“A little sailing-boat was approaching the shore. The man steering was hidden from me by the sail; but the boat was so near that I thought I recognized the flag on the mast. I looked at my watch. Yes! It was Armadale coming over from Santa Lucia at his usual time, to visit us in his usual way.
“Before I had put my watch back in my belt, the means of extricating myself from the frightful position I was placed in showed themselves to me as plainly as I see them now.
“I turned and led the way to the higher part of the beach, where some fishing-boats were drawn up which completely screened us from the view of any one landing on the shore below. Seeing probably that I had a purpose of some kind, Manuel followed me without uttering a word. As soon as we were safely under the shelter of the boats, I forced myself, in my own defense, to look at him again.
“‘What should you say,’ I asked, ‘if I was rich instead of poor? What should you say if I could afford to give you a hundred pounds?’
“He started. I saw plainly that he had not expected so much as half the sum I had mentioned. It is needless to add that his tongue lied, while his face spoke the truth, and that when he replied to me the answer was, ‘Nothing like enough.’
“‘Suppose,’ I went on, without taking any notice of what he had said, ‘that I could show you a way of helping yourself to twice as much—three times as much—five times as much as a hundred pounds, are you bold enough to put out your hand and take it?’
“The greedy glitter came into his eyes once more. His voice dropped low, in breathless expectation of my next words.
“‘Who is the person?’ he asked. ‘And what is the risk?’
“I answered him at once, in the plainest terms. I threw Armadale to him, as I might have thrown a piece of meat to a wild beast who was pursuing me.
“‘The person is a rich young Englishman,’ I said. ‘He has just hired the yacht called theDorothea, in the harbor here; and he stands in need of a sailing-master and a crew. You were once an officer in the Spanish navy—you speak English and Italian perfectly—you are thoroughly well acquainted with Naples and all that belongs to it. The rich young Englishman is ignorant of the language, and the interpreter who assists him knows nothing of the sea. He is at his wits’ end for want of useful help in this strange place; he has no more knowledge of the world than that child who is digging holes with a stick there in the sand; and he carries all his money with him in circular notes. So much for the person. As for the risk, estimate it for yourself.’
“The greedy glitter in his eyes grew brighter and brighter with every word I said. He was plainly ready to face the risk before I had done speaking.
“‘When can I see the Englishman?’ he asked, eagerly.
“I moved to the seaward end of the fishing-boat, and saw that Armadale was at that moment disembarking on the shore.
“‘You can see him now,’ I answered, and pointed to the place.
“After a long look at Armadale walking carelessly up the slope of the beach, Manuel drew back again under the shelter of the boat. He waited a moment, considering something carefully with himself, and put another question to me, in a whisper this time.
“‘When the vessel is manned,’ he said, ‘and the Englishman sails from Naples, how many friends sail with him?’
“‘He has but two friends here,’ I replied; ‘that other gentleman whom you saw with me at the opera, and myself. He will invite us both to sail with him; and when the time comes, we shall both refuse.’
“‘Do you answer for that?’
“‘I answer for it positively.’
“He walked a few steps away, and stood with his face hidden from me, thinking again. All I could see was that he took off his hat and passed his handkerchief over his forehead. All I could hear was that he talked to himself excitedly in his own language.
“There was a change in him when he came back. His face had turned to a livid yellow, and his eyes looked at me with a hideous distrust.
“‘One last question,’ he said, and suddenly came closer to me, suddenly spoke with a marked emphasis on his next words: ‘What is your interest in this?’
“I started back from him. The question reminded me that Ihadan interest in the matter, which was entirely unconnected with the interest of keeping Manuel and Midwinter apart. Thus far I had only remembered that Midwinter’s fatalism had smoothed the way for me, by abandoning Armadale beforehand to any stranger who might come forward to help him. Thus far the sole object I had kept in view was to protect myself, by the sacrifice of Armadale, from the exposure that threatened me. I tell no lies to my Diary. I don’t affect to have felt a moment’s consideration for the interests of Armadale’s purse or the safety of Armadale’s life. I hated him too savagely to care what pitfalls my tongue might be the means of opening under his feet. But I certainly did not see (until that last question was put to me) that, in serving his own designs, Manuel might—if he dared go all lengths for the money—be serving my designs too. The one overpowering anxiety to protect myself from exposure before Midwinter had (I suppose) filled all my mind, to the exclusion of everything else.
“Finding that I made no reply for the moment, Manuel reiterated his question, putting it in a new form.
“‘You have cast your Englishman at me,’ he said, ‘like the sop to Cerberus. Would you have been quite so ready to do that if you had not had a motive of your own? I repeat my question. You have an interest in this—what is it?’
“‘I have two interests,’ I answered. ‘The interest of forcing you to respect my position here, and the interest of ridding myself of the sight of you at once and forever!’ I spoke with a boldness he had not yet heard from me. The sense that I was making the villain an instrument in my hands, and forcing him to help my purpose blindly, while he was helping his own, roused my spirits, and made me feel like myself again.
“He laughed. ‘Strong language, on certain occasions, is a lady’s privilege,’ he said. ‘You may, or may not, rid yourself of the sight of me, at once and forever. We will leave that question to be settled in the future. But your other interest in this matter puzzles me. You have told me all I need know about the Englishman and his yacht, and you have made no conditions before you opened your lips. Pray, how are you to force me, as you say, to respect your position here?’
“‘I will tell you how,’ I rejoined. ‘You shall hear my conditions first. I insist on your leaving me in five minutes more. I insist on your never again coming near the house where I live; and I forbid your attempting to communicate in any way either with me or with that other gentleman whom you saw with me at the theater—’
“‘And suppose I say no?’ he interposed. ‘In that case, what will you do?’
“‘In that case,’ I answered, ‘I shall say two words in private to the rich young Englishman, and you will find yourself back again among the chorus at the opera.’
“‘You are a bold woman to take it for granted that I have my designs on the Englishman already, and that I am certain to succeed in them. How do you know—?’
“‘I knowyou,’ I said. ‘And that is enough.’
“There was a moment’s silence between us. He looked at me, and I looked at him. We understood each other.
“He was the first to speak. The villainous smile died out of his face, and his voice dropped again distrustfully to its lowest tones.
“‘I accept your terms,’ he said. ‘As long as your lips are closed, my lips shall be closed too—except in the event of my finding that you have deceived me; in which case the bargain is at an end, and you will see me again. I shall present myself to the Englishman to-morrow, with the necessary credentials to establish me in his confidence. Tell me his name?’
“I told it.
“‘Give me his address?’
“I gave it, and turned to leave him. Before I had stepped out of the shelter of the boats, I heard him behind me again.
“‘One last word,’ he said. ‘Accidents sometimes happen at sea. Have you interest enough in the Englishman—if an accident happens in his case—to wish to know what has become of him?’
