ALLAN AT BAY.
Two o'clock came; and Pedgift Junior, punctual to his time,
came with it. His vivacity of the morning had all sparkled out;
he greeted Allan with his customary politeness, but without his
customary smile; and, when the headwaiter came in for orders,
his dismissal was instantly pronounced in words never yet heard
to issue from the lips of Pedgift in that hotel: "Nothing at
present."
"You seem to be in low spirits," said Allan. "Can't we get our
information? Can nobody tell you anything about the house in
Pimlico?"
"Three different people have told me about it, Mr. Armadale,
and they have all three said the same thing."
Allan eagerly drew his chair nearer to the place occupied by his
traveling companion. His reflections in the interval since they
had last seen each other had not tended to compose him. That
strange connection, so easy to feel, so hard to trace, between
the difficulty of approaching Miss Gwilt's family circumstances
and the difficulty of approaching Miss Gwilt's reference, which
had already established itself in his thoughts, had by this time
stealthily taken a firmer and firmer hold on his mind. Doubts
troubled him which he could neither understand nor express.
Curiosity filled him, which he half longed and half dreaded to
satisfy.
"I am afraid I must trouble you with a question or two, sir,
before I can come to the point," said Pedgift Junior. "I don't
want to force myself into your confidence. I only want to see
my way, in what looks to me like a very awkward business. Do you
mind telling me whether others besides yourself are interested
in this inquiry of ours?"
"Other people _are_ interested in it," replied Allan. "There's
no objection to telling you that."
"Is there any other person who is the object of the inquiry
besides Mrs. Mandeville, herself?" pursued Pedgift, winding
his way a little deeper into the secret.
"Yes; there is another person," said Allan, answering rather
unwillingly.
"Is the person a young woman, Mr. Armadale?"
Allan started. "How do you come to guess that?" he began, then
checked himself, when it was too late. "Don't ask me any more
questions," he resumed. "I'm a bad hand at defending myself
against a sharp fellow like you; and I'm bound in honor toward
other people to keep the particulars of this business to myself."
Pedgift Junior had apparently heard enough for his purpose. He
drew his chair, in his turn, nearer to Allan. He was evidently
anxious and embarrassed; but his professional manner began to
show itself again from sheer force of habit.
"I've done with my questions, sir," he said; "and I have
something to say now on my side. In my father's absence, perhaps
you may be kindly disposed to consider me as your legal adviser.
If you will take my advice, you will not stir another step in
this inquiry."
"What do you mean?" interposed Allan.
"It is just possible, Mr. Armadale, that the cabman, positive as
he is, may have been mistaken. I strongly recommend you to take
it for granted that he _is_ mistaken, and to drop it there."
The caution was kindly intended; but it came too late. Allan did
what ninety-nine men out of a hundred in his position would have
done--he declined to take his lawyer's advice.
"Very well, sir," said Pedgift Junior; "if you will have it, you
must have it."
He leaned forward close to Allan's ear, and whispered what he had
heard of the house in Pimlico, and of the people who occupied it.
"Don't blame me, Mr. Armadale," he added, when the irrevocable
words had been spoken. "I tried to spare you."
Allan suffered the shock, as all great shocks are suffered,
in silence. His first impulse would have driven him headlong
for refuge to that very view of the cabman's assertion which had
just been recommended to him, but for one damning circumstance
which placed itself inexorably in his way. Miss Gwilt's marked
reluctance to approach the story of her past life rose
irrepressibly on his memory, in indirect but horrible
confirmation of the evidence which connected Miss Gwilt's
reference with the house in Pimlico. One conclusion, and one
only--the conclusion which any man must have drawn, hearing
what he had just heard, and knowing no more than he knew--forced
itself into his mind. A miserable, fallen woman, who had
abandoned herself in her extremity to the help of wretches
skilled in criminal concealment, who had stolen her way back to
decent society and a reputable employment by means of a false
character, and whose position now imposed on her the dreadful
necessity of perpetual secrecy and perpetual deceit in relation
to her past life--such was the aspect in which the beautiful
governess at Thorpe Ambrose now stood revealed to Allan's eyes!
