 Book III. CHAPTER XII of Armadale An hour later, the landlady at Miss Quilt's lodgings was lost in astonishment and the clamorous tongues of children were in a state of ungovernable revolt. Unforeseen circumstances had suddenly obliged tenants of the first floor to terminate the occupation of her apartments and to go to London that day by the eleven o'clock train. Please do have a fly at the door at half past ten, said Miss Quilt, as the amazed landlady followed her upstairs. And excuse me, you good creature, if I beg and pray not to be disturbed till the fly comes. Once inside the room she locked the door and then opened her writing desk. Now for my letter to the major, she said, how shall I word it? A moment's consideration apparently decided her. Searching through her collection of pens, she carefully selected the worst that could be found and began the letter by writing the date of the day on a soiled sheet of note paper in crooked, clumsy characters which ended in a blot made fruitlessly with the feather of the pen. Pausing, sometimes to think a little, sometimes to make another blot, she completed the letter in these words. Honoured sir, it is on my conscience to tell you something which I think you ought to know. You ought to know of the goings-on of myth, your daughter, with the ammiss her armadale. I wish you to make sure, and, what is more, I advise you to be quick about it, if she is going the way you want her to go, when she takes her morning walk before breakfast. I score to make me shift, where there is true love on both sides. But I don't think the young man means truly by myth. What I mean is, I think means only has his fancy. Another person, who shall be nameless betweeks us, has his true heart. Please, pardon my not putting my name. I am only a humble person, and I might get me into trouble. This is all at present, dear sir, from yours. A well-wisher. There! said Miss Quilt, as she followed the letter up. If I have been a professed novelist, I could hardly have written more naturally in the character of a servant than that. She wrote the necessary address to Major Milroy, looked admirably for the last time at course and clumsy writing, which her own delicate hand had produced, and rose to post-letter herself, before she entered next on serious business of backing up. Curious, she sat, when Larry had been posted, and she was back again making her travelling preparations in her own room. Here I am, running headlong into a frightful risk, and I never was in better spirits in my life. The boxes were ready when fly was at door, and Miss Quilt was equipped, as becomingly as usual, in her neat travelling costume. A thick veil, which she was accustomed to her in London, appeared on her country's strobe on it for the first time. One made such rude men occasionally in the railway. She sat with lame-laming, and, though I dress quietly, my hair is so very irakable. She was a little paler than usual, but she had never been so sweet-tempered and engaging, so gracefully cordial and friendly as now, when the moment of departure had come. The simple people of the house were quite moved at taking leave of her. She insisted on shaking hands with Landlord, on speaking to him in her prettiest way, and sunning him in her brightest smiles. Come, she sat with landlady, you have been so kind, you have been so like a mother to me, you must give me a kiss at parting. She embraced children all together in the lamp, with a mixture of humor and tenderness delightful to see, and left a shilling among them to buy a cake. If I was only rich enough to make it a sovereign, she whispered to the mother, how glad I should be. The awkward lad who ran on errands stood waiting at the fly-door. He was clumsy, he was frowsy, he had a gaping mouth and a chun-up nose. But inedible female delight in being charming accepted him, for all that, in the character of a last chance. You dear dingy John, she said kindly at carriage door, I am so poor I have only six pants to give you. With my very best wishes, take my advice, John, grow to be a fine man and find herself a nice sweetheart. Thank you for a thousand times. She gave him a friendly little pet on the cheek, with two of her gloved fingers and smile and nodded and got into the fly. Armadale next, she said to herself as a carriage drove off. Ellen's anxiety not to miss the train had brought him to the station in better time than usual. After taking his ticket and putting his poor man to under the porter's charge, he was facing the platform and thinking of Neely, when he heard rustling of a lady's dress behind him and, turning around to look, found himself face to face with miss Quilt. There was no escaping her this time. The station wall was on his right hand and line was on his left. A tunnel was behind him and miss Quilt was in front, inquiring in her sweetest tones whether Mr Armadale was going to London. Ellen colored scarlet with vexation and surprise. There he was obviously waiting for the train, and there was this portmante close by with his name on it already labeled for London. What answer but the true one could you make after that? Could he let the train go without him and lose the precious hour so vitally important to Neely and himself? Impossible. Ellen helplessly confirmed the printed statement on his portmanteau and heartedly wished himself at the other end of the world as he said the words. How very fortunate, rejoiced miss Quilt. I am going to London too. Might I ask you, Mr Armadale, as you seem to be quite alone, to my escort on a journey? Ellen looked at little assembly of travelers and travelers' friends collected on the platform near the booking office door. They were all Thorpe Ambrose people. He was probably known by sight and miss Quilt was probably known by sight to every one of them. In sheer desperation, exerting more awkwardly than ever, he produced a cigar case. I should be delighted, he said, with an embarrassment which was almost an insult under the circumstances. But I am what people who get sick over a cigar call a slave to smoking. I had light in smoking, said miss Quilt, with undermined adversity and good humour. It's one of the privileges of the men which I have always envied. I am afraid, Mr Armadale, you must think I am forcing myself on you. It certainly looks like it. The real truth is I want particularly to say a word to you in private about Mr Midwinter. The train came up at same moment. Setting Midwinter out of the question, the common distances of politeness left Ellen no alternative but to submit. After having been the cause of her living or situation at major mill-rise, after having pointedly avoided her only a few days since on the high road, to have declined going to London in the same carriage with miss Quilt would have been an act of downright brutality, which it was simply impossible to commit. Damn her! said Ellen internally, as he handed his travelling companion into an empty carriage, officially placed at his disposal, before all the people had stationed by the guard. You shan't be disturbed, sir. The men whispered, confidentially, with a smile and a touch of his head. Ellen could have knocked him down with utmost pleasure. Stop! he said from the window. I don't want the carriage. It was useless. The guard was out of hearing. The whistle blew and the train started for London. The select assembly of travellers' friends left behind on the platform congregated in a circle on the spot with station master in the centre. The station master, otherwise Mr Mac, was a popular character in the neighbourhood. He possessed two social qualifications which invariably impressed the average English mind. He was an old soldier and he was a man of few words. The conclave on the platform insisted on checking his opinion before it committed itself positively to an opinion of its own. A brisk fire of remarks exploded, as a matter of course on all sides, but everybody's view of the subject ended introgatively, in a question aimed point blank at station master's ears. She's caught him, hasn't she? She'll come back Mrs Armadale won't she? He'd better have stuck to Miss Milroy, haven't he? Miss Milroy stuck to him? She paid him a visit at the Great House, didn't she? Nothing of the sort. It's a shame to take the girl's character away. She was caught in a thunderstorm close by. He was obliged to give her shelter and she's never been near the place since. Miss Guilt's been jerry, if you like, with no thunderstorm to force her in. And Miss Guilt's off with him to London in the carriage all to themselves, eh, Mr Mac? Ah, he's a soft one that Armadale, with all his money, to take up with a red-haired woman a good eight or nine years older than he is. She's thirty if she's a day. That's what I say, Mr Mac. What do you say? Older or younger, she'll rule Rosethorpe Ambrose. And I say, for the sake of the place and for the sake of trade, let's make the best of it. And Mr Mac, the man of the world, sees it in same light as I do, don't you, sir? Gentlemen, said Station Master, with his abrupt military accent and his impenetrable military manner, she's a devilish fine woman. And when I was Mr Armadale's age, in my opinion, if her fancy had laid that way, she might have married me. With that expression of opinion, the Station Master wheeled to the right and entranced himself impregnably in stronghold of his own office. The citizens of Thurpe Ambrose looked at closed door and craved shook their heads. Mr Mac had disappointed them. No opinion which openly recognizes the frilty of human nature is ever a popular opinion with mankind. It's as good as saying that any of us might have married her if we had been Mr Armadale's age. Such was the general impression on the minds of the conclave when the meeting had been adjourned and the members were leaving the station. The last of the party to go was a slow old gentleman with habit of deliberately looking about him. Posing at the door, this observant person stared up the