"Likely enough, Mr. Armadale. But the major and Miss Neelie don"t see it in that light, at any rate. I had my eye on them both when the governess told them that Mrs. Milroy had sent for her. If ever I saw a girl look thoroughly frightened, Miss Milroy was that girl; and (if I may be allowed, in the strictest confidence, to libel a gallant soldier) I should say that the major himself was much in the same condition. Take my word for it, sir, there"s something wrong upstairs in that pretty cottage of yours; and Miss Gwilt is mixed up in it already!"
There was a minute of silence. When the voices were next heard by Midwinter, they were further away from the house--Allan was probably accompanying young Pedgift a few steps on his way back.
After a while, Allan"s voice was audible once more under the portico, making inquiries after his friend; answered by the servant"s voice giving Midwinter"s message. This brief interruption over, the silence was not broken again till the time came for shutting up the house. The servants" footsteps pa.s.sing to and fro, the clang of closing doors, the barking of a disturbed dog in the stable-yard--these sounds warned Midwinter it was getting late. He rose mechanically to kindle a light.
But his head was giddy, his hand trembled; he laid aside the match-box, and returned to his chair. The conversation between Allan and young Pedgift had ceased to occupy his attention the instant he ceased to hear it; and now again, the sense that the precious time was failing him became a lost sense as soon as the house noises which had awakened it had pa.s.sed away. His energies of body and mind were both alike worn out; he waited with a stolid resignation for the trouble that was to come to him with the coming day.
An interval pa.s.sed, and the silence was once more disturbed by voices outside; the voices of a man and a woman this time. The first few words exchanged between them indicated plainly enough a meeting of the clandestine kind; and revealed the man as one of the servants at Thorpe Ambrose, and the woman as one of the servants at the cottage.
Here again, after the first greetings were over, the subject of the new governess became the all-absorbing subject of conversation.
The major"s servant was brimful of forebodings (inspired solely by Miss Gwilt"s good looks) which she poured out irrepressibly on her "sweetheart," try as he might to divert her to other topics. Sooner or later, let him mark her words, there would be an awful "upset" at the cottage. Her master, it might be mentioned in confidence, led a dreadful life with her mistress. The major was the best of men; he hadn"t a thought in his heart beyond his daughter and his everlasting clock. But only let a nice-looking woman come near the place, and Mrs. Milroy was jealous of her--raging jealous, like a woman possessed, on that miserable sick-bed of hers. If Miss Gwilt (who was certainly good-looking, in spite of her hideous hair) didn"t blow the fire into a flame before many days more were over their heads, the mistress was the mistress no longer, but somebody else. Whatever happened, the fault, this time, would lie at the door of the major"s mother. The old lady and the mistress had had a dreadful quarrel two years since; and the old lady had gone away in a fury, telling her son, before all the servants, that, if he had a spark of spirit in him, he would never submit to his wife"s temper as he did. It would be too much, perhaps, to accuse the major"s mother of purposely picking out a handsome governess to spite the major"s wife. But it might be safely said that the old lady was the last person in the world to humor the mistress"s jealousy, by declining to engage a capable and respectable governess for her granddaughter because that governess happened to be blessed with good looks. How it was all to end (except that it was certain to end badly) no human creature could say. Things were looking as black already as things well could. Miss Neelie was crying, after the day"s pleasure (which was one bad sign); the mistress had found fault with n.o.body (which was another); the master had wished her good-night through the door (which was a third); and the governess had locked herself up in her room (which was the worst sign of all, for it looked as if she distrusted the servants).
Thus the stream of the woman"s gossip ran on, and thus it reached Midwinter"s ears through the window, till the clock in the stable-yard struck, and stopped the talking. When the last vibrations of the bell had died away, the voices were not audible again, and the silence was broken no more.
Another interval pa.s.sed, and Midwinter made a new effort to rouse himself. This time he kindled the light without hesitation, and took the pen in hand.
He wrote at the first trial with a sudden facility of expression, which, surprising him as he went on, ended in rousing in him some vague suspicion of himself. He left the table, and bathed his head and face in water, and came back to read what he had written. The language was barely intelligible; sentences were left unfinished; words were misplaced one for the other. Every line recorded the protest of the weary brain against the merciless will that had forced it into action.
