Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (756 page)

“Your position with your wife, Arnold,” resumed Sir Patrick, returning gravely to the matter in hand, “is certainly a difficult one.” He paused, thinking of the evening when he and Blanche had illustrated the vagueness of Mrs. Inchbare’s description of the man at the inn, by citing Arnold himself as being one of the hundreds of innocent people who answered to it! “Perhaps,” he added, “the situation is even more difficult than you suppose. It would have been certainly easier for
you
— and it would have looked more honourable in
her
estimation — if you had made the inevitable confession before your marriage. I am, in some degree, answerable for your not having done this — as well as for the far more serious dilemma with Miss Silvester in which you now stand. If I had not innocently hastened your marriage with Blanche, Miss Silvester’s admirable letter would have reached us in ample time to prevent mischief. It’s useless to dwell on that now. Cheer up, Arnold! I am bound to show you the way out of the labyrinth, no matter what the difficulties may be — and, please God, I will do it!”

He pointed to a table at the other end of the room, on which writing materials were placed. “I hate moving the moment I have had my breakfast,” he said. “We won’t go into the library. Bring me the pen and ink here.”

“Are you going to write to Miss Silvester?”

“That is the question before us which we have not settled yet. Before I decide, I want to be in possession of the facts — down to the smallest detail of what took place between you and Miss Silvester at the inn. There is only one way of getting at those facts. I am going to examine you as if I had you before me in the witness-box in court.”

With that preface, and with Arnold’s letter from Baden in his hand as a brief to speak from, Sir Patrick put his questions in clear and endless succession; and Arnold patiently and faithfully answered them all.

The examination proceeded uninterruptedly until it had reached that point in the progress of events at which Anne had crushed Geoffrey Delamayn’s letter in her hand, and had thrown it from her indignantly to the other end of the room. There, for the first time, Sir Patrick dipped his pen in the ink, apparently intending to take a note. “Be very careful here,” he said; “I want to know every thing that you can tell me about that letter.”

“The letter is lost,” said Arnold.

“The letter has been stolen by Bishopriggs,” returned Sir Patrick, “and is in the possession of Bishopriggs at this moment.”

“Why, you know more about it than I do!” exclaimed Arnold.

“I sincerely hope not. I don’t know what was inside the letter. Do you?”

“Yes. Part of it at least.”

“Part of it?”

“There were two letters written, on the same sheet of paper,” said Arnold. “One of them was written by Geoffrey Delamayn — and that is the one I know about.”

Sir Patrick started. His face brightened; he made a hasty note. “Go on,” he said, eagerly. “How came the letters to be written on the same sheet? Explain that!”

Arnold explained that Geoffrey, in the absence of any thing else to write his excuses on to Anne, had written to her on the fourth or blank page of a letter which had been addressed to him by Anne herself.

“Did you read that letter?” asked Sir Patrick.

“I might have read it if I had liked.”

“And you didn’t read it?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Out of delicacy.”

Even Sir Patrick’s carefully trained temper was not proof against this. “That is the most misplaced act of delicacy I ever heard of in my life!” cried the old gentleman, warmly. “Never mind! it’s useless to regret it now. At any rate, you read Delamayn’s answer to Miss Silvester’s letter?”

“Yes — I did.”

“Repeat it — as nearly as you can remember at this distance of time.”

“It was so short,” said Arnold, “that there is hardly any thing to repeat. As well as I remember, Geoffrey said he was called away to London by his father’s illness. He told Miss Silvester to stop where she was; and he referred her to me, as messenger. That’s all I recollect of it now.”

“Cudgel your brains, my good fellow! this is very important. Did he make no allusion to his engagement to marry Miss Silvester at Craig Fernie? Didn’t he try to pacify her by an apology of some sort?”

The question roused Arnold’s memory to make another effort.

“Yes,” he answered. “Geoffrey said something about being true to his engagement, or keeping his promise or words to that effect.”

“You’re sure of what you say now?”

“I am certain of it.”

Sir Patrick made another note.

“Was the letter signed?” he asked, when he had done.

“Yes.”

“And dated?”

“Yes.” Arnold’s memory made a second effort, after he had given his second affirmative answer. “Wait a little,” he said. “I remember something else about the letter. It was not only dated. The time of day at which it was written was put as well.”

“How came he to do that?”

“I suggested it. The letter was so short I felt ashamed to deliver it as it stood. I told him to put the time — so as to show her that he was obliged to write in a hurry. He put the time when the train started; and (I think) the time when the letter was written as well.”

“And you delivered that letter to Miss Silvester, with your own hand, as soon as you saw her at the inn?”

“I did.”

Sir Patrick made a third note, and pushed the paper away from him with an air of supreme satisfaction.

“I always suspected that lost letter to be an important document,” he said — ”or Bishopriggs would never have stolen it. We must get possession of it, Arnold, at any sacrifice. The first thing to be done (exactly as I anticipated), is to write to the Glasgow lawyer, and find Miss Silvester.”

