not alive to hear his precious copy\nasked for at last. He would have ridden his favourite hobby harder than\never now.  How had I come to hear of the copy? was it through anybody\nin the town?\n\nI parried the question as well as I could.  It was impossible at this\nstage of the investigation to be too cautious, and it was just as well\nnot to let Mr. Wansborough know prematurely that I had already examined\nthe original register.  I described myself, therefore, as pursuing a\nfamily inquiry, to the object of which every possible saving of time\nwas of great importance.  I was anxious to send certain particulars to\nLondon by that day's post, and one look at the duplicate register\n(paying, of course, the necessary fees) might supply what I required,\nand save me a further journey to Old Welmingham.  I added that, in the\nevent of my subsequently requiring a copy of the original register, I\nshould make application to Mr. Wansborough's office to furnish me with\nthe document.\n\nAfter this explanation no objection was made to producing the copy.  A\nclerk was sent to the strong room, and after some delay returned with\nthe volume.  It was of exactly the same size as the volume in the\nvestry, the only difference being that the copy was more smartly bound.\nI took it with me to an unoccupied desk.  My hands were trembling--my\nhead was burning hot--I felt the necessity of concealing my agitation\nas well as I could from the persons about me in the room, before I\nventured on opening the book.\n\nOn the blank page at the beginning, to which I first turned, were\ntraced some lines in faded ink.  They contained these words--\n\n\"Copy of the Marriage Register of Welmingham Parish Church. Executed\nunder my orders, and afterwards compared, entry by entry, with the\noriginal, by myself.  (Signed) Robert Wansborough, vestry-clerk.\"\nBelow this note there was a line added, in another handwriting, as\nfollows: \"Extending from the first of January, 1800, to the thirtieth\nof June, 1815.\"\n\nI turned to the month of September, eighteen hundred and three.  I\nfound the marriage of the man whose Christian name was the same as my\nown.  I found the double register of the marriages of the two brothers.\nAnd between these entries, at the bottom of the page?\n\nNothing! Not a vestige of the entry which recorded the marriage of Sir\nFelix Glyde and Cecilia Jane Elster in the register of the church!\n\nMy heart gave a great bound, and throbbed as if it would stifle me.  I\nlooked again--I was afraid to believe the evidence of my own eyes.  No!\nnot a doubt.  The marriage was not there.  The entries on the copy\noccupied exactly the same places on the page as the entries in the\noriginal.  The last entry on one page recorded the marriage of the man\nwith my Christian name.  Below it there was a blank space--a space\nevidently left because it was too narrow to contain the entry of the\nmarriages of the two brothers, which in the copy, as in the original,\noccupied the top of the next page.  That space told the whole story!\nThere it must have remained in the church register from eighteen\nhundred and three (when the marriages had been solemnised and the copy\nhad been made) to eighteen hundred and twenty-seven, when Sir Percival\nappeared at Old Welmingham.  Here, at Knowlesbury, was the chance of\ncommitting the forgery shown to me in the copy, and there, at Old\nWelmingham, was the forgery committed in the register of the church.\n\nMy head turned giddy--I held by the desk to keep myself from falling.\nOf all the suspicions which had struck me in relation to that desperate\nman, not one had been near the truth.\n\nThe idea that he was not Sir Percival Glyde at all, that he had no more\nclaim to the baronetcy and to Blackwater Park than the poorest labourer\nwho worked on the estate, had never once occurred to my mind.  At one\ntime I had thought he might be Anne Catherick's father--at another time\nI had thought he might have been Anne Catherick's husband--the offence\nof which he was really guilty had been, from first to last, beyond the\nwidest reach of my imagination.\n\nThe paltry means by which the fraud had been effected, the magnitude\nand daring of the crime that it represented, the horror of the\nconsequences involved in its discovery, overwhelmed me. Who could\nwonder now at the brute-restlessness of the wretch's life--at his\ndesperate alternations between abject duplicity and reckless\nviolence--at the madness of guilty distrust which had made him imprison\nAnne Catherick in the Asylum, and had given him over to the vile\nconspiracy against his wife, on the bare suspicion that the one and the\nother knew his terrible secret? The disclosure of that secret might, in\npast years, have hanged him--might now transport him for life.  The\ndisclosure of that secret, even if the sufferers by his deception\nspared him the penalties of the law, would deprive him at one blow of\nthe name, the rank, the estate, the whole social existence that he had\nusurped.  This was the Secret, and it was mine! A word from me, and\nhouse, lands, baronetcy, were gone from him for ever--a word from me,\nand he was driven out into the world, a nameless, penniless, friendless\noutcast! The man's whole future hung on my lips--and he knew it by this\ntime as certainly as I did!\n\nThat last thought steadied me.  Interests far more precious than my own\ndepended on the caution which must now guide my slightest actions.\nThere was no possible treachery which Sir Percival might not attempt\nagainst me.  In the danger and desperation of his position he would be\nstaggered by no risks, he would recoil at no crime--he would literally\nhesitate at nothing to save himself.\n\nI considered for a minute.  My first necessity was to secure positive\nevidence in writing of the discovery that I had just made, and in the\nevent of any personal misadventure happening to me, to place that\nevidence beyond Sir Percival's reach.  The copy of the register was\nsure to be safe in Mr. Wansborough's strong room.  But the position of\nthe original in the vestry was, as I had seen with my own eyes,\nanything but secure.\n\nIn this emergency I resolved to return to the church, to apply again to\nthe clerk, and to take the necessary extract from the register before I\nslept that night.  I was not then aware that a legally-certified copy\nwas necessary, and that no document merely drawn out by myself could\nclaim the proper importance as a proof. I was not aware of this, and my\ndetermination to keep my present proceedings a secret prevented me from\nasking any questions which might have procured the necessary\ninformation.  My one anxiety was the anxiety to get back to Old\nWelmingham.  I made the best excuses I could for the discomposure in my\nface and manner which Mr. Wansborough had already noticed, laid the\nnecessary fee on his table, arranged that I should write to him in a\nday or two, and left the office, with my head in a whirl and my blood\nthrobbing through my veins at fever heat.\n\nIt was just getting dark.  The idea occurred to me that I might be\nfollowed again and attacked on the high-road.\n\nMy walking-stick was a light one, of little or no use for purposes of\ndefence.  I stopped before leaving Knowlesbury and bought a stout\ncountry cudgel, short, and heavy at the head.  With this homely weapon,\nif any one man tried to stop me I was a match for him.  If more than\none attacked me I could trust to my heels.  In my school-days I had\nbeen a noted runner, and I had not wanted for practice since in the\nlater time of my experience in Central America.\n\nI started from the town at a brisk pace, and kept the middle of the\nroad.\n\nA small misty rain was falling, and it was impossible for the first\nhalf of the way to make sure whether I was followed or not. But at the\nlast half of my journey, when I supposed myself to be about two miles\nfrom the church, I saw a man run by me in the rain, and then heard the\ngate of a field by the roadside shut to sharply.  I kept straight on,\nwith my cudgel ready in my hand, my ears on the alert, and my eyes\nstraining to see through the mist and the darkness.  Before I had\nadvanced a hundred yards there was a rustling in the hedge on my right,\nand three men sprang out into the road.\n\nI drew aside on the instant to the footpath.  The two foremost men were\ncarried beyond me before they could check themselves.  The third was as\nquick as lightning.  He stopped, half turned, and struck at me with his\nstick.  The blow was aimed at hazard, and was not a severe one.  It\nfell on my left shoulder.  I returned it heavily on his head.  He\nstaggered back and jostled his two companions just as they were both\nrushing at me.  This circumstance gave me a moment's start.  I slipped\nby them, and took to the middle of the road again at the top of my\nspeed.\n\nThe two unhurt men pursued me.  They were both good runners--the road\nwas smooth and level, and for the first five minutes or more I was\nconscious that I did not gain on them.  It was perilous work to run for\nlong in the darkness.  I could barely see the dim black line of the\nhedges on either side, and any chance obstacle in the road would have\nthrown me down to a certainty.  Ere long I felt the ground changing--it\ndescended from the level at a turn, and then rose again beyond.\nDownhill the men rather gained on me, but uphill I began to distance\nthem.  The rapid, regular thump of their feet grew fainter on my ear,\nand I calculated by the sound that I was far enough in advance to take\nto the fields with a good chance of their passing me in the darkness.\nDiverging to the footpath, I made for the first break that I could\nguess at, rather than see, in the hedge.  It proved to be a closed\ngate.  I vaulted over, and finding myself in a field, kept across it\nsteadily with my back to the road.  I heard the men pass the gate,\nstill running, then in a minute more heard one of them call to the\nother to come back.  It was no matter what they did now, I was out of\ntheir sight and out of their hearing.  I kept straight across the\nfield, and when I had reached the farther extremity of it, waited there\nfor a minute to recover my breath.\n\nIt was impossible to venture back to the road, but I was determined\nnevertheless to get to Old Welmingham that evening.\n\nNeither moon nor stars appeared to guide me.  I only knew that I had\nkept the wind and rain at my back on leaving Knowlesbury, and if I now\nkept them at my back still, I might at least be certain of not\nadvancing altogether in the wrong direction.\n\nProceeding on this plan, I crossed the country--meeting with no worse\nobstacles than hedges, ditches, and thickets, which every now and then\nobliged me to alter my course for a little while--until I found myself\non a hill-side, with the ground sloping away steeply before me.  I\ndescended to the bottom of the hollow, squeezed my way through a hedge,\nand got out into a lane.  Having turned to the right on leaving the\nroad, I now turned to the left, on the chance of regaining the line\nfrom which I had wandered. After following the muddy windings of the\nlane for ten minutes or more, I saw a cottage with a light in one of\nthe windows.  The garden gate was open to the lane, and I went in at\nonce to inquire my way.\n\nBefore I could knock at the door it was suddenly opened, and a man came\nrunning out with a lighted lantern in his hand.  He stopped and held it\nup at the sight of me.  We both started as we saw each other.  My\nwanderings had led me round the outskirts of the village, and had\nbrought me out at the lower end of it.  I was back at Old Welmingham,\nand the man with the lantern was no other than my acquaintance of the\nmorning, the parish clerk.\n\nHis manner appeared to have altered strangely in the interval since I\nhad last seen him.  He looked suspicious and confused--his ruddy cheeks\nwere deeply flushed--and his first words, when he spoke, were quite\nunintelligible to me.\n\n\"Where are the keys?\" he asked.  \"Have you taken them?\"\n\n\"What keys?\" I repeated.  \"I have this moment come from Knowlesbury.\nWhat keys do you mean?\"\n\n\"The keys of the vestry.  Lord save us and help us! what shall I do?\nThe keys are gone! Do you hear?\" cried the old man, shaking the lantern\nat me in his agitation, \"the keys are gone!\"\n\n\"How? When? Who can have taken them?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" said the clerk, staring about him wildly in the\ndarkness.  \"I've only just got back.  I told you I had a long day's\nwork this morning--I locked the door and shut the window down--it's\nopen now, the window's open.  Look! somebody has got in there and taken\nthe keys.\"\n\nHe turned to the casement window to show me that it was wide open. The\ndoor of the lantern came loose from its fastening as he swayed it\nround, and the wind blew the candle out instantly.\n\n\"Get another light,\" I said, \"and let us both go to the vestry\ntogether.  Quick! quick!\"\n\nI hurried him into the house.  The treachery that I had every reason to\nexpect, the treachery that might deprive me of every advantage I had\ngained, was at that moment, perhaps, in process of accomplishment.  My\nimpatience to reach the church was so great that I could not remain\ninactive in the cottage while the clerk lit the lantern again.  I\nwalked out, down the garden path, into the lane.\n\nBefore I had advanced ten paces a man approached me from the direction\nleading to the church.  He spoke respectfully as we met. I could not\nsee his face, but judging by his voice only, he was a perfect stranger\nto me.\n\n\"I beg your pardon, Sir Percival----\" he began.\n\nI stopped him before he could say more.\n\n\"The darkness misleads you,\" I said.  \"I am not Sir Percival.\"\n\nThe man drew back directly.\n\n\"I thought it was my master,\" he muttered, in a confused, doubtful way.\n\n\"You expected to meet your master here?\"\n\n\"I was told to wait in the lane.\"\n\nWith that answer he retraced his steps.  I looked back at the cottage\nand saw the clerk coming out, with the lantern lighted once more.  I\ntook the old man's arm to help him on the more quickly.  We hastened\nalong the lane, and passed the person who had accosted me.  As well as\nI could see by the light of the lantern, he was a servant out of livery.\n\n\"Who's that?\" whispered the clerk.  \"Does he know anything about the\nkeys?\"\n\n\"We won't wait to ask him,\" I replied.  \"We will go on to the vestry\nfirst.\"\n\nThe church was not visible, even by daytime, until the end of the lane\nwas reached.  As we mounted the rising ground which led to the building\nfrom that point, one of the village children--a boy--came close up to\nus, attracted by the light we carried, and recognised the clerk.\n\n\"I say, measter,\" said the boy, pulling officiously at the clerk's\ncoat, \"there be summun up yander in the church.  I heerd un lock the\ndoor on hisself--I heerd un strike a loight wi' a match.\"\n\nThe clerk trembled and leaned against me heavily.\n\n\"Come! come!\" I said encouragingly.  \"We are not too late.  We will\ncatch the man, whoever he is.  Keep the lantern, and follow me as fast\nas you can.\"\n\nI mounted the hill rapidly.  The dark mass of the church-tower was the\nfirst object I discerned dimly against the night sky.  As I turned\naside to get round to the vestry, I heard heavy footsteps close to me.\nThe servant had ascended to the church after us.  \"I don't mean any\nharm,\" he said, when I turned round on him, \"I'm only looking for my\nmaster.\"  The tones in which he spoke betrayed unmistakable fear.  I\ntook no notice of him and went on.\n\nThe instant I turned the corner and came in view of the vestry, I saw\nthe lantern-skylight on the roof brilliantly lit up from within.  It\nshone out with dazzling brightness against the murky, starless sky.\n\nI hurried through the churchyard to the door.\n\nAs I got near there was a strange smell stealing out on the damp night\nair.  I heard a snapping noise inside--I saw the light above grow\nbrighter and brighter--a pane of the glass cracked--I ran to the door\nand put my hand on it.  The vestry was on fire!\n\nBefore I could move, before I could draw my breath after that\ndiscovery, I was horror-struck by a heavy thump against the door from\nthe inside.  I heard the key worked violently in the lock--I heard a\nman's voice behind the door, raised to a dreadful shrillness, screaming\nfor help.\n\nThe servant who had followed me staggered back shuddering, and dropped\nto his knees.  \"Oh, my God!\" he said, \"it's Sir Percival!\"\n\nAs the words passed his lips the clerk joined us, and at the same\nmoment there was another and a last grating turn of the key in the lock.\n\n\"The Lord have mercy on his soul!\" said the old man.  \"He is doomed and\ndead.  He has hampered the lock.\"\n\nI rushed to the door.  The one absorbing purpose that had filled all my\nthoughts, that had controlled all my actions, for weeks and weeks past,\nvanished in an instant from my mind.  All remembrance of the heartless\ninjury the man's crimes had inflicted--of the love, the innocence, the\nhappiness he had pitilessly laid waste--of the oath I had sworn in my\nown heart to summon him to the terrible reckoning that he\ndeserved--passed from my memory like a dream.  I remembered nothing but\nthe horror of his situation.  I felt nothing but the natural human\nimpulse to save him from a frightful death.\n\n\"Try the other door!\" I shouted.  \"Try the door into the church! The\nlock's hampered.  You're a dead man if you waste another moment on it.\"\n\nThere had been no renewed cry for help when the key was turned for the\nlast time.  There was no sound now of any kind, to give token that he\nwas still alive.  I heard nothing but the quickening crackle of the\nflames, and the sharp snap of the glass in the skylight above.\n\nI looked round at my two companions.  The servant had risen to his\nfeet--he had taken the lantern, and was holding it up vacantly at the\ndoor.  Terror seemed to have struck him with downright idiocy--he\nwaited at my heels, he followed me about when I moved like a dog.  The\nclerk sat crouched up on one of the tombstones, shivering, and moaning\nto himself.  The one moment in which I looked at them was enough to\nshow me that they were both helpless.\n\nHardly knowing what I did, acting desperately on the first impulse that\noccurred to me, I seized the servant and pushed him against the vestry\nwall.  \"Stoop!\" I said, \"and hold by the stones.  I am going to climb\nover you to the roof--I am going to break the skylight, and give him\nsome air!\"\n\nThe man trembled from head to foot, but he held firm.  I got on his\nback, with my cudgel in my mouth, seized the parapet with both hands,\nand was instantly on the roof.  In the frantic hurry and agitation of\nthe moment, it never struck me that I might let out the flame instead\nof letting in the air.  I struck at the skylight, and battered in the\ncracked, loosened glass at a blow. The fire leaped out like a wild\nbeast from its lair.  If the wind had not chanced, in the position I\noccupied, to set it away from me, my exertions might have ended then\nand there.  I crouched on the roof as the smoke poured out above me\nwith the flame.  The gleams and flashes of the light showed me the\nservant's face staring up vacantly under the wall--the clerk risen to\nhis feet on the tombstone, wringing his hands in despair--and the\nscanty population of the village, haggard men and terrified women,\nclustered beyond in the churchyard--all appearing and disappearing, in\nthe red of the dreadful glare, in the black of the choking smoke.  And\nthe man beneath my feet!--the man, suffocating, burning, dying so near\nus all, so utterly beyond our reach!\n\nThe thought half maddened me.  I lowered myself from the roof, by my\nhands, and dropped to the ground.\n\n\"The key of the church!\" I shouted to the clerk.  \"We must try it that\nway--we may save him yet if we can burst open the inner door.\"\n\n\"No, no, no!\" cried the old man.  \"No hope! the church key and the\nvestry key are on the same ring--both inside there! Oh, sir, he's past\nsaving--he's dust and ashes by this time!\"\n\n\"They'll see the fire from the town,\" said a voice from among the men\nbehind me.  \"There's a ingine in the town.  They'll save the church.\"\n\nI called to that man--HE had his wits about him--I called to him to\ncome and speak to me.  It would be a quarter of an hour at least before\nthe town engine could reach us.  The horror of remaining inactive all\nthat time was more than I could face.  In defiance of my own reason I\npersuaded myself that the doomed and lost wretch in the vestry might\nstill be lying senseless on the floor, might not be dead yet.  If we\nbroke open the door, might we save him? I knew the strength of the\nheavy lock--I knew the thickness of the nailed oak--I knew the\nhopelessness of assailing the one and the other by ordinary means.  But\nsurely there were beams still left in the dismantled cottages near the\nchurch? What if we got one, and used it as a battering-ram against the\ndoor?\n\nThe thought leaped through me like the fire leaping out of the\nshattered skylight.  I appealed to the man who had spoken first of the\nfire-engine in the town.  \"Have you got your pickaxes handy?\" Yes, they\nhad.  \"And a hatchet, and a saw, and a bit of rope?\" Yes! yes! yes! I\nran down among the villagers, with the lantern in my hand.  \"Five\nshillings apiece to every man who helps me!\" They started into life at\nthe words.  That ravenous second hunger of poverty--the hunger for\nmoney--roused them into tumult and activity in a moment.  \"Two of you\nfor more lanterns, if you have them! Two of you for the pickaxes and\nthe tools! The rest after me to find the beam!\" They cheered--with\nshrill starveling voices they cheered.  The women and the children fled\nback on either side.  We rushed in a body down the churchyard path to\nthe first empty cottage.  Not a man was left behind but the clerk--the\npoor old clerk standing on the flat tombstone sobbing and wailing over\nthe church.  The servant was still at my heels--his white, helpless,\npanic-stricken face was close over my shoulder as we pushed into the\ncottage.  There were rafters from the torn-down floor above, lying\nloose on the ground--but they were too light. A beam ran across over\nour heads, but not out of reach of our arms and our pickaxes--a beam\nfast at each end in the ruined wall, with ceiling and flooring all\nripped away, and a great gap in the roof above, open to the sky.  We\nattacked the beam at both ends at once.  God! how it held--how the\nbrick and mortar of the wall resisted us! We struck, and tugged, and\ntore.  The beam gave at one end--it came down with a lump of brickwork\nafter it.  There was a scream from the women all huddled in the doorway\nto look at us--a shout from the men--two of them down but not hurt.\nAnother tug all together--and the beam was loose at both ends.  We\nraised it, and gave the word to clear the doorway.  Now for the work!\nnow for the rush at the door! There is the fire streaming into the sky,\nstreaming brighter than ever to light us! Steady along the churchyard\npath--steady with the beam for a rush at the door. One, two, three--and\noff.  Out rings the cheering again, irrepressibly.  We have shaken it\nalready, the hinges must give if the lock won't.  Another run with the\nbeam! One, two, three--and off.  It's loose! the stealthy fire darts at\nus through the crevice all round it.  Another, and a last rush! The\ndoor falls in with a crash.  A great hush of awe, a stillness of\nbreathless expectation, possesses every living soul of us.  We look for\nthe body.  The scorching heat on our faces drives us back: we see\nnothing--above, below, all through the room, we see nothing but a sheet\nof living fire.\n\n\n\"Where is he?\" whispered the servant, staring vacantly at the flames.\n\n\"He's dust and ashes,\" said the clerk.  \"And the books are dust and\nashes--and oh, sirs! the church will be dust and ashes soon.\"\n\nThose were the only two who spoke.  When they were silent again,\nnothing stirred in the stillness but the bubble and the crackle of the\nflames.\n\nHark!\n\nA harsh rattling sound in the distance--then the hollow beat of horses'\nhoofs at full gallop--then the low roar, the all-predominant tumult of\nhundreds of human voices clamouring and shouting together.  The engine\nat last.\n\nThe people about me all turned from the fire, and ran eagerly to the\nbrow of the hill.  The old clerk tried to go with the rest, but his\nstrength was exhausted.  I saw him holding by one of the tombstones.\n\"Save the church!\" he cried out faintly, as if the firemen could hear\nhim already.\n\nSave the church!\n\nThe only man who never moved was the servant.  There he stood, his eyes\nstill fastened on the flames in a changeless, vacant stare. I spoke to\nhim, I shook him by the arm.  He was past rousing.  He only whispered\nonce more, \"Where is he?\"\n\nIn ten minutes the engine was in position, the well at the back of the\nchurch was feeding it, and the hose was carried to the doorway of the\nvestry.  If help had been wanted from me I could not have afforded it\nnow.  My energy of will was gone--my strength was exhausted--the\nturmoil of my thoughts was fearfully and suddenly stilled, now I knew\nthat he was dead.\n\nI stood useless and helpless--looking, looking, looking into the\nburning room.\n\nI saw the fire slowly conquered.  The brightness of the glare\nfaded--the steam rose in white clouds, and the smouldering heaps of\nembers showed red and black through it on the floor.  There was a\npause--then an advance all together of the firemen and the police which\nblocked up the doorway--then a consultation in low voices--and then two\nmen were detached from the rest, and sent out of the churchyard through\nthe crowd.  The crowd drew back on either side in dead silence to let\nthem pass.\n\nAfter a while a great shudder ran through the people, and the living\nlane widened slowly.  The men came back along it with a door from one\nof the empty houses.  They carried it to the vestry and went in.  The\npolice closed again round the doorway, and men stole out from among the\ncrowd by twos and threes and stood behind them to be the first to see.\nOthers waited near to be the first to hear.  Women and children were\namong these last.\n\nThe tidings from the vestry began to flow out among the crowd--they\ndropped slowly from mouth to mouth till they reached the place where I\nwas standing.  I heard the questions and answers repeated again and\nagain in low, eager tones all round me.\n\n\"Have they found him?\" \"Yes.\"--\"Where?\" \"Against the door, on his\nface.\"--\"Which door?\" \"The door that goes into the church.  His head\nwas against it--he was down on his face.\"--\"Is his face burnt?\" \"No.\"\n\"Yes, it is.\" \"No, scorched, not burnt--he lay on his face, I tell\nyou.\"--\"Who was he? A lord, they say.\" \"No, not a lord.  SIR Something;\nSir means Knight.\" \"And Baronight, too.\" \"No.\" \"Yes, it does.\"--\"What\ndid he want in there?\" \"No good, you may depend on it.\"--\"Did he do it\non purpose?\"--\"Burn himself on purpose!\"--\"I don't mean himself, I mean\nthe vestry.\"--\"Is he dreadful to look at?\" \"Dreadful!\"--\"Not about the\nface, though?\" \"No, no, not so much about the face.  Don't anybody know\nhim?\" \"There's a man says he does.\"--\"Who?\" \"A servant, they say.  But\nhe's struck stupid-like, and the police don't believe him.\"--\"Don't\nanybody else know who it is?\" \"Hush----!\"\n\nThe loud, clear voice of a man in authority silenced the low hum of\ntalking all round me in an instant.\n\n\"Where is the gentleman who tried to save him?\" said the voice.\n\n\"Here, sir--here he is!\" Dozens of eager faces pressed about me--dozens\nof eager arms parted the crowd.  The man in authority came up to\nme with a lantern in his hand.\n\n\"This way, sir, if you please,\" he said quietly.\n\nI was unable to speak to him, I was unable to resist him when he took\nmy arm.  I tried to say that I had never seen the dead man in his\nlifetime--that there was no hope of identifying him by means of a\nstranger like me.  But the words failed on my lips.  I was faint, and\nsilent, and helpless.\n\n\"Do you know him, sir?\"\n\nI was standing inside a circle of men.  Three of them opposite to me\nwere holding lanterns low down to the ground.  Their eyes, and the eyes\nof all the rest, were fixed silently and expectantly on my face.  I\nknew what was at my feet--I knew why they were holding the lanterns so\nlow to the ground.\n\n\"Can you identify him, sir?\"\n\nMy eyes dropped slowly.  At first I saw nothing under them but a coarse\ncanvas cloth.  The dripping of the rain on it was audible in the\ndreadful silence.  I looked up, along the cloth, and there at the end,\nstark and grim and black, in the yellow light--there was his dead face.\n\nSo, for the first and last time, I saw him.  So the Visitation of God\nruled it that he and I should meet.\n\n\n\nXI\n\nThe inquest was hurried for certain local reasons which weighed with\nthe coroner and the town authorities.  It was held on the afternoon of\nthe next day.  I was necessarily one among the witnesses summoned to\nassist the objects of the investigation.\n\nMy first proceeding in the morning was to go to the post-office, and\ninquire for the letter which I expected from Marian.  No change of\ncircumstances, however extraordinary, could affect the one great\nanxiety which weighed on my mind while I was away from London.  The\nmorning's letter, which was the only assurance I could receive that no\nmisfortune had happened in my absence, was still the absorbing interest\nwith which my day began.\n\nTo my relief, the letter from Marian was at the office waiting for me.\n\nNothing had happened--they were both as safe and as well as when I had\nleft them.  Laura sent her love, and begged that I would let her know\nof my return a day beforehand.  Her sister added, in explanation of\nthis message, that she had saved \"nearly a sovereign\" out of her own\nprivate purse, and that she had claimed the privilege of ordering the\ndinner and giving the dinner which was to celebrate the day of my\nreturn.  I read these little domestic confidences in the bright morning\nwith the terrible recollection of what had happened the evening before\nvivid in my memory.  The necessity of sparing Laura any sudden\nknowledge of the truth was the first consideration which the letter\nsuggested to me.  I wrote at once to Marian to tell her what I have\ntold in these pages--presenting the tidings as gradually and gently as\nI could, and warning her not to let any such thing as a newspaper fall\nin Laura's way while I was absent.  In the case of any other woman,\nless courageous and less reliable, I might have hesitated before I\nventured on unreservedly disclosing the whole truth.  But I owed it to\nMarian to be faithful to my past experience of her, and to trust her as\nI trusted herself.\n\nMy letter was necessarily a long one.  It occupied me until the time\ncame for proceeding to the inquest.\n\nThe objects of the legal inquiry were necessarily beset by peculiar\ncomplications and difficulties.  Besides the investigation into the\nmanner in which the deceased had met his death, there were serious\nquestions to be settled relating to the cause of the fire, to the\nabstraction of the keys, and to the presence of a stranger in the\nvestry at the time when the flames broke out.  Even the identification\nof the dead man had not yet been accomplished.  The helpless condition\nof the servant had made the police distrustful of his asserted\nrecognition of his master. They had sent to Knowlesbury overnight to\nsecure the attendance of witnesses who were well acquainted with the\npersonal appearance of Sir Percival Glyde, and they had communicated,\nthe first thing in the morning, with Blackwater Park.  These\nprecautions enabled the coroner and jury to settle the question of\nidentity, and to confirm the correctness of the servant's assertion;\nthe evidence offered by competent witnesses, and by the discovery of\ncertain facts, being subsequently strengthened by an examination of the\ndead man's watch.  The crest and the name of Sir Percival Glyde were\nengraved inside it.\n\nThe next inquiries related to the fire.\n\nThe servant and I, and the boy who had heard the light struck in the\nvestry, were the first witnesses called.  The boy gave his evidence\nclearly enough, but the servant's mind had not yet recovered the shock\ninflicted on it--he was plainly incapable of assisting the objects of\nthe inquiry, and he was desired to stand down.\n\nTo my own relief, my examination was not a long one.  I had not known\nthe deceased--I had never seen him--I was not aware of his presence at\nOld Welmingham--and I had not been in the vestry at the finding of the\nbody.  All I could prove was that I had stopped at the clerk's cottage\nto ask my way--that I had heard from him of the loss of the keys--that\nI had accompanied him to the church to render what help I could--that I\nhad seen the fire--that I had heard some person unknown, inside the\nvestry, trying vainly to unlock the door--and that I had done what I\ncould, from motives of humanity, to save the man.  Other witnesses, who\nhad been acquainted with the deceased, were asked if they could explain\nthe mystery of his presumed abstraction of the keys, and his presence\nin the burning room.  But the coroner seemed to take it for granted,\nnaturally enough, that I, as a total stranger in the neighbourhood, and\na total stranger to Sir Percival Glyde, could not be in a position to\noffer any evidence on these two points.\n\nThe course that I was myself bound to take, when my formal examination\nhad closed, seemed clear to me.  