_From Captain Wragge to Magdalen._
"North Shingles Villa, Aldborough, Suffolk, July 22d.
"MY DEAR GIRL--Your letter has charmed and touched me. Your excuses have
gone straight to my heart; and your confidence in my humble abilities
has followed in the sa me direction. The pulse of the old militia-man
throbs with pride as he thinks of the trust you have placed in him,
and vows to deserve it. Don't be surprised at this genial outburst.
All enthusiastic natures must explode occasionally; and _my_ form of
explosion is--Words.
"Everything you wanted me to do is done. The house is taken; the name is
found; and I am personally acquainted with Mrs. Lecount. After reading
this general statement, you will naturally be interested in possessing
your mind next of the accompanying details. Here they are, at your
service:
"The day after leaving you in London, I traced Mr. Noel Vanstone to
this curious little seaside snuggery. One of his father's innumerable
bargains was a house at Aldborough--a rising watering-place, or Mr.
Michael Vanstone would not have invested a farthing in it. In this house
the despicable little miser, who lived rent free in London, now lives,
rent free again, on the coast of Suffolk. He is settled in his present
abode for the summer and autumn; and you and Mrs. Wragge have only to
join me here, to be established five doors away from him in this elegant
villa. I have got the whole house for three guineas a week, with
the option of remaining through the autumn at the same price. In a
fashionable watering-place, such a residence would have been cheap at
double the money.
"Our new name has been chosen with a wary eye to your suggestions. My
books--I hope you have not forgotten my Books?--contain, under the
heading of _Skins To Jump Into,_ a list of individuals retired from this
mortal scene, with whose names, families, and circumstances I am well
acquainted. Into some of those Skins I have been compelled to Jump, in
the exercise of my profession, at former periods of my career. Others
are still in the condition of new dresses and remain to be tried on. The
Skin which will exactly fit us originally clothed the bodies of a family
named Bygrave. I am in Mr. Bygrave's skin at this moment-and it fits
without a wrinkle. If you will oblige me by slipping into Miss
Bygrave (Christian name, Susan); and if you will afterward push Mrs.
Wragge--anyhow; head foremost if you like--into Mrs. Bygrave (Christian
name, Julia), the transformation will be complete. Permit me to inform
you that I am your paternal uncle. My worthy brother was established
twenty years ago in the mahogany and logwood trade at Belize, Honduras.
He died in that place; and is buried on the south-west side of the local
cemetery, with a neat monument of native wood carved by a self-taught
negro artist. Nineteen months afterward his widow died of apoplexy at a
boarding-house in Cheltenham. She was supposed to be the most corpulent
woman in England, and was accommodated on the ground-floor of the house
in consequence of the difficulty of getting her up and down stairs. You
are her only child; you have been under my care since the sad event at
Cheltenham; you are twenty-one years old on the second of August next;
and, corpulence excepted, you are the living image of your mother. I
trouble you with these specimens of my intimate knowledge of our new
family Skin, to quiet your mind on the subject of future inquiries.
Trust to me and my books to satisfy any amount of inquiry. In the
meantime write down our new name and address, and see how they strike
you: 'Mr. Bygrave, Mrs. Bygrave, Miss Bygrave; North Shingles Villa,
Aldborough.' Upon my life, it reads remarkably well!
"The last detail I have to communicate refers to my acquaintance with
Mrs. Lecount.
"We met yesterday, in the grocer's shop here. Keeping my ears open, I
found that Mrs. Lecount wanted a particular kind of tea which the man
had not got, and which he believed could not be procured any nearer than
Ipswich. I instantly saw my way to beginning an acquaintance, at the
trifling expense of a journey to that flourishing city. 'I have business
to-day in Ipswich,' I said, 'and I propose returning to Aldborough (if I
can get back in time) this evening. Pray allow me to take your order
for the tea, and to bring it back with my own parcels.' Mrs. Lecount
politely declined giving me the trouble--I politely insisted on taking
it. We fell into conversation. There is no need to trouble you with
our talk. The result of it on my mind is--that Mrs. Lecount's one weak
point, if she has such a thing at all, is a taste for science, implanted
by her deceased husband, the professor. I think I see a chance here of
working my way into her good graces, and casting a little needful dust
into those handsome black eyes of hers. Acting on this idea when I
purchased the lady's tea at Ipswich, I also bought on my own account
that far-famed pocket-manual of knowledge, 'Joyce's Scientific
Dialogues.' Possessing, as I do, a quick memory and boundless confidence
in myself, I propose privately inflating my new skin with as much
ready-made science as it will hold, and presenting Mr. Bygrave to Mrs.
Lecount's notice in the character of the most highly informed man she
has met with since the professor's death. The necessity of blindfolding
that woman (to use your own admirable expression) is as clear to me
as to you. If it is to be done in the way I propose, make your mind
easy--Wragge, inflated by Joyce, is the man to do it.
"You now have my whole budget of news. Am I, or am I not, worthy of your
confidence in me? I say nothing of my devouring anxiety to know what
your objects really are--that anxiety will be satisfied when we meet.
Never yet, my dear girl, did I long to administer a productive pecuniary
Squeeze to any human creature, as I long to administer it to Mr. Noel
Vanstone. I say no more. _Verbum sap._ Pardon the pedantry of a Latin
quotation, and believe me,
"Entirely yours,
"HORATIO WRAGGE.
"P.S.--I await my instructions, as you requested. You have only to say
whether I shall return to London for the purpose of escorting you to
this place, or whether I shall wait here to receive you. The house is in
perfect order, the weather is charming, and the sea is as smooth as Mrs.
Lecount's apron. She has just passed the window, and we have exchanged
bows. A sharp woman, my dear Magdalen; but Joyce and I together may
prove a trifle too much for her."