“I stopped, and considered on my side. I had plainly failed to persuade him that I had no secret to serve in placing Armadale’s money and (as a probable consequence) Armadale’s life at his mercy. And it was now equally clear that he was cunningly attempting to associate himself with my private objects (whatever they might be) by opening a means of communication between us in the future. There could be no hesitation about how to answer him under such circumstances as these. If the ‘accident’ at which he hinted did really happen to Armadale, I stood in no need of Manuel’s intervention to give me the intelligence of it. An easy search through the obituary columns of the English papers would tell me the news—with the great additional advantage that the papers might be relied on, in such a matter as this, to tell the truth. I formally thanked Manuel, and declined to accept his proposal. ‘Having no interest in the Englishman,’ I said, ‘I have no wish whatever to know what becomes of him.’
“He looked at me for a moment with steady attention, and with an interest in me which he had not shown yet.
“‘What the game you are playing may be,’ he rejoined, speaking slowly and significantly, ‘I don’t pretend to know. But I venture on a prophecy, nevertheless—you will win it! If we ever meet again, remember I said that.’ He took off his hat, and bowed to me gravely. ‘Go your way, madam. And leave me to go mine!’
“With those words, he released me from the sight of him. I waited a minute alone, to recover myself in the air, and then returned to the house.
“The first object that met my eyes, on entering the sitting-room, was—Armadale himself!
“He was waiting on the chance of seeing me, to beg that I would exert my influence with his friend. I made the needful inquiry as to what he meant, and found that Midwinter had spoken as he had warned me he would speak when he and Armadale next met. He had announced that he was unable to finish his work for the newspaper as soon as he had hoped; and he had advised Armadale to find a crew for the yacht without waiting for any assistance on his part.
“All that it was necessary for me to do, on hearing this, was to perform the promise I had made to Midwinter, when he gave me my directions how to act in the matter. Armadale’s vexation on finding me resolved not to interfere expressed itself in the form of all others that is most personally offensive to me. He declined to believe my reiterated assurances that I possessed no influence to exert in his favor. ‘If I was married to Neelie,’ he said, ‘she could do anything she liked with me; and I am sure, when you choose, you can do anything you like with Midwinter.’ If the infatuated fool had actually tried to stifle the last faint struggles of remorse and pity left stirring in my heart, he could have said nothing more fatally to the purpose than this! I gave him a look which effectually silenced him, so far as I was concerned. He went out of the room grumbling and growling to himself. ‘It’s all very well to talk about manning the yacht. I don’t speak a word of their gibberish here; and the interpreter thinks a fisherman and a sailor means the same thing. Hang me if I know what to do with the vessel, now I have got her!’
“He will probably know by to-morrow. And if he only comes here as usual, I shall know too!”
“October 25th.—Ten at night.—Manuel has got him!
“He has just left us, after staying here more than an hour, and talking the whole time of nothing but his own wonderful luck in finding the very help he wanted, at the time when he needed it most.
“At noon to-day he was on the Mole, it seems, with his interpreter, trying vainly to make himself understood by the vagabond population of the water-side. Just as he was giving it up in despair, a stranger standing by (Manuel had followed him, I suppose, to the Mole from his hotel) kindly interfered to put things right. He said, ‘I speak your language and their language, sir. I know Naples well; and I have been professionally accustomed to the sea. Can I help you?’ The inevitable result followed. Armadale shifted all his difficulties on to the shoulders of the polite stranger, in his usual helpless, headlong way. His new friend, however, insisted, in the most honorable manner, on complying with the customary formalities before he would consent to take the matter into his own hands. He begged leave to wait on Mr. Armadale, with his testimonials to character and capacity. The same afternoon he had come by appointment to the hotel, with all his papers, and with ‘the saddest story’ of his sufferings and privations as ‘a political refugee’ that Armadale had ever heard. The interview was decisive. Manuel left the hotel, commissioned to find a crew for the yacht, and to fill the post of sailing-master on the trial cruise.
“I watched Midwinter anxiously, while Armadale was telling us these particulars, and afterward, when he produced the new sailing-master’s testimonials, which he had brought with him for his friend to see.
“For the moment, Midwinter’s superstitious misgivings seemed to be all lost in his natural anxiety for his friend. He examined the stranger’s papers—after having told me that the sooner Armadale was in the hands of strangers the better!—with the closest scrutiny and the most business-like distrust. It is needless to say that the credentials were as perfectly regular and satisfactory as credentials could be. When Midwinter handed them back, his color rose: he seemed to feel the inconsistency of his conduct, and to observe for the first time that I was present noticing it. ‘There is nothing to object to in the testimonials, Allan: I am glad you have got the help you want at last.’ That was all he said at parting. As soon as Armadale’s back was turned, I saw no more of him. He has locked himself up again for the night, in his own room.
“There is now—so far as I am concerned—but one anxiety left. When the yacht is ready for sea, and when I decline to occupy the lady’s cabin, will Midwinter hold to his resolution, and refuse to sail without me?”
“October 26th.—Warnings already of the coming ordeal. A letter from Armadale to Midwinter, which Midwinter has just sent in to me. Here it is:
“‘DEAR MID—I am too busy to come to-day. Get on with your work, for Heaven’s sake! The new sailing-master is a man of ten thousand. He has got an Englishman whom he knows to serve as mate on board already; and he is positively certain of getting the crew together in three or four days’ time. I am dying for a whiff of the sea, and so are you, or you are no sailor. The rigging is set up, the stores are coming on board, and we shall bend the sails to-morrow or next day. I never was in such spirits in my life. Remember me to your wife, and tell her she will be doing me a favor if she will come at once, and order everything she wants in the lady’s cabin. Yours affectionately, A. A.’
“Under this was written, in Midwinter’s hand: ‘Remember what I told you. Write (it will break it to him more gently in that way), and beg him to accept your apologies, and to excuse you from sailing on the trial cruise.’
“I have written without a moment’s loss of time. The sooner Manuel knows (which he is certain to do through Armadale) that the promise not to sail in the yacht is performed already, so far as I am concerned, the safer I shall feel.”
“October 27th.—A letter from Armadale, in answer to mine. He is full of ceremonious regrets at the loss of my company on the cruise; and he politely hopes that Midwinter may yet induce me to alter my mind. Wait a little, till he finds that Midwinter won’t sail with him either!....
“October 30th.—Nothing new to record until to-day. To-day the change in our lives here has come at last!
“Armadale presented himself this morning, in his noisiest high spirits, to announce that the yacht was ready for sea, and to ask when Midwinter would be able to go on board. I told him to make the inquiry himself in Midwinter’s room. He left me, with a last request that I would consider my refusal to sail with him. I answered by a last apology for persisting in my resolution, and then took a chair alone at the window to wait the event of the interview in the next room.