I did not feel called on to volunteer\nany statement of my own private convictions; in the first place,\nbecause my doing so could serve no practical purpose, now that all\nproof in support of any surmises of mine was burnt with the burnt\nregister; in the second place, because I could not have intelligibly\nstated my opinion--my unsupported opinion--without disclosing the whole\nstory of the conspiracy, and producing beyond a doubt the same\nunsatisfactory effect an the minds of the coroner and the jury, which I\nhad already produced on the mind of Mr. Kyrle.\n\nIn these pages, however, and after the time that has now elapsed, no\nsuch cautions and restraints as are here described need fetter the free\nexpression of my opinion.  I will state briefly, before my pen occupies\nitself with other events, how my own convictions lead me to account for\nthe abstraction of the keys, for the outbreak of the fire, and for the\ndeath of the man.\n\nThe news of my being free on bail drove Sir Percival, as I believe, to\nhis last resources.  The attempted attack on the road was one of those\nresources, and the suppression of all practical proof of his crime, by\ndestroying the page of the register on which the forgery had been\ncommitted, was the other, and the surest of the two.  If I could\nproduce no extract from the original book to compare with the certified\ncopy at Knowlesbury, I could produce no positive evidence, and could\nthreaten him with no fatal exposure.  All that was necessary to the\nattainment of his end was, that he should get into the vestry\nunperceived, that he should tear out the page in the register, and that\nhe should leave the vestry again as privately as he had entered it.\n\nOn this supposition, it is easy to understand why he waited until\nnightfall before he made the attempt, and why he took advantage of the\nclerk's absence to possess himself of the keys.  Necessity would oblige\nhim to strike a light to find his way to the right register, and common\ncaution would suggest his locking the door on the inside in case of\nintrusion on the part of any inquisitive stranger, or on my part, if I\nhappened to be in the neighbourhood at the time.\n\nI cannot believe that it was any part of his intention to make the\ndestruction of the register appear to be the result of accident, by\npurposely setting the vestry on fire.  The bare chance that prompt\nassistance might arrive, and that the books might, by the remotest\npossibility, be saved, would have been enough, on a moment's\nconsideration, to dismiss any idea of this sort from his mind.\nRemembering the quantity of combustible objects in the vestry--the\nstraw, the papers, the packing-cases, the dry wood, the old worm-eaten\npresses--all the probabilities, in my estimation, point to the fire as\nthe result of an accident with his matches or his light.\n\nHis first impulse, under these circumstances, was doubtless to try to\nextinguish the flames, and failing in that, his second impulse\n(ignorant as he was of the state of the lock) had been to attempt to\nescape by the door which had given him entrance. When I had called to\nhim, the flames must have reached across the door leading into the\nchurch, on either side of which the presses extended, and close to\nwhich the other combustible objects were placed. In all probability,\nthe smoke and flame (confined as they were to the room) had been too\nmuch for him when he tried to escape by the inner door. He must have\ndropped in his death-swoon--he must have sunk in the place where he was\nfound--just as I got on the roof to break the skylight window. Even if\nwe had been able, afterwards, to get into the church, and to burst open\nthe door from that side, the delay must have been fatal. He would have\nbeen past saving, long past saving, by that time. We should only have\ngiven the flames free ingress into the church--the church, which was\nnow preserved, but which, in that event, would have shared the fate of\nthe vestry. There is no doubt in my mind, there can be no doubt in the\nmind of any one, that he was a dead man before ever we got to the empty\ncottage, and worked with might and main to tear down the beam.\n\nThis is the nearest approach that any theory of mine can make towards\naccounting for a result which was visible matter of fact. As I have\ndescribed them, so events passed to us outside.  As I have related it,\nso his body was found.\n\n\n\nThe inquest was adjourned over one day--no explanation that the eye of\nthe law could recognise having been discovered thus far to account for\nthe mysterious circumstances of the case.\n\nIt was arranged that more witnesses should be summoned, and that the\nLondon solicitor of the deceased should be invited to attend. A medical\nman was also charged with the duty of reporting on the mental condition\nof the servant, which appeared at present to debar him from giving any\nevidence of the least importance.  He could only declare, in a dazed\nway, that he had been ordered, on the night of the fire, to wait in the\nlane, and that he knew nothing else, except that the deceased was\ncertainly his master.\n\nMy own impression was, that he had been first used (without any guilty\nknowledge on his own part) to ascertain the fact of the clerk's absence\nfrom home on the previous day, and that he had been afterwards ordered\nto wait near the church (but out of sight of the vestry) to assist his\nmaster, in the event of my escaping the attack on the road, and of a\ncollision occurring between Sir Percival and myself.  It is necessary\nto add, that the man's own testimony was never obtained to confirm this\nview.  The medical report of him declared that what little mental\nfaculty he possessed was seriously shaken; nothing satisfactory was\nextracted from him at the adjourned inquest, and for aught I know to\nthe contrary, he may never have recovered to this day.\n\nI returned to the hotel at Welmingham so jaded in body and mind, so\nweakened and depressed by all that I had gone through, as to be quite\nunfit to endure the local gossip about the inquest, and to answer the\ntrivial questions that the talkers addressed to me in the coffee-room.\nI withdrew from my scanty dinner to my cheap garret-chamber to secure\nmyself a little quiet, and to think undisturbed of Laura and Marian.\n\nIf I had been a richer man I would have gone back to London, and would\nhave comforted myself with a sight of the two dear faces again that\nnight.  But I was bound to appear, if called on, at the adjourned\ninquest, and doubly bound to answer my bail before the magistrate at\nKnowlesbury.  Our slender resources had suffered already, and the\ndoubtful future--more doubtful than ever now--made me dread decreasing\nour means unnecessarily by allowing myself an indulgence even at the\nsmall cost of a double railway journey in the carriages of the second\nclass.\n\nThe next day--the day immediately following the inquest--was left at my\nown disposal.  I began the morning by again applying at the post-office\nfor my regular report from Marian.  It was waiting for me as before,\nand it was written throughout in good spirits.  I read the letter\nthankfully, and then set forth with my mind at ease for the day to go\nto Old Welmingham, and to view the scene of the fire by the morning\nlight.\n\nWhat changes met me when I got there!\n\nThrough all the ways of our unintelligible world the trivial and the\nterrible walk hand in hand together.  The irony of circumstances holds\nno mortal catastrophe in respect.  When I reached the church, the\ntrampled condition of the burial-ground was the only serious trace left\nto tell of the fire and the death. A rough hoarding of boards had been\nknocked up before the vestry doorway.  Rude caricatures were scrawled\non it already, and the village children were fighting and shouting for\nthe possession of the best peep-hole to see through.  On the spot where\nI had heard the cry for help from the burning room, on the spot where\nthe panic-stricken servant had dropped on his knees, a fussy flock of\npoultry was now scrambling for the first choice of worms after the\nrain; and on the ground at my feet, where the door and its dreadful\nburden had been laid, a workman's dinner was waiting for him, tied up\nin a yellow basin, and his faithful cur in charge was yelping at me for\ncoming near the food.  The old clerk, looking idly at the slow\ncommencement of the repairs, had only one interest that he could talk\nabout now--the interest of escaping all blame for his own part on\naccount of the accident that had happened.  One of the village women,\nwhose white wild face I remembered the picture of terror when we pulled\ndown the beam, was giggling with another woman, the picture of inanity,\nover an old washing-tub.  There is nothing serious in mortality!\nSolomon in all his glory was Solomon with the elements of the\ncontemptible lurking in every fold of his robes and in every corner of\nhis palace.\n\nAs I left the place, my thoughts turned, not for the first time, to the\ncomplete overthrow that all present hope of establishing Laura's\nidentity had now suffered through Sir Percival's death. He was\ngone--and with him the chance was gone which had been the one object of\nall my labours and all my hopes.\n\nCould I look at my failure from no truer point of view than this?\n\nSuppose he had lived, would that change of circumstance have altered\nthe result? Could I have made my discovery a marketable commodity, even\nfor Laura's sake, after I had found out that robbery of the rights of\nothers was the essence of Sir Percival's crime? Could I have offered\nthe price of MY silence for HIS confession of the conspiracy, when the\neffect of that silence must have been to keep the right heir from the\nestates, and the right owner from the name? Impossible! If Sir Percival\nhad lived, the discovery, from which (In my ignorance of the true\nnature of the Secret) I had hoped so much, could not have been mine to\nsuppress or to make public, as I thought best, for the vindication of\nLaura's rights.  In common honesty and common honour I must have gone\nat once to the stranger whose birthright had been usurped--I must have\nrenounced the victory at the moment when it was mine by placing my\ndiscovery unreservedly in that stranger's hands--and I must have faced\nafresh all the difficulties which stood between me and the one object\nof my life, exactly as I was resolved in my heart of hearts to face\nthem now!\n\nI returned to Welmingham with my mind composed, feeling more sure of\nmyself and my resolution than I had felt yet.\n\nOn my way to the hotel I passed the end of the square in which Mrs.\nCatherick lived.  Should I go back to the house, and make another\nattempt to see her.  No.  That news of Sir Percival's death, which was\nthe last news she ever expected to hear, must have reached her hours\nsince.  All the proceedings at the inquest had been reported in the\nlocal paper that morning--there was nothing I could tell her which she\ndid not know already.  My interest in making her speak had slackened.\nI remembered the furtive hatred in her face when she said, \"There is no\nnews of Sir Percival that I don't expect--except the news of his\ndeath.\" I remembered the stealthy interest in her eyes when they\nsettled on me at parting, after she had spoken those words.  Some\ninstinct, deep in my heart, which I felt to be a true one, made the\nprospect of again entering her presence repulsive to me--I turned away\nfrom the square, and went straight back to the hotel.\n\nSome hours later, while I was resting in the coffee-room, a letter was\nplaced in my hands by the waiter.  It was addressed to me by name, and\nI found on inquiry that it had been left at the bar by a woman just as\nit was near dusk, and just before the gas was lighted.  She had said\nnothing, and she had gone away again before there was time to speak to\nher, or even to notice who she was.\n\nI opened the letter.  It was neither dated nor signed, and the\nhandwriting was palpably disguised.  Before I had read the first\nsentence, however, I knew who my correspondent was--Mrs. Catherick.\n\nThe letter ran as follows--I copy it exactly, word for word:--\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY MRS. CATHERICK\n\n\nSIR,--You have not come back, as you said you would.  No matter--I know\nthe news, and I write to tell you so.  Did you see anything particular\nin my face when you left me? I was wondering, in my own mind, whether\nthe day of his downfall had come at last, and whether you were the\nchosen instrument for working it.  You were, and you HAVE worked it.\n\nYou were weak enough, as I have heard, to try and save his life. If you\nhad succeeded, I should have looked upon you as my enemy. Now you have\nfailed, I hold you as my friend.  Your inquiries frightened him into\nthe vestry by night--your inquiries, without your privity and against\nyour will, have served the hatred and wreaked the vengeance of\nthree-and-twenty years.  Thank you, sir, in spite of yourself.\n\nI owe something to the man who has done this.  How can I pay my debt?\nIf I was a young woman still I might say, \"Come, put your arm round my\nwaist, and kiss me, if you like.\" I should have been fond enough of you\neven to go that length, and you would have accepted my invitation--you\nwould, sir, twenty years ago! But I am an old woman now.  Well! I can\nsatisfy your curiosity, and pay my debt in that way.  You HAD a great\ncuriosity to know certain private affairs of mine when you came to see\nme--private affairs which all your sharpness could not look into\nwithout my help--private affairs which you have not discovered, even\nnow.  You SHALL discover them--your curiosity shall be satisfied.  I\nwill take any trouble to please you, my estimable young friend!\n\nYou were a little boy, I suppose, in the year twenty-seven? I was a\nhandsome young woman at that time, living at Old Welmingham.  I had a\ncontemptible fool for a husband.  I had also the honour of being\nacquainted (never mind how) with a certain gentleman (never mind whom).\nI shall not call him by his name.  Why should I? It was not his own.\nHe never had a name: you know that, by this time, as well as I do.\n\nIt will be more to the purpose to tell you how he worked himself into\nmy good graces.  I was born with the tastes of a lady, and he gratified\nthem--in other words, he admired me, and he made me presents.  No woman\ncan resist admiration and presents--especially presents, provided they\nhappen to be just the thing she wants.  He was sharp enough to know\nthat--most men are.  Naturally he wanted something in return--all men\ndo.  And what do you think was the something? The merest trifle.\nNothing but the key of the vestry, and the key of the press inside it,\nwhen my husband's back was turned.  Of course he lied when I asked him\nwhy he wished me to get him the keys in that private way.  He might\nhave saved himself the trouble--I didn't believe him.  But I liked my\npresents, and I wanted more.  So I got him the keys, without my\nhusband's knowledge, and I watched him, without his own knowledge.\nOnce, twice, four times I watched him, and the fourth time I found him\nout.\n\nI was never over-scrupulous where other people's affairs were\nconcerned, and I was not over-scrupulous about his adding one to the\nmarriages in the register on his own account.\n\nOf course I knew it was wrong, but it did no harm to me, which was one\ngood reason for not making a fuss about it.  And I had not got a gold\nwatch and chain, which was another, still better--and he had promised\nme one from London only the day before, which was a third, best of all.\nIf I had known what the law considered the crime to be, and how the law\npunished it, I should have taken proper care of myself, and have\nexposed him then and there.  But I knew nothing, and I longed for the\ngold watch.  All the conditions I insisted on were that he should take\nme into his confidence and tell me everything.  I was as curious about\nhis affairs then as you are about mine now.  He granted my\nconditions--why, you will see presently.\n\nThis, put in short, is what I heard from him.  He did not willingly\ntell me all that I tell you here.  I drew some of it from him by\npersuasion and some of it by questions.  I was determined to have all\nthe truth, and I believe I got it.\n\nHe knew no more than any one else of what the state of things really\nwas between his father and mother till after his mother's death.  Then\nhis father confessed it, and promised to do what he could for his son.\nHe died having done nothing--not having even made a will.  The son (who\ncan blame him?) wisely provided for himself.  He came to England at\nonce, and took possession of the property.  There was no one to suspect\nhim, and no one to say him nay.  His father and mother had always lived\nas man and wife--none of the few people who were acquainted with them\never supposed them to be anything else.  The right person to claim the\nproperty (if the truth had been known) was a distant relation, who had\nno idea of ever getting it, and who was away at sea when his father\ndied. He had no difficulty so far--he took possession, as a matter of\ncourse.  But he could not borrow money on the property as a matter of\ncourse.  There were two things wanted of him before he could do this.\nOne was a certificate of his birth, and the other was a certificate of\nhis parents' marriage.  The certificate of his birth was easily got--he\nwas born abroad, and the certificate was there in due form.  The other\nmatter was a difficulty, and that difficulty brought him to Old\nWelmingham.\n\nBut for one consideration he might have gone to Knowlesbury instead.\n\nHis mother had been living there just before she met with his\nfather--living under her maiden name, the truth being that she was\nreally a married woman, married in Ireland, where her husband had\nill-used her, and had afterwards gone off with some other person. I\ngive you this fact on good authority--Sir Felix mentioned it to his son\nas the reason why he had not married.  You may wonder why the son,\nknowing that his parents had met each other at Knowlesbury, did not\nplay his first tricks with the register of that church, where it might\nhave been fairly presumed his father and mother were married.  The\nreason was that the clergyman who did duty at Knowlesbury church, in\nthe year eighteen hundred and three (when, according to his birth\ncertificate, his father and mother OUGHT to have been married), was\nalive still when he took possession of the property in the New Year of\neighteen hundred and twenty-seven.  This awkward circumstance forced\nhim to extend his inquiries to our neighbourhood.  There no such danger\nexisted, the former clergyman at our church having been dead for some\nyears.\n\nOld Welmingham suited his purpose as well as Knowlesbury.  His father\nhad removed his mother from Knowlesbury, and had lived with her at a\ncottage on the river, a little distance from our village. People who\nhad known his solitary ways when he was single did not wonder at his\nsolitary ways when he was supposed to be married. If he had not been a\nhideous creature to look at, his retired life with the lady might have\nraised suspicions; but, as things were, his hiding his ugliness and his\ndeformity in the strictest privacy surprised nobody.  He lived in our\nneighbourhood till he came in possession of the Park.  After three or\nfour and twenty years had passed, who was to say (the clergyman being\ndead) that his marriage had not been as private as the rest of his\nlife, and that it had not taken place at Old Welmingham church?\n\nSo, as I told you, the son found our neighbourhood the surest place he\ncould choose to set things right secretly in his own interests.  It may\nsurprise you to hear that what he really did to the marriage register\nwas done on the spur of the moment--done on second thoughts.\n\nHis first notion was only to tear the leaf out (in the right year and\nmonth), to destroy it privately, to go back to London, and to tell the\nlawyers to get him the necessary certificate of his father's marriage,\ninnocently referring them of course to the date on the leaf that was\ngone.  Nobody could say his father and mother had NOT been married\nafter that, and whether, under the circumstances, they would stretch a\npoint or not about lending him the money (he thought they would), he\nhad his answer ready at all events, if a question was ever raised about\nhis right to the name and the estate.\n\nBut when he came to look privately at the register for himself, he\nfound at the bottom of one of the pages for the year eighteen hundred\nand three a blank space left, seemingly through there being no room to\nmake a long entry there, which was made instead at the top of the next\npage.  The sight of this chance altered all his plans.  It was an\nopportunity he had never hoped for, or thought of--and he took it--you\nknow how.  The blank space, to have exactly tallied with his birth\ncertificate, ought to have occurred in the July part of the register.\nIt occurred in the September part instead.  However, in this case, if\nsuspicious questions were asked, the answer was not hard to find.  He\nhad only to describe himself as a seven months' child.\n\nI was fool enough, when he told me his story, to feel some interest and\nsome pity for him--which was just what he calculated on, as you will\nsee.  I thought him hardly used.  It was not his fault that his father\nand mother were not married, and it was not his father's and mother's\nfault either.  A more scrupulous woman than I was--a woman who had not\nset her heart on a gold watch and chain--would have found some excuses\nfor him.  At all events, I held my tongue, and helped to screen what he\nwas about.\n\nHe was some time getting the ink the right colour (mixing it over and\nover again in pots and bottles of mine), and some time afterwards in\npractising the handwriting.  But he succeeded in the end, and made an\nhonest woman of his mother after she was dead in her grave! So far, I\ndon't deny that he behaved honourably enough to myself.  He gave me my\nwatch and chain, and spared no expense in buying them; both were of\nsuperior workmanship, and very expensive.  I have got them still--the\nwatch goes beautifully.\n\nYou said the other day that Mrs. Clements had told you everything she\nknew.  In that case there is no need for me to write about the trumpery\nscandal by which I was the sufferer--the innocent sufferer, I\npositively assert.  You must know as well as I do what the notion was\nwhich my husband took into his head when he found me and my\nfine-gentleman acquaintance meeting each other privately and talking\nsecrets together.  But what you don't know is how it ended between that\nsame gentleman and myself.  You shall read and see how he behaved to me.\n\nThe first words I said to him, when I saw the turn things had taken,\nwere, \"Do me justice--clear my character of a stain on it which you\nknow I don't deserve.  I don't want you to make a clean breast of it to\nmy husband--only tell him, on your word of honour as a gentleman, that\nhe is wrong, and that I am not to blame in the way he thinks I am.  Do\nme that justice, at least, after all I have done for you.\" He flatly\nrefused, in so many words.  He told me plainly that it was his interest\nto let my husband and all my neighbours believe the falsehood--because,\nas long as they did so they were quite certain never to suspect the\ntruth.  I had a spirit of my own, and I told him they should know the\ntruth from my lips.  His reply was short, and to the point.  If I\nspoke, I was a lost woman, as certainly as he was a lost man.\n\nYes! it had come to that.  He had deceived me about the risk I ran in\nhelping him.  He had practised on my ignorance, he had tempted me with\nhis gifts, he had interested me with his story--and the result of it\nwas that he made me his accomplice.  He owned this coolly, and he ended\nby telling me, for the first time, what the frightful punishment really\nwas for his offence, and for any one who helped him to commit it.  In\nthose days the law was not so tender-hearted as I hear it is now.\nMurderers were not the only people liable to be hanged, and women\nconvicts were not treated like ladies in undeserved distress.  I\nconfess he frightened me--the mean impostor! the cowardly blackguard!\nDo you understand now how I hated him? Do you understand why I am\ntaking all this trouble--thankfully taking it--to gratify the curiosity\nof the meritorious young gentleman who hunted him down?\n\nWell, to go on.  He was hardly fool enough to drive me to downright\ndesperation.  I was not the sort of woman whom it was quite safe to\nhunt into a corner--he knew that, and wisely quieted me with proposals\nfor the future.\n\nI deserved some reward (he was kind enough to say) for the service I\nhad done him, and some compensation (he was so obliging as to add) for\nwhat I had suffered.  He was quite willing--generous scoundrel!--to\nmake me a handsome yearly allowance, payable quarterly, on two\nconditions.  First, I was to hold my tongue--in my own interests as\nwell as in his.  Secondly, I was not to stir away from Welmingham\nwithout first letting him know, and waiting till I had obtained his\npermission.  In my own neighbourhood, no virtuous female friends would\ntempt me into dangerous gossiping at the tea-table.  In my own\nneighbourhood, he would always know where to find me.  A hard\ncondition, that second one--but I accepted it.\n\nWhat else was I to do? I was left helpless, with the prospect of a\ncoming incumbrance in the shape of a child.  What else was I to do?\nCast myself on the mercy of my runaway idiot of a husband who had\nraised the scandal against me? I would have died first. Besides, the\nallowance WAS a handsome one.  I had a better income, a better house\nover my head, better carpets on my floors, than half the women who\nturned up the whites of their eyes at the sight of me.  The dress of\nVirtue, in our parts, was cotton print.  I had silk.\n\nSo I accepted the conditions he offered me, and made the best of them,\nand fought my battle with my respectable neighbours on their own\nground, and won it in course of time--as you saw yourself. How I kept\nhis Secret (and mine) through all the years that have passed from that\ntime to this, and whether my late daughter, Anne, ever really crept\ninto my confidence, and got the keeping of the Secret too--are\nquestions, I dare say, to which you are curious to find an answer.\nWell! my gratitude refuses you nothing.  I will turn to a fresh page\nand give you the answer immediately.  But you must excuse one\nthing--you must excuse my beginning, Mr. Hartright, with an expression\nof surprise at the interest which you appear to have felt in my late\ndaughter.  It is quite unaccountable to me.  If that interest makes you\nanxious for any particulars of her early life, I must refer you to Mrs.\nClements, who knows more of the subject than I do.  Pray understand\nthat I do not profess to have been at all overfond of my late daughter.\nShe was a worry to me from first to last, with the additional\ndisadvantage of being always weak in the head.  You like candour, and I\nhope this satisfies you.\n\nThere is no need to trouble you with many personal particulars relating\nto those past times.  It will be enough to say that I observed the\nterms of the bargain on my side, and that I enjoyed my comfortable\nincome in return, paid quarterly.\n\nNow and then I got away and changed the scene for a short time, always\nasking leave of my lord and master first, and generally getting it.  He\nwas not, as I have already told you, fool enough to drive me too hard,\nand he could reasonably rely on my holding my tongue for my own sake,\nif not for his.  One of my longest trips away from home was the trip I\ntook to Limmeridge to nurse a half-sister there, who was dying.  She\nwas reported to have saved money, and I thought it as well (in case any\naccident happened to stop my allowance) to look after my own interests\nin that direction.  As things turned out, however, my pains were all\nthrown away, and I got nothing, because nothing was to be had.\n\nI had taken Anne to the north with me, having my whims and fancies,\noccasionally, about my child, and getting, at such times, jealous of\nMrs. Clements' influence over her.  I never liked Mrs. Clements.  She\nwas a poor, empty-headed, spiritless woman--what you call a born\ndrudge--and I was now and then not averse to plaguing her by taking\nAnne away.  Not knowing what else to do with my girl while I was\nnursing in Cumberland, I put her to school at Limmeridge.  The lady of\nthe manor, Mrs. Fairlie (a remarkably plain-looking woman, who had\nentrapped one of the handsomest men in England into marrying her),\namused me wonderfully by taking a violent fancy to my girl.  The\nconsequence was, she learnt nothing at school, and was petted and\nspoilt at Limmeridge House.  Among other whims and fancies which they\ntaught her there, they put some nonsense into her head about always\nwearing white.  Hating white and liking colours myself, I determined to\ntake the nonsense out of her head as soon as we got home again.\n\nStrange to say, my daughter resolutely resisted me.  When she HAD got a\nnotion once fixed in her mind she was, like other half-witted people,\nas obstinate as a mule in keeping it.  We quarrelled finely, and Mrs.\nClements, not liking to see it, I suppose, offered to take Anne away to\nlive in London with her.  I should have said Yes, if Mrs. Clements had\nnot sided with my daughter about her dressing herself in white.  But\nbeing determined she should NOT dress herself in white, and disliking\nMrs. Clements more than ever for taking part against me, I said No, and\nmeant No, and stuck to No.  The consequence was, my daughter remained\nwith me, and the consequence of that, in its turn, was the first\nserious quarrel that happened about the Secret.\n\nThe circumstance took place long after the time I have just been\nwriting of.  I had been settled for years in the new town, and was\nsteadily living down my bad character and slowly gaining ground among\nthe respectable inhabitants.  It helped me forward greatly towards this\nobject to have my daughter with me.  Her harmlessness and her fancy for\ndressing in white excited a certain amount of sympathy.  I left off\nopposing her favourite whim on that account, because some of the\nsympathy was sure, in course of time, to fall to my share.  Some of it\ndid fall.  I date my getting a choice of the two best sittings to let\nin the church from that time, and I date the clergyman's first bow from\nmy getting the sittings.\n\nWell, being settled in this way, I received a letter one morning from\nthat highly born gentleman (now deceased) in answer to one of mine,\nwarning him, according to agreement, of my wishing to leave the town\nfor a little change of air and scene.\n\nThe ruffianly side of him must have been uppermost, I suppose, when he\ngot my letter, for he wrote back, refusing me in such abominably\ninsolent language, that I lost all command over myself, and abused him,\nin my daughter's presence, as \"a low impostor whom I could ruin for\nlife if I chose to open my lips and let out his Secret.\" I said no more\nabout him than that, being brought to my senses as soon as those words\nhad escaped me by the sight of my daughter's face looking eagerly and\ncuriously at mine.  I instantly ordered her out of the room until I had\ncomposed myself again.\n\nMy sensations were not pleasant, I can tell you, when I came to reflect\non my own folly.  Anne had been more than usually crazy and queer that\nyear, and when I thought of the chance there might be of her repeating\nmy words in the town, and mentioning HIS name in connection with them,\nif inquisitive people got hold of her, I was finely terrified at the\npossible consequences.  My worst fears for myself, my worst dread of\nwhat he might do, led me no farther than this.  I was quite unprepared\nfor what really did happen only the next day.\n\nOn that next day, without any warning to me to expect him, he came to\nthe house.\n\nHis first words, and the tone in which he spoke them, surly as it was,\nshowed me plainly enough that he had repented already of his insolent\nanswer to my application, and that he had come in a mighty bad temper\nto try and set matters right again before it was too late.  Seeing my\ndaughter in the room with me (I had been afraid to let her out of my\nsight after what had happened the day before) he ordered her away.\nThey neither of them liked each other, and he vented the ill-temper on\nHER which he was afraid to show to ME.\n\n\"Leave us,\" he said, looking at her over his shoulder.  She looked back\nover HER shoulder and waited as if she didn't care to go. \"Do you\nhear?\" he roared out, \"leave the room.\" \"Speak to me civilly,\" says\nshe, getting red in the face.  \"Turn the idiot out,\" says he, looking\nmy way.  She had always had crazy notions of her own about her dignity,\nand that word \"idiot\" upset her in a moment.  Before I could interfere\nshe stepped up to him in a fine passion.  \"Beg my pardon, directly,\"\nsays she, \"or I'll make it the worse for you.  I'll let out your\nSecret.  I can ruin you for life if I choose to open my lips.\" My own\nwords!--repeated exactly from what I had said the day before--repeated,\nin his presence, as if they had come from herself.  He sat speechless,\nas white as the paper I am writing on, while I pushed her out of the\nroom.  When he recovered himself----\n\nNo! I am too respectable a woman to mention what he said when he\nrecovered himself.  My pen is the pen of a member of the rector's\ncongregation, and a subscriber to the \"Wednesday Lectures on\nJustification by Faith\"--how can you expect me to employ it in writing\nbad language? Suppose, for yourself, the raging, swearing frenzy of the\nlowest ruffian in England, and let us get on together, as fast as may\nbe, to the way in which it all ended.