platform and down the platform and discovered in the later direction standing behind an angle of the wall an elderly man in black who had escaped notice of everybody up to that time. Why, bless my soul, said the old gentleman advancing inquisitively by a step at a time. It can't be Mr Bashwood. It was Mr Bashwood. Mr Bashwood, whose constitutional curiosity had taken him privately to the station, bent on solving the mystery of Alan's sudden journey to London. Mr Bashwood, who had seen and heard behind this angle in the wall what everybody else had seen and heard and who appeared to have been impressed by it in no ordinary way. He stood stiffly against the wall like a man petrified with one hand pressed on his bare head and the other holding his head. He stood with the doll flush on his face and the doll staring his eyes looking straight into the black depths of the tunnel outside station as if the train to London had disappeared in it but a moment before. Is your head bad? asked the old gentleman. Take my advice. Go home and lie down. Mr Bashwood listened mechanically with his usual attention and answered mechanically with his usual politeness. Yes, sir. He said in a low, lost tone like a man between dreaming and waking I'll go home and lie down. That's right. Rejoice the old gentleman making for the door. And take a pill, Mr Bashwood. Take a pill. Five minutes later the porter charged with the business of locking up the station from Mr Bashwood, still standing bare-headed against wall until looking straight into the black depths of the tunnel as if the train to London had disappeared in it but a moment since. Come, sir, said the porter. I must lock up. Are you out of sorts? Anything wrong with your inside? Try a drop of gin and bitters. Yes, said Mr Bashwood during the porter, exactly as he has answered the old gentleman. I'll try a drop of gin and bitters. The porter choking by the arm and let him out. You'll get it there, said the man, pointing confidentially to a public house and you'll get it good. I shall get it there, echoed Mr Bashwood still mechanically repeating what was said to him and I shall get it good. His will seemed to be paralyzed, his action depended absolutely on what other people told him to do. He took a few steps in the direction of the public house, hesitated, staggered and caught the pillar of one of the station lamps near him. The porter followed and took him by the arm once more. Why, even drinking already, exclaimed the man with a suddenly quickened interest in Mr Bashwood's case. What was it, beer? Mr Bashwood, in his low, lost tones, echoed last word. It was close on the porter's dinner time, but when lower orders of the English people believed they have discovered an intoxicated man, their sympathy with him is boundless. The porter let's dinner take its chance and carefully insisted Mr Bashwood to reach the public house. Gin and bitters will put you on your legs again. Whisper this emeritus and set a right of the alcoholic disasters of mankind. If Mr Bashwood had really been intoxicated, the effect of the porter's remedy would have been marvelous indeed. Almost as soon as the glass was emptied, the stimulant did its work. The long, weakened nervous system of the deputy steward, prostrated for the moment by the shock that had fallen on it, rallied again like a weary horse under the spore. The doll flushed on its cheeks, the doll staring in his eyes, disappeared simultaneously. After a momentary effort, he recovered memory enough of what had passed the thanked porter and asked whether he would take something himself. There was a creature instantly accepted at those of his own remedy, in the capacity of a preventive, and went home to dinner as only those men can go home who are physically harmed by gin and bitters and morally elevated by the performance of a good action. Still strangely abstracted, but conscious now of the way by which he went, Mr Bashwood left the public house a few minutes later in his turn. He walked on mechanically in his dreary black garment, moving like a block on the white surface of the sun-brighted road, as mid-winter had seen him move in the early days of Thorpe Ambrose when they had first met. Arrived at point where he had to choose between the way that led into the town and the way that led to the great house, he stopped incapable of deciding, and careless, apparently, even of making the attempt. Albee revenged on her. He whispered to himself, still observed in his jealous frenzy of rage against the woman who had deceived him. Albee revenged on her. He repeated, in louder tone, if I spend every half penny I've got. Some women, of the disorderly sort, passed him on their way to the town, heard him. Hey, you old brute! They called out with a measureless license of their class. Whatever she did, she served you right. The coursoness of the voice startled him, whether he comprehended the words or not. He shrank away from more interruption and more insult into the quieter road that led to the great house. At the solitary place by the wayside, he stopped and sat down. He took off his hat and lifted his youthful wing a little from his bald, old head, and tried desperately to get behind one immovable conviction which lay on his mind like lead, the conviction that misquilt had been purposely deceiving him from the first. It was useless. No effort would free him from that one dominant impression and from the one answering idea that it had evoked, the idea of revenge. He got up again and put on his hat and walked rapidly forward a little way, then churned without knowing why, and slowly walked back again. If I had only dressed a little smarter, said the poor wretch helplessly, if I had only been a little bolder with her, she might have overlooked my being an old man. The angry fit returned on him. He clenched his clammy, trembling hands, and shook them fiercely in empty air. I'll be revenged on her, he reiterated, I'll be revenged on her if I spend every half penny I've got. It was terribly suggestive of the old she had taken on him that his vindictive sense of injury could not get far enough away from her to reach the man whom he believed to be his rival even yet. In his rage, as in his love, he was absorbed, body and soul, by misquilt. In a moment more, the noise of running wheels approaching from behind startled him. He churned and looked round. There was Mr. Pethgift, the elder, rapidly overtaking him in the gig, just as Mr. Pethgift had overtaken him once already, on that former occasion when he, at least under the window at Great House, and when the lawyer had bluntly charged him with feeling a curiosity about misquilt. In an instant the inevitable connection of ideas burst on his mind. The opinion of misquilt, which he had heard lawyer express to Alan of parting, flashed back into his memory, side by side, with Mr. Pethgift's sarcastic approval of anything in the way of the inquiry which his own curiosity might have chained. I may be even there yet, he thought, if Mr. Pethgift will help me. Stop, sir, he calls out desperately, as the gig came up with him. If you please, sir, I want to speak with you. Pethgift's senior slackened the pace of his fast-rotting mare without pulling up. Come to the office in half an hour, he said. I'm busy now. Without waiting for an answer, without noticing Mr. Bashwood's bow, he gave the mare drain again, and was out of sight in another minute. Mr. Bashwood sat down once more in a shady place by the roadside. He appeared to be incapable of feeling any slight but one unportable slight put upon him by misquilt. He not only declined to resent, he even made the best at Mr. Pethgift's unceremonious treatment of him. Half an hour, he said, resignedly. Time enough to compose myself, and I won't chime. Very kind of Mr. Pethgift, though he mightn't have meant it. The sense of oppression in his head forced him once again to remove his head. He sat with it on his lap, deep in thought. His face bent low, and the wavering fingers of one hand drumming absently on the crown of the head. If Mr. Pethgift, the elder, seeing him, as he said now, could only have looked a little way into the future, the monotonously drumming hand of the deputy steward might have been strong enough, feeble as it was, to stop the lawyer by the roadside. It was the worn, wary, miserable old hand of a worn, wary, miserable old man. But it was, for all that, to use the language of Mr. Pethgift's own parting prediction to Ellen, the hand that was now destined to let light in on misquilt. Part 1 of Armadale This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Armadale by Wilkie Collins Book III Chapter 13 An Old Man's Heart A punctual to the moment when the half-hour's interval had expired, Mr. Bashwood was announced at the office as waiting to see Mr. Pethgift by special appointment. The lawyer looked up from his papers with an air of annoyance. He had totally forgotten the meeting by the roadside. See what he wants, said Pethgift senior to Pethgift junior, working in the same room with him. And if it's nothing of importance, put it off to some other time. Pethgift junior swiftly disappeared and swiftly returned. Well, asked the father. Well, answered the son, he is rather more shaky and unintelligible than usual. I can make nothing out of him except that he persists in wanting to see you. My own idea, pursued Pethgift junior, which is usual sardonic gravity, is that he is going to have a fit and that he wishes to acknowledge your uniform kindness to him by obliging you with a private view of the whole proceeding. Pethgift senior habitually matched everybody, his son included, with their own weapons. Be good enough to remember, Augustus, he rejoined that my room is not a court of law. A bad joke is not invariably followed by rows of laughter here. Let Mr. Bashwood come in. Mr. Bashwood was introduced and Pethgift junior withdrew. You mustn't bleed him, sir, whispered the incorrigible joker, as he passed the