Falsely revealed, or truly revealed? Had she stolen her way back
to decent society and a reputable employment by means of a false
character? She had. Did her position impose on her the dreadful
necessity of perpetual secrecy and perpetual deceit in relation
to her past life? It did. Was she some such pitiable victim to
the treachery of a man unknown as Allan had supposed? _She was no
such pitiable victim_. The conclusion which Allan had drawn--the
conclusion literally forced into his mind by the facts before
him--was, nevertheless, the conclusion of all others that was
furthest even from touching on the truth. The true story of Miss
Gwilt's connection with the house in Pimlico and the people who
inhabited it--a house rightly described as filled with wicked
secrets, and people rightly represented as perpetually in danger
of feeling the grasp of the law--was a story which coming events
were yet to disclose: a story infinitely less revolting, and yet
infinitely more terrible, than Allan or Allan's companion had
either of them supposed.
"I tried to spare you, Mr. Armadale," repeated Pedgift. "I was
anxious, if I could possibly avoid it, not to distress you."
Allan looked up, and made an effort to control himself. "You have
distressed me dreadfully," he said. "You have quite crushed me
down. But it is not your fault. I ought to feel you have done me
a service; and what I ought to do I will do, when I am my own man
again. There is one thing," Allan added, after a moment's painful
consideration, "which ought to be understood between us at once.
The advice you offered me just now was very kindly meant, and
it was the best advice that could be given. I will take it
gratefully. We will never talk of this again, if you please;
and I beg and entreat you will never speak about it to any other
person. Will you promise me that?"
Pedgift gave the promise with very evident sincerity, but without
his professional confidence of manner. The distress in Allan's
face seemed to daunt him. After a moment of very uncharacteristic
hesitation, he considerately quitted the room.
Left by himself, Allan rang for writing materials, and took out
of his pocket-book the fatal letter of introduction to "Mrs.
Mandeville" which he had received from the major's wife.
A man accustomed to consider consequences and to prepare himself
for action by previous thought would, in Allan's present
circumstances, have felt some difficulty as to the course which
it might now be least embarrassing and least dangerous to pursue.
Accustomed to let his impulses direct him on all other occasions,
Allan acted on impulse in the serious emergency that now
confronted him. Though his attachment to Miss Gwilt was nothing
like the deeply rooted feeling which he had himself honestly
believed it to be, she had taken no common place in his
admiration, and she filled him with no common grief when he
thought of her now. His one dominant desire, at that critical
moment in his life, was a man's merciful desire to protect from
exposure and ruin the unhappy woman who had lost her place in
his estimation, without losing her claim to the forbearance that
could spare, and to the compassion that could shield her. "I
can't go back to Thorpe Ambrose; I can't trust myself to speak
to her, or to see her again. But I can keep her miserable secret;
and I will!" With that thought in his heart, Allan set himself to
perform the first and foremost duty which now claimed him--the
duty of communicating with Mrs. Milroy. If he had possessed a
higher mental capacity and a clearer mental view, he might have
found the letter no easy one to write. As it was, he calculated
no consequences, and felt no difficulty. His instinct warned him
to withdraw at once from the position in which he now stood
toward the major's wife, and he wrote what his instinct counseled
him to write under those circumstances, as rapidly as the pen
could travel over the paper:
"Dunn's Hotel, Covent Garden, Tuesday.
"DEAR MADAM--Pray excuse my not returning to Thorpe Ambrose
today, as I said I would. Unforeseen circumstances oblige me to
stop in London. I am sorry to say I have not succeeded in seeing
Mrs. Mandeville, for which reason I cannot perform your errand;
and I beg, therefore, with many apologies, to return the letter
of introduction. I hope you will allow me to conclude by saying
that I am very much obliged to you for your kindness, and that
I will not venture to trespass on it any further.
"I remain, dear madam, yours truly,
"ALLAN ARMADALE."