\n\nIt ended, as you probably guess by this time, in his insisting on\nsecuring his own safety by shutting her up.\n\nI tried to set things right.  I told him that she had merely repeated,\nlike a parrot, the words she had heard me say and that she knew no\nparticulars whatever, because I had mentioned none.  I explained that\nshe had affected, out of crazy spite against him, to know what she\nreally did NOT know--that she only wanted to threaten him and aggravate\nhim for speaking to her as he had just spoken--and that my unlucky\nwords gave her just the chance of doing mischief of which she was in\nsearch.  I referred him to other queer ways of hers, and to his own\nexperience of the vagaries of half-witted people--it was all to no\npurpose--he would not believe me on my oath--he was absolutely certain\nI had betrayed the whole Secret.  In short, he would hear of nothing\nbut shutting her up.\n\nUnder these circumstances, I did my duty as a mother.  \"No pauper\nAsylum,\" I said, \"I won't have her put in a pauper Asylum.  A Private\nEstablishment, if you please.  I have my feelings as a mother, and my\ncharacter to preserve in the town, and I will submit to nothing but a\nPrivate Establishment, of the sort which my genteel neighbours would\nchoose for afflicted relatives of their own.\" Those were my words.  It\nis gratifying to me to reflect that I did my duty.  Though never\noverfond of my late daughter, I had a proper pride about her.  No\npauper stain--thanks to my firmness and resolution--ever rested on MY\nchild.\n\nHaving carried my point (which I did the more easily, in consequence of\nthe facilities offered by private Asylums), I could not refuse to admit\nthat there were certain advantages gained by shutting her up.  In the\nfirst place, she was taken excellent care of--being treated (as I took\ncare to mention in the town) on the footing of a lady.  In the second\nplace, she was kept away from Welmingham, where she might have set\npeople suspecting and inquiring, by repeating my own incautious words.\n\nThe only drawback of putting her under restraint was a very slight one.\nWe merely turned her empty boast about knowing the Secret into a fixed\ndelusion.  Having first spoken in sheer crazy spitefulness against the\nman who had offended her, she was cunning enough to see that she had\nseriously frightened him, and sharp enough afterwards to discover that\nHE was concerned in shutting her up.  The consequence was she flamed\nout into a perfect frenzy of passion against him, going to the Asylum,\nand the first words she said to the nurses, after they had quieted her,\nwere, that she was put in confinement for knowing his Secret, and that\nshe meant to open her lips and ruin him, when the right time came.\n\nShe may have said the same thing to you, when you thoughtlessly\nassisted her escape.  She certainly said it (as I heard last summer) to\nthe unfortunate woman who married our sweet-tempered, nameless\ngentleman lately deceased.  If either you, or that unlucky lady, had\nquestioned my daughter closely, and had insisted on her explaining what\nshe really meant, you would have found her lose all her self-importance\nsuddenly, and get vacant, and restless, and confused--you would have\ndiscovered that I am writing nothing here but the plain truth.  She\nknew that there was a Secret--she knew who was connected with it--she\nknew who would suffer by its being known--and beyond that, whatever\nairs of importance she may have given herself, whatever crazy boasting\nshe may have indulged in with strangers, she never to her dying day\nknew more.\n\nHave I satisfied your curiosity? I have taken pains enough to satisfy\nit at any rate.  There is really nothing else I have to tell you about\nmyself or my daughter.  My worst responsibilities, so far as she was\nconcerned, were all over when she was secured in the Asylum.  I had a\nform of letter relating to the circumstances under which she was shut\nup, given me to write, in answer to one Miss Halcombe, who was curious\nin the matter, and who must have heard plenty of lies about me from a\ncertain tongue well accustomed to the telling of the same.  And I did\nwhat I could afterwards to trace my runaway daughter, and prevent her\nfrom doing mischief by making inquiries myself in the neighbourhood\nwhere she was falsely reported to have been seen.  But these, and other\ntrifles like them, are of little or no interest to you after what you\nhave heard already.\n\nSo far, I have written in the friendliest possible spirit.  But I\ncannot close this letter without adding a word here of serious\nremonstrance and reproof, addressed to yourself.\n\nIn the course of your personal interview with me, you audaciously\nreferred to my late daughter's parentage on the father's side, as if\nthat parentage was a matter of doubt.  This was highly improper and\nvery ungentlemanlike on your part! If we see each other again,\nremember, if you please, that I will allow no liberties to be taken\nwith my reputation, and that the moral atmosphere of Welmingham (to use\na favourite expression of my friend the rector's) must not be tainted\nby loose conversation of any kind. If you allow yourself to doubt that\nmy husband was Anne's father, you personally insult me in the grossest\nmanner.  If you have felt, and if you still continue to feel, an\nunhallowed curiosity on this subject, I recommend you, in your own\ninterests, to check it at once, and for ever.  On this side of the\ngrave, Mr. Hartright, whatever may happen on the other, THAT curiosity\nwill never be gratified.\n\nPerhaps, after what I have just said, you will see the necessity of\nwriting me an apology.  Do so, and I will willingly receive it. I will,\nafterwards, if your wishes point to a second interview with me, go a\nstep farther, and receive you.  My circumstances only enable me to\ninvite you to tea--not that they are at all altered for the worse by\nwhat has happened.  I have always lived, as I think I told you, well\nwithin my income, and I have saved enough, in the last twenty years, to\nmake me quite comfortable for the rest of my life.  It is not my\nintention to leave Welmingham. There are one or two little advantages\nwhich I have still to gain in the town.  The clergyman bows to me--as\nyou saw.  He is married, and his wife is not quite so civil.  I propose\nto join the Dorcas Society, and I mean to make the clergyman's wife bow\nto me next.\n\nIf you favour me with your company, pray understand that the\nconversation must be entirely on general subjects.  Any attempted\nreference to this letter will be quite useless--I am determined not to\nacknowledge having written it.  The evidence has been destroyed in the\nfire, I know, but I think it desirable to err on the side of caution,\nnevertheless.\n\nOn this account no names are mentioned here, nor is any signature\nattached to these lines: the handwriting is disguised throughout, and I\nmean to deliver the letter myself, under circumstances which will\nprevent all fear of its being traced to my house.  You can have no\npossible cause to complain of these precautions, seeing that they do\nnot affect the information I here communicate, in consideration of the\nspecial indulgence which you have deserved at my hands.  My hour for\ntea is half-past five, and my buttered toast waits for nobody.\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY WALTER HARTRIGHT\n\nI\n\n\nMy first impulse, after reading Mrs. Catherick's extraordinary\nnarrative, was to destroy it.  The hardened shameless depravity of the\nwhole composition, from beginning to end--the atrocious perversity of\nmind which persistently associated me with a calamity for which I was\nin no sense answerable, and with a death which I had risked my life in\ntrying to avert--so disgusted me, that I was on the point of tearing\nthe letter, when a consideration suggested itself which warned me to\nwait a little before I destroyed it.\n\nThis consideration was entirely unconnected with Sir Percival. The\ninformation communicated to me, so far as it concerned him, did little\nmore than confirm the conclusions at which I had already arrived.\n\nHe had committed his offence, as I had supposed him to have committed\nit, and the absence of all reference, on Mrs. Catherick's part, to the\nduplicate register at Knowlesbury, strengthened my previous conviction\nthat the existence of the book, and the risk of detection which it\nimplied, must have been necessarily unknown to Sir Percival.  My\ninterest in the question of the forgery was now at an end, and my only\nobject in keeping the letter was to make it of some future service in\nclearing up the last mystery that still remained to baffle me--the\nparentage of Anne Catherick on the father's side.  There were one or\ntwo sentences dropped in her mother's narrative, which it might be\nuseful to refer to again, when matters of more immediate importance\nallowed me leisure to search for the missing evidence. I did not\ndespair of still finding that evidence, and I had lost none of my\nanxiety to discover it, for I had lost none of my interest in tracing\nthe father of the poor creature who now lay at rest in Mrs. Fairlie's\ngrave.\n\nAccordingly, I sealed up the letter and put it away carefully in my\npocket-book, to be referred to again when the time came.\n\nThe next day was my last in Hampshire.  When I had appeared again\nbefore the magistrate at Knowlesbury, and when I had attended at the\nadjourned inquest, I should be free to return to London by the\nafternoon or the evening train.\n\nMy first errand in the morning was, as usual, to the post-office. The\nletter from Marian was there, but I thought when it was handed to me\nthat it felt unusually light.  I anxiously opened the envelope.  There\nwas nothing inside but a small strip of paper folded in two.  The few\nblotted hurriedly-written lines which were traced on it contained these\nwords:\n\n\"Come back as soon as you can.  I have been obliged to move.  Come to\nGower's Walk, Fulham (number five).  I will be on the look-out for you.\nDon't be alarmed about us, we are both safe and well. But come\nback.--Marian.\"\n\nThe news which those lines contained--news which I instantly associated\nwith some attempted treachery on the part of Count Fosco--fairly\noverwhelmed me.  I stood breathless with the paper crumpled up in my\nhand.  What had happened? What subtle wickedness had the Count planned\nand executed in my absence? A night had passed since Marian's note was\nwritten--hours must elapse still before I could get back to them--some\nnew disaster might have happened already of which I was ignorant.  And\nhere, miles and miles away from them, here I must remain--held, doubly\nheld, at the disposal of the law!\n\nI hardly know to what forgetfulness of my obligations anxiety and alarm\nmight not have tempted me, but for the quieting influence of my faith\nin Marian.  My absolute reliance on her was the one earthly\nconsideration which helped me to restrain myself, and gave me courage\nto wait.  The inquest was the first of the impediments in the way of my\nfreedom of action.  I attended it at the appointed time, the legal\nformalities requiring my presence in the room, but as it turned out,\nnot calling on me to repeat my evidence.  This useless delay was a hard\ntrial, although I did my best to quiet my impatience by following the\ncourse of the proceedings as closely as I could.\n\nThe London solicitor of the deceased (Mr. Merriman) was among the\npersons present.  But he was quite unable to assist the objects of the\ninquiry.  He could only say that he was inexpressibly shocked and\nastonished, and that he could throw no light whatever on the mysterious\ncircumstances of the case.  At intervals during the adjourned\ninvestigation, he suggested questions which the Coroner put, but which\nled to no results.  After a patient inquiry, which lasted nearly three\nhours, and which exhausted every available source of information, the\njury pronounced the customary verdict in cases of sudden death by\naccident.  They added to the formal decision a statement, that there\nhad been no evidence to show how the keys had been abstracted, how the\nfire had been caused, or what the purpose was for which the deceased\nhad entered the vestry.  This act closed the proceedings.  The legal\nrepresentative of the dead man was left to provide for the necessities\nof the interment, and the witnesses were free to retire.\n\nResolved not to lose a minute in getting to Knowlesbury, I paid my bill\nat the hotel, and hired a fly to take me to the town.  A gentleman who\nheard me give the order, and who saw that I was going alone, informed\nme that he lived in the neighbourhood of Knowlesbury, and asked if I\nwould have any objection to his getting home by sharing the fly with\nme.  I accepted his proposal as a matter of course.\n\nOur conversation during the drive was naturally occupied by the one\nabsorbing subject of local interest.\n\nMy new acquaintance had some knowledge of the late Sir Percival's\nsolicitor, and he and Mr. Merriman had been discussing the state of the\ndeceased gentleman's affairs and the succession to the property.  Sir\nPercival's embarrassments were so well known all over the county that\nhis solicitor could only make a virtue of necessity and plainly\nacknowledge them.  He had died without leaving a will, and he had no\npersonal property to bequeath, even if he had made one, the whole\nfortune which he had derived from his wife having been swallowed up by\nhis creditors.  The heir to the estate (Sir Percival having left no\nissue) was a son of Sir Felix Glyde's first cousin, an officer in\ncommand of an East Indiaman.  He would find his unexpected inheritance\nsadly encumbered, but the property would recover with time, and, if\n\"the captain\" was careful, he might be a rich man yet before he died.\n\nAbsorbed as I was in the one idea of getting to London, this\ninformation (which events proved to be perfectly correct) had an\ninterest of its own to attract my attention.  I thought it justified me\nin keeping secret my discovery of Sir Percival's fraud.  The heir,\nwhose rights he had usurped, was the heir who would now have the\nestate.  The income from it, for the last three-and-twenty years, which\nshould properly have been his, and which the dead man had squandered to\nthe last farthing, was gone beyond recall.  If I spoke, my speaking\nwould confer advantage on no one.  If I kept the secret, my silence\nconcealed the character of the man who had cheated Laura into marrying\nhim.  For her sake, I wished to conceal it--for her sake, still, I tell\nthis story under feigned names.\n\nI parted with my chance companion at Knowlesbury, and went at once to\nthe town-hall.  As I had anticipated, no one was present to prosecute\nthe case against me--the necessary formalities were observed, and I was\ndischarged.  On leaving the court a letter from Mr. Dawson was put into\nmy hand.  It informed me that he was absent on professional duty, and\nit reiterated the offer I had already received from him of any\nassistance which I might require at his hands.  I wrote back, warmly\nacknowledging my obligations to his kindness, and apologising for not\nexpressing my thanks personally, in consequence of my immediate recall\non pressing business to town.\n\nHalf an hour later I was speeding back to London by the express train.\n\n\n\nII\n\nIt was between nine and ten o'clock before I reached Fulham, and found\nmy way to Gower's Walk.\n\nBoth Laura and Marian came to the door to let me in.  I think we had\nhardly known how close the tie was which bound us three together, until\nthe evening came which united us again.  We met as if we had been\nparted for months instead of for a few days only. Marian's face was\nsadly worn and anxious.  I saw who had known all the danger and borne\nall the trouble in my absence the moment I looked at her.  Laura's\nbrighter looks and better spirits told me how carefully she had been\nspared all knowledge of the dreadful death at Welmingham, and of the\ntrue reason of our change of abode.\n\nThe stir of the removal seemed to have cheered and interested her. She\nonly spoke of it as a happy thought of Marian's to surprise me on my\nreturn with a change from the close, noisy street to the pleasant\nneighbourhood of trees and fields and the river.  She was full of\nprojects for the future--of the drawings she was to finish--of the\npurchasers I had found in the country who were to buy them--of the\nshillings and sixpences she had saved, till her purse was so heavy that\nshe proudly asked me to weigh it in my own hand.  The change for the\nbetter which had been wrought in her during the few days of my absence\nwas a surprise to me for which I was quite unprepared--and for all the\nunspeakable happiness of seeing it, I was indebted to Marian's courage\nand to Marian's love.\n\nWhen Laura had left us, and when we could speak to one another without\nrestraint, I tried to give some expression to the gratitude and the\nadmiration which filled my heart.  But the generous creature would not\nwait to hear me.  That sublime self-forgetfulness of women, which\nyields so much and asks so little, turned all her thoughts from herself\nto me.\n\n\"I had only a moment left before post-time,\" she said, \"or I should\nhave written less abruptly.  You look worn and weary, Walter.  I am\nafraid my letter must have seriously alarmed you?\"\n\n\"Only at first,\" I replied.  \"My mind was quieted, Marian, by my trust\nin you.  Was I right in attributing this sudden change of place to some\nthreatened annoyance on the part of Count Fosco?\"\n\n\"Perfectly right,\" she said.  \"I saw him yesterday, and worse than\nthat, Walter--I spoke to him.\"\n\n\"Spoke to him? Did he know where we lived? Did he come to the house?\"\n\n\"He did.  To the house--but not upstairs.  Laura never saw him--Laura\nsuspects nothing.  I will tell you how it happened: the danger, I\nbelieve and hope, is over now.  Yesterday, I was in the sitting-room,\nat our old lodgings.  Laura was drawing at the table, and I was walking\nabout and setting things to rights.  I passed the window, and as I\npassed it, looked out into the street. There, on the opposite side of\nthe way, I saw the Count, with a man talking to him----\"\n\n\"Did he notice you at the window?\"\n\n\"No--at least, I thought not.  I was too violently startled to be quite\nsure.\"\n\n\"Who was the other man? A stranger?\"\n\n\"Not a stranger, Walter.  As soon as I could draw my breath again, I\nrecognised him.  He was the owner of the Lunatic Asylum.\"\n\n\"Was the Count pointing out the house to him?\"\n\n\"No, they were talking together as if they had accidentally met in the\nstreet.  I remained at the window looking at them from behind the\ncurtain.  If I had turned round, and if Laura had seen my face at that\nmoment----Thank God, she was absorbed over her drawing! They soon\nparted.  The man from the Asylum went one way, and the Count the other.\nI began to hope they were in the street by chance, till I saw the Count\ncome back, stop opposite to us again, take out his card-case and\npencil, write something, and then cross the road to the shop below us.\nI ran past Laura before she could see me, and said I had forgotten\nsomething upstairs.  As soon as I was out of the room I went down to\nthe first landing and waited--I was determined to stop him if he tried\nto come upstairs.  He made no such attempt.  The girl from the shop\ncame through the door into the passage, with his card in her hand--a\nlarge gilt card with his name, and a coronet above it, and these lines\nunderneath in pencil: 'Dear lady' (yes! the villain could address me in\nthat way still)--'dear lady, one word, I implore you, on a matter\nserious to us both.' If one can think at all, in serious difficulties,\none thinks quick.  I felt directly that it might be a fatal mistake to\nleave myself and to leave you in the dark, where such a man as the\nCount was concerned.  I felt that the doubt of what he might do, in\nyour absence, would be ten times more trying to me if I declined to see\nhim than if I consented. 'Ask the gentleman to wait in the shop,' I\nsaid.  'I will be with him in a moment.' I ran upstairs for my bonnet,\nbeing determined not to let him speak to me indoors.  I knew his deep\nringing voice, and I was afraid Laura might hear it, even in the shop.\nIn less than a minute I was down again in the passage, and had opened\nthe door into the street.  He came round to meet me from the shop.\nThere he was in deep mourning, with his smooth bow and his deadly\nsmile, and some idle boys and women near him, staring at his great\nsize, his fine black clothes, and his large cane with the gold knob to\nit.  All the horrible time at Blackwater came back to me the moment I\nset eyes on him.  All the old loathing crept and crawled through me,\nwhen he took off his hat with a flourish and spoke to me, as if we had\nparted on the friendliest terms hardly a day since.\"\n\n\"You remember what he said?\"\n\n\"I can't repeat it, Walter.  You shall know directly what he said about\nyou---but I can't repeat what he said to me.  It was worse than the\npolite insolence of his letter.  My hands tingled to strike him, as if\nI had been a man! I only kept them quiet by tearing his card to pieces\nunder my shawl.  Without saying a word on my side, I walked away from\nthe house (for fear of Laura seeing us), and he followed, protesting\nsoftly all the way.  In the first by-street I turned, and asked him\nwhat he wanted with me.  He wanted two things.  First, if I had no\nobjection, to express his sentiments.  I declined to hear them.\nSecondly, to repeat the warning in his letter.  I asked, what occasion\nthere was for repeating it.  He bowed and smiled, and said he would\nexplain. The explanation exactly confirmed the fears I expressed before\nyou left us.  I told you, if you remember, that Sir Percival would be\ntoo headstrong to take his friend's advice where you were concerned,\nand that there was no danger to be dreaded from the Count till his own\ninterests were threatened, and he was roused into acting for himself?\"\n\n\"I recollect, Marian.\"\n\n\"Well, so it has really turned out.  The Count offered his advice, but\nit was refused.  Sir Percival would only take counsel of his own\nviolence, his own obstinacy, and his own hatred of you.  The Count let\nhim have his way, first privately ascertaining, in case of his own\ninterests being threatened next, where we lived.  You were followed,\nWalter, on returning here, after your first journey to Hampshire, by\nthe lawyer's men for some distance from the railway, and by the Count\nhimself to the door of the house.  How he contrived to escape being\nseen by you he did not tell me, but he found us out on that occasion,\nand in that way.  Having made the discovery, he took no advantage of it\ntill the news reached him of Sir Percival's death, and then, as I told\nyou, he acted for himself, because he believed you would next proceed\nagainst the dead man's partner in the conspiracy.  He at once made his\narrangements to meet the owner of the Asylum in London, and to take him\nto the place where his runaway patient was hidden, believing that the\nresults, whichever way they ended, would be to involve you in\ninterminable legal disputes and difficulties, and to tie your hands for\nall purposes of offence, so far as he was concerned.  That was his\npurpose, on his own confession to me. The only consideration which made\nhim hesitate, at the last moment----\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"It is hard to acknowledge it, Walter, and yet I must. I was the only\nconsideration.  No words can say how degraded I feel in my own\nestimation when I think of it, but the one weak point in that man's\niron character is the horrible admiration he feels for me. I have\ntried, for the sake of my own self-respect, to disbelieve it as long as\nI could; but his looks, his actions, force on me the shameful\nconviction of the truth.  The eyes of that monster of wickedness\nmoistened while he was speaking to me--they did, Walter! He declared\nthat at the moment of pointing out the house to the doctor, he thought\nof my misery if I was separated from Laura, of my responsibility if I\nwas called on to answer for effecting her escape, and he risked the\nworst that you could do to him, the second time, for my sake.  All he\nasked was that I would remember the sacrifice, and restrain your\nrashness, in my own interests--interests which he might never be able\nto consult again.  I made no such bargain with him--I would have died\nfirst. But believe him or not, whether it is true or false that he sent\nthe doctor away with an excuse, one thing is certain, I saw the man\nleave him without so much as a glance at our window, or even at our\nside of the way.\"\n\n\"I believe it, Marian.  The best men are not consistent in good--why\nshould the worst men be consistent in evil? At the same time, I suspect\nhim of merely attempting to frighten you, by threatening what he cannot\nreally do.  I doubt his power of annoying us, by means of the owner of\nthe Asylum, now that Sir Percival is dead, and Mrs. Catherick is free\nfrom all control.  But let me hear more.  What did the Count say of me?\"\n\n\"He spoke last of you.  His eyes brightened and hardened, and his\nmanner changed to what I remember it in past times--to that mixture of\npitiless resolution and mountebank mockery which makes it so impossible\nto fathom him.  'Warn Mr. Hartright!' he said in his loftiest manner.\n'He has a man of brains to deal with, a man who snaps his big fingers\nat the laws and conventions of society, when he measures himself with\nME.  If my lamented friend had taken my advice, the business of the\ninquest would have been with the body of Mr. Hartright.  But my\nlamented friend was obstinate. See! I mourn his loss--inwardly in my\nsoul, outwardly on my hat. This trivial crape expresses sensibilities\nwhich I summon Mr. Hartright to respect.  They may be transformed to\nimmeasurable enmities if he ventures to disturb them.  Let him be\ncontent with what he has got--with what I leave unmolested, for your\nsake, to him and to you.  Say to him (with my compliments), if he stirs\nme, he has Fosco to deal with.  In the English of the Popular Tongue, I\ninform him--Fosco sticks at nothing.  Dear lady, good morning.' His\ncold grey eyes settled on my face--he took off his hat solemnly--bowed,\nbare-headed--and left me.\"\n\n\"Without returning? without saying more last words?\"\n\n\"He turned at the corner of the street, and waved his hand, and then\nstruck it theatrically on his breast.  I lost sight of him after that.\nHe disappeared in the opposite direction to our house, and I ran back\nto Laura.  Before I was indoors again, I had made up my mind that we\nmust go.  The house (especially in your absence) was a place of danger\ninstead of a place of safety, now that the Count had discovered it.  If\nI could have felt certain of your return, I should have risked waiting\ntill you came back.  But I was certain of nothing, and I acted at once\non my own impulse. You had spoken, before leaving us, of moving into a\nquieter neighbourhood and purer air, for the sake of Laura's health.  I\nhad only to remind her of that, and to suggest surprising you and\nsaving you trouble by managing the move in your absence, to make her\nquite as anxious for the change as I was.  She helped me to pack up\nyour things, and she has arranged them all for you in your new\nworking-room here.\"\n\n\"What made you think of coming to this place?\"\n\n\"My ignorance of other localities in the neighbourhood of London. I\nfelt the necessity of getting as far away as possible from our old\nlodgings, and I knew something of Fulham, because I had once been at\nschool there.  I despatched a messenger with a note, on the chance that\nthe school might still be in existence.  It was in existence--the\ndaughters of my old mistress were carrying it on for her, and they\nengaged this place from the instructions I had sent.  It was just\npost-time when the messenger returned to me with the address of the\nhouse.  We moved after dark--we came here quite unobserved.  Have I\ndone right, Walter? Have I justified your trust in me?\"\n\nI answered her warmly and gratefully, as I really felt.  But the\nanxious look still remained on her face while I was speaking, and the\nfirst question she asked, when I had done, related to Count Fosco.\n\nI saw that she was thinking of him now with a changed mind.  No fresh\noutbreak of anger against him, no new appeal to me to hasten the day of\nreckoning escaped her.  Her conviction that the man's hateful\nadmiration of herself was really sincere, seemed to have increased a\nhundredfold her distrust of his unfathomable cunning, her inborn dread\nof the wicked energy and vigilance of all his faculties.  Her voice\nfell low, her manner was hesitating, her eyes searched into mine with\nan eager fear when she asked me what I thought of his message, and what\nI meant to do next after hearing it.\n\n\"Not many weeks have passed, Marian,\" I answered, \"since my interview\nwith Mr. Kyrle.  When he and I parted, the last words I said to him\nabout Laura were these: 'Her uncle's house shall open to receive her,\nin the presence of every soul who followed the false funeral to the\ngrave; the lie that records her death shall be publicly erased from the\ntombstone by the authority of the head of the family, and the two men\nwho have wronged her shall answer for their crime to ME, though the\njustice that sits in tribunals is powerless to pursue them.' One of\nthose men is beyond mortal reach.  The other remains, and my resolution\nremains.\"\n\nHer eyes lit up--her colour rose.  She said nothing, but I saw all her\nsympathies gathering to mine in her face.\n\n\"I don't disguise from myself, or from you,\" I went on, \"that the\nprospect before us is more than doubtful.  The risks we have run\nalready are, it may be, trifles compared with the risks that threaten\nus in the future, but the venture shall be tried, Marian, for all that.\nI am not rash enough to measure myself against such a man as the Count\nbefore I am well prepared for him.  I have learnt patience--I can wait\nmy time.  Let him believe that his message has produced its effect--let\nhim know nothing of us, and hear nothing of us--let us give him full\ntime to feel secure--his own boastful nature, unless I seriously\nmistake him, will hasten that result.  This is one reason for waiting,\nbut there is another more important still.  My position, Marian,\ntowards you and towards Laura ought to be a stronger one than it is now\nbefore I try our last chance.\"\n\nShe leaned near to me, with a look of surprise.\n\n\"How can it be stronger?\" she asked.\n\n\"I will tell you,\" I replied, \"when the time comes.  It has not come\nyet--it may never come at all.  I may be silent about it to Laura for\never--I must be silent now, even to YOU, till I see for myself that I\ncan harmlessly and honourably speak.  Let us leave that subject.  There\nis another which has more pressing claims on our attention.  You have\nkept Laura, mercifully kept her, in ignorance of her husband's\ndeath----\"\n\n\"Oh, Walter, surely it must be long yet before we tell her of it?\"\n\n\"No, Marian.  Better that you should reveal it to her now, than that\naccident, which no one can guard against, should reveal it to her at\nsome future time.  Spare her all the details--break it to her very\ntenderly, but tell her that he is dead.\"\n\n\"You have a reason, Walter, for wishing her to know of her husband's\ndeath besides the reason you have just mentioned?\"\n\n\"I have.\"\n\n\"A reason connected with that subject which must not be mentioned\nbetween us yet?--which may never be mentioned to Laura at all?\"\n\nShe dwelt on the last words meaningly.  When I answered her in the\naffirmative, I dwelt on them too.\n\nHer face grew pale.  For a while she looked at me with a sad,\nhesitating interest.  An unaccustomed tenderness trembled in her dark\neyes and softened her firm lips, as she glanced aside at the empty\nchair in which the dear companion of all our joys and sorrows had been\nsitting.\n\n\"I think I understand,\" she said.  \"I think I owe it to her and to you,\nWalter, to tell her of her husband's death.\"\n\nShe sighed, and held my hand fast for a moment--then dropped it\nabruptly, and left the room.  On the next day Laura knew that his death\nhad released her, and that the error and the calamity of her life lay\nburied in his tomb.\n\n\nHis name was mentioned among us no more.  Thenceforward, we shrank from\nthe slightest approach to the subject of his death, and in the same\nscrupulous manner, Marian and I avoided all further reference to that\nother subject, which, by her consent and mine, was not to be mentioned\nbetween us yet.  It was not the less present in our minds--it was\nrather kept alive in them by the restraint which we had imposed on\nourselves.  We both watched Laura more anxiously than ever, sometimes\nwaiting and hoping, sometimes waiting and fearing, till the time came.\n\nBy degrees we returned to our accustomed way of life.  I resumed the\ndaily work, which had been suspended during my absence in Hampshire.\nOur new lodgings cost us more than the smaller and less convenient\nrooms which we had left, and the claim thus implied on my increased\nexertions was strengthened by the doubtfulness of our future prospects.\nEmergencies might yet happen which would exhaust our little fund at the\nbanker's, and the work of my hands might be, ultimately, all we had to\nlook to for support.  More permanent and more lucrative employment than\nhad yet been offered to me was a necessity of our position--a necessity\nfor which I now diligently set myself to provide.