“My whole future depended now on what passed between Midwinter and his friend! Everything had gone smoothly up to this time. The one danger to dread was the danger of Midwinter’s resolution, or rather of Midwinter’s fatalism, giving way at the last moment. If he allowed himself to be persuaded into accompanying Armadale on the cruise, Manuel’s exasperation against me would hesitate at nothing—he would remember that I had answered to him for Armadale’s sailing from Naples alone; and he would be capable of exposing my whole past life to Midwinter before the vessel left the port. As I thought of this, and as the slow minutes followed each other, and nothing reached my ears but the hum of voices in the next room, my suspense became almost unendurable. It was vain to try and fix my attention on what was going on in the street. I sat looking mechanically out of the window, and seeing nothing.
“Suddenly—I can’t say in how long or how short a time—the hum of voices ceased; the door opened; and Armadale showed himself on the threshold, alone.
“‘I wish you good-by,’ he said, roughly. ‘And I hope, when I am married, my wife may never cause Midwinter the disappointment that Midwinter’s wife has causedme!’
“He gave me an angry look, and made me an angry bow, and, turning sharply, left the room.
“I saw the people in the street again! I saw the calm sea, and the masts of the shipping in the harbor where the yacht lay! I could think, I could breathe freely once more! The words that saved me from Manuel—the words that might be Armadale’s sentence of death—had been spoken. The yacht was to sail without Midwinter, as well as without me!
“My first feeling of exultation was almost maddening. But it was the feeling of a moment only. My heart sank in me again when I thought of Midwinter alone in the next room.
“I went out into the passage to listen, and heard nothing. I tapped gently at his door, and got no answer. I opened the door and looked in. He was sitting at the table, with his face hidden in his hands. I looked at him in silence, and saw the glistening of the tears as they trickled through his fingers.
“‘Leave me,’ he said, without moving his hands. ‘I must get over it by myself.’
“I went back into the sitting-room. Who can understand women? we don’t even understand ourselves. His sending me away from him in that manner cut me to the heart. I don’t believe the most harmless and most gentle woman living could have felt it more acutely than I felt it. And this, after what I have been doing! this, after what I was thinking of, the moment before I went into his room! Who can account for it? Nobody—I least of all!
“Half an hour later his door opened, and I heard him hurrying down the stairs. I ran on without waiting to think, and asked if I might go with him. He neither stopped nor answered. I went back to the window, and saw him pass, walking rapidly away, with his back turned on Naples and the sea.
“I can understand now that he might not have heard me. At the time I thought him inexcusably and brutally unkind to me. I put on my bonnet, in a frenzy of rage with him; I sent out for a carriage, and told the man to take me where he liked. He took me, as he took other strangers, to the Museum to see the statues and the pictures. I flounced from room to room, with my face in a flame, and the people all staring at me. I came to myself again, I don’t know how. I returned to the carriage, and made the man drive me back in a violent hurry, I don’t know why. I tossed off my cloak and bonnet, and sat down once more at the window. The sight of the sea cooled me. I forgot Midwinter, and thought of Armadale and his yacht. There wasn’t a breath of wind; there wasn’t a cloud in the sky; the wide waters of the Bay were as smooth as the surface of a glass.
“The sun sank; the short twilight came and went. I had some tea, and sat at the table thinking and dreaming over it. When I roused myself and went back to the window, the moon was up; but the quiet sea was as quiet as ever.
“I was still looking out, when I saw Midwinter in the street below, coming back. I was composed enough by this time to remember his habits, and to guess that he had been trying to relieve the oppression on his mind by one of his long solitary walks. When I heard him go into his own room, I was too prudent to disturb him again: I waited his pleasure where I was.
“Before long I heard his window opened, and I saw him, from my window, step into the balcony, and, after a look at the sea, hold up his hand to the air. I was too stupid, for the moment, to remember that he had once been a sailor, and to know what this meant. I waited, and wondered what would happen next.
“He went in again; and, after an interval, came out once more, and held up his hand as before to the air. This time he waited, leaning on the balcony rail, and looking out steadily, with all his attention absorbed by the sea.
“For a long, long time he never moved. Then, on a sudden, I saw him start. The next moment he sank on his knees, with his clasped hands resting on the balcony rail. ‘God Almighty bless and keep you, Allan!’ he said, fervently. ‘Good-by, forever!’
“I looked out to the sea. A soft, steady breeze was blowing, and the rippled surface of the water was sparkling in the quiet moonlight. I looked again, and there passed slowly, between me and the track of the moon, a long black vessel with tall, shadowy, ghostlike sails, gliding smooth and noiseless through the water, like a snake.
“The wind had come fair with the night; and Armadale’s yacht had sailed on the trial cruise.”
“London, November 19th.—I am alone again in the Great City; alone, for the first time since our marriage. Nearly a week since I started on my homeward journey, leaving Midwinter behind me at Turin.
“The days have been so full of events since the month began, and I have been so harassed, in mind and body both, for the greater part of the time, that my Diary has been wretchedly neglected. A few notes, written in such hurry and confusion that I can hardly understand them myself, are all that I possess to remind me of what has happened since the night when Armadale’s yacht left Naples. Let me try if I can set this right without more loss of time; let me try if I can recall the circumstances in their order as they have followed each other from the beginning of the month.
“On the 3d of November—being then still at Naples—Midwinter received a hurried letter from Armadale, date ‘Messina.’ ‘The weather,’ he said, ‘had been lovely, and the yacht had made one of the quickest passages on record. The crew were rather a rough set to look at; but Captain Manuel and his English mate’ (the latter described as ‘the best of good fellows’) ‘managed them admirably.’ After this prosperous beginning, Armadale had arranged, as a matter of course, to prolong the cruise; and, at the sailing-master’s suggestion, he had decided to visit some of the ports in the Adriatic, which the captain had described as full of character, and well worth seeing.
“A postscript followed, explaining that Armadale had written in a hurry to catch the steamer to Naples, and that he had opened his letter again, before sending it off, to add something that he had forgotten. On the day before the yacht sailed, he had been at the banker’s to get ‘a few hundreds in gold,’ and he believed he had left his cigar-case there. It was an old friend of his, and he begged that Midwinter would oblige him by endeavoring recover it, and keeping it for him till they met again.
“That was the substance of the letter.
“I thought over it carefully when Midwinter had left me alone again, after reading it. My idea was then (and is still) that Manuel had not persuaded Armadale to cruise in a sea like the Adriatic, so much less frequented by ships than the Mediterranean, for nothing. The terms, too, in which the trifling loss of the cigar-case was mentioned struck me as being equally suggestive of what was coming. I concluded that Armadale’s circular notes had not been transformed into those ‘few hundreds in gold’ through any forethought or business knowledge of his own. Manuel’s influence, I suspected, had been exerted in this matter also, and once more not without reason. At intervals through the wakeful night these considerations came back again and again to me; and time after time they pointed obstinately (so far as my next movements were concerned) in one and the same way—the way back to England.