In those artless words, still entirely unsuspicious of the
character of the woman he had to deal with, Allan put the weapon
she wanted into Mrs. Milroy's hands.
The letter and its inclosure once sealed up and addressed, he was
free to think of himself and his future. As he sat idly drawing
lines with his pen on the blotting-paper, the tears came into
his eyes for the first time--tears in which the woman who had
deceived him had no share. His heart had gone back to his dead
mother. "If she had been alive," he thought, "I might have
trusted _her_, and she would have comforted me." It was useless
to dwell on it; he dashed away the tears, and turned his
thoughts, with the heart-sick resignation that we all know,
to living and present things.
He wrote a line to Mr. Bashwood, briefly informing the deputy
steward that his absence from Thorpe Ambrose was likely to be
prolonged for some little time, and that any further instructions
which might be necessary, under those circumstances, would reach
him through Mr. Pedgift the elder. This done, and the letters
sent to the post, his thoughts were forced back once more on
himself. Again the blank future waited before him to be filled
up; and again his heart shrank from it to the refuge of the past.
This time other images than the image of his mother filled
his mind. The one all-absorbing interest of his earlier days
stirred living and eager in him again. He thought of the sea;
he thought of his yacht lying idle in the fishing harbor at his
west-country home. The old longing got possession of him to hear
the wash of the waves; to see the filling of the sails; to feel
the vessel that his own hands had helped to build bounding under
him once more. He rose in his impetuous way to call for the
time-table, and to start for Somersetshire by the first train,
when the dread of the questions which Mr. Brock might ask, the
suspicion of the change which Mr. Brock might see in him, drew
him back to his chair. "I'll write," he thought, "to have the
yacht rigged and refitted, and I'll wait to go to Somersetshire
myself till Midwinter can go with me." He sighed as his memory
reverted to his absent friend. Never had he felt the void made
in his life by Midwinter's departure so painfully as he felt it
now, in the dreariest of all social solitudes--the solitude of
a stranger in London, left by himself at a hotel.
Before long, Pedgift Junior looked in, with an apology for his
intrusion. Allan felt too lonely and too friendless not to
welcome his companion's re-appearance gratefully. "I'm not going
back to Thorpe Ambrose," he said; "I'm going to stay a little
while in London. I hope you will be able to stay with me?" To do
him justice, Pedgift was touched by the solitary position in
which the owner of the great Thorpe Ambrose estate now appeared
before him. He had never, in his relations with Allan, so
entirely forgotten his business interests as he forgot them now.
"You are quite right, sir, to stop here; London's the place to
divert your mind," said Pedgift, cheerfully. "All business is
more or less elastic in its nature, Mr. Armadale; I'll spin _my_
business out, and keep you company with the greatest pleasure.
We are both of us on the right side of thirty, sir; let's enjoy
ourselves. What do you say to dining early, and going to the
play, and trying the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park to-morrow
morning, after breakfast? If we only live like fighting-cocks,
and go in perpetually for public amusements, we shall arrive
in no time at the _mens sana in corpore sano_ of the ancients.
Don't be alarmed at the quotation, sir. I dabble a little in
Latin after business hours, and enlarge my sympathies by
occasional perusal of the Pagan writers, assisted by a crib.
William, dinner at five; and, as it's particularly important
to-day, I'll see the cook myself."
The evening passed; the next day passed; Thursday morning came,
and brought with it a letter for Allan. The direction was in
Mrs. Milroy's handwriting; and the form of address adopted in
the letter warned Allan, the moment he opened it, that something
had gone wrong.
["Private."]
"The Cottage, Thorpe Ambrose, Wednesday.
"SIR--I have just received your mysterious letter. It has more
than surprised, it has really alarmed me. After having made the
friendliest advances to you on my side, I find myself suddenly
shut out from your confidence in the most unintelligible, and,
I must add, the most discourteous manner. It is quite impossible
that I can allow the matter to rest where you have left it. The
only conclusion I can draw from your letter is that my confidence
must have been abused in some way, and that you know a great deal
more than you are willing to tell me. Speaking in the interest
of my daughter's welfare, I request that you will inform me
what the circumstances are which have prevented your seeing
Mrs. Mandeville, and which have led to the withdrawal of the
assistance that you unconditionally promised me in your letter
of Monday last.