\n\nIt must not be supposed that the interval of rest and seclusion of\nwhich I am now writing, entirely suspended, on my part, all pursuit of\nthe one absorbing purpose with which my thoughts and actions are\nassociated in these pages.  That purpose was, for months and months\nyet, never to relax its claims on me.  The slow ripening of it still\nleft me a measure of precaution to take, an obligation of gratitude to\nperform, and a doubtful question to solve.\n\nThe measure of precaution related, necessarily, to the Count.  It was\nof the last importance to ascertain, if possible, whether his plans\ncommitted him to remaining in England--or, in other words, to remaining\nwithin my reach.  I contrived to set this doubt at rest by very simple\nmeans.  His address in St. John's Wood being known to me, I inquired in\nthe neighbourhood, and having found out the agent who had the disposal\nof the furnished house in which he lived, I asked if number five,\nForest Road, was likely to be let within a reasonable time.  The reply\nwas in the negative.  I was informed that the foreign gentleman then\nresiding in the house had renewed his term of occupation for another\nsix months, and would remain in possession until the end of June in the\nfollowing year. We were then at the beginning of December only.  I left\nthe agent with my mind relieved from all present fear of the Count's\nescaping me.\n\nThe obligation I had to perform took me once more into the presence of\nMrs. Clements.  I had promised to return, and to confide to her those\nparticulars relating to the death and burial of Anne Catherick which I\nhad been obliged to withhold at our first interview.  Changed as\ncircumstances now were, there was no hindrance to my trusting the good\nwoman with as much of the story of the conspiracy as it was necessary\nto tell.  I had every reason that sympathy and friendly feeling could\nsuggest to urge on me the speedy performance of my promise, and I did\nconscientiously and carefully perform it.  There is no need to burden\nthese pages with any statement of what passed at the interview.  It\nwill be more to the purpose to say, that the interview itself\nnecessarily brought to my mind the one doubtful question still\nremaining to be solved--the question of Anne Catherick's parentage on\nthe father's side.\n\nA multitude of small considerations in connection with this\nsubject--trifling enough in themselves, but strikingly important when\nmassed together--had latterly led my mind to a conclusion which I\nresolved to verify.  I obtained Marian's permission to write to Major\nDonthorne, of Varneck Hall (where Mrs. Catherick had lived in service\nfor some years previous to her marriage), to ask him certain questions.\nI made the inquiries in Marian's name, and described them as relating\nto matters of personal history in her family, which might explain and\nexcuse my application.  When I wrote the letter I had no certain\nknowledge that Major Donthorne was still alive--I despatched it on the\nchance that he might be living, and able and willing to reply.\n\nAfter a lapse of two days proof came, in the shape of a letter, that\nthe Major was living, and that he was ready to help us.\n\nThe idea in my mind when I wrote to him, and the nature of my inquiries\nwill be easily inferred from his reply.  His letter answered my\nquestions by communicating these important facts--\n\nIn the first place, \"the late Sir Percival Glyde, of Blackwater Park,\"\nhad never set foot in Varneck Hall.  The deceased gentleman was a total\nstranger to Major Donthorne, and to all his family.\n\nIn the second place, \"the late Mr. Philip Fairlie, of Limmeridge\nHouse,\" had been, in his younger days, the intimate friend and constant\nguest of Major Donthorne.  Having refreshed his memory by looking back\nto old letters and other papers, the Major was in a position to say\npositively that Mr. Philip Fairlie was staying at Varneck Hall in the\nmonth of August, eighteen hundred and twenty-six, and that he remained\nthere for the shooting during the month of September and part of\nOctober following.  He then left, to the best of the Major's belief,\nfor Scotland, and did not return to Varneck Hall till after a lapse of\ntime, when he reappeared in the character of a newly-married man.\n\nTaken by itself, this statement was, perhaps, of little positive value,\nbut taken in connection with certain facts, every one of which either\nMarian or I knew to be true, it suggested one plain conclusion that\nwas, to our minds, irresistible.\n\nKnowing, now, that Mr. Philip Fairlie had been at Varneck Hall in the\nautumn of eighteen hundred and twenty-six, and that Mrs. Catherick had\nbeen living there in service at the same time, we knew also--first,\nthat Anne had been born in June, eighteen hundred and twenty-seven;\nsecondly, that she had always presented an extraordinary personal\nresemblance to Laura; and, thirdly, that Laura herself was strikingly\nlike her father.  Mr. Philip Fairlie had been one of the notoriously\nhandsome men of his time.  In disposition entirely unlike his brother\nFrederick, he was the spoilt darling of society, especially of the\nwomen--an easy, light-hearted, impulsive, affectionate man--generous to\na fault--constitutionally lax in his principles, and notoriously\nthoughtless of moral obligations where women were concerned.  Such were\nthe facts we knew--such was the character of the man.  Surely the plain\ninference that follows needs no pointing out?\n\nRead by the new light which had now broken upon me, even Mrs.\nCatherick's letter, in despite of herself, rendered its mite of\nassistance towards strengthening the conclusion at which I had arrived.\nShe had described Mrs. Fairlie (in writing to me) as \"plain-looking,\"\nand as having \"entrapped the handsomest man in England into marrying\nher.\" Both assertions were gratuitously made, and both were false.\nJealous dislike (which, in such a woman as Mrs. Catherick, would\nexpress itself in petty malice rather than not express itself at all)\nappeared to me to be the only assignable cause for the peculiar\ninsolence of her reference to Mrs. Fairlie, under circumstances which\ndid not necessitate any reference at all.\n\nThe mention here of Mrs. Fairlie's name naturally suggests one other\nquestion.  Did she ever suspect whose child the little girl brought to\nher at Limmeridge might be?\n\nMarian's testimony was positive on this point.  Mrs. Fairlie's letter\nto her husband, which had been read to me in former days--the letter\ndescribing Anne's resemblance to Laura, and acknowledging her\naffectionate interest in the little stranger--had been written, beyond\nall question, in perfect innocence of heart.  It even seemed doubtful,\non consideration, whether Mr. Philip Fairlie himself had been nearer\nthan his wife to any suspicion of the truth.  The disgracefully\ndeceitful circumstances under which Mrs. Catherick had married, the\npurpose of concealment which the marriage was intended to answer, might\nwell keep her silent for caution's sake, perhaps for her own pride's\nsake also, even assuming that she had the means, in his absence, of\ncommunicating with the father of her unborn child.\n\nAs this surmise floated through my mind, there rose on my memory the\nremembrance of the Scripture denunciation which we have all thought of\nin our time with wonder and with awe: \"The sins of the fathers shall be\nvisited on the children.\" But for the fatal resemblance between the two\ndaughters of one father, the conspiracy of which Anne had been the\ninnocent instrument and Laura the innocent victim could never have been\nplanned.  With what unerring and terrible directness the long chain of\ncircumstances led down from the thoughtless wrong committed by the\nfather to the heartless injury inflicted on the child!\n\nThese thoughts came to me, and others with them, which drew my mind\naway to the little Cumberland churchyard where Anne Catherick now lay\nburied.  I thought of the bygone days when I had met her by Mrs.\nFairlie's grave, and met her for the last time.  I thought of her poor\nhelpless hands beating on the tombstone, and her weary, yearning words,\nmurmured to the dead remains of her protectress and her friend: \"Oh, if\nI could die, and be hidden and at rest with YOU!\" Little more than a\nyear had passed since she breathed that wish; and how inscrutably, how\nawfully, it had been fulfilled! The words she had spoken to Laura by\nthe shores of the lake, the very words had now come true.  \"Oh, if I\ncould only be buried with your mother! If I could only wake at her side\nwhen the angel's trumpet sounds and the graves give up their dead at\nthe resurrection!\" Through what mortal crime and horror, through what\ndarkest windings of the way down to death--the lost creature had\nwandered in God's leading to the last home that, living, she never\nhoped to reach! In that sacred rest I leave her--in that dread\ncompanionship let her remain undisturbed.\n\n\nSo the ghostly figure which has haunted these pages, as it haunted my\nlife, goes down into the impenetrable gloom.  Like a shadow she first\ncame to me in the loneliness of the night.  Like a shadow she passes\naway in the loneliness of the dead.\n\n\n\nIII\n\nFour months elapsed.  April came--the month of spring--the month of\nchange.\n\nThe course of time had flowed through the interval since the winter\npeacefully and happily in our new home.  I had turned my long leisure\nto good account, had largely increased my sources of employment, and\nhad placed our means of subsistence on surer grounds.  Freed from the\nsuspense and the anxiety which had tried her so sorely and hung over\nher so long, Marian's spirits rallied, and her natural energy of\ncharacter began to assert itself again, with something, if not all, of\nthe freedom and the vigour of former times.\n\nMore pliable under change than her sister, Laura showed more plainly\nthe progress made by the healing influences of her new life.  The worn\nand wasted look which had prematurely aged her face was fast leaving\nit, and the expression which had been the first of its charms in past\ndays was the first of its beauties that now returned.  My closest\nobservations of her detected but one serious result of the conspiracy\nwhich had once threatened her reason and her life.  Her memory of\nevents, from the period of her leaving Blackwater Park to the period of\nour meeting in the burial-ground of Limmeridge Church, was lost beyond\nall hope of recovery.  At the slightest reference to that time she\nchanged and trembled still, her words became confused, her memory\nwandered and lost itself as helplessly as ever.  Here, and here only,\nthe traces of the past lay deep--too deep to be effaced.\n\nIn all else she was now so far on the way to recovery that, on her best\nand brightest days, she sometimes looked and spoke like the Laura of\nold times.  The happy change wrought its natural result in us both.\nFrom their long slumber, on her side and on mine, those imperishable\nmemories of our past life in Cumberland now awoke, which were one and\nall alike, the memories of our love.\n\nGradually and insensibly our daily relations towards each other became\nconstrained.  The fond words which I had spoken to her so naturally, in\nthe days of her sorrow and her suffering, faltered strangely on my\nlips.  In the time when my dread of losing her was most present to my\nmind, I had always kissed her when she left me at night and when she\nmet me in the morning.  The kiss seemed now to have dropped between\nus--to be lost out of our lives.  Our hands began to tremble again when\nthey met.  We hardly ever looked long at one another out of Marian's\npresence.  The talk often flagged between us when we were alone.  When\nI touched her by accident I felt my heart beating fast, as it used to\nbeat at Limmeridge House--I saw the lovely answering flush glowing\nagain in her cheeks, as if we were back among the Cumberland Hills in\nour past characters of master and pupil once more.  She had long\nintervals of silence and thoughtfulness, and denied she had been\nthinking when Marian asked her the question.  I surprised myself one\nday neglecting my work to dream over the little water-colour portrait\nof her which I had taken in the summer-house where we first met--just\nas I used to neglect Mr. Fairlie's drawings to dream over the same\nlikeness when it was newly finished in the bygone time.  Changed as all\nthe circumstances now were, our position towards each other in the\ngolden days of our first companionship seemed to be revived with the\nrevival of our love. It was as if Time had drifted us back on the wreck\nof our early hopes to the old familiar shore!\n\nTo any other woman I could have spoken the decisive words which I still\nhesitated to speak to HER.  The utter helplessness of her position--her\nfriendless dependence on all the forbearing gentleness that I could\nshow her--my fear of touching too soon some secret sensitiveness in her\nwhich my instinct as a man might not have been fine enough to\ndiscover--these considerations, and others like them, kept me\nself-distrustfully silent. And yet I knew that the restraint on both\nsides must be ended, that the relations in which we stood towards one\nanother must be altered in some settled manner for the future, and that\nit rested with me, in the first instance, to recognise the necessity\nfor a change.\n\nThe more I thought of our position, the harder the attempt to alter it\nappeared, while the domestic conditions on which we three had been\nliving together since the winter remained undisturbed.  I cannot\naccount for the capricious state of mind in which this feeling\noriginated, but the idea nevertheless possessed me that some previous\nchange of place and circumstances, some sudden break in the quiet\nmonotony of our lives, so managed as to vary the home aspect under\nwhich we had been accustomed to see each other, might prepare the way\nfor me to speak, and might make it easier and less embarrassing for\nLaura and Marian to hear.\n\nWith this purpose in view, I said, one morning, that I thought we had\nall earned a little holiday and a change of scene.  After some\nconsideration, it was decided that we should go for a fortnight to the\nsea-side.\n\nOn the next day we left Fulham for a quiet town on the south coast.  At\nthat early season of the year we were the only visitors in the place.\nThe cliffs, the beach, and the walks inland were all in the solitary\ncondition which was most welcome to us.  The air was mild--the\nprospects over hill and wood and down were beautifully varied by the\nshifting April light and shade, and the restless sea leapt under our\nwindows, as if it felt, like the land, the glow and freshness of spring.\n\nI owed it to Marian to consult her before I spoke to Laura, and to be\nguided afterwards by her advice.\n\nOn the third day from our arrival I found a fit opportunity of speaking\nto her alone.  The moment we looked at one another, her quick instinct\ndetected the thought in my mind before I could give it expression.\nWith her customary energy and directness she spoke at once, and spoke\nfirst.\n\n\"You are thinking of that subject which was mentioned between us on the\nevening of your return from Hampshire,\" she said.  \"I have been\nexpecting you to allude to it for some time past.  There must be a\nchange in our little household, Walter, we cannot go on much longer as\nwe are now.  I see it as plainly as you do--as plainly as Laura sees\nit, though she says nothing.  How strangely the old times in Cumberland\nseem to have come back! You and I are together again, and the one\nsubject of interest between us is Laura once more.  I could almost\nfancy that this room is the summer-house at Limmeridge, and that those\nwaves beyond us are beating on our sea-shore.\"\n\n\"I was guided by your advice in those past days,\" I said, \"and now,\nMarian, with reliance tenfold greater I will be guided by it again.\"\n\nShe answered by pressing my hand.  I saw that she was deeply touched by\nmy reference to the past.  We sat together near the window, and while I\nspoke and she listened, we looked at the glory of the sunlight shining\non the majesty of the sea.\n\n\"Whatever comes of this confidence between us,\" I said, \"whether it\nends happily or sorrowfully for ME, Laura's interests will still be the\ninterests of my life.  When we leave this place, on whatever terms we\nleave it, my determination to wrest from Count Fosco the confession\nwhich I failed to obtain from his accomplice, goes back with me to\nLondon, as certainly as I go back myself. Neither you nor I can tell\nhow that man may turn on me, if I bring him to bay; we only know, by\nhis own words and actions, that he is capable of striking at me through\nLaura, without a moment's hesitation, or a moment's remorse.  In our\npresent position I have no claim on her which society sanctions, which\nthe law allows, to strengthen me in resisting him, and in protecting\nHER.  This places me at a serious disadvantage.  If I am to fight our\ncause with the Count, strong in the consciousness of Laura's safety, I\nmust fight it for my Wife.  Do you agree to that, Marian, so far?\"\n\n\"To every word of it,\" she answered.\n\n\"I will not plead out of my own heart,\" I went on; \"I will not appeal\nto the love which has survived all changes and all shocks--I will rest\nmy only vindication of myself for thinking of her, and speaking of her\nas my wife, on what I have just said.  If the chance of forcing a\nconfession from the Count is, as I believe it to be, the last chance\nleft of publicly establishing the fact of Laura's existence, the least\nselfish reason that I can advance for our marriage is recognised by us\nboth.  But I may be wrong in my conviction--other means of achieving\nour purpose may be in our power, which are less uncertain and less\ndangerous.  I have searched anxiously, in my own mind, for those means,\nand I have not found them.  Have you?\"\n\n\"No.  I have thought about it too, and thought in vain.\"\n\n\"In all likelihood,\" I continued, \"the same questions have occurred to\nyou, in considering this difficult subject, which have occurred to me.\nOught we to return with her to Limmeridge, now that she is like herself\nagain, and trust to the recognition of her by the people of the\nvillage, or by the children at the school?  Ought we to appeal to the\npractical test of her handwriting? Suppose we did so.  Suppose the\nrecognition of her obtained, and the identity of the handwriting\nestablished.  Would success in both those cases do more than supply an\nexcellent foundation for a trial in a court of law? Would the\nrecognition and the handwriting prove her identity to Mr. Fairlie and\ntake her back to Limmeridge House, against the evidence of her aunt,\nagainst the evidence of the medical certificate, against the fact of\nthe funeral and the fact of the inscription on the tomb? No! We could\nonly hope to succeed in throwing a serious doubt on the assertion of\nher death, a doubt which nothing short of a legal inquiry can settle.\nI will assume that we possess (what we have certainly not got) money\nenough to carry this inquiry on through all its stages.  I will assume\nthat Mr. Fairlie's prejudices might be reasoned away--that the false\ntestimony of the Count and his wife, and all the rest of the false\ntestimony, might be confuted--that the recognition could not possibly\nbe ascribed to a mistake between Laura and Anne Catherick, or the\nhandwriting be declared by our enemies to be a clever fraud--all these\nare assumptions which, more or less, set plain probabilities at\ndefiance; but let them pass--and let us ask ourselves what would be the\nfirst consequence or the first questions put to Laura herself on the\nsubject of the conspiracy.  We know only too well what the consequence\nwould be, for we know that she has never recovered her memory of what\nhappened to her in London.  Examine her privately, or examine her\npublicly, she is utterly incapable of assisting the assertion of her\nown case.  If you don't see this, Marian, as plainly as I see it, we\nwill go to Limmeridge and try the experiment to-morrow.\"\n\n\"I DO see it, Walter.  Even if we had the means of paying all the law\nexpenses, even if we succeeded in the end, the delays would be\nunendurable, the perpetual suspense, after what we have suffered\nalready, would be heartbreaking.  You are right about the hopelessness\nof going to Limmeridge.  I wish I could feel sure that you are right\nalso in determining to try that last chance with the Count.  IS it a\nchance at all?\"\n\n\"Beyond a doubt, Yes.  It is the chance of recovering the lost date of\nLaura's journey to London.  Without returning to the reasons I gave you\nsome time since, I am still as firmly persuaded as ever that there is a\ndiscrepancy between the date of that journey and the date on the\ncertificate of death.  There lies the weak point of the whole\nconspiracy--it crumbles to pieces if we attack it in that way, and the\nmeans of attacking it are in possession of the Count.  If I succeed in\nwresting them from him, the object of your life and mine is fulfilled.\nIf I fail, the wrong that Laura has suffered will, in this world, never\nbe redressed.\"\n\n\"Do you fear failure yourself, Walter?\"\n\n\"I dare not anticipate success, and for that very reason, Marian, I\nspeak openly and plainly as I have spoken now.  In my heart and my\nconscience I can say it, Laura's hopes for the future are at their\nlowest ebb.  I know that her fortune is gone--I know that the last\nchance of restoring her to her place in the world lies at the mercy of\nher worst enemy, of a man who is now absolutely unassailable, and who\nmay remain unassailable to the end.  With every worldly advantage gone\nfrom her, with all prospect of recovering her rank and station more\nthan doubtful, with no clearer future before her than the future which\nher husband can provide, the poor drawing-master may harmlessly open\nhis heart at last. In the days of her prosperity, Marian, I was only\nthe teacher who guided her hand--I ask for it, in her adversity, as the\nhand of my wife!\"\n\nMarian's eyes met mine affectionately--I could say no more.  My heart\nwas full, my lips were trembling.  In spite of myself I was in danger\nof appealing to her pity.  I got up to leave the room. She rose at the\nsame moment, laid her hand gently on my shoulder, and stopped me.\n\n\"Walter!\" she said, \"I once parted you both, for your good and for\nhers.  Wait here, my brother!--wait, my dearest, best friend, till\nLaura comes, and tells you what I have done now!\"\n\nFor the first time since the farewell morning at Limmeridge she touched\nmy forehead with her lips.  A tear dropped on my face as she kissed me.\nShe turned quickly, pointed to the chair from which I had risen, and\nleft the room.\n\nI sat down alone at the window to wait through the crisis of my life.\nMy mind in that breathless interval felt like a total blank.  I was\nconscious of nothing but a painful intensity of all familiar\nperceptions.  The sun grew blinding bright, the white sea birds chasing\neach other far beyond me seemed to be flitting before my face, the\nmellow murmur of the waves on the beach was like thunder in my ears.\n\nThe door opened, and Laura came in alone.  So she had entered the\nbreakfast-room at Limmeridge House on the morning when we parted.\nSlowly and falteringly, in sorrow and in hesitation, she had once\napproached me.  Now she came with the haste of happiness in her feet,\nwith the light of happiness radiant in her face.  Of their own accord\nthose dear arms clasped themselves round me, of their own accord the\nsweet lips came to meet mine.  \"My darling!\" she whispered, \"we may own\nwe love each other now?\" Her head nestled with a tender contentedness\non my bosom.  \"Oh,\" she said innocently, \"I am so happy at last!\"\n\n\nTen days later we were happier still.  We were married.\n\n\n\nIV\n\nThe course of this narrative, steadily flowing on, bears me away from\nthe morning-time of our married life, and carries me forward to the end.\n\nIn a fortnight more we three were back in London, and the shadow was\nstealing over us of the struggle to come.\n\nMarian and I were careful to keep Laura in ignorance of the cause that\nhad hurried us back--the necessity of making sure of the Count.  It was\nnow the beginning of May, and his term of occupation at the house in\nForest Road expired in June.  If he renewed it (and I had reasons,\nshortly to be mentioned, for anticipating that he would), I might be\ncertain of his not escaping me.  But if by any chance he disappointed\nmy expectations and left the country, then I had no time to lose in\narming myself to meet him as I best might.\n\nIn the first fulness of my new happiness, there had been moments when\nmy resolution faltered--moments when I was tempted to be safely\ncontent, now that the dearest aspiration of my life was fulfilled in\nthe possession of Laura's love.  For the first time I thought\nfaint-heartedly of the greatness of the risk, of the adverse chances\narrayed against me, of the fair promise of our new life, and of the\nperil in which I might place the happiness which we had so hardly\nearned.  Yes! let me own it honestly.  For a brief time I wandered, in\nthe sweet guiding of love, far from the purpose to which I had been\ntrue under sterner discipline and in darker days.  Innocently Laura had\ntempted me aside from the hard path--innocently she was destined to\nlead me back again.\n\nAt times, dreams of the terrible past still disconnectedly recalled to\nher, in the mystery of sleep, the events of which her waking memory had\nlost all trace.  One night (barely two weeks after our marriage), when\nI was watching her at rest, I saw the tears come slowly through her\nclosed eyelids, I heard the faint murmuring words escape her which told\nme that her spirit was back again on the fatal journey from Blackwater\nPark.  That unconscious appeal, so touching and so awful in the\nsacredness of her sleep, ran through me like fire.  The next day was\nthe day we came back to London--the day when my resolution returned to\nme with tenfold strength.\n\nThe first necessity was to know something of the man.  Thus far, the\ntrue story of his life was an impenetrable mystery to me.\n\nI began with such scanty sources of information as were at my own\ndisposal.  The important narrative written by Mr. Frederick Fairlie\n(which Marian had obtained by following the directions I had given to\nher in the winter) proved to be of no service to the special object\nwith which I now looked at it.  While reading it I reconsidered the\ndisclosure revealed to me by Mrs. Clements of the series of deceptions\nwhich had brought Anne Catherick to London, and which had there devoted\nher to the interests of the conspiracy.  Here, again, the Count had not\nopenly committed himself--here, again, he was, to all practical\npurpose, out of my reach.\n\nI next returned to Marian's journal at Blackwater Park.  At my request\nshe read to me again a passage which referred to her past curiosity\nabout the Count, and to the few particulars which she had discovered\nrelating to him.\n\nThe passage to which I allude occurs in that part of her journal which\ndelineates his character and his personal appearance.  She describes\nhim as \"not having crossed the frontiers of his native country for\nyears past\"--as \"anxious to know if any Italian gentlemen were settled\nin the nearest town to Blackwater Park\"--as \"receiving letters with all\nsorts of odd stamps on them, and one with a large official-looking seal\non it.\" She is inclined to consider that his long absence from his\nnative country may be accounted for by assuming that he is a political\nexile.  But she is, on the other hand, unable to reconcile this idea\nwith the reception of the letter from abroad bearing \"the large\nofficial-looking seal\"--letters from the Continent addressed to\npolitical exiles being usually the last to court attention from foreign\npost-offices in that way.\n\nThe considerations thus presented to me in the diary, joined to certain\nsurmises of my own that grew out of them, suggested a conclusion which\nI wondered I had not arrived at before.  I now said to myself--what\nLaura had once said to Marian at Blackwater Park, what Madame Fosco had\noverheard by listening at the door--the Count is a spy!\n\nLaura had applied the word to him at hazard, in natural anger at his\nproceedings towards herself.  I applied it to him with the deliberate\nconviction that his vocation in life was the vocation of a spy.  On\nthis assumption, the reason for his extraordinary stay in England so\nlong after the objects of the conspiracy had been gained, became, to my\nmind, quite intelligible.\n\nThe year of which I am now writing was the year of the famous Crystal\nPalace Exhibition in Hyde Park.  Foreigners in unusually large numbers\nhad arrived already, and were still arriving in England.  Men were\namong us by hundreds whom the ceaseless distrustfulness of their\ngovernments had followed privately, by means of appointed agents, to\nour shores.  My surmises did not for a moment class a man of the\nCount's abilities and social position with the ordinary rank and file\nof foreign spies.  I suspected him of holding a position of authority,\nof being entrusted by the government which he secretly served with the\norganisation and management of agents specially employed in this\ncountry, both men and women, and I believed Mrs. Rubelle, who had been\nso opportunely found to act as nurse at Blackwater Park, to be, in all\nprobability, one of the number.\n\nAssuming that this idea of mine had a foundation in truth, the position\nof the Count might prove to be more assailable than I had hitherto\nventured to hope.  To whom could I apply to know something more of the\nman's history and of the man himself than I knew now?\n\nIn this emergency it naturally occurred to my mind that a countryman of\nhis own, on whom I could rely, might be the fittest person to help me.\nThe first man whom I thought of under these circumstances was also the\nonly Italian with whom I was intimately acquainted--my quaint little\nfriend, Professor Pesca.\n\n\nThe professor has been so long absent from these pages that he has run\nsome risk of being forgotten altogether.\n\nIt is the necessary law of such a story as mine that the persons\nconcerned in it only appear when the course of events takes them\nup--they come and go, not by favour of my personal partiality, but by\nright of their direct connection with the circumstances to be detailed.\nFor this reason, not Pesca alone, but my mother and sister as well,\nhave been left far in the background of the narrative.  My visits to\nthe Hampstead cottage, my mother's belief in the denial of Laura's\nidentity which the conspiracy had accomplished, my vain efforts to\novercome the prejudice on her part and on my sister's to which, in\ntheir jealous affection for me, they both continued to adhere, the\npainful necessity which that prejudice imposed on me of concealing my\nmarriage from them till they had learnt to do justice to my wife--all\nthese little domestic occurrences have been left unrecorded because\nthey were not essential to the main interest of the story.  It is\nnothing that they added to my anxieties and embittered my\ndisappointments--the steady march of events has inexorably passed them\nby.\n\nFor the same reason I have said nothing here of the consolation that I\nfound in Pesca's brotherly affection for me, when I saw him again after\nthe sudden cessation of my residence at Limmeridge House.  I have not\nrecorded the fidelity with which my warm-hearted little friend\nfollowed me to the place of embarkation when I sailed for Central\nAmerica, or the noisy transport of joy with which he received me when\nwe next met in London.  If I had felt justified in accepting the offers\nof service which he made to me on my return, he would have appeared\nagain long ere this.  But, though I knew that his honour and his\ncourage were to be implicitly relied on, I was not so sure that his\ndiscretion was to be trusted, and, for that reason only, I followed the\ncourse of all my inquiries alone.  It will now be sufficiently\nunderstood that Pesca was not separated from all connection with me and\nmy interests, although he has hitherto been separated from all\nconnection with the progress of this narrative.  He was as true and as\nready a friend of mine still as ever he had been in his life.\n\n\nBefore I summoned Pesca to my assistance it was necessary to see for\nmyself what sort of man I had to deal with.  Up to this time I had\nnever once set eyes on Count Fosco.\n\nThree days after my return with Laura and Marian to London, I set forth\nalone for Forest Road, St. John's Wood, between ten and eleven o'clock\nin the morning.  It was a fine day--I had some hours to spare--and I\nthought it likely, if I waited a little for him, that the Count might\nbe tempted out.  I had no great reason to fear the chance of his\nrecognising me in the daytime, for the only occasion when I had been\nseen by him was the occasion on which he had followed me home at night.\n\nNo one appeared at the windows in the front of the house.  I walked\ndown a turning which ran past the side of it, and looked over the low\ngarden wall.  One of the back windows on the lower floor was thrown up\nand a net was stretched across the opening.  I saw nobody, but I heard,\nin the room, first a shrill whistling and singing of birds, then the\ndeep ringing voice which Marian's description had made familiar to me.\n\"Come out on my little finger, my pret-pret-pretties!\" cried the voice.\n\"Come out and hop upstairs! One, two, three--and up! Three, two,\none--and down! One, two, three--twit-twit-twit-tweet!\" The Count was\nexercising his canaries as he used to exercise them in Marian's time at\nBlackwater Park.