“How to get there, and especially how to get there unaccompanied by Midwinter, was more than I had wit enough to discover that night. I tried and tried to meet the difficulty, and fell asleep exhausted toward the morning without having met it.
“Some hours later, as soon as I was dressed, Midwinter came in, with news received by that morning’s post from his employers in London. The proprietors of the newspaper had received from the editor so favorable a report of his correspondence from Naples that they had determined on advancing him to a place of greater responsibility and greater emolument at Turin. His instructions were inclosed in the letter, and he was requested to lose no time in leaving Naples for his new post.
“On hearing this, I relieved his mind, before he could put the question, of all anxiety about my willingness to remove. Turin had the great attraction, in my eyes, of being on the road to England. I assured him at once that I was ready to travel as soon as he pleased.
“He thanked me for suiting myself to his plans, with more of his old gentleness and kindness than I had seen in him for some time past. The good news from Armadale on the previous day seemed to have roused him a little from the dull despair in which he had been sunk since the sailing of the yacht. And now the prospect of advancement in his profession, and, more than that, the prospect of leaving the fatal place in which the Third Vision of the Dream had come true, had (as he owned himself) additionally cheered and relieved him. He asked, before he went away to make the arrangements for our journey, whether I expected to hear from my ‘family’ in England, and whether he should give instructions for the forwarding of my letters with his own to theposte restanteat Turin. I instantly thanked him, and accepted the offer. His proposal had suggested to me, the moment he made it, that my fictitious ‘family circumstances’ might be turned to good account once more, as a reason for unexpectedly summoning me from Italy to England.
“On the ninth of the month we were installed at Turin.
“On the thirteenth, Midwinter—being then very busy—asked if I would save him a loss of time by applying for any letters which might have followed us from Naples. I had been waiting for the opportunity he now offered me; and I determined to snatch at it without allowing myself time to hesitate. There were no letters at theposte restantefor either of us. But when he put the question on my return, I told him that there had been a letter for me, with alarming news from ‘home.’ My ‘mother’ was dangerously ill, and I was entreated to lose no time in hurrying back to England to see her.
“It seems quite unaccountable—now that I am away from him—but it is none the less true, that I could not, even yet, tell him a downright premeditated falsehood, without a sense of shrinking and shame, which other people would think, and which I think myself, utterly inconsistent with such a character as mine. Inconsistent or not, I felt it. And what is stranger—perhaps I ought to say madder—still, if he had persisted in his first resolution to accompany me himself to England rather than allow me to travel alone, I firmly believe I should have turned my back on temptation for the second time, and have lulled myself to rest once more in the old dream of living out my life happy and harmless in my husband’s love.
“Am I deceiving myself in this? It doesn’t matter—I dare say I am. Never mind whatmighthave happened. Whatdidhappen is the only thing of any importance now.
“It ended in Midwinter’s letting me persuade him that I was old enough to take care of myself on the journey to England, and that he owed it to the newspaper people, who had trusted their interests in his hands, not to leave Turin just as he was established there. He didn’t suffer at taking leave of me as he suffered when he saw the last of his friend. I saw that, and set down the anxiety he expressed that I should write to him at its proper value. I have quite got over my weakness for him at last. No man who really loved me would have put what he owed to a peck of newspaper people before what he owed to his wife. I hate him for letting me convince him! I believe he was glad to get rid of me. I believe he has seen some woman whom he likes at Turin. Well, let him follow his new fancy, if he pleases! I shall be the widow of Mr. Armadale of Thorpe Ambrose before long; and what will his likes or dislikes matter to me then?
“The events on the journey were not worth mentioning, and my arrival in London stands recorded already on the top of the new page.
“As for to-day, the one thing of any importance that I have done since I got to the cheap and quiet hotel at which I am now staying, has been to send for the landlord, and ask him to help me to a sight of the back numbers ofThe Timesnewspaper. He has politely offered to accompany me himself to-morrow morning to some place in the City where all the papers are kept, as he calls it, in file. Till to-morrow, then, I must control my impatience for news of Armadale as well as I can. And so good-night to the pretty reflection of myself that appears in these pages!”
“November 20th.—Not a word of news yet, either in the obituary column or in any other part of the paper. I looked carefully through each number in succession, dating from the day when Armadale’s letter was written at Messina to this present 20th of the month, and I am certain, whatever may have happened, that nothing is known in England as yet. Patience! The newspaper is to meet me at the breakfast-table every morning till further notice; and any day now may show me what I most want to see.”
“November 21st.—No news again. I wrote to Midwinter to-day, to keep up appearances.
“When the letter was done, I fell into wretchedly low spirits—I can’t imagine why—and felt such a longing for a little company that, in despair of knowing where else to go, I actually went to Pimlico, on the chance that Mother Oldershaw might have returned to her old quarters.
“There were changes since I had seen the place during my former stay in London. Doctor Downward’s side of the house was still empty. But the shop was being brightened up for the occupation of a milliner and dress-maker. The people, when I went in to make inquiries, were all strangers to me. They showed, however, no hesitation in giving me Mrs. Oldershaw’s address when I asked for it—from which I infer that the little ‘difficulty’ which forced her to be in hiding in August last is at an end, so far as she is concerned. As for the doctor, the people at the shop either were, or pretended to be, quite unable to tell me what had become of him.
“I don’t know whether it was the sight of the place at Pimlico that sickened me, or whether it was my own perversity, or what. But now that I had got Mrs. Oldershaw’s address, I felt as if she was the very last person in the world that I wanted to see. I took a cab, and told the man to drive to the street she lived in, and then told him to drive back to the hotel. I hardly know what is the matter with me—unless it is that I am getting more impatient every hour for information about Armadale. When will the future look a little less dark, I wonder? To-morrow is Saturday. Will to-morrow’s newspaper lift the veil?”
“November 22d.—Saturday’s newspaperhaslifted the veil! Words are vain to express the panic of astonishment in which I write. I never once anticipated it; I can’t believe it or realize it, now it has happened. The winds and waves themselves have turned my accomplices! The yacht has foundered at sea, and every soul on board has perished!