“Wait a little!” cried a voice at the veranda. “Don’t forget that I have come back from Baden to help you!”

Sir Patrick and Arnold both looked up. This time Blanche had heard the last words that had passed between them. She sat down at the table by Sir Patrick’s side, and laid her hand caressingly on his shoulder.

“You are quite right, uncle,” she said. “I
am
suffering this morning from the malady of having nothing to do. Are you going to write to Anne? Don’t. Let me write instead.”

Sir Patrick declined to resign the pen.

“The person who knows Miss Silvester’s address,” he said, “is a lawyer in Glasgow. I am going to write to the lawyer. When he sends us word where she is — then, Blanche, will be the time to employ your good offices in winning back your friend.”

He drew the writing materials once more with in his reach, and, suspending the remainder of Arnold’s examination for the present, began his letter to Mr. Crum.

Blanche pleaded hard for an occupation of some sort. “Can nobody give me something to do?” she asked. “Glasgow is such a long way off, and waiting is such weary work. Don’t sit there staring at me, Arnold! Can’t you suggest something?”

Arnold, for once, displayed an unexpected readiness of resource.

“If you want to write,” he said, “you owe Lady Lundie a letter. It’s three days since you heard from her — and you haven’t answered her yet.”

Sir Patrick paused, and looked up quickly from his writing-desk.

“Lady Lundie?” he muttered, inquiringly.

“Yes,” said Blanche. “It’s quite true; I owe her a letter. And of course I ought to tell her we have come back to England. She will be finely provoked when she hears why!”

The prospect of provoking Lady Lundie seemed to rouse Blanche s dormant energies. She took a sheet of her uncle’s note-paper, and began writing her answer then and there.

Sir Patrick completed his communication to the lawyer — after a look at Blanche, which expressed any thing rather than approval of her present employment. Having placed his completed note in the postbag, he silently signed to Arnold to follow him into the garden. They went out together, leaving Blanche absorbed over her letter to her step-mother.

“Is my wife doing any thing wrong?” asked Arnold, who had noticed the look which Sir Patrick had cast on Blanche.

“Your wife is making mischief as fast as her fingers can spread it.”

Arnold stared. “She must answer Lady Lundie’s letter,” he said.

“Unquestionably.”

“And she must tell Lady Lundie we have come back.”

“I don’t deny it.”

“Then what is the objection to her writing?”

Sir Patrick took a pinch of snuff — and pointed with his ivory cane to the bees humming busily about the flower-beds in the sunshine of the autumn morning.

“I’ll show you the objection,” he said. “Suppose Blanche told one of those inveterately intrusive insects that the honey in the flowers happens, through an unexpected accident, to have come to an end — do you think he would take the statement for granted? No. He would plunge head-foremost into the nearest flower, and investigate it for himself.”

“Well?” said Arnold.

“Well — there is Blanche in the breakfast-room telling Lady Lundie that the bridal tour happens, through an unexpected accident, to have come to an end. Do you think Lady Lundie is the sort of person to take the statement for granted? Nothing of the sort! Lady Lundie, like the bee, will insist on investigating for herself. How it will end, if she discovers the truth — and what new complications she may not introduce into a matter which, Heaven knows, is complicated enough already — I leave you to imagine.
My
poor powers of prevision are not equal to it.”

Before Arnold could answer, Blanche joined them from the breakfast-room.

“I’ve done it,” she said. “It was an awkward letter to write — and it’s a comfort to have it over.”

“You have done it, my dear,” remarked Sir Patrick, quietly. “And it may be a comfort. But it’s not over.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think, Blanche, we shall hear from your step-mother by return of post.”

CHAPTER THE THIRTY-EIGHTH.

THE NEWS FROM GLASGOW.

THE letters to Lady Lundie and to Mr. Crum having been dispatched on Monday, the return of the post might be looked for on Wednesday afternoon at Ham Farm.

Sir Patrick and Arnold held more than one private consultation, during the interval, on the delicate and difficult subject of admitting Blanche to a knowledge of what had happened. The wise elder advised and the inexperienced junior listened. “Think of it,” said Sir Patrick; “and do it.” And Arnold thought of it — and left it undone.

Let those who feel inclined to blame him remember that he had only been married a fortnight. It is hard, surely, after but two weeks’ possession of your wife, to appear before her in the character of an offender on trial — and to find that an angel of retribution has been thrown into the bargain by the liberal destiny which bestowed on you the woman whom you adore!

They were all three at home on the Wednesday afternoon, looking out for the postman.

The correspondence delivered included (exactly as Sir Patrick had foreseen) a letter from Lady Lundie. Further investigation, on the far more interesting subject of the expected news from Glasgow, revealed — nothing. The lawyer had not answered Sir Patrick’s inquiry by return of post.

“Is that a bad sign?” asked Blanche.