back of his father's chair, hot water bottles to the soles of his feet and a mustard plaster on the pit of his stomach. That's the modern treatment. Sit down, Bashwood, said Pethgift senior when they were alone, and don't forget that time's money, out with it, whatever it is, at the quickest possible rate and in the fewest possible words. These preliminary directions, bluntly but not at all unkindly spoken, rather increased than diminished the painful agitation under which Mr. Bashwood was suffering. He stammered more helplessly, he trembled more continuously than usual, as he made his little speech of thanks and added his apologies at the end for intruding on his patron in business hours. Everybody in the place, Mr. Pethgift, sir, knows your time is valuable. Oh, dear, yes, oh, dear, yes, most valuable, most valuable. Excuse me, sir, I'm coming out with it. Your goodness, or rather your business, no, your goodness gave me half an hour to wait, and I have thought of what I had to say and prepared it and put it short. Having got as far as that, he stopped with a pained, bewildered look. He had put it away in his memory, and now, when the time came, he was too confused to find it. And there was Mr. Pethgift mutely waiting, his face and manner expressive alike of that silent sense of the value of his own time, which every patient who had visited a great doctor, every client who has consulted a lawyer in large practice, knows so well. Have you heard the news, sir? Stammered Mr. Bashwood, shifting his ground in despair and letting the uppermost idea in his mind escape him, simply because it was the one idea in him that was ready to come out. Does it concern me? asked Pethgift senior, mercilessly brief and mercilessly straight in coming to the point. It concerns a lady, sir. No, not a lady, a young man, I ought to say, in whom you used to feel some interest. Oh, Mr. Pethgift, sir, what do you think? Mr. Armadale and Ms. Guilt have gone up to London together today. Alone, sir, alone in a carriage reserved for their two selves. Do you think he's going to marry her? Do you really think, like the rest of them, he's going to marry her? He put the question with the sudden flush in his face and the sudden energy in his manner. His sense of the value of the lawyer's time, his conviction of the greatness of the lawyer's condescension, his constitutional shyness and timidity, all yielded together to his one overwhelming interest in hearing Mr. Pethgift's answer. He was loud for the first time in his life in putting the question. After my experience of Mr. Armadale, said the lawyer, instantly hardening in look and manner, I believe him to be infatuated enough to marry Ms. Guilt a dozen times over if Ms. Guilt chose to ask him. Your news doesn't surprise me in the least, Bashwood. I'm sorry for him. I can honestly say that, though he has set my advice at defiance. And I'm more sorry still, he continued, softening again as his mind reverted to his interview with Neely under the trees of the park. I'm more sorry still for another person who shall be nameless. But what I have to do with all this and what on earth is the matter with you? He resumed, noticing for the first time the abject misery in Mr. Bashwood's manner, the blank despair in Mr. Bashwood's face which his answer had produced. Are you ill? Is there something behind the curtain that you are afraid to bring out? Do you understand it? Have you come here, here in my private room in business hours with nothing to tell me but that young Armadale has been fool enough to ruin his prospects for life? Why, I foresaw it all weeks since and what is more, I as good as told him so at the last conversation I had with him in the great house. At those last words Mr. Bashwood suddenly rallied. The lawyer's passing reference to the great house had led him back in a moment to the purpose that he had in view. That's it, sir, he said eagerly. That's what I wanted to speak to you about. That's what I've been preparing in my mind. Mr. Pedgift, sir, the last time you were at the great house when you came away in your gig you overtook me on the drive. I dare say I did remarked Pedgift resinely. My mare happens to be a trifle quicker on her legs than you are on yours, Bashwood. Go on, go on. We shall come in time, I suppose to what you are driving at. You stopped and spoke to me, sir, proceeded Mr. Bashwood, advancing more and more eagerly to his end. You said you suspected me of feeling some curiosity about Ms. Guilt and you told me, I remember the exact word, sir, you told me to gratify my curiosity by all means for you didn't object to it. Pedgift senior began for the first time to look interested in hearing more. I remember something of the sort, he replied and I also remember thinking it rather remarkable that you should happen you won't put it in any more offensive way to be exactly under Mr. Armadale's open window while I was talking to him. It might have been accident, of course, but it looks rather more like curiosity. I could only judge by appearances concluded Pedgift pointing his sarcasm with a pinch of snuff and appearances Bashwood were decidedly against you. I don't deny it, sir. I only mention the circumstance because I wish to acknowledge that I was curious and am curious about Ms. Guilt. Why? asked Pedgift senior seeing something under the surface in Mr. Bashwood's face and manner but utterly in the dark thus far as to what that something might be. There was silence for a moment. The moment passed, Mr. Bashwood took the refuge usually taken by nervous, unready men placed in a circumstances when they were at a loss for an answer. He simply reiterated the assertion that he had just made. I feel some curiosity, sir. He said with a strange mixture of doggedness and timidity about Ms. Guilt. There was another moment of silence. In spite of his practised acuteness and knowledge of the world the lawyer was more puzzled than ever. The case of Mr. Bashwood presented the one human riddle of all others which he was least qualified to solve. Though year after year witnesses in thousands and thousands of cases the remorseless disinheriting of nearest and nearest relations the unnatural breaking up of sacred family ties the deplorable severance of old and firm friendships due entirely to the intense self-absorption which the sexual passion can produce when it enters the heart of an old man the association of love with affirmity and grey hairs arouses. Nevertheless all the world over no other idea than the idea of extravagant improbability or extravagant absurdity in the general mind if the interview now taking place in Mr. Pettgif's consulting room had taken place at his dinner table instead when wine had opened his mind to humorous influences it is possible that he might, by this time have suspected the truth. But in his business hours was in the habit of investigating men's motives seriously from the business point of view and he was, on that very account simply incapable of conceiving any improbability so startling any absurdity so enormous as the absurdity and improbability of Mr. Bashford's being in love. Some men in the lawyer's position would have tried to force their way to enlightenment by obstinately repeating the unanswered question Pettgif's senior wisely postponed the question until he had moved the conversation on another step. Well, he resumed let us say you feel a curiosity about Ms. Guilt. What next? The palms of Mr. Bashford's hands began to moisten under the influence of his agitation as they had moistened in the past days when he had told the story of his domestic sorrows to midwinter at the great house. Once more he rolled his handkerchief into a ball and dabbed it softly to and fro from one hand to the other. May I ask if I am right? Sir, he began in believing that you have a very unfavourable opinion of Ms. Guilt you are quite convinced, I think. My good fellow interrupted Pettgif's senior Why need you be in any doubt about it? You were under Mr. Armadale's open window all the while I was talking to him and your ears, I presume were not absolutely shut. Mr. Bashford showed no sense of the interruption. The little sting of the lawyer's sarcasm was lost in the nobler pain that wrung him from the wound inflicted by Ms. Guilt. You are quite convinced, I think, sir, he resumed, that there are circumstances in this lady's past life which would be highly discreditable to her if they were discovered at the present time. The window was open at the great house, Bashford and your ears, I presume, were not absolutely shut. Still impenetrable to the sting, Mr. Bashford persisted more obstinately than ever. Unless I'm greatly mistaken, he said, your long experience in such things has even suggested to you, sir, that Ms. Guilt might turn out to be known by the police? Pettgif's senior's patients gave way. You've been over ten minutes in this room, he broke out. Can you or can you not tell me in plain English what you want? In plain English, the passion that had transformed him, the passion which, in Ms. Guilt's own words, had made a man of him burning in his haggard cheeks Mr. Bashford met the challenge and faced the lawyer, as the worried sheep faces the dog, on his own ground. I wish to say, sir, he answered, that your opinion in this matter is my opinion too. I believe there is something wrong in Ms. Guilt's past life which she keeps concealed from everybody and has to be the man who knows it. Pettgif's senior saw his chance and instantly reverted to the question that he had postponed. Why? He asked for the second time. For the second time Mr. Bashford hesitated. Could he acknowledge that he had been mad enough to love her and mean enough to be a spy for her? Could he say, she has received me from the first and she has deserted me, now her object is served? After robbing me of my happiness, robbing me of my honour, robbing me of my last hope left in life she has gone from me forever and left me nothing but my old