“Here is the account cut out of this morning’s newspaper:
“‘DISASTER AT SEA.—Intelligence has reached the Royal Yacht Squadron and the insurers which leaves no reasonable doubt, we regret to say, of the total loss, on the fifth of the present month, of the yachtDorothea, with every soul on board. The particulars are as follows: At daylight, on the morning of the sixth, the Italian brigSperanza, bound from Venice to Marsala for orders, encountered some floating objects off Cape Spartivento (at the southernmost extremity of Italy) which attracted the curiosity of the people of the brig. The previous day had been marked by one of the most severe of the sudden and violent storms, peculiar to these southern seas, which has been remembered for years. TheSperanzaherself having been in danger while the gale lasted, the captain and crew concluded that they were on the traces of a wreck, and a boat was lowered for the purpose of examining the objects in the water. A hen-coop, some broken spars, and fragments of shattered plank were the first evidences discovered of the terrible disaster that had happened. Some of the lighter articles of cabin furniture, wrenched and shattered, were found next. And, lastly, a memento of melancholy interest turned up, in the shape of a lifebuoy, with a corked bottle attached to it. These latter objects, with the relics of cabin furniture, were brought on board theSperanza. On the buoy the name of the vessel was painted, as follows: “Dorothea, R. Y. S.” (meaning Royal Yacht Squadron). The bottle, on being uncorked, contained a sheet of note-paper, on which the following lines were hurriedly traced in pencil: “Off Cape Spartivento; two days out from Messina. Nov. 5th, 4 P.M.” (being the hour at which the log of the Italian brig showed the storm to have been at its height). “Both our boats are stove in by the sea. The rudder is gone, and we have sprung a leak astern which is more than we can stop. The Lord help us all—we are sinking. (Signed) John Mitchenden, Mate.” On reaching Marsala, the captain of the brig made his report to the British consul, and left the objects discovered in that gentleman’s charge. Inquiry at Messina showed that the ill-fated vessel had arrived there from Naples. At the latter port it was ascertained that theDorotheahad been hired from the owner’s agent by an English gentleman, Mr. Armadale, of Thorpe Ambrose, Norfolk. Whether Mr. Armadale had any friends on board with him has not been clearly discovered. But there is unhappily no doubt that the ill-fated gentleman himself sailed in the yacht from Naples, and that he was also on board of the vessel when she left Messina.’
“Such is the story of the wreck, as the newspaper tells it in the plainest and fewest words. My head is in a whirl; my confusion is so great that I think of fifty different things in trying to think of one. I must wait—a day more or less is of no consequence now—I must wait till I can face my new position, without feeling bewildered by it.”
“November 23d.—Eight in the morning.—I rose an hour ago, and saw my way clearly to the first step that I must take under present circumstances.
“It is of the utmost importance to me to know what is doing at Thorpe Ambrose; and it would be the height of rashness, while I am quite in the dark in this matter, to venture there myself. The only other alternative is to write to somebody on the spot for news; and the only person I can write to is—Bashwood.
“I have just finished the letter. It is headed ‘private and confidential,’ and signed ‘Lydia Armadale.’ There is nothing in it to compromise me, if the old fool is mortally offended by my treatment of him, and if he spitefully shows my letter to other people. But I don’t believe he will do this. A man at his age forgives a woman anything, if the woman only encourages him. I have requested him, as a personal favor, to keep our correspondence for the present strictly private. I have hinted that my married life with my deceased husband has not been a happy one; and that I feel the injudiciousness of having married ayoungman. In the postscript I go further still, and venture boldly on these comforting words: ‘I can explain, dear Mr. Bashwood, what may have seemed fake and deceitful in my conduct toward you when you give me a personal opportunity.’ If he was on the right side of sixty, I should feel doubtful of results. But he is on the wrong side of sixty, and I believe he will give me my personal opportunity.
“Ten o’clock.—I have been looking over the copy of my marriage certificate, with which I took care to provide myself on the wedding-day; and I have discovered, to my inexpressible dismay, an obstacle to my appearance in the character of Armadale’s widow which I now see for the first time.
“The description of Midwinter (under his own name) which the certificate presents answers in every important particular to what would have been the description of Armadale of Thorpe Ambrose, if I had really married him. ‘Name and Surname’—Allan Armadale. ‘Age’—twenty-one, instead of twenty-two, which might easily pass for a mistake. ‘Condition’—Bachelor. ‘Rank or profession’—Gentleman. ‘Residence at the time of Marriage’—Frant’s Hotel, Darley Street. ‘Father’s Name and Surname’—Allan Armadale. ‘Rank or Profession of Father’—Gentleman. Every particular (except the year’s difference in their two ages) which answers for the one answers for the other. But suppose, when I produce my copy of the certificate, that some meddlesome lawyer insists on looking at the original register? Midwinter’s writing is as different as possible from the writing of his dead friend. The hand in which he has written ‘Allan Armadale’ in the book has not a chance of passing for the hand in which Armadale of Thorpe Ambrose was accustomed to sign his name.
“Can I move safely in the matter, with such a pitfall as I see here open under my feet? How can I tell? Where can I find an experienced person to inform me? I must shut up my diary and think.”
“Seven o’clock.—My prospects have changed again since I made my last entry. I have received a warning to be careful in the future which I shall not neglect; and I have (I believe) succeeded in providing myself with the advice and assistance of which I stand in need.
“After vainly trying to think of some better person to apply to in the difficulty which embarrassed me, I made a virtue of necessity, and set forth to surprise Mrs. Oldershaw by a visit from her darling Lydia! It is almost needless to add that I determined to sound her carefully, and not to let any secret of importance out of my own possession.
“A sour and solemn old maid-servant admitted me into the house. When I asked for her mistress, I was reminded with the bitterest emphasis that I had committed the impropriety of calling on a Sunday. Mrs. Oldershaw was at home, solely in consequence of being too unwell to go to church! The servant thought it very unlikely that she would see me. I thought it highly probable, on the contrary, that she would honor me with an interview in her own interests, if I sent in my name as ‘Miss Gwilt’—and the event proved that I was right. After being kept waiting some minutes I was shown into the drawing-room.
“There sat Mother Jezebel, with the air of a woman resting on the high-road to heaven, dressed in a slate-colored gown, with gray mittens on her hands, a severely simple cap on her head, and a volume of sermons on her lap. She turned up the whites of her eyes devoutly at the sight of me, and the first words she said were—‘Oh, Lydia! Lydia! why are you not at church?’
“If I had been less anxious, the sudden presentation of Mrs. Oldershaw in an entirely new character might have amused me. But I was in no humor for laughing, and (my notes of hand being all paid) I was under no obligation to restrain my natural freedom of speech. ‘Stuff and nonsense!’ I said. ‘Put your Sunday face in your pocket. I have got some news for you, since I last wrote from Thorpe Ambrose.’
“The instant I mentioned ‘Thorpe Ambrose,’ the whites of the old hypocrite’s eyes showed themselves again, and she flatly refused to hear a word more from me on the subject of my proceedings in Norfolk. I insisted; but it was quite useless. Mother Oldershaw only shook her head and groaned, and informed me that her connection with the pomps and vanities of the world was at an end forever. ‘I have been born again, Lydia,’ said the brazen old wretch, wiping her eyes. ‘Nothing will induce me to return to the subject of that wicked speculation of yours on the folly of a rich young man.’
