The Woman in White (63 page)

I open a new page. I advance my narrative by one week.

The history of the interval which I thus pass over must remain
unrecorded. My heart turns faint, my mind sinks in darkness and
confusion when I think of it. This must not be, if I who write am
to guide, as I ought, you who read. This must not be, if the clue
that leads through the windings of the story is to remain from end
to end untangled in my hands.

A life suddenly changed—its whole purpose created afresh, its
hopes and fears, its struggles, its interests, and its sacrifices
all turned at once and for ever into a new direction—this is the
prospect which now opens before me, like the burst of view from a
mountain's top. I left my narrative in the quiet shadow of
Limmeridge church—I resume it, one week later, in the stir and
turmoil of a London street.

The street is in a populous and a poor neighbourhood. The ground
floor of one of the houses in it is occupied by a small
newsvendor's shop, and the first floor and the second are let as
furnished lodgings of the humblest kind.

I have taken those two floors in an assumed name. On the upper
floor I live, with a room to work in, a room to sleep in. On the
lower floor, under the same assumed name, two women live, who are
described as my sisters. I get my bread by drawing and engraving
on wood for the cheap periodicals. My sisters are supposed to
help me by taking in a little needlework. Our poor place of
abode, our humble calling, our assumed relationship, and our
assumed name, are all used alike as a means of hiding us in the
house-forest of London. We are numbered no longer with the people
whose lives are open and known. I am an obscure, unnoticed man,
without patron or friend to help me. Marian Halcombe is nothing
now but my eldest sister, who provides for our household wants by
the toil of her own hands. We two, in the estimation of others,
are at once the dupes and the agents of a daring imposture. We
are supposed to be the accomplices of mad Anne Catherick, who
claims the name, the place, and the living personality of dead
Lady Glyde.

That is our situation. That is the changed aspect in which we
three must appear, henceforth, in this narrative, for many and
many a page to come.

In the eye of reason and of law, in the estimation of relatives
and friends, according to every received formality of civilised
society, "Laura, Lady Glyde," lay buried with her mother in
Limmeridge churchyard. Torn in her own lifetime from the list of
the living, the daughter of Philip Fairlie and the wife of
Percival Glyde might still exist for her sister, might still exist
for me, but to all the world besides she was dead. Dead to her
uncle, who had renounced her; dead to the servants of the house,
who had failed to recognise her; dead to the persons in authority,
who had transmitted her fortune to her husband and her aunt; dead
to my mother and my sister, who believed me to be the dupe of an
adventuress and the victim of a fraud; socially, morally, legally—
dead.

And yet alive! Alive in poverty and in hiding. Alive, with the
poor drawing-master to fight her battle, and to win the way back
for her to her place in the world of living beings.

Did no suspicion, excited by my own knowledge of Anne Catherick's
resemblance to her, cross my mind, when her face was first
revealed to me? Not the shadow of a suspicion, from the moment
when she lifted her veil by the side of the inscription which
recorded her death.

Before the sun of that day had set, before the last glimpse of the
home which was closed against her had passed from our view, the
farewell words I spoke, when we parted at Limmeridge House, had
been recalled by both of us—repeated by me, recognised by her.
"If ever the time comes, when the devotion of my whole heart and
soul and strength will give you a moment's happiness, or spare you
a moment's sorrow, will you try to remember the poor drawing-
master who has taught you?" She, who now remembered so little of
the trouble and terror of a later time, remembered those words,
and laid her poor head innocently and trustingly on the bosom of
the man who had spoken them. In that moment, when she called me
by my name, when she said, "They have tried to make me forget
everything, Walter, but I remember Marian, and I remember YOU"—in
that moment, I, who had long since given her my love, gave her my
life, and thanked God that it was mine to bestow on her. Yes! the
time had come. From thousands on thousands of miles away—through
forest and wilderness, where companions stronger than I had fallen
by my side, through peril of death thrice renewed, and thrice
escaped, the Hand that leads men on the dark road to the future
had led me to meet that time. Forlorn and disowned, sorely tried
and sadly changed—her beauty faded, her mind clouded—robbed of
her station in the world, of her place among living creatures—the
devotion I had promised, the devotion of my whole heart and soul
and strength, might be laid blamelessly now at those dear feet.
In the right of her calamity, in the right of her friendlessness,
she was mine at last! Mine to support, to protect, to cherish, to
restore. Mine to love and honour as father and brother both.
Mine to vindicate through all risks and all sacrifices—through
the hopeless struggle against Rank and Power, through the long
fight with armed deceit and fortified Success, through the waste
of my reputation, through the loss of my friends, through the
hazard of my life.