man's longing slow and sly and strong and changeless for revenge. Revenge that I may have if I can poison her success by dragging her frailties into the public view revenge that I'll buy for what is gold or what is life to me with the last farthing of my hoarded memory and the last drop of my stagnant blood could he say that to the man who sat waiting for his answer? No, he could only crush it down and be silent. The lawyer's expression began to harden once more. One of us must speak out, he said, and as you evidently won't, I will. I can only account for this extraordinary anxiety of yours to make yourself acquainted with Ms. Gould's secrets in one of two ways. Your motive is either an excessively mean one, no offence, Bashwood. I'm only putting the case or an excessively generous one. After my experience of your honest character and your creditable conduct it is only your due that I should absolve you at once of the mean motive. I believe you are as incapable as I am, I can say no more of turning to mercenary account any discoveries you might make to Ms. Gould's prejudice in Ms. Gould's past life. Shall I go on any further? Or would you prefer, on second thoughts, opening your mind frankly to me of your own accord? I should prefer not interrupting you, sir, said Mr. Bashwood. As you please, pursued, bed-gift senior, having absolved you of the mean motive, I come to the generous motive next. It is possible that you are an unusually grateful man and it is certain that Mr. Armadale has been remarkably kind to you. After employing you under Mr. Midwinter in the steward's office he has had confidence enough in your honesty and your capacity. Now his friend has left him to put his business entirely and underservedly in your hands. It's not in my experience of human nature but it may be possible, nevertheless, that you are so gratefully sensible of that confidence and so gratefully interested in your employer's welfare that you can't see him in his friendless position going straight to his own disgrace and ruin without making an effort to put it in two words. Is it your idea that Mr. Armadale might be prevented from marrying Miss Guilt if he could be informed in time of a real character? And do you wish to be the man who opens his eyes to the truth? If that is the case he stopped in astonishment acting under some uncontrollable impulse Mr. Bashwood had started to his feet. He stood with his without face lit up by a sudden irradiation from within which made him look younger than his age by a good twenty years. He stood gasping for breath enough to speak and gesticulated entreatingly at the lawyer with both hands. Say it again, sir. He burst out eagerly recovering his breath before Pedgift Senior had recovered his surprise. The question about Mr. Armadale, sir, only once more, only once more Mr. Pedgift, please. With his practised observation closely and distrustfully at work on Mr. Bashwood's face, Pedgift Senior motioned to him to sit down again and put the question for the second time. Do I think, said Mr. Bashwood, repeating the sense but not the words of the question that Mr. Armadale might be parted from Miss Guilt if she could be shown to him as she really is? Yes, sir. And do I wish to be the man who does it? Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. It is rather strange, remarked the lawyer, looking at him more and more distrustfully, that you should be so violently agitated simply because my question happens to have hit the mark. The question happened to have hit a mark which Pedgift little dreamed of. It had released Mr. Bashwood's mind in an instant from the dead pressure of his one dominant idea of revenge and had shown him a purpose to be achieved by the discovery of Miss Guilt's secrets which had never occurred to him till that moment. The marriage which he had blinded regarded as inevitable was a marriage that might be stopped not in Alan's interest but in his own and the woman whom he believed that he had lost might yet in spite of circumstances be a woman one. His brain whirled as he thought of it. His own aroused resolution almost daunted him by its terrible incongruity with all the familiar habits of his mind and all the customary proceedings of his life. Finding his last remark and answered Pedgift's senior considered a little before he said anything more. One thing is clear we send the lawyer with himself. His true motive in this matter is a motive which he is afraid to avow. My question evidently offered him a chance of misleading me and he has accepted it on the spot. That's enough for me. If I was Mr. Armadale's lawyer the mystery might be worth investigating. As things are it's no interest of mine to hunt Mr. Bashwood from one to another till I run him to earth at last. I have nothing whatever to do with it and I shall leave him free to follow his own roundabout courses in his own roundabout way. Having arrived at that conclusion Pedgift's senior pushed back his chair and rose briskly to terminate the interview. Don't be alarmed Bashwood he began. The subject of our conversation is a subject exhausted so far as I am concerned. I have only a few last words to say and it's a habit of mine as you know to say my last words on my legs. Whatever else I may be in the dark about I have made one discovery at any rate. I have found out what you really want with me at last you want me to help you. If you would be so very very kind sir stammered Mr. Bashwood if you would only give me the great advantage of your opinion and advice. Wait a bit Bashwood we will separate those two things if you please. A lawyer may offer an opinion like any other man but when a lawyer gives his advice by the Lord Harry sure it's professional you are welcome to my opinion in this matter. I have disguised it from nobody. I believe there have been events in Ms. Gwill's career which if they could be discovered would even make Mr. Armadale infatuated as he is afraid to marry her. Supposing of course that he really is going to marry her for though the appearances are in favor of it so far it is only an assumption after all. As to the mode of proceeding by which the blots on this woman's character might or might not be brought to light in time she may be married by license in a fortnight if she likes. That is a branch of the question on which I positively declined to enter. It implies speaking in my character as a lawyer and giving you what I declined positively to give you my professional advice. Oh sir don't say that pleaded Mr. Bashwood. Don't deny me the great favor the inestimable advantage of your advice I have such a poor head Mr. Pettgift. I'm so old and so slow sir and I get so sadly startled and worried when I'm thrown out of my ordinary ways. It's quite natural you should be a little impatient with me for taking up your time. I know that time is money to a clever man like you would you excuse me would you please excuse me if I venture to say that I saved a little something a few pounds sir and being quite lonely with nobody dependent on me I'm sure I may spend my savings as I please blinds to every consideration but the one consideration of propitiating Mr. Pettgift he took out a dingy ragged old pocket book and tried with trembling fingers to open it on the lawyer's table. Put your pocket book back directly said Pettgift's senior richer men than you have tried that argument with me and have found that there is such a thing off the stage as a lawyer who is not to be bright I will have nothing to do with the case under existing circumstances if you want to know why I beg to inform you that Ms. Guilt sees to be professionally interesting to me on the day when I seized to be Mr. Armadale's lawyer I may have other reasons besides which I don't think it necessary to mention the reason already given is explicit enough go your own way and take your responsibility on your own shoulders you may venture within reach of Ms. Guilt's clause and come out again without being scratched time will show in the meanwhile I wish you good morning and I own to my shame that I never knew till today what a hero you were this time Mr. Batchwood felt the sting without another word of expostulation or entreaty without even saying good morning on his side he walked to the door opened it softly and left the room and off chapter 13 part 1 book 3 chapter 8 part 2 of Armadale this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Armadale by Wilkie Collins chapter 8 part 2 the parting look in his face and the sudden silence that had fallen on him were not lost on pet give senior Batchwood will end badly said the lawyer shuffling his papers and returning impenetrably to his interrupted work the change in Mr. Batchwood's face and manner to something dogged and self-contained was so startlingly uncharacteristic of him that it even forced itself on the notice of pet give junior and the clerks as he passed through the outer office a custom to make the old man there but they took a boisterously comic view of the marked alteration in him deaf to the merciless Ray the Ray with which he was assailed on all sides he stopped opposite young pet gift and looking him attentively in the face said in a quiet absent manner like a man thinking aloud I wonder whether you would help me open an account instantly said pet give junior to the clerks in the name of Mr. Batchwood place a chair for Mr. Batchwood with the footstool close by in case he wants it supply me with a choir of extra double woe satin paper and a gross of picked quills to take notes of Mr. Batchwood's case and inform my father instantly that I'm going to leave him and set up in business for myself on the strength of Mr. Batchwood's patronage take a seat sir pray take a seat and express your feelings freely still impenetrably deaf to the Ray the Ray of which he was the object Mr. Batchwood waited until pet gift junior had exhausted himself and then turned quietly away I ought to have known better he said in the same absent manner as