\n\nI waited a little while, and the singing and the whistling ceased.\n\"Come, kiss me, my pretties!\" said the deep voice.  There was a\nresponsive twittering and chirping--a low, oily laugh--a silence of a\nminute or so, and then I heard the opening of the house door. I turned\nand retraced my steps.  The magnificent melody of the Prayer in\nRossini's Moses, sung in a sonorous bass voice, rose grandly through\nthe suburban silence of the place.  The front garden gate opened and\nclosed.  The Count had come out.\n\nHe crossed the road and walked towards the western boundary of the\nRegent's Park.  I kept on my own side of the way, a little behind him,\nand walked in that direction also.\n\nMarian had prepared me for his high stature, his monstrous corpulence,\nand his ostentatious mourning garments, but not for the horrible\nfreshness and cheerfulness and vitality of the man. He carried his\nsixty years as if they had been fewer than forty. He sauntered along,\nwearing his hat a little on one side, with a light jaunty step,\nswinging his big stick, humming to himself, looking up from time to\ntime at the houses and gardens on either side of him with superb,\nsmiling patronage.  If a stranger had been told that the whole\nneighbourhood belonged to him, that stranger would not have been\nsurprised to hear it.  He never looked back, he paid no apparent\nattention to me, no apparent attention to any one who passed him on his\nown side of the road, except now and then, when he smiled and smirked,\nwith an easy paternal good humour, at the nursery-maids and the\nchildren whom he met.  In this way he led me on, till we reached a\ncolony of shops outside the western terraces of the Park.\n\nHere he stopped at a pastrycook's, went in (probably to give an order),\nand came out again immediately with a tart in his hand. An Italian was\ngrinding an organ before the shop, and a miserable little shrivelled\nmonkey was sitting on the instrument.  The Count stopped, bit a piece\nfor himself out of the tart, and gravely handed the rest to the monkey.\n\"My poor little man!\" he said, with grotesque tenderness, \"you look\nhungry.  In the sacred name of humanity, I offer you some lunch!\" The\norgan-grinder piteously put in his claim to a penny from the benevolent\nstranger.  The Count shrugged his shoulders contemptuously, and passed\non.\n\nWe reached the streets and the better class of shops between the New\nRoad and Oxford Street.  The Count stopped again and entered a small\noptician's shop, with an inscription in the window announcing that\nrepairs were neatly executed inside.  He came out again with an\nopera-glass in his hand, walked a few paces on, and stopped to look at\na bill of the opera placed outside a music-seller's shop.  He read the\nbill attentively, considered a moment, and then hailed an empty cab as\nit passed him.  \"Opera Box-office,\" he said to the man, and was driven\naway.\n\nI crossed the road, and looked at the bill in my turn.  The performance\nannounced was Lucrezia Borgia, and it was to take place that evening.\nThe opera-glass in the Count's hand, his careful reading of the bill,\nand his direction to the cabman, all suggested that he proposed making\none of the audience.  I had the means of getting an admission for\nmyself and a friend to the pit by applying to one of the scene-painters\nattached to the theatre, with whom I had been well acquainted in past\ntimes.  There was a chance at least that the Count might be easily\nvisible among the audience to me and to any one with me, and in this\ncase I had the means of ascertaining whether Pesca knew his countryman\nor not that very night.\n\nThis consideration at once decided the disposal of my evening.  I\nprocured the tickets, leaving a note at the Professor's lodgings on the\nway.  At a quarter to eight I called to take him with me to the\ntheatre.  My little friend was in a state of the highest excitement,\nwith a festive flower in his button-hole, and the largest opera-glass I\never saw hugged up under his arm.\n\n\"Are you ready?\" I asked.\n\n\"Right-all-right,\" said Pesca.\n\nWe started for the theatre.\n\n\n\nV\n\nThe last notes of the introduction to the opera were being played, and\nthe seats in the pit were all filled, when Pesca and I reached the\ntheatre.\n\nThere was plenty of room, however, in the passage that ran round the\npit--precisely the position best calculated to answer the purpose for\nwhich I was attending the performance.  I went first to the barrier\nseparating us from the stalls, and looked for the Count in that part of\nthe theatre.  He was not there.  Returning along the passage, on the\nleft-hand side from the stage, and looking about me attentively, I\ndiscovered him in the pit.  He occupied an excellent place, some twelve\nor fourteen seats from the end of a bench, within three rows of the\nstalls.  I placed myself exactly on a line with him.  Pesca standing by\nmy side. The Professor was not yet aware of the purpose for which I had\nbrought him to the theatre, and he was rather surprised that we did not\nmove nearer to the stage.\n\nThe curtain rose, and the opera began.\n\nThroughout the whole of the first act we remained in our position--the\nCount, absorbed by the orchestra and the stage, never casting so much\nas a chance glance at us.  Not a note of Donizetti's delicious music\nwas lost on him.  There he sat, high above his neighbours, smiling, and\nnodding his great head enjoyingly from time to time.  When the people\nnear him applauded the close of an air (as an English audience in such\ncircumstances always WILL applaud), without the least consideration for\nthe orchestral movement which immediately followed it, he looked round\nat them with an expression of compassionate remonstrance, and held up\none hand with a gesture of polite entreaty.  At the more refined\npassages of the singing, at the more delicate phases of the music,\nwhich passed unapplauded by others, his fat hands, adorned with\nperfectly-fitting black kid gloves, softly patted each other, in token\nof the cultivated appreciation of a musical man.  At such times, his\noily murmur of approval, \"Bravo! Bra-a-a-a!\" hummed through the\nsilence, like the purring of a great cat.  His immediate neighbours on\neither side--hearty, ruddy-faced people from the country, basking\namazedly in the sunshine of fashionable London--seeing and hearing him,\nbegan to follow his lead.  Many a burst of applause from the pit that\nnight started from the soft, comfortable patting of the black-gloved\nhands.  The man's voracious vanity devoured this implied tribute to his\nlocal and critical supremacy with an appearance of the highest relish.\nSmiles rippled continuously over his fat face.  He looked about him, at\nthe pauses in the music, serenely satisfied with himself and his\nfellow-creatures.  \"Yes! yes! these barbarous English people are\nlearning something from ME.  Here, there, and everywhere, I--Fosco--am\nan influence that is felt, a man who sits supreme!\" If ever face spoke,\nhis face spoke then, and that was its language.\n\nThe curtain fell on the first act, and the audience rose to look about\nthem.  This was the time I had waited for--the time to try if Pesca\nknew him.\n\nHe rose with the rest, and surveyed the occupants of the boxes grandly\nwith his opera-glass.  At first his back was towards us, but he turned\nround in time, to our side of the theatre, and looked at the boxes\nabove us, using his glass for a few minutes--then removing it, but\nstill continuing to look up.  This was the moment I chose, when his\nfull face was in view, for directing Pesca's attention to him.\n\n\"Do you know that man?\" I asked.\n\n\"Which man, my friend?\"\n\n\"The tall, fat man, standing there, with his face towards us.\"\n\nPesca raised himself on tiptoe, and looked at the Count.\n\n\"No,\" said the Professor.  \"The big fat man is a stranger to me. Is he\nfamous? Why do you point him out?\"\n\n\"Because I have particular reasons for wishing to know something of\nhim.  He is a countryman of yours--his name is Count Fosco.  Do you\nknow that name?\"\n\n\"Not I, Walter.  Neither the name nor the man is known to me.\"\n\n\"Are you quite sure you don't recognise him? Look again--look\ncarefully.  I will tell you why I am so anxious about it when we leave\nthe theatre.  Stop! let me help you up here, where you can see him\nbetter.\"\n\nI helped the little man to perch himself on the edge of the raised dais\nupon which the pit-seats were all placed.  His small stature was no\nhindrance to him--here he could see over the heads of the ladies who\nwere seated near the outermost part of the bench.\n\nA slim, light-haired man standing by us, whom I had not noticed\nbefore--a man with a scar on his left cheek--looked attentively at\nPesca as I helped him up, and then looked still more attentively,\nfollowing the direction of Pesca's eyes, at the Count.  Our\nconversation might have reached his ears, and might, as it struck me,\nhave roused his curiosity.\n\nMeanwhile, Pesca fixed his eyes earnestly on the broad, full, smiling\nface turned a little upward, exactly opposite to him.\n\n\"No,\" he said, \"I have never set my two eyes on that big fat man before\nin all my life.\"\n\nAs he spoke the Count looked downwards towards the boxes behind us on\nthe pit tier.\n\nThe eyes of the two Italians met.\n\nThe instant before I had been perfectly satisfied, from his own\nreiterated assertion, that Pesca did not know the Count.  The instant\nafterwards I was equally certain that the Count knew Pesca!\n\nKnew him, and--more surprising still--FEARED him as well! There was no\nmistaking the change that passed over the villain's face. The leaden\nhue that altered his yellow complexion in a moment, the sudden rigidity\nof all his features, the furtive scrutiny of his cold grey eyes, the\nmotionless stillness of him from head to foot told their own tale.  A\nmortal dread had mastered him body and soul--and his own recognition of\nPesca was the cause of it!\n\nThe slim man with the scar on his cheek was still close by us.  He had\napparently drawn his inference from the effect produced on the Count by\nthe sight of Pesca as I had drawn mine.  He was a mild, gentlemanlike\nman, looking like a foreigner, and his interest in our proceedings was\nnot expressed in anything approaching to an offensive manner.\n\nFor my own part I was so startled by the change in the Count's face, so\nastounded at the entirely unexpected turn which events had taken, that\nI knew neither what to say or do next.  Pesca roused me by stepping\nback to his former place at my side and speaking first.\n\n\"How the fat man stares!\" he exclaimed.  \"Is it at ME? Am I famous? How\ncan he know me when I don't know him?\"\n\nI kept my eye still on the Count.  I saw him move for the first time\nwhen Pesca moved, so as not to lose sight of the little man in the\nlower position in which he now stood.  I was curious to see what would\nhappen if Pesca's attention under these circumstances was withdrawn\nfrom him, and I accordingly asked the Professor if he recognised any of\nhis pupils that evening among the ladies in the boxes.  Pesca\nimmediately raised the large opera-glass to his eyes, and moved it\nslowly all round the upper part of the theatre, searching for his\npupils with the most conscientious scrutiny.\n\nThe moment he showed himself to be thus engaged the Count turned round,\nslipped past the persons who occupied seats on the farther side of him\nfrom where we stood, and disappeared in the middle passage down the\ncentre of the pit.  I caught Pesca by the arm, and to his inexpressible\nastonishment, hurried him round with me to the back of the pit to\nintercept the Count before he could get to the door.  Somewhat to my\nsurprise, the slim man hastened out before us, avoiding a stoppage\ncaused by some people on our side of the pit leaving their places, by\nwhich Pesca and myself were delayed.  When we reached the lobby the\nCount had disappeared, and the foreigner with the scar was gone too.\n\n\"Come home,\" I said; \"come home, Pesca to your lodgings.  I must speak\nto you in private--I must speak directly.\"\n\n\"My-soul-bless-my-soul!\" cried the Professor, in a state of the\nextremest bewilderment.  \"What on earth is the matter?\"\n\nI walked on rapidly without answering.  The circumstances under which\nthe Count had left the theatre suggested to me that his extraordinary\nanxiety to escape Pesca might carry him to further extremities still.\nHe might escape me, too, by leaving London.  I doubted the future if I\nallowed him so much as a day's freedom to act as he pleased.  And I\ndoubted that foreign stranger, who had got the start of us, and whom I\nsuspected of intentionally following him out.\n\nWith this double distrust in my mind, I was not long in making Pesca\nunderstand what I wanted.  As soon as we two were alone in his room, I\nincreased his confusion and amazement a hundredfold by telling him what\nmy purpose was as plainly and unreservedly as I have acknowledged it\nhere.\n\n\"My friend, what can I do?\" cried the Professor, piteously appealing to\nme with both hands.  \"Deuce-what-the-deuce! how can I help you, Walter,\nwhen I don't know the man?\"\n\n\"HE knows YOU--he is afraid of you--he has left the theatre to escape\nyou.  Pesca! there must be a reason for this.  Look back into your own\nlife before you came to England.  You left Italy, as you have told me\nyourself, for political reasons.  You have never mentioned those\nreasons to me, and I don't inquire into them now. I only ask you to\nconsult your own recollections, and to say if they suggest no past\ncause for the terror which the first sight of you produced in that man.\"\n\nTo my unutterable surprise, these words, harmless as they appeared to\nME, produced the same astounding effect on Pesca which the sight of\nPesca had produced on the Count.  The rosy face of my little friend\nwhitened in an instant, and he drew back from me slowly, trembling from\nhead to foot.\n\n\"Walter!\" he said.  \"You don't know what you ask.\"\n\nHe spoke in a whisper--he looked at me as if I had suddenly revealed to\nhim some hidden danger to both of us.  In less than one minute of time\nhe was so altered from the easy, lively, quaint little man of all my\npast experience, that if I had met him in the street, changed as I saw\nhim now, I should most certainly not have known him again.\n\n\"Forgive me, if I have unintentionally pained and shocked you,\" I\nreplied.  \"Remember the cruel wrong my wife has suffered at Count\nFosco's hands.  Remember that the wrong can never be redressed, unless\nthe means are in my power of forcing him to do her justice. I spoke in\nHER interests, Pesca--I ask you again to forgive me--I can say no more.\"\n\nI rose to go.  He stopped me before I reached the door.\n\n\"Wait,\" he said.  \"You have shaken me from head to foot.  You don't\nknow how I left my country, and why I left my country.  Let me compose\nmyself, let me think, if I can.\"\n\nI returned to my chair.  He walked up and down the room, talking to\nhimself incoherently in his own language.  After several turns\nbackwards and forwards, he suddenly came up to me, and laid his little\nhands with a strange tenderness and solemnity on my breast.\n\n\"On your heart and soul, Walter,\" he said, \"is there no other way to\nget to that man but the chance-way through ME?\"\n\n\"There is no other way,\" I answered.\n\nHe left me again, opened the door of the room and looked out cautiously\ninto the passage, closed it once more, and came back.\n\n\"You won your right over me, Walter,\" he said, \"on the day when you\nsaved my life.  It was yours from that moment, when you pleased to take\nit.  Take it now.  Yes! I mean what I say.  My next words, as true as\nthe good God is above us, will put my life into your hands.\"\n\nThe trembling earnestness with which he uttered this extraordinary\nwarning, carried with it, to my mind, the conviction that he spoke the\ntruth.\n\n\"Mind this!\" he went on, shaking his hands at me in the vehemence of\nhis agitation.  \"I hold no thread, in my own mind, between that man\nFosco, and the past time which I call back to me for your sake.  If you\nfind the thread, keep it to yourself--tell me nothing--on my knees I\nbeg and pray, let me be ignorant, let me be innocent, let me be blind\nto all the future as I am now!\"\n\nHe said a few words more, hesitatingly and disconnectedly, then stopped\nagain.\n\nI saw that the effort of expressing himself in English, on an occasion\ntoo serious to permit him the use of the quaint turns and phrases of\nhis ordinary vocabulary, was painfully increasing the difficulty he had\nfelt from the first in speaking to me at all. Having learnt to read and\nunderstand his native language (though not to speak it), in the earlier\ndays of our intimate companionship, I now suggested to him that he\nshould express himself in Italian, while I used English in putting any\nquestions which might be necessary to my enlightenment.  He accepted\nthe proposal.  In his smooth-flowing language, spoken with a vehement\nagitation which betrayed itself in the perpetual working of his\nfeatures, in the wildness and the suddenness of his foreign\ngesticulations, but never in the raising of his voice, I now heard the\nwords which armed me to meet the last struggle, that is left for this\nstory to record.[3]\n\n[3] It is only right to mention here, that I repeat Pesco's statement\nto me with the careful suppressions and alterations which the serious\nnature of the subject and my own sense of duty to my friend demand.  My\nfirst and last concealments from the reader are those which caution\nrenders absolutely necessary in this portion of the narrative.\n\n\"You know nothing of my motive for leaving Italy,\" he began, \"except\nthat it was for political reasons.  If I had been driven to this\ncountry by the persecution of my government, I should not have kept\nthose reasons a secret from you or from any one.  I have concealed them\nbecause no government authority has pronounced the sentence of my\nexile.  You have heard, Walter, of the political societies that are\nhidden in every great city on the continent of Europe? To one of those\nsocieties I belonged in Italy--and belong still in England.  When I\ncame to this country, I came by the direction of my chief.  I was\nover-zealous in my younger time--I ran the risk of compromising myself\nand others.  For those reasons I was ordered to emigrate to England and\nto wait.  I emigrated--I have waited--I wait still.  To-morrow I may be\ncalled away--ten years hence I may be called away.  It is all one to\nme--I am here, I support myself by teaching, and I wait.  I violate no\noath (you shall hear why presently) in making my confidence complete by\ntelling you the name of the society to which I belong.  All I do is to\nput my life in your hands.  If what I say to you now is ever known by\nothers to have passed my lips, as certainly as we two sit here, I am a\ndead man.\"\n\nHe whispered the next words in my ear.  I keep the secret which he thus\ncommunicated.  The society to which he belonged will be sufficiently\nindividualised for the purpose of these pages, if I call it \"The\nBrotherhood,\" on the few occasions when any reference to the subject\nwill be needed in this place.\n\n\"The object of the Brotherhood,\" Pesca went on, \"is, briefly, the\nobject of other political societies of the same sort--the destruction\nof tyranny and the assertion of the rights of the people.  The\nprinciples of the Brotherhood are two.  So long as a man's life is\nuseful, or even harmless only, he has the right to enjoy it.  But, if\nhis life inflicts injury on the well-being of his fellow-men, from that\nmoment he forfeits the right, and it is not only no crime, but a\npositive merit, to deprive him of it.  It is not for me to say in what\nfrightful circumstances of oppression and suffering this society took\nits rise.  It is not for you to say--you Englishmen, who have conquered\nyour freedom so long ago, that you have conveniently forgotten what\nblood you shed, and what extremities you proceeded to in the\nconquering--it is not for you to say how far the worst of all\nexasperations may, or may not, carry the maddened men of an enslaved\nnation.  The iron that has entered into our souls has gone too deep for\nyou to find it. Leave the refugee alone! Laugh at him, distrust him,\nopen your eyes in wonder at that secret self which smoulders in him,\nsometimes under the everyday respectability and tranquillity of a man\nlike me--sometimes under the grinding poverty, the fierce squalor, of\nmen less lucky, less pliable, less patient than I am--but judge us\nnot! In the time of your first Charles you might have done us\njustice--the long luxury of your own freedom has made you incapable of\ndoing us justice now.\"\n\nAll the deepest feelings of his nature seemed to force themselves to\nthe surface in those words--all his heart was poured out to me for the\nfirst time in our lives--but still his voice never rose, still his\ndread of the terrible revelation he was making to me never left him.\n\n\"So far,\" he resumed, \"you think the society like other societies. Its\nobject (in your English opinion) is anarchy and revolution. It takes\nthe life of a bad king or a bad minister, as if the one and the other\nwere dangerous wild beasts to be shot at the first opportunity.  I\ngrant you this.  But the laws of the Brotherhood are the laws of no\nother political society on the face of the earth.  The members are not\nknown to one another.  There is a president in Italy; there are\npresidents abroad.  Each of these has his secretary.  The presidents\nand the secretaries know the members, but the members, among\nthemselves, are all strangers, until their chiefs see fit, in the\npolitical necessity of the time, or in the private necessity of the\nsociety, to make them known to each other.  With such a safeguard as\nthis there is no oath among us on admittance.  We are identified with\nthe Brotherhood by a secret mark, which we all bear, which lasts while\nour lives last.  We are told to go about our ordinary business, and to\nreport ourselves to the president, or the secretary, four times a year,\nin the event of our services being required.  We are warned, if we\nbetray the Brotherhood, or if we injure it by serving other interests,\nthat we die by the principles of the Brotherhood--die by the hand of a\nstranger who may be sent from the other end of the world to strike the\nblow--or by the hand of our own bosom-friend, who may have been a\nmember unknown to us through all the years of our intimacy.  Sometimes\nthe death is delayed--sometimes it follows close on the treachery.  It\nis our first business to know how to wait--our second business to know\nhow to obey when the word is spoken.  Some of us may wait our lives\nthrough, and may not be wanted.  Some of us may be called to the work,\nor to the preparation for the work, the very day of our admission.  I\nmyself--the little, easy, cheerful man you know, who, of his own\naccord, would hardly lift up his handkerchief to strike down the fly\nthat buzzes about his face--I, in my younger time, under provocation so\ndreadful that I will not tell you of it, entered the Brotherhood by an\nimpulse, as I might have killed myself by an impulse.  I must remain in\nit now--it has got me, whatever I may think of it in my better\ncircumstances and my cooler manhood, to my dying day.  While I was\nstill in Italy I was chosen secretary, and all the members of that\ntime, who were brought face to face with my president, were brought\nface to face also with me.\"\n\nI began to understand him--I saw the end towards which his\nextraordinary disclosure was now tending.  He waited a moment, watching\nme earnestly--watching till he had evidently guessed what was passing\nin my mind before he resumed.\n\n\"You have drawn your own conclusion already,\" he said.  \"I see it in\nyour face.  Tell me nothing--keep me out of the secret of your\nthoughts.  Let me make my one last sacrifice of myself, for your sake,\nand then have done with this subject, never to return to it again.\"\n\nHe signed to me not to answer him--rose--removed his coat--and rolled\nup the shirt-sleeve on his left arm.\n\n\"I promised you that this confidence should be complete,\" he whispered,\nspeaking close at my ear, with his eyes looking watchfully at the door.\n\"Whatever comes of it you shall not reproach me with having hidden\nanything from you which it was necessary to your interests to know.  I\nhave said that the Brotherhood identifies its members by a mark that\nlasts for life. See the place, and the mark on it for yourself.\"\n\nHe raised his bare arm, and showed me, high on the upper part of it and\nin the inner side, a brand deeply burnt in the flesh and stained of a\nbright blood-red colour.  I abstain from describing the device which\nthe brand represented.  It will be sufficient to say that it was\ncircular in form, and so small that it would have been completely\ncovered by a shilling coin.\n\n\"A man who has this mark, branded in this place,\" he said, covering his\narm again, \"is a member of the Brotherhood.  A man who has been false\nto the Brotherhood is discovered sooner or later by the chiefs who know\nhim--presidents or secretaries, as the case may be.  And a man\ndiscovered by the chiefs is dead. NO HUMAN LAWS CAN PROTECT HIM.\nRemember what you have seen and heard--draw what conclusions YOU\nlike--act as you please.  But, in the name of God, whatever you\ndiscover, whatever you do, tell me nothing! Let me remain free from a\nresponsibility which it horrifies me to think of--which I know, in my\nconscience, is not my responsibility now.  For the last time I say\nit--on my honour as a gentleman, on my oath as a Christian, if the man\nyou pointed out at the Opera knows ME, he is so altered, or so\ndisguised, that I do not know him.  I am ignorant of his proceedings or\nhis purposes in England.  I never saw him, I never heard the name he\ngoes by, to my knowledge, before to-night.  I say no more.  Leave me a\nlittle, Walter.  I am overpowered by what has happened--I am shaken by\nwhat I have said.  Let me try to be like myself again when we meet\nnext.\"\n\nHe dropped into a chair, and turning away from me, hid his face in his\nhands.  I gently opened the door so as not to disturb him, and spoke my\nfew parting words in low tones, which he might hear or not, as he\npleased.\n\n\"I will keep the memory of to-night in my heart of hearts,\" I said.\n\"You shall never repent the trust you have reposed in me. May I come to\nyou to-morrow? May I come as early as nine o'clock?\"\n\n\"Yes, Walter,\" he replied, looking up at me kindly, and speaking in\nEnglish once more, as if his one anxiety now was to get back to our\nformer relations towards each other.  \"Come to my little bit of\nbreakfast before I go my ways among the pupils that I teach.\"\n\n\"Good-night, Pesca.\"\n\n\"Good-night, my friend.\"\n\n\n\nVI\n\nMY first conviction as soon as I found myself outside the house, was\nthat no alternative was left me but to act at once on the information I\nhad received--to make sure of the Count that night, or to risk the\nloss, if I only delayed till the morning, of Laura's last chance.  I\nlooked at my watch--it was ten o'clock.\n\nNot the shadow of a doubt crossed my mind of the purpose for which the\nCount had left the theatre.  His escape from us, that evening, was\nbeyond all question the preliminary only to his escape from London.\nThe mark of the Brotherhood was on his arm--I felt as certain of it as\nif he had shown me the brand; and the betrayal of the Brotherhood was\non his conscience--I had seen it in his recognition of Pesca.\n\nIt was easy to understand why that recognition had not been mutual.  A\nman of the Count's character would never risk the terrible consequences\nof turning spy without looking to his personal security quite as\ncarefully as he looked to his golden reward.  The shaven face, which I\nhad pointed out at the Opera, might have been covered by a beard in\nPesca's time--his dark brown hair might be a wig--his name was\nevidently a false one.  The accident of time might have helped him as\nwell--his immense corpulence might have come with his later years.\nThere was every reason why Pesca should not have known him again--every\nreason also why he should have known Pesca, whose singular personal\nappearance made a marked man of him, go where he might.\n\nI have said that I felt certain of the purpose in the Count's mind when\nhe escaped us at the theatre.  How could I doubt it, when I saw, with\nmy own eyes, that he believed himself, in spite of the change in his\nappearance, to have been recognised by Pesca, and to be therefore in\ndanger of his life? If I could get speech of him that night, if I could\nshow him that I, too knew of the mortal peril in which he stood, what\nresult would follow? Plainly this. One of us must be master of the\nsituation--one of us must inevitably be at the mercy of the other.\n\nI owed it to myself to consider the chances against me before I\nconfronted them.  I owed it to my wife to do all that lay in my power\nto lessen the risk.\n\nThe chances against me wanted no reckoning up--they were all merged in\none.  If the Count discovered, by my own avowal, that the direct way to\nhis safety lay through my life, he was probably the last man in\nexistence who would shrink from throwing me off my guard and taking\nthat way, when he had me alone within his reach. The only means of\ndefence against him on which I could at all rely to lessen the risk,\npresented themselves, after a little careful thinking, clearly enough.\nBefore I made any personal acknowledgment of my discovery in his\npresence, I must place the discovery itself where it would be ready for\ninstant use against him, and safe from any attempt at suppression on\nhis part.  If I laid the mine under his feet before I approached him,\nand if I left instructions with a third person to fire it on the\nexpiration of a certain time, unless directions to the contrary were\npreviously received under my own hand, or from my own lips--in that\nevent the Count's security was absolutely dependent upon mine, and I\nmight hold the vantage ground over him securely, even in his own house.\n\nThis idea occurred to me when I was close to the new lodgings which we\nhad taken on returning from the sea-side.  I went in without disturbing\nany one, by the help of my key.  A light was in the hall, and I stole\nup with it to my workroom to make my preparations, and absolutely to\ncommit myself to an interview with the Count, before either Laura or\nMarian could have the slightest suspicion of what I intended to do.\n\nA letter addressed to Pesca represented the surest measure of\nprecaution which it was now possible for me to take.  I wrote as\nfollows--\n\n\"The man whom I pointed out to you at the Opera is a member of the\nBrotherhood, and has been false to his trust. Put both these assertions\nto the test instantly.  You know the name he goes by in England.  His\naddress is No. 5 Forest Road, St. John's Wood.  On the love you once\nbore me, use the power entrusted to you without mercy and without delay\nagainst that man.  I have risked all and lost all--and the forfeit of\nmy failure has been paid with my life.\"\n\nI signed and dated these lines, enclosed them in an envelope, and\nsealed it up.  On the outside I wrote this direction: \"Keep the\nenclosure unopened until nine o'clock to-morrow morning.  If you do not\nhear from me, or see me, before that time, break the seal when the\nclock strikes, and read the contents.\" I added my initials, and\nprotected the whole by enclosing it in a second sealed envelope,\naddressed to Pesca at his lodgings.\n\nNothing remained to be done after this but to find the means of sending\nmy letter to its destination immediately.  I should then have\naccomplished all that lay in my power.  If anything happened to me in\nthe Count's house, I had now provided for his answering it with his\nlife.\n\nThat the means of preventing his escape, under any circumstances\nwhatever, were at Pesca's disposal, if he chose to exert them, I did\nnot for an instant doubt.  The extraordinary anxiety which he had\nexpressed to remain unenlightened as to the Count's identity--or, in\nother words, to be left uncertain enough about facts to justify him to\nhis own conscience in remaining passive--betrayed plainly that the\nmeans of exercising the terrible justice of the Brotherhood were ready\nto his hand, although, as a naturally humane man, he had shrunk from\nplainly saying as much in my presence.  The deadly certainty with which\nthe vengeance of foreign political societies can hunt down a traitor to\nthe cause, hide himself where he may, had been too often exemplified,\neven in my superficial experience, to allow of any doubt.  Considering\nthe subject only as a reader of newspapers, cases recurred to my\nmemory, both in London and in Paris, of foreigners found stabbed in the\nstreets, whose assassins could never be traced--of bodies and parts of\nbodies thrown into the Thames and the Seine, by hands that could never\nbe discovered--of deaths by secret violence which could only be\naccounted for in one way.  I have disguised nothing relating to myself\nin these pages, and I do not disguise here that I believed I had\nwritten Count Fosco's death-warrant, if the fatal emergency happened\nwhich authorised Pesca to open my enclosure.\n\nI left my room to go down to the ground floor of the house, and speak\nto the landlord about finding me a messenger.  He happened to be\nascending the stairs at the time, and we met on the landing. His son, a\nquick lad, was the messenger he proposed to me on hearing what I\nwanted.  We had the boy upstairs, and I gave him his directions.  