“After hearing this, I should have left her on the spot, but for one consideration which delayed me a moment longer.
“It was easy to see, by this time, that the circumstances (whatever they might have been) which had obliged Mother Oldershaw to keep in hiding, on the occasion of my former visit to London, had been sufficiently serious to force her into giving up, or appearing to give up, her old business. And it was hardly less plain that she had found it to her advantage—everybody in England finds it to their advantage in some way to cover the outer side of her character carefully with a smooth varnish of Cant. This was, however, no business of mine; and I should have made these reflections outside instead of inside the house, if my interests had not been involved in putting the sincerity of Mother Oldershaw’s reformation to the test—so far as it affected her past connection with myself. At the time when she had fitted me out for our enterprise, I remembered signing a certain business document which gave her a handsome pecuniary interest in my success, if I became Mrs. Armadale of Thorpe Ambrose. The chance of turning this mischievous morsel of paper to good account, in the capacity of a touchstone, was too tempting to be resisted. I asked my devout friend’s permission to say one last word before I left the house.
“‘As you have no further interest in my wicked speculation at Thorpe Ambrose,’ I said, ‘perhaps you will give me back the written paper that I signed, when you were not quite such an exemplary person as you are now?’
“The shameless old hypocrite instantly shut her eyes and shuddered.
“‘Does that mean Yes, or No’?’ I asked.
“‘On moral and religious grounds, Lydia,’ said Mrs. Oldershaw, ‘it means No.’
“‘On wicked and worldly grounds,’ I rejoined, ‘I beg to thank you for showing me your hand.’
“There could, indeed, be no doubt now about the object she really had in view. She would run no more risks and lend no more money; she would leave me to win or lose single-handed. If I lost, she would not be compromised. If I won, she would produce the paper I had signed, and profit by it without remorse. In my present situation, it was mere waste of time and words to prolong the matter by any useless recrimination on my side. I put the warning away privately in my memory for future use, and got up to go.
“At the moment when I left my chair there was a sharp double knock at the street door. Mrs. Oldershaw evidently recognized it. She rose in a violent hurry, and rang the bell. ‘I am too unwell to see anybody,’ she said, when the servant appeared. ‘Wait a moment, if you please,’ she added, turning sharply on me, when the woman had left us to answer the door.
“It was small, very small, spitefulness on my part, I know; but the satisfaction of thwarting Mother Jezebel, even in a trifle, was not to be resisted. ‘I can’t wait,’ I said; ‘you reminded me just now that I ought to be at church.’ Before she could answer I was out of the room.
“As I put my foot on the first stair the street door was opened, and a man’s voice inquired whether Mrs. Oldershaw was at home.
“I instantly recognized the voice. Doctor Downward!
“The doctor repeated the servant’s message in a tone which betrayed unmistakable irritation at finding himself admitted no further than the door.
“‘Your mistress is not well enough to see visitors? Give her that card,’ said the doctor, ‘and say I expect her, the next time I call, to be well enough to seeme.’
“If his voice had not told me plainly that he felt in no friendly mood toward Mrs. Oldershaw, I dare say I should have let him go without claiming his acquaintance; but, as things were, I felt an impulse to speak to him or to anybody who had a grudge against Mother Jezebel. There was more of my small spitefulness in this, I suppose. Anyway, I slipped downstairs; and, following the doctor out quietly, overtook him in the street.
“I had recognized his voice, and I recognized his back as I walked behind him. But when I called him by his name, and when he turned round with a start and confronted me, I followed his example, and started on my side. The doctor’s face was transformed into the face of a perfect stranger! His baldness had hidden itself under an artfully grizzled wig. He had allowed his whiskers to grow, and had dyed them to match his new head of hair. Hideous circular spectacles bestrode his nose in place of the neat double eyeglass that he used to carry in his hand; and a black neckerchief, surmounted by immense shirt-collars, appeared as the unworthy successor of the clerical white cravat of former times. Nothing remained of the man I once knew but the comfortable plumpness of his figure, and the confidential courtesy and smoothness of his manner and his voice.
“‘Charmed to see you again,’ said the doctor, looking about him a little anxiously, and producing his card-case in a very precipitate manner. ‘But, my dear Miss Gwilt, permit me to rectify a slight mistake on your part. Doctor Downward of Pimlico is dead and buried; and you will infinitely oblige me if you will never, on any consideration, mention him again!’
“I took the card he offered me, and discovered that I was now supposed to be speaking to ‘Doctor Le Doux, of the Sanitarium, Fairweather Vale, Hampstead!’
“‘You seem to have found it necessary,’ I said, ‘to change a great many things since I last saw you? Your name, your residence, your personal appearance—?’
“‘And my branch of practice,’ interposed the doctor. ‘I have purchased of the original possessor (a person of feeble enterprise and no resources) a name, a diploma, and a partially completed sanitarium for the reception of nervous invalids. We are open already to the inspection of a few privileged friends—come and see us. Are you walking my way? Pray take my arm, and tell me to what happy chance I am indebted for the pleasure of seeing you again?’
“I told him the circumstances exactly as they had happened, and I added (with a view to making sure of his relations with his former ally at Pimlico) that I had been greatly surprised to hear Mrs. Oldershaw’s door shut on such an old friend as himself. Cautious as he was, the doctor’s manner of receiving my remark satisfied me at once that my suspicions of an estrangement were well founded. His smile vanished, and he settled his hideous spectacles irritably on the bridge of his nose.
“‘Pardon me if I leave you to draw your own conclusions,’ he said. ‘The subject of Mrs. Oldershaw is, I regret to say, far from agreeable to me under existing circumstances—a business difficulty connected with our late partnership at Pimlico, entirely without interest for a young and brilliant woman like yourself. Tell me your news! Have you left your situation at Thorpe Ambrose? Are you residing in London? Is there anything, professional or otherwise, that I can do for you?’
“That last question was a more important one than he supposed. Before I answered it, I felt the necessity of parting company with him and of getting a little time to think.
“‘You have kindly asked me, doctor, to pay you a visit,’ I said. ‘In your quiet house at Hampstead, I may possibly have something to say to you which I can’t say in this noisy street. When are you at home at the Sanitarium? Should I find you there later in the day?’
“The doctor assured me that he was then on his way back, and begged that I would name my own hour. I said, ‘Toward the afternoon;’ and, pleading an engagement, hailed the first omnibus that passed us. ‘Don’t forget the address,’ said the doctor, as he handed me in. ‘I have got your card,’ I answered, and so we parted.
“I returned to the hotel, and went up into my room, and thought over it very anxiously.