before he is his father's son all over he would make game of me on my deathbed he paused a moment at the door mechanically brushing his hat with his hand and went out into the street the bright sunshine dazzled his eyes the passing vehicles and foot passengers startled and bewildered him he shrank into a by street and put his hands over his eyes I'd better go home he thought and shut myself up and think about it in my own room his lodging was in the small house in the poor quarter of the town he let himself in with his key and stole softly upstairs the one little room he possessed met him cruelly look round at where he might with silent memorials of Miss Guilt on the chimney piece were the flowers she had given him at various times all withered long since and all preserved on a little china pedestal protected by a glass chain on the wall hung a wretched colored print of a woman which she had caused to be nicely framed and glazed because there was a look in it that reminded him of her face in his clumsy old mahogany writing desk were the few letters brief and peremptory which she had written to him at the time when he was watching and listening meanly at Thor Bambro's to please her and when turning his back on these he sat down weirdly on his sofa bedstead there hanging over one end of it was the gaudy cravat of blue satin which he had bought because she had told him she liked bright colors and which he had never yet had the courage to wear though he had taken it out morning after morning with the resolution to put it on habitually quiet in his actions habitually restrained in his language he now sees the cravat as if it was a living thing that could feel and flung it to the other end of the room with an oath the time passed and still though his resolution to stand between Miss Guilt and her marriage remained unbroken he was as far as ever from discovering the means which might lead him to this end the more he thought and thought of it the darker and the darker his course in the future looked to him he rose again as slowly as he had sat down and went to his cupboard I'm feverish and thirsty he said a cup of tea may help me he opened his canister and measured out his small allowance of tea less carefully than usual even my own hands won't serve me today he thought as he scraped together the few grains of tea that he had spilled and put them carefully back in the canister in that fine summer weather the one fire in the house was the kitchen fire he went downstairs for the boiling water with his teapot in his hand nobody but the landlady was in the kitchen she was one of the many English matrons whose path through this world is a path of thorns and who take a dismal pleasure whenever the opportunity is afforded them in inspecting the scratched and bleeding feet of other people in a light condition with themselves her one vice was of the lighter sort the vice of curiosity and among the many counterbalancing virtues she possessed was the virtue of greatly respecting Mr. Bashwood as a lodger whose rent was regularly paid and whose ways were always quiet and civil from one year's end to another what did you please to want sir asked the landlady boiling water is it did you ever know the water boil when you wanted it did you ever see a sulkier fire than that I'll put a sticker or two in if you'll wait a little and give me the chance dear dear me you'll excuse my mention it sir but how poorly you do look today the strain on Mr. Bashwood's mind was beginning to tell something of the helplessness which he had shown at the station appeared again in his face and manner as he put his teapot on the kitchen table and sat down I'm in trouble ma'am he said quietly and I find trouble gets harder to bear than it used to be ah you may well say that grown the landlady I'm ready for the undertaker Mr. Bashwood when my time comes whatever you may be you're too lonely sir when you're in trouble it's some help though not much to shift a share of it off on another person's shoulders if you're a good lady and only been alive now sir what a comfort you would have found her wouldn't you a momentary spasm of pain passed across Mr. Bashwood's face the landlady had ignorantly recalled him to the misfortunes of his married life he had been long since forced to quiet her curiosity about his family affairs by telling her that he was a widower and that his domestic circumstances had not been happy ones but he had taken her further into his confidence than this the sad story which he had related to midwinter of his drunken wife who had ended her miserable life in a lunatic asylum was the story which he had shrunk from confiding to the talkative woman who would have confided it in her turn to everyone else in the house what I always say to my husband when he's low sir pursued the landlady intent is what would you do now Sam without me when his temper don't get the better of him it will boil directly Mr. Bashwood he says Elizabeth I could do nothing when his temper does get the better of him he says I should try the public house Mrs and I'll try it now ah I've got my troubles a man with grown up sons and daughters tippling in a public house I don't call to mind Mr. Bashwood whether you ever had any sons and daughters and yet no I think of it I seem to fancy you said yes you had daughters sir weren't they and ah dear dear to be sure all dead I had one daughter ma'am said Mr. Bashwood patiently only one who died before she was a year old only one repeated the sympathizing landlady it's as near boring as it ever will be sir give me the teapot only one ah it comes heavier don't it when it's an only child you said it was an only child I think didn't you sir for a moment Mr. Bashwood looked at the woman with bank and eyes and without attempting to answer her after ignorantly recalling the memory of the wife who had disgraced him she was now as ignorantly forcing him back on the miserable remembrance of the son who had ruined and deserted him for the first time since he had told his story to midwinter at their introductory interview in the great house his mind reverberated once more to the bitter disappointment and disaster of the past again he thought of the bygone days when he had become security for his son and when that son's dishonesty had forced him to sell everything he possessed to pay the forfeit that was exacted when the forfeit was due I have a son ma'am he said becoming conscience that the landlady was looking at him in mute and melancholy surprise I did my best to help him forward in the world and he has behaved very badly to me did he now rejoin the landlady with an appearance of the greatest interest behaved badly to you almost broke your heart didn't he ah it will come home to him sooner or later don't you fear honor your father and mother wasn't put on Moses's tables of stone for nothing Mr. Bashwin where may he be and what is he doing now sir the question was in effect almost the same as the question which midwinter had put the circumstances had been described to him as Mr. Bashwin had answered it on the former occasion so in nearly the same words he answered it now my son is in London ma'am for all I know to the contrary he was employed when I last heard of him in no very credible way at the private inquiry office at those words he suddenly checked himself his face flushed he pushed away the cup which had just been filled for him and rose from his seat the landlady started back a step there was something in her lodger's face that she had never seen in it before I hope I've not offended you sir said the woman recovering her self-possession and looking a little too ready to take offence on her side at a moment's notice far from it ma'am far from it in a strangely eager, hurried way I've just remembered something something very important I must go upstairs it's a letter, a letter a letter I'll come back to my team ma'am I beg your pardon, I much obliged you you've been very kind I'll say goodbye if you'll allow me for the present to the landlady's amazement he cordially shook hands with her and made for the door he and teapot to take care of themselves the moment he reached his own room he locked himself in for a little while he stood holding by the chimney-piece waiting to recover his breath the moment he could move again he opened his writing-desk on the table that for you, Mr. Pedagift and son, he said with a snap of his fingers as he sat down I've got a son too there was a knock at the door a knock soft considerate and confidential the anxious landlady wished to know whether Mr. Bashwood was ill and begged to intimate for the second time that she earnestly trusted she had given him no offence no, no, he called through the door I'm quite well, I'm writing ma'am, I'm writing pleased to excuse me she's a good woman, she's an excellent woman he thought when the landlady had retired I'll make her a little present my mind so unsettled I might never have thought of it, but for her oh, if my boy is at the office still oh, if I can only write a letter that will make him pity me he took up his pen and sat thinking anxiously thinking long before he touched the paper slowly, with many patient pauses to think and think again and with more than ordinary care to make his writing legible he traced these lines my dear James you will be surprised I'm afraid to see my handwriting pray don't suppose I'm going to ask you for money or to reproach you for having sold me out of house and home when you forfeited your security and I had to pay I'm willing and anxious to let bygones be bygones and to forget the past it is in your power if you are still at the private inquiry office to do me a great service I am in sore anxiety and trouble on the subject of a person in whom I am interested the person is lady please, don't make game of me for confessing this if you can help it if you knew what I am now suffering I think you would be more inclined to pity than to make game of me I would enter into particular