He\nwas to take the letter in a cab, to put it into Professor Pesca's own\nhands, and to bring me back a line of acknowledgment from that\ngentleman--returning in the cab, and keeping it at the door for my use.\nIt was then nearly half-past ten.  I calculated that the boy might be\nback in twenty minutes, and that I might drive to St. John's Wood, on\nhis return, in twenty minutes more.\n\nWhen the lad had departed on his errand I returned to my own room for a\nlittle while, to put certain papers in order, so that they might be\neasily found in case of the worst.  The key of the old-fashioned\nbureau in which the papers were kept I sealed up, and left it on my\ntable, with Marian's name written on the outside of the little packet.\nThis done, I went downstairs to the sitting-room, in which I expected\nto find Laura and Marian awaiting my return from the Opera.  I felt my\nhand trembling for the first time when I laid it on the lock of the\ndoor.\n\nNo one was in the room but Marian.  She was reading, and she looked at\nher watch, in surprise, when I came in.\n\n\"How early you are back!\" she said.  \"You must have come away before\nthe Opera was over.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I replied, \"neither Pesca nor I waited for the end.  Where is\nLaura?\"\n\n\"She had one of her bad headaches this evening, and I advised her to go\nto bed when we had done tea.\"\n\nI left the room again on the pretext of wishing to see whether Laura\nwas asleep.  Marian's quick eyes were beginning to look inquiringly at\nmy face--Marian's quick instinct was beginning to discover that I had\nsomething weighing on my mind.\n\nWhen I entered the bedchamber, and softly approached the bedside by the\ndim flicker of the night-lamp, my wife was asleep.\n\nWe had not been married quite a month yet.  If my heart was heavy, if\nmy resolution for a moment faltered again, when I looked at her face\nturned faithfully to my pillow in her sleep--when I saw her hand\nresting open on the coverlid, as if it was waiting unconsciously for\nmine--surely there was some excuse for me? I only allowed myself a few\nminutes to kneel down at the bedside, and to look close at her--so\nclose that her breath, as it came and went, fluttered on my face.  I\nonly touched her hand and her cheek with my lips at parting.  She\nstirred in her sleep and murmured my name, but without waking.  I\nlingered for an instant at the door to look at her again.  \"God bless\nand keep you, my darling!\" I whispered, and left her.\n\nMarian was at the stairhead waiting for me.  She had a folded slip of\npaper in her hand.\n\n\"The landlord's son has brought this for you,\" she said.  \"He has got a\ncab at the door--he says you ordered him to keep it at your disposal.\"\n\n\"Quite right, Marian.  I want the cab--I am going out again.\"\n\nI descended the stairs as I spoke, and looked into the sitting-room to\nread the slip of paper by the light on the table.  It contained these\ntwo sentences in Pesca's handwriting--\n\n\"Your letter is received.  If I don't see you before the time you\nmention, I will break the seal when the clock strikes.\"\n\nI placed the paper in my pocket-book, and made for the door. Marian met\nme on the threshold, and pushed me back into the room, where the\ncandle-light fell full on my face.  She held me by both hands, and her\neyes fastened searchingly on mine.\n\n\"I see!\" she said, in a low eager whisper.  \"You are trying the last\nchance to-night.\"\n\n\"Yes, the last chance and the best,\" I whispered back.\n\n\"Not alone! Oh, Walter, for God's sake, not alone! Let me go with you.\nDon't refuse me because I'm only a woman.  I must go! I will go! I'll\nwait outside in the cab!\"\n\nIt was my turn now to hold HER.  She tried to break away from me and\nget down first to the door.\n\n\"If you want to help me,\" I said, \"stop here and sleep in my wife's\nroom to-night.  Only let me go away with my mind easy about Laura, and\nI answer for everything else.  Come, Marian, give me a kiss, and show\nthat you have the courage to wait till I come back.\"\n\nI dared not allow her time to say a word more.  She tried to hold me\nagain.  I unclasped her hands, and was out of the room in a moment.\nThe boy below heard me on the stairs, and opened the hall-door.  I\njumped into the cab before the driver could get off the box.  \"Forest\nRoad, St. John's Wood,\" I called to him through the front window.\n\"Double fare if you get there in a quarter of an hour.\" \"I'll do it,\nsir.\" I looked at my watch.  Eleven o'clock.  Not a minute to lose.\n\nThe rapid motion of the cab, the sense that every instant now was\nbringing me nearer to the Count, the conviction that I was embarked at\nlast, without let or hindrance, on my hazardous enterprise, heated me\ninto such a fever of excitement that I shouted to the man to go faster\nand faster.  As we left the streets, and crossed St. John's Wood Road,\nmy impatience so completely overpowered me that I stood up in the cab\nand stretched my head out of the window, to see the end of the journey\nbefore we reached it.  Just as a church clock in the distance struck\nthe quarter past, we turned into the Forest Road.  I stopped the driver\na little away from the Count's house, paid and dismissed him, and\nwalked on to the door.\n\nAs I approached the garden gate, I saw another person advancing towards\nit also from the direction opposite to mine.  We met under the gas lamp\nin the road, and looked at each other.  I instantly recognised the\nlight-haired foreigner with the scar on his cheek, and I thought he\nrecognised me.  He said nothing, and instead of stopping at the house,\nas I did, he slowly walked on.  Was he in the Forest Road by accident?\nOr had he followed the Count home from the Opera?\n\nI did not pursue those questions.  After waiting a little till the\nforeigner had slowly passed out of sight, I rang the gate bell. It was\nthen twenty minutes past eleven--late enough to make it quite easy for\nthe Count to get rid of me by the excuse that he was in bed.\n\nThe only way of providing against this contingency was to send in my\nname without asking any preliminary questions, and to let him know, at\nthe same time, that I had a serious motive for wishing to see him at\nthat late hour.  Accordingly, while I was waiting, I took out my card\nand wrote under my name \"On important business.\" The maid-servant\nanswered the door while I was writing the last word in pencil, and\nasked me distrustfully what I \"pleased to want.\"\n\n\"Be so good as to take that to your master,\" I replied, giving her the\ncard.\n\nI saw, by the girl's hesitation of manner, that if I had asked for the\nCount in the first instance she would only have followed her\ninstructions by telling me he was not at home.  She was staggered by\nthe confidence with which I gave her the card.  After staring at me, in\ngreat perturbation, she went back into the house with my message,\nclosing the door, and leaving me to wait in the garden.\n\nIn a minute or so she reappeared.  \"Her master's compliments, and would\nI be so obliging as to say what my business was?\" \"Take my compliments\nback,\" I replied, \"and say that the business cannot be mentioned to any\none but your master.\" She left me again, again returned, and this time\nasked me to walk in.\n\nI followed her at once.  In another moment I was inside the Count's\nhouse.\n\n\n\nVII\n\nThere was no lamp in the hall, but by the dim light of the kitchen\ncandle, which the girl had brought upstairs with her, I saw an elderly\nlady steal noiselessly out of a back room on the ground floor.  She\ncast one viperish look at me as I entered the hall, but said nothing,\nand went slowly upstairs without returning my bow.  My familiarity with\nMarian's journal sufficiently assured me that the elderly lady was\nMadame Fosco.\n\nThe servant led me to the room which the Countess had just left. I\nentered it, and found myself face to face with the Count.\n\nHe was still in his evening dress, except his coat, which he had thrown\nacross a chair.  His shirt-sleeves were turned up at the wrists, but no\nhigher.  A carpet-bag was on one side of him, and a box on the other.\nBooks, papers, and articles of wearing apparel were scattered about the\nroom.  On a table, at one side of the door, stood the cage, so well\nknown to me by description, which contained his white mice.  The\ncanaries and the cockatoo were probably in some other room.  He was\nseated before the box, packing it, when I went in, and rose with some\npapers in his hand to receive me.  His face still betrayed plain traces\nof the shock that had overwhelmed him at the Opera.  His fat cheeks\nhung loose, his cold grey eyes were furtively vigilant, his voice,\nlook, and manner were all sharply suspicious alike, as he advanced a\nstep to meet me, and requested, with distant civility, that I would\ntake a chair.\n\n\"You come here on business, sir?\" he said.  \"I am at a loss to know\nwhat that business can possibly be.\"\n\nThe unconcealed curiosity, with which he looked hard in my face while\nhe spoke, convinced me that I had passed unnoticed by him at the Opera.\nHe had seen Pesca first, and from that moment till he left the theatre\nhe had evidently seen nothing else.  My name would necessarily suggest\nto him that I had not come into his house with other than a hostile\npurpose towards himself, but he appeared to be utterly ignorant thus\nfar of the real nature of my errand.\n\n\"I am fortunate in finding you here to-night,\" I said.  \"You seem to be\non the point of taking a journey?\"\n\n\"Is your business connected with my journey?\"\n\n\"In some degree.\"\n\n\"In what degree? Do you know where I am going to?\"\n\n\"No.  I only know why you are leaving London.\"\n\nHe slipped by me with the quickness of thought, locked the door, and\nput the key in his pocket.\n\n\"You and I, Mr. Hartright, are excellently well acquainted with one\nanother by reputation,\" he said.  \"Did it, by any chance, occur to you\nwhen you came to this house that I was not the sort of man you could\ntrifle with?\"\n\n\"It did occur to me,\" I replied.  \"And I have not come to trifle with\nyou.  I am here on a matter of life and death, and if that door which\nyou have locked was open at this moment, nothing you could say or do\nwould induce me to pass through it.\"\n\nI walked farther into the room, and stood opposite to him on the rug\nbefore the fireplace.  He drew a chair in front of the door, and sat\ndown on it, with his left arm resting on the table.  The cage with the\nwhite mice was close to him, and the little creatures scampered out of\ntheir sleeping-place as his heavy arm shook the table, and peered at\nhim through the gaps in the smartly painted wires.\n\n\"On a matter of life and death,\" he repeated to himself.  \"Those words\nare more serious, perhaps, than you think.  What do you mean?\"\n\n\"What I say.\"\n\nThe perspiration broke out thickly on his broad forehead.  His left\nhand stole over the edge of the table.  There was a drawer in it, with\na lock, and the key was in the lock.  His finger and thumb closed over\nthe key, but did not turn it.\n\n\"So you know why I am leaving London?\" he went on.  \"Tell me the\nreason, if you please.\" He turned the key, and unlocked the drawer as\nhe spoke.\n\n\"I can do better than that,\" I replied.  \"I can SHOW you the reason, if\nyou like.\"\n\n\"How can you show it?\"\n\n\"You have got your coat off,\" I said.  \"Roll up the shirt-sleeve on\nyour left arm, and you will see it there.\"\n\nThe same livid leaden change passed over his face which I had seen pass\nover it at the theatre.  The deadly glitter in his eyes shone steady\nand straight into mine.  He said nothing.  But his left hand slowly\nopened the table-drawer, and softly slipped into it. The harsh grating\nnoise of something heavy that he was moving unseen to me sounded for a\nmoment, then ceased.  The silence that followed was so intense that the\nfaint ticking nibble of the white mice at their wires was distinctly\naudible where I stood.\n\nMy life hung by a thread, and I knew it.  At that final moment I\nthought with HIS mind, I felt with HIS fingers--I was as certain as if\nI had seen it of what he kept hidden from me in the drawer.\n\n\"Wait a little,\" I said.  \"You have got the door locked--you see I\ndon't move--you see my hands are empty.  Wait a little.  I have\nsomething more to say.\"\n\n\"You have said enough,\" he replied, with a sudden composure so\nunnatural and so ghastly that it tried my nerves as no outbreak of\nviolence could have tried them.  \"I want one moment for my own\nthoughts, if you please.  Do you guess what I am thinking about?\"\n\n\"Perhaps I do.\"\n\n\"I am thinking,\" he remarked quietly, \"whether I shall add to the\ndisorder in this room by scattering your brains about the fireplace.\"\n\nIf I had moved at that moment, I saw in his face that he would have\ndone it.\n\n\"I advise you to read two lines of writing which I have about me,\" I\nrejoined, \"before you finally decide that question.\"\n\nThe proposal appeared to excite his curiosity.  He nodded his head.  I\ntook Pesca's acknowledgment of the receipt of my letter out of my\npocket-book, handed it to him at arm's length, and returned to my\nformer position in front of the fireplace.\n\nHe read the lines aloud: \"Your letter is received.  If I don't hear\nfrom you before the time you mention, I will break the seal when the\nclock strikes.\"\n\nAnother man in his position would have needed some explanation of those\nwords--the Count felt no such necessity.  One reading of the note\nshowed him the precaution that I had taken as plainly as if he had been\npresent at the time when I adopted it.  The expression of his face\nchanged on the instant, and his hand came out of the drawer empty.\n\n\"I don't lock up my drawer, Mr. Hartright,\" he said, \"and I don't say\nthat I may not scatter your brains about the fireplace yet. But I am a\njust man even to my enemy, and I will acknowledge beforehand that they\nare cleverer brains than I thought them. Come to the point, sir! You\nwant something of me?\"\n\n\"I do, and I mean to have it.\"\n\n\"On conditions?\"\n\n\"On no conditions.\"\n\nHis hand dropped into the drawer again.\n\n\"Bah! we are travelling in a circle,\" he said, \"and those clever brains\nof yours are in danger again.  Your tone is deplorably imprudent,\nsir--moderate it on the spot!  The risk of shooting you on the place\nwhere you stand is less to me than the risk of letting you out of this\nhouse, except on conditions that I dictate and approve.  You have not\ngot my lamented friend to deal with now--you are face to face with\nFosco! If the lives of twenty Mr. Hartrights were the stepping-stones\nto my safety, over all those stones I would go, sustained by my sublime\nindifference, self-balanced by my impenetrable calm.  Respect me, if\nyou love your own life! I summon you to answer three questions before\nyou open your lips again.  Hear them--they are necessary to this\ninterview. Answer them--they are necessary to ME.\"  He held up one\nfinger of his right hand.  \"First question!\" he said.  \"You come here\npossessed of information which may be true or may be false--where did\nyou get it?\"\n\n\"I decline to tell you.\"\n\n\"No matter--I shall find out.  If that information is true--mind I say,\nwith the whole force of my resolution, if--you are making your market\nof it here by treachery of your own or by treachery of some other man.\nI note that circumstance for future use in my memory, which forgets\nnothing, and proceed.\" He held up another finger.  \"Second question!\nThose lines you invited me to read are without signature.  Who wrote\nthem?\"\n\n\"A man whom I have every reason to depend on, and whom you have every\nreason to fear.\"\n\nMy answer reached him to some purpose.  His left hand trembled audibly\nin the drawer.\n\n\"How long do you give me,\" he asked, putting his third question in a\nquieter tone, \"before the clock strikes and the seal is broken?\"\n\n\"Time enough for you to come to my terms,\" I replied.\n\n\"Give me a plainer answer, Mr. Hartright.  What hour is the clock to\nstrike?\"\n\n\"Nine, to-morrow morning.\"\n\n\"Nine, to-morrow morning? Yes, yes--your trap is laid for me before I\ncan get my passport regulated and leave London.  It is not earlier, I\nsuppose? We will see about that presently--I can keep you hostage here,\nand bargain with you to send for your letter before I let you go.  In\nthe meantime, be so good next as to mention your terms.\"\n\n\"You shall hear them.  They are simple, and soon stated.  You know\nwhose interests I represent in coming here?\"\n\nHe smiled with the most supreme composure, and carelessly waved his\nright hand.\n\n\"I consent to hazard a guess,\" he said jeeringly.  \"A lady's interests,\nof course!\"\n\n\"My Wife's interests.\"\n\nHe looked at me with the first honest expression that had crossed his\nface in my presence--an expression of blank amazement.  I could see\nthat I sank in his estimation as a dangerous man from that moment.  He\nshut up the drawer at once, folded his arms over his breast, and\nlistened to me with a smile of satirical attention.\n\n\"You are well enough aware,\" I went on, \"of the course which my\ninquiries have taken for many months past, to know that any attempted\ndenial of plain facts will be quite useless in my presence.  You are\nguilty of an infamous conspiracy! And the gain of a fortune of ten\nthousand pounds was your motive for it.\"\n\nHe said nothing.  But his face became overclouded suddenly by a\nlowering anxiety.\n\n\"Keep your gain,\" I said.  (His face lightened again immediately, and\nhis eyes opened on me in wider and wider astonishment.) \"I am not here\nto disgrace myself by bargaining for money which has passed through\nyour hands, and which has been the price of a vile crime.\n\n\"Gently, Mr. Hartright.  Your moral clap-traps have an excellent effect\nin England--keep them for yourself and your own countrymen, if you\nplease.  The ten thousand pounds was a legacy left to my excellent wife\nby the late Mr. Fairlie.  Place the affair on those grounds, and I will\ndiscuss it if you like.  To a man of my sentiments, however, the\nsubject is deplorably sordid.  I prefer to pass it over.  I invite you\nto resume the discussion of your terms.  What do you demand?\"\n\n\"In the first place, I demand a full confession of the conspiracy,\nwritten and signed in my presence by yourself.\"\n\nHe raised his finger again.  \"One!\" he said, checking me off with the\nsteady attention of a practical man.\n\n\"In the second place, I demand a plain proof, which does not depend on\nyour personal asseveration, of the date at which my wife left\nBlackwater Park and travelled to London.\"\n\n\"So! so! you can lay your finger, I see, on the weak place,\" he\nremarked composedly.  \"Any more?\"\n\n\"At present, no more.\"\n\n\"Good! you have mentioned your terms, now listen to mine.  The\nresponsibility to myself of admitting what you are pleased to call the\n'conspiracy' is less, perhaps, upon the whole, than the responsibility\nof laying you dead on that hearthrug.  Let us say that I meet your\nproposal--on my own conditions.  The statement you demand of me shall\nbe written, and the plain proof shall be produced.  You call a letter\nfrom my late lamented friend informing me of the day and hour of his\nwife's arrival in London, written, signed, and dated by himself, a\nproof, I suppose? I can give you this.  I can also send you to the man\nof whom I hired the carriage to fetch my visitor from the railway, on\nthe day when she arrived--his order-book may help you to your date,\neven if his coachman who drove me proves to be of no use.  These things\nI can do, and will do, on conditions.  I recite them.  First condition!\nMadame Fosco and I leave this house when and how we please, without\ninterference of any kind on your part.  Second condition! You wait\nhere, in company with me, to see my agent, who is coming at seven\no'clock in the morning to regulate my affairs.  You give my agent a\nwritten order to the man who has got your sealed letter to resign his\npossession of it.  You wait here till my agent places that letter\nunopened in my hands, and you then allow me one clear half-hour to\nleave the house--after which you resume your own freedom of action and\ngo where you please.  Third condition! You give me the satisfaction of\na gentleman for your intrusion into my private affairs, and for the\nlanguage you have allowed yourself to use to me at this conference.\nThe time and place, abroad, to be fixed in a letter from my hand when I\nam safe on the Continent, and that letter to contain a strip of paper\nmeasuring accurately the length of my sword.  Those are my terms.\nInform me if you accept them--Yes or No.\"\n\n\nThe extraordinary mixture of prompt decision, far-sighted cunning, and\nmountebank bravado in this speech, staggered me for a moment--and only\nfor a moment.  The one question to consider was, whether I was\njustified or not in possessing myself of the means of establishing\nLaura's identity at the cost of allowing the scoundrel who had robbed\nher of it to escape me with impunity.  I knew that the motive of\nsecuring the just recognition of my wife in the birthplace from which\nshe had been driven out as an impostor, and of publicly erasing the lie\nthat still profaned her mother's tombstone, was far purer, in its\nfreedom from all taint of evil passion, than the vindictive motive\nwhich had mingled itself with my purpose from the first.  And yet I\ncannot honestly say that my own moral convictions were strong enough to\ndecide the struggle in me by themselves.  They were helped by my\nremembrance of Sir Percival's death.  How awfully, at the last moment,\nhad the working of the retribution THERE been snatched from my feeble\nhands! What right had I to decide, in my poor mortal ignorance of the\nfuture, that this man, too, must escape with impunity because he\nescaped ME? I thought of these things--perhaps with the superstition\ninherent in my nature, perhaps with a sense worthier of me than\nsuperstition.  It was hard, when I had fastened my hold on him at last,\nto loosen it again of my own accord--but I forced myself to make the\nsacrifice.  In plainer words, I determined to be guided by the one\nhigher motive of which I was certain, the motive of serving the cause\nof Laura and the cause of Truth.\n\n\n\"I accept your conditions,\" I said.  \"With one reservation on my part.\"\n\n\"What reservation may that be?\" he asked.\n\n\"It refers to the sealed letter,\" I answered.  \"I require you to\ndestroy it unopened in my presence as soon as it is placed in your\nhands.\"\n\nMy object in making this stipulation was simply to prevent him from\ncarrying away written evidence of the nature of my communication with\nPesca.  The fact of my communication he would necessarily discover,\nwhen I gave the address to his agent in the morning.  But he could make\nno use of it on his own unsupported testimony--even if he really\nventured to try the experiment--which need excite in me the slightest\napprehension on Pesca's account.\n\n\"I grant your reservation,\" he replied, after considering the question\ngravely for a minute or two.  \"It is not worth dispute--the letter\nshall be destroyed when it comes into my hands.\"\n\nHe rose, as he spoke, from the chair in which he had been sitting\nopposite to me up to this time.  With one effort he appeared to free\nhis mind from the whole pressure on it of the interview between us thus\nfar.  \"Ouf!\" he cried, stretching his arms luxuriously, \"the skirmish\nwas hot while it lasted.  Take a seat, Mr. Hartright.  We meet as\nmortal enemies hereafter--let us, like gallant gentlemen, exchange\npolite attentions in the meantime. Permit me to take the liberty of\ncalling for my wife.\"\n\nHe unlocked and opened the door.  \"Eleanor!\" he called out in his deep\nvoice.  The lady of the viperish face came in \"Madame Fosco--Mr.\nHartright,\" said the Count, introducing us with easy dignity. \"My\nangel,\" he went on, addressing his wife, \"will your labours of packing\nup allow you time to make me some nice strong coffee? I have writing\nbusiness to transact with Mr. Hartright--and I require the full\npossession of my intelligence to do justice to myself.\"\n\nMadame Fosco bowed her head twice--once sternly to me, once\nsubmissively to her husband, and glided out of the room.\n\nThe Count walked to a writing-table near the window, opened his desk,\nand took from it several quires of paper and a bundle of quill pens.\nHe scattered the pens about the table, so that they might lie ready in\nall directions to be taken up when wanted, and then cut the paper into\na heap of narrow slips, of the form used by professional writers for\nthe press.  \"I shall make this a remarkable document,\" he said, looking\nat me over his shoulder. \"Habits of literary composition are perfectly\nfamiliar to me.  One of the rarest of all the intellectual\naccomplishments that a man can possess is the grand faculty of\narranging his ideas.  Immense privilege! I possess it.  Do you?\"\n\nHe marched backwards and forwards in the room, until the coffee\nappeared, humming to himself, and marking the places at which obstacles\noccurred in the arrangement of his ideas, by striking his forehead from\ntime to time with the palm of his hand.  The enormous audacity with\nwhich he seized on the situation in which I placed him, and made it the\npedestal on which his vanity mounted for the one cherished purpose of\nself-display, mastered my astonishment by main force.  Sincerely as I\nloathed the man, the prodigious strength of his character, even in its\nmost trivial aspects, impressed me in spite of myself.\n\nThe coffee was brought in by Madame Fosco.  He kissed her hand in\ngrateful acknowledgment, and escorted her to the door; returned, poured\nout a cup of coffee for himself, and took it to the writing-table.\n\n\"May I offer you some coffee, Mr. Hartright?\" he said, before he sat\ndown.\n\nI declined.\n\n\"What! you think I shall poison you?\" he said gaily.  \"The English\nintellect is sound, so far as it goes,\" he continued, seating himself\nat the table; \"but it has one grave defect--it is always cautious in\nthe wrong place.\"\n\nHe dipped his pen in the ink, placed the first slip of paper before him\nwith a thump of his hand on the desk, cleared his throat, and began.\nHe wrote with great noise and rapidity, in so large and bold a hand,\nand with such wide spaces between the lines, that he reached the bottom\nof the slip in not more than two minutes certainly from the time when\nhe started at the top.  Each slip as he finished it was paged, and\ntossed over his shoulder out of his way on the floor.  When his first\npen was worn out, THAT went over his shoulder too, and he pounced on a\nsecond from the supply scattered about the table.  Slip after slip, by\ndozens, by fifties, by hundreds, flew over his shoulders on either side\nof him till he had snowed himself up in paper all round his chair. Hour\nafter hour passed--and there I sat watching, there he sat writing.  He\nnever stopped, except to sip his coffee, and when that was exhausted,\nto smack his forehead from time to time.  One o'clock struck, two,\nthree, four--and still the slips flew about all round him; still the\nuntiring pen scraped its way ceaselessly from top to bottom of the\npage, still the white chaos of paper rose higher and higher all round\nhis chair.  At four o'clock I heard a sudden splutter of the pen,\nindicative of the flourish with which he signed his name.  \"Bravo!\" he\ncried, springing to his feet with the activity of a young man, and\nlooking me straight in the face with a smile of superb triumph.\n\n\"Done, Mr. Hartright!\" he announced with a self-renovating thump of his\nfist on his broad breast.  \"Done, to my own profound satisfaction--to\nYOUR profound astonishment, when you read what I have written.  The\nsubject is exhausted: the man--Fosco--is not. I proceed to the\narrangement of my slips--to the revision of my slips--to the reading of\nmy slips--addressed emphatically to your private ear.  Four o'clock has\njust struck.  Good! Arrangement, revision, reading, from four to five.\nShort snooze of restoration for myself from five to six.  Final\npreparations from six to seven.  Affair of agent and sealed letter from\nseven to eight.  At eight, en route.  Behold the programme!\"\n\nHe sat down cross-legged on the floor among his papers, strung them\ntogether with a bodkin and a piece of string--revised them, wrote all\nthe titles and honours by which he was personally distinguished at the\nhead of the first page, and then read the manuscript to me with loud\ntheatrical emphasis and profuse theatrical gesticulation.  The reader\nwill have an opportunity, ere long, of forming his own opinion of the\ndocument.  It will be sufficient to mention here that it answered my\npurpose.\n\nHe next wrote me the address of the person from whom he had hired the\nfly, and handed me Sir Percival's letter.  It was dated from Hampshire\non the 25th of July, and it announced the journey of \"Lady Glyde\" to\nLondon on the 26th.  Thus, on the very day (the 25th) when the doctor's\ncertificate declared that she had died in St. John's Wood, she was\nalive, by Sir Percival's own showing, at Blackwater--and, on the day\nafter, she was to take a journey! When the proof of that journey was\nobtained from the flyman, the evidence would be complete.\n\n\"A quarter-past five,\" said the Count, looking at his watch. \"Time for\nmy restorative snooze.  I personally resemble Napoleon the Great, as\nyou may have remarked, Mr. Hartright--I also resemble that immortal man\nin my power of commanding sleep at will.  Excuse me one moment.  I will\nsummon Madame Fosco, to keep you from feeling dull.\"\n\nKnowing as well as he did, that he was summoning Madame Fosco to ensure\nmy not leaving the house while he was asleep, I made no reply, and\noccupied myself in tying up the papers which he had placed in my\npossession.\n\nThe lady came in, cool, pale, and venomous as ever.  \"Amuse Mr.\nHartright, my angel,\" said the Count.  He placed a chair for her,\nkissed her hand for the second time, withdrew to a sofa, and, in three\nminutes, was as peacefully and happily asleep as the most virtuous man\nin existence.\n\nMadame Fosco took a book from the table, sat down, and looked at me,\nwith the steady vindictive malice of a woman who never forgot and never\nforgave.\n\n\"I have been listening to your conversation with my husband,\" she said.\n\"If I had been in HIS place--I would have laid you dead on the\nhearthrug.\"\n\nWith those words she opened her book, and never looked at me or spoke\nto me from that time till the time when her husband woke.\n\nHe opened his eyes and rose from the sofa, accurately to an hour from\nthe time when he had gone to sleep.\n\n\"I feel infinitely refreshed,\" he remarked.  \"Eleanor, my good wife,\nare you all ready upstairs? That is well.  My little packing here can\nbe completed in ten minutes--my travelling-dress assumed in ten minutes\nmore.  What remains before the agent comes?\" He looked about the room,\nand noticed the cage with his white mice in it.  \"Ah!\" he cried\npiteously, \"a last laceration of my sympathies still remains.  My\ninnocent pets! my little cherished children! what am I to do with them?\nFor the present we are settled nowhere; for the present we travel\nincessantly--the less baggage we carry the better for ourselves.  My\ncockatoo, my canaries, and my little mice--who will cherish them when\ntheir good Papa is gone?\"\n\nHe walked about the room deep in thought.  He had not been at all\ntroubled about writing his confession, but he was visibly perplexed and\ndistressed about the far more important question of the disposal of his\npets.  After long consideration he suddenly sat down again at the\nwriting-table.\n\n\"An idea!\" he exclaimed.  \"I will offer my canaries and my cockatoo to\nthis vast Metropolis--my agent shall present them in my name to the\nZoological Gardens of London.  The Document that describes them shall\nbe drawn out on the spot.\"\n\nHe began to write, repeating the words as they flowed from his pen.\n\n\"Number one.  Cockatoo of transcendent plumage: attraction, of himself,\nto all visitors of taste.  Number two.  Canaries of unrivalled vivacity\nand intelligence: worthy of the garden of Eden, worthy also of the\ngarden in the Regent's Park.  Homage to British Zoology.  Offered by\nFosco.\"\n\nThe pen spluttered again, and the flourish was attached to his\nsignature.\n\n\"Count! you have not included the mice,\" said Madame Fosco\n\nHe left the table, took her hand, and placed it on his heart.\n\n\"All human resolution, Eleanor,\" he said solemnly, \"has its limits.  MY\nlimits are inscribed on that Document.  I cannot part with my white\nmice.  Bear with me, my angel, and remove them to their travelling cage\nupstairs.\"\n\n\"Admirable tenderness!\" said Madame Fosco, admiring her husband, with a\nlast viperish look in my direction.  She took up the cage carefully,\nand left the room.\n\nThe Count looked at his watch.  In spite of his resolute assumption of\ncomposure, he was getting anxious for the agent's arrival.  The candles\nhad long since been extinguished, and the sunlight of the new morning\npoured into the room.  It was not till five minutes past seven that the\ngate bell rang, and the agent made his appearance.  He was a foreigner\nwith a dark beard.\n\n\"Mr. Hartright--Monsieur Rubelle,\" said the Count, introducing us. He\ntook the agent (a foreign spy, in every line of his face, if ever there\nwas one yet) into a corner of the room, whispered some directions to\nhim, and then left us together.  \"Monsieur Rubelle,\" as soon as we were\nalone, suggested with great politeness that I should favour him with\nhis instructions.  