"In my state of health, I cannot involve myself in a lengthened
correspondence. I must endeavor to anticipate any objections you
may make, and I must say all that I have to say in my present
letter. In the event (which I am most unwilling to consider
possible) of your declining to accede to the request that I have
just addressed to you, I beg to say that I shall consider it my
duty to my daughter to have this very unpleasant matter cleared
up. If I don't hear from you to my full satisfaction by return
of post, I shall be obliged to tell my husband that circumstances
have happened which justify us in immediately testing the
respectability of Miss Gwilt's reference. And when he asks me
for my authority, I will refer him to you.
"Your obedient servant, ANNE MILROY."
In those terms the major's wife threw off the mask, and left her
victim to survey at his leisure the trap in which she had caught
him. Allan's belief in Mrs. Milroy's good faith had been so
implicitly sincere that her letter simply bewildered him. He saw
vaguely that he had been deceived in some way, and that Mrs.
Milroy's neighborly interest in him was not what it had looked on
the surface; and he saw no more. The threat of appealing to the
major--on which, with a woman's ignorance of the natures of men,
Mrs. Milroy had relied for producing its effect--was the only
part of the letter to which Allan reverted with any satisfaction:
it relieved instead of alarming him. "If there _is_ to be a
quarrel," he thought, "it will be a comfort, at any rate, to have
it out with a man."
Firm in his resolution to shield the unhappy woman whose secret
he wrongly believed himself to have surprised, Allan sat down to
write his apologies to the major's wife. After setting up three
polite declarations, in close marching order, he retired from the
field. "He was extremely sorry to have offended Mrs. Milroy. He
was innocent of all intention to offend Mrs. Milroy. And he
begged to remain Mrs. Milroy's truly." Never had Allan's habitual
brevity as a letter-writer done him better service than it did
him now. With a little more skillfulness in the use of his pen,
he might have given his enemy even a stronger hold on him than
the hold she had got already.
The interval day passed, and with the next morning's post Mrs.
Milroy's threat came realized in the shape of a letter from her
husband. The major wrote less formally than his wife had written,
but his questions were mercilessly to the point:
["Private."]
"The Cottage, Thorpe Ambrose, Friday, July 11, 1851.
"DEAR SIR--When you did me the favor of calling here a few days
since, you asked a question relating to my governess, Miss Gwilt,
which I thought rather a strange one at the time, and which
caused, as you may remember, a momentary embarrassment between
us.
"This morning the subject of Miss Gwilt has been brought to
my notice again in a manner which has caused me the utmost
astonishment. In plain words, Mrs. Milroy has informed me
that Miss Gwilt has exposed herself to the suspicion of having
deceived us by a false reference. On my expressing the surprise
which such an extraordinary statement caused me, and requesting
that it might be instantly substantiated, I was still further
astonished by being told to apply for all particulars to no less
a person than Mr. Armadale. I have vainly requested some further
explanation from Mrs. Milroy; she persists in maintaining
silence, and in referring me to yourself.
"Under these extraordinary circumstances, I am compelled, in
justice to all parties, to ask you certain questions which I will
endeavor to put as plainly as possible, and which I am quite
ready to believe (from my previous experience of you) that you
will answer frankly on your side.
"I beg to inquire, in the first place, whether you admit or deny
Mrs. Milroy's assertion that you have made yourself acquainted
with particulars relating either to Miss Gwilt or to Miss Gwilt's
reference, of which I am entirely ignorant? In the second place,
if you admit the truth of Mrs. Milroy's statement, I request to
know how you became acquainted with those particulars? Thirdly,
and lastly, I beg to ask you what the particulars are?