as only I know your quick temper and I fear exhausting your patience perhaps it may be enough to say that I have reason to believe the lady's past life has not been a very credible one and that I am interested more interested than words can tell in finding out what her life has really been and in making the discovery within a fortnight from the present time though I know very little about the ways of business in an office like yours I can understand that without first having the lady's present address nothing can be done to help me unfortunately I am not yet acquainted with her present address I only know that she went to town today accompanied by a gentleman in whose employment I now am and who as I believe will be likely to write to me for money before many days more are over his head is this circumstance of a nature to help us I venture to say us because I count already my dear boy on your kind assistance and advice don't let money stand between us I have saved a little something and it is all freely at your disposal pray pray write to me by return of post if you will only try your best to end the dreadful suspense under which I am now suffering you will atone for all the grief and disappointment you caused me in times that are past I will confer an obligation that he will never forget on your affectionate father Felix Bashwood after waiting a little while to dry his eyes Mr. Bashwood added the date and address and directed the letter to his son at the private inquiry office shady side place London that done he went out at once and posted his letter with his own hands it was then Monday and if the answer was sent by return of post the answer would be received on Wednesday morning the interval day, the Tuesday was passed by Mr. Bashwood in the stewards office at the great house he had a double motive for absorbing himself as deeply as might be in the various occupations connected with the management of the estate in the first place employment helped him to control the devouring impatience with which he looked for the coming of the next day in the second place the more forward he was with the business of the office the more free he would be to join his son in London without attracting suspicion to himself by openly neglecting the interest placed under his charge toward the Tuesday afternoon vague rumors of something wrong at the cottage found their way through major Milroy's servants to the servants at the great house and attempted ineffectually to engage the attention of Mr. Bashwood impenetrably fixed on other things the major and Miss Neely had been shut up together in mysterious conference and Miss Neely's appearance after the close of the interview plainly showed that she had been crying this had happened on the Monday afternoon and on the next day that present Tuesday the major had startled the household by announcing briefly that his daughter wanted to change to the heir of the seaside and that he proposed taking her himself by the next train too low-staffed the two had gone away together but very serious and silent but both apparently very good friends for all that opinions at the great house attributed this domestic revolution to the reports current on the subject of Allen and Miss Guilt opinions at the cottage rejected that solution of the difficulty on practical grounds Miss Neely had remained in excessively shut up in her own room from the Monday afternoon to the Tuesday morning when her father took her away the major during the same interval had not been outside the door and had spoken to nobody and Mrs. Millroy at the first attempt of her new attendant to inform her of the prevailing scandal in the town while the servants lived by flying to one of her terrible passions the instant Miss Guilt's name was mentioned something must have happened, of course to make major Millroy and his daughter so suddenly from home but that something was certainly not Mr. Armondale's scandalous elopement in broad daylight with Miss Guilt the afternoon passed and the evening passed and no other event happened which had taken place at the cottage nothing occurred for nothing in the nature of things could occur to dissipate the delusion on which Miss Guilt had counted the delusion which all Thorpe Ambrose now shared with Mr. Bashwood that she had gone privately to London with Allen in the character of Allen's future wife on the Wednesday morning the postman entering the street was encountered by Mr. Bashwood himself so eager to know if there was a letter for him that he had come out without his hat there was a letter for him the letter that he longed for from his vagabond son these were the terms with which Bashwood the Younger answered his father's supplication for help after having previously ruined his father's prospects for life Shadyside Place Tuesday July 29 my dear dad we have some little practice in dealing with mysteries at this office but the mystery of your letter beats me all together are you speculating on the interesting hidden frailties of some charming woman or after your experience of matrimony are you actually going to give me a stepmother at this time of day whichever it is upon my life your letter interests me I am not joking mind though the temptation is not an easy one to resist on the contrary I have given you a quarter of an hour of my valuable time already the place you date from sounded somehow familiar to me I referred back to the memorandum book and found that I was sent down to Thorpe Ambrose to make private inquiries not very long since my employer was a lively old lady who was too sly to give us her right name and address as a matter of course we set to work at once and found out who she was her name is Mrs. Oldershaw and if you think of her for my stepmother I strongly recommend you do think again before you make her Mrs. Bashwood if it is not Mrs. Oldershaw then all I can do so far is tell you how you may find out the unknown ladies address come to tell yourself as soon as you get the letter you expect from a gentleman who has gone away with her I hope he is not a handsome young man for your sake and call here I will send somebody to help you in watching his hotel or lodgings and if he communicates with the lady or the lady with him you may consider her address discovered from that moment once let me identify her and know where she is and you shall see all her charming little secrets as plainly as you see the paper on which your affectionate son is now writing to you a word more about the terms I am as willing as you are to be friends again but though I own you were out of pocket by me once I can't afford to be out of pocket by you it must be understood that you are answerable for all the expenses of the inquiry we may have to employ some of the women attached to this office if your lady is too wide awake or too nice looking to be dealt with by a man there will be cab hire and postage stamps admissions to public amusements if she is inclined that way she leans for pew openers if she is serious and takes our people into churches to hear popular preachers and so on my own professional services you shall have gratis but I can't lose by you as well only remember that and you shall have your way you shall be bygones and we will forget the past your affectionate son James Bashwood in the ecstasy of seeing help placed at last within his reach the father put his sons atrocious letter to his lips my good boy he murmured tenderly my dear good boy he put the letter down and fell into a new train of thought the next question to face was what time Mr. Pedgift had told him Miss Squilt might be married in a fortnight one day of the fourteen had passed already and another was passing he beat his hand patiently on the table at his side wondering how soon the want of money would force Alan to write to him from London tomorrow he asked himself or next day tomorrow passed and nothing happened the next day came and the letter arrived and it was on business as he had anticipated it asked for money as he had anticipated and there at the end of it in a post-script was the address added concluding with the words you may count on my staying here till further notice he gave one deep gasp of relief and instantly busied himself though there were nearly two hours to spare the train started for London impacting his bag the last thing he put in was his blue satin cravat she likes bright colours he said and she may see me in it yet end of chapter 8 book III chapter 14 part 1 of Armadale this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer visit LibriVox.org recording by Nadine Karpoulé Armadale by Wilkie Collins 14 Miss Gueld's Diary All Saints to Race New Root London July 28 Monday night I can hardly hold my head up I am so tired but in my situation I dare not trust anything to memory before I go to bed I must write my customary record of the events of the day so far the turn of luck in my favour it was long enough before it took the turn seems likely to continue I succeeded in forcing Armadale the brute required nothing short of forcing to leave Thorpe Ambrose for London alone in the same carriage with me before all the people in the station there was a full attendance of dealers in small scandal all staring hard at us and all evidently drawing their own conclusions either I know nothing of Thorpe Ambrose or the town gossip is busy enough by this time with Mr. Armadale and Miss Gueld I had some difficulty with him for the first half hour after we left the station the God the delightful man I felt so grateful to him had shut us up together in expectation of half a crown at the end of the journey Armadale was suspicious of me and he showed it plainly little by little I tamed my wild beast partly by taking care to display no curiosity about his journey to town and partly by interesting him on the subject of his friend midwinter dwelling especially on the opportunity that now offered itself a reconciliation between them I kept harping on this string