“The serious obstacle of the signature on the marriage register still stood in my way as unmanageably as ever. All hope of getting assistance from Mrs. Oldershaw was at an end. I could only regard her henceforth as an enemy hidden in the dark—the enemy, beyond all doubt now, who had had me followed and watched when I was last in London. To what other counselor could I turn for the advice which my unlucky ignorance of law and business obliged me to seek from some one more experienced than myself? Could I go to the lawyer whom I consulted when I was about to marry Midwinter in my maiden name? Impossible! To say nothing of his cold reception of me when I had last seen him, the advice I wanted this time related (disguise the facts as I might) to commission of a Fraud—a fraud of the sort that no prosperous lawyer would consent to assist if he had a character to lose. Was there any other competent person I could think of? There was one, and one only—the doctor who had died at Pimlico, and had revived again at Hampstead.
“I knew him to be entirely without scruples; to have the business experience that I wanted myself; and to be as cunning, as clever, and as far-seeing a man as could be found in all London. Beyond this, I had made two important discoveries in connection with him that morning. In the first place, he was on bad terms with Mrs. Oldershaw, which would protect me from all danger of the two leaguing together against me if I trusted him. In the second place, circumstances still obliged him to keep his identity carefully disguised, which gave me a hold over him in no respect inferior to any hold thatImight give him overme. In every way he was the right man, the only man, for my purpose; and yet I hesitated at going to him—hesitated for a full hour and more, without knowing why!
“It was two o’clock before I finally decided on paying the doctor a visit. Having, after this, occupied nearly another hour in determining to a hair-breadth how far I should take him into my confidence, I sent for a cab at last, and set off toward three in the afternoon for Hampstead.
“I found the Sanitarium with some little difficulty.
“Fairweather Vale proved to be a new neighborhood, situated below the high ground of Hampstead, on the southern side. The day was overcast, and the place looked very dreary. We approached it by a new road running between trees, which might once have been the park avenue of a country house. At the end we came upon a wilderness of open ground, with half-finished villas dotted about, and a hideous litter of boards, wheelbarrows, and building materials of all sorts scattered in every direction. At one corner of this scene of desolation, stood a great overgrown dismal house, plastered with drab-colored stucco, and surrounded by a naked, unfinished garden, without a shrub or a flower in it, frightful to behold. On the open iron gate that led into this inclosure was a new brass plate, with ‘Sanitarium’ inscribed on it in great black letters. The bell, when the cabman rang it, pealed through the empty house like a knell; and the pallid, withered old man-servant in black who answered the door looked as if he had stepped up out of his grave to perform that service. He let out on me a smell of damp plaster and new varnish; and he let in with me a chilling draft of the damp November air. I didn’t notice it at the time, but, writing of it now, I remember that I shivered as I crossed the threshold.
“I gave my name to the servant as ‘Mrs. Armadale,’ and was shown into the waiting-room. The very fire itself was dying of damp in the grate. The only books on the table were the doctor’s Works, in sober drab covers; and the only object that ornamented the walls was the foreign Diploma (handsomely framed and glazed), of which the doctor had possessed himself by purchase, along with the foreign name.
“After a moment or two, the proprietor of the Sanitarium came in, and held up his hands in cheerful astonishment at the sight of me.
“‘I hadn’t an idea who “Mrs. Armadale” was!’ he said. ‘My dear lady, haveyouchanged your name too? How sly of you not to tell me when we met this morning! Come into my private snuggery—I can’t think of keeping an old and dear friend like you in the patients’ waiting-room.’
“The doctor’s private snuggery was at the back of the house, looking out on fields and trees, doomed but not yet destroyed by the builder. Horrible objects in brass and leather and glass, twisted and turned as if they were sentient things writhing in agonies of pain, filled up one end of the room. A great book-case with glass doors extended over the whole of the opposite wall, and exhibited on its shelves long rows of glass jars, in which shapeless dead creatures of a dull white color floated in yellow liquid. Above the fireplace hung a collection of photographic portraits of men and women, inclosed in two large frames hanging side by side with a space between them. The left-hand frame illustrated the effects of nervous suffering as seen in the face; the right-hand frame exhibited the ravages of insanity from the same point of view; while the space between was occupied by an elegantly illuminated scroll, bearing inscribed on it the time-honored motto, ‘Prevention is better than Cure.’
“‘Here I am, with my galvanic apparatus, and my preserved specimens, and all the rest of it,’ said the doctor, placing me in a chair by the fireside. ‘And there is my System mutely addressing you just above your head, under a form of exposition which I venture to describe as frankness itself. This is no mad-house, my dear lady. Let other men treat insanity, if they like—Istop it! No patients in the house as yet. But we live in an age when nervous derangement (parent of insanity) is steadily on the increase; and in due time the sufferers will come. I can wait as Harvey waited, as Jenner waited. And now do put your feet up on the fender, and tell me about yourself. You are married, of course? And what a pretty name! Accept my best and most heart-felt congratulations. You have the two greatest blessings that can fall to a woman’s lot; the two capital H’s, as I call them—Husband and Home.’
“I interrupted the genial flow of the doctor’s congratulations at the first opportunity.
“‘I am married; but the circumstances are by no means of the ordinary kind,’ I said, seriously. My present position includes none of the blessings that are usually supposed to fall to a woman’s lot. I am already in a situation of very serious difficulty; and before long I may be in a situation of very serious danger as well.’
“The doctor drew his chair a little nearer to me, and fell at once into his old professional manner and his old confidential tone.
“‘If you wish to consult me,’ he said, softly, ‘you know that I have kept some dangerous secrets in my time, and you also know that I possess two valuable qualities as an adviser. I am not easily shocked; and I can be implicitly trusted.’
“I hesitated even now, at the eleventh hour, sitting alone with him in his own room. It was so strange to me to be trusting to anybody but myself! And yet, how could I help trusting another person in a difficulty which turned on a matter of law?
“‘Just as you please, you know,’ added the doctor. ‘I never invite confidences. I merely receive them.’
“There was no help for it; I had come there not to hesitate, but to speak. I risked it, and spoke.
“‘The matter on which I wish to consult you,’ I said, ‘is not (as you seem to think) within your experience as a professional man. But I believe you may be of assistance to me, if I trust myself to your larger experience as a man of the world. I warn you beforehand that I shall certainly surprise, and possibly alarm, you before I have done.’
“With that preface I entered on my story, telling him what I had settled to tell him, and no more.