"If any special justification for putting these questions be
needed--which, purely as a matter of courtesy toward yourself,
I am willing to admit--I beg to remind you that the most precious
charge in my house, the charge of my daughter, is confided to
Miss Gwilt; and that Mrs. Milroy's statement places you, to all
appearance, in the position of being competent to tell me whether
that charge is properly bestowed or not.
"I have only to add that, as nothing has thus far occurred to
justify me in entertaining the slightest suspicion either of my
governess or her reference, I shall wait before I make any appeal
to Miss Gwilt until I have received your answer--which I shall
expect by return of post. Believe me, dear sir, faithfully yours,
"DAVID MILROY."
This transparently straightforward letter at once dissipated
the confusion which had thus far existed in Allan's mind. He saw
the snare in which he had been caught (though he was still
necessarily at a loss to understand why it had been set for him)
as he had not seen it yet. Mrs. Milroy had clearly placed him
between two alternatives--the alternative of putting himself in
the wrong, by declining to answer her husband's questions; or the
alternative of meanly sheltering his responsibility behind the
responsibility of a woman, by acknowledging to the major's own
face that the major's wife had deceived him.
In this difficulty Allan acted as usual, without hesitation. His
pledge to Mrs. Milroy to consider their correspondence private
still bound him, disgracefully as she had abused it. And his
resolution was as immovable as ever to let no earthly
consideration tempt him into betraying Miss Gwilt. "I may have
behaved like a fool," he thought, "but I won't break my word;
and I won't be the means of turning that miserable woman adrift
in the world again."
He wrote to the major as artlessly and briefly as he had written
to the major's wife. He declared his unwillingness to cause a
friend and neighbor any disappointment, if he could possibly help
it. On this occasion he had no other choice. The questions the
major asked him were questions which he could not consent to
answer. He was not very clever at explaining himself, and he
hoped he might be excused for putting it in that way, and saying
no more.
Monday's post brought with it Major Milroy's rejoinder, and
closed the correspondence.
"The Cottage, Thorpe Ambrose, Sunday.
"SIR--Your refusal to answer my questions, unaccompanied as
it is by even the shadow of an excuse for such a proceeding,
can be interpreted but in one way. Besides being an implied
acknowledgment of the correctness of Mrs. Milroy's statement,
it is also an implied reflection on my governess's character.
As an act of justice toward a lady who lives under the protection
of my roof, and who has given me no reason whatever to distrust
her, I shall now show our correspondence to Miss Gwilt; and I
shall repeat to her the conversation which I had with Mrs.
Milroy on the subject, in Mrs. Milroy's presence.
"One word more respecting the future relations between us, and
I have done. My ideas on certain subjects are, I dare say, the
ideas of an old-fashioned man. In my time, we had a code of honor
by which we regulated our actions. According to that code, if a
man made private inquiries into a lady's affairs, without being
either her husband, her father, or her brother, he subjected
himself to the responsibility of justifying his conduct in the
estimation of others; and, if he evaded that responsibility, he
abdicated the position of a gentleman. It is quite possible that
this antiquated way of thinking exists no longer; but it is too
late for me, at my time of life, to adopt more modern views. I am
scrupulously anxious, seeing that we live in a country and a time
in which the only court of honor is a police-court, to express
myself with the utmost moderation of language upon this the last
occasion that I shall have to communicate with you. Allow me,
therefore, merely to remark that our ideas of the conduct which
is becoming in a gentleman differ seriously; and permit me on
this account to request that you will consider yourself for the
future as a stranger to my family and to myself.
"Your obedient servant,
"DAVID MILROY."
The Monday morning on which his client received the major's
letter was the blackest Monday that had yet been marked in
Pedgift's calendar. When Allan's first angry sense of the tone
of contempt in which his friend and neighbor pronounced sentence
on him had subsided, it left him sunk in a state of depression
from which no efforts made by his traveling companion could rouse
him for the rest of the day. Reverting naturally, now that his
sentence of banishment had been pronounced, to his early
intercourse with the cottage, his memory went back to Neelie,
more regretfully and more penitently than it had gone back to her
yet." If _she_ had shut the door on me, instead of her father,"
was the bitter reflection with which Allan now reviewed the past,
"I shouldn't have had a word to say against it; I should have
felt it served me right."