My position is defined—my motives are acknowledged. The story of
Marian and the story of Laura must come next.

I shall relate both narratives, not in the words (often
interrupted, often inevitably confused) of the speakers
themselves, but in the words of the brief, plain, studiously
simple abstract which I committed to writing for my own guidance,
and for the guidance of my legal adviser. So the tangled web will
be most speedily and most intelligibly unrolled.

The story of Marian begins where the narrative of the housekeeper
at Blackwater Park left off.

On Lady Glyde's departure from her husband's house, the fact of
that departure, and the necessary statement of the circumstances
under which it had taken place, were communicated to Miss Halcombe
by the housekeeper. It was not till some days afterwards (how
many days exactly, Mrs. Michelson, in the absence of any written
memorandum on the subject, could not undertake to say) that a
letter arrived from Madame Fosco announcing Lady Glyde's sudden
death in Count Fosco's house. The letter avoided mentioning
dates, and left it to Mrs. Michelson's discretion to break the
news at once to Miss Halcombe, or to defer doing so until that
lady's health should be more firmly established.

Having consulted Mr. Dawson (who had been himself delayed, by ill
health, in resuming his attendance at Blackwater Park), Mrs.
Michelson, by the doctor's advice, and in the doctor's presence,
communicated the news, either on the day when the letter was
received, or on the day after. It is not necessary to dwell here
upon the effect which the intelligence of Lady Glyde's sudden
death produced on her sister. It is only useful to the present
purpose to say that she was not able to travel for more than three
weeks afterwards. At the end of that time she proceeded to London
accompanied by the housekeeper. They parted there—Mrs. Michelson
previously informing Miss Halcombe of her address, in case they
might wish to communicate at a future period.

On parting with the housekeeper Miss Halcombe went at once to the
office of Messrs. Gilmore & Kyrle to consult with the latter
gentleman in Mr. Gilmore's absence. She mentioned to Mr. Kyrle
what she had thought it desirable to conceal from every one else
(Mrs. Michelson included)—her suspicion of the circumstances
under which Lady Glyde was said to have met her death. Mr. Kyrle,
who had previously given friendly proof of his anxiety to serve
Miss Halcombe, at once undertook to make such inquiries as the
delicate and dangerous nature of the investigation proposed to him
would permit.

To exhaust this part of the subject before going farther, it may
be mentioned that Count Fosco offered every facility to Mr. Kyrle,
on that gentleman's stating that he was sent by Miss Halcombe to
collect such particulars as had not yet reached her of Lady
Glyde's decease. Mr. Kyrle was placed in communication with the
medical man, Mr. Goodricke, and with the two servants. In the
absence of any means of ascertaining the exact date of Lady
Glyde's departure from Blackwater Park, the result of the doctor's
and the servants' evidence, and of the volunteered statements of
Count Fosco and his wife, was conclusive to the mind of Mr. Kyrle.
He could only assume that the intensity of Miss Halcombe's
suffering, under the loss of her sister, had misled her judgment
in a most deplorable manner, and he wrote her word that the
shocking suspicion to which she had alluded in his presence was,
in his opinion, destitute of the smallest fragment of foundation
in truth. Thus the investigation by Mr. Gilmore's partner began
and ended.