“I made no secret, at the outset, of my intention to personate Armadale’s widow; and I mentioned without reserve (knowing that the doctor could go to the office and examine the will for himself) the handsome income that would be settled on me in the event of my success. Some of the circumstances that followed next in succession I thought it desirable to alter or conceal. I showed him the newspaper account of the loss of the yacht, but I said nothing about events at Naples. I informed him of the exact similarity of the two names; leaving him to imagine that it was accidental. I told him, as an important element in the matter, that my husband had kept his real name a profound secret from everybody but myself; but (to prevent any communication between them) I carefully concealed from the doctor what the assumed name under which Midwinter had lived all his life really was. I acknowledged that I had left my husband behind me on the Continent; but when the doctor put the question, I allowed him to conclude—I couldn’t, with all my resolution, tell him positively!—that Midwinter knew of the contemplated Fraud, and that he was staying away purposely, so as not to compromise me by his presence. This difficulty smoothed over—or, as I feel it now, this baseness committed—I reverted to myself, and came back again to the truth. One after another I mentioned all the circumstances connected with my private marriage, and with the movements of Armadale and Midwinter, which rendered any discovery of the false personation (through the evidence of other people) a downright impossibility. ‘So much,’ I said, in conclusion, ‘for the object in view. The next thing is to tell you plainly of a very serious obstacle that stands in my way.’
“The doctor, who had listened thus far without interrupting me, begged permission here to say a few words on his side before I went on.
“The ‘few words’ proved to be all questions—clever, searching, suspicious questions—which I was, however, able to answer with little or no reserve, for they related, in almost every instance, to the circumstances under which I had been married, and to the chances for and against my lawful husband if he chose to assert his claim to me at any future time.
“My replies informed the doctor, in the first place, that I had so managed matters at Thorpe Ambrose as to produce a general impression that Armadale intended to marry me; in the second place, that my husband’s early life had not been of a kind to exhibit him favorably in the eyes of the world; in the third place, that we had been married, without any witnesses present who knew us, at a large parish church in which two other couples had been married the same morning, to say nothing of the dozens on dozens of other couples (confusing all remembrance of us in the minds of the officiating people) who had been married since. When I had put the doctor in possession of these facts—and when he had further ascertained that Midwinter and I had gone abroad among strangers immediately after leaving the church; and that the men employed on board the yacht in which Armadale had sailed from Somersetshire (before my marriage) were now away in ships voyaging to the other end of the world—his confidence in my prospects showed itself plainly in his face. ‘So far as I can see,’ he said, ‘your husband’s claim to you (after you have stepped into the place of the dead Mr. Armadale’s widow) would rest on nothing but his own bare assertion. AndthatI think you may safely set at defiance. Excuse my apparent distrust of the gentleman. But there might be a misunderstanding between you in the future, and it is highly desirable to ascertain beforehand exactly what he could or could not do under those circumstances. And now that we have done with the main obstacle thatIsee in the way of your success, let us by all means come to the obstacle thatyousee next!’
“I was willing enough to come to it. The tone in which he spoke of Midwinter, though I myself was responsible for it, jarred on me horribly, and roused for the moment some of the old folly of feeling which I fancied I had laid asleep forever. I rushed at the chance of changing the subject, and mentioned the discrepancy in the register between the hand in which Midwinter had signed the name of Allan Armadale, and the hand in which Armadale of Thorpe Ambrose had been accustomed to write his name, with an eagerness which it quite diverted the doctor to see.
“‘Isthatall?’ he asked, to my infinite surprise and relief, when I had done. ‘My dear lady, pray set your mind at ease! If the late Mr. Armadale’s lawyers want a proof of your marriage, they won’t go to the church-register for it, I can promise you!’
“‘What!’ I exclaimed, in astonishment. ‘Do you mean to say that the entry in the register is not a proof of my marriage?’
“‘It is a proof,’ said the doctor, ‘that you have been married to somebody. But it is no proof that you have been married to Mr. Armadale of Thorpe Ambrose. Jack Nokes or Tom Styles (excuse the homeliness of the illustration!) might have got the license, and gone to the church to be married to you under Mr. Armadale’s name; and the register (how could it do otherwise?) must in that case have innocently assisted the deception. I see I surprise you. My dear madam, when you opened this interesting business you surprisedme—I may own it now—by laying so much stress on the curious similarity between the two names. You might have entered on the very daring and romantic enterprise in which you are now engaged, without necessarily marrying your present husband. Any other man would have done just as well, provided he was willing to take Mr. Armadale’s name for the purpose.’
“I felt my temper going at this. ‘Any other man wouldnothave done just as well,’ I rejoined, instantly. ‘But for the similarity of the names, I should never have thought of the enterprise at all.’
“The doctor admitted that he had spoken too hastily. ‘That personal view of the subject had, I confess, escaped me,’ he said. ‘However, let us get back to the matter in hand. In the course of what I may term an adventurous medical life, I have been brought more than once into contact with the gentlemen of the law, and have had opportunities of observing their proceedings in cases of, let us say, Domestic Jurisprudence. I am quite sure I am correct in informing you that the proof which will be required by Mr. Armadale’s representatives will be the evidence of a witness present at the marriage who can speak to the identity of the bride and bridegroom from his own personal knowledge.’
“‘But I have already told you,’ I said, ‘that there was no such person present.’
“‘Precisely,’ rejoined the doctor. ‘In that case, what you now want, before you can safely stir a step in the matter, is—if you will pardon me the expression—a ready-made witness, possessed of rare moral and personal resources, who can be trusted to assume the necessary character, and to make the necessary Declaration before a magistrate. Do you know of any such person?’ asked the doctor, throwing himself back in his chair, and looking at me with the utmost innocence.
“‘I only know you,’ I said.
“The doctor laughed softly. ‘So like a woman!’ he remarked, with the most exasperating good humor. ‘The moment she sees her object, she dashes at it headlong the nearest way. Oh, the sex! the sex!’
“‘Never mind the sex!’ I broke out, impatiently. ‘I want a serious answer—Yes or No?’
“The doctor rose, and waved his hand with great gravity and dignity all round the room. ‘You see this vast establishment,’ he began; ‘you can possibly estimate to some extent the immense stake I have in its prosperity and success. Your excellent natural sense will tell you that the Principal of this Sanitarium must be a man of the most unblemished character—’
“‘Why waste so many words,’ I said, ‘when one word will do? You mean No!’
“The Principal of the Sanitarium suddenly relapsed into the character of my confidential friend.
“‘My dear lady,’ he said, ‘it isn’t Yes, and it isn’t No, at a moment’s notice. Give me till to-morrow afternoon. By that time I engage to be ready to do one of two things—either to withdraw myself from this business at once, or to go into it with you heart and soul. Do you agree to that? Very good; we may drop the subject, then, till to-morrow. Where can I call on you when I have decided what to do?’
“There was no objection to my trusting him with my address at the hotel. I had taken care to present myself there as ‘Mrs. Armadale’; and I had given Midwinter an address at the neighboring post-office to write to when he answered my letters. We settled the hour at which the doctor was to call on me; and, that matter arranged, I rose to go, resisting all offers of refreshment, and all proposals to show me over the house. His smooth persistence in keeping up appearances after we had thoroughly understood each other disgusted me. I got away from him as soon as I could, and came back to my diary and my own room.