Midwinter tore up the sheet of paper as he had torn up the other sheets before it, and, sinking under the struggle at last, laid his weary head on the pillow. Almost on the instant, exhaustion overcame him, and before he could put the light out he fell asleep.
He was roused by a noise at the door. The sunlight was pouring into the room, the candle had burned down into the socket, and the servant was waiting outside with a letter which had come for him by the morning"s post.
"I ventured to disturb you, sir," said the man, when Midwinter opened the door, "because the letter is marked "Immediate," and I didn"t know but it might be of some consequence."
Midwinter thanked him, and looked at the letter. It _was_ of some consequence--the handwriting was Mr. Brock"s.
He paused to collect his faculties. The torn sheets of paper on the floor recalled to him in a moment the position in which he stood. He locked the door again, in the fear that Allan might rise earlier than usual and come in to make inquiries. Then--feeling strangely little interest in anything that the rector could write to him now--he opened Mr. Brock"s letter, and read these lines:
"Tuesday.
"MY DEAR MIDWINTER--It is sometimes best to tell bad news plainly, in few words. Let me tell mine at once, in one sentence. My precautions have all been defeated: the woman has escaped me.
"This misfortune--for it is nothing less--happened yesterday (Monday).
Between eleven and twelve in the forenoon of that day, the business which originally brought me to London obliged me to go to Doctors"
Commons, and to leave my servant Robert to watch the house opposite our lodging until my return. About an hour and a half after my departure he observed an empty cab drawn up at the door of the house. Boxes and bags made their appearance first; they were followed by the woman herself, in the dress I had first seen her in. Having previously secured a cab, Robert traced her to the terminus of the North-Western Railway, saw her pa.s.s through the ticket office, kept her in view till she reached the platform, and there, in the crowd and confusion caused by the starting of a large mixed train, lost her. I must do him the justice to say that he at once took the right course in this emergency. Instead of wasting time in searching for her on the platform, he looked along the line of carriages; and he positively declares that he failed to see her in any one of them. He admits, at the same time, that his search (conducted between two o"clock, when he lost sight of her, and ten minutes past, when the train started) was, in the confusion of the moment, necessarily an imperfect one. But this latter circ.u.mstance, in my opinion, matters little. I as firmly disbelieve in the woman"s actual departure by that train as if I had searched every one of the carriages myself; and you, I have no doubt, will entirely agree with me.
"You now know how the disaster happened. Let us not waste time and words in lamenting it. The evil is done, and you and I together must find the way to remedy it.
"What I have accomplished already, on my side, may be told in two words.
Any hesitation I might have previously felt at trusting this delicate business in strangers" hands was at an end the moment I heard Robert"s news. I went back at once to the city, and placed the whole matter confidentially before my lawyers. The conference was a long one, and when I left the office it was past the post hour, or I should have written to you on Monday instead of writing to-day. My interview with the lawyers was not very encouraging. They warn me plainly that serious difficulties stand in the way of our recovering the lost trace. But they have promised to do their best, and we have decided on the course to be taken, excepting one point on which we totally differ. I must tell you what this difference is; for, while business keeps me away from Thorpe Ambrose, you are the only person whom I can trust to put my convictions to the test.
"The lawyers are of opinion, then, that the woman has been aware from the first that I was watching her; that there is, consequently, no present hope of her being rash enough to appear personally at Thorpe Ambrose; that any mischief she may have it in contemplation to do will be done in the first instance by deputy; and that the only wise course for Allan"s friends and guardians to take is to wait pa.s.sively till events enlighten them. My own idea is diametrically opposed to this.
After what has happened at the railway, I cannot deny that the woman must have discovered that I was watching her. But she has no reason to suppose that she has not succeeded in deceiving me; and I firmly believe she is bold enough to take us by surprise, and to win or force her way into Allan"s confidence before we are prepared to prevent her.
"You and you only (while I am detained in London) can decide whether I am right or wrong--and you can do it in this way. Ascertain at once whether any woman who is a stranger in the neighborhood has appeared since Monday last at or near Thorpe Ambrose. If any such person has been observed (and n.o.body escapes observation in the country), take the first opportunity you can get of seeing her, and ask yourself if her face does or does not answer certain plain questions which I am now about to write down for you. You may depend on my accuracy. I saw the woman unveiled on more than one occasion, and the last time through an excellent gla.s.s.