till I said his tongue going and made him amuse me as a gentleman is bound to do when he has the honor of escorting a lady on a long railway journey what little mind he has was full, of course of his own affairs and Miss Marois no words can express the clumsiness he showed in trying to talk about himself without taking me into his confidence all mentioning Miss Marois name he was going to London he gravely informed me on a matter of indescribable interest to him it was a secret for the present but he hoped to tell it me soon it had made a great difference already in the way in which he looked at the slander spoken of him in Thorpe Ambrose he was too happy to care what the longest thread of him now and he should soon stop their mouth by appearing in a new character that would surprise them all so he plundered on with the firm persuasion that he was keeping me quiet in the dark it was hard not to laugh when I thought of my anonymous letter on its way to the major but I managed to control myself though I must own with some difficulty as the time wore on I began to feel a terrible excitement the position was I think a little too much for me there I was alone with him talking in the most innocent easy familiar manner and having it in my mind all the time to brush his life out of my way when the moment comes as I might brush a stain of my gown it made my blood leap and my cheeks flush I caught myself loving once or twice much louder than I ought and long before we got to London I thought it desirable to put my face in hiding by pulling down my vein there was no difficulty on reaching the terminus in getting him to come in the cab with me to the hotel where midwinter is staying he was all eagerness to be reconciled with his dear friend principally I have no doubt because he wants the dear friend to lend a helping hand to the elopement the real difficulty lay, of course with midwinter my certain journey to London had allowed me no opportunity of writing to combat his superstitious conviction that he and his former friend are better apart I thought it wise to leave Armadale in the cab at the door and to go into the hotel by myself to pave the way for him fortunately midwinter had not gone out he is still light at seeing me some days sooner than he had hoped had something infectious in it I suppose poo! I may own the truth to my own diary there was a moment when I forgot everything in the world but our two selves as completely as he did I felt as if I was back in my teens until I remembered the loud in the cab at the door 5 and 30 again in an instant his face altered when he heard who was below and what it was I wanted of him he looked not angry but distressed he yielded however before long not to my reasons for I gave him none but to my entreaties his old fondness for his friend might possibly have had some share in persuading him against his will but my own opinion entirely under the influence of his fondness for me I waited in the sitting room while he went down to the door so I knew nothing of what passed between them when they first saw each other again but oh the difference between the two men when the interval had passed and they came upstairs together and joined me they were both agitated but in such different ways the hateful armadale so loud and red and clumsy the dear, lovable midwinter so pale and quiet with such a gentleness in his voice when he spoke and such tenderness in his eyes every time they turned my way armadale overlooked me as completely as if I had not been in the room he referred to me over and over again in the conversation he constantly looked at me to see what I thought while I sat in my corner silently watching them he wanted to go with me and see me safe to my logins and spare me all trouble with the cab man and the luggage when I thanked him and declined armadale looked unaffectedly relieved at the prospect of seeing my back turned and of having his friend all to himself I left him with his awkward elbows half over the table scrolling a letter from his mirror and shouting to the waiter that he wanted to bed at the hotel I had calculated on his staying as a matter of course where he found his friend staying it was pleasant to find my anticipations realized and to know that I have as good as got him now under my own eye after promising to let midwinter know where he could see me tomorrow I went away in the cab to hunt for lodgings for myself with some difficulty I have succeeded in getting an undurable sitting room and bedroom in this house where the people are perfect strangers to me having paid a weeks rent in advance for I naturally preferred dispensing with a reference I find myself with exactly three shillings and nine pence left in my purse it is impossible to ask midwinter for money after he has already paid Mrs. Aldershaw's note of hand I must borrow something tomorrow on my watch and chain at the Pwn Brokers enough to keep me going for a fortnight is all and more than all that I want in that time or in less than that time midwinter will have married me July 29th two o'clock early in the morning I sent a line to midwinter telling him that he would find me here at three this afternoon that done I devoted the morning to two errands of my own one is hardly worth mentioning it was only to raise money on my watch and chain I got more than I expected and more even supposing I buy myself one or two little things in the way of cheap summer dress than I am at all likely to spend before the wedding day the other errand was of a far more serious kind it led me into an attorney's office I was well aware last night though I was too wary to put it down in my diary that I could not possibly see midwinter this morning in the position he now occupies toward me without at least appearing to take him into my confidence on the subject of myself and my circumstances accepting one necessary consideration which I must be careful not to overlook there is not the least difficulty in my drawing on my invention and telling him any story I please for thus far I have told no story to anybody midwinter went away to London before it was possible to approach the subject as to the mere rise having provided them with a customary reference I could fortunately keep them at arms length on all questions relating purely to myself and lastly when I affected my reconciliation with Armadale on the drive in front of the house he was full enough to be too generous to let me defend my character when I had expressed my regret for having lost my temper and threatened Miss Miroy and when I had accepted his assurance that my pupil had never done or meant to do me any injury he was too magnanimous to hear a word on the subject and grab it affairs thus I am quite unfettered by any former assertions of my own and I may tell any story I please with the one drawback hinted at already in the shape of a restraint whatever I may invent in the way of pure fiction I must preserve the character in which I have appeared at Thorpe Ambrose for with the notoriety that is attached to my other name and no other choice but to marry Midwinter in my maiden name as Miss Gwilt this was the consideration that took me into the lawyer's office I felt that I must inform myself before I saw Midwinter later in the day of any awkward consequences that may follow the marriage of a widow if she conceals her widow's name knowing of no other professional person whom I could trust I went boldly to the lawyer I had my interest in his charge at that terrible pastime in my life which I have more reason than ever to shrink from thinking of now he was astonished and, as I could plainly detect, by no means pleased to see me I had hardly opened my lips before he said he hoped I was not consulting him again with a strong emphasis on the word on my own account I took the hint and put the question I had come to ask in the interest of that accommodating personage on such occasions an absent friend the lawyer evidently saw through it at once but he was sharp enough to turn my friend to good account on his side he said he would answer the question as a matter of courtesy toward a lady represented by myself but he must make it a condition that this consultation of him by deputy should go no further I accepted his terms for I really respected the clever manner in which he contrived to keep me at arm's length without violating the laws of good breeding in two minutes I heard what he had to say mastered it in my own mind and went out short as it was the consultation told me everything I wanted to know I risked nothing by marrying midwinter in my maiden of my widow's name the marriage is a good marriage in this way that it can only be set aside if my husband finds out the imposter and takes proceedings to invalidate our marriage in my lifetime that is the lawyer's answer in the lawyer's own words it relieves me at once in this direction at any rate of all apprehension about the future the only imposter my husband will ever discover and then only if he happens to be on the spot is the imposter that puts me in the place and gives me the income of Armaday's widow and by that time I shall have invalidated my own marriage forever half past two midwinter will be here in half an hour I must go and ask my glass how I look I must rouse my invention and make up my little domestic romance am I feeling nervous about it something flutters in the place where my heart used to be at five and thirty two and after such life as mine six o'clock he has just gone the day for our marriage is a day determined on already I have tried to rest and recover myself I can't rest I have come back to these leaves there is much to be written in them since midwinter has been here that concerns me nearly let me begin with what I hate most to remember and so be the sooner done with it let me begin with the paltry string of falsehoods which I told him about my family troubles what can be the secret of these men's hold on me how is it that he alters me so that