Meanwhile, Miss Halcombe had returned to Limmeridge House, and had
there collected all the additional information which she was able
to obtain.

Mr. Fairlie had received his first intimation of his niece's death
from his sister, Madame Fosco, this letter also not containing any
exact reference to dates. He had sanctioned his sister's proposal
that the deceased lady should be laid in her mother's grave in
Limmeridge churchyard. Count Fosco had accompanied the remains to
Cumberland, and had attended the funeral at Limmeridge, which took
place on the 30th of July. It was followed, as a mark of respect,
by all the inhabitants of the village and the neighbourhood. On
the next day the inscription (originally drawn out, it was said,
by the aunt of the deceased lady, and submitted for approval to
her brother, Mr. Fairlie) was engraved on one side of the monument
over the tomb.

On the day of the funeral, and for one day after it, Count Fosco
had been received as a guest at Limmeridge House, but no interview
had taken place between Mr. Fairlie and himself, by the former
gentleman's desire. They had communicated by writing, and through
this medium Count Fosco had made Mr. Fairlie acquainted with the
details of his niece's last illness and death. The letter
presenting this information added no new facts to the facts
already known, but one very remarkable paragraph was contained in
the postscript. It referred to Anne Catherick.

The substance of the paragraph in question was as follows—

It first informed Mr. Fairlie that Anne Catherick (of whom he
might hear full particulars from Miss Halcombe when she reached
Limmeridge) had been traced and recovered in the neighbourhood of
Blackwater Park, and had been for the second time placed under the
charge of the medical man from whose custody she had once escaped.

This was the first part of the postscript. The second part warned
Mr. Fairlie that Anne Catherick's mental malady had been
aggravated by her long freedom from control, and that the insane
hatred and distrust of Sir Percival Glyde, which had been one of
her most marked delusions in former times, still existed under a
newly-acquired form. The unfortunate woman's last idea in
connection with Sir Percival was the idea of annoying and
distressing him, and of elevating herself, as she supposed, in the
estimation of the patients and nurses, by assuming the character
of his deceased wife, the scheme of this personation having
evidently occurred to her after a stolen interview which she had
succeeded in obtaining with Lady Glyde, and at which she had
observed the extraordinary accidental likeness between the
deceased lady and herself. It was to the last degree improbable
that she would succeed a second time in escaping from the Asylum,
but it was just possible she might find some means of annoying the
late Lady Glyde's relatives with letters, and in that case Mr.
Fairlie was warned beforehand how to receive them.

The postscript, expressed in these terms, was shown to Miss
Halcombe when she arrived at Limmeridge. There were also placed
in her possession the clothes Lady Glyde had worn, and the other
effects she had brought with her to her aunt's house. They had
been carefully collected and sent to Cumberland by Madame Fosco.

Such was the posture of affairs when Miss Halcombe reached
Limmeridge in the early part of September.

Shortly afterwards she was confined to her room by a relapse, her
weakened physical energies giving way under the severe mental
affliction from which she was now suffering. On getting stronger
again, in a month's time, her suspicion of the circumstances
described as attending her sister's death still remained unshaken.
She had heard nothing in the interim of Sir Percival Glyde, but
letters had reached her from Madame Fosco, making the most
affectionate inquiries on the part of her husband and herself.
Instead of answering these letters, Miss Halcombe caused the house
in St. John's Wood, and the proceedings of its inmates, to be
privately watched.

Nothing doubtful was discovered. The same result attended the
next investigations, which were secretly instituted on the subject
of Mrs. Rubelle. She had arrived in London about six months
before with her husband. They had come from Lyons, and they had
taken a house in the neighbourhood of Leicester Square, to be
fitted up as a boarding-house for foreigners, who were expected to
visit England in large numbers to see the Exhibition of 1851.
Nothing was known against husband or wife in the neighbourhood.
They were quiet people, and they had paid their way honestly up to
the present time. The final inquiries related to Sir Percival
Glyde. He was settled in Paris, and living there quietly in a
small circle of English and French friends.