"1. Is her hair light brown, and (apparently) not very plentiful? 2. Is her forehead high, narrow, and sloping backward from the brow? 3. Are her eyebrows very faintly marked, and are her eyes small, and nearer dark than light--either gray or hazel (I have not seen her close enough to be certain which)? 4. Is her nose aquiline? 5 Are her lips thin, and is the upper lip long? 6. Does her complexion look like an originally fair complexion, which has deteriorated into a dull, sickly paleness? 7 (and lastly). Has she a retreating chin, and is there on the left side of it a mark of some kind--a mole or a scar, I can"t say which?
"I add nothing about her expression, for you may see her under circ.u.mstances which may partially alter it as seen by me. Test her by her features, which no circ.u.mstances can change. If there is a stranger in the neighborhood, and if her face answers my seven questions, _you have found the woman_! Go instantly, in that case, to the nearest lawyer, and pledge my name and credit for whatever expenses may be incurred in keeping her under inspection night and day. Having done this, take the speediest means of communicating with me; and whether my business is finished or not, I will start for Norfolk by the first train.
"Always your friend, DECIMUS BROCK."
Hardened by the fatalist conviction that now possessed him, Midwinter read the rector"s confession of defeat, from the first line to the last, without the slightest betrayal either of interest or surprise. The one part of the letter at which he looked back was the closing part of it.
"I owe much to Mr. Brock"s kindness," he thought; "and I shall never see Mr. Brock again. It is useless and hopeless; but he asks me to do it, and it shall be done. A moment"s look at her will be enough--a moment"s look at her with his letter in my hand--and a line to tell him that the woman is here!"
Again he stood hesitating at the half-opened door; again the cruel necessity of writing his farewell to Allan stopped him, and stared him in the face.
He looked aside doubtingly at the rector"s letter. "I will write the two together," he said. "One may help the other." His face flushed deep as the words escaped him. He was conscious of doing what he had not done yet--of voluntarily putting off the evil hour; of making Mr. Brock the pretext for gaining the last respite left, the respite of time.
The only sound that reached him through the open door was the sound of Allan stirring noisily in the next room. He stepped at once into the empty corridor, and meeting no one on the stairs, made his way out of the house. The dread that his resolution to leave Allan might fail him if he saw Allan again was as vividly present to his mind in the morning as it had been all through the night. He drew a deep breath of relief as he descended the house steps--relief at having escaped the friendly greeting of the morning, from the one human creature whom he loved!
He entered the shrubbery with Mr. Brock"s letter in his hand, and took the nearest way that led to the major"s cottage. Not the slightest recollection was in his mind of the talk which had found its way to his ears during the night. His one reason for determining to see the woman was the reason which the rector had put in his mind. The one remembrance that now guided him to the place in which she lived was the remembrance of Allan"s exclamation when he first identified the governess with the figure at the pool.
Arrived at the gate of the cottage, he stopped. The thought struck him that he might defeat his own object if he looked at the rector"s questions in the woman"s presence. Her suspicions would be probably roused, in the first instance, by his asking to see her (as he had determined to ask, with or without an excuse), and the appearance of the letter in his hand might confirm them.
She might defeat him by instantly leaving the room. Determined to fix the description in his mind first, and then to confront her, he opened the letter; and, turning away slowly by the side of the house, read the seven questions which he felt absolutely a.s.sured beforehand the woman"s face would answer.
In the morning quiet of the park slight noises traveled far. A slight noise disturbed Midwinter over the letter.
He looked up and found himself on the brink of a broad gra.s.sy trench, having the park on one side and the high laurel hedge of an inclosure on the other. The inclosure evidently surrounded the back garden of the cottage, and the trench was intended to protect it from being damaged by the cattle grazing in the park.
Listening carefully as the slight sound which had disturbed him grew fainter, he recognized in it the rustling of women"s dresses. A few paces ahead, the trench was crossed by a bridge (closed by a wicket gate) which connected the garden with the park. He pa.s.sed through the gate, crossed the bridge, and, opening a door at the other end, found himself in a summer-house thickly covered with creepers, and commanding a full view of the garden from end to end.