I wrote two lines to Pesca, authorising him to\ndeliver my sealed letter \"to the bearer,\" directed the note, and handed\nit to Monsieur Rubelle.\n\nThe agent waited with me till his employer returned, equipped in\ntravelling costume.  The Count examined the address of my letter before\nhe dismissed the agent.  \"I thought so!\" he said, turning on me with a\ndark look, and altering again in his manner from that moment.\n\nHe completed his packing, and then sat consulting a travelling map,\nmaking entries in his pocket-book, and looking every now and then\nimpatiently at his watch.  Not another word, addressed to myself,\npassed his lips.  The near approach of the hour for his departure, and\nthe proof he had seen of the communication established between Pesca\nand myself, had plainly recalled his whole attention to the measures\nthat were necessary for securing his escape.\n\nA little before eight o'clock, Monsieur Rubelle came back with my\nunopened letter in his hand.  The Count looked carefully at the\nsuperscription and the seal, lit a candle, and burnt the letter. \"I\nperform my promise,\" he said, \"but this matter, Mr. Hartright, shall\nnot end here.\"\n\nThe agent had kept at the door the cab in which he had returned. He and\nthe maid-servant now busied themselves in removing the luggage.  Madame\nFosco came downstairs, thickly veiled, with the travelling cage of the\nwhite mice in her hand.  She neither spoke to me nor looked towards me.\nHer husband escorted her to the cab. \"Follow me as far as the passage,\"\nhe whispered in my ear; \"I may want to speak to you at the last moment.\"\n\nI went out to the door, the agent standing below me in the front\ngarden.  The Count came back alone, and drew me a few steps inside the\npassage.\n\n\"Remember the Third condition!\" he whispered.  \"You shall hear from me,\nMr. Hartright--I may claim from you the satisfaction of a gentleman\nsooner than you think for.\" He caught my hand before I was aware of\nhim, and wrung it hard--then turned to the door, stopped, and came back\nto me again.\n\n\"One word more,\" he said confidentially.  \"When I last saw Miss\nHalcombe, she looked thin and ill.  I am anxious about that admirable\nwoman.  Take care of her, sir! With my hand on my heart, I solemnly\nimplore you, take care of Miss Halcombe!\"\n\nThose were the last words he said to me before he squeezed his huge\nbody into the cab and drove off.\n\nThe agent and I waited at the door a few moments looking after him.\nWhile we were standing together, a second cab appeared from a turning a\nlittle way down the road.  It followed the direction previously taken\nby the Count's cab, and as it passed the house and the open garden\ngate, a person inside looked at us out of the window.  The stranger at\nthe Opera again!--the foreigner with a scar on his left cheek.\n\n\n\"You wait here with me, sir, for half an hour more!\" said Monsieur\nRubelle.\n\n\"I do.\"\n\nWe returned to the sitting-room.  I was in no humour to speak to the\nagent, or to allow him to speak to me.  I took out the papers which the\nCount had placed in my hands, and read the terrible story of the\nconspiracy told by the man who had planned and perpetrated it.\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONTINUED BY ISIDOR, OTTAVIO, BALDASSARE FOSCO\n\n(Count of the Holy Roman Empire, Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the\nBrazen Crown, Perpetual Arch-Master of the Rosicrucian Masons of\nMesopotamia; Attached (in Honorary Capacities) to Societies Musical,\nSocieties Medical, Societies Philosophical, and Societies General\nBenevolent, throughout Europe; etc.  etc.  etc.)\n\n\n\nTHE COUNT'S NARRATIVE\n\nIn the summer of eighteen hundred and fifty I arrived in England,\ncharged with a delicate political mission from abroad. Confidential\npersons were semi-officially connected with me, whose exertions I was\nauthorised to direct, Monsieur and Madame Rubelle being among the\nnumber.  Some weeks of spare time were at my disposal, before I entered\non my functions by establishing myself in the suburbs of London.\nCuriosity may stop here to ask for some explanation of those functions\non my part.  I entirely sympathise with the request.  I also regret\nthat diplomatic reserve forbids me to comply with it.\n\nI arranged to pass the preliminary period of repose, to which I have\njust referred, in the superb mansion of my late lamented friend, Sir\nPercival Glyde.  HE arrived from the Continent with his wife.  I\narrived from the Continent with MINE.  England is the land of domestic\nhappiness--how appropriately we entered it under these domestic\ncircumstances!\n\nThe bond of friendship which united Percival and myself was\nstrengthened, on this occasion, by a touching similarity in the\npecuniary position on his side and on mine.  We both wanted money.\nImmense necessity! Universal want! Is there a civilised human being who\ndoes not feel for us? How insensible must that man be! Or how rich!\n\nI enter into no sordid particulars, in discussing this part of the\nsubject.  My mind recoils from them.  With a Roman austerity, I show my\nempty purse and Percival's to the shrinking public gaze. Let us allow\nthe deplorable fact to assert itself, once for all, in that manner, and\npass on.\n\nWe were received at the mansion by the magnificent creature who is\ninscribed on my heart as \"Marian,\" who is known in the colder\natmosphere of society as \"Miss Halcombe.\"\n\nJust Heaven! with what inconceivable rapidity I learnt to adore that\nwoman.  At sixty, I worshipped her with the volcanic ardour of\neighteen.  All the gold of my rich nature was poured hopelessly at her\nfeet.  My wife--poor angel!--my wife, who adores me, got nothing but\nthe shillings and the pennies.  Such is the World, such Man, such Love.\nWhat are we (I ask) but puppets in a show-box? Oh, omnipotent Destiny,\npull our strings gently! Dance us mercifully off our miserable little\nstage!\n\nThe preceding lines, rightly understood, express an entire system of\nphilosophy.  It is mine.\n\nI resume.\n\n\nThe domestic position at the commencement of our residence at\nBlackwater Park has been drawn with amazing accuracy, with profound\nmental insight, by the hand of Marian herself.  (Pass me the\nintoxicating familiarity of mentioning this sublime creature by her\nChristian name.) Accurate knowledge of the contents of her journal--to\nwhich I obtained access by clandestine means, unspeakably precious to\nme in the remembrance--warns my eager pen from topics which this\nessentially exhaustive woman has already made her own.\n\nThe interests--interests, breathless and immense!--with which I am here\nconcerned, begin with the deplorable calamity of Marian's illness.\n\nThe situation at this period was emphatically a serious one. Large sums\nof money, due at a certain time, were wanted by Percival (I say nothing\nof the modicum equally necessary to myself), and the one source to look\nto for supplying them was the fortune of his wife, of which not one\nfarthing was at his disposal until her death.  Bad so far, and worse\nstill farther on.  My lamented friend had private troubles of his own,\ninto which the delicacy of my disinterested attachment to him forbade\nme from inquiring too curiously.  I knew nothing but that a woman,\nnamed Anne Catherick, was hidden in the neighbourhood, that she was in\ncommunication with Lady Glyde, and that the disclosure of a secret,\nwhich would be the certain ruin of Percival, might be the result.  He\nhad told me himself that he was a lost man, unless his wife was\nsilenced, and unless Anne Catherick was found.  If he was a lost man,\nwhat would become of our pecuniary interests? Courageous as I am by\nnature, I absolutely trembled at the idea!\n\nThe whole force of my intelligence was now directed to the finding of\nAnne Catherick.  Our money affairs, important as they were, admitted of\ndelay--but the necessity of discovering the woman admitted of none.  I\nonly knew her by description, as presenting an extraordinary personal\nresemblance to Lady Glyde.  The statement of this curious\nfact--intended merely to assist me in identifying the person of whom we\nwere in search--when coupled with the additional information that Anne\nCatherick had escaped from a mad-house, started the first immense\nconception in my mind, which subsequently led to such amazing results.\nThat conception involved nothing less than the complete transformation\nof two separate identities.  Lady Glyde and Anne Catherick were to\nchange names, places, and destinies, the one with the other--the\nprodigious consequences contemplated by the change being the gain of\nthirty thousand pounds, and the eternal preservation of Sir Percival's\nsecret.\n\nMy instincts (which seldom err) suggested to me, on reviewing the\ncircumstances, that our invisible Anne would, sooner or later, return\nto the boat-house at the Blackwater lake.  There I posted myself,\npreviously mentioning to Mrs. Michelson, the housekeeper, that I might\nbe found when wanted, immersed in study, in that solitary place.  It is\nmy rule never to make unnecessary mysteries, and never to set people\nsuspecting me for want of a little seasonable candour on my part.  Mrs.\nMichelson believed in me from first to last.  This ladylike person\n(widow of a Protestant priest) overflowed with faith.  Touched by such\nsuperfluity of simple confidence in a woman of her mature years, I\nopened the ample reservoirs of my nature and absorbed it all.\n\nI was rewarded for posting myself sentinel at the lake by the\nappearance--not of Anne Catherick herself, but of the person in charge\nof her.  This individual also overflowed with simple faith, which I\nabsorbed in myself, as in the case already mentioned.  I leave her to\ndescribe the circumstances (if she has not done so already) under which\nshe introduced me to the object of her maternal care.  When I first saw\nAnne Catherick she was asleep.  I was electrified by the likeness\nbetween this unhappy woman and Lady Glyde.  The details of the grand\nscheme which had suggested themselves in outline only, up to that\nperiod, occurred to me, in all their masterly combination, at the sight\nof the sleeping face. At the same time, my heart, always accessible to\ntender influences, dissolved in tears at the spectacle of suffering\nbefore me.  I instantly set myself to impart relief.  In other words, I\nprovided the necessary stimulant for strengthening Anne Catherick to\nperform the journey to London.\n\n\nThe best years of my life have been passed in the ardent study of\nmedical and chemical science.  Chemistry especially has always had\nirresistible attractions for me from the enormous, the illimitable\npower which the knowledge of it confers.  Chemists--I assert it\nemphatically--might sway, if they pleased, the destinies of humanity.\nLet me explain this before I go further.\n\nMind, they say, rules the world.  But what rules the mind? The body\n(follow me closely here) lies at the mercy of the most omnipotent of\nall potentates--the Chemist.  Give me--Fosco--chemistry; and when\nShakespeare has conceived Hamlet, and sits down to execute the\nconception--with a few grains of powder dropped into his daily food, I\nwill reduce his mind, by the action of his body, till his pen pours out\nthe most abject drivel that has ever degraded paper.  Under similar\ncircumstances, revive me the illustrious Newton.  I guarantee that when\nhe sees the apple fall he shall EAT IT, instead of discovering the\nprinciple of gravitation.  Nero's dinner shall transform Nero into the\nmildest of men before he has done digesting it, and the morning draught\nof Alexander the Great shall make Alexander run for his life at the\nfirst sight of the enemy the same afternoon.  On my sacred word of\nhonour it is lucky for Society that modern chemists are, by\nincomprehensible good fortune, the most harmless of mankind.  The mass\nare worthy fathers of families, who keep shops.  The few are\nphilosophers besotted with admiration for the sound of their own\nlecturing voices, visionaries who waste their lives on fantastic\nimpossibilities, or quacks whose ambition soars no higher than our\ncorns.  Thus Society escapes, and the illimitable power of Chemistry\nremains the slave of the most superficial and the most insignificant\nends.\n\nWhy this outburst? Why this withering eloquence?\n\nBecause my conduct has been misrepresented, because my motives have\nbeen misunderstood.  It has been assumed that I used my vast chemical\nresources against Anne Catherick, and that I would have used them if I\ncould against the magnificent Marian herself. Odious insinuations both!\nAll my interests were concerned (as will be seen presently) in the\npreservation of Anne Catherick's life. All my anxieties were\nconcentrated on Marian's rescue from the hands of the licensed imbecile\nwho attended her, and who found my advice confirmed from first to last\nby the physician from London. On two occasions only--both equally\nharmless to the individual on whom I practised--did I summon to myself\nthe assistance of chemical knowledge.  On the first of the two, after\nfollowing Marian to the inn at Blackwater (studying, behind a\nconvenient waggon which hid me from her, the poetry of motion, as\nembodied in her walk), I availed myself of the services of my\ninvaluable wife, to copy one and to intercept the other of two letters\nwhich my adored enemy had entrusted to a discarded maid.  In this case,\nthe letters being in the bosom of the girl's dress, Madame Fosco could\nonly open them, read them, perform her instructions, seal them, and put\nthem back again by scientific assistance--which assistance I rendered\nin a half-ounce bottle.  The second occasion, when the same means were\nemployed, was the occasion (to which I shall soon refer) of Lady\nGlyde's arrival in London.  Never at any other time was I indebted to\nmy Art as distinguished from myself.  To all other emergencies and\ncomplications my natural capacity for grappling, single-handed, with\ncircumstances, was invariably equal.  I affirm the all-pervading\nintelligence of that capacity. At the expense of the Chemist I\nvindicate the Man.\n\nRespect this outburst of generous indignation.  It has inexpressibly\nrelieved me.  En route! Let us proceed.\n\n\nHaving suggested to Mrs. Clement (or Clements, I am not sure which)\nthat the best method of keeping Anne out of Percival's reach was to\nremove her to London--having found that my proposal was eagerly\nreceived, and having appointed a day to meet the travellers at the\nstation and to see them leave it, I was at liberty to return to the\nhouse and to confront the difficulties which still remained to be met.\n\nMy first proceeding was to avail myself of the sublime devotion of my\nwife.  I had arranged with Mrs. Clements that she should communicate\nher London address, in Anne's interests, to Lady Glyde.  But this was\nnot enough.  Designing persons in my absence might shake the simple\nconfidence of Mrs. Clements, and she might not write after all.  Who\ncould I find capable of travelling to London by the train she travelled\nby, and of privately seeing her home? I asked myself this question.\nThe conjugal part of me immediately answered--Madame Fosco.\n\nAfter deciding on my wife's mission to London, I arranged that the\njourney should serve a double purpose.  A nurse for the suffering\nMarian, equally devoted to the patient and to myself, was a necessity\nof my position.  One of the most eminently confidential and capable\nwomen in existence was by good fortune at my disposal. I refer to that\nrespectable matron, Madame Rubelle, to whom I addressed a letter, at\nher residence in London, by the hands of my wife.\n\nOn the appointed day Mrs. Clements and Anne Catherick met me at the\nstation.  I politely saw them off, I politely saw Madame Fosco off by\nthe same train.  The last thing at night my wife returned to\nBlackwater, having followed her instructions with the most\nunimpeachable accuracy.  She was accompanied by Madame Rubelle, and she\nbrought me the London address of Mrs. Clements.  After-events proved\nthis last precaution to have been unnecessary.  Mrs. Clements\npunctually informed Lady Glyde of her place of abode. With a wary eye\non future emergencies, I kept the letter.\n\nThe same day I had a brief interview with the doctor, at which I\nprotested, in the sacred interests of humanity, against his treatment\nof Marian's case.  He was insolent, as all ignorant people are.  I\nshowed no resentment, I deferred quarrelling with him till it was\nnecessary to quarrel to some purpose.  My next proceeding was to leave\nBlackwater myself.  I had my London residence to take in anticipation\nof coming events.  I had also a little business of the domestic sort to\ntransact with Mr. Frederick Fairlie.  I found the house I wanted in St.\nJohn's Wood. I found Mr. Fairlie at Limmeridge, Cumberland.\n\nMy own private familiarity with the nature of Marian's correspondence\nhad previously informed me that she had written to Mr. Fairlie,\nproposing, as a relief to Lady Glyde's matrimonial embarrassments, to\ntake her on a visit to her uncle in Cumberland. This letter I had\nwisely allowed to reach its destination, feeling at the time that it\ncould do no harm, and might do good. I now presented myself before Mr.\nFairlie to support Marian's own proposal--with certain modifications\nwhich, happily for the success of my plans, were rendered really\ninevitable by her illness.  It was necessary that Lady Glyde should\nleave Blackwater alone, by her uncle's invitation, and that she should\nrest a night on the journey at her aunt's house (the house I had in St.\nJohn's Wood) by her uncle's express advice.  To achieve these results,\nand to secure a note of invitation which could be shown to Lady Glyde,\nwere the objects of my visit to Mr. Fairlie.  When I have mentioned\nthat this gentleman was equally feeble in mind and body, and that I let\nloose the whole force of my character on him, I have said enough.  I\ncame, saw, and conquered Fairlie.\n\nOn my return to Blackwater Park (with the letter of invitation) I found\nthat the doctor's imbecile treatment of Marian's case had led to the\nmost alarming results.  The fever had turned to typhus. Lady Glyde, on\nthe day of my return, tried to force herself into the room to nurse her\nsister.  She and I had no affinities of sympathy--she had committed the\nunpardonable outrage on my sensibilities of calling me a spy--she was a\nstumbling-block in my way and in Percival's--but, for all that, my\nmagnanimity forbade me to put her in danger of infection with my own\nhand.  At the same time I offered no hindrance to her putting herself\nin danger. If she had succeeded in doing so, the intricate knot which I\nwas slowly and patiently operating on might perhaps have been cut by\ncircumstances.  As it was, the doctor interfered and she was kept out\nof the room.\n\nI had myself previously recommended sending for advice to London. This\ncourse had been now taken.  The physician, on his arrival, confirmed my\nview of the case.  The crisis was serious.  But we had hope of our\ncharming patient on the fifth day from the appearance of the typhus.  I\nwas only once absent from Blackwater at this time--when I went to\nLondon by the morning train to make the final arrangements at my house\nin St. John's Wood, to assure myself by private inquiry that Mrs.\nClements had not moved, and to settle one or two little preliminary\nmatters with the husband of Madame Rubelle.  I returned at night.  Five\ndays afterwards the physician pronounced our interesting Marian to be\nout of all danger, and to be in need of nothing but careful nursing.\nThis was the time I had waited for.  Now that medical attendance was no\nlonger indispensable, I played the first move in the game by asserting\nmyself against the doctor.  He was one among many witnesses in my way\nwhom it was necessary to remove.  A lively altercation between us (in\nwhich Percival, previously instructed by me, refused to interfere)\nserved the purpose in view.  I descended on the miserable man in an\nirresistible avalanche of indignation, and swept him from the house.\n\nThe servants were the next encumbrances to get rid of.  Again I\ninstructed Percival (whose moral courage required perpetual\nstimulants), and Mrs. Michelson was amazed, one day, by hearing from\nher master that the establishment was to be broken up.  We cleared the\nhouse of all the servants but one, who was kept for domestic purposes,\nand whose lumpish stupidity we could trust to make no embarrassing\ndiscoveries.  When they were gone, nothing remained but to relieve\nourselves of Mrs. Michelson--a result which was easily achieved by\nsending this amiable lady to find lodgings for her mistress at the\nsea-side.\n\nThe circumstances were now exactly what they were required to be. Lady\nGlyde was confined to her room by nervous illness, and the lumpish\nhousemaid (I forget her name) was shut up there at night in attendance\non her mistress.  Marian, though fast recovering, still kept her bed,\nwith Mrs. Rubelle for nurse.  No other living creatures but my wife,\nmyself, and Percival were in the house. With all the chances thus in\nour favour I confronted the next emergency, and played the second move\nin the game.\n\nThe object of the second move was to induce Lady Glyde to leave\nBlackwater unaccompanied by her sister.  Unless we could persuade her\nthat Marian had gone on to Cumberland first, there was no chance of\nremoving her, of her own free will, from the house.  To produce this\nnecessary operation in her mind, we concealed our interesting invalid\nin one of the uninhabited bedrooms at Blackwater.  At the dead of night\nMadame Fosco, Madame Rubelle, and myself (Percival not being cool\nenough to be trusted) accomplished the concealment.  The scene was\npicturesque, mysterious, dramatic in the highest degree.  By my\ndirections the bed had been made, in the morning, on a strong movable\nframework of wood.  We had only to lift the framework gently at the\nhead and foot, and to transport our patient where we pleased, without\ndisturbing herself or her bed.  No chemical assistance was needed or\nused in this case.  Our interesting Marian lay in the deep repose of\nconvalescence.  We placed the candles and opened the doors beforehand.\nI, in right of my great personal strength, took the head of the\nframework--my wife and Madame Rubelle took the foot.  I bore my share\nof that inestimably precious burden with a manly tenderness, with a\nfatherly care.  Where is the modern Rembrandt who could depict our\nmidnight procession? Alas for the Arts! alas for this most pictorial of\nsubjects! The modern Rembrandt is nowhere to be found.\n\nThe next morning my wife and I started for London, leaving Marian\nsecluded, in the uninhabited middle of the house, under care of Madame\nRubelle, who kindly consented to imprison herself with her patient for\ntwo or three days.  Before taking our departure I gave Percival Mr.\nFairlie's letter of invitation to his niece (instructing her to sleep\non the journey to Cumberland at her aunt's house), with directions to\nshow it to Lady Glyde on hearing from me.  I also obtained from him the\naddress of the Asylum in which Anne Catherick had been confined, and a\nletter to the proprietor, announcing to that gentleman the return of\nhis runaway patient to medical care.\n\nI had arranged, at my last visit to the metropolis, to have our modest\ndomestic establishment ready to receive us when we arrived in London by\nthe early train.  In consequence of this wise precaution, we were\nenabled that same day to play the third move in the game--the getting\npossession of Anne Catherick.\n\nDates are of importance here.  I combine in myself the opposite\ncharacteristics of a Man of Sentiment and a Man of Business.  I have\nall the dates at my fingers' ends.\n\nOn Wednesday, the 24th of July 1850, I sent my wife in a cab to clear\nMrs. Clements out of the way, in the first place.  A supposed message\nfrom Lady Glyde in London was sufficient to obtain this result.  Mrs.\nClements was taken away in the cab, and was left in the cab, while my\nwife (on pretence of purchasing something at a shop) gave her the slip,\nand returned to receive her expected visitor at our house in St. John's\nWood.  It is hardly necessary to add that the visitor had been\ndescribed to the servants as \"Lady Glyde.\"\n\nIn the meanwhile I had followed in another cab, with a note for Anne\nCatherick, merely mentioning that Lady Glyde intended to keep Mrs.\nClements to spend the day with her, and that she was to join them under\ncare of the good gentleman waiting outside, who had already saved her\nfrom discovery in Hampshire by Sir Percival. The \"good gentleman\" sent\nin this note by a street boy, and paused for results a door or two\nfarther on.  At the moment when Anne appeared at the house door and\nclosed it this excellent man had the cab door open ready for her,\nabsorbed her into the vehicle, and drove off.\n\n(Pass me, here, one exclamation in parenthesis.  How interesting this\nis!)\n\nOn the way to Forest Road my companion showed no fear.  I can be\npaternal--no man more so--when I please, and I was intensely paternal\non this occasion.  What titles I had to her confidence! I had\ncompounded the medicine which had done her good--I had warned her of\nher danger from Sir Percival.  Perhaps I trusted too implicitly to\nthese titles--perhaps I underrated the keenness of the lower instincts\nin persons of weak intellect--it is certain that I neglected to prepare\nher sufficiently for a disappointment on entering my house.  When I\ntook her into the drawing-room--when she saw no one present but Madame\nFosco, who was a stranger to her--she exhibited the most violent\nagitation; if she had scented danger in the air, as a dog scents the\npresence of some creature unseen, her alarm could not have displayed\nitself more suddenly and more causelessly.  I interposed in vain.  The\nfear from which she was suffering I might have soothed, but the serious\nheart-disease, under which she laboured, was beyond the reach of all\nmoral palliatives.  To my unspeakable horror she was seized with\nconvulsions--a shock to the system, in her condition, which might have\nlaid her dead at any moment at our feet.\n\nThe nearest doctor was sent for, and was told that \"Lady Glyde\"\nrequired his immediate services.  To my infinite relief, he was a\ncapable man.  I represented my visitor to him as a person of weak\nintellect, and subject to delusions, and I arranged that no nurse but\nmy wife should watch in the sick-room.  The unhappy woman was too ill,\nhowever, to cause any anxiety about what she might say. The one dread\nwhich now oppressed me was the dread that the false Lady Glyde might\ndie before the true Lady Glyde arrived in London.\n\nI had written a note in the morning to Madame Rubelle, telling her to\njoin me at her husband's house on the evening of Friday the 26th, with\nanother note to Percival, warning him to show his wife her uncle's\nletter of invitation, to assert that Marian had gone on before her, and\nto despatch her to town by the midday train, on the 26th, also.  On\nreflection I had felt the necessity, in Anne Catherick's state of\nhealth, of precipitating events, and of having Lady Glyde at my\ndisposal earlier than I had originally contemplated.  What fresh\ndirections, in the terrible uncertainty of my position, could I now\nissue? I could do nothing but trust to chance and the doctor.  My\nemotions expressed themselves in pathetic apostrophes, which I was just\nself-possessed enough to couple, in the hearing of other people, with\nthe name of \"Lady Glyde.\" In all other respects Fosco, on that\nmemorable day, was Fosco shrouded in total eclipse.\n\nShe passed a bad night, she awoke worn out, but later in the day she\nrevived amazingly.  My elastic spirits revived with her.  I could\nreceive no answers from Percival and Madame Rubelle till the morning of\nthe next day, the 26th.  In anticipation of their following my\ndirections, which, accident apart, I knew they would do, I went to\nsecure a fly to fetch Lady Glyde from the railway, directing it to be\nat my house on the 26th, at two o'clock.  After seeing the order\nentered in the book, I went on to arrange matters with Monsieur\nRubelle.  I also procured the services of two gentlemen who could\nfurnish me with the necessary certificates of lunacy.  One of them I\nknew personally--the other was known to Monsieur Rubelle.  Both were\nmen whose vigorous minds soared superior to narrow scruples--both were\nlabouring under temporary embarrassments--both believed in ME.\n\nIt was past five o'clock in the afternoon before I returned from the\nperformance of these duties.  When I got back Anne Catherick was dead.\nDead on the 25th, and Lady Glyde was not to arrive in London till the\n26th!\n\nI was stunned.  Meditate on that.  Fosco stunned!\n\nIt was too late to retrace our steps.  Before my return the doctor had\nofficiously undertaken to save me all trouble by registering the death,\non the date when it happened, with his own hand.  My grand scheme,\nunassailable hitherto, had its weak place now--no efforts on my part\ncould alter the fatal event of the 25th.  I turned manfully to the\nfuture.  Percival's interests and mine being still at stake, nothing\nwas left but to play the game through to the end.  I recalled my\nimpenetrable calm--and played it.\n\nOn the morning of the 26th Percival's letter reached me, announcing his\nwife's arrival by the midday train.  Madame Rubelle also wrote to say\nshe would follow in the evening.  I started in the fly, leaving the\nfalse Lady Glyde dead in the house, to receive the true Lady Glyde on\nher arrival by the railway at three o'clock.  Hidden under the seat of\nthe carriage, I carried with me all the clothes Anne Catherick had worn\non coming into my house--they were destined to assist the resurrection\nof the woman who was dead in the person of the woman who was living.\nWhat a situation! I suggest it to the rising romance writers of\nEngland.  I offer it, as totally new, to the worn-out dramatists of\nFrance.\n\nLady Glyde was at the station.  There was great crowding and confusion,\nand more delay than I liked (in case any of her friends had happened to\nbe on the spot), in reclaiming her luggage.  Her first questions, as we\ndrove off, implored me to tell her news of her sister.  I invented news\nof the most pacifying kind, assuring her that she was about to see her\nsister at my house.  My house, on this occasion only, was in the\nneighbourhood of Leicester Square, and was in the occupation of\nMonsieur Rubelle, who received us in the hall.\n\nI took my visitor upstairs into a back room, the two medical gentlemen\nbeing there in waiting on the floor beneath to see the patient, and to\ngive me their certificates.  After quieting Lady Glyde by the necessary\nassurances about her sister, I introduced my friends separately to her\npresence.  They performed the formalities of the occasion briefly,\nintelligently, conscientiously.  I entered the room again as soon as\nthey had left it, and at once precipitated events by a reference of the\nalarming kind to \"Miss Halcombe's\" state of health.\n\nResults followed as I had anticipated.  Lady Glyde became frightened,\nand turned faint.  For the second time, and the last, I called Science\nto my assistance.  A medicated glass of water and a medicated bottle of\nsmelling-salts relieved her of all further embarrassment and alarm.\nAdditional applications later in the evening procured her the\ninestimable blessing of a good night's rest.  Madame Rubelle arrived in\ntime to preside at Lady Glyde's toilet.  Her own clothes were taken\naway from her at night, and Anne Catherick's were put on her in the\nmorning, with the strictest regard to propriety, by the matronly hands\nof the good Rubelle.  Throughout the day I kept our patient in a state\nof partially-suspended consciousness, until the dexterous assistance of\nmy medical friends enabled me to procure the necessary order rather\nearlier than I had ventured to hope.  That evening (the evening of the\n27th) Madame Rubelle and I took our revived \"Anne Catherick\" to the\nAsylum.  She was received with great surprise, but without suspicion,\nthanks to the order and certificates, to Percival's letter, to the\nlikeness, to the clothes, and to the patient's own confused mental\ncondition at the time.  I returned at once to assist Madame Fosco in\nthe preparations for the burial of the False \"Lady Glyde,\" having the\nclothes and luggage of the true \"Lady Glyde\" in my possession.  They\nwere afterwards sent to Cumberland by the conveyance which was used for\nthe funeral.  I attended the funeral, with becoming dignity, attired in\nthe deepest mourning.\n\n\nMy narrative of these remarkable events, written under equally\nremarkable circumstances, closes here.  The minor precautions which I\nobserved in communicating with Limmeridge House are already known, so\nis the magnificent success of my enterprise, so are the solid pecuniary\nresults which followed it.  I have to assert, with the whole force of\nmy conviction, that the one weak place in my scheme would never have\nbeen found out if the one weak place in my heart had not been\ndiscovered first.  Nothing but my fatal admiration for Marian\nrestrained me from stepping in to my own rescue when she effected her\nsister's escape.  I ran the risk, and trusted in the complete\ndestruction of Lady Glyde's identity. If either Marian or Mr. Hartright\nattempted to assert that identity, they would publicly expose\nthemselves to the imputation of sustaining a rank deception, they would\nbe distrusted and discredited accordingly, and they would therefore be\npowerless to place my interests or Percival's secret in jeopardy.  I\ncommitted one error in trusting myself to such a blindfold calculation\nof chances as this.  