I hardly know myself again I was like myself in the railway carriage yesterday with Armaday it was surely frightful to be talking to the living man through the whole of that long journey with the knowledge in me all the while that I meant to be his widow and yet I was only excited and fevered hour after hour I never shrunk once from speaking to Armaday but the first trumpery falsehood I told midwinter turned me cold when I saw that he believed it I felt a dreadful hysterical choking in the throat when he entreated me not to reveal all my troubles and once I am horrified when I think of it once when he said if I could love you more dearly I should love you more dearly now I was within a hair breadth of turning traitor to myself I was on the very point of crying out to him lies all lies I'm a fiend in human shape marry the wretchedest creature that prowls the streets will marry a better woman than me yes the seeing his eyes moisten the hearing his voice tremble while I was deceiving him shook me in that way I have seen handsomer men by hundreds cleverer men by dozens what can these men have roused in me is it love I thought I had loved never to love again does a woman not love when the man's hardness to her to drown herself a man drove me to that last despair in days gone by did all my misery at that time come from something which was not love have I lived to be five and thirty and am I only feeling now what love really is now when it is too late ridiculous besides what is the use of asking what do I know about it what does any woman ever know the more we think of it the more we deceive ourselves I wish I had been born an animal my beauty might have been of some use to me then it might have got me a good master here is the whole page of my diary field and nothing written yet that is of the slightest use to me my miserable made up story must be told over again here while the incidents are fresh in my memory or how am I to refer to it consistently on after occasions when I may be obliged to speak of it again there was nothing new in what I told him it was the commonplace rubbish of the circulating libraries a dead father a lost fortune vagabond brothers whom I dread ever seeing again a bed-ridden mother dependent on my exertions I waited down I hate myself I despise myself when I remember that he believed it because I said it that he was distressed by it because it was my story I will face the chances of contradicting myself I will risk discovery and ruin anything rather than dwell on that contemptible deception of him a moment longer my lies came to an end at last and then he talked to me about his prospects oh what a relief it was to turn to that at the time what a relief it is to come to it now he has accepted the offer about which he wrote to me at Thorpe Ambrose and he is now engaged as occasional foreign correspondent to the new newspaper his first destination is Naples I wish it had been some other place for I have certain past associations with Naples which I am not interested to renew it has been arranged that he is to leave England not later than the 11th of next month by that time therefore I who am to go with him must go with him as his wife there is not the slightest difficulty about the marriage all this part of it is so easy that I begin to dread an accident the proposal to keep the thing strictly private which it might have embarrassed me to make comes from Midwinter marrying me in his own name the name that he has kept concealed from every living creature but myself and Mr. Brock it is his interest that not a soul who knows him should be present at the ceremony his friend Armaday least of all he has been a week in London already when another week has passed he proposes to get the license and to be married in the church belonging to the parish in which the hotel is situated these are the only necessary formalities I had but to say yes he told me and to feel no further anxiety about the future I said yes with such a devouring anxiety about the future that I was afraid he would see it what minutes the next few minutes were when he whispered delicious words to me while I hid my face on his breast I recovered myself first and led him back to the subject of Armaday having my own reasons for wanting to know what they said to each other after I had left them yesterday the manner in which Midwinter replied showed me that he was speaking under the restraint of respecting a confidence placed in him by his friend long before he had done I detected what the confidence was Armaday had been consulting him exactly as I anticipated on the subject of the allotment although he appears to have remonstrated against taking the girl secretly away from her home Midwinter seems to have felt some delicacy about speaking strongly remembering widely different as the circumstances are that he was contemplating a private marriage himself I gathered at any rate that he had produced very little effect by what he had said and that Armaday had already carried out his absurd intention of consulting the head clerk in the office of his London lawyers having got as far as this Midwinter put the question which I felt must come sooner or later he asked if I objected to our engagement being mentioned in the strictest secrecy to his friend I will answer he said respecting any confidence that I place in him and I will undertake when the time comes so to use my influence over him as to prevent his being present at the marriage and discovering what he must never know that my name is the same as his own it would help me he went on to speak more strongly about the object that has brought him to London if I can require the frankness with which he has spoken of his private affairs to me the same frankness on my side I had no choice but to give the necessary permission and I gave it it is of the utmost importance to me to know what cause Major Miroid takes with his daughter and Armaday after receiving my anonymous letter and unless I invite Armaday's confidence in some way I am nearly certain to be kept in the dark let him once be trusted with the knowledge that I am to be Armaday's wife and what he tells his friend about his love affair he will tell me when it had been understood between us that Armaday must be taken into our confidence we began to talk about ourselves again how the time flew what a sweet enchantment it was to forget everything in his arms how he loves me oh poor fellow how he loves me I have promised him tomorrow morning in the regents' park the less he is seen here the better the people in this house are strangers to me certainly but it may be wise to consult appearances as if I was still at Thorpe Ambrose and not to produce the impression even on their minds that midwinter is engaged to me if any after inquiries are made when I have run my grand risk the testimony of my London landlady might be testimony worth having that wretched old Bashwood writing of Thorpe Ambrose reminds me of him what will he say when the town gossip tells him that Armaday has taken me to London in a carriage reserved for ourselves it really is too absurd in a man of Bashwood's age and appearance to presume to be in love July 30th news at last Armaday has heard from Miss Mirroy my anonymous letter has produced its effect the girl is removed from Thorpe Ambrose already and the whole project of the elopement is blown to the winds at once and forever this was the substance of what midwinter had to tell me when I met him in the park I effected to be excessively astonished and to feel the necessary feminine longing to know all the particulars not that I expect to have my curiosity satisfied I added for Mr Armaday and I are little better than mere acquaintances after all you are far more than a mere acquaintance in Anand's eyes, said midwinter having your permission to trust him I have already told him how near and dear you are to me hearing this I thought it desirable before I put any questions about Miss Mirroy to my own interests first and to find out what effect the announcement of my coming marriage had produced on Armaday it was possible that he might be still suspicious of me and that the inquiries he made in London at Mrs Mirroy's instigation might be still hanging on his mind did Mr Armaday seem surprised I asked when you told him of our engagement and when you said it was to be kept a secret from everybody he seemed greatly surprised said midwinter to hear that we were going to be married all he said when I told him it must be kept a secret was that he supposed there were reasons on your side for making the marriage a private one what did you say I inquired when he made that remark I said the reasons were on my side and said midwinter and I thought it right to add considering that Alan had allowed himself to be misled by the ignorant distrust of you at Thorpe Ambrose that you had confided to me the whole of your sad family story and that you had amply justified your unwillingness under any ordinary circumstances to speak of your private affairs I breathed freely again he had said just what was wanted just in the right way thank you I said for putting me right in your friend's estimation does he wish to see me headed by way of getting back to the other subject of mismira and the elopement he is longing to see you return midwinter he is in great distress poor fellow distress which I have done my best to soothe but which I believe would yield far more readily to a woman's sympathy than to mine where is he now I asked he was at the hotel and to the hotel I instantly proposed it is a busy crowded place and with my veil down I have less fear of compromising myself there than at my quiet lodgings besides it is vitally important to me to know what Armadale does next under this total change of circumstances for I must so control his proceedings as to get him away from England if I can we took a cab such was my eagerness to sympathize with the heartbroken lover that we took a cab end of part one