He looked, and saw the figures of two ladies walking slowly away from him toward the cottage. The shorter of the two failed to occupy his attention for an instant; he never stopped to think whether she was or was not the major"s daughter. His eyes were riveted on the other figure--the figure that moved over the garden walk with the long, lightly falling dress and the easy, seductive grace. There, presented exactly as he had seen her once already--there, with her back again turned on him, was the Woman at the pool!
There was a chance that they might take another turn in the garden--a turn back toward the summer-house. On that chance Midwinter waited. No consciousness of the intrusion that he was committing had stopped him at the door of the summer-house, and no consciousness of it troubled him even now. Every finer sensibility in his nature, sinking under the cruel laceration of the past night, had ceased to feel. The dogged resolution to do what he had come to do was the one animating influence left alive in him. He acted, he even looked, as the most stolid man living might have acted and looked in his place. He was self-possessed enough, in the interval of expectation before governess and pupil reached the end of the walk, to open Mr. Brock"s letter, and to fortify his memory by a last look at the paragraph which described her face.
He was still absorbed over the description when he heard the smooth rustle of the dresses traveling toward him again. Standing in the shadow of the summer-house, he waited while she lessened the distance between them. With her written portrait vividly impressed on his mind, and with the clear light of the morning to help him, his eyes questioned her as she came on; and these were the answers that her face gave him back.
The hair in the rector"s description was light brown and not plentiful.
This woman"s hair, superbly luxuriant in its growth, was of the one unpardonably remarkable shade of color which the prejudice of the Northern nations never entirely forgives--it was _red_! The forehead in the rector"s description was high, narrow, and sloping backward from the brow; the eyebrows were faintly marked; and the eyes small, and in color either gray or hazel. This woman"s forehead was low, upright, and broad toward the temples; her eyebrows, at once strongly and delicately marked, were a shade darker than her hair; her eyes, large, bright, and well opened, were of that purely blue color, without a tinge in it of gray or green, so often presented to our admiration in pictures and books, so rarely met with in the living face. The nose in the rector"s description was aquiline. The line of this woman"s nose bent neither outward nor inward: it was the straight, delicately molded nose (with the short upper lip beneath) of the ancient statues and busts. The lips in the rector"s description were thin and the upper lip long; the complexion was of a dull, sickly paleness; the chin retreating and the mark of a mole or a scar on the left side of it. This woman"s lips were full, rich, and sensual. Her complexion was the lovely complexion which accompanies such hair as hers--so delicately bright in its rosier tints, so warmly and softly white in its gentler gradations of color on the forehead and the neck. Her chin, round and dimpled, was pure of the slightest blemish in every part of it, and perfectly in line with her forehead to the end. Nearer and nearer, and fairer and fairer she came, in the glow of the morning light--the most startling, the most unanswerable contradiction that eye could see or mind conceive to the description in the rector"s letter.
Both governess and pupil were close to the summer-house before they looked that way, and noticed Midwinter standing inside. The governess saw him first.
"A friend of yours, Miss Milroy?" she asked, quietly, without starting or betraying any sign of surprise.
Neelie recognized him instantly. Prejudiced against Midwinter by his conduct when his friend had introduced him at the cottage, she now fairly detested him as the unlucky first cause of her misunderstanding with Allan at the picnic. Her face flushed and she drew back from the summerhouse with an expression of merciless surprise.
"He is a friend of Mr. Armadale"s," she replied sharply. "I don"t know what he wants, or why he is here."
"A friend of Mr. Armadale"s!" The governess"s face lighted up with a suddenly roused interest as she repeated the words. She returned Midwinter"s look, still steadily fixed on her, with equal steadiness on her side.
"For my part," pursued Neelie, resenting Midwinter"s insensibility to her presence on the scene, "I think it a great liberty to treat papa"s garden as if it were the open park!"
The governess turned round, and gently interposed.
"My dear Miss Milroy," she remonstrated, "there are certain distinctions to be observed. This gentleman is a friend of Mr. Armadale"s. You could hardly express yourself more strongly if he was a perfect stranger."
"I express my opinion," retorted Neelie, chafing under the satirically indulgent tone in which the governess addressed her. "It"s a matter of taste, Miss Gwilt; and tastes differ." She turned away petulantly, and walked back by herself to the cottage.