The next day brought another letter--a welcome letter this time,
from Mr. Brock. Allan had written to Somersetshire on the subject
of refitting the yacht some days since. The letter had found the
rector engaged, as he innocently supposed, in protecting his old
pupil against the woman whom he had watched in London, and whom
he now believed to have followed him back to his own home. Acting
under the directions sent to her, Mrs. Oldershaw's house-maid had
completed the mystification of Mr. Brock. She had tranquilized
all further anxiety on the rector's part by giving him a written
undertaking (in the character of Miss Gwilt), engaging never to
approach Mr. Armadale, either personally or by letter! Firmly
persuaded that he had won the victory at last, poor Mr. Brock
answered Allan's note in the highest spirits, expressing some
natural surprise at his leaving Thorpe Ambrose, but readily
promising that the yacht should be refitted, and offering the
hospitality of the rectory in the heartiest manner.
This letter did wonders in raising Allan's spirits. It gave him
a new interest to look to, entirely disassociated from his past
life in Norfolk. He began to count the days that were still to
pass before the return of his absent friend. It was then Tuesday.
If Midwinter came back from his walking trip, as he had engaged
to come back, in a fortnight, Saturday would find him at Thorpe
Ambrose. A note sent to meet the traveler might bring him to
London the same night; and, if all went well, before another
week was over they might be afloat together in the yacht.
The next day passed, to Allan's relief, without bringing any
letters. The spirits of Pedgift rose sympathetically with the
spirits of his client. Toward dinner time he reverted to the
_mens sana in corpore sano_ of the ancients, and issued his
orders to the head-waiter more royally than ever.
Thursday came, and brought the fatal postman with more news from
Norfolk. A letter-writer now stepped on the scene who had not
appeared there yet; and the total overthrow of all Allan's plans
for a visit to Somersetshire was accomplished on the spot.
Pedgift Junior happened that morning to be the first at the
breakfast table. When Allan came in, he relapsed into his
professional manner, and offered a letter to his patron with
a bow performed in dreary silence.
"For me?" inquired Allan, shrinking instinctively from a new
correspondent.
"For you, sir--from my father," replied Pedgift, "inclosed in one
to myself. Perhaps you will allow me to suggest, by way of
preparing you for--for something a little unpleasant--that we
shall want a particularly good dinner to-day; and (if they're not
performing any modern German music to-night) I think we should do
well to finish the evening melodiously at the Opera."
"Something wrong at Thorpe Ambrose?" asked Allen.
"Yes, Mr. Armadale; something wrong at Thorpe Ambrose."
Allan sat down resignedly, and opened the letter.
["Private and Confidential."]
"High Street Thorpe Ambrose, 17th July, 1851.
"DEAR SIR--I cannot reconcile it with my sense of duty to your
interests to leave you any longer in ignorance of reports current
in this town and its neighborhood, which, I regret to say, are
reports affecting yourself.
"The first intimation of anything unpleasant reached me on Monday
last. It was widely rumored in the town that something had gone
wrong at Major Milroy's with the new governess, and that Mr.
Armadale was mixed up in it. I paid no heed to this, believing it
to be one of the many trumpery pieces of scandal perpetually set
going here, and as necessary as the air they breathe to the
comfort of the inhabitants of this highly respectable place.
"Tuesday, however, put the matter in a new light. The most
interesting particulars were circulated on the highest authority.
On Wednesday, the gentry in the neighborhood took the matter up,
and universally sanctioned the view adopted by the town. To-day
the public feeling has reached its climax, and I find myself
under the necessity of making you acquainted with what has
happened.