I committed another when Percival had paid the\npenalty of his own obstinacy and violence, by granting Lady Glyde a\nsecond reprieve from the mad-house, and allowing Mr. Hartright a second\nchance of escaping me.  In brief, Fosco, at this serious crisis, was\nuntrue to himself.  Deplorable and uncharacteristic fault! Behold the\ncause, in my heart--behold, in the image of Marian Halcombe, the first\nand last weakness of Fosco's life!\n\nAt the ripe age of sixty, I make this unparalleled confession. Youths!\nI invoke your sympathy.  Maidens! I claim your tears.\n\nA word more, and the attention of the reader (concentrated breathlessly\non myself) shall be released.\n\nMy own mental insight informs me that three inevitable questions will\nbe asked here by persons of inquiring minds.  They shall be\nstated--they shall be answered.\n\nFirst question.  What is the secret of Madame Fosco's unhesitating\ndevotion of herself to the fulfilment of my boldest wishes, to the\nfurtherance of my deepest plans? I might answer this by simply\nreferring to my own character, and by asking, in my turn, Where, in the\nhistory of the world, has a man of my order ever been found without a\nwoman in the background self-immolated on the altar of his life?  But I\nremember that I am writing in England, I remember that I was married in\nEngland, and I ask if a woman's marriage obligations in this country\nprovide for her private opinion of her husband's principles? No! They\ncharge her unreservedly to love, honour, and obey him.  That is exactly\nwhat my wife has done.  I stand here on a supreme moral elevation, and\nI loftily assert her accurate performance of her conjugal duties.\nSilence, Calumny! Your sympathy, Wives of England, for Madame Fosco!\n\nSecond question.  If Anne Catherick had not died when she did, what\nshould I have done? I should, in that case, have assisted worn-out\nNature in finding permanent repose.  I should have opened the doors of\nthe Prison of Life, and have extended to the captive (incurably\nafflicted in mind and body both) a happy release.\n\nThird question.  On a calm revision of all the circumstances--Is my\nconduct worthy of any serious blame? Most emphatically, No! Have I not\ncarefully avoided exposing myself to the odium of committing\nunnecessary crime? With my vast resources in chemistry, I might have\ntaken Lady Glyde's life.  At immense personal sacrifice I followed the\ndictates of my own ingenuity, my own humanity, my own caution, and took\nher identity instead.  Judge me by what I might have done.  How\ncomparatively innocent! how indirectly virtuous I appear in what I\nreally did!\n\nI announced on beginning it that this narrative would be a remarkable\ndocument.  It has entirely answered my expectations. Receive these\nfervid lines--my last legacy to the country I leave for ever.  They are\nworthy of the occasion, and worthy of\n\n                                      FOSCO.\n\n\n\nTHE STORY CONCLUDED BY WALTER HARTRIGHT\n\n\nI\n\nWhen I closed the last leaf of the Count's manuscript the half-hour\nduring which I had engaged to remain at Forest Road had expired.\nMonsieur Rubelle looked at his watch and bowed.  I rose immediately,\nand left the agent in possession of the empty house. I never saw him\nagain--I never heard more of him or of his wife. Out of the dark byways\nof villainy and deceit they had crawled across our path--into the same\nbyways they crawled back secretly and were lost.\n\nIn a quarter of an hour after leaving Forest Road I was at home again.\n\nBut few words sufficed to tell Laura and Marian how my desperate\nventure had ended, and what the next event in our lives was likely to\nbe.  I left all details to be described later in the day, and hastened\nback to St. John's Wood, to see the person of whom Count Fosco had\nordered the fly, when he went to meet Laura at the station.\n\nThe address in my possession led me to some \"livery stables,\" about a\nquarter of a mile distant from Forest Road.  The proprietor proved to\nbe a civil and respectable man.  When I explained that an important\nfamily matter obliged me to ask him to refer to his books for the\npurpose of ascertaining a date with which the record of his business\ntransactions might supply me, he offered no objection to granting my\nrequest.  The book was produced, and there, under the date of \"July\n26th, 1850,\" the order was entered in these words--\n\n\"Brougham to Count Fosco, 5 Forest Road.  Two o'clock. (John Owen).\"\n\nI found on inquiry that the name of \"John Owen,\" attached to the entry,\nreferred to the man who had been employed to drive the fly. He was then\nat work in the stable-yard, and was sent for to see me at my request.\n\n\"Do you remember driving a gentleman, in the month of July last, from\nNumber Five Forest Road to the Waterloo Bridge station?\" I asked.\n\n\"Well, sir,\" said the man, \"I can't exactly say I do.\"\n\n\"Perhaps you remember the gentleman himself? Can you call to mind\ndriving a foreigner last summer--a tall gentleman and remarkably fat?\"\nThe man's face brightened directly.\n\n\"I remember him, sir! The fattest gentleman as ever I see, and the\nheaviest customer as ever I drove.  Yes, yes--I call him to mind, sir!\nWe DID go to the station, and it WAS from Forest Road.  There was a\nparrot, or summat like it, screeching in the window.  The gentleman was\nin a mortal hurry about the lady's luggage, and he gave me a handsome\npresent for looking sharp and getting the boxes.\"\n\nGetting the boxes! I recollected immediately that Laura's own account\nof herself on her arrival in London described her luggage as being\ncollected for her by some person whom Count Fosco brought with him to\nthe station.  This was the man.\n\n\"Did you see the lady?\" I asked.  \"What did she look like? Was she\nyoung or old?\"\n\n\"Well, sir, what with the hurry and the crowd of people pushing about,\nI can't rightly say what the lady looked like.  I can't call nothing to\nmind about her that I know of excepting her name.\"\n\n\"You remember her name?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.  Her name was Lady Glyde.\"\n\n\"How do you come to remember that, when you have forgotten what she\nlooked like?\"\n\nThe man smiled, and shifted his feet in some little embarrassment.\n\n\"Why, to tell you the truth, sir,\" he said, \"I hadn't been long married\nat that time, and my wife's name, before she changed it for mine, was\nthe same as the lady's--meaning the name of Glyde, sir.  The lady\nmentioned it herself.  'Is your name on your boxes, ma'am?' says I.\n'Yes,' says she, 'my name is on my luggage--it is Lady Glyde.' 'Come!'\nI says to myself, 'I've a bad head for gentlefolks' names in\ngeneral--but THIS one comes like an old friend, at any rate.' I can't\nsay nothing about the time, sir, it might be nigh on a year ago, or it\nmightn't.  But I can swear to the stout gentleman, and swear to the\nlady's name.\"\n\nThere was no need that he should remember the time--the date was\npositively established by his master's order-book.  I felt at once that\nthe means were now in my power of striking down the whole conspiracy at\na blow with the irresistible weapon of plain fact. Without a moment's\nhesitation, I took the proprietor of the livery stables aside and told\nhim what the real importance was of the evidence of his order-book and\nthe evidence of his driver.  An arrangement to compensate him for the\ntemporary loss of the man's services was easily made, and a copy of the\nentry in the book was taken by myself, and certified as true by the\nmaster's own signature.  I left the livery stables, having settled that\nJohn Owen was to hold himself at my disposal for the next three days,\nor for a longer period if necessity required it.\n\nI now had in my possession all the papers that I wanted--the district\nregistrar's own copy of the certificate of death, and Sir Percival's\ndated letter to the Count, being safe in my pocket-book.\n\nWith this written evidence about me, and with the coachman's answers\nfresh in my memory, I next turned my steps, for the first time since\nthe beginning of all my inquiries, in the direction of Mr. Kyrle's\noffice.  One of my objects in paying him this second visit was,\nnecessarily, to tell him what I had done.  The other was to warn him of\nmy resolution to take my wife to Limmeridge the next morning, and to\nhave her publicly received and recognised in her uncle's house.  I left\nit to Mr. Kyrle to decide under these circumstances, and in Mr.\nGilmore's absence, whether he was or was not bound, as the family\nsolicitor, to be present on that occasion in the family interests.\n\nI will say nothing of Mr. Kyrle's amazement, or of the terms in which\nhe expressed his opinion of my conduct from the first stage of the\ninvestigation to the last.  It is only necessary to mention that he at\nonce decided on accompanying us to Cumberland.\n\nWe started the next morning by the early train.  Laura, Marian, Mr.\nKyrle, and myself in one carriage, and John Owen, with a clerk from Mr.\nKyrle's office, occupying places in another.  On reaching the\nLimmeridge station we went first to the farmhouse at Todd's Corner.  It\nwas my firm determination that Laura should not enter her uncle's house\ntill she appeared there publicly recognised as his niece.  I left\nMarian to settle the question of accommodation with Mrs. Todd, as soon\nas the good woman had recovered from the bewilderment of hearing what\nour errand was in Cumberland, and I arranged with her husband that John\nOwen was to be committed to the ready hospitality of the farm-servants.\nThese preliminaries completed, Mr. Kyrle and I set forth together for\nLimmeridge House.\n\nI cannot write at any length of our interview with Mr. Fairlie, for I\ncannot recall it to mind without feelings of impatience and contempt,\nwhich make the scene, even in remembrance only, utterly repulsive to\nme.  I prefer to record simply that I carried my point.  Mr. Fairlie\nattempted to treat us on his customary plan. We passed without notice\nhis polite insolence at the outset of the interview.  We heard without\nsympathy the protestations with which he tried next to persuade us that\nthe disclosure of the conspiracy had overwhelmed him.  He absolutely\nwhined and whimpered at last like a fretful child.  \"How was he to know\nthat his niece was alive when he was told that she was dead? He would\nwelcome dear Laura with pleasure, if we would only allow him time to\nrecover. Did we think he looked as if he wanted hurrying into his\ngrave? No.  Then, why hurry him?\" He reiterated these remonstrances at\nevery available opportunity, until I checked them once for all, by\nplacing him firmly between two inevitable alternatives.  I gave him his\nchoice between doing his niece justice on my terms, or facing the\nconsequence of a public assertion of her existence in a court of law.\nMr. Kyrle, to whom he turned for help, told him plainly that he must\ndecide the question then and there. Characteristically choosing the\nalternative which promised soonest to release him from all personal\nanxiety, he announced with a sudden outburst of energy, that he was not\nstrong enough to bear any more bullying, and that we might do as we\npleased.\n\nMr. Kyrle and I at once went downstairs, and agreed upon a form of\nletter which was to be sent round to the tenants who had attended the\nfalse funeral, summoning them, in Mr. Fairlie's name, to assemble in\nLimmeridge House on the next day but one.  An order referring to the\nsame date was also written, directing a statuary in Carlisle to send a\nman to Limmeridge churchyard for the purpose of erasing an\ninscription--Mr. Kyrle, who had arranged to sleep in the house,\nundertaking that Mr. Fairlie should hear these letters read to him, and\nshould sign them with his own hand.\n\nI occupied the interval day at the farm in writing a plain narrative of\nthe conspiracy, and in adding to it a statement of the practical\ncontradiction which facts offered to the assertion of Laura's death.\nThis I submitted to Mr. Kyrle before I read it the next day to the\nassembled tenants.  We also arranged the form in which the evidence\nshould be presented at the close of the reading.  After these matters\nwere settled, Mr. Kyrle endeavoured to turn the conversation next to\nLaura's affairs.  Knowing, and desiring to know nothing of those\naffairs, and doubting whether he would approve, as a man of business,\nof my conduct in relation to my wife's life-interest in the legacy left\nto Madame Fosco, I begged Mr. Kyrle to excuse me if I abstained from\ndiscussing the subject.  It was connected, as I could truly tell him,\nwith those sorrows and troubles of the past which we never referred to\namong ourselves, and which we instinctively shrank from discussing with\nothers.\n\nMy last labour, as the evening approached, was to obtain \"The Narrative\nof the Tombstone,\" by taking a copy of the false inscription on the\ngrave before it was erased.\n\n\nThe day came--the day when Laura once more entered the familiar\nbreakfast-room at Limmeridge House.  All the persons assembled rose\nfrom their seats as Marian and I led her in.  A perceptible shock of\nsurprise, an audible murmur of interest ran through them, at the sight\nof her face.  Mr. Fairlie was present (by my express stipulation), with\nMr. Kyrle by his side.  His valet stood behind him with a\nsmelling-bottle ready in one hand, and a white handkerchief, saturated\nwith eau-de-Cologne, in the other.\n\nI opened the proceedings by publicly appealing to Mr. Fairlie to say\nwhether I appeared there with his authority and under his express\nsanction.  He extended an arm, on either side, to Mr. Kyrle and to his\nvalet--was by them assisted to stand on his legs, and then expressed\nhimself in these terms: \"Allow me to present Mr. Hartright.  I am as\ngreat an invalid as ever, and he is so very obliging as to speak for\nme.  The subject is dreadfully embarrassing.  Please hear him, and\ndon't make a noise!\"  With those words he slowly sank back again into\nthe chair, and took refuge in his scented pocket-handkerchief.\n\nThe disclosure of the conspiracy followed, after I had offered my\npreliminary explanation, first of all, in the fewest and the plainest\nwords.  I was there present (I informed my hearers) to declare, first,\nthat my wife, then sitting by me, was the daughter of the late Mr.\nPhilip Fairlie; secondly, to prove by positive facts, that the funeral\nwhich they had attended in Limmeridge churchyard was the funeral of\nanother woman; thirdly, to give them a plain account of how it had all\nhappened. Without further preface, I at once read the narrative of the\nconspiracy, describing it in clear outline, and dwelling only upon the\npecuniary motive for it, in order to avoid complicating my statement by\nunnecessary reference to Sir Percival's secret.  This done, I reminded\nmy audience of the date on the inscription in the churchyard (the\n25th), and confirmed its correctness by producing the certificate of\ndeath.  I then read them Sir Percival's letter of the 25th, announcing\nhis wife's intended journey from Hampshire to London on the 26th.  I\nnext showed that she had taken that journey, by the personal testimony\nof the driver of the fly, and I proved that she had performed it on the\nappointed day, by the order-book at the livery stables.  Marian then\nadded her own statement of the meeting between Laura and herself at the\nmad-house, and of her sister's escape.  After which I closed the\nproceedings by informing the persons present of Sir Percival's death\nand of my marriage.\n\nMr. Kyrle rose when I resumed my seat, and declared, as the legal\nadviser of the family, that my case was proved by the plainest evidence\nhe had ever heard in his life.  As he spoke those words, I put my arm\nround Laura, and raised her so that she was plainly visible to every\none in the room.  \"Are you all of the same opinion?\" I asked, advancing\ntowards them a few steps, and pointing to my wife.\n\nThe effect of the question was electrical.  Far down at the lower end\nof the room one of the oldest tenants on the estate started to his\nfeet, and led the rest with him in an instant.  I see the man now, with\nhis honest brown face and his iron-grey hair, mounted on the\nwindow-seat, waving his heavy riding-whip over his head, and leading\nthe cheers.  \"There she is, alive and hearty--God bless her! Gi' it\ntongue, lads! Gi' it tongue!\" The shout that answered him, reiterated\nagain and again, was the sweetest music I ever heard.  The labourers in\nthe village and the boys from the school, assembled on the lawn, caught\nup the cheering and echoed it back on us.  The farmers' wives clustered\nround Laura, and struggled which should be first to shake hands with\nher, and to implore her, with the tears pouring over their own cheeks,\nto bear up bravely and not to cry.  She was so completely overwhelmed,\nthat I was obliged to take her from them, and carry her to the door.\nThere I gave her into Marian's care--Marian, who had never failed us\nyet, whose courageous self-control did not fail us now.  Left by myself\nat the door, I invited all the persons present (after thanking them in\nLaura's name and mine) to follow me to the churchyard, and see the\nfalse inscription struck off the tombstone with their own eyes.\n\nThey all left the house, and all joined the throng of villagers\ncollected round the grave, where the statuary's man was waiting for us.\nIn a breathless silence, the first sharp stroke of the steel sounded on\nthe marble.  Not a voice was heard--not a soul moved, till those three\nwords, \"Laura, Lady Glyde,\" had vanished from sight.  Then there was a\ngreat heave of relief among the crowd, as if they felt that the last\nfetters of the conspiracy had been struck off Laura herself, and the\nassembly slowly withdrew. It was late in the day before the whole\ninscription was erased. One line only was afterwards engraved in its\nplace: \"Anne Catherick, July 25th, 1850.\"\n\nI returned to Limmeridge House early enough in the evening to take\nleave of Mr. Kyrle.  He and his clerk, and the driver of the fly, went\nback to London by the night train.  On their departure an insolent\nmessage was delivered to me from Mr. Fairlie--who had been carried from\nthe room in a shattered condition, when the first outbreak of cheering\nanswered my appeal to the tenantry. The message conveyed to us \"Mr.\nFairlie's best congratulations,\" and requested to know whether \"we\ncontemplated stopping in the house.\" I sent back word that the only\nobject for which we had entered his doors was accomplished--that I\ncontemplated stopping in no man's house but my own--and that Mr.\nFairlie need not entertain the slightest apprehension of ever seeing us\nor hearing from us again.  We went back to our friends at the farm to\nrest that night, and the next morning--escorted to the station, with\nthe heartiest enthusiasm and good will, by the whole village and by all\nthe farmers in the neighbourhood--we returned to London.\n\nAs our view of the Cumberland hills faded in the distance, I thought of\nthe first disheartening circumstances under which the long struggle\nthat was now past and over had been pursued.  It was strange to look\nback and to see, now, that the poverty which had denied us all hope of\nassistance had been the indirect means of our success, by forcing me to\nact for myself.  If we had been rich enough to find legal help, what\nwould have been the result? The gain (on Mr. Kyrle's own showing) would\nhave been more than doubtful--the loss, judging by the plain test of\nevents as they had really happened, certain.  The law would never have\nobtained me my interview with Mrs. Catherick.  The law would never have\nmade Pesca the means of forcing a confession from the Count.\n\n\n\nII\n\nTwo more events remain to be added to the chain before it reaches\nfairly from the outset of the story to the close.\n\nWhile our new sense of freedom from the long oppression of the past was\nstill strange to us, I was sent for by the friend who had given me my\nfirst employment in wood engraving, to receive from him a fresh\ntestimony of his regard for my welfare.  He had been commissioned by\nhis employers to go to Paris, and to examine for them a fresh discovery\nin the practical application of his Art, the merits of which they were\nanxious to ascertain.  His own engagements had not allowed him leisure\ntime to undertake the errand, and he had most kindly suggested that it\nshould be transferred to me.  I could have no hesitation in thankfully\naccepting the offer, for if I acquitted myself of my commission as I\nhoped I should, the result would be a permanent engagement on the\nillustrated newspaper, to which I was now only occasionally attached.\n\nI received my instructions and packed up for the journey the next day.\nOn leaving Laura once more (under what changed circumstances!) in her\nsister's care, a serious consideration recurred to me, which had more\nthan once crossed my wife's mind, as well as my own, already--I mean\nthe consideration of Marian's future.  Had we any right to let our\nselfish affection accept the devotion of all that generous life? Was it\nnot our duty, our best expression of gratitude, to forget ourselves,\nand to think only of HER?  I tried to say this when we were alone for a\nmoment, before I went away.  She took my hand, and silenced me at the\nfirst words.\n\n\"After all that we three have suffered together,\" she said \"there can\nbe no parting between us till the last parting of all.  My heart and my\nhappiness, Walter, are with Laura and you.  Wait a little till there\nare children's voices at your fireside.  I will teach them to speak for\nme in THEIR language, and the first lesson they say to their father and\nmother shall be--We can't spare our aunt!\"\n\nMy journey to Paris was not undertaken alone.  At the eleventh hour\nPesca decided that he would accompany me.  He had not recovered his\ncustomary cheerfulness since the night at the Opera, and he determined\nto try what a week's holiday would do to raise his spirits.\n\nI performed the errand entrusted to me, and drew out the necessary\nreport, on the fourth day from our arrival in Paris.  The fifth day I\narranged to devote to sight-seeing and amusements in Pesca's company.\n\nOur hotel had been too full to accommodate us both on the same floor.\nMy room was on the second story, and Pesca's was above me, on the\nthird.  On the morning of the fifth day I went upstairs to see if the\nProfessor was ready to go out.  Just before I reached the landing I saw\nhis door opened from the inside--a long, delicate, nervous hand (not my\nfriend's hand certainly) held it ajar.  At the same time I heard\nPesca's voice saying eagerly, in low tones, and in his own language--\"I\nremember the name, but I don't know the man.  You saw at the Opera he\nwas so changed that I could not recognise him.  I will forward the\nreport--I can do no more.\" \"No more need be done,\" answered the second\nvoice.  The door opened wide, and the light-haired man with the scar on\nhis cheek--the man I had seen following Count Fosco's cab a week\nbefore--came out.  He bowed as I drew aside to let him pass--his face\nwas fearfully pale--and he held fast by the banisters as he descended\nthe stairs.\n\nI pushed open the door and entered Pesca's room.  He was crouched up,\nin the strangest manner, in a corner of the sofa.  He seemed to shrink\nfrom me when I approached him.\n\n\"Am I disturbing you?\" I asked.  \"I did not know you had a friend with\nyou till I saw him come out.\"\n\n\"No friend,\" said Pesca eagerly.  \"I see him to-day for the first time\nand the last.\"\n\n\"I am afraid he has brought you bad news?\"\n\n\"Horrible news, Walter! Let us go back to London--I don't want to stop\nhere--I am sorry I ever came.  The misfortunes of my youth are very\nhard upon me,\" he said, turning his face to the wall, \"very hard upon\nme in my later time.  I try to forget them--and they will not forget\nME!\"\n\n\"We can't return, I am afraid, before the afternoon,\" I replied. \"Would\nyou like to come out with me in the meantime?\"\n\n\"No, my friend, I will wait here.  But let us go back to-day--pray let\nus go back.\"\n\nI left him with the assurance that he should leave Paris that\nafternoon.  We had arranged the evening before to ascend the Cathedral\nof Notre Dame, with Victor Hugo's noble romance for our guide.  There\nwas nothing in the French capital that I was more anxious to see, and I\ndeparted by myself for the church.\n\nApproaching Notre Dame by the river-side, I passed on my way the\nterrible dead-house of Paris--the Morgue.  A great crowd clamoured and\nheaved round the door.  There was evidently something inside which\nexcited the popular curiosity, and fed the popular appetite for horror.\n\nI should have walked on to the church if the conversation of two men\nand a woman on the outskirts of the crowd had not caught my ear.  They\nhad just come out from seeing the sight in the Morgue, and the account\nthey were giving of the dead body to their neighbours described it as\nthe corpse of a man--a man of immense size, with a strange mark on his\nleft arm.\n\nThe moment those words reached me I stopped and took my place with the\ncrowd going in.  Some dim foreshadowing of the truth had crossed my\nmind when I heard Pesca's voice through the open door, and when I saw\nthe stranger's face as he passed me on the stairs of the hotel.  Now\nthe truth itself was revealed to me--revealed in the chance words that\nhad just reached my ears.  Other vengeance than mine had followed that\nfated man from the theatre to his own door--from his own door to his\nrefuge in Paris.  Other vengeance than mine had called him to the day\nof reckoning, and had exacted from him the penalty of his life.  The\nmoment when I had pointed him out to Pesca at the theatre in the\nhearing of that stranger by our side, who was looking for him too--was\nthe moment that sealed his doom.  I remembered the struggle in my own\nheart, when he and I stood face to face--the struggle before I could\nlet him escape me--and shuddered as I recalled it.\n\nSlowly, inch by inch, I pressed in with the crowd, moving nearer and\nnearer to the great glass screen that parts the dead from the living at\nthe Morgue--nearer and nearer, till I was close behind the front row of\nspectators, and could look in.\n\nThere he lay, unowned, unknown, exposed to the flippant curiosity of a\nFrench mob! There was the dreadful end of that long life of degraded\nability and heartless crime! Hushed in the sublime repose of death, the\nbroad, firm, massive face and head fronted us so grandly that the\nchattering Frenchwomen about me lifted their hands in admiration, and\ncried in shrill chorus, \"Ah, what a handsome man!\" The wound that had\nkilled him had been struck with a knife or dagger exactly over his\nheart.  No other traces of violence appeared about the body except on\nthe left arm, and there, exactly in the place where I had seen the\nbrand on Pesca's arm, were two deep cuts in the shape of the letter T,\nwhich entirely obliterated the mark of the Brotherhood.  His clothes,\nhung above him, showed that he had been himself conscious of his\ndanger--they were clothes that had disguised him as a French artisan.\nFor a few moments, but not for longer, I forced myself to see these\nthings through the glass screen.  I can write of them at no greater\nlength, for I saw no more.\n\nThe few facts in connection with his death which I subsequently\nascertained (partly from Pesca and partly from other sources), may be\nstated here before the subject is dismissed from these pages.\n\nHis body was taken out of the Seine in the disguise which I have\ndescribed, nothing being found on him which revealed his name, his\nrank, or his place of abode.  The hand that struck him was never\ntraced, and the circumstances under which he was killed were never\ndiscovered.  I leave others to draw their own conclusions in reference\nto the secret of the assassination as I have drawn mine. When I have\nintimated that the foreigner with the scar was a member of the\nBrotherhood (admitted in Italy after Pesca's departure from his native\ncountry), and when I have further added that the two cuts, in the form\nof a T, on the left arm of the dead man, signified the Italian word\n\"Traditore,\" and showed that justice had been done by the Brotherhood\non a traitor, I have contributed all that I know towards elucidating\nthe mystery of Count Fosco's death.\n\nThe body was identified the day after I had seen it by means of an\nanonymous letter addressed to his wife.  He was buried by Madame Fosco\nin the cemetery of Pere la Chaise.  Fresh funeral wreaths continue to\nthis day to be hung on the ornamental bronze railings round the tomb by\nthe Countess's own hand.  She lives in the strictest retirement at\nVersailles.  Not long since she published a biography of her deceased\nhusband.  The work throws no light whatever on the name that was really\nhis own or on the secret history of his life--it is almost entirely\ndevoted to the praise of his domestic virtues, the assertion of his\nrare abilities, and the enumeration of the honours conferred on him.\nThe circumstances attending his death are very briefly noticed, and are\nsummed up on the last page in this sentence--\"His life was one long\nassertion of the rights of the aristocracy and the sacred principles of\nOrder, and he died a martyr to his cause.\"\n\n\n\nIII\n\nThe summer and autumn passed after my return from Paris, and brought no\nchanges with them which need be noticed here.  We lived so simply and\nquietly that the income which I was now steadily earning sufficed for\nall our wants.\n\nIn the February of the new year our first child was born--a son. My\nmother and sister and Mrs. Vesey were our guests at the little\nchristening party, and Mrs. Clements was present to assist my wife on\nthe same occasion.  Marian was our boy's godmother, and Pesca and Mr.\nGilmore (the latter acting by proxy) were his godfathers. I may add\nhere that when Mr. Gilmore returned to us a year later he assisted the\ndesign of these pages, at my request, by writing the Narrative which\nappears early in the story under his name, and which, though first in\norder of precedence, was thus, in order of time, the last that I\nreceived.\n\nThe only event in our lives which now remains to be recorded, occurred\nwhen our little Walter was six months old.\n\nAt that time I was sent to Ireland to make sketches for certain\nforthcoming illustrations in the newspaper to which I was attached.  I\nwas away for nearly a fortnight, corresponding regularly with my wife\nand Marian, except during the last three days of my absence, when my\nmovements were too uncertain to enable me to receive letters.  I\nperformed the latter part of my journey back at night, and when I\nreached home in the morning, to my utter astonishment there was no one\nto receive me.  Laura and Marian and the child had left the house on\nthe day before my return.\n\nA note from my wife, which was given to me by the servant, only\nincreased my surprise, by informing me that they had gone to Limmeridge\nHouse.  Marian had prohibited any attempt at written explanations--I\nwas entreated to follow them the moment I came back--complete\nenlightenment awaited me on my arrival in Cumberland--and I was\nforbidden to feel the slightest anxiety in the meantime.  There the\nnote ended.  It was still early enough to catch the morning train.  I\nreached Limmeridge House the same afternoon.\n\nMy wife and Marian were both upstairs.  They had established themselves\n(by way of completing my amazement) in the little room which had been\nonce assigned to me for a studio, when I was employed on Mr. Fairlie's\ndrawings.  On the very chair which I used to occupy when I was at work\nMarian was sitting now, with the child industriously sucking his coral\nupon her lap--while Laura was standing by the well-remembered\ndrawing-table which I had so often used, with the little album that I\nhad filled for her in past times open under her hand.\n\n\"What in the name of heaven has brought you here?\" I asked.  \"Does Mr.\nFairlie know----?\"\n\nMarian suspended the question on my lips by telling me that Mr. Fairlie\nwas dead.  He had been struck by paralysis, and had never rallied after\nthe shock.  Mr. Kyrle had informed them of his death, and had advised\nthem to proceed immediately to Limmeridge House.\n\nSome dim perception of a great change dawned on my mind.  Laura spoke\nbefore I had quite realised it.  She stole close to me to enjoy the\nsurprise which was still expressed in my face.\n\n\"My darling Walter,\" she said, \"must we really account for our boldness\nin coming here? I am afraid, love, I can only explain it by breaking\nthrough our rule, and referring to the past.\"\n\n\"There is not the least necessity for doing anything of the kind,\" said\nMarian.  \"We can be just as explicit, and much more interesting, by\nreferring to the future.\" She rose and held up the child kicking and\ncrowing in her arms.  \"Do you know who this is, Walter?\" she asked,\nwith bright tears of happiness gathering in her eyes.\n\n\"Even MY bewilderment has its limits,\" I replied.  \"I think I can still\nanswer for knowing my own child.\"\n\n\"Child!\" she exclaimed, with all her easy gaiety of old times. \"Do you\ntalk in that familiar manner of one of the landed gentry of England?\nAre you aware, when I present this illustrious baby to your notice, in\nwhose presence you stand? Evidently not! Let me make two eminent\npersonages known to one another: Mr. Walter Hartright--THE HEIR OF\nLIMMERIDGE.\"\n\n\nSo she spoke.  In writing those last words, I have written all. The pen\nfalters in my hand.  The long, happy labour of many months is over.\nMarian was the good angel of our lives--let Marian end our Story."