"To begin at the beginning. It is asserted that a correspondence
took place last week between Major Milroy and yourself; in which
you cast a very serious suspicion on Miss Gwilt's respectability,
without defining your accusations and without (on being applied
to) producing your proofs. Upon this, the major appears to have
felt it his duty (while assuring his governess of his own firm
belief in her respectability) to inform her of what had happened,
in order that she might have no future reason to complain of his
having had any concealments from her in a matter affecting her
character. Very magnanimous on the major's part; but you will see
directly that Miss Gwilt was more magnanimous still. After
expressing her thanks in a most becoming manner, she requested
permission to withdraw herself from Major Milroy's service.
"Various reports are in circulation as to the governess's reason
for taking this step.
"The authorized version (as sanctioned by the resident gentry)
represents Miss Gwilt to have said that she could not
condescend--in justice to herself, and in justice to her highly
respectable reference--to defend her reputation against undefined
imputations cast on it by a comparative stranger. At the same
time it was impossible for her to pursue such a course of conduct
as this, unless she possessed a freedom of action which was quite
incompatible with her continuing to occupy the dependent position
of a governess. For that reason she felt it incumbent on her to
leave her situation. But, while doing this, she was equally
determined not to lead to any misinterpretation of her motives
by leaving the neighborhood. No matter at what inconvenience to
herself, she would remain long enough at Thorpe Ambrose to await
any more definitely expressed imputations that might be made on
her character, and to repel them publicly the instant they
assumed a tangible form.
"Such is the position which this high-minded lady has taken up,
with an excellent effect on the public mind in these parts. It
is clearly her interest, for some reason, to leave her situation,
without leaving the neighborhood. On Monday last she established
herself in a cheap lodging on the outskirts of the town. And on
the same day she probably wrote to her reference, for yesterday
there came a letter from that lady to Major Milroy, full of
virtuous indignation, and courting the fullest inquiry. The
letter has been shown publicly, and has immensely strengthened
Miss Gwilt's position. She is now considered to be quite a
heroine. The _Thorpe Ambrose Mercury_ has got a leading article
about her, comparing her to Joan of Arc. It is considered
probable that she will be referred to in the sermon next Sunday.
We reckon five strong-minded single ladies in this
neighborhood--and all five have called on her. A testimonial was
suggested; but it has been given up at Miss Gwilt's own request,
and a general movement is now on foot to get her employment as a
teacher of music. Lastly, I have had the honor of a visit from
the lady herself, in her capacity of martyr, to tell me, in the
sweetest manner, that she doesn't blame Mr. Armadale, and that
she considers him to be an innocent instrument in the hands of
other and more designing people. I was carefully on my guard with
her; for I don't altogether believe in Miss Gwilt, and I have my
lawyer's suspicions of the motive that is at the bottom of her
present proceedings.
"I have written thus far, my dear sir, with little hesitation or
embarrassment. But there is unfortunately a serious side to this
business as well as a ridiculous side; and I must unwillingly
come to it before I close my letter.
"It is, I think, quite impossible that you can permit yourself
to be spoken of as you are spoken of now, without stirring
personally in the matter. You have unluckily made many enemies
here, and foremost among them is my colleague, Mr. Darch. He has
been showing everywhere a somewhat rashly expressed letter you
wrote to him on the subject of letting the cottage to Major
Milroy instead of to himself, and it has helped to exasperate the
feeling against you. It is roundly stated in so many words that
you have been prying into Miss Gwilt's family affairs, with the
most dishonorable motives; that you have tried, for a profligate
purpose of your own, to damage her reputation, and to deprive her
of the protection of Major Milroy's roof; and that, after having
been asked to substantiate by proof the suspicions that you have
cast on the reputation of a defenseless woman, you have
maintained a silence which condemns you in the estimation of all
honorable men.
"I hope it is quite unnecessary for me to say that I don't attach
the smallest particle of credit to these infamous reports. But
they are too widely spread and too widely believed to be treated
with contempt. I strongly urge you to return at once to this
place, and to take the necessary measures for defending your
character, in concert with me, as your legal adviser. I have
formed, since my interview with Miss Gwilt, a very strong opinion
of my own on the subject of that lady which it is not necessary
to commit to paper. Suffice it to say here that I shall have a
means to propose to you for silencing the slanderous tongues of
your neighbors, on the success of which I stake my professional
reputation, if you will only back me by your presence and
authority.
"It may, perhaps, help to show you the necessity there is
for your return, if I mention one other assertion respecting
yourself, which is in everybody's mouth. Your absence is, I
regret to tell you, attributed to the meanest of all motives.
It is said that you are remaining in London because you are
afraid to show your face at Thorpe Ambrose.
"Believe me, dear sir, your faithful servant,
"A. PEDGIFT, Sen."
Allan was of an age to feel the sting contained in the last
sentence of his lawyer's letter. He started to his feet in a
paroxysm of indignation, which revealed his character to Pedgift
Junior in an entirely new light.
"Where's the time-table?" cried Allan. "I must go back to Thorpe
Ambrose by the next train! If it doesn't start directly, I'll
have a special engine. I must and will go back instantly, and
I don't care two straws for the expense!"
"Suppose we telegraph to my father, sir?" suggested the judicious
Pedgift. "It's the quickest way of expressing your feelings, and
the cheapest."
"So it is," said Allan. "Thank you for reminding me of it.
Telegraph to them! Tell your father to give every man in Thorpe
Ambrose the lie direct, in my name. Put it in capital letters,
Pedgift--put it in capital letters!"
Pedgift smiled and shook his head. If he was acquainted with no
other variety of human nature, he thoroughly knew the variety
that exists in country towns.
"It won't have the least effect on them, Mr. Armadale," he
remarked quietly. "They'll only go on lying harder than ever. If
you want to upset the whole town, one line will do it. With five
shillings' worth of human labor and electric fluid, sir (I dabble
a little in science after business hours), we'll explode a
bombshell in Thorpe Ambrose!" He produced the bombshell on
a slip of paper as he spoke: "A. Pedgift, Junior, to A. Pedgift,
Senior.--Spread it all over the place that Mr. Armadale is coming
down by the next train."
"More words!" suggested Allan, looking over his shoulder. "Make
it stronger."
"Leave my father to make it stronger, sir," returned the wary
Pedgift. "My father is on the spot, and his command of language
is something quite extraordinary." He rang the bell, and
dispatched the telegram.
Now that something had been done, Allan subsided gradually
into a state of composure. He looked back again at Mr. Pedgift's
letter, and then handed it to Mr. Pedgift's son.
"Can you guess your father's plan for setting me right in the
neighborhood?" he asked.
Pedgift the younger shook his wise head. "His plan appears to be
connected in some way, sir, with his opinion of Miss Gwilt."
"I wonder what he thinks of her?" said Allan.
"I shouldn't be surprised, Mr. Armadale," returned Pedgift
Junior, "if his opinion staggers you a little, when you come to
hear it. My father has had a large legal experience of the shady
side of the sex, and he learned his profession at the Old
Bailey."
Allan made no further inquiries. He seemed to shrink from
pursuing the subject, after having started it himself. "Let's
be doing something to kill the time," he said. "Let's pack up
and pay the bill."
They packed up and paid the bill. The hour came, and the train
left for Norfolk at last.
While the travelers were on their way back, a somewhat longer
telegraphic message than Allan's was flashing its way past them
along the wires, in the reverse direction--from Thorpe Ambrose
to London. The message was in cipher, and, the signs being
interpreted, it ran thus: "From Lydia Gwilt to Maria
Oldershaw.--Good news! He is coming back. I mean to have an
interview with him. Everything looks well. Now I have left the
cottage, I have no women's prying eyes to dread, and I can come
and go as I please. Mr. Midwinter is luckily out of the way.
I don't despair of becoming Mrs. Armadale yet. Whatever happens,
depend on my keeping away from London until I am certain of not
taking any spies after me to your place. I am in no hurry to
leave Thorpe Ambrose. I mean to be even with Miss Milroy first."
Shortly after that message was received in London, Allan was back
again in his own house.
It was evening--Pedgift Junior had just left him--and Pedgift
Senior was expected to call on business in half an hour's time.